Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos Contest 2023 — Making use of photos to improve Wikipedia pages

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A picture is worth a thousand words. (Photo via Wikimedia Commons, freely licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0)

Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos (WPWP) 2023 is the fourth edition of this annual contest that provides avenue for Wikipedia editors to improve Wikipedia language projects with photos and other relevant media files. This helps to provide additional contextual information to articles, enliven topics and generally enrich Wikipedia prose presentations.

Photos and media files help greatly in capturing the reader’s attention better than a long-form text. Graphical illustrations can convey significant information in small spaces compared to text and are often easier to understand. Other media files can make Wikipedia articles more instructive and pleasing to read.

This is to promote the use of digital media files collected from various Wikimedia photography contests, photowalks organized by the Wikimedia community, on Wikipedia article pages.

However, while there are millions of freely-licensed images on Wikimedia Commons, a significant number of Wikipedia articles are lacking appropriate photos. Only a tiny portion of Commons’ vast collection is being used on Wikipedia article pages. Yet, every year, thousands of images are uploaded through various Wikimedia programs, photowalks, and international photo contests such as Wiki Loves Monuments, Wiki Loves Africa, Wiki Loves Earth, Wiki Loves Folklore, among others, many important images and illustrations are collected, but are not being properly put into use due to lack of concerted effort.

Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos aims to tackle this interesting challenge and use that to improve Wikipedia contents and encourage users to not only upload, but also put those uploaded photos into actual use on Wikipedia projects.

Wikimedia Affiliates, groups and individuals are all invited to participate.

The 2023 edition of the contest is officially open from July 1st and will run for two months till August 31st.

Colin Thubron (pictured left) is a British travel writer and novelist. This photo of his was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons on September 11, 2011, roughly two years after his biographical entry was created on Swedish Wikipedia (top right) in October 2009. However, this particular Wikipedia article would go on for a long time without any photo — despite the fact that one is available for over a decade on Wikimedia Commons. The page only got the photo 11 years later, in 2022 (bottom right), thanks to a Wikipedia editor participating in the Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos Contest 2022 edition.

How to join as organizer

If you are interested in organizing the competition in your country/region or you are representing an affiliate or group, please sign up at the Participating Communities page and also consider subscribing to the Campaign Organizers mailing list. The central Organizing Team posts updates and general announcements in the list.

Organizers can contact the International Organizing Team using contact info below at any time for support.

How to join as individual

Any Wikipedia editor who has a Wikimedia account (created on any Wikimedia project) is eligible to participate. However, specific Wikipedia projects may have additional requirements. See our FAQs. To participate as an individual follow these steps.

  1. Go to List of participating communities
  2. Choose any community to participate.
    • OR, list yourself as an independent participant.
  3. During the campaign period, use the hashtag for the community you choose in step If you are an independent participant use #WPWP.
  4. There’s a Resources page prepared to help participants understand the many ways to find articles wanting photos and how to find the appropriate photos on Commons.
  5. Ask questions on the campaign discussion page if things are not clear.
Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos 2023 Promotion Flier
Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos 2023 Promotion Flier

Contacting the International Team

There are several ways to contact the Campaign’s organizing team.

  1. Use the campaign main discussion page on Meta-Wiki
  2. Post to the public organizers’ mailing list
  3. Send an email to wpwpcampaign@gmail.com

For more information and other resources about the campaign, check our home page: Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos 2023

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