Hello Wikimedians,

My name is Deniz and I am working for the Wikimedia Foundation during the 2010 Fundraiser as the liaison between the Russian community and the Foundation. This year's fundraiser is intended to be a collaborative and global effort, we recognize that banner messages that perform well in the United States don't necessarily translate well, or appeal to Russian audiences. And No one knows better what will appeal to Russian readers and editors than you!

We're currently asking volunteer chapters and a number of language communities to help us maximize the potential of the fundraiser by getting deeply involved in the messaging, planning, and execution of this year's fundraiser. We want everyone in the community to get involved to make sure we have a fundraiser that represents all of us. Our first steps are to suggest and translate banners, and start a discussion in your community. What can we do to improve Fundraising and localize messages? On the Fundraising meta page we've started the banner suggestion process, analysis of tested banners, and recruiting volunteers. There are already quite a few great Russian banner submissions up on Meta.

I'm here both to answer questions as they come up and to listen to your feedback about what types of messaging will work and won't work. We'll constantly be tweaking or changing things, based on your input, to try to make everything as perfect as possible for the readers and donors in your language and region.

Use the talk pages on meta, talk to your local communities, talk to others, talk to us, and add your feedback to the proposed messages as well. I look forward to working with you during this year's fundraiser, please feel free to contact me with any suggestions or questions about the fundraiser this year.

Fundraising 2010 meta: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2010 Banner submissions: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2010/Messages Fundraising Committee: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2010/Committee Banners we've tested so far: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2010/Banner_testing

My Best,

Deniz