Grants:APG/Proposals/2018-2019 round 2/Wikimedia Norge/Proposal form

Overview edit

1. In order to support community review, please provide a brief description of your organization's work in the upcoming funding period.

Wikimedia Norge is requesting 1,970,000 NOK for the 2019–2020 funding period to continue our work with national GLAM and educational partners, and international Wikimedia affiliate partners, to increase the diversity in content and among contributors on the Wikimedia projects. We will concentrate on projects and events about gender gap, for example our Women in Red project with The National Library and Oslo Metropolitan University as partners. The other main area we will work on is indigenous languages, especially the Sami languages that are spoken in Norway by the Sami people. 2019 is the International Year of Indigenous Languages and as one of UNESCO’s civil society partners Wikimedia Norge do different collaborations and events throughout the year to increase Sami related content on the Wikimedia projects. Norway is a country where gender issues and the rights of indigenous people are supported on a government level and by different structures in society such as national institutions, organizations and by a large part of the public press. This provides Wikimedia Norge great opportunties to align our work to the international strategic direction and focus on knowledge and communities that have been left out by structures of power and privilege.


2. Name, fiscal year, and funding period.
  • Legal name of organization: Wikimedia Norge
  • Organization's fiscal year: 1.1.2019–31.12.2019
  • 12-month funding period requested: 01/07/19-30/06/20
  • Currency requested: NOK
  • Name of primary contact: Astrid Carlsen, Executive director


3. Amount requested.

Exchange rate =0,11697 USD
The exchange rate last year was 0,127. The difference in exchange rates from last year to this year amounts to about 20,000 USD less in funding requested by Wikimedia Norge in this proposal. This page shows last years Wikimedia Foundation Annual Plan Grant proposal and the amount requested.

Table 1

Currency requested US$
Total expenses for the upcoming year 2,675,000 312,895
APG funding requested for the upcoming year 1,970,000 230,431
Amount of funding received from WMF for the current year 1,970,000 250,190


4. How does your organization know what community members and contributors to online projects need or want? Does your organization conduct needs assessments or consult the contributors and volunteers most involved with its work?

Wikimedia Norge consults and takes part in discussions on the village pumps of the Northern Sami, Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk Wikipedias. We discuss ideas and concerns from community members via email, social media (mostly Facebook), telephone calls, meetings and wiki meetups. This give us useful feedback and information on how we should best use the resources we have available for projects the community members and contributors to online projects need or want. We also have ongoing conversations and host meetings with GLAM partners and educational partners to make sure we plan activities they have a strong interest in supporting and promoting. This is also important for applications for external funding we write with partners. We have done two user surveys the last couple of years, one community survey and one about Northern Sami Wikipedia. We are planning for a new community survey in January 2020 and will look at how Wikimedia Nederland set up their recent editor survey. We have many contributors and volunteers involved in our work also through different groups, for example the group working on Wikimedia Norge wiki grants and wiki meet-ups in Oslo with external guests speaking. We are happy that our efforts over several years on more volunteer invovlement are showing results.



Annual plan summary edit

Wikimedia Norge’s strategy edit

Wikimedia Norge's strategy was revised by the board in 2017–2018 to start our process to align with the international strategic direction of knowledge as a service and knowledge equity. The two biggest changes in the Wikimedia Norge strategy were choosing diversity as a more prominent thematic approach and the second change was that we want to focus more on international collaboration with other affiliates and partner organizations. These changes were done for several reasons. We identified our biggest opportunities for partnerships, external funding and outreach within diversity projects. Wikimedia Norge's civil society partnership with UNESCO on The Year of Indigenous Languages 2019 serves as a good example on how our strategy influences our work and priorities for our Sami project. Our ongoing collaboration with The National Archive and Wikimedia Armenia on making achieve material made by women available on the Wikimedia projects is another example, as is our Women in Red project with The National Library and Oslo Metropolitan University.

The change in Wikimedia Norge staff from 1 April 2019 from having a 30 % FTE as education manager to a 30 % FTE as diversity manager also supports these strategic changes. The board of Wikimedia Norge reached a 50/50 gender balance after the board election during the general assembly on 9 March 2019.

