The Library of Alexandria (and Moushira and Abdel Rahman in particular)
helped organize and host an Arabic Wikipedia day yesterday... if I read
correctly, people contributed roughly 685 new articles in a day, and 4200
this month (increasing the project size by almost 1% in a day! and 6% this
month). I looked at a selection from today, and nothing seemed scripted,
/many/ contributors added new articles, including a number of anons. And
it's good to see that the obligations imposed by the heavier volume is being
taken seriously:
http://ar.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D8%A8%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%8A%D8%A7%D9%86http://www.bibalex.org/english/media/NewsDetails.aspx?NewsID=2278
I think Khaled Hosny and EGLUG in Cairo helped put on their own Wikipedia
day(s?) earlier in August. There was certainly discussion of
Arabic-language editing drives at Wikimania in Alexandria, but it's pretty
awesome to see it taking place -- barnraisings are a good spectator sport
(and motivation to practice a new language :-). Congrats to everyone
involved, browsing the results made my night.
SJ
(who heard about the event but forgot during the day, and was reminded by
the sitenotice when browsing ar:wp for something quite different...)
I woudl like to dedicate this thread to the Wikimania of your dreams.
No argument, no debate, just ideas, a giant brainstorming of what the
Wikimania of your dreams would be. Please throw your stuff in, and try
to make it only positive things (ie.write "something that's green"
rather than "something that's not blue or red".)
here is the Wikimania of my dreams:
-It would be in a city easy to reach, with a big airport and cheap
flights incoming because it's a huge hub, or it would be next door
(Frankfurt airport ;-) )
- It would be in a top-notch conference facility, with tons of plugs
everywhere, air conditionned if needed, modular conference rooms, all
in one place and close to the accommodation building (a mix of
Cambridge, Alexandria for the conference facility, Taipei and
Frankfurt for access).
- It would have a great outdoor and indoor community area, with wifi
that works all the time, with comfy couches as well as ground mats for
the yoga-types, with coffee, cookies, juices and fresh water available
at all times. (a mix of Frankfurt and Taipei)
- It would have all the accommodation in one place, close to the
conference grounds, or even actually _on_ the conference grounds, and
it would be cheap but practical, clean and modern accommodation, with
different possibilities - share a room, not share a room, share a dorm
etc. (a mix of Frankfurt and Taipei)
-It would have an amazing range of food for lunches, which would be
served in a big room where annoucements and meetings can take place (a
mix of Taipei and Cambridge).
- It would take place in a really "wow" place so that we get speakers
to *want to come* to speak (Harvard or Bibliotheca Alexandrina)
- It would be close to sightseeing stuff for social evenings as
"discovery trips".
- It would have an amazing party location and an amazing party with
dancers with rotating hat-thingies (just like Alexandria!)
- It would host up to 500 people, not more, so I can get to meet
almost all of them. :-)
- And finally, to steal Sj's idea, it would have a giant rotating
Wikipedia globe that people could get into and make roll around like a
hamster wheel, just for the fun of it.
Cheers,
Delphine
--
~notafish
NB. This gmail address is used for mailing lists. Your emails will get lost.
Ceci n'est pas une endive - http://blog.notanendive.org
Dear Moushira and all,
With reference to Moushira's note below, I believe that you and your team really did a wonderful job. Believe me, I have been to four other conferences this last year--2 of them were international--and, in my view, the Wikimania one was better than the four of them in terms of organization, among other things. I and other presenters were not even able to access the wireless network except rarely in one of these. So, good job, and I am sure that those Wikipedians who have seen the Pyramids, Sphinx, and temples in Luxor, etc. have very much enjoyed them. For me, it was a great venue where I met many people who are working on Arabic open source stuff, translation, etc. whom I could never have met elsewhere.
Cheers,
--Muhammad
>I just signed up to the list to drop a few lines to the long thread of
> emails entitled: Re:Comments :). I believe I do not have much to say after
> all that was said, I can just clarify few points, but first: Majorly, I am
> sorry to hear that your experience in the country that hosted Wikimania 2008
> was that harsh, and I wish you a pleasant experience in the future
> Wikimanias. I wish the team could have made it better to you by any means,
> but I am afraid we have no control over Egyptian culture! I am sorry. Hint:
> The families that you used to see near by BA premises; they do not live or
> reside there and they are not homeless. They are patients and patients
> families that make it early to the public hospital that is next doors to the
> library. They are mostly from country side, travel long miles to reach their
> early, and they are too many that mostly the hospital does not occupy them.
> A local debate has long been taking place on the relocation of the hospital,
> but after all they are patients, they are harmless, and this is mostly how
> things are in our side of the world..
