Hello everyone,
Looking at the various discussions surrounding the Berlin Agreement -- and
particularly in anticipation of the first meetings of the Wikimedia
Chapters Association, where future plans for chapters in the US might
become a point of contention -- I think it may be beneficial for us to more
formally adopt and promulgate a shared vision for the future of US-based
chapters at our in-person meeting at Wikimania.
Having said that, I think that trying to come up with something as detailed
as the Berlin Agreement -- establishing a formal organization, adopting a
detailed charter, and so forth -- would be premature for us; most of our
regional groups haven't gone down the path of formally incorporating and
becoming official chapters, and there's little value to creating a formal
infrastructure until that happens.
Instead, I'd like to propose that we put together an agreement in principle
to outline a shared vision for the development of US chapters. The
agreement would essentially outline three key goals:
(1) Creating a network of regional Wikimedia chapters across the United
States;
(2) Building collaboration among the regional Wikimedia chapters in the US;
and
(3) At some point in the future, forming an association of Wikimedia
chapters in the US.
By signing the agreement, the signatories would simply indicate their
support of these goals. The agreement could therefore be signed on an
individual basis -- i.e. each of the attendees at our July meeting could
sign on their own behalf -- rather than only by chapters or other regional
groups (which would sharply limit the number of potential signatures, and
significantly increase the complexity of the entire exercise).
Would something along these lines be of interest to the participants here?
Cheers,
Kirill
--
Kirill Lokshin
Secretary | Wikimedia District of Columbia
http://wikimediadc.org | @wikimediadc