Wikimedia Norge’s three programs for the 2019–2020 funding period has diversity as an overarching theme and this theme is an integrated part of in all three programs; in partnerships with GLAM and educational institutions, at events, in online editing competitions, applications for press accreditations, in our communication work to name some examples.

Wikimedia Norge is currently working together with Prospera to get funding for a joint project. Prospera is a Norwegian foundation that helps non-profits solve critical challenges with the support of consultants who donate their time and skill sets. During the Wikimedia Norge project consultants from Prospera will work with the executive director and board of Wikimedia Norge on a 3 month project on organizational and strategic development. The project has a planned start in September 2019. This is good timing, assuming the Wikimedia movement have agreed on recommendations for our 2030 strategy by Wikimania in Stockholm in August.

Starting with the July 2018–June 2020 Annual Plan for Wikimedia Norge we have gathered and overview of all relevant documentation for our early planning on one page on our wiki. This documentation includes: action plan, budget, guiding documents, the boards annual plan and staff's reports on programs, communication activities, and spendings etc. This page gives both Wikimedia Norge' members and volunteers, board members and staff members, an overview of our work and the link between what we want to achieve, how we are going to achieve it, what resources we spend on achieving it, the division of tasks between board and staff, and how it all went in the Reports-section.


Program overview edit

Wikimedia Norge has three programs for the upcoming funding period. All three program have been part of our work for several years and have a strong forcus on a selcted group of partnerships and a set of activities and events we do on an annual basis. The fact that some activities and events are annual helps us plan our work ahead and do it in an efficent way. It also means that both volunteers and partners know that for example each October we do a Wikinobel event at The Nobel Peace Center and they can reach out to us and plan their own engagemnet.

Supporting Communities

This program will strength and support the work done by and the collaborations between a diversity of communities, partner organizations and Wikimedia Norge

The goals of this program are:

  • WMNO will be an organization that works together with a diverse set of communities and is considered an influential organization in free culture and open knowledge.
  • WMNO will offer different types of support to new and active volunteers that enables contributions to the Wikimedia projects.
  • WMNO will support different community initiatives and share volunteers' stories in social media.

To reach the above mentioned goals we have a set of community support activities we have organized over several years now. The community support activities are used and appreciated by both Wikimedia Norge members and other volunteers. Examples of different activities Wikimedia Norge offer to support community activities are: wiki grants, a drone project, The Wikipedia Library, online editing and photo contests, wiki meet-ups and Wikidata-workshops, applying for press accreditations, sharing stories from volunteers and our work in different communication channels. The communication channels we use are: Homepage, wiki, Blog, newsletters, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter.

Closing Content Gaps

This program will add high quality content to close content gaps on the Wikimedia projects by partnerships between Wikimedia Norge, volunteers and major Norwegian institutions

The goals of this program are:

  • WMNO will explore existing national and international partnerships to diversify the content available on the Wikimedia projects.
  • WMNO will support initiatives and contest that results in high quality images uploaded to Wikimedia Commons with image use across many Wikipedias.
  • Through partnerships with GLAM and education institutions WMNO will give access to and contribute to free knowledge.

The three main projects in this in this program includes partnerships we have worked on for a years already and they all have external funding approved for the upcoming funding period. The 3 main projects are:

In this program we work with partner institutions on Wikidata uploads, Wikimedia Commons uploads, writing of Wikipedia articles by students (as an elective at Oslo Metropolitan Univeristy), organizing events and taking part at conferences, and outreach activities such as online competitions to give some examples. The main partnerships for our program on Closing Content Gaps are: The National Library, The National Archive, The Directorate of Cultural Heritage, Nordland County Library/Márkomeannu Festival, Vestfold County Museum, Sami Language Centers across the country (main partner in Oslo), The University of Tromsø, Oslo Metropolitan University and Wikimdedia affiliates like Wikimedia Armenia. Most of these partnerships have been build over several years. In doing the Sami project our exeperience from the exsisting partnerships are very useful in how we approach new partners within the Sami community.

