Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Coordinators/Globalizing our presence


 * Note: I have created a separate page because this might end up being a very long discussion. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 03:43, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

Discussion by coordinators
Greetings, in an attempt to globalize the Project, or the concept of Military History as a whole, I propose the following::*Since our inception, we have one of the largest, most successful, and as well as most active projects on English Wikipedia (the largest of Wikipedias). However, we never looked out of our home Wiki to see the what is ongoing with Military history domain on other language projects, and also as well as other Wikimedia projects like Wikidata, Wikisource etc. At this point, I would say it is one of the most neglected domains on other projects. So now that we have enough experience in establishing and successfully running a Military History WikiProject, it's time we help other editors on other Wikimedia projects. So to do this, first we need to be present on Meta-Wiki (the central coordination site for all Wikimedia projects) as an official affiliate of Wikimedia Foundation i.e. initially as a User group with much simple requirements, and then after within 2–4 years we'll plan to evolve as a Thematic organization with much more legally established structure.

For those who are not aware of Wikimedia affiliates, to explain in brief, they are the groups contributing to the Wikimedia movement, the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees with recommendation from the Affiliations Committee recognizes models of affiliation within the Wikimedia movement – chapters, thematic organizations, and user groups. Chapters are incorporated independent non-profits representing the Wikimedia movement and supporting movement work globally, focused within a specific geography (examples include Wikimedia India, Wikimedia New York City etc.) Thematic organizations are incorporated independent non-profits representing the Wikimedia movement and supporting work focused on a specific theme, topic, subject or issue within or across countries and regions (example include Catalan Wikimedia) User groups are open membership groups with an established contact person and history of projects, designed to be easy to form (examples include Wikimedia User Group China, GLAM Macedonia User Group etc.) These user groups after a few years activity, they may end up being a Chapter or a Thematic organization depending upon their scope and focus.

Before we can proceed, I want to make clear about certain things to avoid confusion.
 * This user group (or thematic organization in future) will function completely independent of this WikiProject. However, your opinions and suggestions will always be considered with much value.
 * To example with an example, it'll be like the relation between, WikiProject India – Wikimedia Chapter (India), WP:UK – Wikimedia UK. It is like WikiProject UK here is about the content related to United Kingdom on English Wikipedia, but Wikimedia UK, which legally established in United Kingdom and having physical presence serves a support organization for the entire Wikimedia movement in UK. The same will be the relation between MILHIST Project, here, on English Wikipedia, and the affiliate that we form.
 * The affiliate on Meta-Wiki will runs its own processes and functions completely according its bylaws.
 * In some cases, while working with the affiliate, you may need to disclose your identity.

To promote Military history domain on other Wikimedia projects, I really want to see this happening. However it is upto other coordinators's individual interest whether wish to get involved in this, in the sense, you can always give your comments and suggestions, but intrest in taking part in the affiliate's administration and daily working. After a bit of research, if I am not wrong, most of the coordinators are not aware of the affiliate part of the Wikimedia movement, however you can always learn,.

As this point, I invite the coordinators to discuss the name of the affiliate, my ideas are "Wikimedia Military History Consortium" "Wikimedia Military History Genus" "Wikimedia Military History Syndicate" "Wikimedia Military History Chapter", you comments please. Also as, , are extensively in affiliates related activities in wider Wikimedia community, can give us more in-depth insights on this, and of course every one is welcome to put in their comments. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 04:16, 24 October 2017 (UTC)


 * Given that many members of this project have cross-cutting interests (for interest, I'm pretty active both here and on Wikivoyage and Wikimedia Commons) there's something to be said for a body to improve cross-wiki coordination. However, what would such a body actually do? Nick-D (talk) 04:25, 24 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Hi Nick, thanks for the quick comment. The body or more technically the affiliate would promote cross-wiki coordination of Military history domain, conduct activities and contests on a global scale, organize meet-ups and conferences, help editors from other Wikis to establish WikiProjects in their home Wiki, support editors to conduct outreach activities especially focused on Military history both financially and logistically. They are a few focus areas of the affiliate, however once established they can be more structured. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 04:49, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

