Grants talk:IdeaLab/Public domain in GLAM and Wikipedia

Comments from I JethroBT (WMF)

Hi David and Leonardo, thanks for your idea on improving access and understanding regarding public domain materials, and for your work in specifying your activities, budget, and goals so far. Being able to integrate this work into our projects and educate contributors on image policy can be challenging, and I think projects aligned with those goals are beneficial. I have a few questions about the project:

• One part of this project is to improve a tool that provides information about when works fall into the public domain. What improvements do you want to make, and how do those changes coincide with the project goals? How will the tool be used in the event(s) that make up the other part of this project? Outside of the events, what will you do to encourage the use of your tool by editing communities?
• I think surveying the institutions and individuals you want to work with is a great idea. What types of questions will you be asking? You definitely don't need to have an entire survey prepared at this point, one aspect that caught my attention is that if one of your goals is to increase understanding of concepts like remix culture, copyright, public domain, do you plan to use the survey to assess those goals, and how?
• What's the timeline like for this project? How long will it take to do the software development work? When will the festival event(s) with GLAM institutions be? What kind of planning is needed for those events, and how long will that process take?
• Finally, what support do you need from on-wiki volunteers, and is there anything I can help with? If you'd like to schedule a time to chat about your proposal over Skype or Google Hangouts, let me know.

Thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 23:54, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

comments from Thepwnco

@Hiperterminal and C3r098: Hi and thanks for this idea! I love the idea of promoting more awareness around the public domain and connecting that to increased content uploading and sharing. I had some of the same questions as User:I_JethroBT_(WMF) stated above, and would encourage you to further expand on the details of proposed activities. In addition, I wondered if, in your experience, a lack of awareness around the public domain is in fact the main challenge with making content available for Wikimedia projects. In my experience, sharing and digitizing content is often impeded by a lack of staff/volunteer time, resources, and digitization equipment. Would your project seek to also resolve these issues? Or do the GLAM institutions you're planning to target already have the necessary resources/equipment to participate in digitization activities?

Cheers. -Thepwnco (talk) 15:46, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

Reply to I JethroBT (WMF) and Thepwnco

Hi!

Thanks for your comments. I hope Leonardo edit this if I am not clear. I am going to reply in order:

First to I JethroBT (WMF):

• About the tool:
  • The tool is a way to understand the colombian copyright law and know exactly when a work fall into the public domain just answering some questions:
    • What kind of work is? For example: Book, painting, picture, movie, etc.
    • What kind of author? For example: A single person, a company, an anonymous author, etc.
    • Is the author dead?
    • If the author is dead, in which year died?
    • The tool answer if this work is in public domain or no, and if no, when it falls in the public domain. You can try a prototype in spanish here to see it working, just with literary works. The idea is to improve not just for literary works, but for all the rest (movies, pictures, sounds, etc.). We plan to use it in the events to show if a work is in the public domain or not. If a work is in public domain, it means we could share it on Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons and other wikis. If we develop this colombian public domain calculator, for being consequent with the enforcement of the public domain, we want to share the software and the documentation with a public domain license (our prototype is here documented). If any other country want to build their own public domain calculator, could modify the workflows and the software, because every country has different lengths and we would be very happy to share it for example in Wikimedia local chapters. The future of this tool is make a bridge: If you have a work in Public Domain, add the possibility to upload content to Wikipedia or Wikimedia Commons. The editing communities could be more sure they are not infringing copyright law, identifying more clearly if what they want to share is in public domain.
• About the survey:
  • We had run some workshops about the use of Internet and surprisingly the people don't know what is Internet and how it works. For example, they think Wikipedia is written by robots (I am too geek, but not a robot yet :P ) and when you edit Wikipedia and explain in some cases you don't need to be registered, it's like magic for the people. The survey could be a basic questionnaire about how Wikipedia works, if they knew they could edit it, upload content, use it, etc. We want to include some topics about copyright and public domain, because in the school copy information and use Wikipedia is forbidden. We wan to show there is no problem to copy and use Wikipedia, but you have to know hot to do it correctly. We are librarians and we are very good making references. The idea of the survey is try to measure if the main ideas of the workshop are clear: For example: "Wikipedia does not publish original thought: all material in Wikipedia must be attributable to a reliable, published source."
  • An example of the questions:
    • Do you know that you could edit Wikipedia? - Yes / No
    • Do you know Wikipedia is not the only wiki from Wikipedia Foundation? - Yes / No
    • Do you know that you could add images, video and sounds? - Yes - No.
  • This sounds very basic, but maybe that's one reason why we have less than 4 millions of articles in spanish than english. We want to track what new works are uploaded to Wikimedia Commons and what articles are edited in our event.
• About the timeline
  • We could made this project in 5 months:
    • Two months for translate from lawyers to workflows the colombian law. We could start asking to GLAM institutions for what they have in public domain digitized. Here we are going to have small meetings to present the project.
    • Two months to translate the workflows into software, documentation, information architecture and graphic design. We could starts with the logistic of the event and digital campaigns to invite people and speakers.
    • One month to prepare and run the event in one day. We want to publish informations for the people, to duplicate this event in their own institutions, specially the people from GLAM.
  • I am working in a detailed gantt if you need it. But this is the main idea of the schedule.
• About the support from volunteers
  • We are very happy to include people from the community. Here in Colombia is easier when you have somebody from outside. I don't know how do you do this, but maybe you have experience in this topic. A Google Hangout could help. My user for Google is david@hiperterminal.com.

