New Readers/Updates

The team will write updates here at least monthly about what we've been working on. You can find ways to participate at each of the focus area pages (awareness, affordability, offline) and see our active quarterly goals at New Readers/Quarterly goals.

June 30, 2017

See slide 66 for a high-level update.

General

We reported our high-level status at the Reading quarterly checkin for Q3. Individual projects are reported in their teams' quarterly checkins. Starting for Q4, in a few weeks, we will be reporting on the program as a whole with more detail.

We are working on releasing the research data from last year's ethnographic research in Mexico, India, and Nigeria according to our open access policy. We'll update here when that's completed.

The follow up phone survey for Iraq is almost ready to launch. Translations are complete, and it is going through a final round of debugging. We look forward to getting the results and will share them alongside an analysis of the accompanying campaign when we have the data shortly.

We also received feedback from the FDC on the annual plan with criticism about our work's connection to community members. We are eager to demonstrate how incorrect that understanding is. It is critical to us to work hand in hand with local communities, and we're actively defining how we do that - you can see more of that reasoning here in our response to the FDC. If there is more you think that we can do to collaborate with community members in the countries we are working in, please let us know!

The last month has also been a big month for travel across the New Readers team...

• 

  "Hello from Nigeria!"

  For Movement strategy research, Jorge, Anne, and Adele were in Brazil and Ravi was in Indonesia. This research is intended to inform the ongoing [[movement strategy]], and we're also looking forward to incorporating the findings more quickly into our work for New Readers. The protocol was extended from that of the research that we did last year in Mexico, India, and Nigeria, but with a broader focus that included reaching people who had no internet access at all. While in the field, the team also met with community members to get their input, share what we've been learning, and look for potential collaborations.
• Zack and Jack were in Nigeria, both for work supporting the movement strategy, and also to connect with the Nigerian marketing committee and agency for the awareness campaigns. For the movement strategy, they met and collected direction from 21 participants. They were also lucky to attend a Wikimedia Nigeria community event to mark Democracy Day- a national holiday in Lagos- meeting 28 local Wikimedians.
• Jorge attended Iberocoop in Buenos Aires, and led strategy track with Marco from Wikimedia Chile. Iberocoop community shared their thoughts and concerns with WMF, reflected in a letter to Katherine. The letter describes in detail their requests and thoughts, which overall reflect a need to be better served by WMF across different topics.

Offline

A download of the PDF for the article about Mumbai in Hindi, from a mobile phone. For the list of contributors, see: https://hi.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E0%A4%AE%E0%A5%81%E0%A4%AE%E0%A5%8D%E0%A4%AC%E0%A4%88&action=history

We completed a heuristic evaluation for the Wikimed app to improve usability. The Kiwix development team has started to incorporate this feedback, and plans to continue to use it to fuel improvements in the coming year.

You can almost read ZIM files in the beta Wikipedia Android App! This is a big step to providing more complete offline support in the app, and we're excited to continue this work. We'll share here once the build is out for you to investigate and give us feedback.

Mobile print styles are out for the web. This means that from any mobile phone, if you choose to print as PDF you will have a mobile-formatted PDF to save the article offline. Check out an example to the right.

Actors getting set to film in Nigeria

Behind the scenes on set

Awareness

The video campaign in Iraq launched, with the video being available in Arabic and Kurdish, with more than 2.7 million views so far. The engagement rate on content (computed as actions taken on the content divided by total impressions) is currently around 0.8% which is 1.6x the industry benchmark of 0.5%. You can also add subtitles in your language to this blank version to share! This was done with the direction of the Iraqi Wikimedians, who wrote the titles, suggested the Wikipedia articles for inclusion, and pushed for the videos to show life in Iraq that is not war or destruction. We're really happy with the result, and we'll be sharing more about this, including results from a follow up phone survey, at metrics soon.

The first video in Nigeria has been filmed! Check out a still embedded to the right. This short ad is inspired by Chinua Achebe’s “Things Fall Apart” and includes the actor famous for portraying “Onkonkwo” in the 1971 Nigerian film adaptation. The second ad will be filming soon. All creative direction has been conducted in collaboration with 5 members from the Nigerian User Group. We'll share both final versions when they're completed.

