Grants:Project/TheNEBstudio/WikiMillennials
This project is funded by a Project Grant
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gmail.com• User:CotonMah
COVID-19 edit
Our project being mainly based on media production (drawing, audio), it can perfectly be done remotely. And even the workshops can be redesigned to become online events.
Budgets for transportation can be cut out obviously.
(Sorry, no time to develop more due to short deadlines, but if we obtain the grant, we will be able to adapt to the circumstances).
Project idea edit
What is the problem you're trying to solve? edit
Youth, and in particular maginalized youth, don't feel empowered to edit Wikipedia and share their knowledge. We lack stories and role models with which they could identify and which could inspire them to join our movement.
We work in the field of entertainment and we have noticed that indeed, to our knowledge, there are very few stories (fictional or documentary) that allow people to discover Wikimedians in action (contrary to other types of volunteers like free-software programers or climate activists), and there are even fewer stories about young people from marginalized backgrounds, such as LGBTQI+ communities, or people of color.
We think this lack of representation contributes to the general lack of awareness about contribution to Wikimedia projects, and lack of vocation to contribute, in particular among these underrepresented populations.
Of course, lack of awareness and lack of representation are wide problems and won't be integrally solved by one project, but we hope we can contribute in our own way to help the Wikimedia Movement diversify by trying an innovative method.
What is your solution to this problem? edit
Context edit
We are a French collective of comic book artists, The NEB studio, (with a wikipedian among us) who are used to mix fiction (comic books, world building) with meaningful engagement (we collaborate with FabLabs and MediaLabs to organize workshops in which, through storytelling, we lead people to learn about science, ecology, etc.).
For example, we created a series of creative workshops named "Galaxie", where people invented a science-fiction story but based on real scientific information and reasoning, thanks to our partnership with the science center La Casemate and our scientific mentors who were present for each workshop, astrophisician Cécile Renault and exogeologist, specialist of planet Mars Eric Lewin. We also published a webcomic in partnership with Grenoble's Municipal Library to have the public discover and learn about rare and precious manuscripts that never come out of the safe.
We are also inspired by the Wikimedia workshops organized by our friends here in the local group of Grenoble that address content gaps: creating articles about women, recording marginalized languages such as Creoles on Lingua Libre, etc. And we would like to spread the word and bring new audiences to such events.
Solution edit
Our solution is to include Wikipedia, awareness about free knowledge, and representation of minorities as a part of our next transmedia storytelling project, « Millennials ». This projects will consist of a webcomic freely accessible online, a podcast, a series of online calls to action, and offline workshops so people actually take action through a collaborative moment. All of them intended for a 18 to 30 years old audience.
The project is actually not just about Wikipedia: it will deal with a lot of contemparary issues such as climate crisis, social marginalization, LGBT+ lives, etc. in order to build a global picture of how we can collectively build a society that takes a different path. But for us, empowerment through accessing and creating free knowledge is a crucial piece of this puzzle, and that is why we want to feature Wikimedia projects within our story and workshops.
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More precisely, this is how our project will talk about Wikimedia:
- the webcomic is about young magicians who are wondering how to meaningfully use their powers to have a positive impact on the world. A couple of these magicians will be Wikimedians, who will use Wikipedia in the story to fight fake news and document knowledge from marginalized cultures.
- the podcast will be a « behind-the-scenes » format, with the creators of the comic interviewing real Wikimedians (a mix of women and men for gender equity) who have inspired them for the story ("magicians in real life").
- the online calls to action will consist of community management on social media. After the release of the webcomic and podcast episodes, we'll invite people to imitate these fictional and real-life role models, by launching easy challenges like « share a picture about LGBT+ on Commons and repost here » , « add a non-western source and show us! », « go record 10 words in creole / in slang on Lingua Libre and share the result ! », as well as links towards more engaging content such as the WikiMOOC or upcoming editathons. We plan that active participants to our challenges will win a trip to participate to our offline events.
- the offline workshops will be two editathons with innovative formats, happening in Grenoble and designed as pilots that can be reused in the future or in other cities.
- We will invite our readers and listeners, as well as specific populations, to come and contribute about marginalized topics (women, POC, LGBT - if possible collaborating with wiki volunteer groups who already are in this dynamic, or projects like Wiki for Human Rights).
