Wikimedia Meta-Wiki

Grants:Project/UNESCO/Wikimedian in Residence at UNESCO 2019-2020

< Grants:Project
statusselected
Wikimedian in Residence at UNESCO 2019-2020
summaryIn the past 3 years we have:
  • Helped UNESCO’s publication workflows incorporate sharing open license content on Wikimedia projects.
  • Supported other Intergovernmental Organisations and the wider public to share content on Wikimedia projects.
  • Supported Wikimedia contributors to easily discover and use UNESCO content and the documentation produced.

We have the understanding, the relationships, and a roadmap to mass adoption of open licensing and sharing of content on Wikimedia projects across the UN. The process to do this is:

  • Work to share content at large scale from UNESCO
  • Build the relationships between UN agencies and Wikimedia organisations to run projects
  • Work with UN agencies to share content under Wikimedia compatible open licenses
  • Capacity building to make easier to share content on Wikimedia projects for everyone
By the end of this grant in early 2020, we will have the policies, documentation and processes in place to share knowledge from across the UN on Wikimedia projects. At which point we aim to increase the scale of the project through an external grant.
targetWikipedia, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons, Wikisource
type of grantoffline programs and events
amount€69,846 (42% of total project cost of €167,271)
type of applicantgroup
contact• mrjohncummings@gmail.com
affiliateNo
volunteer• Gutam2000
join
endorse
created on11:16, 23 November 2018 (UTC)


Project idea

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What is the problem you're trying to solve?

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What problem are you trying to solve by doing this project? This problem should be small enough that you expect it to be completely or mostly resolved by the end of this project. Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.


The United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) outline 17 major issues we have to tackle by 2030. The SDGs are not small goals, as they all require large societal change. For instance, the world has 12 years to halve carbon emissions to avoid catastrophic climate breakdown.

Unfortunately, the UN system does not have the resources to achieve the SDGs. The combined yearly total operating budget for all UN agencies is $48 billion per year. This is around 1/3rd of the UK National Health Service yearly budget of $149 billion and less than the New York City yearly council budget of $89 billion. If the SDGs are going to be reached by 2030, they will include efforts from civil society, local and national governments, and individuals.

Yet, the information needed by people to reach the SDGs is not easily accessible. It is often fragmented across hundreds of low traffic websites, buried in long UN reports, not available in the reader’s language, not available in accessible formats and/or not even online. In addition, the information is restricted by copyright and in hard to reuse formats such as pdf, meaning it cannot be expanded on, adapted, merged, translated or even copied. To support these limitations, a study by the World Bank showed that almost 1/3rd of their publications had never been viewed and only 13% had been viewed more than 250 times.

The role of Wikipedia and the SDGs

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Wikipedia is the 5th most used website in the world, available in over 300 languages. Wikipedia results appear on the first page of most Google searches (one estimate is 99%), and is used by a huge number of third party services including Google Knowledge Graph, Google Assistant and Siri. Wikipedia is also used by YouTube and Facebook to inform people about propaganda and disinformation/fake news. Additionally, there are hundreds of projects using offline Wikipedia through Kiwix and Rachel. The public is looking to Wikipedia to provide the knowledge they need to reach the SDGs.    

“Wikipedia is why, even though I spent most of my adult life out of school as a refugee, when I finally got to a safe place and into a university I was able not only to compete with my peers, but to excel.”

Ali, Wikipedia 15 respondent


“An encyclopaedia will be an overall attempt by the knowledgeable, the learned societies or anyone else, to represent the state-of-the-art in their field. An encyclopaedia will be a living document, as up to date as it can be, instantly accessible at any time.”

Tim Berners-Lee writing in Physics World in 1992, explaining that an encyclopedia will be needed to navigate information on the World Wide Web

Wikipedia, however, does not yet offer the information people need to understand the SDGs and their solutions. Therefore, we need to accelerate the rate at which knowledge is made available, accessible and used by people to be able to attain the SDG goals. For example, finding solutions to cut down carbon emissions by half in the next 12 years.

The UN network and its abundance of information

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The UN system and its very large network of partners holds a significant proportion of the information needed for people to fulfill many of the SDGs. UN agencies act as global observatories for subjects; they collate and summarise information and data through reports, providing a global framework for understanding the SDG challenges.

John has been working at UNESCO for 3 years as Wikimedian in Residence and with Navino Evans for 1 year building prototypes and documentation to show the benefit of UN agencies cooperating with Wikimedia and building documentation and processes to make contribution easier. UNESCO has a wide remit which gives it a central place in the UN, working with many other agencies, it also has a mandate to promote open licensing. Many UN agencies are now interested in working with Wikimedia and in adopting open licenses but lack the skills and resources.  Additionally, Wikimedia does not offer the level of documentation needed for organisations to do this work independently. And, the UN does not have the policies, processes or understanding in place to share its knowledge on Wikipedia.

How to get the knowledge from the UN into Wikipedia

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The process of getting the information from UN agencies to Wikipedia is difficult and time consuming. First, Wikimedia’s instructions are often of low quality and/or missing. Second, the Wikimedian community does not have the framework in place for the UN to share their knowledge. Third, training experts to edit Wikipedia does not appear to be scalable, as the process has been very challenging. For example, Wikimedia Foundation research shows retention rates for in person training workshops is below 1%. Note that this statistic only takes into account experts with the time and interest in contributing to Wikipedia who also have access to training.

Experts are already writing the text from organisations in usable language in publications, but unfortunately this is not where people look for information (they often turn to Wikipedia). Open licensing allows us to put this text directly in Wikipedia, but most UN agencies do not currently use open licenses.

In addition, Wikimedia chapters and user groups often struggle to change licensing policy in organisations due to a lack of connections. UN policy is often global and Wikimedia has the knowledge to offer meaningful input based on practical experience, but only if people are aware that policy consultations are happening. For example, Wikimedia was able to give feedback on the UNESCO Open Education Resources Recommendation because John was there to find out it was happening and talk to the person who was running it.

Wikipedia and open licensing are too difficult

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Open licensing content is a complicated process for many organisations. Many UN agencies want to adopt open licenses and share content on Wikimedia projects, but do not have the experience needed to do so. Knowledge and instructions exist within Wikimedia and other open knowledge organisations, but they are often fragmented. In addition, no one has mapped user journeys for these types of organisations.

What is your solution?

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For the problem you identified in the previous section, briefly describe your how you would like to address this problem. We recognize that there are many ways to solve a problem. We’d like to understand why you chose this particular solution, and why you think it is worth pursuing. Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.

In the past 3 years we have:

  1. Helped UNESCO’s publication workflows incorporate sharing open license content on Wikimedia projects.
  2. Supported other Intergovernmental Organisations and the wider public to share content on Wikimedia projects.
  3. Supported Wikimedia contributors to easily discover and use UNESCO content and the documentation produced.

Which we have achieved through:

Working with UN agencies

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  • Built WikiProject United Nations to provide a central place for UN agencies to share their knowledge with Wikimedia
  • Researched, created an outline and coordinated the partnership agreement between UNESCO and Wikimedia.
  • Working with the UN Open Access Working Group (20+ Heads of Rights and publishing at UN agencies) to build resources to understand and adopt open licenses and duplicate work with Wikimedia done at UNESCO. John and Ana ran a 3 day workshop for a working group co-organised with SPARC, World Wide Web Foundation and World Bank.
  • Surfacing and scoping opportunities for chapters, including a project with OHCHR around the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights with Wikimedia Argentina, Wikimedia UK and Wikimedia Sweden and another with the International Year of Indigenous Languages with Wikimedia Norway.
  • Working with another UN agency to plan a Wikimedian in Residence position.

