We have confirmed the dates of the consultation: October 4th and 5th (weekend).  If you haven't do so yet, please do give some thought to the Delegates and Venue sections of the organization page:

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:India_Community_Consultation_2014

I hope some community conversations about delegates are taking place.  As I said 5 days ago, we'd rather have communities nominate delegates, than to have to select people ourselves.  

For communities that do not come up with community nominations, we will be selecting people on the basis of proxy measures such as levels of engagement on wiki, on lists, and good standing (not banned etc.), but this may well not be the optimal delegates from the community's standpoint.

   Asaf

On Wed, Aug 20, 2014 at 10:33 PM, Asaf Bartov <abartov@wikimedia.org> wrote:

Hello again, everyone.

(I would appreciate forwarding/translation, again)

I hope discussions are underway about nominating delegates for this meeting, as we will need to begin arranging logistics in a couple of weeks.

In the meantime, one of you anonymously offered comments on the talk page, and I have now addressed them, here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:India_Community_Consultation_2014

I'm particularly calling out to your attention that the meeting is not expected to set the future of work in India, or to bind communities into accepting whatever is agreed upon at the meeting.  On the contrary, it is a joint visioning and strategizing meeting, whose final output, ideally, would be a roadmap, a set of proposals, and a shared understanding of different possible roles of organizations and informal structures in India, all of which would be offered back, on-wiki, to the communities to discuss and develop further, or not. 

Some communities may embrace some of the ideas, others may object or just choose not to adopt them for now, and others still may struggle to even have that kind of conversation.  All of these outcomes are valid, and we are decidedly not looking for (another) one-size-fits-all strategy for all of India.

Please do visit the page and help us decide the venue and begin building the participant list.  We would much rather have communities nominate, as well as individuals self-nominate, to participate, than having to select whom to invite ourselves (though of course we would do that to ensure minimal representation, if we need to).

Thanks,

   Asaf

On Sun, Aug 17, 2014 at 8:50 PM, Asaf Bartov <abartov@wikimedia.org> wrote:

Dear fellow Wikimedians,

(this is important and a rare opportunity -- please do take a few moments to read.)

I would like to draw your attention to a major piece of news:

The Wikimedia Foundation is convening a community consultation on the future of Wikimedia work in India, to be held in October in Bangalore, with significant representation from across India, the different projects, and the different language communities.

Please see the following page on Meta for details, context, and to begin discussion the delegates you would like to see participating.  All costs will be borne by the Foundation.

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Community_Consultation_2014

Let's try and keep discussion on the talk page of that page on Meta, so everyone can follow, even people not on this list.

Also, your help in forward this widely, translating as necessary, etc., would be MUCH appreciated.  Again, this is an important opportunity, and we need to ensure we get every community's attention.

I look forward to this conversation very much!

   Asaf