[Foundation-l] A question for the Wikimania jury

[Delirium]

Robert Rohde wrote:
> Jason, you seem to be under a misconception.  Wikimanias are primarily
> organized by teams of local volunteers and primarily funded by a combination
> of attendee fees and corporate donors, so they take in about as much money
> as they spend.  Yes, the Foundation does have a role in planning,
> organization, and financing, but in many ways not the dominant role.
>   

An important role, though, is blessing it as the official worldwide 
Wikimedia conference. This is what attracts most of the corporate 
donors, and without that status, it's very difficult to get any funding, 
so therefore hard to put on a significant conference without 
prohibitively high attendee fees.

The Atlanta bid team attempted to turn their Wikimania bid into a 
Wikimedia Conference of the Americas, but as far as I can tell they 
weren't able to keep the sponsors on board once it was no longer the 
international event, and it basically fell through.

-Mark