Wikimedia Belgium

Reports/2015/Report of 1st semester

< Reports
statusFunded
WM BE/Budget 2015 H1
This is a 6 month grant application for the activities of the Wikimedia Belgium chapter. It includes the first steps in the goal of our association Engaging people in free knowledge by organising the General Assembly and the first Project Days.
targetWikimedia Belgium impacts wiki communities mainly in Dutch, French, German and English; and the communities of smaller Belgian dialects.
strategic priorityIncrease participation
start dateJanuary 15
start year2015
end dateJune 30
end year2015
budget (local currency)7,810 €
budget (USD)8878,25 USD
grant typeGroup
non-profit statusYes
creator• MADe
contact• maarten@wikimedia.be• derek@wikimedia.be
organization•
created on09:41, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Goal

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Wikimedia Belgium was set up end of last year. It is based on this presentation given to the board, and was approved by the board on Dec 31, 2014. It is based on the SWOT analysis of our organisation performed with our members.

This is an application for the activities of the Wikimedia Belgium chapter in the coming six months (January-June). It includes

  • Part #1 - outreach efforts to our community (General Assembly, website);
  • Part #2 - the first steps in organising projects (Project Days, provisioning for the first small projects); and
  • Part #3 - capacity building of the board (regular board meetings, attendance at WM related conferences).

Planned and executed

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Activities

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WMBE Capacity building activities

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Planned Activity Executed activites Date Link/Comment
Organisation of meetings with our stakeholders: board meetings, General Assembly, FOSDEM booth.| FOSDEM 31 January 2015 - 01 February 2015 https://fosdem.org/ ( see below)
General Assembly 2015 24 January 2015 First General Assembly Wikimedia Belgium 2015-01-24_General_Assembly
Board Meetings 28 June 2015 June board meeting
5 May 2015 May board meeting preparation of Wikimedia conference Berlin 13-17 may.
15 March 2015 March Board Meeting
24 January 2015 GA & board meeting
Organisation of WM BE Project Days Project Day 1 04 February 2015 to foster new projects : Engage with our community and institutions during 4-hours Project Days, our proposed one-stop-shop to discuss with WM BE new projects, arrange (micro) grants and liaison with the Wikimedia Foundation, when appropriate.
WM related conferences GLAM Wiki 2015 Den Haag (NL) 12-15 April 2015 GLAM WIKI 2015, Den Haag, attended by Romaine, Dimi (funded directly by WMF) and DerekvG
Wikimedia Conference Berlin (DE) 13-18 May 2015 Wikimedia Conference 2015 Berlin attended by Maarten, Dimi (funded directly by WMF) and User:DerekvG
Mediatraining, Utrecht Wikimedia Nederland and bureau ‘de mediaspecialist’ 05 April 2015 Geertvp and DerekvG attended the training
WMNL/WMBE Coordination meeting 09 May 2015 MADe, Geertvp and DerekvG attended the meeting
 
