Talk:CIS-A2K/Work plan April 2013 - June 2014

Query about the grant status

Hi, looks great. I've gone through it to make the language and formatting consistent.

It's unclear what "approval" of 26M is, as opposed to the "sanctioning" of 11M. "Sanctioning" might better be avoided, since it has a number of meanings.

Thank. Tony (talk) 09:24, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

Dear Tony, Thank you for your feedback and for taking time out to edit the text. Much appreciated! Have reverted one change (Giving feedback to Giving Feedback) so the links we have circulated work.

Tried to address your query. Please see and let know if it is clear. Thanks again.--Vishnu(talk)19:24, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

Excellent. Thanks for clarifying! Tony (talk) 08:02, 30 April 2013 (UTC) Ah, and I did an experiment with f vs F in a link to that section ... both work, so I've learnt something today. No big deal, though. Tony (talk) 08:20, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Discussion on work plan

Hi, you have listed the names who contributed to the work plan here. Could you please provide the links, where you had all the discussions, got all the ideas, inputs from all the contributors. Don't tell there was no on-wiki discussions, and IRC. And if you like to respond, do it soon, not the way you usually respond after several months. Thanks. -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 09:39, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

Dear Ansuman, Thank you for taking interest in A2K team's work plan. The team used various channels to take inputs and feedback from Wikimedia India community. You can view the IRC logs here, Odia discussion page here, Kannada discussion page here, Konkani discussion page here and Bengali discussion page here, and more discussions can be viewed here and here. Rest of the discussion happened either in language community meetups, over one-on-one discussions, mails or phone calls. Should you have any more questions please let us know and we'll try to respond at the earliest. Nitika.t (talk) 11:19, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

• Fast, it worked! IRC: In the common IRC, 4 user excluding 3 A2K employee. In Odia, 5 excluding 1 A2K. In Kannada, 7 excluding 1 A2K. So total 16 users at IRC. And I don't understand why you mentioned these links of work plan talk pages?, these are merely feedback. May be you guys did some modification. Anyway lets see.
• At Odia work plan talk page 2 users including Arjuna, at Telugu none, at Kannada none from Kannada; Arjuna and Sumana only, at Konkani 2 users, at Bengali 4 users; feedback taken from mailing list, at overall support only Arjuna (Sumana's help meant for you guys), and at pilot project again only Arjuna, and the current discussion started this month only.
• I can imagine the amount of participation at respective language Wikipedias, and over one-on-one, mails and phone calls. I am sure you meant "and" not "or". Or you are really not sure how those are happened? Or may be you are not involved in this process!
• So it's clear that most part of the work plan is made by A2K. That is why the content is so dubious. I just mentioned one and you had to rephrase it! This is how you want to bring clarity, Vishnu?
• It doesn't matter how many contributors participated in this work plan. Seeing this dubious work plan, I don't believe that ideas, and inputs are properly received/taken. So it'd better if you could categorize them based on how you communicated.
• I wonder why can't you guys made these things clear! Why I have to ask these?
• Also I wonder 'How you guys have been working with this dubious work plans?' And after all these months you are ready to change/modify the work plans? How we are letting this happen? I don't understand what is happening here. Please help! I think we are redefining lame on meta. And I afraid someone might say 'this can only happen in India!' -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 10:21, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

User:ansumang, fail to see how lack of participation of users in irc, wiki discussions can be wholly the fault of A2K. Also some of your comments like 'dubious work plans", "lame on meta" are not appreciated as they are antagonistic and to no purpose. Kindly tone down the rhetoric & stick to facts and specific grievances. In good faith, AshLin (talk) 13:59, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks Ashwin. I am sorry for the tone. It is not wholly the fault of A2K, and i never said it. I know those are not appreciative. But I think those are appropriate given the situation. Thanks for your concern. Though the thought did cross my mind that 'i should get blocked for this.' To all: So feel free to take any action against me, but please don't take any action against A2K. ;-) -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 16:19, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

I request all members to have a look at the Action Plan. Please feel free to discuss on the talk page. Hindustanilanguage (talk) 12:21, 21 August 2013 (UTC).

Reliable sources and languages

Some of the claims being made on the language projects appear to be flawed. It says there is insufficient access to primary sources in those languages and funds/activities are being planned for scanning and making such material available. Now, at least on the English language Wikipedia there is no such idea, we routinely use sources in French and German and cite them - in fact even the citation templates have a language parameter. (And even if I do not know French or German, there are volunteers who are out to help in this) If there is really an idea that each language Wikipedia needs to have WP:RS in the same language, then there is a clear problem in the policies themselves. Shyamal (talk) 14:04, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

Feedback collected from wikipedians on mailing list discussions

By Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay

<http://tagoreweb.in/>, SNLTR's hosted instance and <http://sarat-rachanabali.becs.ac.in/> are limited in their utility that they provide no means of using the text as a corpus or, trainer. These are efforts worthy of appreciation. However, providing the means for others to re-use the content as opposed to passive browser based viewing is equally important.

I hope your assessment included that fact. Plus, I am always wary when I read statements like "SNLTR has established that Unicode 5.0 and above as the standard that can be adopted for different e-governance applications and is also in parity with the international practice and standard". In my limited understanding of how standardization does happen, this is not the case.

By Ragib Hasan

That's a nice plan. One thing I'd recommend is to get media involved (perhaps you already have that in the plan, sorry if I'm just repeating it). In particular, you need to get the local Bengali language media (newspaper, TV) involved so that they publish news reports on Wikipedia.

In Bangladesh, it was not easy at the start to get people interested. It took a good media campaign in Bengali language newspapers to get people interested. Also, you should get in touch with the Bengali language blogging community in India (if there is one) and try to get them involved.

By the way, the number of native speakers cited at the start of the article is vastly underestimated .... Bangladesh alone has 160 million native speakers, plus at least half of that in West Bengal.

Ragib User:Ragib

By Dwaipayan Chakraborti

As Ragib mentioned, local media is important. Do we have any plan on this already? Anyone in touch with media? Or knows anybody? Jayanta nath may be of help.

Regards,

Dwaipayan Chakraborti

By Jayanta Nath

English news media had already reported about Bengali Wikipedia few times. But Local Bengali news media ( Anandabazar, Bartaman, Eisomy, Pratidin, Ajkaal,) no response at all and no interest about Bengali Wikipedia. I had tried with my personal level of contact. All Bengali news print media want business from Wikipedia, then only they can report about Bengali Wikipedia. Anyone in this mailing list in touch with Bengali media for fresh contact?

Regards, Jayanta

Target groups and their priorities

• Recently we had a press- wikimedia panel discussion as part of Telugu Wikipedia Celebration in April 2013 at Hyderabad. I also made attempts to do wiki academies for Jouranlists in the past few years in Telugu and Kannada. Based on what I understand, journalists are always pressed for time and while it will be useful for them to know about Wikipedia, they may not turn out to be editors. At best they will be able to provide a good coverage for Wikipedia events. It is better to target journalism training schools and incorporate wikipedia during their course, as a way to hone their skills while helping wikipedia. Also my experience with engineering colleges is not that great for promoting Non English wikipedias. Engineering colleges provide is good computing infrastructure. If we can get the non engineering students to utilise that infrastructure or provide alternate computing infrastructure, that can be very helpful.--Arjunaraoc (talk) 04:18, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

• Mostly I agree with these points. But let me add some points based on my experiences. I had actually fixed up training sessions for journalists at Bangalore, Mangalore/Udupi and Mysore in collaboration with the union of working journalists. The request has actually from them. During my program at Mangalore, a group of journalists who came to cover the event showed eagerness to learn to edit Wikipedia. They were all unanimous in saying that the workshops should be conducted after the Karnataka elections and after the formation of new government. That means this will happen in June/July. I agree with other point you talked about engineering college students. I actually did the workshop for them in English. The idea was that some of them will add content in English, may be about their place, people, culture, etc, and some will add in Kannada. That's exactly what has happened. But currently students are busy preparing for their exams and hence there is slow down from their part. --Pavanaja (talk) 10:05, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

• Thanks for your response. Best wishes. --Arjunaraoc (talk) 04:51, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Mysore Folklore Museum

One additional institution to perhaps partner with: the Mysore Folklore Museum. Sharihareswara (WMF) (talk) 01:52, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the pointer. I will visit there during my next visit to Mysore. BTW, I did my PG at Mysore at the same location where this museum is present. --Pavanaja (talk) 10:11, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Konkani Work Plan Discussion

Since there is currently no text here, I cannot offer feedback... but am making some suggestions all the same.

