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Another 5 Years: What Have We Learned about the Wikipedia Gender Gap and What Has Been Done? (Part 1)
http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/another-5-years-what-have-we-learned-about-the-wikipedia-gender-gap-and-what-has-been-done-part-1
<b>Five years after Wikimedia Foundation’s 2011 editor survey was conducted and revealed the gender gap issue, scholars, practitioners, and communities around the globe have come a long way to address the gender imbalance of the online encyclopedia. This blog post series (of three parts) serve as a summary of movements and discoveries about Wikipedia gender gap on both local (India) and global scales.</b>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><em>“Our editing community continues to suffer
from a lack of women editors…. only 8.5% of editors are women.</em>”</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Probably
the most cited statement for Wikipedia gender gap studies, the <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/76/Editor_Survey_Report_-_April_2011.pdf">editor
survey</a> conducted by Wikimedia Foundation in April 2011 revealed
the alarming imbalance within the online encyclopedia community(s). In the same
survey, the percentage of female Wikipedians in India is reported as only 3%. When
we have repeatedly emphasized on the development and changes the internet can
bring to our societies, how do we ensure that behind our computer screen it is
not just another mirror reflecting what has been silenced and forgotten?</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"> </p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>What is the Wikipedia gender gap?</strong></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">There
are two main focus on the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_bias_on_Wikipedia">gender
gap within Wikipedia</a> – the editor demographic and the coverage of
topics – which are essentially flip sides of a coin. With fewer female
contributors, we are losing a more diverse knowledge platform for all. But the
issue is far more complex than simply having less information about “friendship
bracelets” than “baseball cards.”</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Looking
at the biography pages on Wikipedia, researchers found that not only is the number of
female biographies much lower than males’ (due to historical factors, availability
of firsthand sources, and editors’ interest), but the linguistic and topical
bias within also presents <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Writing_about_women#cite_note-1">a male-centered discourse</a>. For example, on women’s
biography pages, words related to one’s gender such as “women,” “female,”
“lady” will be used more commonly than the counterpart words in men’s pages;
and that a women’s biography will have more information about her marriage and
family life than her male counterpart’s. Studies also found that female-related
articles are more likely to be linked to male-related ones but not the other
way around<a name="_ftnref1" href="file:///C:/Users/Ting-Yi/Desktop/coop/Blog%20post/BP2_Gender%20Gap%20summary.docx#_ftn1"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference">[1]</span></span></a>. This
demonstrates that the editing preference, styles, and content
are closely related to the editors’ genders and how they see the world. In
other words, language and knowledge cannot be separated from one’s gender – the
Internet may be bodiless but it can never become genderless<a name="_ftnref2" href="file:///C:/Users/Ting-Yi/Desktop/coop/Blog%20post/BP2_Gender%20Gap%20summary.docx#_ftn2"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference">[2]</span></span></a>.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Wagner et al.’s paper<a name="_ftnref3" href="file:///C:/Users/Ting-Yi/Desktop/coop/Blog%20post/BP2_Gender%20Gap%20summary.docx#_ftn3"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference">[3]</span></span></a> in early
2016 also confirmed the existence of a “glass ceiling” for female figures to be
considered “notable” enough to have a Wikipedia bio page (or for the page not
to be deleted). Who gets to decide what is “notable enough” becomes
questionable when we understand the gender bias. As a matter of fact, while the
difference in male and female biography numbers is narrower for globally known
figures, a larger gender gap exists for “local hero(ine)s” because of the
notability threshold applied. That is to say, many women and female-related
topics are underrepresented (and underappreciated) on Wikipedia.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>The danger and why it matters</strong><strong></strong></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><em><u>Low awareness</u></em></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The
Wikipedia gender gap is problematic and deserves more attention than ever not
only because gender imbalance should be tackled both online and offline, but
also that this imbalance is so prevalent and has been taken for granted by most.
Little do people consider, that with every single “click” on one’s google
search, we can be provided with an answer from a single-gender narration. This
imbalance and its problems are behind the scene – the share of male and female
editors are never on the surface without a holistic survey. While gender
balance has been pushed in our business, education, and government sectors, the
online encyclopedia feeding <a href="http://www.internetlivestats.com/internet-users/">billions</a> of
internet users (and <a href="http://www.trai.gov.in/WriteReadData/PIRReport/Documents/Indicator_Reports.pdf">over
300 million in India</a> itself) is
still constructed in a male-dominant culture with little questioning from the
public.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><em><u>Legacy
and influence</u></em></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">There
is the saying that Internet is changing the human default from “forgetting”
into “remembering.” Wikipedia can serve as a great tool for digitization of
knowledge and the preservation of languages. What is to be recorded now will
become parts of (perhaps the most accessible) history in the future, and we
cannot afford a history without women’s voices and knowledge. Hence, to include
more women editors and women-related content is not simply out of a concern of
diversity, it is to ensure that this time we can pass on the legacy in a better
and more equitable fashion for the whole population.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><em><u>The vicious
circle</u></em></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"><em>“We’ve to participate in meet ups
and workshops, then question (from family members) arises like how many guys
are there, is there any girl or not. In one sentence we're discouraged by our
surrounding</em>.”</p>
<p align="right" style="text-align: right;">– Female editor from local community</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The urgency of this problem is that
the lesser women are presented in the communities, the harder a motivation can
be established for new female editors to join. Now that we have made this issue
visible, the core mission we have is to ensure a change in the system and
environment that helps women feel more welcomed and comfortable – even when
they are aware that they are the minority.</p>
<div>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">In the next part
of this blog series:<a class="external-link" href="http://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/another-5-years-what-have-we-learned-about-the-wikipedia-gender-gap-and-what-has-been-done-part-2"> <strong>Why is
there a Gender Gap?</strong></a></p>
</div>
<p> </p>
<div><br clear="all" />
<hr align="left" size="1" width="33%" />
<div id="ftn1">
<p><a name="_ftn1" href="file:///C:/Users/Ting-Yi/Desktop/coop/Blog%20post/BP2_Gender%20Gap%20summary.docx#_ftnref1"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference">[1]</span></span></a> Wagner, Graells-Garrido,
Garcia, & Menczer, (2016). Women through the glass ceiling: gender
asymmetries in Wikipedia. <em>EPJ Data Science</em>. (5)1. Pp 1-24.</p>
<p>Graells-Garrido,
Lalmas, & Menczer, (2015). First women second sex: gender bias in Wikipedia.
