Abu Dhabi: After the overwhelming success of the 2021 Arabic Edition of the competition, the Emirates Literature Foundation and Wikimedians of the UAE User Group have launched the English Edition of the Kateb Maktub competition.
Organizers of the event have urged all the Wikipedia editors and enthusiasts to create English articles about Arab authors before the deadline on 18th August, 2022.
The competition aims to introduce Arabic literature and Arab writers to the English-speaking global community by increasing the number of articles available on Wikipedia.
Winners of the competition will be offered cash prizes, with the person securing the 1st Place getting $500 as prize. Runners-Up of the competition along with 3rd Place holders will be awarded with $400 and $300 respectively as prizes.
The contest has been divided into two categories, for Experts and Beginners, with a panel of experts and certified editors from the Wikimedia community judging the entries.
EXPERTS CATEGORY
Individuals competing in the 1st Category for Experts must be registered members of Wikipedia for at least 4 months prior to the start of the competition, 18th July, 2022, and should have edited 500 articles within the competition duration.
BEGINNERS CATEGORY
Participants of this category must be Wikipedia users who have been registered members on the platform for less than 4 months before the start of the competition and should have edited less than 500 articles within the competition duration.
To support the participants, the user group has composed a list of notable Arab authors’ names such as Ahlam Basharat and Ahmed Qandil and Arabic book titles such as “Memory of the Flesh”.
From the time they choose an author, contributors will have 24 hours to upload the article to Wikipedia to ensure there are no duplicates. Contributors can also choose to recreate an existing Arabic article in English.
KATEB MAKTUB PROJECT
Launched in 2020, the Kateb Maktub project is an initiative of the Emirates Literature Foundation in collaboration with the Wikimedians of UAE User group to drive a significant increase in the number of Arab author pages on Wikipedia in both Arabic and English, bringing Arabic literature the attention and appreciation it deserves.
To date, Kateb Maktub has successfully expanded the number of Wikipedia pages by more than 500 percent.