Camera equipment program

(Redirected from Proposal:Camera equipment program)
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In order to support free culture photography of Australian topics, this Wikimedia Australia program will provide photographers with consistent and dependable funding to update their equipment periodically as technology improves and equipment wears out.

In our community are many photographers who have consistently contributed Australian photographs to Wikimedia over many years, often contributing thousands of photographs which are viewed every day by the Australian public. This program is targetted at investing in new equipment for these community members, based on prior performance, and providing incentives for additional community members to become regular contributors of Australian photographs. Wikimedia Australia will develop additional programs, projects and prizes to specifically recognise quality photos and outreach to bring in new contributors. (e.g. Wikipedia loves ... my town)

To achieve the goals of this program, minimum quality thresholds are defined for eligible photographs, favouring machine verifiable checks where possible. The photographs of eligible applicants are public, allowing the community to review whether each collection of photographs meets the spirit of the conditions.

Conditions

The conditions ensure that the photographers collection of work include many distinct subjects, that the photographs are sufficiently high quality to be useful, and the photographs can be readily found using finding aids such as categorisation, geotagging, and use on a Wikimedia project.

In order to qualify, photographs must

  • be uploaded onto Wikimedia Commons under an licence listed at commons:Commons:Copyright tags
  • depict subjects within Australia or in Australian territorial waters
  • be of some discernible educational value, and cover a range of topics
  • be described
  • be placed into categories under the main topical category that are relevant to the subject(s) depicted/shown in the photograph
  • be of an appropriate resolution
    1. images uploaded before 1 January 2009 must be 800 pixel on the shortest edge
    2. images uploaded on or after 1 January 2009 must be 1000 pixel on the shortest edge

Program

Kickstart support

Wikimedia Australia will reimburse applicants up to $200 for photography equipment when they have loaded 1000 eligible photos onto Wikimedia Commons, including photographs by other people, and categorised them into 1000 different categories. These photos must be reasonably usable - when applying, the committee will request a link to uploaded photos, in order to determine their potential for use. There is no longer a requirement for minimum use on Wikimedia projects for a period of time.

Applicants can only receive this kickstart support once.

Small equipment support

Wikimedia Australia will reimburse applicants up to $500 for photography equipment when the first 500 of their own freely licensed eligible photos have been loaded onto Wikimedia Commons. These photos must be reasonably usable - when applying, the committee will request a link to uploaded photos, in order to determine their potential for use. There is no longer a requirement for minimum use on Wikimedia projects for a period of time.

Applicants can only receive the small equipment support once.

Large equipment support

Wikimedia Australia will reimburse applicants $1000 for photography equipment for each contribution of at least 2000 of their own freely licensed photos to Wikimedia Commons. While the criteria for reimbursement is at the discretion of the committee, in general, the photos must be reasonably usable and suitably categorised - when applying, the committee will request a link to uploaded photos, in order to determine eligibility.

Applicants can only receive this reimbursement once every financial year.

Evaluation

It will be the responsibility of the applicant to categorise their photographs into a single hidden category on Commons (see mw:Help:Categories#Hidden categories), and identify the photographs which have been in use in Wikimedia content for three months.

Before considering an application, the committee will ensure that the Wikimedia community has had sufficient opportunity to review an applicant's collection of photographs to ensure they are within Commons policies, such as commons:COM:SCOPE, and meet the spirit of the outlined conditions for this program.

Approval

Wikimedia Australia committee members are not required or expected to verify that all photographs are compliant with all of the conditions. The final decision will be at the discretion of the committee.

Successful recipients will be listed on the Wikimedia Australia website by their Commons username.

Recipients of reimbursements in this program must agree to upload 500 new photographs to Wikimedia Commons within 24 months. This should include photographs using the new equipment when appropriate, be properly described (as above), however they do not need to be Australian topics if that is not possible in the circumstances.

Other information

This program can be used retrospectively for receipts of camera equipment purchased 12 months prior to the application for reimbursement.

If the applicant has successfully applied for funds under this program, or received more than AUD$100 within the prior 24 months for photography or photography equipment from other grant or prizes, those amounts received will be deducted from the grant amount available under this program.

This means that there must be a 24 month between a small grant and a "Kickstart support" application.
However a recipient of a small grant can receive another $300 via the "Small equipment grant" within the 24 months.

Program budget

The budget for each financial year will be determined by the committee during its regular annual planning processes. The program is periodically subject to review to ensure that the program is meeting strategic and operational goals.

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