Work for a video campaign in India is beginning, with recruitment of 3 Hindi-speaking community members to join Bishaka Datta and a representative from CIS-A2K on the creative committee.

Affordability

No updates around affordability at this time - stay tuned.

May 16, 2017

General

Monthly Metrics: April. The New Readers section starts at 12:30.

The team presented a status update at the Wikimedia Foundation's monthly metrics and activities meeting in April. Check out the video if you'd like a snapshot of our activities and how we're thinking about next steps.

The follow-up phone survey for Iraq is undergoing final design review by different members of the New Readers team, and is nearly complete. The focus of the follow-up survey is to measure Wikipedia awareness changes and identify how well both the Asiacell marketing campaigns and our own branding updates on the mobile web may have contributed to any growth. The phone survey contract is currently going through internal approvals, and the phone survey itself is expected to start in June and be completed by the end of that month. The Global Reach team will share those results when they're completed.

We're working to systematize our consultations with communities so that we can be sure to get their expertise. Check out how we're thinking about approaching this.

Under the umbrella of the Movement Strategy, there are 2 additional research trips (to Brazil and Indonesia) being conducted this month with a similar line of questioning to what we investigated in Mexico, India, and Nigeria last year. Members of the New Readers team are participating in both trips, and we're excited to incorporate these findings into our work.

Offline

The new mobile print styles are set to roll out soon. These came from the research finding that people are downloading content and sharing it between devices. From there, we followed up with evaluative research globally, with a special focus in India.

Otherwise, work continues on the Android app and the Kiwix Wikmed grant.

Awareness

The video for the campaign in Iraq to coincide with the launch of a Wikipedia Zero partnership is almost ready, and we're excited to share it soon. We'll also be presenting on this work in July at the Foundation's monthly metrics meeting.

Work continues on the video production for Nigeria, in partnership with the volunteer marketing committee.

In India, we are in the process of selecting an agency to work with. Once the agency and pilot language(s) are selected, we will build the volunteer marketing committee.

Affordability

We've started looking into what other organizations and movements are saying about access to knowledge and the internet in order to better understand the context in which we fit. See our initial research here, and let us know what we're missing.

April 24, 2017

General

Our quarterly goals for April - July are now set. You can view them here.

We'll be presenting a general update at the Foundation's monthly metrics meeting on Thursday, April 27 as well as a specific update about the campaigns and surveys in Iraq.

Much of the New Readers team attended WMCON in Berlin. It was a great opportunity to connect more with affiliates and chapters and participate in the discussions for the Movement Strategy process.

Offline

Report for concept testing in India, 2017

The second round of research is completed for online-to-offline prototypes on the mobile web. We have decided, in collaboration with the Reading Web team, to pursue the prototype for "Wikilater" that creates a mobile-optimized print style for PDFs. Our testing showed that this option was most useful and understandable to the readers we tested with. For the time being, we will not pursue implementation of the other prototypes.

The Android team continues to investigate an implement ZIM file reading in the app. This means that readers will be able to import and read packaged offline content, like Kiwix creates.

Awareness

Comparison of old and new header for mobile web.

The Reading Web team launched a new header to the mobile web which shows the wiki's wordmark more prominently. This should help people visiting Wikipedia and the other projects know where they are on the internet. The first phone survey in Iraq is complete and results are posted on meta. We're preparing for the second round of surveys following collaborative awareness raising efforts by Asiacell, community members, and Foundation staff. Comparing the two surveys and analyzing site and social media traffic will allow us to understand the effectiveness of different methods of awareness raising. We'll use this to inform our approach to other awareness campaigns globally.

In Nigeria, the partnership with Smile will launch in May. It will include creative approaches to "how to use Wikipedia." Smile has 200,000 active members.

Also in Nigeria, we're working to develop a video marketing strategy in partnership with local community members and a local vendor. The brief for the project was built from a survey of Nigerian Wikipedia readers and the video production will be done in close partnership with 5 community members from Nigeria: Olushola Olanyian, Blossom Ozurumba, Sam Oye, Kayode Yusuf, and Tayo Alimi.

