Welcome!
This is where Women in Red plans future events and discusses ideas for more general improvements. Everyone is welcome to make suggestions or work on tasks. What we decide to do is based on consensus. No one is in charge. You don't have to be a member to participate. Like elsewhere on Wikipedia: be polite, be bold. Join the discussion here or on our project talkpage.
Thanks for alerting me but I am still having difficulty with the new automated environment. I realize it was intended to make things easier but yesterday I spent almost an hour looking into recent events but was unable to cope with simple issues like changing a title or adding a photo. For people of my age (in their eighties), after contributing for years and years in one environment, it is not easy to adapt to new procedures despite the step-by-step instructions. I am, of course, always happy to provide assistance once an event has been added and fully support the proposal to relieve WAU of this burdensome task. Thank you, Lajmmoore, for taking the initiative. I also wondered whether we could call upon the assistance of Megalibrarygirl and Espresso Addict, not only to work on the month-to-month setups but also to help with mass-messaging.--Ipigott (talk) 08:48, 28 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think I need to spend some more time learning. I can take the STEM month though as that's later in the year. I didn't see this before I started off the firming up list for jan below. Not sure I can get much further as the some templates need changing for 2025 and I haven't been able to work out how to do this. TheResilientEngineer (talk) 08:37, 28 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I will have a go at setting up for Jan, as I did a month shortly after the templates were set up. I'll call on template maker MSGJ if it gets tricky.--Oronsay (talk) 18:31, 28 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hi there, MSGJ. It's good to hear you are ready to help. I was wondering if you could improve the interfaces so that we are not faced with time-consuming tasks such as changing the title of an event, adding a photo or editing some of the pre-determined additions to the RH margin. It would be great if we could have an editable draft of the entire event as we used to have in the past. If such improvements could be made, I would certainly be willing to participate far more actively.--Ipigott (talk) 18:07, 29 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Mar: I volunteer to take March. (Note, my term on the WMF Board of Trustees ends next month (Dec 2024), so I can return to being more helpful around here, e.g., MassMessage on short notice, etc.) --Rosiestep (talk) 23:37, 27 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
In addition to the year long initiatives we have the recurring Women in STEM for October and Alphabet Run. More than 3 items might be too many for October. I know there has been talk about Women and their works which I'm happy to weave into the STEM month to recognise inventions, projects, materials, buildings etc etc created by women in STEM.
Can I suggest we do Halloween though? It's timely and might be very fun and get lots of engagement. Happy to draft the event but would appreciate some help to make sure it's suitably informative for participants. Once I've got the go-ahead I'll get this set up today/tomorrow. TheResilientEngineer (talk) 15:14, 10 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for starting this up, TheResilientEngineer. I'd truly prefer that Women's Works be a stand-alone event vs. woven into STEM (or anything else). In addition to inventions, projects, materials, buildings etc etc created by women in STEM, and aside from women's artworks and women's literary productions (plethora of these), there are women's conferences, the schools that women founded, etc. Perhaps there might consideration to shift Women's Works to November (or December) if October is quite full? BTW, including the works of STEM women during the STEM event makes sense, too... this year and every year. --Rosiestep (talk) 16:11, 10 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Alternatively, perhaps Women's Works could be considered as the 2026 Annual Year-Long Initiative. It would certainly be unique if our annual event did not focus on biographies. --Rosiestep (talk) 16:15, 10 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Events #350 and #351 are okay, except that they need photos in the infobox to replace the WiR logo. I don't know how to do that, or I would. --Rosiestep (talk) 17:31, 11 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Help with Spooky redlists please? I've started one for witches, uncertain whether I've made errors setting it up or if there is not the wikidata to pull from. Please suggest other redlists to feed into the event page and I can add those in. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheResilientEngineer (talk • contribs) 03:53, 12 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Rosiestep I think everything is in place for mass messaging now. Please feel free to double check stuff. I've added a tip of the month from the list. I don't know of any other announcements to add in. But the event pages are all good. Thank you! TheResilientEngineer (talk) 10:43, 29 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Innisfree987, Lajmmoore, Megalibrarygirl, Victuallers: The 5 of us are the ones who do the WiR MassMessaging, so I'm alerting you to a problem with the invitation I MassMessaged yesterday (which occurred in previous months, too). It is explained here. Thankfully, the issue is being corrected by others. But we should be aware of it, and not repeat it in the future. Good news ... it's easy to not repeat the problem. Instructions: When preparing our invite, ensure that all <big>...</big> and <small>...</small> tags start and end on the same line, with no manual line breaks. This is because they are called "inline" tags, which means they can't be used to wrap multiple lines of text. P.S. As a reminder, I'll add this info/instructions here. Please let me or Jonesey95 know if you have questions. Thanks. --Rosiestep (talk) 14:13, 30 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
YEAR-LONG INITIATIVES
#1day1woman 2024
** Event #326: #1day1woman #1day1woman
Music - Year long initiative Y
** Event #327: Music Year long initiative Education Year long initiative Y
Aware that October is only round the corner and I had volunteered to sort this out. I will need some help as I fell out of practice with wiki-ing after life threw me a curve ball at the start of the year.
