> Ah yes, thanks Thomas, so there is. :-) In which case, I'd really
> appreciate a timely response to my other questions - my attendance may
> depend upon getting an invoice to my university.
Responding to this particular issue - yes, it is possible, I need to know
the institution name and address as well as any additional infomation
that should be on the invoice (like purchase order number or whatever
your sponsor may require).
--
Marcin Cieslak
Wikimania 2010 Gdansk ++ http://www.wikimania2010.pl/
Dear all,
As you know, the results from the review (which are here:
http://wikimania2010.wikimedia.org/wiki/Review_results) are available
for some time already. However, we are still waiting for
confirmations/cancellations from some authors. We have sent
notifications to all the authors twice, however, it seems that some of
these emails could end up in spam folders (especially in gmail). As we
need to create a final program schedule soon, could you please
confirm/cancel your presentations as soon as possible or contact us if
you are still not sure (e.g., visa problems)? Moreover, if you are in a
direct contact with one of the authors of unconfirmed presentations -
please draw his/her attention.
We are going to close the page with the review results from editing on
Wednesday. From that time the authors of unconfirmed presentations will
have to contact us to discuss their presentation slots.
Best regards,
Wikimania Program Team
Hi all,
Registration for Wikimania 2010 should be open very shortly. In the
meantime, however, anyone on this list with visa concerns should
e-mail me off-list so I can begin the process of getting you what you
need.
Regards,
Austin
On Thu, Jun 17, 2010 at 10:58 PM, Michael Snow <wikipedia(a)verizon.net> wrote:
> On 6/17/2010 5:35 PM, phoebe ayers wrote:
>> OK, so I guess my question is (and we talked about this on IRC too) --
>> who has the power or the ability -- or who *should*, in a perfect
>> world -- create such a committee? We don't have much precedent for
>> this. There were concerns over who or what body can create
>> governance/oversight structures, particularly if this isn't really
>> just a Foundation issue.
>>
> I suppose the board could create the committee, if it's not clear who
> else might have the authority. Or perhaps better, the board could
> authorize its creation. I think the board is a bit reluctant to jump in,
> partly for the reason Sue mentioned that overseeing Wikimania is not
> really a board-level issue (it's primarily operational rather than
> strategic), but also because the board is not well placed to fill and
> maintain committees like this. When it becomes a situation of appointing
> people none of us really knows, or feeling that there are probably
> people we're not aware who ought to be recruited to a committee like
> this, it's pretty uncomfortable to have that responsibility. But if we
> authorized the committee and then let the staff and experienced
> Wikimania volunteers review applications or expressions of interest to
> join the committee, that might work out. That's kind of the direction
> things have moved in any case. Some of the early committees that still
> function have evolved to a place outside the board's immediate activity,
> and the current work of the governance committee is focused more on
> structures needed to organize the board's own functions.
>
> --Michael Snow
Yes, authorization seems right. I wouldn't really expect that the
Board actually fill such a committee or even necessarily ask for
direct reports. The question that came up in IRC though was where
would such a committee derive its authority from (assuming it had any
particular authority). Perhaps the answer for this is "it doesn't" and
simply fills a communication and reporting role that is currently
lacking. Or perhaps (my ideal scenario) we come up with a way where
the interested community grants it authority by building the
structure, filling the seats, etc., and that is generally recognized.
I'm interested in this case specifically of course, but I also am
wondering more generally what the current state of affairs is for
forming any sort of operational, community-driven committee. Of course
we're good at forming wikiprojects to do things that need doing, but
for areas that also require overlap with things that the office works
on, it seems tricky.
Re: scheduling a time at wikimania for discussing this potential
glorious wikimania committee: yes, let's. I wanted to have a reprise
of the Future of Wikimania discussion from last year, anyway. How
about Sunday? I'll volunteer to check with the 2011 team and other
interested parties and schedule a time. This overlaps with Manuel's
panel, too, but I think we need a dedicated time maybe. Stay tuned!
-- phoebe
p.s. if we get both James Owen AND James Forrester involved it will be
unstoppable. Powered by James^2.
On Thu, Jun 17, 2010 at 12:06 PM, Sue Gardner <sgardner(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
> Hi folks,
>
> For several years now, people have occasionally floated the notion
> that there should be a permanent Wikimania oversight committee –
> basically, a group of people responsible for giving some coaching and
> guidance and oversight to the local planning team each year. Over the
> years, support has been offered each year by people like Phoebe, James
> Forrester, Delphine (Delphine both in her staff role and as a
> volunteer) and SJ … but there has never (AFAIK) been a formal
> oversight committee. I think there probably should be.