• There is definite interest in a Konkani Wikipedia, but we seem to have hit an air pocket due to lack of interest.
• There is a need to build two communities (i) the literary community, who has the content (ii) the tech guys, who can sort out keyboard and other issues -- or popularise available solutions being used by other same-script groups. As of now, there is no bridge between the two.
• Volunteering needs some priming. Maybe we should work with a handful of volunteers who are willing to convert the basic strings needed to set up a Wikipedia. I've already been working (at the personal level) with Isidore Dantas, urging him to help with it... and he has been doing a good job (Romi-script Konkani).
• Instead of getting caught up with contentious issues like which script is official or the most suited, in my view it would be helpful to build Wikipedia for at least the main three scripts (Kannada, Roman and Devanagari) and let all coexist. The dialectical differences that exist between different scrips makes for difficulties in machine translation and differing comfort levels to use scripts which one is not used to.
• Some institutions have been approached too by various quarters (Goa Konkani Academy, Dalgado Konkani Academy in Panjim, Goa University staff) but unless we get something actually going to show, it would be hard to convince people to start volunteering. For a number of reasons, I'd think that Konkani writers are often less computer-savvy than writers of other Indian languages... It's now changing, but still... --Fredericknoronha (talk) 16:49, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

==

• Please add St Aloysius College Managlore as an institution where we could consider having workshops like we did at the Nirmala Institute in Goa. I will help set it up. As Frederick suggests, we could have all the three script tracks (Kannada, Roman and Devanagari)and working together in a physical space will probably be helpful.Outofindia (talk) 07:48, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Have taken the liberty to put the above feedback as a separate thread, otherwise it was looking like Fredericknoronha has written it.Visdaviva (talk) 17:19, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Approach for Village/Block/District project

Village/Block/District project in Telugu Wikipedia was not useful for growing Wikipedia, as even five years after stubs were created using a bot, large percentage of articles never grew into regular articles. It is better to take the top down approach of district articles and then based on that experience, expanding to include Block/Village articles.--Arjunaraoc (talk) 03:16, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback Arjuna. I feel the same, many stubs are being created for the sake of creating articles. I feel like A2K is missing the depth of issues and trying to jump to reach the goals. And sadly the simple and direct method, engaging with the community on-wiki has not been happening! All these plans only create question marks.

• Can you explain how exactly Srujanika is going to help? Please address the license issue, otherwise it could create a big mess.
• Who is/are going to train who? And is this being planned to do it remotely or in a particular city?
• Could you add the report and outcome of IIMC, Dhenkanal education program to or:ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ:ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ ଶିକ୍ଷା ପ୍ରକଳ୍ପ/ଭାରତୀୟ ଜନସଂଚାର ସଂସ୍ଥାନ, ଢେଙ୍କାନାଳ ?? Thank you! -- ɑηsuмaη ^«T» 12:31, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Final discussion summary

Thanks a lot Arjuna and Ansuman. My sincere apologies for delay in answering here on Meta. There were two community meetups at Bhubaneswar and Cuttack to discuss about the Village/Block/District project. It was also discussed in the village pump. There was an IRC for discussion on executing the plans. In the entire process of discussion of deciding the WikiProject community was involved on meetup, mailing list, IRC and village pump discussions.

Answers to questions raised by Ansuman:

• Can you explain how exactly Srujanika is going to help? Please address the license issue, otherwise it could create a big mess.

Srujanika has digitized over 500 books (in collaboration with National Institute of Tehnology, Rourkela) majority of which are out of copyright. The low resolution scanned PDFs are hosted on NIT, Rourkela's website. There are other books and several volumes of Bigyan Tarang published by Srujanika are also digitized. Srujanika has agreed to share the books online so that the community could make use of them as primary resources for creating articles. So there would be no copyvio.

• Who is/are going to train who? And is this being planned to do it remotely or in a particular city?

This is been planned and would be communicated soon.

• Could you add the report and outcome of IIMC, Dhenkanal education program to or:ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ:ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ ଶିକ୍ଷା ପ୍ରକଳ୍ପ/ଭାରତୀୟ ଜନସଂଚାର ସଂସ୍ଥାନ, ଢେଙ୍କାନାଳ?

here. --Subhashish Panigrahi (talk) 00:09, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

Odia EP, IIMC (continuance)

I don't know how to respond after 3 months. Sorry. And I don't understand how it became "Final discussion summary" when you never participated in this discussion before! User:Visdaviva how do you want me to react to this?

• Could you create a WP page for Srujanika and update on this periodically? Do you know how much of its content we can actually use?
• 3 months ago i asked for the outcome. Bolg post shows incorrect information! and the figures vary at or:ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ:ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ ଶିକ୍ଷା ପ୍ରକଳ୍ପ/ଭାରତୀୟ ଜନସଂଚାର ସଂସ୍ଥାନ, ଢେଙ୍କାନାଳ-୧
  • Blog post says 16 Wikipedians and WP page says 12. 4 names mentioned as Usernames are not even registered.
  • Number of total articles 12 (not 16), in which only 2 are at main space and rest 10 are at User space. One page has no text at all. 2-4 pages have No reference. Others are basically stubs, with 1-3 references. Wake up Subhashish this is not done (finish this one first), and you started discussing for another EP! You want to be on Wikipedia for a short period of time or what. What's the plan?
  • And in the final page, report is missing! and also name.

Seeing the standard of articles, anybody could say that the outcome in terms of having article is Zero. An education program can not be done like this. AFAIK 2nd workshop was attended by only Mrutyunjaya Bhai (correct me if I'm wrong), and 3rd was (not a workshop, just to evaluate and reward) by 4/5 Wikipedians. It's difficult to know who attended which events, the names are not listed properly. User:Visdaviva do you know yet the amount of money A2K spent for this particular EP? I'd like to know please share. Seeing the way A2K done this EP, I can't let this happen again on Odia Wikipedia. And please be honest and specific while writing reports and don't lie. User:Visdaviva you wanted me to help, this is the best i can do. -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 12:32, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

And Mrutyunjaya Bhai, do you have anything to say in this? -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 12:32, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks User:ansumang for considering my request to engage with the Odia plans. Appreciate your honest feedback. We would need your and other Odia Wikipedians' similar continuous participation and feedback.

