Grants talk:APG/Proposals/2017-2018 round 1/Wikimedia Czech Republic/Proposal form

Dear Wikimedia Czech Republic team: Thank you for submitting your proposal! We will be reviewing it in the next few days/weeks with any clarifying questions, if any. All the best, Morgan Jue (WMF) (talk) 19:26, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

WMF questions

Financial information

Hello Petra Pejšová (WMCZ), Vojtěch Dostál) and Aktron I am doing a deep dive in the financials and I am not sure I understand certain numbers. In table 2, you write that there were 2,152,000 CZK of planned expenses. If I look at this table, it shows a total of 2,122,000 CZK as planned expenses. Why is there a difference? This should be the same number. Thanks for your help on this! Delphine (WMF) (talk) 11:52, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

• Hello Delphine (WMF), you absolutely right, the plan was 2,122,000 CZK for the year 2017. I would like to apologize. It's my mistake, I rewrote it wrong.

Questions

Dear WM-CZ (Petra Pejšová (WMCZ) & Vojtěch Dostál), welcome to the FDC process :-) I've got a couple of questions, about your application.

• I'm fascinated by the "Number of objects" metric you have chosen - and I think it's a really interesting and useful way of looking at things. This is arguably the first time a metric has been so connected to real-world things, not wiki-representations of them. You say that it "roughly corresponds to a Wikidata item" but the description (footnote 2) seems to be synonymous with the meaning of a wikidata item - what is the difference? Wittylama (talk) 10:29, 27 October 2017 (UTC)
  • Thank you Wittylama. There is probably no difference in terms of definition. However we did not want to sound as if we always pair our objects with specific existing Wikidata items (although our rules now do recommend addition of uploaded pictures to Wikidata via P18 property.--Vojtěch Dostál (talk) 18:55, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
    • This is a sensible approach, not being formally tied to Wikidata items, just in case, but nevertheless it being the de-facto understanding. I'm interested to see how this works for you, and recommend you connect the Q number to your tracking tables, which might enable some interesting data-visualisations at the end of the reporting period. Wittylama (talk) 22:14, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• By contrast "bytes added" is a much-criticised metric from across all sides of the Wikimedia community - both grant applicants and grant reviewers - as being simplistic and was removed from the standardi "Global Metrics" as a result. I see you state that it rates equally "authors of few but extremely long articles as well as prolific writers of a lot of very short articles", but size of content isNotEqualTo value of content. Are you confident this is a robust and useful tool for measuring your work? Wittylama (talk) 10:29, 27 October 2017 (UTC)
  • We discussed this many times within our team and we recognize the disadvantages of this metric. There is currently not a single easily measurable metric for determining what you call value - e.g. to differentiate between high-quality and low-quality editors, or is there? Of course we are careful in applying this metric. For example, "Bytes added" is at least a proxy for students' diligence in education programs etc. In contrast, it is basically useless for measuring contributions in Wikidata or even in some cases on Wikipedia where a lot of edits could just be mindless copying. --Vojtěch Dostál (talk) 18:55, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
    • I recommend having a look at both the Wiki Education Foundation and WM-Israel applications in this round of APG for some alternative methods of measuring quality of student contributions. Wittylama (talk) 22:14, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• You are focusing with both mental and financial investment in the Wikimedia Commons Android App as a measure of success of your programs. The page's own description says says that it has an unstable history of being developed, available for download or even with a named 'owner'. It is now developed independently and has received the WMF's trademark approval. Unlike external software development of things like Kiwix (supported by WMCH) this software appears to rely on being the 'official' app. What assurances do you have that it is supported by the WMF technical (and legal) roadmap, and the Commons community in general? Wittylama (talk) 16:54, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
  • The Commons App now has a viable community of its own, a community that regularly discusses developments, funding, decision-making etc. We do not as much depend on technical help from WMF as we do on their continuous 'approval' of the app to call it the 'official app'. We are in a continuous discussion with WMF but so far we remain optimistic about long-term future. Josephine could tell you more about our arrangements with WMF. We also strive to ensure that the pictures uploaded through the app are of adequate quality so that the Commons community is not overwhelmed. So far I dare to say there is not much opposition against the app as seen from endorsements on the recent grant renewal (actually one WMF employee called it 'a success story of open source development').--Vojtěch Dostál (talk) 18:55, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
    • That is indeed high praise. Thanks for adding that opinion User:Deskana_(WMF). Wittylama (talk) 22:14, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
      • I have a lot of praise for the app, but I do want to make it clear that what I said is not some kind of "official WMF statement". I'm happy to help the team working on the Commons app where I can, but I have not been involved with the Mobile Apps team for a few years now, and am not in a position to make any promises of any particular kind of support. I will continue to advocate for the team, of course! :-) --Dan Garry, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 23:24, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