Hello Sue and all,
Good timing -- we just had a long conversation about this in the
#wikimedia open meeting this afternoon. There were quite a few
participants, including several past wikimania organizers.
Quick summary of that discussion:
* there is definite interest in an ongoing Wikimania (oversight,
governance, guidance) (body, committee, group) (we talked for quite a
while about those various names and their different connotations)
* there are a few potential roles that people see for such a group:
** 1) collecting and writing better documentation about the
conference, including best practices for organization and what has
happened in the past
** 2) answering questions from Wikimania organizers about past
practices, helping coordinate who to ask about various aspects
** 3) providing oversight to the overall wikimania process -- for
instance making sure that a bid jury is called and the bids are
submitted in time (like elections)
** 4) providing oversight/governance as the conference progresses --
for instance, getting regular reports about the conference. Along with
this, the org team would have someone to report to if, say, a venue
burns down or some other catastrophe happens.
These ideas are roughly in order of how much controversy they
generated among discussion participants. I think we all pretty much
agreed that we need better conference documentation, and a loose
community group of past organizers and interested participants can
provide such documentation. Here's a start:
Conference handbook: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania/Handbook
-- let's write the big book of Wikimania
Conference checklist:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania/checklist -- make sure you
have everything you need
Conference community:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania/community -- a start at a
community group, w/ interested participants.
We discussed however that for any oversight/governance functions we
might need a more formalized structure and perhaps a formal mandate.
This seemed like a Board-level issue to several people (including me).
We also discussed that there's not a good process for proposing and
forming community committees that would interact with the Foundation
on various issues.
What do you all think?
best,
Phoebe
OK, so I guess my question is (and we talked about this on IRC too) --
who has the power or the ability -- or who *should*, in a perfect
world -- create such a committee? We don't have much precedent for
this. There were concerns over who or what body can create
governance/oversight structures, particularly if this isn't really
just a Foundation issue.
I totally agree that part of such a body's role could be to help
coordinate between the permanent staff whose work might touch on
Wikimania, and the rotating local organization team.
-- phoebe
On Thu, Jun 17, 2010 at 3:48 PM, <susanpgardner(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> A couple of fast thoughts:
>
> * I think it's debatable whether it's board-level or not. It's board-level in the sense that it's "not staff-level" -- meaning it's mainly a community responsibility rather than a staff responsibility. But to the extent that part of the role of the committee would be to ask the staff for help if Wikimania is floundering, that is probably not a board-level issue. For example, I can't imagine the board making a resolution asking me to intervene to offer more support if one year Wikimania were floundering. That just doesn't feel like a governance issue.
>
> * Which leads me to point two, which is that from my perspective, I actually do want someone to flag to me if Wikimania is floundering, and to ask me officially to have the staff get involved. Wikimania in Gdansk this year has had some problems, and I have felt awkward about how to best resolve them, given that (again) it's a community-led event, not a staff-led event. But I don't think the board should need to involve itself in that, because again, I think it's not a governance issue.
>
> * Those aren't super-significant issues from my perspective though. Upshot from my perspective: I think that there's lots of good energy and thinking happening on this, and it feels like people are pretty aligned in feeling we want some form of oversight/guidance/something, in place supporting excellent Wikimanias every year. Which is great. Does someone want to organize a meeting about this for Gdansk? I'm hoping Phoebe will attend, and Casey and SJ, and whoever else is interested. I will be happy to put it in my schedule, and I think James would probably be interested too. (James Owen, not Forrester. I actually don't know if James Forrester is coming this year, although now that I think of it, maybe he is one of the train-travelling people?)
>
> Thanks,
> Sue
> -----Original Message-----
> From: phoebe ayers <phoebe.wiki(a)gmail.com>
> Date: Thu, 17 Jun 2010 13:28:37
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List<foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Cc: Wikimania general list \(open subscription\)<wikimania-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Floating a notion: permanent Wikimania committee?
>
> On Thu, Jun 17, 2010 at 12:06 PM, Sue Gardner <sgardner(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
>> Hi folks,
>>
>> For several years now, people have occasionally floated the notion
>> that there should be a permanent Wikimania oversight committee –
>> basically, a group of people responsible for giving some coaching and
>> guidance and oversight to the local planning team each year. Over the
>> years, support has been offered each year by people like Phoebe, James
>> Forrester, Delphine (Delphine both in her staff role and as a
>> volunteer) and SJ … but there has never (AFAIK) been a formal
>> oversight committee. I think there probably should be.
>
> Hello Sue and all,
>
> Good timing -- we just had a long conversation about this in the
> #wikimedia open meeting this afternoon. There were quite a few
> participants, including several past wikimania organizers.