>
> On Wi-Fi: I am sorry if anyone had problems with getting connected, this is
> mostly for the uneven distribution of users; the access point of B1 was
> mostly occupied, while the one on entrance level and the level before had
> room for plenty of IPs. Relocating could have helped..I am sorry if that was
> not made clear on site, and I apologize and am sorry if anyone suffered with
> getting connected.
>
> Effeietsanders: Press Conference video is available along with other
> sessions here<http://www.bibalex.org/isis/Frontend/archive/Archive_Movie.aspx>
>
> Wishing Patricio and his team all best of luck with Wikimania2009..
>
> Best Regards,
> Moushira
>
--
Muhammad Abdul-Mageed,
PhD Student
Dept. of Linguistics,
Indiana University, Bloomington,
USA
www.mumageed.blogspot.com
> ******************************************
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1
Whether it's those of you who are preparing to go to Alexandria and
those of you who are going to get tired of hearing the stories from
those of you that did, you probably didn't expect to see that as a
subject line quite yet.
However, I'm writing this email now, to allow an ample amount of time in
advance of the bidding process to begin to set the dates. This is done
for several reasons; not the least of which to allow those interested in
bidding ample time for getting their bid ideas into place.
I believe that bringing up the dates for Wikimania 2009 was advantageous
for several reasons; the first being that it allows a specific 2009 team
to learn from the 2008 conference. The question now is whether bidding
for 2010 should take place in the fall, shortly after Wikimania 2008, to
take advantage of the momentum generated by the current conference,
while the event is still fresh in people's heads; or should we wait
until the beginning of 2009, like we did this year with Wikimania 2009.
I'm sure this will be somewhat of a discussion during this year's event.
~ I'd also like to involve as wide a representation of the community at
large in the process; this is why I'm sending this email out now, while
Wikimania is on people's minds.
- --
Cary Bass
Volunteer Coordinator
Your continued donations keep Wikipedia running! Support the Wikimedia
Foundation today: http://donate.wikimedia.org
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
Phone: 415.839.6885 x 601
Fax: 415.882.0495
E-Mail: cary(a)wikimedia.org
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.8 (Darwin)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org
iEYEARECAAYFAkh3clsACgkQyQg4JSymDYkzagCgpwOolC6lSCPNFDU/BL/0/BF5
UvsAoL7z9oAH3f9kkXRmt2eh2RROEvlN
=vucm
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
Dear Majorly and all,
>
> I just signed up to the list to drop a few lines to the long thread of
> emails entitled: Re:Comments :). I believe I do not have much to say after
> all that was said, I can just clarify few points, but first: Majorly, I am
> sorry to hear that your experience in the country that hosted Wikimania 2008
> was that harsh, and I wish you a pleasant experience in the future
> Wikimanias. I wish the team could have made it better to you by any means,
> but I am afraid we have no control over Egyptian culture! I am sorry. Hint:
> The families that you used to see near by BA premises; they do not live or
> reside there and they are not homeless. They are patients and patients
> families that make it early to the public hospital that is next doors to the
> library. They are mostly from country side, travel long miles to reach their
> early, and they are too many that mostly the hospital does not occupy them.
> A local debate has long been taking place on the relocation of the hospital,
> but after all they are patients, they are harmless, and this is mostly how
> things are in our side of the world..
>
> On Wi-Fi: I am sorry if anyone had problems with getting connected, this is
> mostly for the uneven distribution of users; the access point of B1 was
> mostly occupied, while the one on entrance level and the level before had
> room for plenty of IPs. Relocating could have helped..I am sorry if that was
> not made clear on site, and I apologize and am sorry if anyone suffered with
> getting connected.
>
> Effeietsanders: Press Conference video is available along with other
> sessions here<http://www.bibalex.org/isis/Frontend/archive/Archive_Movie.aspx>
>
> Wishing Patricio and his team all best of luck with Wikimania2009..
>
> Best Regards,
> Moushira
>
>
>
Hi everyone,
This probably comes WAY too late, but better late than never. This was my
first Wikimania, definitely and hopefully not my last. I enjoyed the
sessions and meeting everyone although I had to leave on the morning of the
last day. I would also like to add my thanks to the organizing team and
Bibliotheca Alexandrina staff for the efforts put into this.