  • Hi Wittylama, nice to meet you. :) As the project maintainer of the Commons Android app, I'll try and answer a few of your questions: The only instability in the history of the Android app was the removal from the Play Store by the WMF Mobile Apps team (due to lack of resources and a desire to focus those resources on the Wikipedia app). After it was picked up by Syced in 2015 and relaunched as a community-maintained app, the Android app has been continuously available for download, stable, and regularly developed (I am unsure about the status of the iOS app). The only transition of 'owner' has been from Syced to myself, and that was a very smooth transition done by mutual arrangement (I daresay most of the community would have been unaware that a change happened ;)). This histogram, with the accompanying annotations, could assist in visualizing the app's historical stability. We are not reliant on technical assistance from WMF, and while our "official" status (in order to be allowed to publish under WMF's Play Store account) is very beneficial due to increased user acquisition, lack thereof would not be a death knell to the app (although I have recently talked to Corey Floyd and Aeryn Palmer from WMF, and have been reassured that they intend to keep the Commons app on their Play Store account for the foreseeable future as long as we fulfill several requirements). As mentioned by Vojtěch Dostál, we have received generally encouraging responses from the Commons community after demonstration of good uploads vs deletion statistics. Misaochan (talk) 07:42, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• Your "Wikidata & Tech" program area is covered by the metric of "active installs" (of the Commons Android app). This is described as "number of devices using the Wikimedia Commons App" - that is, not only that the app has been downloaded, but also that it is being used. is it possible to obtain this data, or only the download numbers? Are you informed when people open the app, or perhaps you're measuring the number of unique usernames uploading files to Commons via the app through a hidden/tracking category? Wittylama (talk) 10:46, 27 October 2017 (UTC)
  • To tell the truth, I might have been a bit vague when defining the metric - but I consider any current install on device to be an "active install" by definition. For me, these are all devices which are functional and in regular use. Josephine might know if we are able to measure more than that (but I fear that we don't collect much usage data due to privacy concerns). --Vojtěch Dostál (talk) 18:55, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
    • I am not an expert in this field, but I understood that it is technically difficult to know whether someone has opened your app on their phone, or how frequently they open it, not to mention the privacy considerations. Simple download numbers are misleading because that does not include people who have deleted the app, used it once and forgot about it, or never actually used it. But, since this is an app with a specific purpose - to upload content to Commons - we have a relatively easy metric to capture, and one that doesn't require special privacy permissions. The real "success criteria" of the App is an upload to Commons, not merely installing/opening the app itself. Therefore, I would argue that your metric should be how many different usernames actually upload files to Commons using the app within your measured tim period. I assume that a tracking category can/will be added to all uploads with this App, so it should be easy to see the public logs of all uploaders using that hidden category. To further improve the quality of the metric, you could also remove any usernames where all their files had been subsequently deleted, and highlight the proportion of uploads which are being used to illustrate pages on WP etc. Wittylama (talk) 22:14, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
      • I agree with the suggestion that looking at uploads is the best way to evaluate success. That said, I think the other metrics of installs, and installs on active devices, are still useful, as they are easily available in Google Play and therefore trivial to compute. I also urge caution when referring to "downloads" as a metric, as the term is very imprecise and could mean multiple different things; the Google Play dashboard does not use the term anywhere for this reason. I'm happy to elaborate more, if that'd be useful. :-) --Dan Garry, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 23:38, 31 October 2017 (UTC)
      • To clarify, "number of active installs" on Google Play is defined as "number of Android devices that have been active in the past 30 days on which your app is installed", which isn't the same as "downloads". If a user deletes the app, the number of active installs actually goes down. But I do agree that uploads made via the app could be another metric - we (the app developer community) regularly use this metric ourselves via a tool created by one of our members (you can see this in real time here, but bear in mind that 2017Q4 is still ongoing). Running a query to find out how many unique users uploaded images to Commons via our app is also a possibility, similar to what is done here, and the number/proportion of uploads used to illustrate Wikipedia etc articles can be found on GLAMorous. However, Vojtěch and I are unsure if these metrics can or should be added to WMCZ's proposal. It would be great if we could get some feedback on that. Misaochan (talk) 09:42, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
• Relatedly, that metric (active installs) is applicable to the "tech" but not the "wikidata" component of "wikidata & tech" program. Does this mean that the success of your other Wikidata activities (collaboration with the national library, wikidata workshops) are measured by the "bytes added" and "content pages" metrics? You are only listing a target of 4 "newly registered" for this program - is that sufficiently ambitious? Wittylama (talk) 10:46, 27 October 2017 (UTC)
  • We are also measuring 'Participants' in these cases. The Commons app has indeed this extra metric called 'active installs' but 'bytes added' and 'content pages' are not applicable there so it sort of evens out. We will be happy for other suggestions, be it already for 2018 or for subsequent years. --Vojtěch Dostál (talk) 18:55, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for your quick replies User:Vojtěch. Sincerely, Wittylama (talk) 22:14, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Wikinity

