Please find below the minutes of our meeting last Tuesday (apologies for the wiki markup!). Please send any corrections, comments or questions to me, post on the wiki Talk page or reply to this on the list.
Regards,
Andrew
=======
'''Wikimedia UK Board meeting
'''Tuesday 19 th May 2009, 8:30pm BST at #wikimedia-uk-board
Present: Michael Peel (MP) (Chair); Andrew Turvey (AT) (Minutes); Paul Williams (PW); Steve Virgin (SV); Joseph Seddon (JS); Tom Holden (TH)
Apologies: Zeyi He (ZH)
== Minutes of the previous meeting ==
The [[Meetings/2009-05-12|minutes of the meeting of the 12 th May]] were approved with minor changes.
The following actions were carried forward:
JS to send the tokens of our appreciation to the retiring Directors, tellers and external speakers.
'''ACTION: JS
TH to contact the bank to notify them of the new directors, to change the signatories to any two of MP, AT and TH and to set up AT and MP on the online banking.
'''ACTION: TH
PW will talk to SV and ZH to get them set up with an account on IRC and give them operator rights.
'''ACTION: PW, SV, ZH
MP has transferred ownership of wikimedia.co.uk to us; MP still to organise transfer of wikimedia.org.uk with current owner.
'''ACTION: MP
AT is to respond to the pressure group whose letter had been received.
'''ACTION: AT
AT will send the opt out email re Phorm once wikimedia.org.uk has been transferred.
'''ACTION: AT
JS and MP agreed to send at least one suggestion regarding initiatives to ZH before the next meeting.
'''ACTION: JS and MP
MP agreed to email a summary on cultural partnerships around the Board members for discussion at the next meeting.
'''ACTION: MP
AT agreed to email a summary on the proposed process to agree the chapter-selected seats in 2010.
'''ACTION: AT
ZH to send a note round the Board with details of the discussions she has had with people at her university to discuss running campaigns to encourage people to edit Wikipedia.
'''ACTION: ZH
PW will continue to research what is needed to produce business cards for Wikimedia UK officials.
'''ACTION: PW
== Matters arising ==
MP will move the private wiki to http://board.wikimedia.org.uk.
'''ACTION: MP
== Treasurer's Report ==
Member Number 28's application was approved and he becomes a member with immediate effect as his payment has already cleared.
It was agreed to put the Registers of Members, Directors etc. on the private wiki.
'''ACTION: AT
== Secretary's Report ==
AT reported two items of correspondence:
# A letter from our MP, with a response from the minister responsible regarding the HMRC delays.
# A referral from the en-wiki OTRS queue from an Imperial College spin off company asking for our help on the use of wikis in education. AT agreed to circulate to the Board, discuss on the mailing list and follow up.
'''ACTION: AT
== HMRC Response ==
Agreed to use the expanded draft from AT as the basis for our response.
Other ideas to be incorporated into the text include:
* The nature study comparing wikipedia to Britannica [ http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v438/n7070/full/438900a.html ]
* examples of activities that other chapters, e.g. WMDE, and the WMF have done
* any other “real world” case studies concerning Wikip/media, including the UNU-MERIT survey [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Survey ] [ http://blog.wikimedia.org/2009/04/16/first-preliminary-results-from-unu-mer… ]
* surveys of how Wikip/media is used by students, academics and professionals
* discussions with Zeyi on her research work
SV will look into starting a survey on social media sites
'''ACTION: SV
MP agreed to find some references we can quote regarding the use of wikipedia as class assignments.
'''ACTION: MP
Agreed to continue to edit on the wiki and to approve at the next meeting.
'''ACTION: ALL
== Newsletter ==
JS agreed to complete the section on the 2010 Wikimedia UK conference tonight.
MP agreed to expand the “press coverage” and “other chapters” sections and distribute tomorrow.
'''ACTION: JS; MP
== Membership Drive ==
PW agreed to start pushing this and organise the [[Membership/Drive]] page. MP, AT, SV, JS agreed to send suggestions to PW about this by a fortnight's time.
'''ACTION: MP, AT, SV, JS
So that we can use it for members-only merchandising, AT agreed to send the email to the Foundation previously discussed asking for permission to use their trademarks.
