Grants talk:PEG/TingChen/WikiDACH Conference

A decision has been made on this grant. Comments are still welcome on this page.

GAC members who support this request

1. rubin16 (talk) 07:50, 31 May 2015 (UTC)
2. Alleycat80 (talk) 07:01, 10 June 2015 (UTC)
3. --DerekvG (talk) 22:42, 10 June 2015 (UTC) for this organisation budget not for covering losses or if conference doesn't get organised
4. Support. --Hasive • talk • 05:51, 18 June 2015 (UTC)
5. Good request, interesting conference, precisely defined goals and measures of success.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 07:07, 18 June 2015 (UTC)
6. I would have enjoyed more support from WM DE MADe (talk) 20:30, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

GAC members who support this request with adjustments

1. --Rebecca Cotton (talk) 02:28, 12 July 2015 (UTC) - I would like to see a lot more support from the DEWP community here, before moving forward with this request, since they are crucial to making this conference a success.

GAC members who abstain from voting/comment

1. I would abstain because Wikimedia CH may support it with some scolarships. --Ilario (talk) 16:25, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

Question from organizer

Hi, can you tell me if the decision is made now, or at which time the decision can be made?--Wing (talk) 17:51, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

GAC comments

place of the conference

I understand that presence in various areas is important but, bearing in mind travel costs, wouldn't it be better to organize event in Berlin? Do you have particular local partners that would take up additional travel costs? Local partners that will provide attendees? rubin16 (talk) 12:16, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

Hello, thank you very much for the question. There are a few reasons why we decided for Schwerin as the conference place. And I am glad that you asked and am happy to explain these reasons:

1. We have very strong support in Schwerin, we don't need to pay for the venue, which is a very important cost factor. We get support from local partners that will cover cost for catering, and part of accomodation, which are also very important cost factors in Germany. Berlin (or any major center inside of Germany) is in every respect more expensive.
2. In respect to travel cost Berlin is not necessarily cheaper for most attendees. Berlin is not central in the german speaking region. Travel from most of german speaking regions to Berlin is comparable to travel to Schwerin.
3. While places like Berlin, Cologn, Frankfurt, Zurich or Viena are for more famous in the world, they are more better covered in the Wikimedia projects. The less reknowned places, like Schwerin, are less good covered. So the win to have conferences there is larger in comparison to the centers.
4. We have generally the experience that while in the big centers it is very difficult to get contact and win partners, because there are always some "big" things happening there with which we have to compete. On the other hand, in the more remote places Wikipedia is a name that can really win partners. We see this in Schwerin and there are other partner cities in the queue who would be happy to host an international conference with Wiki in the name.
5. One of the purposes of the conference is to get reach in the more remote regions. While we plan the conference for this year in Schwerin, next year it would probably be in a region in Austria or in the Switzerland. This is a main concept of the conference.--Wing (talk) 16:12, 13 May 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for the answers here and below! rubin16 (talk) 17:34, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

partnerships

I see that local authorities are already in contact with you, will they help with promotion of the event? Are there any other partners? rubin16 (talk) 12:16, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

Yes, the state parliament is one of the most important partner who will provide venue. We are also in contact with other partners, both local as well as Germany wide. Since the negociation is still on going, I will not put names here. But we will publish all our partners as soon as the contract is agreed and signed.--Wing (talk) 16:17, 13 May 2015 (UTC)

measures of success

If you particularly interested in that venue of conference, I would also segregate attendees related to local community: percentage of local editors from all new editors, percentage of local attendees from all attendees, etc. You also set links with local educational institutions and local business as goals but what will be the measures of success? For example, setting Wikimedian in Residense with some of the business, starting education programme, getting free media, etc. It won't be a short-term outcome but if you are intended in building relations, that could be a nice final goal rubin16 (talk) 12:16, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

Hello, we discussed this suggestion in our organizational team. This is why we get back to your suggestion a bit later. We think that it is a very good suggestion and we are eager to include it into our concept and measures of success. In our concept we are going to do the following to include the general public in the city and the region:

1. We have support from the state department of press releasement (Landespresseamt), which will help us to distribute information of the conference to the local press
2. We will only raise a very low attendant fee so that everyone who is interested in Wikimedia project can attend. This is a concept that was well proved by the first Skillshare conference in Lüneburg and the conference in Dornbirn, Austria.

