User:Zarasophos/Wikimania

From those not there

To do

Ask Kudpung for his mail threads

Interview organizer of this year's scholarships

Interview Scholar 1

Interview Scholar 2

Compare scholars & reports: meta:Grants:Wikimania scholars, https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Wikimania/Scholarships/Reports/2017

Parallel: Ask Jmabel about whether meta:Cascadia Wikimedians/2018 Wikimedia Conference report#Looking forward his report from Wikimedia Conference 2018 means they're planning to abolish that. What does that mean for Wikimania?

Mail threads

2015

Thread

Sympathetic E-Mail: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimania-l/2015-July/006936.html

WMF staff reply: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimania-l/2015-July/006951.html

2017

Thread

"The same questions every year :)"

Established chorus: You can't single out single contributors to make your point.

2018

Thread

"Congratulation to all the selection committee who break the tradition of selecting one of the Malayalam communities two permanent Wikimania attendees by selecting both of them."

Initial complaint (the same people AND they don't share anything): https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimania-l/2017-May/008026.html

Lots of people shouting "Shut up"

Numbers: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimania-l/2017-May/008040.html

Changes made this year: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimania-l/2017-May/008034.html

Attempt at solution: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimania-l/2017-May/008047.html

Other Comments

Comments under Signpost piece from last year calling for reports

Interviews

Praveenp

Hello Praveenp, thank you for taking the time to answer these questions! If you have any counter-questions directed at me, feedback or other input, feel free to leave it here. And now, let's get into the subject matter.

1. What is your opinion on Wikimania Scholarships? What, in your opinion, is currently wrong with them?
2. What has been your personal experience with them so far?
3. Do you know if other people have the same complaints?
4. Has anything happened so far as a result of you raising this matter?
5. Anything else you want to add?

That's it for now, though I'll maybe ask some follow-ups later. Again, thank you for your time! Zarasophos (talk) 12:51, 22 June 2018 (UTC):Hi, Thank you for asking me about this, I will try to answer this to the best of my knowledge.

1) What is your opinion on Wikimania Scholarships? What, in your opinion, is currently wrong with them?

A) Wikimania Scholarship is a necessity. There are many users who want to understand and share in Wikimania but unable to attend by their own. Scholarships help them. IMO, But the process is easily manipulatable to those who familiar with the course, because of that many people get scholarships again and again, while many others never get the chance to attend Wikimania. In small language communities like Malayalam (ml.wiki*) this problem gets even bigger. Since there are no large number of users to apply for the scholarship, it become easy to achieve a scholarship, for those who know how to write successful applications. Every year these repeated scholarship receivers get more experience to fine tune their application more effectively.

If the selection process is solely depends on the attractiveness of application, the selection committee fails. After years of experience, we know the process should be remoulded. It is not easy to answer how, because we don't know how "a successful application" affects the committee.

2) What has been your personal experience with them so far?

A) I am active in Wikimedia projects since 2006, I am sure that there were many cases of repeated scholarship in the earlier times also. I don't remember how many times I applied, although I didn't applied in my early years. I have passed to Phase 2 every time I applied except once, but never received a scholarship. I haven't applied this year.

3) Do you know if other people have the same complaints?

A) Yes I know other users. There were always private conversation, chats, private social media posts or group mails related to scholarships. It is not easy to speak out about this because almost all active users (including those who received scholarships and those who didn't) know each other. Users also afraid that complaining about a process which other users are successful will portray them as incompetents. I have also seen Tamil language users complaining about repeated scholarships. Please see this too.

4) Has anything happened so far as a result of you raising this matter?

A) I believe so. Both positively and negatively.

It was too difficult to discuss about this earlier in an open platform. But now a days, it feels like a matter need more discussion. It didn't progress much yet, but there is a collective positive change.

I've raised this issue first in 2015. When I applied scholarship in 2016, I was not passed to Phase 2, despite I have contributed to Wikipedia, Commons, Translatewiki, Phabricator (since bugzilla) etc. I was(am) also a bureaucrat at ml.wikipedia at that time. The rejection from the scholarship candidate list was totally against Phase 1 criteria. The rejection mail was sent by Ellie Young. I've asked a clarification, specifically mentioning Phase 1 criteria but never get a reply. I consider this as a personal negative consequence.

5) Anything else you want to add?

A) People who get repeated scholarship, share lesser and lesser every year. In recent years, nothing was shared to other users. Only When I raised the issue this year, it came to our knowledge that last year's scholarship recipient didn't attend Wikimania and scholarship inherited to this year.

Despite I specifically wrote I was not in search of scholarship, people want to shrink this to me. Last year somebody want to suggest me for Wikimania if they could. This year it was even ridiculous. Somebody want to specifically help me in application for Sweden and host me there! So they are well aware that they know how to write a successful application. But not yet shared anything to community regarding scholarship application or Wikimania experience.

Kerala (Indian state where Malayalam language spoken) is a small patch of land of just 550 KM length and 70 KM of Width. I am just adding this to share the perspective of small community in a small landmass where people are too familiar to each other to criticize. Somehow in my early editing years, I had a very less personal offline relation to others, and later I kept it that way. So it is easy for me to speak about matters which include other users than many others.

If you haven't already seen the threads in the mailing list, please check those too 2018, 2017, 2015. Regards.--Praveen:talk 17:19, 23 June 2018 (UTC)