'''ACTION: AT == Any other business == JS reported that Manchester Tourist Board have offered their support to hosting a future Wikimania conference. The Board has also had a separate discussion on email about volunteering to host the 2010 chapters meeting. Discussion ensued on whether we should host a combined 2010 chapters meeting and UK Conference in Manchester. JS will discuss with MTB whether they could support this event and express a statement of interest in regards to the chapters meeting on the chapters list. JS will continue to follow up over the next two weeks. MP and JS will liaise on discussing it with previous chapters meeting hosts Wikimedia Deutschland, Nederland and France. '''ACTION: JS We discussed ways to encourage donations. It was agreed directors should accept cash donations at wikimeets etc, give paper receipts and pay the cash into a bank branch. TH will follow up opening a non-charity PayPal account. TH will provide bank
account details on request. '''ACTION: TH
The May newsletter has been published at http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/
Newsletter/May2009 and is copied below for your convenience:
Summary: Whilst our application to HMRC has not yet been successful,
we're after your views on the proposed New Chapters' Agreement, your
suggestions for a Wikimedia UK conference next year and your ideas
for initiatives to start! We also bring you updates on Wikipedia
Loves Art, Other Chapters' Activities, Meet-ups and Press coverage.
In this month's newsletter:
1. HMRC Application Status
2. New Chapters' Agreement
3. Wikimania 2010 (and beyond!)
4. Initiatives
5. Wikipedia Loves Art
6. Other Chapters' Activities
7. Meet-ups
8. Press coverage
HMRC Application Status
As you are probably already aware, the UK Tax Authorities have
rejected our application to be recognised as a charity for tax
purposes, arguing that the production of an encyclopedia does not
consist of "promoting education". The Board continue to believe that
our purposes are charitable and are looking into ways of appealing
this decision. We are currently in the process of drafting and
sending a letter of appeal to the HMRC, along with seeking legal advice.
New Chapters' Agreement
The Wikimedia Foundation has released the latest version of the
Chapters' Agreement, which binds all chapters of the WMF. The new
version includes many changes, and WMUK wants to hear what it's
membership thinks of the changes! Got any comments or ideas for the
agreement? Let the Board know by emailing board(a)wikimedia.org.uk or
the mailing list (wikimediauk-l), and we will put together a response
not only from the Board, but the community at large!
Wikimania 2010 (and beyond!)
Unfortunately the UK wasn't successful in our bid to bring the 2010
Wikimania Conference to Oxford. Wikimania 2010 will be held in
Gdansk, Poland and we hope that as many UK participants will be able
to attend and support the conference. The chapter sends its thanks
out to all those volunteers who helped in creating the bid. Despite
this, the chapter has already made a name for itself having been
approached by the Greater Manchester Tourist Board in supporting a
future Wikimania Bid and any conferences that we may wish to hold
within Manchester.
Currently our goal is the running of a Wikimedia UK conference next
year in conjuntion with our AGM. The location for the 2010 AGM has
not been set, and members are invited to send in suggestions for
where they believe would be able to host such a conference. For more
information, or if you have any ideas for WMUK's involvement in
conferences or wish to help out with any of the above contact our
Conferences Director at conferences(a)wikimedia.org.uk
Initiatives
Wikimedia UK is currently soliciting ideas for Initiatives for the
chapter to pursue! Under the helm of our new Initiatives Director,
Zeyi He [http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board#Zeyi_He], we are looking
to develop and take forward as many initiatives as we can - and we
need your input and assistance in making as many of these work as
possible. The Board is looking at a minimum of 3 completed
initiatives before the next AGM - so if you have any ideas, you can
either list them on the Ideas page [http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/
Initiatives/Ideas], develop them on the Proposals page [http://
uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Initiatives/Proposals], or contact our
Initiatives Director at initiatives(a)wikimedia.org.uk!
Wikipedia Loves Art
The chapter supported the "Wikipedia Loves Art" [http://
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WLART] photography contest in
February and since then the participating museums have been hard at
work checking each photograph for compliance with the copyright rules
and awarding bonus points for particularly good images. They have now
started to announce winners [http://www.flickr.com/groups/
wikipedia_loves_art/] and we hope to be able to announce the winners
from the Victoria & Albert museum shortly.
Other Chapters' Activities
A mailing list has been started for Wikimedians in Ireland [https://
lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaie]. Additionally,
several events have been or will be held in conjunction with museums
- at the start of May WM Argentina held Wikipedia invade el Museo de
La Plata [http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Wikipedia:Wikipedia_invade_el_Museo_de_La_Plata], and next month the
Netherlands chapter, Vereniging Wikimedia Nederland, will be running
Wiki Loves Art [http://www.vrijebeelden.nl/].
Meet-ups
London 21 - 17th May 2009
See Wikipedia's Page [http://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:WP:LONDON21] on
London 21 for more information on the topics discussed!