I tried to quickly read all of the post-conference mailing list discussion
on the good and the bad of the conference, opinions on Alexandrina, Egypt,
personal experiences and all that's related, and would just like to add my
personal view to what I feel is a healthy and constructive discussion in
which I was glad to see a diversity of opinion, openness in sharing personal
views and experiences as well as a reasoned analysis on how this Wikimania
relates to previous and future Wikimanias. Again, I am dropping in rather
late into this discussion and I do believe that most of whatever I would
have liked to add or share has already been said, and which I am in
agreement with, so the need to reiterate many of the points discussed wanes,
as what I might think of as personal opinion might read as perennial
paraphrase.
That said, the impulse to share with you my personal take on some specific
points remains, so you will have to forgive me :). In the interest of being
as brief as possible, I will resist the temptation of writing a drawn-out
essay on everything I would like to address with a "personal take" (I tend
to do that sometimes:)).
The issues in question are those related to the views shared by some here
about their experiences in Egypt. By "experiences in Egypt" I am discounting
judgments on the organization of the conference, as I already saw that such
issues (of the organizational efficiency of the conference, that is) were
duly addressed by many contributers, and will continue to be addressed
during the lead-up to the 2010. What I am going to address- or rather
comment on – is the issue of "openness". Yes, it is wildly general term but
it is also one that you are all very familiar with: open media, open
culture, open access are all topics discussed at this and previous
wikimanias, and which form a discourse that will continue to be addressed in
future wikimanias and other conferences. Most important to the context of
this discussion, these are issues that you all have an interest in by the
mere virtue of being wikipedians.
Caveat lector: Similar to all experiences and opinions expressed here, my
own commentary on these issues is naturally and unavoidably influenced by my
own personal experiences, views and background, and this is starting to read
like it is going to be a drawn-out treatise as opposed to "brief personal
take", so grab some coffee.
(Just kidding)
I as I started catching up on reading the mailing list messages, I came
across what Majorly wrote on his experience in Egypt. I was not surprised at
the "only negative" experience described, as I am aware of where it comes
from, I acknowledge many of the unfortunate situations that conspired to
construct such a negative experience (which definitely saddens me as a
native of Egypt), and surely understand that the extent to which we can step
outside our personal "comfort zones" - formed by our own cultures,
communities and environments – is liable to a very wide spectrum of
variation. However, what I have difficulty coming to terms with - and I do
believe some would concur given the majority of opinions expressed here- is
how some would be so absolutist in their conclusions in such a way to
express things with such finality (to which they are entitled to in every
way of course, but that is not the point). For example, Majorly has made up
his mind that he "never want[s] to go to Egypt again, nor the next
Wikimania", he adds that "there is no way I'd consider going to Buenos
Aires". Wow.
Now, before the point I am attempting to get across gets misinterpreted, let
me get this out of the way: It's a free world! (well, some of it, at least).
Where Majorly – and others – decide to go or not go is entirely their own
business. Nevertheless, since we (by "we" I mean people who have at least a
somewhat expanded understanding of the general notion of "openness", and
given the context of our general collective interests being in the realm of
freedom of knowledge, information and expression) are sharing experiences
and views, and then expressing opinions on such experiences and views, I
feel compelled to share how I feel about such a sentiment.
I have been fortunate enough to do a fair share of continent-hopping over
the course of the past few years, and I am glad I was able to see a pretty
good chunk of the world at a relatively young age. I am not going to wax
lyrical on the merits and virtues of travel, as chances are that many or
most of you are already avid travelers. What I would like to emphasize,
however, is the one thing that fascinates me most about going somewhere new:
the different. I say the "different" minus any value judgment which we
inevitably, oftentimes validly and sometimes inaccurately make consciously
or unconscionably on what is, or what initially appears to be, alien to us,
because I do think that the different – be it positive or negative - holds
intrinsic value insofar as it can add to (or change) us as individuals, and
the subsequent aggregate – and hopefully positive - effect on our
understanding of others.
What you make of this value is up to you, but to me it is often a form of
incremental personal enlightenment, on a very small level, that must be
valued and embraced, rather than shunned and avoided. We, as wikipedians and
self-proclaimed "advocates of openness", took up a slightly larger share of
an oft-discussed but frequently practically abandoned global responsibility
to value and promote diversity, cultural awareness and sensitivity, and
receptivity to the new and different even if it means that we have to
forsake – for even the shortest of times – our respective comfort zones.
What I took the liberty to very generically term as "openness" here has
multiple, varied but still connected and related definitions. To me, it can
border on the hypocritical to claim that I am an advocate of open knowledge
if I am myself not open or receptive to a different culture that might
starkly contrast to my own.
