Wikipedia Town in Japan Heritage”Kitagi Island”

“Wikipedia Town” is a workshop in Japan that involves walking, researching, and writing on Wikipedia. On March 1st and 2nd, 2025, Wikipedia Town in Japan Heritage “Kitagi Island” was held on Kitagi Island in Japan.

Background of the event

The first Kitagishima Open Datathon was held on the island exactly 10 years ago, on January 11th and 12th, 2015. This event marks the second time it has been held.

2015 was the year when Wikipedia Town workshops were first held in Japan, and this event also marked the 10th anniversary of Wikipedia Town. Ten years ago, several members of the Open Data Kyoto Practice Group visited Kitagi Island, and this time I also participated as a member of the Open Data Kyoto Practice Group, in addition to Kazuto Aoki (Professor at the Fukui Prefectural University Regional Economic Research Institute), who also participated 10 years ago.

Ten years ago, Kitagi Island was looking for ways to revitalize the area. I heard that members of the Open Data Kyoto Practical Group conducted on-site research on the island, and then added Wikipedia articles “Kitagi Island” and “Kitagi Stone”. Kitagi Island seems to have a culture of proactively adopting new ideas, and the previous year, in 2014, an artist-in-residence program called the “Kitagi North Design Project” was also held.

How I got involved

What motivated me to participate in this event was the existence of the former movie theater “Hikari Theater” on Kitagi Island. Hikari Theater closed its doors around 1967, but nearly half a century later in 2015, it was revived as a viewing facility by the Hikari Theater Friendship Association.

In 2019, it was selected as a constituent cultural property of Japan Heritage, and is one of Kitagi Island’s important tourism resources. It is also one of the successful examples of the reevaluation and utilization of existing movie theater architecture, and it was of great interest to me as I am researching existing movie theater architecture across the country. I toured the Hikari Theater with a guide from the Hikari Theater Friendship Association.

Wikipedia editing activities

This event was a two-day event with overnight stays. The afternoon of the first day and the morning of the second day were set aside for editing Wikipedia, and the Wikipedia team split into several groups to carry out the editing work.

The high school student from Kanagawa Prefecture and the graduate student from Kyoto City had no prior experience editing Wikipedia. The instructor, Kazuto Aoki, supported their editing and added to the Wikipedia articles “Kitagi Stone” and “Kitagi Island,” while I created new Wikipedia articles for “Hikari Theater” and “Hatanaka Heinojo.”

This two-sided strategy allowed the first-time editors from afar to feel a sense of accomplishment in having their writing published, and two topics of great interest to the islanders were created as Wikipedia articles. I think the Wikipedia team as a whole produced well-balanced results.

編集記事

光劇場 – Wikipedia – 新規作成。

畑中平之丞 – Wikipedia – 新規作成。

北木石 – Wikipedia – 加筆。

北木島 – Wikipedia – 加筆。