Upcoming UK Meetups
* London 22 [http://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:WP:LONDON22] -
Sunday 14th June @ 13:00 - Penderel's Oak Pub, Holborn WC1
Press coverage
A few highlights of press coverage this month: an Irish student's
Wikipedia hoax duped newspapers into circulating a fake quote (AFP)
[http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/
ALeqM5gQV2LU_QhL5w_BcPY5B6pvuUUMGg], and en:User:Stifle participated
in a live radio debate on NewsTalk Radio (Ireland) on the 9 May.
I submitted a request to OPSI (HMSO) to release pictures of MPs and
Lords under a free licence. They are a number of problems, for example
OPSI don't own the copyrights. However, we can use their 'unlocking'
tool to show there is a demand.
I find it amazing that thee aren't free pictures of our
representatives. In the US, pictures of Senators and Representatives
are Public Domain.
Anyway, to see more go to
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/unlocking-service/2009/05/16/PhotographsOfLordsAndMPs
.
Hi all,
The next board meeting is tomorrow evening; Tuesday 12 May 2009,
8.30-10.30BST, in the #wikimedia-uk-board channel on
irc.freenode.net, with discussion in #wikimedia-uk. The draft agenda
is at:
http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meetings/2009-05-12/Agenda
Board members: please confirm whether you'll be present or not on the
agenda page.
Thanks,
Mike
Tips for our website ?
----- Forwarded Message -----
From: "Casey Brown" <cbrown1023.ml(a)gmail.com>
To: "Local Chapters, board and officers coordination (closed subscription)" <internal-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Sent: Sunday, 17 May, 2009 21:58:18 GMT +00:00 GMT Britain, Ireland, Portugal
Subject: [Internal-l] Non Profit Website Design & Fundraising
Wikimedia Australia is working on cleaning up their website
(specifically their main page). Angela mentioned an interesting
article that gave some good pointers.
<http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/05/14/non-profit-website-design-exampl…>
Guillaume also wrote a blog post about chapter fundraising:
<http://www.gpaumier.org/blog/229_five-fundraising-tips-for-wikimedia-chapte…>,
which is interesting.
Mark (Mwpnl) mentioned that Wikimedia Nederland might find these
articles useful, so sharing it with you guys too. :-)
--
Casey Brown
Cbrown1023
I've started a discussion at Talk:Meetings#Public IRC logs about whether we should continue to make publicly available the IRC logs of old IRC discussions. Please let me know what you think there or in reply to this message.
Thanks
Andrew
There is an ongoing discussion on English Wikinews about ID cards for
community accredited reporters (http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/WN:WARIC). Basic
summary of the idea put forward by skenmy is to have more professional ID
cards than the home-laminated ones currently issued.
It struck me that with Wikinews being such a small community it would be
quite a bit of money to spend on the professional card printer. Initially
this prompted me to consider some sort of 'accredited photographer ID' for
Commoners. Bearing this in mind in relation to projects like 'Wikipedia
loves art' brings me here, along with another minor point that might justify
the printer expense.
Would WMUK'ers see a use for a community test for distribution of cards to
established project photographers? A clear code of conduct alongside this
might help open doors at museums, exhibitions, and events and help WP and
WN.
A second use for an ID printer would possibly be WMUK membership cards, or
even for other chapters. I would guess the German chapter is big enough to
have their own printer and run their own cards. This in itself might suit
the Wikinews goal as cards could be issued more locally.
Lastly, a Wikinews technicality I think this overcomes. The WMF cannot take
any position on the Wikinews accreditiation process without potentially
exposing themselves to editorial liability. Putting this in chapter hands
and at arm's length would help, for any wiki community process of issuing ID
cards.
What are people's thoughts on expanding the scope of skenmy's proposal as
outlined above?
Brian McNeil
Hi all,
Please find below the minutes of the board meeting on Tuesday which I'll also post to the wiki. Please forward any corrections or comments to me or raise on the talk page.
Regards,
Andrew
=====
Wikimedia UK Board meeting
Tuesday 12 th May 2009, 8:30pm BST at #wikimedia-uk-board
Present: Michael Peel (MP) (Chair); Andrew Turvey (AT) (Minutes); Paul Williams (PW); Steve Virgin (SV); Joseph Seddon (JS); Zeyi He (ZH) (part)
Apologies: Tom Holden (TH); Zeyi He for late arrival
Minutes of the previous meeting
The minutes of the meeting of the 5 th May were approved with minor changes.
ZH joined the meeting
The following actions were carried forward:
JS to send a token of our appreciation to the retiring Directors, tellers and external speakers. AT will provide addresses.
ACTION: AT; JS
TH to contact the bank to notify them of the new directors, to change the signatories to any two of MP, AT and TH and to set up AT and MP on the online banking.
