[Wikimediaau-l] Wikimania 2010 bid idea: joint-bid with iSummit?

Sat Aug 23 07:10:41 UTC 2008

Hi Liam and List,

This is a fantastic post which I unfortunately don't have time to reply to all right now, but I would like to make one point: we should take pains to hold workshops and do stuff outside of just Sydney and Melbourne.  Capacity-building workshops should also be held in Adelaide, Perth and Brisbane at a minimum, if we want this to be a national organisation and not just Wikimedia Sydney+Melbourne.  

I really think we'd have the interest to make such a thing viable, especially since Adelaide and Brisbane both got decent turnout for the incorporation meetings, while only one Sydneysider made the effort to turn out (from memory, please correct me if I'm wrong here).  The interest is obviously there, and we should do our best to harness it rather than concentrating only on a couple of geographic areas.

Cheers,
Craig

-------------------
Craig Franklin
PO Box 1093
Toombul, Q, 4012
Australia
http://www.halo-17.net - Australia's Favourite Source of Indie Music, Art, and Culture.

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Liam Wyatt 
  To: Wikimedia-au 
  Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2008 10:01 PM
  Subject: [personal] Re: [Wikimediaau-l] Wikimania 2010 bid idea: joint-bid with iSummit?

  I agree that it is indeed strange that taipei and buenos aires are considered more accessible destinations than australia. The "over-representation" is the same thing that happens in elite sport (e.g. Olympics) where we always punch above our weight. I think we should think of this as a positive and see the quotes that I pulled as positive rather than negative. We are a special case and that is a good thing! People take notice of us and this bodes well for how much WM-AU can achieve. Remember that the only two times the Olympics have come to the Southern Hemisphere have been to Australia!

  So, moving to practical matters:

  part 1 - 

  Well, if we do indeed decide to do a national event of some sorts I think there are two directions we could take it: Internal or External. 

  1) Internal - a.k.a "Capacity Building"
  This would be focused on the existing wiki community with other related groups (e.g. Linux Australia or OLPC Australia). The idea would be to improve the technical expertise of Australian Wikimedians both on-wiki (with workshops on media-wiki, illustration, copyright etc.) and off-wiki (with workshops on fundraising, the australian non-profit space etc.) and some things that cross over both (such as dealing with the Australian OTRS queue). The added value of being able to meet and share experiences in the real world can also not be underestimated. 

  2) External - a.k.a. "Outreach"
  This would be a different focus - one which looked at expanding our 'presence' in the australian scene. It would be about explaining to people who are not wikimedians about who we are and what we are here for. This would be to educate several key groups: the media, academics, single interest groups, cultural institutions. The media often mis-represents us but is also very interested in working with us because of how we make their research job so much easier. Academics also have a love/hate relationship with wikimedia [this is my particular area of interest]. Single interest groups - i'm thinking of people such as the world-class amateur astronomy Australia produces - need to be introduced to how sharing their passion through our projects can be achieved. Finally, cultural institutions such as museums, libraries and galleries are aware of our common aim of public education but don't know how to tie-in to what we do. 

  Both of these types of events would be difficult to achieve but also very valuable to the chapter (and the projects as a whole). But I think we would need to be clear about the purpose of the event as these two purposes cross over somewhat at Wikimania - we should start with one at a time. 

  End of part 1 - please comment on this dichotomy. 

  Part 2 -

  As for how we might do this, it is currently my opinion (although I'm willing to have this opinion changed :-) that we should start with the former - working on as small a budget as possible - and then proceed to the latter which should be done with sponsorship and try to look snazzy. This greatly resembles Brianna's "three tier" approach of going local>national>global but this is more internal(national)>external(national)>global.  

  I propose that we try to hold two sessions of the first type (capacity building) - one in Melbourne and one in Sydney. Perhaps one of these could even be at the same time as the AGM. My hope would be that people offer to share their spare sofas/foldout beds and return the favour in the other direction. This would greatly cut down on the cost of accommodation (I'm still working on how to cut down on the cost of travel...). Along the lines of a bar-camp everyone would be encouraged to participate not just sit and watch. We don't have to all present or lead a session but we should all be engaged in growing our own skills and knowledge and sharing the knowledge that we do have to others. This would be a highly practical event that I imagine would go for 2 days 3 nights. 

  The second of the events would be held in an attempt to show ourselves to Australia. This would require an impressive venue and go for a day. We would invite people from the aforementioned areas of interest and run it like a mini conference. There would hopefully be sessions specifically tailored to each group (media, academic etc.). If we hadn't already launched an official presence by then (e.g. a Blog and website) then this would be the time. This would require sponsorship and proper planning. 
  Perhaps these different groups require such a different approach that they should be dealt with at different times, different events etc. 

  I wrote to Cary Bass (volunteer coordinator on the foundation staff in San Fran.) today on Skype and asked him about that discussion on the IRC chat that was posted here regarding board/staff visiting us in Australia. He said that yes indeed they would come - but we would have to provide airfares. So, the more we raise and allocate to that, the more people who would come from overseas.   So, apart from actually developing our skills, experience and public awareness this would be the other factor in getting wikimania - having the foundation come to visit!

  end of part 2. please comment on this practical application proposal. 

  All in all, I think I've written too much today! Sorry for being so verbose. 

  Best, 
  -Liam Wyatt

  wikipediaweekly.com
  Skype - Wittylama
  Wikipedia - [[User:Witty lama]]
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimediaau-l/attachments/20080823/b596a8ca/attachment-0001.htm 