Coordination meeting WM NL and WM BE on May 9, 2015

Outreach Agenda

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June
May
April
March
 
Rue du Trône Troonstraat, location of most of our Board Meetings
 
 
On 7 and 8 March an Art+Feminism Edit-a-thon was organised in Brussels. With this edit-a-thon a presentation has been given about Free/Libre and Open Source, about Wikimedia & Wikipedia and about the the gendergap on Wikipedia. During the edit-a-thon articles have been written about the subjects of art and feminism, mostly related to Belgium. Besides the attempt to close the gendergap, the participants also worked on the Belgiumgap: the relative limited number of articles about Belgian subjects.
More information about the edit-a-thon is at the project page.
February
    • 25 February 2015 Europeana Fashion, International Conference, MoMu, Antwerp,
Ste.caneva has given a presentation for Wikimedia Belgium concerning the role of CC licenses during the Workshop 'Handling Intellectual Property in Fashion Images' [1]. The workshop was organized by Gabrielle De Pooter (MoMu Antwerpen) and was chaired by Roxanne Peters, Intellectual Property Manager at Victoria and Albert Museum London and the author of the Europeana Fashion Guidelines for IPR [2]. The other participants were Jill Cousins, Executive Director at Europeana Foundation, and Alexis Hallemans, Partner at law firm CMS DeBacker Belgium, an expert in IPR law. The presentation of Wikimedia Belgium has focused on the Wiki vision regarding the use of CC lincenses when GLAMs open up their digital archives: more precisely, on the efficiency of a SA clause and on the reasons why this license is, in most cases, preferrable to NC and ND. Pictures of the event are available on Flickr [3]
w:outreach:GLAM/Newsletter/February_2015/Contents/Belgium_report
  • 23 February 2015 Open Belgium 2015 Namur
The Open Knowledge Foundation Belgium organised on 23 February 2015 the yearly conference Open Belgium 2015 in Namur. Romaine gave there a presentation about Wikimedia and copyright. Website Open Belgium 2015
w:outreach:GLAM/Newsletter/February_2015/Contents/Belgium_report
  • 20 February 2015 - Wikimedia Belgiums budget for the first six months of 2015 has been approved
  • 20 February 2015 - Civic Epistemologies Workshop on the Roadmap, KUL, Leuven
Ste.caneva & Romaine have attended the Workshop of the Civic Epistemologies network [4] in Leuven. During the Stakeholders' Session, they have introduced Wikimedia Belgium and the Wikimedia projects that can help GLAMs and educational institutions to enhance a closer interaction between researchers, Cultural Heritage institutions, and citizens. Photos and slides from the event are available on the project's website [5]
w:outreach:GLAM/Newsletter/February_2015/Contents/Belgium_report
  • 4 February 2015 - Projects Days, or how can Wikimedia Belgium help you with your plans and projects?
January
  • Announcement SOIMA 2015
In September Wikimedia Belgium is the partner in the international conference of SOIMA 2015, organised in Brussels. SOIMA 2015: Unlocking Sound and Image Heritage is an international conference on ensuring a safe and creative future for sound and image heritage. In the days before the conference workshops are organized. Website
  • Wiki Loves Art 2016
In January and February we are discussing and preparing the organisation of Wiki Loves Art in Belgium. Already multiple partners in the field of open data and cultural institutions have indicated they are willing to organise the project with us. The plan at this moment is to organise the contest in February 2016, while we like to start planning and working on the project in March 2015.
 
Together with the WMF at FOSDEM
 
FOSDEM
Wikimedia was present with a professional stand at FOSDEM, the yearly Free and Open Source Software Developers' European Meeting in Brussels. The stand was organised by Wikimedia Belgium and the Wikimedia Shop provided us materials to be used at our stand, including stickers, pens, flyers and buttons. Wikimedia Belgium and Wikimedia Deutschland provided also some materials. Participants at the conference who Twittered about the Wikimedia Shop or provided some proof of being an editor of Wikipedia/Wikimedia, got a free Wikimedia T-shirt. Editors could also choose a water bottle or a hoodie.
At the stand we got, besides the questions about Wikipedia and Wikimedia, a lot of questions about Wikidata and MediaWiki. At the conference software developers from MediaWiki and Wikidata were present, and also gave some talks about these subjects. The focus of the stand was this yearly mainly on Wikimedia and Wikipedia. Next year we like to expand this also with more materials related to MediaWiki and Wikidata, as that would attract more attention to the software in what most people here have interest in.
Even while the gendergap at FOSDEM is larger than in the Wikimedia movement, we had the chance to speak with a lot of female Wikipedia contributors. The impression I got from these conversations and my experiences with organising writing sessions is, that to attract female contributors like
- in-person workshops/edit-a-thons to have a social interaction.
- social software on-wiki to enable users easily to form groups so they are not feeling alone, but easily can work together with other users in a group.
Groups will have a central discussion page, there are recent changes to be able to see the activities of other group members, being able to create tasks, having a wish list, and so on.
At FOSDEM Quim Gil and Andre Klapper had a talk with the subject Wikimedia adopts Phabricator, deprecates seven infrastructure tools - First hand experiences from a big free software project on a complex migration. (link)
Links:
- Wikimedia organisation
- Some photos of the conference
  • 29-31 January 2015 - Europeana Photography Final Conference, KUL, Leuven
Ste.caneva attended Europeana Photography conference [6] to establish contacts between Wikimedia Belgium and the Photo Consortium [7]
follow-up : invitation of Wikimedia Belgium invited to give a presentation during the stakeholders' workshop organized by the project Civic Epistemologies at KUL, Leuven, on 20 February
w:outreach:GLAM/Newsletter/February_2015/Contents/Belgium_report
  • 27 January 2015 - Preparation meeting for the Project Days and FOSDEM
  • 24 January 2015 - Our first General Assembly
 