Those of you in the "First world" are living where innovation, access and
decent standards of living are already existent, and most politicians are
already doing a pretty good job of messing up the world, so what openness do
you speak of if cultural bridges are not built at the grassroots level? Why
would we let our personal biases, ethnocentrism and fears of the different
or uncomfortable cloud our visions of amazing opportunities for the
promotion of potential platforms of global understanding? You can edit and
read wikipedia all you like, you can be an open knowledge activist, or an
arm chair promoter of openness, but if you shy away from going out and
bumping your head against another culture/people/environment, dealing with,
absorbing and learning from whatever is different in the process, then you
should ask yourself if whatever you are doing is really meaningful. It is
very simple really, you either go or you don't, but you will never really
know unless you go. The way I see it, talk all you like about promotion of
openness, freedom and access in conferences in the "First World", but if
you're serious about it, go where it really matters now, go to the
South/Third World/developing world...whatever you would like to call it. If
you feel that uncomfortable with it, that is understandable and you should
stay home or go somewhere similar to home, just don't call yourself and
advocate of openness. To you, it is probably just it's just a hobby :),
which is still fine by me.
Chaos, unpredictability, poor hygiene are constants when you travel in
developing countries. Dishonest people, dangerous areas and general
travel-related risks are constants anywhere you travel. Degrees of these
hazards vary, but if you can't deal with it, stay home. It is that simple.
It is just unfortunate, though, that you are going to miss quiet a lot in
what little time you've got on this Earth.
I said I tend to write more than I originally intended to and I did just
that, but I also did forewarn :), and apologies if I digressed or lacked
clarity, but I do hope I was able to get my thoughts across.
Cheers,
Hani Morsi
Thanks Aphaia! I hope we all can make the world a better place!
Best,
--
Muhammad Abdul-Mageed,
PhD Student
Dept. of Linguistics,
Indiana University, Bloomington,
USA
www.mumageed.blogspot.com
------------------------------
Message: 2
Date: Mon, 4 Aug 2008 19:01:29 +0900
From: Aphaia <aphaia(a)gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] Wikimania-l Digest, Vol 34, Issue 4
To: "Wikimania general list (open subscription)"
<wikimania-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Message-ID:
<35be2a710808040301h2bdd2711lbd80e40c0de8543a(a)mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Hiya,
thanks Muhammad for taking our all criticism positive. I'd like to
quote a Japanese saying among Japanese merchants: a criticizing
customer is your treasure; most people complain to their friends and
they'll never show.
Hope our input will help your country, and we'll make a better and
greater visit, if someday we have another chance to get in.
Cheers,
On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 2:53 AM, Muhammad Abdul-Mageed
<mumageed(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
> I do agree with almost all what you said, Austin. I can understand all the
> complaints and I think our friends who brought such complaints had enjoyed
> the conference and maybe some places they may have visited in Egypt. Also,
I
> guess many of them were trying to help by bringing such things up, rather
> than criticize. After all, we are to do our best to help get the message
> across to everybody and everywhere and in the process we know we will face
> difficulties. Lately, I have been traveling extensively in the US and
Europe
> and, even in these first world countries, I have come across some stuff
that
> did not meet our expectations.
>
> Yesterday, I have been talking to a friend who just came back from a
> charity visit to Mauritania and she has been telling me how poor the
country
> is. She is American and she is rich and she did it out of good well. She
> lost weight and had to sleep on the floor, etc. But she enjoyed it, since
> she felt she was helping people. We Wikipedians, I guess, share the same
> spirit: helping the unprivileged by providing info. for free. It is a good
> thing and I am sure that most of us are ready to offer some sacrifices in
> the way.
>
> What I will really like is to have some of our local group in Egypt
> summarize the complaints so that we can send them to the BA director. The
> man is enthusiastic and maybe he can get these to some minister, media,
etc.
> I know for sure he is aware of many of the problem and I know how
difficult
> change maybe, but I also met many zealous, friendly youngpersons in Egypt
> who made me believe in their power to change. Look what Egyptian activists
> are doing over the Internet to change the country to the better. A
> successful national strike was organize almost exclusively on Facebook,
for
> those those do not know. If such complaints get summarized I will do my
best
> to get to the media, with an intention to improve rather than negatively
> criticize.
> --
> Muhammad Abdul-Mageed,
> PhD Student
> Dept. of Linguistics,
> Indiana University, Bloomington,
> USA
> www.mumageed.blogspot.com
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Sat, 2 Aug 2008 13:33:39 -0500
> From: "Austin Hair" <adhair(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] Comments
> To: "Wikimania general list (open subscription)"
> <wikimania-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <e2a50e360808021133m3b135d2aw74b892dc560c9bfd(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> I've been busy all week, so when I finally caught up with this thread
> I found myself marveling at the complaints of
> inexperienced travelers,
> acknowledging several fair gripes about this year's venue,
> appreciating the more insightful points by some posters, and being
> particularly encouraged by Patricio's post.
