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2234 discussions

Speaker from Library of Congress
by Brian 23 Nov '05

23 Nov '05

Google recently donated $3M to the Library of Congress for their World Digital Library project, which seeks to coordinate with world libraries to digitize their works. The project is looking for more private funding, and I've emailed them requesting more information on the possibility of providing a speaker for Wikimania 2006. If they are interested, I will put them in contact with one of the Wikimania coordinators. More information: http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,69646,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_7 http://international.loc.gov/intldl/intldlhome.html brian0918 [[en:User:Brian0918]]

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program notes
by phoebe ayers 23 Nov '05

23 Nov '05

All -- I've updated the program page (http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2006/Program#Schedule) with the suggestions made so far about the '06 program. You may want to take a look (and add your own) before the next program meeting. cheers, phoebe [[user:brassratgirl]]

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Meeting recap
by SJ 21 Nov '05

21 Nov '05

A few notes follow from the wikimania chat this weekend. Other notes you can read online (including a summary, once it's put up in the coming day or two) here: * We must finalize dates and reserve rooms by next week. There may be a short meeting devoted to that this weekend; scheduling tabled to the mailing list. * A short program meeting will be held Wednesday on irc at 2200 UTC. * December 3, 2200 UTC was suggested for the next Wikimania chat, alternating back to the time of the first chat. If you can't make Saturdays in general, or really want to attend but can't make that time, speak up. * A few other issues were tabled for discussion on the mailing list and wiki -- how to handle meta-questions about press accreditation (to discuss here? a Wikimania FAQ on meta?), and what short announcements & blurbs to draft ( "save the date", "about wikimania" ), for broad translation/distribution. Cheers, Sj

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Reminder: Wikimania IRC chat, Saturday 1600 UTC; Program meeting next week
by SJ 17 Nov '05

17 Nov '05

Dear all, A reminder: the next Wikimania chat will be this Saturday at 1600 UTC in #wikimania. There will also be a specific program meeting next week. With a handful of people responding that M/T next week could work, I'd like to suggest Tuesday at 1400 UTC or 2200 UTC. What do people think of those times? If you can make it on Tuesday, which time would work better for you? Cheers, SJ

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Wikimentary: great news, updates
by SJ 17 Nov '05

