CIS-A2K/Work plan July 2016 - June 2017/Tulu
Tulu Wikipedia has been in incubation since 2007. CIS-A2K put efforts to bring Tulu Wikipedia out of incubation during the previous work plans. The efforts yielded good results and Tulu Wikipedia is quite close to becoming live. Hence, CIS-A2K's efforts will continue during this work plan year also.
Performance against plans
editDue to awareness created, many new people joined efforts to bring Tulu Wikipedia out of incubation (the data is given in the Impact section). Efforts were made to improve many articles that were added earlier but were quite small and without references. While editathons were conducted to add more articles, a small team of editors spent a major part of their time improving articles by way of increasing the length, adding interwiki links, references and images. They also spent time translating all the important strings that needed to be translated to bring the project out of incubation. Because of this, the total number of articles did not increase as it did during the previous plan year. But there was an overall improvement in Tulu Wikipedia in these areas - addition of new editors, improvements of existing articles, addition of better articles and translations of most needed strings.
Impact
editLike any other Indian language Wikipedia, Tulu Wikipedia is also experiencing uneven growth. CIS-A2K took part in some editathons, workshops and meetups[1],[2]. CIS-A2K also helped the community drive many activities on its own. Editathons and workshops were held at Mangaluru and Udupi and the meetups were held at Mangaluru. Translations of all important strings have been accomplished. A meeting of Tulu Wikipedians was held on Feb 15, 2016, where it was decided that-
- tcy will be the code for Tulu Wikipedia (Tulu Wikipedia will be tcy.wikipedia.org) and
- Kannada script will be used for Tulu Wikipedia[3].
Tulu community felt the need to have tutorials for learning Tulu Wikipedia. CIS-A2K anchored this work. With the help of Tulu Wikipedians a total of 7 tutorial videos have been created[4].
Tangible impact
editHere is the growth of Tulu Wikipedia in table form[5]:
| Year | Month | Edits per month | New pages | Bytes added | Editors per month |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 7 | 345 | 14 | 56086 | 7 |
| 2015 | 8 | 1124 | 28 | 292820 | 22 |
| 2015 | 9 | 548 | 10 | 94397 | 11 |
| 2015 | 10 | 396 | 9 | 205539 | 5 |
| 2015 | 11 | 638 | 8 | 86106 | 4 |
| 2015 | 12 | 397 | 10 | 76275 | 4 |
| 2016 | 1 | 139 | 7 | 54786 | 3 |
| 2016 | 2 | 282 | 6 | 110870 | 6 |
Here is the summary of the growth:
| Month | Total articles | Total editors with more than 10 edits | Editors with at least one edit |
| Jul 2014 | 365 | 19 | 50 |
| Jul 2015 | 890 | 74 | 142 |
| Feb 2016 | 1054 | 93 | 186 |
-
Bytes added per month during the period July 2015 - June 2016 -
New pages created per month during the period July 2015 - June 2016 -
Edits per month during the period July 2015 - June 2016 -
Editors per month during the period July 2015 - June 2016 -
Total articles during the period July 2015 - June 2016
Intangible impact
editThere were 6 media mentions about the editathon that was held at Mangaluru during Aug 14-16, 2015.
Needs Assessment
edit
Tulu Wikipedia community is still a bit isolated from many of the Wikimedia activities and happenings. Most editors do not participate in Wikimedia mailing lists and online discussions on global Wikimedia websites. Most discussions about Tulu Wikipedia is happening in a Whatsapp group, and some in a Facebook group. CIS-A2K has had discussions with the community through these channels apart from email and telephonic conversations. The Tulu Wikipedia community felt these are the areas that have to be focused in the next plan year.
- Bring in new editors and make them active editors.
- Strengthen existing editors by supporting them in different ways like providing required resources, additional trainings, creating additional training resources.
- Focus on Tulu language, Tulu culture, Tulu people, places and traditions. No documentation exists in Tulu language about these things. Tulu Wikipedia should fill this void by way of creating articles on these topics.
- GLAM activities around the above themes.
- Quality improvement of existing articles.
- So far there were outreach activities at Mangaluru and Udupi only. There is a need to organise more outreach at other places.
Implementation plan
editTable 3
Program (1) # of newly registered users (2) # of active editors involved (3) # of individuals involved (4a) # of new images/media added to Wikimedia articles/pages (4b) # of new images/media uploaded (optional) (5) # of articles added or improved on Wikimedia projects (6) Absolute value of bytes added to or deleted from Wikimedia projects Educational Institutions partnership 40 4 175 4000 500 200 400,000 Outreach programs 40 4 80 40 60 120 240,000 Theme based editathons 10 10 30 100 600 100 200,000 GLAM activities 5 15 20 150 1000 100 - Regular meetups and trainings - 10 20 - - - - Quality imrovements - 10 20 300 - 500 50,000
Table 3 notes:Bytes are indicative of Text not images
Cultivating new editors
editEducational Institutes
Mangalore University has a Tulu chair which carries out studies, research and documentation about Tulu language and culture. The Department of Kannada has included a paper about Tulu in its post-graduate program. However, both of these produce the output in Kannada. CIS-A2K has initiated discussions with these departments and efforts will be made to establish partnership. CIS-A2K has ongoing partnerships with other institutions in that area but so far the work was focused mainly on Kannada. Now efforts will be made to add Tulu also. Other institutes with whom efforts will be made to establish partnership are listed below.
| Name of the Institution | Status | Description | Wikimedia project | WMF Strategy Alignment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mangalore University, Mangaluru | Approached | Content generation | Wikipedia | |
| Karnataka Theological College, Mangaluru | Approached | Content generation | Wikipedia & Wikimedia Commons | |
| St. Aloysius College, Mangaluru | Ongoing | Content generation | Wikipedia & Wikimedia Commons | |
| Alva’s Education Foundation, Moodbidri | Ongoing | Content generation | Wikimedia commons | |
| SDM College, Ujire | Ongoing | Content generation | Wikipedia |
- Goal(Plan)
To reach out to these institutions and try to have a partnership with them and sign MoU where needed.