Subhashish could you please address these important questions raised by User:ansumang comprehensively and accurately, at the earliest? I think it is important to exactly disclose the money A2K has spent on this Odia Education Programme and to discuss the impact/outcomes transparently with the Odia Wikimedia Community on OR WP, if not done already. Further, it is also essential to discuss the "Learning and Challenges" faced in implementing this programme with the Odia community's participation. As User:ansumang has rightly pointed out if A2K were to proceed further with this programme let's all be better informed. If this critical examination could result in bettering the EP design, Odia community could churn out the first successful Education Programme, and set a model for the rest of the Indian language communities to follow. Having personally witnessed the enthusiasm of the majority of the Odia community members, I believe WE CAN --Visdaviva (talk) 14:14, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks Ansuman, Apologies for mistakes incurred you have listed. I'm replying back next week with the details you have asked for. Appreciate your patience. --Subhashish Panigrahi (talk) 13:54, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

Dear Ansuman, Thanks a lot for your patience. Here is the answer to the individual queries you asked for:

Regarding Srujanika

Srujanika has digitized books (Literary books; Poetry, Fictions, Essays, Historical books), periodicals (Utkala Deepika and Asha), Encyclopedias (Jnanamandal, copyrighted) which are published by various publishers. Some of them are out of copyright and some are copyrighted by the publishers. Srujanika also has their own publications including the monthly magazine Bigyan Tarang’’. It is difficult to tell which portion of which book would be useful. Rather, it was discussed during the meeting with Srujanika about listing the articles the wikipedia community would like to write. Would you like to take lead in engaging the community for listing these articles? Please feel free to edit the draft I have created a draft for this project, will move this to namespace after the community discussion.

Regarding the discrepancy of data

Sincere apologies for the mistakes. I have corrected the data on the blog. The total no. of articles created is 8 after the user sub page articles are moved. Initially the plan was for more than 4 months. But because of the exams in December one workshop could not be conducted. Because of the exams in February the program has to be closed by January end. So apart from one initial workshop which I attended and the second workshop (attended by Mrutyunjaya bhai and Manoranjan Mallik bhai) we could not conduct any workshop for the students. The first workshop was introductory workshop and students were not aware of typing. Part of the second workshop was spent in teaching them Odia typing and editing. Because of other cultural programs the third workshop has to be kept limited only distributing certificates.

Regarding expenses

I travelled twice to Odisha during the program: One in November and the other one in January. Here are the expenses for the trips:
November:
Air ticket: ₹ 15,272
Accommodation, local travel and meals: ₹ 25,478
Total: ₹ 40,750
January:
Air ticket: ₹ 18,465
Accommodation, local travel and meals: ₹ 17,468
Payment to Academy of Media Learning: ₹ 9,464
Total: ₹ 45,397
EP was not the only work I had done during these trips. I also attended other workshops, community meet ups. During my first trip in November I had attended the Odisha Youth Inspiration Award 2012 and two other workshops in Bhubaneswar (one Academy of Media Learning in which you were present and one at KMBB College of Engineering). During my second trip in January I had attended the 9th anniversary celebration of Odia Wikipedia in Bhubaneswar. During the EP I had stayed in the staff quarter of wikipedian Manoranjan Mallik at NALCO for which I had not paid for. The expenses includes some of the meals I had with the community members and travel and lunch organized during the 9th Odia Wikipedia celebration. --Subhashish Panigrahi (talk) 12:53, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

Can you please elaborate the payment to AML? And how much was spent on 9th anniversary celebration of Odia Wikipedia and Odisha Youth Inspiration Award? Details please. -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 13:29, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

• Subhashish Panigrahi, User:ansumang & User:MKar can we please also discuss about the learning and challenges faced in executing this EP? What has worked and what has not worked? For me it looks like the time of this OR EP was really bad. Also clear expectations from the students and institution seem to be lacking. Also more per-preparatory work would have helped? More On-Wiki engagement by the OR community?...etc.
• Subhashish Panigrahi, I think your experience has also changed since this Odia EP and probably it will be nice if you can share what kind of design changes need to be made for this EP to be more successful. Probably, you could reflect on this based on the recent Konkani work A2K has done. It is very useful to cross pollinate the Lessons and success stories. Why don't you share this with User:ansumang, User:MKar and others from OR WP?
• Could I also suggest that the wider Odia community be involved in this? Probably you Subhashish Panigrahi and User:ansumang could also take back all these discussions and disclosures in Odia on OR WP? You know it better :) --Visdaviva (talk) 05:41, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Ansuman, there was a small confusion from the accounts section. ₹ 9,464 was spent during the ninth celebration at AML in the month of January for travel for guests, meals, rent for the venue and other administrative/logistics expenses. I have corrected the mistake. We did not pay anything to AML during November and apart from all these expenses for travel, accommodation and meals nothing was spent for the Odisha Youth Inspiration Award.

Vishnu, I'm working on a [[:w:or:ବ୍ୟବହାରକାରୀ:Psubhashish/ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ:ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ ଶିକ୍ଷା ପ୍ରକଳ୍ପ/ଭାରତୀୟ_ଜନସଂଚାର_ସଂସ୍ଥାନ,_ଢେଙ୍କାନାଳ-୧/Learning|learning section]] which would include the points you've mentioned.Ansuman and Mrutyunjaya bhai, please feel free to share your feedback, ideas, experience and learning in the same page. Once finalized we can share with the community. Could I also request you both to keep this in English. We can always translate the final version to Odia and share that with the community.--Subhashish Panigrahi (talk) 09:12, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

┌─────────────┘
You should have corrected by striking out the old expenses and provide the new one. You said confusion! Why? Now i doubt the amounts you mentioned are exact. ₹ 9,464 for 9th celebration! I don't like the way A2K spending money. Perhaps you should discuss the budget before spending with the community from now on. Why you had to pay for the venue? What other logistics expenses? AML has everything, projector and all. How many guests had to travel and from where? I understand the printing expenses, and cake. Still how it became ₹ 9,464? I see only 8-10 existing Wikipedians attended all are based in Bhubaneswar, Cuttack, Angul.

• On EP; A2K spent ₹ 80,000 for 8 stubs!
• Who are responsible for this? User:Visdaviva doesn't take the responsibility as he was not in the team. User:Ijon? WMF? CIS?
• Please spend the donation money wisely. Just because WMF granted the money, it's not yours. I know you know, then stop messing around!
• User:Visdaviva, if you want to conduct another EP, First get at least 10 volunteers in the same city then train them for at least 1 month by conducting 3-4, 5-6 hour long workshops (You have planned to train the volunteers, right? Why not train them first then conduct EP). During this one month, those are new should write at least 2 good articles each. So when you conduct EP, you could assign them, 2/3 students per 1 volunteer. Also get at least 4-6 volunteers for on-wiki assistance, if the total number of participating students are within 10-20. And get at least 2 A2K employees on ground for an EP. Else No EP. And what success story of Konkani you are talking about? First show us the list of articles. If you can train new users and get success then what is the need of EP? Go ahead train the students of the institutes.
• I'm sorry i don't talk politely, to liars and dishonest people. And for own sake, stop making excuses and apologizing, you don't need to apologize to me. Have the shame and be honest. Thanks. -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 12:50, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Dear Ansuman, Thanks for sharing this detailed feedback on this. I'd answer to the questions soon. --Subhashish Panigrahi (talk) 12:03, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Amount of money spent for EP

₹ 80,000 was not spent entirely for the EP. Part of it was spent. I already have given details about the other events/meetings/wikipedia/celebrations I had to attend. In both of these trips I also met wikipedians in Bhubaneswar, Cuttack and Nalconagar. They were not put up on wiki as events apart from some documentation. Writing here again just to clarify:

1. November:
   1. Community meetup in Kolkata
   2. Odisha Youth Inspiration Award 2012
   3. Odia Wikipedia workshop at Academy of Media Learning in which you were present
   4. Odia Wikipedia workshop at KMBB College of Engineering
2. January:
   1. 9th anniversary celebration of Odia Wikipedia
   2. Celebrattion event at IIMC, Dhenkanal

