About Thing 14
Purpose: Explore Wikimedia Commons as a platform for amplifying digital collections and inspect the structured linked data embodied in Wikimedia.
Learning Outcomes: Awareness of Digital Public Library of America's Wikimedia project and the usefulness of linked data. Learners may consider similar Wikimedia projects that might work for your local digital collections.
Intended Audience: Beginner
Prerequisites: Thing 4. Editing in Wikidata
Author: Hsianghui Liu-Spencer, Carleton College
Expected Duration: 45-60 minutes
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.
Getting Started
Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) collaborates with cultural institutions across the United States to aggregate content from their digital collections. One of their recent projects, DPLA + Wikimedia, has added millions of image files from partner organizations to Wikimedia Commons, the digital asset management platform that is used and linked to from other Wikimedia projects like Wikipedia. They are expanding on this work by making improvements to the structured data in Wikimedia Commons. This structured data may look familiar to you if you have completed Thing 4. Editing in Wikidata.
Activities
Watch a video:
- Under the "About Structured Data on Commons" section, watch Introduction to Structured Data on Wikimedia Commons.webm (03:43)
Explore Wikimedia Commons:
- Browse Wikimedia Commons, a sister project to Wikipedia.
- Read over a guide to contributing content to Wikimedia Commons.
Explore connections between Wikimedia Commons, Wikipedia, and Wikidata:
- View the Wikidata item Appeal to the Great Spirit (Q4780980).
- Look at the image statement, then click on the image "Appeal to the Great Spirit."
- View the item in Wikimedia Commons.
- From the "Appeal to the Great Spirit" image, click on "More details."
- Scroll down to the section "File usage on Commons" and look for "Category: Appeal to the Great Spirit," which links to a group of all related or relevant images.
- You could also spend some time browsing the "Structured data" part of the record and explore how the information is connected to the Wikidata item for Appeal to the Great Spirit.
- View the connection in Wikipedia.
- Visit the Wikipedia article of Appeal to the Great Spirit. Notice the image in the article takes you back to Wikimedia Commons, where it is stored. The structured data in the Wikimedia Commons record connects you to the Wikidata item page.
Reflection
What is the connection between the structured data in Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata? Why do you think some Libraries and Cultural Heritage institutions choose Wikimedia as another discovery platform? What factors would make you choose to contribute? Are there limitations that would make you ponder a bit more?
Additional Resources
These are all related to the process of adding digital items to Wikimedia Commons and connecting to Wikipedia articles.
- The Wiki Show, "How to Upload a Picture to Wikimedia Commons (Wikipedia Editing Basics).” YouTube, 15 Jan. 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIbqj-ae7xk
- Art + Feminism, “Advanced FAQ - Adding Images to Wikimedia Commons.” YouTube, 22 Jan. 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmIfRrhav1c
- “Commons:Categories.” Wikimedia Commons, 19 Feb. 2023, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Categories
What is the connection between the structured data in Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata? Why do you think some Libraries and Cultural Heritage institutions choose Wikimedia as another discovery platform? What factors would make you choose to contribute? Are there limitations that would make you ponder a bit more?