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Strategy/Wikimedia movement/2017/Cycle 1/Report/Methodology

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Our methodology for identifying themes for Cycle 2

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The initial synthesis of community discussions that took place between March 14 and April 18 resulted in 13 common themes. Upon review of these themes, the movement strategy team identified ideas that grouped together naturally. Other ideas related more to the tactics of how we do things, rather than the outcome we hope to achieve in the world. As a result, we distilled these findings into five contrasting themes for organized groups and communities to debate in Cycle 2.

Note: These five groupings were developed by review of the initial 13 themes and related subthemes at the top level, not by another manual tagging of each individual statement. Not every individual statement will fit perfectly into each of the five themes, and there is a strong possibility for overlap across the final themes. These groupings are based on the core strategy team’s interpretation and judgement and we are conscious of our own biases, so we recognize that others may have a different perspective on the data. You are invited to take a look at the data, run your own analyses, and share your findings.

The themes are mapped by color. If you see a cell with a different background color, that means it was assigned to a different theme than when it was originally grouped.

13 Themes Sub-theme Number of References Cycle 2 Themes
Content Quality 158 The Most Respected Source of Knowledge

Discussions of content and knowledge mostly how to improve the content quality - often measured by reliability, credibility, neutrality, readability - so that Wikimedia project could be a better knowledge resources.

Reliability, Credibility 71
Neutrality 65
Ease, Accessibility 58
Gaps, Bias 36
Other 3
Knowledge Biases 3
Gaps 2
Other 26
Community Health 151 Healthy, Inclusive Communities

There was frequent mention of improving the experience for contributors and the overall health of the Wikimedia community, including through greater diversity and gender balance.

Engagement, Support 114
Other 0
Users, Editors, Contributors New 78
Engagement 61
Paid, Incentivized 29
Experienced 23
Readers 8
Other 14
Outreach, Awareness Diversity, Inclusion 57
Gender 20
Other Global Outreach 126
Emerging Communities Availability across languages 76 A Truly Global Movement

Many hoped Wikimedia could better meet the needs of emerging communities, including through better outreach and awareness, availability across languages, and access.

Access 29
Other 25
Innovation Adapting to technological context 75 The Augmented Age

Discussions also explored how innovation and technology can be best leveraged for Wikimedia to adapt and improve, including through automation, other medias, and moving beyond Wikipedia.

Beyond Wikipedia 39
Automation 29
Other medias 24
Other 6
Education Institutions 42 Leveraging the Knowledge Ecosystem

Collaboration was a common topic, most frequently as it relates to the education sector, but also more broadly with other internal and external actors.

Existing programs 23
Educators 7
Other 54
Collaboration External 69
Internal 66
Partnerships 48
Communication 42
Policy, Advocacy 25
Other 3
Organizational Foundation 38
Funding 32
Governance 25
Staffing 19
Other 25
Features N/A 216 Not included as a theme for strategic direction

Topics like features and values were commonly discussed. While important, these ideas related more to the tactics of how we do things, rather than the outcome we hope to achieve in the world. Statements related to features will be routed to the appropriate department at Wikimedia Foundation.

Values Mission 41
Open Source 27
Decentralization 15
Free 14
Others 4
Sustainability, Growth N/A 16