>
> As a veteran Wikimania organizer, and having participated in the
> selection process for every Wikimania to date, I could write an essay
> on what I think about our annual conference (which, despite the
> inevitable problems, people still attend). I'll try to be brief here,
> though.
>
> No conference venue is going to be perfect. One year there won't be
> enough snacks; another venue won't have adequate power ports in
> certain areas; a country might have too many poor people. (Read up,
> these are actual complaints cited in this thread alone.) No
> conference venue, period, is going to have adequate WiFi?I do this for
> a living; I taped access points to walls in Frankfurt, and the fact is
> that it's not a perfect technology.
> (It's not even a particularly
> good one, actually, but we manage.)
>
> Every year those involved learn from the previous year's mistakes, and
> we make new ones. Because every venue is different, new problems will
> occur that were never anticipated in the past. What makes Wikimania
> great is just getting everyone together in one place, and though I'm
> not going to say "kwitcherbitchin," I will say that some of the
> complaints I've seen simply aren't helpful. This said, I hope
people
> keep posting, because I'd rather roll my eyes at a noob comment than
> risk missing out on a good point.
>
> I'm looking forward to Wikimania 2009. Patricio and his team are
> impressively dedicated to doing this right, and have practically
> treated the last two Wikimanias as a case study?and good thing, since
> each one gets harder and harder to top. I have no doubt we won't be
> disappointed.
>
> Austin
>
> P.S. Since all we've seen
> are the unpleasant arrival stories, I want
> to relate mine: I arrived in Cairo at 3:55 a.m., spent a mere 30
> minutes buying a visa and getting through passport control, got a cab
> to the hotel my friends had checked into a few hours before, got a key
> from reception, crashed for a few hours, had a leisurely breakfast,
> got a cab to the train station, took a train to Alexandria, and got a
> cab to another hotel. All it takes is a little prior research and
> planning, and a little bit of savvy. Yes, along the way I was waylaid
> by unscrupulous cab drivers in the airport, had my driver disrupt a
> wedding, waited an hour in the heat of the Cairo train station, had to
> negotiate a seat swap with another passenger to sit with my friends,
> watched as a cab driver spent five minutes banging on his engine with
> a pair of pliers to get his '72 Lada running again, and overpaid for
> most everything, only to spend the next two nights with
> three beds
> crammed into a particularly small room of a colonial hotel; although I
> realize not everyone finds this sort of thing fun as I do, you have to
> manage your own expectations. There are no golden carriages in the
> developing world.
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikimania-l mailing list
> Wikimania-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l
>
>
--
KIZU Naoko
http://d.hatena.ne.jp/Britty (in Japanese)
Quote of the Day (English): http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/WQ:QOTD
------------------------------
Message: 3
Date: Tue, 5 Aug 2008 22:09:32 +0300
From: "Hani Morsi" <hani.morsi(a)gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] Comments
To: wikimania-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
Message-ID:
<c3a00e5d0808051209j6644715fsccb33ca16a705350(a)mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="windows-1252"
Hi everyone,
This probably comes WAY too late, but better late than never. This was my
first Wikimania, definitely and hopefully not my last. I enjoyed the
sessions and meeting everyone although I had to leave on the morning of the
last day. I would also like to add my thanks to the organizing team and
Bibliotheca Alexandrina staff for the efforts put into this.
I tried to quickly read all of the post-conference mailing list discussion
on the good and the bad of the conference, opinions on Alexandrina, Egypt,
personal experiences and all that's related, and would just like to add my
personal view to what I feel is a healthy and constructive discussion in
which I was glad to see a diversity of opinion, openness in sharing personal
views and experiences as well as a reasoned analysis on how this Wikimania
relates to previous and future Wikimanias. Again, I am dropping in rather
late into this discussion and I do believe that most of whatever I would
have liked to add or share has already been said, and which I am in
agreement with, so the need to reiterate many of the points discussed wanes,
as what I might think of as personal opinion might read as perennial
paraphrase.
That said, the impulse to share with you my personal take on some specific
points remains, so you will have to forgive me :). In the interest of being
as brief as possible, I will resist the temptation of writing a drawn-out
essay on everything I would like to address with a "personal take" (I
tend
to do that sometimes:)).
