Hi Nkansah,

thanks for your mail! For the coordinating team it is mostly important to have a good mix of people who have time, commitment and experience. There is no need that everyone has technical skills, but it would be very helpful if some have. There is no official age limitation, it is more important how mature one behaves (please note that this is basically a working group, and not so much a formal board function). 

There is not much software 'behind WLM' so there is in that respect not much training. There is of course a lot of documentation, but mostly it is (I'm afraid) a self-learning process. 

Last year we ran the coordination with four very active people. This was sometimes on the low side. 

There is no formal geographical limitation - although being from a country that successfully organized Wiki Loves Monuments - and that could organize it again without your continued support would definitely be a big advantage. I would really be sad if you joining the international coordination team would for example mean that the activities in Ghana would be decreased significantly. 

Best,

Lodewijk

El jueves, 11 de octubre de 2012, Nkansah Rexford escribió:

Hi,

My questions:

1. To be a part of the organizing team, do I need any technical and/or programming skills (e.g PHP, SQL etc)?
2. Any age limitation?
3. Will newbie volunteers be trained to use the software infrastructure behind WLM, or they'll have to figure our stuffs based on their experience?
4. How many volunteers do you need (or how many volunteers will you recommend to run WLM 2013 successfully)?
5. Any geographical limitation?

I guess thats all I wish to ask for now.

However, I'm willing to volunteer. I'm from Ghana.

Rexford

On Thursday, October 11, 2012, Lodewijk wrote:

Hi all,

2012 has been the second year that we have an international Wiki Loves Monuments competition, and it is quite a ride! While we're not finished yet with this years competition, it is probably good to look forward to 2013. A number of countries have indicated they would love to join next year. Some who have already participated this year, some who will be joining for the first time. Some who participated this year, but not to the extent they would have liked to. 

But for a smooth organization, we will need a dedicated volunteer team for the international coordination. This year the team consisted from Maarten (Multichill), Elke (Elya), Tomasz (Odder) and myself with the valuable support of Barbara who was working from the Wikimedia Deutschland office. At least a few of this team have indicated that they are unlikely to help coordinate to the same level as this year.

Lets put it bluntly: without coordinating team, there will be no international competition for Wiki Loves Monuments in 2013. So the question is... are there any volunteers? 

Maybe you wonder what this coordinating is all about. Most of it is stuff that others will never see. Talking with network partners, keeping track of status and documentation, a whole bunch of technical stuff in tool- and database maintenance and also a lot of knowledge transfer to local teams (chats, meetings, workshops). The time it costs can vary widely, but should not be underestimated (I think a few hundred hours is on the lower side). Of course the more skills and people, the less work per person. 

Would you be interested? Just drop me a note or ask some questions on this list, in a chat or somewhere else. We don't need to make this decision right now - but if we want another WLM international - we will need to get started with budget requests pretty soon thanks to the more complicated budget allocation rules we're facing. I'm happy to help get that done - but only if I'm confident that there will be a great team once again :) 

I'm looking forward to any questions or emails on this topic. 

Best,

Lodewijk (not on behalf of anyone)

--
+Nyarko Rexford

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