In <em>Proceedings of the 26th ACM Conference on Hypertext & Social Media </em>(pp165)<em>.</em></p>
<p>Wagner, Garcia, Jadidi, & Strohmaier, (2015). It’s a man’s
Wikipedia? Assessing
gender inequality in an online encyclopedia. From the Wikipedia editor
community is sensible to gender in <em>Proceedings of the Ninth International
AAAI Conference on Web and Social Media 454.</em> URL: https://www.aaai.org/ocs/index.php/ICWSM/ICWSM15/paper/viewFile/10585/10528</p>
</div>
<div id="ftn2">
<p><a name="_ftn2" href="file:///C:/Users/Ting-Yi/Desktop/coop/Blog%20post/BP2_Gender%20Gap%20summary.docx#_ftnref2"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference">[2]</span></span></a> Code, L. (2000). Encyclopedia
of feminist theories. London: Routledge</p>
</div>
<div id="ftn3">
<p><a name="_ftn3" href="file:///C:/Users/Ting-Yi/Desktop/coop/Blog%20post/BP2_Gender%20Gap%20summary.docx#_ftnref3"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference">[3]</span></span></a> Wagner, Graells-Garrido,
Garcia, & Menczer, (2016). Women through the glass ceiling: gender
asymmetries in Wikipedia. <em>EPJ Data Science</em>. (5)1. Pp 1-24.</p>
</div>
</div>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/another-5-years-what-have-we-learned-about-the-wikipedia-gender-gap-and-what-has-been-done-part-1'>http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/another-5-years-what-have-we-learned-about-the-wikipedia-gender-gap-and-what-has-been-done-part-1</a>
</p>
No publishertingCIS-A2KAccess to KnowledgeGenderWikipediaWikimedia2016-09-21T10:13:59ZBlog EntryWikiwomen’s Meetup at St. Agnes College Explores Potentials and Plans of Women Editors in Mangalore, Karnataka
http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/wikiwomen2019s-meetup-at-st-agnes-college-explores-potentials-and-plans-of-women-editors-in-mangalore-karnataka
<b>Karnataka is known for its diverse linguistic cultures. Aside from Kannada, many are native speakers of Konkani, Tulu, and other languages. A small Wikiwomen's meetup was held on Saturday, August 27th at St. Agnes College, Mangalore, to invite female Wikipedians from the region. Many of them were new to the online encyclopedia but demonstrated strong interest in learning and contributing more Indic language content online.</b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">A <a href="https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meetup/Mangaluru/WikiWomen/1">Wikiwomen’s meetup</a> was held at St. Agnes College on August 27<sup>th</sup> in the hope to strengthen the bonding and communication between female Wikipedians in Mangalore. Attendees of the meetup on Saturday included five Kannada Wikipedian, one Konkani Wikipedian, one from the recently gone live Tulu Wikipedia, and Ting-Yi Chang from the CIS A2K team. Two of the Kannada Wikipedians are staff and faculty members of the College’s library and Department of Kannada respectively. Both were brought into Wikipedia by <a href="http://cis-india.org/openness/kannada-wikipedia-edit-a-thon-in-st-agnes-college-mangaluru-to-bridge-gender-gap-in-wikipedia">edit-a-thons</a> held on the college campus in the last few months</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The meetup started off with a round of brief self-introduction and an inspiring introductory presentation by Dhanalakshimi K T, a St. Agnes commerce student who had successfully organized the last two women’s edit-a-thons on her campus.</p>
<blockquote>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">“<i>Wikipedia is a great tool for knowledge sharing. When we edit in our own languages, people from outside of the city who don’t speak English can learn things more easily online.... It is the respect and passion I have for my language."</i></p>
</blockquote>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The presentation also touched upon some feasible benefits that editors gains through participating in Wikipedia/media projects: improvement in writing and research skills, nurturing a critical thinking habit when reading texts and doing research, learnings from collaborative work experience, improvement in language and communication skills, etc. One of the participants later mentioned that with the hobby of editing Wikipedia, she began actively researching in her interested topics. Even in occasions when she had no time to actually update the content onto Wikipedia, the knowledge she gained throughout the research process has already enriched her and broadened her horizon of the subject.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The second half of the presentation consists of an introduction to the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Five_pillars">5 pillars rules</a> and some other advice of Wikipedia editing. Participants who were newcomers showed great interest and actively raised questions surrounding the use of different editing tools including the infobox templates, translation tools, useful markups, and personal sandboxes.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">When being asked about the barriers they have faced so far in editing Wikipedia, most agreed that time issues do prevent them sometimes as their offline commitments (work, family, school) can take priority over it. However, most participants also concluded that “those who are truly interested will eventually find the time.” On the other hand, access to internet and facilities has not been reported as a barrier in their cases, but all agreed that it can be for many other women. Awareness was emphasized as a crucial factor when trying to bring in more women to Wikipedia. One of the student participants shared her experience,</p>
<blockquote>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><i>“Some people may have never heard of Wikipedia before; some misunderstood its use and potential… when I talked about Kannada Wikipedia with my peers, first they thought it was some website for Kannada stories writing…. But when I explained to them what it is and how we can edit, they were all very excited and very much wanted to try."</i></p>
</blockquote>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">In the latter discussion of the meetup, participants talked about the tentative event plans for the next few months. Two sessions were suggested to be held by November, 2016. One as a workshop for the newcomers and the other as an editing event for more experienced female Wikipedians. All participants, old and new, are really excited to strengthen the bonding between Wikiwomens in Mangalore. Some suggested there should be more casual meetups every few weeks to help them communicate more and plan upcoming community events, including an ongoing event that can be held in March, 2017 for the International Women’s Day and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiWomen%27s_History_Month">Wikiwomen’s History Month</a>.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The meetup continued with more discussion on various language Wikipedias’ development. As an experienced Wikipedian and an actively outreaching community member, participant Harriet Vidyasagar explained the complexity in Konkani Wikipedia, which contains five scripts, and the importance of those scripts in Konkani language’s history and culture. All participants agreed that seeing their mother tongues’ scripts online and creating more content to make their culture and language visible are a great source of happiness and a motivation for them to continue editing. The session ended with exchange of contacts and group pictures.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/wikiwomen2019s-meetup-at-st-agnes-college-explores-potentials-and-plans-of-women-editors-in-mangalore-karnataka'>http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/wikiwomen2019s-meetup-at-st-agnes-college-explores-potentials-and-plans-of-women-editors-in-mangalore-karnataka</a>