We are currently working on the concrete metric for the measures of success. This will take some time because such metrics are not always easy to formulate and we don't want to do it in a hurry, but want to do it good. We will come back to this a bit later and include it both in our concept as well as in our metrics.

One additional information that is not directly related to the suggestion but it happened that the suggestion made us to think about this: We have looked into active Wikipedians in the city and found (as far as the users disclosed it themselves) that for a city with about 100k citizens there are only two active Wikipedians we can find. Even take into account that there are more Wikipedians that didn't disclose their location this is a very low number. We think this is a confirmation that our concept is absolutely necessary. That we do see a gap in the regions, even in german speaking areas. We are approaching the local Wikipedians to ask them to be actively involved in our program.--Wing (talk) 07:10, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

At least participants 200 but new articles only 25? --Hasive • talk • 05:53, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Budget items

Could you explain what you need "meat" (Items 3 and 6 of the budget "meat" = german "fleish") for , are your preparation discussions that violent that you actually need meat to put on the black eyes attendees are left with after the meeting? (pun) but seriously I assume it's a translation mistake what do you mean to say with it, you may answer in german I understand that language and I will help you transalting it correctly --DerekvG (talk) 10:42, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, should be "Food", corrected. It is for the preparation meeting of the organizational team.--Wing (talk) 06:45, 20 May 2015 (UTC)

thanks --DerekvG (talk) 16:34, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

costs for the whole conference and what was learned from last years planning

Hi there,

Nice to see you are working on this again! :-)

As far as I can see this grant would only cover the costs for the prepatory meetings before the conference, correct?

Since the metrics you give are for the whole conference, could you list the complete estimate for the conference and what organisation will carry what costs? (If you have them, also links to the grant pages, where the grant is being discussed?) Do you have a central planning site you could link here?

I know this conference was discussed quite controversially amongst the German community last year, for various reasons. How is that developing this year, and do you have a list of supporters of the German speaking community that have shown interest and/or support for this conference?

Since the conference did not take place last year despite quite a lot of planning: What are the main things you changed or will change this year to ensure that the conference takes place? All the best! --Rebecca Cotton (talk) 13:27, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Hello, sorry for the late answer. I was in vacation and am just catching up will all the e-mails.

Yes, the grant should ONLY cover the costs for the organizing team.

The actual total cost calculation of the conference is listed here: http://wikidach.org/Konzept#Finanzplan We don't have an english translation currently for this, but basically it lists everything that we have calculated on (including the costs of the organization team).

In this month (as soon as I have digged throw the mails and communications) we will publish a call for helpers and recruit supporters. We are currently also contacting local Wikimedia project participants for support.

To the last question. We have now a new team. Inside of the organization team Ralf and Robert are from last year's team. Sebastian, Manuel and I are new. Every one of us are dedicated to make this conference happen. Since the begin of the year Ralf traveled four times to Schwerin and our partner confirmed again their support for the conference and their sponsorship for the conference. We have reworked our concept, sharpened the profile, emphasized the philosophy of going to the remote part of the region. We have reworked our financial planning. Cut away things that are not necessary and by talking with local partners, made a lot of the costs more concrete. We also changed our funding concept. Instead of ask funding from the Foundation and from the chapters the biggest part of our funding concept is based on sponsores from outside of the movement. The only funds that we are requesting from the Foundation and chapters are this fund (organizational costs) and the travel support for participants of the chapters (excluding the organization team, which is covered by this fund).--Wing (talk) 10:25, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

