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
Hi all,
Voting is now open in the sixteenth annual Picture of the Year contest:
<https://w.wiki/5xRn> - please vote! The first round of voting will be
open for 2 weeks.
Any user with more than 75 edits before Jan. 1, 2022 is eligible to
vote; if you're not sure the voting tool will automatically check for you.
If you have any questions, please see the help page: <https://w.wiki/5xSZ>.
P.S. You may notice this is the 2021 edition, we fell behind on starting
the contest. We can always use more volunteers to help, please let us
know if you're interested in helping in the future.
Thanks,
-- POTY Committee
Hello Everyone,
I’m pleased to announce Wikiclubs pilots in India.
The WikiClubs pilot aims to enable the creation of WikiClubs at educational
institutions in India. The pilot project is a joint effort between IIIT
Hydrabad and Wikimedia foundation and will be led by IIIT Hyderabad and
supported by the Foundation. In the program, the participants will be
expected to start WikiClubs at their respective institutions, to contribute
to the growth and diversification of culture and heritage sources on
Wikisource and Wikimedia Commons in India, especially targeted around
Andhra Pradesh and Telangana states of India, for more details visit
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WikiClubs_pilot_in_India
Sincerely
Kasyap (he/him)
IndicWiki Project Team - IIIT-H
9014120442 , kasyap.krupal(a)research.iiit.ac.in
Greetings, Everyone!
The WMF Inuka team [1] would like to thank everyone who attended the
Wikistories office hours, provided feedback, and asked questions about our
exploration to incorporate the Wikistories workflow in Commons [2]. We
received valuable input from the office hours participants who attended the
different office hours, and we have summarized the discussions here:
https://etherpad.wikimedia.org/p/Wikistories_Office_hours_with_WikiCommons
Takeaways from the discussions
Most questions asked during office hours were aimed at understanding the
tool's features and its moderation in Commons. We answered the questions
based on our design thoughts; some other comments were insights for the
Inuka team into areas of consideration while working on the initiative to
optimize the tool's usage when it is developed.
Therefore, the above suggests curiosity from Commons contributors about the
Wikistories initiative. The Inuka team sees this as a sign to proceed to
the next step of this project unless the community collectively thinks
otherwise.
What next?
We are allowing other community members to read the office hours note, ask
follow-up questions or provide feedback about the initiative for the Inuka
team’s awareness and engagement as we proceed on this project. The Inuka
team will post periodic updates to help the WikiCommons community stay
aware and involved during the project phases.
Best regards
Uzoma Ozurumba
On behalf of the WMF Inuka team
[1] https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Inuka_team
[2] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Wikistories_on_Commons