The same process is beginning in India, and we'll update here as it evolves. In the meanwhile, Zack McCune has released results from a survey that he ran with 321 respondents from India to help shape our approach to messaging. The input ranges from how we should describe Wikipedia, to what channels, and priority messages. Check it out!

Rapid Grants towards awareness began with pilots in Botswana and Nigeria. We're excited to see how these initial efforts go and hopefully expand this program in the next fiscal year!

Affordabilty

In Afghanistan, Roshan will launch Wikipedia Zero.

Wikipedia Zero programs in Nepal and Bangaladesh are ending. Community members from both countries have reached out for alternate solutions, reinforcing the need for us to address this barrier both for readers and contributors.

Jorge Vargas attended RightsCon Brussels, where the need for solutions to address affordability was a theme.

Our investigations into approaches for addressing affordability are still in early stages. Please let us know on the program's talk page if you have ideas!

March 8, 2017

General

• Annual planning for the cross-departmental New Readers program is done, and we look forward to hearing your feedback when the plan is made public on April 1.
• Q4 planning:
  • Our Q4 goals are in the process of being finalized, and will be made available here. We will share more detail as we get into planning.
  • Increasing awareness in Nigeria will be a focus. Smile Nigeria’s Wikipedia Zero launch and Eskimi Wikipedia Fan Club, are two excellent opportunities to push the needle for awareness. Smile Nigeria is working on confirming the launch date. Eskimi has shared a template agreement that is currently being reviewed by the legal team. We will be tracking metrics before, during, and after these campaigns to establish baselines for expectations of impact.
• We are working to get our work documented and updated on Meta, so expect to see updates throughout this hub in the coming weeks.

Offline

Our understanding of usage of Wikimedia content offline

• As a follow up to Mobile World Congress 2017, Jorge will be meeting with Brazilian partner (Positivo) on the offline pilot. Kiwix integration on a Linux-based hardware similar to Kiwix-plug still ongoing. Other opportunities with them are in the pipeline.

• We completed an analysis of the offline industry around Wikimedia content. This incorporates our understanding of what is happening with Wikimedia content offline globally. If you have comments, additions, or suggestions, please let us know!
• Anne, Jorge, and Toby are advisors for the offline medical grant for Kiwix. We're offering support for design, usability, strategy, and product. As part of this, we're figuring out how their work and ours fit together.
• Concept and usability testing for the offline prototypes for the mobile web are wrapping up - we'll share those results shortly.
• The Android team is committed to implementing richer offline functionality in the app. Specifically, they're planning to be able to import and display ZIM files, which Kiwix produces. This next quarter will be focused on the investigation of technical and product considerations for this work.

Awareness

Iraq community members welcome the launch of Wikipedia Zero by Asiacell

• We had a Launch Event in MWC Barcelona for Wikipedia Zero - Iraq. This is a first of its kind press conference for a global reading program backed by the Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation. One good learning from this initiative is that we need to lead the partnership with corporate launches. We screened a video in which community members from Iraq urge everyone to contribute to Wikipedia and welcome the launch of Wikipedia Zero by Asiacell. The video was received well by attendees. We have earned more than 100 news stories in 31 countries from the launch announcement.
• Iraq video ad production starts next week. We are working closely with a community member there, who is helping us to reflect the cultural direction of Iraqi community members. We have commissioned an original piece of music for this ad featuring Iraqi instrumentation, following the creative direction of our same community contact.
• We have started interviewing Nigerian marketing agencies for awareness program work. The search is directed by the with the results from the community survey focusing on video production that can explain Wikipedia in schools and on social media. Check the marketing briefs for Nigeria and India.
• First phone survey results are coming in from Iraq. They are a good benchmark for the effectiveness of awareness campaigns. The second survey will be launched soon after consultation with New Readers team to build content for that. Data from phone surveys is appealing for the international press. This is a good story opportunity.

Affordability

• Grace, Adele, and Abbey are working to build and execute the third and last workshop for Affordability. We are excited to act upon solutions that are identified through these workshops.

