Project Outreach

INTRODUCTION

PROBLEM

The hurdle in front of us is that Wikidata is one of the newest Wikimedia projects. It is not known and understood enough yet. Wikidata’s main objective is to provide a centralized access to the structured data and manage them. In order to do that Wikidata needs a large number of contributors and users. This has not been achieved yet.

METHODOLOGY

1. WORKING WITH DATABASE AND DOCUMENTATION

In the beginning week of my project I will work over the documentation of Wikidata. I’ll try to get familiar with the database.

To increase the number of users it is very vital that people understand what Wikidata is. For this documentation should be improved. First of all, language barrier should be removed. I’ll work over the translations, I’ll make sure that documentation is available in all possible languages. This will make it possible to have users from all over the world.

To increase contribution from existing user, I’ll prepare a discussion page where users can post their queries related to the  problems they face while working with Wikidata.

Also, I’ll work on the existing documentation. The FAQ page needs improvement. Few more queries need to be posted and answered. For example the link Random Item which appears on the left hand side of Wikidata page has not been explained. Also, I am planning to add a find button in the FAQ page. This will allow the user to get directly linked to their query instead of going through the entire FAQ page.

2. SOCIAL MEDIA CAMPAIGN

In the second phase of the Project Outreach my goal will be to increase the number of users through social media campaigns.

Facebook

Prepare Facebook pages where online discussions, news updates and storytelling related to Wikidata will be done. This will not only increase the number of users visiting Wikidata but also increase voluntary contributors.

I’ll prepare few videos and presentations that will be released on YouTube. These videos will depict all sorts of information listed on https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Main_Page in an attractive manner. These videos will be linked to Facebook pages. This will help the user to not only understand Wikidata but also improvise him/her to become a contributor to Wikidata.

Google+

Prepare snippets and link them to Google+. This will increase SEO (Search Engine Optimization) of Wikidata. Google+ provides Authorship that verifies the person who shared the post as an author. Hence, Authorship makes it easy to connect with followers and build a network. Any content linked with the snippet will be indexed higher.The quicker we're indexed, the sooner users will find our content. With millions of pieces of content published on a daily basis, Google+ provides some way to stand out from the rest. You Tube videos will also be linked to these snippets.

Twitter