Annual plan/2022

The grant 2022 for Wikimedia Belgium (WMBE) was approved on 31 Jan 2022.

Logo Wikimedia Belgium

Affiliate strategy

We need more collaboration with other (larger) institutions, organisations, and peer affiliates. We can’t do everything ourselves. We have limited (human and financial) resources. Our current strategy of collaboration with institutions and organisations works. But it should be intensified. Word of mouth advertising works. We need more knowledgeable and sustainable volunteers. We need new board members.

Cultural institutions have also problems with (paid) personnel and budget reduction. And so we might need to attract more volunteers, Wikipedians and Wikimedians, to gather and structure valuable content.

We might attract students and young professional heritage people to start writing for Wikipedia, and using Wikidata to amend and document items. And uploading and categorising pictures to illustrate heritage. This is also possible via the Wikimedian in residence project.

But we need to guide them to a list of (missing or incomplete) subjects, closely linked to their interests, using Wikipedia, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons, and LysteriaBot. See manage Wiki projects using Wikidata.

Constraints

Constraints for the coming year(s):

• The corona pandemic is under control worldwide since March 2022. Now we can organise again physical activities.
• We need to work in 3 or 4 languages (nl/fr/en/de). This requires a lot of translation effort. People love to read, write, and speak in their own language.
• Examples of successful organisations are attracting and stimulating other institutions: meemoo, Industriemuseum, Jenevermuseum, Museum Hof van Busleyden, Erfgoedcel Leuven
• This year we have significant more budget:
  • Larger WMF grant
  • Wikimedian in residence project (Friends of Wikimedia Belgium Fund)

Enabling factors

• Fast internet connections
• Powerful client devices
• Open source software
• Virtualisation (Wikimedia cloud)
• Manage Wiki projects using Wikidata

Programs

Basically, WMBE will continue the same (good, proven) programs and activities as the last previous years. We will go for more stability, predictability, impact, and performance. Through 2022 we plan for more virtual activities due to corona. We plan to better support the volunteers (online help, expenses, documentation, helpdesk, training, and assistance).

We continue to use the Outreach program planning and review tool to monitor the progress and the impact of our activities on the progress of the projects. We announce and document the activities on Wikipedia, Wikidata, and Wikimedia Commons project pages. Technical aspects are documented on the WMBE website, Wikidata, and other projects, as appropriate for the project. We refer to existing documentation and procedures on other Foundation websites. We use social platforms to announce and report our activities.

We use Phabricator to report technical and operational problems.

We educate collaborating institutions and organisations to use Wikidata and Wikimedia Commons, and related tools being instruments to promote and facilitate the creation of new Wikipedia pages for their own benefit. Institutions and organisations have less budgets to pay employees, so they could benefit from the Wikipedia/Wikimedia volunteers to create and maintain web pages.

We need to pay more attention to volunteer, partner, and social platform communication. Our own websites, Facebook,Twitter, and Telegram are evident instruments. The press, radio, and television are also to be kept in the loop.

We need to choose a limited number of successful and visible campaigns/activities, rather than a multitude of small, unwatched, or less important activities, that do not attract much attention or participants.

Let us also pay attention to the integration of Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons, and Wikipedia, and the long-term strategy (Strategy 2030). This requires much more public attention.

We search for more collaboration with schools, universities, and more generic cultural institutions and organisations. Heritage clubs should be more attracted to our activities. Recent and early retired people are seeking an interesting new hobby, but they might require more technical training and might suffer from a slower learning curve? Individuals of +65 are less susceptible to IT techniques, and the MediaWiki interface which is not always simple, straightforward, nor well documented.

We need to plan for freelance work. There is currently a lot of operational work to do, that is currently done by one single, or a few volunteers.

Volunteer program

Volunteers should not feel alone. We need to support volunteers.

• Support volunteers (transport, museum tickets, training, books, brochures)
• We have 2 Chromebooks available for use during edit-a-thons
• Provide printed material:
  • Schrijven voor Wikipedia
  • How to upload photos
  • Brochure ateliers FR/NL

Activities that are planned:

• Femmes et Sciences
• Wikimedian in residence project

GLAM program

Collaboration with Musea and organisations.

• Vlaams Architectuurinstituut, VAi, Antwerpen
• Industriemuseum, Gent
• Project digitalisering Museum Hof van Busleyden, Stadsarchief Mechelen, meemoo
• House of Talents, Brussels
• Open Knowledge Belgium, Brussels
• meemoo, Gent
• Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België, Brussels

• Civic Lab Brussels
• Plantentuin Meise

Educational program

Collaboration with educational institutions.

• Primary schools? Check the facts/reliability - fake news - ask your parents
• Secondary schools
• Hogescholen:
  • Erasmushogeschool Brussel
• Universiteitsbibliotheek, Letteren en Wijsbegeerte, UBGent, Universiteit Gent
• Other universities: VUB, ULB, Universiteit Antwerpen, Universiteit Hasselt

• KMI (Koninklijk Meteorologisch Instituut, Ukkel/Uccle)

Heritage program

Wiki Loves Heritage photo contest (also more documenting on Wikidata and Wikipedia)

Collaboration with heritage organisations:

• Erfgoedcel Pajottenland Zennevallei
• Erfgoedcel Leuven
• Denderstreek
• Hageland
• Vlaamse kouters
• Vlaamse Ardennen

YouTube

Video training on how to use the MediaWiki applications and tools.

Techniques

We need to provide permanent education about Wikimedia techniques.

Documentation, awareness, promotion, implementation of automated tools: Technical training (how/when to use which WM tools => overlapping, (non)technical)

Wikipedia (multiple languages: mainly nl, fr, en, de) Wikimedia Commons Wikidata Lexemes Wikidata Query QuickStatements OpenRefine ListeriaBot

Pywikibot PAWS ISA Tool WDFIST FIST Mix’n’match Pattypan Phabricator

Special attention

Humans are limited in capacity (mental, time availability, fatigue, boredom, repeated operations/tasks, understanding). We need more:

• volunteers
• coaches
• project managers
• board members
• closer collaboration with institutions, and better follow-up

At the same time we need:

• to continue budget follow-up/reallocation/monitoring/reporting
• to adhere to government administration requirements
• office and meeting room renting
• websites (platform costs, maintenance)

Training

Non-technical training

• Board development (management skills, general ledger principles, people & team skills, weekend)
• Volunteer development
  • Project management
  • Setting up activities

Technical training

• Wikipedia editing
• Wikimedia Commons
• Wikidata data modelling
• Copyright and licensing
• Listeriabot queries based on Wikidata Query (SPARQL) to deliver auto generated lists
• Livestream workshops (video recording)
• Video training
• How to use the Wikimedia cloud tools (advantages)
• Using Wikimedia Meet (Jitsi server)

Organisation and Strategy

• Collaborate with neighbouring affiliates sharing the same languages (WMNL, WMFR, WMCH)
• Sustainable Development Goals
• Wikimedia Strategy goals
• Freelance work

See also

• Budget and resource plan 2022
• Grant 2022 for Wikimedia Belgium (meta)
• WMBE strategy 2023-2025

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