Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and Central Asia (CA) Strategy Talk

Dear Wikimedians,

I would like to remind you that the deadline of the call for submissions for the Wikimedia CEE Meeting 2022 is approaching and closes on 31 July. If you plan to attend the conference and would like to share your learning and experience with the other Wikimedians from the CEE communities, you can follow the instructions on the submissions page to submit your session proposal.

Best regards,
Kiril

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From June 24-26 dedicated team members of the MSG team organised Global Hub Conversations event for anyone interested in the hubs’ conversation. The purpose of the event was to improve shared understanding of the implications of piloting the hubs by

  • facilitating agreement on the previously published draft minimum viable criteria to enable piloting, and
  • using the space to discuss concerns and share the different points of view.

The report of June 24-26 Global Hub Conversations has been published by @KVaidla_WMF on meta (Hubs/Documentation/June 2022 Global Conversations - Meta) and ready for your reading and comments.

The report with key agreements, open questions and next steps is available here on the forum.

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A couple of days ago, Wikimedia Foundation published its Annual Plan for FY 2022/2023

We invite your reflections and questions at any time on Meta . (Read more on Diff)

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Together with @AAkhmedova_WMF and @BPipal_WMF we have submitted a workshop proposal for the upcoming CEE Meeting – Movement Strategy Grants Co-creation workshop.

Our proposal aims to introduce people to the idea of the Movement Strategy Implementation Grants. We also plan to help people with the process of co-creation and brainstorming, which allows small groups (even unknown before), to start creating something useful for the entire group and the community to which this group serves.

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Wikimania 2022 is just around the corner! Have you registered yet? The program is available here.

On day 1 we invite you to join the Movement Strategy: Lightning talks with Toni Ristovski (Shared Knowledge), Ivana Madžarević (Wikimedia Serbia), and Natalia Szafran-Kozakowska (Wikimedia Polska) at 10:35-11:25 UTC. (There will be part 2 and part 3 on different days).

Some of the sessions organized by CEE friends that might be of interest to you:

[Please check the details of the above mentioned sessions as they are spread throughout 11-14 August]

I love that there are also corporeal practices such as Meditação do Riso (Laughter meditation) :heart_eyes:. Don’t forget to make some space and move :wink:

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Wikimedians of the Year 2022 have been announced during the Wikimania weekend. Check them out!

Re-sharing a reminder about the CEE Meeting 2022 posted by Zana Strkovska on WM CEE Telegram group:

“The deadline for registration is tonight. We need everyone to be registered, even self-funded participants”. Please use this link for official registration.

Dear Wikimedians of the CEE and CA communities!

The UCoC Revisions Committee has published a revised version of the Enforcement Guidelines. You are invited to give your feedback and comment on this version from September 8, 2022 until October 8, 2022. You may share yours on the Meta Talk page, on the MS Forum, or during the conversation hour.

:speech_balloon: The conversation hour for the CEE and CA, Africa and the Middle East will take place on 2022-09-24T15:00:00Z. Live interpretation into Russian, French and Arabic will be provided. The calls will not be recorded. Participation via video or audio is not required; participants may engage using text chat.

:paintbrush: To participate please sign up here.

Wikimedia Research Fund: If you are a Wikimedia researcher or you are interested in becoming one, you can apply for research funds (USD 2K-50K) until December 16, 2022. While all research proposals related to Wikimedia projects are welcome, we particularly encourage research studies on medium to small size languages and communities, as well as in low resourced languages and projects. You can even propose to repeat a past study in a given language in another language!

More info at Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Research & Technology Fund/Wikimedia Research Fund - Meta.

Apply by December 16, 2022 and/or spread the word!

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Dear all, the MCDC will start the community consultation to gather feedback on the three drafts sections of the Charter from November 20 to December 18, 2022. Before the community consultation period, to ensure that everyone is well-informed to fully participate and are empowered to contribute their perspective on the Movement Charter, “Ask Me Anything about Movement Charter” sessions have been scheduled.

The session for Europe, MENA and Sub Saharan Africa will take place this week on 2022-11-12T15:00:00Z2022-11-12T16:30:00Z :left_speech_bubble: Interpretation available in Arabic, French and Russian.

During the session the MCDC members will be available to answer your questions. Looking forward to seeing many of you this Saturday!

Hi All,

As most of you are aware, the Movement Charter Drafting Committee (MCDC) is currently collecting community feedback about three draft sections of the Movement Charter: Preamble, Values & Principles, and Roles & Responsibilities (intentions statement).

How can you participate and share your feedback?