Brainstorming session during our General Assembly on Jan 24, 2015
  • 19 January 2015 - European Commission, Brussels
WMBE organised a workshop for the representatives of the European Commission. We explained how Wikipedia is organised and how should be dealt with issues in Wikipedia articles. The project will continue in coming months.
  • 14 January 2015 - Mons2015 & Mundaneum
WMBE organised a discovering workshop for the staff of Mons 2015 and the Mundaneum. The Mundaneum, engaged itself to upload many pictures from its collections (Category:Mundaneum).

Impact

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Target public

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Wikimedia Belgium impacts wiki communities mainly in Dutch, French, German and English; and the communities of smaller Belgian dialects.


More specifically, WM BE wants to reach out to

  • the existing Wikiproject volunteers, contributors, illustrators
  • GLAM organisations, GLAM institutions and GLAM-support organisations
  • Education institutions
  • existing open knowledge organisations in Belgium ('Communication efforts')
  • off-wiki volunteers (to strengthen the Micro Grant Program).

Fit with strategy

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Measures of success

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WM BE working on our communication with the media
 
ICAB Business and Technology Incubator in Brussels, the proposed location for our General Assembly
Outreach efforts to our community (Part #1)
  • Well organised General Assembly (January); OK
  • Finished website (by March); NOT OK delayed
  • Continuous communication to our members; NOT OK delayed(goes together with website)
Setup grant program (Part #2)
  • Organisation two Project Days, attended by 50 people in total ONLY ONE realized
  • 7 projects participated/organised directly by WM Belgium or by partners. OK
Capacity building of the board (Part #3)
  • organisation of 2 board meetings; OK
  • presence of Wikimedia Belgium at FOSDEM; OK
  • presence of Wikimedia Belgium at open data /knowledge conferences; OK
  • Presence of some board members at a Wikimedia events or meeting in Europe;
    • Wikimedia Conference Berlin; OK
    • Glam-Wiki conference Den Haag; OK
    • Hackaton Lyon; NOK

Resources and risks

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Resources

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The grant request is supported by the Wikimedia Belgium board.

Project Volunteers

Project Volunteers to be invited Art+Feminism organisers :

Risks

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Risk Comment Measures to Avoid Measures to Address Expected outcome
Early stage of our organisation (see abc) A lack of experience - Train board members and Volunteers on the job Media Communication training at WM NL
a)Communication / communication breakdowns mediation after comm breakdown setup email, mailing list, collaborative project page Example
b)Trust building mediation after breakdown not only electronic communication, face to face meetings and experience sharing Example
c)Peer Review - no single person projects, always a revieuwer Example
lack of procedures & resistance towards procedural approach and limitations Apply procedures as imposed by BE-authorities, WMF Define procedures precisely and in writing,
implement top down and not by consensus		 It will take 3-5 years to have a more or less complete set of operational & reporting procedure; 2 more to have a workable procedure guide
troll-attack Cannot be avoided Have troll blocked by stewards / deny attention, resist te urge to defend the KOL.Z. case
Lack of external funding WMF-funding requests Contribution in kind form partners (work performed, grant requests from authorities Engage cooperation form WMNL, WMDE, WMFR or WMUK
Grants from WMF		 As we get more established in the collaboration with our GLAM partners we can discuss more openly their resource commitments, and funding through their grant/subsidy channels
Difficulties finding volunteers Volunteers might have their own projects with a funding issue;
staffing problems : experience, commitment, volunteer burn out;
unwelcomming attitude at wikipedia		 Example Wikipedia training, Wikiducation;
Volunteer PDI(personal development initiative) : On wiki volunteer training (admin, conflict handling, arbcom, stewarts), Off wiki volunteer training (Wikipedia Train-the-trainer, Wikipedia Ambassador program), Wikiductaion Educator training program		 Example
Accomodation finding good venues for meetings & events. Suitable location : close to public transport, pref'y in Brussels, price (free = illusion). Example Example Example
Distance Belgium = 300 km across; geographical distribution of members/volunteers makes transport an issue Example Example Example
Example Example Example Example Example