- We plan 2 editathons because we want to intervene in different neighbourhoods and thus reach different types of young people: students on the campus, and popular youth in disadvantaged suburbs.
- These editathons will have an innovative and dynamic format, with 3 spaces for 3 types of contribution: Lingua Libre recording, Photography for Commons, and Wikipedia enrichment. We hope that this format will be more engaging for young audiences and allow discovering the diversity of Wikimedia projects and ways to collect and spread knowledge.
To summarize, our solution is to try out new approaches for outreach and recruitment based on popular culture (webcomic, podcast), social media and innovative offline formats. We think that the media is the message, and only by using the media young people use we will be able to reach out to them.
Project goals edit
- Inspire youth from marginalized groups to join Wikimedia projects as contributors by creating and sharing stories about inspiring and diverse role models
- Try out and document a new outreach approach, using wbecomic, podcast, social media, and workshops with a different format, as a means to reach out and appeal to young audiences - document and evaluate this approch to share it with the Wikimedia Movement for reuse (learning pattern or other format)
- Create a series of cool visuals (released under CC-BY-SA) starring diverse young Wikimedian magicians (women, LGBT+ folks, POCs) that can be used throughout the movement for broader outreach: tshirts, flyers, posters, banners, goodies...
Project impact edit
How will you know if you have met your goals? edit
1. During your project, what will you do to achieve this goal? (These are your outputs.)
- The webcomic will have been written, drawn and published, and will be accessible online for free, in both French and English
- The webcomic will have been read at least 2000 times (we actually hope for a lot more, but we don't want to oversell)
- The podcast will have been recorded, mixed and released, and will be accessible online for free in French
- The podcast will have been listened to at least 2000 times (probably more).
- Our series of visuals' will be available on Commons, and we will have shared their existence through Wikimedian channels so people can re-use them throughout the movement
- Our calls to action on social media will have created engagement online, with at leat 200 likes or shares, and at least 40 people actively participating to our wiki-challenges (hopefully more).
- Interest from influencers and the press will also be considered a factor of success.
- Our workshops will have gathered at least 30 young participants, with a 40/60 gender equity ratio at least. They will have discovered 3 different Wikimedia projects (Lingua Libre, Commons and Wikipedia) and made a meaningful contribution on each. We also hope some of them will join the local wiki group, or create their own group on the campus or in their neighborhood.
2. Once your project is over, how will it continue to positively impact the Wikimedia community or projects? (These are your outcomes.)
- The webcomic and the podcast will continue to be available online, be a source of inspiration for readers and listeners, as well as cultural objects that Wikimedians can use to increase awareness in an original way. The webcomic will likely turn into a hardcopy edition, and be translated into new languages in its digital format, reaching yet another audience.
- The visuals available on Commons will be a nice set of images that all Wikimedians can re-use in multiple contexts.
- The new format of wiki workshop that we will have tested will have been documented and will be available for re-use (learning pattern or other format).
- Some of the participants to the calls to actions and workshops will have become actual editors and continue to edit.
- We hope that our efforts towards young and popular audiences will trigger a new dynamic of collaboration, for example between wiki-groups and popular education structures and students associations, long after our workshops are over.
- If we have the opportunity, we'd love to share this experience through a presentation during a wiki-event (WikiConvention francophone, Wikimania, why not the next Queering Wikipedia...)
Do you have any goals around participation or content? edit
- Total participants : 40 at least
- Newly registered users : 30 at least
- Number of content pages created or improved, across all Wikimedia projects : 200
But overall our goal is more qualitative than quantitative.
Project plan edit
Activities edit
Creation
Artists and technicians will create the webcomic and the podcast. This includes: writing, storyboarding and drawing ; gathering interviewees, recording the interview, mixing.
Artists will also draw the promotion visuals and release them under CC-BY-SA.
Online activities
We will design the calls to action, post them on social media, and actively share and promote them to create engagement. We will monitor how and how much people engage with our wiki-challenges, and encourage them by giving feedback.
Editathons organizing
We will set up partnerships with local venues and associations, and co-organize the two events with them. This will include emails, meetings and paperwork.
We will actively reach out to young women and men to engage them to participate to our workshops. This will include communicating with specialized associations on campus and in the city, printing flyers and posters, disseminating them, and communicating on social media.
