 Welcome and hello to the Wikimedia Sound Logo Project Roundtable and Q&A. I'm saying hi from windy, cold, but very sunny Johannesburg. My name is Matoto Mazadella. I'm the senior manager in the communications department at the Wikimedia Foundation. I'm joined by my colleague Taz. Taz, can you introduce yourself please? Hello, hello from a very hot and sticky London. My name is Taz Elias. I'm the brand collaborations lead at the foundation. I'm Matoto's colleague in the brand studio. And I am working with Matoto on the sound and music aspects of this contest. So if you're here today, you're probably curious to learn more about the Sound Logo Project and Contest. It's a project to create a sound for Wikimedia's knowledge and content with you, our volunteer communities, and pretty much any free knowledge enthusiast around the world. We'll tell you more about the details of this project in this session, giving you a project overview and the people behind it. We'll also show you the many ways you can get involved and leave ample time at the end to cover off any questions that you may have after listening to the session. And so to begin with the project overview, we know that many people around the world are seeking knowledge and information, and they're doing so increasingly using voice assistants from their laptops or their phones using applications like Siri and Alexa and many, many more. This is hardly new information. We're entering the Internet of Things. Our content, Wikimedia content, is also on audio devices and is also increasingly available around the world. Unfortunately right now, this content is often not identified, and so the listener probably doesn't know this content is coming from a Wikimedia project. So a sound logo in brief is a collection of sounds such as a short mnemonic, usually one to four seconds long. And the idea is that this little mnemonic would be played in an audio interface when content from Wikimedia is served. It's a device that is very similar to the well-known Tadam that Netflix uses and the Nokia sounds for those who are there in the 90s. A sound logo offers us, Wikimedia, very many new ways to be identified in the knowledge ecosystem through audio interfaces. And so the team behind the sound logo project is a big collaboration. We are incredibly happy to have a global set of community liaisons. I think they are on the call today. And we also have staff from the foundation who are working on the project in various capacities, as well as supporters and advisors from department colleagues at the foundation. On the call, we might have many of your colleagues as organizers and volunteers. Andy, Beantel, Irina, John and Mohamed, I'm sure they are saying hi in the chat. And I then pass on to Terz, who will share more about the global contest itself. Thanks very much, yeah. A few words about the contest design, because this is an open global contest, which we're looking to crowdsource the sound logo and work with one of our partners. So we'll just go into that now. So the contest itself is based mostly on a lot of the previous logo contests that the Wikimedia movement have been integral in creating. But as it's a new kind of contest in that we're looking for sound, there are some new aspects as well. So as I said, it's an open global contest. So it will be created on a WordPress portal, which actually means that members of the public and those that may not have a Wikimedia account can participate. One other important aspect is because it's an open global contest, we're very likely to get numerous submissions and with that comes the need for a screening team to ensure that we capture any submissions that are technically incorrect or could be seen as vandalism. So we're looking for a community screening team to help with that aspect early on in the contest. The final vote, which will be for the final 10 sound logos, will take place on Wikimedia Commons. And there will be prizes for the winner and for the other nine finalists as well, which we're finalizing at the moment. So just a word on our technical partner for this project. We're working with an agency, a sonic agency called Massive Music, who have been making sound logos and other sonic branding tools for the past 20 years. They're global leaders and they've been working with us for a fair few months, ensuring that the contest and all of the aspects behind the contest work and are legally sound. Next slide, please. So a bit more to where the community comes in. We're going to have a selection committee who will be deciding with Massive Music exactly which 10 sound logos will go to the final vote. Our colleague Murdad, who I'm sure many of you know has been working hard behind the scenes to put together the selection committee. And here are a few aspects of how the sound logo should sound, which is what we're calling the brief and it would be included on the web portal as a criteria for entrance. So the sound logo should feel human, inspired, smart and warm, all very emotive descriptors for the movement itself. Three aspects which are technical requirements is that it should comprise of multiple layers, textures or sounds. So that essentially means that there should be more than one sound and each sound should happen and play back one over the other. So we had a masterclass session on Thursday with our