We are 27 expert freelance Wikimedia professionals with decades of experience working with Wikipedia and its sister projects in all aspects, including content, community, technology, & governance.
We work with organizations aligned with the Wikimedia mission to share their knowledge and expertise with the world, and we support each other in our professional growth.
Our Skills
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Community Organizing and Capacity Building
Skills: Community engagement, volunteer management, community liaising, facilitation, and workshop training.
Areas: Designing programs, projects and events, scholarship processes, collaborative drafting, and movement organizing.
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Content, Research, and Article Writing
Skills: Article assessment, editing for notability and neutrality, and expanding special subjects.
Areas: High-stakes topics, including individuals and organizations, to improve sourcing, writing quality and counter misinformation by leveraging targeted references and extensive research for the Wikimedia projects.
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Training, Education, & Public Engagement
Skills: Teaching undergraduate and postgraduate, mentoring, tutoring new users, conference keynotes, media interviews, and public writing.
Areas: Events and edit-a-thon and workshop facilitation, podcasting, and livestreams, multilingual programs.
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Institutional Partnerships (GLAM)
Skills: Managing Wikimedian in Residence (WiR) programs, complex partnerships, copyright analysis, open licensing, Creative Commons, and Freedom of Panorama.
Areas: GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Archives, Museums) partnerships, academic and higher education integration, guides and workbooks for institutional engagement.
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Technology, Engineering, and Data Science
Skills: MediaWiki extensions, wiki hosting, Toolforge, MediaWiki API, user scripts, gadgets, page styling, semantic data models, SPARQL, QuickStatements, OpenRefine, PattyPan.
Areas: Mediawiki and Wikibase implementation, Wikidata Query Service, bulk ingestion and multimedia uploads, schemas, Translatewiki.
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Strategy, Governance & Grantmaking
Skills: Strategic planning, project design, governance issues, risk and reputation, and public funding.
Areas: Fundraising and grantmaking, proposal writing, budget creation, reporting, financial auditing, product strategy, and product marketing.
Members Include:
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Jake Orlowitz, WikiBlueprint
Specialties: Wikipedians in Residence, Information Literacy, Misinformation, Project Management, Collaborative Drafting
I am a decades-long Wikipedia editor and administrator, and the former Senior Program Manager for Libraries and Knowledge Integrity at the Wikimedia Foundation. I founded and ran The Wikipedia Library, a partnership with 70 publishers to give 25,000 editors free access to 100,000 academic and scholarly journals. I kicked off the partnership with Internet Archive to rescue 15 million dead links on Wikipedia. I also built the Wikipedia Adventure learning game and tutorial. I have a passion for introducing people and organizations to our community and guiding them to prolific contributions.
Clients: Pérez Art Museum, Linux Foundation, Annual Reviews
Location: California, US
Language(s): English
Username: Ocaasi
Website: WikiBlueprint.com
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Léa Lacroix, Mindful Projects
Specialties: Community events, Wikidata, community engagement, project management, partnerships, local Wikimedia groups, training
I’m a community engagement consultant, supporting Wikimedia organizations to run projects and design events for their communities. Involved in the Wikimedia movement since 2010, first as a local group organizer then as the community engagement coordinator for Wikidata, I designed and ran dozens of community events, conferences, hackathons and meetups in several countries. I’m offering consulting, training and sharing my expertise on a broad range of topics: running community events, Wikidata projects, intercultural cooperation and documentation. I’m also training your new staff to get onboard with editing pages in wikitext and using the Translate Extension.
Clients: Wikimedia Deutschland, Wikimedia CH, Wikimedia Italia
Location: Sicily, Italy
Language(s): French, English, Italian, German
Username: Auregann
Website: Auregann.It
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Mary Mark Ockerbloom
Specialties: Wikipedia, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons, US Copyright, Science, Disinformation, GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Archives & Museums), Craft
I work with educational, scientific and cultural organizations to fill knowledge gaps in science, history of science, and craft. I advise partners on appropriate use of Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata. I assess whether topics are suitable for Wikipedia. I create and update information to keep Wikimedia platforms accurate and up-to-date. I have been a Wikipedian in Residence at the Science History Institute and Annual Reviews. For Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, I created a Wikipedia Workbook for Cultural Institutions (2024, 2nd ed.). I co-host the Philadelphia WikiSalon and give workshops and talks. At WCNA2024 I presented on dealing with disinformation.