The MCDC is looking forward to receiving all types of feedback in different languages from the community members across the Movement and Affiliates. You can participate in the following ways:

  • Attend the community conversation hour focused on the CEE and CA region, which takes place on November 26, 2022 at 15.00-16.30 UTC (check your local time zone). Details of the regional community conversation hours are published here
  • Fill out a survey (optional and anonymous)
  • Share your thoughts and feedback on the Meta talk page
  • Share your thoughts and feedback on the MS Forum:
  • Send an email to: movementcharter@wikimedia.org if you have other feedback to the MCDC.
    Thank you for your participation.

On behalf of the Movement Charter Drafting Committee

A summary of the CEE Meeting written by @Kiril_Simeonovski was posted on Diff today!

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Reminder to provide feedback on the Movement Charter content

Hi all,
The Movement Charter Drafting Committee (MCDC) invites everyone interested in the governance of the Wikimedia movement to fill out this :memo:optional and anonymous survey. The survey is accessible in 15 languages.

If you have questions about the Movement Charter and why it is needed, what will the Movement Charter solve in the Movement and how will the Movement Charter affect your community, among others, please read the FAQ prepared by the MCDC.

Thank you for your participation!
On behalf of the Movement Charter Drafting Committee

I am Nikos Likomitros, a Wikipedian, member of the Wikimedia user group Greece, and I come here with really good news. In November, according to stats.wikimedia.org, Uzbek Wikipedia garnered 11.4 million pageviews in Uzbekistan, while Russian got 11.1 million pageviews in the same country. This is the first time that a Central Asian language overtakes Russian in its country in any given month.

Uzbek Wikipedia, is a Wikipedia that has noted rapid growth in pageviews and community since 2015. In December 2015 Uzbek had only 438 thousand pageviews in this month, right now however Uzbek reached 11.4 million pageviews in November and in December the number will be around that level, around 12 million certainly, with a possibility to surpass Russian again (as of pageviews.toolforge.org in the pageviews of the first twelve days of this month has been noted an increase of around 12% in comparison with the pageviews of the first twelve days of the previous month). Karakalpak has grew from just around 5 thousand in December 2015 to more than 50 in November 2022, with Uzbek community planning to develop both Uzbek and Karakalpak next year. Tajik, spoken by around 1.7 million people according to the national censuses, and 6 to 11 million according to various studies, also noted 26 thousand pageviews in November in comparison with 2 thousand in December 2015, meaning that Uzbekistanis regardless their nationality opt to read content in their national or otherwise native language more and more frequently. Uzbek is the first Wikipedia in Central Asia to surpass 1,000 active users while before WikiStipendiya Uzbek grew from 786 users with one edit in 2018 to 1,921 in 2021 (source for these statistics is uz.wikiscan.org) and these year they will surpass 6,000 users thanks to WikiStipendiya and other growth. Also Uzbek was nearing Russian with a pace faster than the other Wikipedias of this area; I assume this happens because of the increase of the internet access in Uzbekistan and because the majority of the population is under 30, as Uzbek became state language after independence in 1991, although with abundant use of Russian from the people and the government itself (even today, many TV channels have Russian language local-made programs and Cyrillic Uzbek is the preferred alphabet for many; even state media use it.)

Before WikiStipendiya Uzbek had around 300 active users, growing a lot since 2016 when just 70 active users existed. And without WikiStipendiya, Uzbek would have grew to around 330 to 350 users, displaying the great potential of Uzbek Wikipedia these days.

Until summer Uzbek will surpass Russian in various months while after September 2023 the lead will become more stable and will extend to nearly all the period between September and June (in the summer months most FSU Wikipedias record a decrease of around 50 percent in pageviews, probably because schools are closed; I assume this based on the fact that every weekend there is a noticeable decrease in the daily pageviews even now. In order to understand what I said better, Uzbek Wikipedia had exactly 8 million pageviews in June but slightly more than the half of 8 million in July and August, i.e. something more than 4 million each month), based in an elaboration of today’s trends. In order to further improve this lead and the general quality of Uzbek Wikipedia, a suggested step is to undertake efforts to expand existing articles, either as a part of WikiStipendiya, or independently. This is a crucial step to bolster the lead. Congratulations to the Uzbek community, for this achievement. WikiStipendiya is a great success, although improvements in the quality of translation need to be done in some pages.

