Between the Brackets: a MediaWiki Podcast

A podcast about the people and ideas behind the MediaWiki software. Interviews with developers and users of MediaWiki, both for Wikimedia sites (Wikipedia, Wikidata, etc.) and the many uses of MediaWiki in companies, organizations, governments and personal uses. Credits: audio production done via the Audacity software; theme music performed by Victor Noriega.

Episode 211: Shani Evenstein Sigalov 07/14/2026

Episode 211: Shani Evenstein Sigalov 🕑 1 hour 34 minutes Dr. Shani Evenstein Sigalov is an educator, researcher, and long-standing Open Knowledge advocate, working at the intersection of education, technology, innovation and openness. She is the founder of the AI Bridges project at the Digital Humanities Research Hub at the University of London. She is also a former member and vice chair of the Board of Trustees at the Wikimedia Foundation. Links for some of the topics discussed: Wikipedia article /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/42093965

Episode 210: Cory Massaro 06/30/2026

Episode 210: Cory Massaro 🕑 1 hour 31 minutes Cory Massaro is a staff software engineer on the Abstract Wikipedia team at the Wikimedia Foundation. Links for some of the topics discussed: MediaWiki extension (2026 paper by Michael Falk) (Cory Massaro Substack account) (Benjamin LaBadie, February 2024) /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/41912010

Episode 209: Daniel Dobriy 06/02/2026

Episode 209: Daniel Dobriy 🕑 1 hour 28 minutes Daniel Dobriy is the founder and managing director of the company Dobriy AI. He is also a researcher at WU Vienna University and Austria's Bilateral AI Cluster of Excellence. Links for some of the topics discussed: MediaWiki extension /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/41511510

Episode 208: BTB Digest 33 05/20/2026

Episode 208: BTB Digest 33 🕑 27 minutes Clips from five recent episodes! Liam Wyatt considers LLMs as a vessel for Wikipedia content; Steve Shattuck weighs Cargo against Semantic MediaWiki; Paul Vodrazka lays out how he became an AI coder; Noam Cohen defends Wikipedia from charges of bias; Wandji Collins recounts becoming a MediaWiki volunteer; and more! /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/41367390

Episode 207: Ad Strack van Schijndel 05/05/2026

Episode 207: Ad Strack van Schijndel 🕑 1 hour 35 minutes Ad Strack van Schijndel is the founder and CEO of Juggel, a Dutch company whose product, also named Juggel, is an AI-centered MediaWiki distribution. Before founding Juggel, he was the founder and CEO of the MediaWiki-based consulting company Wikibase Solutions. Links for some of the topics discussed: - talk by Ad at MUDCon spring 2026 MediaWiki extension /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/41165925

Episode 206: Sandra Fauconnier 04/21/2026

Episode 206: Sandra Fauconnier 🕑 1 hour 3 minutes Sandra Fauconnier is an art historian by training who works on digital projects in the cultural sector. She has worked at different times for Wikimedia Nederland, the Wikimedia Foundation, and Wikimedia Sverige. Links for some of the topics discussed: on Meta-Wiki on Wikidata on MediaWiki Commons /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/40959740

Episode 205: Wandji Collins 04/09/2026

Episode 205: Wandji Collins 🕑 52 minutes Wandji Collins is a software engineer and engineering manager at Tech Chantier, as well as a volunteer MediaWiki developer. Links for some of the topics discussed: MediaWiki extension /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/40793860

Episode 204: Noam Cohen 03/24/2026

Episode 204: Noam Cohen 🕑 1 hour 15 minutes Noam Cohen is a journalist and writer who has written extensively about Wikipedia since 2007 for publications including The New York Times and Wired. He is the author of the 2017 book The Know-It-Alls: The Rise of Silicon Valley as a Political Powerhouse and Social Wrecking Ball, which was just released in paperback form with a new introduction by the author. You can also see this interview , on YouTube. Links for some of the topics discussed: website page (includes links to Noam's articles about Wikipedia) /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/40608695

Episode 203: Paul Vodrazka 03/10/2026

Episode 203: Paul Vodrazka 🕑 1 hour 11 minutes Paul Vodrazka is a shift leader in the CNC (computer numerical control) department at the Winnipeg-based company Custom Castings. He manages the internal wikis for Custom Castings, and is also the author of the MediaWiki extension Layers. Links for some of the topics discussed: "" Wikipedia article MediaWiki extension on GitHub "" Wikipedia article "" Wikipedia article /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/40387470

Episode 202: BTB Digest 32 02/24/2026

Episode 202: BTB Digest 32 🕑 23 minutes It's another BTB Digest! Hear clips from five recent episodes. Cormac Parle notes the challenges in structured data in Wikimedia Commons, Vera de Kok reminisces about her early years as a Wikimedia photographer; Stephen Harrison cautions against dismissing AI encyclopedias; Brian Wolff summarizes the philosophy of JavaScript gadgets, Shlomit Lir points out the tension between equity and neutrality, and more! /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/40221575

