I just tried to watch some presentation videos from Wikimania.
Some had very weak sound, some had no sound in the first minutes,
some only played the first minute and then stopped. I don't think
the Wikimania videos are unique in having such problems. Video is
new to Commons, and the expert contributors are more familiar with
still images.
How can we learn to make better videos? Are there some good
instructions? Perhaps a free instruction video (Wikibooks, but a
video instead of a book) on how to produce good videos is what we
need. In fact, the English Wikibooks has a title on "Video
Production", http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Video_Production but it
doesn't have a clear focus (pun not intended). It starts out with
discussing satellite TV and has long sections on file formats in
different operating systems.
There is a help page on Commons for converting video to the Ogg
Theora format, but that is only the last step in a long chain.
Given that video is new, how can we find and rate videos, nominate
"good/featured videos", and give advice on how to improve quality?
Is the Commons village pump enough for this? Commons has a
separate graphics village pump. Do we also need a separate video
village pump?
Current digital video cameras use hard disks or memory cards,
instead of tape cassettes. Many new models cost less than 300
euro (or dollars), some as little as 120 euro (memory card perhaps
not included). Some have a special "Youtube mode", and I guess
that kind of usage is what drives the price down. What models are
good, and what should one watch out for?
We can find free still photos on Flickr and copy them to Commons.
Is there somewhere we can find free videos and copy them? Yes, at
the Internet Archive. Somewhere else?
--
Lars Aronsson (lars(a)aronsson.se)
Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se
A few months ago I switched our TimedMediaHandler's config to support the
newer, more bandwidth-efficient VP9/Opus variant of WebM and to use these
preferably over the older VP8/Vorbis version when creating scaled,
playback-ready derivatives.
(This does not affect upload support -- you may continue to upload video
files in WebM VP9, WebM VP8, or Ogg Theora formats, with either Vorbis or
Opus audio.)
Conversions of existing files on Commons ran in the background for some
weeks, finishing in November. I'm now running a final pass for
high-resolution files and any files on other wikis that didn't get a
conversion yet, in preparation for removing the VP8 derivatives in the next
couple of weeks to free storage space.
This should have relatively little visible effect for users, unless someone
is relying on the particular derivative files with extensions like
".360p.webm"; the new versions are named like ".360p.vp9.webm".
Note that IE 11 users using the "WebM Media Foundation Components for IE
<https://www.webmproject.org/ie/>" will not be able to play back the new
VP9/Opus files natively, as this driver has never been updated for VP9 or
Opus. IE 11 users will receive low-resolution, slow JavaScript-based video
playback instead. If you find this is troublesome, the recommended solution
is to switch to any other browser.
Third-party MediaWiki + TimedMediaHandler users should be aware that the
defaults are changing, and in future the VP8-specific support and code
paths may be removed. TimedMediaHandler will probably change a lot in the
coming months with upcoming WebVTT subtitle format, a streamlined
videojs-based player, and hopefully more!
-- brion
Hello everyone,
We are proud to announce the launch of the 5th Wiki Loves Africa
photographic contest, on the 1st of February 2019.
This year, the theme of the contest will be PLAY.
The theme Play! encourages the submission of visual representations of
joyful and serious games, sport, and recreation in the form of board or
mental games, physical fun or contests, playful interactions, theatrical
and musical performances, etc. It is intentionally broad and open to
interpretation.*Play*is a range of voluntary, intrinsically motivated
activities done for recreational pleasure and enjoyment.
As with last year, there will be two separate prize categories for
photos and media that encompass:
As its name might make it obvious... this is about Africa. But diaspora
and interested people from everywhere around the world are welcome to
participate... as long as it is related to Africa :)
Compared to previous years, the contest will be shorter this year (one
month instead of two). But we expect no less success !
If you want to help (photo cleanup, relaying messages, translations
etc.), please contact us or simply jump in.
For your general interest, some stats may be found here :
https://tools.wmflabs.org/wikiloves/africa
There is a rather active Facebook page (for the public) and Facebook
group (for organizers) : https://www.facebook.com/wikilovesafrica/
Like us to follow the news.
The contest page is available here :
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Wiki_Loves_Africa_2019
Cheers
Florence
// sorry for cross-posting
The FileExporter will soon be released as a beta feature to all wikis. The
planned deployment date is January 16.
Some background: Files from local wikis should be transferred to Wikimedia
Commons if their license allows it. This way, they can be used by all
wikis. But if you wanted to import a local file to Commons in the past, you
couldn’t properly transfer its file and page history. It was a wish from a
survey of the German-speaking communities to find a solution to this
problem.
Now, the FileExporter makes it possible to import a file from a local wiki
to Wikimedia Commons, while keeping its history intact. A first version has
already been a beta feature on a few first wikis since June 2018. [1] Since
then, bugs were fixed and features were added.