Hi Krishna. Similar ideas have been discussed before (if you haven't already, have a scroll through the archives of WT:MHC; there might be something of interest in there); they never really went anywhere but I was supportive of the general idea. I used to be heavily involved in Wikimedia UK; less so these days but we still have a good relationship. I really love the idea of Milhist going cross-wiki and setting itself up in "real life". I'd love to have a conference to discuss coverage of military history topics across Wikimedia, and for us to hold events with professional military historians and enthusiast groups and museums. I don't want to rain on the parade, quite the opposite, I'm really, really enthusiastic about the idea but I want to offer some cautionary advice:
 * First of all, don't make things more complicated than they need to be: the less bureaucracy the better. For example, don't set your sights on becoming a thematic organisation with a huge budget if there are easier ways of achieving our aims. For example, instead of having significant funds of our own (which requires bureaucracy and paper trails for obvious and very good reasons) we could apply for grants from the WMF or chapters.
 * Keep it grounded in the community and keep the aims clear. Part of the challenge facing the WMF and chapters is that much of what they do is so far removed removed from the nuts and bolts of of building and maintaining an encyclopaedia that most editors see it as completely irrelevant. This gulf has only grown as chapters and the WMF have professionalised (see point 1, professionalisation is pretty much obligatory when you're handling six- and seven-figure sums).
 * Be aware that many people are pressed for time. Wikipedia is a hobby and a voluntary project, so most of us have to spend 40 hours a week doing something much less interesting to pay the rent, and some of us have families and other commitments, so we don't want this to become too onerous otherwise nobody will have time to lead it (or they'll have to sacrifice their article-writing time, which is counter-productive). Again, see point 1—the bigger we make it, the more onerous it becomes.

If we want to do something tangible that requires money and falls within Wikimedia UK's purview, I'd be happy to front a grant request. HJ Mitchell &#124; Penny for your thoughts?  07:41, 24 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your comments, and very much for reference to the archives. I could see what has happened, what went after that. Coming to your comments;
 * Yeah, your suggestion on thematic organization is worth considering. Actually when I was thinking about this, and also when I put this here, I was a bit-over excited. Thematic organization is something that we could plan in a very long term (say no less than 5–7 years after establishing a successful user group). Also we need to get enough experience on handling things across cross-wikis. Simple grants from WMF, and chapters is a great idea.
 * I very much experienced your second comment practically. if you can see, my association with the India chapter as an EC member, brought down my on-Wiki activity i.e. editing, and now I've pulled myself back to the line. Yeah, contributing to encyclopedia should be our top priority, we'll make sure that the group we form, has this on the top. May be we could organize more on-Wiki edit-a-thons like Wikipedia Asian Month etc. However, that's for later.
 * Yeah, we will try to keep the structure simple, and may be we can one admin to handle the admin issues, so that the users don't give their time to maintenance issues killing their encyclopedic contributions.
 * I'll also notify the project talk page, so that we can more comments and suggestions before we can more further. However, I want to know your stand on the title of the user group. Please review the four names that I've suggested. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 13:09, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
 * I'm confused about this. What is it we aren't doing to draw in other mil history projects? We translate other articles, and collaborate with other projects to promote subject matter. Are you proposing we set ourselves up outside of Wikipedia? One of the quickest ways to do that might be to develop relationships with the Military History organizations. Of course, then we have to overcome academia's aversion to Wikipedia as a source, but hey, that ought to be easy!  auntieruth (talk) 15:50, 26 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the comment. Yes, we'll draw in other mil history projects, but if am not wrong, I believe that any other Wikimedia project has its own MILHIS projects. Of course, there are editors working MILHIS area, but all of them are scattered with no regular interaction with other editors as we do. Yes, it would be great to develop relationships with organizations, but for that we need to have a formal affiliation to ourselves, and a physical presence as well. Please see my replies below to Hchc and Ed, which might help in addressing your comment. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 12:05, 3 November 2017 (UTC)


 * Krishna, could you give an indication of what the "quick wins" here would be... what are the first 2-3 concrete benefits that you'd hope to deliver? (e.g. "if we did this, I'd be aiming to organise a meet-up in Berlin next year", or "if we did this, I'd be intending to engage with the MilHist Museum about digitalising its sources" etc.) Hchc2009 (talk) 07:12, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the comments. Here are a few quick wins;
 * If we form a user group, partnerships would be a vital outcome. Since WPr MILHIS here, i.e. on en Wiki, is not formally affialiated to any body, it would be vague to approach any institution for partnerships. As user group, is formally affialiated to the Wikimedia Foundation, we can approach organizations working on similar lines and collaborate with them to use their resources for encyclopedic development.
 * We'd be aiming to form a subject specific Wikipedia library i.e. Wikipedia Military History Library on the tracks on The Wikipedia Library.
 * We'd aiming to have a global meet-up of editors working in the area of military history on all Wikimedia projects. This'll help us to strengthen the community relations in long-term.
 * We'd be aiming to conduct a cross-wiki military history contest, similar to Wikipedia Asian Month.
 * Looking forward to hear more inputs from you. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 12:00, 3 November 2017 (UTC)