Why we had to pay for the venue

₹ 9,464 was the total amount spent including taxes. We tried to find a suitable venue for free, but could not find any then. If you want details about this amount please visit our office or write to ushacis-india.org. --Subhashish Panigrahi (talk) 13:25, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

• Thanks. I think everyone here could figure out that 80k was not spent entirely on EP. The total amount was somewhere 86-87. So this 9+k and amount spent in those events you mentioned would be around 3-4K. Then total amount spent on EP, lets say 86 minus 14, 72. Happy! No i don't want to know more details on this, the details you could share should be enough.
• I don't know what you guys think is the proper way. But in my opinion, from now on whenever A2K wants to spend money on any events, visits, celebrations you guys should notify the community on-wiki about the details of the budget in advance. I think in the community everyone deserves to know and decide if the amount is fair, much or less. Also, the way the money should be spent, e.g. if the community wants to pay for the venue for a celebration or/and meetup. This'd also help others to know how things work and measure the success. Lets also discuss this at Odia Wikipedia. -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 14:49, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Subhashish Panigrahi & User:ansumang Not sure if this is how we need to take the discussion forward? Travelling right now. Will soon get back on this. --Visdaviva (talk) 16:26, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

My Comments

• Reasons of failure: Completely agree with Subhasish
  • Could not organise the required number of wokshops.
  • During EP participants were typing using a proprietary keyboard layout for their everyday assignments.
  • I was not able to give my 100% effort, due to my personal professional workloads :(
• Till now I am not aware about the SOP of an EP.
  • Even though I am not trained (for conducting EP), I was involved in the EP from start to finish both on-site and on-wiki, So I am partly taking responsibility for the failure of the EP.
• I was not aware about the budget before August 2013.
  • I had not received any financial benefit for the Dhenkanal EP, even if I was offered for the same . (Till now also I am not interested for any financial benefit.)
• Future plan?
  • Future EP (if any happens...)/ other wiki activities can be improved with support of more wikipedians/ community members and more detailed planning.
  • Yes, Yes and Yes, together We can do it definitely; no doubt about it :)--Mrutyunjaya Kar (talk) 08:40, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

• Thanks for the response, and thanks for being modest. But i do not think you are responsible a bit. I'm surprised, A2K hasn't responded on this yet. You did more than A2K, A2K didn't come, didn't provide sufficient support and resources. I hope A2K or whoever in charge of this takes the complete responsibility. -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 08:41, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Key Pointers and (my) learning from the discussion on IIMC Dhenkanal

• It is important to recognize that the planned OR EP at IIMC, Dhenkanal was not successfully rolled out due to various issues.

I feel a thorough due diligence, planning and continuous evaluation should be in place before rolling out such programs in future. This discussion on the IIMC EP Program would have been much more productive had it happened when the Program was in progress 9 months ago.

• There is no clarity on how much CIS-A2K spent on this program. User:ansumang claims that it could be INR 72,000/-. User:Psubhashish claims that it cannot be that much as the majority of the expense was incurred for travel and stay (twice to Odisha) and he has also taken part in 5 other activities (cumulatively) during these visits.

CIS-A2K in consultation with the WP Community (in this case it is Odia Community) should find means of informing the community the expenses involved in executing such program/s. This should be part of the Program evaluation and design. I feel, we need to also include CIS-A2K staff time, as part of the costs incurred for the program.

• User:ansumang has specifically asked who (specific person) is going to take responsibility for the failure of IIMC, Dhenkanal program.

As Program Director of CIS-A2K, I will take full responsibility for it. I am open to any punitive measure the Odia WP community collectively suggests.

--Visdaviva (talk) 02:55, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

• I asked about the expenses for EP. You guys only shared the amount. Now you are saying there is no clarity! You should share why there is no clarity? Based on your response, i cut down the amount from 87 to 72. Now i don't understand what you are trying to say? Why are you telling us that "we need to also include staff time, ..."? Yes do that, make a note of it. But be specific on what and where you spend the time. Do whatever you want to do, but don't do anything on Odia Wikipedia without community's approval.
• You will take full responsibility! When? Why? Punitive measure! really, how? Can you suggest few options how the community could do that! :D -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 13:01, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

Cross posting the learning here for reference:

What worked

Active involvement of WP community members

Wikipedians who were based close to Dhenkanal (Mrutyunjaya Kar and Manoranjan Mallick) provided on-ground support for the workshops. Mrutyunjaya Kar was present for all the three events and also for on-wiki coordination of the project page. Wikipedians from Cuttack (Srikant Kedia and Kamalakanta Nayak) supported for the first workshop and were present during the first meeting. Other Odia Wikipedians (Subas Chandra Rout and Manoranjan Behera) were present on the final day of event.

Institutional collaboration

The initial discussion with Prof. Mrinal Chatterjee from IIMC was attended by Odia Wikipedians Mrutyunjaya Kar, Srikant Kedia, Manoranjan Mallick, and Kamalakanta Nayak and myself along with faculty member Jitendra Pati and teaching associates Sucharita and Bhagaban Sahu. The college arranged for computer labs and classrooms very efficiently.

Learning

Clarity on expectations and deliverables

The goals and deliverables from the students, guide-faculty members, CIS-A2K and supporting Wikipedians could have been defined explicitly. Pre-deciding on these parameters can bring more clarity, momentum and success. Part of this was also because of the short time of the program (i.e. two 1-2 hour workshops) which was not enough for any substantial amount of content generation or expanding a sustainable community.

Short term workshops

Workshops organsied for aspiring Wikipedians should be longer than 1-2 hour workshops. Indic language typing is a critical part of the workshop and needs more practice for correct and efficient typing. During this education program students were engaged for 1-2 hours and two workshops were not sufficient for them to learn and practice very well. Ideally we should try and organise 2 day event with minimum of 5-6 hrs long workshops each day.

Thorough preparation and logistics

Wikipedians were not prepared for such a long term program at that moment. With a small community based in various places whose primary contribution is limited more in on-wiki participation there is a need for good preparation for the logistical arrangements for wikipedians to conduct workshops. In this case it was not that easy for the Wikipedians to travel far and conduct workshops. Majority of the first workshop was spent in creating user accounts for the students and basic typing training. The second workshop was partially spent for typing training and creating and editing articles.

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy

Learning something without fun doesn't last long and doesn't bring excitement to contribute, especially voluntarily. Though it was difficult for the wikipedians to make the workshops more fun in the very limited time this could be a great learning for all of us. Education programs need day long workshops with a lot of exciting fun activities. Otherwise workshops would be boring like regular lectures and students would not be excited enough to continue for long.

Community level involvement

Though it is very difficult to get everyone from the community on board for a program because of many reasons (Primarily due to availability of wikipedians, time constraint, logistics and most importantly interest of Wikipedians) a proper support system was not set up in place. Mrutyunjaya Kar, who was primarily involved in this project was overburdened with his other administrative contribution to Wikipedia, community building initiatives in Nalconagar and professional occupation. There is always a need of dividing work among the wikipedians who are interested and specifically mention the amount of amount of involvement that would be needed from the coordinators.