partners, Massive Music. We went into all of the detail and provided some music production tools and instructions and guidance on how to do that. We were able to watch that masterclass very soon. Your sound logo submission should be between one and four seconds long and it should only contain original sounds or sounds that are CC0 or public domain. So there are the main aspects of submissions. Next slide, please. Is that mine? No. Sorry, I can't hear you. Can you hear me now? Yep. Awesome. Thanks, Tas. So naturally, we really want to make this a participatory process in not just the contest design, we wanted to indeed, but also in the way that we were making decisions. We part of designing the contest as Tas shared involved a range of community conversations that were led by my Medard who is in our movement communications team. And the objective here was to really offer communities a chance to take in a lot of information about quite a complex and new way of seeking a logo, a sound logo. And we put all of this in a contest proposal in nine languages on meta and had it for review over May and June, inviting suggestions and feedback on the talk page and in other forums including an email. We also hosted two dedicated virtual sessions that were part information sharing as well as an introduction to some sonic concept. And hearing these, the results, just a snapshot of the results is, for us this was an incredible milestone for the project because hearing many of these questions and comments allowed us to reflect and also make decisions for the next steps of the project. All of this is documented on meta. We were looking out to hear where there was support and where there was no clear objection, allowing us to make the immediate next steps and steps towards the completion of the project clear while keeping you all updated. And this big sort of feedback from the session was that there was quite a surprising and very good to know that this is an exciting project. People are very excited that it's happening and they increasingly want to get involved and want to find out how. And that they wanted something that was, that many people really wanted to reiterate was that conceptualizing and capturing and producing sounds is quite complex and takes time and that this process, the contest itself should not be rushed. And so it's wonderful that we're here at Wikimedia to give communities around the world a preview and a head start to conceptualizing and collaborating so that they have almost a month and a half a head start before the rest of the world can join in. Same with the selection. They will come in around how it might be more difficult to make a selection of a sound, which is not the same as making, comparing two logos. One has to listen and take it in. And so we needed that voting period also to have some breathing room in the contest design. And lastly, absolutely in a completely Wikimedia way, this has to be a ways for people to collaborate. And so we wanted, we heard very clearly that people wanting to work or submit a sound should be given a chance to collaborate. And so we found ways to allow for that, including an open library that is on the contest page on Meta that has a forum for one to collaborate but also resources to use meeting up to the contest open. And so the best part, how do you get involved? Taz will share more. You're muted, Taz. Can you hear me now? Yeah, sorry about that. I have a plus one in the room. So the team are currently working on the WordPress web portal, which will allow us to receive screen and review submissions. We're also looking at how the vote will take place on Wikimedia Commons as well. At the moment, my dad is working on putting together a screening team. So if you are interested in becoming a part of the screening team, please email sound logo one word at Wikimedia.org. As I mentioned before, my dad is also putting together the selection committee. Matoto is working on global outreach with more of our colleagues from the communications department at the foundation and also looking at promotion. As I mentioned, the workshop happened at Wikimedia a couple of days ago and that will be available for you to review very shortly. The production of the contest promotion materials is also underway. So here's a timeline, a rough timeline. So the submission period for you to submit your sound logo entrance will be from mid-September to mid-October. It will last roughly a month, so it's coming up soon. The final vote will be open for three weeks, roughly from the end of November this year. There will be a legal review where the foundation our partners, Massive Music and the musicologists and independent musicologists will start their due diligence, copyright checks, contracting and clearance, which will take a fair few weeks, but that's to ensure that the sound is unique, can be registered and can represent all of the hard work that the Wikimedia community do every day. And we are aiming to announce the winner in early 2023. So that's a quick look ahead at what's coming up for the sound logo team. So ways for you to get involved. Here's just a few, but if you have any questions, thoughts, ideas or suggestions, please reach out to the community liaisons and the team as well. So first things first, when it's available, watch the sound logo masterclass. It's