The issues in question are those related to the views shared by some here
about their experiences in Egypt. By "experiences in Egypt" I am
discounting
judgments on the organization of the conference, as I already saw that such
issues (of the organizational efficiency of the conference, that is) were
duly addressed by many contributers, and will continue to be addressed
during the lead-up to the 2010. What I am going to address- or rather
comment on ? is the issue of "openness". Yes, it is wildly general
term but
it is also one that you are all very familiar with: open media, open
culture, open access are all topics discussed at this and previous
wikimanias, and which form a discourse that will continue to be addressed in
future wikimanias and other conferences. Most important to the context of
this discussion, these are issues that you all have an interest in by the
mere virtue of being wikipedians.
Caveat lector: Similar to all experiences and opinions expressed here, my
own commentary on these issues is naturally and unavoidably influenced by my
own personal experiences, views and background, and this is starting to read
like it is going to be a drawn-out treatise as opposed to "brief personal
take", so grab some coffee.
(Just kidding)
I as I started catching up on reading the mailing list messages, I came
across what Majorly wrote on his experience in Egypt. I was not surprised at
the "only negative" experience described, as I am aware of where it
comes
from, I acknowledge many of the unfortunate situations that conspired to
construct such a negative experience (which definitely saddens me as a
native of Egypt), and surely understand that the extent to which we can step
outside our personal "comfort zones" - formed by our own cultures,
communities and environments ? is liable to a very wide spectrum of
variation. However, what I have difficulty coming to terms with - and I do
believe some would concur given the majority of opinions expressed here- is
how some would be so absolutist in their conclusions in such a way to
express things with such finality (to which they are entitled to in every
way of course, but that is not the point). For example, Majorly has made up
his mind that he "never want[s] to go to Egypt again, nor the next
Wikimania", he adds that "there is no way I'd consider going to
Buenos
Aires". Wow.
Now, before the point I am attempting to get across gets misinterpreted, let
me get this out of the way: It's a free world! (well, some of it, at
least).
Where Majorly ? and others ? decide to go or not go is entirely their own
business. Nevertheless, since we (by "we" I mean people who have at
least a
somewhat expanded understanding of the general notion of "openness",
and
given the context of our general collective interests being in the realm of
freedom of knowledge, information and expression) are sharing experiences
and views, and then expressing opinions on such experiences and views, I
feel compelled to share how I feel about such a sentiment.
I have been fortunate enough to do a fair share of continent-hopping over
the course of the past few years, and I am glad I was able to see a pretty
good chunk of the world at a relatively young age. I am not going to wax
lyrical on the merits and virtues of travel, as chances are that many or
most of you are already avid travelers. What I would like to emphasize,
however, is the one thing that fascinates me most about going somewhere new:
the different. I say the "different" minus any value judgment which
we
inevitably, oftentimes validly and sometimes inaccurately make consciously
or unconscionably on what is, or what initially appears to be, alien to us,
because I do think that the different ? be it positive or negative - holds
intrinsic value insofar as it can add to (or change) us as individuals, and
the subsequent aggregate ? and hopefully positive - effect on our
understanding of others.
What you make of this value is up to you, but to me it is often a form of
incremental personal enlightenment, on a very small level, that must be
valued and embraced, rather than shunned and avoided. We, as wikipedians and
self-proclaimed "advocates of openness", took up a slightly larger
share of
an oft-discussed but frequently practically abandoned global responsibility
to value and promote diversity, cultural awareness and sensitivity, and
receptivity to the new and different even if it means that we have to
forsake ? for even the shortest of times ? our respective comfort zones.
What I took the liberty to very generically term as "openness" here
has
multiple, varied but still connected and related definitions. To me, it can
border on the hypocritical to claim that I am an advocate of open knowledge
if I am myself not open or receptive to a different culture that might
starkly contrast to my own.
Those of you in the "First world" are living where innovation, access
and
decent standards of living are already existent, and most politicians are
already doing a pretty good job of messing up the world, so what openness do
you speak of if cultural bridges are not built at the grassroots level? Why
would we let our personal biases, ethnocentrism and fears of the different
or uncomfortable cloud our visions of amazing opportunities for the
promotion of potential platforms of global understanding? You can edit and
read wikipedia all you like, you can be an open knowledge activist, or an
arm chair promoter of openness, but if you shy away from going out and
bumping your head against another culture/people/environment, dealing with,
absorbing and learning from whatever is different in the process, then you
should ask yourself if whatever you are doing is really meaningful. It is
very simple really, you either go or you don't, but you will never really
know unless you go. The way I see it, talk all you like about promotion of
openness, freedom and access in conferences in the "First World", but
if
you're serious about it, go where it really matters now, go to the
South/Third World/developing world...whatever you would like to call it. If
you feel that uncomfortable with it, that is understandable and you should
stay home or go somewhere similar to home, just don't call yourself and
advocate of openness. To you, it is probably just it's just a hobby :),
which is still fine by me.
