#Wikimedia #GLAM - donation of pictures from #Syria

The Tropenmuseum was asked to make available pictures they have from Syria. Today, it is my pleasure to inform you about a donation by the "Nationaal Museum van Wereldculturen,

At the time we celebrated the Erasmus Prize and, at the time we worried about Bassel Khartabil. There is little hope for Bassel but there is hope for us to become informed about Syria.

It is Ramadan, and whether you believe or not, this is an auspicious time to consider the information we have on Syria.

Share the pictures you hold in Commons. As we learn just a little more about the country, its peoples and history we may find them to be just like us.
Thanks,
       GerardM

#Wikipedia - #Freebassel and #Erasmusprijs

Yesterday our Wikipedia community received the Erasmusprijs. It was a wonderful occasion where the king of the Netherlands handed the prize to three Wikipedians :).

It was wonderful. I met with many old friends, it was the first time that I was in the presence of our king and queen, and princess Beatrix.. AWESOME is the word.

One burning topic, something that tempered the spirits, was Bassel, our fellow Wikipedian from Syria who has been sentenced to death. He embodies our values and the values of the Erasmus society. One question that was considered was what to do.

We can steal a page out of the book of Amnesty International and the director of the Dutch branch suggested calling embasies. It did work for Amnesty in the past. We may ask attention for Bassel on the Wikipedia central notice and, this is being worked on.

More ideas came up. I met with old friends from the Tropenmuseum. They are the original GLAM partners and they will consider providing us with material about Syria or Iraq. Thinking along these lines, it could become a "snowball project" where every GLAM is asked to participate and donate from their collection.

I met an old friend from Germany, she came up with the idea of asking refugees to edit Wikipedia in whatever language about their country, their topics. It would keep them occupied, not happy but busy in a positive way and make them Wikipedians like Bassel.


The only thing we can really do as Wikipedians is do what we do best. It is provide information in a neutral point of view. Arguably because of the lack of information about Syria we are not doing what we should do. Recognising this it is fitting when we support Bassel by writing in our own way in our own project about Syria, its people, its history. It is the best message that we can give. Like Bassel we dream of a world where we can all share in the sum of all knowledge.
Thanks,
      GerardM

#Archive #KIT saved by #Library of #Alexandria

When governments cut spending, the results are often disastrous. The subsidies of the Royal Institute for the Tropics were slashed and, consequently its activities and its archive were no longer funded. The archive is enormous; 7 kilometres of books, magazines and more.

If it was not for the Library of Alexandria, it would all go into the shredder. Much of the information in this archive is unique and it contains information that is relevant for the Netherlands and for many countries in the tropics as well.

The contract for the transfer has been signed and on the one hand it is a relief that all this information is kept on the other hand it is a disgrace that an archive of such prominence is only saved at the very last moment.

The Library of Alexandria is well known for its ability to digitise books. With a little bit of luck they will decide to digitise the KIT archive. In this way the information that is in this archive is not completely lost to people doing research in the Netherlands.
Thanks,
       GerardM

An unknown woman from #Indonesia, a picture from the #Tropenmuseum

The Tropenmuseum has provided us with a large collection of images from its collection. Within Commons these images are particularly relevant because there is so little available on the subjects covered by this collection.

Attribution to the GLAMs we are working with is vitally important. Providing an insight to how a collection is used determines subsidies.

As these images are by and large in a category, it is possible to use that category and accumulate data with it. GLAMorous informs about the number of articles using images in a category. Even more relevant is the BaGLAMa tool; this is where you find the number of page views for these images.

There is room for improvement; there is a template for the Tropenmuseum but it is not part of the data on most images from the Tropenmuseum. There are templates for creators like Isidore van Kinsbergen; they are not universally applied either.

When the data on images exists in a database, it will become much easier to combine data in many new ways. Adding the creator and institution templates prepares for the moment when these templates are populated with data from Wikidata.
Thanks,
      GerardM

What to do when #Wikipedia does not provide the information II

King Abd al-Rahman of #Morocco was a nephew of the king that preceded him. His father of mother were probably brothers of king Slimane. As long as I did not know exactly how they are related, the genealogy tool made by Magnus will not show all the rulers of the Alaouite dynasty.