February 10, 2017

General

• Wiki Indaba was a great experience for our team, we are thrilled to keep working with the communities that we met there. Some highlights:
  • Introduced New Readers, the phone surveys, and Partnerships to the attending community members
  • Built messaging for upcoming campaigns with conference attendees
  • We learned a lot more about what's happening with offline, most notably with regards to Kiwix (thanks to Stephane) and WikiFundi (thanks to Isla and Florence)
  • Taught attendees how to apply for RapidGrants
  • And of course, we enjoyed an amazing sweets table from some 20+ countries
• Annual Planning is starting. We're working on a draft to define the scope of New Readers work for the annual plan. We will have the full draft of the cross-departmental program soon, and you'll be able to see it with the rest of them when the annual plan is submitted.
• As mentioned in previous updates, we have been working on developing a new list of target countries to replace the "global south." We defined the process and the scope of the project in October 2016, and kicked off a discussion to find the best classification. After some months of conversation, we will put this project on hold. We believe the Movement Strategy conversations that will take place this year will provide a deeper insight and define prioritization, that can be complemented by the work we did. We will remain focused on the pilot countries: Mexico, India, Nigeria.

Offline

• Our first round of evaluative design research on 3 prototypes for offline web support is now complete. Check out the presentation with the results!. We will conduct another on the ground in India this month.
• Jorge and Anne continue to work on understanding the entire offline space as well as identify user needs that have come up. This will help to define how we might best reach people with offline content.
• Toby, Anne, and Jorge kicked off the advisory board meetings with Stephane and Emmanuel from Kiwix, as part of the Offline Medical grant. These meetings will continue on a monthly basis, with the goal of coordinating a strategic conversation on the best collaboration between the Foundation and Kiwix along the process.
• To support the grant, Abbey is starting a heuristic evaluation of the Kiwix Android Wikimed app.

Awareness

• The results of the messaging surveys led by Communications with support from Abbey are finished, and the results are really interesting. You can read more about the Nigeria messaging survey here.
  • The objective of these two messaging surveys was to learn how Wikimedians in India and Nigeria describe and promote Wikipedia. A messaging survey for Mexico is still planned and to be discussed on how and when to launch it.
  • With the publication of these surveys, the next step is to form "marketing committees" with local communities in Nigeria and India.
• The Communications and Global Reach teams are working on an event announcing the Iraq Wikipedia Zero partnership in Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The event will take place on February 28th with the campaign slogan: امنح المعرفة (“Share the knowledge”). This event will be the official kick-off of the partnership, to be followed by the the awareness campaign.
• The Naiim TV box project for India is ongoing: 1) the partnership agreement is under WMF legal review, 2) we are waiting for Naiim to provide the first guidance on the user interface, 3) we have shared the WM API information with Naiim and waiting on them to start the tech implementation.

Affordability

• We will be running 2 phone surveys in Iraq to support the Wikipedia Zero launch there. The first is running now and should be finalized by the end of the month. The second survey (post-launch) should take place 6-8 weeks after the first one is finalized so that we can see if the awareness campaign has impact.
• The Nigeria phone survey full data set is now published on Meta.
• The first affordability workshop, lead by Abbey, Adele, and Grace, took place Feb 3. We discussed personas, user needs, design principles, and alignment on current solutions and how they meet user needs or not. Rounds 2 and 3 of the workshop are already designed and will be taking place this month.
• The text of the Wikipedia Zero case study being produced by GSMA is now final/locked. GSMA is working on design of the case study and plan to release it in early March.

January 25, 2017

General

Several members of the New Readers team are attending Wiki Indaba in Ghana this week! Kacie, Jack, Anne, and Zack will participate in lots of different activities and panels. We're looking forward to connecting with Wikimedians supporting Africa.

Offline

• The Global Reach team continues to explore different third parties that are delivering Wikipedia content offline. One of them is Endless Mobile, with whom they've had preliminary conversations to understand how they operate and include Wikipedia in their devices. Endless Mobile is using Wikipedia content but not branding it (calling it Encyclopedia instead of Wikipedia). The team talked to them at their HQ (SF) and Jorge met their country manager in Mexico - a country where they're currently expanding operations.
• As the first round of testing online to offline prototypes is now complete, we're working on finalizing the reports, which will be ready in the following weeks. In February, we will be testing prototypes with readers in India.