In the rest of Central Asia this is far from happening in another country at least for the next 5 years. In Kazakhstan, Kazakh has 15 to 25 million pageviews each month (except July and August when pageviews dip to 2 or 3 million when schools are closed) and Russian holds on around 35 to 45 million pageviews per month year round, with some growth. In Tajikistan Tajik has a growth spiral that resembles Uzbek Wikipedia’s one, going from 75 to 438 thousand pageviews per month in the same period that I noted for Uzbek. However Russian has more than 2 million pageviews per month there and given the lacks there it will take time. In Kyrgyzstan Kyrgyz has steady growth, but Russian is having approximately 6 to 8 million pageviews while Kyrgyz floats between 3 and 4 million except summer where it dips below million in Kyrgyzstan. In Turkmenistan Turkmen has steadily growing, despite minimal growth in articles; from 44 thousand pageviews in December 2015 they rose to 283 thousand last month. However with Turkish growing from 60 to 220 thousand in just three years (these two languages are partially intelligible, not in the degree of Azerbaijani and are both Oghuz languages) it is realistic that Turkish may become the most popular Wikipedia in Turkmenistan sometime in the future, after 2030 for a time before Turkmen reaches it.

How the other Wikipedias of Central Asia can take lessons, and what they can do to improve their standing substantially. Here’s some advices that ate generally performing:

• Give emphasis in writing significant pages about your country and vital articles, e.g. a page about a topic related to Kyrgyzstan that Kyrgyz hasn’t, but Russian or English (or even Uzbek) has one.
• Expand existing articles. Improving the quality of your articles, your reputation as e.g. Kyrgyz Wikipedia grows a lot.
• Open Wikipedia to the society. Advertise it on the media, to your friends, to the society in order to attract more users. Introduce it to schools as well, a space with abundant readership for all Central Asian Wikipedias (as I spoke for introducing Wikipedia as a means of information to schools and introducing the children to write/expand articles in it, you can take Armenian WikiClubs as an example; they have remarkable success).

Because WikiStipendiya shows that we can improve substantially the standing of a local language even if English, French or Russian is very significant in Kazakhstan, Bangladesh or Burundi, these tips are easily applicable to Indic and African wikis. Quality pages and quality translations must be however, the first and foremost priority.

Excuse me for the long text, but I am very fond of Wikipedia statistics and I chose to include some analysis of the climate in Central Asia as well, in order to give you an understanding on what happens in the rest of Central Asia.

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FYI: Scholarship applications for Wikimania 2023 are now open until Sunday, 5 February! Wikimania 2023 will be held in Singapore from 16–19 August. More info on Diff.

Hello,
Gentle reminder, the voting period for the revised Universal Code of Conduct Enforcement Guidelines is open until 23:59 (UTC) January 31, 2023. :ballot_box: Vote here
Please visit the voter information page on Meta-wiki for voter eligibility information and details on how to vote.

The voting result of Universal Code of Conduct revised Enforcement Guidelines are as below:

  • 3097 voters from 146 Wikimedia communities voted
  • 76% in support of the Enforcement Guidelines, and 24% in opposition.

Statistics for the vote are available here . The results and comments collected during this vote will be submitted to the Board of Trustees for their review. The current expectation is that the Board of Trustees review process will complete in March 2023.

The Movement Charter Drafting Committee announced Call for Advisors inviting individuals interested in supporting the work of the Drafting Groups and Sub-committees to become advisors. Further details can be found in this post.

Hello everyone,

This a reminder that the Wikimedia Foundation Legal Department is hosting office hours with community members about updating the Wikimedia Terms of Use.

The office hours will be held on April 4, at 17:00 UTC to 18:30 UTC. See for more details here on Meta.

We hereby kindly invite you to participate in the discussion. Please note that this meeting will be held in English language and led by the members of the Wikimedia Foundation Legal Team, who will take and answer your questions. Facilitators from the Movement Strategy and Governance Team will provide the necessary assistance and other meeting-related services.

On behalf of the Wikimedia Foundation Legal Team,

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Hello. The message is about the new Wikimedians’ Telegram group that I opened, intended for the Wikimedians of the Balkan region. Anyone here from the Balkans and not only can join.

Here this group is intended for sharing Wikimedia news, as well as related discussions concerning and related to the Wikipedias of the Balkan peninsula and the activities of Wikimedia usergroups/affiliates there. Also you can share news about the Balkan Wikipedias.

The new Telegram group “Wikimedians of the Balkans” is intending to unite the Balkan Wikipedians, in a region deeply divided from the past conflicts. It is intended to be a hub for communication between the Wikimedians and Wikipedians of our region, from Croatia to Romania and Serbia to Greece and Turkey.

You can join here: Telegram: Contact @wikibalkan.

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