So I did all the usual things to find out:

• I googled
• I went to the library
• I blogged about it
• I asked on Facebook in a SIG with many people from Morocco

All this did not work.. So I asked a friend at the Tropenmuseum. He asked Mohamed Saadouni who told me that "Moulay Abderrahman is the son of Moulay Hicham, a brother of Moulay Slimane". He even provided me with a reference.



When you are adding statements to Wikidata, it helps when you can can get satisfaction out of the visualisation of the facts. Moulay Hicham exists at this time only in Wikidata, t would be good when be showed as a "red link" as there is no article in any Wikipedia about him. i

When you add data on subjects that have their basis in Africa, you will find that the information in Wikipedia is spotty and that it is very much seen from Western eyes. I am for instance not convinced that Morocco was a sultanate. He is called Moulay Hicham and Wikipedia makes "moulay" equal to "Prince". The current "King" is actually a "Malik".. I do not know enough so I remain puzzled.
Thanks,
      GerardM

I #spy with my little eye

When people go to events, they take pictures. They post them to Facebook for the whole world to see. This picture was taken by Ziko and everyone in the picture can be identified by the people who know them.

There is effective software that makes an educated guess based on previous identifications. I wonder how effective it would be on historic pictures.  At Commons we have many pictures without the names of the people in the portrait.

These three young ladies are known to be the daughters of the Sultan of Jogjakarta. It is likely that there are other pictures of his court with these young ladies. When they are identified in one picture, it may be possible to identify them in this picture as well.

A lot of money has been invested in such spying software by many organisations. It would be cool if the resulting technology was put to use for something uncontroversial.
Thanks,
      GerardM

The #Batak #script gets its #font

 Thank you #Wikimedia Foundation

History is written by the victor. The Dutch were victorious over the Batak people and as a result they became part of what is now Indonesia. At that time the Batak languages were written in the Batak script and many documents ended up in Dutch archives and museums like the Tropenmuseum.

Once the existence of a script is recognised in the ISO-15924, the characters of that script can be defined in Unicode. Once they are defined in Unicode, a font can be created for a script. When this font is freely licensed, everybody may use this font. Existing documents and literature can be transcribed and texts that were transcribed in something other then Unicode can be converted.

With documents and literature transcribed or converted, they can become available for research and when they can be easily found, it becomes possible to understand more of the history of the Batak people from their point of view.

A free font makes it possible to display the Batak characters. As you can understand, with the development of a first Unicode font for the Batak script, there is not much to display yet. Documents and literature have to be transcribed and typically a keyboard is used for this. A standard keyboard does not map to Batak characters and a keyboard mapping is what makes this possible.

The Wikimedia Foundation makes it possible to have this font. A grant has been given to do a GLAM project about Batak documents in Dutch museums and archives. Scans of Batak documents will be uploaded on Commons and the transcriptions will have to go to a Wikisource that supports both the WebFonts and the Narayam extension.

Now that we can start building a font, we are getting ready to reach out to people who have documents in one of the Batak languages. We will be reaching out to people who know these languages and as people like myself transcribe documents, they are the ones who have to identify the precise Batak language.

As you may understand, a project like this is many faceted. It will be an adventure to learn how many facets there are. Watch this space for future updates.
Thanks,
     GerardM

#WCN11 #Tropenmuseum knows the stories of expeditions

As colonial powers extended their reach, they send expeditions to those parts of the world where they might find an “el dorado”. Many of these expeditions had a dual purpose and expanding the knowledge of the world was one. When you were lucky, you lived to tell the tale. You arrived home heavy with notes, artefacts both human, animal, plant and inanimate. These artefacts were analysed and when done, they ended up in depots of museums. Museums like the Tropenmuseum.

The Dutch anthropological museums all got “their” part of these expeditions and now is the time when thanks to digitisation all the notes and artefacts can come together. Just bringing them together is already a lot of fun but it is only by telling the story to the public that it gains in relevance.

The Tropenmuseum is really happy with many of the results of their donations of Indonesian materials; it is the Indonesian Wikipedia where their material is used most. A project about expeditions may become as relevant as they are when the first systematic references occur in a written language.

Digitising the documents, the photos and combining them in Wikipedia articles is worthwhile in itself however this is not telling the stories of the expeditions and the stories of the collections. Telling the stories is what will make all the material come alive.

The pictures go into Commons, the subjects in Wikipedia, the sources in Wikisource. Can we have a Wikistories to tell the story and have a framework for all the content of the expeditions ?