Thanks a lot for your comments!

Now, I am going to answer to Thepwnco:

• About the activities
  • We want to make some conferences and unconferences in a morning and an edit-a-thon in the noon if we run this in one day. The idea is to use a GLAM space with an auditorium and rooms. The auditorium could be for a keynote speaker and then go to smaller spaces and groups. I made this before for an event in the Colombian National Library called "Digital Book Week" (here the programme in spanish), but the idea is to make an offline in one day, but a digital campaign for more time.
• About the digitization
  • We notice that the institutions have lots of digitized material in public domain, but they don't share it on Wikipedia and we plan to enrich Wikipedia articles with public domain works. The main problem is that the public domain is being remixed and closed as this poems, now out of public domain from Rafael Pombo. This events could help understand public domain and why we should keep works open, for example trough Wikipedia.
  • It's true the institutions need volunteers, resources and digitize materials. But this project aims to institutions with this resources who want to get visibility of their collections.

Thanks for your comments! I hope to be clear. If no, please let me know. I could further expand the idea.

Best from Bogotá. -David (talk) 04:00, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

Eligibility confirmed, round 1 2017

This Project Grants proposal is under review!

We've confirmed your proposal is eligible for round 1 2017 review. Please feel free to ask questions and make changes to this proposal as discussions continue during the community comments period, through the end of 4 April 2017.

The committee's formal review for round 1 2017 begins on 5 April 2017, and grants will be announced 19 May. See the schedule for more details.

Questions? Contact us.

--Marti (WMF) (talk) 19:53, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Comments from Ruslik0

Thank you for your proposal but I have a few comments/questions:

1. In your project there are no any measures of success. How will we know whether the project succeeded of failed?
2. In the budget it is unclear how much money will be paid to the people and how much money will be used to purchase goods and services. I think that you should clearly separate these two types of expenditures.
3. Who is going to do the developmental part of work? Do you have an expertise in the software development?
4. What programming language are you going to use?
5. Is the program code open source and/or under a free license?
6. What is the duration of the project?

Ruslik (talk) 19:04, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

Reply to Ruslik0

Hi Ruslik0! Thanks for your comments.

Here my reply:

1. The measure of the success is linked with the specific goals:
   1. Review that is clear how a work falls into public domain. When we made it for literature works, we find there are specific cases when a work never fall into the public domain, for example unpublished works from institutions. We review in the past just literature works and we have to do the same for audiovisual, software and music, for example. The first outcome is a workflow like this reviewed by lawyers. If we complete the workflow with every single case, this is a successful at this point.
   2. We count how many editions are made in the events and how many new works were added that are in public domain and are part of a GLAM institution. The higher number, the better.
   3. We want to make a form to ask to the people attending with a poll, before and after the event to see if there is a perception of something learned with us and count how many people participate in this event. The perception is subjective, but we are happy if the people feels they learn something new in the perception pool. The higher number for participants, the better.
   4. The outcome for this is the publication of the documents to do this event again by yourself. If we publish this document, we get success in this goal.
2. Ok, thanks! I could publish that separately, but need a little more time.
3. I used to work as software developer and here you can find the source code of the first prototype. So, I am the software developer
4. PHP.
5. The software is licensed under public domain. We want to be coherent doing and keeping things in public domain. The same for the publications or other results like pictures, flayers, digital material or others.
6. It takes 5 months. Here you have the gantt of the project

Let me prepare the reply for the budget. I will be back as soon as possible!

David (talk) 10:34, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

Hi Ruslik0. Here it is:

People	Time (months)	Month price (COP)	Total price (COP)	Total price (USD aprox)
Information arquitecht	2	5 000 000	10 000 000	3 373
Lawyer	2	5 000 000	10 000 000	3 373
Software develop	2	3 500 000	7 000 000	2 172
Graphic designer	2	2 500 000	5 000 000	1 686
Blogger (documentation and publications)	5	1 000 000	5 000 000	1 686
Total			37 000 000	12 479

Goods and services	Total price (COP)	Total price (USD aprox)
Flayers and advertising	150 000	50
Souvenirs	150 000	50
Food / Coffee stations	700 000	236
Auditorium	500 000	168
Administration of the project	2 000 000	674
Extra margin	1 500 000	505
Total	5 000 000	1 686

All that we count was made on Colombian Peso (COP) and then we calculate the cost in US Dollars (USD). Could be a difference for the exchange today vs. exchange on march 14th, when we publish the first version of the proposal. In COP is the same amount.

