Meet the Wikimedians of the Year 2024

The Wikimedia movement would not be possible without the unique, diverse community of Wikimedians, united by a love of knowledge sharing.

Each year the Wikimedian of the Year awards, presented by Wikipedia Founder Jimmy Wales, honor outstanding contributions to our mission. We celebrate the individuals whose talent, commitment, and hard work to the Wikimedia mission are exceptional. These contributors make Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects possible. Through a wide range of categories, we celebrate the enthusiastic newcomers and the seasoned longtimers. We honor those who excel in technical roles and those who enrich our projects through diverse media. We celebrate the entire spectrum of contributions: From those who expand our reach and create beloved content, to the unsung heroes who power our infrastructure and support the communities as functionaries, with these awards we recognize the invaluable work of every Wikimedian.

Without further ado, we present the 2024 Wikimedian of the Year winners:

The Wikimedian of the Year: Clovermoss

Meet the youngest Wikimedian of The Year in history! Hannah Clover, also known as Clovermoss, is 21- born one year after Wikipedia itself. Despite her young age, Clover  is already a seasoned English Wikipedia contributor with over 24,000 edits, and administrator rights. Her work embodies some of the most inspiring qualities in our movement: a sense of belonging and the joy of contributing to free knowledge. Through the “Editor reflections” project, Clovermoss gathered more than 200 stories and experiences of English Wikipedia editors. She is a strong advocate for mobile editing and supporting newcomers in the Wikimedia movement. For her, being a Wikipedia editor is not just about contributing to an online encyclopedia, it is about making a meaningful contribution to the world. Today, we celebrate her as our Wikimedian of the Year. 

Clovermoss’s Wikipedia journey began in 2018, shortly after her 16th birthday. As it often happens for Wikipedians, she started editing because there was a mistake, and she wanted to fix it. The simple act of fixing a typo in an article about the song she had been listening to that day started her Wikimedia journey and connected her to the global Wikimedia community. She instantly understood the world-changing power of knowledge sharing, saying in her own words: “What sixteen year old doesn’t want to make a difference in the world?”

She became an active Wikimedia editor, aiming to enhance content aligned with her own reader interests. Many of her edits are related to her home country, Canada, where she notices a quite surprising content gap. She also adds photos to Wikimedia Commons, but Wikipedia remains her favorite project. 

One of her most treasured wikimemories is the moment of pride and joy when she saw her first article featured on the main page of English Wikipedia in the Did You Know column. Not only was she proud of her own success, but she also cherished the community support that made it possible, especially the support coming from the editor who believed in the article enough to nominate it.

Clovermoss is a dedicated mentor to new editors. She curates a comprehensive resource center on her user talkpage, aptly named Newbie Central, where newcomers can find helpful information and ask questions. She welcomes messages and inquiries from anyone taking their first steps in the wiki world, especially those who might be feeling overwhelmed. Her main advice is to just embrace your own Wikipedia editing experience. “We all make mistakes, have our own struggles, and learn over time. No one’s path is the same and that’s okay. But if you’re persistent and willing to listen to feedback, you’ll do fine,” she says.

From her very first edit, she wanted to be part of the Wikipedia community. This sense of belonging continues to motivate her today. In 2023, she participated in WikiConference North America, where she met many other Wikimedians. Inspired by the interesting conversations with her peers, she started Editor reflections.

Clovermoss is a champion of keeping Wikipedia accessible – even in your pocket. With 75% of her edits done on a mobile device, she’s been a vocal advocate for improving the mobile editing experience. “We all accomplish incredible things on our smartphones –  just think of the mountains of text people write daily when conversing with friends!” –  Clovermoss believes unlocking this potential is crucial for Wikipedia’s future. Her reflections on mobile editing and tireless advocacy have been instrumental in helping the community understand how to leverage mobile technology effectively within the wiki world. 

As a Wikipedia administrator herself, she is worried about the unsustainable frequency of admin promotions. To combat this, Clovermoss would like to see more people becoming admins. While acknowledging the rising standards, she emphasizes the importance of a balanced approach, recognizing the value of diverse skill sets within the admin corps rather than solely pursuing the “perfect” candidate.

