Grants:IdeaLab/Wikipedia Gender Concerns Reporting Tools

statusnot selected

Wikipedia Gender Concerns Reporting Tools

Create a tool which makes it easy to report gender-related concerns and compile data, while maintaining necessary confidentiality.

amount7064 USD

grantee• QEDK• Djembayz

idea creator• Djembayz

project manager• QEDK

community organizer• Cbratbyrudd

advisor• Snowycats

this project needs...

volunteer

developer

grantee

designer

give feedback

join

endorse

created on02:05, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

Project idea

What is the problem you're trying to solve?

Many calls for data regarding the Gender Gap go unanswered, because this data is either unavailable or too time consuming to compile. Similarly, many calls for help regarding negative gender-related situations go unanswered or unresolved, in large part because there is no clear reporting mechanism available. Implementation of existing site policies on non-harassment and incivility toward women and gender minorities requires a way to systematically monitor and compile the community's gender-related concerns.

What is your solution?

The paragraph below, drawn from an article in "The New Statesmen", describes the technical requirements of such a system.

"A reporting system that was designed to appreciate women’s experiences with harassment and discrimination would provide reporting tools that do, at the very least, six things:

one, make it easy to report multiple incidents at the same time;
two, provide a way for users to explain context or cross-platform harassment;
three, have moderators who are trained to understand the reality of women’s safety needs;
four, have guidelines that define “legitimate threat” in a way that isn’t only the threat of the kind of “imminent violence”, usually perpetrated by a stranger and most often experienced by a man, but the less visible, more pervasive, harms suffered by women at the hands of people they know;
five, give users maximum privacy controls; and,
lastly, provide options would allow users to designate surrogates or proxies who can step in to track and report incidents."

An existing app of this type which is not specific to Wikipedia is the ADC Michigan Civil Rights Action App. It is described as a "Cyber Civil Rights Monitor. The program supports victims of online harassment by positioning cyber assault as an offense on civil rights. The Cyber Civil Rights Monitor provides guidance, education, and advocacy for all victims of cyber bullying, regardless of age, ethnicity or religion."

Goals

Develop as much of the functionality described above as our developers feel is reasonable to complete within the scope of this Gender Gap Inspire Campaign.
Provide prototype or working models of these tools for administrators and WMF staff to test out.
Collect data for effective interventions regarding the Gender Gap.
Enable confidential reporting of gender-related concerns.
Improve retention of female editors.
Facilitate efforts to resolve gender-related concerns for editors of all genders.
Make the site a happier experience for everybody!

References

Soraya Chemaly. Silicon Valley sexism: why it matters that the internet is made by men, for men. New Statesman, Feb. 4, 2015.
Lapowsky, Issie (2015-02-17). "An App That Lets Kids Report Bullies Anonymously". WIRED. Retrieved 2015-02-23.
ASU project combats online threats toward women, girls, March 15, 2015

Get Involved

Participants

Project manager This idea would gain traction if devs were to work on it. I don't know if it would help because we need hardcore evidence that sexism occurs, but if it does, I'd love to help. QEDK (talk) 03:57, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
Volunteer I can help in data collection, analysis and presentation of results.→Masssly ^✉ 01:25, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Advisor I would love to help with this idea! I see a lot of opportunity in this idea with room to grow. I would love to help you by being your new Advisor. Snowycats (talk) 12:22, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Community organizer Hello, I recently submitted a similar proposal-- see Create_an_avenue_to_easily_report_biased_editors. I am interested in getting involved with this project. I noticed that you page says that you also work with project grants. Is there a way to get a grant for this project?

