Wikimedia South Africa/Year Report 2016

Annual Report for Fiscal Year 2015–16

This report describes the activities of Wikimedia South Africa during Fiscal Year 2015–16, covering the period from October 2015 through November 2016.

Governance

In November 2014, the Wikimedia ZA Board of Directors held a strategy planning meeting and defined three strategic priorities for the organisation:

Professionalise and Diversify
Build Membership Base
Support the local editing community
Outreach

Professionalisation was put on hold due to the unsuccessful application of an Annual Grant in 2014/15. This has been reactivated somewhat with the planned application for a Small Annual Grant from the foundation to fund the employment of a few, part-time, key personal. Most importantly a book keeper to keep track of expenses. Service to the local editing community was enhanced through a better understanding of it through the survey conducted of the community in June/July 2015, this also resulted in an increase in the number of people resistered on the chapter's mailing list. Roughly 400 Wikipedia editors filled out the survey.

In November 2015 the chapter reviewed the strategy moving forward reiterated the need for enhancing diversity, engage in outreach activities, and increase general awareness of the chapter as well as Wikipedia editing.

At the end of the 2015–16 fiscal year, Wikimedia ZA had 19 registered members, with 747 members on the chapter's facebook page, and 263 people on the chapter's mailing list.

Programs

Chapter activities 2015–16

Edit-a-thons

Art Feminism

See also | Art + Feminism 2016 CT

Wikimedia ZA hosted two edit-a-thons in support of the Art + Feminism project on the 5 March 2016 and 9 April 2016 in partnership with the Michaelis School of Fine Art at the University of Cape Town. Funding for catering for this event came from the Wikimedia Foundation. The venue was provided by the university whilst Wikimedia ZA helped organised it and provided volunteers to help run the event.

Participants at the 5 March Art+Feminism edit-a-thon in Cape Town.
Participants socialising during the break at the Art+Feminism edit-a-thon on the 9 April in Cape Town, South Africa

African Metal

See also| Metal edit-a-thon

As part of an ongoing series of edit-a-thons Wikimedia ZA has teamed up with the South African heavy metal community to do a number of events targeted at expanding the number and quality of articles on Wikipedia related to Heavy Metal Music in Africa. The first event was done on the 21st May 2016 and the last event of 2016 was done on the 19th November. The venue was provided for free along with internet access and computers by the American Corner at the Cape Town Central Library. This event has catalysed a regular series of edit-a-thons on a boarder range of topics open to the general public at the American Corner to be hosted every second month.

Participants at the 1st Cape Town metal edit-a-thon on the 21st May 2016 being shown the basics of editing.
The 3rd Wikimedia ZA Cape Town edit-a-thon on the 19th November 2016 at the American Corner at Cape Town Central Library, South Africa.

Primary School

Ongoing edit-a-thons

Meetups

First joburg meetup 2016

Wikimedia ZA has hosted a number of Wikipedia Meetups over the 2015/16 period. The chapter considers the hosting of such meetups important both as fun social activities for editors but also as an important type of social outreach to encourage a greater sense of community engagement within the South African editing community. It also provides an open and welcoming environment for interested members of the non-editing public to join and engage with existing editors and so learn more about Wikipedia. Two meetups, one in Johannesburg and one in Cape Town, were held on the 15th January to celebrate Wikipedia's 15th birthday.

Cape Town

See also | Cape Town Meetups
From September 2015 to Octover 2016 5 meetups were held in Cape Town. In 2017 it is planned to host meetups more regularly on a quarterly basis whilst also hosting regular edit-a-thons every two months.

Johannesburg

See also | Johannesburg 1
On the 5th March 2016 chapter members in Johannesburg hosted the first meetup outside of Cape Town at the Goethe Institute. More such meetups on a more regular basis are planned for 2017.

Wiki From Above

The winning photograph from the 2016 Wiki From Above competition of the Katse Dam in Lesotho.

See also | WFA 2016

Wikimedia ZA conducted its second Wiki From Above aerial photographic competition ran from April 2016 to August 2016. The first competition was conducted in 2015.

At total of 84 aerial images were submitted by 16 participants with 53.6% of all submitted images being used on 70 Wikipedia pages.

The grant application for Wiki From Above 2016 can be seen here.

Kiwix & Sinenjongo High School

See also | Kiwix Report

First funding in the fiscal year 2014-15 this project was wrapped up in November 2016 with the instillation of a offline Wikipedia Kiwix unit at Sekunjalo High School at Joe Slovo Park, Cape Town. The object of this project was to test out the deployment of the Kiwix system in the field whilst also illustrating the technology to potential interested organisations for future possible role out.

Handover of the Kiwix unit installed at Sinenjongo High School in Cape Town, South Africa. In the picture is Douglas (from Wikimedia ZA) on the left and the schools principle on the right receiving the Kiwix unit.
Original location of the Kiwix unit installed at Sinenjongo High School in the school principle's office in December 2015. Although the location was secure it was not ideal as the metal walls of her office blocked the signal to the rest of the school.
The Kiwix unit installed at Sinenjongo High School in Cape Town, South Africa in September 2016. This was the second attempt at installing the device. This time in a location that was both secure from possible theft and that allowed for easy WiFi access from outside in the rest of the school. This location was successful.
An external view of the Kiwix unit at Sinenjongo High School in its 2016 location. The two aerials of the WiFi booster can be seen protruding from the air vent holes on the wall of the building.
Testing the Kiwix unit installed at its 2016 location in the school.

Advocacy

On the 11 August 2015 a representative of Wikimedia ZA (Douglas Scott) was invited to attend a workshop in Pretoria, South Africa on the amendment of the South African Copyright Act. This was of great interest to the chapter as editors and chapter members had encountered problems with the current act regarding freedom of panorama in South Africa. This was especially problematic for the Wiki Loves Monuments photographic competition as the act currently prevents people from uploading recently built monuments and works of public art under a CC-BY-SA licence required for an image to be hosted on Wikimedia Commons. Wikimedia ZA used this opportunity to advocate for the amendment of the act to allow for freedom of panorama in South Africa. As part of this advocacy Wikimedia ZA submitted a document to the Department of Trade and Industry with suggested Amendments to the act (see link above). The amendment process is still ongoing with a followup workshop on the 6 December 2016 which Wikimedia ZA will attend.