When she is not editing, Clovermoss enjoys knitting, a skill she discovered when she was just ten years old. She is happy to give knitted scarves to her friends. You can also find her spending a lot of time in nature: hiking, running, gardening, swimming, and climbing trees. As she says herself, “There’s nothing like an eight hour walk in the forest to bring you peace.” 

My main advice is to be kind. You never really know what someone else is going through, and I think assuming good faith is of utmost importance. Our community can never really thrive if we don’t aspire to make it a healthy place to contribute no matter who you are.

Wikimedia Laureate: DerHexer

Martin, known as DerHexer in the Wikimedia Movement, is the longest serving Wikimedia Steward, supporting global communities in this role since 2007. He is our Wikimedia Laureate for 2024. 

He is a longtime Wikimedian, present in our movement since 2005. Martin has been a champion to the movement in many ways: He’s an author of Good and Featured articles; administrator of the German and English Wikipedia, as well as Meta-Wiki; photographer of hundreds of award-winning images used in Wikipedia;an administrator of the media archive Wikimedia Commons; organizer of various events (Wikipedia academies, photo shoots in parliaments, etc.); and much more. He has played a crucial role in implementing one of the most important technical changes in the Wikimedia world: Single User Login, which helps users to contribute more easily to multiple Wikimedia projects. His greatest accomplishment? Martin is most known and celebrated for being the longest serving Wikimedia steward, serving in this role continuously for almost 17 years. 

Stewards are the unsung heroes working tirelessly behind the scenes of the Wikimedia projects. They are a group of globally elected users from various backgrounds, holding global technical rights that allow them to support communities across Wikimedia platforms and work towards the liability and safety of our projects. As DerHexer himself describes, “As Wikimedia Stewards, we are usually staying in the background, doing all that tricky work other users usually don’t want to do, just on a global scale. We implement consensus and support smaller projects in particular to be free of spam and vandalism, but we also deal with some of the heaviest activities others likely prefer not to know nor worry about (password hacks, violations of personality or copyrights, abusive texts and images, and so on).” 

DerHexer enjoys this type of work, as it allows him to explore and improve processes while also helping other Wikimedians shine, as he himself says: “I understand my main contribution as taking the load off others so that they can contribute in their places much better than I could there”. He is also a tireless promoter of the work of the stewards, and a social person. DerHexer helped to create a user group for Wikimedia Stewards and has represented it at Wikimedia gatherings.

He notices that a lot has changed since he started his Steward work 17 years ago: the workflows have become more global, more tools have emerged, and there is a growing attention and support from the Wikimedia Foundation. But he is also aware that with the growing popularity of Wikipedia, there is much more work to do when it comes to keeping content free of vandalism and users safe. Stewards’ work is more important than ever before, and there is a need for a much larger and diverse group of active stewards to tackle global challenges and a need for coordination and support. The global meeting of Wikimedia Stewards in 2015 is one of his most treasured Wikimedia memories, and he hopes that the 10th anniversary of this meeting will bring its second edition, which would help with all the global challenges. 

DerHexer sees the movement as a social and special place, saying: “I love to guide Wikimedians through my home city Berlin, where most of them likely know me from. I love to meet people and learn about their start, motivation and challenges. And obviously, I love when we come together in person to share knowledge and work on making things better.”

We are more than just an encyclopedia, more than just written text. We are human beings with all pro’s and con’s, but if we only want it, we can be helpful in so many roles and functions within the Wikiverse, often working hard in the background without immediate visibility. But we need media to visualize knowledge, people interested in clean-up and maintenance work to keep information updated and information verifiable, a sense for assisting and protecting a huge global community with its needs, tech experts and designers to let our projects shine, and we need to create spaces where people can invent and motivate so that we can advance. Every single good contribution furthers our projects, and that’s what we as a community and the world will be thankful for.

