2025:Program/Building a Common Language for the Wikimedia Movement

Session title: Building a Common Language for the Wikimedia Movement

Session type: Panel

Track: Legal & Advocacy

Language: en

🎥 Session recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81EZ9ALM9Ng&list=PLhV3K_DS5YfJtMBKTkOdmzfP3ENS24BJ-&t=14849 🎥

This session will showcase our work on developing a shared vocabulary to ensure coherence in explaining the Wikimedia project model. Led by the Wikimedia Movement Advocacy Network, we aim to strengthen how we communicate Wikimedia’s value to policymakers, editors, and the public. We focus on terms used in policy discussions that help frame Wikimedia projects as digital public goods, emphasize their commons-based governance, and highlight their role in public digital infrastructure. The panel will feature members of the advocacy network, a representative from the Digital Public Goods Alliance, and a Latin American expert in commons governance. Together, they will explore how this framing can inform advocacy, policy, and community engagement. The recent recognition of Wikipedia as a digital public good adds momentum to this participatory conversation, which invites insights and reflections from across the Wikimedia Movement.

Description

As global discussions increasingly center on the importance of digital public goods, the Wikimedia Movement is uniquely positioned to contribute with its open, collaborative, and community-governed model. The recent recognition of Wikipedia as a Digital Public Good by the Digital Public Goods Alliance (DPGA) offers an opportunity to align our advocacy efforts with a broader international agenda focused on equity, sustainability, and access. At the same time, these concepts might not be clear to members of the Movement.

In this session, we aim to visualize the work of the Wikimedia Movement Advocacy Network in developing a shared language that ensures coherence and consistency in explaining the Wikimedia projects model. This language is designed to bridge audiences—decision-makers, editors, and members of the public—by clearly articulating the value and structure of Wikimedia projects. We consider it especially important to articulate the nature of Wikimedia projects as digital public goods, the significance of their governance as commons, and their role within public digital infrastructure. By strengthening how we talk about Wikimedia, we can better position the movement in policy conversations, funding discussions, and broader debates about the digital commons.

Aims and Objectives:

1. To share our work on developing a shared advocacy vocabulary that explains the Wikimedia model clearly and consistently.

2. To highlight how Wikimedia projects embody the characteristics of digital public goods and why this matters.

3. To explore the significance of commons-based governance in sustaining the Wikimedia ecosystem.

4. To connect Wikimedia’s mission to global efforts to build inclusive and equitable public digital infrastructure.

5. To create a space for reflection and exchange with movement participants and external partners on how to deepen and expand this advocacy work.

The session will begin with a moderated panel featuring a member of the Wikimedia Advocacy Network working group, presenting our process and key learnings; a representative from the DPGA, offering insight into how digital public goods are defined and why recognition matters; a Latin American scholar or practitioner with expertise in digital commons, bringing regional and conceptual perspectives. Following the panel, we will open the floor for dialogue with participants.

How does your session relate to the event theme, Wikimania@20 – Inclusivity. Impact. Sustainability?

Inclusivity:

Our session promotes inclusive advocacy by developing shared language that helps diverse communities explain the Wikimedia model in ways that resonate locally and globally. It centers voices from the Global South, especially Latin America.

Impact:

By framing Wikimedia as a digital public good, we strengthen its visibility and relevance in global policy discussions, opening space for greater institutional support and broader social impact.

Sustainability:

We highlight Wikimedia’s governance as a digital commons—community-driven, transparent, and participatory—as key to sustaining the movement long-term.

What is the experience level needed for the audience for your session?

Some experience will be needed

Resources

• https://wikimedia.eventyay.com/talk/media/wikimania2025/submissions/KJXEY9/resources/Building_a_common_language_-_Wik_5aTlf8e.docx

Speakers

• Catalina Frigerio Dattwyler

Lawyer specializing in technology, privacy, and regulation. She holds a Master's degree in Economic Analysis of Law (Erasmus Mundus Programme of the European Union) and an MPA in Digital Technology and Policy from University College London, in addition to a diploma in Intellectual Property (PUC). She has experience advising private and public, national and international entities on issues of personal data, intellectual property, cybersecurity, and artificial intelligence. As Director of Advocacy and Public Policy at Wikimedia Chile, she promotes the open platform model for knowledge generation to both decision-makers and the public.

• Bolaji Ayodeji

Bolaji is a Software Engineer and Developer Advocate. As DPG Evangelist & Technical Coordinator at the Digital Public Goods Alliance, he works to support the growth of open-source technologies and digital public goods for digital transformation and social impact. He has spent the past years working at the intersection of web engineering, data, developer relations, product/program/community management, technical writing, and teaching for various developer-tool startups and non-profit technology and education organisations.

• Alek Tarkowski

I am a cofounder and Director of Strategy at Open Future, a think tank for the digital commons, and a Board member at Wikimedia Europe. I have 20 years of experience with movement activism and advocacy work for openness and the digital commons. In the past, I have been involved in the Wikimedia Movement strategy process (Partnerships working group), co-chaired the Creative Commons network strategy process, sat on the Board of Creative Commons and co-founded Communia, the association for the digital public domain, and founded the Polish digital think tank Centrum Cyfrowe.

• Evelin Heidel

Program Director, Wikimedistas de Uruguay.