On Wed, Jan 21, 2009 at 2:24 AM, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen <cimonavaro(a)gmail.com> wrote: If the very tiny country had enough active wikimedians to create critical mass for two chapters, and if those two groups found that they absolutely could not work together and that it would be far easier for them to organize separately, then yes that would be okay. The size of the region isn't nearly so important as other factors like activity level. We also cannot pretend that we know how people in country X should organize better then those people do themselves. Organizers will tell us what's right for them, we do not tell them what is right for them (although we can always make thoughtful suggestions). --Andrew Whitworth

On Wed, Jan 21, 2009 at 12:01 PM, Michael Snow <wikipedia(a)verizon.net> wrote: I agree with you on this point, but I don't think it's for us (board, chapcom, etc) to decide whether the additional overhead is called for. Obviously we should make all the information and caveats known to all applicant groups before they are approved to become a chapter, but they really have to be relied upon to make the final decisions concerning themselves. Chapters may want to focus on local works. The Istanbul chapter may want to focus it's attention on activities that happen in and around Istanbul only. People from Ankara could join the chapter but would be excluded from it's activities because of distance. As much as we might like the Istanbul chapter to expand it's focus to cover the entire country, they might find themselves unwilling or unable to do so. Do we then keep the people of Ankara from forming a second chapter in Turkey because of it? WMNYC has focused it's energy towards on-the-ground and in-person activities like "Wikipedia Loves Art", or "Wikis Take Manhattan". People who are too far away will not be able to participate in these activities. You could say that they could be a national group and organize other events in other cities. But then you would have separate groups within the chapter organizing and participating in separate activities with no meaningful interaction between them. If a smaller regional chapter can pay more attention to it's members, foster better cooperation, and support more outreach activities by virtue of being able to focus on a smaller geographical area, I think that's a major benefit to consider. --Andrew Whitworth

On Thu, Jan 22, 2009 at 7:30 AM, Delphine Ménard <notafishz(a)gmail.com> wrote: Disagreement is fine! We're obviously dealing with a lot of hypotheticals here. I guess maybe I should have stipulated that the two chapters in the tiny country be mutually-exclusive and non-overlapping. We don't have two chapters operating in New York City simultaneously, but we could definitely have two regional chapters operating in the country simultaneously. What we want is for Wikimedians to be able to join _A_ chapter if they are interested, but we don't want them to have to choose between multiple options. There either is a chapter in your area that you can join, or your area is free for the creation of a new chapter. If we have critical mass to support two chapters in a given country (no matter how tiny), and if they don't overlap and if they don't interfere with each other, I think they should be allowed to organize themselves in that way. Now, realistically I think this whole issue is a non-starter. I don't suspect we are going to see places that are both sufficiently "tiny" _and_ have the critical mass needed to support two chapters. I think you and I have both seen, Delphine, that creating a new chapter takes a lot of work and there are precious few people willing and able to make it happen. Chapters don't just spring to life out of thin air, and they don't multiply like rabbits. I think it may be quite a long time until we see a second US chapter, much less before we get two applications from Luxembourg. While I don't think we should draw a line and say all countries smaller then a certain size can't qualify for subnational chapters, I also don't forsee that countries below a certain size threshold are going to be interested in it anyway. Right, every country is going to pose different situations, and Belgium might not make sense to separate into two chapters if there aren't clear geographic boundaries between the two. Creating new chapters isn't an excuse to avoid working and collaborating with people who are different from yourself, but it should instead be a vehicle for overcoming barriers and getting people involved. If language barriers are accompanied by clear geographic barriers, that is a good use case for separate chapters. This is similar to what had been happening with the Canadian group, where most of their organizing was being done in english but they were trying to get more french-speakers involved as well. Our projects are multilingual, and I think in most cases we should expect our chapters to support that as well. However, if language is one of several barriers that prevent Wikimedians from getting involved, then separate chapters should be created to help get more people to participate. --Andrew Whitworth