</p>
No publishertingCIS-A2KAccess to KnowledgeGenderKonkani WikipediaKannada WikipediaEvent2016-09-01T14:39:53ZBlog EntryThe Gay Pride Charade
http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/indian-express-nishant-shah-july-3-2016-gay-pride-charade
<b>For most of the milllenials, news is formed by trends, what goes viral, and often open to speculation, projection, manipulation and deceit.</b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The article was <a class="external-link" href="http://indianexpress.com/article/technology/social/the-gay-pride-charade-2889743/">published in Indian Express</a> on July 3, 2016.</p>
<hr />
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The world of social media can be a minefield of misinformation, and it does get difficult to verify facts and ensure the veracity of the information that comes to us on the winged notifications of our apps. This becomes starkly clear in times of crises. Hence, when the historic and heinous shootout at a gay night club in Orlando, USA, shook the world with horror and grief a couple of weeks ago, when the first tweets appeared on my timeline, my initial reaction was denial. Instead of believing those first responders, I was already searching for more credible news lines that could confirm — or hopefully deny — the massacre. It took only a few minutes, though, to realise that #StandWithOrlando was a reality that we will have to accommodate in the story of continued violence and abuse of sexual minorities around the world.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">However, not all deception is bad. One of the most fantastic responses to the shoot-out was from a Quebec-based satirical website called JournalDemourreal.com that published a photoshopped image showing the Canadian PM Justin Trudeau kissing the leader of the Canadian opposition party Tom Mulcair, with a headline that the two, despite their differences, are “united against homophobia”. I know that I liked this fake story four times on different newsfeeds, half-believing, half-wishing that it was true, before I realised that it is a hoax. Morphed as it might be, the doctored image enabled people to talk about the tragedy as demanding a personal and a policy-level action, ranging from acceptance and freedom, to control of guns and protecting the rights of life and dignity for the sexual minorities who continue to remain persecuted in the world.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The image also allowed many queer people in different parts of the world — especially in the countries where homosexuality continues to be criminalised and severely punished — to participate not only in the global grief but also to demand that their governments take more responsibility towards its queer population.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">While this photoshopped picture was making the rounds, another tweet showed up on my timeline. This time it was a tweet from our media-savvy PM, <a href="http://indianexpress.com/profile/politician/narendra-modi/">Narendra Modi</a>, who claimed that he was “shocked at the shootout in Orlando.”And further added that his “thoughts and prayers are with the bereaved families and the injured”. When I saw this tweet, my reaction again, was that this must be another joke. Because even as queer rights activists in the country struggle to fight for the decriminalisation of homosexuality, through their curative petitions in the Supreme Court in India, PM Modi’s government has continued its hateful diatribe against queer people in the country. His party has called homosexuality “anti-Indian” and “anti-family”. The party’s favourite, Baba Ramdev, continues his hate speech, offering to cure homosexuality through yoga.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Ever since the current government took power, documented hate crimes against queer people have more than doubled in the country. So when the PM decided to offer his condolences to those in Orlando, I figured that either it was a fake Twitter account masquerading as the PM or it was some kind of a hacker troll — maybe Anonymous, the online guerrilla activists, who recently took over ISIS- friendly websites and filled them up with information about male homosexuality as a response to the shoot-out — had taken control of the Twitter account. But it turned out that this piece of information was not photoshopped or hacked. It was actually true, and we were to believe in earnest that while the government doesn’t care about the millions of queer people being denied their rights to live and love in their country, it is heartbroken about what happened in the USA.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">It does make you wonder about the world we live in, where a photoshopped image sounded more plausible than an undoctored tweet. It emphasises why Orlando cannot be treated as one isolated instance in another country, but that #WeAreOrlando. For right now, Orlando is also in India. It is a reminder that while we have been fortunate not to have such an instance of dramatic violence, there are millions of people in the country who are forced to live and die in deception for their sexual orientation.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/indian-express-nishant-shah-july-3-2016-gay-pride-charade'>http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/indian-express-nishant-shah-july-3-2016-gay-pride-charade</a>
</p>
No publishernishantGenderInternet Governance2016-07-25T01:10:28ZBlog EntryFlashpoint #TrollControl: Maneka versus NCW
http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/times-now-july-8-2016-flashpoint-troll-control-maneka-versus-ncw
<b>Amidst the debate over controlling online trolls - the proposal by Union Women and Child Development Minister to curb violence against women on the internet has triggered a fight between the minister and the National Commission for Women (NCW). </b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">While Maneka Gandhi asked the NCW to monitor the internet to control trolls against women - NCW Chief Lalitha Kumaramangalam questioning the feasibility of the Minister's proposal, saying the internet is too big a space to be monitored. Sunil Abraham was interviewed. Times Now Television interviewed Sunil Abraham on this. <strong><a class="external-link" href="http://www.timesnow.tv/videoshow/4491210.cms">Watch the video here</a></strong>.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/times-now-july-8-2016-flashpoint-troll-control-maneka-versus-ncw'>http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/times-now-july-8-2016-flashpoint-troll-control-maneka-versus-ncw</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaGenderInternet Governance2016-07-09T02:11:59ZNews ItemWomen's Safety? There is an App for That
http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/gender-it-rohini-lakshane-may-19-2016-womens-safety-there-is-an-app-for-that
<b>“After locking ourselves in a room for more than 6 days, this is what we came out [sic] with. Join us in helping make WOMEN feel SAFE,” read a gloating press release about a smartphone app for women to notify their near ones that they were in distress. It was one among many such PRs frequently landing in my mailbox after the rape and murder of a young student on board a private bus in Delhi in 2012.
