Talk:Wikicite/e-scholarship/Marajozkee

@Marajozkee: thank you (and the team) for this proposal.

• Can you clarify what the word-list would actually be? You have identified 200 as a target - which? and why those?
• Also, what is the specific outcome intended: Wikidata Lexeme items? Wiktionary pages? For the audio files - is the idea that you would record yourselves into the computer microphone and upload these files?
• as you can imagine the idea of the scholarship program is not to replace volunteer editing. Can you Describe how the work in this project is qualitatively and quantitatively different/harder than your normal volunteer contributions?
• The purpose of wikicite is Open citations and Fibia graphic meta data. Can you explain how this project relates to that goal.

Sincerely LWyatt (WMF) (talk) 10:36, 1 October 2020 (UTC)

@LWyatt (WMF):

Thank you for going through our project in detail and coming up with your queries.

• The word list will be common spoken Santali words. 200 words is a target as of now to start with this pilot project, (if possible more) actually we are looking for quality rather than quantity, considering the time frame and strength of our team. Though, we intend to go for a bigger project as we complete this pilot project. As of now there are only 9 pronunciation audio files recorded (link), and they need to be properly linked with wikidata and other Wikimedia sister projects for a better usage, we will be working on alphabetically ordered list while keeping in mind the most common spoken and used words.
• Our main objective is to initiate a process to document the commons spoken words of the Santali language and make their presence felt online. Yes, we will be recording audio files for each word by ourselves, categorize them on Wikimedia commons, then link them with wikidata by creating wikidata items, adding all relevant statements, references, translations, pseudonyms, site links, and if possible with a quality image.
• One main thing to mention is that “Santali Wiktionary” is in an incubator stage. This project will definitely show a ray of hope for the Santali wikimedians and will ease up their work while collecting and working with data.
• The title of the project says everything, “Hello Santali!”. The Santali language has been in use over thousands of years mainly in oral communication. Now in order to broaden its utility, it has become necessary to document the Santali language, and this project marks the foundation. This is a unique research project which needs research (which we have already started), work and time commitment (not volunteering) from members to bring out the “quantity and quality” that you are talking about, as we have to go through several bibliographical references, journals, speaking with old Santali speakers to make sure we document the right word, with right spelling, pronunciation and citing proper references. So, that we can enrich the world of Wiki with data from multiple sources before working on them.
• I and my team believe this project is an example and completely align with the goals of WikiCite: open citations, references, and/or linked bibliographic data in Wikimedia.
• I think I have answered all your above queries, still, if you have any further queries, we are ready to answer them. Last but not the least, I like to mention that this project connects and enriches more or less all Wikimedia sister projects and we are extremely happy to put up this project.

Sincerely Rajeeb (talk) 08:48, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

Concerns from Bengali Wikipedia community about this e-scholarship

I am a Wikimedian working on Bengali Wikimedia projects, I am not connected with any user group or similar entity. I am not a member of Santal Wikimedians as well. A discussion (parmalink) is taking place on Bengali Wikipedia village pump at this moment which concerns this e-scholarship application.

I, as an individual Bengali Wikipedian, want to inform you of the portion of the concerns which are related to this grant support. This support has raised a number of questions, such as the following:

• To the best of my knowledge, Rajeeb (User:Marajozkee) doesn't know Santali. The person has shown no experience in the particular area of work and had almost no contribution of uploading pronunciation using LinguaLibre. It is really questionable how such a grant is approved to such an inexperienced person who does not even know Santali. 213 USD was asked to teach four people on an online platform about how to use Lingua Libre and how to upload the recordings. For coordinating (if that means teaching how to upload the recordings), 213 USD or 15,000 INR is too much according to my volunteering experience. Similar types of funding issues have also created great community mistrust in Bangla Wikipedia as well, therefore doubt on the whole procedure deepens here.
• I don’t know if the other four people received their money, but I'll assume they did. I have nothing with these other four people but with 700-1000 USD (51,000-73,000 INR) how did they manage with Lingua Libre to record only 200 words? That is definitely an exorbitant amount! Santali is not some sort of dead language, it is one of the 22 scheduled languages of India. The applicant or the other four people didn’t have to do field work to record the language. They were all doing this from their homes! Compare this with Tito Dutta who has single-handedly recorded and uploaded 48,000 Bengali recordings without asking for any money! I strongly feel that this grant approval has encouraged paid editing of works which are otherwise done by volunteers in other communities, which seems deeply frustrating to me and my colleagues on Bengali Wikimedia community.
• I don't know if the rest of the money was received by the others, but assuming good faith, even if they have received the money, I also have doubts about whether the Santali Wikipedia community even knows about this grant. One admin of Santali Wikipedia confirmed to me that he didn’t know about this grant and said the 3 people have been asked for bank details only after the grant applicant was alarmed by the discussions on Bengali Wikipedia.
• There is no evidence that the LinguaLibre community or Wikimedia France (who maintains and runs LinguaLibre) community has been informed about this plan.

