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Edit: January 31, 2008- Join WikiPilipinas Filipina Stories Contest

WikiPilipinas is calling all Filipinos worldwide to contribute and share information that is fundamentally Pinoy. Its objective is to propel WikiPilipinas.org to be one of the top ten wikis of the world.

WikiPilipinas.org describes itself as the popular and free web-based encyclopedia of the Philippines. It wants to bring in thousands of volunteers to take part in “knowledge revolution,” a campaign to foster nationalism and garner cultural recognition of the Philippines in the world.

The portal is based on MediaWiki, the same technology platform of Wikipedia, the world’s largest web-based, free content encyclopedia project. But WikiPilipinas is localized to contain content that is specifically Filipino. A wiki is a knowledge-sharing tool on the Internet. Wikis are online websites that allow users to add, remove, edit, and share contents easily and quickly.

Originally codenamed Wikipiniana, WikiPilipinas is currently the world’s biggest Philippine encyclopedia available on the web. It was launched on March 15, 2007 and in just five months, it has published more than 33,000 articles, which are sectioned in 12 knowledge portals: people and society, culture and arts, media and entertainment, sports and leisure, history, economy and business, government and politics, geography and travel, religion and beliefs, science and technology, Philippine communities, and a Philippine web directory.
Aside from its growing encyclopedic content, WikiPilipinas has added several other features such as (1) an almanac of lists (2) a Yahoo-style directory of the top Philippine knowledge portals and (3) community portals specifically aimed at reaching underserved communities such as Tsinoy, Hispano-Filipino, and Filipino-American.

Within the year, WikiPilipinas aims to reach its stated benchmark of 100,000 articles to propel it to the top 10 wiki encyclopedias of the world, which include the English, French, Chinese, Dutch, Spanish, German, Polish, Italian, Portugese, and Swedish wikis.

WikiPilipinas founder Gaspar Vibal, notes this achievement would “serve as proof that Philippine culture has the depth and substance to stand alongside the best in the world.”
Vibal and his team of knowledge workers at WikiPilipinas invite volunteers, young and old, from all over the world to join and contribute in expanding its knowledge portal. The public is invited to visit the WikiPilipinas exhibit at the Manila International Book Fair on August 29 to September 2, 2007 at the World Trade Center in Pasay City for a sneak peek and a walk-through. Visitors can participate in live demonstrations and tutorials on the Philippine wiki revolution.

WikiPilipinas is the second project of the Vibal Foundation, the corporate social arm of Vibal Publishing House, Inc., an educational publishing company that has served the nation for more than 50 years. Last year, Vibal Foundation launched its pilot project, Filipiniana.net.

FOR MORE INFORMATION, visit www.wikipilipinas.org. For press inquiries, please contact Julius Corotan (0906 6230 702, e-mail jules@vibalpublishing.com) or Rio Brigino (0927 452 7021, e-mail rio@vibalpublishing.com)

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 23rd, 2007 at 11:14 am and is filed under Press Release. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.