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commons-app / apps-android-commons

The Wikimedia Commons Android app allows users to upload pictures from their Android phone/tablet to Wikimedia Commons
https://commons-app.github.io/
Apache License 2.0
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Hold workshops to teach people how to use our app to contribute to Commons #1871

Open misaochan opened 5 years ago

misaochan commented 5 years ago

This was inspired by Shyamal's report in 2016 where he used our app to hold a Commons workshop in the Himalayas, citing:

A discovery was that people of the region are happy to use WhatsApp and Instagram to upload images but seemed to be a bit hesitant about using a browser and were quite happy to see the Upload to Commons app. It seems that there would be great value to localizing this as well as creating some kind of multi-share app that would save people the need to upload a single image to multiple sites and incur additional mobile internet cost.

I was thinking that at the end of 2019, after we have completed most of the improvements that are planned for our PG (trying to be optimistic here! :)), it might be a good idea to run a couple of workshops to teach people how to use the app to contribute to Commons, with focus on either Global South locations, or female contributors.

If we have volunteers to run them, I can include this in our PG proposal with a request for cost reimbursement. All travel should be local only (or at least low-cost ground transport) and it is expected that people will bring their own Android mobile phones, so costs should be kept low, preferably less than USD 200 per workshop.

Perhaps those in India (@maskaravivek , @ashishkumar468 , @tanvidadu , @ujjwalagrawal17 ?) could hold a local workshop there, and perhaps I or another woman (@neslihanturan , @tanvidadu ?) might run one for women. Or any other volunteers?

VojtechDostal commented 5 years ago

I would be very happy to "spread the word" through the usual Wikimedia channels. I am positive that many chapters might chip in with a workshop in their country. Might be a very nice campaign indeed.

misaochan commented 5 years ago

That would be wonderful, thanks! :) Would it help them if we prepared material for them to use in their teaching (e.g. a slideshow)? My main concern is that such material would get outdated quickly because of active development in our app, but if it helps it could still be worth the effort. (Also, the material would not be localized)

VojtechDostal commented 5 years ago

Maybe it would be better to collaboratively prepare a list of "things people need to know" about the app and uploading to Commons. I think the most didactive approach to showing the app would be an opportunity to do a live videocast of things happening on teacher's mobile device (he/she could walk them through the app). But I'm not sure if there is a good free app which allows reliable videocast.

misaochan commented 5 years ago

We can definitely do a live videocast, but the main issue with using that as a tutorial is lack of easy updating options. With a list or other written media we can easily edit sections, but with a videocast, when anything is changed within the app, it will be difficult to update just that section of the videocast AFAIK.

A list of "things people need to know" about the app on Commons sounds like a great idea!

VojtechDostal commented 5 years ago

:-) I don't mean to do the videocast, let's just document ways how people can capture the screen themselves and do a live show.

misaochan commented 5 years ago

Oh, I see! That looks a lot more feasible, haha. Will add this to our project plan. :)

ilgazer commented 5 years ago

The workshop concept looks like a wonderful idea. While the workshops remain in the distant future, i think it is worthwhile to start thinking about it. To begin with:

misaochan commented 5 years ago

Who would be the target demographic of these workshops?

Preferably underrepresented communities in Commons - which I think covers pretty much everywhere in the Global South, and additionally, non-male contributors anywhere in the world?

How would our audience learn about these workshops? We can't exactly afford ads, and would word of mouth be efecive enough?

Pamphlets and posters, perhaps? If we hold them in universities, there will be boards to put posters up for events. The only cost would be printing, if a volunteer could design the poster (as we did in the 2017 hackathon).

Where would these workshop be held? For example, for a target audience of young people, universities could be a good idea.

Great idea! I think universities would be excellent, especially for a low cost budget.

neslihanturan commented 5 years ago

Great idea, can you imagine how many bug reports we can get with this way, I am very excited again! I am in as a volunteer:)

misaochan commented 5 years ago

@neslihanturan Great, thanks! :D

sivaraam commented 5 years ago

In case you're interested, I could help with this too. I live in India. Possibly with the help of user groups here, I could try conducting a workshop here. I'm OK if you've planned for a workshop somewhere else, though as I haven't conducted workshops before :-)

Typically, how much audience would you expect to attend the workshop?

sivaraam commented 5 years ago

Also, let me know if there is a particular place you're trying to target in India.

misaochan commented 5 years ago

Fantastic, @sivaraam , thanks for offering. :) India would be great for a workshop. I don't have a particular part of India in mind, what would you (and the other folks who live in India) recommend?

For audience, I think we probably shouldn't target more than 20-30 per workshop. You might not be able to get around quickly enough to help everyone if the group was too large. Of course, it would depend on how many volunteers we have to run it, and the size of the free/cheap venues.

sivaraam commented 5 years ago

I don't have a particular part of India in mind, what would you (and the other folks who live in India) recommend?

Just thinking out loud, may be the people in the villages?

tanvidadu commented 5 years ago

Sorry for the late reply! I would also like to volunteer. I can help in organizing technical workshops focused on Open Source and how to contribute to Commons in my college, NSIT both as part of university technical fest or a standalone event. The target audience will be the university students from NSIT as well as other nearby colleges and universites.

misaochan commented 5 years ago

Wonderful, @tanvidadu , thanks for volunteering! :) I think one workshop held in a university (by you), and one held by @sivaraam in the villages as he recommended, would be fantastic.

It will likely take a while before we are ready for this, since we need to get the backend overhaul completed and all major issues solved before it would make sense to hold these workshops. Probably in ~6 months from now or so?

misaochan commented 4 years ago

Important: Originally I had planned for these to be held roughly around the middle of this year. However, due to the new directives listed at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:Project , "All offline (in-person) public events funded by Rapid Grants, Project Grants, or Annual Plan Grants must be cancelled or postponed until further notice", and "We will not be approving grants for offline events happening before September 15, 2020 until further notice".

So we will have to postpone these workshops, or there is also the option of cancelling them if that isn't feasible.

misaochan commented 4 years ago

As we are approaching the end of our grant, unfortunately I will have to remove this from the grant tasks as per WMF's updated Covid directives:

Due to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, all in-person or offline events funded by the Wikimedia Foundation's grants have been indefinitely cancelled or postponed

I think we can leave this issue open though, so that in the (far) future if someone wants to run a volunteer workshop they can refer to it.