Hello Everyone: I'd like to share two pieces of good news. 1. The Chapter grant has been approved. More details here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:WM_IN/Bootstrap_Grant 2. The Conference grant has also been approved. More details here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:WM_IN/WikiConference_India_2011 We are really hoping that Chapter members come forward to fill the empty EC positions and actively participate in the functioning of the EC and help the Chapter expand its reach and impact in India. Further, we hope that community members also become members of the Chapter - an FAQ is here: http://wiki.wikimedia.in/Membership-FAQ Further, the process for nominations for the EC Elections have been put up as well: http://members.wikimedia.in/Executive_Committee_Elections_2011 [This is a members only page.] We are grateful to the Nominations Committee: http://wiki.wikimedia.in/Announcements/Nominations_Committee_appointment We are also hoping that there is active participation in the WikiConference India - this is our community Conference and it is up to us to make it a success. Best, Gautam John _______________________________________________ Wikimediaindia-l mailing list Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l

Ravi, Thank God someone feels like this. Be our guest, please prove us wrong by getting us a great big sponsorship. We really welcome help in this field. I'm sure if you are succesful, and we have enough funds, we could reduce the grant or use it elsewhere than for the Wiki Conference. Warm regards, Ashwin Baindur ------------------------------------------------------ On Wed, Aug 24, 2011 at 8:01 PM, Ravishankar <ravidreams(a)gmail.com> wrote: _______________________________________________ Wikimediaindia-l mailing list Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l

Theo, Although I may not agree with Ravi or Ashwin completely, I feel that open-minded discussion about this doesn't hurt. The grant and its details are public, and Ravi has expressed his opinion on it. Ravi is a longtime Wikipedian on Tamil Wikipedia, and one of the authors of this: http://www.archive.org/details/BadriSeshadriAnIntroductiontoTamilWikipediab… (Personally, I don't think his mail intended to denigrate anyone's work. I've known him as a really committed Wikipedian - he's done some amazing work in Tamil Nadu) Ashwin does have a point though when he says that it is quite a task getting sponsorship for event of this scale. Event organizers hunting for sponsors almost an year before the event isn't uncommon. Cheers, On Wed, Aug 24, 2011 at 8:10 PM, Theo10011 <de10011(a)gmail.com> wrote: -- Hari Prasad Nadig http://hpnadig.net http://twitter.com/hpnadig http://flickr.com/hpnadig _______________________________________________ Wikimediaindia-l mailing list Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l

Theo, Although I may not agree with Ravi or Ashwin completely, I feel that open-minded discussion about this doesn't hurt. The grant and its details are public, and Ravi has expressed his opinion on it. Ravi is a longtime Wikipedian on Tamil Wikipedia, and one of the authors of this: http://www.archive.org/details/BadriSeshadriAnIntroductiontoTamilWikipediab… (Personally, I don't think his mail intended to denigrate anyone's work. I've known him as a really committed Wikipedian - he's done some amazing work in Tamil Nadu) Ashwin does have a point though when he says that it is quite a task getting sponsorship for event of this scale. Event organizers hunting for sponsors almost an year before the event isn't uncommon. Cheers, On Wed, Aug 24, 2011 at 8:10 PM, Theo10011 <de10011(a)gmail.com> wrote: -- Hari Prasad Nadig http://hpnadig.net http://twitter.com/hpnadig http://flickr.com/hpnadig _______________________________________________ Wikimediaindia-l mailing list Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l