In previous years I don't think there have been "themes", it was just left as Women in STEM. A theme might be a good idea though — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 10:20, 9 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You're right Martin, I was confused because Oct 24 was also a focus on archaeology and Nov 24 on engineers. I will request the edit to the event page etc. to reflect this. TheResilientEngineer (talk) 16:20, 9 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Personal opinion, I like keeping it broad, "Women in STEM", as there are so many redlist options, which gives all the editors out there who don't actively communicate with us a lot of choices. Similarly, each September, we focus on "Writers", again with multiple lists. That said, I'd support any narrower theme if that's preferred this year. --Rosiestep (talk) 19:39, 9 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
After reading a little about Margriet Herroes, a victim of the witch hunts who took her own life, I think it would be interesting, considering that 31 October is Halloween, to dedicate that month to women who were victims of witch hunts, historians of persecution, including magicians, fortune tellers, occultists, mediums, etc. I have the impression that something like this has already been proposed (forgive me, I have been quite disconnected from the Women in Red project for more than two years, which I am now resuming). Best regards. _-_Alsor (talk) 11:38, 1 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think if we can get some redlists sorted this could be good. I wonder if a crowd-soured list might be good as I know there are lots of Scottish witches on Wikidata, amny of whom arren't notable, which might obfuscate a Wikidata-drawn redlist? Lajmmoore (talk) 10:28, 24 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I did start a WD list on witches but I've not done a great job. If you're able to help that would be good. As Rosiestep has suggested below I think CS list as well will be helpful and happy to get this started unless one already exists? TheResilientEngineer (talk) 10:22, 15 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Always up for a Halloween event. If you start or improve an appropriate article for this event, be sure to submit it for DYK, they will likely have a few queues of special links for Halloween. Last year I had an article linked in DYK on Halloween, about classical scholar Margaret C. Waites, because her ghost is said to haunt a college building. There's also the whole range of horror writers, horror filmmakers, etc., to include in a redlist.Penny Richards (talk) 14:17, 9 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think this is a topic that is lacking redlists and sourcing. I would not be comfortable dead-naming people. It would create far more upset than support IMO. --WomenArtistUpdates (talk) 21:41, 7 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with WAU and, in any case, we offer LGBTQ+ women and Wiki Loves Pride every year in June, which surely covers this group. Oronsay (talk) 03:42, 8 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'd support a transgender focussed event - there are several lists by the LGBT wikiproject and (like with indigenous women) we can share primers for how to write sensitively about trans women Lajmmoore (talk) 09:46, 24 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I think it would be important that, in light of this annual event, editors be reminded/informed to include new articles in Lists of deaths by year, which lists deceased notable personalities by month and day and to which I have been contributing for years. According to Wikipedia statistics, it is one of the most read entry on Wikipedia, and Deaths in 2024 had a total of almost 50 million visits. In this way, the new biographies of women who died in XXXX year would be more visible. Best regards. _-_Alsor (talk) 16:47, 12 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Seems like a fun idea to write about chefs, cookbook authors, baristas, farmers, recipes invented by women, founders/columnists/editors/publishers of magazines associated with F&B, plate and glassware designers, etc. --Rosiestep (talk) 17:13, 24 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Also nutritionists, dietitians, food scientists, vintners, hunger relief workers, eating disorder specialists ... Plenty of room to range on this one. Penny Richards (talk) 16:52, 21 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Food is a great idea! There's a really good Smithsonian list somewhere for black women and food, will try to remember to find it! Lajmmoore (talk) 10:29, 24 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Grnrchst and Rosiestep:, We can easily push Developing countries to September. I have a different suggestion though. I'd like us to consider making the 2026 Alphabet Run next year be alphabetic by country of interest rather than name. We'd cover the world by the end 2026 without making distinctions about economics or "development". Am I missing the downside, or do you think this might be a good idea for 2026? --WomenArtistUpdates (talk) 16:17, 21 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@WomenArtistUpdates: I like the idea, but we'll need to figure out a good balance for it, as the proportion of countries starting with certain letters varies. Going by sovereign states, there are 11 A countries, 17 B countries, 17 C countries, 4 D countries, 8 E countries, 3 F countries, 11 G countries, 3 H countries, 9 I countries, 3 J countries, 5 K countries, 9 L countries, 18 M countries, 10 N countries, 1 O country, 10 P countries, 1 Q country, 3 R countries, 26 S countries, 11 T countries, 7 U countries, 4 V countries, 1 Y country and 2 Z countries.