Media Contributor of the Year: Caner

Our Media Contributor of the year 2024 is Caner Özyayıkçı, also known as user Kurmanbek. Kurmanbek is a young Wikimedian from Turkey, an editor of Turkish Wikipedia, and an interface admin in this project. He is a member of many Wikimedia user groups, including Wikimedia Community User Group Turkey (WMTR), Wikimedians of Turkic Languages ​​User Group, and the CEE Hub Youth Group. But most of all, he is a brilliant graphic designer, using his talent and imagination to create visual assets for community campaigns, events, and conferences around the world. Through them, he not only promotes the projects, but he also translates the spirit and the culture of each community into his designs, and through that, brings more understanding and connections between cultures. 

He brought to life the visual identity of Eesha, the mascot for the Wiki Women Camp 2023, and created the visual identities of numerous Movement conferences, including Turkic Wikimedia Conference, CEE Meeting 2023 and 2024, Heritage Guard Network and Wikimedia Japan-Türkiye Friendship. 

In his work, talent and imagination combine and synergize with historical knowledge and cultural awareness. For example, the brand identity of Turkic Wikimedia Conference is inspired by the first alphabet of the Turkic people, Orkhon, and the traditional Iznik pottery. 

This design work goes beyond just promoting community projects and events, Kurmanbek explains, “Graphic design elements are the visual language communities use to connect with people and organizations. These elements go beyond aesthetics, conveying a community’s perspectives and aspirations through powerful visual messages. They can also foster a sense of belonging, as these graphics become unique identifiers, representing the shared identity of the community.”

Kurmanbek is also committed to building bridges across regions of the world. He is a co-creator of the Japan-Türkiye Friendship project, which unites Wikimedians separated by geography but brought together by their shared passion for knowledge. He also worked on creating the Wiki Student Clubs Türkiye structure, which brings together all Wiki student clubs in Türkiye. Naturally, Kurmanbek is also a contributor to Turkish Wikipedia. He likes creating and translating articles related to current events, countries, public transportation and restored historical buildings, as well as uploading pictures of Istanbul to Wikimedia Commons.

Like many Wikimedians, Kurmanbek is a passionate collector. Postage stamps, postcards, banknotes, coins, flags – anything that whispers a story finds a home in his collection. Each item becomes a gateway, meticulously studied and researched to unlock its cultural significance. This insatiable curiosity about the world fuels their love of travel and photography. Every new country brings the chance to engage with locals, to immerse themselves in the vibrant tapestry of cultures and lifestyles. And of course, the journey wouldn’t be complete without a soundtrack – a diverse playlist overflowing with new discoveries, some becoming instant favorites on repeat.

People can know the Wikimedia movement as a movement where they can best transmit their language and cultural heritage to the future, as well as meet Wikimedians with whom they can work together for open knowledge according to their interests. It’s fun and motivating to work with users from around the world who share the same interests!

Newcomers of the year: the Wayuu community

This year, we celebrate a community of newcomers to the Wikimedia movement, the vibrant Wayuu Indigenous community, and the launch of their Wikipedia in Wayuunaiki. Last year marks the end of their journey from an incubator project to a fully-fledged encyclopedia. Wayuunaiki Wikipedia is now a platform for preserving and sharing Wayuu knowledge. This invaluable resource connects generations, empowering the community to tell their own stories and build a lasting legacy, and it is supported by the recognition of the Wikimedistas Wayuu User Group. Our newcomers are represented by Leonardi Fernández (user:Leonfd1992), who was one of the key people bringing this community to the Wikimedia projects and is an administrator of the newly created Wikipedia in Wayuunaiki. 

Wayuu people are an Indigenous community living on the Guajira Peninsula, in the northernmost part of eastern Colombia and north of western Venezuela. Their language is Wayuunaiki, spoken by around 400,000 people. And until recently, they did not have their own language edition of Wikipedia. 

Changing that was not an easy task: workshop participants needed to cross borders between countries and often lacked computer equipment or internet connection that would allow them to easily develop content. There was also a need to develop digital skills and bring more understanding of Wikipedia itself. This challenging work was successful thanks to the collaborative spirit among the Wayuu people and the engagement of some of the project leaders. 