As per Rebecca's comment above what assurances can you give us that the conference will actually take place,--DerekvG (talk) 10:42, 19 May 2015 (UTC) As a matter of fact (and please Alex comment on this) i might consider it useful to conditionally grant this sum, Iḿ not in favour of result bound granting this is not based the measure of succes but about actually running this show, so in the knowledge that the organsaition has failed to deliver already more then once for this DACH conference : if the Wikidach conference does not take place/is postponed/is cancelled then we don't fund this preparation cost, would that be an acceptable policy given the grant system ( I don't want to introduce a principle that doesn't exist in the grant system, iḿ not in favour of changing the rules of the game in mid-match)--DerekvG (talk) 11:00, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

In your budget and before any mention of th expences you make following statement : " For the conference we are only searching for a grant to cover the organizational costs. The conference cost will be covered by sponsors, either in kind or as restricted grants. " Om the Dach-Finanzplan here you currently have an uncovered budget of nearly 140.000 € of the total 224.000 € budget. Apart form the above assertion / statement of intention i read NO risk mention in your budget and I see no garantee-measure that cover the risk of when GAC actually covers the pre-event ongaistaional travel cost GAC is not left holding the stick for the uncovered organsaitional expences. --DerekvG (talk) 11:00, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Hi, fair point. You are right. The purpose for the organizational grant is to run the conference. It is not the conference itself. Personally I don't find it satisfactory just to state this. For one this is obvious and for the second I don't see the sense to organize (or to fund the organization) a conference without to know why to organize a conference and what is should be the result. This is the reason why I put the conference gaol into the request.

As in the answer from me to Rebecca Cotton you can find our current finantial planning here. The page you pointed out is obsolete and not updated any more (the reason is that we don't have the admin access to that server which makes a lot of updates very difficult). We have currently about still one third of our costs uncovered. But we are just into the detailed discussion phase with local partners and we are very confident to have them covered.

As of your suggestion that the fund should be paid back if the conference doesn't take place. I think it is fair. I will talk this with my co-organizers. But be assured that we are all dedicated to have this conference happening. So for me this is just a theoretical condition.--Wing (talk) 14:45, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

costs for the whole conference and what was learned from last years planning

Hi there,

Nice to see you are working on this again! :-)

As far as I can see this grant would only cover the costs for the prepatory meetings before the conference, correct?

Since the metrics you give are for the whole conference, could you list the complete estimate for the conference and what organisation will carry what costs? (If you have them, also links to the grant pages, where the grant is being discussed?) Do you have a central planning site you could link here?

I know this conference was discussed quite controversially amongst the German community last year, for various reasons. How is that developing this year, and do you have a list of supporters of the German speaking community that have shown interest and/or support for this conference?

Since the conference did not take place last year despite quite a lot of planning: What are the main things you changed or will change this year to ensure that the conference takes place? All the best! --Rebecca Cotton (talk) 13:27, 17 May 2015 (UTC) As per Rebecca's comment above what assurances can you give us that the conference will actually take place,--DerekvG (talk) 10:42, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Better targets + local sponsorships

Hi, thanks for submitting. I think the targets are airy at best. Why not aim for specific collaborations? Why not develop a new project while in the conference? What are specific reasons the German-speaking wikipedians need to meet? Is there a plan to include other German open content organizations in the conference or is this just only editors?

I'm echoing other people here in wondering if the budget wouldn't've been much smaller if the conference would be in Berlin. Why not opt for that?

Also, since there is so much time ahead (and I have only warm words to say on this!) - I would urge you to consider raising external sponsorships - especially from other German open data initiatives. I think you would get partners like that, and this may lead to diversifying - not only your budget, but also your capabilities of achieving partners thru other collaborators interested in more German open content.

Alleycat80 (talk) 17:40, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Hello, the main idea behind the concept is out-reach. It is not just a Wikimedians-meet-up. That we do have as Ziko pointed out below. The concept here is go into the remote regions and activate locals by partnering with them, by engaging them, by envolving them. This is the concept.

