Grants:Project/Rapid/Art Jarka/Documentation of endangered buildings and artworks/Report

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Report accepted
This report for a Rapid Grant approved in FY 2017-18 has been reviewed and accepted by the Wikimedia Foundation.


Goals[edit]

Did you meet your goals? Are you happy with how the project went?

Partly I am happy, on the other side, due to complications caused by the COVID situation, we were not able to do all the planned photo walks and we haven't got enough time to process all photographs to Wikipedia.

Outcome[edit]

Please report on your original project targets. Please be sure to review and provide metrics required for Rapid Grants.


Target outcome Achieved outcome Explanation
60 newly illustrated articles 50 newly illustrated articles The outcome was almost met. We newly illustrated 50 articles and provided an extra or better illustration to another 35 articles. There are two reasons, why we haven't achieved this goal. The first are various complications participants had due to the COVID-19 pandemic, especially of a personal character, which was causing delays in uploading photographs and processing them into articles. The second reason, which slowed down processing time was the fact that in the fall of 2021, numerous problems with standalone mass upload tools VicunaUploader and Pattypan had emerged. Thus we know, that some of the trips intended to be trips covered by support were not processed to the servers. So we may expect some more uploads as indicated below and we hypothesize, that there are some articles created with the goal to illustrate them with photographs from these trips - the work which hopefully will be done in the future.
1200 uploaded photos to Wikimedia Commons 7599 uploaded photos to Wikimedia Commons Outcome achieved (see project category). This number might be even higher, because participants still continue to upload their images. The higher amount of images than expected is due to the fact, that participants were very precise, in photographing objects. This number may be even higher due to photographs created without support from this project, but covering the same topic (some of them could be found in this category).
2 new contributors 2-3 new contributors We were able to build on the idea of merging communities - i.e. motivating members of the off-wiki community to realize their goals within the Wikimedia projects.


Learning[edit]

Projects do not always go according to plan. Sharing what you learned can help you and others plan similar projects in the future. Help the movement learn from your experience by answering the following questions:

  • What worked well?
    • The cooperation with the off-wiki community worked well, because it provided us with some tips on what is important to photo document, so we didn't need to search the Internet largely. This off-wiki Facebook-based community also provided crucial support when identifying photographed objects and providing more information about them. As stated in the grant proposal, photographers were not just covering "endangered" artworks, but all-important artworks they encountered in the area. Sometimes they were not able to identify them and at this point, the Facebook community helped to provide some crucial information.
    • Also the planning and photodocumentating worked relatively well.
  • What did not work so well?
    • As far as we know, the problems of personal character prevented participants to work on their trips on time, which led to the fact, that some bunches of photographs were not processed in time. We believe if there is no COVID-19, this would work well.
    • During the course of the granted project, we figured out that the original assumption of covering endangered architecture and traveling zig-zag around the country is a problem, because in many cases the resources to write articles about photographed objects or their authors were difficult to get. So once the participant got bibliographic resources to one side (namely town) it would be more effective to cover hole are. That's why finally we switched tactics and we were focusing to cover everything in towns. But this was hit by another problem, the possibility to stay on-site overnight.
    • There was also a problem to manage new contributors. Part of the work could do the community, but motivating them and at the same time participating in both projects and living personal lives seems to be not applicable. That's why we think this would need a dedicated person, who would make a bridge between the off-wiki community and Wikipedia. And due to the fact we were not able to provide enough time to them, problems like copyvio when editing articles had emerged. Luckily the wiki community recognized that and worked it out.
  • What would you do differently next time?
    • We see that the model of the project we created is difficult in basis. Next time, we would find ways how to make it easier. But three circumstances would have changed. Think about, whether the turbulent times (like the COVID-19 pandemic, and nearby war in Ukraine) can negatively impact the performance of the project. Find a different area of interest - e.g. authors of public art, because with a broader area lots of time is spent on identification and creating articles (including the search for bibliographic resources). Lastly, we would find resources for volunteer manager. The last requisition may lead to a much higher number of new contributors, with fewer problems on their way to Wikipedia.

Finances[edit]

Grant funds spent[edit]

Please describe how much grant money you spent for approved expenses, and tell us what you spent it on.

We spent 13014,05 CZK on transportation supporting photographers to travel to the site of interest and photograph for Wikipedia.

Remaining funds[edit]

Do you have any remaining grant funds?

There are 22 540,95 CZK left and we would send them back to Wikimedia Foundation. The reason for such a high amount left is mentioned above - due to some COVID-related and mass upload tools problems, some photo walks haven't been completed. Another reason to have such a high amount left is that we forgot we had finances on alimentation.

Anything else[edit]

Anything else you want to share about your project?

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