Awareness

• As mentioned in prior updates, the Global Reach team continues to explore opportunities to connect with local fan bases in Nigeria, which has been moving along. New opportunities to promote Wikipedia via TV households in India are also starting to be explored.
• The Communications team concluded the two messaging surveys to learn how Wikimedians in India and Nigeria describe and promote Wikipedia. They're now processing responses and will be sharing results when such is finished. We have plans to run the survey in Mexico this quarter, with the support of Wikimedia MX.
• The Communications and Global Reach teams are working together on the awareness campaign for the new Wikipedia Zero partnership in Iraq.

Affordability

• The Global Reach team is in the process of signing another Wikipedia Zero agreement in Burundi.
• The Iraq phone survey will be conducted later this quarter - translations are in progress. The exact timing for the follow-up/second phone survey is still TBD.
• Workshops are scheduled to develop our efforts around affordability starting January 27th.

December 23, 2016

General

The target countries consultation is complete. We will now begin to develop a list of countries from the criteria selected and run metrics against them going forward. We do not plan to deprecate the "global south" metrics yet. See the linked page for more information. [note to reviewers, I need to write up that report before this goes out]

Several members of the New Readers team will be attending Wiki Indaba in Ghana to support community efforts, learn from people who live in Africa, and share what we've learned so far. Kacie, Jack, and Zack are currently confirmed to attend.

The complete data from the phone survey in Mexico is now publicly available! We are excited to share this with you and will continue to publish data from the other surveys conducted.

Offline

The first round of testing online to offline prototypes is now complete, and we will be delivering a report early in 2017 with what we learned. Thanks to everyone who participated on meta and otherwise!

The New Readers team advised on grants related to offline access during this quarter's Project Grants cycle. Several members of the team, to be confirmed, will be serving as advisors on the Offline Medical grant with Kiwix. We are excited for closer collaboration with the the Kiwix and WikiProject Med teams.

Members of the Global Reach team participated in the UN's Internet Governance Forum, where much of the focus was about bringing the next billion online and sharing relevant content with those that are new to the internet.

Awareness

The Global Reach team has been investigating potential media partnerships in India with the goal that people discover Wikimedia content, know that it's coming from Wikimedia, and understand what Wikimedia is.

Global Reach has also been looking into opportunities to connect with local fan bases in Nigeria.

The Communications team has launched two messaging surveys to learn how Wikimedians in India and Nigeria describe and promote Wikipedia. The surveys collect data on messaging tactics, key words, and recommended media formats for promoting Wikipedia.

They are also developing an awareness campaign to launch alongside the new Wikipedia Zero partnership in Iraq.

Affordability

The Global Reach team is launching a Wikipedia Zero partnership in Iraq this quarter. We will be conducting phone surveys before and after the launch in order to understand a benchmark and impact of the awareness campaigns and Zero program there.

As mentioned in the last update, workshops are scheduled to develop our efforts around affordability in January/February 2017.

December 1, 2016

General

The core team have been working on defining the scope of work for New Readers as well as the theory of change across the 3 focus areas (offline, awareness, and affordability) using a Log Frame. We hope to have this completed for Offline and Awareness this quarter, with Affordability following in Q3FY1617. We will be using this space to update about what we're doing specifically under New Readers as well as related work that we're tracking in the Wikimedia movement.

The target countries consultation is ongoing, and has been seeing some engagement. This will help us focus our metrics in a broader sense than in the 3 pilot countries. Will close and draw conclusions before holiday break in a few weeks.

Phone surveys from Global Reach are complete and the team is working on releasing the raw data, in compliance with our open access policy. This is ongoing and there will be a presentation in Q3 (Jan - Mar 2017) to share this further.

Offline

The team is researching and mapping all of the offline use cases and solutions that we're aware of across Wikimedia movement projects and bringing those into the theory of change for the project in order to help prioritize our efforts. This includes conversations with the team behind Kiwix, the Wikipedia Medical Apps, and others. We're also keeping an eye on the Community Tech Wishlist proposals related to Offline.

