Hi Asaf

In my personal capacity I'm not able to assist at this time as I have a number of projects that are nearing completion and thus cannot take the time to assist or coordinate. 

From the discussions on the list, though, it seems alittle as if the concerns that locals have raised - which probably are 'accurate' representations of what happened after the fact - are being 'overlooked' and you're kinda just going to go ahead anyway ... For example I'm not sure if any 'post exericse' activity has been considered to perhaps support those language communities manage the sudden upsurge of new people/content etc to ensure that this isn't an unsustainable activity at the end of the day?   (And I don't have the solutions right now myself!)

Be that as it may, I'm also assuming that you would soon need to begin discussions with universities to find out who/where/when you will be able to conduct these content sprints? I'm not sure if you have this sorted out, but if not I have a name or two of people at Wits and UCT - Lourie has mentioned Stellenbosch - with whom you might be able to take discussion forward here locally.  Let me know if you need these.

Regards
Kerryn



* * * *
Kerryn McKay
The African Commons Project

082 334 6165
skype:  kerrynmac
twitter:  kerrynmckay






On Sat, Jun 18, 2011 at 1:27 AM, Asaf Bartov <abartov@wikimedia.org> wrote:
Hello again, everyone.


On Wed, Jun 15, 2011 at 7:02 PM, Asaf Bartov <abartov@wikimedia.org> wrote:

As for judges -- yes, Google's figure of 35 judges per language would be a challenge, certainly for Zulu and Tswana.  We shall try to achieve at least half that many for each.  I ask for your help in this -- volunteer judges can sign up on the page I just created in Meta to start concentrating information about this[5].  I will also be reaching out to some non-Wikipedians to serve as judges -- academics, linguists, etc.

I am also on the lookout for a volunteer trainer from South Africa, ideally a speaker of at least one of the three target languages.  The trainer needs to be available for a whole week of fairly intensive training sessions in 2-3 universities in South Africa and 2-3 others in Botswana, on the week beginning July 25th.  The Foundation will fund travel; Google will fund accommodation.  The Foundation will also help prepare the training materials.  Please let me know if you're interested and available.

If none of the people receiving this e-mail are interested, perhaps some of you can help us find someone who would be?
 
Once again, I welcome any suggestion for improvement, to make this as successful and beneficial to our movement and mission as possible.

If one of you is planning to respond to or engage with me on this, but hasn't found the time yet, I'd appreciate a quick note, just so I know we shall have _some_ cooperation from WMZA.

Thanks!

--
    Asaf Bartov
    Wikimedia Foundation


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