Grants talk:PEG/Wiki Loves Monuments international team/2015 coordination/Report

Special Thank you

• User:Romaine (International team)
• User:Effeietsanders (International team)
• User:Ilya (jury tool)
• Wikimedia Ukraine (jury tool)
• Wikimedia Germany (fiscal sponsorship)
• Nicole Ebber (WM DE)
• Stephan Roest (WM DE)

For everyone I forgot, please contact me and I will add. --Ilario (talk) 12:12, 6 April 2016 (UTC)

Report comments

Hi Ilario. Thank you for this report and to the entire organizing team for coordinating the international activities of WLM 2015. We appreciate that the team stepped up this year and took on the challenge of organizing the international competition at such late notice. As discussed in the proposal, we want to make sure this doesn't happen again this year. One of the activities listed in the grant request was "build a permanent team to manage WLM at the international level in the future". Was the team able to make progress on this? If not, do you know what the plans are for 2016? Also, one of the measures of success was "better documentation is available for the all important parts of organizing a Wiki Loves Monuments." Does the team still plan on creating this documentation? If not, why not? Romaine was involved in the original discussion around this activity, so maybe you can provide an update?

We understand that global metrics don't apply at the international level and will be reported by grantees who applied for country-specific grants, but we did want to know some of the numbers from the contest. It looks like the Commons category: Images from Wiki Loves Monuments 2015 has 231,724 photos, with 23,669 (~10%) distinct images in use on Wikimedia projects. Do you know how many people participated globally?

Regarding the unspent funds, payment to WMDE as the fiscal sponsor is a reimbursement so we will only send them the amount spent -- 5,146.61 EUR.

Thank you again for all your work. Cheers, Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 20:41, 25 April 2016 (UTC)

Hello Alex Wang,

• Concerning the better documentation, this has (so far I had been able to and knew what to improve) already been done in August 2015. I am only not sure how I should describe it in the table. I do not want to claim 100%, as I believe there is always something to be improved. However, I think that also with the reorganisation of the documentation pages the quality of the process has been improved and matches with the needs of the local organising teams.
• The number of participants is something that needs to be determined with an off-wiki tool. During the Wikimedia Conference in Berlin some tools passed by, but I have to dig in my notes to find the right one. But yes, it will be based on the mentioned category.
• It is a pity that it was not possible for you to join the past Wikimedia Conference in Berlin because of some issues (I heard), I think that after the changes the Foundation and movement experiences now, it would be good to set a better understanding of the various parts of the movement in all parts of the movement. To do that, face-to-face talks are essential as those cause the least disturbance and confusion, and the highest possible quality communication. So I am happy that I was enabled to have those talks this year.
• During the conference I have asked all affiliates present if they are going to organise Wiki Loves Monuments this year. Last year I was not at this conference, and was as result not in the position to have a talk with all the affiliates to get that overview. This has lead, among other causes, to a large conflict between the team of Wiki Loves Monuments and the Fundraising Team. I think, after having spoken with some people from the Fundraising Team in the past days, both teams acknowledge the importance of this data to have a good organisation of both Fundraising and Wiki Loves Monuments. For this year this part of the issue has been resolved and will be shared between both teams, as well as that based on this data a mutual collaboration will be grown, and I am happy to see the willingness. But I am already concerned for 2017, as also the admission process if this conference led to the problems of 2015 and attempts to retrieve those data otherwise were not successful. Concerning this I have spoken with multiple people during the conference, after which I could only conclude that the bureaucracy put in place (of course for good reasons) by the Wikimedia Foundation is the decisive factor in this. I hope that WMF can acknowledge the importance of this data and that the Foundation can think how the collection of this data can be practically supported.
• Concerning "build a permanent team to manage WLM at the international level in the future". -> So far I can see and remember at this point in time, I am not aware of making this happen. Having giving thoughts to this subject I am disappointed to say that I do not see how to have a permanent team to have a sustainable future, I do not see any option how to get this secured. I indeed believe that having such arranged, can lead to less stress, less work (no wheel invention needed), and being able to work on a long term instead of short term, etc. Having thought about this, I personally do think we cannot get this done without outside support (outside = outside WLM team). A community can do very much, but I lean to the idea that a sustainable long-term future is beyond the capacity of the volunteer community. - Also I think I have to indicate in the light of this, that seen over the past years, also crucial tools are at risk of no longer being maintained/available, as well as the death of the Wiki Loves Monuments app. Commons/Wikipedia itself has a sustainable future, the important layers of supporting infrastructure surrounding our wikis still have not after ten years of Wikipedia and concerns me for years already.
• "If not, do you know what the plans are for 2016?" -> The situation of 2015 was problematic, I have learned that the amount of work I need to do for properly organising Wiki Loves Monuments, makes it impossible for me to lead the/a team. I am committed to do the workload again in 2016. To be able to have a successful Wiki Loves Monuments I think we need someone who can lead a team. After some advice I am now searching behind the scenes for someone who can take up those role/task. I think I have found something, is interested, but has not said yes, and because of privacy concerns I cannot share any details about this publicly. However, I do think you may be able to help.

More details I will not and cannot share publicly on this page, but we can have a private talk about it. Romaine (talk) 23:07, 25 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi Romaine. Thanks for all your responses. I agree, that meeting face-to-face is the best way to resolve a lot of outstanding issues quickly. I was disappointed not to be able to attend the conference, but am happy you had so many productive meetings, especially with the Fundraising Team. I am not sure I am totally clear on what "data" you are referring to -- do you meant the dates that the different banners are being run in each country, both for WLM and fundraising? It would be good to have a follow-up conversation regarding organizing for 2017 and beyond. I will contact you to set something up. Cheers, Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 19:51, 27 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi Alex, I will give my comments below.

Documentation: the work to be done is not complicated, there are some technical things to do but it's sufficient to organize them in time. I am working for Wiki Loves Earth in Switzerland to build a en:Work breakdown structure (WBS) defining the work packages. This will help to give the organization and the lead to someone else without any problem. I think that something similar can be done for Wiki Loves Monuments and can help to separate the work from the persons.

Permanent team: in my opinion it makes sense. At the moment all is organized around a leader and it's done on daily basis. Permanent team doesn't mean a staff but a creation of a team immediately after the end of any contest.

Figures: Here are the numbers. WLM 2015 has had 6'618 uploaders with a total of 231'431 images.

In my opinion the organization of an important event like this needs to be managed appropriately, the important aspects that a leader should have are more connected with the organization and the communication and should be able to manage conflicts. --Ilario (talk) 10:14, 28 April 2016 (UTC)