2019:Libraries/Libraries in Wikidata tutorial

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Libraries/Libraries in Wikidata tutorial

Strickland · Friday 15:00 - 16:30

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Notes

• This session is a workshop and will take place from 15:00 to 16:30 on Day 1 (August 16) in Strickland (B315).
• If you are interested to attend please add yourself here.
• To view the overall program of the Libraries space, please visit 2019:Libraries/Program.

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Slides

The slidedeck for this tutorial is available on Commons.

Description

According to IFLA’s data, there are 2.5 million libraries in the world, including 350,000 with internet access (see https://librarymap.ifla.org/map). In Wikidata, however, we find few than 19,000 libraries (live count) and a distinct lack of coverage in some areas, particularly the global south (see map of libraries in Wikidata). Adding libraries to Wikidata and creating categories with structured data on Commons will establish a presence in the Wikimedia projects and could encourage contributions. Advocacy and outreach work that teaches librarians how to edit and update their library’s Wikidata item will also provide them with valuable data literacy skills.

This interactive library-focused tutorial will serve as an introduction to Wikidata, structured data and the potential for libraries to use linked open data. For attendees, this is an opportunity to learn how to edit, query and visualise Wikidata and use structured data on Commons.

Relationship to the theme

This session will address the conference theme — Wikimedia, Free Knowledge and the Sustainable Development Goals — in the following manner:

This session is well-aligned with Goal 17: Partnerships for the goals as the interconnected nature of linked open data can help us to share knowledge with libraries in less developed countries and provide them with data and content that can foster innovation.

Introducing librarians to Wikidata and supporting them to develop the necessary skills to find and reuse data will facilitate access to open data and content that might otherwise be unavailable in their library. Likewise, if libraries share content from their collections, there is the potential to diversify the knowledge available in the Wikimedia projects. This would address the specific target to ‘enhance… international cooperation on and access to science, technology and innovation and enhance knowledge sharing on mutually agreed terms, including through improved coordination among existing mechanisms…’.

Supporting libraries would also help to ‘strengthen efforts to protect and safeguard the world’s cultural…heritage’, which is a target of Goal 11: Sustainable cities and communities, and can provide access to the bibliographic information necessary to enhance scientific research, which is a target of Goal 9: Industry, innovation and infrastructure.

Session outcomes

At the end of the session, the following will have been achieved:

Attendees will gain the skills to edit Wikidata items about libraries and can help to keep the information up-to-date. They will also be able to teach others how to edit and, therefore, the session can build capacity for advocacy of Wikidata to libraries. It will also increase the number of editors who are actively working to improve the coverage of libraries in Wikidata.

Session leader(s)

• Simon Cobb (User:Sic19)

Session type

Each Space at Wikimania 2019 will have specific format requests. The program design prioritises submissions which are future-oriented and directly engage the audience. The format of this submission is a:

• Computer-based training
• Discussion-based training

Requirements

The session will work best with these conditions:

• Room:

Either a classroom or clustered layout as per https://venuesquare.com/classroom-training-room-layout-styles-setup/ would be fine.

• Audience:

15-20 (or more, if I have support to run the session). No prior knowledge or skills required.

• Recording:

It would be useful to record the instructional aspect of the session as online training materials.

• Time requested:

60-90 minutes

Interested attendees

• OlafJanssen (talk) 10:31, 6 August 2019 (UTC)