Grants:Project/Rapid/Maurice Flesier/Wiki Finds Cemeteries Turkey/Report

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Goals

Did you meet your goals? Are you happy with how the project went?

In general, we were extremely satisfied with the outcomes of the project. It was the first photo walk event in Turkey organized by Turkish Wikipedia volunteers. Although the grave photography work which is the theme of the project, was initially met with interesting and unaccustomed, it was generally appreciated by the contributors and positive feedback was obtained from the users. It was a learning and experience project for me as an individual as well as an organizer. We carried out a total of 33 photo walks in 5 cities, exceeding the planned 27 photo walks.

Outcome

Please report on your original project targets. Please be sure to review and provide metrics required for Rapid Grants.

Target outcome	Achieved outcome	Explanation
27 photo-walks with 10-15 participants	33 photo-walks with 11 active participants	Most of the photo walks were completed individually due to different locations and COVID-19 concerns. Some of the walks were held as a group, mostly in Istanbul.
750 photos	1,288 photos uploaded to Commons	The target outcome was comfortably exceeded with the valuable efforts of the volunteers. Notable people's graves, gravestones, mausoleums, tombs and general photographs of inside of cemeteries were taken. Some grave photos were taken from several angles and some of them were duplicated because there were several people in them and to provide the diversity in Wiki projects.
Minimum 400 and maximum 500 photos used on Wikimedia projects	Total 626 photos were used in Wikimedia projects including TR Wikipedia and Wikidata.	The main objective of the project was to bring the photographs to the readers in Wikimedia projects. The majority of photographs were included in person's biographies and cemetery articles, with appropriate and descriptive captions.
New articles	12 articles (a total of 52,994 bytes in size) created in Turkish Wikipedia	As part of the cemetery project, 11 notable people's articles, 1 cemetery article were created and 1 cemetery article has been extensively edited. Even though it is not among the project goals, it is also pleasing for me that the articles have been created.
New Wikidata items and Commons categories	253 Commons categories and 20+ Wikidata items created and hundreds of properties added to items.	Added related grave images and coordinates to Wikidata items and incorrect birth and death information of notable people has been revised. In Wikimedia Commons, categories for grave owners and cemetery articles were opened and a regular archiving was done.

Gallery

Learning

Projects do not always go according to plan. Sharing what you learned can help you and others plan similar projects in the future. Help the movement learn from your experience by answering the following questions:

What worked well?

This was a different project idea that I've been thinking about since 2020 and wanted to implement. Achieving our goals statistically is the biggest success in the project. Before the start of project, we contacted the photography club of Boğaziçi University and talked about the project. One of the biggest successes of the project was that we briefed the community about the project at the online Wiki Tuesday meetings and explained the idea that the Turkish community can also produce a project and achieve it.

What did not work so well?

1. We could not rent a venue for a training and planning attended by the participants. Because of the pandemic situation proved to be very challenging, as we could not organise any physical activities throughout the competition with jointly. In addition to the effects of the pandemic, the anonymous contribution preferences of a majority audience and their reluctance to participate in face-to-face activities were also experienced as a factor in the project.

2. Unfortunately, restrictions on photographing Christian and Jewish cemeteries and the issue of entry and permission were one of the biggest problems we experienced. That's why, we had to use mobile phones when professional cameras were not allowed.

What would you do differently next time?

1. It has been an experimentation and analysis project for me with its positive and negative effects. Choosing of winter season and seasonal conditions were the biggest mistake during the project. Due to the harsh winter conditions and closed roads this year, we had to postpone many photo walks. Cloudy weather and insufficient light adversely affected the quality of the photos. For these reasons, I will definitely try to match the spring and summer seasons in a similar project next time. I will also post this topic on the Wiki Cemeteries User Group talk page to get the attention of different communities.

2. The photo shoot permission problem will be the first issue that I need to solve before the project next time. I realized that this was essential for a comfortable and organized photo walk event.

3. I will try different methods to encourage experienced participants for the face-to-face meetings. I have experienced that an efficient training and planning organization event in a collective time and place is a must before the project.

Finances

Grant funds spent

Please describe how much grant money you spent for approved expenses, and tell us what you spent it on.

Vouchers and prizes to top 3 participants: 248 USD
Data: 108 USD
Hiring of Camera: 230 USD
Graphics design images and certificates: 145 USD
Bank fees and charges: 30 USD
Transportation and accomodation: 350 USD
Food & snacks: 200 USD
Printed materials (books and publications about burial places): 25 USD
Promotional badge gift for all active participants: 27 USD
Transfer expenses and EFT: 30 USD
Unexpected expenses: 50 USD

Total spent: 1443 USD

Remaining funds

Do you have any remaining grant funds?

Yes, the remaining grant funds amount to 400 USD. I would like to use the unused funds in different project, if appropriate.

The funds remaining from this grant in the amount of US$400 were deducted from another grant payment for Grants:Programs/Wikimedia_Community_Fund/Rapid_Fund/Wiki_For_Human_Rights_2022_in_Turkey_(ID:_21958926).

Anything else

Anything else you want to share about your project?

It is a pleasure for us to create such a valuable archive on Wikimedia Commons. Thank you for making this project possible! We have an idea of repeating the project next year. Of course, if time and conditions allow to us.