Leonardi Fernández, a student of social and cultural anthropology at the university of Zulia, understands well the importance of the Indigenous communities being able to share their own history in their language. Without this ability to self represent, Indigenous communities like Wayuu access knowledge not in their own, but in dominant languages, and they see knowledge about themselves told not with them but about them. For Leonardi, Wikimedia projects are a great platform, where encyclopedic knowledge can be shared by Wayuu themselves, in their own language. He has been a tireless advocate for projects in Wayuunaiki, conducted Wikimedia training for his community, found allies for this dream, and helped by translating large parts of Wikipedia interface. No wonder that his most joyful Wikimedia moment was when on 27 February 2023, a message informing about the creation of Wikipedia in Wayuunaiki landed on his Wikimedia discussion page. The project has now 576 Wikipedia articles, and this is just a beginning. 

Wikimedistas Wayuu strives to contribute and align with the vision of the Wikimedia Foundation, which states: “Imagine a world where every human being can freely share the sum of all knowledge.” In our case, we envision accessing our information in our own language and, at the same time, sharing it freely, without denial or difficulty in accessing it in any context.

Functionary of the Year: Vira Motorko

Through the newly created category of the Functionary of The Year, we proudly honor unsung heroes who tirelessly work behind the scenes to ensure the safety, smooth operation, and sustainability of Wikimedia projects. We are thrilled to present this inaugural award to Vira Motorko, also known as Ата, an administrator of Ukrainian Wikipedia. Ата is known for her constant work on the small tasks that often get unnoticed but are always needed: translating tech messages, documenting templates, improving interface messages, or formatting. She finds the tasks others may overlook and makes sure they are done and benefit the project. 

Ата’s Wikipedia journey began unexpectedly with an interest in illuminati. She was reading a Dan Brown book, and while checking different concepts online, discovered a disproportion of information between English and Ukrainian Wikipedia. She translated the missing information, and this became her first step into the wikiworld.

Since the beginning, the lack of readily available Ukrainian knowledge fuels her passion for the project. Struggling with untranslated Russian textbooks early in her university studies, she saw Wikipedia as a perfect way to actively support her native language in the digital environment. Through publishing articles in Ukrainian Wikipedia, she hopes to ease access to information for future generations, both for academics and casual readers.

Contributing to Wikimedia unlocks a deep sense of purpose for Ата “The Wikimedia Movement is useful to the world on so many levels, and this realization is my fuel,” she says. These improvements can typically be done immediately: whether it’s correcting a typo, improving an interface message, or documenting a template, Ата finds immediate opportunities to contribute and enhance the platform. And when the full scale Russian invasion of Ukraine happened in 2022, editing Wikipedia projects became a safe haven, a familiar activity Ата could cling onto. 

Her favorite Wikimedia memory is related to John A. Agnew, a prominent figure in the field of geography. Ата, at the time a geography student, wrote an article about him in the Ukrainian Wikipedia, and contacted John Agnew with a request for a picture that could accompany the biography. Thanks to that interaction, a photo of John Agnew was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons. “I sometimes think about this anecdote as an essence of the digital time: not only is a prominent professor available for chat to a foreign student, but a Wikipedian can arrange something new to be published on the other side of the globe. Fascinating!” she says. 

Wikipedia content is something she enjoys: whether it is a list of food preparation utensils or the John William Godward – Dolce Far Niente picture found on Commons. And when she is not on the wiki, she likes to read books, rewatch comfortable anime-series, play pub quizzes with friends, and follow her favorite vloggers: the Green brothers. 

We do what we can. There are different amounts of resources available to different language communities, sometimes they are not enough. In order to organize something our contributors have to stop doing the thing itself and switch to organizing it, sometimes we don’t have enough people for both. Information coverage about equally important things can be unequal in depth, sometimes the world is unjust like that. We do what we can. And we continue doing it.

Honorable mention: Gu Eun-ae

Through the honorable mention award, we have celebrated Wikimedia affiliate staff members who go above and beyond in their roles. This year, we honor another exceptional person from the affiliates: Ms. Gu Eun-ae, who you may also know from her username Motoko C. K. is a Director of Wikimedia Korea, an organization she also helped to build. Wikimedia Korea has done outstanding work to promote diversity among Wikimedia users, working with young generations of contributors, and filling knowledge gaps in important topics. 