Incentives and retention

These two parameters are very critical. To keep the contribution purely voluntary it is hard to define the incentive for the hard work done by the students. Not everyone is equally excited for the philosophical reason (Love for language, growth of free content). Especially for students something that would help their career could be the biggest incentive. This bit of Wikipedia contribution helping students in their long term career needs to be poured to the students in a more lucid way. Retention is also another biggest challenge for Wikipedia outreach. Posted by User:Psubhashish

Discussions at Telugu Wikipedia

Link to discussions at Te wikipedia

Creating awareness-Lessons from past initiatives

For creating awareness, some of the proposals were already piloted (Video for Hindi Wikipedia, editing guide in Malayalam, Publicity through Facebook in Kannada) by the India programs/Wikipedia Communities. It will be useful to share the lessons from those pilots and devise alternative ways to create awareness. Google has run the Google internet bus project in India in 2009 to create a large impact, which achieved publicity while creating awareness. A Wikipedia bus with about Android tablets with native language input method through on screen keyboards and good mobile intenet connectivity, which could tour for few months with in a state could be an alternative initiative worth exploring, as it may create better impact.--Arjunaraoc (talk) 03:36, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Dear Arujana, Thank you for your feedback. Wikipedia Bus is a brilliant idea!! We were thinking of 'Wikimedia Mobile Lab' almost on similar lines but your idea sounds better. We will surely explore the feasibility and possibility of this idea.

Thank you for pointing to the earlier efforts about awareness building, we will certainly take the learnings into consideration and devise alternative modes if needed.--Vishnu (talk)08:25, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

bug reporting and resolution

I noticed: Often community members express the need to have effective bug resolution. There is a need to facilitate bug reporting and resolution.

It might be a good idea to translate this blog post on how to create a good first bug report into Indian languages and distribute it appropriately. Also, Andre Klapper, Wikimedia Foundation bug wrangler, and Runa Bhattacharjee of the localisation team are both available to help with the task of facilitating bug reporting and bug resolution. I hope that helps! Sharihareswara (WMF) (talk) 01:56, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Timeline and focus

The proposed timeline is too long IMO. It is better to do couple of pilots for 3-6 months time frame to assess the potential. There appears to be too much focus on increasing editors. In any pilot, the readers who will turn out to be editors will be a small fraction and even those numbers will not be sustainable, unless the readerbase increases on a sustainable basis through institutionalisation of creating awareness through Education partnerships and active community events.--Arjunaraoc (talk) 03:45, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Arjuna's feedback was discussed further in this IRC. --Visdaviva (talk) 17:12, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

I have to agree that doing a one-year project in such a big way is a bit out of the norm of the agile approach that has been evolved and time-tested on all the Wikipedia projects. I am quite sure the numerous collaborators listed on this project can pick a couple of common themes and begin working on them straight away with a two month timeline and check for themselves if they can continue. A quick fail would be better if things do not go the way they are planned. Shyamal (talk) 05:37, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

Agree with Shyamal and Arjuna. One year is too long. Interested people may leave, they may get bored, or have other commitments. ----Rsrikanth05 (talk) 10:30, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Agree with all of you. We are trying to do short term partnerships or run short term programs to strengthen the Konkani community. We're looking at partnering with some institutes like Konkani Department at Goa University, Directorate of Official Language - Government of Goa, Nirmala Institute of Education etc. and we're looking at no more than 2-3 months long programs. However for this particular pilot, Performing Arts and Wikipedia, is something that is still under discussion and will be decided when new Program Officer comes on board and takes charge of this pilot. Nitika.t (talk) 10:44, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Arjunaraoc, Shyamal and Rsrikanth05.. would it be useful to work with a milestone (no. of articles) than the time frame of one year? What is an ideal time? Is there any past experience that we can bank on done by WMI or any community within India? Appreciate relevant links. --Visdaviva (talk) 08:20, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

I suspect that what we need here is a clarity of vision. My impression as a community member purely from what is available on wiki is that the A2K organization are engaging with "expert editors" to develop "articles" that are chosen by the "expert editors". Personally I would rather see these "experts" uploading all the material they have to the Internet Archive and leaving these sources for future editors to make use of than actually have to spend time on editing-which option would also really bring into focus what the A2K funding is actually used for-"buying" time from experts? "buying" resources that experts have? or "freeing" locked up resources? Will the efforts have impact beyond the life of the A2K project? Clarity on principles would make it easier to see how the structures and actions could fit in. Shyamal (talk) 16:27, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

Hi, you cannot set No. of Articles, or size of articles as a milestone. Articles vary by quality, by content, because of the information available about them, and the interest of editors editing them. You can't achieve any deliverables if you take quantity as a target. At the Chapter, we don't look at Quantity as a deliverable, we try and take User feedback from workshops attended. ----Rsrikanth05 (talk) 06:06, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

So sorry about coming late into this but had been on a wiki break of sorts. So, here are my points in brief.

1. I agree with what the others have said in terms of the timeline being too long. Wikipedians have been used to a maximum of one year long off-line projects (Wikimania). It might make sense to tone down the timeline in line with this idea. But, from the other side, I understand that talking to and educating these organisations on the free knowledge thing can take the kind of time mentioned here.
2. Perhaps the A2K can work on several pilots at once within a short span and get the institutions in section-by-section. For example, talk to one institution on one performing art which might really get what Wikipedia is about and engage with this wing first.
3. The focus of selecting the organisations could be devolved to the Wikipedians in the locality/language.

Prad2609 (talk) 17:32, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Prad2609 +1 for point 1 and 2. Do not understand though why you suggest that "selecting the organisations be devolved to the Wikipedians in the locality/language"? I think this is where A2K could complement the Community members by bringing in the institutions on board, which requires a lot of effort. This is not to mean that A2K will not take Community members into cognizance. In fact this is explicitly stated as a requirement by many Wikipedians across languages. Would like to go with my experience of acitvely interacting with Indian Language Wikimedia Communities for now, but I am open to be corrected and proven wrong on this. Thanks! Great that you have come back from Wiki-break :) --Visdaviva (talk) 06:36, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

What I mean is that the A2K need visit institutions where Wikipedians have expressed their interest in working. I do not see the point of going and talking to institutions where Wikipedians do not find interesting. Prad2609 (talk) 17:00, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

Rationale for choosing performing arts as a pilot target for the A2K project

(sorry, hard to follow the organization of these pages - copy of this) I ran through the links but do not see a debate or rationale for the choice of performing arts as an area to work with in the A2K project. While it is certainly an interesting area, it would seem like something that has low impact. Would really have thought something related to geography, agriculture, health or other aspects of day to day application would be an area of work where local language Wikipedias could show their real value. I am quite sure that there must have been a debate among highly-qualified folks, but would be nice to know. Shyamal (talk) 14:05, 1 August 2013 (UTC)

Hello Shyamal. Thanks for asking a useful question. Gives us a chance to explain the thinking within the A2K team. Firstly, it is important to note that this is only one of the Pilots that we intend to take up through this year. So we are definitely open to considering some of the aspects that you have mentioned. For instance, we are exploring the possibility of taking up a bio-diversity and Western Ghats as topics. Hopefully, with the new Programme Officer (Pilot projects) on board there could be more momentum, as the rest of the team currently has its hands full. Some of the factors that made us select Performing Arts are: a) Areas like Geography, Health and Agriculture are relatively better covered than Performing Arts. This is a sense that we got during the interaction with various community members in Indian languages and the five language Wikipedias that we looked at; b) Some of the Indian language Wikimedia communities have already taken up pilots on these aspects. For instance, Odia and Telugu communities have a Village/District project. In fact these are also part of our plan. See this for instance; c) There also seems to be a demand for content on Performing Arts among journalists, researchers and students; and d)this was dovetailing into some of the institutional partnerships that we proposed to work with. Not sure if you see these as compelling reasons. Would love to have you engage with us in developing a Bio-diversity pilot. --Visdaviva (talk) 17:30, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the response, however I really wanted to see the original transcripts of the debate. An important thing on Wikipedia has been process rather than outcome and it would be good to see the process by which these decisions are taken. Ideally it should be on-wiki, but given that many people in India fear transparency, it would be great if the numerous collaborators listed on the report have the points they made listed next to them. It would really be nice to see the essential Wikipedia processes here before specific outcomes are sought. To start with, debates and decision making on-wiki. Shyamal (talk) 02:16, 3 August 2013 (UTC)

There are other points out here as well that could be clarified on the project page:

• • One gets the impression that the project collaborators are going to be creating a primary reference here which probably needs to be clarified.
  • Assuming that it will follow policy and not be a primary reference, what secondary/tertiary sources would the people involved in the performing arts use?
    • If these can be listed, it would make for more sustainable usage to make those sources accessible (via digital libraries etc.) - so that "anyone" else can actually edit in this area and quote the high quality sources.

