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Wikimedia Laureate:

A journey

Wikimedia: User:Ambrosia10

ORCID: 0000-0002-5398-7721

email:siobhan_leachman@yahoo.co.nz

mastodon: @siobhan_leachman@mastodon.nz

Slides: https://bit.ly/WMFKeyNote23

DOI: 10.5281/ZENODO.10202257

5th October 2023

Headshot by Siobhan Leachman CC0 via Wikicommons.

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Smithsonian Transcription

Centre

Smithsonian Institute. Coloured steel engraving by R. Metzeroth. Wellcome Trust CC0 via Wikicommons.

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Joseph Nelson Rose

Catalogue

Rose, greenhouse cacti, 1912, 1919 - 1929 by Joseph Nelson Rose No known copyright restrictions.

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Editing

English Wikipedia

English Wikipedia article for Rose E. Collom CC BY-SA 4.0

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Biodiversity Heritage Library

Screenshot of the Biodiversity Heritage Library flickr account. Copied for the purpose of education under section 44 of the New Zealand Copyright Act 1994.

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So MANY women illustrators

Screenshot of https://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/hernaturalhistory Copied for the purpose of education under section 44 of the New Zealand Copyright Act 1994.

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WikiCommons

Wikicommons category for Maud Horman-Fisher CC BY-SA 4.0

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Wikipedia notability criteria

Screenshot of Notability Criteria Wikipedia article “nutshell” CC BY-SA 4.0

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Wikidata logo https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Wikidata-Archi38.svg CC BY-SA 3.0

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#HerNaturalHistory campaign

HerNaturalHistory image via slide in https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Women_in_Natural_History_Wikipedia_Editing_Workshop_Slides_March_13_2019.pdf by Ariel Cetrone CC BY-SA 4.0

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#1Lib1Ref

campaign

1lib1ref sticker by Ocaasi (WMF) CC BY-SA 4.0

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Wikidata and Wikicommons logos. Public domain. Wikipedia logo. CC BY SA 3.0

My Wikiverse

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Gif by Dario Taraborelli CC0

New Zealand Moths

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iNaturalist Before and After

Screenshots of iNaturalist species page. Copied for the purpose of education under section 44 of the New Zealand Copyright Act 1994.

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Auckland Museum medal

Image of the Auckland War Memorial Museum medal awarded to Siobhan Leachman 2018 by Siobhan Leachman CC0

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SPNHC+TDWG 2018

Screenshot of slide from TDWG/SPNHC presentation by Siobhan Leachman CC BY 4.0

Another pivotal moment in my Wiki journey was my attendance at a joint conference held in Dunedin in 2018. This was the SPNHC (Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections) and TDWG (the Biodiversity Data Standards Organisation) conference. My attendance was fully funded by me because, at this stage, I had absolutely no idea about the existence of Wikimedia Foundation grants.

And when BHL staff realised I was attending, they invited me to present a paper at their symposium. In my presentation I explained about my work creating Wikipedia articles about moths, how I cited in that article literature sourced from BHL, how I uploaded specimen images sourced from museums into Wikicommons, and linking all this in Wikidata. AND how all this work was immediately reused in iNaturalist.

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Wikicite project

WikiCite logo by DarTa CC0

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Cascade

of

Collaboration

and

Outreach

Disambiguation paper CC BY 4.0, Paleo disambiguation guidelines CC0, Presentation to Te Papa, National Museum of New Zealand CC0, Wikipedia Weekly Network Biodiversity youtube tile CC BY 4.0, VALA website and RadioNZ website copied for the purpose of education under section 44 of the New Zealand Copyright Act 1994,

My attendance at the SPNHC & TDWG conference & also the WikiCite conference led to a cascade of opportunities to undertake collaborative projects and outreach. Just some examples include making friends with Nicole Kearny, the manager of BHL Australia. She successfully advocated for me to be a keynote speaker at VALA - a huge Libraries and technology conference in Australia, giving me the opportunity to explain how important open access and reuse is when contributing to the Wikiverse. I participated in youtube broadcasts with fellow wikimedians including Dario, showing how to create species Wikipedia articles in multiple languages, upload images from iNaturalist to Wikicommons to reuse in those articles and also how to edit Wikidata species items.

I presented on Wiki at numerous institutions, at society meetings and at conferences. This included presenting to staff at Te Papa, the National Museum of New Zealand, having meetings regarding Wiki at the National Library of New Zealand and presenting at New Zealand’s GLAM and digital conference.

Another person I met at the SPNHC & TDWG conference was the botanist Quentin Groom. He invited me to co-author the Biodiversity Data Standards Guidelines for disambiguating people. These standards guide the biodiversity community the world over and encourages them to add and link their people data via Wikidata. I've also been interviewed by Radio New Zealand, for variety podcasts and I’ve wikified a Bioblitz.