Chaos, unpredictability, poor hygiene are constants when you travel in
developing countries. Dishonest people, dangerous areas and general
travel-related risks are constants anywhere you travel. Degrees of these
hazards vary, but if you can't deal with it, stay home. It is that simple.
It is just unfortunate, though, that you are going to miss quiet a lot in
what little time you've got on this Earth.
I said I tend to write more than I originally intended to and I did just
that, but I also did forewarn :), and apologies if I digressed or lacked
clarity, but I do hope I was able to get my thoughts across.
Cheers,
Hani Morsi
I do agree with almost all what you said, Austin. I can understand all the complaints and I think our friends who brought such complaints had enjoyed the conference and maybe some places they may have visited in Egypt. Also, I guess many of them were trying to help by bringing such things up, rather than criticize. After all, we are to do our best to help get the message across to everybody and everywhere and in the process we know we will face difficulties. Lately, I have been traveling extensively in the US and Europe and, even in these first world countries, I have come across some stuff that did not meet our expectations.
Yesterday, I have been talking to a friend who just came back from a charity visit to Mauritania and she has been telling me how poor the country is. She is American and she is rich and she did it out of good well. She lost weight and had to sleep on the floor, etc. But she enjoyed it, since she felt she was helping people. We Wikipedians, I guess, share the same spirit: helping the unprivileged by providing info. for free. It is a good thing and I am sure that most of us are ready to offer some sacrifices in the way.
What I will really like is to have some of our local group in Egypt summarize the complaints so that we can send them to the BA director. The man is enthusiastic and maybe he can get these to some minister, media, etc. I know for sure he is aware of many of the problem and I know how difficult change maybe, but I also met many zealous, friendly youngpersons in Egypt who made me believe in their power to change. Look what Egyptian activists are doing over the Internet to change the country to the better. A successful national strike was organize almost exclusively on Facebook, for those those do not know. If such complaints get summarized I will do my best to get to the media, with an intention to improve rather than negatively criticize.
--
Muhammad Abdul-Mageed,
PhD Student
Dept. of Linguistics,
Indiana University, Bloomington,
USA
www.mumageed.blogspot.com
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Sat, 2 Aug 2008 13:33:39 -0500
From: "Austin Hair" <adhair(a)gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] Comments
To: "Wikimania general list (open subscription)"
<wikimania-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Message-ID:
<e2a50e360808021133m3b135d2aw74b892dc560c9bfd(a)mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
I've been busy all week, so when I finally caught up with this thread
I found myself marveling at the complaints of inexperienced travelers,
acknowledging several fair gripes about this year's venue,
appreciating the more insightful points by some posters, and being
particularly encouraged by Patricio's post.
As a veteran Wikimania organizer, and having participated in the
selection process for every Wikimania to date, I could write an essay
on what I think about our annual conference (which, despite the
inevitable problems, people still attend). I'll try to be brief here,
though.
No conference venue is going to be perfect. One year there won't be
enough snacks; another venue won't have adequate power ports in
certain areas; a country might have too many poor people. (Read up,
these are actual complaints cited in this thread alone.) No
conference venue, period, is going to have adequate WiFi?I do this for
a living; I taped access points to walls in Frankfurt, and the fact is
that it's not a perfect technology. (It's not even a particularly
good one, actually, but we manage.)
Every year those involved learn from the previous year's mistakes, and
we make new ones. Because every venue is different, new problems will
occur that were never anticipated in the past. What makes Wikimania
great is just getting everyone together in one place, and though I'm
not going to say "kwitcherbitchin," I will say that some of the
complaints I've seen simply aren't helpful. This said, I hope people
keep posting, because I'd rather roll my eyes at a noob comment than
risk missing out on a good point.
I'm looking forward to Wikimania 2009. Patricio and his team are
impressively dedicated to doing this right, and have practically
treated the last two Wikimanias as a case study?and good thing, since
each one gets harder and harder to top. I have no doubt we won't be
disappointed.