Look forward to more on-wiki discussions. Shyamal (talk) 02:16, 3 August 2013 (UTC)

You are right Shyamal. We did not have a debate or On-Wiki discussion to arrive at a topic for the Pilot. It was an internal discussion within the CIS-A2K team and we hoped that there will be a discussion on this when announced on Meta; on the mailing lists and on IRC. Except for Arjuna and now you, we have not had much engagement on the proposed Pilot. We could still open this up for discussion and invite community feedback on the possible topics for pilots. Probably by end of August. We could host a dedicated IRC for this. What do you think?

• In general, could not agree anymore about the importance of the open process and transparency in our work. I think, we had an open and transparent process in developing the Indian Language Wikipedia plans and all of this is done on-wiki. Also we have been otherwise transparent and accountable (if not, at least sincerely and seriously attempting) about our work to the community; like, openly disclosing our travel plans on respective regional mailing lists, putting up blogs on almost every activity we do, A2K Newsletter circulation, grant budget disclosure, etc. But I do strongly believe that transparency and accountability are an ongoing processes and how ever much we do, there is still a lot to improve. Any further specific feedback on our efforts so far and in future vis-a-vis transparency and community accountability will be appreciated. Happy that you are closely engaging with CISA2K work.

I do not mean to question the integrity of the operations of this project, just that it would be good if the cultural practices of Wikipedia communication and debate are followed and secondarily complemented by email or IRC channels. Each has its role and although IRC is more spontaneous, on-wiki discussion tend to be more thoughtful, cumulative (based on earlier comments) and unlike email, tends to be more easy (when properly indented) to follow as it is in one place. Importantly it would be nice to have the specific contributions (at least paraphrased) of the people on this list. If their contributions are not listed, it can look like of an unethical practice (at least in scholarship - e.g.). Further, it would be good to see the entire team participate on-wiki (as if they were community - rather than have us-vs-them in-out groups). If only one project member responds here, it gives the impression that there is no shared vision and that the project is working in a traditional hierarchical mode. It would be particularly nice to see a team with diversity and a strong sense of direction expressed here even if it the multiple voices are dissonant (at least I would see that as positive!). Shyamal (talk) 05:45, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Very useful suggestion in terms of listing down specific contributions. Completely in agreement.

Diversity in the team is very important and I strongly believe in that and advocating it. Not to say that the hierarchies do no exist. But definitely not for an engagement like this one. I am hoping that the other A2K team members might also participate in these or such discussions. Let's see.--Visdaviva (talk) 06:48, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

• Re. primary reference...We are extremely clear that we will be using secondary/tertiary sources, which is also why we have mentioned conducting a "baseline survey through the anchor institutions on the existing material available on performing arts in their respective languages", etc.
  • Re. what secondary sources are available... I think this is already addressed, Shyamal. Could I urge you to re-read the Execution details? Let me know if we need to elaborate it further. Similarly, listing of the existing resources, has already been proposed. Please let me know if this is not coming across sharply. Thanks. --Visdaviva (talk) 20:29, 3 August 2013 (UTC)

I can restate it having re-read the statements namely: "have ready-made content/archival material pertaining to performing arts and Aggregate available material in respective languages." - this needs expansion and clarity, if it is privately prepared manuscripts, it would not meet en:WP:RS - at least on the English language WP, not sure about whether such policies are in place in Indic languages. If they are not peer-reviewed works or traditionally published texts, does this mean other forms of media? Shyamal (talk) 05:45, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Definitely not private manuscripts. As I understand archival material would be photographs, lithographs, chromo-lithographs, posters, pamphlets, audio and video recordings which would go on Commons. Aggregation would be of published material like books, conference proceedings, journals, anthologies, books or booklets of encyclopedic nature, news paper features and exhibition booklets in English and regional languages. --Visdaviva (talk) 06:58, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Are these going to be digitally archived? Freely licensed? Where? Do clarify on the project page. Shyamal (talk) 04:47, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

Talking about the section under rationale. The rationale seems to suggest that there is content already easily available. Could this not then be easily accessed by Wikipedians. What value add is the A2K team to provide to the same? Can you not let the Wikipedians do the bulk of the heavy lifting on this? Your time/effort might be better spent on trying to access sources which are difficult for Wikipedians to get at and might need a more professional approach or more weight of the movement to get behind them to open certain doors. Just a perception. Prad2609 (talk) 17:36, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Deliverables should be Wiki-based

Hi,

• As a first step to serious engagement & execution of the Pilot project, the Wikipedia community should engage in discussion on Wiki and decide what is desirable, reduce to what is achievable and identify the Pilot's needed deliverables in the general subject i.e. performing arts in India.
• The deliverables should be clearly defined Wikipedia articles, lists, images, videos, soundclips, improvements, FAs, GAS, portals, Wiki-books, Wiki-source etc.
• The deliverables should span multi-languages (may restrict to a few to be practical) and must involve Commons and WikiSource, at the very least.
• There would be paths to achieve these deliverables, each of which is a milestone. There should be parallel processes.
• As is usually the case with WMF driven initiatives, Wikipedia editors do not seem to be integrated into the process. Involving knowledgeable editors are the best, easiest, most suitable and most economical way to achieve and maintain Wikipedia principles, pillars, MoS and avoid copyright, RS, copyvio pitfalls and other issues which invariably crop up.
• My personal choice would be a two way process pattern simultaneously:-
  • Develop Indic language deliverables directly and have a fact/image/reference transfer process to English Wikipedia.
  • Develop En deliverables and have a fact/image/reference transfer process to Indic language Wikipedia.

AshLin (talk) 06:30, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks AshLin for the useful detailing of the execution strategy. But not sure if one should start with these as first steps, especially when one is trying to involve institutional partners and bringing on board people who are interested in the subject area and are currently not Wikipedians. I feel it is important to first build a base, while one could engage with the Community parallely. Probably it could also differ based on the pilot area.

Useful if you could list out more specific steps on "involving knowledgeable editors". Am all game to change the way the WMF driven initiatives are done :) Let's please make it community driven. Change in attitude from the Community members end will also be an important precursor to truly achieve this. I believe this should be a two way process. Otherwise it will look too artificial or could become an exercise of manufacturing consent, every time. But I understand that, given the historical baggage, this has to be a slow process and cannot be achieved in a specific time period. I believe in the last 3-4 months time this process seems to be relatively faster with some Indian Language communities, with which we are actively engaging. Of course a lot more needs to be done.

