The winners of the "Wikipedians to the Games" competition will receive a trip to the event in London complete with airfare, accommodation and fixed expenses as well as the chance to report on and contribute articles about Australian athletes and the Australian tTeam's performance for Wikipedia and Wikinews.

To enter, Wikipedians and Wikinews contributors who are Australian residents must create content about the Australian Paralympic Movement with the aim to achieve the highest article ratings possible on the online encyclopedia.

Points will be awarded for the number of articles created that achieve high ratings, including articles that appear in the "Did you Know?" section of the Wikipedia home page and those granted Featured Article and Good Article status within the Wikipedia community.

The competition is a collaboration of the Australian Paralympic Committee (APC) and Wikimedia Australia and is open from now until April 20.

"Joining with Wikimedia Australia brings an exciting component to the APC's History Project," said the APC Knowledge Services General Manager, Tony Naar.

"It creates and preserves information about our Paralympic history and also is a highly effective way of communicating it with people around the world.

"The information is also being used by historian Murray Phillips, who is writing the history of the Paralympic movement in Australia for the APC."


The APC's relationship with Wikimedia Australia has developed through the APC Paralympic History Project which is designed to capture and preserve the history of the Paralympic Movement in Australia.

Since August 2011, approximately 400 articles have been created about the Australian Paralympic Movement and its athletes by Wikipedia editors.

The growing collection of articles attracted more than 54,000 views in December 2011 alone.

In the past 18 months, the APC's History Project has resulted in the Australian Paralympic Hall of Fame and annual reunions of past Australian Paralympic Teams such as Australia's remaining Paralympians from the first ever Games in Rome in 1960.

The project has also uncovered and preserved thousands of pieces of previously lost Paralympic memorabilia including photographs, Paralympic medals and team uniforms.

To find out more details click here.

Contact the writer of this story at [email protected]


Related stories
July 2011: Australia launch major project to tell story of Paralympics