Greetings, fellow FB'ers!! A couple of points. I mentioned this before on IRC, why is Social Media and FB being used by the India operations? If this is an initiative by WMF, I would have thought it could have been taken on from SF. Expert opinions about "Why Facebook" aside, this pilot program doesn't seem to have anything unique for the Indian context. It is still the same scatter approach, get more people to 'Like', and between the mountains of, "OMG, lol, I like totally like Wikipedia. lol" get them to make an edit. After going through the "numbers", there seems to be a conversion rate of 8% or less with a total edits of less than 300.
Second, I understand that there might be 2 skill-sets involved here. But I don't know how qualified Indian staff members, or even SF ones are, to take on one-on-one teaching assignments like these. To the best of my knowledge, SF staff for the most part avoid teaching assignments, which are done by a handful of editors on staff. Most of the Indian staff member's editing started after or a few months prior to joining WMF, and turned into teaching within a month or two. In Noopur's case, I understand, that teaching and editing might be two different skill-sets, but I don't know if she possesses the other one either. She is without doubt qualified to Tweet and FB ( lawd knows, I can't argue ;) ), but teaching others to edit? She barely completed her first year editing, sometime last week I think, and a lot of those edits were in the course of her job. I'm weary only because this was one of the large problems with the IEP. On Mon, May 28, 2012 at 5:35 PM, Noopur Raval <nra...@wikimedia.org> wrote: > Dear all, > > Greetings! Here's an update on the Social Media pilot > program<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Program/Pilot_Designs/Social_Media>. > Just a small recap before I go on to the numbers. > > *Why Facebook?* > Why we decided to go with Facebook at all is because potential new editors > are more comfortable and familiar with the channel. To illustrate, after > outreach sessions, we tried staying in touch with around 100 participants > using a combination of email and talk page messages and got just 3 > responses. When we sent an invite to a Facebook page where they could get > help and inputs on how to edit, we got 300 signed up in less than 3 days. > Also, social media requires relatively lower investments of time and > resources from our community and many Internet savvy people are comfortable > using it. The Social Media program was started in order to effectively > utilize platforms like Facebook and community groups there (like the Odia > Wikipedia group, Kannada Wikipedia group) in order to engage more new > editors and give them basic lessons on editing. > > However, running a Facebook group is very different from using Facebook > for personal updates. That's why after observing how these groups work > and interacting with a few editors who started these groups, we developed a > systematic 19 point guide that looks at various aspects of how to do use > Facebook effectively including aspects like discipline in messaging, > structuring the interactions, tone of messaging, selecting articles, being > cautious with Wikispeak etc. (Of course, it keeps in mind WP:NOTFACEBOOK.) > {{Like}} > > Here's a sneak peek into what we've been doing on two different groups: > > 1) You can also write on > Wikipedia<https://www.facebook.com/groups/wikipediasupport/> > > This group was primarily started to give lessons in English editing. > Although all of us use social network sites, it is important to understand > that the way we interact on Wikipedia is very different from Facebook. This > is the gap we are trying to bridge through more deliberate messaging. As > mentioned in the detailed program > guide<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Program/Pilot_Designs/Social_Media#Process>, > we try and do regular editing sessions with fun, interesting articles that > have adequate space for improvement (therefore making it easier for new > editors to make their first edits.) > > Through a series of 5 basic tasks like creating a username, correcting a > spelling mistake, adding a line of information, adding a reference and > adding an interwiki link, we try and get the user to make their first 5 > edits in less than 10 minutes. Our initial experiments show promise and of > the 400+ members right now, over 30 users have participated in these > mini-editing sessions and have now edited for the very first time. (You > can see their usernames in the > doc<https://www.facebook.com/groups/wikipediasupport/doc/353268748054711/>on > the group; do note that are the names of 7 existing editors also on that > list, who are the mentors.) > So, out of 400+ members, over 30 edited. This would have a conversion rate of 8% or less, I believe. The total edits generated by this exercise don't seem to exceed 250-300 edits, since the inception. I wonder, don't workshops, or mid-size meetups have mostly the same response generated without this much fanfare. I'm sure, yelling at a busy street might have similar conversion rates. > > To cite examples, User: > Zamsam<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Zamsam>(a young new > editor) came