Wikimedian of the Year

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wikimedian of the Year
Photo of Alaa Najjar in a striped shirt
2021 recipient Alaa Najjar
Awarded forMajor achievements within the Wikimedia movement
LocationTraditionally presented at Wikimania
Presented byJimmy Wales
Formerly calledWikipedian of the Year
First awardedAugust 2011; 10 years ago (2011-08)

The Wikimedian of the Year is an annual award that honors Wikipedia editors and other contributors to Wikimedia projects to highlight major achievements within the Wikimedia movement, established in August 2011 by Wikipedia's co-founder Jimmy Wales. Wales selects the recipients and honors them at Wikimania, an annual conference of the Wikimedia Foundation—except in 2020, when the recipient was announced at an online meeting as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic.[1] From 2011 to 2017, the award was named Wikipedian of the Year.[2]

In 2011, the first title was given to Rauan Kenzhekhanuly for his work on the Kazakh Wikipedia. The following year, it was awarded to an editor identified as "Demmy" for creating a bot to translate 15,000 short English articles into Yoruba, a language spoken in Nigeria. In 2013, Rémi Mathis of Wikimédia France and the French Wikipedia was named for his role in an article controversy. In 2014, the award was given posthumously to Ukrainian journalist Ihor Kostenko, who actively promoted the Ukrainian Wikipedia on social networking sites and was killed during a protest. Wales named an undisclosed recipient in 2015, and hopes someday to tell their story. In 2016 the first joint award was presented to Emily Temple-Wood and Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight for their efforts to combat harassment on Wikipedia and increase its coverage of women. Other recipients include Felix Nartey, Farhad Fatkullin, and Emna Mizouni.

In addition to the main award, Susanna Mkrtchyan and Satdeep Gill were the first to receive honorable mentions in 2015. Since then, seven honorable mentions have been conferred.

List of recipients[]

List of Wikimedian of the Year winners
Year Image Recipient Principal project Rationale Ref(s)
2011 A man with a dotted shirt and small hair and smiling. Rauan Kenzhekhanuly Kazakh Wikipedia Kenzhekhanuly recruited a stable community to improve the Kazakh Wikipedia, which in a year increased from 4 to over 200 active editors, and 7,000 to 130,000 articles. Wales was criticized by fellow Wikipedians because of Kenzhekhanuly's ties to the government of Kazakhstan. Wales stated on Reddit in 2015 that he'd been unaware of Kenzhekhanuly's prior positions in the Kazakh government and said that if he had known Kenzhekhanuly was going to go on to become deputy governor of a Kazakh region, he would have "refused to give that award".[3] [2]
[4]
2012
—
 "Demmy" Yoruba Wikipedia "Demmy" created a bot to translate 15,000 short English articles into Yoruba, a language spoken in Nigeria. [2]
2013 A man with short hair in a black coat wearing glasses. Rémi Mathis French Wikipedia Mathis, a chairman of Wikimédia France and the French Wikipedia administrator, who received the honor for his role in the controversy surrounding the French article "Pierre-sur-Haute military radio station". [5]
[6]
2014 A man wearing an orange with blue stripes jersey. Ihor Kostenko Ukrainian Wikipedia Kostenko, a Euromaidan activist, was an editor on the Ukrainian Wikipedia and actively promoted it on social networking sites. He was killed during a protest on February 20, 2014, and received the award posthumously. [7]
[8]
2015
—
 undisclosed Wales named an anonymous editor in pectore, and hopes someday to tell the reasons why without endangering the recipient. [9]
2016 A woman wearing aquamarine top and smiling. Emily Temple-Wood English Wikipedia The first joint recipients for their efforts to combat harassment on Wikipedia and increase its coverage of women. Temple-Wood had created nearly 400 articles and improved hundreds more, many of which are about women scientists and LGBT and women's health. Stephenson-Goodknight had improved more than 3,000 articles, co-created a space to welcome new contributors to the site, and co-founded women's outreach projects, including the "WikiWomen's User Group", "WikiProject Women", and the "Women in Red" campaign. [10]