Is toollabs:wikinity similar to toollabs:wiki-needs-picture, which currently has 964 suggestions for Czech Republic? --Nemo 14:42, 12 November 2017 (UTC)

Similar but it's based on a different principle. Wiki Needs Pictures displays only manually added requirements while Wikinity reads from Wikidata (looking for items without a picture). There are thousands of suggestions in Wikinity for the area of the Czech Republic --Vojtěch Dostál (talk) 07:40, 13 November 2017 (UTC)

Ah ok, so Wikinity is more similar to FIST actually. Thanks, Nemo 08:50, 13 November 2017 (UTC)

FIST searches for existing images, does it not? --Vojtěch Dostál (talk) 08:24, 14 November 2017 (UTC)

More questions :)

Hello Petra Pejšová (WMCZ), Vojtěch Dostál, Aktron and Misaochan. thanks for the submission! Some of the items I know and understand thanks to Aktron's presentations in Poland and WMPL history but I hope you won't mind that having read your proposal a few times, I still would like to ask you about a few details. :)

Firstly, Wikimedia Commons Mobile App - you have stated: We also contribute to the development of Wikimedia Commons Mobile App which has started to display nearby unphotographed items after being financially and logistically supported by Wikimedia Czech Republic in 2017. and then you provide two detailed goals:

• Promotion of the Wikimedia Commons mobile app aims to increase the usage of the Wikimedia Commons mobile app worldwide. (...)
• Further technical development of the Wikimedia Commons app will be funded by our chapter according to decisions made in the developer community. (...) while the linked document suggests it was rather an initiative of WMCZ:

  As some of you may know, Wikimedia Czech Republic has kindly offered to include us in their grant proposal for 2018 funding. :) We will need to come up with a list of improvements that we intend to implement in 2018. @VojtechDostal has informed me that their proposal is due on 1 Oct 2017, so we will need to "finalize" the list by the end of September ideally.