Data

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Example queries (click the links below to see them working in Wikidata query service)


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Text

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Media

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Events

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Through these activities we have shown proof that working with Wikipedia to share knowledge allows UNESCO to reach a far wider public with detailed information that traditional report publication.

We have the understanding, the relationships, and a roadmap to mass adoption of open licensing and sharing of content on Wikimedia projects across the UN. The process is as follows:

  • Work to share content at large scale from UNESCO
  • Build the relationships between UN agencies and Wikimedia organisations to run projects
  • Work with UN agencies to share content under Wikimedia compatible open licenses
  • Capacity building to make easier to share content on Wikimedia projects for everyone

By the end of this grant in early 2020, we will have the policies, documentation and processes in place to share knowledge from across the UN on Wikimedia projects. At which point, we aim to increase the scale of the project.

John is currently working with UNESCO and WMF staff to outline a project and identify large external grant funders. Applying for a grant through a UNESCO agency provides more options for funding including from government delegations and the UN Foundation.


Project goals

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What are your goals for this project? Your goals should describe the top two or three benefits that will come out of your project. These should be benefits to the Wikimedia projects or Wikimedia communities. They should not be benefits to you individually. Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.

In this grant period we will:

  1. Work to share content at large scale from UNESCO: We now have the policies and infrastructure in place to share a large amount of content from UNESCO on Wikimedia projects. By the start of this project period UNESCO’s website will have 1.5 million open license web pages and a working media archive with 100,000s of open license images, which will increase as their digitisation project progresses. Through this work, we can show what working cooperation at scale between Wikimedia and UN agency can achieve.
  2. Build the relationships between UN agencies and Wikimedia organisations to run projects: There is a huge interest in working with Wikimedia in the UN. Building relationships between UN agencies and Wikimedia organisations will provide long term sustainable cooperation.
  3. Work with UN agencies to share content under Wikimedia compatible open licenses: Many UN agencies are being instructed by their member states to move to open access publishing models. We can provide them with the information they need to make policy and practical choices that can benefit everyone, helping the knowledge spread farthest by having adopted truly open licenses.
  4. Capacity building to make easier to share content on Wikimedia projects for everyone: we will continue to highlight and fix structural issues with Wikimedia processes tools and documentation, so it is easier for everyone to understand, be involved and contribute to Wikimedia projects.

Project impact

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How will you know if you have met your goals?

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For each of your goals, we’d like you to answer the following questions:

  1. During your project, what will you do to achieve this goal? (These are your outputs.)
  2. Once your project is over, how will it continue to positively impact the Wikimedia community or projects? (These are your outcomes.)

For each of your answers, think about how you will capture this information. Will you capture it with a survey? With a story? Will you measure it with a number? Remember, if you plan to measure a number, you will need to set a numeric target in your proposal (e.g. 45 people, 10 articles, 100 scanned documents). Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.

Due to the complexity of the project and the number of activities, we have added the outputs and outcomes under each activity in the Activities section.

Do you have any goals around participation or content?

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Are any of your goals related to increasing participation within the Wikimedia movement, or increasing/improving the content on Wikimedia projects? If so, we ask that you look through these three metrics, and include any that are relevant to your project. Please set a numeric target against the metrics, if applicable. Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.

The Work to share content at large scale from UNESCO and Work with UN agencies to share content under Wikimedia compatible open licenses sections are focussed on content

The Build the relationships between UN agencies and Wikimedia organisations to run projects and Capacity building to make easier to share content on Wikimedia projects for everyone are focused on participation.

The metrics for each are listed under every activity.


Project plan

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Activities

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Tell us how you'll carry out your project. What will you and other organizers spend your time doing? What will you have done at the end of your project? How will you follow-up with people that are involved with your project?

Due to the wide range of activities and specialised work, we need additional people working one day per week on data policy, data imports and data documentation.

  • John Cummings: John has been working as WiR at UNESCO for 3 years, working on the projects outlined in the ‘What is your solution’ section.
  • Ana Brandusescu: Ana is an expert on research and data policy. She previously worked for the World Wide Web Foundation, and ran the UN Open Access working group data workshop. Having someone from outside the Wikimedia world will be invaluable when writing documentation to avoid jargon and assumed knowledge.
  • Navino Evans: Nav’s background is in teaching and co-founding the website Histropedia. He worked with John for 1 year on the UNESCO WiR project, working on data imports and data documentation.
  • Sean McBirnie: Sean is the other co-founder of Histropedia, he will work with Nav on data import and documentation, there is a huge amount of work to do in this area.

As described above the activities are split into four broad categories:

  1. Work to share content at large scale from UNESCO:
  2. Build the relationships between UN agencies and Wikimedia organisations to run projects:
  3. Work with UN agencies to share content under Wikimedia compatible open licenses:
  4. Capacity building to make easier to share content on Wikimedia projects for everyone:

It is planned that this will be the last WMF project grant applied to do this work. We plan to apply for a significant multi year grant from a large funder to give the project sustainability and all it to expand to the size of the issues it is aiming to address.

We are using the Wikimedia Foundation Asana package to map the work, which unfortunately cannot be shared directly, please see the screen grabs below to see that the work flow and dependencies. These are not meant to be read thoroughly, but for illustration that we have a process to manage a complex project.


Work to share content at large scale from UNESCO

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We now have the policies and infrastructure in place to share a large amount of content from UNESCO on Wikimedia projects. By the start of this project period, UNESCO’s website will have 1.5 million open license web pages and a working media archive with 100,000s of open license images, with the number increasing as their digitisation project progresses. The project will show how working at scale with a UN agency can look like and what it can achieve. We will build evidence that large scale cooperation across the UN is valuable both for agencies and future funders of work.

By the start of the grant period, UNESCO will have a huge amount of content available under Wikipedia compatible licenses:

  • 1500+ UNESCO publications


  • Encourage reuse of UNESCO publication text on Wikimedia projects: We have worked with UNESCO staff to add text from UNESCO publications to 260 Wikipedia articles, helping knowledge to move from the organisation to the public. We will work further on this with Wikimedia community members, including having competitions to use more text on Wikipedia.
    • Metrics: Text from UNESCO publications used in 1000 Wikipedia articles.
    • Outcomes: Proof of concept for reusing text in Wikipedia for other organisations (documented in the UN Handbook described below).


  • Encourage reuse of UNESCO media content on Wikimedia projects: We will run competitions to encourage people to reuse content. Our previous competitions increased the number of page views of UNESCO content on Wikipedia from 1 million page views a month to over 10 million per month. We have found that providing low-cost-but-hard-to-acquire prizes (e.g. books about World Heritage signed by the head of World Heritage) has been very effective in helping integrate the content from UNESCO and other agencies into Wikipedia. We plan to run several competitions during the year around integrating content, matching datasets to Wikidata, and transcription.
    • Metrics: Media content from UNESCO is viewed 80 million times per month.
    • Outcomes: Documented ways of running competitions with UN agencies to encourage use of content (documented in the UN Handbook).


  • Upload content from UNESCO archives: Work with Wikimedia Sweden to mass upload content from UNESCO archives (100,000s of media files) to Wikimedia Commons, Wikisource and Wikidata as part of the FindingGLAMs project
    • Metrics: 100,000+ images from UNESCO archives on Wikimedia projects
    • Outcomes: Case study available for other UN agencies to follow (documented in the UN Handbook).