Thanks,

GerardM

#Tropenmuseum is not only for the #Netherlands

Closure is what seems like the future for the Tropenmuseum. A letter informs that the Dutch government intends to stop its subsidy by 2013.

The Tropenmuseum has been one of the first big institutions that cooperated with Wikimedians and this has been documented on this blog. It is not the first time the Dutch government has the Tropenmuseum in its crosshairs.

The problem with the Tropenmuseum is that it is the repository of artefacts where the Dutch are only its custodians. Irreplaceable artefacts where the continued existence and a continued public presence ensures that we can source our history and learn how history is not as we know it.

The Tropenmuseum has been brilliant in its cooperation with us Wikimedians and the collection of imagery they have shared with us has been happily received and is extensively used. There is however so much more we can do with the Tropenmuseum, we plan to do with the Topenmuseum...

GLAM are essential to ensure that the sum of all knowledge we aim to share is encyclopaedic and truthful. The Tropenmuseum has been so important to us. This news is awful and it begs the question how the Dutch government intends to meet its continued obligation as the custodian of the world class heritage that is the Tropenmuseum collection.
Thanks,
       GerardM

The #Batak script and #GLAM

When the Batak script became supported by Unicode, the Batak languages became technically ready for the 21th century. Practically there is still a long way to go because there is no font yet that supports Batak.

The cost of having a technically correct font that does justice to the language created is relatively minor; for some EUR 5000,- such a font will be created and become available under a free license.

Once a font is available, it is possible to reach out to museums in the Netherlands like the Tropenmuseum and ask them for quality scans of their documents in the Batak script. When these are then transcribed, a rich source of information about the Batak culture will become available.

There are plans for a conference in Bali where people who are involved in Indonesian languages are to be motivated for involvement in WMF projects. Demonstrating how languages can get a new lease of live can be done by having a source project running for the Batak languages in combination with Dutch museums.

This kind of outreach has been suggested to Wikimedia Australia. Sadly they have not come to a conclusion yet on what to do. I would love to see this project started as soon as possible and am happy to reach out to the Dutch museums.
Thanks,
       GerardM

Doing a good job, and then the reward ...

Having been involved on the #Wikimedia side of GLAM, it was my privilege to learn people in many parts of the world interested in different aspects of both Wiki and GLAM. With the whole program becoming more official, it was time to make myself an "ambassador"  now that I still can or forget about it.

I did and clearly there is a clear need for people who are available for questions, who are willing to give people their bearings. The lessons learned from the Tropenmuseum and from my language involvement make for a happy fusion.

I have had wonderful conversations with two ladies, one from Mexico and one from South Africa. Both were a mix of GLAM and language and exhilaratingly different.

Thelmadatter was getting into contact with me independently about Wikipedia for native Mexican languages and the different ways you can approach a museum. The Tropenmuseum has many Mexican objects in its collection and this made for an interesting exchange of views. Mexican arts and crafts have a rich tradition and they can do with increased visibility.

An organisation in South Africa wants to improve information about Africa in Wikipedia for Africans. This conversation went very much the other way; we started with GLAM and ended up what practical activities will infuse activity in Wikipedias like the one in Xhosa or Zulu. I gave them a challenge and, when they accept I will blog about their organisations and what they aim to do.
Thanks,
      GerardM

Nostalgia and #Indonesia ...

The #Tropenmuseum had a symposium with the title Colonial Nostalgia. The first part of the evening were two introductions of books and the second part started with four highly esoteric introductions to the subject.

As my family had no connections to "de oost", practically Indonesia was for me the Indonesian rice table, the remembrance plaques in the chapel near my school and the statue of Jan Pieterszoon Coen in front of the Westfries Museum.

In the introductions a structure was given to what is it that gets people's interested for times gone by. I did not fit in. The question if there had been signs of "whites only" at Indonesian swimming pools was new to me. It did evoke passions in the public and, one of the speakers was willing to give 100 EURO for proof that such signs actually existed.

My involvement in Indonesia originated in the wish by the Tropenmuseum to share its Indonesian collection with Wikipedia. The realisation of this resulted in the use of its great collection in many languages as illustrations, particularly in Bahasa Indonesia. The people that use the Tropenmuseum collection may write because of a sense of nostalgia, it may also be because they write an encyclopaedia and historic articles ask for historically relevant illustrations.
Thanks,
      GerardM

The perfect companion to the #Tropenmuseum on #Commons

When the Tropenmuseum donated their incredible collection of photographs, the sheer size is such that it is hard to take it all in. I could not be more pleased to learn about the imminent publication of "Photographs of the Netherlands East Indies". The book will be presented at the Colonial Nostalgia symposium on Thursday March 17.