Clients: Science History Institute, Annual Reviews, Vizcaya Museums and Gardens
Location: USA
Language(s): English
Username: Mary Mark Ockerbloom
Website: A Celebration of Women Writers
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James Hare, Scatter
Specialties: Wikibase, Citations, WikiProjects, Wikidata, Query Service, Hosting, Tech Tools
I am a software developer, product manager, and consultant. I have been on the Internet since the late 1990s. In 2004 I registered an account on a little-known website called Wikipedia, volunteering in different ways. As Wikipedia grew my role expanded, including various volunteer and professional roles. I elaborate on my wiki user page. These days I consult on technical projects through my business Scatter. I am quite involved on the Wikipedia spinoff project Wikidata. I am enthusiastic about decentralized knowledge graphs, decentralized technology in general, and the potential of open standards and open technology.
Clients: Internet Archive, Hacks/Hackers, NIOSH
Location: Oregon, US
Language(s): English
Username: Harej
Website: scatter.red
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Subhashish Panigrahi
Specialties: Wikipedia strategy; program and project consultation; managing and training in DEI, grants, and community engagement; copyright and open licensing; branding; institutional partnerships
I am an expert Wikipedia administrator with 13 years in social entrepreneurship, digital rights, community building and language technology. I supported Wikipedia communities in over 25 languages, built the largest South Asian-language speech corpus in the Public Domain, co-founded Wikimedia Affiliate Odia Wikimedians. I am a National Geographic Society-awarded documentary filmmaker, with all films under Creative Commons Licenses. I built a network of 200 changemakers and catalyzed 45K open source contributors across Asia-Pacific. I worked at the Wikimedia Foundation as a Community and Programs strategist. I help foundations, innovators, businesses, and networks make long-term cultural, ethical and practical systemic shifts.
Clients: Wikimedia Foundation, Global Voices, Pratham Books
Location: Toronto, Canada
Language(s): English, Odia, Hindi
Username: Psubhashish
Website: psubhashish.com
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Elisabeth von Münch, PhD
Specialties: Wikipedia editing in the area of climate change, science communication through Wikipedia, online training for Wikipedia editing, facilitation of online edit-a-thons
I’m a seasoned Wikipedia editor with over 55,000 edits since 2014, ranking in the top 2000 worldwide among Wikipedians by edit count. Passionate about climate change, I have worked with clients like Stockholm Environment Institute, Skat Foundation, Project Everyone, South South North, and the Earth System Governance Project. Together, we enhance Wikipedia's climate science content, making it easier to understand, more accurate, up to date and balanced. I also train and mentor newcomers in Wikipedia editing. With a PhD in chemical engineering and experience in designing wastewater treatment plants, I bring a solid academic training and background to my work.
Clients: Stockholm Environment Institute, Skat Foundation, Earth System Governance Project
Location: Ulm, Germany
Language(s): English, German
Username: EMsmile
Website: LinkedIn
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Andy Mabbett
Specialties: Wikipedia, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons - Training, Bulk Upload, Policy Advice, Lectures, Conference Keynotes
I have been Wikimedian in Residence with over a dozen museums, galleries and other institutions, and provide consultancy to public bodies, charities, companies, and universities. My work encompasses all aspects, including public engagement events, staff/ volunteer training, copyright/licensing validation, media-, data-, and metadata uploads, management briefing and advice on policy. I have taught Wikimedia courses at the Polytechnic University of Milan for PhD students in the sciences; for a University of Birmingham MA programme; and others. I have delivered guest university lectures on four continents, and keynote speeches on five, at conferences on open content, open data, science, libraries and archives.
Clients: BBC, Royal Society of Chemistry, UK Parliament
Location: Birmingham, England
Language(s): English
Username: Pigsonthewing
Website: pigsonthewing.org.uk
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Mervat Salman
Specialties: Wikipedia, Movement Strategy, Project Management, training, community events organization, facilitation
I started editing Wikipedia in 2012, and became an admin in 2013, and now I've made 183,046 global edits. I've conducted and managed several online/offline events including editathons, editing and photo contests, and training and learning sessions. I was director of the WikiArabia 2015 conference, a member of the scholarships committee of WikiArabia 2022, 2024, a member of the Wikimania scholarships committee 2017-2019. I've Volunteered in the MS community health working group and joined the WMF Code of Conduct team as a contractor in 2019, and the Movement Strategy Facilitation team from 2021-2023. I've been a member of the Conference Grants Review Committee since 2016, the elections committee since 2024, and director of the Wikimedians of the Levant user group since 2022. I currently work as a Wikimedian in Residence with the World Intellectual Property Organization since February 2024.