  • Work with the International Year of Indigenous Languages: Wikimedia Norway is a partner of the IYIL. We compliment their work by collating language databases and import them into Wikidata with IYIL team and partners. Based on the data analysis, we will create visualisations that highlight important issues around endangered languages and showcase the data. We will also create a case study for the value of thoroughly mapping an area on Wikidata.
    • Metrics: The largest language databases have been indexed in Wikidata.
    • Outcomes: Case study for cooperation between Wikimedia and an international year including a partnership with a Wikimedia chapter (documented in the UN Handbook described below). Largest language databases provide a framework for other language data to connect to.


  • Create process to sift through 1.5 million pages of text for useful text content for Wikipedia: UNESCO will make 1.5 million pages of text (across 6 languages) available under CC BY-SA. We need a process to sift through the pages and understand what can be used on Wikipedia and other projects.
    • Metrics: Text from 1,000 UNESCO web pages is used on Wikipedia.
    • Outcomes: A usable process to survey a large volume of text and import useful parts into Wikipedia.


  • Work on Wiki4Women: Wiki4Women in 2018 was a single day, gender gap event which hosted over 250 people at UNESCO Headquarters, including ambassadors and the UNESCO Director General. We plan to repeat and expand on this event to build capacity for gender gap work in the long run.
    • Metrics: A large training event bringing attention to the issue of the gender gap with UN staff and government delegations. Work to build capacity to help bridge the gender gap (to be defined).
    • Outcomes: Case study for others to use when working with large organisations including UN agencies for International Women’s Day and other international days.


Build the relationships between UN agencies and Wikimedia organisations to run projects

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UN agencies have offices all over the world and work in many languages, they have a distributed structure somewhat similar to Wikimedia. UN agencies plan work up to two years in advance. To take advantage of opportunities and be part of conversations, we need to have relationships with people there, in advance of doing work.

John has built many contacts and UN agencies have expressed a lot of interest in working with Wikimedia.  However, we do not want to create a bottleneck due to lack of capacity. This year we have outlined a process to connect UN agencies with Wikimedia chapters. We can have multiple chapters working with one agency, with one chapter to work as the ‘lead’ organisation. Partnering with chapters can create a long-term, sustainable partnership and allow the chapter and the agency to build up expertise in a specific area of work.

  • Act as a focal point to create projects between Wikimedia and the UN: This will be the primary aim of this part of the project. John has now become ‘the Wikipedia person’ within the UN and has started to connect chapters and user groups with UN agencies who want to work with Wikimedia. We think it is sensible to continue this role, not to be a bottleneck or to control projects but to act as a network connector, having experience in both ‘worlds’. We will also keep a list of projects at Wikiproject United Nations.
    • Metrics: Establish more connections and relationships between UN agencies.
    • Outcomes: Long term partnerships between UN agencies and Wikimedia organisations.


  • Document efficient and effective processes for formal partnerships between Wikimedia and UN agencies that enable project collaboration between several chapters. UN agencies use formal partnerships as the framing for projects and there are some complications with Wikimedia being a complicated structure.
    • Metrics: A clear process that Wikimedia Foundation and Chapters can use to have formal partnerships with UN organisations.
    • Outcomes: Higher profile and more awareness of Wikimedia organisations to foster more effective and efficient partnerships.


  • Start research on the information needed within Wikimedia projects to achieve the SDGs: We know many of the learning goals needed to reach the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). For example, UNESCO has outlined the learning goals needed to reach the SDGs. However, we need to know which content is needed to reach these learning goals. Wikipedia is the 5th most used website in the world but it is unclear what role it and other Wikimedia projects play.
    • Metrics: A document that outlines the potential relationship between Wikimedia and the SDGs.
    • Outcomes: Chapters and user groups have a better understanding of the relationship between Wikimedia and the SDGs and, by extension, the organisations working on the SDGs.


  • Encourage UN organisations to promote Wikimedia projects on social media: e.g Wiki Loves Monuments, Wiki Loves Earth and Wiki Loves Africa.
    • Metrics: 5 UN agencies promote at least 1 Wiki Loves competition in 2018-19.
    • Outcomes: A wider number of people are aware of the competitions, more people contribute images.


  • Outlining projects that can be done with Wikimedia without open licensing content: to build a relationship and to practically understand the value of working with Wikimedia. This can be explained on the Wikiproject United Nation collaboration summary.
    • Metrics: A list of activities that organisations can do with Wikimedia, for those who do not have open license content yet. The list of activities can also be generalised for non UN organisations.
    • Outcomes: More cooperation between Wikimedia and UN organisations and higher quality documentation on activities for others to use.


  • Highlight opportunities for Wikimedia to contribute to UN consultations: There are many opportunities to contribute to UN consultations on policy and other recommendations. Wikimedia was able to give feedback on the UNESCO Open Education Resources Recommendation because John was there to find out it was happening and talk to the person who was running it. We will highlight opportunities to the Wikimedia public policy group and others.
    • Metrics: Wikimedia people working on policy are more aware of opportunities to provide input to UN consultations.
    • Outcomes: More UN consultations include Wikimedia and other open organisation’s input.


  • Presentations and conferences: Attending, presenting and encouraging attendance at UN and Wikimedia conferences and other events for open knowledge and people working on the SDGs. This includes supporting Wikimedia to get stands at UN events and plan activities (e.g John helped secure a Wikimedia table at Internet Governance Forum and will do the same for Mobile Learning Week). Events could include:
    • Internet Governance Forum
    • Mobile Learning Week
    • Conferences for International Days e.g Arabic Language Day at UNESCO
    • UN staff attending Wikimania 2019 (the theme is the SDGs)
    • WikiArabia
    • WikiIndaba
    • Celtic Knot
    • Creative Commons Summit
    • Mozilla Festival
    • Allied Media Conference
    • Metrics: A higher visibility and understanding of Wikimedia within the UN system and vice versa.
    • Outcomes: More project opportunities.


Work with UN agencies to share content under Wikimedia compatible open licenses

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UN agencies are being told by their member states to move to Open Access models. We can provide them with the information they need to make policy and practical decisions that can benefit everyone, and help their knowledge spread the farthest by using truly open licenses. UNESCO has a unique position within the UN syetem to be able to encourage change. Because of its broad remit UNESCO acts a central publisher for the flagship multi agency reports (e.g the UN World Water Development Report), this means it has established relationships and connections with the other agencies. UNESCO also has a mandate to promote open licenses to others including to other UN agencies.

In addition, UN agencies often act as a place to share best practices within a field. This could be an opportunity to establish open licenses as a part of this set of best practices. Helping UN agencies adopt open licenses will carry over into the work we plan to do from 2020 - to work at scale with the UN system on Wikimedia projects funded by a large external grant.

  • Pilot projects with UN agencies: We will continue to work with UN agencies on pilot projects to show them the value of working with Wikimedia. E.g we will work with WIPO to reuse more text from their publications, building on the work we did to create the Wikipedia article Industrial Property from WIPO publication text and sharing images from their publications on Wikimedia Commons. We currently have contacts and outlines of projects with WIPO, HDX, ESA, FAO, UNDPI and OHCHR.
    • Outputs: 5 more UN agencies have worked with Wikimedia.
    • Outcomes: Working within Wikimedia becomes seen as beneficial within the UN system more widely.


