Informatics Educational Institutions & Programs

Illumination at Buddha’s Alm

The WikiAlpenforum (WAF) met this time in Switzerland, at the country retreat Ried, a Tibetan-Buddhist cultural center near Bern, where cows with their calves graze on the pasture and horses and other farm animals live happily. This was the first time that Wikipedians from all five countries belonging to WikiAlpenForum were present. Altogether there were twelve participants from Switzerland, Austria, Germany, Italy and France. For three days we abstained from meat and alcohol and wandered for hours through the woods and alpine meadows, deep in conversation, as we passed by orchards and farmhouses. Indeed, the peaceful, contemplative surroundings contributed much to the positive outcome of the meeting. We were invited by our Swiss friends and many thanks are due to LantusL for the super organisation of the WAF excursion. Truly a promising prelude for the WikiCon 2018 in St. Gallen.

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  Wo wir tagten: Landguet Ried
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  Feld, Wald und Wiesen

First, the political

Our first stop, on Friday, was the Bundeshaus in Bern, the seat of the Government and Parliament of the Swiss Federation. Why the Bundeshaus the center of the Swiss democracy is and how the Swiss state with its federalist structure functions were explained to us during a two hours-long private tour by a Swiss wikipedian who is employed in the Bundeshaus. Afterwards we returned by the Bern-Niederwangen train to our quarters in Landgut Ried. After a vegetarian meal, the next item on the program was to be devoted to free discussion or editing. Instead of editing, we spent the entire time brainstorming, discussing all that was on our minds concerning Wikipedia and the WikiAlpenForum in the near future and gathering ideas for the next day. The discussions were primarily in English.

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  Im Bundeshaus in Bern ...
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  ... eine Lehrstunde in Demokratie

Presentation and Reporting

Next day, after a healthy breakfast with fruit and cereal, the first item on the agenda was the integration and structuring of the WAF activities and WAF contents, particularly considering the multitude of topics in the German, English, Italian and French Wikipedia. These are the results of our WAF excursions, which have also produced more than a thousand photos already uploaded to the Commons. We had already written a small exposé of important topics on the blackboard, which was meant to serve as a guide to the contents and structure of the WikiAlpenForum, It quickly became clear, that as we had discussed during the previous weeks and months in Munich, Berlin, Vienna, Zurich, Innsbruck, Paris, Grenoble and Trento, presentation and reporting of our labors on Wikipedia articles had been neglected. It was clear to us all, that an more intensive presentation of the many encyclopedia contents resulting from the WikiAlpenForum is necessary, including a presentation of the contributions from each of the chapters. We plan to present a WAF strategy paper with more details about just what this may look like around the middle of the year. The topic for the afternoon session was the hydroelectric power station Mühlenberg, which required a three-hour march on foot. We utilized the hike to learn much about the local botanical highlights, also to enjoy the wonderful houses and to learn about the local intensive production of culinary herbs in the region.

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  Diskutieren, präsentieren, berichten
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  Wohin geht die Reise von WAF?

Multilingual topic exchange

In spite of the exhausting day, we managed to pull ourselves together again in the evening and worked to expand our WAF-Meta-Site. We also discussed some of the topics that we want to address in the near future. Our Swiss and French friends plan to devote their energy to the topic of witch burnings in the various regions of the Alps. Also to the topic Women in Alpinism and in the Alpine Clubs. In addition we discussed in detail the general topic of cuisine in the Alps, particularly the articles which have appeared in the recent past, how better to define the cuisine of the Alps and which topics need to be looked at next. An additional main topic continues to be important to the botanists in our group: Alpine plant gardens. Here it appears necessary to establish as quickly as possible a comprehensive list of all the Alpine plant gardens in the countries of the Alps region, so that we can deal with the gardens one after the other. Actually, this was our first topic exchange in which all four Wikipedia Language project countries were represented. In the future, this exchange of topic ideas should be a part of all our WAF meetings, whether large or small. But communications on our WAF pages should also function as a central part of our WikiAlpenForum exchange.

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  WAF-ler aus 5 Alpenländern ...
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  ... next time perhaps in Innsbruck

Wikipedia crosses the alps

There was another topic which especially electrified us all: the suggestion made by our Tyrolean friends to bring the WikiCon 2019 to Innsbruck. New would be, that three experienced Orga members of the WikiAlpenForum would assist the three members of the Wikipedia community in Innsbruck in the organization of the meeting. The application has already been submitted. If it works out, there would be a significant shift towards the south, with the WikiCons 2018 in St. Gallen. Grenoble and Como. WikiCon 2019 in Innsbruck would be a big boost. Welcome to the Alps! Pi, To, Xa 14.6.