The two way process.. I couldn't have put it better myself. This is what I also had in mind, with one more additional step though. That is to have one Indian Language to another Indian Language transfer directly than mediating it through English WP

--Visdaviva (talk) 07:31, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for your response, Vishnu. I would like to expound further on my comments. At the outset, it is my sincere belief that a big part of the "problem" is nothing but discussing and defining things in term of "me/you" as this dialog is creeping into. I will henceforth avoid using this especially in accusatory mode. I, for one, accept in good faith, that the A2K project aims to achieve what it is being funded to do - increase access to knowledge, with specific reference to Wikimedia Foundation run platforms. Just as the Community expects you will embrace them as true partners in whatever you do. I agree that transparency has definitely improved since the India Program days. However, integrated involvement of the Community needs to be achieved in planning, discussion and decision-making all of which needs to be done on wiki, as Shyamal mentioned above. That is the "desired level of transparency". It may involve hassle, delay & much effort in deliberation but will give the A2K venture something intangible which every outreach activity or real-life Wikipedia needs, and very few have had, - trust of the community. Nuff'said. Lets go into the main topic of this thread - Deliverables.

• Since the A2K project is intended to increase access to knowledge and funding is WMF, which implies the knowledge platforms involved are WMF projects, I think you will agree that the nature of the deliverables should be as I had stated.
• The final form of the deliverables will be in two sets - Part A (those we need to so as to achieve the Pilot Project aim - in this case, to increase the knowledge of performing arts in India, basically Wikipedia deliverables); and, Part B - those needed to meet the interest of other stakeholders - principally the institutions we are talking about.
• The first step for any successful mission/task is to identify the aim - WE should discuss the aim in general, explore the facets and then identify the specifics. This forms a draft set of deliverables which get refined as time passes. This is what I referred to as the Part A.
• Based on the general and specific aim, we then contact and involve institutional partners who are relevant to the aims of the project. Doing otherwise, means we have no idea what we exactly want/need from them.
• As far as the institutional stakeholders are concerned, involving them in the Pilot Project will also require that we meet their interest as stakeholders. For example, some of deliverables may be well be Wikipedia deliverables, such as, help with developing a Wikipedia article on the institution, or articles on the key issues they are interested,but which may not figure in Part A deliverables. There will also be other deliverables of other types which they would desire, such as, say, lectures to institutional staff on Wikipedia issues, press releases, joint outreach activities, joint research in topics, creating some primary materials - mainly in the form of media, etc, final reports of collaboration etc, etc. These would be mutually decided as we interact with the institutional stakeholders. Part B deliverables kept getting added/removed/modified as we go ahead and interact with them. By the time we have reached a charter of cooperation with each stakeholder, our Part B deliverables should have largely been finalised.
• With draft set of Part A & B deliverables we then go ahead with planning the execution. The execution will need to involve not only outreach with the institutional stakeholders but all editors, city or language communities, and the community as a whole. Much thought needs to put into this. But that is another thread. Here, I discuss only deliverables, how to formulate, what nature, what shape they take & related issues.
• As regards the third track you mentioned, indic to indic language WP, it would definitely exist and in a particular case or so may be substantive, but it would require bilingual editors who cross-edit both language Wikipedias. However, perhaps this may be a much smaller part of the process and one which we could not institutionally drive or depend upon as most of us as are bilingual in En and mother-tongue WP only. Truly multi-lingual editors, should we find them, would be rare and precious commodity and I see little more we could do than encourage them. But definitely, this third track will need to be added to the list of two, I initially mentioned above.
• AshLin (talk) 13:38, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

• "However, integrated involvement of the Community needs to be achieved in planning, discussion and decision-making all of which needs to be done on wiki, as Shyamal mentioned above..." Just to reiterate that all the planning, discussion and decision making for the A2K work plans has been done in a participatory manner including on wiki, f2f discussions, IRC and mailing list disclosures. It is also important to note that a multi pronged approach was adopted to reach out to as many community members as possible in developing the plans. As pointed out by Shyamal, except for deciding on the topic of "Performing Arts", which still could be discussed and changed. Also it should be noted that A2K will be revisiting the work-plans every quarter. Useful to read this. --Visdaviva (talk) 08:38, 9 August 2013 (UTC)
• The feedback on the deliverables is very methodically laid out Ashwin. Brings a lot of clarity to the steps. Only worry would be whether we could proceed so sequentially, as we are dealing with multiple institutions, multiple languages and multiple communities. But it is definitely good to begin with this clarity. --Visdaviva (talk) 15:32, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

Nature of Community Involvement

• Involving knowledgeable users would mean informing the community at large, taking their feedback right fro the grassroots level to advanced levels and ensuring their participation in every step, as explained by both Shyamal and AshLin, the process of discussion should be made on-wiki and should involve long-term users. ----Rsrikanth05 (talk) 10:44, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

• Agree with you. But they don't communicate/respond on-wiki properly. That means we need to disinvolve A2K employees, i don't consider them all long-term users based on their experience level and inability to deal with various issues. -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 10:45, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Ansuman! I know how you feel but I think we should give this project a fair chance even if none of its members have had any prior involvement with any of the Wikimedia projects. If "they" are not part of the community "we" should be welcoming them. I think the team really needs to be part of the community and engage with the community and we need to guide and goad the team even if it does not involve remuneration which is seen to set apart the project team from other community members. Shyamal (talk) 16:41, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, i understand. But the question is, are they willing to involve the community. I don't think so, they are just pretending. I had a long discussion with Vishnu on on-wiki participation and transparency. So I know, they are not ready for this, they don't want any transparency. Because it's easy for them, less work. And I know they could say the same, so there is no point discussing. And the greatest excuse of all is this, i don't know who wrote this but please have a look , India Access To Knowledge/Programme Plan#Approach to measuring results and evaluation and India Access To Knowledge/Work plan April 2013 - June 2014#Risk and mitigation. Quoting one of the sentences from many "This kind of work has failure fore-written". They are doing just experiments. So I guess it's okay if we don't see any outcome. WMF has handed over the project to CIS, and who is evaluating A2K's work? The team itself!? I think there is no one, to watch and take actions? And AFAIK, many users don't support A2K for various reasons. To name a few, their mistakes at wiki-editing, so many errors in the numbers/figures (which shows how much they care), attitude, many complaints yet no action. I think we are loosing users because of this farce. Do we realize that many users are silent, not participating well in the community discussions. PS:"They" here could be one, two or all members of the A2K team. -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 09:20, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

"I had a long discussion with Vishnu on on-wiki participation and transparency. So I know, they are not ready for this, they don't want any transparency." - Not sure from where you get this impression. I clearly stated including on this page various measures initiated so far in being transparent with A2K's work. However, there is and will be a definite scope for improvement. It would be constructive if you list out specific measures that A2K could adopt.

"This kind of work has failure fore-written" - Thanks for pointing this out. Have revised it. Please check.

"They are doing just experiments. So I guess it's okay if we don't see any outcome." - The nature of the work of developing Indian Language Wikipedias and associated 'open knowledge digital volunteer communities' is clearly experimental. AFAIK there is no foolproof model. It's important to recognize this. Re. not having outcomes...What makes you think so? Projected Goals/outcomes, some even have activity-wise break-ups, are already listed out for every part of the plan. So reasonably positive that we will meet most of the listed outcomes.

"who is evaluating A2K's work? The team itself!? I think there is no one, to watch and take actions?" - Among other mechanisms a quarterly review of performance against plans had also been proposed. See this. I think I have suggested (in our e-mail discussions) if you could be part of Community Advisory Team for Odia Work Plan, but you refrained. You can still consider being part of it.

"many users don't support A2K for various reasons. To name a few, their mistakes at wiki-editing, so many errors in the numbers/figures (which shows how much they care), attitude, many complaints yet no action." Thanks for listing out the mistakes. We will definitely try and improve on all these aspects. It will be useful if you point to complaints made in the last 4 months, so that necessary action can be taken after appropriate evaluation.

"I think we are loosing users because of this farce." -- Useful if you could please substantiate this with data or examples.

