Hi,
A reporter is doing a story on Indian academicians on Wikipedia.. . If
you know about any academicians / people from the education system who edit
Wikipedia, it would be great help.. Are there anyone in the India mailing
list ?
Please drop *a personal mail to me* with the contact informations ,
if so.
Thanks in advance.
Regards
Tinu Cherian
Hisham ,
Welcome to the world of Wikimedia / Wikipedia ! Looking forward to closely
working with you.
Best wishes !
Regards
Tinu Cherian
On Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 6:43 AM, Arjuna Rao Chavala <
arjunaraoc(a)googlemail.com> wrote:
> Hi Hisham,
>
> A warm welcome and best wishes.
>
> Cheers
> Arjuna Rao Chavala
> President, Wikimedia Chapter, India
>
> On Tue, Feb 15, 2011 at 10:40 PM, Barry Newstead <bnewstead(a)wikimedia.org>wrote:
>
>> Dear colleagues, (please feel free to cross-post this to local lists
>> within India)
>>
>> I am pleased to announce the appointment of Hisham Mundol as a consultant
>> to the Wikimedia Foundation to support us in our program initiatives in
>> India.
>>
>> As you know, the Wikimedia Foundation declared India to be a strategic
>> priority during the strategic planning process [1]. I announced our plans
>> for the formation of an office in August 2010 and the Wikimedia Foundation
>> Board of Trustees approved the creation of the Wikimedia India chapter in
>> June 2010. India is a priority for the Wikimedia movement as it has a strong
>> and growing community of Wikimedians building the Indic and English language
>> projects. It is a country where the Wikimedia movement can achieve our
>> mission and learn important lessons for achieving impact elsewhere. The
>> engagement of Hisham will enable the Wikimedia Foundation to pilot new
>> initiatives aimed at accelerating the growth of the community in India. I am
>> very happy we’ve now reached this point.
>>
>> As I have mentioned in the past, we have a lot of momentum in India but we
>> have a long way to go to achieve our full potential as a movement. Indians
>> represent 4% of the world’s Internet users today (and this share is
>> growing), yet they only represent 1.5% of page edits on Wikipedia. We should
>> be able to rapidly increase this share - across all projects - and expand
>> readership in a corresponding fashion.
>>
>> Hisham’s title will be Consultant, India National Programs. He will
>> report to me. His role will be to design and implement specific pilot
>> programs that encourage many more Indians to become contributors to our
>> projects in Indic languages as well as English. The National Programs
>> initiative will focus on the following areas in the first year:
>>
>> -
>>
>> Design and implement an India-wide program to increase Wikimedia’s
>> footprint on university and college campuses with students and faculty with
>> the aim of encouraging contributions to Wikimedia projects
>> -
>>
>> Support the launch and implementation of community-initiated programs
>> that seek to increase the editor base for Wikimedia projects
>> -
>>
>> Engage with the community and chapter to build a strong relationship
>> among these stakeholder groups and create communications forums that allow
>> for effective partnerships
>>
>> As a newcomer to the Wikimedia movement, Hisham’s first task will be to
>> deepen his understanding of us: our history, goals, values, culture and
>> mission. To that end, he will be spending the coming weeks (not months!) in
>> learning mode: Hisham and I will be meeting with community members in
>> Mumbai, Pune and Bangalore on Feb 23-25 and then Hisham will join community
>> meetings across the country as they occur. Hisham will also spend time in
>> San Francisco with the staff of the Wikimedia Foundation, as well as with
>> other like-minded individuals and organizations and he will attend the
>> chapter conference in Berlin.
>>
>> Hisham will be creating a workspace on strategy wiki where he will share
>> what he is learning and develop the core elements of the action plan going
>> forward. We encourage active community engagement on this wiki. We aim to
>> move to action quickly and welcome input and guidance from across the
>> community.
>>
>> Hisham was most recently a consultant with the Public Health Foundation of
>> India (in a partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation). He
>> designed and implemented large-scale national programs on HIV/AIDS
>> prevention. He worked to understand the dynamics of hard-to-reach
>> communities by conducting in-depth, on-the-ground analysis (ask him to tell
>> you about his experience talking to drivers while sitting under their
>> trucks). The programs he designed and implemented sought to convince people
>> in large numbers - 400 million young people across the nation - to change
>> very personal behaviours. While we are not tackling issues of such an
>> intimate nature, we do aim to convince large numbers of people across the
>> country to contribute their personal time to Wikimedia projects. During
>> this assignment, Hisham worked closely with public, private and community
>> groups (local and international) to work through the details of the programs
>> and build partnerships for implementing them at scale. He did so in a manner
>> that used persuasion rather than power to build support to move things
>> forward. We think his experience navigating these varied groups position
>> him well to work in the Wikimedia community. His earlier career was in
>> marketing and business development with a number of well-known businesses:
>> Infosys, Accenture, Cadbury and Unilever. This experience positions him well
>> to engage with a movement and organization that is global in nature, in
>> particular to work with a team that is based halfway around the world.
