Grants:PEG/Kruusamägi/Minority Translate

Funded

This submission to the Project and Event Grants Program was funded in the fiscal year 2013-14. This is a grant to a group.

IMPORTANT: Please do not make changes to this page without the explicit approval of Project and Event Grants Program staff. They will be reverted.

This project has already been funded, but you may still add or review comments on the discussion page.
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Report: Please visit Grants:PEG/Kruusamägi/Minority Translate/Report to read this report, comment on this report, or review its status.

This grantee has requested a change to the project start or completion date submitted here, and this change has been approved by WMF and is now reflected on this submission page. Please see the discussion page for details, including reporting requirements that may have changed as a result of this change.

This Wikimedia Foundation grant has a fiscal sponsor. Mittetulundusühing Keeleleek administered the grant on behalf of Ivo Kruusamägi.

Legal name of organization or individual requesting this grant: Mittetulundusühing Keeleleek; For organizations: Are you a for-profit entity? No; For organizations: If non-profit (US) or equivalent (outside the US) status is available in your country, do you have or are you pursuing such status (please be specific): Yes
Grant recipient organization: Mittetulundusühing (MTÜ) Keeleleek http://www.keeleleek.ee
Grant contact name: Kristian Kankainen
Grant contact username or email: kristiankeeleleek.ee
Grant contact title (position): Founder
Project lead name: Ivo Kruusamägi
Project lead username or email: User:Kruusamägi
Project lead title (position), if any: Coordinator
Full project name: Minority Translate; Codename "Tõlkevidin"
Amount requested in USD or local currency (USD will be assumed if no other currency is specified): 1150 €
Provisional target start date: 1 March 2014
Provisional completion date: ~~31 March 2014~~ 15 April 2014

Goals and measures of success

Project goal

Goal is to finally create a tool that would help to boost the development of small Wikipedias. Hopefully it would be used for many minority language versions, and by the end of 2014, thousands of articles would be started with this same tool. It may also help to bring new people into the ranks of wikipedians.

The program would allow to mark down exact translations, so it could also be useful for linguists for linguistic analyses. Specially as it will be used for languages that have few or no texts online. Thus language resources collected could act as a Rosetta Stone for minority languages and help to develop language technology for these underresourced languages.

Idea behind of the tool dates back to the spring 2013. At a lecture about small languages and internet on a lecture course "Wikipedia", held in Tartu University, we got an idea for a simple tool, that would greatly help to speed up the article creation process. As we found out, that such tools where being developed by WMF. Last written down document was this. But as by the start of 2014 there still isn't anything really ready by WMF, hence we re-evaluated our idea. It's a mistake that we didn't proceed with the project back then as we could had created this within 1-2 months and it would have been ready by the middle of 2013. We'd like to start the project now and not wait any longer.

Measures of success

Please provide a list of measurable criteria that will be used determine how successful the project is. You will need to report on the success of the project according to these measures after the project is completed.

Measures of success: We will consider this project a success, if by the end of 2014, this translation tool would be used within at least 5 language versions and more than 1000 articles would be created with it.

Project scope and activities

This section describes what will happen if this project is funded. Who will do what, and when?

List of activities: Programmer would create the tool according to the discussed specifications. It will be tested within Võro Wikipedia and changes would be made if needed. Web server would be set up to store the statistics and language information. The tool will be promoted both within Wikipedia and to linguists and minority language representatives. Because the program may benefit from specialized setup and additions, then it would be created to be easily customizable. Support will be provided for the program for the coming years. As the people involved are interested in the project, then there will be no problem to provide additions for years to come and without additional costs.

Budget and resources

Please provide a detailed breakdown of project expenses according to the instructions here.

Grantees are subject to line-item scrutiny of expenses. Changes to the approved budget beyond 10% in any category must be approved in advance.

Project budget table

Programmers fee	1050 €	(after taxes that would be ca 625 €)
Additional costs	100 €	(server rent, legal costs, reserve)

For a programmer that would be ca 200 h of work. Testing and feedback would be done by other people involved in project. Same with the promotion of the tool among wikipedians and linguists.

Total cost of project: 1150 €

Total amount requested from the Project and Event Grants program: 1150 €

Additional sources of revenue that may fund part of this project, and amounts funded: --

Non-financial requirements

See a description of non financial assistance available. Please inform Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) of any requirements for non-financial assistance now.

Requests for non-financial assistance: --

Resources

This section is optional. It may be used to highlight the potential grantee's potential for successfully executing this project.

Team: Kruusamägi, Andrjus, Metsavend, Pusle8, Võrok and Kristian Kankainen.
Special skills or qualifications: 2 of the team members work in the Institute of the Estonian Language, 1 works in the Võro Institute, 2 are administrators in Estonian Wikipedia and 1 is administrator in Võro Wikipedia.
Evidence of past success: I created WMEE and I have been behind many of its most successful projects (or instance education project and photo competitions).

Resources: Our main partner would be NGO Keeleleek, which is a free software propagating unit in the Estonian language technology landscape.

Impact

In the sections below, please describe how the project is related to the Wikimedia mission and Wikimedia's strategic priorities.

Fit to strategy

How will this project support the key organizational objectives of

increasing reach, participation, quality, credibility, organizational maturity and effectiveness, or financial sustainability?

This statement should address at least one of the strategic priorities listed here specifically. See Project and Event Grants program criteria for decisionmaking.: The project will provide a tool for small Wikipedias to speed up the article creation process. For the creation of Wikipedia content and involvement of minor language speakers, not much is required, besides the ease of access to translation tools and content to start with. Therefor this is important in a sense of more people will be able to contribute and do it more effectively.

Benefits

If the project will benefit a specific online community, please tell us.: Small Wikipedias would have a tool, that would help to speed up the article creation process.; It will help current activists behind the small language versions with their work of getting the Wikipedias off the ground.; This application may introduce new writers to the Wikipedia community and provide them with the knowledge needed for the content creation.

Please provide a brief statement about how the project is related to other work in the Wikimedia movement. For example, does the project fit into a work area such as GLAM, education, organizational development, editor retention, or outreach?: The project will be a part of outreach activities and will support the minority language Wikipedias.

If successful, will the project have the potential to be replicated successfully by other individuals, groups, or organizations? Please explain how in 1–2 sentences.: If successful, it could be used both within and outside of the Wikimedia community and it may increase the creation of free software tools and additions for Wikipedia.

Please list other benefits to the movement here.: Sometimes the easiest and least expensive solution to begin with may come from within the movement. This time it is a stand-alone app that mediates information within Wikipedia and the final output, to the desired extent. With a small group of interested participants it could be created with a fraction of a time and money compared to the development within WMF.; The use of it by schools and among children and teenagers may have numerous benefits to the activity of the user as well as factors of ethnolinguistic vitality of any particular language.

For grantees

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Create a request for an extension of the approved project completion date.
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