Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Wiki Loves Monuments 2024 in the United States (ID: 22765300)/Final Report
Application type: Standard application
Part 1: Project and impact
1. Describe the implemented activities and results achieved. Additionally, share which approaches were most effective in supporting you to achieve the results. (required)
Wiki Loves Monuments 2024 in the United States held its upload campaign through the month of October, inviting both editors and readers alike to upload photos of American "monuments". In this context, a "monument" refers to a protected historic site that is recognized by a governmental body or other organization, such as a historical society. In the United States, this primarily consists of places listed on the National Register of Historic Places, which is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance. We also accept photos of historic sites that are recognized by tribal, state, and local governments, as well as historical societies and related organizations.
Like every year, the vast majority of participants were drawn to the photo campaign via our CentralNotice banner that runs throughout the month across Wikimedia sites, for both editors and readers.
We had ~380 participants upload over 2,700 photos of history sites to the Wikimedia Commons. This is an increase from 2023, in which we had ~260 participants upload just under 2,500 photos.
Of these photos, ~8% are being used across Wikimedia wikis. Of our 380 participants, ~75% registered after the start of the competition, indicating that Wiki Loves Monuments continues to be a driver of first-time contributors.
Our judging prices took place through the month of November, determining our top-10 winners that won prizes and went on to the international competition. Our winners can be viewed here.
2. Documentation of your impact. Please use space below to share links that help tell your story, impact, and evaluation. (required)
Share links to:
- Project page on Meta-Wiki or any other Wikimedia project
- Dashboards and tools that you used to track contributions
- Some photos or videos from your event. Remember to share access.
You can also share links to:
- Important social media posts
- Surveys and their results
- Infographics and sound files
- Examples of content edited on Wikimedia projects
- Event page
- US winners
- All uploads
- Jury process
- Wiki Loves statistics portal
- ~380 participants
- ~75% registered after the start of the competition.
- 2,700 photos of historic sites in the United States uploaded.
- 11 jury members from across the United States
Our top-10 winners:
Additionally, share the materials and resources that you used in the implementation of your project. (required)
For example:
- Training materials and guides
- Presentations and slides
- Work processes and plans
- Any other materials your team has created or adapted and can be shared with others
- The Wiki Loves tool provides statistics about all the various Wiki Loves photo campaigns, by year and country.
- Most support material comes from the international team page.
3. To what extent do you agree with the following statements regarding the work carried out with this Rapid Fund? You can choose “not applicable” if your work does not relate to these goals. Required. Select one option per question. (required)
| A. Bring in participants from underrepresented groups | Neither agree nor disagree |
| B. Create a more inclusive and connected culture in our community | Agree |
| C. Develop content about underrepresented topics/groups | Agree |
| D. Develop content from underrepresented perspectives | Agree |
| E. Encourage the retention of editors | Agree |
| F. Encourage the retention of organizers | Agree |
| G. Increased participants' feelings of belonging and connection to the movement | Strongly agree |
| F. Other (optional) |
Part 2: Learning
4. In your application, you outlined some learning questions. What did you learn from these learning questions when you implemented your project? How do you hope to use this learnings in the future? You can recall these learning questions below. (required)
You can recall these learning questions below: While our contest is largely the same every year, we always learn new things with each run of the contest, including:
- Learning about hundreds of historic sites and which ones still need to be documented
- Learning about new cultural heritage organizations and their registries
- Learning about the types of historic sites people are interested in, based on what is submitted and used across Wikimedia sites
- Ways that people are interested in both capturing and consuming historical and cultural heritage, particularly in the context of current events
- New and growing technologies that are being used to capture historic sites (e.g. drones, panoramas, photo spheres, etc.)
~8% of our ~2,700 uploads are already being used across Wikimedia sites (Wikipedia articles, Wikidata items, etc.). These photo additions greatly enhance our text content. Photos came from nearly all 50 states (unfortunately nothing from Rhode Island this year), as well as various territories. Photographs included historic sites from federal-, state-, and local-level lists. Submissions from local historic lists are always exciting to see as it means that participants are engaging with their local historical societies and documentation.
We had some unique submissions that showcased ways the community views and captures historic sites. At least one photographer contributed photos from a battle reenactment (example); one photographer contributed a series of stained glass from churches (example); and one photographer contributed a drone shot of Grant's Tomb. These sort of photographs that go beyond the typical wide photos of buildings provide new perspectives and capture specific facets of the monuments, which is great to see.
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5. Did anything unexpected or surprising happen when implementing your activities? This can include both positive and negative situations. What did you learn from those experiences? (required)
Our judging process ended up with three photographers winning twice (i.e. having two photos in the top-10). While we have had an individual place twice in the top-10 in the past, this is the first time we had three photographers do so. This is perhaps unsurprising, as if the jury ranks a photo from a photographer highly, it could be expected that they would rank other photos from that same photographer highly as well.
I believe it's in the interest of the contest and community for us to increase the variance of the winners. For next year, I'd like to see us implement new rules, such as a photographer only being able to have one photo in the top-10, and possible a historic site only able to apear once in the top-10. This is something I'd like to discuss with my fellow organizers, jury, and community to figure out what sort of limits would be best and fair for next year.
