Re: [Wiki Loves Monuments] drop off in submissions, banner

On Thu, Sep 12, 2013 at 1:21 AM, Romaine Wiki <romaine_wiki(a)yahoo.com> wrote: Perhaps the best place for talking about the banners of the CentralNotice is at: https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commons_talk:Wiki_Loves_Mon… Discussion kicks off there! -- Karthik. Romaine -------------------------------------------- On Wed, 9/11/13, Lodewijk <lodewijk(a)effeietsanders.org> wrote: Subject: Re: [Wiki Loves Monuments] drop off in submissions, banner To: "Wiki Loves Monuments Photograph Competition" <wikilovesmonuments(a)lists.wikimedia.org> Date: Wednesday, September 11, 2013, 7:45 PM (oh, and ps: probably native countries like the US and GB work very differently than non-native English countries. Here participate would definitely resonate much better, and 'snap' would only be confusing. But that is probably stating the obvious) 2013/9/11 Lodewijk <lodewijk(a)effeietsanders.org> I think there are two major factors in our image count: 1) new participants, people who never edited before. 2) super uploaders, people with more than 100 images The highest contribution to the number of images is 2) by a leap. This is mostly people with a reservoir of images - primarily in Spain, Poland and Germany. The banner has primarily an influence on 1), which is also important. I definitely wouldn't mind a change in the banner, but I would suggest to let that coincide with the drop of Privacy Policy (which was poorly situated - the original plan was to run it in August). In some other countries, there are more banners competing even (like in NL, a conference banner with call for speakers). Another way than the wording, is the design. I would suggest we continue this 'what is the best banner' discussion on a talkpage somewhere, to keep it consistent. Romaine, what would be a good location for that? Lodewijk 2013/9/11 Michael Maggs <Michael(a)maggs.name> Both "Snap a snapshot for Wikipedia" and "It's a snap, Wiki Loves Monuments" are the best I have heard so far, and they would work in the UK as well as the US. Maybe have them both running at 50% ? Michael On 11 Sep 2013, at 17:41, Peter Ekman wrote: I too have noticed a drop off in photos submitted in the last few days. It's fairly important to determine what caused the drop off if we can. It might be something totally outside of our control, e.g. the situation in Syria, but might be something like a change in banner display, which we do have some control over. Did the drop happen in most countries? We don't have full control over all Wikimedia banners - we do have to share the space with others, but perhaps they might be willing to delay some of their displays if we ask nicely. I do agree that changing the banner from time-to-time can help. I don't agree that a banner of ""Participate in the world's largest photo-contest and help Wikipedia," would help any. The imperative verb "Participate" is very weak, and is not natural to American English speakers. It suggests a high school home economics teacher telling us that we have to bring cookies to the annual bake-off. Something more active is definitely needed, something along the line (but not exactly) of a high school football coach saying "Go out there and kick some butt!" That would definitely get some attention as a banner, but not the exact type of attention we want. A teaser ad might work however, e.g. "About your photos on Wikipedia .... (smaller type) upload them to Wiki Loves Monuments" "Snap" might be a verb we want to use. It gives an idea of the action that we want people to take (snap a snapshot), unlike "participate." So perhaps "Snap a historic site, Wiki Loves Monuments" It could wake people up. Or maybe "Snap a snapshot for Wikipedia". As a noun "It's a snap, Wiki Loves Monuments" I don't think these ideas are good enough yet for an actual banner, but I think that folks should brain-storm this and come up with new ideas. Straight informative banners can sound bureaucratic or just boring. Different languages or dialects should be considered separately, as translations are really tricky, e.g. "It's a snap" might mean something entirely different in British English PeteUser:Smallbones