Looking back at the Wiki-year 2022 in Czechia

Last year, we also came together to improve and further develop WMCZ activities and came up with several new things in addition to our traditional activities. Let’s take a look at how we managed to promote and develop free culture and support volunteering and the growth of the Czech community around Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects last year.

Last year we hit several milestones

The year 2022 had several highlights in the Czech Wikimedia world – the Czech Wikipedia celebrated 20 years and its first half a million articles, and Wikidata also celebrated its anniversary. We welcomed the new year with a public event celebrating our activities with an exhibition and a Poetry Slam for Wikipedia. For the first time, we held Wikipedia Human Rights Month in June, and started providing online Wikipedia-advisory on a weekly basis for anyone who wants to improve their Wikipedia writing and needs a helping hand.

Online and offline meetings and activities

It is not easy to choose the most important things from last year. We organized over 185 events – courses, seminars, workshops, editathons for almost 1500 participants. More than eight hundred volunteer photographers and editors participated in our editing and photography competitions. Women’s Month on Wikipedia, the Czech Wiki Photo contest for the best free photo, Describe a Monument, and the call for better coverage of Czechoslovak history Czechoslovakia 1948-89 are all classics that form the backbone of our activities for the community and the public. We also steadily organize a series of activities for seniors across the country, including free editing courses, activities for schools, and we have established a new Media Literacy Portal, which is mainly worked on by students or librarians.

Establishing strategic partnerships – museums, libraries and other institutions

Last year was also a year of partnerships for us – the number of strategic partnerships with various institutions reached 70. But it’s not about the numbers, for us it’s all about the people, relationships and opportunities that we can mutually gain from in successful collaborations. We value long-term partnerships – our long-standing cooperation with the National Library has borne fruit in the form of automatic updating of the Database of National Authorities to Wikidata, and our intensive cooperation with the Museum of East Bohemia in Hradec Králové has been spiced up with a new course Students Write Wikipedia at the University of Hradec Králové. Building partnerships is a long haul and we are happy to do it.

And now for something international

We co-organised the fourth European meeting of GLAM coordinators in Prague and presented the first international project we are launching in cooperation with ICOM at the CEE Meeting. Our members were one of the most successful organizers of last year’s Asian Wikipedia Month international competition.

As founding chapters, we have been at the forefront of the birth of two Wikimedia Hubs to foster thematic collaborations between Wikimedians in the region – the CEE Hub and the European Hub. At the European Parliament, we shed light on the place of Wikipedia-like projects in the fight against misinformation.

The team of employees is becoming bigger and more stable

All of the above was also achieved thanks to broadening and stabilization of the team – at the beginning of the year we renewed part of the team of educational programs. I am particularly pleased that we were able to find a new lead trainer. Pavel Bednařík has taken on the difficult role very well – among other things, he revived Wiki Meet-ups s in Olomouc and brought a new emphasis on film topics to Wikipedia. He and his other new colleague Jan Sýkora, coordinator of the senior program, organized a beautiful Senior WikiTown in Olomouc.

Another newcomer, Richard Sekerák, who has taken up the new position of Photographer Program Coordinator, has also had several successes – among other things, he prepared the Protected Areas micro-competition, which enriched Wikimedia Commons with beautiful photos of Czech nature, and organized the tenth Wikiexpedition, which was also attended by Austrian volunteers. The new Advocacy Coordinator Milan Holeček is helping us to promote free licenses. We are building on a stable management team and effective teamwork. It is a pleasure to be part of a team that works with such commitment.

Main thanks as always go to the volunteers

None of this would be possible without the volunteer support of our members and the active volunteer work of all the Wikipedians and Wikipedian photographers and all those who tirelessly contribute to all Wikimedia projects. I’m very pleased that of the people attracted to our activities last year more than half were newcomers and third women. and that our members have been successful in organizing Wikiclubs and Wikimeet-ups around the country. In addition, they host activities that allow sharing experiences and at the same time enrich Wikimedia projects such as the Czech-Slovak Hackathon.

Thank you to all of you who have helped to bring any activity to the world last year – to all the tutors, co-organisers, partners, donors, participants of our events and also to all of you who have kept your fingers crossed for us during the year or recommended Wikimedia Czech Republic activities to your friends. Together we can do more!

On behalf of the Wikimedia CZ team, Executive Director Klára Joklová