Wiki Loves Indian Cities

Wiki Loves Indian Cities is an initiative aimed at organizing Wiki Loves competitions within the urban landscapes of India, implemented through multiple stages. The inaugural phase is slated for the prominent urban centers of Andhra Pradesh and select cities nationwide, welcoming participation from photographers affiliated with or outside Wikimedia Commons. Each city competition will extend over a month, with subsequent phases involving jury evaluations and other associated tasks spanning approximately one-and-a-half months.

Why Wiki Loves Indian Cities

India holds the title of the most populated country and boasts one of the largest populations of professional and amateur photographers globally. However, in terms of Commons contributions, there's a notable scarcity of Wikimedians utilizing DSLR/Mirrorless cameras. Based on the data collected from Commons, it's evident that only about 10 individuals possess a substantial collection of high-quality pictures from India. Reviewing Quality Images, Valued Images, and Featured Pictures reveals that several major cities in India have merely around 2-3 Featured Pictures or lack any altogether. Therefore, the idea is to enhance the quality of content on Wikimedia projects.

Objectives

To build a stable Wikimedia Commons Community in India.
To receive high quality content from Photographers of India.

Project Timeline

Phase 01 (2024)

SL No.	Project location	Community Included	No. of uploads	Timeline	Organizers	Supported by
01	Visakhapatnam	Telugu Wikimedians	1402	January - May	IM3847, Pavan (CIS-A2K), Nivas	CIS-A2K
02	Mangaluru	Karavali Wikimedians	2111	May - June	Mr Santhosh Notagar, Dr Vishwanath Badikana, Ms Babitha Shetty	CIS-A2K
03	Bhopal	Hindi Wikimedians	0	---	IM3847, Prasoon Srivatsava
04	Tirupati	Telugu Wikimedians	0	---	---
05	Ahmedabad	Gujarati Wikimedians	0	---	---

Phase 02 (2025)

Hyderabad
Godavari region (Old East & West)
Guntur & Palnadu
Vijayawada-Machilipatnam
Warangal
Rayalaseema

How it Works?

Each contest will be 3-4 months long and has three phases:

Pre-Contest Phase - 1 month before the contest
Contest Phase - For the span of the contest (Usually 1 month)
Post-Contest Phase - 1 month after the contest

Pre-Contest Phase

Step-1: Engage with the local community to compile a list of required images for a specific geographic area:

Priority 1: Articles lacking images
Priority 2: Images needed for significant locations
Priority 3: Articles with low-quality images

Step-2: Proposal for Wiki Loves City banners in the targeted geographic locations/states across all Wikipedia platforms.

Step-3: Present key articles and their viewership metrics for promotion.

Step-4: Create posters and short videos to advertise the photography contest on social media.

Step-5: Plan for photo walks with the assistance of local non-profit photography clubs.

Step-6: Identify potential photographers and content creators on social media photography platforms and inform them about the contest.

Contest Phase

Step-1: Display banners on Wikipedia projects and enhance social media posts.

Step-2: Conduct workshops to introduce Wikimedia Commons community to participants both online and offline, and organize photo walks.

Step-3: Encourage local community members to translate available articles from English Wikipedia to local language Wikipedias.

Step-4: Enhance historical and etymological data on articles related to the city/geographic location, with support from local libraries and the community.

Step-5: Regularly follow up with registered photographers throughout the competition.

Step-6: Facilitate a jury panel discussion and select three jury members with assistance from the Commons Community.

Post-Contest Phase

Step-1: Categorize received images.

Step-2: Workshop with Local Wikimedia community to analyse images we have received.

Step-3: Identify images suitable for supporting the Articles for Creation (Workshop).

Step-4: Incorporate the most informative images into English and other language Wikipedia articles and Wiki Voyage (Edit-a-Thon).

Step-5: Prize winning images to be concluded by Jury.

Step-6: Sending Swag kits to Jury panels, Organizers and Winners.

Step-7: Document the list of images received and used on Wikimedia platforms, bytes of data added to English Wikipedia, and number of articles translated and improved in local language Wikipedias.