17 Nov '05

Dear all, The Wikimentary project, which started as the kernel of an idea at Wikimania when the Globalvision documentary team was moved to see what the community would do with their raw footage, is taking off. Rory O'Connor at Globalvision has really been pushing to make this happen; through some heroic efforts on his part we now have low-res copies of all 25 tapes they shot, a high-res copy of one tape (#8), and a 'rough cut' he edited together that PBS will be airing in January -- all available via archive.org at the moment. You can see a guest blog-post about this on the Frontline/World blog here : http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/blog/2005/11/its_a_wiki_wiki.html The rough cut (be the first to write a review ;-): http://www.archive.org/details/WIKIMANIA-ROUGH_CUT.mov Transcripts: http://www.archive.org/details/WIKIMANIA_TRANSCRIPTS NEXT STEPS: If you'd like to take part in the project, or work on your own short wikimentary using this content, you can help in a few ways. 1. Download the transcripts (all of which are rough, have some mistakes, and are currently Word files) and one of the low-res 'screener' files; listen to the screener while editing the transcript. Upload the fixed transcript, as something other than a Word file, to Wikisource :-) 2. Help others learn how to edit their own video. Add ot the [[m:Video]] guide on meta; learn more about various editing platforms (iMovie might work well as an interim step), help set up a qt/wmv/other --> theora conversion tool (if there isn't already a good service online). Some existing editing guides: http://current.tv/studio/survivalguide/ (for tv-quality video production) 3. Update [[m:Wikimentary]] with notes and links. Discuss the project on [[m:Talk:Wikimentary]]. 4. Edit your own video from the raw footage! Right now only Tape #8 is available via archive.org in high-res, but for a test project you could edit something together from the screeners. More to come. Andy Carvin, a notorious podcaster and vlogger, is interested in helping teach people to start editing their own video; he's worked on a related project recently with some elementary shool students in Atlantic City. And the resulting video is adorably amazing: http://www.starw.org/acrc/2005/11/witches-aliens-and-school-board.html Rory's latest update is included below. ++SJ ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Rory O'Connor <Roc(a)globalvision.org> Date: Nov 16, 2005 11:45 PM Subject: Re: Wikimentary latest All, I'm pleased to announce that files containing the following are all now accessible at the URL below: 1. 'screeners' of all media shot by Globalvision at WikiMania; 2. transcripts in MS word of all screeners 3. a 'screener 'of the rough cut; 4. An 'editable' larger file of the rough cut; 5. a MS word file of the script for the rough cut 6. One 'editable' large file of one tape (008) of the media shot by Globalvision in Frankfurt. To see and download any or all, go to: http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=wikimedia EXPLANATORY NOTE: What we are calling 'screeners' are smaller, lower quality files suitable for downloading and meant to be looked at in conjunction with the word files of the matching transcription. In other words, 'screener 008' is the low quality media version of the eighth tape we shot. It should be matched by a MSW file of the transcription of tape 008. When looked at in conjunction, one should be ready to them correct the extant transcription and wiki-ize it to make it a perfect match. In most cases the current transcripts are close--but few if any are perfect. So there is initial work to be done just looking at the tapes and fixing the transcripts. One can also download the 'screener' of my rough cut, which should match perfectly with the MSW script file of same. If it doesn't, please amend it. The 'editable' file of the rough cut is also available for anyone who wants to begin tearing it apart and improving it. We continue to upload the larger 'editable' files of the other media as well, and are working out several kinks and issues associated with that. Thus far, only tape 008 is available in this form. Also, for video newbies, here's a link to a fairly comprehensive video production primer available online -- the VC2 Survival Guide -- courtesy of Current.tv: http://current.tv/studio/survivalguide/ Finally, if you haven't seen it yet, here's the URL for the 'Dispatch' I recently posted about WikiMania and the wikimentary project at the web site of the PBS program 'Frontline World" http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/blog/2005/11/its_a_wiki_wiki.html I still need to see and sign and maybe post some sort of license for all the above; a wiki to discuss if not work on this would be a good idea, if anyone is so moved; and it might be nice if there were a mechanism to let everyone who attended the conference to know about all this, no? Hope to hear from some of you soon... -Rory On 11/5/05 4:50 PM, "Jimmy Wales" <jwales(a)wikia.com> wrote: > SJ wrote: >> An easy way to get people involved is to have them finish up the >> missing transcriptions; once we have the files in a suitable place >> online. > > This is a very fine idea. I can help with this. In my previous email, > I said that I don't know how to edit video, and that still holds true. > I suppose I do know how to make or correct a transcript. I just > download a video clip, I watch it, and while I'm watching it I type or > else I edit/correct what someone else has typed. > >> Absolutely ! For the purposes of transcription, which seems the >> fastest way to get people collaborating on the content, it would be >> great to have audio streams separate from the video. Is there a >> simple way to do this at the source? That content, at least, could be >> uploaded to Wikimedia servers and played with immediately. > > Yes, absolutely. Getting the audio up somewhere quickly would be > totally fine. :-) > -- ++SJ

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Wikimania meeting minutes 2005/11/05
by SJ 13 Nov '05

