Hi everyone -
Zack here from the Communications team at the Foundation. I want to say some more about the theme for the Foundation’s annual report and why we picked it.
We chose the theme in early October as a way to remind the world how Wikipedia works and why our movement matters. By that time, and before the U.S. elections, the state of fact-based information had become a highly-discussed topic internationally. We received questions from the media about how and why Wikipedia was able to avoid the fake news phenomenon, while many other companies had become amplifiers for false information. We heard from donors about the importance of Wikipedia in a world where verifiable information is not promised. We saw, as always, an unwavering commitment from the community to presenting the facts.
International conversations around fake news and facts only serve to reinforce how the Wikimedia movement’s commitment to verifiability and neutrality are indispensable.[1] This is not just an American or a political phenomenon. Last year in India, a false story about a surveillance chip in a new 2,000 rupee bill spread widely on WhatsApp, which has 50 million monthly users in India (the news was eventually debunked).[2] Just this week, 37 French news organizations came together to launch CrossCheck a collaboration to address the spread of false information online.[3]
In this year’s annual report we offer 10 facts as ways into our communities and our work. They are introductions for Wikimedians who document climate change, increase the number of women’s biographies, offer language and learning to refugees, or add new languages to Wikipedia (welcome Tulu!). They are stories, as are always included in the annual report, that show who Wikimedians are and why their work is so powerful. The stories are meant to appeal to even the most general and non-Wikimedia-familiar reader. So we consciously work to show how the big data points of 2016 last year are evaluated and interpreted by Wikimedians.
The 10 facts are also ways to examine the impact of Foundation projects.
From Support & Safety to understanding New Readers, there are stories of
how collaborations between communities and departments make amazing things happen.
Concerning the banners, we crafted that language as a broad thank you and an invitation for the curious to learn more about the Wikimedia movement and the Wikimedia Foundation. Quite consciously we sought language that is not political. If you have copy ideas on how to relate that message better, I would be happy to work with you! -> zmccune [at] wikimedia [dot] org
Yair, Florence, and everyone, I am grateful that you opened this discussion. And I hope I can help explain more things as questions come up.
- Zack
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability
[2] http://indianexpress.com/article/technology/tech-news-technology/nope-rs-200... [3] http://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2017/02/28/lutte-contre-les-faus...
From: Florence Devouard [email protected] Date: Thu, Mar 2, 2017 at 1:08 AM Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] More politics: "WMF Annual Report" To: [email protected]
Le 02/03/2017 à 01:15, Erik Moeller a écrit :
On Wed, Mar 1, 2017 at 3:44 PM, Florence Devouard [email protected] wrote:
For example... the message "one in six people visited another country in 2016"... illustrated by "SeaTac Airport protest against immigration ban. Sit-in blocking arrival gates until 12 detainees at Sea-Tac are released. Photo by Dennis Bratland.CC BY-SA 4.0"
Really... "visiting a country" is a quite different thing from "immigrating".
The caption is in fact misleading because it uses the phrase "immigration ban", which is a mischaracterization of the ban. The Executive Order was not an immigration ban; it (temporarily) banned people from those countries from entering the United States, even for visits, with some exceptions. See:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/31/us/politics/t rump-immigration-ban-groups.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_13769#Visitors .2C_immigrants_and_refugees
If the photo remains, I recommend changing this caption to use either "travel ban" or "entry ban"; both phrases are used in the Wikipedia article.
Erik
Nod. Erik and Dan, what you say make sense.
Florence
Thanks for jumping in Zach.
Good explanations and contextual background. Thanks.
Bunch of suggestions for fixes and small improvement (sourcing, legend) have been offered on this list by others. Good.
I have another easy to implement suggestion that might help to decrease potential confusion.
Currently, the default fact displayed at the top of the fact page and on every other page is the "half of refugees are of school-age".
Typically, this fact is not so obviously related to Wikipedia and it is probably a bit confusing to see it appear so proeminently in the annual report.
When jumping into the fact page, the refugee fact is still at the top and followed by the global warming one (maybe again not so Wikipedia obviously related)
Maybe a pick for the default top fact, more directly related to Wikipedia, would have been a good idea, such as "most wikipedia articles are in languages other than English" or "wikipedia is updated 350 times per minute".