Works for me. "works" has always been in our remit, but it could do with being re-emphasised (we can include Jilly Cooper books! without wondering if she (and that Shakespeare bloke) are getting "too much" attention). 4meter4's list should affect (improve) dozens of articles about actors, directors, singers, composers, authors, printers, and cinematographers who happen to be women. Victuallers (talk) 12:19, 2 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. I'm glad the responses are positive. When would we like to have this edit-a-thon, and what would be the best process for getting it organized and created? Also, I think there are other WikiProjects besides the ones I listed that could be invited. There are many studio art related projects for example, but even general topic areas could be invited. Someone from say Wikipedia:WikiProject Biology could write an article on a biology book written by a woman for example. We wouldn't necessarily have to limit invitations to just the projects that focus on arts and literature. Works of non-fiction are legitimate content for this edit-a-thon as well.4meter4 (talk) 22:08, 2 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Is this a possible candidate for our year long initiative for 2026? I realize it wouldn't add to our stats, but it is a fairly rich topic. Just putting it out there. The constraint I see is that there isn't a good source of redlinks (or is there?). Either way, the best way to get this going is to add the idea to our planning page at Wikipedia:WikiProject Women in Red/Ideas. That is where the brainstorming of how happens. There you can see what is already on the calendar for upcoming months. We generally do not have more that three meet-ups in a given month. --WomenArtistUpdates (talk) 22:35, 2 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It's definitely worth considering. I was originally imagining a month long wikipedia wide push to try and get editors outside the project involved with some different barnstar prizes based on amount of participation. It's a good way to recruit new members here, and/or get people thinking about topics related to women that they might wish to work on within the content area they usually edit in. Think of it as WIR planting seeds within other projects to increase wikipedia's coverage of women. That's the advantage of a short term edit-a-thon; the impact it could have on editing habits outside WIR.4meter4 (talk) 23:08, 2 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, 4meter4, for this constructive suggestion. I agree with you that inclusion in our monthly events would be a good way to start. As far statistics, I have found that writing about works created by women frequently leads to red-linked women who can then be covered in biographies. But it would also be useful if we could find a way of providing meaningful statistics on works created by women. We used to record them in our early monthly stats but for some reason we were urged to limit our listings to biographies (which are in any case covered by Humaniki). I'm not at all sure that was a sensible move. In any case, why don't we simply create an extra slot for "works created by women" in September? It could usefully be linked to our item on women writers but should of course be an independent event.--Ipigott (talk) 11:37, 3 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oh I never got that advice Ian I still add non biogs into the list. Maybe trial the proposal for one month for a potential year long effort. I think it would aid collaboration if we had a WIR tag that would take a choice of work i,e, theatre, film, books etc so that it would add two projects. Women in Red and Wikiproject Books. Maybe we could type "WIR|Books" or "WIR|Theatre" etc. I've no idea how to do this but maybe someone can consider this it looks do-able. Victuallers (talk) 12:05, 3 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Roger. I'm happy to see you still add women's creations to the list but am afraid they will have been deleted. Some time back Tagishsimon strongly suggested that we should keep to biographies and the automatic listings have been created on that basis. As there has been so little in connection with works created by women (except for literature), I think it would be useful to devote a monthly evemt to any such words. If need be, we could later specialize on works in different sectors of interest.--Ipigott (talk) 15:03, 3 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I understand that this should be the case for automatic counts. I was told as a manager that "you get what you count". If you count the number of people arriving on time... then more will arrive on time. You cannot confuse this by adding in the milk deliveries each morning. Counting biographies is a simple easy to do measure, but its only close to what we want. We do want to include womens' work, even if we cannot measure it so easily. A great painter is defined by their works not their life story per se. For instance, I have updated St Mary's Secondary School, Zomba and added it to #327. Its good work I reckon, the girls there can now find their school cross referenced into other articles... even if the biog count doesnt include it. HTH Victuallers (talk) 07:02, 4 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
4meter4 - I have copied/ moved this conversation from the main WIR talk page. It seems like the way to go here is to do a month long event to start with. At this point, we need to know what you would need in order to obtain your desired meet-up. If you are still in the planning stages and think September is too soon, perhaps October, or a month in 2026. It looks like there is a fair amount in interest in leveraging this into a collaboration with other projects. I think you would be the person to facilitate that and also any redlists. Please respond with your thoughts. Thank you! --WomenArtistUpdates (talk) 23:18, 4 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@WomenArtistUpdates I've never led a meetup before, and there would be a learning curve for me. I am happy to take on some of the leadership, but I think it would be better if a seasoned meetup leader were to be involved whom I could collaborate with. Is there someone willing to take this on? I think October or November would be a better month to do this. Best.4meter4 (talk) 16:31, 7 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Love this idea. I've just learnt how wide the variety of barnstars is so, the levels of contribution/variety of contribution will have to be considered carefully. Perhaps the redlink barnstar for 25 women, the goddess barnstar for 25 women from different occupations, the commons barnstar where they have 25 women and included images in all of them?
