1) I agree with Andrew that the WMF's support is necessary and will not be too hard to get. :) The only thing is that we need to clarify some of the bylaws. I'll talk to you tomorrow about his.
2) About fundraising, if that is a problem at the beginning, I am sure ChapComm can and will help start us up. Furthermore, before we incorporate or file with the IRS, we are going to need to talk to a lawyer. However, to my knowledge, that is currently being taken care of by Johnny.
3) It would be interesting to have that as a "membership requirement". We must also keep in mind that we can "copy" ideas from other groups and work together with them. There are many ideas that are a "one-time thing" and there are others that will span most of our existence (things like visiting schools and discussing free licensed materials with teachers).
Another thing we need to think about like the bank account is the formation of a website and e-mail address. We were in the paper about having three meetups, think of how the press might view this. I think Andrew and I agree that pa.wikimedia.org is the best idea for a website and an OTRS queue would be good for an e-mail.
We also need to draft a letter for other mailing lists and to possibly send to local newspapers. However these two things can wait until *after* we incorporate and become "official".
Casey Brown Cbrown1023
-----Original Message----- From: wikimediapa-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:wikimediapa-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Andrew Whitworth Sent: Monday, July 09, 2007 9:47 PM To: wikimediapa-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [WikimediaPA-l] Getting the ball rolling a little more, etc.
I agree with you, we really do need to think about what to do next. My opinions on your three tracks:
1) I think that our interaction with the WMF is going to be crucial, and I would far prefer to have their approval then otherwise. From what I've seen about it, the chapters committee is very helpful and is not likely to cause us a gigantic problem. If there arent any major objections to the current set of bylaws, I saw we submit them to the committee for approval.
2) Agreed. Before we do anything about incorporating or applying for non-profit status, we should see where we are with the WMF, and we should see how viable our fundraising efforts can be.
3) The more ideas for projects the better, We can list them at the pretzel stand, or we can create a new subpage for projects as well. Maybe that should be the membership requirement, in lieu of a cash fee: you must submit
an idea for an outreach project.
--Andrew Whitworth