[11]

[12]

[13]

A woman wearing a black top and earring and smiling. Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight English Wikipedia
2017 A black man with short hair smiling. Felix Nartey English Wikipedia Nartey received the award for his addition of content about his home country, Ghana, and leading several initiatives to promote the importance of editing Wikipedia. In his dedication, Wales mentioned that Nartey played a leading role in the organization of the 2nd Wiki Indaba conference 2017 in Accra, and has been critical in building up the local communities in Africa. [14]
2018 A man wearing a blue shirt and smiling. Farhad Fatkullin Tatar Wikipedia In 2009, Fatkullin joined the Wikimedia movement. He describes himself as being "in love with Tatar Wikipedia". From 2015, Fatkullin has been contributing to Wikipedia on dialects of Russia, including the Tatar language. [15]
2019 A woman with black and little orange medium hair in a dark blue and white top and smiling in front of a camera. Emna Mizouni Arabic Wikipedia In 2013, Mizouni with other people founded Carthagina. She began contributing to Wikimedia projects in 2013 with that year's Wiki Loves Monuments. She has helped to organize several major Wikimedia conferences, including the inaugural WikiArabia conference, and co-chaired Wikimania 2018's program committee. In 2016, she joined the Affiliations Committee and in 2018, she became vice-chairperson of it. [16]
2020 Wikimedia Summit 2019 - Portrait Sandister Tei (1).jpg Sandister Tei English Wikipedia Tei contributed actively to Wikipedia articles about the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact in Ghana. [1]
2021 WikiArabia '19 517 (cropped).jpg Alaa Najjar Arabic Wikipedia Najjar was honored at the Wikimania 2021 conference, which was held virtually, for his work on Arabic Wikipedia and on medical projects, especially the COVID-19 project. [17]

Honorable mentions[]

List of Wikimedian of the Year honorable mentions
Year Image Recipient Principal project Rationale Ref(s)
2015 A woman with short hair wearing a black top with white drawings. Susanna Mkrtchyan Armenian Wikipedia Mkrtchyan, a member of the board of directors from Wikimedia Armenia. She was awarded for her off-wiki activities including "One Armenian – One Article", an editing campaign and youth camp project to aid new editors of Armenia. [18]
A asian man with blue shirt with a small beard smiling Satdeep Gill Punjabi Wikipedia (Eastern) Gill is an Indian contributor on the Punjabi Wikipedia. He was awarded for encouraging people at his university to edit the Punjabi Wikipedia, making it the fastest-growing Indic-language Wikipedia that year. [9]
2016 A man with a sweater looking in front of camera. Mardetanha Persian Wikipedia Mardetanha created the Persian-language version of the "Wikipedia Library", which helps editors to find sources for articles. Three publishers have donated the research access to their works to editors. [19]
A woman wearing necklace with glasses and smiling. Vassia Atanassova Bulgarian Wikipedia Atanassova established the "#100wikidays" contest, which challenges editors to create one Wikipedia article per day for one hundred days. Over 120 contributors joined the contest and third of the editors have completed it.
2017
—
 Diego Gómez
—
 Colombian student who was prosecuted for copyright violation after having shared an academic paper online. He was later acquitted. [20]
[21]
2018 A asian man wearing glasses looking in front of camera. Nahid Sultan Bangla Wikipedia Sultan is an active member of Wikimedia Bangladesh. [22]
[23]
A woman wearing a white sweatshirt, glasses and smiling. Jess Wade English Wikipedia Wade is a physicist who began a year-long effort to create Wikipedia articles about scientists and engineers which "better represent women and people of colour". As of February 2020, she had written over 900 new articles. [24]
[25]
[26]
2021 Netha Hussain-925.jpg Netha Hussain English Wikipedia and Malayalam Wikipedia Netha is a medical practitioner originally from India. She has provided invaluable contributions to medical content on Wikimedia projects, focusing much of her effort during 2020-21 on the coverage of COVID-19. She also started the Vaccine Safety Project to address misinformation surrounding COVID-19 vaccines. [27]
Carmen Alcázar - 2.jpg Carmen Alcázar Spanish Wikipedia Alcázar was recognized for her work to reduce the gender gap on Spanish Wikipedia. [28]

