Diversity for WMF is in its fundraising and in its results

Diversity is a stated objective and the Wikimedia Foundation does a comparatively good job.. except that it could be so much better.

It is known that (read Gapminder) genuinely rich people live in every country. The Wikimedia Foundation as a rule does not target the truly rich and consequently the average donation is low. It makes us independent of the vagaries of the opinions of the really rich. As Wikimedia becomes a truly global organisation, it should raise funds everywhere and report what WMF does locally. 

As we report on what we do locally, it follows that we have an interest for any locality. As local children do use Commons we ask people to upload pictures of a local policeman, firefighter, nurse, police car ambulance etc for them to use. As students read in their own language we easily offer e-books using the hub best suited for the purpose. When as a response we are asked to provide services, we prioritise the local service and we will internationalise and localise to get the most out of our investments.

As we become more global and diverse, the percentage of what the provision of our services will represent more and more the global distribution of people. It will grow our community, it will grow our audience and we will evolve away from an organisation managed from "the center of the world".

Plenty of challenges ahead but not so much the amount of money the highest earners in the WMF get paid. At that I do not give a fuck as long as the job gets done and, so should you.

Thanks,

        GerardM

Black representation matters, the Congressional Black Caucus

A friend asked me to help bolster the notability of black scientists. I was told of a "black caucus" with chairs and a list would help. I googled and found a black caucus with chairs and we did not know them at Wikidata. They were the chairs of the Congressional Black Caucus. Maybe not the caucus intended but of such a prominence that I added them all.

These are only the leaders and obviously over time the membership of the Congressional Black Caucus changed with the different elections. Someone else may add the data. 

The information I used could be found on English Wikipedia and is part of the article about the Congressional Black Caucus. Typically, when a position is considered important enough, it has its own article. When it does, it has more relevance and more information is available about the relevance and the history of such a position.

When Black representation matters, you want substantial lists and articles both on Wikidata and Wikipedia.

Thanks,

     GerardM

#Wikidata - Cyrus J. Colter and G. B. Lancaster - #diversity

Cyrus J. Colter was inducted on the Black Literary Hall Of Fame in 1999. He has a Wikipedia article in Japanese and his Wikidata item has been expanded with a link to Open Library and VIAF

According to a tweet, G. B. Lancaster was once one of New Zealand's most popular writers. When you google her, you find that G.B. Lancaster is a pseudonym for Edith Joan Lyttleton. For Mrs Lyttleton there is now a link to Open Library as well.

From a diversity point of view, both Mr Colter and Mrs Lyttleton represent minorities. Giving attention to either increases the diversity of Wikidata. Linking both authors to the Open Library has the most inclusive effect. There is now a bigger public for the books they have written.
Thanks,
      GerardM

#Wikimedia - Women in blue

Dear Rosie, I saw your presentation. You want women in blue. In it you mention 300 lists of women. That is a lot of lists. In the mean time the biggest list of women with no article in a Wikipedia can be found on Wikidata.

There has been research in suggesting subjects to people and it works. Leila Zia, one of the WMF researchers wrote about a project they did. So the mechanism is there and you know, Wikidata has oodles of women with no article in "your" Wikipedia that have enough relevance given.

So how about a generator for ideas for articles to write? Leila knows many algorithms and Wikidata knows about many if not most of the women that are on your lists.. Come to think of it, why not add all the lists in Wikidata in the first place?
Thanks,
       GerardM

#Wikimedia - Funding #Wikieducation is problematic

How can you not love WikiEducation.. It has a great reputation bringing the editing of Wikipedia to curricula. When you check out their Twitter account, their blog, their results they do an awesome job.

You can once you realise it is instrumental in maintaining the existing bias that favours English and English Wikipedia. Realistically you cannot even blame them for it because they define their operations as limited to the USA and Canada.

Still there are problems.
* People assume that the example of using university students to write articles is to be followed. For most of the Wikipedias there is too little content. The type of articles is not what is needed, more basic articles are needed.
* The Wikimedia Foundation has a huge bias for the English Wikipedia and consequently the 70% of the word population who do not speak English are underserved and less than 50% of the traffic of the WMF is English Wikipedia.

The solution is not to defund Wiki Education. A solution will only come once the WMF acknowledges that they have a diversity problem, a problem they do not acknowledge.
Thanks,
      GerardM

PS Does Wiki Education support French?

#Wikidata - Premio Almirante Álvaro Alberto

The Premio Almirante Álvaro Alberto is named after admiral Álvaro Alberto da Mota e Silva. They are both notable for their own reasons.