>>
>> We have scheduled an IRC chat with Hisham and myself for Thursday,
>> February 17 at 22:00 India Standard Time (16:30 UTC).
>>
>> I want to thank everyone who helped in the selection process that
>> identified Hisham. It was a five month process in which we made an open call
>> for consultants (using my visit in September to drum up interest via
>> conversations with the community and the media) in India and around the
>> world. We had 197 applicants from a wide range of professional backgrounds.
>> Egon Zehnder’s India office, part of a leading global executive search
>> firm, helped screen candidates and manage the process. Egon Zehnder
>> conducted indepth interviews with 25 candidates based on the inputs from
>> Bishakha and I who helped shortlist. I interviewed 12 candidates via Skype
>> in the first round and then I had the help of Bishakha Datta and Achal
>> Prabhala to interview the top seven in person in Bangalore. Our top two
>> candidates met with Sue and Erik in Delhi and then Hisham met with the
>> entire WMF leadership team and a broad group of staff members in San
>> Francisco.
>>
>> We are very happy with the selection of Hisham. We recognize that we did
>> not manage to hire someone from inside the Wikimedia community or the open
>> source community. We did look for people with this background and one of
>> our finalists was a long time open source advocate. We also engaged with a
>> long time Wikimedian for a role, though he ultimately decided to withdraw
>> for personal reasons. We are committed to seeing Hisham integrate himself
>> into the community quickly and to seeing him add people to his team from the
>> community. We hope that the community will engage actively with him to
>> bring him into the fold. Hisham will most definitely bring fresh
>> perspectives to the movement that will help us grow and change for the
>> better.
>>
>> Please join me in welcoming Hisham to the Wikimedia movement.
>>
>> Note: An FAQ will follow shortly.
>>
>> Best,
>> Barry
>> [1] *http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Plan/Role_of_the_WMF*<http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Plan/Role_of_the_WMF>
>> [2] *
>> http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimediaindia-l/2010-August/000850.ht…
>> *<http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimediaindia-l/2010-August/000850.ht…>
>>
>> --
>> Barry Newstead
>> Chief Global Development Officer
>> Wikimedia Foundation
>> Tel: +1-415-839-6885 x. 6634
>> Skype: barry.wikimedia
>> Twitter: @bazanews
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Wikimediaindia-l mailing list
>> Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l
>>
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikimediaindia-l mailing list
> Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l
>
>
Hi,
Can we have a Wiki meetup in Hyderabad on Feb 13?
I am a Tamil Wikipedian since 2005 and have relocated to the city recently.
Hope I can be part of the Wiki enthusiasts team here and contribute by all
means.
Thanks,
Ravi
--
1 GB @ 11 USD per year web hosting.
http://milkhost.com/
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: CherianTinu Abraham <tinucherian(a)gmail.com>
Date: Sun, Feb 6, 2011 at 11:43 PM
Subject: Re: [Wikimediaindia-l] Communication from the Executive Committee
regarding first meeting
To: "Discussion list on Indian language projects of Wikimedia." <
wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Hearty congratulations to Arjuna Rao , Hari Prasad & Anirudh Bhati as the
new office bearers of the Wikimedia India chapter. Well deserved & best
wishes for the future.
Having said that, this unexpected announcement leaves me with
several unanswered questions. This has to do nothing with any doubts on
the calibre , integrity & abilities of new office bearers or the rest of the
committee members. I still personally share a very close & cordial relations
with all of the exec comn members, but that doesn't prevent me from asking
lots of questions and concerns as an ordinary Wikimedian like me and it may
be possibly shared by several others in this list.
a) If there was to be a change of the office bearers of the chapter (
decided) on the Jan 22 Exec Comm meeting, why wasn't it announced publicly?
Was there an agenda of election of new office bearers for this meeting or
just happened as a co-incidence ? What were the other decisions taken on
that meeting ? Is there a publicly available minutes of meeting ?
b) How were the new office bearers elected ? Was there an election ? Did the
previous office bearers voluntarily resign and called for a new election?
Was there a vote ? If there was a vote, will it be publicly shared? What was
the need of change of office bearers within few months of chapter approval
or one month of chapter registration ? I thought the term of the executive
committee members and the office bearers was for two years.
I am sorry but I have to say this , IMHO it is not an ethical
and transparent process if the 7 executive members keep electing each other,
each time !!!!
c) There were several discussions on this mailing list on the chapter on Jan
30 th , 2011 [1] [2] ( after the so called meeting) and had mentions of the
current office bearers and none of the executive com members even bothered
to clarify. I remember at least two of the exec members replying to those
threads then.
d) So the new office bearers' elections happened on Jan 22 , 2011 ? And I
wonder what took the chapter several weeks to announce , such a important
change publicly ? Remember this "new election" happened even without a
publicly announced agenda, before the meeting. How many such elections can
we expect during the current term of the committee?
We already had lots of concerns shared by the community for the lack
of transparency by the chapter and these kinds of things will only underline
them.
If this is the way the chapter intends to operate, I am deeply concerned and
worried about its future.