For the "online to offline" use case, where readers have internet access some of the time and want to have content available when they're not connected, we are currently testing prototypes with both readers and community members. See the prototypes and tell us what you think. We'll close this round of comments December 16, 2016 and will share a summary the following week.

Digging into one use case that's fully offline, Jack Rabah visited a Jordanian refugee camp and found there was a lot of demand for offline solutions. As soon as he walked into the camp, there was basically no cell reception and little access to knowledge. Further exploration of providing support for this use case is on hold until we can map out solutions and make sure we're providing something effective.

Awareness

The Communications team is working on developing repeatable approaches to marketing and advocacy for raising Wikipedia awareness around the world. This process begins by consulting communities on messaging: how do people explain Wikipedia? What are powerful use cases to tout for potential new users? We then examine high visibility and influence channels to share these messages: where do people learn about new products, services? What types of media (e.g. video, posters) are most popular and persuasive? Finally, the Communications team develops complete timeline and system to publish and measure the impact messages.

We are currently prototyping this for an awareness campaign in conjunction with a new Wikipedia Zero launch in Iraq. We have consulted Wikipedia users in Iraq for their key messages and determined that digital videos are the most popular media formats for raising awareness. We have also drafted a script for the video, and worked with our Wikipedia Zero partner to set wide distribution for the video across Iraq. Building this plan and process in a smaller market will allow us to optimize before India and Nigeria messaging pushes in early 2017.

Affordability

Workshops for concept generation and defining the theory of change around affordability are scheduled for end of Jan/beginning of February.

The Global Reach team is launching new Wikipedia Zero partnerships in Iraq and Nigeria next quarter (Jan - Mar 2017).

August 8 2016

Wikiconference India 2016 slide deck

Zack McCune and Dan Foy gave a presentation of the research at the WikiConference India 2016 this past weekend to around 20 attendees. The presentation specifically focused on what we've been learning in India. The deck is available here and embedded to the right.

AGomez (WMF) (talk) 18:42, 8 August 2016 (UTC)

June 22, 2016

I got to talk to some members of the research team in India on Friday and have followed up with them since then.

As of Friday, they had already conducted about 30 interviews, a number which has increased. They started with 2 days of interviews in Delhi. After Delhi, they moved to Jaipur and started interviews there on Friday, remaining until Monday. They met with a good range of respondents within the target profile in the protocol (age ranges, genders, wiki awareness, internet access, occupations). They're meeting people in all sorts of different locations - places of work, parks, stores, universities, etc. On Saturday, they conducted an all day analysis, creating a few personas, user journeys, and diving deeper into analysis of observations moving toward patterns.

As opposed to Nigeria, instruments have been adjusted to be in Hindi and Tamil (in addition to English) to support more translation and understanding of needs around multiple languages.

We're really excited to share the findings in full from both this and the trips to Nigeria and Mexico soon.

AGomez (WMF) (talk) 16:50, 22 June 2016 (UTC)

May 24, 2016

I spoke with Abbey Ripstra and Jack Rabah this weekend from their hotel in Epe, Nigeria. We had some trouble with the internet connection, so we were only able to talk briefly.

The research team has been in Lagos, Epe, and is now in Benin City. They’ll be continuing to interview participants from rural areas before going back to Lagos to wrap up the research and plan for our next sprint in June in India. They’ve been learning a lot from a lot of people - as of Saturday they’d already conducted around 60 interviews! At the end of every day, they’re debriefing on the interviews so that they can learn collectively as they go. By doing synthesis daily, it becomes clear when some questions are answered, allowing the team to dive deeper into another line of inquiry. They’re adjusting research instruments and lines of questioning as they go. They have already started developing user journeys and some personas, which we will be sharing publicly when they return.

The team has been learning about how the education system in Nigeria works for people as well as how technology plays a part in their lives. They’ve been seeing lots of people using low-end smartphones for social media, and there’s not a lot of recognition for the Wikipedia globe or name.

We’ll be sharing out the findings in full later.

- AGomez (WMF) (talk) 20:51, 24 May 2016 (UTC)