If you’re interested in importing local files, please give the feature a
try. Even though it’s a beta feature, you can use it for real file
imports. Please
note that in order to get started, you need to
1.
activate the beta feature “FileExporter” on your wiki [2], and
2.
make sure your wiki has a proper configuration file. Configuration files
are maintained by each wiki's community. They define, among other
things, whether a file can be exported. Exports from wikis without a
configuration file are blocked. Find more more information in the
documentation. [3]
We’re looking forward to your feedback on the central feedback page! [4] A
big thanks to everyone who gave feedback so far.
If you wish to learn more about the project, have a look at the page of the
wish. [5]
For the Technical Wishes team,
Johanna
[1] deployment plan:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WMDE_Technical_Wishes/Move_files_to_Commons…
[2] go to Preferences > Beta features, e.g.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-betafeat…
[3] documentation on configuration files:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WMDE_Technical_Wishes/Move_files_to_Commons…
[4] central feedback page:
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help_talk:Extension:FileImporter
[5] project page:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WMDE_Technical_Wishes/Move_files_to_Commons
Johanna Strodt Project Manager Community Communications Technical Wishlist,
Wikimedia Deutschland
Greetings,
I am a freelance architect and quite a new Wikimedia Contributor. For the last months I'm working on a project, together with some other friends, that document all the forgoten, neglected buildings in the city of Tirana (Albania) through making the community contribute to the further development of it. You can learn more about the project by visiting https://preservingtirana.city/, which is build based on open source tools and hosted on GitHub: https://github.com/JoraKasapi/PreservingTirana. An important element of the documentation process of these old historical buildings are also the photos taken by myself and other contributors of the project.
We thought to use Wikimedia Commons to add all the photos of these old buildings of Tirana wich have a certain architectural and historic importance.
I have already added some of the photos in different subcategories, which you can find here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Old_historical_buildings_of_Tir…
I have used 'Old historical buildings of Tirana' as the main category where the photos are at the moment and different subcategories for each building. Each subcategory would have different photos of that certain building where everybody can add even more photos for this subcategory. The name of the buildings are not the official ones (simply because most of them don't have official names) .This is more or less the way we thought the categorisation and subcategorisation in Wikimedia Commons, would work for the project.
At this point we would really want your opinion if this is the right way to do it, or if it's alowed according to the way you generally proceed. I have this project particularly at heart so I would really appreciate your reply as soon as you read this email, without bothering to much of course.
Thank you in advance and kind regards!
Best,
Jora
======================================
Hi all, following up on last month's announcement... [0]
Multilingual file captions will be released this week, on either Wednesday,
9 November or Thursday, 10 November 2019. Captions are a feature to add
short, translatable descriptions to files. Here's some links you might want
to look follow before the release, if you haven't already:
* Read over the help page for using captions - I wrote the page on
mediawiki.org because captions are available for any MediaWiki user, feel
free to host/modify a copy of the page here on Commons. [1]
* Test out using captions on Beta Commons. [2]
* Leave feedback about the test on the captions test talk page, if you have
anything you'd like to say prior to release. [3]
Additionally, there will be an IRC office hour on Thursday, 10 January with
the Structured Data team to talk about file captions, as well as anything
else the community may be interested in. Date/time conversion, as well as a
link to join, are on Meta. [4]
Thanks for your time, I look forward to seeing those who can make it to the
IRC office hour on Thursday. I'll reply to this post once I confirm exactly
what day file captions will be released to Commons.
0.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commons:Village_pump&oldid=…
1. https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:File_captions
2. https://commons.wikimedia.beta.wmflabs.org/
3.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons_talk:Structured_data/Beta_captio…
4. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/IRC_office_hours#Upcoming_office_hours
--
Keegan Peterzell
Community Relations Specialist
Wikimedia Foundation
Love is an important subject for humanity and it is expressed in different
cultures and regions in different ways across the world through different
gestures, ceremonies, festivals and to document expression of this rich and
beautiful emotion, we need your help so we can share and spread the depth
of cultures that each region has, the best of how people of that region,
celebrate love.
Wiki Loves Love (WLL) is an international photography competition of
Wikimedia Commons with the subject love testimonials happening in the month
of February from 1th - 28th.
The primary goal of the competition is to document love testimonials
through human cultural diversity such as monuments, ceremonies, snapshot of
tender gesture, and miscellaneous objects used as symbol of love; to
illustrate articles in the worldwide free encyclopedia Wikipedia, and other
Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) projects.
The theme of 2019 WLL is Celebrations, Festivals, Ceremonies and rituals of
love.
Sign up your affiliate or individually at
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Wiki_Loves_Love_2019/Participants
.
To know more about the contest, check out our Commons Page
<https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Wiki_Loves_Love_2019>and FAQs
page <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Wiki_Loves_Love_2019/FAQ>.
There are several prizes to grab. Hope to see you spreading love this
February with Wiki Loves Love!
Imagine...The sum of all love!
Wiki Loves Love team
Rupika Sharma
Co-ordinator
Wiki Loves Love
*https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Wiki_Loves_Love_2019
<https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Wiki_Loves_Love_2019>*
*https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Wikilover90
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Wikilover90>*