Grants talk:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/General Support Fund/Maintenance of OpenRefine and its Wikimedia-related extensions

Comments from I JethroBT (WMF)

@Magdmartin and Ainali: Hello Martin and Jan, and thank you for your proposal to support the maintenance of OpenRefine and other initiatives to develop your organization. Because this proposal is unique in several respects in that it involves a major tool, requires development work, but also focuses on the general maintenance rather than enhancement of those tools, and also involves other activities, I have needed to take more time to review these circumstances with my team and determine an appropriate eligibility decision for your proposal. Unfortunately, we will not be able to conduct formal review of the proposal, as it is not eligible for review by the Regional Fund Committee. Please see my comments and remarks below regarding this decision:

• First, I want to acknowledge that OpenRefine has been funded through previous funding programs the Community Resources team has maintained, namely, through the former Project Grants program (see for example, this funded proposal from 2021). This funding program supported some technology-based projects with support from some Technology teams at the Foundation at the time during the review and decisionmaking process. The program was closed at the end of 2021 due to a relaunch of our funding programs to address a variety of community and internal needs. One funding program that now exists because of that relaunch is the General Support Fund, which this proposal was submitted under.
• Since that relaunch, the Community Resources team had hoped to design a funding program in collaboration with technology teams at the Wikimedia Foundation to support technology development projects, such as this one. That program has unfortunately not materialized for a variety of reasons beyond the scope of this immediate discussion, and there is no current plan to open a Technology Fund as we had hoped.
• The General Support Fund program was not designed or resourced for technology-based projects, and our review is not supported by Technology teams at the Foundation. Consequently, we cannot review these proposals as indicated on the funding program page: Proposals that are primarily focused on large-scale software development are not eligible for review. A decision to fund this proposal supporting OpenRefine would conflict with this restriction, and more generally, would complicate our eligibility criteria in the future by allowing technology funding in some cases, but not others, based on ambiguous criteria, or at least, on criteria that do not currently exist.
  • Furthermore, the Community Resources team as well as Regional Fund Committees generally do not have relevant expertise or background to meaningfully review and make funding decisions on projects that involve technology or tool development, even if that development is limited to maintenance (as opposed to developing new features or an entirely new tool from scratch). Expertise in Regional Fund Committees is more typically related other dimensions of movement work, such as in GLAM programs, local and regional community knowledge, movement campaigns, general outreach initiatives, community engagement practices, event planning, capacity and skill building in movement organizations, and other areas.
• Importantly, some parts of this proposal include activities that clearly do not fall under technology development-related activities, such as building capacity for your organization to improve its training activities and related goals, as well as general community engagement/outreach. However, other parts of the proposed work necessarily involve tasks that require developer time or hiring new developers to address these priorities, such as bug and security fixes, software releases, quality improvements, and community requests. This work involves significant developer time and makes up the majority of the proposed budget. My conclusion is that in spite of some non-technology activities that have been proposed here, the success of this proposal depends on supporting ongoing development work on OpenRefine.
• Finally, the Community Resources team is preparing to reevaluate its own practices around funding technology-related work, which has more recently been supported through the Rapid Fund program for small-scale technology projects. Consequently, we will be taking a temporary pause on generally funding Rapid Fund proposals related to technology development while we perform this evaluation. While this evaluation is not directly related to this proposal, it would not make sense for us to fund a large-scale software development proposal while suspending funding for smaller-scale software work.

Based on these factors, the proposal is not eligible for review. However, in a future round, a proposal where your proposed activities do not or only minimally involve development work may be eligible for review. If you have questions or would like meet to discuss this decision further, please feel free to respond here or contact me to arrange a meeting to discuss further. With thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 18:02, 1 November 2024 (UTC)

@I JethroBT (WMF), thank you for your time in reviewing our grant application and for your detailed feedback. It is much appreciated.

Our application sparked quite a discussion within our forum, particularly around eligibility. Since OpenRefine is fundamentally a software project, developer time is essential for maintaining the project, including addressing bug fixes, security updates, software releases, and onboarding new contributors. We intended to communicate that our application is specifically for maintenance rather than new “large-scale software development.” This is something I addressed during my introductory call with the North America Program Officer, where I understood that some support for software maintenance could potentially be included in the budget.

If there is room for us to revise our proposal, we would be open to:

• Adjusting the budget to allocate less than 50% toward development, with more resources directed toward trainer stipends or a reduction in the overall requested amount.
• Based on conversations with OpenRefine users and developers at the WikiConvention francophone/2024, I realized that a Developer Advocate role could be beneficial to OpenRefine. With approval from OpenRefine Core Dev team, this position would focus on contributor onboarding and community engagement, helping us build capacity within the project while performing minor maintenance.

We recognize that the Wikimedia Foundation is currently reassessing its approach to funding technology projects, and we understand if this proposal may not align with the current priorities or timing.

Thank you again for your thoughtful insights and guidance. Should there be an opportunity to adapt our application to better fit the fund’s objectives, we would welcome the chance to explore this further.

Best regards, Magdmartin (talk) 21:13, 5 November 2024 (UTC)