The sad thing is that one major thing that won't be available this year is international prizes. Even if we get international team, I doubt they will apply for a grant from WMF and ask for prizes for international winners. In this case, I don't think we really need an international team.. Romaine is doing good. He's providing good technical support. Saqib

Hi Taweetham, There were indeed a few people that volunteered. However, after that nobody stood up and took responsibility to make things happen. Also, please note that in the past year the international team had 6 people and the feeling was there was too much work already. The tasks for an international team, to make an international competition possible, are quite wide. You will find an overview on https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Wiki_Loves_Monuments_2013/Timeli… (the lower part). Please note that this timeline starts in January/February. It is June now. I'm glad to hear that you feel that Romaine is doing a good job, but please note that what he's doing is normally not considered technical support. When we mention technical, it is usually referring to making sure the tools are up and running (the map tools, evaluation tools, websites, monuments database etc). Romaine is mostly making sure everybody has access to the upload forms and centralnotice - which is of critical importance too. If you set up an international competition, in my humble opinion you will have to make sure the quality is good. People have a set of expectations with an international competition, and while WLM has always been a bit messy, that should definitely include proper international prizes, a good and balanced jury, a proper jury report, some international coordination, a proper website and documentation. If you are confident you can manage that, please be my guest. But my request is to do it well, if you do it. Wiki Loves Monuments has a good name to uphold and if we want to use it again in the future as a major competition, a very messy last minute competition in the year before would not help. I'm sorry we didn't have this discussion half a year ago when the question was first raised - then there would have been plenty of time for a proper knowledge transfer and organization. Right now, I personally don't feel too confident about that. But like I said: if countries want to set up national competitions, great! As long as the technical infrastructure is there, that should be OK. If the infrastructure is actually there, I don't know to be honest :) I hope this elaborates a bit where my assumptions come from. Best, Lodewijk 2014-06-30 2:15 GMT+02:00 <KaewWiki(a)gmail.com>om>: