Wikimaps User Group

Wikimaps User Group logo

Wikimaps User Group

The Wikimaps User Group aims to gather Wikimedia users engaged with a variety of activities with geographic information, from across the movement. As long as you work with anything regarding maps, such as creating maps for Wikimedia Commons, or working on geographical data, such as adding coordinates to Wikipedia articles or creating WDQS query map views in Wikidata, you are very welcome to join us!

Project scope

Wikimaps represents the international mapping community in the Wikimedia projects. The members of the group work with Wikimedia & geography related projects in many different ways. The user group is a lightweight non-organization. It serves the geographically spread community by providing a place for discussion to mature ideas together and bringing them forward in the Wikimedia community.

Activities

The Telegram group is the main form of activity for the group.

Two contact persons are elected for the next year before the end of each year in an election on these pages. At the same occasion the group elects a person to represent the group in the Wikimedia Conference.

Reporting of projects takes place collaboratively on the Reports subpage.

Membership

Anyone is welcome to join the group and the discussion.

Contacts

Updated for 2021

Goals

Wikimaps activities focused previously on historical mapping, but the user group is made for all mapping related activities. The goal is that people with many different ideas for using the geographic component in their projects can come together, share their expertise and help each other forward. Bringing the interests and expertise together will help in showing the importance of geographic data in Wikimedia projects.

Plans for the future

These topics are discussed on a subpage. Join the discussion!

Currently, the group has decided to remain lightweight with minimum governance. In the future this may change if the group finds interest in arranging activities requiring a heavier governance model.

Wiki Loves Maps Helsinki was an event hosted in Helsinki in 2015. A similar event took place in Norway at #Hack4NO. Wiki Loves Maps might become a yearly event as a meeting and a creative hack event between the OpenStreetMap, Wikimedia and other open geodata communities, such as humanitarian mapping, governmental open geodata, data journalism or digital humanities groups.

Pictures from the Wikimaps album
A historian and an archivist discussing maps
Guest speaker Mauricio Giraldo from the NYPL at Wiki Loves Maps Helsinki 2015
DroneArt Helsinki! A photogrammetry workshop in Helsinki
Historical Maps workshop in Wikimania Esino Lario in 2016

Communication

Reports

Wikimaps User Group Activity Reports