Work will also be needed to design the innovative format of our workshop and document it.
Editathons facilitation
Wikimedia volunteers will facilitate the events. Because of our original format, we'll need 6 seasoned Wikimedians on each event.
Timeline
The project timeline would look like this:
- June 2020: receiving funds
- Summer 2020: planning and organizing with all projects stakeholders
- Fall 2020: lauching the project, discussing with Wikimedia communities to refine expectations
- Winter 2020-2021: writing and creating the comic, visuals and podcast
- Spring 2021: products realease + workshops (either online or in-person depending on Covid situation)
- All along the project: connecting with communities, entertaining social media channels
Budget edit
Webcomic and series of visuals - 2000€
As we understand that the Wikimedia Foundation is not really about funding webcomics, we only ask help from you for a tiny portion of the total creation budget (1500€ out of a total of 15000€ for one episode, the rest of the funds will come from other channels).
- Scriptwriter : 500€
- Artists (drawing and coloring) : 1000€
- Promotional visuals : 400€ (1 image takes ~4hours minimum: with 400€, net payment for the author would be 340€, allowing for the creation of 6 visuals, at a rate of 10-14€/h)
Podcast - 1800€
- Sound designer : 1000€ (500€ net of charges, 35h at a 15€/h rate)
- Interviewer preparation work, writing, organization : 200€ (170 net, 11hours at a 15€/h rate)
- Transportation of interviewer and/or interviewees, plus catering : 600€ (really depends on where they are, might be less)
Organization work - 700€
- Social media creation of posts + community management: 200€ (100 net, 7h at 15€/h)
- Events organizing: 300€ (150 net, 10h at 15€/h)
- Documentation and follow up: 200€ (100 net, 7h at 15€/h)
Events fees - 1600€
- Printing outreach material : 200€
- Printing 30 cool wiki-tshirts : 300€
- Catering : 600€ (300€ per event, 12€/person/day, 25 people per event)
- Transportation of volunteer faciliators : 500€ (250€ per event)
TOTAL HUMAN RESOURCES - 3900€
TOTAL EQUIPMENT - 500€
TOTAL TRANSPORTATION and CATERING - 1700€
Unforeseen expenses - 500€
TOTAL 6600€
Community engagement edit
Our main audience here is young people who are not Wikimedians yet. The « solution » section above describes pretty well how we plan to engage with them: a webcomic, a podcast, community management on social media, and workshops.
But of course, we'll need need the Wikimedia community to engage too at various stages:
- In the pre-production phase:
- we will work with the Wiki-groups in Grenoble and Lyon and co-create the workshop with them (a couple of our members are also wikipedians in this group)
- we will hold a listening session to present the project and hear about Wikimedians' ideas about it. For this, particular outreach will be made towards:
- WikiMOOC organizers and Wikimedians involved with improving newcomers experience about how to create efficient and simple calls to action
- Wikimedia Groups related to underrepresented communities (Afrocrowd, Noircir, Wikimedia LGBT, WikiWomen groups...) to engage them around the project, especially to think about what kind of visuals they think would be useful to them
- In the production phase:
- we will engage wikimedians to create translations in various languages (we could do that through posting the script on Meta and marking for translation - needing maybe ~500$ more to cover the additionnal work of collecting translations and including them in the panels)
- we will ask wikimedians to participate in the podcast, telling their stories.
- Release phase:
- all products (comic, podcast, visuals) will be released throughout wikimedian channels
- a couple of blog post to share our experiences with communities
- we will reach back to community organizers from underrepresented groups (actually we hope to keep in contact all along, through social media and such) to make sure they are aware that the products are now available for use.
- Long-term:
- Ensuring discoverability of the various products, both inside and outside the Wikimedia movement
Get involved edit
Participants edit
- The NEB studio : 4 young professional creators who have experience in publishing successful comic books and faciliating innovative workshops (note: we are a majority of women and LGBT folks)
- Théodore, Zoé, and Aurore : 3 Sciences Politiques students who are helping this project become a success as part of their curriculum.
- Swann : professional sound designer for video games and podcasts
- Opsylac : seasoned Wikimedian, organizer of numerous editathons and workshops in Grenoble
- Jeanne Noiraud : seasoned Wikimedian, member of the Grenoble wiki-group
Community notification edit
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Endorsements edit
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