  • Work to import data from UN agencies into Wikidata: Navino and Sean will work with many UN agencies to import their data into Wikidata. This will involve cleaning, processing and matching the data so that it can be imported into Wikidata. They will also generate visualisations from the data imported and create work lists to encourage other community members to fill in missing data, Wikipedia articles, and other Wikimedia content. The volume of data that UN agencies want to import in to Wikidata is very high. UN data provides the high level information, which, in turn, provides a framework for other datasets. Our work will include finding ways to import data from Humanitarian Data Exchange (a central UN repository of data) to Wikidata, including automating updates. The ultimate aim is to set up processes that make it easy to stay synchronised with new data from UNESCO and other UN agencies automatically.
    • Metrics: Visualisations, including work lists for the community that highlight missing Wikipedia articles and data. Data is imported from multiple different UN agencies, with automated processes setup for a small number of test cases.
    • Outcomes: Data from UN agencies is seen more widely. The value of Wikidata is seen more widely within the UN. A case study is available for others to use.


  • Promote the work we have been doing with UNESCO: Promote the work we have been doing with UNESCO by working with the UNESCO press team, Wikimedia Foundation social media team and others. The materials produced will provide an overview of the benefits of the collaboration to act as a case study for other agencies to understand and follow.
    • Metrics: Blog posts and media stories about the work we have been doing.  
    • Outcomes: More awareness of working with Wikimedia within the UN. Another case study for other Wikimedia organisations to use.


  • Create a process to map topics of interest for partner organisations on Wikidata: One of the issues we found working with agencies (also perceived as a broader problem) is that it is often difficult to understand how topics that partner organisations are interested in are covered on Wikimedia projects. Given this, we will develop a process to use datasets, reports, and other resources from partner organisations to create an index of the subjects on Wikidata to understand coverage on Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects (e.g. Coverage of Biosphere Reserves across different Wikipedia languages - Wikipedia article coverage).
    • Metrics: A process to map the interests of an organisation onto Wikimedia projects. Wikidata is expanded with more items on concepts.
    • Outcomes: It is easier for organisations to see the value of working with Wikimedia and what work can be achieved.


  • Focus on up to three SDGs to improve content: Research and build evidence for up to three SDGs to test the hypothesis that working with Wikimedia has a significant impact on people’s understanding of a subject. We will potentially focus on SDG 13 (Climate Action), SDG 14 (Life Below Water) and SDG 15 (Life on Land), which are all strongly interconnected. We will work closely with May Hachem, who works on her project HerStory with the UN, on SDG 5 (Gender Equality).
    • Metrics: Wikimedia projects have much improved content on up to three SDGs.
    • Outcomes: There is evidence and case studies for the value of working with Wikimedia to educate people about the subjects related to the SDGs.


  • Create a model and process for surveying data on a subject: We will work with UNESCO delegations to build a new model to understand what data is available on a subject. Being within the UN system gives us a unique opportunity to contact many government delegations to ask them to provide information from their country on a subject. For the FindGLAMs project we will do this for galleries, libraries, archives and museums and built also heritage registers (the lists that Wiki Loves Monuments needs). We have a worked on a prototype for this with Iceland and now have what we believe to be a comprehensive index of all the lists of notable Icelandic women. We will soon import this into Wikidata and which will allow us to understand who is in the gender gap for Iceland. This will be useful information for Wikipedians to work on new articles and also could be a useful tool for journalists, researchers and other people outside Wikimedia. We will then write up the process and generalise it to allow others to use part of or the whole process to map other areas. This will benefit people trying to map any are and also be beneficial for Wikimedia initiatives like Wiki Loves Earth and Wiki Loves Monuments.
    • Metrics: Improved Wikidata coverage of galleries, libraries, archives, museums, built heritage and women.
    • Outcomes: A clear process to collate knowledge on a subject on Wikidata from UN delegations and other organisations with knowledge on a subject (e.g. international associations with national member organisations).


  • Handbook for UN agencies to adopt open licensing: Since joining UNESCO, John has played an integral role in the UN Open Access Working Group (WG), which leads copyright and publishing across many UN agencies. In July 2018, John and Ana ran a three day workshop for the Open Access WG - across two countries and continents (France and the US) along with remote participation - on making Intergovernmental Organisations (IGOs) content open access and to include open data. As a result of this workshop, we have an outline and research materials to create a handbook, a step by step process for implementing or improving Open Data and Open Access in IGOs that have an interest in adopting open licenses. We will collate existing resources and create new documentation where needed. The handbook will be co-written with the members of the WG (and will include case studies from agencies), SPARC and Europeana among others in a participatory and collaborative process (e.g. include their experience and needs). The handbook will be specific to a UN audience, but could also be used by a general audience. A generic version of the handbook will be created for non UN agencies that will remove specialist UN only considerations e.g CC IGO licenses. The handbook will take organisations through the whole process of open licensing. It will include activities like creating a publication workflow to share individual assets from publications to make them easier to reuse, see the draft document for the TOC. Ana and John will work together to organise and write the handbook, including running additional workshops. Having someone with a broad experience outside Wikimedia will reduce assumed knowledge and jargon.
    • Metrics: Two UN agencies are able to adopt open licenses because they used and contributed to the handbook.
    • Outcomes: New synergies and collaboration efforts between UN agencies as a result of co-working on the handbook. This could result in case studies and success stories on how this handbook has supported key points of contact to present and explain the importance of open access and open data to their team and agency.


Facilitate sharing of content on Wikimedia projects through capacity building:

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Much of the capacity building will be done through creation of models of working, documentation and processes for Wikidata. Wikidata is becoming more important in outreach projects. First, by sharing information; and second, by acting as a way to understand coverage of topics across Wikimedia projects over all supported languages.

The Wikidata documentation pages we have written so far have been viewed 10,000 times in 2018 just in English, Data donation has been translated into 32 languages and Wikidata in Wikimedia projects into 20 languages.

Within this grant period, we want to build the tools and documentation needed for the rest of UN agencies to cooperate with Wikimedia. Because we are working with UN agencies the documentation we are writing needs to be of very high quality; clear, precise, with no jargon or assumed knowledge and easy to use. This means it is also usable for a general audience.

Having high quality documentation in place will be essential for expanding cooperation between UN agencies and Wikimedia - to increase the quality of service and make it easier for chapters and user groups to take part.

Wikidata documentation
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Navino and Sean will spend the bulk of their time building out documentation for Wikidata. We have done a lot of work on this already, but still a lot of the basic infrastructure of Wikidata is still missing. The work will focus on three main areas:

  • Data quality
  • Data consistency
  • Making it easier for the Wikidata community to grow and develop

In 2018 we ran a Request for Comment on improving the data import process and are basing much of our work on this.

  • Improve Wikidata:Dataset imports: We now have a working central dataset imports record but it needs feedback from dataset importers and improvements to make it more usable and more widely used.
    • Metrics: A clearer and easier to use process to collate data on a subject, learn how to import it into Wikidata, import it into Wikidata and record that it has been imported.
    • Outcomes: More data in Wikidata, more complete data on a subject, and of higher quality.


  • Create the missing Wikidata tours: Wikidata tours is one of the main ways people learn how to use Wikidata, but many are missing. Having more tours is important to help grow the Wikidata community and also for Wikipedia editors to understand Wikidata more, helping them feel in control and reducing much of the hostility to Wikidata from other Wikimedia communities. This will include tours for adding qualifiers, references, sitelinks and statement ranks, all of which are currently missing from the tours section completely.
    • Metrics: New Tours are available for qualifiers, references, sitelinks and statement ranks.
    • Outcomes: Wikidata is easier to learn and contribute to, more contributors and a lowering of misunderstandings and hostility to Wikidata from other Wikimedia projects.


