On 22/12/2007, Oldak Quill oldakquill@gmail.com wrote:
On 22/12/2007, Angela beesley@gmail.com wrote:
This spun off from a different discussion elsewhere, but I was wondering about the possibility of printing Christmas cards based on images from Commons. Maybe a partnership with a printing company could be made for next year's fundraiser? (I'd buy them!)
Angela
I don't think Commons should officially release greetings cards for a religious festival. Greetings cards could generate funds but would not further our aims. Why don't we direct fundraising efforts at something that will also further the aims of the Wikimedia Fondation and/or Commons? Ideally, this would be something educational or informative. For Wikipedia, for example, this might be producing and selling WikiBooks to generate funds.
I also don't think Wikimedia/Commons should endorse one particular religion (or religious festival) in this way. Transcending cultural barriers is core to what we are trying to achieve and giving a nod to a particular religious/cultural practice doesn't seem compatible.
People can write their own captions, eh.
Are you guys thinking of creating cards with limited flexibility - choose from X pre-selected images and Y pre-selected messages - or something where you can generate the card you want "on the fly"?
I think something in between would be really cool - let people choose from any QI or FP, but also have default "here's one we prepared earlier" options. (Sensible defaults are half the battle won when you give people options I think :))
But the you have the whole thing of infrastructure, and who is responsible and omgz-are-we-publishing-something, and who gets the money at the end of the day. Like would it really be just a big exercise in making profit for CafePress.
The partnership seems to be the sticking point. We seem to lack suitable contacts.
cheers Brianna