Open access is about unlocking research and making scientific knowledge freely available to everyone.
For Wikipedians, it’s not an abstract ideal—it’s essential to ensuring people can find reliable, high-quality information where they already look for it.
Every month, thousands visit English Wikipedia to learn about climate change (75,000 readers), HIV/AIDS (70,000), or the Russo-Ukrainian War (300,000). Behind those pages are thousands of volunteers who curate and improve the content.
Open access helps them do that work. It lets research flow beyond academia and reach the public who need it.
But how do we build better bridges between Wikimedians and the open access communities worldwide?
In a recent project, we surveyed all affiliates of the Wikimedia movement to get an understanding of what current open access and open science activities within the Wikimedia movement look like.
We, of course, already know that many Wikimedians have contributed to open science throughout the years: as Wikimedians in Residence at academic institutions, in collaborations with research programs, conducting Wikipedia trainings with PhD students and scholars, or advocating for institutional change towards openness.
But no one has had a broad picture of what activities the Wikimedia movement has done, or is currently doing.
This is why we surveyed all the Wikimedia affiliates, not by statistically representative means, but to explore the general interest and gather input for an initial mapping.
Of all the affiliates in the movement, roughly 20 % responded to our survey. Of the respondents, 90 % expressed an interest in being informed of, or engaged in, open science activities within the movement. There is thus a strong interest in collaboration.
We also found that more activities than we had envisioned already exist. Almost half of the respondents stated that they already engage in open science activities in one way or another – showing that there is a strong foundation to build upon.
Of those replying that they are already engaging in open science activities, activities involved advocacy for better legislation or policies; building networks (such as with libraries) and collaborating with researchers and research institutions to add and improve content on the Wikimedia platforms, organizing Wiki campaigns related to science or sometimes even to conduct research and publish in open-access journals; developing and sharing open educational resources and promoting citizen science activities; or organizing conferences related to science.
Affiliates were also interested in:
- Exploring funding opportunities for open science work
- International collaboration to lower barriers for engaging in open science initiatives
- Communicating and sharing the word about open science projects and activities in affiliates and other parts of the movement
- Finding ways to make Wikimedia content more aligned with the FAIR principles
Building on this strong interest in collaboration, we are in the process of developing an Open Science Wiki Community, inspired by the long-standing and successful GLAM Wiki Community. If you are interested in joining this Community, we invite you to share your contact details.
As we close out Open Access Week and celebrate UN Day, we invite you to join us in forging stronger connections among Wikimedians, and laying the groundwork for increased capacity-building, knowledge sharing and coordination around open science.
Project partners:
Wikimedia Sverige
Wikimedistas de la Universidad Nacional de La Plata
BOAI Org
11:00am-12:30pm CST/1:00-2:30pm EDT/2:00-3:30pm BRT
The BOAI Org and the National Council of Rectors of Costa Rica (CONARE) are pleased to announce the second event in our series of webinars addressing the worrying trend of diamond journals adopting the APC model. This webinar will focus on Brazil. Continue reading “Second Webinar in Series Highlighting the Need to Protect the Diamond Open Access Model in Latin America”