Location: Virtual Meeting at this linkhttps://meet.jit.si/WikiAotearoa IMPORTANT: The first person joining the meeting needs to sign in as the "Moderator" using a Google, Facebook, or GitHub account; other attendees can then join without any authentication – see the jitsi blog for more information. NOTE: This video conferencing software link will ask permission to use your computer camera and microphone. You will need to agree to get full functionality. Google Chrome or Chromium is recommended for the best experience (not all aspects work correctly with other browsers). The Jitsi web-based video conferencing platform is 100% open source and fully encrypted. No account is needed and it's free.
Cost: Free
Meetup code of conduct and anonymity when meeting via video conference
This video conferencing meetup is a replacement for an in-person meetup. While attending and remaining anonymous is supported by the group, lurking is not supported and will be actively discouraged. All attendees are expected to use their User name as an identifier on the video conference call and to introduce themselves and their interest in joining the call on the chat channel of the call as a minimum. Participation using video and / or voice in addition to Chat is encouraged but not required.
Some members of the group have been the target of cyber bullying in the past and these measures are intended to support creating a safe space for collaboration.
If a new attendee joins the group with video and voice disabled, they will be encouraged to participate by the facilitator, using this script:
Welcome new attendee. This group respects your right to remain anonymous. This group has a policy of discouraging lurking as it makes some of us uncomfortable. If you are happy to introduce yourself over voice, please let us know what you've been working on and if you need help with any editing issues.
If you're not comfortable updating the group by voice, then that's okay. You have the option of introducing yourself and adding your user page link into the chat feature. The chat is deleted once the video conference finishes.
If you want to remain completely anonymous and not chat, then this meetup is not for you. We make comprehensive and extensive notes of the meetup that will be included in the meetup page afterwards. That's the best way to catch up with what this meetup has been doing if you don't want to contribute during the video call.
If you're not sure how to use the chat feature you can access it by clicking on the icon that looks like a speech bubble in the bottom left corner.
If, after an appropriate length of time, the new attendee does not participate by video, voice, or chat, the facilitator of the group will remove the attendee from the video call.
If the new attendee persists in logging in, the group will discuss abandoning the meet up.
The Jitsi video conferencing platform has a chat feature. This is used to share URLs and other commentary while the discussions are occurring. The facilitators may take a copy to help with writing up outcomes from the meeting on the meeting Wikipedia page. Any copies will be deleted once outcomes and notes are completed.
The Annual General Meeting of Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand Inc will be held this coming week, and members have received an invitation.
The bulk funding proposal for 2025-26 has been submitted to Wikimedia Foundation and is currently being assessed. For details see: Annual Plan for Year 3.
Recent updates and community and WANZ activities are included in the draft community report for the 2024-25 year. Editors and organisers are encouraged to contribute to this report. It will close off at the end of June, and is an important part of the 2024/25 end-of-period report to Wikimedia Foundation.
Recent highlights include the award of a Wikipedian-in-Residence grant to DrThneed supported by Giantflightlesssbirds, for a 6 month part-time placement at University of Otago. Another highlight was a presentation by several WANZ committee members to a meeting of VicTeach at Victoria University of Wellington, letting them know about the support that is available for using Wikipedia and other platforms in a teaching and learning context.
If you're an event organiser, don't forget to add your event as a programme to the Campaign Dashboard July 2024 – June 2025. The Dashboard is a key tracking tool for reporting back to Wikimedia Foundation and will help us ensure that we get funding in future years. If you are unsure how to add programmes to the Campaign dashboard you can find further information here on how to create a new event dashboard and how to link it to the overall campaign dashboard. Alternatively contact: Ambrosia10 (talk) on her talk page for help.
If you're interested in organising a Wiki event, Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand (WANZ) provides support funding. Contact info @ wikimedia.nz for more information on how to apply. It's really simple – we promise!