Before the symposium there will be guided tours by the authors of the two books published by the Royal Tropics Institute. The other book is about Oceania at the Tropenmuseum. This book will cover the history of the Tropenmuseum collection from what was Dutch New Guinea.

These English language books together are bound to offer an intriguing glimpse in the evolution from what was orginially a colonial collection.

To make the occasion extra cheerful, a new look and feel with much improved information about the Tropenmuseum will be available on Commons.
Thanks,
      GerardM

PS I do not know the ISBN numbers

Danza Indonesia at the #Tropentheater

As I become involved with the #Tropenmuseum and #Indonesia, I sometimes get information that I love to share. February 6 there will be a performance of modern Indonesian dance:

Highlights from 10 years of modern Indonesian dance

In this performance six talented traditional Javanese dancers experiment with a new body language from the rich Javanese tradition en morph this into modern dance. On music by Ligeti, Rahayu Supanggah and Dedek Wahyudi they present most beautiful solos and duets from their repertoire.

It is about top dancers like Agus Margiyanto, Cahwati, Martinus Miroto, Retno Sulistyorini and Heru Purwanto (replaces Rury Avianty). All have performed here before but in a completely different setting.

Danza Indonesia offers an amazing control and surprising choreographies where traditional moves and modern dance idiom fuse into an exciting amalgam. Mirogo will function as the dramaturge and ensure that the cohesion of the individual parts. Iskader Loedin will provide appropriate lighting.

A presentation as part of the Wild Wild East Festival

Note: it is possible to conclude the world dance performance by enjoying the delicious world buffet, including a drink, in the Café Restaurant Soeterijn of the Tropentheater. You pay only € 36,50 in total (€17,50 for the buffet and a reduced rate for the performance). Reservations available through 020-568 8500

This shows that Indonesian dance is not only for tourists. Its idiom finds its way in the world of modern dance and the classic Indonesian dance styles are alive and well.
Thanks,
      GerardM

A #Tropenmuseum embarrassment of riches

The Dutch #Wikipedia article about the #Tropenmuseum can do with some sprucing up. Susanne asked me to have a look and I already updated the address, the number of visitors of 2010 in the many Wikipedias that have an article.

What I also want to do is add information about the permanent exhibitions. These make a visit to the Tropenmuseum worthwhile never mind the many extraordinary temporary exhibitions.

The issue I am faced with is that as I was so bold to ask for some illustrations to go with the permanent exhibitions, I was given a DVD with superb illustrations and the Tropenmuseum visitors guide (ISBN 978 90 6832 613 0). That gives me many issues I want to deal with.

NG_Marindkrijger_FOTO_1000 8193.jpg

The issues I am faced with:

• some pictures are already on Commons but in a lower resolution
• some of these pictures do not have the right attributions
• the technical quality of these objects is not always as good
• there is no meta data with the images I received .. but the book ..
• many images are of such a quality that they deserve to feature
• some pictures have a name that is plain weird

W-Schilderij Opera 6215-1.jpg

My plan of action is to do one thing at a time: first start with a short description of the permanent exhibitions and then do what I can and look for help from whoever can give it..
Thanks,
      GerardM

Bad news from the #Tropenmuseum

Bad news comes soon enough and the news from the Tropenmuseum feels like a harbinger of more bad news to come. The Royal Institute of the Tropics (KIT) will see its subsidy slashed by 4 million Euro. Two million will be the reduction on the budget for the Tropenmuseum.

This is bad news. It is particularly sad when you consider that much of the importance of the Tropenmuseum is in the way it brings other cultures closer to the experience of the people of the Netherlands. As the PVV, a xenophobic party, has a large influence in Dutch politics it feels like a prelude of more things to come.

The Tropenmuseum has proven itself as a friend and its engagement in the Wikimedia world has improved its solid reputation. The Tropenmuseum and KIT are important and its budget cut has made the news. Many other GLAMs will face similar cuts and this will not make the news to this extend.

GLAMs are the repositories of our cultural heritage. As the goal of the Wikimedia movement is to share all knowledge with everyone, they are our natural partners. Less money for museums means less money for digitalisation and outreach. It means that they will be looking for money, for cooperation..
Thanks,
     GerardM

Good news from the #Tropenmuseum

I love good news and particularly good news from friends..