If you need anything else, please, let me know.

Cheers!

David (talk) 11:18, 11 May 2017 (UTC)

Round 1 2017 decision

This project has not been selected for a Project Grant at this time.

We love that you took the chance to creatively improve the Wikimedia movement. The committee has reviewed this proposal and not recommended it for funding. This was a very competitive round with many good ideas, not all of which could be funded in spite of many merits. We appreciate your participation, and we hope you'll continue to stay engaged in the Wikimedia context.

Next steps: Applicants whose proposals are declined are welcome to consider resubmitting your application again in the future. You are welcome to request a consultation with staff to review any concerns with your proposal that contributed to a decline decision, and help you determine whether resubmission makes sense for your proposal.

Over the last year, the Wikimedia Foundation has been undergoing a community consultation process to launch a new grants strategy. Our proposed programs are posted on Meta here: Grants Strategy Relaunch 2020-2021. If you have suggestions about how we can improve our programs in the future, you can find information about how to give feedback here: Get involved. We are also currently seeking candidates to serve on regional grants committees and we'd appreciate it if you could help us spread the word to strong candidates--you can find out more here. We will launch our new programs in July 2021. If you are interested in submitting future proposals for funding, stay tuned to learn more about our future programs.

Aggregated feedback from the committee for Public domain in GLAM and Wikipedia

Scoring rubric	Score
(A) Impact potential Does it have the potential to increase gender diversity in Wikimedia projects, either in terms of content, contributors, or both? Does it have the potential for online impact? Can it be sustained, scaled, or adapted elsewhere after the grant ends?	5.1
(B) Community engagement Does it have a specific target community and plan to engage it often? Does it have community support?	4.4
(C) Ability to execute Can the scope be accomplished in the proposed timeframe? Is the budget realistic/efficient ? Do the participants have the necessary skills/experience?	4.1
(D) Measures of success Are there both quantitative and qualitative measures of success? Are they realistic? Can they be measured?	3.6
Additional comments from the Committee: The project has a few common points with the WM strategic priorities, and the final product (Public Domain works) isn't the true goal of the projects, but they could improve the actual multimedia files in our projects. The project could be used in other places in South America due the similar laws in other countries. Idea of focusing on awareness of copyright/public domain is good and aligns with the mission of Wikimedia and the open knowledge movement but not enough evidence is provided to show that awareness is the main barrier or that this tool is needed and would result in more contributions of public domain materials to Wikimedia projects. The project is within Wikimedia's strategic priorities and can have at least some online impact though the long sustainability of the proposed online calculator is questionable. The major potential impact is regarding GLAM donations, unlike PD calculator that is unlikely to have significant impact. If successful this project can be replicated in other countries. There are no clear metrics in the project and there is a huge risk: the Colombian law and Commons. The users must be aware that Commons is a rude (and awful) place to develop a project with unclear copyright status, as the user’s want to work. There is a huge potential offline, but a huge battle online, due to Commons admins. Specific targets for goals are not provided. The main risks are that the tool would be largely unused; other barriers faced by GLAMs are not addressed; and not enough editing support is provided to GLAMs (preventing meaningful reuse of content donations). The approach is iterative. The goals are relatively modest and the risks are relatively high: it is not clear whether the right lawyers can be found and whether all subsequent outreach to the GLAM institutions would produce any results. There are no clear measures of success. Average score here: the project is probably innovative for Colombia, but public domain content donations were already organised in other countries. There are no measures of success. I don't know if they have sufficient skills to develop the project: there are goodwill ideas but it is not connected with local users (Wikimedistas de Colombia) and I note a lack of proper usage of wiki-terms in the project. The idea could work in 12 months, but the giant stop sign is in Commons. The grantees have a passionate interest in the topic and some previous involvement with Wikimedia projects but overall do not seem to have enough experience to undertake some of the proposed activities, such as leading edit-a-thons. I think the proposal is too ambitious and would recommend either focusing on creating a tool, or surveying GLAMs, or organizing a festival (but not all). The scope can be accomplished in 12 months but the budget is not well developed: it is not clear how much will be paid to the applicant and how much to purchase goods and services. The on-wiki experience of the participants is limited, though they have a background off-wiki. So, their skills/experience is difficult to judge. Doubts both regarding ability to execute (both participants are rather new and do not seem to have a good experience with copyright laws) and regarding the budget (rather vague budget lines without clear explanation what is behind each line, i.e. who will do what). I don't see a particular interest of Spanish Wikipedian or Colombian users. No endorsements. Would be nice to see support from Wikimedia Colombia. The community outreach is limited. Weak community support: while Columbia has an active community and there are quite a lot of people with good knowledge of copyright laws in Iberocoop, they are not involved in this. It's mainly a series of sessions, but there is not a clear impact. I can not support this project mainly because it the risks appear to be high relative to possible benefits. While the idea in itself is good, I do not think that both the team and the budget are good enough. I would suggest working with other Colombian Wikimedians and more broadly with other people in Iberocoop to improve the project.