I am finally able to share with you the biggest benefit of WMRS Microgrants projects for this year. It's about cooperation with one very old institution, and it was necessary to wait for their formal letter.
But first about the side effects of the Microgrants project...
When you are going outside and tell people that you are willing to support their projects, it could lead into interesting outcomes. It is important to understand possibilities which could be opened and catch them.
We got one interesting proposal. It was about a long term project of making photos of one person. The project was very interesting, but it turned out that it's not suitable to be supported by Wikimedia, as well as the amount of needed money is so small, that I am able to fund it personally.
However, that was not the end. That guy, an amateur photographer (with professional skills) is actually the top Serbian lector. He proofread the Orthography of Serbian language.
He is also a lexicographer, working in Matica srpska [1].
So, we met in my office. While drinking some alcohol, besides his own project, we were talking about the state of Serbian lexicography and culture in general.
We were talking about Matica srpska, as well; about present financial state of the institution, which has money for salaries and the most important projects, but doesn't have for a number of projects.
I had bold ideas, of course, but I was quite skeptical about rational possibility of cooperation between WMRS and Matica srpska. However, he convinced me that the president of MS is likely willing to cooperate and that we should talk about that.
So he told me that he'll arrange the meeting with the president and that we should talk about that.
Few weeks later I led WMRS delegation (our ED Mile and our program manager Ivana were in the delegation) to the initial talks with MS.
I think we were talking two hours. And I am quite confident to tell you that on June 20th, 2014 happened one historical event, not just for Wikimedia Serbia, but also for Serbian culture and free knowledge.
I wasn't able to talk about this till today, when we got formal letter from MS, which summarize our meeting and emphases their commitment to accessibility of knowledge to as much people as it's possible.
If you are in Slavic culture in general, you should know what Matica srpska is. As the most of you are not, here is the story in short...
MS is the oldest cultural and scientific institution in Serbia. They are the main lexicographical and encyclopedistic institution in Serbia. It isn't easily comparable with large cultures, but, basically, if we don't count independent institutions, 90% of dictionaries and the most important encyclopedias have been created inside of MS or with MS as the leader of the project.
We share one important trait with the institutions like MS is. It's about long term goals. We want to start cooperation and develop it. So, we are starting with cooperation slowly. During the next year our goal is to liberate two dictionaries. One is ornithological, the other one covers dialects of Vojvodina.
That's just the beginning, of course. Their editions are the main dictionaries of Serbian language and we'll discuss the next year about the steps toward liberating them. They are also in charge for creation of national encyclopedia, but it has its own Board and during the next months we should start talking with the Board, as well.
The significance of this cooperation for Wikimedia is that we are at the beginning of the first close relations with one main national cultural institution, which focus is creating dictionaries and encyclopedias. They share our goals, as well as they want to cooperate with us.
And it's not just about liberating content because we will help it financially. It's their commitment, as well. They want to share their content on Internet. With our (technological, licensing etc.) help, they will become the institution which shares their content by default, no matter if we are involved or not.
I know that this story is not applicable in many cases. It's not rational to expect that the University of Oxford would do the same. However, I am sure that this story *is* applicable in many cultures of the similar size, like Serbian is.
It is also important that the visibility of Wikimedia organizations all over the world is very important. You could get something very valuable if you show that you are friendly.