[Wikimedia-l] About the concentration of resources in SF (it was: "Communication plans for community engagement"

[Federico Leva (Nemo)]

Sorry for double post; Erik's post below is useful to illustrate my 
point which I failed to communicate 
(<http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2013-September/128053.html>).

Erik Moeller, 28/07/2013 09:31:
> On Sat, Jul 27, 2013 at 8:41 PM, Craig Franklin
> <cfranklin at halonetwork.net> wrote:
>> For the benefit of chapters that are interested in this space, can you
>> offer any examples of projects that are of an appropriate size and type for
>> a chapter to take on?
>
> It's a great question, Craig. One idea that I think is worth kicking
> around is how we can partner together in increasing diversity in our
> developer, design & product community while working on important
> problems. [...]
>
> So, how could this work for a Wikimedia chapter? Perhaps as a new
> diversity outreach program run by the chapter, inspired by OPW? Or
> perhaps integrated with OPW, if GNOME Foundation is open to it? Or a
> completely different approach, e.g. learning from Etsy's efforts to
> increase diversity by partnering with Hacker School? [1] I don't know
> - but I think it's worth experimenting with.

I don't know if this is *the* way forward, but I think this proposal is 
an example of something that makes sense. Why? It defines a scope which 
works towards the goals and plans of all involved entities together 
(overlap) but is also under the control of each of them separately 
(accountability etc.).
So, if e.g. WMF decides not to enable the new extension produced by an 
intern, at least the chapter can say it has successfully increased 
diversity in the developer community. Don't put all your eggs in one 
basket; especially if you're not holding it.

Nemo

>
> I do think it's something a small org could pull off, because a lot of
> it is about communication/coordination more than about managing a
> complex cross-disciplinary engineering effort. And it's perhaps a good
> way for a chapter, too, to get familiar with some of the intricacies
> and complexity of doing engineering work in our context without
> committing yet to building out a full-on tech department.
>
> The important part is that we connect people new to our ecosystem with
> capable mentors/reviewers -- whether those are experienced volunteers,
> employed by WMF, or employed by a chapter that's already doing
> engineering work like WMDE. Without that mentorship support, it
> doesn't work.
>
> Erik
>
> [1] http://firstround.com/article/How-Etsy-Grew-their-Number-of-Female-Engineers-by-500-in-One-Year
>