[Wiki Loves Monuments] Wiki Loves Monuments in Italy largely blocked by WMF fundraising

[attolippip]

Sad news indeed.
Is there a public discussion about this issue anywhere?
Can we get the WMF comments about it publicly?

Best regards,
antanana
ED of Wikimedia Ukraine

2015-08-18 21:42 GMT+03:00 Romaine Wiki <romaine.wiki at gmail.com>:

> Hi all,
>
> Sad news.
> The title of this thread seems a bit hard, but that is practically the
> situation as it looks now.
>
> *Background*
> Wiki Loves Monuments is the yearly photo contest since 2010, organised by
> many local Wikipedia communities and local chapters. For this contest a
> banner is shown on top of Wikipedia pages in the specific countries to
> attract attention from the public to participate in enriching Wikipedia
> with photos of the local cultural heritage.
>
> Wiki Loves Monuments depends for at least 99% on the banner. When there is
> no banner, the uploads and results drop dramatically, as possible
> participants are not informed and can't easily find the contest site. Also
> participants need time to go on location to take photos and see the banner
> above Wikipedia afterwards to find their way back.
>
>
>
> *What is the situation?*
> * The fundraising team plans to have a fundraising banner in Italy during
> the month September.
> * The local team of Wiki Loves Monuments in Italy is organising the
> contest in Italy and needs a banner as well.
>
> As there can be shown only one banner at the time, there have been talks
> about these conflicting banners. Result: Wiki Loves Monuments get only
> 37,5% of the time, the fundraising banner 62,5% of the time.
>
> Now you maybe think that 37,5% of the time is still large, but the
> appearances are deceptive because of the different ways the banner is used,
> and because the differences in numbers of upload throughout the month
> September. Also the banner is not shown at all during two full weeks,
> important weeks to attract participants. In the end I estimate, based on
> the usage and issues of previous years, etc, that only 10-15% of the
> uploads are made in comparison what normally would have been expected.
>
> This is what I would call a devastating effect.
>
> And this is purely because of bad planning at WMF:
> * They haven't checked which countries participated continuously the past
> years.
> * They haven't informed which countries are likely to participate.
> * And they say they can't move the fundraising banner to another month,
> but it is still a mystery why that isn't possible.
>
> This same issue was originally the case in two countries, but somehow it
> was possible to move it for the second country.
>
> This is really sad for Italy. Extra sad because of the difficult copyright
> situation in Italy, what requires the local team already to do much much
> much more work than in most other countries, just to have a normal contest.
> The Italian team does a great job this year.
>
>
> *My conclusion*
> The community is working very hard on improving and expanding the content
> of Wikipedia by organising Wiki Loves Monuments. I always thought that this
> was the number one priority of the whole Wikimedia movement. Did I made a
> wrong assumption somehow?
>
> But when it actually matters, the community project bears the bunt. This
> is sad, very sad.
>
>
> Please all, support the Italian team, they do a great job and deserve a
> successful contest.
>
> Greetings,
>
> Romaine
>
>
>
> PS: I am one of the international organisers of Wiki Loves Monuments this
> year, but this e-mail is written on my personal account only.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wiki Loves Monuments mailing list
> WikiLovesMonuments at lists.wikimedia.org
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikilovesmonuments
> http://www.wikilovesmonuments.org
>
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