The Emirates Literature Foundation and the Wikimedians of the UAE have teamed up to host an edit-a-thon to celebrate International Women’s Day.
The event is dedicated to recognising Emirati women’s achievements at both a local and international level, with a goal of creating at least 50 new Wikipedia pages for notable Emirati women. This will also help narrow the gap between the number of pages for Emirati men and women on the website. They can be in Arabic, English or both.
The edit-a-thon will take place at Sharjah’s House of Wisdom from 4pm to 6pm on March 8. Those who want to attend, will need to bring their own laptops. Maryana Iskander, chief executive of the Wikimedia Foundation, and Ahlam Bolooki, director of the Emirates Airline Festival of Literature and the UAE Wikimedia User Group will also be in attendance.
For those unable to attend in person, there is the option to be a part of the event virtually. All participants will receive certificates recognising their contribution, as well as a small gift, and those who create the greatest number of articles will get a special prize from the Wikimedians of UAE group and the Emirates Literature Foundation.
Wikimedian of the Year
Last year, Alaa Najjar was named Wikimedian of the Year thanks to his contribution to Arabic Wikipedia’s Covid-19 coverage.
The annual award, established in 2011 by Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales, honours top-performing editors and contributors to Wikipedia and Wikimedia projects.
An active contributor since 2014, Najjar has been responsible for nearly 500,000 edits across Wikimedia. He is both an administrator and an editor of Arabic Wikipedia, the 10th most-viewed language in the online encyclopedia, and has contributed to more than 170,000 edits to the site, most of which focus on medical and health subjects.
“Most of my edits on Arabic Wikipedia are in medicine, anatomy and biology articles, but I contribute in various fields,” Najjar told The National.
The articles that stand out most to him are the ones that were featured by Wikipedia, as well as the ones that met the encyclopedia’s Good Article criteria. The label is granted to articles that are well-written, factually accurate, neutral in point of view and illustrated by properly credited photographs.