Episode 201: Steve Shattuck 02/10/2026

Episode 201: Steve Shattuck 🕑 58 minutes Steve Shattuck is a retired research assistant who created and runs the wiki AntWiki. Links for some of the topics discussed: category on AntWiki (1999 book by Steve Shattuck) /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/40066630

Episode 200: Liam Wyatt 01/27/2026

Episode 200: Liam Wyatt 🕑 1 hour 14 minutes It's the (belated) 25th anniversary of the founding of Wikipedia - and the 200th episode! For this special episode, we have the return of Liam Wyatt (username Wittylama), a longtime Wikipedia volunteer and commentator, the first-ever Wikipedian-in-residence, and now a Senior Technical Partnerships Manager at the Wikimedia Foundation, to talk about Wikipedia's past, present and future. Links for some of the topics discussed: at Internet Archive (video) (November 2025 Diff blog post) (January 2026 blog post) (November 2025 GLAM-Wiki talk by Liam) (May 2025 presentation by Giuseppe Lavagetto) (January 2026 essay by Christophe Henner) /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/39901985

Episode 199: Shlomit Lir 01/13/2026

Episode 199: Shlomit Lir 🕑 1 hour 11 minutes Shlomit Lir is a writer, editor, and researcher at the University of Haifa, specializing in the politics of knowledge. Since 2024, she has been a public critic of Wikipedia, especially relating to its coverage of Israel. Links for some of the topics discussed: (2024 report for the World Jewish Congress) " (response post by several Wikimedians) (2024 Pirate Wires article by Ashley Rindsberg) (2025 document for the World Jewish Congress) /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/39720225

Episode 198: Brian Wolff 12/30/2025

Episode 198: Brian Wolff 🕑 1 hour 35 minutes Brian Wolff is a longtime MediaWiki and Wikimedia developer. He returns to the podcast for (maybe) one last in-person discussion before his move to Calgary, Alberta. We talk about political goings-on at the Wikimedia Foundation, developments in the software world, and random thoughts on classic sci-fi. Links for some of the topics discussed: (Wikimedia Foundation press release, December 2025) (March 2006 article in El Tiempo about Bernadette's brief kidnapping) , October 2025 project Wikipedia article Wikipedia article /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/39570525

Episode 197: Between the Brackets 2025 Holiday Special 12/16/2025

Episode 197: Between the Brackets 2025 Holiday Special 🕑 58 minutes It's the holiday special! Special guests, a musical performance (all from the MediaWiki world), and a tale of a life-changing encounter. /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/39433025

Episode 196: Stephen Harrison 12/02/2025

Episode 196: Stephen Harrison 🕑 1 hour 37 minutes Stephen Harrison is a tech lawyer and journalist who has been writing about Wikipedia since 2018, including for Slate and The New York Times. He joins us to talk about all the Wikimedia-related events of the crazy month of October 2025, including the release of Jimmy Wales' book, Larry Sanger's "nine theses", some near-violence in New York City, and the launch of the site Grokipedia. Links for some of the topics discussed: by Larry Sanger (The Wikipedian blog post) (Slate article by Stephen Harrison, October 2025) Yaron's about Grokipedia by Jimmy Wales (New York Post article, November 2025) , November 2025 /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/39244375

Episode 195: BTB Digest 31 11/18/2025

Episode 195: BTB Digest 31 🕑 28 minutes Clips from five recent episodes! Dan Andreescu considers a new "Datawiki" project, Wojciech Pędzich makes use of the Wikipedia sound logo, Thomas Chin retells a piece of Wikimedia development lore, SJ Klein contemplates the use of "Abstractese", Matt Latourelle explains Ballotpedia's neutrality, and more! /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/39085525

Episode 194: Vera de Kok 11/04/2025

Episode 194: Vera de Kok 🕑 1 hour 57 minutes Vera de Kok is a freelance photographer, developer and wiki consultant who was named Media Contributor of the Year at the 2025 Wikimania conference for her contributions to both Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata. Links for some of the topics discussed: (September 2025 blog post by Vera) (Vermeer painting) tool tool Wikimedia Commons gadget Wikidata gadget Wikipedia article Wikipedia article essay on Wikipedia Wikipedia article episode of Autistic Culture podcast (December 2024 Diff blog post) (September 2025 Diff blog post) Wikipedia article Wikipedia article Wikipedia article (won Vera 4th place in a Dutch Wikipedia writing contest) (microphone USB interface) Wikipedia article on Wikimedia Commons /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/38912015

Episode 193: Cormac Parle 10/21/2025

Episode 193: Cormac Parle 🕑 1 hour 17 minutes Cormac Parle is a principal software engineer in the Product & Tech team at the Wikimedia Foundation. Links for some of the topics discussed: (2021 talk by Cormac) /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/38733670

Episode 192: Matt Latourelle 10/08/2025

Episode 192: Matt Latourelle 🕑 52 minutes Matt Latourelle is director of technology operations for the wiki-based website Ballotpedia. Links for some of the topics discussed: (talk by Matt Latourelle and Joseph Sanchez, MediaWiki Users and Developers Workshop Spring 2025) (Ballotpedia essay) /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/38516155