Austin
P.S. Since all we've seen are the unpleasant arrival stories, I want
to relate mine: I arrived in Cairo at 3:55 a.m., spent a mere 30
minutes buying a visa and getting through passport control, got a cab
to the hotel my friends had checked into a few hours before, got a key
from reception, crashed for a few hours, had a leisurely breakfast,
got a cab to the train station, took a train to Alexandria, and got a
cab to another hotel. All it takes is a little prior research and
planning, and a little bit of savvy. Yes, along the way I was waylaid
by unscrupulous cab drivers in the airport, had my driver disrupt a
wedding, waited an hour in the heat of the Cairo train station, had to
negotiate a seat swap with another passenger to sit with my friends,
watched as a cab driver spent five minutes banging on his engine with
a pair of pliers to get his '72 Lada running again, and overpaid for
most everything, only to spend the next two nights with three beds
crammed into a particularly small room of a colonial hotel; although I
realize not everyone finds this sort of thing fun as I do, you have to
manage your own expectations. There are no golden carriages in the
developing world.
It's now been a week since I got back. I enjoyed the actual conference, and
meeting everyone in person. However, I have made up my mind that I never
want to go to Egypt again, nor the next Wikimania.
First off, the planning for this conference was pretty poor with regards to
information. What I mean is, I had to pester people on IRC to get any kind
of information regarding how to get to the shuttle, what to do on arrival
etc. The schedule the team was supposed to be following wasn't followed. The
scholarships were very late indeed, and when I finally received my "I'm
sorry, but..." email, I'd already booked.
The fact there was very little info *on the wiki* is atrocious. I had to
pester Mido on IRC several times a week, to try and squeeze any information
out. It got to about a week before I was due to leave, and still with no
answers to basic questions, I sent an email to this list, begging for
information. Eventually it was answered, but it was never put on the wiki. I
spoke to some people, who don't subscribe to this list, so didn't ever
receive this important information.
The whole shuttle thing was a disaster. We should not have needed to sign up
- just run a "shuttle" every 4 hours as stated. No where did you mention
where the shuttle would be on arrival (until I explicitly asked on the list,
even then it was wrong). The shuttle for me on return left at 7:30am when my
flight was at 5pm. Why was there not a later shuttle?
On arrival, I was with Charles Matthews, and we spent several hours waiting
at the airport, then we realised we were in the wrong hall. So, after
meeting with two other Wikimanians, we waited a further two hours for the
shuttle, which was very late. We arrived in Alexandria at 1am-ish. I was put
in a room that was a different one to the one I had been told I was in.
After a very nutritious breakfast, we went to the first day of the
conference bright and early. The schedule changed several times, there was a
lack of plugs in the halls, and some of the talks were frankly dull (this
applies to all three days).
There was not really anywhere suitable to go for lunch, so we sort of sat
around on the floor... not good. How did Alexandria get chosen in this
respect - the social areas were basically non existent.
On returning to the dorms, I found that I had to change rooms, again, still
not to the one that I was put into originally. The beds were rather hard, no
sheets were provided, and there was no toilet paper in the toilets (luckily
I had brought my own as I imagined something as basic as that would be left
out).
The next two days went similarly I suppose. The end of conference party was
done badly again. Why did we have to get a sticker? No one even checked I
had one when I got onto the coach. The party was OK, and the food was
probably the best I had the entire time I was there.
I left the next day, with Brianmc (sharing a cab). We got to Cairo airport,
but the wrong terminal for me. I had to make my own way to Terminal 1, after
being tricked by someone into paying money I shouldn't have had to to get
there. I was then harrassed by a man who claimed to be an "honest policeman"
who charged me £300 EGP for the use of his cab. He wouldn't let me leave,
even after I spilt water in his car. I tried to walk away, and he grabbed my
arm demanding I paid him. I don't think I'd ever felt so awful in my life.
It was the most horrible experience of the conference. Why are people like
that allowed to roam about the airport, looking for weak, defenceless (and
rich) tourists like myself? It's ridiculous.
I am still struggling to see how Egypt was chosen to host Wikimania. Yes,
the people at the conference were nice and friendly, and the conference was
enjoyable enough, with a few minor issues, but the country itself is the
worst I have ever been to. You cannot cross the road without risking being
killed by the mad drivers (who beep at all hours of the day for no apparent
reason). They should save painting lanes on the roads, as no one bothers
following them. There was a family living in the street, the same street the
BA is situated on. Just goes to show what a mix of life there is.
I was so disturbed and put off by my experience of Egpyt, there is no way
I'd consider going to Buenos Aires. While I'm sure they are very different
places, I don't want to risk anything like the harrassment, the poor hygene,
the dangerous roads and the poor organisation again. It'll be way too
expensive for me as well, and I doubt I'd get a scholarship. I'd rather go
somewhere closer to the UK where I live, or where the culture is more
similar to here.
I'm sorry my words are harsh. This is not a dig at anyone, just my honest
concerns about how this whole thing turned out. I know for sure others feel
the same way I do about a lot of the things I said.
--
Al Tally
(User:Majorly)