  • Implement model to record schemas for subjects within Wikidata items: last year we outlined a model to get community agreement and a record of schemas for subjects within Wikidata items. Having schemas for subjects will help to improve data consistency allowing Wikidata to be more useful and easier to query.
    • Metrics: A process to model schemas for subjects in Wikidata within Wikidata items.
    • Outcomes: Higher data modelling consistency allowing easier querying. Tool writers can create tools to visualise schemas.


  • Survey Wikidata Help pages for gaps and inconsistencies: Wikidata help pages have been developed by many different people without any overarching plan. The areas that are incomplete need to be identified and added to Phabricator and/or wiki pages so all volunteers can contribute in a controlled way without redoing the same work.


We also need to ensure that all of the documentation pages are pitched at the correct skill level for the target audience and use consistent language and terminology throughout.

    • Metrics: Better quality more complete help pages with more links.
    • Outcomes: Help pages are more helpful.


  • Run additional RFCs: The RFC we ran last year helped us to understand many of the issues but it was very broad, we need to run additional RFCs for specific documentation and processes.  
    • Metrics: A better understanding of what is needed and wanted by Wikidata community members around documentation.
    • Outcomes: Documentation can be more easily created.


  • Improve property proposal instructions: Property proposals are an important part of importing data into Wikidata. However, currently the process is unclear (e.g. the instructions need improvement). As new types of data are added to Wikidata it is very important that the correct properties are used and that new properties are added when required. Without clear instructions on the method to propose new properties there is a risk of data not being imported correctly or simply not being imported at all.
    • Metrics: Clearer property proposal instructions.
    • Outcomes: More people are able to make property proposals.


  • Using Tabular data for importing detailed statistics into Wikidata: UNESCO Institute of statistics and other UN agencies hold a large amount of data that is updated yearly. This data about the current state of the world including historic trends is extremely important to have available and queryable in Wikidata. Many community members have expressed concern over adding historical statistical data of this kind as it will lead to extremely long Wikidata pages for countries and regions, making them hard to browse through. By importing this data as a Tabular data file on Wikimedia Commons we can include all historical data, as well as any other breakdown available in the data (e.g. Number of out of school children broken down by gender and education level) with just a single statement required on Wikidata. While tabular data properties already exist on Wikidata (e.g. population), it is not possible to query the data within the Tabular data files yet. Some work has already been done towards making this tabular data available in the query service, but this has not been moving quickly. By importing more data we can make a stronger case for this feature moving further toward the top of the todo list for the Wikidata developers.
    • Metrics: At least 5 new tabular data properties created on Wikidata, with corresponding data added from Wikidata.
    • Outcomes: Encourage more people to import and use Commons Tabular data by showcasing the benefits. Create more incentives for Wikidata developers to make tabular data available in the query service.


  • Feedback UI issues to the Wikidata team: UN data is often too rich for the current capabilities of the Wikidata UI. Work needs to be done with the Wikidata team to help fix structural issues with the Wikidata UI, allowing more accurate historical values to be imported. Work is also required to allow a larger amount of data in Wikidata pages. UN agencies have real world examples of historic data and their expertise will be valuable in solving these issues.
    • Metrics: Create proposals for new features based on real world case studies using data we import.
    • Outcomes: Create a roadmap of improvements to the Wikidata UI that will make it easier to browse historical items with very rich and extensive data.


  • Create a process and documentation to survey external datasets for inclusion in Wikidata: This will allow other editors and data importers to benefit from our experience with UN datasets. This ties in to our existing work on the Dataset Imports areas on Wikidata, as non technical users are able to propose datasets for import which are tagged as ‘help needed’.  The new documentation will also offer guidance on how to check if desired datasets are suitable for Wikidata.
    • Metrics: New documentation pages with guidance for editors seeking data that can be imported into Wikidata.
    • Outcomes: A greater volume of data import jobs being added to the Dataset Imports.


  • Create generic versions of the queries we’ve created: Navino has done a lot of work creating queries for UNESCO data to ensure data quality. We will create generic versions for the Wikidata query instructions to allow other people to use the same processes.
    • Metrics: Documentation page that lists useful queries/visualisations for editing and reporting metrics related to data imports, including instructions on customising them for different use cases.
    • Outcomes: Gives editors the ability to generate a wide range of powerful queries without needing advanced knowledge of Wikidata queries. Leading to more detailed queries and a wider use of Wikidata.


  • Make queries to map which datasets exist for different subject areas: as part of Wikidata:Dataset imports we created a process to record which datasets exist for a subject, but we still need to add queries to allow people to easily understand which datasets exist, which have been ingested into Wikidata and which may potentially be missing.
    • Metrics: A library of queries that can be used to find datasets by topic, status, data format, licence or any other metric that is represented in Wikidata.
    • Outcomes: Greatly increased discoverability of current data imports happening on Wikidata. This increases coordination, reduces duplication of effort and encourages more data to be imported.


  • Work with Joe Mabel on Wikidata data modelling help pages: Assist with writing instructions for related areas of Wikidata. Showcase the benefit of good instructions to encourage more time and resources to be used in this area.
    • Metrics: New set of documentation pages detailing how different topics are modelled on Wikidata.
    • Outcomes: Greater consistency across items of the same type on Wikidata. More editors contributing to the documentation pages.


  • Inform tool creators of current needs of partner organisations: Map what still needs to be created for partners to carry out imports and report metrics on the reuse of their data on Wikidata. Make Magnus and other tool writers aware of this list of needs so they can focus their efforts on known issues.
    • Metrics: Published list of unsolved issues that are of most importance to data partners.
    • Outcomes: More tools being developed to address difficulties in importing data into Wikidata and reporting metrics. This in turn leads to more data partners adding data to Wikidata.


  • Create guidance on making visualisations from datasets: Much of the value of adding data into Wikidata comes from the ability to combine it with data from other sources and visualise it. Currently very few community members are able to generate these visualisations as it requires advanced knowledge of the SPARQL query language. Creating lots of example visualisations with proper documentation makes it easier for others to learn the skills required to create visualisations from scratch, or make small modifications to the example queries that do not require advanced knowledge.
    • Metrics: Create beginner and advanced tutorials for practical querying on Wikidata, including at least one video tutorial (following on from the success of Navino’s previous SPARQL tutorial video).
    • Outcomes: More people are able to learn how to create visualisations and understand the range of visualisations. Visualisation best practice is shared more effectively.


  • Create blog posts and other material to communicate the goals and progress of the project to improve documentation: In addition to the handbook and Wikidata tours, there will be several blog posts and other material. These will include information on the import processes being developed, supporting the overarching goal of making Wikidata more accessible and understandable. The challenge will be to translate these technical topics into easy to understand jargon free language, to be understood by the widest possible audience, e.g. Wizards, Muggles and Wikidata: The Room of Requirement for structured knowledge
    • Metrics: At least 4 blog posts, including case studies outlining all the steps taken to import a selection of UNESCO data.
    • Outcomes: Wikidata editors and data partners learn from our prior experience and are encouraged to share their own experiences in the same way.


  • Ensure the documentation is well used by working to make it fully integrated, well publicised and translated into as many languages as possible.  
    • Outputs: Measure how well used the documentation is in terms of page views.
    • Outcomes: More widespread use of documentation leads to more new editors and better feedback mechanism for ongoing improvement.