Thanks for your time!

https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grants:IdeaLab/Create_an_avenue_to_easily_report_biased_editors&wteswitched=1#What_is_the_problem_you%27re_trying_to_solve%3F Cbratbyrudd (talk) 19:16, 26 July 2018 (UTC)

Endorsements

I can see the value of having a tool that makes it easier to report, manage, and track all types of harassment, and to make sure it is designed to be friendly toward gender issues. Sydney Poore/FloNight (talk) 17:38, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
I like this idea very much. It would certainly provide not only an opportunity for users to report gender-based hostility, but the resulting data may also provide a quantitative baseline for additional interventions and studies. --Mssemantics (talk) 23:10, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
Great idea ! The tool would help identify offenders quickly, and having a skipper like Djembayz would be a great bonus. Would like to caution that abusers might claim that there is some conspiracy to malign them by repeatedly reporting them. Please do not fall for this ploy. There is no conspiracy unless it is coming from users with very few or no other edits. A report is a report, and cannot be neglected because of allegations of some worldwide conspiracy.OrangesRyellow (talk) 16:45, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
Sounds great: reporting, and a body of knowledge to work from is the only way to prove that gender issues are a problem for sceptical members of the community calling for evidence (though we shouldn't have to do this) as well. Sadads (talk) 21:26, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
A tool like "report harassment" can be useful in general, and not only for gender-related issues. The treatment of harassment reports is, however, more complicated and would probably need to have at least one experienced psychologist behind — NickK (talk) 02:56, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Love the idea of "reporting" or contributing in a way that is something more lightweight than SOFIXIT or BEBOLD. This has been a problem for years, not just with Gender Gap issues, but for any and everything in Wikipedia for which someone has an insight or contribution to the fold, but the complexity of our interface, community, policies and technical system get in the way. -- Fuzheado (talk) 15:44, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
I think that insofar as we recognize the gender gap in material, it seems like an essential step to have a way to point out where it's happening, as essential as the "citation needed" function to keep wikipedia objective, progressive, and helpful. Aebergeronp (talk) 16:15, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
This is a great, practical idea. I'd like to see a tool similar to the ticket generators used in technical support, in which it's possible to track the requests as well as the actions taken and resolution. --Luxxxbella (talk) 17:07, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Excellent idea. Hmlarson (talk) 00:06, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
Valuable and necessary. Ocaasi (talk) 00:55, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
This sounds like a good idea. Xttina.Garnet (talk) 23:24, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
I think this is a great idea. Would it work across several languages - it would be even greater if it did. Nattes à chat (talk) 21:46, 11 October 2016 (UTC)

Expand your idea

Do you want to submit your idea for funding from the Wikimedia Foundation?

Expand your idea into a grant proposal

Project plan

Activities

To build a simple, speedy helpdesk that seamlessly integrates with Wikipedia. It'll allow people to report concerns anonymously or otherwise (OAuth login).

Budget

3564 USD - Using Mojo Helpdesk for 5 years
- Paid to Mojo Helpdesk
2500 USD - Metrics collection and research whitepaper
- Split between researchers and project managers.
1000 USD - Web design, integration with Wikipedia and otherwise
- Split between developers

Community engagement

We'll set up a CentralNotice banner to all editors, stating that if they have gender concerns, they can contact us. Furthermore, we'll maintain an on-wiki page, where our records shall be made public. We'll survey before the start of the helpdesk as to see the willingness and acceptance of this system. Then, we select the admins from the Ada Initiatives proposal to be ticket managers. After the 3 years of running the ticketing system, we evaluate our success rate and publish the whitepaper. That's it.

Sustainability

Our metrics will be updated continually and all case files will be put on-wiki to promote further research. Also, a whitepaper shall be published after the project's round 1 (i.e. at the end of 3 years).

Measures of success

Improve female editor retention by 50%. This is a very rough sketch since nothing like this has been done before.
Best way to understand is if all tickets are resolved amicably.

Project team

Djembayz (advisor) - He's involved with WikimediaDC. Is good at community organizing
Snowycats (advisor) - Don't know yet. Trying to ping them.
QEDK (grantee) - although a minor - I've been to gender-gap workshops and I am experienced on-wiki. That's pretty much it.
We'll put up the 2 devs (also grantees) later as it's undecided.

Community notification

Please paste links below to where relevant communities have been notified of your proposal, and to any other relevant community discussions. Need notification tips?