13 Nov '05

Society of Wikimaniacs November 5, 2005, 20:00 UTC irc.freenode.net#wikimania Present : _sj_, akl, Alkivar, Angela, AnyFile, brettstil, brion, Chris_Parham, delphine, e2m__, EricaG, gwdash, JamesF, jikomboe, MikeSnow, mysekurity, Phroziac, randy_f, reagleBRKLN, sasha_ (asw), Shanel, shekhar, Solensean, TitaniumDreads, ...but silent : Bdka, cathyma, Chiacomo, CraigSpurrier, da_didi, GerardM, Get_It, here, mattis, MichaelDiederich, poli_, Rdsmith4, SabineCretella, soufron, SvenDowideit, tobacman, tractor, zwitter ...and away : AppleBoy, Austin, GhostFreeman, JeLuF, mark, Rince, Schuyler, SethIlys, 1. Long before the meeting, Alkivar links to [[Jason Scott Sadofsky]] ("a computer history archivist... who is humorously anti-wikipedia") and suggests he would make a good speaker. Also notes that on campus you can have better parties later than you can elsewhere in town. 2. e2m__ asked if attendees from Asia, Africa, and South America will be particularly welcome. The meeting is just starting, and this is never answered... are they? See also the discussion of conference goals, below. Via email, Node suggested organizing travel groups of people from similar countries / languages, to help them get used to the new environment; and to offer partner-interpreters (for each group?) -- to encourage people with poor English skills to attend who normally avoid such international events. http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimania_2006#International_outreach 3. Time sensitive issues first : dates for the conference? There are 3 promising weekends : July 22-23, July 29-30, and August 5-6. The weekend in August seems to be the easiest for people to schedule, but may be more expensive for flights from Europe. 3A - Todo: compare flight prices for these dates. 3B - Harvard professional schools start late for the US, but early for Europe. UK high schools get out late, will still be in session mid-July (so flights might be cheaper). 3C - Anyfile did a quick price search; prices were the same for those two weekends. Group & corporate flight discounts were mentioned. 4. Working with the Harvard dorm & room offices : the [room] office hasn't sorted out their schedule yet; will get to it "very soon". UPDATE: The optimal week[end] for dorms is in early August (we could get any combination of dorms we want, up to 450 beds). Still waiting on room details. 5. Amgine: will the whole event be at the Harvard Law School? Answer: No. The MIT Media Lab wants to host some smaller events, even all of the hacking days. They've also offered to book their largest hall, Kresge auditorium, if we want to use it. 6. Where is there food? Places mentioned : The Harkness Commons (next door), on-campus caterers (cheers from the local union member), nearby restaurants around Harvard & Kendall Square. 7. Timeline : budget 3 months for travel preparation after acceptnace of papers, for the most difficult cases. CfP in January, December; give initial acceptances by April. 8A : Next meeting - when is good? rotate every meeting by 15.2 days? Pick two times and switch between them? Have multiple meetings on some weeks? We settle on the second option. Next meeting tentatively set for 1600 UTC, Saturday November 19. 8B : Have short meetings and keep most discussion on [Meta]. Clean out the Wikimania wiki and decide if want the site to be a wiki next year. 9A. What should the conference goals be? We agree generally that it should support the online communities, and be a party and social gathering; and that it should involve "a conference". We had some trouble defininzg 'conference.' How could we describe the community and academic parts of Wikimania more clearly? Is international outreach important? Increasing the visibility of small projects? Increasing outreach to underrepresented languages? Should the goals for this year be different than they were last year? 9B. Naming : JamesF liked "symposium" better than conference, but didn't find broad support . (Wikisym's use of the term was noted.) Mysekurity suggested "the [N]th First Annual" conference, a la the Ignobels. MikeSnow chimed in with "Wikimania 2.0". 10. Design, logos, mascots. Mysekurity wanted a logo contest. This met with some definite opposition. Conference t-shirts and laptop stickers, however... JamesF dreams of having a different shirt from each wikimania in 20 years. Delphine suggests a confernce mascot... a new one every year. (the Wikipedia worm? Bob the Angry Sunflower? a dolphin? a weasel? a marmot?) 11. Advisors : Sj brings up Tthe idea of a general advisory panel -- representatives from outside the community, from different parts of the world, who could suggest and provide intros to potential speakers and sponsors. Chris Parham noted the structure doesn't have to be formal, but that getting people involved in this way would be helpful. Delphine wanted to know what the advisors would do, other than advising the program team. 12. Announcements. Will there be announcements on the main WP page[s]? A sitewide notice? When, for how long? At the first opportunity to sign up, before a major paper/registration deadline? It is noted that sitewide notices were put up last year on fr:wp, to some complaints, but not on en:wp. 13. Media streaming. Mysekurity: webcam streams? audio? Mysekurity: will it be broken down into 'important' and 'not important' segments? Akl: as long as there's someone to do it... mysekurity would be glad to '''help''' (emphasis his :) 14. Feedback from attendees and presenters. Attendees from last year want a social list to keep up with friends from Wikimania. Other feedback already left on meta needs to be reviewed. 15. Licensing of papers. General agreement: ask speakers to agree to a reasonably free license, and to audio/video reproduction if they're being recorded, well ahead of time. 16. Conference planning software. No word from Austin, Jakob, or Patrick; it is generally agreed that a license agreement on paper submission makes sense. JamesF mentions that he was at some point happy to help Austin improve on last year's reg system; regrets mentioning it again :-) It is also agreed we should choose our program planning software in time for the program team to look at it. 17. Program team and Papers This team is one of the first to act. How will it be structured? Who will be on it? Who will lead it? We should get help from outside the community; technologists and academics (e.g., Sunir, others from Wikimania '05?) methodically split up papers into review groups. Amgine notes CfPs should have a postmark deadline. Delphine says there should be a very official, and a secret unofficial deadline. Sj suggests having an early deadline for people who need advnce notice; Delphine said she will pay Sj a beer if anyone submits a paper early. Mysekurity: will papers be physical, on a wiki? will they be editable / commentable by others before the event? Delphine notes she would not like that. 18. Other teams Website and conf-software are also needed soon. Ditto general conference organization. How should the organization be divided? Should they be split into formal committees? Do we need to hire people to coordinate the volunteers, or have an external conference organizer? Sj noted there is an agenda item on the upcoming board meeting re: hiring an organizer for Wikimania. 19. Multilingualism Soleansan thinks we should translate papers into Swahili, "or at least in Réunion creole," so people don't get the impression that WP is only English, or only for English-speakers. Alkivar thinks we need Fr/Es/De translations for every major speaker. Delphine suggests waiting until registration is opened and we see who signs up. akl notes that in Frankfurt, none of the German attendees needed translations. . Sj added that we know hardly any relevant presenters who don't speak in English, but if we had a better way of finding/filtering potential speakers, we might find them. Delphine suggests spending money on travel sponsorships and visas, and not on translation.. But we didn't release the CfP in too many languages last year... can sj evaluate a Russian paper? via a translator. (e.g., the Chinese-language paper submitted last year) akl wants to know if the next irc meeting will be held in swahili, russian or in chinese? :) 20. Closure and followups Two hours was a bit long. Follow-ups on the wiki: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimania_2006/En#November_5_discussion ++SJ

