There is probably scope to take material from Wikizine and things like it and kill off the insider jargon. A lot of people who are actively involved take some of the jargon for granted (I probably do sometimes) and while all the discussions take place in public, to a lot of people – including some of the journalists who cover issues – they remain opaque.
So, yes, an irregular jargon-free newsletter might be a good idea.
Brian.
-----Original
Message-----
From:
comproj-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org
[mailto:comproj-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On
Behalf Of Ziko van Dijk
Sent: 28 January 2009 20:50
To: Discussion list for the
Communication Projects Group
Subject: Re: [ComProj] Newsletter
That is an excellent idea! Like a Wikizine, only written for
non-wikimedians?
Cary
Yes, indeed. Our other information channels are extremely limited to
Wikimedians, we ourselves often don't remark that. Think about your uncle, your
teacher, your elderly neighbour. A newsletter for non-Wikimedians should be
reread by at least two other Wikimedians than the author, maybe even checked
for difficultuies by non-Wikimedians.
Several ways are possible:
* Everytime there is something to report, WMF sends a newsletter.
* Every week, WMF sends a newsletter with a couple of collected, relevant news
* Every fortnight or month, WMF sends a newsletter that is more similar to a
magazine or paper, with sections and stuff you would suppose to find in a
journal for the members of an association.
This thing should get a name that is more inviting for non-Wikimedians (or
"normal people"), like "Wikimedia News", "Informations
for friends of Wikipedia", not a cryptic "Wikizine" (WIKIpedia
MagaZINE).
As Jerry says, be conscious about your readership.
Ziko
Ziko van Dijk wrote:
> Hello,
>
> In order to surf on the new wave of contributions to this list,
> here a suggestion:
>
> WMF certainly has a lot of e-mail addresses of people who are not
> really Wikimedians, but who are interested in what we do:
> professionals, hard core readers, teachers, politicians, potential
> donators and so on. Why not create a newsletter they can get per
> e-mail, maybe once a week. With news that is relevant to them and
> written in a way they understand (no techno babble, no Wiki
> jargon).
>
> We do have this blog, you can have RSS yes, but many of these
> people don't know what a blog or RSS is. Simply a mail service they
> can subscribe on, and no bothering or searching later.
>
> Kind regards
>
> Ziko
>
>
>
> 2009/1/28 Cary Bass <cary@wikimedia.org> <mailto:cary@wikimedia.org>>
>
> Hi, welcome, Jerry!
>
> I am glad you're here. Comproj is in a bit of a slow point right
> now while we reassess what we're here for, but you can help us in
> that reassessment!
>
> Cary
>
> Jerry~Yuyu wrote:
>> Halo all
>
>> I wonder if most of know me already.
>
>> This is User:Yuyu on Wikimedia projects, I start hanging around
>> in Chinese Wikipedia since 2004, and became a sysop there. And
>> I've been helping out in meta since Wikimania 2007, mostly on
> translation
>> and did give some comments in ComCom mailing list
>
>> As a student of Journalism in Hong Kong who spent his childhood
>> in Mainland China, I think I can help with the Press and PR stuff
>>
> here.
>> As a deputy-president of the local chapter in HK, I've already
>> handled dozens of media inquires and interviewed by several '].
>
>> I hope I can help here as much as possible.
>>> Jeromy-Yu Maximilian Chan Jerry~ии User:Yuyu http://jeromyu.info
>> MSN: jeromyuchan@msn.com <mailto:jeromyuchan@msn.com>
> <mailto:jeromyuchan@msn.com <mailto:jeromyuchan@msn.com>>
>
>> <http://blogue.jeromyu.info/>
>
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