very valuable. It goes through the basics of sound logos, where sound logos came from and why they're so important now, at least of all because many of us are online and many of us are using sound solely to gain knowledge. So watch the sound logo masterclass. Very valuable. Next, find and tag existing sounds that are in the public domain or create from a zero. We'll be sharing a link to what they're calling the sound lab, which is the collaboration space that has lots of sounds for you to use on your submissions. And we're inviting people to bring together a lot more. Think of concepts as well. How do you feel the Wikimedia movement could best be represented by sound? So we're asking you to conceptualize that. Take some time to think what sounds represent the Wikimedia movement best. And you can start sharing with your community members and concepting together capture sounds. So capture sounds on your mobile phone or if you've got a microphone and a laptop, perhaps you can capture sounds out and about. That's a great way to think about concepting and work your way towards the final sound. And then once the contest is open, submit your unique sound logo to the contest where we'll be screening, reviewing, scoring and selecting. Encourage others to submit sounds as well. This is very important because we're very, very keen for the Wikimedia community to submit sounds that represent their community. And then lastly, inquire to join the screening team because we need lots of people to review sounds. We're expecting quite a few sounds, so it'd be great if the movement could be a part of that screening process too. So that's about it in terms of ways to get involved. I think that might be the last slide. Yes, that is. So we're opening the floor for people to ask questions, share thoughts, feelings about the contest, et cetera. So we'll just have a look in the sidebar. Have there been any questions? Sorry, go on. I just want to say a heartfelt thank you to everyone who has taken the time to familiarize themselves with the contest so far from the early essay that we wrote in November, right up to the consultations in May and June. We appreciate your enthusiasm and your interest and your suggestions and look forward to more. I think the slides may have gone at one point, but we will be uploading these slides to Wikimedia Commons soon after this round table for everyone to review at their leisure. Awesome. Yeah, I just updated the link for the sound lab. I don't think it was working, but I think Mohammed and I have both dropped those links in there in the chat. So we have a question from the Etherpad. There's some skepticism about the initiative. One of the main objectives from the commenter side is what exact usage of sound logo of Wikimedia is this going to be and in what situations. Right now I struggle to think of any. Okay. I think we can answer that from a top line of perspective. So in the first instance, Matoto mentioned that the first use case for the sound logo is going to be for voice assistance. In the, I think it may have been an earlier version, but we can certainly share some research that points to a proliferation of sound assistant uses or smart speakers, as they're often called, which are used at home like the Amazon Echo, for example, and the Google Apple HomePod and things like that. So those smart speakers, as they're called collectively, are used quite readily around the world and use is growing exponentially. And the research points to the fact that a very large percentage and it has always been over 75% of particular searches, which are knowledge based and fact based, use Wikimedia content for their answers. We have the research figures that we can share as mentioned, but an awful lot of the time, more often than not, the Wikimedia content isn't identified. It's coming from Wikimedia projects. So we saw this as an opportunity to create something that can identify the Wikimedia volunteers' hard work. And this is just a start. The first use case is for that purpose, but it can, of course, be used for multiple uses, including, you know, on the many videos that the movement create that could signify and identify that they're part of the Wikimedia movement. It could be used on content made outside of the movement as well alongside the logos that already exist as part of the Wikimedia visual identity. So I hope that answers your question. If you want to add anything there, Tata. Thanks for the question. And just to add one more resource that would have an exhaustive list of use cases and some of the research that Tata has mentioned, you can find on the FAQ tab on the Sound Logo Meta page. And I will add it here. There was also a request for the session on Thursday, which I actually just saw pop up in the feed loop. There were a few technical issues, but I'll share it now. But please be sure if anyone would like any resources or assistance, please email SoundLogo at wikimedia.org. That's a great place to access not only your community liaisons, of which there are five, but also the project team direct. So let me find the link quickly and I'll share that in the chat if there's any more questions. All right, so I think I have found a YouTube link, so I'm going to drop that in the chat if anyone would like to review the SoundLogo Masterclass from Thursday. I'll just double check