Grants:PEG/WM US-NYC/Short term funding program/Report

Report accepted

This report for a Project and Event grant approved in FY 2012-13 has been reviewed and accepted by the Wikimedia Foundation.

To read the approved grant submission describing the plan for this project, please visit Grants:PEG/WM US-NYC/Short term funding program.

You may still comment on this report on its discussion page, or visit the discussion page to read the discussion about this report.
You are welcome to Email grants at wikimedia dot org at any time if you have questions or concerns about this report.

Compliance and completion

Did you comply with the requirements specified by WMF in the grant agreement?: YES

Promises made -

marketing techniques USD 500
General funds for small projects, USD 500
Wikimania Takes Manhattan. This is a project of our own that will help raise awareness about the projects and be a major outreach event for us. This will cover fliers, food, and tents. USD 1000

Wikimania Takes Manhattan consumed about 80% of the funds. Wikimedia New York City conducted marketing with other funds and was able to make a successful bid for an additional $1000 funding from a another nonprofit organization, which the organization budgeted for additional snacks at events.

Is your project completed?: YES; All promises made in receiving the grant funding have been fulfilled.

Did you use any of the grant funds?: YES; The funds from this grant are consumed in entirety.

Activities and lessons learned

Hosting a series of events in New York City to support Wikimania 2012 in Washington DC was an excellent idea. Many people visited New York City for the first time as a result of this and were able to tour the city, visit museums, and come to know each other socially before jumping in to the intensity of the Wikimania conference. Wikimedia New York City was able to leverage a lot of local resources, including free tickets provided by museums, guide services by local Wikipedians for foreign guests, and simply the pleasure of visiting Manhattan only because we were able to charter the bus with the funds from this grant and promise safe, certain, and easy travel for visitors from NYC to DC.

Activities

There were several days of activities associated with the Wikimania Takes Manhattan and en:Wikipedia:Wiki_World's_Fair events. Approximately 30 people joined the city tour and another 30 joined the museum tour, and about 50 people attended the Wiki World's Fair on Governor's Island. The places we visited as a group include the following: Highline Park Museum of Natural History Metropolitan Museum of Art Central Park Morgan Library Roosevelt Park

Lessons learned

What lessons were learned that may help others succeed in similar projects? Consider the following questions and respond with 1 - 2 paragraphs.

What went well?

We did not know how much interest there would be in foreign guests adding extra days to their stay to visit New York City in addition to attending the Wikimania conference in DC. As it turned out, there was not enough room on our chartered bus for everyone to ride with us. It would be a good idea for future Wikimania conferences to consider whether they should offer attendees 1-3 extra days of organized tourism. For Wikimedia NYC, we organized tours of places of Wikipedian interest - museums, libraries, and places like parks where people meet and talk.

What did not go well?

We were unable to make room on our bus for everyone who wanted to ride. We offered reservations months in advance, but people's travel plans usually were not finalized until just a few weeks before, then we had a rush of people requesting seats on the bus days before, then finally the day before we left even more people wanted bus seats. We gave advice on how some people could take commuter bus services when they could not fit on our chartered bus but anyone who plans group travel in the future should anticipate that tourists from other countries may not have all their plans settled and will need all kinds of advice when they arrive. Local people should be on hand to support them!

Some foreign guests had lots of questions. Wikimedia NYC was not planning for this, so we had to set up an email list for people who were visiting NYC so that they could subscribe to this list and use it only for a few days.

What would you do differently if you planned a similar project?

Perhaps no one noticed any problems in our hosting, but if Wikimedia NYC were to host an event to complement another Wikimania, this is what the organization would do differently-

Introduce people to all decisions and options months in advance, including recommended options (which were provided far in advance) and alternative options (which were not provided far in advance). Options should include the following:
1. housing options - a hostel is recommended, but what else might people want?
2. travel options - Wikimedia NYC chartered a bus, but for those people who could not take it, what other options did they have?
3. touring options - Wikimedia NYC members led tours, but some people did not want the tours. We did not provide links to things they could do alone, and they seemed to find things to do, but what could we have recommended?
4. noting social events - Wikimedia NYC planned several periods of time when people could hang out in a park and talk with each other. Some people wanted this social time and other people wanted to break and do other things alone. We posted itineraries but some people did not notice these postings. For future events Wikimedia NYC would want to make all planned activities and timings completely clear and encourage all participates to ask questions in advance if they had them. The project pages describing these events on Wikipedia stayed rather quiet despite lots of people having read them and feeling like asking questions.

Project goal and measures of success

This section should reference the project goals and measures of success described in the approved grant submission. See Grants:PEG/WM US-NYC/Short term funding program to review the goals and metrics listed in the approved submission.

Wikimedia NYC used grant funds to charter a bus to transport Wikipedians from NYC to DC and the organization filled every seat on that bus. Additionally, having that bus was enough to drive the chapter to pool other resources to host a busload of international Wikipedians for three days. Wikimedia NYC believes that this is a lot of impact for just the price of bus fare for each participant.