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RE: [Wikimania-l] Wikimania meeting minutes 2005/11/05
by Poor, Edmund W 11 Nov '05

11 Nov '05

Note that Harvard Square is near Harvard Law School (restaurants are 5 min. to 15 min. by walking). Kendall Square is near MIT Media Lab. I might be able to interest my mother in providing bed and breakfast for a couple; she has a spare bedroom with a Queen-size bed overlooking a lovely garden. Conference goals should be: 1. Enhance community interaction: make it more fun to be a Wikipedian / WikiMedian! 2. Improve the quality of Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects I can get professional encyclopedia editors to attend / speak at the conference - all with PhD's in their fields. I am preparing a paper and/or speech (with slides) on "Online Interactions which Facilitate the Production of Quality". Ed Poor (who grew up in Cambridge, Mass.) > -----Original Message----- > From: wikimania-l-bounces(a)Wikipedia.org > [mailto:wikimania-l-bounces@Wikipedia.org] On Behalf Of SJ > Sent: Thursday, November 10, 2005 9:24 PM > To: wikimania-l(a)wikipedia.org > Subject: [Wikimania-l] Wikimania meeting minutes 2005/11/05 > > > Society of Wikimaniacs > November 5, 2005, 20:00 UTC > irc.freenode.net#wikimania > > Present : _sj_, akl, Alkivar, Angela, AnyFile, brettstil, > brion, Chris_Parham, delphine, e2m__, EricaG, gwdash, > JamesF, jikomboe, MikeSnow, mysekurity, Phroziac, randy_f, > reagleBRKLN, sasha_ (asw), > Shanel, shekhar, Solensean, TitaniumDreads, > > ...but silent : Bdka, cathyma, Chiacomo, CraigSpurrier, > da_didi, GerardM, Get_It, here, mattis, MichaelDiederich, > poli_, Rdsmith4, SabineCretella, soufron, SvenDowideit, > tobacman, tractor, zwitter ...and away : AppleBoy, Austin, > GhostFreeman, JeLuF, mark, Rince, Schuyler, SethIlys, > > 1. Long before the meeting, Alkivar links to [[Jason Scott > Sadofsky]] ("a computer history archivist... who is > humorously anti-wikipedia") and suggests he would make a good > speaker. Also notes that on campus you can have better > parties later than you can elsewhere in town. > > 2. e2m__ asked if attendees from Asia, Africa, and South > America will be particularly welcome. The meeting is just > starting, and this is never answered... are they? See also > the discussion of conference goals, below. > > Via email, Node suggested organizing travel groups of people > from similar countries / languages, to help them get used to > the new environment; and to offer partner-interpreters (for > each group?) -- > to encourage people with poor English skills to attend who > normally avoid such international events. > http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimania_2006#Internation > al_outreach > > 3. Time sensitive issues first : dates for the conference? > There are 3 promising weekends : July 22-23, July 29-30, and > August 5-6. The weekend in August seems to be the easiest > for people to schedule, but may be more expensive for flights > from Europe. > > 3A - Todo: compare flight prices for these dates. > > 3B - Harvard professional schools start late for the US, but > early for Europe. UK high schools get out late, will still > be in session mid-July (so flights might be cheaper). > > 3C - Anyfile did a quick price search; prices were the same > for those two weekends. Group & corporate flight discounts > were mentioned. > > 4. Working with the Harvard dorm & room offices : the [room] > office hasn't sorted out their schedule yet; will get to it > "very soon". > > UPDATE: The optimal week[end] for dorms is in early August > (we could get any combination of dorms we want, up to 450 > beds). Still waiting on room details. > > 5. Amgine: will the whole event be at the Harvard Law School? > Answer: No. The MIT Media Lab wants to host some smaller > events, even all of the hacking days. They've also offered > to book their largest hall, Kresge auditorium, if we want to use it. > > 6. Where is there food? Places mentioned : The Harkness > Commons (next door), on-campus caterers (cheers from the > local union member), nearby restaurants around Harvard & > Kendall Square. > > 7. Timeline : budget 3 months for travel preparation after > acceptnace of papers, for the most difficult cases. CfP in > January, December; give initial acceptances by April. > > 8A : Next meeting - when is good? rotate every meeting by 15.2 days? > Pick two times and switch between them? Have multiple > meetings on some weeks? We settle on the second option. > Next meeting tentatively set for 1600 UTC, Saturday November 19. > > 8B : Have short meetings and keep most discussion on [Meta]. > Clean out the Wikimania wiki and decide if want the site to > be a wiki next year. > > 9A. What should the conference goals be? We agree generally that it > should support the online communities, and be a party and > social gathering; and that it should involve "a conference". > We had some > trouble defininzg 'conference.' How could we describe the community > and academic parts of Wikimania more clearly? > Is international outreach important? Increasing