Wikipedia:Wiki World's Fair/2012



The Wiki World's Fair / Free Culture Festival was held on Governors Island in beautiful New York Harbor on Saturday July 7 as part of the Great American Wiknic, and as part of Wikimedia New York City's welcoming international visitors for Wikimania Takes Manhattan.

The event will combine a wiki-picnic and civic celebration in the southern section of the Parade Ground, sharing an area with the FIGMENT participatory art festival's arcade-themed artist-designed minigolf course, sculpture garden, and treehouse.

The celebration will be led by Wikimedians and Free Culture Alliance NYC, with DIY fair pavilions (bamboo poles to be provided!) for numerous represented Wikiverse and Free Culture initiatives.

You can sign up below, or also RSVP on the meetup.com page.

The event will last from 11am to 3pm.

For the regular monthly wiki-meetings in the New York area, see Meetup/NYC.

Great Bamboo Wikihenge
The centerpiece Great Bamboo Wikihenge will be a mashup of two modern classics of NYC installation art, Big Bambú at the Met and The Gates in Central Park, and also the proud global eccentrics' tradition of Stonehenge replicas and derivatives.

Our variation on the Neolitihic circle will be surrounded by a dozen or more Wiki-Pavilion gates, each designed and built as a creative customized play off of a basic torii-style pattern, with "the commons" - our grassy wiki-picnic and performance space, in the central area.

For food, remember this is "the picnic anyone can edit", and that means potluck, so please bring your own special dishes and noshes to share and add to the culinary mix.

Formal and informal groups from throughout the Wikiverse and Free Culture worlds, and also nonprofity groups with initiatives supporting such aims, are all invited to submit a Wiki-Pavilion, to be constructed on-site from:


 * 6 foot (1.8 m) bamboo poles, with twine for lashing, also ribbon, paper and card stock decorations (to be provided)
 * poster session-type displays from each group to be attached to the bamboo structure (please prepare ahead of time)
 * and all to be hand-built during the event, in an appropriately open source and literally crowd-sourced manner!

Also, feel free to bring any themed games or fashionable accessories to make it more fair-like.

We will also be visiting and playing in the adjacent FIGMENT long-term exhibitions area, and there are also options for more complementary activities on the Governors Island calendar, including the free Rite of Summer Classical Music Festival featuring Ljova and the Kontraband at 1 PM and 3 PM.

But when we leave at the end of the day, we take it all down and Leave No Trace.

Potential types of Wiki-Pavilions include: 
 * Wikimedia Europe Pavilion, Wikimedia Asia Pavilion, Wikimedia Ibero-America Pavilion
 * GLAMzone for Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums
 * Wiktionary Village
 * Creative Commons Castle
 * Mind The Gender Gap Scenic Railway

Wiki-Cabaret sign up

 * We will hold an informal 'Wiki-Cabaret' contest for poetry, poetry slam, music, dance, performance art, comparative encyclopedia readings, re-purposed public domain text (anything creative really!) under 3 minutes focused on Wikipedia and related projects, with fabulous t-shirt-shaped prizes.
 * Add your (user)name and the name of your piece.


 * - I have not chosen my piece yet.  Blue Raspberry    (talk)   18:48, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
 * - Maybe a poem or a song about Wikipedia. --Shujen Chang (talk) 17:37, 1 July 2012 (UTC)
 * - Maybe trying some Wikipedia stand up comedy. Be mercyful. :-) Ziko (talk) 23:32, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Wiki-Pavilion sign up

 * Add your (user)name and the name of the Wiki-Pavilion you are affiliating with. All nonprofity initiatives in the Wikiverse and Free Culture worlds are invited, including universities, cultural institutions, and Wikimedia chapters/regions.


 * Each group should bring poster session-type displays to be attached to the bamboo structure:

You can also RSVP on the meetup.com page.


 * Hannah, Free Culture NYU Pavilion (model: Washington Square Arch)
 * Schnevets (Steven Socha) NYU Pavilion
 * Theo10011 - Asia Pavilion
 * Wikitanvir -- Asia Pavilion or Wikimedia Bangladesh Pavilion!
 * Pharos - Wikimedia East Coast Pavilion (model: Northeast Corridor railway line)
 * Joe - no pavilion yet :P
 * Wikimedia Australia/Oceania Pavilion?--Pharos (talk) 17:09, 29 May 2012 (UTC)


 * MikesUptown - Neighborhoods Pavilion to come
 * Tomlzz1 (talk) The dotNeighborhoods
 * Ainali - Probably a Wikimedia Sverige pavilion (if I can convince a few people to join)
 * Or maybe something pan-Scandinavian? How about a Viking longship!--Pharos (talk) 17:09, 29 May 2012 (UTC)
 * A West European one? Ziko (talk) 18:35, 5 June 2012 (UTC)
 * With the current turn up, perhaps an European would be best. Ainali (talk) 18:06, 26 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Shujenchang Wikimedia Asia Pavilion
 * Magioladitis
 * Jweiss11 (talk)
 * Peter.C •  talk  •  contribs  18:08, 26 June 2012 (UTC)
 * GChriss represent'n Open Video. +A wireless Elphel video kit (model: a small couch, maybe plus a TV, poster-less)
 * It'll be one hell of an adventure for me to get there, but I'm sure it won't disappoint; compensates for having to back out of Wikimania a few days ago. The Blade of the Northern Lights  ( 話して下さい ) 01:37, 5 July 2012 (UTC)
 * OpenStreetMap! Had a last minute idea for a paper wiki map, will come over and see whats possible--Plane Mad 12:15, 7 July 2012 (UTC)