Grants talk:Project/Documenting digitization practices in Wikimedia communities

Opposition and discussion

(This was moved from the endorsements section I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 17:04, 27 November 2018 (UTC))

•  Oppose I'm sorry, but I believe the funds asked are excessive for a personal project. There are chapters that recieve a lot less and have higher reporting and accountability standards. I am aware the digitization is an important issue, but there are much cheaper ways to accomplish that. We have to be responsible with donors. Best, --Warko (talk) 20:00, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
• Strong oppose I am flabbergasted at the amount of funds requested for this grant, which is greater than the amount of funds granted to some Wikimedia chapters already established for years and with much more paperwork to do and much higher accountability standards than this grant, and that has been used to do much more activities by these chapters than one single project. Also, the US$2,000 monthly salary is much higher than a regular "good" salary in Argentina -here we're talking about 7 minimum wages per month; and worse, this is a part-time dedication work, not even full-time. Digitization is very important, but we need to use donor funds wisely, and if complex accountability standards are expected from chapters to get funds, we shouldn't expect any less from individual grants, especially from a submission with such inflated amounts. Maor X (talk) 20:25, 24 November 2018 (UTC)
•  Oppose – As mentioned before, this grant presents an expensive budget, paying a monthly salary larger than an average full-time professional in Argentina, without any consideration of checks and accountability during the project. The grant would be one of the largest given to any Wikimedia community or member in Latin America, including grants that have required a lot of study, evaluation and accountability for chapters, demanding direct impact on our projects. Besides that, I have serious question regarding the capacity of the applicant to conduct the project, considering my experience with her while I was ED of Wikimedia Argentina and she was in charge of the Digitization Program of the chapter. In that project, there were several problems of accountability regarding the DIY scanners borrowed by the chapter to the applicant of this grant and a total lack of documentation regarding that project. --Osmar Valdebenito, B1mbo (talk) 00:10, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
•  Oppose I find this grant request problematic on different levels. To start with, it mentions Wikimedia affiliates –such as Wikimedia Argentina– that were not involved beforehand, and are to find themselves “overseen” by this proposal. Secondly, I think it is dangerous to distort grants –meant to empower individual Wikimedians– into some kind of bidding process for consulting contracts. If WMF or Wikimedia affiliates decide something along the lines of this proposal to be a priority, they could either do it in-house, rely on Wikimedia volunteers (I know that Zeroth is working on this, for instance) or hire dedicated contractors and budget accordingly –third-party consulting services always have significant overhead costs, even when disguised as community grants. Third, it’s worth noting the proposer has had a working relationship with Wikimedia Argentina in the past. Back in the day, we already denied support to a proposal that would have included some sort of dedicated, personal monthly fee (which, FWIW, is completely out of scale with the local non-profit scene). Fourth, I don’t find acceptable that WMF staffers promote or suggest support for this grant proposal (or any other) on social media as it has been the case, more so without previous input from the concerned Wikimedia affiliates. —Galio (talk) 02:33, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Hi Galio, I think this is valuable feedback, and you might be right around the WMF bidding, but I'm not the one to judge that. To disclose COI, this is a proposal that we have been discussing with Astinson_(WMF) for quite a long time now. I would also like to clarify two things, first, this is just a draft, so I started contacting people last week and my intention was to keep on doing that this week as well (although I might reconsider presenting this proposal at all). Second, as you know, I didn't have a working relationship with Wikimedia Argentina. I had a volunteer relationship, which I believe is quite different. Cheers, Scann (talk) 14:25, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Comment Thanks for this reply and for expanding on Astinson_(WMF)'s involvement –which I still don't find quite appropriate. I referred to a working relationship (and not a work relationship) to avoid implying you had a formal contract relationship with Wikimedia Argentina, though it's true it can be tricky. That said, it would be misleading to frame it as purely volunteer, since it was at least an hybrid —WMAR contracted DIY scanners from Scann, while support could have indeed been considered volunteer work. --Galio (talk) 14:45, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Comment Hi Galio, can we clarify further? Wikimedia paid for the raw materials to build the DIY BookScanners (and I might add, to some extent). Building the frames, contacting the institutions, training and support was all done on a volunteer basis. Scann (talk) 15:10, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Comment FWIW, Wikimedia Argentina paid Scann invoices with a closed, round amount for complete scanners. Galio (talk) 15:28, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Hi @Galio: I provided feedback on the generation/formation of the idea with @Scann: during the course of the last few months and it follows on a long term conversation I have had with Zeroth, Scann and others about documenting digitization practices. I provide such collaboration with every grantee that makes such a request -- I have seen and reviewed multiple proposals and ideas off-wiki this round in addition to this one (such as this Bhutan Digitization Grant as well as two incoming grants from museums in the United States). I have provided this with previous rounds of grantees as well. For grants/grantees that I work closely with, I ask colleagues like User:SandraF (WMF) to provide domain specific feedback to the grant officers and grant committees, as well as the public expert comments like the one for this editathon series or this one on the WIR role in Quebec. If you are concerned about my comment on the Facebook post at [1]: it is my practice to ping relevant communities when I see projects come up that are directly relevant to their work (see for example: this note on the talk page of the grant). I have done this in the past for both grants and other communications, to make sure that potentially directly affected community members don't miss that communication in the deluge of communication that happens in the movement. Astinson (WMF) (talk) 15:13, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Hey @Astinson (WMF):, I don't think your comment on the grant proposal is OK from a COI point of view; one as a WMF Staff member cannot participate in the design of a grant proposal and then forward it, tagging some people that might endorse the proposal, instead of checking with the involved affiliates first of all - or did @Scann: check with them? Also, there is specific WMF Staff who can help draft a grant proposal and provide assistance to the grantee-to-be, that's their job. I understand your good intentions, but things should be done according to the workflow, IMHO. Maor X (talk) 21:05, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

