Submissions:2016/What's Wikidata? How does it work?


 * Title: What's Wikidata? How does it work? -- Learning the Wikidata Basics


 * Theme: Tech/Community


 * Academic Peer Review option: no


 * Type of submission: Workshop


 * Author: Alex Stinson and Stas Malsyshev


 * E-mail address: astinson[a]wikimedia.org & smalyshev[a]wikimedia.org


 * Username:User:Astinson (WMF)/User:Sadads & User:Smalyshev


 * Affiliation: Wikimedia Foundation


 * Abstract:

Wikidata has a growing influence on the Wikimedia community, shaping everything from Infoboxes, to multilingual campaigns, to citations and other parts of Wikimedia content. However, for those of us not familiar with Wikidata, or without a background in linked, structured open data, there a number of concepts and assumptions about Wikidata which might challenging or are not obvious, leading to questions like: "What is Wikidata? How does it work? How can I make an impact and start editing?"

This workshop will focus on helping Wikimedians who already have experience editing other Wikimedia projects, to figure out the basic skills needed to become engaged in the Wikidata. The Workshop will do a brief introduction to editing Wikidata, it community and practice, including answering the questions:
 * What is Wikidata? What problems does it solve?
 * How do you navigate a multilingual, editable data community?
 * How does Wikidata structure itself? What do we mean by Q and P numbers?
 * What ought to be in Wikidata?
 * How do I edit Wikidata? When should I edit Wikidata?
 * What are the simplest ways to get engaged?
 * How, in theory, can I use Wikidata to contribute to Wikimedia projects?
 * Where can I find more information and help for understanding Wikidata?

This workshop will cover more basic skills and not include:
 * How to use the Wikidata Query Service and/or API -- there is another workshop, which will focus on retrieving and using the data created by volunteers in Wikidata: Submissions:2016/Wikidata_and_Query_Service_-_understanding_and_presenting_the_data.
 * How to do mass uploads of data from other free and open sources
 * How to use campaigns to improve Wikidata
 * How to embed Wikidata in other Wikimedia projects

Wikidata allows Wikimedia projects to share, exchange and truly internationalize and create multilingual impact between Wikimedia projects -- lets make sure we all know how it works!


 * Length of presentation: 60 minute workshop


 * Special schedule requests: Please place before Submissions:2016/Wikidata_and_Query_Service_-_understanding_and_presenting_the_data on the schedule so that folks who attend the first workshop can decide if they want to attend the second.


 * Preferred room size: Room for at least 50, if not more -- preferably with space for folks to pull out their laptops and follow along. Wikidata "Basics" workshops have been absolutely packed in other Wikimedia events (Wikimania, Wikimedia Conference CEE, Wikimedia India Conference


 * Will you attend WikiConference North America if your submission is not accepted?: Yes

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