the > visibility of small projects? Increasing outreach to > underrepresented languages? Should the goals for this year > be different than they were last year? > > 9B. Naming : JamesF liked "symposium" better than > conference, but didn't find broad support . (Wikisym's use of > the term was noted.) > Mysekurity suggested "the [N]th First Annual" conference, a > la the Ignobels. MikeSnow chimed in with "Wikimania 2.0". > > 10. Design, logos, mascots. Mysekurity wanted a logo contest. This > met with some definite opposition. Conference t-shirts and > laptop stickers, however... JamesF dreams of having a > different shirt from each wikimania in 20 years. Delphine > suggests a confernce mascot... a new one every year. (the > Wikipedia worm? Bob the Angry Sunflower? a dolphin? a > weasel? a marmot?) > > 11. Advisors : Sj brings up Tthe idea of a general advisory > panel -- representatives from outside the community, from > different parts of the world, who could suggest and provide > intros to potential speakers and sponsors. Chris Parham > noted the structure doesn't have to be formal, but that > getting people involved in this way would be helpful. > Delphine wanted to know what the advisors would do, other > than advising the program team. > > 12. Announcements. Will there be announcements on the main > WP page[s]? A sitewide notice? When, for how long? At the > first opportunity to sign up, before a major > paper/registration deadline? It is noted that sitewide > notices were put up last year on fr:wp, to some complaints, > but not on en:wp. > > 13. Media streaming. Mysekurity: webcam streams? audio? > Mysekurity: will it be broken down into 'important' and 'not > important' segments? > Akl: as long as there's someone to do it... mysekurity would > be glad to '''help''' (emphasis his :) > > 14. Feedback from attendees and presenters. Attendees from > last year want a social list to keep up with friends from > Wikimania. Other feedback already left on meta needs to be reviewed. > > 15. Licensing of papers. General agreement: ask speakers to > agree to a reasonably free license, and to audio/video > reproduction if they're being recorded, well ahead of time. > > 16. Conference planning software. No word from Austin, Jakob, > or Patrick; it is generally agreed that a license agreement > on paper submission makes sense. JamesF mentions that he was > at some point happy to help Austin improve on last year's reg > system; regrets mentioning it again :-) It is also agreed we > should choose our program planning software in time for the > program team to look at it. > > 17. Program team and Papers > This team is one of the first to act. How will it be > structured? Who will be on it? Who will lead it? We should > get help from outside the community; technologists and > academics (e.g., Sunir, others from Wikimania '05?) > methodically split up papers into review groups. > Amgine notes CfPs should have a postmark deadline. > Delphine says there should be a very official, and a secret > unofficial deadline. Sj suggests having an early deadline > for people who need advnce notice; Delphine said she will pay > Sj a beer if anyone submits a paper early. > Mysekurity: will papers be physical, on a wiki? will they be > editable / commentable by others before the event? Delphine > notes she would not like that. > > 18. Other teams > Website and conf-software are also needed soon. Ditto > general conference organization. How should the organization > be divided? > Should they be split into formal committees? Do we need to > hire people to coordinate the volunteers, or have an external > conference organizer? > Sj noted there is an agenda item on the upcoming board > meeting re: hiring an organizer for Wikimania. > > 19. Multilingualism > Soleansan thinks we should translate papers into Swahili, "or > at least in Réunion creole," so people don't get the > impression that WP is only > English, or only for English-speakers. Alkivar thinks we need > Fr/Es/De translations for every major speaker. Delphine > suggests waiting until registration is opened and we see who > signs up. akl notes that in Frankfurt, none of the German > attendees needed translations. . > Sj added that we know hardly any relevant presenters who > don't speak in English, but if we had a better way of > finding/filtering potential speakers, we might find them. > Delphine suggests spending money on travel sponsorships and > visas, and not on translation.. But we didn't release the > CfP in too many languages last year... can sj evaluate a > Russian paper? via a translator. (e.g., the Chinese-language > paper submitted last year) > akl wants to know if the next irc meeting will be held in > swahili, russian or in chinese? :) > > 20. Closure and followups > Two hours was a bit long. Follow-ups on the wiki: > > http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimania_2006/En#November _5_discussion ++SJ _______________________________________________ Wikimania-l mailing list Wikimania-l(a)Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l

