Basque Wikimedians User Group/Reports/2023

In 2023, the Basque Wikimedians User Group has kept its initiative. On the one side, it has expanded its Education Program, bolstering the project Ikusgela. It has, additionally, encouraged other projects outside of the Education Program, summarized as follows.

Organization

The growth experienced in the last year has broght about changes in the way we operate in order to be able to address all our projects. At the General Assembly held in January 2024, the association elected the new Directive Board, appointing Gartxoak as the new president of the association. On the other hand, the association has appointed Theklan Executive Director (ED) in line with his present-day activity and responsibilities.

Projects

Education

2023 has seen the end of the Education Program carried out in previous years, summarized in an assessment report on the work done so far. The Basque Wikimedians Users' Cultural Association launched an ambitious plan four years ago with an aim to substantially improve the contents of Basque Wikipedia. The proposal to develop the growth of Wikipedia in specific areas materialized in content most required for students aged 12-16, as well as new proposals for all readers. Other projects such as the Txikipedia or Ikusgela have also been created during this period.

We have intensified international cooperation, improved the presence and communication in the Basque Wikipedia, and upgraded the position of the Basque Wikipedia among the first twenty languages of the world in different quality lists. In the last four years, we have doubled the number of words, twelve times more than the referential Basque Encyclopedic Dictionary Lur.

We have managed to get the contribution of over 7,000 editors, that is, 1% of those who have been literate in Basque have participated writing in Basque Wikipedia during these four years. We don`t know any similar cases in other Wikipedias. Moreover, all universities have been involved in this improvement, as have all Secondary School networks. We have trained hundreds of their teachers and in some centres they have academic programs to contribute to and enhance the Wikipedia.

See the Full Report, for detailed information

Pedagogical projects in progress

This year we have made progress in developing educational projects. On the one hand, we are creating a work group on Designing Learning Scenarios for the Future that will strengthen the relationships between education and Wikimedia. On the other hand, students of the Master Degree in Teacher Training of the Basque Summer University (UEU) have participated in the Education Program. After receiving training on basic edition of Wikipedia, they have elaborated articles related to Nature Sciences and Mathematics, as well as 6 collective assignments on the didactic use of Wikipedia. Their reports are available in the Education Portal. The Secondary School of Zumaia attached to the public education network, in collaboration with Aquarium of San Sebastian, has also developed a hands-on didactic unit related to Wikipedia.

Ikusgela

Video production

One of the sections we present this year is about Digital Challenges. This video explain how Artificial Intelligence works. It has subtitles in English.

In 2023, we created 35 video clips distributed in the following sections:

Philosophy (Commons)
Economy (Commons)
Basque literature (Commons)
Environment (Commons)
Digital challenges (Commons)
Zortziko txikian (Quick recap in eight steps, Commons)

In addition, significant video frames have been received in one Wikipedia category, and video introduction captures in another one.

Internationalization

With the help of WikiCred, we had the opportunity to subtitle videos for the first time. Philosophy videos have been adapted to Catalan. In addition, all the Ikusgela videos have the subtitles at least in one of the following languages: English, Spanish, French, Catalan, Hausa, Bengali, Arabic, Turkish, Slovenian, Gaelic, Greek and Russian.

Here are all the subtitles. We coordinate through this Ikusgela work page to get new translations in other languages.

Dissemination

The main portal [1] of the Aula (classroom) on Basque Wikipedia was redesigned to present all videos with an interface similar to that of a multimedia portal.

By the end of the year, 279 articles in the Basque Wikipedia had a video clip from Ikusgela. All these pages have received 326,227 annual visits.

In addition to being inserted in Commons , Wikipedia and Ikusgela website, these video clips have been distributed across other channels such as Youtube, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Telegram, Mastodon, Peertube and TikTok.

Txikipedia (WikiChildren 8-13)

The Txikipedia project has already exceeded the limit of 6,700 articles. Two were its main stimuli: on the one hand, the project with the Federation of Ikastolas, with over 2,000 students per third year. These students, in small groups, have worked over 500 articles. Additionally, in the Secondary School from Zumaia, its 2nd grade schoolchildren have created almost 250 articles with scientific topics.

+Info

(Basque) Wikiproject Zumaia-Txikipedia
Commons: Txikipedia_workshop_at_Zumaia_BHI_School

Navarre

Again, in Navarre we have had a worker to develop projects, but it is the first time she has worked all year round. She has worked on activities for the future on historical memory associations, the Public University of Navarre and and several municipalities.

WikiEmakumeak (WikiWomen)

EWKE has assisted the WikiEmakumeak groups emerging locally. On the one hand, it provided technical support for these projects. On the other hand, EWKE participated in the project of portraits of forgotten women. EWKE also created a project in 2023 to generate biographies of 30,000 women (33% of all biographies), with a time horizon until 2027. In February we launched the 100 BBC women competition.

(Basque) See the project: 30.000 women
(Basque) To follow the work of WikiEmakumeok (WikiWomen) group: WikiEmakumeok

Outreach and other contributions

WikiForHumanRights

In April 2023 we participated in the #WikiForHumanRights campaign. We hold a Wikipedia competition in Basque in order to create articles. All results can be seen here. 402 kilobytes, 50 new articles, 20,217 words and 478 bibliographic references were incorporated. A total of 15 people participated.