As of the question Berlin would be cheaper: If you can point out a venue like the one in the castle of Schwerin in Berlin that is willing to provide all those in-kind-sponsorship we get from Schwerin, we are happy to contact them.

And yes, we are raising external sponsorship. That is one of the very basic concept behind this conference.--Wing (talk) 15:18, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

So, can you provide numbers for estimation of how much budget would be allocated (= raised) from external partners? or will all monetary costs be borne by the WMF? Alleycat80 (talk) 01:14, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Hello, as stated below in my answer to Poupou:

you can find the current finantial planning here.

In total we have requested four funds inside of the movement, and only these four: This one for the organization team costs. One to each german speaking chapter for travel cost of their members (excluding the organization team) who want to attend this conference. These are all grants we are asking inside of the movement.

Grants outside of movement are mostly inkind grants that cover renue, technic, in city travel and maybe a possibility of cheap stay. Some of them we are currently negociating.--Wing (talk) 15:01, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you, much clearer now. I still think that concrete sponsorships are a good idea, but it's only a suggestion. Good luck! Alleycat80 (talk) 07:01, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

Hello, what we can confirm currently is the parliament (who will donate location, technique) and the chamber for commerce and industry. We are currently talking with the city transportation company about a flatrate in-cite transportation fee for attendants, with three local hotels about a contingency accommodation price and with the catering company who provides cantina service in the parliament about providing catering for a cheap price. There are also talks with other local businesses about further fundings. We will publish the names of these donations as soon as the contracts are signed on the financial plan I linked above. Both the parliament and the chamber for commerce and industry also indicated cost free (but not as comfortable) accommodation possibilities. We are currently checking these possibilities of their viability.--Wing (talk) 08:50, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

Community comments

poupou's comments

I assume that you cannot set up an event of such size with 6.000 EUR alone - what are the total costs and who is going to cover the delta between the funding for which you apply here and the total amount? Will you - apart from this grant - rely on sponsorship only or are you also applying for funding from the German, Swiss or Austrian Wikimedia chapters? Regards,--Poupou l'quourouce (talk) 20:54, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

My question above has been answered meanwhile through the link to your Finanzplan. What makes me wonder, however, is: what happened to Olaf Kosinsky and why is he no longer part of your team? Clearly the whole WikiDACH idea was his, which he has been nurturing for several years now and I know that the concept was heavily relying on the personal contacts Olaf had made to members or the parliament and other Schwerin officials during the parliament photo event. So why did he drop out? How are you going to fill the gap? Regards,--Poupou l'quourouce (talk) 10:37, 20 May 2015 (UTC)

Hello, you can find the current finantial planning here. The skillshare.eu site is outdated and will not be updated further, because we don't have the admin access on that server.

In total we have requested four funds: This one for the organization team costs. One to each german speaking chapter for travel cost of their members (excluding the organization team) who want to attend this conference. These are all grants we are asking inside of the movement.

Grants outside of movement are mostly inkind grants that cover renue, technic, in city travel and maybe a possibility of cheap stay. Some of them we are currently negociating.

Olaf left the organization team mostly because of personal reasons.

Ralf had traveled this year four times to Schwerin to ensure that our partner is still dedicated to this conference.--Wing (talk) 15:01, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for your above comments. One more thing: I understand that this is explicitly not a community-meet-up, but meant to work as an outreach event. Yet it seems to me that you will still need quite a lot of community people there, because otherwise it will be difficult to make outreach happen. Taking this into account, I am wondering why no-one whatsoever has stated any interest in attending WikiDACH from the German Wikipedia community so far? Or ist this again the wrong page: Wikipedia:WikiDACH/2015/Interesse? Regards,--Poupou l'quourouce (talk) 20:21, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Hello Poupou, I just published Call for Help and Call for Papers on the Wikipedia project site. And yes, we expect and will need support from the community. We will reach out in the next weeks to motivate more people for the conference and also make the project more prominent to the community.--Wing (talk) 10:45, 2 July 2015 (UTC)

