For those I haven't met, I work at WMF on the team that manages mobile partnerships.

The Vodafone ad was their own initiative (we didn't know about it in advance).  Since the ad doesn't use the Wikipedia logo, it doesn't need approval to create.  We see this happen a fair amount in other countries too. These ads are good for creating exposure and awareness, but if a company is willing to spend that money to advertise Wikipedia, we would prefer to work with them on it to ensure accurate messaging.  We did talk with Vodafone since, and will be more directly involved in future creations.

This is completely independent of the Wikipedia Zero program that Gautam noted, but bringing that to India is high priority, and we're working on it.  Nothing to say on that yet, but I hope soon.

Amit



------------------------------

Message: 7
Date: Wed, 16 May 2012 04:34:12 -0700
From: Gautam John <gautam@prathambooks.org>
To: Wikimedia India Community list
       <wikimediaindia-l@lists.wikimedia.org>
Subject: Re: [Wikimediaindia-l] Vodafone advertisement -- Internet is
       fun,    Wikipedia
Message-ID:
       <CAMmJ7UoFztyrMKwv0WyVwpzSC=_G5oK-PHRCU1fQQ=dov+gy5w@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

I wonder if the WMF push to get access to Wikipedia on mobiles has
anything to do with this...

https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Mobile_Partnerships_Q_and_A

Thank you.

Best,

Gautam
________
http://blog.prathambooks.org/p/social-media.html



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End of Wikimediaindia-l Digest, Vol 168, Issue 1
************************************************



--
Amit Kapoor
Mobile Partnerships
Wikimedia Foundation