Strategy/Wikimedia movement/2018-20/2019 Community Conversations/Strategy Salons/Reports/ESEAP Strategy Summit

Date and location

Dates : June 29, 2019 - June 30, 2019
Place : Pullman Bangkok King Power Hotel, Bangkok, Thailand
Event Page: ESEAP Strategy Summit 2019

Participant List

No	Username	Country
1	Zawthet
2	Alphama
3	Exec8
4	Dody Ismoyo
5	FroyAgta
6	06Ivonne
7	Hillun Vilayl Napis
8	Shangkuanlc
9	林立云
10	JM99
11	Motoko C. K.
12	Ryuch
13	Fumihiro Kato
14	nfmia
15	無聊龍
16	Bidgee
17	22Kartika
18	BJ Sinaga
19	MurielMary
20	Beeyan
21	Ninjastrikers
22	MarvinBikolano
23	Jayraj15
24	Tuanminh01
25	Giantflightlessbirds
26	Fantasticfears
27	Bahnfrend
28	WhisperToMe
29	SNN95
30	SPramudya (WMF)
31	B20180

What happened

Participants from ESEAP countries share and explore stories about their work as Wikimedians. They shared what are the blockers and opportunities in their respective countries and discussed what global structures and systems relate to these issues, what needs to change at the country and regional level, and what are the tradeoffs. At the end of the discussion we discovered similar challenges and opportunities as a region and tried to develop a vision for where we should go.

The participants then divided into several groups discussing different thematic areas. There are 4 themes discussed at the summit, which are: Diversity, Community Health, Partnerships, and Capacity Building. Each of the groups wrote recommendations for these themes. The following are the summary of recommendations proposed by the participants in each thematic area.

Diversity - Recommendations

Affiliates and local groups should invest a minimum of 25% of their time and resources on mentoring and developing new Wikimedians in terms of induction and retention to create a positive and happy experience for Wikimedians.

This concern came out of the realization that offline outreach programs rarely retain editors but users who discovered our projects (Wikipedia, Wikisource, Commons, etc.) and tried to edit themselves usually stays. However, we did not invest enough to mentor this type of users.

Wikimedia Foundation should prioritize developing mobile editing tools, newbie information package or resources (on movement structure, systems, governance, projects, etc.) and a more personalized editing interface.

Mobile editing tools because most of the users in our region are online with their mobile phones not their laptops but the editing tools are not adequate enough to support a good mobile editing experience.

Newbie information package because a lot of newbies are left to discover the jungle of Wikipedia and its sister projects by themselves, without any help or knowing where to find any help. Providing useful resources for newbies can improve their experience and also introduce them to the structure and governance of the movement.

Personalized editing interface because by personalizing our interface to their users according to their likes and interests, we create a very personal experience and encourage them to contribute on what they love most. For example, if a user claimed that they like astronomy and history, we could present them with articles to read in the topics and articles to improve in the topics.

Systems should be developed within Wikimedia community (organizers and volunteers), groups, and partners to share best practices around membership. This could be done by organizational pairing (e.g. Wikimedia Korea and Thailand), knowledge portals where best practices can be shared, and developing non-text training materials and resources (audio or video).

Develop recognition systems for editors in order to increase content creation by subject area experts (professional, academic) to have more diverse (non pop culture) content.

This concern came out because we see a lot of pop culture contents while subject matter experts or academics are discouraged to edit Wikipedia because they are not acknowledged for it. We could get around this by developing some kind of award or hall of fame for editors, not only due to the huge quantity of their edits but for the quality of their edits. If they did a very valuable edit or writing on topics that most people could not write or find references of, it would be very nice and help editor retention if we could acknowledge them for it.

Community Health - Recommendations

For 2030:

To establish local trust and safety team within each affiliate to enforce friendly space policy and set an action plan to deal with harassment in local communities in a timely and efficient manner. Establish a fundamental and universal Code of Conduct - written as a global policy and adaptable according to local contexts.

Set up mentorship programs for both new members in communities and for new affiliates. So that newcomers know how, know who and know why, so they can learn quick and be part of the community quick (retention). Older affiliates in the region to help new affiliates establish, how to run, how to apply for something, help them to grow, how to operate. This is done by encouraging internal and regional partnerships. This would lead to more friendly atmosphere in the domain of editing, without tensions between experienced and new editors.

Establish guidelines for personal data collection, usage, access and protection with a controlled centralized platform to collect user data instead of out of the box interface.

Partnerships - Recommendations

External approaches to partnerships
Frameworks that encourage WMF to use its global positioning and influence to leverage partnerships that can have regional and local impact, especially in emerging communities.

For examples:

Corporate Social Responsibility in relevant and overlapping domains.

E.g. WMF and Kodak partner to catalogue collections of magazines .

Local example from Indonesia .

WMF chapters in established countries to connect their diplomatic missions with affiliates and communities in emerging settings, on a regular basis or around events, such as those increasing content and contribution.

E.g. Wikimedia Deutschland and Goethe institute in Indonesia.

Sweden and French chapters with their diplomatic missions and cultural institutions (e.g. Alliance Française) and Wikimedia groups in emerging communities.

Multilateral organizations.

WMF and UNESCO around cultural and educational domains .

WMF and UNICEF and UNWOMEN on addressing the gender gap in content and contribution .

E.g. Swedish embassy supporting community in Indonesia to increase Javanese women in art Wiki

Media organizations.

Can also collaborate with Advocacy working group.

Internal approaches to partnerships
To establish structures that facilitate free exchange of partnership models, expertise and opportunities at regional and global levels that widely exist within the movement.

For examples:

An easy to use central hub or platform with good UX/UI (e.g. P2P, marketplace, tags) to easily search for partners within the movement that can assist an individual or organization / affiliate on a specific topic.

Focus on models of partnership with local/regional values and impact with:

Better awareness of context and better transferability of knowledge / capacity.

Good UX/UI - beyond Meta.

Relevance.

Assumptions: communities to upload and be willing to share their experiences and expertise, digitally and where possible in person (e.g. by using rapid grants to visit another country in the region and help in establishing relevant partnerships).

Collaboration opportunities for the partnerships working group on this central hub with: product & technology working group, capacity building working group, and by extension, resource allocation and roles & responsibilities working groups.

What will change: strengthening systems to share capacity regionally, and partnership mechanisms and models in the spirit of regional collaboration. Also applies to capacity building, R&R, community health.

Identifying NGOs that can leverage their networks, experience and connections at a local level that supports local affiliates.

WMF to set up offline thematic associations that bring many voices together beyond conferences and can build and enhance partnerships more easily (e.g. education is already happening).

An enduring internal partnership also, beyond conferences.

Capacity Building

Recruit more organizers

Organizations act as catalyzing agents to bring new members to our communities, and increase in retaining editors. Support (programming and structural) should be provided to train and recruit organizers

Community growth

Our recommendation is to plan and execute a multi-pronged approach to expand our Wiki communities. For longterm: Wikimedians at large (mobile experience wikimedians vs. static ones),e.g. Wiki blitz, non-editors pair up with editors to edit/improve one article. A short achievement event vs. longer editathons.

Organize more competitions, e.g. WLM, WLE, Wiki club, meet ups.