User:Anthere/wikicommons overview
Launched on September 7, 2004 as a free repository of multimedia files (including images, sounds, and video) for all the Wikimedia Foundation projects, the Commons is growing very quickly. On April 16, 2005, 76,568 multimedia files were available. There were 5,259 registered users, including 53 administrators and 2 bureaucrats.
Multilingualism is probably the most difficult challenge to be taken up by the Commons. This project is expected to be directly used by all of the Wikimedia Foundation projects, whatever the language. Furthermore, Commons contributors from all backgrounds meet and must communicate beyond their own language barriers. Our main solution to the problem of multilingual file searching is the assignment of categories directly to pictures, and the ability to view thumbnails in category pages. Within the site, users have developed an important system of language templates allowing help pages to be available in nearly ten different languages. The creation of a translation coordination core allows help page translation requirements to be coordinated. Additionally, the Commons interface is available in most languages. We have 15 English-speaking administrators, 13 German-speaking administrators, 6 French-speaking, 3 Dutch-speaking, 3 Polish-speaking, 2 Russian-speaking, 2 Swedish-speaking, and 1 speaker each of Romanian, Japanese, Portuguese, Icelandic, Hebrew, Czech, Bulgarian and Belarusian.
In addition, the Commons enjoys some technical features which facilitate the use of its files. A special link allows direct access to the last uploaded files with thumbnails. Multimedia files can be directly used on the Wikimedia Foundation sites without having to copy them into local databases. The "gallery" tag, developed for the last version of the MediaWiki software, allows the rapid construction of thumbnail pages.
Although the Commons is mainly a site offering a service to the other projects of the Wikimedia Foundation, users of the Commons have very rapidly added communication and exchange tools similar to those found on the Wikipedia site, notably a "bistro" and a page to vote on deletion of files. A distribution list has been created, as well as an IRC channel at Freenode (#commons.wikimedia). A specific community life has thus been built, gradually, on site. It expresses itself particularly in the voting for Featured Pictures, which are discussed, and decided, daily. Some of these images are profoundly beautiful and are the personal work of particularly gifted "Commoners". Eighty-six images have been chosen as featured pictures. One can see there the sign of the vitality and the originality of a project which has existed for a mere seven months, but which is already one of the most beautiful accomplishments of the Wikimedia Foundation.