The award was mentioned in an article on the German Wikipedia for César Camacho. The award was not known to Wikidata and was added. The website of the conferring organisation gives me the impression that it is the "National Council for Scientific and Technological Development" and part of the Brazilian ministry of sciences. When you look for it in Wikidata, it is embarrassing.

The admiral is probably a child of his time. He was military and also a very relevant scientist. As a military man he held the rank of vice admiral and as a scientist he was twice the president of the academy of scientists. He was also very much involved in the Brazilian nuclear program.

When you consider the notability of Brazil, it is astounding how little is known in Wikidata. Many politicians have been added for Brazil; national senators and deputies. 

Brazil is one of the top twenty countries in the world I think, when you consider any and all of the "lesser" countries it is obvious that we know even less. When Wikipedia and by inference Wikidata is about the sum of all knowledge, there is a lot of white space where all our tools have no impact.
Thanks,
     GerardM

#Wikidata - #diversity of #science - Professor Govind Swarup

Professor Swarup received the TWAS prize. The TWAS Prize is an annual award instituted in 1985 by The World Academy of Sciences to recognise excellence in scientific research in the global South. It follows that when attention is given to scientists like Mr Swarup, it should be easy to link to other scientists, particularly those from the global south.

With twenty two awards Mr Swarup does not disappoint. Many of the awards are from India; one of the conferring organisations, the Indian Science Congress Association, lists 41 awards. Its rule that a scientist can now receive only one award in his lifetime indicates how many scientists are recognised by the ISCA.

Making the TWAS prize winners more complete by adding the awards helps to improve the diversity of scientists. It is not only women who have not been fully recognised it is also the scientists from the global south.
Thanks,
      GerardM

#Wikidata user story - #Wikipedia #diversity and diversity #research

Diversity, especially the "gender gap" is one of the best researched subjects of Wikipedia. There are many projects that have it as their goal to diminish the gap they object to.

Wikidata has the best and most up to date information about any Wikipedia. People are updating Wikidata all the time, typically its information is based on a Wikipedia.

Take gender; many a Wikipedia has a category for this so it is easy to update Wikidata based on what is in such categories. When a researcher is interested in the articles where Wikidata does not have such information, articles will be found and it is appreciated when Wikidata is updated by them as part of these activities. As a rule, the percentage of "humans" with no known gender is dropping anyway.

When a Wikipedia editor has an interest in female scientists that do not have an article in English, it is easy enough to have a query for that. Not all female scientists with or without a Wikipedia article can be found this way but it is just a matter of adding them in Wikidata. When another editor is interested in female scientists with no article in German of Kannada, it is just one change in the same query.
Thanks,
        GerardM

#Wikidata - Black Art

Charles Alston is one of the artists who are of interest to the Black Lunch Table. Mr Alston died in 1977. One of his struggles was to have his art appreciated in the same way as any other art. It is why he refused to be exhibited in William E. Harmon Foundation shows, which featured all-black artists in their travelling exhibits. Alston and his friends thought the exhibits were curated for a white audience, a form of segregation which they protested. They did not want to be set aside but exhibited on the same level as art peers of every skin color.

Today is 2017 and the BLT addresses this black experience and gains the same attention for black artists by writing in Wikipedia about them. It is why many artists with a black experience gain more information in Wikidata, artists like Mr Alston. The one thing where Wikidata differs from Wikipedia is that it is all about connections. The more a person is connected, the more relevant in different settings. Mr Alston had a notable spouse, he was a founder and member of an art group, he studied and worked. All these things are easy and obvious in Wikidata.

From an artists point of view, other things are of relevance too; what awards did he gain, what museums have work in their collection and where did he exhibit. There is yet no obvious way how to make such a claim. Like so many young men of his time, he was in the army in the 372nd Infantry Regiment but that is not quite what Mr Alston is about. This could be relevant for people who care about the military and also, the 372nd was a black experience as well.

Most articles on the English Wikipedia for a person have categories about education, work at a faculty. Adding the implied information for everyone is almost as easy as adding it for one person. It makes adding statements something of a black art, an art that looks complicated an art that connects everything.
Thanks,
      GerardM

#Wikidata - Historical amnesia

A discussion about contemporary politics is not based on facts, nor on the interpretation of facts it is much more based on identity and what group you belong to. It is important to politicians to frame their message and much of this framing is done through a selective use of facts and the presentation of opinion as facts.

The Wikimedia community is not about politics except where facts are concerned. Facts matter; for instance Mrs Clarissa Sligh cares about "historical amnesia", read her website and see what is meant. Mrs Sligh qualifies as far as I am concerned as a "Black Lunch Table" candidate. They are artists from the African diaspora and giving attention to them is a project that aims to lessen the diversity gap that exists.