Hey all. For quite a while now I've been working on articles about revolutionary women (i.e. women who either participated in revolutions or were involved in revolutionary movements/organisations). Most of my submissions have been to other themed events, but I was thinking it might be fun to do a specific edit-a-thon focused on revolutionary women. I can try putting together a red list for it, perhaps we could do it some time next year? --Grnrchst (talk) 14:39, 27 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hey @Grnrchst I think this should go on the agenda next year. April 2025 does not have a theme attributed. Perhaps we add it to the list? When we get round to March it would be great if you can help create the event page, would you be happy to do that? TheResilientEngineer (talk) 08:48, 21 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I was just fiddling around with the number of links redlist, as I noticed it hadn't updated in over a year, and managed to get it back to working order. It got me thinking whether we should have an edit-a-thon focused specifically on creating articles with a high number of interwiki links; the redlist includes articles with 7 or more interwiki links. This could be a nice way to focus on the higher importance (for lack of a better term) articles that other language wikis have recognised as worthy of articles. --Grnrchst (talk) 09:46, 8 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Faced with the continuing problems with Humaniki (see WiR talk page), it seems to me it would be useful for this project to have an alternative approach to statistics on the proportion of biographies of women on the EN wiki. We should not be dependent on the availability of Humanity's principal creator, who is in any case usually busy with other assignments.--Ipigott (talk) 10:38, 2 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This section is purely administrative. It is not about the ongoing discussions of topics.
WiR generally has a variety of monthly, quarterly and annual events. WiR also sends out an “invitation” to its registered participants notifying them of those events. This is an effort to list tasks associated with the administrative tasks of updating and adding pages. We will be maintaining this list to assist with Quality Assurance. This is a working document and should be maintained to reflect current bast practices. WomenArtistUpdates (talk) 16:52, 18 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
As of March 2024 we are working with a new set of cascading templates. Because the template speak to each other the preview of the template might not be as expected. For example 302 might look like 304. Additionally some pages won't preview correctly unless the editor purges the page to update the cache.
The interrelated templates allow us to make changes and pages once, without updating new and past events throughout the WiR ecosystem. This will ultimately reduce mistakes, bad directs, and misinformation. The coders involved are watching these pages to ensure they work correctly. March 2024 is the first iteration. If direction are not clear it is the drafter's fault - not the coders, so please be gentle.
Each month there will be new events and ongoing events
YEAR-LONG INITIATIVES
#1day1woman 2024
** Event #293: #1day1woman #1day1woman
Education - Year long initiative
** Event #294: Education Year long initiative Education Year long initiative
NEW - Alphabet run Q & R
* Alphabet run Q & R
** Event #299: Alphabet run Q & R
NEW - Women's History Month | Art+Feminism - 260 as go by
* Art+Activism
** Event #300: Art+FeminismY
NEW - Find Her
* Find Her
** Event #301: Find HerY
Step 2 - create the event page at Wikipedia:WikiProject Women in Red/Meetup/n where n is the number of the new event. You can use the {{WIR meetup}} header template to help you, which will populate the event header and right side infoboxes.
Step 3 - add the "body" of the page (welcome, redlists, purpose) using a similar editathon as a starting point. You can copy sections from previous month to add boilerplate language. For example, start at Participants copy through the bottom of the page (example). (Remember to update month and event number in the pasted sections.)
Step 6 - invite and receive feedback from a sufficient number of WiR enthusiasts that the event page and invite are okay. Mark reviewed items with {{ok}}
** Event #327: Music Year long initiative Education Year long initiative
