Wiki Project Med/Grants
Wikipedia is one of the world's foremost medical resources by usage with content available in 250+ languages. It is written by volunteers of which about half are health care providers and half are members of the lay public. As a user generated site all content is a work in progress.
There are a many ongoing efforts to improve both the quality, scope, and language availability of the content. While content is available in 250+ languages much content is only covered in English and a number of other major European languages. Since 2012 we have been collaborating with Translators Without Borders to improve availability in languages spoken in parts of the world that are less wealthy.
Wiki Project Med Foundation edit
Wiki Project Med Foundation is a New York based 501(c)(3) not for profit whose purpose is to promote the development of medical content on Wikimedia projects by, among other things, forming collaborations with other like-minded organizations, giving talks / lectures at universities and other organizations, and working to improve access to subscription-based medical literature for Wikipedians. While we are incorporated in New York State and tax exempt in the United States we are a global group. Its members seek to provide the sum of all medical knowledge to all people in their own language.
Translation project edit
The project involves first improving English language health related content. Before any content is sent for translation it is reviewed by a physician. As of June 2015 we have nearly 200 topics that have been improved in this manner and are ready for translation.[1]
These articles are then posted for translation by our partners at Translators Without Borders, by fellow Wikipedians, or by corporate partners. Following the translation the content is integrated back into the Wikipedia in that language. We are in need of people to help coordinate this process. Currently language interns have filled this role; however, we do not have long term funding for their positions.
We have proven our ability to generate content in multiple languages during the worst part of the Ebola outbreak in 2014. We were able to generate Ebola content in more than 110 languages in a relatively short period of time - beating all other health organizations such as the World Health Organization. [citation needed] This content was also the most used single source of Ebola content by those in the three most affected countries, Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Nigeria.
Language centers edit
Translating into languages that are most in need of content is often the significant challenge as there is often a lack of volunteers partly due to the lack of appropriate computer hardware. While cell phones may be sufficient to access medical content they are not very useful for the generation of content.
Previously our partners, Translators Without Boarders, received around $12,000 in funding from the Indigo Foundation to support their translation center in Nairobi. During this time we were able to make significant progress in generating content in Swahili and Yoruba.
Improving the English content edit
Since 2012 we have been collaborating with the University of California San Francisco School of Medicine. This last year we also had the School of Pharmacy also join us. There is interested from further medical and other health profession schools to become involved. Students however require substantial guidance for educational projects to be a success. We are requesting funding for teaching assistants to help with guidance of the students and universities in question.
Digital last mile edit
A key aspect of our project is that we have made great strides in solving the digital last mile: the final step of getting content out to those in the developing world. Through Wikipedia Zero 400 million people in 59 countries have access to Wikipedia without data charges.[2] In June 2015 we launch a free and open access app on Google play which is a collection of all our English medical content.[3] Other languages are coming soon. We additionally are in discussion with cellphone manufacturers about having this content pre-loaded on cellphones before they are shipped. This content is currently provided on One Child Per Laptop.[4]
Open access edit
All content we produce is under an open access license (CC BY SA). This includes the underlying software. This means that anyone can build upon the work that we are doing (including if what they are doing is of a commercial nature).
Funding edit
- Translation center coordinator
- Teaching assistant
- Translation center