#1Lib1Ref campaign 15 May - 5 June 2025- WANZ and the New Zealand editing community is supporting the world wide effort to encourage librarians and other knowledge advocates to add at least one reference to Wikipedia articles. See the WANZ #1Lib1Ref campaign page. If you are interested in contributing make sure you join/register for the event! Next meeting, once business is finished, we'll keep the link open for another hour so attendees that wish to can contribute to this effort.
16–18 May 2025 Aotearoa WikiCon 2025 Christchurch: Over 30 registrations, and last-minute registration is possible but should happen very soon, as dinner and lunch numbers need to be confirmed this coming week. The programme is beiing finalised and potential session facilitators are still welcome; based on attendee responses, the sessions will be Adding maps to an infobox, Making a Wikidata query, Modelling iwi, hapū, or runanga correctly in Wikidata, OpenStreetMap, Wikipedia and disinformation, Commons copyright templates, Attracting young editors, Getting Reliable Sources, and Structured Data on Commons, along with unallocated time for people to discuss other topics of interest and a lighting talks session for short reports and ideas. Registration.
Giantflightlessbirds is running Wikipedia for Activisits, a free online workshop, on 22 May, 7pm NZST. It's open to complete beginners, and aimed at helping political/social activists understand how Wikipedia and Commons work, how they can be useful platforms, and how not to misuse them. Please share the registration link with groups that might be interested.
August New Zealand Species Wikiblitz - (Dates to be confirmed) is being organised by Christine, Stitchbird2 and Ambrosia10. Would anyone be interested in holding similar events in Auckland, Christchurch, Dunedin or other places. We'd provide slide deck, resources etc. We're intending to have virtual "check in" times in our two events on different weekends but are wondering if others want to run similar events on the same day at the main centers or other places around New Zealand. Is there any interest from anyone the group?
Opportunity to say what you’re working on and if you need help to do anything or want anything demonstrated. You can add requests for help here prior to the meeting if you want
Ambrosia10 Returned from Berlin attending the Biodiversity Heritage Library Annual Meeting. Presented on the work of the BHL-Wiki working group of which I am chair. Also attended and presented on Research Expeditions and Wikidata at the BHL Day. Major news from that meeting is that the Smithsonian is withdrawing administrative funding from BHL as from 1 January 2026. See this blog regarding this news.
I've been doing a lot of Wikicommons work, adding structured data to whole categories of images via OpenRefine and curating the Category:Files from the Biodiversity Heritage Library. I've been ensuring the source publication has a Wikidata item, adding the appropriate commons category to that Wikidata item and then generating a Wikidata infobox from that linking. I've also been continuing to work on mix'n'match datasets such as the Harvard Index of Botanists, BHL creator id datasets etc.
I've been part of the research expeditions working group of TDWG Biodiversity Data standards and have been involved in updating the community during yearly meetings on our collaborative work. Our presentation happened at 3AM NZ time and the recording will be released soon.
I've been organising with Stitchbird2 and Noracrentiss two proposed species wikiblitzes concentrating on increasing the quality of New Zealand species content in Wiki projects. We are happy to have new editors attend but will be concentrating on content. We are also planning these wikiblitzes having a "light" virtual presence to try and include other editors around the country. We are anticipating having virutal "check ins" at the beginning, middle and end of each of the two blitzes. We were wondering if Giantflightlessbirds, DrThneed, Winnieswikiworld or anyone else would like to run informal or more formal gatherings for interested editors in other main cities or other places around the country. We would be happy to share our slide deck, resources and lists of articles needed to be worked on if anyone is interested in doing this.
I've also been organising with Stitchbird2 a possibility of an outreach event and engagement with the yearly conference of the Australasian Systematic Botany Society. I've recently been in an email exchange with the data person in charge of the NZ Forestry herbarium.