</b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The article by Rohini Lakshané was <a class="external-link" href="http://www.genderit.org/node/4744/">published in Gender IT.org</a> on May 19, 2016. This was also mirrored by <a class="external-link" href="http://feminisminindia.com/2017/01/09/womens-safety-mobile-apps/">Feminism in India</a> on January 9, 2017.</p>
<hr style="text-align: justify; " />
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The incident had spurred protests across the country and made international headlines. Along with all this came a slew of new “women’s safety” apps. Existing ones, many of which had fizzled out, were conveniently relaunched. My own experience of user-testing such apps in India back then was that they were unreliable at best and dangerously counterproductive at worst. Some of them were endorsed by governments and celebrities and ended up being glorified despite their flaws, their technical and systemic handicaps never acknowledged at all.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">There are myriad mobile phone apps meant to be deployed for personal safety, but their basic functioning is more or less the same: the user activates the app (by pressing a button, shaking the device or similar cue), which sends a distress message containing the users’ location to pre-defined contacts. Some apps include additional artefacts such as a short audio or video recording of the situation. Some others augment this mechanism by alerting the police and other agencies best placed to respond to the emergency. For example, the Companion app for students living on campus notifies the university along with police. The <a href="https://newsroom.uber.com/india/introducing-an-integrated-sos-alert-solution-for-law-enforcement/"><span style="text-decoration: underline;">SOS buttons in taxi-hailing apps such as Uber</span></a> enable the user’s contacts to follow the cab’s GPS trail and notify them and the cab company’s “incident response team” of emergencies. Apps such as Kitestring would treat the lack of the user’s response within a time-window as the trigger for a distress message. All their technical wizardry perhaps makes it easy to lose sight of the fact that technology is not a saviour but a tool or an enabler, that technology alone cannot be the panacea of a problem that is deeply complex and, in reality, rooted in society and governance.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The Indian government announced last month that every phone sold in the country from January 2017 should be equipped with a <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-36139985"><span style="text-decoration: underline;">panic button that sends distress flares to the police and a trusted set of contacts</span></a>. Nearly half the phones sold in India <a href="http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prSG25827215"><span style="text-decoration: underline;">cost USD 100 or less</span></a>. Prices are kept so low by sacrificing features and the quality of the hardware; there are a lot of phones with substandard GPS modules, poor touchscreens, slow processors, bad cameras, tiny memory, and dismal battery life. They run on different versions of different operating systems, some of them outdated. All of these factors would determine if someone is able to use the app at all and how quickly they and their phone would be able to respond to an emergency. Additionally, mobile phone signals become thin or shaky in areas with a high number of users and buildings located cheek-by-jowl. Even when the mobile hardware is good and the mobile signal usable, GPS accuracy can be spotty and constant location tracking would hog battery. These issues would affect the efficacy of any app. Besides, there is too much uncertainty for an app developer to factor in. (Two years ago, I learnt about an app called Pukar, then operational in collaboration with police departments in four cities in India. Pukar solved the problem of potential inaccuracy of the GPS location by getting the user’s contacts to tell the police where the person in distress might be.) Designing a one-size-fits-all safety app is almost impossible. The app that rings a loud alarm when triggered may save someone’s life or spoil the chances of someone who is trying to get help while hiding. Different people may be vulnerable to different kinds of distress situations and an app can at best be optimised for some target user groups.</p>
<blockquote style="text-align: justify; ">
<p>An app that does not work in tandem with existing machinery for law enforcement and public safety is a bad idea.</p>
</blockquote>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">In the end, the “technical” problems may actually be problems of economic disparity. Making it mandatory for people to own phones equipped with certain hardware or requiring them to upgrade to more reliable devices would drive the phones out of the financial reach of many. Indian manufacturers have expressed concerns that the proposed <a href="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-news/Panic-button-GPS-feasible-within-the-deadline-but-will-raise-costs/articleshow/51998103.cms"><span style="text-decoration: underline;">panic button would raise costs for them as well the end buyers</span></a>. Popularising a downloadable app and informing its target users how to install and work it correctly needs a marketing blitzkrieg, which is something only the state or well-funded developers can afford. The New Delhi police department runs a dedicated control room for reports arriving from its safety app, Himmat (the word for courage in many Indian languages). It’s an expensive affair.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">An app that does not work in tandem with existing machinery for law enforcement and public safety is a bad idea. It puts the onus of “keeping women safe” on members of their social circles or on intermediaries and private parties such as cab companies, while absolving law enforcement agencies of their failing to provide security. It opens doors to victim blaming in case someone is unable to use the app at the right time in the right way, or if the app fails.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">On the contrary, an app that does loop in the police raises concerns about surveillance and protection of data available to the police, which is especially problematic in places such as India where there is no law for privacy or data protection. Alwar, one of the cities where Pukar was implemented, is super-populated with a large geographical area and a high crime rate. Police departments in such places tend to be overworked and understaffed. Without significant policing reforms, it is questionable whether they will be able to respond in time. A sting operation done by two media outlets on 30 senior officials of the New Delhi police department in 2012 showed the <a href="http://www.ndtv.com/india-news/in-and-around-delhi-cops-blame-rapes-on-women-tehelka-investigation-with-ndtv-475442"><span style="text-decoration: underline;">cops blaming victims of sexual violence with gay abandon</span></a>. “If girls don't stay within their boundaries, if they don't wear appropriate clothes, then naturally there is attraction. This attraction makes men aggressive, prompting them to just do it [sexual assault]," reads one of their nuggets. “It's never easy for the victim [to complain to the police]. Everyone is scared of humiliation. Everyone's wary of media and society. In reality, the ones who complain are only those who have turned rape into a business," goes another. An app that lets known people monitor someone’s location also poses the risk of abuse, coercion and surveillance by intimate partners or members of the family.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Unfortunately, there is no app for reforming a morass in law enforcement or dismantling patriarchy.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/gender-it-rohini-lakshane-may-19-2016-womens-safety-there-is-an-app-for-that'>http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/gender-it-rohini-lakshane-may-19-2016-womens-safety-there-is-an-app-for-that</a>