Hello Wing, still there is only one entry from a member of the German community on the interested participants page. Also there are no entries on the page where submissions for talks could be listed. I don't know where you have published the Call for Help and Call for Papers, maybe I just missed it. But it does not seem to me, that the German community took notice of your project so far (neither in a positive nor in a negative way - it just feels like nobody knows about it). Regards,--Poupou l'quourouce (talk) 15:36, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

Hello, as you can see on the page you have linked, meanwhile there are already more than 10 people who have listed themselves. And I would certainly happy to see if you can join us too.--Wing (talk) 19:09, 17 August 2015 (UTC)

southpark's comments

From the page: From the project community we have positive feedback for the conference concept - you do? I couldn't find any discussion anywhere about WikiDach 2015 except for grant proposal. -- southpark (talk) 12:32, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Could you please explain what organization• SkillShare exactly means? -- southpark (talk) 12:41, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

To the first question. Please give me a few days, I need to get back to Ralf to get the links.

To the second question I would like to elaborate here in more detail: By the end of last year when we decided to restart the idea of this conference we faced one question: Who will be the organizer of this conference. As you may know in German such a conference needs an organizer who will also carry juristical responsibilities (like insurance etc.). There are three possibilities that we discussed in detail: We can organize the conference as private persons, we can ask one of our partner to take the role, we can encorporate an organization and put it in this role. The second one was denied quickly. The first one has draw backs that we cannot compensate. So it remained the third option. Skillshare e.V. was doment since years. We said in our concept that we want to follow the philosophy of the first Skillshare, so it was logic to ask if we can take over Skillshare to organize this conference. The request was answered positively and without any issue. So that is why we joined Skillshare e.V., revived it, regrouped it, and put it as the organizer.--Wing (talk) 15:11, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Tony1 comments

• The start-date passed some time ago. Can you please update it so that the application is not in effect retrospective?
• "Goal"—I see no goal in that section.
• "Activities"—Given that conferences are usually a poor investment in terms of impact on the WMF's sites and communities, I'm unwilling to support an event that shows no signs of themes, specific activities and personnel.
• "Impact"—All very vague.
• "Fit with strategy"—I see no fit with strategy. Certainly a "venue where people can chat" seems far from a good investment of donors' funds when we have a looming crisis in dealing with legacy code. The German, Austrian, and Swiss chapters are relatively high-budget affairs, and in my view do not use their funding sufficiently well to coordinate impact on the German-language sites for which they share support. Nowhere is the problem or need for this event expressed cogently.
• "Measures of success"—Very weak, vague, and impossible to match with specific activities (they haven't yet been organised so we can assess this).

Sorry, but this is far from supportable in any way. Tony (talk) 14:38, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

I know my comments weren't positive, but they do point to ways in which the application could be improved. Nothing much has been done to the application overleaf, and there's no response to my post here. Tony (talk) 10:21, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

Hello, sorry for the late response. I was in vacation and did not take my computer with me. To be honest I find it difficult to answer your questions / improvement suggestions. If they could be more concrete (like which point of our impact is "very vague", or what is "not very vague" in your opinion) I could try to give a more detailed response. Thank you very much never the less for the feed back.--Wing (talk) 15:14, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Perhaps we're in a circular situation. I find there's not much to grip onto in the application, and thus find it hard to make specific suggestions or ask specific questions. All I can say is that those sections I've cited above appear to lack substance. Perhaps Alex can help if you contact her? Tony (talk) 16:42, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

I'll be pleased when those sections are properly done. Then we can discuss the application. Tony (talk) 07:13, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

Ziko comments

Hello, I just wonder why some people think that the location should be in Berlin, to make the event cheaper.... About the Skillshare tradition: I thought that the tradition of that event in Lüneburg 2010 was continued by the "WikiCon", which will take place again in autumn 2015, this year in Dresden? How does the WikiDach meeting relate to WikiCon, what are the specific differences? By the way, if there is already an autumn event for all German speaking Europe in Dresden (also in Eastern Germany), why not have such an event in spring?--Ziko (talk) 09:17, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

Hello Ziko,

without going into much details in the history. The date of first weekend of November for this conference was set up already by the end of last year. There is a price we have to pay for our concept of involving local partners, and that is it is difficult to be too flexible without loosing the partners. The date for this year's WikiCon was set up in March (if I remember correctly). By that time we are in contact with the organizers of WikiCon, we also invited them to attend our weekly meetings to coordinate the two conferences.

