Contributing to the Spoken Wikipedia WikiProject

Today in my search for web-based knowledge I discovered a new WikiProject which allows users to upload Ogg Vorbis (.ogg) audio files of wikipedia articles. It seemed like a nice little nerd project to begin on a relaxing day off from work.

I first needed to find a program that would allow me to record, edit and export audio files in the .ogg file format which is the only format wikipedia supports. I went with the free program Audacity. The program is fairly intuitive. I've never really used any audio editing software but was able to at least get by without reading the directions which, in general is the way I like to do things :)

Given my current obsession with Namibia I went ahead and tackled the country's main wikipedia page.

I dove right in, recording sections individually and compiling them using Audacity. After about two hours of recording I had a complete file. As I went back to the wikiproject page I realized that there were a couple spoken wikipedia conventions I hadn't abided by. I later discovered that, being a new wikiproject, these conventions really are just guidelines and it even states if they would prevent you from using a file its probably best to just upload it anyway.

I thought that I should include the recommended introduction and concluding statement. Going back and adding in parts to the Audacity project was difficult. I ended up having to make minor additions to each of the 20 or so separate tracks which ultimately made up the .ogg file.

Once that had been taken care of and the file was ready to go I discovered that in order to upload files to wikipedia you have to be an "established user". In order to be autoconfirmed as an established user you need to have an account active for more than four days and have made ten or more contributions or edits. I have made a few but not ten, so before I could upload my file I had to find a few more things to edit in the wikiworld. Once I reached the threshold I was able to upload the file.

At 27 minutes 10 seconds the audio file is quite long but if you're interested in hearing all or parts of it just go to the Namibia wikipedia article and click on the audio icon in the upper right corner.