</p>
No publisherrohiniGenderInternet Governance2017-01-10T02:48:34ZBlog EntryWhy The New Government Policy Mandating Panic Buttons On Phones Isn’t Going To Protect Women
http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/why-the-new-government-policy-mandating-panic-buttons-on-phones-isn2019t-going-to-protect-women
<b>Recently, the Union Minister for Communications and Information Technology Mr Ravi Shankar Prasad tweeted about new rules mandating a panic button in every cell phone sold in the country from January 2017. To keep ladies safe, of course.</b>
<p>The story by Madhura Kadaba was published in the <a class="external-link" href="http://theladiesfinger.com/panic-buttons/">Ladies Finger</a> on May 14, 2016. Rohini Lakshané was quoted.</p>
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<p style="text-align: center; "><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/RaviShankarPrasad.png" alt="Ravi Shankar Prasad" class="image-inline" title="Ravi Shankar Prasad" /></p>
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<p style="text-align: justify; "><a href="http://pib.nic.in/newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=142272">According to a statement released by the Telecommunications Ministry</a>, the panic button will be activated by pressing a designated button on a smartphone or by holding down both ‘5’ and ‘9’ keys on a basic phone. Pressing the panic button is expected to alert police and designated friends or relatives, similar to apps launched previously by police departments like <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.smartcloud.delhi&hl=en">Himmat</a>.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">It followed remarks from the Union Minister for Women and Child Development, Ms Maneka Gandhi, in the Lok Sabha in December 2015. “Every cell phone will have an in-built panic button. Now, all new cell phones will be made with panic buttons. But in case of all old cell phones, you can go to the person who owns the company or the dealer and they will adjust it for you. If a woman is in trouble, she can just press the button on the cell phone and she will immediately get help.”</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Two days later, reacting to concerns that the mandate could increase mobile phone costs, Mr Ravi Shankar Prasad said, “<a href="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-news/Panic-button-Ravi-Shankar-Prasad-to-discuss-mobile-price-hike/articleshow/52028900.cms">Manufacturers… have given their support. My expectation is that they will render their support in social justice and women security</a>.”</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">After a point, it almost becomes a farce — the government’s continuous search for grand, one-stop solutions to dealing with sexual violence. We had the <a href="https://in.news.yahoo.com/what-they-are-planning-to-do-with-the-rs-1-000-crore-nirbhaya-fund-050843333.html">vast coffers of the Nirbhaya fund</a>, which went nowhere. It had tech solutions coming out of its 1000-crore ears. It included plans for setting up control rooms in 114 cities within 9 months back in 2014 and surveillance cameras in all public transport vehicles including autos! Who was going to be watching the feed of these cameras, if ever by some vast change in the face of humanity such a thing happened, you may wonder? Or as journalist Revati Laul wrote, “Given that police stations across the country are short staffed, given how many of them cannot even afford paper to file a first information report (FIR) or fuel for the police personnel’s motorbike, just how will the appearance of these control rooms change that? How will switchboards help if police stations in even big cities like Varanasi have too few vehicles to cater to the existing load of emergencies they have to deal with?” But hush, don’t interrupt when Daddy is talking.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Recently, we published an investigation into the <a href="http://theladiesfinger.com/investigation-where-are-the-one-stop-centers-for-rape-victims-under-the-nirbhaya-fund/">one-stop centres</a> promised by the Nirbhaya fund. These centres are supposed to provide services like assistance in lodging FIRs, medical assistance for medical examinations, and therapy. On paper, Delhi is supposed to have 6. Good luck locating them because they don’t exist. Most of the staff of the hospitals where the centers were to be located were clueless about the program.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">But perhaps we should forget the tiresome past and move to the shiny button-filled future. We asked Rohini Lakshane, a technology expert and Program Officer at the Centre for Internet and Society what she thought of panic buttons. Recently she reviewed a <a href="http://tech.firstpost.com/news-analysis/mobile-apps-for-personal-safety-64274.html">bunch</a> of personal safety apps geared toward women and was very unimpressed. About the government’s new plan, she said, “GPS accuracy in India can sometimes be patchy and not very accurate, and continuous location tracking drains the battery, something that could be problematic for people with phones that do not have good GPS hardware or a long battery life.” Lakshane added, “The app would also enable tracking by family members, which can increase the chance of intimate partner abuse and violence. There have been instances in which apps that provide real-time location or periodic updates of the location of a person to a contact have enabled abuse by intimate partners or by members of the family.” In short, you are unlikely to get the help you need in case of stranger danger and continue to face whatever oppression you maybe facing from your ‘loved ones’.</p>
<p>Which brings us to the biggest problem with panic buttons, the idea that what Indian women should live in fear of scary strangers outside the house.</p>
The story by Madhura Kadaba was published in The Ladies Finger on May 14, 2016. Rohini Lakshane was quoted. The story by Madhura Kadaba was published in the Ladies Finger on May 14, 2016. Rohini Lakshane was quoted.
