Itzik, I am sorry that I did not reply to this earlier. I am just kind of baffled that we are having this discussion now, months after all these questions where asked (see Future of the Wikimedia Conference) and all the information about the scope and the slight loosening of the attendee ratio have been put up on Meta. Following that, there have been discussions about which groups to invite (recognised, non-recognised), but not a single one about the number of attendees - although it has always been asked for input.
Our main drive behind opening up was that we felt the 2(+1) rule is kind of outdated, and it makes sense to have people sent those representatives who they really believe need to be there. Either as a contributing or a profiting attendee, but of course focussing on the topics that are covered in the conference themes. This is also why my colleagues from the event team only opened the registration _after_ the rough outline of the programme has been published by the programme team.
As for the broader topic about the purpose, scope and future of the WMCON, I think it does make sense to discuss this on-list (or better wiki) before the event. An exchange of arguments and possible solutions is welcome, those can be used to prepare for the session at WMCON. I am definitely glad that we now have this discussion and I like to hear more of people's thoughts.
As for the broader, broader topic that for example Risker mentions above, I hope that the Chapters Dialogue will be able to provide insights and food for thought. The presentation at the WMCON and the extensive documentation that will be provided on-wiki afterwards, can help foster these discussions on those movement related issues.
Again, I am glad that the pre-conference has now been initiated and that we can use the following days to get in the right mood for the conference weekend.
Thanks and best regards, Nicole
On 2 April 2014 22:18, Itzik Edri itzik@infra.co.il wrote:
What the purpose of this discussion? The program committee already scheduled a session about the future of the WMCON. And as we are a week before, and I believe it's too late to cancel flights and hotels booking, nothing will probably going to be changed, even if there will be consensus about the purpose of the conference.
And while it seem like the discussion is about WMUK's attendees only - I must say I don't think this is the case. They are maybe the biggest delegations (we may starts to change the term this year from "representatives" to "delegation", which fit the case better), but not the only ones. There are other chapters who sends more than the others.
The silence and the ignorance of the organizer team regarding their decision on that is something which worries me more, I think.
On Wed, Apr 2, 2014 at 7:59 PM, Chris Keating chriskeatingwiki@gmail.comwrote:
Great! We are starting to have the conversation we need to have!
So: What is the purpose of the Wikimedia Conference?
This has never been clearly defined, in my view.
I certainly found attending last year useful as it was a chance to get to know face-to-face people I only knew over email, to share some useful experience of Wikimedia UK's with other chapters, and to get an insight into how others were thinking, and have some meetings which needed to be done face-to-face.
In general those are very useful things. But is that what the conference is for?
Chris On 2 Apr 2014 17:17, "Cristian Consonni" kikkocristian@gmail.com wrote:
(my 2cents here, not speaking in any capacity besides my personal free will)
2014-04-02 14:32 GMT+02:00 Jens Best jens.best@wikimedia.de:
Have a nice time in Berlin, maybe I will drop by on some of the evening events at least. :)
May I say? Please come by also at the conference. I understand the point of having a rule (which we can decide if it is a strict rule or whatever) of 2+1 representatives because it helps to limit costs and it also assures that there isn't over-representation of an entities over some others (which are both good arguments, btw) but thinking of having a closed event were you can not come along if you are interested to do so and you happen to live nearby seems Deeply Wrong(TM) to me. For comparison all General Assemblies of Wikimedia Italia are public, everyone can come along and speak, of course when it comes to voting (e.g. board elections) only members have the right to vote. We always have some bystanders (this includes the occasional "I am painter, why I don't have my Wikipedia page?") and, to date, our assemblies have never being flooded by strangers :-). Moreover, for the sake of "bias" and over-representation I think that this will not be of much more impact than the fact of chosing to hold the event itself in Berlin.
Cristian
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