Budget

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Please provide a detailed breakdown of project expenses according to the instructions here. See Budget Guidelines. Grantees are subject to line-item scrutiny of expenses. Changes to the approved budget beyond 10% in any category must be approved in advance.

Changes in the budget

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During a telephone call with the WMF, the following changes were done in the grant request (original version):

  • the number board meetings was lowered to 2 for the first 6 months. Together with the Project Days (2x) and the General Assembly, this creates enough moments for the board to meet up.
  • As aknowledgement of the Wikimedia Foundation, the rent of this first General Assembly was paid by Transforma Bxl (savings of about 400€). There is no need to request budget for the General Assembly end of January.
  • The necessity of the Project Days was discussed with the Foundation. After consideration it was accepted as a way to build projects. The WMF requested us to keep two things in mind: it is the task of the local chapter to organise programmatic activities (eg. organising projects), not just to help third parties to organise it. Secondly, the local chapter should watch out as they have only a limited capacity to do projects. It should be avoid to "overpromise" things to third parties.
  • The cost of the Project Days was lowered due to a lower venue cost (400€ instead of 700€)
  • The provisioning for projects was increased. Originally the budget was made up of 6x 150€ + 1x 600€. This was increased to 6x 150€ + 1x 1500€.

Project budget table

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All amounts rounded to the next multiple of 5.00 €

Activity Budget granted Actual Spending Carry over to 2nd semester Comments
Outreach efforts to our community (Part #1)|
1.1 Organisation General Assembly (1 time) € 0,00 € 93.08 € 93.08 Travel costs overssen at reduction in discussion
1.2 Setup website € 1.070,00 € 0,00 € 1.070,00 Implementation of website delayed to September
1.3 Communication to our members (postal mail, telephone) € 150,00 € 0,00 € 150,00 Implementation of website and communication to members delayed to September
Projects and Setup Micro grant program (Part #2)
2.1 Organisation 2 Project Days (Feb, June) € 1.100,00 € 350,00 € 750,00 1 Project Days organised. Venue cost by Transforma bxl (180e), travel costs.
2.2 Provisioning projects (6x under 150€, 1x under 1500€) € 2.400,00 € 240,00 € 2.160,00 Excludes projects above 1500€, as these will be discussed directly with the WMF in the PEG system
Capacity building of the board (Part #3)
3.1 Organisation regular Board Meetings (2x) € 400,00 € 245,00 € 155,00 Travel costs, occassional drinks.
3.2 Attendance 2 persons to Wikimedia related conferences (Wikimedia Conference, Hackathon) € 1.040,00 € 1.910,00 € -870,00 Transport costs and accomodation. overspending due to unfamiliarity with costs of attending conferences. We propose to request help from the Foundation with intercontinental travels. Within Europe we can organize travel more economically, and budget sharper
3.3 Attendance at meetings of Dutch, French and German WM € 900,00 € 100,00 € 800,00 Transport and accomodation costs (only Dutch meeting)
3.4 Wikimedia presence at FOSDEM and similar conferences € 750,00 € 900,00 € -150,00 Overspend on flyers for Fosdem (800€), travel costs General Assembly and public events
1.4 Unbudgetted general administrative expences € 0,00 €115,00 € -115,00 unforeseen expences
Totals : € 7810 € 3935 € 3875

Total project amount Granted

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7,810 €

Total amount spend

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3935€

Amount te be carried forward to WMBE Grant-request 2015 S2

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3875 €

Additional sources of revenue

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Report of the 2nd semester

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