Grants/WikiSangamotsavam 2013/Malayalam Wiki Conference 2013

Project details

 * Official project name:
 * WikiSangamotsavam 2013 - Malayalam Wiki Conference 2013, the second annual conference of Malayalam Wikimedians


 * Project start date:
 * 21 December 2013


 * Project completion date
 * 23 December 2013


 * Brief Description:
 * WikiSangamotsavam 2013 [abbreviation: mlWS2013] (Malayalam Wiki Conference 2013) is the second edition of the annual grand conference of Malayalam Wikimedians (ml.wikipedia.org & sister projects), of Kerala, India. Apart from an annual get-together of all ml Wikimedians, this project serves to some intensive experience sharing, wide media coverage and social attention. The programme incorporates a set of pre-conference outreach and GLAM events, some featured events and edit-a-thons predominantly for Malayalam wikipedia. As of now, WikiSangamotsavam is the biggest Wikipedia outreach event in India conducted by a local language community. Details of the first edition of WikiSangamotsavam, which was a great success, can be found here.

Financial details

 * Currency requested:
 * Indian Rupees (INR)


 * Amount requested in currency requested:
 * INR 221,385


 * Equivalent amount in US$ on the date of this submission:
 * US$3,501


 * List the exchange rate used to calculate the amount listed in US$:
 * US$0.015812777 per euro (quoted from bloomberg.org on 11 November 2012)

Special Note
The overall project cost is '''Rs. 654575'''. However, we would like the WMIN to take up only a part of this expense, i.e. for part of the conference infrastructure, Wiki Handbooks, GLAM-related feature events and travel scholarships for invited delegates from other Indic Wikimedia communities (Detailed break-up provided below). We are also soliciting the help of more entities such as Wikimedia India and CIS-A2K etc.

Grantee details

 * Are you an organization, an individual, or an individual submitting on behalf of a group?
 * GROUP
 * (The two project leads who are cosignatories on the Grant Agreement are cobeneficiaries on the project's bank account).


 * Group information:
 * Name of group:
 * WikiSangamotsavam-2013/Organizers WikiSangamotsavam -2013 Organizing Committee


 * Purpose of group:
 * A regional group of Wikimedians who conduct the annual conference of ml.wikimedia community on a regular basis, but are not a formal chapter or incorporated entity. The group is headed by a committee selected and endorsed by the active Wikimedia community members from the ml.wikimedia. (See link below)
 * Link to information about your group:
 * Organising Committe (Malayalam), WikiSangamotsavam-2013/Organizers WikiSangamotsavam -2013 Organizing Committee (Page at Metawiki of Wikimedia.org)

Contact information

 * 1st Project Lead:
 * Project lead name:
 * Adv. T.K Sujith
 * Project lead username or email:
 * User:Adv.tksujith, tksujith at gmail dot com
 * Project lead title (position within group), if any:
 * General Convenor of Wikisangamotsavam Organising Committee


 * 2nd Project Lead:
 * Project lead name:
 * Adv. P. Manojkumar
 * Project lead username or email:
 * User:Mpmanoj‎, manojkumarmano at gmail dot com
 * Project lead title (position within group), if any:
 * Treasurer of Wikisangamotsavam Organising Committee

Project goal
Please briefly describe what will be accomplished if the project is successful.
 * Project goal:
 * The planned second edition of Malayalam WikiSangamotsavam 2013 ('mlWS2013') aims to reinforce the synergy of ml.wiki community by improving upon their peer co-operation, mass outreach and absorption of fresh contributors. The program will result in greater content enrichment, content quality and emancipation of potential knowledge sources related to Wikimedia projects, in all Indian languages in general and in Malayalam language in particular. mlWS2013 will further catalyze our already recognized achievements in liaising with the government, academics, writers and students and common public.

Measures of success
Please provide a list of measurable criteria that will be used determine how successful the project is. You will need to report on the success of the project according to these measures after the project is completed.
 * Measures of success:
 * A significant boost in the number of active users (Up by at least 100)
 * A significant boost in the number of article creation and edit rates, particularly on focused topics
 * A new approach in synergizing content creation among Indian language community wikis by focusing on topics of common interest
 * A nation-wide media exposure to the cause and mission of Wikimedia projects by print, air and online media.
 * Conception of new GLAM collaboration ventures between wikimedia community and public agencies over the severl months to follow.
 * Penetration of Wikimedia and open knowledge platforms into more student and teaching communities

Project scope and activities
''This section describes what will happen if this project is funded. Who will do what, and when?''