Raising Awareness of Free, Trusted Knowledge

This program will rise awareness of whose knowledge is shared on the Wikimedia projects and welcome new voices to contribute

The goals of this program are:

  • Norway has a national online encyclopedia, by some viewed as a competitor to Wikipedia, and WMNO will raise awareness on how Wikipedia works and is part of an international ecosystem of knowledge.
  • WMNO will continue to build strong partnerships with a selected group of partners that share our vision of free knowledge.
  • By participating in major national events in Norway, WMNO will advocate for diversity on Wikimedia projects and beyond.

In this program, we work mainly on annual events, communication work and image uploads to Wikimedia Commons. Examples on different events we either are invited to partcipate in or organize ourelf are: a March 8 /WikiGap event with The Swedish Embassy in Oslo, the Oslo Freedom Forum in May, the indigenous music festival Riddu Riđđu in July, The Researcher Days organized by The Research Council in September, and Wikinobel at The Nobel Peace Center to mark the announcement of The Nobel Peace laureate in October. Another set of activities in this program are different types of communication work we do to share stories about these events and the importance of free knowledge. The radical negative changes that has happend over the last years in many democracies in Europe have not happened in Norway and we are in a privileged position where we can speak up about threats to free knowledge without fear of repercussions.

The main partnerships for our program on Raising awareness of free, trusted knowledge are: The Nobel Peace Center, The Research Council in Norway, Oslo Freedom Forum/Human Rights Foundation, Riddu Riđđu Festival, NetBlocks, UNESCO/IYIL2019, The Free Knowledge Advocacy Group EU and The Swedish Embassy in Oslo.

Budget edit

Wikimedia Norge's budget for 2019–2020 was approved by our general assembly 9 March 2019, as this record shows. The budget that was presented to the general assembly can be read here. It does not include in-kind donations. This is the first Wikimedia Foundation Annual Plan Grant application where we include all in-kind donations Wikimedia Norge receives. A large part of the in-kind donations are honorariums for people taking part at Wikimedia Norge events and venues we get to use without paying rent. These types of donations are very important to us as an organization as they reflect how our partners are willing to invest resources in events we organize. They are even more important for many community members as a recognition of their volunteer contributions. For example, when a highly profiled tech person in Norway came and spoke at a wiki meetup in Oslo for volunteers it was a good thing for the community health and for motivation. The negotiation of in-kind donations are also important for us in building partnerships. The honorariums we don’t have to pay add up to a significant sum because of the salary levels we have in Norway (overview of average monthly earnings can been read on this page). On top of those in-kind donations, over the last 4 months Wikimedia Norge has been awarded external funding from 3 different Norwegian funders; The Arts Council, NUUG Foundation and UNESCO Norge. The total sum of this funding is: 374,000 NOK. Wikimedia Norge’s work over many years on securing external funding is now showing good results due to our strong partnerships and a more narrow focus on diversity in our projects. When external funding, membership fees and donations and in-kind donations are summarized, one can say that 40 % of Wikimedia Norge revenues are from external funding.

Wikimedia Norge has had a good track record of staying on budget for the last 5 years. Our progress report for July 2018–January 2019 shows that 58 % of our expenses were spend to date. Wikimedia Norge passed the audit review (auditors review for 2018 (in Norwegian)) and the Wikimedia Norge audit committee review (annual report 2018) without any remarks during our general assembly March 9 2019.