Project goal

Help increase the membership of Wikimedia NYC by 250% by December 31st, 2012
Encourage more volunteerism by current members
Increase brand awareness of the Wikimedia Foundation
Develop connections with local cultural and educational institutions

Did you achieve your project goal? How do you know your goal was achieved? Please answer in 1 - 2 paragraphs.

Concerning the membership increase - the membership increase measurement is in hindsight impractical. Some measures of increased participation including vastly increased attendance at Wikipedia Days in 2012 and 2013, and Wikimedia NYC is happy for that. Perhaps 10 additional people show up to meetings and special events at least twice a year, so that indicates some increase in community participation. Many more people, more than 250%, show up at least once to an event each year. Wikimedia NYC participants are probably presenting to about 500 people a year at least one time, with the biggest event being Wikimania where about 150 people attend. The other goals are side effects of this increased membership outreach.

Cultural organizations want more attention than Wikimedia NYC can give. Actually that will never be a problem and providing them Wikipedia support will be the biggest problem.

Concerning the NYC Wikimania 2012 meetup - that was a major success. A lot of people from other countries expressed that they felt their first trip to the United States was more meaningful because they were able to see the Statue of Liberty. Somehow in foreign consciousness the people of many countries respect the Statue of Liberty. The guides in New York did a lot of planning and the Statue of Liberty was kind of an afterthought and just something to show people while we traveled between sites of interest, but somehow the sight of that statue built a lot of anticipation and drive among multiple visitors and seeing it meant a lot more to some people than the activities which we at Wikimedia NYC thought were the real attractions. In any case people seemed to have fun throughout their stay in Manhattan and no one seemed disappointed to visit NYC.

Measures of success

List the measures of success exactly as provided in the approved grant submission, and evaluate your project according to each measure listed there.: Wikimedia NYC fulfilled the promises made in receiving the grant. If anything went wrong it was that the organization should have requested more funding and expanded the scope of the event, because the scope was slightly too small.
Provide an overall assessment of how your project went according to these measures.: The project went as well as it could have gone.
If you were to plan a similar project, would you measure it differently? If yes, please explain how.: One change that could have been made is to request funding to increase global diversity. Going to NYC was an added expense to the trip and while we did have excellent diversity in attendees, there were people at Wikimania from developing countries who would have also visited New York if they had money to do so. Wikimedia NYC did not consider any duty it might have had to provide assistance to foreign Wikimania guests who might like to attend this extra event if only they had a little extra money. We did mostly free events, arranged for guests to stay in inexpensive hostels, provided free tickets to places which were not free, and paid for the transport from NYC to the conference, but still we could have done something to arrange funding for the costs which remained and were minimal by local standards but substantial for people from some other economies.

Impact

This section ties this project to Wikimedia's broader goals, and shows what the project accomplished.

What impact did this project have on WMF's mission and the strategic goals? Please answer in 1 -2 paragraphs and include specific measures of impact such as the number of readers or editors reached by a particular project, or the number of articles edited or improved.

Stabilize infrastructure

We can now depend on at least 100 people attending our annual Wikipedia Day event. This was consistent for two years.

Increase participation

Wikimedia NYC can depend on regular and new participants to show up to any advertised event. Also if we promote events more then we can depend on more attendance.

Improve quality

Events went from being confused to being more stable, and with stability comes increased quality.

Increase reach

Reach is no longer a concern. The organization has more opportunities for outreach than its members can manage.

Encourage innovation

Innovation takes time and the existing community needs support and needs time to make connections to each other.

Money

Incoming

$2000 to do outreach April - July 2012 WikiMania Takes Manhattan and en:Wikipedia:Wiki_World's_Fair

Outgoing

Wikimania Takes Manhattan and en:Wikipedia:Wiki_World's_Fair

13-Feb-12 Events Alessandra Villami Wikipedia Day help ($53.52 of $100 - rest paid from our own indepenent funds)
12-Feb-12 Events Short term funding program Greyhound Wikimania 2012 ($1,274.00)
13-Feb-12 Short term funding program BoltBus GLAMcamp DC ($24.00)
13-Feb-12 Events Short term funding program Luis Daniel Palacios Wikipedia Day help ($110.00)
23-Feb-12 Events Dave Miller Wikipedia Day help ($140.00)
7-Mar-12 Events Francesco Pizzeria Wiknic on Governor's Island ($398.48)
total - ($2,000)

Remaining funds

Are there any grant funds remaining?: Answer YES or NO.; NO

Please list the total amount (specify currency) remaining here. (This is the amount you did not use, or the amount you still have after completing your grant.)

$0

If funds are remaining they must be returned to WMF, reallocated to mission-aligned activities, or applied to another approved grant.

Please state here if you intend to return unused funds to WMF, submit a request for reallocation, or submit a new grant request, and then follow the instructions on your approved grant submission.

No, there is no remaining grant funding.