Grants talk:Project/Rapid/Suyash Dwivedi/11th World Hindi Conference 2018/Report

Some Questions

I want to raise some questions regarding this event

• Why the project was not able to receive it's most of the goals? Like workshop was not taken place, No new partners, Not part of any parallel sessions.
• Why you mention 10 days accommodation since you demand in grant only 6? Are you really stay there 10 days in place of 6? If yes please clarify the reason.
• You mention in the report about "utter lack of manpower". As I know about this event, initially we were planing to involve 10 people. This was also discussed (might be unofficially) in January Delhi Hindi Wikiconference 2018. You also put the project grant regarding this (Link), Which was incomplete and rejected immediately by foundation. Why you not go ahead with this grant? You also mention that we would be accompany more team members, but when It was discussed You also oppose this idea & claimed that only two members are sufficient. It means you didn't plan well this event.
• You mention about the "Institutions/ Representatives Contacted". I saw that most of the organisations are India based. Then what is need to go Mauritius for this work?
• You also mention in what worked well section that we distributed the SWAG material. You also attached the photos about this. But I don't think this works very well because none of the new contributor comes to the Hindi wiki after this.
• You also call me prior to this event and claimed that Indian govt gave us relaxation in travel and many other things (like Free food, Local travel support). You also mention these things in grant request. But I don't found anyone because you mention lot of budget in the event.
• You also uploaded the images of Hon'ble Anerood Jugnauth & Smt Sushma Swaraj ji visited your stall. But It's seems false claim.
• You mention 12 units of food, but also said in the report that many times we cooked food ourself. Really is it 824 INR per unit?

At last I don't found any utility and benefit of this event. In future these types of event shouldn't be organise.-- Prongs31 14:38, 14 March 2019 (UTC)

• We Request you to please check the report again almost all the goals were achieved.

1. To increase readership of Wikipedia
2. Expand network of potential partners
3. Increase awareness of Wikimedia projects

We have tried to organize some hands-on workshop about Wikipedia but it couldn't happen because of unplanned programme changes following the sudden demise of former Indian PM Sh. Atal Bihari Vajpayee and organizers tight programme reschedule thereafter. We are still in touch with some of the potential partners. We managed to attend 4 parallel sessions and actively participated in it.Ministry of External Affairs mentioned and appreciated about Wikipedia efforts towards Hindi language and open knowledge promotion in their book named भोपाल से मॉरीशस (in the Hindi language) 5 times (Page 176,196,200,205 and 213). Please also refer Wikipedia Coverage in Hindi Vishwa Daily News Paper of 11th World Hindi Conference.

• We had to reschedule our stay to get cheaper flight tickets as the available flights near to conference days, were almost three times costlier.

The conference was for 18-20 and compulsory pre-conference exhibitors meet on 17, 3 days to reach in advance means we should reach there before 15. To reach before 15 ( being holiday there) we should have departed on 13 which cost to ₹74,410 per head and just one day in advance ie on 12 flight was for ₹ 26,849. Thereby saved about 1 lakh on one side. Similarly post conference ticket on 21 was ₹40,700, however, on 23 it was ₹24,303, thereby saving ₹32,000 on one side. Therefore total saving was ₹ 1,32,000 on the journey only; but the expense incurred on 4 and days was ₹20,800 only, that too almost near already declared lodging expenditure. We hope this query of yours is satisfactorily addressed now.

• Although this grant co-contact person Innocentbunny also discussed and informed the community on village-pump for discussions, but this grant didn't succeed. Please go through this link thoroughly once again, you will get the answer that is self-explanatory. We never claimed that mere 2 members are enough, but was advised by the foundation grant manager as per the link above.

Also please go through this link it's talk page where it was again strongly suggested by foundation grant manager to go for only 2 persons. Hope your query is answered.

• Most of the institutions were expected to be Indian only, as India is the largest and native country for Hindi. But the collection of such Hindi related institutions and representative was planned there at Mauritius by the organizer (MEA), and not by us, therefore the venue selection was beyond our scope. We sincerely hope that you understand that It would be difficult to find such a big herd of Hindi related institutions at one place other than WHC. If it would have been in India, Hindi wiki would have participated/represented there also.
• Idea of Swag distribution was spread by the foundation itself, and its purpose is to attract and connect aware people to the wiki. Please don't expect that mere giving a badge makes someone promise you an article from him. Its main purpose was to introduce awareness for the wiki, which may aid the user/viewer count, but may/may not in editor count.
• Govt gave relaxation and support in many heads like
  • Exemption for paying Registration Fee of Rs 5000 for each participant so in total Rs 10,000.
  • Got 3X3 meter area for the stall in Exhibition at free of charge.
  • Air Mauritius arranged 20% discount, which is adjusted in airfares as discussed as above. All the booking related correspondence emails were also CC with grant admin and CIS.
  • We got Free food, Local travel support during conference days only ie 3 days.
• You must be aware that there are certain protocols to take photographs of such high dignitaries. As you can notice that the photographs are in motion blur because We had to take the photo and by the same time attend the stall.
• Thanks for pointing out the mistake. We had been there for 10 days. Out of 10 leaving 03 days for conference leaves 07 days.2 meals X 2 persons X 07 days =28 pax Therefore an average of ₹ 353 per pax.

We respect your views on utility and benefits. --Suyash Dwivedi (talk) 17:24, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for replying after a while!

• Can you provide supporting documents for all your claims on Village Pump or Here besides "भोपाल से मॉरीशस" book? Which 4 session you participated? Can you tell the names of those sessions?
• Your answer about journey still not satisfactory.
• The WMF staff also said that

“ There are many incomplete sections in this proposal, notably in the community input, context and participation sections ”

I think that this the reason why grant was declined. As you also said Innocentbunny discussed about this grant. As far as I know (because also participated in some discussions) you never discussed about it seriously as a main grantee.