Nevertheless, I think there are a lot of differences between WikiCon as it had evolved today and Skillshare as it was in Lüneburg or Nürnberg or later in Dornbirn, and the type of conference we are currently organizing with WikiDACH:

1. We are not organizing a community-meet-up-conference. We are organizing an out-reach conference with community envolvement (for obvious reasons)
2. Our concept is based on a heavy involvement and sponsorship from the local partners, while the current WikiCon is mostly funded by the chapters

We agreed from the beginning with the WikiCon organizers that the two conferences are not competing with each other. We have two different concept and philosophy and there is room for both.--Wing (talk) 15:31, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for the explanations. What did not become clear to me - it is supposed to be a meeting with 200-350 participants. How much % do you expect to be "local Wikimedians", "non local Wikimedians", "locals without Wikimedia background"? --Ziko (talk) 21:34, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

WMF comments

Thanks to Wing and the rest of the organizing team for putting together this proposal and actively engaging in the discussion. We're interested in the general idea for the event -- to create a community and knowledge about and around Schwerin (and other localities in subsequent) years. However, we have a number of remaining questions that build on the discussions above.

1. The most important piece of information we're still missing is the amount of community support and interest -- both from the active Wikimedia community you are hoping to engage and the local communities you are hoping to do outreach for. We need to see evidence that there is a strong interest from both sides. The grant request states that there is "positive feedback for the conference concept from the project community". When asked about this above, the reply was that outreach to helpers/supporters would happen in June and was finally done in early July. What has the feedback been so far? This is key because after the conference is over, the real work of follow-up will begin. Who will be able to capitalize on new connections and move forward with new projects and partnerships? Before we could move forward with supporting this conference, we would need to see a lot more activity on the WikiDACH planning pages and German Wikipedia project page.
2. It sounds like you have established good relationships with the local chamber of commerce and the parliament of the State of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Since you've had these connections for over two years, it would be great to understand what activities or partnerships have been undertaken that would give us confidence a much larger project, such as this conference, will be a success. For example, have local volunteers been able to organize small workshops or any other events that have prepared the community for a larger partnership? How has the German community capitalized on these relationships?
3. Another main goal is to establish links between the community and local educational institutions via the state Ministry of Education. Do you have volunteers that are interested in and have the capacity for developing education programs? What are the specific interests of the ministry?
4. Please provide more details on the goal to establish links between the community and local businesses. What would these types of partnerships look like? What do you see as the opportunities for engagement with local businesses? Are there specific businesses you have identified that would be good potential partnership, aligned with the mission of the Wikimedia movement?
5. The budget was missing the section on additional sources of revenue, which I have now added back in. Please provide information on the overall cost of the conference and the confirmed sponsors.
6. In terms of the activities outlined in the request, we do need a lot more information about the themes, panel topics, presentations, etc. While they may not all be confirmed, there should be an active discussion ongoing of what is needed and what people are interested in. Please read our conference program resources for more details on what we expect to see in a conference grant proposal.

We are happy to set up a call to discuss the comments above and revisions to the proposal. Looking forward to your responses and seeing how we can make this conference a success, with high engagement and plans for concrete follow-up. Cheers, Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 19:17, 14 July 2015 (UTC)

Hello Alex, I sent the following mail on August 10th but didnot receive any response yet:

Hello Alex,

sorry for come back to you late. It is vacation time.

