I think the issue is with the word "liability". That has a legal meaning to
me that perhaps it wouldn't to others.
It's a bit of a misunderstanding that user groups "are not required to
become legal entities". We would be a legal entity whether or not we
registered; we'd simply be an unincorporated association if we didn't
register. That is indeed much simpler, but it comes with its own set of
risks. I don't want to get into a lengthy discussion of the legal issues
here, but let's just say that it's not a zero-cost and zero-risk approach.
That's a good point that there's a disjuncture between the kind of
activities that a group does and the affiliations model. For example, a
chapter could be quite small and a user group can be quite large, and there
is some flex in the issues that each will experience.
I'm happy to talk off-list about the legal issues if you wish. My head is
pretty packed with it, since I've been dealing with a lot of it over the
past few months as we're trying to scale up our activities and we're
looking at hosting the Wikimedia Conference next year. As you say, other
groups with different kinds of activities and ambitions might choose to
take a different and less careful approach. For example, a college
Wikipedia club with limited growth ambitions may have a lot less to think
about than we do.
I feel like I'm getting muddled in my explanation so I'll stop here and
just say that I'm happy to continue this conversation off list. Hopefully
we can get back to the discussion about affiliate user groups and mentoring
in general.
On Sun, Oct 18, 2015 at 10:27 PM, Gregory Varnum <gregory.varnum(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
It is limited liability on both parts, meaning that
user groups are not
required to become legal entities, or maintain the higher reporting and
capacity requirements that chapters and thematic organizations are required
to maintain.
The considerations that you are mentioning are tied to your activities and
not your status as a user group. It is a misleading and discouraging to
others to imply that running a user group in the United States requires all
of that liability and workload. User groups are not required to become
legal entities (which Cascadia has opted to do), and can be as simple as a
student club at a university. In other words, not all user groups are
alike. The level of liability is tied to the activities the group engages
in, not the affiliations model.
-greg (User:Varnent)
Vice Chair, Affiliations Committee
On Oct 19, 2015, at 12:56 AM, Pine W
<wiki.pine(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Hi Manuel,
Can you clarify what you mean by "limited liability" for user groups? I
think you mean limited responsibilities as far as WMF is concerned. As
far
as the United States authorities are concerned,
we have plenty of
paperwork
that we're expected to deal with,
particularly if we're handling funds
and/or hosting public events. Most of the paperwork is the same whether
there are 5 people or 500 people involved, so it's a pretty complex
operation, particularly if volunteers are dealing with all of this with
no
paid help. I had some experience with business
law prior to my
involvement
in Cascadia Wikimedians, and even with that
background I'm finding that
there is a lot to learn and a lot of paperwork to deal with in order to
keep our user group on solid legal ground.
Pine
On Sun, Oct 18, 2015 at 10:05 AM, Schneider, Manuel <
manuel.schneider(a)wikimedia.ch> wrote:
> Hi Ilario,
>
> it is the will of the board to make it easy to start a recognised body
to
> do work and it is totally acceptable if these
bodies also die after
having
> fulfilled their purpose - or grow and develop
into other affiliation
> models. So the criterium for us is easy entry.
>
> Anyway the user groups have limited liability and responsibilities,
access
> to ressources is controlled on a case by case
basis eg. through the
Grant
> Avisory Committee and every year user groups
must be renewed, for this
we
> want so see a simple report. So every ug with
the minimum of activity -
a
> report written, having responded to our
follow-up e-mail - is renewed.
>
> /Manuel
>
> --
> sent from mobile phoneAm 18.10.2015 4:46 nachm. schrieb Ilario Valdelli
<
> valdelli(a)gmail.com>gt;:
>>
>> I personally think that the main concern, in this proliferation of
>> groups, is an lack of the implementation of a "good governance".
>>
>> A user group is like a body, it can born, can develop and can die.
>>
>> At the moment there is an unclear guideline about the monitoring and
the
>> development of these groups: they can
only born.
>>
>>
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_user_groups
>>
>> Basically the affiliation committee creates these entities, but don't
>> monitor them and don't evaluate to retire (or the best would be to
>> freeze) some old entities when they become essentially inactive or
> silent.
>>
>> In this case the balance would be compensated and the proliferation of
>> these groups would have a sense.
>>
>> Kind regards
>>
>> On 18.10.2015 16:48, Gregory Varnum wrote:
>>> The Affiliations Committee (AffCom) has been preparing for the
> increased momentum since the user group model was implemented, and it
> follows a pattern that we’ve been seeing over the past couple of years.
In
> 2013, we approved 10 user groups, last year
we approved 19, and so far
this
> year we have approved around 20. That number
will likely increase next
> year. This growing momentum is why we have continued to tweak the
approval
> process to be faster and able to handle the
growing momentum. So, from
our
> perspective, this is something we have been
preparing for from the
start,
> and not a surprise.
>>>
>>> Personally, I think further complicating affiliate classifications is
> a bad idea. “Small” and “larger” are very culturally relative, varies
> across the models (there are user groups “larger” than chapters),
changes
> over time, and implies that “large”
affiliates do work “small”
affiliates
> cannot, when we continue to see that is in
fact not the case at all. The
> current criteria for WMCON is active and inactive, which seems far more
> appropriate. Additionally, dividing them will not save much money, if
any,
> as there would still presumably be a
gathering for the “small”
affiliates.
>
> I agree with Leigh and others that affiliates should receive more
support, but
I do not think those efforts will be served well by further
dividing them.
>
> -greg (User:Varnent)
> Vice Chair, Wikimedia Affiliations Committee
>
>
--
Ilario Valdelli
Wikimedia CH
Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens
Association pour l’avancement des connaissances libre
Associazione per il sostegno alla conoscenza libera
Switzerland - 8008 Zürich
Tel: +41764821371
http://www.wikimedia.ch
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