  • Facilitate translation of documentation pages into other languages: To help encourage the translation of the documentation we can run competitions and editathons.
    • Metrics: Measure how many times the translated pages have been viewed. Have core documentation translated into at least 3 languages.
    • Outcomes: Better access to Wikidata for non-English speakers.


  • Work with tool creators to develop tools which report on usage of imported data: Discuss and develop ideas with the community. Create proposals for new tools that are needed to solve particular needs of partner organisations.
    • Metrics: A reporting system in place that communicates the needs of the data importers and partner organisations to the tool developer community.
    • Outcomes: Encourage more tool developers to work on metric reporting apps, which is of critical importance in forming new data partnerships with external organisations (who often need to demonstrate the value of switching to open data).


Open license text on Wikimedia projects documentation
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Creating a process to reuse open license text from UNESCO and measure page views was extremely helpful in sharing UNESCO knowledge on Wikipedia. However, this process is currently available only in English, French and Spanish, and is not well used. We also do not yet have a good or reusable process for understanding and recording which text from a publication could be used on Wikimedia projects. These are important issues to address as this process provides an easy way for experts to share their knowledge on Wikipedia.

The amount of open license content is very large and continues to grow. There are over 9,000 Open Access journals. The process of sharing open license text on Wikipedia fills a specific gap in UN publishing models: between long-form publications with hundreds of pages and short social media messages. Wikipedia offers the middle ground, breaking their knowledge up into more usable chunks and putting it where people are looking


  • Translate process into other languages: Currently the documentation to add open license text into Wikipedia is available in English, French and Spanish. Work with chapters and community members to translate and localise it for, at least, Arabic, Russian, Chinese (the other 3 UN languages) and Portuguese (the most common 7th language the UN publishes content in).
    • Metrics: Instructions for the process are available in 4 more languages.
    • Outcomes: Text from open license publications in more languages can shared on Wikipedia. Wikipedia content can be improved more easily.


  • Create a process to analyse and annotate publications for useful text for Wikimedia projects: We need a process to analyse publications for text that may be useful for Wikipedia. Currently there is no way for subject matter experts and Wikimedians to work together online to understand which text can be used and which text has been used on different Wikimedia projects in different languages. Often we found text identified as useful for English Wikipedia was also useful for French and Spanish Wikipedia. Given this, the analysis of a publication may only need to happen once. This is an important process to create as publications can be 100s of pages long e.g the General History of Africa is available under CC BY-SA is available in 11 languages and is over 7200 pages in total.
    • Metrics: A process is available.
    • Outcomes: Text from open license publications can be used more easily on Wikipedia.



  • Encourage more people to understand and use the documentation for reusing open license text: We have blog posts planned and drafted for outlining the process, benefits and challenges of reusing open license text on Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects. This is an important part of fully capitalising on the existing content within Wikipedia and ensuring maximum use of new text that has been added as part of this project.
    • Metrics: Blog posts are published.
    • Outcomes: More people understand how to use open license text on Wikipedia.


  • Expand and improve instructions through pilot projects: We will also work with a small number of organisations outside the UN to understand how this process can be used with text from other sources and to improve the documentation. The first of these organisations is Vidhayak Bharti, an Indian child’s rights initiative. We helped them to change the license of their publications to be Wikipedia compatible and have started to add text from their publications into Wikipedia articles, the first one being India Tribal Belt.
    • Metrics: 5 organisations’ text are used on Wikipedia.
    • Outcomes: Better documentation is available. More case studies are available for others to use.

Budget

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How you will use the funds you are requesting? List bullet points for each expense. (You can create a table later if needed.) Don’t forget to include a total amount, and update this amount in the Probox at the top of your page too!

Nº Category Item description Unit cost Number of units for 12 months Total cost in Euros Total cost US Dollars Notes Source of funding
1 Venue Senior staff time including directors, staff time for meetings and research related to the project.

A large office, office services (computer, printing, photocopying, etc) Meeting rooms for internal and external meetings (e.g the rooms used for the GLAMwiki Coordinators Meeting were provided free of charge).

13% of total grant budget 1 19243.85 21938 UNESCO standard costing of 13% of project costs. UNESCO
2 Project management UNESCO Wikimedian in Residence salary and taxation 25.64 1269 32537.16 37092 John Cummings WMF (This grant)
3 Project management UNESCO Wikimedian in Residence salary and taxation 25.64 681 17467.28 19913 John Cummings Wikimedia Sweden
4 Project management Wikidata expert salary and taxation 25.64 390 10000 11400 Navino Evans WMF (This grant)
5 Project management Wikidata expert salary and taxation 25.64 390 10000 11400 Sean McBirnie WMF (This grant)
6 Project management Data policy expert salary and taxation 25.64 390 10000 11400 Ana Brandusescu WMF (This grant)
7 Project management Archive staff time to coordinate with project staff and Wikimedia Sweden on uploads to Wikimedia projects N/A N/A 9424.62 10744 UNESCO
8 Project management Software developer time to add any functionality needed to UNESCO archive to work with Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata N/A N/A 9424.62 10744 Staff time and contractor time to improve sharing UNESCO content on Wikimedia Commons using the Wikimedia API UNESCO
9 Project management UNESCO Communication and Information sector staff time to recommend text and add information to Wikipedia. N/A N/A 9424.62 10744 An estimated minimum investment of senior management staff time based on the current level of investment. UNESCO
10 Project management UNESCO Education sector staff time to recommend text and add information to Wikipedia. N/A N/A 9424.62 10744 An estimated minimum investment of staff time based on the current level of investment. UNESCO
11 Project management UNESCO Science sector staff time time to recommend text and add information to Wikipedia. N/A N/A 9424.62 10744 An estimated minimum investment of staff time based on the current level of investment. UNESCO
12 Travel Travel budget and accomodation 1 1940.81 2213 Travel budget for John Cummigs Wikimedia Sweden
13 Travel Travel budget and accomodation 1 2059 2347 Travel budget for John Cummigs WMF (This grant)
14 Travel Travel budget and accomodation 1 1000 1140 Travel budget for Navino Evans WMF (This grant)
15 Travel Travel budget and accomodation 1 1000 1140 Travel budget for Sean McBirnie WMF (This grant)
16 Travel Travel budget and accomodation 1 1000 1140 Travel budget for Ana Brandusescu WMF (This grant)
17 Travel Travel and accomodation 1 1000 1140 Travel budget for Navino Evans WMF (This grant)
18 Travel International travel insurance 1 200 228 John has a policy in place through Countrywide John Cummings
19 Travel Budget for travel for another 3 days Open Access working group meeting to complete the Open Access handbook N/A N/A 4000 4560 Based on the budget from the previous Open Access working group meeting of 10 x travel from Geneva + accommodation , World Bank staff time and online meeting setup cost, WIPO funding for 2 people’s travel from the UK Various UN agencies
20 Prize budget A budget for prizes for running on wiki competitions, mostly books and postage costs. The real value of the prizes will come from the people who will sign them. 1000 1140 WMF (This grant)
21 Equipment Canon 6D camera 1 3000 3420 Canon 6D camera and lens which will be used to document the residency and projects. John Cummings
22 Equipment Asus UX305 Laptop 1 800 912 Used by John Cummings during meetings, conferences and other travel. John Cummings
23 Equipment Acer Aspire V15 Nitro 1 900 1026 Used by Navino Evans during his work Navino Evans
24 Equipment Acer Aspire S3-391 1 500 570 Used by Sean McBirnie during his work Sean McBirnie
25 Equipment Desktop computer 1 850 969 Used by Sean McBirnie during his work Sean McBirnie
26 Equipment Apple Macbook Pro 1 1400 1596 Used by Ana Brandusescu during her work Ana Brandusescu
Contingency budget Unanticipated travel expenses 1 250 285 Contingency travel budget

Risk probability: 25%

WMF (This grant)
Total UNESCO The total funding UNESCO will provide 66366.67 75658
Total other UN agencies Total funding provided by other UN agencies 4000 4560
Total Wikimedia Sweden The total funding Wikimedia will provide through the FindingGLAMs budget 19408.77 22126
Total applicants The total the applicants to this grant bring 7650 8721
Total WMF (This grant) Including contingency 69845.61 79624
Total overall cost Including contingency 167271.05 190689


Note: the exchange rate was calculated on 29th November 2018 at €1 = $1.14. The excel sheet for this budget table is available here.


