[Wikimedia Chapters Reports] Wikimedia France monthly report -- March 2010

[Bastien Guerry]

                    WMFR monthly report - march 2010
                    ================================

The WMFR monthly status update is back -- this is the activity report
for the last month, March 2010.

- *WMFR is growing*: the last fundraising campaign attracted 60 new
  members and WMFR now enjoys 200 active members.  Welcome to them!

- *WMFR hired its first employee*: Bastien Guerry will assist WMFR in
  various projects, his main commitment for 2010 being a conference
  turned toward the academic/GLAM world.

- *WMFR elected the new board* during its annual general assembly: a
  warm welcome to the new board members Nicolas Vigneron (secretary),
  Pierre Beaudouin (treasurer), Thierry Coudray (assistant treasurer)
  and a sincere thank you to Delphine and Alexandre for their past
  involvement as board members.


General Assembly 2010 (march, 13th-14th 2010) 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The board has been renewed 
===========================

Here is the new board:

- Adrienne Alix, president
- Pierre Beaudouin, treasurer (newly elected)
- Nicolas Vigneron, secretary (newly elected)
- Julien Fayolle, vice-president
- Thierry Coudray, assistant treasurer (newly elected)
- Rémi Bachelet (reelected)
- Florence Devouard
- Christophe Henner (reelected)
- Rémi Mathis (reelected)

We held three votes: 1) The members approved the moral and financial
annual reports.  2) Members agreed on supporting Montreal's application
for hosting Wikimania 2011. 3) Members voted on letting WMFR try to get
the "recognition of public utility" label.

Brainstorming thematic sessions (march, 13th) 
==============================================

We then held three collective brainstorming sessions:

  Ludovic Péron (from both WMFR and WMCH) facilitated a workshop on "how
  to get accreditations as a photograph for Wikimédia France?".  The
  members raised the question as to whether chapters should try to
  coordinate and share more information about this, but apparently most
  problems are specific to each event, the trick being to bring a BIG
  camera.

  Bastien Guerry presented a general review (WOW report) of his first
  month experience with WMFR and what he found surprising.  Long story
  short: there are tons of energy and potential, let's make it real by
  improving inside and outside communication, and by publicly assuming
  values and partnerships.

  Jean-Fred presented the regional activity of the western "cabale" (aka
  la Non-Cabale de l'Ouest).  This is a very active group of wikipedians
  holding regular meetings in Rennes, adding many pictures of Brittany
  (and more) to Wikimedia Commons, maintaining local contacts within the
  citiy and with public authorities, etc.

Thematic workshops (march, 14th) 
=================================
  
Sunday 14th was dedicated to three workshops: 1) ongoing partnerships
with GLAMs, 2) internal communication processes, 3) academic/GLAM
conference (colloque).

  The city of Toulouse (south west of France contacted WMFR to build a
  partnership about their prehistorical collections so that wikimedians
  might be allowed to take pictures of it and work with labs on proper
  scientific metadata.  This partnership might span over other picture
  collections from the city of Toulouse in the next months.

  Internal communication of WMFR can be improved: the monthly newsletter
  is back; some members are working on a "welcome kit" to help newcomers
  better understand where they can help and propose new projects.  The
  purpose of the various mailing lists will be clarified so that people
  can join small - but effective - active working groups.

  The colloque is planned to take place at the end of 2010.  There is an
  overall agreement on the fact that WMFR should focus on GLAMs for this
  colloque.  The next steps are these: find a location, stabilize a
  date/time, make a "save your date" announcement, build the program,
  call for contributions.

WMFR's participation to local events and conferences 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

- March, 12th: Julien Fayolle participated to a debate about Web 2.0.

- March, 21st: Adrienne Alix presented WMFR and fr.wp to PhD students
  from the Wikipeplum project (a project of scientific communication),
  also presenting them with the /Plume !/ project (some PhD students
  validating credits by contributing to fr.wp.)

- March, 22nd: Emilie, Carl and Bastien represented WMFR to the Forum of
  Cognitive Sciences.  They engaged in fruitful discussions with
  students and researchers about fr.wp and Wikiversity.

- March, 29th: Adrienne Alix presented fr.wp participated to a panel
  about « Internet for everyone, by everyone? » organized by the local
  LUG in Toulouse.

- Three members (Jastrow, Jeffdelonge and Mikani) covered the local
  elections and took pictures of various events.

(Of course, this list is not exhaustive.)

News from some Wikimedia projects 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On march 16th, the french wikiversity reached 1000 courses: see [this
blog entry] (fr) for WMFR's announcement.

In February, WMF deleted some french texts from the french Wikisource,
after the (french) publisher Éditions Gallimard sent them a take-down
notice.  WMFR [blogged about this] to clarify the issue.

[this blog entry]: http://blog.wikimedia.fr/la-wikiversite-francophone-atteint-les-1-000-lecons-1431
[blogged about this]: http://blog.wikimedia.fr/gallimard-retrait-wikisource-domaine-public-1447