WikiMeetups/Bangalore/Bangalore45

Summary
Barry Newstead, Global Development Officer, Wikimedia Foundation and Hisham Mundol, Wikimedia Foundation India Programs are visiting Bangalore and wishes to interact with the Wiki Community members of Bangalore.

Date and Venue
Date: : Sunday, 29-Apr-2012 Time: 4:00 PM IST

Venue: The Centre for Internet and Society No. 194, 2nd 'C' Cross, 4th Main Domlur 2nd Stage Opposite to Domlur Club Bangalore 560 071 Karnataka

Intended Audience
Anyone interested in Wikipedia (user, contributor or curious about it). Wikipedians from any part of India or the world and anyone who is interested in Wikipedia! Meetup is open to members of all Wikimedia projects and Wikipedians from all languages. All are welcome, and we are especially interested in seeing newcomers to join the experienced Wikipedians/Wikimedians. If you are interested in coming, please add your name below.

Getting there

 * By Road:
 * From MG Road, Brigade Road, Central Business District, Vidhan Soudha — Come straight on Old Airport Road towards Domlur, and take a Left after Steves Gym / Paratha House. Go straight, and continue straight after the Domlur BDA Complex crossroads. Further, go straight, cross bridge over storm water drain, and take Left AFTER The Energy Research Institute [TERI]. You will see Domlur Club on the LEFT. Take a right onto the SECOND lane, opposite the gate of the Club. The CIS building has a white gate and is on the RIGHT-hand side, first gate.
 * From Hosur Road, Electronics City, Koramangala, Sarjapur, Bannerghatta — Take Inner Ring Road/Intermediate Ring Road towards the Domlur-Old Airport flyover. Proceed straight towards Indra Nagar by taking the flyover. Take a Left just AFTER the flyover, before the Pedestrian Foot Over Bridge [FOB]. Proceed forward and take the Third LEFT towards TERI. Take a Right before TERI and proceed as above.
 * From Old Airport, HAL, Marathalli, Varthur — Come on Old Airport-Varthur Road, cross Domlur flyover, take a Right AT the flyover proceed towards IndraNagar and proceed as per above to reach.
 * From Old Madras, Road, Indira Nagar, Ulsoor — Take 100feet Road [Under Metro] to Domlur flyover. Take a Right BEFORE the flyover, at the Pedestrian Foot Over Bridge [FOB]. Proceed forward and take the Third LEFT towards TERI. Take a Right before TERI and proceed as above.


 * By Bus:
 * From Kempegowda Bus Station [Majestic], KR Market, Shivaji Nagar, take a bus towards Old Airport, Domlur and get down at the Water Tank and Proceed as above.
 * From Banashankari, Central Silk Board — Take a bus towards Indiranagar/Domlur and get down at Doopanahalli 100 Feet Ring Road bus stop just after the flyover, and proceed as above.
 * From Hanumanthanagar, Srinagar, Girinagar and other parts of Southwest Bangalore - Catch a bus of the 201 series at Srinagar or Kamakhya and get down at Domlur Bus Stand, walk towards TERI (hardly 100 metres behind Domlur Bus Stand), and proceed as above.

Agenda

 * Meeting with Barry

Attended

 * 1) Barry Newstead
 * 2) Arkrishna
 * 3) Arunram
 * 4) Hisham
 * 5) Tejas
 * 6) Sohan
 * 7) Sbblr0803(Abhiram C)
 * 8) Omshivaprakash
 * 9) Pavithra (User:pavithrah)
 * 10) Santanoo (User: bhattacharjee.santanoo)
 * 11) Arjuna Rao
 * 12) Rsrikanth05
 * 13) Ratnakar (User:Ratnakar.kulkarni)

Signed Up
Add your name as " # " if you have an username or else add " # Name" or use the facebook event page. You may require to Create a username & confirm the email address to edit this page. If you don't wish to create a login but wants to add your name here, please let us know at arkrishna12px@undefinedwikimedia.in or tinucherian12px@undefinedwikimedia.in