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<p style="text-align: justify; ">In fact, carefully conducted research shows over and over again that Indian women are most likely to face violence from their families, within their homes. The Mumbai programme RAHAT’s report <a href="http://theladiesfinger.com/whats-the-ratio-of-known-vs-stranger-rapists-take-a-wild-guess-that-and-other-highlights-from-the-2015-rahat-report-on-sexual-violence/">shows</a> that 91 percent of the accused in reported cases of rape were by known persons. Add on the fact if you have even a fleeting acquaintance with a man who attacks you the police are additionally reluctant to <span>do anything</span>.</p>
<p>Not that the police like to file complaints if you have been raped by a <a href="http://theladiesfinger.com/tag/ready-to-report/">stranger</a>. That way they are quite equal opportunity about ignoring complaints.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Perhaps we should have a panic button in our phones after all. A daily reminder that you should fear rape, in case for a moment you had decided to stop worrying. A daily reminder that if you do get raped you must remember to press a button that goes nowhere. A great metaphor for how we deal with victims of sexual violence in India.</p>
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<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/why-the-new-government-policy-mandating-panic-buttons-on-phones-isn2019t-going-to-protect-women'>http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/why-the-new-government-policy-mandating-panic-buttons-on-phones-isn2019t-going-to-protect-women</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaGenderInternet Governance2016-05-15T09:45:36ZNews ItemA Selection of Tweets on How to Make Crowdmaps Effectual for Mapping Violence against Women
http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/gender-it-february-19-2015-selection-tweets-how-make-crowdmaps-effectual-mapping-violence-against-women
<b>This is a collection of tweets by Rohini Lakshane on making crowdmaps more effective for mapping gender violence. The compilation of tweets has been republished by GenderIT.org.</b>
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<p><br />For more see the <a class="external-link" href="http://www.genderit.org/feminist-talk/selection-tweets-how-make-crowdmaps-effectual-mapping-violence-against-women">original published on the website of Gender IT.org</a> on February 19, 2015.</p>
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<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/gender-it-february-19-2015-selection-tweets-how-make-crowdmaps-effectual-mapping-violence-against-women'>http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/gender-it-february-19-2015-selection-tweets-how-make-crowdmaps-effectual-mapping-violence-against-women</a>
</p>
No publisherrohiniGenderInternet Governance2015-03-12T00:42:08ZBlog EntryRe-Wiring Women's Rights Debates in the Digital Age
http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/re-wiring-women-rights-debates-in-digital-age
<b>IT for Change in partnership with Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan and ANANDI organized this event on September 13 and 14, 2014. Rohini Lakshane participated as a speaker.
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<p>Website:<br /> <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.itforchange.net/ITfC_Course_Re-wiring_womens_rights/index.php/Agenda">http://www.itforchange.net/ITfC_Course_Re-wiring_womens_rights/index.php/Agenda</a><br /> <br /> Speakers List:<br /> <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.itforchange.net/ITfC_Course_Re-wiring_womens_rights/index.php/Session_speakers">http://www.itforchange.net/ITfC_Course_Re-wiring_womens_rights/index.php/Session_speakers</a></p>
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<h3>Video</h3>
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<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/re-wiring-women-rights-debates-in-digital-age'>http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/re-wiring-women-rights-debates-in-digital-age</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaGenderVideoInternet GovernanceICT2015-02-12T17:07:32ZNews ItemDigital Gender: Theory, Methodology and Practice
http://editors.cis-india.org/raw/digital-humanities/digital-gender-theory-methodology-practice
<b>Dr. Nishant Shah was a panelist at a workshop jointly organized by HUMlab and UCGS (Umeå Centre for Gender Studies) at Umeå University from March 12 to 14, 2014. He blogged about the conference.</b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Read the original published by HUMLAB Blog on March 20, 2014 <a class="external-link" href="http://blog.humlab.umu.se/?p=5147">here</a>. Details of the workshop on Digital Gender can be seen <a class="external-link" href="http://www.humlab.umu.se/digitalgender">here</a>.</p>
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<p style="text-align: justify; ">“When I was first invited to be a part of the Digital Gender conference curated by Anna Foka at the HUMlab in Umea, Sweden, there were many things that I had expected to find there: Historical approaches to understanding the relationship between digital technologies and practices and construction of gender, multi-modal and multi-disciplinary frameworks that examine the intersections of gender and the digital; Material and discursive descriptions of how we understand gender in contemporary realms. And indeed, I found it all there, and more, as a great collection of people, came together in dialogues of scholarly rigour, critical inquiry and political solidarity and empathy, to learn, to teach, to exchange research and scholarship. Given my past experiences of being at HUMlab and the incredible range of scholarship that was curated there, this came as no surprise.</p>
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<th><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/shah.png" alt="Nishant Shah" class="image-inline" title="Nishant Shah" /></th>
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<td>Above: Dr. Nishant Shah in HUMlab</td>
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<p style="text-align: justify; ">However, the one thing that stood out for me was an incredible session on Game Making conducted by Carl-Eric Engqvist. When I first saw it in the programme, I was apprehensive. What can Game Making have to do with digital gender? What would we learn from trying to design a game? I have been in ‘doing workshops’ before where things don’t always go as planned. Especially with the new ‘maker culture’ movements and DIY hipster phases, I have often found myself disappointed with workshops that focus too much on the technological and the interface. And I was in two minds about this – surely, we could have spent the time in more traditional academic experiences – round tables, discussion groups, or even just increased time for the participants to present their work. And so when the workshop began, I was waiting for it to make sense – to see what the game making’ workshop could have in store for the motley group of people that had assembled there.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Engqvist started off by showing us three games that have inspired him the most and what he wanted us to take as our points of thought and from that moment on, I knew we were in safe hands. Engqvist was not interested in games for gaming. He was interested in games as artefacts, as ways of thinking, as modes of engagement into exploring, reifying and concretizing many of the questions around power and empathy. And more than anything else, he presented with us the idea that games can be pedagogic, they can be learning tools; and though they might be designed for young players, they can be ways by which we translate our academic knowledge and research into practice.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">What emerged in the subsequent two hours, was a great exercise in feminist methods and knowledge meeting new pedagogy and discussions. The group divided into two teams and set out to make a game that would be suitable for 8-10 year olds, and questions ideas of power and imbalance in their lives. Here are some things that I learned from the conversations:</p>