ACTION: TH
MP to set up a private wiki for sharing documents.
ACTION: MP
PW will talk to SV and ZH to get them set up with an account on IRC and give them operator rights.
ACTION: PW, SV, ZH
PW will investigate whether the domain www.wikimedia.org.uk can occur free of charge; if not, MP is authorised to pay the £23 transfer fee. MP will also follow up hosting for the www.wikimedia.org.uk domain.
ACTION: PW, MP
TH is following up the subscription fee received without a membership form.
ACTION: TH
AT is to respond to the pressure group whose letter had been received.
ACTION: AT
AT will investigate whether it is possible for UK domains to opt out of Phorm and, if so, send the opt out letter once the domain has been transferred.
Treasurer's Report
TH had nothing further to report.
Secretary's Report
AT had nothing further to report.
HMRC Response
TH has posted the letter on the wiki at [[Response to HMRC]]. AT had made some suggestions at [[Talk:Response to HMRC]]. AT agreed to expand these into an alternative wording, and the other members will comment on wiki for final decision at the next meeting.
The WMF has offered to fund the cost of a barrister's advice.
It was agreed that the Board would still send a response to HMRC after the next meeting rather than delaying it to wait for formal advice.
ACTION: AT
Draft New Chapter Agreement
The meeting went in camera. Details of decisions and actions are noted in the confidential minutes
ACTION: MP
MP agreed to circulate to other Board members the comments on the agreement received from Tango42.
ACTION: MP
Newsletter
It was agreed to send May the newsletter out on 20 th , and to move the date progressively earlier in the month. PW agreed to start drafting and to assign sections.
ACTION: PW
Website
MP agreed to set up email addresses for initiatives(a)wikimedia.org.uk and volunteers(a)wikimedia.org.uk to forward to ZH & PW respectively.
ACTION: MP
PW agreed to send round instructions for registering with OTRS
ACTION: PW
It was agreed that personal addresses in the form firstname.lastname(a)wikimedia.org.uk would be cancelled once people are no longer working for the chapter – e.g. For former board members.
Initiatives
ZH asked for suggestions as to how she could fulfil her role. AT, JS, PW, SV and MP agreed to send at least one suggestion to ZH before the next meeting.
AT suggested the Board adopt a “timeline” similar to the one used by the interim Board and target completing three initiatives by the time of the next AGM.
ACTION: AT, JS, PW, SV and MP
Cultural partnerships
MP agreed to email a summary on this topic around the Board members for discussion at the next meeting.
ACTION: MP
Process to select chapter seats on the Foundation Board
MP agreed to email a summary on this decision around the Board members for discussion at the next meeting.
ACTION: AT
Any Other Business
ZH mentioned she had held discussions with people at her university to discuss running campaigns to encourage people to edit Wikipedia. She agreed to send a note with details round the Board.
ACTION: ZH
JS mentioned that a new Wikimedia mailing list has been launched for Wikimedians in Ireland. If they proceed to form a chapter, we need to make an arrangement for WM-UK members who are residents of Northern Ireland to participate in the Irish chapter should they wish. It was agreed we'd include this news in our newsletter and support the development of the mailing list or any future chapter in any other way we could.
PW asked if he could have business cards printed for his role. It was agreed this could be paid by the chapter. PW will research this and follow up with TH.
ACTION: PW
Meeting closed at 22:46
----- Original Message -----
From: "rupert.thurner" <rupert.thurner(a)gmail.com>
To: wikimediauk-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
Sent: Sunday, 10 May, 2009 20:12:30 GMT +00:00 GMT Britain, Ireland, Portugal
Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] Minutes of yesterday's Board meeting
>> would it be possible to slightly adjust your "bylaws" and add
>> education as most other wikimedia chapters do?
When the by-laws were written we talked about "educational content". This was our attempt to marry the charitable aim of "promoting education" with the Mission of the Wikimedia Foundation stated at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mission. Our correspondence made clear and repeated reference to "promoting education" so they were in no doubt how our Object links into the law on charitable activities.
Adjusting the bylaws would be a long process. We would need to call a general meeting of members, and get 75% approval for the change. We would also need the Foundation to approve the change which could take months.
The tax authorities' objection was not based on the wording of our Articles - their interpretation of the law was that producing an encyclopedia did not count as "promoting education" under UK law. We're contesting that interpretation - see http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Submission_to_HMRC for the draft of the response we are writing.
If we fail in this appeal one route we could go down is to revise the objects but our immediate response is to ask the matter to be referred to the Charity Commission who are more familiar with the law in this area.
Regards,
Andrew