Budget Narrative

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Investment from the UN
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UNESCO has invested significant time in the project to date. This includes providing an office for me for the past 3 years, 1000 hours+ of staff time and additional projects like Wiki4Women which also had a budget of over €50,000 (Wikimedia Foundation, Wikimedia France and Les sans pagEs were partners of the event.

UNESCO is committed to offering significant in-kind and staff time contributions to the project cost, in addition to their standard programme support cost which is calculated as 13% of the total spend on the project delivery - please see explanatory note here.

This level of investment from UNESCO in Wikimedia from staff will continue with additional staff time allocated for working to share a large volume of UNESCO archive material on Wikimedia projects.

Other UN agencies have also invested staff time and budget through travel budget for UN staff members and staff from World Wide Web Foundation and SPARC attending John’s Open Access working group meeting. John organised and co-ran the Open Access working group at UNESCO with the World Bank in Washington DC. There are plans to run another similar event in 2019.

Investment from Wikimedia Sweden
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Wikimedia Sweden are providing John with around €20,000 funding for this project as part of the FindingGLAMs project. This will cover some of the work around building workflows to enable collaboration between UN government delegations and chapters and some of the basic Wikimedia documentation work. However the funding from Wikimedia Sweden is contingent on this grant proposal being accepted. The funding covers around 2 days per week for the year, the type of work does not allow for the money to be used full time for a shorter period.

Changes from last year’s budget
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We are increasing the number of people working on the project from two to four, but for only one day a week each. The activities of the two new people, Ana and Sean are documented above in the Activities section. All team members are paid the same per hour. There is no increase in the amount asked per hour from last year.

It is a  more efficient use of John’s time to work with Navino and Sean who are very technically skilled and who created the website Histropedia. The time needed for John to learn many of the skills needed would be a large proportion of the project time and in many cases the documentation for John learn the skills needed does not exist.

John’s travel budget has been increased by 1000 euros since the last grant request as it is very likely John will be travelling more to Geneva to work with other UN agencies. Having a flexible travel budget was invaluable in the last grant, it allowed John to attend conferences and meetings that were not organised until after the grant period had begun. The travel budget would be spent on travel to international conferences and travel within Europe to meetings including at UN offices in Geneva. The travel budget for Navino, Sean and Ana will be spent on travel to conferences to meet with UN staff members and run trainings and workshops at Wikimedia events.

Future funding
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This is the last grant we will apply to from Wikimedia Foundation for this project, it is unfair on other projects to repeatedly ask for grant funding. The Wikimedia Foundation grants program has provided support and we soon reach a point where we can seek external funding to scale to the size of the issue. John is working with UNESCO and WMF staff to outline a project and potential funders. Having UNESCO involved allows more opportunities for funding including government delegations and the UN Foundation.

Community engagement

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Community input and participation helps make projects successful. How will you let others in your community know about your project? Why are you targeting a specific audience? How will you engage the community you’re aiming to serve during your project?

Explained in the activities section

Get involved

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Participants

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Please use this section to tell us more about who is working on this project. For each member of the team, please describe any project-related skills, experience, or other background you have that might help contribute to making this idea a success.

Applicants

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  • John Cummings
  • Ana Brandusescu
  • Navino Evans
  • Sean McBirnie

UNESCO staff

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Community notification

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Please paste links below to where relevant communities have been notified of your proposal, and to any other relevant community discussions. You are responsible for notifying relevant communities of your proposal, so that they can help you! Depending on your project, notification may be most appropriate on a Village Pump, talk page, mailing list, etc. Need notification tips?

On Wikimedia projects

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On other platforms

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Endorsements

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Do you think this project should be selected for a Project Grant? Please add your name and rationale for endorsing this project below! (Other constructive feedback is welcome on the discussion page).

