It has been a very tough 20 months since the community last experienced the joy and delight of coming together at Wikimania. Wikimedia Foundation staff have been working hard since the decision was taken to cancel Wikimania in Bangkok in 2020, trying to find a way we can come together and celebrate our movement. 

For 2021 we are going to host a virtual Wikimania with the aim of it being by and for the community. We recently established the Core Organising Team (COT) with volunteers from across our communities.  As the COT develops the event we will seek out your support and appreciate your help throughout this new, yet very exciting process

WIKIMANIA UPDATES

In case you haven’t seen the latest information around this year’s virtual Wikimania, here’s a few links to inform you of the latest developments. 

• Save the Date & Core Organizing Team

• Call for Community Input

We will be sharing Wikimania updates with the larger movement on a weekly basis. Please see the link below for the first of this weekly series. 

• Scholarships & Sessions

The official Wikimania Wiki is currently being developed, and we will be going live with this soon. 

WIKIMANIA SCHOLARSHIP PROGRAM

As you may know, every year some people are awarded a scholarship to attend Wikimania. These scholarships are through programs offered by different affiliate organizations or the Foundation. The format of those scholarships has been changed for this year as we don’t need to fund travel, accomodation, conference fees, or visas for a virtual event. We do, however, still have the resources that are usually allocated to Wikimania’s scholarship program available. We therefore want to distribute those funds to affiliate organizations interested in this opportunity.

This year we can lower the individual costs of scholarships, yet aim bigger, and help more people participate in a virtual Wikimania. 

We know every community will have different needs that will need to be addressed to allow as many attendees as possible to join Wikimania, - this is where we need your help! You know your local community best. So we would like to empower you to make decisions as you best see fit.

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?

With the support of the Foundation’s grants team we will be providing funding to support people attending Wikimania.  What we would like to have happen is that we provide funds to your affiliate organization so that you can tailor support that will best help your community.  This funding is available to all affiliates independent of any current grants like the APG.

HOW WILL THIS WORK IN PRACTICE?

Funding will come from the Foundation. As the Foundation teams sort out how this can be done from a Legal, Finance and Administration standpoint. This could simply mean redirecting a portion of existing grants and allocating the spend to Wikimania. We will be sharing more information on how to apply for this support in the upcoming period of time. 

WHAT IS ELIGIBLE TO GET FUNDED?

Below is a list of examples of where we think scholarships can help;

* Data/Internet packages and temporary bandwidth so people can participate

* Support to pre-record presentations

* At home support with child care, or similar assistance

* Safe in-person meetups that coincide with live activities

* Safe post Wikimania meetups resulting from having attended Wikimania

* Admin/operation costs for Affiliates to distribute funds

* Costs to Affiliates to organize presentation/workshop/time at the conference

We ask that the affiliates organizations, take the lead with distributing scholarship assistance to your community members, as you know how best to create real impact for your community. This means that you would have the freedom to award scholarships to those in your community as you see fit. All the COT needs is an email of what you want to do and how much, we'll review them and confirm the amount.

WHO ARE YOU? HOW DO I GET IN TOUCH WITH YOU?

As the COT's affiliate contact, I'm here to help you through the next few months. I hear some ask who am I? In short, I'm User:Gnangarra. I've been contributing for 15 years, I'm a member of Wikimedia Australia and spent 4 years as Vice President and 2 years as President. I'm one of the current organisers of ESEAP. I know my experience within an affiliate organization will help me to quickly help you and understand what possible barriers of entry exist. 

Please contact me anytime my email is gnangarra@wikimedia.org.au, I'm on this  all-affiliates@lists.wikimedia.org mailing list. I'm also happy to zoom, skype, remo, googlemeet, or talk via any other platform.

My COT colleague who will be supporting the affiliate organization work is User:WikiTatik 

Watch this space as there will be more exciting opportunities to come for affiliates to show and shine during Wikimania.

Regards,