Wikipedia came to Ms. Gu’s life by accident: it was 2007, and while looking for information on the internet, she stumbled upon Korean Wikipedia. When she saw a typo in an article, led by an instinct well known to all Wikipedia contributors, she decided to fix it. This brought her to click the “Edit button” for the first time. She realized that this button not only allows her to improve and contribute to the work of others, but also brings her a lot of joy. Ms. Gu became more and more involved in Wikipedia, and eventually – in building Wikimedia Korea. She still treasures the moment her organization was approved as a Wikimedia chapter, and the moment of joined community celebration of that achievement. 

Wikimedia Korea is a star organization working with young editors, supporting diversity, and enriching Wikimedia content, on topics that really matter. One of the projects that Ms. Gu takes the most pride in is a project focused on improving content about AIDS/HIV in Korean Wikipedia. There are still a lot of knowledge gaps surrounding this project, and she is happy that through this work, neutral and verifiable knowledge about the disease, treatment, and preventive measures was brought to the readers of Korean Wikipedia. 

As an editor, she made sure that the poetry of Jeong Cheol, a Korean politician and poet she values, are present on the Korean Wikisource. 

When Ms. Gu is not busy with Wikimedia, she enjoys traveling and documenting her travels by taking pictures with her mirrorless camera and instant camera, and then sharing the visual memories with her friends and family. But her favorite hobby is learning foreign languages, which are for her bridges to other viewpoints and people. 

Wikimedia projects are open to anyone from all over the world. We need to admit that we can sometimes be wrong, and make a mistake on the projects, therefore we always have to be ready to listen to other user’s opinions and consider not short-sighted results but common long-term goals. 

Tech Contributor of the Year: Siddharth VP

Siddharth VP is a prolific contributor to MediaWiki core infrastructure. He is deeply valued by the community for his work on scripts, bots and gadgets, and appreciated for his contribution around Gadget and Echo extensions. Siddharth has been in the Wikimedia movement for a decade, and today we celebrate him as the 2024 Tech Contributor of the Year. 

While his Wikimedia journey started in 2014, he became more active in technical spaces in 2018. At that time, he started working on Twinkle, a widely used gadget, which helps in patrolling recent changes and new pages. Soon, he started writing user scripts and developing bots. And when he noticed that MediaWiki, a software used in Wikimedia projects, can also be made better, he started contributing to MediaWiki itself. Siddharth VP focused on the features that empower the community – primarily the Gadget extension. For him, the greatest value comes from features (like the API, Scribunto, and Gadgets) that enable the community to extend or build upon them, so that MediaWiki itself does not need to try handling every possible use case. 

Among his many achievements, the one that he is most proud of is the draft submission interface which has come to be the primary way for new users to submit new articles for consideration. Over 6000 drafts are submitted every month!

Siddharth is motivated by the impact even the smallest technical contributions have: even tiny ones can improve the experience of thousands of Wikipedia readers! The fact that he can learn along the way is another great motivation. 

He also appreciates the community side of things: “The MediaWiki community has always been very supportive. People are very keen on reviewing each other’s work and suggesting helpful improvements. When mistakes are made, everyone is focused only on fixing the issues caused and not on assigning blame.” This year, Siddharth participated in the 2024 Wikimedia Hackathon in Tallinn, where he could finally meet in person the people he has been collaborating with online for years. And this event became one of his favorite wikimemories. 

When asked what his advice is for technical contributors, Siddharth shares, “Go ahead and dabble in everything – whether it’s writing user scripts, automating tasks with bots, developing tools on Toolforge, or working on MediaWiki itself, there’s a whole toolbox waiting to be explored. Developing an all-round proficiency helps in identifying the most optimal intervention to solve a problem.”

When Siddharth is not busy with Wikimedia, he is a passionate chess player. 

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Congratulations to all of this year’s winners! Thanks for all you do!