Clients: Wikimedia Foundation, WIPO, Arabic Wiki Community
Location: Amman, Jordan
Language(s): Arabic, English, some Spanish
Username: Mervat
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Jan Ainali, Open By Default
Specialties: Wikipedia, Wikidata, training, coaching, Community events, transparency,
I’m a seasoned Wikimedia expert with over 18 years of experience in the Wikimedia movement. I’ve held pivotal roles, including co-founding Wikimedia Sverige and serving as its chairman. My innovative contributions include reusing Wikidata in the award-winning Govdirectory project and hosting the Wikidata Live Editing show. My work earned the Swedish Wikimedian of the year in 2021. Through Open By Default, I leverage my expertise to promote open knowledge and collaborative solutions. My commitment to sustainable development and open source principles underpins my services aimed at enhancing transparency and accessibility in the digital age.
Clients: Wikimedia Sverige, Wikimedia Norge
Location: Amsterdam, Netherlands
Language(s): Swedish, English
Username: Ainali
Website: openbydefault.se
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Nicolas Vigneron
Specialities: Wikidata, Wikisource, Wikimedia Commons, Training and Content+Data Import
I've been editing Wikimedia projects since 2004, first on Wikipedia then on Wikimedia Commons, Wikisource, Wikidata and most recently on Wikifunctions. I have given presentations and trainings around these projects since 2009. Between 2021 and 2023, I became a Wikimedian in Residence twice, first at the libraries of Clermont Auvergne and then at the Museum of Brittany. I'm interrested in and edit primarily around culture and heritage, in partnership with institutions. For instance, I've imported data for the SAPA Foundation, the Swiss Archive of the Performing Arts, creating 14,000 items in Wikidata.
Clients: Wikimedia CH, Universities (Rennes, Quimper)
Location: Bretagne, France
Language(s): French, English, Breton
Username: VIGNERON
Website: LinkedIn
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Cindy Cicalese
Specialities: MediaWiki extension development, semantic modeling, training, DevOps
I've worked with MediaWiki since 2007, starting as a Principal Engineer at MITRE, where I maintained dev, staging, and production wikifarms for government and internal customers. I've open-sourced about a dozen extensions since 2012, including PluggableAuth, the second most downloaded extension on ExtensionDistributor. From 2017 to May 2025, I served at the Wikimedia Foundation as Senior Product Manager for MediaWiki and Principal Engineer on MediaWiki core and Developer Experience. I then joined health tech startup Selfiie before founding Amethyst Collaborative Knowledge. I also serve on the board of the MediaWiki Stakeholders' Group.
Clients: WikiWork, WikiTeq, NobleProg
Location: UnitedStates
Languages: English
Username: Cindy.cicalese
Website: https://amethyst-ck.com
About Us
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We are Wikimedians at heart, passionate members of the movement.
We work for the benefit of the movement in collaboration with the community.
We positively contribute and help the community learn while doing so.
We give back with improved processes, tools, and documentation.
We use our real names and rely on our professional reputations.
We view each other as collaborators and share our expertise.
We comply with all Wikimedia Foundation Terms of Use and local wiki policies.
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What are the benefits of using a Wikimedia consultant?
Wikipedia is part of Wikimedia. A Wikimedia consultant is a phenomenally competent guide for engaging, contributing, and organizing with Wikipedia's content, the sister projects (Commons, Wikidata...) and the broader community. Years or even decades of experience yield professional partnerships, measurable impact, and lasting influence and visibility. Highly ethical practitioners build trust and form relationships while avoiding blowback, wasted time, and false promises that violate community norms.
Who can join this group?
Experienced, expert, effective, and ethical Wikimedians who are freelancers or consultants accepting clients now or with multiple current clients.
What is the purpose of joining this group?
Make excellent practitioners visible, maintain high ethical standards, share stories, challenges, and solutions, refer clients to other members with specific skills, collaborate together and gain more work.
What is this group not?
A company, industry lobby, corporate influence group, association of PR or Marketing professionals, a paid editing agency, a formally recognized Wikimedia movement affiliate, or connected with or endorsed by the Wikimedia Foundation.
How do you handle conflict of interest?
We overwhelmingly work with nonprofits and mission aligned organizations, so we generally have an alignment of interest. That said, we fully abide by all Wikimedia Terms of Use and Conflict of Interest Policies and Guidelines across the movement and on local wikis. We disclose any client on behalf of whom we edit or advocate.
Is a Wikimedia consultant different than a Wikipedia consultant?
Wikipedia is the best known and most popular project that billions of people use and learn from each month. Experts in Wikipedia focus on improving its articles; however, the Wikimedia universe is large with huge, lesser known projects that focus on images, linked data, and technology. Each consultant has a different focus and set of skills, many geared towards Wikipedia, but what we have in common is that we are members of the broader movement called Wikimedia and committed to its success.
Contact Us
Whether you're interested in our services or joining our network, get in touch with us below and we will get back to you as soon as possible.