--Visdaviva (talk) 03:31, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

It seems like we need to examine the MoU between CIS-A2K and WMF to see if we have the right even to seek transparency or open-debate. If it a case of funding to a private NGO project, perhaps we do not have a right to seek engagement or a voice in all this. I have posted elsewhere to request the actual conditions under which the project is being funded. Shyamal (talk) 03:14, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

I have responded about the CISA2K transparency here --Visdaviva (talk) 00:53, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

• Thanks Shyamal, i didn't know this. I am extremely sorry if i violated any rights here. Just want to respond to Vishnu, then I'm done. There is no point discussing about this uncertain Project. Probably it's best for everyone if we (i) leave it alone irrespective of what chaos it is gonna make! Reply to Vishnu: From you i got the impression and I am sorry i can't help you. Are you sure the rest of contents in the work plans are good? Because I had gone through only that section, and you had to rephrase it! Good luck with your experiments. Make proper plans, no matter how much time it takes. About evaluation, so now i'm sure officially there is no one, to watch the progress and what the team is doing?, no wonder. You only consider matters which are happened in the last 4 months! I was talking about A2K for Wikimedia, which is there since inception. Should we forget there was no A2K before you? Finally i don't want to violate any privacy. If you have so much doubt that you need example/data for everything then don't expect us to believe in your work, ability. Sorry Vishnu for not helping with your project and causing distress. At least i don't have ego problems accepting mistakes unlike you. Thanks for your time. -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 15:47, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

• Thanks Srikanth "should involve long-term users" pray explain more-who and how. Specific points will be useful. "informing the community at large" & "ensuring their participation in every step" - did we not do it? Please tell us how we could improve in addition to what we have done/doing. --Visdaviva (talk) 08:57, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

I would think that engaging with the community automatically means communicating on-wiki with participants active now and those who might join later - so it is more useful not to have design as if there were specific people who need to be heeded to. In other words, there should be no specific need to identify "long-term users" - if one used on-wiki communication, there will be an automatic response from the ones who care, either now or later. Shyamal (talk) 16:16, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

Disagree with the comment that CISA2K has not communicated on-wiki or engaged with the community well enough vis-a-vis work plan development. To be noted: initial drafts of the plans (including the Pilot project) were published on Meta for discussion some months ago; announcements were made on all India Wikimedia mailing lists asking for feedback (with links pointing to Meta); drafts were shared with WMI Chapter EC seeking feedback; announcements were made on FB and twitter asking feedback; announcement was made on Wikimedia Forum; an IRC was organized to get feedback; A2K monthly newsletter carried information about draft work-plans; and reached out to some individual WMI community members requesting feedback. Further, the current discussion is continuing on-wiki. --Visdaviva (talk) 18:24, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

'New Section'! what, we don't make any sense! I understand it's hard for you to agree as you lead the team. A2K, having the less amount of support should reach to users through talk pages individually. Shyamal, Good thought. Lets see how the team works on it, and how much time they need to complete this task. Or whether the team is willing to apply our suggestions at all? We will see how many users come forward and support this team? And I think the team need to exercise their hands at wiki-editing, and it seems a good task to start with. -- ɑηsuмaη «Talk» 07:27, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

I have made the point above that the additional interaction, transparency of Vishnu & A2K team is good to have but not sufficient. What we need is integration in decision-making/process with community. One realises that this is not required to be universal but should definitely be there in the core knowledge activities. More importantly, integration with community needs to begin right away. I feel the Performing Arts pilot is a good place to start, even though its beginning and activities have been otherwise. AshLin (talk) 15:26, 10 August 2013 (UTC).

Very useful point. Completely agree with starting this discussion. Shall we start a discussion on what kind of Pilots that CISA2K and the community could take up? Let's even let go of the 'Performing Arts' as a topic if that is a bone of contention.

"What we need is integration in decision-making/process with community." I have outlined on this page the process CISA2K followed in integrating the community in the decision-making vis-a-vis developing the work-plans for 2013-14. Could you Shyamal, AshLin, Rsrikanth05 and ɑηsuмaη please specifically state or list what else we should have done or do and what we should not have done? This is important for CISA2K so that these could be done in future. Appreciate your feedback. --Visdaviva (talk) 07:18, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Long term users don't need to be identified. They will find you if you make an announcement. For EG: On the English Wikipedia, we used to have the India project newsletter, which we can reboot to carry info about such projects. Woefully, not many people ON the wiki are aware. Not many Wikipedians are on the mailing list, and the converse also applies. ----Rsrikanth05 (talk) 14:25, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

• The above discussion about the "Nature of Community Involvement" is a broad discussion about the CISA2K work and would probably makes better sense if this entire section is moved here. Also this could bring others into the discussion on this critical aspect. --Visdaviva (talk) 11:45, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Draft Aim for Pilot Project – Performing Arts in India

Here is a draft aim :

To increase the knowledge about performing arts in India by :

• creating a framework of articles on performing arts in India in multiple Indic languages (includes English).
• substantially increasing the knowledge of Performing Arts in India on Wikipedia so that all major art forms, genres, artists, events, artistic works are covered.
• interacting with prominent artists and GLAM institutions concerned with performing arts with a view to bringing new information and media into the WMF knowledge projects.

AshLin (talk) 06:00, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Great! You deserve a gift of a book purchase coupon for that crisp and clear set of actionable suggestions. Alas I have no say in the A2K project! Shyamal (talk) 06:22, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

List of Topics suitable for development as articles on WPs under aegis of Pilot Project – Performing Arts in India

One way we can start earmarking a very few articles for development is by seeing what is on Wiki & identifying gaps & what it should be like. This link is pertinent :-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Performing_arts_in_India

AshLin (talk) 06:33, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

For those who don't know, Performing arts include dance, music, opera, theatre, magic, spoken word, circus arts, recitation and musical theatre. From Performing arts. AshLin (talk) 13:51, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Key articles on English Wikipedia appear to be :-

• Performing arts in India (red link)
• Dance in India
• Theatre of India
• Music of India
• Indian musical instruments

AshLin (talk) 13:51, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks a lot Ashwin for initiating this section. This was very much needed to prioritising the tasks to be taken up. Collaborative editing has worked well in some of the cases and we could start with it. Many of the less known and notable articles take birth because of the intervention of some kind of strategic project (e.g. Theyam from Kerala because of the Oral citation project). From a long list Wikipedians from various language Wikipedia communities could shortlist the articles they'd like to write in their language Wikipedia (that others might not write in their Wikipedias) and there would be some common articles which everyone would be editing in their Wikipedias. Ashwin, could I request you to list the challenges we might face for interlanguage community collaboration and technicalities we'd need (e.g. Tag and assess, bots, etc.)? --Subhashish Panigrahi (talk) 05:06, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

Work continues here AshLin (talk) 12:22, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

Evaluation Results?

The results of the quarterly evaluations for the quarter ended June 2013 is pending. Is one to be released or would you start in September? Prad2609 (talk) 16:19, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

Hi Prad2609, we're going to share the report soon, let's say in two weeks or so. Nitika.t (talk) 14:19, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

Hello Prad2609. Apologies for this inordinate delay in giving a further update on this. There was confusion with regard to the Quarterly Evaluation reports of our plans. Though we put out a draft of the Work-plans in April, the community review and WMF approval took some time (i.e. until July 2013). Thus we will be undertaking this exercise from July onwards. We will put out the first quarterly evaluation reports at the earliest. For the CIS-A2K work until June 2013, a comprehensive report is available here. Do share your feedback on this here. Thanks.--Visdaviva (talk) 09:13, 6 November 2013 (UTC)