Meta-Press.es

Decentralized search engine & automatized press reviews

Funds from the NLnet Foundation

With the v1.0 online and the good stats of the launch, I applied again for funding, where I previously got at least an answer :

  • Mozilla via the MOSS

  • the NLnet foundation

  • the Open Society Institute (OSI)

  • the OpenTech Fund (OTF)

And the NLnet answered positively !

NLnet is part of the NGI Zero consortium of European associations dealing with the complexity of the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, and gathering a number of complementary skills around software development to boost grantees with more than just money.

Their grant process is straight and efficient. It counts few steps, but those spread across 4 months. First, they really study applications on their side and come back with pertinent technical questions for you if your project fits in the funded areas.

If your project is working and needs a reachable improvement, and if it presents enough interest for the internet to take the seat of another applying project, your application is presented to the European Commission for validation.

Then NLnet and you establish a Memorandum of Understanding, a document that will describe the steps of your intended work on the project and the associated part of the grant. Once a step is reached, you can claim your grant portion. No need for more paper work, it’s charitable donation.

Here are the steps of the 2019-12-019 Memorandum of Understanding of Meta-Press.es :

  • Search automation :

    • automation of searches (at least on daily basis) #31

    • procedure to test the sources and discover which stopped working

  • UI improvement :

    • translatable UI (and French translation) #30

    • user preferences : for dark background, headline loading, number of results by sources #17, live-search-reload at filter change or not…

    • direct links to : report feedback #37, create new source, reset filters #38

  • Browser integration :

    • ask for fewer permissions (as per #33)

    • notifications when results are available (after long search) #20

  • More sources :

    • double the current number of sources (120 → 240)

    • including all the Newspapers of Record (English page)

  • Audits :

    • accessibility audit

    • security audit

The grant is fixed at 20k€.

The Wau Holland Foundation kindly granted 1k€ again this year.

My main objective is to go from the current working state to a stable state, easy to keep working.

Meta-Press.es has been downloaded 2000 times during the 3 first months and is still at 800 users by day as per Mozilla statistics.