  1. A powerful plan of better achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals through global dissemination of information sourced from from many underrepresented countries, and serving the whole world. Endorsed as a fellow Wikimedian in Residence who sees the value and skill and innovation in this approach. Pharos (talk) 17:09, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
  2. Solid project plan in an important space with a team that have showed results before. I'll endorse that! Ainali (talk) 18:30, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
  3. A project with great results so far which needs to continue.Ανώνυμος Βικιπαιδιστής (talk) 19:53, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
  4. John et. al. have been doing great work, and this deserves continuing funding. - Jmabel (talk) 20:34, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
  5. I’ve leveraged the work of this project in my own Wiki-work. Great project and should receive continuing funding. - PKM (talk) 21:20, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
  6. This may be the most important project, in terms of world-wide impact, in the funding requests. This is complex and highly important work that desperately needs doing. The proposers have articulated a concrete plan for moving forward. I strongly encourage supporting it. Mary Mark Ockerbloom (talk) 22:48, 21 December 2018 (UTC) Wikipedian in Residence, Science History Institute, Philadelphia, PA.
  7.   Support John has brought much more funding and resources into the Wikimedia ecosystem than he has ever requested. This project in past iterations has been a great value. I know there is a Wikimedia concern about perpetual funding, and John has said that after this year he expects to have other funding streams including money to cover his time. This project is one of the few funded Wikimedia projects of any sort to produce Wikimedia user documentation which actually is broadly relevant and has brought on more regular participants. I use and appreciate the precedents which John has set in Wikimedia product design, as many of his workflows are functionally tools with utility across projects in Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons, and Wikidata. John also participates in Wikimedia community governance as a peer with anyone else, and I really appreciate the institutional leadership he demonstrates by doing this. Funding this project will return more value than almost anything else proposed on the board. Blue Rasberry (talk) 23:11, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
  8.   Support-Micru (talk) 10:31, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
  9.   Support - one of the stronger project plans I've seen, a more than legitimate goal, and an extremely clear-cut statement that no further funding will be sought. Significant chapter support also shows another Wikipedia organisation buys in to the work enough to commit money. Given our health finances at the moment, seems a good thing to fund. Nosebagbear (talk) 11:12, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
  10.   Support GMGtalk 13:12, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
  11.   Support. Mervat (talk) 14:44, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
  12.   Support Especially, with the perspective of a larger funder taking over the job of funding the project in the future. ChristianKl ❪✉❫ 15:00, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
  13.   Support Pasleim (talk) 17:04, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
  14.   Support though I find the Commons/Wikipedia part more useful/effective. Jura1 (talk) 18:36, 22 December 2018 (UTC)
  15.   Support Like tears in rain (talk) 10:40, 23 December 2018 (UTC)
  16. I totally support this project, John has been doing lots of great work for the past few years. He knows very well what his plans will lead him and he will never request a similar grant without being sure he can make it happen. May Hachem93 (talk) 15:17, 23 December 2018 (UTC)
  17.   Support This is one of the most valuable partnership we have at the moment, so let it going on! Sannita - not just another it.wiki sysop 15:56, 23 December 2018 (UTC)
  18.   Support, laudable goals, proven track record.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 17:58, 24 December 2018 (UTC)
  19.   Support, Good for Wikimedia and UN Vulphere 13:53, 25 December 2018 (UTC)
  20. Sounds like an excellent project Richard Nevell (talk) 14:22, 26 December 2018 (UTC)
  21. I strongly endorse this project. The UNESCO has policy on Open Access and is working with all the Free/Open Source and Open Access Communities in bridging the digital divide and also for the SDGs. This proposal for Wikimedian at UNESCO would help both the UNESCO and Wikipedia and the community at large in making the open access to knowledge. Gutam2000 (talk) 08:59, 29 December 2018 (UTC)
  22. Looking at the plan and the structuring, this project must produce excellent results. The project is original about of current concerns. I approve it. Rigobert Kenmogne. 41.202.207.6 09:38, 29 December 2018 (UTC)
  23.   Support Anass Sedrati (talk) 20:47, 29 December 2018 (UTC)
  24.   Support Houssem Abida (talk) 22:05, 29 December 2018 (UTC)
  25. This will have direct and indirect positive impact on the community as a whole and valuable external impact as well. Vahidmasrour (talk) 19:30, 1 January 2019 (UTC)
  26.   Strong support Strong support for this project. John is doing an amazing work with the UNESCO and we should support him to continue doing this through this new project which will have a big impact. Yamen (talk) 21:39, 1 January 2019 (UTC)
  27.   Strong support Wow, share UNESCO's content on Wikimedia projects and digitisation, 1.5 million open license web pages and 100,000s of open license images, relationships between UN agencies and Wikimedia organisations to run projects, Wikidata & Wiki4Women are sublime goals! And I know this team will do it. WikiDonne UG is happy to support any future Wiki4Women event in Italy. Camelia (talk) 00:43, 2 January 2019 (UTC)
  28. This is a valuable project with plenty of opportunities and synergies. I have worked closely with John for a few years and I feel comfortable that he and the team will deliver according to plan (otherwise we obviously would not contribute significant funding again this year). Wikimedia Sverige look forward continuing to work with the project team both with this project and to identify other funding streams to cover future work. John Andersson (WMSE) (talk) 20:08, 2 January 2019 (UTC)
  29.   Strong support As the communications coordinator for Wikimedia UK, I strongly support this grant, as it would be beneficial for the broader Wikimedia community in the UK to have John's work funded until 2020. I am also doing a project to promote Wikidata in the UK, and having Nav Evans funded to improve Wikidata documentation would also be a great help in this regard. Jwslubbock (talk) 12:57, 3 January 2019 (UTC)
  30.   Support --Gereon K. (talk) Important milestone in our outreach.
  31.   Strong support So much good work here! Lirazelf (talk) 15:11, 7 January 2019 (UTC)
  32.   Strong support This is such a great prize if we can unlock it. It feels wrong that the United Nations are taking pictures in Africa and then giving the pictures copyrights based with American and European photographers. This is wrong. This team are the best people to do this task by working co-cooperatively with the UN. Pleased to see the UN are putting up a lot of money but they should really be 100% funding this as the outcome should be of benefit to all. Hope that they can get over the tipping point and we can see "all rights reserved" removed as the default choice for UN pictures. Victuallers (talk) 20:27, 7 January 2019 (UTC)
  33.   Support this need to keep going! VIGNERON # discut. 17:09, 8 January 2019 (UTC)
  34.   Support John and co have done great work opening up UNESCO content but also in providing documentation for the wider community. There is so much more UNESCO could do to share their wealth of information and data more widely via Wikimedia projects. So i fully support this application. Jason.nlw (talk) 11:27, 9 January 2019 (UTC)
  35. This is a brilliant project which has relevance to people all over the world. There are various ways that other Wikimedians in Residence could learn and benefit from this project too. Zeromonk (talk) 16:00, 10 January 2019 (UTC)
  36.   Support, work with UNESCO is impactful and useful. I personally know efforts on Wiki Loves Earth that are helpful and deserve being further developed in the forthcoming years. The work on content liberation and promotion of Wikimedia projects is very valuable. Continuing this project would make an impact, and I really appreciate the idea of seeking external funding to make this project sustainable — NickK (talk) 23:39, 10 January 2019 (UTC)
  37.   Support Changing the workflows and policies of target organisations is possibly the most valuable activity for our movement in the long term, because it frees up enormous amounts of work and content. What the applicants have already achieved is very impressive, and I like that their work spans across multiple Wikimedia projects. I also like the work John has been doing and continues to do on the needs of Wikidata contributors and clear step-by-step instructions that enable them to start contributing. The requested funds are small for what they are trying to achieve. MartinPoulter (talk) 11:32, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
  38. The work that John Cummings and his team have been pursuing at the UN for the past three years has been rich and worthwhile, contributing valuable knowledge to both Wikipedia and Wikidata, which we would otherwise struggle to navigate and access. John has also been doing great work in terms of advocacy and education in regards to open knowledge and open data with the staff from the various member states of the UN which has an impact on a policy level beneficial worldwide. There is still much work to do in both those areas though and therefore I believe it is essential for the funding for this project to be extended for another year. Delphine Dallison (talk) 12:17, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
  39.   Support Needless to say, this project has been impactful since its start. I strongly support John's work with UNESCO. African Hope (talk) 12:23, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
  40. This project has great potential to make more of existing data and knowledge creation - whilst also contributing to culture shift within UN Agencies to support engagement with open knowledge. Timgdavies (talk) 15:05, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
  41. A very worthwhile project T.Shafee(Evo﹠Evo)talk 12:00, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
  42.   Strong supportThis is a relatively modest outlay for a project that with bags of potential for a massive impact in the longer term; on improving documentation for current Wikimedia contributors and new initiates alike; on institutional policies and workflows; on the discoverability and reuse of open knowledge worldwide. What they have delivered already in the last few years is impressive and shows this project is a golden opportunity. Stinglehammer (talk) 15:53, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
  43.   Strong support Jorid Martinsen (WMNO) (talk) 22:03, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
  44. This project makes an important contribution to put culturally relevant information from UN organisations into the public domain. The efforts required to openly license the UN's works and content are not trivial but achievable, as evidenced by several other cases of openly licensing organisational works. The successful completion of this project may also have the effect of creating a 'culture of openness' within UN agencies who may interact with the Wikimedia community more strongly, and continue to license works openly. Danlammerhirt (talk) 08:59, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
  45.   Strong support This project is very meaningful and they have done great work. Definitely support it. Venuslui (talk) 18:56, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
  46. Meaningful project MB-one (talk) 20:12, 18 January 2019 (UTC)
  47.   Strong support Abhinav619
  48.   Strong support- Manavpreet Kaur (talk) 08:25, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
  49.   Strong support Athikhun.suw (talk) 01:35, 26 January 2019 (UTC)
  50.   Support Kaizenify (talk) 01:31, 28 January 2019 (UTC)
  51.   Strong support- Rajeeb (talk) 19:35, 5 February 2019 (UTC)
  52.   Strong support Shypoetess (talk) 19:12, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
  53.   Strong support Strongly support the continuation of this important project LornaMCampbell (talk) 18:02, 15 July 2019 (UTC)
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