Marshelec: Since early 2024, I have supported the New Zealand National Parks project with improvement of articles, with a particular focus on Kahurangi National Park. The size of this article (in words of readable prose) has been expanded from 347 in January 2024 to 4713 words as it stands today. However, there was not much progress over the past 12 months, because I was seeking detailed content about the complex geology and geomorphology of the park that was one of the reasons for the designation of the area as a national park. A friend who has a background in geology agreed to search for sources and prepare content on this topic. After doing a lot of work, he has donated content that warranted its own article. With the help of User:Panamitsu I have "wikified" the donated content, and yesterday I published Geology and geomorphology of Kahurangi National Park. I will need to prepare a suitable summary section to go into the main Kahurangi National Park article, with a link to this new article. After the geology content is improved, the Kahurangi National Park article may be a candidate for GA nomination. I have also created a new article for the small settlement of Pākawau in Golden Bay, and am working on Draft:Wharepapa Arthur Marble Aquifer, (this is the aquifer that supplies the renowned Te Waikoropupū Springs). I have also expanded Tākaka and Te Waikoropupū Springs (although more is needed).
On a totally unrelated topic, I have been expanding SS Erlangen (1929), an article about the fascinating story of the German cargo vessel that escaped from New Zealand at the outbreak of WWII and travelled to a neutral port in Chile, after spending many weeks gathering firewood in Carnley Harbour in the Auckland Islands. There is much more to do on this still._Marshelec (talk) 21:26, 26 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Rapid grant to Wikifying a conference was approved - thanks to those who supported it.
Am working on an assignment for anatomy students which will involve assessing Wikipedia articles on particular ankle muscles alongside AI-generated articles, and then making suggestions for improving the article. The students only have a short time for the assignment (alongside their dissection work) so we are not asking them to actually learn to edit.
The Commons Workflow meetup in Adelaide, in the Royal Society room of the South Australian MuseumI've been continuing work on the Aotearoa Wikipedian at Large project on Banks Peninsula, now focussed on the settlement of Rāpaki, as well as continuing work with the Ashburton District Council on their photo collection and archives.
I have just been in Australia for two weeks, including spending three days with Adam Moriarty (formerly at Auckland Museum) at the South Australian Museum, helping them develop an institutional Wikimedia strategy. At the invitation of Belinda Spry from WMAU I ran a workshop for Adelaide Wikipedians called The Commons Workflow (handout here) on how to add one's photos to Wikipedia via Commons and Wikidata, which was so successful I'm turning it into a four-session online course to be launched after WikiCon.
In response to the Denniston Plateau occupation I created an online workshop to be run for the first time on 22 May (see above).
Not a lot of Wikipedia work this month unfortunately. Published my marae infobox which has already had some very good feedback.
Still working on some data wrangling to get Christchurch parks into Wikidata. Unfortunately finding OpenRefine to be quite a clunky tool for the job.
Finished proofreading on one of our Ashburton project books: the Ashburton Borough Centenary pamphlet published in the 70s. Very easy job as the OCR software had a really easy time parsing everything.
Oronsay: Slowly proofreading The Little Blue Devil on Wikisource, 6-10 pages most days. I'm also working on various theatre magazines on Trove, looking for images; then screenshooting, trimming, uploading to Commons, Wikidata and Wikipedia. Still working through Victorian Honour Roll of Women on Wikidata/Wikipedia, adding year and refs where missing, creating Wikidata for the more notable of them. Also adding ORCID ids to women educated at or working at University of Sydney to help their linking project.
Alexeyevitch: has been doing quite a lot of work on Wikipedia, mostly for Wikipedia:WikiProject Plants. He's been working vigorously to get Metrosideros bartlettii to Featured Article status, and it eventually did get promoted! I was very satisfied with the end result and how good the flow and grammar are! I must thank User:PrinceTortoise for helping me. I also worked on Nothofagus menziesii, which was promoted to Good Article. I later reviewed Dracophyllum's nomination of Trunk (botany), which passed. I'm currently working on Dacrydium cupressinum (more commonly known as the rimu) which is pretty exciting; I don't see it often, but there are reportedly a few specimens in the suburb I live in.