Episode 191: SJ Klein 09/23/2025

Episode 191: SJ Klein 🕑 1 hour 25 minutes Samuel J. "SJ" Klein is an affiliate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University. He co-founded the Knowledge Futures project, served as director of content for One Laptop Per Child, and was on the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees from 2009 to 2015. Links for some of the topics discussed: /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/38331680

Episode 190: Thomas Chin 09/09/2025

Episode 190: Thomas Chin 🕑 1 hour 34 minutes Thomas Chin is a software engineer in the Data Platform Engineering team at the Wikimedia Foundation. Links for some of the topics discussed: podcast on mediawiki.org in MediaWiki code (provided by the MediaWikiServices class) (2009 blog post by Domas Mituzas about Michael Jackson-related Wikipedia crash) (August 2025 article) (June 2025 article) /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/38147050

Episode 189: BTB Digest 30 08/26/2025

Episode 189: BTB Digest 30 🕑 28 minutes A new BTB Digest! Cindy Cicalese is surprised about the popularity of her PluggableAuth extension, Luca Mauri extols the benefits of Federation, Edward Chernenko laments the difficulties in running a humor wiki, Marijn van Wezel discusses GDPR compliance, Markus Glaser offers a solution for collaborative editing in MediaWiki, and more! /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/37971120

Episode 188: Wojciech Pędzich 08/12/2025

Episode 188: Wojciech Pędzich 🕑 56 minutes Wojciech Pędzich (roughly pronounced "VOY-chek PEND-zhik") is a longtime Wikimedia volunteer, having served as an administrator on the Polish Wikipedia, a Wikimedia Steward, a member of the Wikimedia Affiliations Committee, a board member of Wikimedia Polska, an organizer of the Wikimedia Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) meeting, and an organizer of Wikimania, among other things. He is currently one of six candidates for the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees. Links for some of the topics discussed: English Wikipedia article , July 2023 , launched March 2021 (100 hours, September 26–30, 2023, Warsaw) ( by Robert Drózd, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license.) /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/37780740

Episode 187: Dan Andreescu 07/29/2025

Episode 187: Dan Andreescu 🕑 1 hour 33 minutes Dan Andreescu (user name Milimetric) is a staff software engineer in the Data Platform Engineering team, and an interim manager in the Experiment Platform team, both in The Wikimedia Foundation. Links for some of the topics discussed: project /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/37600195

Episode 186: Richard Heigl and Markus Glaser 07/16/2025

Episode 186: Richard Heigl and Markus Glaser 🕑 2 hours 6 minutes Richard Heigl and Markus Glaser (pictured, left to right) are two of the three founders and heads of the German consulting Hallo Welt!, along with Anja Ebersbach. Hallo Welt! is best known for producing the MediaWiki-based software BlueSpice. Links for some of the topics discussed: , April 2025 MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension (or BlueSpiceChecklist) MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension ("Why accessibility costs so much"), July 2025 article in Linux Magazin that quotes Richard and Markus library /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/37430965

Episode 185: Marijn van Wezel 07/01/2025

Episode 185: Marijn van Wezel 🕑 55 minutes Marijn van Wezel is a part-time developer at the MediaWiki consulting company Wikibase Solutions. He is also working on a master's degree in computer science at Radboud University Nijmegen. Links for some of the topics discussed: MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension (talk by Marijn van Wezel and Jimmy van Delft at MediaWiki Users and Developers Workshop Spring 2025) MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/37240850

Episode 184: Edward Chernenko 06/03/2025

Episode 184: Edward Chernenko 🕑 50 minutes Edward Chernenko is a software developer, with extensive experience in MediaWiki development and consulting. He is also the administrator of Absurdopedia, a Russian-language humor wiki that is part of the loosely-affiliated Uncyclopedia family. Links for some of the topics discussed: on mediawiki.org MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/36838445

Episode 183: BTB Digest 29 05/22/2025

Episode 183: BTB Digest 29 🕑 31 minutes (Star-studded) highlights from five recent episodes! Trevor Parscal says the Wikimedia Foundation has become political, Selena Deckelmann sheds light on her management approach, Jonathan Lee complains about Fandom's tactics, Denny Vrandečić disputes the idea that Abstract Wikipedia could replace regular Wikipedia, Ward Cunningham recounts coming up with the name "wiki", and more! /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/36670865

Episode 182: Luca Mauri 05/06/2025

Episode 182: Luca Mauri 🕑 1 hour 21 minutes Luca Mauri is an IT manager who in his free time runs the Italian-language Star Trek wiki WikiTrek - which in turn gets much of its data from another wiki, DataTrek, which runs on MediaWiki in conjunction with Wikibase. Links for some of the topics discussed: "" article on English Wikipedia MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension MediaWiki extension /episode/index/show/betweenthebrackets/id/36461200

Between the Brackets: a MediaWiki Podcast

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