 * List of activities:

The budget statement below points out all the activities planned. We have presented all details regarding the program and its management at our community Wikipedia project pages but in Malayalam language. We are also adding translations of these pages into English to the Meta under the folder WikiSangamotsavam-2013, gradually. A Committee comprising of active Wikipedians, local leaders, volunteers and well wishers have been formed with a well defined responsibility matrix in place.

Budget and resources
Please provide a detailed breakdown of project expenses according to the instructions here.

''Grantees are subject to line-item scrutiny of expenses. Changes to the approved budget beyond 10% in any category must be approved in advance.''


 * Project budget table:

Following are the bidget details covering all expenses and sources of expected grants. The heads against which, each grant will be spent are shown as separate tables. A detailed break-up of cost estimates are also provided underneath.

(The original version with any possible/contingent amendments are available at the Malayalam Wikipedia page: https://ml.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wp:WS2013/Finance )

Budget overview
Assumed Exchange Rate for conversion of any sums provided by WMF:  1 US$ =  63.24  INR  (As on 12/11/2013)

Schedule of estimates

 * Legend
 * INR = Indian Rupees; VA = Voluntary Assistants; LP = Local Participants; RP = Regional Participants; NP = National Participants; SP = Student Participants; CG = Chief Guests; HA = Helper Assistants; MR= Media Representatives)

Non-financial requirements

 * Requests for non-financial assistance:
 * We will require permission to use the logos of Wikipedia and similar projects for use on the SWAG, information brochures and media publicity materials used for this event. None of such materials are produced or distributed for a price or profit.
 * It is our earnest desire to take maximum advantage of this occasion by way of massive publicity and media exposure to the maximum possible extend, even at a global level, as it will greatly boost the morale and motivate many new contributors. We request WMF/WMIN to assist, endorse and augment such media outreach.
 * We also request WMIN to support us in our seeking grand requests and assistance from other sources (as projected above) in whichever way and extend possible by way of WMIN's goodwill and influence.
 * We are striving hard to produce or gather a moderately sufficient quantity of SWAG merchandize to the conference attendees and students using the limited resources available. It will be highly appreciated if WMIN can supplement this by sending additional quantities of stickers and similar materials,
 * We may want to publish one or more blog posts on our project on WMIN's blog. We will need help reaching out to the communications team at WMIN to coordinate this.

Resources
Social Media: Facebook
 * Resources:
 * List of team members
 * Adv. T.K Sujith‍‍
 * Viswaprabha
 * Shiju Alex
 * Netha Hussain
 * Kannan Shanmugham
 * Anoopan
 * Ramesh N.G
 * User:Mpmanoj
 * Akhil Krishnan
 * Community Support
 * Project Page
 * List of Persons interested to participate (as on 13/11/2013)
 * Site Notice
 * Endorsements
 * Team Competency
 * Malayalam Community have organised more than fifty outreach programmes within the state of Kerala, neighboring regions and also at locations abroad where target community members are densely populated: See the template
 * Project Lead Adv. T.K Sujith have organised more than a dozen events within past 3 years.
 * The conference and associated events are taking place in a city where the community has a strong base. There is also a handsome number of off-wiki volunteers who are wholeheartedly supporting the movement and now prepared to help the program management.
 * The community maintains very good reputation and relations with the governmental, academic, media and local administration agencies. This will ensure smooth transactions and facilitations for the successful completion of the program.
 * Many of the team members are professionally qualified, trained and experienced in conducting such events for both corporate and non-profit entities.
 * They also share a lot of lessons learnt from a similar large program (WikiSangamotsavam 2012) conducted last year at Kollam.
 * Success Stories:
 * Shanmugham - WikiSangamotsavam 2012/Malayalam Wiki Conference 2012/Report|WikiSangamotsavam 2012,
 * Shanmugham - Malayalam Wikipedia/10th Birthday Celebrations/Report|ML Wiki 10th Birth Day Celebrations

Fit to strategy

 * WikiSangamotsavam 2013 is Conceived with the ultimate objective of penetrating the movement into more masses. Our previous efforts have been slowly bringing visible changes in the perception of public about Wikimedia projects. Today, a considerable segment of the common public in Kerala are aware of the existence and altruistic cause of Wikipedia. However, like other parts of India and Global South, the massive influx of potential editing contributors to ml.wiki projects still needs to be increased to make it a reputable number. This program aspires to set another significant  milestone on this long road map.


