{"id":242,"date":"2025-05-22T14:00:06","date_gmt":"2025-05-22T12:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wikimedia.de\/2024\/?page_id=242"},"modified":"2025-07-24T15:59:47","modified_gmt":"2025-07-24T13:59:47","slug":"framework","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.wikimedia.de\/2024\/en\/themes\/framework\/","title":{"rendered":"Strong alliances for Free Knowledge – our voice in politics"},"content":{"rendered":"
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How freely accessible knowledge is depends on political decisions and legal frameworks. That is why Wikimedia Deutschland is fighting for policymakers to create better framework conditions for Free Knowledge \u2013 not only in Germany, but also at an international level. In 2024, we also gained the attention of decision-makers in politics, education and culture.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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\n \n Ten policy recommendations for open AI in education <\/span>\n <\/h2>\n <\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Generative AI applications such as ChatGPT & Co are being used in more and more areas of life and work. While students want to learn with and about artificial intelligence, too, there is also growing concern about the risks: Most AI models are commercial and their functioning is not transparent, their responses are often unreliable and there is a lack of regulatory frameworks and critical reflection. If AI applications are increasingly shaping learning and teaching, what could open alternatives look like that comply with data protection regulations and are oriented towards the common good? To discuss this question, we launched the Open AI in Education Forum<\/a> in 2024. Among the participants: educational scientist Nele Hirsch, participants in the initiative “More openness in AI in education” and numerous experts from the education sector.<\/p>\n

This resulted in 10 education policy recommendations<\/a> on infrastructure, education in practice and legal foundations.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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\n At the forum, we gained the following two important insights: The German federal government and the individual state governments should definitely fund learning and training resources on AI under free licenses. And they should jointly provide public digital infrastructures for hosting open AI systems. <\/blockquote>\n Dr. Anne-Sophie Waag, Education Policy Officer<\/cite>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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During the presentation of the results<\/a>, it became clear that the recommendation to create a new training culture and structure with open formats has political support. The participants also agreed across party lines that open and transparent AI systems should be used in education.<\/p>\n

In order to advance the implementation of the policy recommendations, 2024 was characterized by intensive discussions with members of the Committee on Education, Research and Technology Assessment of the German Bundestag, with employees of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research as well as the state institutes for teacher training and the media centers in the individual German federal states. The Standing Conference of the Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs (KMK) also invited us to present our findings.<\/p>\n

In 2025, we are continuing the dialog with the “Open AI in schools” conference. In cooperation with the State Institute of Lower Saxony in charge of quality development in schools, we want to visualize the potential of open AI applications and raise awareness for the requirements needed to use them effectively in education.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Lizenz: Ekvidi<\/a>, Wikimedia-DE-Event-14052024-36<\/a>, CC BY-SA 4.0<\/a><\/div>\n <\/figcaption>\n <\/figure>\n
\n In the presence of invited digital and education politicians, we presented the ten recommendations for action on artificial intelligence in education in May 2024. From left to right: Anne-Sophie Waag (WMDE), Dr Holger Becker (SPD), Maximilian Funke-Kaiser (FDP), Sabine Gr\u00fctzmacher\n(B\u00fcndnis90\/Gr\u00fcne), Franziska Hoppermann (CDU), Nele Hirsch (moderator) and Franziska Heine (WMDE). <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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\n \n Federal government recognizes digital volunteers – finally! <\/span>\n <\/h2>\n <\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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In 2024, we continued our long-standing commitment to digital volunteering<\/a> with a great deal of energy. We explained how digital volunteering differs from analog volunteering, what the opportunities are to get involved and what political framework conditions are needed to effectively promote digital volunteering. We were listened to several times in 2024: at the Federal President’s Citizens’ Festival<\/a>, we answered many questions about Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata and were able to show visitors just how diverse digital volunteering is.<\/p>\n

The Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth has also recognized this in 2024. After we pointed out that digital volunteering should be included in the engagement strategy, ministry representatives successfully exchanged ideas with the team Policy & Public Sector. In the engagement strategy published at the beginning of December, the German government recognized digital volunteers as an independent form of engagement<\/a> for the first time \u2013 that is a milestone.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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\n \n Setback and partial success: the fight for openly accessible examination papers continues <\/span>\n <\/h2>\n <\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Of course, not all battles can be won immediately, as the “Classified Examination” project shows. Together with the portal for freedom of information FragDenStaat, we have been demanding for years that examination papers from previous years should be made digitally and publicly available \u2013 after all, they were financed with public funds. However, numerous Ministries of Education are still selling or giving away the license for publication to publishers who make a profit from this. For us, this is unacceptable! That’s why we launched a petition<\/a> in March 2024 to show the Ministries of Education and Cultural Affairs in the German federal states that many people share our demands. However, although almost 55,000 signatures were collected, the Standing Conference of the Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs rejected the delivery of the petition. At least the Baden-W\u00fcrttemberg Ministry of Education and Cultural Affairs announced that it would make old examination papers freely available with immediate effect \u2013 a partial success.<\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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\n \n Wikimedia Deutschland initiates community of practice for free access to culture <\/span>\n <\/h2>\n <\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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More and more museums and cultural institutions are making their collections \u2013 or parts of them \u2013 available digitally and under a free license. Not only does this facilitate virtual tours through art collections, it also unlocks new opportunities for researchers. However, science benefits above all when cultural data is not only open, but also networked. Only the links made possible by Linked Open Data reveal previously undiscovered connections \u2013 especially with regard to the research achievements of marginalized groups. Examples are women who have done important research work but whose achievements have so far been attributed to men; or local guides or collectors from the Global South who played a decisive role in Western research trips in colonial times (not always voluntarily) but were never mentioned in the official historiography of museums. They can gain visibility through Linked Open Data.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Linked Open Data explained simply<\/p>\n\n

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Linked Open Data<\/a> (LOD) means that freely accessible data is linked together. This allows information from different sources to be combined and used more effectively. For example, a database on famous personalities is automatically linked to a database on birthplaces. LOD makes knowledge networkable and machine-readable – similar to Wikipedia, but with structured data.<\/p>\n <\/div>\n \n

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