This cascade of presentations, workshops and collaborations continues to this day.

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Wellington

Wiki Community

Mike Dickison Wikipedian at Large Caroline Léna Becker, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Edit for Equity by Mike Dickison, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

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Wellington Wiki Meetup by PukapukaPai, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Wellington Wiki meetup

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Screenshot by Quilt Phase, Apache License 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

COVID = Virtual

These physical meetups continued until the beginning of 2020. But then COVID hit. Now COVID is horrendous in many respects. But I’m of the opinion that for the New Zealand wiki scene it was the best thing that ever happened to us. As a result of COVID lockdowns everyone in our community was forced to upskill on how to attend and participate in virtual meetings.

Victoria and I continued to hold our “Wellington” meetups but during lockdown we did so virtually. We happily included anyone interested from around the country and even Australia if they wanted to attend. After we came out of lockdown Victoria and I decided to continue physical Wellington wiki meetups but reduced it frequency to once a month. This gave us the space to establish a regular virtual meetup for New Zealand editors.

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Wikimedia

Aotearoa New Zealand

Screenshot of Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand infobox via Meta-Wiki CC BY-SA 4.0

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Future

Projects,

Collaborations

and

Outreach

Screenshots of the Women Genera prepublication, Hidden Figures Project tile, ECN logo, CitSciOz2023 logo, all copied for the purpose of education under section 44 of the New Zealand Copyright Act 1994, screenshot of Wikidata WikiProject Research expeditions CC BY-SA 4.0.

So what else does the future hold for me? Well I’ve got multiple editing projects currently underway, including continuing with projects on scientific collectors as well as New Zealand moths. As well as the Wellington and Aotearoa New Zealand meetups, in 2024 I’m hoping to organise a number of themed virtual and in person editing events aimed at Wellington and New Zealand based editors.

My engagement with BHL continues apace. JJ Dearborn, their data manager invited me onto their cataloguing committee. They want guidance as BHL becomes more active with various Wikiprojects. I’m also intending to become more involved in the Wikimedia Foundation & BHL Working Group monthly meeting, which will formally reconvene in January.

I have a variety of wiki adjacent projects that will hopefully come to a successful conclusion over the next year. For example I am collaborating on a project with several internationally renowned botanists researching women after whom flowering plant genera have been named. We’ve used Wikidata for this project and intend to publish two scholarly articles on our research in the near future. I also hope to finish a collaboration with a group of university educators producing resources to support an undergraduate course on “hidden figures” in natural history collections. This course will contain a Wikidata module.

I’ve just started a project collaborating with members of the TDWG biodiversity data standards community to create best practice guidelines for research expedition Wikidata items. This will hopefully assist and encourage natural history institutions and their staff to contribute research expedition data to Wikidata.

As for presentations, in the next few months I have an upcoming presentation to the United States Entomological Collections Network as well as a Keynote presentation to the Australian Citizen Science conference. At both of these I’ll be discussing my wiki work and explaining how anyone can contribute. I’ve also received funding from Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand to attend the 2023 TDWG conference in Hobart, continuing my engagement and outreach efforts with this organisation and its members.

I’m definitely looking forward to the future and won’t be slowing down anytime soon. Thank you for listening and does anyone have any questions?

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© Siobhan Leachman, 2023. Unless indicated otherwise for specific images, this slide deck is licensed for re-use under the Creative Commons CC0 licence. Please note that this licence does not apply to any images. Those specific items may be re-used as indicated in the image rights statement within each slide. In essence, you are free to copy, distribute and adapt this slide deck, as long as you abide by the other licence terms.

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Request

Impact metrics by Siobhan Leachman CC0 via Wikicommons

“What ONE THING WIkimedia foundation can do to help you with your work?”

I would like the Wikimedia Foundation to consider how it might support the creation of GLAM impact metric tools, tools that are stable and persistent. As you’ve all heard much of my work relies on GLAMs (Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums) particularly natural history museums and libraries.

These organisations are motivated to support and undertake Wiki work as our aims are aligned. BUT in a resource squeezed world, these GLAMs need to be able to report back to their funders about the effectiveness of their engagement with Wiki. They need metrics to justify the resources used and to encourage further support and engagement.

Unfortunately many of the Wiki GLAM impact metric tools are unreliable. This has a flow on effect of dampening the enthusiasm of GLAMs to actively engage with Wiki. This can in turn dampen the amount of GLAM content available. Many natural history institutions are starting to prioritise those places most affected by climate change and the extinction crisis. Editors need the ability to access and reuse that vital data, images and information.

If Wikimedia Foundation helps support the creation of GLAM impact metric tools that are stable and persistent, I believe this would have a flow on effect of helping me and others like me to access to GLAM knowledge and content, for the benefit of us all.