Wikimania Comes to America
by Jessica Baumgart, jessica_baumgart@harvard.edu

“Are wikis just another technology fad?” “What’s so useful about Web pages anyone can edit? “What’s the value of Wikipedia?” If questions like these keep you awake at work, a conference in Cambridge, Massachusetts, from Friday, August 4, through Sunday, August 6, might be for you: 2006 Wikimania, the International Wikimedia Conference.

The conference will feature several tracks, like law, technology, and access to information. Special activities, like Hacking Days and a potential citizen journalism seminar, are being arranged for the days before and after Wikimania. Because of the number of Boston area librarians interested in wikis and Wikimedia Foundation projects, planning is underway for many presentations and activities directly relevant to librarians, archivists, and similar information professionals. Last year’s conference in Frankfurt am Main, German, was a big success.

Learn more about the conference and register on its wiki at: http://wikimania2006.wikimedia.org/. There are still lots of opportunities to get involved to help with the planning, session organizing, translating, publicity, and more, too.