Hi all, I appreciate the transparent, detailed and professional planning of conference and I am sorry I couldn't take part in WikiConference related planning earlier. For those who don't know, I am a Tamil Wikimedian since 2005 with 20,000+ edits. My major interest lies in outreach and policy decisions concerning Tamil Wikimedia projects. http://toolserver.org/~quentinv57/sulinfo/Ravidreams Am I qualified to express my opinions now ? ;) I have two major concerns: 1. The overall budget. It is huge even if we get 100% commercial sponsorship. We could do more useful things with this budget. 2. The amount of money that is being granted from the foundation. Given the indication that this may be an annual event, here are my ideas on *how a WikiConference shall be arranged. * * WikiConference need not be an annual event. * It should be planned well in advance ( a year in advance at least to allow time for planning and fund-raising ) * Let's not have an ambitious plan and wonder for funding. We should have a realistic estimate for non-grant funding and plan accordingly. *Bidding city / community should show guarantee to meet at least half the budget by means of commercial sponsors and other revenue sources.* If they cannot provide this guarantee, they should revise the budget. * Tie up with local universities / academic institutions for free venue / dorms and look for the dates when these can be available. WikiConference is a media event and I am sure there will be many hosting partners for a brand like Wikipedia. If we can convince schools to run campus ambassador programs why not they be convinced to host this? * Need not be a 3 day event. Even a 1 or 2 day event will be good. (will cut down logistics, accommodation costs) . *What if this is 2001 with no WMF and grants? How will we plan and organize?* *This is not a corporate conference to have 100% professional and rocking experience at any cost. This is a community conference and that spirit should be kept. * *Here are some ways to minimise expense and generate revenue:* * We are getting lakhs of eyeballs for sponsorship / participation announcement and they all land in WikiConference India home page. But http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WikiConference_India_2011/Sponsorship has no info and I couldn't find sponsorship related info anywhere else. This should be the highlighted info in conference homepage asking for sponsors. * Why not convert the conference itself into a fund-raiser? Open a donation booth. Have an agreement with chapter / foundation to get 50% donations for conference expenses and donate the rest to the movement. Can we place a banner of this budget in the conference venue? Will our expenses be justified to a common man? Will people be motivated to donate? If not, we are doing something the wrong way. * Registration cost should be at least 300 INR per day. ( The current budget allots 200 INR plus per day for food alone). The value of the conference is in the knowledge they gain and not in the goodies we give. Meritorious candidates can apply for sponsorships. We don't need a crowd. The local crowd may come and forget it as yet another event. The prime focus should be to bring together best minds already active in Wikimedia at one place. The attendees party can be free for scholarship recipients but others can pay. If you compare that a movie going experience in Mumbai should cost at least 200 INR per head, we need not feel shy to charge where it is due. * Sell Wikipedia souvenirs including T-Shirts, mugs etc.,. Or give them as a freebie when people make large donations. * If we can make the event a two-day conference, we can cut down logistics and accommodation costs. Even an international event like Wikimania has some less quality presentations. Have four tracks: Language Wikipedia projects, English Wikipedia, Tech and General. ( I found only two seminar rooms in the budget and assume only 2 or 3 tracks) Have only the best papers and move the rest to lighting talks. Personally, I am not so happy with some of the ways WMF, chapters are spending the donated money and I know there are more people feeling this way. If even regular Wikipedians feel like this, we should be more responsible in how we project ourselves for the public. I have been a regular donor to WMF but will reconsider from this year on. A good idea will be to apply to join the grants committee or take part in the discussions there. So, this is nothing personal against WikiConference India. Personally, I have experiences running a whole day blog camp for 200 people with less than 50,000 INR with no registration cost and free lunch. In another instance, Tamil Wikipedians ran a 3 day Wikipedia workshop for 1000s of people with less than a 20,000 INR budget. So, I can't help compare the value brought forth by some of the items in the current WikiConference budget. There have been tens of outreach programs by local communities so far with zero grants and zero cost. Special mention can be made of annual Wikipedia meetup, CD releases by Malayalam Wikipedia and State wide article contest by Tamil Wikipedia. Just because we have a chapter and grants now doesn't mean we can spend it somehow. We shall look for unconventional ways to invest wisely which will have maximum ROI. Here are some examples: * Once, a financially striving Tamil Wikipedian was contributing regularly by spending his own money from a browsing center. We managed to collect some cash from the community and presented him a PC with internet connection. Cost: 25,000 INR. You can guess his edit activity now and the lifetime value it brings. India is still a developing country and there may be many more such Wikipedians. Why not develop a Laptop scholarship program for qualified Wikipedians? * http://www.noolaham.org is a volunteer driven NPO that aims to digitize Tamil resources from Sri Lanka. Their annual budget for 2010 was roughly 8 lakh INR and they have digitized 1000s of books so far. This is a significant achievement for a regional language given their civil war situations. When we wonder about lack of citations for Indian languages, imagine the impact of similar projects bootstrapped for all Indian languages. * A resource center with one or two full-time professionals can be run for each Wikipedia with an annual cost of less than 10 lakh INR and this will have a huge impact on the quality and quantity of the Wikipedias. Finally, every Wikimedian has his own way of contributing to the movement. He cannot and need not take part in all activities but if he has an opinion on what is done in the name of community, I believe it should be discussed with an open mind. I will not be able to attend this year's WikiConference due to personal reasons. My best wishes for the event and special kudos for the organisers. Regards, Ravi _______________________________________________ Wikimediaindia-l mailing list Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l