 * 1) Omshivaprakash 09:53, 19 April 2012 (IST)
 * 2) Arkrishna 10:19, 19 April 2012 (IST)
 * 3) Tejas 13:10, 19 April 2012 (IST)
 * 4) Sohan 13.15, 19 April 2012 (IST)
 * 5) Hisham
 * 6) Sbblr0803(Abhiram C)
 * 7) M G Harish 21:03, 19 April 2012 (IST)
 * 8) Barry Newstead 21:07, 19 April 2012 (IST)
 * 9) Swarup Bose
 * 10) Arunram

Best wishes

 * 1) Best Wishes. Out of the town --naveenpf 14:49, 19 April 2012 (IST)

Announcements/Event Notices
Please list external links announcing the meet-up here.
 * Facebook Invite :

Twitter

 * Tweet with #WPMBL45 twitter hashtag http://twitter.com/#!/search/%23WPMBL45

Media coverage
Please list coverage of this event by media here.

Photos
Please upload to commons and add category Commons:Category:Bangalore Meetup 29 April 2012

Report
We had a very successful Bangalore Meetup 45 on 29th April (http://wiki.wikimedia.in/WikiMeetups/Bangalore/Bangalore45). Yes, it is the FORTY-FIFTH meetup in the city - which is quite extraordinary by any standards anywhere in the world!!!

As is unique and special about Bangalore meetups, we had participation from multiple communities - in this case Kannada, Telugu, English, Sanskrit and Tamil.

In total, we had 13 people attending, including Barry from WMF.

We wanted to share some tips on how we conducted the meet-up this time - which you might find useful as you conduct various meetups.

a) We invited folks one-on-one, in addition to the posts on the mailing lists.

b) At the start of the meet-up, after the introductions, we asked people why they have come to the meet-up - and aligned the meet up accordingly to address the question "What do you want to gain from today"

c) We made sure that EVERY single person talks. Near the 3/4 mark of the meetup,  we stopped everything and reached out to the quiet folks and got them to talk - and they had SO MUCH to say!!!  Don't let any one person or any one topic monopolise the discussion.

d) Discuss specific next steps. Folks get energised when you talk about specific next steps.  The ideas we got were so inspiring: wiki summer camps for students, Kannada GLAM, Telugu digital outreach model, Sanskrit education program!

e) Make it fun! We laughed throughout the meetup!!!

Coming now to the specific things we discussed, here’s a summary of the various discussions

a) Kannada Wikipedia spoke about the Translation Enhancement project - and the challenges they were facing getting new users. It was discussed on how we can try and use the Kannada wikipedia facebook group - which now has nearly 1800 followers - to see if we can attract new or retired users to Kannada Wikipedia project.  This will also require a basic FAQ to be updated for Kannada and maybe even an outreach presentation.

b) Another discussion was to explore GLAM or a school project in Kannada. It was also suggested that we can explore a Wikipedia summer camp - as so many students are now on summer holidays.  (This is an idea that will have relevance across the country and across communities.)

c) Wiktionary continues to have potential in Kannada - and indeed other languages - and we should explore ways of promoting participation. This is an area where we did not have any specific ideas and we welcome all community members who might have some insights to share them for us - and for other communities.  Wiktionary (and Wikisource) are great ways for folks to get introduced to our communities and projects (because they are relatively easy to contribute to.)

d) A school project was also discussed in Sanskrit - involving 11th-12th standard - and we should have some discussions around this. There are many students studying the subject in these years and we must try and explore how we can encourage them (and their teachers) to incorporate Sanskrit Wikipedia as part of their teaching programs.  It will help energise the Sanskrit community and projects - and will make Sanskrit learning so much more fun.  Wikisource was discussed as a high-potential project.  Nitika and Shiju from India Program will be in touch with the Sanskrit community to see how this can be done d) All of us discussed with the Telugu community members about their ambitions to get newbies into their community and the challenges they are facing and it was suggested that an exploration should be done if we can try a digital outreach pilot can be done for Telugu. The basic idea would be to have a notice on Telugu Wikipedia that progressively invited those interested in learning about Telugu to click through to pages which would have a basic outreach presentation as well as FAQs (all in Telugu) and encourage them to edit.

e) Shiju, Nitika & Noopur will be in touch with Kannada, Sanskrit and Telugu communities to help out on these initiatives.

The meeting concluded with a group picture - which is available at this link: Commons:File:WikiMediaBangaloreMonthlyMeetup45_2012April29.jpg

- ( Report by RadhaKrishna Arvapally)