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INTRODUCTION TO

WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

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BY

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NWONWU UCHECHUKWU PASCALINE

Africa Wiki Women - On Wiki Skills Mentorship Program

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Nwonwu Uchechukwu Pascaline

Nwonwu Uchechukwu Pascaline is a dedicated Wikimedia contributor and advocate for cultural preservation and gender equality. She serves as the Wiki Loves Folklore Central African Ambassador 2024/2025, Ambassador for Africa Wiki Women, Project lead for IG Wiki Commons Hub and the Anglophone Facilitator for the Africa Wiki Women Technical Research Team. Additionally, she has contributed as an international juror for various Wiki Loves campaigns, including Wiki Loves Folklore 2024 and 2025 and Wiki Loves Monument 2024.

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Her work is focused on empowering communities, closing the gender gap, and promoting cultural heritage through Wikimedia projects.

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Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. The W’s

Who can use commons files?

Who can contribute to commons?

Where can I use commons files?

  1. Understanding Commons Interface
  2. Contributing to commons?
  3. File formats
  4. License
  5. Category

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INTRODUCTION

Wikimedia Commons is a media file repository making available public domain and freely licensed educational media content (images, sound and video clips) to everyone, in their own language. The repository is created and maintained by volunteers.

Wikimedia Commons uses the same wiki-technology as Wikipedia and everyone can edit it. Unlike media files uploaded to other projects, files uploaded to Wikimedia Commons can be embedded on pages of all Wikimedia projects without the need to separately upload them there.

Launched on 7 September 2004, Wikimedia Commons hit the 1,000,000 uploaded media file milestone on 30 November 2006 and currently contains 124,176,587 as at 4 August 2025.

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The “W’s

  • Who can use commons files?

Anybody can use commons files, you don’t need to belong to any Wikimedia project.

  • Who can contribute?�Anybody with a Wikimedia account (username) can contribute to Wikimedia commons.

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Understading Commons Interface

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

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Where can I use commons files ?

On Wikimedia projects (Wikipedia, Wikidata, Wikiversities e.t.c)

Online forums or discussions.

Research papers and academic works.

Presentations.

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What can you contribute to Wikimedia Commons?

  • Adding Timed text (subtitle/caption) to videos on commons.
  • Fixing categories
  • Translating pages
  • Translating captions and descriptions
  • Images of notable people, buildings, culture, animals, plants e.t.c
  • Logos, icons and graphics.
  • Videos
  • Audios
  • PDF
  • Book covers, illustrations and scan of public domain materials.
  • Infographics and charts.
  • Historical documents, manuscripts, and archival materials.

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What is a media file?

  • A media file is any digital file containing images, video, audio, or other multimedia content.
  • These files are created using various software or tools and can be stored on devices like computers, smartphones, tablets, and flash drives.
  • Media files can be shared through channels such as email, social media, and messaging or learning apps.

Types of files

Audio

video

Images

Text

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File Formats

  • Images: SVG, PNG, JPEG, GIF and WebP.
  • Sound - MP3, MIDI. Ogg(audio), WebM (audio), FLAC and WAV.
  • Video - WebM (video), Ogg Theora (video), MPEG-1 (video) and MPEG-2 (video).
  • Textual Format - PDF and Timed text.

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LICENSE

You must give proper permissions to any file you want to upload on commons.

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Files must be freely licensed.

Wikimedia Commons only accepts free content. File must have no copyright restrictions.

You must share file under creative commons right.

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CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSE

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There are six different license types, listed from most to least permissive.

CC BY

CC BY-SA

CC BY-NC

CC BY-NC-SA

CC BY-ND

CC BY-NC-ND

The CC0 Public Domain Dedication

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  • Creative Commons licensing is a standardized license that allows creators to retain copyright while granting permissions to others to use, share, and build upon their work.

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  • It provides flexible rules and a legal framework for creators to express how others can use their content, whether it is images, music, videos, or written materials.

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https://w.wiki/AyJ4

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https://w.wiki/AyJ4

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Understanding Creative Commons Licenses and Usage

https://creativecommons.org/share-your-work/cclicenses/

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Tip

The best way to decide which is appropriate for you is to think about why you want to share your work, and how you hope others will use that work.

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Category

  • The category structure is the primary way to organize and find files on the Commons. It is essential that every file can be found by browsing the category structure. E.g
  • Category: Africa Wiki Women
  • Wiki Loves Africa
  • African Cuisine

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Hands on Demo on How To Create a new Category

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Thank you very much!