that's the right link. I'm not sure you saw the question in the Q-Taz around the criteria the screening team will use to utilize to judge the sound. Or is that all in the video? We can. I think it's the two-minute delay between YouTube and feed loop. And so we're good to proceed, I think we're good. No, they didn't. Do you see the question in the Q&A? I also drop in. You know what, let me just write a comment. It's quite simple and the slide should be on the screen now. It's essentially the last three bullet points on that. So the screening team will look to hear if there are at least two sounds that overlap with one another to create a layered composition. They'll also listen to see if the sound is between one and four seconds long. And they'll look to hear if they can recognize any sounds or sounds that may not be original or part of the public domain. But this is, of course, this would require further research for the team to speak to the person that submitted it. They will provide rationale and justification for their sound as well. But further to that, the screening team will log on to the web portal through the back end and as screeners, they will have a list of questions that if the answer is yes to one of them, which pertains to the criteria, all they need to do is tick it. So the criteria is there and we'll be sharing that criteria with anyone that would like to apply to the screening team and they can make a decision as to whether they would like to do it. It's very straightforward, very easy, not different to anything that Wikimedians do on our projects every day. The main bulk of the questions is to do with vandalism because we do need to screen to that for vandalism. So there'll be questions. Could it be perceived as being offensive or anything like that or not suitable in representing Wikimedia? But it is very straightforward. We'll share the criteria very soon. I think there was a question from Tomi, which I'll just scroll back up. It says, Wikipedia is mostly about reading and images. There ought to be an audio side and other sensory perceptions also to it. Why not being welcome to the Wikipedia homepage by a characteristic sound? Make sure it can be turned off though. As being part of this project, I would wholeheartedly agree because sound is one of my life passions. It would be very useful in ensuring that sound goes some way to representing Wikimedia content, but that of course is something that the community would need to rally around and agree on happening. But of course it's something. It's a use case that the sound that's chosen could be utilized for. But I wholeheartedly agree with you, Tomi. Just going back through the chat list. Apologies for the technical difficulties earlier. I think there was a question that I may have missed earlier. It says, Taz talked about a session held on Thursday. Can I get the link? I shared it once quite a bit, but I need to understand how the sound level is done. There are volunteers to organize baseball training. That is possible. In the case of many of you may know, a person that has organized the community, and is doing a lot of the research that's going to be made available. I'm currently working on, I think, four training sessions for volunteers between now and the submission window for Sound Logo is closing. So the answer is yes. So we're just organizing. We're figuring out when they should take place to ensure that anyone in the world of retail sound logo at Wikimedia. To express your interest, and as soon as it's available, we'll announce on the matter where else the community gets on or communicate through telegram and the other communication channels. I see there's quite a few people who've joined since we began, about 43 attendants on Fidlou, probably more on YouTube. For those who are just joining, this was a short introduction and overview of the Sound Logo project, sharing steps we have taken so far, consultations we've had with members of the Wikimedia communities around the world, and the results, as well as the plans to launch the contest in the coming month during September. Any questions you have, if you've reviewed some of the material on matter, or you attended the master class during the week on the first day of Wikimedia, please share your questions here. We still have time with you. So this is your chance. So there's a question on the Q&A tab or more of a comment. If you're local to destinations like South Africa, it could be super unique. Imagine there could be a huge amount of information there, there can be a huge amount of visually impaired and others. Thanks very much, Andrea. Yes, for sure. I would definitely, I'm going to post the link to the master class that we did on Thursday again for everyone to see how the craft of creating sound logos differs to music production and the standards of music, creation of music, concepting. It's not very different, but there are certain aspects. We spoke about the sounds not particularly pertaining to one specific culture, but more of a global movement. And Joe, who led the music production and technical aspects of the master class, shared without drawing that much attention to it, a very, very smart way to take a sound from a very specific locale. So we used an African drum, and then he added things to it and added effects and manipulated it to give it a more