<ol>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The nature of true power: One of the most interesting discussions that emerged was where the power resides. Scripted games often give us the illusion of power by making the power of the script writer invisible. While games are often open to creative interpretation and negotiation, these are only within the context of the constraints of the game. How do we design games that are then transparent about their own limitations? Can we think of a game that is about building the game rather than playing a game? Can we think of game outside of structures of competition and winning, closer to the designs of the Theatre of the Oppressed?</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Collective Empathy: The most dramatic revelation in the game making exercise was the engineering of empathy. There were many different suggestions on how to build empathy. One of the ideas was to put the players in simulations of real-life crises, asking them to take up different roles as antagonists and protagonists within the conflict, along with by-standers who can choose to be allies. However, drawing from legal narratives of rape, that demand that the rape victim be not subjected to re-living the experience through testimonies in court, we decided that it might be not fruitful to make participants re-live real-life trauma in the course of the game. Eventually, we decided that the way to escape this would be to let the participants be in control of their own simulations, and offer them ways of establishing trust and empathy.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The power of narratives: In designing the narrative of the game, what came out was our own personal narratives of why we believe in the things that we do. How do we devise a game that has narratives of the everyday that can eventually transcend into becoming special? How does the playing of the game itself lead to repeated narratives, each customised to the situation? How do we create conditions and infrastructure that encourages users to iterate, repeat, remix and remediate ideas so that they become rich and layered narratives? And most importantly, how do we take something that is traumatic or troublesome, something that scares or angers us, and get the help of our fellow players, to reappropriate it, diffuse its hostile edge, and make it more amenable and something that we can cope with?</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">DIY experiences: We recognised as a group, that we were more interested in a game that was about crafting experiences rather than designing learning goals. Or in other words, we wanted something so simple that it triggers something at the most visceral level, allowing the players to dig deeper into their own selves and come up with ideas that could resonate with the others. The ambition also was to have the gamers be in control of the intensity and thus define the parameters of their own gaming experience rather than be put into conditions or situations that might lead to further trauma.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Teaching versus Learning: The largest chunk of our discussions pivoted around these two concepts. When designing a pedagogic game, how do we locate ourselves and the players? Do we assume the role of pedagogues who have specific messages to deliver, or do we assume the role of co-learners who will build a set of rules that create new conditions of playing every time? How do we further ensure that the games will have a feminist pedagogy of recursive and self-reflexive criticality along with a clear message of empathy, collaboration and togetherness?</li>
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<th><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/Presentation.png" alt="Presentation" class="image-inline" title="Presentation" /></th>
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<td>Presentation of the game ‘Drawing It Out’</td>
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<p style="text-align: justify; ">What emerged through these five learning principles was a simple game that we called ‘Drawing It Out’. Here are the rules of the game, followed by some pictures that emerged as we played the game ourselves in the group.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Game: Drawing It Out.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Players: 3-6.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Age: 8 and above</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Materials: A number dice, a dice with different emotion words written on it: Shame, Anger, Frustration, Love, Fear, Hope. A tea-timer of 3 minutes. Sheets of blank paper, different coloured pens and pencils.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Instructions:</p>
<ol>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Each member in the group rolls the number dice. The person with the highest roll gets to roll the emotion dice.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The emotion dice lands on any one of the emotions. For example: Fear.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The tea-timer is turned, and each player, sitting in a circle, gets three minutes to draw the one thing that they are afraid of.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">When the time is over, each player gets to talk about the thing that they are afraid of.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Once everybody has explained their fear, they pass their sheet of paper to the person on the right. The tea-timer is turned. The next person draws something else on the sheet of paper – adding, remixing, morphing, changing the original drawing – to show how they can help in overcoming the particular fear. In the case of hopeful words like Love and Hope, the players add how they would increase and share in the feeling.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Each time the tea-timer runs out, the paper moves on to the next person in the circle. The process is repeated till the sheet of paper reaches the person who had first drawn on it.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">At the end, each person looks at the sheet of paper they had begun with and the others talk about the ways in which they have added to the original drawing.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The participants roll the number dice again and repeat the process. Participants are not allowed to draw the same thing if the emotion is repeated. The game can be played till there is interest or time to play it.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The players get to take the sheets of remixed papers home with them as artefacts and signs of the trust established within the game.”</li>
</ol>
<hr />
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Dr. Nishant Shah is the co-founder and Director-Research at the Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, India. He is also an International Tandem Partner at the Centre for Digital Cultures, Leuphana University, Germany and a Knowledge Partner with the <a href="http://www.hivos.net/" target="_blank">Hivos Knowledge Programme</a>, The Netherlands. Recently Dr. Nishant Shah visited HUMlab to participate in the conference “Digital gender: Theory, Methodology and Practice” (<a href="http://www.humlab.umu.se/digitalgender" target="_blank">http://www.humlab.umu.se/digitalgender).</a></p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/raw/digital-humanities/digital-gender-theory-methodology-practice'>http://editors.cis-india.org/raw/digital-humanities/digital-gender-theory-methodology-practice</a>
</p>
No publishernishantGenderDigital Humanities2014-04-07T04:07:27ZBlog EntryIndian WikiWomen celebrate Women’s History Month
http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/indian-wiki-women-history-month