Thus,

1. Final list of goals, timelines and the budget for 2018 for these activities would be great.
2. Is the "Project manager for multimedia" (0.5 FTE) a position (solely) dedicated to the app?
3. WMCZ's connection with the Commons App is still not entirely clear to me. :) I do know that your current APG plan is to already work on it, Vojtěch serves as an advisor for the current renewed IEG grant and a mentioned hackathon in Prague was to work on this issue (blogpost) + other workshops were to be done in CZ. However, would you be this kind to elaborate?
4. The app has been historically funded directly by WMF, e.g. via this grant. Why do you want to change it?
5. Finally, could you explain some more what support is to be brought by WMCZ (beyond funding the main maintainer) and how/why do you plan to, e.g., promote the app worldwide? I would love to learn your rationale and plans, especially as the tech development is a field where we still have not found a "golden solution" in the Mov ement.

Secondly, the community support. Your proposal is very much media acquisition focused, with mediagrants, wikiexpeditions and other local photographic actions. Besides that, you are planning to continue the outreach with students and seniors. Do you plan some other actions, like Wikipedia/Wiktionary/... community support, conference scholarships or so? Furthermore, your current APG programme includes Wikiclubs - did you find them effective? Do you phase them out?

Finally, fundraising. Your submission mentions 0.2 FTE for it and that the "Seniors Write Wikipedia" contractor has been already funded by your fundraising activity. Could you give some detail? What kind of costs and benefits do you expect here?

Thank you in advance, aegis maelstrom δ 23:50, 12 November 2017 (UTC)

Hi aegis maelstrom, here are the answers to your questions:

ad part 1

1. A very good overview of planned improvements is here. This APG proposal was filed before our Commons App team received result of another IEG renewal proposal which is now approved and will fund improvements of the app until February 2018. However, the uncertainty over IEG meant that we could not complete the timeline of specific improvements earlier. We are now opening these discussions but it will take some time and the priority will certainly be on completing the IEG goals and then following up on them.
2. No, the project manager for multimedia is a project manager in charge of the Media Acquisition program.
3. Can you please explain what you exactly mean? I think you described our activities concerning the commons app rather nicely :-).
4. Personally I'd say that IEG funding is the same level of "WMF funding" as APG. However, IEG is not meant to continue indefinitely, it's just a short start-up grant, then possible renewal period, and that's it. This year we decided to provide the Commons App team with our administrative force and include the project in our APG - for reasons explained below in #5. We are in discussions with the WMF grantmaking team on how to best support the Commons App in future (from 2019 on).
5. We are bringing two main benefits to the team. One is our administrative force and accountability of an established NGO that is eligible to APG grants and is able to write them and execute them - because we have the experience. The second benefit is our knowledge of the Wikimedia ecosystem, we are able to promote the app efficiently among Wikimedians, who we think will like and use the app. This includes our ability to use social sites efficiently, which is crucial to success but hasn't been used much by the tech community of the Wikimedia Commons app due to their inexperience with that.

ad part 2

• We do support the existing communities. Some of it is included in our three main programs ("Train the trainers" sessions to improve knowledge in specific areas of Wikipedian expertise, advanced Wikidata workshops, lending service for photographic equipment), some of it isn't included but we still do it (annual WikiConference, support for monthly Wikipedian meetings in Prague and Brno, travel scholarships).
• We still organize Wikiclubs (in Prague and in Brno) but we seem to have omitted them from the project plan, for which we apologize. This is because there are almost no associated costs to Wikiclubs so we have probably forgotten about them. However we are now able to provide very precise metrics for Wikiclubs, calculated automatically each week (see here) - in short, yes, they are very effective and attract a subgroup of Wikipedians who love to edit together.

ad part 3

• Until 2017 we have relied on our volunteers and employees to do fundraising for specific occasions and we have been successful; it enabled us to fund the contractor you mention but also other things, such as part of the budget for the 2018 Wikiconference. However, we feel we 1) don't work well with existing partners and 2) we don't harness the full potential of the company fundraising. We feel this is low-hanging fruit. A new fundraiser is to centralize these activities, keep a list of partners, keep them informed about our activities, work with them on continuing their support for us, and also find new partners/donors for our organization. We are pretty much in the beginnings so we're experimenting on a fairly small scale but we feel this will help us become more independent on WMF, something that WMF has stressed in many past talks.

--Vojtěch Dostál (talk) 15:43, 14 November 2017 (UTC)