 * mlWS2013 includes a 'WikiVidyarthi Sangamam', a gathering of selectively invited School students who are already exposed to Wikipedia as early contributors or are in the process of the same currently. A minimum of 100 students will be participating in this. [Malayalam community had collaborated with such students and schools in previous years and has introduced several important public domain volumes into ml.Wikisources enriching both the contents of Wikisource as well as the computing skills of those students]. Plans for a student's conference this year is already well received and appreciated by many schools of the region. The infusion of Wikipedia concepts and collaborative advantages into the minds of these students will go a long way enhancing the content and readership of our projects on a statewide scale.
 * mlWikiSangamotsavam includes a meet for 'differently abled' users. Some successful leaders in this field, some of them themselves differently abled, will present, demonstrate and train their tools and methods in using Wikipedia without a helping assistant, to the a specially invited target group users.
 * One of the core session of WikiSangamotsavam is planned to be a seminar-cum-symposium on the symbiotic accomplishments and future possibilities between the stakeholders of Malayalam language and the Wikimedia projects. This is programmed to be participated and directed by eminent personalities from the academia, government, media and literary and creative intelligentsia. The expected outcomes are intense mutual assurance and a very lucrative future interaction and engagement. This is going to affect the prospects of GLAM, Wikipedia content, Wikisource input, Wikimedia Commons repositories and the user base of WM projects in a very positive way.
 * The location where the program is being conducted, Alappuzha, is well known as one of the Ramsar wetlands hot points. Currently, in Kerala and in India in general, a massive public awareness momentum is being built up, on the need of preserving special climatic regions and its effect on sustained environmental and biodiversity systems. Leveraging on the circumstances, we intend to add several feature events to this program such as a half-day Wetland study trip "Wiki Jala Yatra" (Wiki Wetland Exploration). A select number of active Indian Wikipedians (including delegates from 14 other Indic Wikimedia communities) together with eminent subject matter experts, scientists and teachers will participate in this expedition. The participants are expected to create and/or enrich articles on related topics in their own community wikipedia pages, imbibing lessons from this experience.
 * The program will also include a photowalk around the city and its vicinities prior to the core events. We intend to initiate a QR Code project within a few weeks after the conference, with the permission and co-operation of the state government departments (of tourism, forest, transport etc.) as a pilot model which has the prospects to be scaled up massively over the entire state of Kerala. Such a project will benefit both the interests of Wikipedia as well as the people and government of Kerala.


 * The conference will invite upto 30 delegates, specially selected and invited, from the other Wikipedia communities from India. We intend to make use of this opportunity to start new models of national collaboration where contributions within each community projects can be reused efficiently among the remaining ones. The long term focus areas for these models will be political geography, railways and surface transport, biological taxonomy, geodesic information, films and music. The models will heavily rely on the upcoming interfaces of Wikidata.

Benefits

 * Malayalam Wikimedia community and all of its projects will be benifiting from this event. In addition, most Indic Wikimedia communities by way of lessons learnt on collaborative exchange of content enriching and content management.


 * Please provide a brief statement about how the project is related to other work in the Wikimedia movement. :Please see above under section "Fit to strategy". GLAM, Wikisources, WikiVoyage, Wikimedia Commons are some of the specific areas the program will effect positively.


 * If successful, will the project have the potential to be replicated successfully by other individuals, groups, or organizations?
 * Yes. At Malayalam Community, we always like to impart and share our experiences and lessons learnt to peer communities as well as any organizations and movements connected with open knowledge and educational missions. The delegates to the conference can benefit from some of the first hand experiences on the innovations and steps we undertake to keep ourselves as one of the most vibrant communities in India.


 * Please list other benefits to the movement here.
 * Please see above under section "Fit to strategy".