Below are tables of Wikimedia Norge's total projected revenues and expenses for the upcoming funding year 2019–2020:

Revenues NOK $US
Annual Plan Grant, Wikimedia Foundation 1,970,000 230,431
External funding 340,000 39,770
In-kind donations 380,000 44,449
TOTAL PROJECTED REVENUES 2,690,000 314,649
Expenses NOK $US
Staff expenses
Staff expenses Program 1 Supporting communities 432,000 50,531
Staff expenses Program 2 Closing content gaps 432,000 50,531
Staff expenses Program 3 Raising awareness of free, trusted knowledge 216,000 25,266
Staff expenses Operations 360,000 42,109
Operations expenses (Office costs, audit & accountancy, travel costs staff & board members) 485,000 56,730
Program expenses
Program 1 Supporting communities 330,000 38,600
Program 2 Closing content gaps 290,000 33,921
Program 3 Raising awareness of free, trusted knowledge 130,000 15,206
TOTAL PROJECTED EXPENSES 2,675,000 312,895
Surplus 15,000 1,755

We have also included a table to show the split of salary expenses per program and operations in percentages:

% of staff expenses per program and on operations
Program 1 Supporting communities 30 %
Program 2 Closing content gaps 30 %
Program 3 Raising awareness of free, trusted knowledge 15 %
Staff expenses Operations 25 %

Grant metrics and evaluation edit

Grant metrics
Participants Newly registered Content pages Diversity Volunteer hours
Program 1 Community Support 500 50 10,000 5,000 600
Program 2 Content 500 200 10,000 10,000 500
Program 3 Free Knowledge 400 20 2,000 100
TOTAL FOR ALL PROGRAMMES 1,400 270 20,000 17,000 1,200

Explanation of grantee defined metrics:

  • Diversity: Number of new or improved articles on women's biographies on the Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk or Northern Sami Wikipedias and number of Sami-related items added to Wikidata
  • Community hours: Hours community members spend on organizing activities or helping staff organize activities (not included are hours spend adding content)


Comments on metrics:
We very much welcomed the grantee defned metrics when they were introduced for the 2016–2017 funding period. Both metrics Wikimedia Norge decided on, diversity and community hours, have increased over the past three years. The significant increase in Diversity, from 1,000 to 17,000, shows the increased diversity focus we have in our GLAM and educational partnerships. Focusing on diversity as an overall approach for the upcoming funding period will lead to a slightly decline in Newly registered, as we will work with smaller groups of people. But at the same time this focus has given us an increase over the years in the number of participants. The reason for this is that the gender gap on Wikipedia is very much an issue that engages the press and public in Norway and it's one of Wikimedia Norge's best oppourtunities to attract attention to our work. For Wikimedia Norge an interesting idea in metrics to track and report on would be metris that could reflect our work on partnerships as this is so central to our work.


Evaluation of Wikikmedia Norge's work:
Every quarter, before board meeetings, staff from Wikimedia Norge shares reports on wiki on our activities, spendings and communication work. This gives volunteers, members and the Wikikmedia Norge board and committees the oppourtunity to follow and oversee over work and it's important for us to be transparent on how our resources are spent. In our progress and impact reports we have a list of targets under every program we report on. The last report from Wikimedia Norge, for the term July 2018–January 2020, on recieved Annual Plan Grant from the Wikimedia Foundation can be read here.

Verification and signature edit

Please enter "yes" or "no" for the verification below.

The term “political or legislative activities” includes any activities relating to political campaigns or candidates (including the contribution of funds and the publication of position statements relating to political campaigns or candidates); voter registration activities; meetings with or submissions and petitions to government executives, ministers, officers or agencies on political or policy issues; and any other activities seeking government intervention or policy implementation (like “lobbying”), whether directed toward the government or the community or public at large. General operating support through the FDC may not be used to cover political and legislative activities, although you may make a separate grant agreement with the WMF for these purposes.
I verify that no funds from the Wikimedia Foundation will be used
for political or legislative activities except as permitted by a grant agreement
Yes


Please sign below to complete this proposal form.

IMPORTANT. Please do not make any changes to this proposal form after the proposal submission deadline for this round. If a change that is essential to an understanding of your organization's proposal is needed, please request the change on the discussion page of this form so it may be reviewed by FDC staff. Once submitted, complete and valid proposal forms submitted on time by eligible organizations will be considered unless an organization withdraws its application in writing or fails to remain eligible for the duration of the FDC process.
Please sign here once this proposal form is complete, using four tildes. Astrid Carlsen (WMNO) (talk) 19:26, 1 April 2019 (UTC)