Asian month

In collaboration with the Arab Digital Content Association of Jordan, we organized an exchange of articles in the context of the Asian Month. The goal was to improve Wikipedia in Basque with articles on Palestine, responding to the conflict that has erupted this year. 86 entries, 1,387 kilobytes added, 70,543 words, 178 new articles, 2,084 references and 299 images.

All information: here

Work done in Wikidata

Weather data in the Basque Country

In order to enrich Wikipedia articles with climate content, several data from weather observations by official agencies in the Basque Country was transferred to Wikipedia within a project between students and teachers. During the 2022/23 academic year two students in Bachelor in Computer Engineering and Artificial Intelligence Degree have worked with two professors and one wikipedian. The Canadian Weather Observations Wikiproject has been used as an example. In summary, it has been obtained, processed, shaped in the appropriate format, uploaded to Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata and shown the information in the articles of Wikipedia through climate diagrams, graphs and maps. In addition, the data provided have made it possible to expand the possibility of conducting more extensive searches and analyses.

The following information regarding weather stations throughout the Basque Country (Basque Autonomous Community, Navarre and Northern Basque Country) has been collected: location coordinates, data on the collection point, whether they are recorded automatically or manually, etc. More detailed information can be found in the following document: Weather data in Wikipedia and Wlikata (2023) Paula Ontalvilla, Xabier Irastorza, Galder Gonzalez, Ana Zelaia and Kepa Sarasola.

Weather stations in Wikidata (https://w.wiki/6gAz).

300 Basque musical groups and their albums

Information from the albums of 300 major groups in Basque music has been uploaded to Wikidata in the framework of another project among students and teachers. The list of albums of these groups is extensive, at the moment in the portal badok.eus of Basque music there are about 1,350 groups. Of these, 300 have been major groups. These groups and albums have enabled direct links to access further information in the portal badok.eus in just one click.

At the time of completion of the project, in Wikidata there are records of 1,144 albums of these 300 interpreters. More detailed information can be found in the following document: Euskal musika-taldeak eta albumak Wikidatan (2023) Koldo Etxaniz, Galder Gonzalez, Lorea Loinaz, Ane Paniagua, Kepa Sarasola and Ana Zelaia.

Linked Data, Knowledge Graphs, Wlikata/Wikibase

Within UEU summer courses, a full day course (6 hours) was organised on 7 July 2023. This one-day workshop presented the basis of Linked Data and Semantic Web models and how machines can interpret knowledge graphs using these technologies. The largest free knowledge-graph, Wikidata, was also presented and explained, examining different ways of contribution.

Web Semantica
Wikidata
Wikidata API
SPARQL language and Wikikata SPARQL query interface
Wikibase
Practical exercises

Basque Marines in World War II

In recent years, Sancho de Beur Foundation has carried out an investigation into the Marines of Basque origin during the Second World War. From EWKE we worked with them to get this information on both Wikipedia and Wikidata, and we've uploaded some free photos to Wikimedia Commons. This work has made it possible to produce a historical memory and to clarify a fragment of history so far totally unknown. The work carried out has subsequently been reported in press.

Medialab Tabakalera

We continued to work with MediaLab Tabakalera in Donostia to upload to Wikidata and investigate the authorities of that library. Up to now, data for 13,837 persons have been upload.

d:Property_talk:P10069

Air assets

Castle of Xabier (Xabierko gaztelua)

The main goal of this project was to make the heritage of the Basque Country more visual. To do so, it was proposed to record videos from four castles of the Basque Country through drone. This work was left to a member of the association and these are the results delivered in 2023:

As expected, videos of four castles have been made:

Castle of Xabier, 3:38 min.
Castle of Deio, 3:07 min.
Castle of Amaiur, 2:15 min.
Castle of Garaño, 2:59 min.

Free music was selected from Wikimedia Commons to be included in the video clips. The videos were added to Wikipedia and Wikidata.

In the media

On social networks

Youtube: @Ikusgela

Twitter: @euwikipedia @ikusgela

Instagram: @Ikusgela

Facebook: @Euskarazko Wikipedia

Telegram: @Ikusgela

Mastodon: @euwikipedia, @Ikusgela, @Txikipedia @wlikosia

Peertube: Peertube.eus: Ikusgela _kanala

Itinerancies

Porto

In 16-18 June, the Spanish and Portuguese Wikimedia organized for the first time a meet-up aiming to foster minority languages in the context of the Iberian Peninsula. The event took place during two days in Porto, attended by a number of participants from different Wikipedia projects, some of them recently created, and academic personalities. The Basque Wikimedians User Group delivered a presentation introducing the Basque Wikipedia and its present-day developments, challenges and achievements.

Twitter: [1] [2] [3]

Daily Berria: [4]

Others

A wikimedian visited Iberoconf in Bogota, Colombia
A member of EWKE attended Wikimania in Singapore.
Two EWKE members attended the meeting organized by the Spanish Wikimedia in Salamanca.