I think the "wikipedia is updated 350 times per minute" might be the one which makes the more sense to put first as it explains faked news concept.
In short... maybe reshuffling the order of "facts" and choosing another default one.
What do you think ? Makes sense ? Or was there a specific thought behind putting the refugee first ? (aside from putting a pict of children that is).
And adding perhaps a one-liner to explain this "facts" approach.
A question... is translation of the annual report considered ?
Florence
PS: Otherwise, I think Risker makes a good point.
Le 02/03/2017 à 02:26, Zachary McCune a écrit :
Hi everyone -
Zack here from the Communications team at the Foundation. I want to say some more about the theme for the Foundation’s annual report and why we picked it.
We chose the theme in early October as a way to remind the world how Wikipedia works and why our movement matters. By that time, and before the U.S. elections, the state of fact-based information had become a highly-discussed topic internationally. We received questions from the media about how and why Wikipedia was able to avoid the fake news phenomenon, while many other companies had become amplifiers for false information. We heard from donors about the importance of Wikipedia in a world where verifiable information is not promised. We saw, as always, an unwavering commitment from the community to presenting the facts.
International conversations around fake news and facts only serve to reinforce how the Wikimedia movement’s commitment to verifiability and neutrality are indispensable.[1] This is not just an American or a political phenomenon. Last year in India, a false story about a surveillance chip in a new 2,000 rupee bill spread widely on WhatsApp, which has 50 million monthly users in India (the news was eventually debunked).[2] Just this week, 37 French news organizations came together to launch CrossCheck a collaboration to address the spread of false information online.[3]
In this year’s annual report we offer 10 facts as ways into our communities and our work. They are introductions for Wikimedians who document climate change, increase the number of women’s biographies, offer language and learning to refugees, or add new languages to Wikipedia (welcome Tulu!). They are stories, as are always included in the annual report, that show who Wikimedians are and why their work is so powerful. The stories are meant to appeal to even the most general and non-Wikimedia-familiar reader. So we consciously work to show how the big data points of 2016 last year are evaluated and interpreted by Wikimedians.
The 10 facts are also ways to examine the impact of Foundation projects. From Support & Safety to understanding New Readers, there are stories of how collaborations between communities and departments make amazing things happen.
Concerning the banners, we crafted that language as a broad thank you and an invitation for the curious to learn more about the Wikimedia movement and the Wikimedia Foundation. Quite consciously we sought language that is not political. If you have copy ideas on how to relate that message better, I would be happy to work with you! -> zmccune [at] wikimedia [dot] org
Yair, Florence, and everyone, I am grateful that you opened this discussion. And I hope I can help explain more things as questions come up.
- Zack
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability
[2] http://indianexpress.com/article/technology/tech-news-technology/nope-rs-200... [3] http://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2017/02/28/lutte-contre-les-faus...
From: Florence Devouard [email protected] Date: Thu, Mar 2, 2017 at 1:08 AM Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] More politics: "WMF Annual Report" To: [email protected]
Le 02/03/2017 à 01:15, Erik Moeller a écrit :
On Wed, Mar 1, 2017 at 3:44 PM, Florence Devouard [email protected] wrote:
For example... the message "one in six people visited another country in 2016"... illustrated by "SeaTac Airport protest against immigration ban. Sit-in blocking arrival gates until 12 detainees at Sea-Tac are released. Photo by Dennis Bratland.CC BY-SA 4.0"
Really... "visiting a country" is a quite different thing from "immigrating".
The caption is in fact misleading because it uses the phrase "immigration ban", which is a mischaracterization of the ban. The Executive Order was not an immigration ban; it (temporarily) banned people from those countries from entering the United States, even for visits, with some exceptions. See:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/31/us/politics/t rump-immigration-ban-groups.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_13769#Visitors .2C_immigrants_and_refugees
If the photo remains, I recommend changing this caption to use either "travel ban" or "entry ban"; both phrases are used in the Wikipedia article.
Erik
Nod. Erik and Dan, what you say make sense.
Florence