A Tropenmuseum tweet

The visitor number for the Tropenmuseum has increased in 2010 by 12% to 197.000. The news about the record number of visitors comes with news of exhibitions in the new year.. one will show contemporary art and the other will show how death has its place in the world.
Thanks,
     GerardM

#Statistics for our GLAM partners

At #Wikimedia #Commons we have been building great relations with many GLAMs. Many of them have provided us with awesome material that has found its way in our Wikipedias.

In this era of pressures on the budgets of GLAMs it is important to appreciate what it is that we give in return. A fuzzy feeling that we use their pictures as illustrations in our articles, that we use the cultural heritage that is conserved by these institutions does not really help them. It is like with the Wikimedia Fundraiser they want the facts, the numbers regularly so that they can consider the effectiveness of their partnership with us.

We are good at making use of GLAM material, we are bad at letting GLAMs know how good we are. The best we have is one of Magnus's toys called BaGLAMa. Magnus will be presenting at the conference in London and for this reason he ran an update with his tool so now we have numbers for March and October 2010.

Eruption of the Merapi volcano in 1930 used 6 times

For the Tropenmuseum, BaGLAMa indicates a big growth of the visibility of its material. In March its images were seen 1,871,789 times and this grew in October to 4,133,814.

Another of Magnus's tools, GLAMorous informs us how many images are used on the different Wikipedias. It can drill deeper and inform on what pictures are used where.

In order to maintain a healthy relation with our GLAM partners we need to do better. The traffic statistics have to be updated every month, access to statistics information needs to be in one place. The problem is not that it cannot be done, the problem is who is going to do it. What value do we give to out GLAM relations, will it become a priority or will we muddle on.
Thanks,
       GerardM

#Amazon versus #Google books

When you are looking for a book on a subject, it is important to understand the difference between what is on offer at Amazon and by Google.

The content of Google books was created by scanning the contents of multiple libraries. These books were scanned, characters were recognised and the spelling was checked. The resulting product is significant because this collection is based on the buying decisions of the libraries that were processed in this way.



Amazon is an auction site. People sell books and if you do not know what you are looking for, you may end up paying good money for extracts of Wikipedia. This may be disappointing but it is perfectly legal.

When you buy on Amazon, you get a dead wood item. When you get a book from Google, you get a digital file. When you buy from Amazon, you have to consider the cost of shipping and the time involved. A Google book is send over the net and it is almost instantly available.

As Google does scan books from libraries, they effectively provide a solution to cover the inadequacy of the publishing industry. This approach ensures that books will remain available even when they are no longer in print and consequently no longer commercially viable.
Thanks,
    GerardM

PS I wonder if they have specialised libraries like the one held by the Tropenmuseum.

Blow the war horn !!

#Commons has featured pictures. Having a picture featured is valuable on many levels. It is recognition for the picture and it means that the picture is likely to be used in many Wikipedias. Crucial in my understanding is that it is about featured pictures, not featured photos.

The issue with the current featured picture candidate process is dominated by digital photo think. A macro picture of a fly on some shit has a better chance of featuring then the picture below.

This picture is take in Burkina Faso and show a Samo man playing the so called war horn. This picture was taken during one of the collection expeditions of the Tropenmuseum in 1970 and 1971 in preparation of the exhibition in 1971-1972 titled "Samo. An African savanna people in development".

The Samo are one of the Mandé peoples and as far as Wikipedia is concerned they do not exist. From such a perspective, the war horn should be sounded to promote the coverage of subjects in both Commons and Wikipedia. Arguments like "FP status is to notice the special qualities of a picture, not to make anthropological advertisements" mean that only modern photos will be elected.  The quality of the picture is in line with the norm of the period. The true quality of the picture is best seen here where you find a 15MB TIFF file with blemishes removed, sharpness increased, levels adjusted, slightly cropped and rotated.

When historical pictures are consistently undervalued, it degrades not only the value of the featured pictures, it also degrades the value of Commons itself. Commons is a repository of educational material. Historic pictures show events that often do not repeat. Anthropological pictures show cultures that are not our own. When such pictures are not welcomed on the front page, when featured pictures are only good enough when they fit the latest craze Commons shows how little it values what it should be about; a repository of educational images useful for the whole world and about the whole world.
Thanks,
       GerardM