Grants:TPS/Sky Harbor/Open Source Bridge 2015

This Wikimedia Participation Support request was funded in the fiscal year 2014-15. A report is available.

statusfunded

Travel & Participation Support

Open Source Bridge 2015

summaryI plan to deliver a presentation on the community-building aspects of the recently-concluded Philippine Cultural Heritage Mapping Project (CHMP).

event locationPortland, Oregon

event websitehttp://www.opensourcebridge.org

event date(s)June 24-26, 2015

amount requestedUSD 1600

home countryPhilippines

creator• Sky Harbor

submitted on09:48, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

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Proposed participation

Hi, my name is Josh Lim (Sky Harbor), and I have been an active Wikimedian for the last ten years. Currently, I sit on the Board of Trustees of Wikimedia Philippines, I am a member of the Affiliations Committee, and as of writing I am running in this year's Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees election.

Half of my active life as a Wikipedian has been spent analyzing and studying the social dynamics and power relations between communities, specifically our own. Initially starting off as an academic endeavor I undertook as part of my studies, my research work on the Wikimedia community has since been presented at international conferences, including one Wikimania (2013) and two Open Source Bridges (2013 and 2014). I still conduct research endeavors into our community, its past and its future from time to time, and this year, I intend to present Why Relationships Matter in Community Building: Experiences from the Philippine Cultural Heritage Mapping Project at this year's Open Source Bridge, which has already been accepted.

This presentation will focus on specific strategies we employed to remind participants that veteran editors were helping them (thus reducing the likelihood of them being bitten by other editors), part of our overall goal to reduce editor burnout throughout the project's lifecycle. These strategies however can apply to any context (not necessarily cultural heritage, not necessarily content generation), and we would love to share our experiences with other tech communities and vice-versa.

Goal and expected impact

We are considering extending the CHMP for a second year, so it would be really helpful for us to get input from other communities as to how they retain participants which would help us refine our processes. Although we have metrics to measure the effectiveness of our volunteers, measuring our retention rate for editors and our insights into what allows them to stay on is still largely anecdotal, and I believe that should we come up with a way to measure this more accurately. Having a conversation on that during Open Source Bridge would be very, very helpful: as this builds on my presentation last year (which was attended by around 25-30 people), I look forward to seeing how we've built this up over that time frame.

At the same time, I strongly believe that online communities and community-building is a key feature of this conference, and having that conversation would help that exchange of ideas which would be beneficial not only for the Wikimedia projects, but for open source as a whole.

Budget breakdown

• Airfare: $1600
  • This is for a round-trip ticket from Manila to Portland on Delta Air Lines, departing on June 23 and returning June 30. This is the only one-stop option between Manila and Portland; while there are cheaper flights, they all require making two stops and switching airlines.

I intend to make my own arrangements for accommodation during the conference.

Other instructions

If possible, I would like to request the Wikimedia Foundation to book the flight for me. :)