• I agree on institutions participated points.
• Thank you for clearing my doubts about Govt relaxations & Protocols.

In a nutshell, Once again you are not provide any substantial about the follow-ups. Please answer the questions about follow-ups asked below. You already crossed 21 day time limit!-- Prongs31 14:54, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

An Observation

I think that Wikimedia foundation have no idea to check outcome reality. For example grantee clamed all parameter in yes while there is no such data has provided for supporting this clamed. I am closely watching readership and contribution data but founded no any kind of impression of effect from this activity on Wikipedia. Even wiki source was almost dead till November 2018 before another team led by ajit Kumar Tiwari started to evolve this. WMF must fix any kind of accountability regarding this type of big event where per person expence gone near 1000$ otherwise all hard earned money will go in wrong hand and it will not improve Wikipedia on right way. I am also finding CIS on wrong way to supporting this type of events without proper checking of given link or fact that whether they exist or not? अनिरुद्ध! (talk) 19:38, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

Impact Analysis

Hello @Suyash.dwivedi:

Thanks for your hardwork and proactive initiative on this project for representing Hindi Wikipedia, on behalf of the entire Hindi Wiki Community.

@Prong$31: has already asked some questions related to the program, finances and logistics, I'm sure you have answers to those questions...

A) However, I am more concerned about the Impact, Outcome and future prospects (as planned/expected) related to this initiative. Specifically with the Outcome section of your report. For every targeted outcome, I see a "YES" written with some explanations, some of which look unquantifiable and also insignificant. Obviously you represented us in the event and Hindi Wikipedia pamphlets were distributed, but was the outcome fruitful enough to put a blatant "YES" as your outcome?

The targets put out in the grant application were such:

“

1. Number of event attendees:1500
2. Number of new potential partners: 1-2
3. Number of outreach activity participants:1-2
4. Number of new editors:10-20
5. Number of articles created or improved:10-15

”

How does this Project actually stand on these self-set targets? and can you please explain the method taken to measure the outcome of this project based on these targets? and based on what outcomes were these conclusions made that the project has achieved it's targets?

For instance:

• Who are the 1-2 new partners? and please give us the meta link to the projects under consideration/in-action with them.
• ---Same for the "outreach activity partners". Who are they?
• Who are the 20-30 new editors?
• Links to the 10-15 new articles created/improved by these editors.

If your initiative hasn't really achieved these self-set targets then this report should really be revised to reflect the actual reality of the situation.

From what I understand and believe is that this was supposed to be an important project for Hindi Wikipedia, since participating in the World Hindi Conference was a crucial chance for Hindi Wikipedia to stand among many other organisations working for Hindi, Government Bodies, Institutions, Individuals, etc. primarily to gain more limelight among them and to search for potential partners among any of these groups, so that we could have started some sort of pilot project/partnerships with these organisations so as to expand our reader base/active editor count. Of course this was the first time, and of course we can't expect everything to go as planned, but your report should be true on the ACTUAL IMPACT of this initiative, as promised/planned in the grant application, which most certainly is not reflected in your report in it's current form.

B) More specifically on the future partnerships:

For once, it felt good to see the delegates and participants present there, appretiating the Wikipedia platform and urging others to contribute to Wikipedia as well.[1][2] In the grant application, you had told about follwing-up with the new contacts by:

“ "Mailing list, regular telephonic conversations /Hangout, and by keeping there aware about what's going on in Wikipedia like competitions like Wiki Loves Monuments, Wikipedia Asian Month ect." ”

---Regular mails, Hangouts groups, etc. appears to be an easy and effective way to keep them connected with Wikipedia and Hindi Wikipedia specifically. I'd like to know if you have actually followed up with this, and if yes, is there any specific communication that you would want to share, or any specific group/organisation that seems interested in proactively partnering with us?

It has been more than 6 months since the event, I don't know of any follow up initiative in any form as a result of this event, should we expect any follow up at all? If yes, then what are the plans? If no, then that would be another failure, which must be included in the report.

C) I have always been a supporter of such initiatives, If done with a plan, good-will and in a way that the community approves of it. However, many in the community don't see any fruitful outcome from this project, and even your report does not depict it honestly. Also, the community seems deeply divided on the issue of such outreach initiatives, some even questioning the actual contribution to Hindi Wikipedia by these grant-based outreach initiatives. What are your views on this trend?

I have come to know that you will be busy these days and will be free to answer these questions after some days, which is fine, but do keep in mind that there is a time limit within which the report is to be reviewed.

Thanks again,

 Innocentbunny    TALK  17:34, 20 March 2019 (UTC)

Refund for Customs duties

Hello WJifar (WMF), I request you to please increase the grant to refund Customs duties balance amount of INR 7,261 (~USD105) Thank You.-- Suyash Dwivedi (talk) 11:50, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

@Suyash.dwivedi: I think you should first inform about the followup of this event to our community despite granting refund. We ask these questions almost 2 months ago but neither you answered here nor on village pump of Hindi wiki.-- Prongs31 09:23, 12 May 2019 (UTC)

Report incomplete

Since the grantee has been unresponsive to the community feedback and raised concerns on the discussion page, I have to mark this report as incomplete.

Dear Suyash.dwivedi, you will need to address all raised concerns, questions, and issues, in order to bring this report and you back to eligibility. Until then, you are unfortunately ineligible for future funding from WMF.

Dear Prong$31, अनिरुद्ध कुमार, and Innocentbunny, thank you for your detailed review and feedback on the discussion page. I appreciate your engagement with the review process.

Best regards, DSaroyan (WMF) (talk) 10:20, 22 October 2020 (UTC)