[Foundation-l] Wikimedia Pennsylvania

[GerardM]

Hoi,
The Wikimedia Foundation is the organisation that enables our projects. A
chapter is an organisation, most often member based, that organises
activities for the communities of the projects in that country. A chapter is
the supporting organisation for the WMF in a country,

The Wikimedia Foundation is an organisation that has a global remit. A
chapter has a national remit. It is good to differentiate between the two.
It is for this reason that a US chapter makes eminent sense.

Thanks,
     GerardM

On 7/11/07, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
>
> Daniel Mayer wrote:
> > --- Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On Jul 10, 2007, at 8:35 AM, Dmcdevit wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>> Brion Vibber wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> What's the argument in favor of state-level blocks?
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>> Indeed, out of curiosity, what is the reason for a sub-country chapter
> >>> at all, in contrast to most others? This might be obvious, but it
> >>> doesn't seem anyone has said it yet.
> >>>
> >> One reason is that the United States is a really really really big
> >> country.  France is the largest country in the EU.  It's a little
> >> smaller than Texas, so if France were an American state (an amusing
> >> and unlikely thought) it would be the 3rd largest.
> >>
> >> Having a "local chapter" including both New York City, Chicago, and
> >> Los Angeles doesn't feel very "local".
> >>
> >
> > Any US-wide chapter would be divided into regions and have local clubs
> for metro areas. I really
> > don't see the point in duplicating overhead when a single legal
> structure could benefit an entire
> > nation.
> >
> Given that the Wikimedia Foundation is already US-incorporated, why do
> we even need a separate legal structure for a Wikimedia US, as opposed
> to having it be an unincorporated body?  The things that I see other
> countries' Wikimedia chapters doing that need a legal entity, such as
> collecting donations tax-deductibly, liasing with local corporations,
> running local servers, etc., are already handled in the US by the main
> WMF, so what would the new legal entity do?
>
> -Mark
>
>
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