In contemporary anti politics it is relevant that facts are available. All the Wikimedia projects are political in that they deny any singular political message their limited view on facts. It is important to overcome the bias of the demagogues and pundits and bring together information that paints a difference.
Thanks,
       GerardM

#Wikidata - Jamaica and William O'Brien, 2nd Earl of Inchiquin

William O'Brien, the second Earl of Inchiquin is an interesting person. When you consider what Wikidata knew about him, much of it is missing. No members of the Irish Privy council were known, and he was not noted as being a governor of Jamaica. It is not known that a ransom was paid by the English parliament to the Turks.

When you read the Wikipedia article, It is mentioned in one sentence that he was the first governor of Jamaica but that is all there is. There is not much more except that he died in Jamaica in 1692 and that he was Vice-Admiral of the Caribbean Seas.

When you consider the bias in all this, it is found in the lack of attention for countries like Jamaica. Their history is in the people who were responsible for what is their country. When you read about the family of the earl, you may note that he married women of substance and obviously they are notable enough for inclusion in Wikidata. What is not known is if his wife accompanied him to Jamaica..

Much of the source material on the history of countries like Jamaica can be found in British archives and museums. Improving on the articles on people like Mr O'Brien and sharing this information widely will make Wikipedia more useful outside of its immediate and current interest.
Thanks,
       GerardM

#Wikidata - Anne Ridley and #AcademiaNet

AcademiaNet is a database of excellent female scientists. It has identifiers for all of them and thanks to the excellent Mix'n'Match tool by Magnus many of these notable scientists are now part of Wikidata.

Anne Ridley is one of them. What AcademiaNet provides is much more information. It would be good when we confirm information using the AcademiaNet database and when they are so inclined, we could use their information to populate information about these notable women, making it even easier to write articles about them in Wikipedia.

Mrs Ridley is the first winner of the Hooke medal. She did receive additional awards..
Thanks,
     GerardM

#Wikipedia - Support understanding the #gender gap

#Wikidata needs to mature. #Wikipedia needs to mature. They both have wishes they aim to fulfil that escapes them. The gender gap is such an issue and it can be used to illustrate how both will mature when they cooperate.

When you want to know how many articles are expected to be written at a given point you need to analyse the red links. They indicate articles that are likely notable and indicate a structural need in Wikipedia. To do that you need data and you need a tool.

When links exist for every red link to an item in Wikidata, you have both the data and a tool. This will help Wikipedia with its disambiguation, and it will show up what a Wikipedia is missing. It is a tool that may drive people to write articles about the missing links.

All the red links will now link to Wikidata and articles in other Wikipedias. It also allows for people to add statements to Wikidata so that facts about those items are known. For instance that it is about a woman. When statements to awards, professions and events are known, there is added weight to write an article.

In this way two purposes are served; researchers have better tools that help them understand the gender gap and it will help people who care about he gender gap work on reducing that gap.

Technically it is not that complicated to achieve. If there is a problem with this proposal it may be that Wikipedians need to understand that this is not a power grab but a way to improve quality and efficiency of their project.
Thanks,
      GeratdM

#Diversity - A Woman's hall of Fame

Wikipedia has a category of some 40 Women's hall of Fame. They are women from the past and the present that are seen as exemplary. For all the women who have an English article there is now a statement indicating that they are seen as such.

For many women who are on these lists there is no article. Obviously when the objective is to have quality articles on notable women, it is good when there are lists with articles that could be written.

There are such lists and the best thing is they is some form of automated maintenance. The Women in Red project has such lists. Many of their lists find their basis in Wikidata and it is therefore possible to add people to their lists by adding key data.

All the women who have articles are now known as such, The next thing is to add the missing articles, the red links. So far I have added items for them one by one and stated what they are known for. Obviously this is a stub. More information is needed to state what they are known for, where they lived, why they are notable. It is not only how you enrich the data it is also how you increase diversity.
Thanks,
      GerardM

#Wikimedia - how to deal with #diversity

#Wikipedia has been analysed sufficiently that we know that in so many ways it is not diverse enough. Too few women, too few people of colour, too few people of other cultures and countries.

Such analysis are typically made for English Wikipedia only. The same analysis can be made for any other Wikipedia. Emily is an inspiration but the effect she has is mostly limited to English Wikipedia so we need more people to get involved and make a notable difference in the things that divide us.

Great science is repeatable and research on Wikipedia is done best on the data in Wikidata. Queries about the number of entries relevant to diversity are easily done. Restricting information to a particular Wikipedia is not a problem either. The benefit of using Wikidata is that you can determine what a Wikipedia does not know about but what we as a community find notable.