@Maor X: Hi Maor, this is Chris Schilling, the program officer for Project Grants. Astinson (WMF)'s involvement with this proposal was not problematic. Wikimedia Foundation staff are routinely involved with grant proposals at a variety of stages. They can take on roles as advisors, offer feedback during the drafting or different review periods, endorse or oppose proposals, and often have specific expertise (such as in GLAM partnerships) that helps the program officer and the Project Grants Committee understand the proposal and make good decisions. Between myself and my team, we do not have expertise across all the topics that we receive grant proposals for, so it is sensible for us to rely on other staff to provide that support. It is also not problematic for volunteers or staff to invite people to review proposals. Our grants processes do not operate like other kinds of on-wiki discussions because the reviewing process is not limited to reviewing comments that endorse or oppose the proposal, and we encourage people to bring attention to proposals that interest them. Importantly, the final recommendations for funding Project Grants are not made by staff, they are made by Wikimedia volunteers who represent the committee. I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 05:16, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

•  Oppose I'm worried by the fact that little by little people are coming to the movement with this kind of projects that blur the concept of volunteering, the cornerstone of the Wikimedia movement. I know it's difficult to combine volunteer work with "real" work, but in 8 years that I've been involved I can say from my own experience and projects that it is indeed possible. This proposal has drawn my attention because of the really high costs it proposes. Wasn't there really any other way to do it, given these costs? Can't the existing digitization group do this work in a volunteer and sequential way? Actually, aren't they already doing it? Doesn't the WMF have staff who can do this job? Wotancito (talk) 17:48, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
•  Oppose First of all, this is a personal request that doesnt come from the user group that was created for the same reasons the grantee specifies in her objective and deliverables and moreover, completely overlaps with whats already being done in the Digitization User Group, which was created to "... generate a knowledge base to outline the processes and different methods of execution, focusing on the practical process, as well as, different alternatives for equipment (that is financially feasible and reasonable).", "Create video, text tutorials and OER for different digitization projects.", "Organize workshops with other Wikimedians and the public in general in which we can explain and teach how different digitization projects work as well as various methods for digitizing work." among others. This is already being done in the telegram group we stablished after our first meeting in Berlin this year, and in the Meta pages of the user group. We have been doing this in a volunteer way, allowing everyone that had or has an existing Digitization project to share their experiences, methods, problems and ways to solve them. Of course its time consuming for a person, like Wikipedia or Wikidata is, and we do it anyway because we are volunteers, and we manage to reach profesional levels still. I believe in the shared efforts that had led us to this point, in a selfless way, contributing each one of us from our own experiences and communities, and i think we havent beeing doing such a bad job to request a huge amount of money to make it "more professional".Swiss Foundation Public Domain (talk) 22:11, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