to the group and wanted to create the article on > cricketer Ajit Chandila <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajit_Chandila>. > Once we helped him create the article, he started contributing to > Chandila's article and moved on to another cricketer, Manvinder > Bisla's<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manvinder_Bisla>article. Similarly, > User:10gible > <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/10gible>joined us to edit > the article on Lalu > Prasad Yadav <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lalu_Prasad_Yadav> while > User:Neeasmaverick<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Neeasmaverick>edited > the article on his college, Jawaharlal > Nehru University<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jawaharlal_Nehru_University>, > Vicky Donor <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicky_Donor> and Amul > girl<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amul_girl>and > User:Saranshkataria<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Saranshkataria>edited > Aloo > Chaat <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aloo_Chaat> and > Rasgulla<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rasgulla>. > > Most of the listed new users here, only make minor edits and then stop completely. There also seems to be something odd here, the formatting of citations, knowledge of template formatting and edit summaries, aren't common from new editors in the first week. And I'm only speaking from my experience of dealing with new editors for close to 2 years on IRC. I see Srikeit and a couple of senior editors helping out and editing in tandem, maybe that's it. > This could not have been possible without a group of wonderful mentors > like Debanjan, Karthik, Deepon, Sheel, Pratik and Harsh who volunteered and > constantly keep helping new editors. We had Skype calls and regular chats > just to ensure that we connect with new users in a way they find most > comfortable. > > The first hurdle of getting new editors to do a set of basic tasks has > been crossed for some. The challenge going forward will always be is to > sustain the interest of these new editors and make them long term editors > hopefully by multiple editing sessions. That still needs to be figured out. > Any inputs, comments and help are welcome. > > 2) Odia Wikipedia group <https://www.facebook.com/groups/OdiaWiki/> > > This group caters to Odia Wikipedians as well as people who speak the > language and might be interested in knowing about Wikipedia. We used > similar techniques as above to expand the group conversations beyond > existing Wikipedians and encourage new editors to participate. > > Once when an article on Handia <https://or.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handia> (a > local beverage) was posted, a new > User:Swetapadma<https://or.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E0%AC%AC%E0%AD%8D%E0%AD%9F%E0%AC%AC%E0%AC%B9%E0%AC%BE%E0%AC%B0%E0%AC%95%E0%AC%BE%E0%AC%B0%E0%AD%80:Swetapadma07&action=edit&redlink=1>came > forward to contribute images. Since then, she has been contributing to > articles on Odia cuisine and adding images to articles on Tribes of Odisha. > User:Hellohappy<https://or.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E0%AC%AC%E0%AD%8D%E0%AD%9F%E0%AC%AC%E0%AC%B9%E0%AC%BE%E0%AC%B0%E0%AC%95%E0%AC%BE%E0%AC%B0%E0%AD%80:Hellohappy>edited > the article on Capital > High School, > Bhubaneswar<https://or.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_High_School,_Bhubaneswar> > . > > So far almost 10 new users have joined in and made their first few edits > in the past month. Given the small size of Indic communities, this could be > a very effective way of encouraging newbies. This also helps because it > means that it filters in those who have Internet connectivity, are > passionate about the language and (in most cases) are familiar with typing > in Indic languages). > > Again, this was done with the help of existing Odia Wikipedians like > Gorvachove, Mrutyunjay Kar, Gyanranjan Sahu, Suratha Parhi, Diptiman and > others. > This is really what I wanted to mention. It has been close to an year, and the majority of updates and work I've read consistently mention odia wikipedia and smaller Indic language groups. I don't know if that is intentional to keep the visibility low, or just a preference. I am all for improving Indic Wikis, but there are other Indic languages who desperately need attention. For example Hindi Wikipedia, while the largest language within India, is and has been, in dire need of attention. I am also under the impression that the entire Indian staff speaks Hindi very well, along with the majority of readers on this list, yet, there have been little or no attempts to improve the Hindi Wikipedia. Earlier this year, there were multiple issues with hi.wp with user rights abuses, copyright violations etc. I don't think anyone besides Ashwin and a couple of senior editors bothered looking into or offering to help. There needs to be more consistency when talking about Indic languages. I see the same smaller Wikis mentioned over and over a lot more than others. Regards Theo
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