Newcomer of the Year[]

List of Newcomer Wikimedian of the Year
Year Image Recipient Principal project Rationale Ref(s)
2021 Carma Citrawati.jpg Carma Citrawati WikiPustaka [29]

20th Year Honouree[]

List of 20th Year Honouree Wikimedian of the Year
Year Image Recipient Principal project Rationale Ref(s)
2021 Lodewijk WikiIndaba.jpg Lodewijk Gelauff Wiki Loves Monmuments Lodewijk is a prolific contributor, a mentor to many Wikimedians, and a volunteer for many community groups and efforts. He is one of the initiators of Wiki Loves Monuments, the annual Wikipedia photo contest around cultural heritage, and has led this project for a decade.[30] [31]

Tech Innovator winner[]

List of Tech Innovator Wikimedian of the Year
Year Image Recipient Principal project Rationale Ref(s)
2021 =User:Jayprakash12345 during Wikimania 2019. Jay Prakash IT and software development and support [32]

Rich Media winner[]

List of Rich Media Wikimedian of the Year
Year Image Recipient Principal project Rationale Ref(s)
2021 Ananya DSC 5339.jpg Ananya Mondal Wikimedia Commons [32][33]

See also[]

References[]

  1. ^ Jump up to: a b Quist, Ebenezer (October 16, 2020). "Ghanaian lady awarded by Wikipedia as its worldwide best worker for 2020". Yen.com.gh. Archived from the original on November 9, 2020. Retrieved November 9, 2020.
  2. ^ Jump up to: a b c Morris, Kevin (April 26, 2013). "Winners of Wikipedia's biggest award still haven't received prize money". The Daily Dot. Archived from the original on May 18, 2020. Retrieved June 24, 2016.
  3. ^ Michel, Casey G. (April 2, 2015). "Wikipedia Founder Distances Himself from Kazakhstan PR Machine". EURASIANET.org. Retrieved September 6, 2020.
  4. ^ Orlowski, Andrew (December 22, 2014). "What's Jimmy Wales going to do with $500k from the UAE?". The Register. Archived from the original on June 3, 2016. Retrieved June 24, 2016.
  5. ^ "Rémi Mathis". École nationale des chartes (in French). December 19, 2016. Archived from the original on June 29, 2020. Retrieved June 29, 2020.
  6. ^ Geuss, Megan (April 6, 2013). "Wikipedia editor allegedly forced by French intelligence to delete "classified" entry". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on April 8, 2013. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  7. ^ "Ukraine Today: Ihor Kostenko given posthumous annual award (VIDEO)". Kyiv Post. September 14, 2014. Archived from the original on May 18, 2020. Retrieved June 24, 2016.
  8. ^ Savchuk, Iryna (August 15, 2014). "Ukrainian from the Heavenly Hundred becomes Wikipedian of the Year". Kyiv Post. Archived from the original on May 18, 2020. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  9. ^ Jump up to: a b Sutherland, Joe (July 31, 2015). "2015 Wikipedians of the Year unveiled in Mexico". Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on June 23, 2016. Retrieved June 24, 2016.
  10. ^ "Emily Temple-Wood macht Wikipedia weiblicher". Geo (in German). Archived from the original on May 28, 2020. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  11. ^ Gordon, Maggie (November 9, 2017). "Wikipedia editing marathons add women's voices to online resource". Houston Chronicle. Archived from the original on August 16, 2018. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  12. ^ D’Alterio, Emily (March 12, 2019). "Women in culture and tech: Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight, academic, Wikipedian and champion of 'impractical' girls". Europeana Pro. Archived from the original on May 28, 2020. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  13. ^ Zahneis, Megan (July 19, 2018). "Some Colleges Cautiously Embrace Wikipedia". Chronicle. Archived from the original on May 28, 2020. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  14. ^ Ofori-Boateng, Pamela (August 29, 2017). "Felix Nartey named Wikimedian of the Year 2017!". Classic Ghana. Archived from the original on December 20, 2017. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  15. ^ "Татарстанец Фархад Фаткуллин стал". Tatar-inform (in Russian). Archived from the original on June 29, 2020. Retrieved June 7, 2020.