These concerns reflect the frustration of my comrades/fellow wikipedians on Bengali language project. We have always wished good for the Santali community and our concerns are not meant to accuse them of anything. --আফতাবুজ্জামান (talk) 17:15, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

Also i already notified the community about this report/complain (just in case if someone wants to add something). Thanks. --আফতাবুজ্জামান (talk) 20:16, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

Dear আফতাবুজ্জামান - I thank you for writing this detailed explanation. I publicly acknowledge that this, and also the village pump discussion, have been read. I hope you understand that I do not wish to publicly discuss individual volunteers and individual projects.

With regards to the cost/price of this grant program: unlike all other WMF grant programs, the WikiCite eScholarship program was designed in a different way - where the recipient does not determine the amount of money with a budget of proposed expenses. Instead, the amount is determined by the number of people number of days, and where those people live. The 'value' of each place is set according to the USA State Department table of living allowances. The specific calculations are described here: WikiCite/e-scholarship#Program_description. I designed this program this way in order to find a way to provide grants for people during the pandemic 'stay at home' period. The advantage of using this method of allocating money is that it is 'neutral' - people don't have to explain their own costs of living and the amount is different for different places around the world. The significant and well-known disadvantage is that for many cities/countries around the world, the amounts that the USA State Department recommends is not an amount that a local person in that country would spend to live. It is a valuation based on how much it costs for the USA State Department employee to live in that city for a day, not for how much it costs a local to live there. This is a flawed measurement of value - however it is the best (only?) measure that is global, public, and is independently designed. Alternatives would be to make a 'fixed' amount for anyone in the world; or for me to make a personal assessment of living cost based on my own best-guess – and both of those are very unfair/inequitable options! In any case: this eScholarship program is only running for this one round, and the WikiCite program is concluding in the middle of 2021. I have given a briefing to the WMF grantmaking department on the advantaged and disadvantages of this eScholarship program trial, and the department might wish to continue something similar in the future, based on the lessons learned from this time.

Thank you for your understanding. LWyatt (WMF) (talk) 16:56, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

@LWyatt (WMF):, It's not about overinflated costs only. Rajib Dutta (Marajozkee) involved Wikimedia Bangladesh in his projects initiatives, which is a falsehood. He said that he discussed with community leaders on the subject, which is another falsehood because his so called community members have denied their knowing of his project. Besides, he shows multiple fields of works, e.g. translation, uploading files, writing documents etc, of which he has no proof yet. Some Bangla Wikimedians joined his online discussion and some of them said that the discussion was of no substance. Rajib told that he would give them money or data package if they attended the call, but so far none of the attendees has received what he promised to give. Simply put, he has done too little things and showed that he actually had to spend money and resources for it. When he was asked for interpretation of these events, he said he was super busy and others should not be concerned about how much money he gets from Wikimedia community. But any member of Wikimedia deserves to be held accountable. But Rajib does not want any of us to hold him accountable. He said we were poking fingers at him, while he just organized an online video call one day, and - yeah, that's all. Strong actions should be taken against him ASAP. Regards, Ppt2003 (talk) 08:28, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

Dear Ppt2003, yes I recognise that the concerns raised here and on the Bengali Wikipedia village pump go beyond the question of costs for this specific grant; these wider concerns have been read and received. Nonetheless, I hope you understand that I do not wish to publicly discuss individual volunteers and individual projects. LWyatt (WMF) (talk) 17:18, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

@LWyatt (WMF):, The first question I want to ask is whether you have already given him money to carry out his phony initiatives? And Second, should you not consider a ban on Rajib in light of these events? (I mean, he should not emerge unscathed from this). Regards, Ppt2003 (talk) 17:30, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

Ppt2003, this specific grant as one of all the 23 different WikiCite grants which were approved in October, have all been funded. Each project within that round of grants has its own timetable for activities. As I've said - the complaint which has been raised about this grant has been received and understood. I thank you for your time in bringing your concerns to my/our attention, but I also hope you will understand that I am unwilling to enter into debates about specific individuals or activities in public. LWyatt (WMF) (talk) 22:55, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

Update: Bangla Wikipedia community decided to block "User:Marajozkee" for various reasons (including above). --আফতাবুজ্জামান (talk) 19:03, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

Yes - I am aware of this decision. Thank you for ensuring that it is documented. LWyatt (WMF) (talk) 19:48, 28 January 2021 (UTC)