Research should serve a purpose. When notable people do not have an article, it should be easy and obvious how to determine this as a result. This list of female psychiatrists shows who does or does not have an article in the English Wikipedia. Write an article about one of them and next time you run the query there is one person less without an article. This query can be easily amended in any way you like.

Research serves its purpose when it identifies issues and provides pointers how to deal with it.
Thanks,
       GerardM

#Wikidata - #women in #psychiatry II

Paula Caplan - foto by Lesley Bohm

As diversity is important and as psychiatry has my focus, it is obvious what to do. I concentrate on Wikidata and among others I made several improvements to the item of Mrs Caplan. One thing was missing so I asked for a photo to be published under a free license.

Mrs Caplan was underwhelmed with Wikidata, yes I showed her "Reasonator" but the information is incomplete. She send me this photo and her resume and she informed me that the Wikipedia article about her is incorrect in places.

So the challenge is to improve her article, do justice to who she is and the relevance of her work in psychiatry. Evaluate it and seek a neutral point of view of what her science tells us in other articles as well.
Thanks,
       GerardM

#Wikidata - #women in #psychiatry

Women who make their mark in psychiatry are underreported. Currently Wikidata knows currently about 366 female psychiatrists. Many of them have been off the trodden path, many of them have expressed opinions that are very much in contrast with what is generally accepted at true.

I learned about one person, Mrs Paula Caplan because her books and publications were not accepted on a forum that is supposed to support people. Mrs Caplan is a decorated psychiatrist, a professor it is just that a corporate sponsor did not like what she had to say. One of the awards she received, the Christine Ladd-Franklin award she shared with another professor; Mrs Lisa Cosgrove. When you read her resume, it is not strange to find that she does not have a Wikipedia article. Her work addresses the problems and ethical dilemmas that arise in the mental health field (especially in psychiatry) when there are financial ties between the pharmaceutical industry and researchers or professional organizations.

One way to chip at the gender gap in our Wikimedia world is by adding info about all the remarkable women of psychiatry in Wikipedia or Wikidata. When you read about all the missing people, it becomes obvious how much work there is to do justice to them and to their work.
Thanks,
      GerardM

#Wikipedia - anti-psychiatry and Mrs Elizabeth Packard

The term "anti-psychiatry" is seen as derogatory. By being labeled as such, many arguments are dismissed. For this reason it is reasonable that the case of Mrs Packard is adorned with the template of "anti-psychiatry" after all she founded the Anti-Insane Asylum Society and wrote several books to make her case.

Mrs Packard was committed to an asylum because a husband could have his wife committed without either a public hearing or her consent. She disagreed with him about religion and the couple also disagreed on child rearing, family finances, and the issue of slavery. In 1863, in part due to pressure from her children who wished her released, the doctors declared that she was incurable and discharged her.

Mrs Packard wrote several books about and founded the "Anti-Insane Asylum Society". In 1867, the State of Illinois passed a "Bill for the Protection of Personal Liberty" which guaranteed all people accused of insanity, including wives, had the right to a public hearing. She also saw similar laws passed in three other states.

When this is what anti-psychiatry is about, I do question the use of  "anti-psychiatry" as something negative.
Thanks,
     GerardM

#Wikidata - Dorothea Dix

Mrs Dix is remembered on the "Great Americans Series". It is a series of stamps and it includes many women. They are definitive stamps meaning that they were part of the regular issue of a country's stamps, available for sale by the post office for an extended period of time and designed to serve the everyday postal needs of the country.

Arguably Mrs Dix is honoured in this way and recognising this in Wikidata is not obvious.

Mrs Dix is not called a psychiatrist. However her insight into the suffering of the "insane" and her work did contribute more to mental health than the many who used that title and only saw people and were of no real benefit to them.
Thanks,
       GerardM

#Wikidata - #diversity connecting relevant people

Mrs Nanette Gartrell is a great example when you want to explain about diversity. She is female, a psychiatrist and according to an old version of the DSM she is crazy ... nowadays, it is mostly accepted for people to be gay.

While enriching the information for Mrs Gartrell, much of the related information is not known in Wikidata. Mrs Garttrell won several awards, it makes sense to know the organisations that conferred them and other award winners are nice to have as well.

Mrs Garttell is especially relevant because of the research that she did. She researched the quality of the upbringing of children in a lesbian family. By and large they are happy families and kids grow up well. It is the kind of message that is important to hear.

As someone like Mrs Gartrell gets well linked in the fabric of Wikidata, chances are that she will be included in all kinds of queries. As she does, more people will learn of the current state of science and provide people with arguments to ponder.
Thanks,
     GerardM