- Objective(Execution)
- To organise workshops at these institutes and train the participants
- To have the existing community members involve in the outreach programs
- To generate articles in Tulu Wikipedia
- To add some new editors to Tulu Wikipedia and make them active.
- Target(Projection)
- About 40 new Wikipedians for Tulu Wikipedia
- About 200 new articles for Tulu Wikipedia
- Improving about 200 existing articles
- Adding about 500 new images related to Tulu language and culture to Commons
Outreach Programs
Tulu Wikipedian community is now concentrated mostly in cities, namely, Mangaluru and Udupi. The Tulu Wikipedian community feels the need to expand the community to other cities as well.
- Goal(Plan)
Organising outreach programs in cities beyond Mangaluru and Udupi so as to create awareness and attract new editors in these cities.
- Objective(Execution)
- To organise outreach programs in smaller cities to create awareness about Tulu Wikipedia.
- To organise outreach programs like workshops and editathons in smaller cities.
- To organise such programs in cities like Kasaragod, Ujire, Moodabidre, Puttur, Sullia, etc.
- Target(Projection)
- About 20-40 new editors for Tulu Wikipedia.
- About 60-120 new articles for Tulu Wikipedia.
- Awareness about Tulu Wikipedia.
Content Generation
editTheme based editathons
There is a need to have encyclopedic content about Tulu language, Tulu culture, Tulu people, places and traditions in Tulu language. For example, Tulunadu (Tulu land) has unique practice called bhootaaraadhane (loosely meaning devil workship). Lot has been written about this in different books, periodicals, research publications, but in languages other than Tulu. Theme based editathons are aimed at filling this void by way of creating articles on thematic topics.
- Goal(Plan)
Organise theme based editathons at different places
- Objective(Execution)
- Themes could be Tulu language, Tulu culture, Tulu folklore, Tulu people, places of Tulunadu (Tulu land)
- To organise 3-5 such editathons
- Target(Projection)
- About 60-100 new articles on the above themes
- Adding about 300-600 new images to Commons
GLAM Activities
Wikimedia Commons has very little material on Tulu culture, Tulu people, places and traditions of Tulunadu. GLAM activities at various places of Tulunadu will help in filling this void. Theme based editathons proposed in another section of this work-plan and these GLAM activties will complement each other.
- Goal(Plan)
GLAM related activities like photowalks at different places.
- Objective(Execution)
- To organise photowalks at various places of Tulunadu
- To organise photowalks at various archives and museums like Bassel Mission Archives Mangalore, St Aloysius College archives Mangalore, Manjusha Museum Dhrmasthala , Regional Research Centre Udupi, etc.
- To add photos and videos related to Tulu culture, Tulu folklore, Tulu people, places of Tulunadu to Commons.
- To organise 3-5 such photowalks.
- Target(Projection)
- Adding about 300-1000 new images to Commons
- Adding about 10-30 new videos to Commons
Strengthening Existing Community
editRegular meetups and trainings
Regular meetings of active Wikipedians help in improving the community spirit. During these meetings, experienced Wikipedians can help strengthen the community by conducting advanced trainings and providing advice, tips and tricks. CIS-A2K will be act like a catalyst to these activities and the ownership of the activities will lie with Tulu community.
- Goal(Plan)
Organise regular meetings of active Wikipedians. Try to bring in some experienced WIkipedians from any language and have simple training programs conducted by them.
- Objective(Execution)
- To organise regular meetups
- To bring in some expert Wikipedians to these meetups
- To organise training programs by these experienced Wikipedians to provide tips and tricks
- To strengthen the community spirit
- Target(Projection)
- To have 5-8 meetups
- To have 10-15 Wikipedians attend these meetups
Quality improvement
editQuality improvements
During the initial stages of Tulu Wikipedia development, which was and is still in, incubation, many small articles were added. Many of these articles were added without any interwiki links, references and images. Lack of encyclopedic content in Tulu language is one main reason of not able to provide Tulu content as reference to the articles. But a lot of work has been done in documenting Tulu culture in Kannada and English. References can be added from these resources. Efforts will be made to improve the quality of Tulu Wikipedia by addressing the above mentioned issues.
- Goal(Plan)
To improve the quality of articles in Tulu Wikipedia.
- Objective(Execution)
- To add interwiki links, references and images to articles which do not have these.
- To increase the length of articles which are very small.
- To add images to articles wherever they are missing or needed.
- To add sections to articles where they are missing.
- Target(Projection)
- To add interwiki links and references to about 300 articles.
- To increase the length of about 500 articles.