On 08/25/2012 09:46 PM, Lodewijk wrote:
Maybe the question should first be: what kind of Wikimania do we want. Personally, I would be totally happy with down scaling the conference a bit. Less visitors (500-600), less events and less professional. Let it be more volunteer focused, and yes, perhaps also a bit more chaotic.
I concur and I'm glad you brought this topic up.
Wikimedians are not professionals, they are volunteers. Our community /is/ chaotic and a bit unorganized. It's fine if Wikimania reflects that.
That also means we can change the nature of bids: more back to basic and more focus on location, venue and accomodation.
We should also focus on making Wikimania more affordable. If that means choosing cheaper locations that might be a bit less spectacular, that's fine with me. I've always thought the charm of Wikimania stems from its participants and not a particular venue.
Manuel (among others) is organizing WikiCon 2012, which will start in a few days in Austria. The fee is only 10 Euro for the full conference (three days), and that even includes meals and a place to sleep in a gym. Last year's WikiCon was fantastic even though there was not an exotic venue, a beach party, a wonderful port or a disco night in the center of a large city. I'm not saying that I don't enjoy such events, nor that they aren't parts of the positive memory I have of past Wikimanias, but expensive and exotic events and locations should not be considered a "must" for future Wikimanias.
Regards, Tobias
Ps.: The WikiCon conference for german-speaking countries is a great example of an event between the magnitude of million-dollar-events like Wikimania and zero-dollar local community meetups. They work great, help to get to know each other in real life (and to sort out differences) as well as exchanging ideas and bringing the movement forward. You should have a WikiCon in your country, too!