As you can see on our Wikipedia site we were nevertheless active and meanwhile we are also getting feedback for support:

• https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiDACH/2015/Call_for_Helps
• https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiDACH/2015/Teilnehmer

We tried to reach the local community but as I already said in the grant request the region is not that abandont of Wikipedians. And again for us this is more a reason for our concept to exactly go these places, and not the places where there are already alot of Wikipedians.

Next week the organization team is planning to go to Schwerin to meet the employees of the paliament so that we will decide the rooms and also the supports from the other departments. And exactly for such preparatory works we are searching for the grant. Which means, that the time is now more urgent for us now.

If you can arrange a call next week to clarify the last questions I am happy to take part in. Also Sebastian will join the call.

Best regards

Ting

Request for information

I'm wondering how this conference would be distinctive from this one. Could someone please make a case in this light? Tony (talk) 10:23, 20 July 2015 (UTC)

Hello Tony, there are many:

• The WikiCon goes to the centers like Cologne, Karlsruhe, Dresden, we go to the regions
• The WikiCon is mainly organized with the fund inside of the Wikimedia movement, we try to use as less as possible resources inside of the movement, instead we try to organize as much as possible resources outside of the movement
• The WikiCon is mainly a community gathering. We are organizing an outreach conference.

Just to name a few most important.--Wing (talk) 11:27, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Funding decision

Hi Ting, Robert, Sebastian and the rest of the organizing team. Thank you for your continued engagement in the discussion and for your time this week to talk through the goals of the project. We have a better understanding of the dual objectives of the conference: 1) to bring active Wikimedians to Schwerin to get them interested in writing about the area and developing projects; and 2) to conduct outreach and increase general awareness about Wikimedia projects in the Schwerin community.

In general, this could be a great idea if it were an area with a core of active Wikimedians and a group of identified people who are interested in learning more about Wikimedia. As we discussed, we do not fund general outreach events in areas without local, active Wikimedians who are able to follow-up with any connections made. It is hard enough to develop partners of the type you are discussing (education, GLAM, etc.) when there is a group of local active Wikimedians. It is much, much harder to do this in an area where you are starting from nothing. We realize this can be a chicken-and-egg type of situation. That is why we do support smaller activities to generate interest, such as wikiexpeditions for active Wikimedians to little known areas or series of editing training workshops for local residents who are interested in learning more about Wikimedia projects (but led by a local Wikimedian who can follow-up between sessions both online and offline). We would happily support these types of activities in Schwerin to build relationships and these core groups. We’re open to discussing more ideas like this with the team.

We understand a number of people on the organizing team have been working in Schwerin and developing contacts over the last two years. We would have expected smaller activities to have taken place and shown some traction with the local community before planning a large conference. The activities that have happened in Schwerin have all been led by the organizing team because of the challenge in securing any local participants (such as the photo project).

We understand that there have been challenges getting support from the broader German Wikimedia community for holding a conference there or organizing activities and that WMDE has also elected not to fund this event at the current stage and with the current level of community participation. We respect the local community’s expertise on this matter.

We realize you have already received a large amount of support from the local government and interest in future projects from a number of institutions, such as the Ministry of Education, Deutsche Journalisten-Verband, and the city/state archives. These are great opportunities. However, without specific follow-up plans and local volunteers, we are concerned the projects will not be implemented.

Unfortunately, there are too many outstanding concerns with the proposal to support it at this time. We would need to see much larger support from the existing editing community, evidence of local interest and their participation in smaller successful events, and more concrete goals, partnership plans, and program for a larger conference.

Again, we appreciate all the time the team has invested in developing this plan and the relationships in Schwerin. We do believe there are good opportunities to increase awareness about the area and cover content gaps, as well as engage new local editors. However, we would like to see a different approach to engaging both these communities -- developing projects in line with the communities’ scale and interest. We are happy to talk through possible ideas. Please let us know if you have questions about the above. Best, Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 18:52, 31 August 2015 (UTC)