Dear Harsh,
First of all thanks to you and the volunteers in Ahmendabad who are keen to
contribute to Mediawiki. it is evident from your contributions to Gujarati
(around Mediawiki) that you and others are very interested to do your bit.
Please continue to do this with the passion and the enthusiasm some of you
have show already.
On Sun, Jan 6, 2013 at 12:34 AM, Harsh Kothari <harshkothari410(a)gmail.com>wrote;wrote:
Next is I don't want to get involved in this type
of discussion. I just
want to contribute and code. This is probably the best we can do, since the
rest of Ahmedabad group members are also more interested in coding than in
formal discussions like this one. We silently help growing the MediaWiki
community across India. That is what matters.
As a far these "formal discussions" go they are essential to sort out and
bring clarity to the emerging models proposed by the foundation. There are
matters of scope of multiple entities at play, overlapping turfs, trademark
licensing, membership, continuity of activities and funding that
are involved.
Building volunteer groups is best done without the need for a registered
entity as they come with the burden of maintaining and ensuring compliance
to the regulatory authorities. The focus while bootstrapping these ought to
be (as you right said) on building the volunteer pool.
Let the chapter and the WMF sort out the larger model while you folks keep
the focus on the technical work that you are passionate about. I am sure
the chapter or the WMF would be happen to support if you were to need any
help.
Dear All,
For now, it is unclear to me what treating the Ahmedabad Mediawiki user
group as a formal wikimedia user group actually means? Does that mean it
would be non-incorporated entity and have trademark reuse rights (from the
chapter?). It suppose it would need to depend on funding as needed from the
chapter or WMF.
Can someone clarify?
Is there any other aspect that I may be missing?
To chime in on the observations made earlier on the thread...I for for one
also believes...
India has been a test bed to test out models without thinking through the
ramifications enough. The creation of India programs (first intended as a
temporary office, then a formal entity, subsequently wound up (which came
as a huge shock to many) and handed over to CIS (now A2K). I do think some
of these moves ought to have happened with more chapter involvement.
If for one don't understand how first a focused
Boots-on-the-ground initiative is launched and subsequently there is a move
to a narrowed focused model (a complete change in approach). This move has
surely impacted the dynamics at the ground in India immensely. We have lost
some truly good wikipedians who have moved on in disillusionment.
I care for the movement and do believe that strengthening chapters to be
the custodians of the movement in respective countries is the way to go
forward. In my view, all movement entities should focus on assisting
chapters to be successful who in term focus on supporting the community and
local outreach. If there isn't belief in chapters, better to scrap them
than run parallel entities (I am not referring to the Ahmedabad initiative
here).
What is sad is in the midst of this complexity of organisational entities,
we perhaps risk losing truly enthusiastic volunteers whose only interest
is in contributing to the movement. Catalysing and supporting volunteer
enthusiasm and interest ought to be our collective sole purpose and focus.
I request Harsh and the other volunteers to keep the focus on the "coding"
and the cool stuff than get caught up in the debate of the organizational
complexity which is best left to the chapter EC and the WMF to sort out
quickly.
regards
Arun