Wikipedia:Meetup/Wellington/Edit for Equity – History

WP:E4E5

What's it about?

Only 17% of Wikipedia's biographies are of women and only 10% of its editors are female. Women and non-binary New Zealanders are underrepresented on Wikipedia, and you can help us change this! Edit for Equity is ran four "edit-a-thons" to help bring more voices and diverse content to the the fifth most searched website in the world; this event, coinciding with the 125th anniversary of the first women's-suffrage election, is to improve the representation of New Zealanders in history. Experienced Wikipedians will provide a tutorial for beginners and troubleshoot, and there'll be snacks and refreshments. All you need to bring is your laptop!

When and where

Wed 28 November 2018, 5:00–9:00 pm NZST
Internet NZ, Level 11, 80 Boulcott St, Wellington
Participants from anywhere in the world are welcome to join in remotely.

The four previous edit-a-thons in this series were STEM (Sustainability Trust, Tues 9 October), Film, Music, & TV (Ngā Taonga, Thurs 11 October), Art and Literature (Adam Art Gallery, Sat 13 October), and Politics and Social Change (InternetNZ, Sunday 14 October).

Timetable

5:00: Meet and greet
Introductions, name lanyards, and account creation if needed
5:15–6:00: Intro to Wikipedia
We'll learn how Wikipedia works and how to improve and create articles. There will be experienced editors present who'll be buddied up with newcomers.
6:00–9:00: Editing
Our goal is to improve the representation of women and non-binary people in Wikipedia; we'll focus today on women and non-binary people in NZ history, but you're welcome to pursue any project you want. You can improve existing articles, add photos, or create stub articles for people missing from Wikipedia. See below for some ideas.

Attending

These edit-a-thons are free and open to all. Register here on Eventbrite for any or all of them.
We invite people of all gender identities and expressions, particularly transgender and cisgender women, and non-binary folks, to participate!
This workshop will be following "friendly space" guidelines; check them out. Harassment and disruption won't be tolerated, online or offline.

People attending

What to bring

Your own laptop and power cord, if you have one. Laptops are definitely easier to edit on than iPads. We will have some extra laptops available for people who don't have their own.
Any snacks or drink you want; refreshments are provided.
Any resources such as books, journals, magazine or newspaper articles relevant to women you're interested in.
Photos you've taken that could illustrate articles; you'll learn how to donate these to Wikimedia Commons so other Wikipedia articles can use them.

Preparation

If you're coming, try to create a Wikipedia account beforehand: don't wait until the day to do it! Here's a form you can use. Creating an account makes editing much easier (here's more info on why you should). You'll need to pick a "handle" for your username; you could use your real name, but it's nice to have the option to be a bit anonymous if you want. Here's some advice on picking a username.
Read up on Wikipedia: there are lots of tutorials, like the Wikipedia Adventure, and useful guides, like the Editing Wikipedia brochure. The more you prepare, the more you'll be able to get done. You may want to read up on avoiding common mistakes, but Wikipedia has a "don't bite the newbies" policy, and we'll be there to troubleshoot.
Have a think about topics you'd like to work on; do a little research first so you're prepared. You don't have to be an expert; anyone who can do library research and write clearly can contribute to Wikipedia. Good references for Wikipedia articles are news stories, textbooks, or magazine articles. The best candidates for Wikipedia articles are people who are "notable". In Wikipedia terms, "notability" usually means they're mentioned in print in various reliable independent sources, such as news stories, textbooks, or magazine articles. If you're proposing to add someone to Wikipedia it's important to make sure they're "notable"; talk to us if you're not sure – we can help.
We'll also need photos. Those need to be a) free of any copyright or b) released under a Creative Commons license or c) your own work. If you're not familiar with Creative Commons, see below. If you've taken photos and are happy to donate them, great! Bring them along. If you know of anyone who has good photos, approach them and ask them if they'd like their work to be seen and used by people all over the world (with them credited, of course). Lots of women need photos on their pages but the photos have to be released under an open license by the copyright holder. If you took the photo, that's you; but if you didn't, you need to get the photographer to donate the photo to Commons. We can help.

Guides to editing

Wikipedia Basics: A nice step-by-step tutorial that walks you through editing and preparing for your first edit-a-thon. Less overwhelming than the official Help pages!
Information about Creative Commons, Wikimedia Commons, and crowdsourced photos, harrychapman.nz

To work on

We'll be adding some suggestions for articles to work on here; you can add them too. We have a whole spreadsheet full of suggestions you can draw from.

Outcomes

Created

Improved

Files in use	Files uploaded	New editors	Pages created	Pages improved	7 day retention
1	6	5	1	26	5

Please take photos of the workshop, making sure to only include people who've consented to being photographed (wearing green lanyards). You can add these to Commons under the category "Wikimedia meetups in New Zealand".