On 1 July 2012 22:47, <fabian(a)unpopular.org.uk> wrote:
I would like to know what other people understand as
the "open access
ethos of Wikimedia UK". The reason I ask is that I have been informed that
Midas - who are delivering the Training for Trainers programme - have been
arguing that as they chose to use a process which was not written for
WMUK, some of their material is not available under a CC license.
I believe you are referring to the outcome of the meeting of 27 June
at the office between Midas and me. If so, what you have written does
not really represent the position correctly.
As the initial tender specified "An agreement
that the training materials
produced will be open access under a CC-BY-SA licence" I do not really
understand how Midas chose to use non CC material in the process for
delivering their course. At first glance it would seem that this is not in
compliance with the temrs of the tender.
I cannot answer that directly. It would be helpful to note, though,
that the course is one that they have given before, and actually have
given since. From the point of view of the material, it would be
helpful to divide it into three:
(a) slides and handout materials;
(b) training notes;
(c) material that is proprietary and where the rights are not with Midas.
The material under (a) is released under CC-by-SA, as I understood
from meeting them (Martin Poulter was there via Skype). The other
material is not.
They
have suggested that WMUK pay an additional fee which they are happy to
quote for.
There I think you have misunderstood the notes of the meeting.
What I asked was that Midas quote for a different package of material.
It is not part of the workshop course as given June 9-10.
While I was there on the courseI chatted to Candy of Midas, and one
thing that came up was a distinction between "coach" and "mentor". I
thought this was interesting, in that on Wikipedia (IMO) we seem to
conflate the two. As an idea of how we could get some of this external
know-how into "the system", I suggested that Midas quote to WMUK for a
training package on the topic "coaching and mentoring". This they are
happy to do, but it would be written for WMUK.
It was my suggestion that the quote should be itemised, to show
clearly the cost of releasing under CC-by-SA. I thought this was the
transparent way to go, I support where possible the "open ethos", but
if there is a cost to it, I think we all should know what that is.
Please note that this package is not in any case covered by the
initial tender for TfT. If the package is bought, we could run part of
a VLE workshop from it ourselves, both trying to put over the content,
and evaluating the package.
That at least is why I brought the matter up.
I must admit that I find Open access and open content
as being quite
fundamental to Wikipedia, the sister projects and WMUK. This is whaqt I
understand by "Supporting Free and Open Knowledge". I personally have a
strong commitment to developing "Open Educational Resources" and was
particularly looking forward to the Eduwiki conference which has this as
one of its themes.
In this context, I don't really understand why WMUK is having difficulty
in making sure that its own training programme sits comfortably into the
CC framework. I would welcome any comments which would help explain this?
There is an agreement between WMUK and Midas on paper, but I have only
had some of the consequences of it explained to me.
Charles