Regards
Tinu Cherian
N.B.
a) To clarify, I don't intend to run for any office positions for the
chapter. But I may have to even think twice to be part of a body which
clearly intends to work without any proper transparency and works
disconnected from the community, which it supposedly represents.
b) I have always supported the chapter previously in the several discussions
earlier, but this announcement put me really worried and hence this mail.
Anyways, my best wishes again for the new office bearers and the chapter.
Hoping the see more transparent and candid efforts from the chapter in
future.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: BalaSundaraRaman <sundarbecse(a)yahoo.com>
Date: Sun, Feb 6, 2011 at 7:23 PM
Subject: [Wikimediaindia-l] Communication from the Executive Committee
regarding first meeting
To: "Discussion list on Indian language projects of Wikimedia." <
wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Cc: Narasimha Rao <raomkn(a)yahoo.co.in>, Ting Chen <tchen(a)wikimedia.org>,
Delphine Ménard <dmenard(a)wikimedia.org>, Sunil Abraham <sunil(a)cis-india.org>,
Ray Saintonge <saintonge(a)telus.net>, Achal Prabhala <aprabhala(a)gmail.com>
Dear all,
Following the registration of the Wikimedia Chapter, the first meeting of
the Executive Committee (EC) was held on the 22nd January 2011 at 2 PM at
194, 2nd C Cross, Domlur 2nd Phase, Bangalore 560071.
As mandated by the MoA, the office bearers were elected. The executive
committee now constitutes of:
- Arjuna Rao Chavala, *President*
- Hari Prasad HS, *Secretary*
- Anirudh Singh Bhati, *Treasurer*
- Arun Ramarathnam, Member
- BalaSundaraRaman Lakshmanan, Member
- Gautam K John, Member
- Srinivas Gunta, Member
We would like to take the opportunity to thank the Centre for Internet and
Society, Bangalore for allowing generous use of their office facility for
the conduct of chapter meetings and helping with registration formalities
with services of a Consultant.
We take this opportunity to thank the following people: (in alphabetical
order) Achal Prabhala, Barry Newstead, Bence Damokos, Bishakha Datta,
Delphine Meynard, M Narasimha Rao, Ray Saintonge, Sunil Abraham, and Ting
Chen.
We thank the Wikimedia Community for their help and encouragement and
patience with the registration process.
For brief biographies and photos of the EC members, please see:Wikimedia
India Chapter Executive Committee
Members<http://wikimedia.in/wiki/Wikimedia_India_Chapter_Executive_Committee_Members>
On behalf of Wikimedia Chapter
BalaSundaraRaman Lakshmanan,
Member, Wikimedia Chapter
"That language is an instrument of human reason, and not merely a medium for
the expression of thought, is a truth generally admitted."
- George Boole, quoted in Iverson's Turing Award Lecture
--
Rahimanuddin Shaik
నాని
॥రామానుజార్య దివ్యాజ్ఞాం వర్ధతామపివర్ధతాం॥
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Arjuna Rao Chavala <arjunaraoc(a)googlemail.com>
Date: Mon, Feb 7, 2011 at 2:22 PM
Subject: [Wikimediaindia-l] Follow up on Communication from EC
To: "Discussion list on Indian language projects of Wikimedia." <
wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Hi all,
I am glad to see the discussion on Wikimedia India list to the communication
about the constitution of the EC and election of office bearers. Let me
thank all those who responded and who extended their good wishes.
As the President of the Wikimedia Chapter, let me take this opportunity to
clarify some of the concerns expressed by the community.
Office bearers election:
Wikimedia Chapter is a registered society and we have to conduct the
proceedings as per the MoA. The elections were conducted post registration
as mandated by MoA.
Delay in communicating the result:
Due to the busy schedules, travel plans of some of the EC members the
paperwork following the first meeting of the EC was delayed. Without
paperwork, as an official entity we would be unable to send out a public
statement.
While the delay stays acknowledged, the EC should able to work together in
minimizing delays in future.
Communication:
The chapter got registered just around a month back. And the office bearers
have taken up their roles in the official capacity only recently.
Moving forward, we should be able to ensure that there is focus on better
communication with the community.
Next steps:
We are starting to get a bank account opened. Once it is ready, we will be
able to announce the opening of membership. Please do bear with us in case
of any delays in paper work.
Meanwhile, if anybody needs clarifications, please feel free to write to
wikimedia-in-exec(a)lists.wikimedia.org and we will do utmost to respond at
the earliest.
Thanks
Arjuna Rao Chavala
President, Wikimedia Chapter
_______________________________________________
Wikimediaindia-l mailing list
Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l
--
Rahimanuddin Shaik
నాని
॥రామానుజార్య దివ్యాజ్ఞాం వర్ధతామపివర్ధతాం॥
Hi,
Can we have a Wiki meetup in Hyderabad on Feb 13?
I am a Tamil Wikipedian since 2005 and have relocated to the city recently.
Hope I can be part of the Wiki enthusiasts team here and contribute by all
means.
Thanks,
Ravi