THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: After the success of ‘Malayalam Loves Wikipedia’ movement last year, the Malayalam Wiki Community has launched its second edition. Through this movement, which is planned from February 15 to April 15, people can upload informative pictures of popular places, offices, prominent persons, politicians, cultural and social leaders, book covers etc.
Organised to improve the data base as well as to attract more Malayalam speaking people to Wikimedia movement, the ‘Malayalam Loves Wikipedia’ movement last year was a big hit. As many as 2,158 copyright-free pictures were added to Wikipedia commons last time. Wikimedia Commons is an online repository of free-use images, sound and other media files. A large number of non-wikimedians participated in the event last year.
New users, who want to upload informative pictures, can log on to the site and upload their photos. Not just copyright-free pictures, videos too can be uploaded either to Wikipedia commons or to Malayalam wikipedia. Individuals and media can make use of these images in the future.
Tinu Cherian, board member of Wikimedia India Chapter, said information would be more useful if a picture was uploaded along with it. “The first part of ‘Malayalam Loves Wikipedia’ movement witnessed good response. A large number of images on diverse topics was uploaded. Though not a regular contributor to Wikipedia Commons, I have uploaded around 100 images during the project,” said Tinu, who is an IT professional in Bangalore.
Malayalam wikimedians believe that the movement could create awareness about copyright-free images, Wikimedia Commons and will attract more Malayalam speaking people to the wikimedia movement. The picture must either be taken by the contributor or the owner of image must send mail confirming approval to the Wikimedia. The images can be uploaded to ‘commons.wikimedia.org’ or to ‘ml.wikipedia.org’.