global sound as we're calling it, which is very smart. I would love to see in the notes, in the rationale for sound logo submissions that they, you know, participants started with sounds that are local to them and they went through a process to change and manipulate those sounds to give them a much more global sound to represent the global movement. So it starts with them and it sort of radiates into the wider movement, which I think is a beautiful story. So I think we may have a few more questions to just go through. Another comment from Tommy. That's amazing, Tommy. I would, this is a question and a request if you are open to collaborating with members of the Wikimedia community who may not have as much experience in all the audio designers you do, it would be amazing if you could offer your services to help those that may have, you know, may have ideas and concepts that they'd like to submit, but they may not necessarily have the experience to do so. So I'll be hoping to see an email from you coming to our inbox at soundlogoatwikimedia.org. Another question from Chimery. Can people who are not Wikipedia join in the sound logo contest? Yes, they can. It's an open global contest, so anyone can submit a sound. It's as simple as that. We've made it an open global contest in order to get as many submissions as possible because we know that. You know, our colleague Tommy has experience in audio production design, but perhaps not that many people in the movement do, so we're opening it to allow for submissions. And of course the most important thing is that we have Wikimedia volunteers on the selection committee to decide which sounds make it through to the final ten. So although it is open, those sounds will make it through to the final without a green light, as it were, from the volunteers. And additionally, since the voting platform will be on Commons, it will require anyone wanting to vote to sign up and log in and have a log in. And so while it is really open to everyone, the voting portion of the sound logo project, the real decision between the ten finalists is most likely going to be made by Wikimedians who have a log in. And I have a comment from Tommy. Having AI choose and manipulate the sounds might add some neutrality to the logo, I imagine. That would be an amazing scenario. This is just my personal opinion. AI, I think, is still relatively fraught with glitches, I would say. It's a lovely suggestion. I would love to see the sound logo that is chosen by AI and the sound logo that is chosen by the community. Of course, just for my own personal preference. It's very encouraging to see here in the attendees' familiar faces, people who have joined either the masterclass or the community consultations or have commented on the talk page. Again, appreciate your support and your recommendations and comments and suggestions. Please keep them coming. For question from Goodness, in the chat, any sound production app you can recommend. I'd certainly recommend creating a sound on a desktop or a laptop computer and the software that I'd recommend to use is called Ableton Live Lite. It's free software. It's incredibly powerful. It's seen as being industry standard for beginners who would like to create sound and music. I'll drop it in the chat now. I'll drop a link to it in the chat. If your preference is to use open source software, there is a program called Audacity, which is a little bit more limited in how you can create. We will also have a list of resources, tools and software on the web portal as well. If you search for any DAW, which stands for Digital Audio Workspace, have a look through the DAWs that are on offer and take some time to do some research, read reviews, maybe download some, have a play, see which one you like. But again, the Sound Logo Masterclass is a great place to start. It teaches you the basics on how to create a Sound Logo from scratch. We have about a minute left just so anybody who's been drafting their question and hasn't posted it yet, please do so now and we can answer here. If you didn't get time to share your question here, again, there are various social media groups, WhatsApp, Telegram, and I think Signal as well, and Instagram and Sound Logo at wikimedia.org. For any questions you have about what we've shared here today. Yeah, we've got another question from Suyash. What about the sounds not produced with the help of any computer software, MIDI, et cetera? Any sounds that are what we would call naturally acoustic, sounds that are recorded out in the open world that are controlled by MIDI, and in short, MIDI is a controlled language that MIDI keyboards use to trigger sounds. You could record a bird tweeting outside, for example, and you'd put it in a digital audio workstation and map it to a key on a keyboard and MIDI will be able to play the different scales of that bird sound, so you can have a really high-pitched bird sound or a really low-pitched bird sound like my voice. That's what MIDI is. So as long as the sound that you are creating is original, that you've recorded, or is a CC0 sound, MIDI's fine. That's perfectly okay. You can record and use as you wish. So I think that starts out of time. Thanks, everyone. Have a lovely rest of your Wikipedia and be sure to email us and the liaisons on the email that you can see there. Thank you. Thanks.