On Fri, Dec 4, 2009 at 10:50 AM, Jeromy-Yu Maximilian Chan <
yuyu(a)wikimedia.hk> wrote:
On Mon, Nov 23, 2009 at 6:45 AM, Tzu-Chiang Liou
<tcliou(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Thanks Jeromy,
Hey guys, don't know what's the status now. But regarding to the regional
cooperation
for Asia-wide chapters, I have some personal ideas:
Most of all, I agree we do need to enhance the interaction among local
chapters, but
more importantly, we should come up with some "niches". For example, why
do we
need such "space". A possible reference is the European local chapters.
While they
have common goals or target interest groups, it's only a matter of time
for them to
gather together and work toward similar subjects.
Then, how about Asia, here are my two cents (patches welcome):
1. Content-oriented: it's nice to have regional content-driven event like
Wikipedia
Academy. And the success of such event is, I think, based on the tightly
and long
term commitment from local community. Such commitment could hardly been
achieved
by colleagues too far away from us, thus the regional collaboration is
essential.
I think in this part, what we can do, I think, is experience sharing, which
the 1st stage goal of our future cooperation. Of course in long term we can
really do thing joint-chapter stuff physically.
All Wikipedia academies so far have been national - not regional. But, in
theory I think it would be nice. Perhaps for content, we could organise for
anyone who wishes, to meet in a particular place of a country once every two
years to do a collaborative field-trip. For example, if there was enough
preparation time, it might be interesting to do "Wikimedia in Asia visits
Ankor Wat" or something like that. This is a long term project though.
2. Policy-oriented: We should actively engage in
some inter-governmental
organizations
in Asia-wide area. For example, I know and have some contacts in UN's
open source
organization in Thailand. I believe some of you might have interesting
connections as
well. Make good use of that. And try to initiate appropriate agendas in
APCE or ASENA
like "Open Content Licensing in Digital World". Increasing our visibility
in regional
organizations.
That sounds great to me, that would be a long thread to discuss on the new
list.
Yes, this is also a big/long term thing, but this is something the European
chapters are starting to work on already with submissions to the EU. Maybe
this will come with time, but we might be able to do something like sending
a representative to the ASEAN or EastAsianSummit meeting when it comes to
one of our countries.
3. Besides mailing list, we should increase the
physical interaction among
regional local
chapters. And initial workshops or relative events. I know budget is
normally a challenging
part for many chapters (especially for junior members), hence 4.
Yes, as with everything, this will come with time and with increased budget
(once more of us are involved in active fundraising).
4. Mid-term goal is to establish a charity
organization that could receive
donation.
For the annual fundraising fro Asia-wide area, we should negotiate with
the Foundation
to keep certain amount for local development. And keep in the some kind of
trust.
WM Hong Kong is taking part in this year's annual fundraising with WMF, so
we will share what experience we got this year to you
I don't believe it would be legal to set up a pan-asian charity. All
charities have to be national (unless I'm very mistaken). As there are more
of us who are involved in the fundraising activities I believe it will
become important for the richer chapters in the region to assist the
chapters that are younger or receive less fundraising money. Once we have a
few well-developed chapters, they might try to "sponsor" the development of
a chapter in a neighboring country.
As with everything suggested in this email, I believe the collaboration is
largely dependent on us being well developed in our own chapters before we
can start looking at inter-chapter things. Or, if there is something that is
REALLY popular with us we could potentially submit to the WMF for a
"combination chapter grant". This would need 1 chapter to be the
"host" of
the idea/money, but it might be possible.
By the way, maybe we should invite members in Wikimedia Australia? I know
some
of them would like to initiate Asia-Wide cooperation as well. And how
about Japan,
though they don't have association, we could still exchange ideas with
them, right?
I don't know about Japan or the other Australians, but I'm certainly
here
:-)
-Liam, Australia. [[witty lama]]