>
> Quick summary of that discussion:
> * there is definite interest in an ongoing Wikimania (oversight,
> governance, guidance) (body, committee, group) (we talked for quite a
> while about those various names and their different connotations)
>
> * there are a few potential roles that people see for such a group:
> ** 1) collecting and writing better documentation about the
> conference, including best practices for organization and what has
> happened in the past
> ** 2) answering questions from Wikimania organizers about past
> practices, helping coordinate who to ask about various aspects
> ** 3) providing oversight to the overall wikimania process -- for
> instance making sure that a bid jury is called and the bids are
> submitted in time (like elections)
> ** 4) providing oversight/governance as the conference progresses --
> for instance, getting regular reports about the conference. Along with
> this, the org team would have someone to report to if, say, a venue
> burns down or some other catastrophe happens.
>
> These ideas are roughly in order of how much controversy they
> generated among discussion participants. I think we all pretty much
> agreed that we need better conference documentation, and a loose
> community group of past organizers and interested participants can
> provide such documentation. Here's a start:
>
> Conference handbook: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania/Handbook
> -- let's write the big book of Wikimania
> Conference checklist:
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania/checklist -- make sure you
> have everything you need
> Conference community:
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania/community -- a start at a
> community group, w/ interested participants.
>
> We discussed however that for any oversight/governance functions we
> might need a more formalized structure and perhaps a formal mandate.
> This seemed like a Board-level issue to several people (including me).
> We also discussed that there's not a good process for proposing and
> forming community committees that would interact with the Foundation
> on various issues.
>
> What do you all think?
>
> best,
> Phoebe
>
On 17 June 2010 23:48, <susanpgardner(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> (James Owen, not Forrester. I actually don't know if James Forrester is coming this year,
> although now that I think of it, maybe he is one of the train-travelling people?)
I am, to both counts, and you can rely on me turning up to anything to
do with Wikimania organisation. :-)
J.
--
James D. Forrester
jdforrester(a)wikimedia.org | jdforrester(a)gmail.com
[[Wikipedia:User:Jdforrester|James F.]]
Hi all,
I've arrived in Gdańsk, along with Juliana Da Costa Jose, and we're
continuing the process of putting together the resources to make this
conference happen. We have a lot of work ahead of us, but all of the
important bits are in place, and I'm confident that we can organize a
Wikimania that won't disappoint.
To anyone who's sent me an e-mail in the last 24 hours, and hasn't yet
received a reply: I sincerely apologize, and promise to get back to
you before noon tomorrow CET. I hope you understand that I just spent
a solid day trekking from the Netherlands to Poland on a series of
trains, and am still catching up. Meanwhile, I'm off to bed.
Regular updates to follow.
Austin
Forwarding message for HaeB.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: HaeB <haebwiki(a)gmail.com>
Date: 2010/6/16
Subject: Privacy of registration data
To: wikimania-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
Hi,
by its nature, the Wikimania registration form at
https://wm10reg.wikimedia.org/ needs to ask for sensitive personal
information. However, it currently does not state what this
information will be used for and who will have access to it. I was
told that the usual Wikimedia privacy policy applies - could we add a
link to it on the registration form, for clarification?
(http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Privacy_policy) Thanks!
As a general remark, the privacy of Wikimania registration data has
been an issue in the past. While for example the Buenos Aires team
appears to have been very diligent in that regard, there have been at
least two other Wikimanias where real names of participants were
posted on the Web, against their will.
Regards,
HaeB
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benutzer:HaeBhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:HaeB
Now we have less than 20 days left for the conference. As you know, for most
of the countries outside EU/USA, VISA is mandatory to enter POLAND.
To apply for a Polish VISA from my country (INDIA), the INVITATION LETTER
(in Polish language) addressed to the Consulate General of the Republic of
Poland <http://www.polishconsulate.com/contact.html> in Mumbai is
mandatory. (That might be the case with most of the non-EU/USA countries).
This INVITATION LETTER need to be faxed directly to Consulate General, and a
scanned copy/photo copy of that letter is mandatory along with the VISA
application that we submit to the consulate. Otherwise our VISA applications
will not be processed by the travel agencies.
*My VISA is not yet processed since I haven't received a copy of this
letter. *Could some one please help me (and many other Wikimaninas)
regarding this.I am sending this letter to this group since I am not
receiving any reply for any of the mails that I sent regarding this.
Kindly remember that the system in many countries will not work as per
European/US standards. Considering that this is an international conference,
it would be good if there is some one there at the other end who can handle
these type of issues.
We are helpless if we are not getting support from the Polish Wikimedians
who are organizing this event.
Shiju