We did have a user submit a photo that had a sunset edited into the background, which we were able to catch and remove from the jury process. With photo editing technology rapidly improving and becoming commonly available (thanks to advanced in artificial intelligence and related technology), this is something Wiki Loves events are likely to see more of across the board, and is something we need to be conscious of. For Wiki Loves Monuments in the United States, we do already have a rule that disallows edits like these ("Digital manipulations must not deceive the viewer. Correcting flaws, some color adjustments, and other minor edits are acceptable."). However, the challenge is catching these contributions.
We did have a good number of photos uploaded outside of the contest window. These were a mix of contributors being confused about when the United States upload window was (some nations do September, others October). Other users were contributing photos through "missing photo" links on the English Wikipedia that linked to our upload campaign; photos uploaded through these links would go into our photo pool, regardless of whether the user intended to submit to the contest. For future years, we'll want to maximize clarity on the upload window, and ensure that the upload campaign link is only linked and enabled when the upload window is live.
6. What is your plan to share your project learnings and results with other community members? If you have already done it, describe how. (required)
Our winners have been posted here.
Wiki Loves Monuments is an international, federated competition. Learnings are shared over the years through our list serve, talk pages, and sessions at Wikimedia conferences all around the world (including Wikimania and WikiConference North America). We plan to participate in these discussions and share what we can with other organizers, as we do each year.
Part 3: Metrics
7. Wikimedia Metrics results. (required)
In your application, you set some Wikimedia targets in numbers (Wikimedia metrics). In this section, you will describe the achieved results and provide links to the tools used.
| Target | Results | Comments and tools used | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Number of participants | 500 | 380 | While we did not hit our goal of 500 uploaders, we did increase from ~260 in 2023. With more outreach adn coordination in future years, I believe we can continue to increase this number. |
| Number of editors | 500 | 380 | |
| Number of organizers | 3 | 3 | We had three core organizers, and a jury with 11 members. |
| Wikimedia project | Target | Result - Number of created pages | Result - Number of improved pages |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wikipedia | |||
| Wikimedia Commons | 5000 | 2700 | 0 |
| Wikidata | |||
| Wiktionary | |||
| Wikisource | |||
| Wikimedia Incubator | |||
| Translatewiki | |||
| MediaWiki | |||
| Wikiquote | |||
| Wikivoyage | |||
| Wikibooks | |||
| Wikiversity | |||
| Wikinews | |||
| Wikispecies | |||
| Wikifunctions or Abstract Wikipedia |
8. Other Metrics results.
In your proposal, you could also set Other Metrics targets. Please describe the achieved results and provide links to the tools used if you set Other Metrics in your application.
| Other Metrics name | Metrics Description | Target | Result | Tools and comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Images used on wikis | The percent of uploads that are used across Wikimedia projects. This may be realized in the months following the event as editors add images to Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects over time. | 10 | 8 | This is a long-tail goal, and 8% of our photos being used across Wikimedia wikis is a solid start. This may continue to grow by a few percentage points as photos continue to be added to Wikidata, Wikipedia articles in various languages, etc. |
9. Did you have any difficulties collecting data to measure your results? (required)
No
9.1. Please state what difficulties you had. How do you hope to overcome these challenges in the future? Do you have any recommendations for the Foundation to support you in addressing these challenges? (required)
Part 4: Financial reporting
[edit]10. Please state the total amount spent in your local currency. (required)
1771.15
11. Please state the total amount spent in US dollars. (required)
1771.15
12. Report the funds spent in the currency of your fund. (required)
Provide the link to the financial report https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1tZSuH7DTCOIvZmg6j9MArNLNlIVNY55DBLAm-X6aMf4/edit?gid=0#gid=0
12.2. If you have not already done so in your financial spending report, please provide information on changes in the budget in relation to your original proposal. (optional)
Our expenses were lower than planned. One winner was not able to be reached to accept their award, and we were able to use some mailing, printing, and sticker supplies from prior years.
13. Do you have any unspent funds from the Fund?
Yes
13.1. Please list the amount and currency you did not use and explain why.
We underspent by $268.85. One winner was not able to be reached to accept their award, and we were able to use some mailing, printing, and sticker supplies from prior years.
13.2. What are you planning to do with the underspent funds?
C. I am planning to send them back to the WMF
13.3. Please provide details of hope to spend these funds.
N/A
14.1. Are you in compliance with the terms outlined in the fund agreement?
Yes
14.2. Are you in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations as outlined in the grant agreement?
Yes
14.3. Are you in compliance with provisions of the United States Internal Revenue Code (“Code”), and with relevant tax laws and regulations restricting the use of the Funds as outlined in the grant agreement? In summary, this is to confirm that the funds were used in alignment with the WMF mission and for charitable/nonprofit/educational purposes.
Yes
15. If you have additional recommendations or reflections that don’t fit into the above sections, please write them here. (optional)
Review notes
[edit]Review notes from Program Officer:
N/A
Applicant's response to the review feedback.
N/A