<b>March 2013 was a busy month for women Wikimedians in India, as we conducted various events, such as edit-a-thons and workshops to celebrate the presence of women in Wikimedia projects. The women Wikimedians, members of the Wikimedia India Chapter and the Access to Knowledge Team, brainstormed about the possible events, which we wanted to conduct to encourage women to participate and to increase the quality of articles related to Indian women in Wikipedias in English and the Indian languages.</b>
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<p style="text-align: justify; ">This is a guest post by <a class="external-link" href="http://blog.wikimedia.org/2012/03/27/wiki-women-joining-indic-languages/">Netha Hussain</a>, a Wikipedia contributor from India who regularly contributes to Malayalam Wikipedia, among other projects. The blog post was originally <a class="external-link" href="http://blog.wikimedia.org/2013/04/24/indian-wikiwomen-celebrate-womens-history-month/">published on the Wikimedia Foundation page</a>.</p>
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<p style="text-align: justify; ">We decided to conduct the workshops and meetups in various Indian cities, in addition to online edit-a-thons. We created a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WHMIN13">co-ordination page</a> on English Wikipedia and added suggestions for articles to edit. We invited participants to join the edit-a-thon by spreading the word on mailing lists, social media networks and blogs. <a href="http://www.timescrest.com/society/world-wide-wiki-womens-web-dot-com-9981" rel="nofollow">The Times of India</a> published a feature about the event, which attracted many newbies to participate in it. We also created separate pages for offline events taking place in parallel, and we added a summary of the events to the main page. The participants of the edit-a-thon signed up on the co-ordination page, where we also added the details and status of Women’s History Month events happening in various Indian language Wikipedias.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The inaugural event took place on International Women’s Day (March 8) at Nirmala Institute of Education, Goa. Out of 100 participants who attended the event, 90 were female. Veteran Wikimedians <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Rohini">Rohini</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Nitika.t">Nitika</a> conducted a basic Wikipedia editing workshop. The event also set off the two-day long online edit-a-thon in which fourteen editors participated. Among those who participated in the program were homemakers, students and professionals. Rohini took charge as the Chairperson of the special interest group (SIG) for Gendergap at the Wikimedia Chapter India on the day of the workshop (March 8). She plans to conduct more workshops for women in the future.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Organizers subsequently held a series of events at two venues in Bengaluru and one in <a href="http://ml.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E0%B4%B5%E0%B4%BF%E0%B4%95%E0%B5%8D%E0%B4%95%E0%B4%BF%E0%B4%AA%E0%B5%80%E0%B4%A1%E0%B4%BF%E0%B4%AF:%E0%B4%B5%E0%B4%BF%E0%B4%95%E0%B5%8D%E0%B4%95%E0%B4%BF%E0%B4%AA%E0%B4%A0%E0%B4%A8%E0%B4%B6%E0%B4%BF%E0%B4%AC%E0%B4%BF%E0%B4%B0%E0%B4%82/%E0%B4%8E%E0%B4%B1%E0%B4%A3%E0%B4%BE%E0%B4%95%E0%B5%81%E0%B4%B3%E0%B4%82_2">Ernakulam</a>. Experienced Wikimedians <a href="http://wiki.wikimedia.in/User:Pavithra" rel="nofollow">Pavithra</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Nicke.me">Nikita Belavate</a> led the workshops in Bengaluru. The <a href="http://wiki.wikimedia.in/Wikipedia_Women%27s_Workshop_Bangalore_2013" rel="nofollow">workshop</a> also served as an occasion for editors living in and around Bengaluru to meet. The Ernakulam event was aimed at increasing the participation of women in Malayalam Wikipedia and was led by Wikimedian <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Dittymathew">Ditty Mathew</a>. Around 40 women participated in the three edit-a-thons. A Wikipedia Academy with 9 participants was conducted in Hyderabad. Led by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Anupama_Srinivas">Anupama Srinivas</a>, the last of all events took place on 30 March, 2012, in <a href="http://wiki.wikimedia.in/Wikipedia_Workshop_for_Women,_Chennai" rel="nofollow">Chennai</a>.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Nikita, who led the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wiki_Women%27s_Workshop_by_FSMK_and_WMIN">Bangalore event</a>, said she was filled with happiness watching the exuberance in the eyes of women participants who edited and saved their edits live on Wikipedia. “This year’s Women’s History month makes me once again believe in the power of women and honing it by empowering them, Wikiwomenising them,” said Nikita.</p>
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<th><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/BangaloreWorkshop.png" alt="Bangalore Workshop" class="image-inline" title="Bangalore Workshop" /></th>
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<td style="text-align: center; ">Participants of the Bangalore workshop organized by FSMK</td>
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<p style="text-align: justify; "><a href="http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Visdaviva">Vishnu Vardhan</a>, the Program Director of the Access to Knowledge team, was with the WikiWomen throughout the editathon, connecting people, planning events and urging them to contribute. He encouraged his mother, wife and female cousins to contribute to Wikipedia.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">“I wish more of us took the initiative of involving the women in our life to share their knowledge on Wikipedia and truly make the Wikipedias the sum of all human knowledge,” he said. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Outofindia">Harriet</a>, one of the key organizers of the women’s day events, believes that the Indian Wikimedia community has gained momentum in favor of bridging the gender gap because of this event. She urged the Indian community to follow this success and to increase the participation of women in the Wikimedia movement. Though she could not attend the events in person, she ensured her participation in the edit-a-thon by arranging the logistics, monitoring the coordination page and suggesting changes.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The events had good participation from men as well. Among the 14 participants who signed up on English Wikipedia, 5 were men. In Malayalam Wikipedia, 18 out of the 26 participants who signed up for the online edit-a-thon were men. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Dileepunnikri">Dileep Unnikrishan</a>, a male participant of the edit-a-thon, and a fan of Wikipedia, participated in the Ernakulam event because he was curious to find out how Wikipedia works. With women participants, he edited three articles and found it exciting to “be a part of the movement that has brought about a knowledge revolution in the world. The best thing I noticed about Wiki is that it has a peer-to-peer way of organization, which makes it warm and welcoming to newbies like me,” said Dileep.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The Indian WikiWomen are planning to conduct similar events in the future to increase the participation of women in Wikipedia and its sister projects. We are hopeful we will bridge the gender gap in the Indian Wikimedia community by conducting outreach programs, increasing awareness about free knowledge programs among women and conducting action-oriented events targeting women.</p>
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For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/indian-wiki-women-history-month'>http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/indian-wiki-women-history-month</a>
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No publisherNetha HussainAccess to KnowledgeGenderWikipediaWikimediaOpenness2013-04-29T09:21:45ZBlog Entry