Dear friends, One element of the discussions on "Movement Roles" was about other / new entities within our movement, aside the already existing Foundation and the Chapters, which I prefer to call "national Wikimedia organizations". I would like to present to you here my idea of "Language Contact Persons" who form a link between the Foundation and the Wikipedia language versions. == New entities?== James Forrester and his group (sorry, I don't remember who was the official primus inter pares) presented in/before Haifa a list of new kinds of Wikimedia entities: * Chapters not based on national boundaries, but subjects such as railways, art, ethnic cultures, mathematics etc. * informal groups * Official partners, e.g. a museum we (the Foundation? a national Wikimedia organization?) that already exists outside our movement ==Scepticism== I myself, and also some people I have talked to, are very sceptical about such new entities. I believe that in theory it is possible to create and maintain them, but in practice there can come up a lot of problems. Imagine that a group wants to join that is occupied with Marxism, or Zionism, or other potentially controversial subjects. And then groups with antimarxism, antizionism etc. What subjects exactly (and what kind of behavior) do we want to allow? And what actual problem we would try to solve with such new entities? One particular question is the organization of ethnic or linguistic groups which cannot have a national Wikimedia organization (chapter), but which also cannot or don't want to integrate into existing national Wikimedia organizations. The best known example are the Catalans together with the Scottish Wikipedians (or just some of them?). == A concrete problem to be solved == I must mention here my personal interests. I am an editor of Wikipedia in Esperanto, a small, transnational language that never can have a national Wikimedia organization. We Esperanto-Wikipedians can also not easily integrate into existing national Wikimedia organizations because we live in many different countries, where other (national) languages are dominant. So, as an Esperantist I would like it very much to see a Esperanto "chapter" of Wikimedia, but as a Wikimedian in general I am afraid that it would open a box of Pandora. Thinking of practical problems, I remember that we small language Wikipedians often don't have good connections with the Wikimedia organizations. We don't know well how to make use of the existing material and other ressources. And the Foundation and the national Wikimedia organizations know little of us. When I go to the Foundation and ask whether we are allowed to use the logos for a flyer in my small language, then the Foundation might ask itself: *Who is this Ziko, can we trust him, does he speak for more people than only himself?* == Language Contact Person (LCP) == I would like to suggest a small solution to solve a part of the problems. Every language version of Wikipedia should designate a "Language Contact Person" for relations with the Foundation (and national Wikimedia organizations). This LCP is to be elected by a poll with the same requirements as for admins. A deputy LCP is also to be elected, in order to replace a LCP when necessary. If one of both is no longer active, it will be the task of the remaining one to take care of a new election of that other position. You know, originally it is often an admin who represents a language version in one way or other. But that is not really the task of an admin, and other people might be a suitable LCP but are not interesting in becoming an admin. The LCP would be only a liaison officer, he won't "officially represent" the language version. Like adminship it will be less a position of honour but of work. The LCP has to report to the Foundation about the language version and its community and outreach, monthly or at least once a year. (Think of my "Tell us about your Wikipedia" project on Meta.) And when the Foundation wishes to contact that language version, for example when it needs a translation or wants the whole movement to know about something important, the LCP is the best way to take care of that. The LCP knows the village pumps and mailing lists etc. of his language. So, in future, Casey Brown does not have to search and contact all those language versions and their activists, but will simply post to a common mailing list of all LCPs and they will do the rest. On the other hand, when the Wikipedians of a particular language version have a specific problem and seek for help from the Foundation, they can do that most efficiently via their LCP. Of course, a LCP is not only useful for small languages. Think of Spanish, a global language. Some Spanish speaking countries have a national Wikimedia organization, others have not. A Spanish Wikipedia LCP can be the coordinator of a flyer in Spanish for all of the Spanish speaking countries. == Experimental phase == My suggestion is that the Foundation asks the Wikipedia language versions to elect LCPs (and their deputies). After a year, the Foundation evaluates the experiences with the LCPs, whether they really make communication more efficient or not. Then, * the LCP system can remain the same as it is, * or has to be abolished because it caused more work than it helped, * or the system will be given a more formal basis, with the LCP getting a higher status or more tasks, or even becoming the nucleus of language based formal Wikimedia organizations. Maybe the LCP experiences can be of value with regard to Wikimedia projects such as Wikisource, Wikibooks etc. Please let me know what you think about the possibility and potential usefulness of Language Contact Persons. Kind regards Ziko -- Ziko van Dijk The Netherlands http://zikoblog.wordpress.com/ _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

== Language Contact Person (LCP) == I would like to suggest a small solution to solve a part of the problems. Every language version of Wikipedia should designate a "Language Contact Person" for relations with the Foundation (and national Wikimedia organizations). This LCP is to be elected by a poll  with the same requirements as for admins.

== New entities?== James Forrester and his group (sorry, I don't remember who was the official primus inter pares) presented in/before Haifa a list of new kinds of Wikimedia entities: * Chapters not based on national boundaries, but subjects such as railways, art, ethnic cultures, mathematics etc.

== Language Contact Person (LCP) == I would like to suggest a small solution to solve a part of the problems. Every language version of Wikipedia should designate a "Language Contact Person" for relations with the Foundation (and national Wikimedia organizations). This LCP is to be elected by a poll  with the same requirements as for admins. [...]