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Reminder: IRC discussion today at 2200 UTC
by SJ 09 Nov '05

09 Nov '05

...in #wikimania. Comments, agenda changes, etc can be added here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2006/Planning#Agenda http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimania_2006#November_5_discussion ...SJ

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General discussion this Saturday
by SJ 02 Nov '05

02 Nov '05

Saturday seems to work for everyone but AlexanderWait, who says he's fine with that. Let's have an open IRC chat in #wikimania on Sat, 2200-2300 UTC. If you can't make the meeting (and even if you can), please write down your thoughts and link to them. If you're feeling bold, you can link them directly from the agenda. I added some agenda items; feel free to edit them and add more: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2006/Planning#Meetings For instance, someone last week offered that it would be useful to have regional advisors from outside the community, to suggest (and to provide introductions to) potential speakers and sponsors. That could be interesting; but needs discussion. ++SJ

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Wikimania discussion @ Berkman last Thursday
by SJ 02 Nov '05

02 Nov '05

(Originally written up as a blog post) Last Thursday night there was a public meeting (in person and on IRC) @ Berkman to let people in the area know what the conference might be like. It was held at Berkman, hosted by the Thurs. night blog group (already a Berkman satellite run by the local community). 20 people came; every one taking two hours out of their night to think and talk about wikis and Wikimania. About a third were affiliated with Harvard; there were people from Wellesley, MIT; a teacher from BU; three librarians; a few local hackers and old LiveJournal community moderators. There was a joyful energy in the air. The audience included developers who use MediaWiki regularly; teachers who use wikis in their course and project designs; and enthusiastic editors and users. Most had not been involved with the earlier planning for the bid; this was a very introductory presentation. I skimmed over the [[m:wikimania 2006]] pages, and filled in a few details about what things were like last year. There was some discussion about what local groups could do to help make it a better conference. A few Wikimedians took part via IRC (which was cool) but there wasn't much IRC conversation. A repeated question was how to get Wikimedians around the world more involved; which prehaps will be discussed more this week. ++ SJ

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