Grants:Project/Rapid/Pine/Continuation of educational video and website series/Newsletters/Newsletter 3

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Video tutorial "Referencing with VisualEditor" – newsletter issue 3 long version

Video tutorial "Referencing with VisualEditor" – newsletter issue 3

Introduction and highlights

Hello! As I mentioned in the previous newsletter, the scripts selected for production were at draft 2. These have been revised again, and are now at draft 2.11. I am proceeding into production with the draft 2.11 scripts, but comments are always welcome.

Details regarding how the project is going

New project coordination space

NavWiki Welcome Page

There is now a coordination space for this project on the Outreach Wiki at Outreach/NavWiki. Questions and comments are welcome on the project talk page! Hopefully the new link is easy to remember.

External Resources

Explain this. See Outreach/NavWiki/External Resources

Grant report

Link to the "final" grant report. Explain that I am continuing the project after the end of the report.

Status of scripts

Also as I mentioned in the previous newsletter, in addition to the scripts that are selected for review, other scripts which have been drafted but not selected for production will temporarily remain at draft 1. These scripts may be produced in the future, especially if there is feedback regarding the initial videos from this pilot project.

Production flow and viewer flow

Here is a reminder regarding the prioritization of the videos and the viewers' planned progression through those videos.

Flow of scenes and prioritization for production

Request for constructive criticism and comments

These scripts are going into production during the next several weeks, but you can continue to comment on them if you would like. Comments can be helpful even after the videos are produced, both so that I can consider revising these scripts and so that I can consider the feedback when developing future videos.

Several more draft scripts have been written. Their production is paused until after the first two videos are published and the community has an opportunity to provide feedback. Links to the scripts which are currently paused are available in the NavWiki Development Lab.

Time and budget, and problems with my relationship with WMF

This pilot project is taking more time than I anticipated, and the original budget of $2000 (USD) has long been exhausted. For this pilot project, I plan to produce selected videos without requesting additional funds. I am also developing the project coordination space with my volunteer time.

Depending on the feedback and use of the pilot videos, I may request funding to develop additional videos in the future, probably starting with scripts that are already at draft version 1, but I would prefer not to use WMF funding in part because of concerns about conflicts of interest between the community and WMF.

I had planned a significant chunk of unpaid time earlier this year for video production, but I instead spent a large portion of that time responding to WMF's power grab on English Wikipedia. (See this report in The Signpost.)

It is difficult for me to see how I can accept WMF funding in a way that does not create a conflict of interest between my potential financial dependence on WMF and my desire to support the interests of the community. If I want more WMF funding and/or became dependent on WMF funding then I would have an incentive keep quiet the next time that WMF clashes with the community because (1) I would fear that I would risk disapproval of future grant requests and/or (2) any time that I spend objecting to WMF's actions is likely to be unpaid time and is likely to postpone paid work on this project, which (a) could be bad for my personal financial situation and (b) any delays to the project could give WMF a justification for cutting future funding. However, the need for large quantities of time for the many stages of researching, communicating, developing, and publishing training materials mean that this project will probably need funding if it is to become highly successful, especially in multiple languages and for multiple Wikimedia projects. If I seek further funding for this project then I would prefer to have a non-WMF funding source. I will think further about funding for this project if the community's feedback regarding the pilot videos is positive.

Relevant quotes

From IRC

<mynameisnotdave> Wikipedia is like 'find a car, you don't need a license, and try driving without crashing. And oh, here's a highway code that you can try to read while driving'

From an opinion piece in The Signpost by User:Gog the Mild

"Which brings me back to psychological preparedness. I was not accustomed to being the new member of an established group and the slow kid at the back of the class at the same time. Relying on the charity of others to metaphorically tie my shoelaces. It grated. This was entirely my own, fairly reasonable (I think), issue. Nor was I prepared for the casual offhandedness which is fairly common. Recently I suffered a mass revert with the edit summary "Learn some intellectual property law". This bluntness rankled. It was my issue rather than the reverting editor's, but that didn't help reduce the rankle. Since discovering MilHist I have stumbled around in this small corner of Wikipedia, occasionally bumping into helpful tools which I endeavour to clutch close.

"The near complete lack of usable guides – IMO – to the basics is heavily compensated by the, usually, enormous willingness of complete strangers to spend time and effort correcting my idiocies, reducing my ignorance and remembering that they too were newbies once. Members of the Military History Project have collegially made the project a comfortable place to work in such a natural, even graceful, way that what they have achieved seems normal."

Closing comments

Thank you for your interest and patience. I continue to believe that the finished videos will be useful for new Wikipedians and for the people who guide them.

Yours in service,

↠Pine (✉) 06:37, 11 November 2019 (UTC)