  16. ^ Nadiya, Jennene (October 17, 2019). "Emna Mizouni, première femme arabe à obtenir le prix "Wikimédienne de l'année"". Tunisie Haut Debit (in French). Archived from the original on May 28, 2020. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  17. ^ "Arab medical professional Alaa Najjar honoured by Wikipedia for Covid-19 coverage". The National. Retrieved August 17, 2021.
  18. ^ "Վիքիպեդիայի հիմնադրի անակնկալը Սուսաննա Մկրտչյանին". MediaMax (in Armenian). July 29, 2015. Archived from the original on May 28, 2020. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  19. ^ Erhart, Ed (June 24, 2016). "Jimmy Wales names Emily Temple-Wood and Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight as Wikipedians of the Year". Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on July 3, 2016. Retrieved June 24, 2016.
  20. ^ Harmon, Elliot (December 21, 2017). "Diego Gómez Is Safe, but Threats to Curiosity Still Abound". Electronic Frontier Foundation. Archived from the original on June 29, 2020. Retrieved June 7, 2020.
  21. ^ Wikimania 2017 Closing Ceremony. Wikimedia Foundation. Event occurs at 17:30. Archived from the original on June 29, 2020. Retrieved June 7, 2020 – via YouTube.
  22. ^ Koebler, Jason (April 27, 2016). "Wikipedia's Piracy Police Are Ruining the Developing World's Internet Experience". Vice. Archived from the original on June 29, 2020. Retrieved June 7, 2020.
  23. ^ Elsharbaty, Samir (July 26, 2018). "Farhad Fatkullin named Wikimedian of the Year for 2018". Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on June 29, 2020. Retrieved June 7, 2020.
  24. ^ "Una scienziata al giorno". PressReader. August 12, 2018. Archived from the original on June 29, 2020. Retrieved June 29, 2020.
  25. ^ Evans, Jocelyn (February 11, 2020). "Physicist writes 900 Wikipedia entries to boost diversity in science". ITV News. Archived from the original on May 27, 2020. Retrieved May 27, 2020.
  26. ^ Devlin, Hannah (July 24, 2018). "Academic writes 270 Wikipedia pages in a year to get female scientists noticed". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Archived from the original on June 29, 2020. Retrieved June 7, 2020.
  27. ^ Foundation, Wikimedia (August 15, 2021). "Meet Netha Hussain: Wikimedian of the Year 2021 Honourable Mention winner". Diff. Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  28. ^ Foundation, Wikimedia (August 15, 2021). "Meet Carmen Alcázar: Wikimedian of the Year 2021 Honourable Mention winner". Diff. Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  29. ^ Riquelme, Rodrigo. "Carmen Alcázar y la Editatona ganan mención honorífica en los premios al Wikimedista 2021". El Economista. Retrieved August 17, 2021.
  30. ^ Meet the 2021 Wikimedians of the year
  31. ^ Interview with Lodewijk Gelauff
  32. ^ Jump up to: a b Sharma, Unnati (August 17, 2021). "3 Indians win Wikimedia awards for helping provide free, accessible knowledge on the internet". ThePrint. Retrieved August 17, 2021.
  33. ^ "Meet Ananya Mondal: Wikimedian of the Year 2021 Rich Media winner". diff.wikimedia.org. Retrieved August 18, 2021.

External links[]

Retrieved from ""