Hi all, I appreciate the transparent, detailed and professional planning of conference and I am sorry I couldn't take part in WikiConference related planning earlier. For those who don't know, I am a Tamil Wikimedian since 2005 with 20,000+ edits. My major interest lies in outreach and policy decisions concerning Tamil Wikimedia projects. http://toolserver.org/~quentinv57/sulinfo/Ravidreams Am I qualified to express my opinions now ? ;) I have two major concerns: 1. The overall budget. It is huge even if we get 100% commercial sponsorship. We could do more useful things with this budget. 2. The amount of money that is being granted from the foundation. Given the indication that this may be an annual event, here are my ideas on *how a WikiConference shall be arranged. * * WikiConference need not be an annual event. * It should be planned well in advance ( a year in advance at least to allow time for planning and fund-raising ) * Let's not have an ambitious plan and wonder for funding. We should have a realistic estimate for non-grant funding and plan accordingly. *Bidding city / community should show guarantee to meet at least half the budget by means of commercial sponsors and other revenue sources.* If they cannot provide this guarantee, they should revise the budget. * Tie up with local universities / academic institutions for free venue / dorms and look for the dates when these can be available. WikiConference is a media event and I am sure there will be many hosting partners for a brand like Wikipedia. If we can convince schools to run campus ambassador programs why not they be convinced to host this? * Need not be a 3 day event. Even a 1 or 2 day event will be good. (will cut down logistics, accommodation costs) . *What if this is 2001 with no WMF and grants? How will we plan and organize?* *This is not a corporate conference to have 100% professional and rocking experience at any cost. This is a community conference and that spirit should be kept. * *Here are some ways to minimise expense and generate revenue:* * We are getting lakhs of eyeballs for sponsorship / participation announcement and they all land in WikiConference India home page. But http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WikiConference_India_2011/Sponsorship has no info and I couldn't find sponsorship related info anywhere else. This should be the highlighted info in conference homepage asking for sponsors. * Why not convert the conference itself into a fund-raiser? Open a donation booth. Have an agreement with chapter / foundation to get 50% donations for conference expenses and donate the rest to the movement. Can we place a banner of this budget in the conference venue? Will our expenses be justified to a common man? Will people be motivated to donate? If not, we are doing something the wrong way. * Registration cost should be at least 300 INR per day. ( The current budget allots 200 INR plus per day for food alone). The value of the conference is in the knowledge they gain and not in the goodies we give. Meritorious candidates can apply for sponsorships. We don't need a crowd. The local crowd may come and forget it as yet another event. The prime focus should be to bring together best minds already active in Wikimedia at one place. The attendees party can be free for scholarship recipients but others can pay. If you compare that a movie going experience in Mumbai should cost at least 200 INR per head, we need not feel shy to charge where it is due. * Sell Wikipedia souvenirs including T-Shirts, mugs etc.,. Or give them as a freebie when people make large donations. * If we can make the event a two-day conference, we can cut down logistics and accommodation costs. Even an international event like Wikimania has some less quality presentations. Have four tracks: Language Wikipedia projects, English Wikipedia, Tech and General. ( I found only two seminar rooms in the budget and assume only 2 or 3 tracks) Have only the best papers and move the rest to lighting talks. Personally, I am not so happy with some of the ways WMF, chapters are spending the donated money and I know there are more people feeling this way. If even regular Wikipedians feel like this, we should be more responsible in how we project ourselves for the public. I have been a regular donor to WMF but will reconsider from this year on. A good idea will be to apply to join the grants committee or take part in the discussions there. So, this is nothing personal against WikiConference India. Personally, I have experiences running a whole day blog camp for 200 people with less than 50,000 INR with no registration cost and free lunch. In another instance, Tamil Wikipedians ran a 3 day Wikipedia workshop for 1000s of people with less than a 20,000 INR budget. So, I can't help compare the value brought forth by some of the items in the current WikiConference budget. There have been tens of outreach programs by local communities so far with zero grants and zero cost. Special mention can be made of annual Wikipedia meetup, CD releases by Malayalam Wikipedia and State wide article contest by Tamil Wikipedia. Just because we have a chapter and grants now doesn't mean we can spend it somehow. We shall look for unconventional ways to invest wisely which will have maximum ROI. Here are some examples: * Once, a financially striving Tamil Wikipedian was contributing regularly by spending his own money from a browsing center. We managed to collect some cash from the community and presented him a PC with internet connection. Cost: 25,000 INR. You can guess his edit activity now and the lifetime value it brings. India is still a developing country and there may be many more such Wikipedians. Why not develop a Laptop scholarship program for qualified Wikipedians? * http://www.noolaham.org is a volunteer driven NPO that aims to digitize Tamil resources from Sri Lanka. Their annual budget for 2010 was roughly 8 lakh INR and they have digitized 1000s of books so far. This is a significant achievement for a regional language given their civil war situations. When we wonder about lack of citations for Indian languages, imagine the impact of similar projects bootstrapped for all Indian languages. * A resource center with one or two full-time professionals can be run for each Wikipedia with an annual cost of less than 10 lakh INR and this will have a huge impact on the quality and quantity of the Wikipedias. Finally, every Wikimedian has his own way of contributing to the movement. He cannot and need not take part in all activities but if he has an opinion on what is done in the name of community, I believe it should be discussed with an open mind. I will not be able to attend this year's WikiConference due to personal reasons. My best wishes for the event and special kudos for the organisers. Regards, Ravi _______________________________________________ Wikimediaindia-l mailing list Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l

You know, these are excellent ideas and it does highlight an issue we have faced. How does the wider community and the Chapter find out what is happening in each language community and geography? If we can't discover this, then we can't engage and support it either, right?

1. Chapter shall conduct IRC discussions with each langauge community at least once in few months. It is best done one community at a time to give more time and space for each of them. Not all language community members are in India and not all can become chapter members.

2. For Wikimedia India newsletter efforts, we shall encourage people to share similar stories and proposals. A newsletter need not contain statistics alone :)