 * One thing worth considering is that Affcom will likely veto a "Wikimedia Military History" name if we're not adequately representing other projects. It'd be more likely to be something like "English Wikipedia military history usergroup" or somesuch. :-) I'd also like to see some concrete ideas on how such a usergroup would help, eg to form a coordinating body to apply for grants for editing contests and purchasing source material. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 20:18, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the comment. I agree with you the "Wikimedia Military History" is unlikely if we don't represent other projects. But my plan goes this way; We'll start here with a basic idea and then, take it to meta. On Meta-Wiki, we'll invite all editors working on military history topic area from all the Wikimedia projects to be a part of this user group. Then we can have a broad discussion on the mandate, which is likely to represent "Military History" all Wikimedia projects. However, I am not definite on this, I would like to hear from you whether this would be a feasible option or not? Yes, this is would a coordinating body for grants, but I feel that should not be our only intention. We focus on cross-wiki collaboration of military historians. Please see above mentioned quick wins. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 12:00, 3 November 2017 (UTC)
 * is on Affcom if he'd be able to weigh in on the feasibility of a "Wikimedia Military history," but just in case he's busy, I'll ping too. I suspect that there would be a high bar for being the psuedo-representative for an entire topic area on all Wikimedia sites, but I could also see an argument that the bar I have in mind is so high that almost no topic areas could reach it. :-) Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 04:01, 20 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Hi Ed, thanks for the comment. After giving it some thought, I agree with you on the point that may be representing the topic area on entire Wikimedia projects may be psuedo-representative. Projects like Wikispecies and Wikivoyage may not be withing our scope, and like Wikiquote and Wikibooks, which have very minimal scope for Military history topic area. Also projects like Wikimedia Commons, Wikiquote, Wikitionary are completely different from objective Wikipedia, and hence are different in terms of military history topic area as well. As they don't have much work in this area, obviously their participation may be less and nil, in cases. I am not going against the original concept, but just voicing my thoughts. But we can definitely explore option of "Wikipedia Military History", because we can easily pitch in military history editors working on other language Wikipedias, also it becomes it easy for the organization to have an understanding between members, because all of them are basically focused on Wikipedia. --Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 05:23, 20 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Pinging for opinion on the above comment, before taking the discussion to Meta-Wiki. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 10:22, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
 * I don't have a lot of time to pitch in on this, but I'm interested to see where the discussion goes. :-) Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 01:36, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Comments from members

 * This is a good idea, however if we go onto other Wikimedia sites and Wikipedia, we should consider the merits of being "WikiProject Military". Dysklyver  13:46, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Greetings Dysklyver, thanks for your support. Once we have some ideas on what to do and how to do and all, we discuss on the name and logo, something like "Wikimedia Military ..." "Wikimedia Warfare ....". Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 14:07, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Yes that's fine (I will keep an eye out for when that discussion starts), my thoughts are mostly that although here on en-wiki we are 'Military History', it should be noted that we have the scope of all military and warfare related subjects, even if it is current. It might be easier for other people, especially those who speak different languages, if we keep it simple. (because the name will be garbled in translation). Regarding what we should do, it would seem sensible to go with the initial comments of starting up on Metawiki, and then advertise locally here and on other projects to build connections to the new project from everywhere else, it is pretty obvious to me, that although it will be separate, it is people here on en-wiki which will start it up. There is nothing wrong with our existing logo IMO, but if someone does a better one I would probably support it. Dysklyver  14:27, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
 * I strongly agree with you on the point that "Military History" might get garbled while translating, it is better to keep it simple. Of course meta-Wiki is the best place to discuss matters related to cross-Wiki collaborations. However, as we are active this part i.e. Military topics, it is better to form a good base here, and then build a good structure for it on Meta. Regarding the logo, it is better to adopt a derivative of Wikimedia standard logos. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk &bull;&#32;mail) 15:47, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Why would the names get garbled in translation? If there's someone starting a new milhist wikiproject on a different wiki then there must be someone who knows the language well enough to translate the title accurately. Or do you mean mistranslation during discussions on metawiki? Alcherin (talk) 17:21, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
 * This is not easy to explain, but basically other languages are structured in a way which means that it is not actually possible to accurately translate, we would end up with a title that is structured differently. which means something like Historical military or History of the Military would be a best case translation. It would be easy to get Old armed forces, decrepit military study or militia made up of pensioners as a translation if someone was slack (or used Google translate). If we go for a single word, it can't really be garbled, even Google translate can cope with converting the word 'Military' into 180 languages. Dysklyver  17:38, 25 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Most languages have a primary word for "history" and a primary word for "military" or "military-related" (you'll notice both made it into the Oxford 3000 of important English words, because these are important concepts and therefore primary words for them exist in most languages). A machine translation can easily manage when you have two common words like that. You might get "History of the military" instead of "Military history" (as happened with Google Translate and Chinese), but there's not much in the way of further error when you're translating one phrase of two common words. Alcherin (talk) 20:53, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

I am not totally convinced on this, I suppose it could be ok to go for Military History. Provided that someone keeps an eye on avoiding the bad examples I quoted above of course! Dysklyver 21:02, 25 October 2017 (UTC)