I am please to announce that we are in the process of building the new web
site for Wiki Canada. Wiki Canada currently does not have a logo. If
you're interested in proposing a logo design for Wiki Canada, please contact
me directly. Initially we will need to replace the default wiki logo image
which is attached to this email.
--
View Alan Walker's profile on LinkedIn
[http://fastalan.com]
Hi,
it seems the list moderator never approved this message (sent twice),
so re-sending.
Lodewijk Gelauff
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Lodewijk <lodewijk(a)effeietsanders.org>
Date: 2010/11/28
Subject: Wikimedia Canada
To: wikimedia-ca(a)lists.wikimedia.org
Cc: Chapters Committee list <chaptercommittee-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Dear all,
(sending this to the mailing list, hoping to make sure that way to
reach all relevant people)
I understood from Barry Newstead that James Heilman have been in touch
with him about Wikimedia Canada. As chapcom, we have had some
communication with several people (on a few occasions) from Canada in
the past about creating a Canadian chapter, but somehow contact was
lost and the discussion went into nothing.
To me, it is unclear what the current status is exactly. I would
appreciate it if you could give us an overview of the what the
situation is. The last thing I heard was that there was a discussion
whether to found under the old or new laws, both having advantages and
disadvantages. You will of course understand that chapcom will not
take a position in such discussion, and that that has to be resolved
internally.
Most likely you are already aware of a lot of the following
information, but I will send it in any case, just to make sure all
information is put together.
Wikimedia Chapters are local organizations striving for the same goals
as the Wikimedia Foundation - supporting creation and dissimination of
free knowledge and content. Generally speaking, a Wikimedia
organisation in any country should definitely involve members of the
local Wikimedia communities – the membership shouldn't be exclusive to
Wikimedians, yet the local Wikimedia communities should be able to
feel a sense of ownership towards the nascent chapter in their
country.
As the people are the glue that hold together and propel a chapter to
sustainable activity, I would urge you to try to gather more local
supporters - especially Wikimedians among them - for the idea of the
local chapter and to set up a central planning page on Meta Wiki[1]
and list yourselves on the list of chapters in discussion[2]. This
meta planning page and setting up a mailing list could help you in
gathering the people - as well as organising local meetups or
seminars. Once the venues for discussion are set up, you could
probably have more luck soliciting input by approaching the active
editors on the various Wikipedias and motivating them towards taking a
more active local role in the Wikimedia mission. I see you have
already made a very good start with this, but to have a viable
chapter, you might want to try and gather more people to become active
members.
You can find a lot of information about the approval process on
metawiki[3], where we tried to outline every step. Let me know if you
have any questions or need help finding the relevant venues to contact
local Wikipedians (e.g. the mentioned Village Pumps, sitenotices,
etc.). Please keep me updated on the progress you are making and how
things are going. We are especially interested in knowing who and how
many people are involved, and what your ideas are for forming a
chapter. If you would like to brainstorm, give or take suggestions or
be in contact for any other thing, please do email me.
Good luck and please do stay in touch,
Best regards,
Lodewijk Gelauff
chapters committee
[1] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Countryname
[2] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters
[3] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Step-by-step_chapter_creation_guide
Jit makes a very good point wrt the best point in the process to apply
for charity status. I agree that our next step after incorporation
should be getting a chapters agreement with Wikimedia.
--
James Heilman
MD, CCFP-EM, B.Sc.
With respect to the submitted documents of incorporation, they are not
written in stone. Amendments can be filled at any time and may need to
be filled a couple of times to get wording that the Canada Revenue
Agency is willing to except as charitable.
The process is:
1) Incorporate as a non profit
2a) Submit application for charity status to Canadian Revue Agency
2b) Apply to the chapters committee to be recognized as an official chapter
3) If we wish to use ca.wikimedia.org this would be the time when we
would get the domain I assume.
--
James Heilman
MD, CCFP-EM, B.Sc.
WRT being part of the "steering committee" it was set up only for getting
this organization through the incorporation process. The documents has been
submitted. Only if it fails will more input be needed. If does pass the
bureaucratic hurtles and people disagree with any of the bylaw we can than
discuss amendments. Some of the previous email contain personal information.
While I am open to sharing this others may be less so.
WRT where we go next everyone has an equal opportunity to provide input. As
we are not formally an organization at this point there is no official
membership and no one to give official approval to carry something out. This
also means that any funding needed will be personally provided. Once we have
a bank account and a formal link with Wikimedia opportunities for funding
may appear. We will eventually need a site which will accept donations. I
think Alan Walker has expressed interest in creating something like this. It
is my hope that it will eventually go live at an address such as .
ca.wikimedia.org Wiki UK has a good design that we could emulate here
http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page and
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_UK
If anyone has projects they wish to pursue please feel free to begin
discussion either here or on the meta site. The meta site of course could
use further development. Someone able to maintain translation into French
would be nice. Once incorporation has taken place I have a friend who has
agreed to help with this.
Projects I have been working on getting up and running include: 1) A
Wikimedia club at UBC. Another faculty member and Wikipedian
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jbmurray has expressed interest in this.
2) Pushing for release of material by the Canadian government into the
creative common. A bunch of other great suggestions are listed here
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Canada/Potential_Projects
--
James Heilman
MD, CCFP-EM, B.Sc.
There have been some concerns raised that not enough discussion has taken
place wrt incorporation before documents where submitted.
WRT contacting the chapters committee:
June13 2010 I contact Cary Bass about setting up Wiki Canada.
June 14th 2010 he sent this message to chap comm
I email chap comm list again July 21st, 2010 as I had heard no reply from
June, Jerry Yuyu replyed
I send this gentleman our bylaws Aug 4th, 2010
I email Sue Gardner July 30th, 2010 and she replied that she would help find
us someone from chap comm. for an ongoing interactions
Oct 6th 2010 I send all the documents of incorporation to Sue Gardner as I
had not heard further from chap comm
On Oct 18th this was forwarded to Erik Moeller and Barry Newstead
Documents of incorporatation where sent in to the Federal govenment early
Nov. 2010
I meat in San Fransisco with Barry newstead in mid Nov 2010
WRT getting other involved I have made hundreds of edits over the last year
to the meta site as seen here
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Canada making explicitly clear of
my desire to get Wiki Canada incorporated. I send personally emails to
everyone on the previous steering committee questioning them about a desire
to get the process rolling again. I think I emailed a few of them twice.
Anyone at any time has always been free to jump on in and help. The precess
has always been exceedingly open.
I am very excited to see the reply from Lodewijk and am looking forwards to
the chap comm getting involved in this process. Our documents and statement
of purpose are on the meta site. I would be happy to email chap comm our
most recent copy if they wish to contact me.
--
James Heilman
MD, CCFP-EM, B.Sc.
If the government rejects Wiki Canada ( as the name could be potentially
confused with the federal government ) we can discuss what other name we
should us.
The name of incorporation however is not that important as we will be
operating under the name "Wikimedia Canada" once we have signed a chapters
agreement. The reason we are incorporating under a different name is to keep
the government happy. We need to be at arms lenght from other organizations
to be a charity.
--
James Heilman
MD, CCFP-EM, B.Sc.