 Oppose First, in a nutshell this is a request of a consultancy to create a full documentation, a kit of tactics and a group of recommendations by a person who is asking funds to Wikimedia Foundation as a salary for one year. As a former Grants Committee member the high amount requested and the overall form of the proposal really concerns me. I want to put the attention of my Wikimedian colleagues at the committee for the next reasons:

1. We usually as volunteers are putting a variety of skills and knowledge to the service of Wikimedia movement in a pure volunteer basis to get the things well done. Many of us performed projects and initiatives that can qualify perfect in size and quality as an external consultancy without any cost to the donors, so, in this sense, the approbation of a grant like this open the door to any consultant in the world to ask a salary from Wikimedia or indeed for any of us to come to the Grants program to ask a salary to perform a job just changing some words to elude the historical controls and processes of the funds here. In my POV this is not exactly the spirit of the Grants Program.
2. Secondly, as far I know there is an ongoing effort at WMF to work more on Digitalization with contracted persons on marginalized communities. In that sense there is no reason to put more funds in the area also User:Pdproject mentioned something valuable, there is a good base of volunteers *doing* documentation and activities
3. Third, all the Wikimedia affiliates and WMF knows well that the matters around get funds to have salaries, honoraries, contracted persons and staff have a sensible and controlled environment and any organization needs to fulfill a hard process, work years and years with more accountability and controls and show proofs of efficiency and managing funds to get their first staff. If this grant is approved, will be the precedent for any affiliate on Wikimedia that you can get staff or full time paid persons just naming different the goals and objectives and eluding all the usual way definitively changing the rules of the game on how we manage our resources but the overall idea of funds supporting volunteer projects will be overcome and organisms like FDC will be simply unnecessary. Best, ProtoplasmaKid (WM-MX) (talk) 23:00, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposal Withdrawn

Hi everyone, as this grant proposal has several problematic aspects (including some unfortunate mishandling on my side when it comes to reaching out to people) I won't be presenting the proposal. Just to clarify, I thought that presenting this as a draft and then reaching out to the communities I was thinking to work with was enough communication, but I have clearly made a mistake on that side. I expected that this page was the place where the discussion was going to happen, but I was wrong. I should have reached out to the communities while drafting the proposal, and not after presenting it as a draft. I'm sorry for this and I've taken notice of that mistake. There wasn't any plan of acting on bad faith or working on secrecy around this, it was more a misreading on my side between several conversations that we had with Alex, what I thought was needed and what I've been working on through my fellowship, and the way in which this community handles its own decisions. I didn't want to overhaul or jump through hoops in any process.

It wasn't my intention to create a conflict, and I'm sorry that Astinson (WMF) had to deal with any of this. I want to clear out any possible COI that a friend and colleague might have only on my account and based on a mistake that I did. I think that Alex has his own track record with the work that he does and inside this community, and he was acting all the way through in good faith.

I think the proposal could have been improved (like providing a budget breakdown to explain the costs, that could also have been lowered down if everyone agreed that the cost of the professional activities was too expensive), but I think that the mistakes I've done in communicating this (before and after) have ended up undermining this proposal as a hole, and I think it's difficult to make it a viable proposal as it is now.

Cheers, --Scann (talk) 01:59, 27 November 2018 (UTC)