Wikimedia South Africa/Board Meeting/30 April 2019

Wikimedia ZA Board meeting - 30 April 2019

Attendance

• Ian
• Michael
• Rossouw
• Adri
• Douglas
• Bobby

Apologies

• Coenraad

Agenda

Grant update

• Douglas has updated application, has asked for feedback from Winifred, hasn't heard back yet.
• Douglas reluctant to make last-minute changes to avoid resetting the process.
• Tonight is the deadline.
• No one else from the board has followed Douglas closely, so no-one else closely familiar with the process.

Brief on Copyright Amendment Bill update

• Battle heating up
• Tide seems to be turning, social media now seems to be leaning in favour of the Bill
• Thanks Douglas for writing the two articles
• Re-create has added a commonly-asked questions section to deal with most common issues: https://www.re-createza.org/commonly-asked-questions

WMZA tax situation

• No update, no response to Douglas' request from accountant
• Douglas to update public benefit status application (previously filed in 2014, rejected because Douglas was mistakenly classified as dead), accountants to file on our behalf
• First step towards Section 18A, so people that donate to use can offset against tax

Wiki Loves Africa update

• Everything has been submitted to the main jury
• Winners will be announced in June
• Adri to create 2 social media posts with our entries, encourage people to update their descriptions
• 6 out of the 10 winners are uncontactable
• Agree with discussion on the African Wikimedians mailing list about the usability of the images, many of the images are not usable
• Suggestions
  • Better communicate entry requirements
  • Get future entrants to categorise etc. their images properly so they can be identified, and used.
• Adri to write a report

Wiki Loves Earth

• No involvement from WMZA this year

Rising Voices request

• Links
  • https://rising.globalvoices.org/blog/2019/03/18/celebrating-african-linguistic-diversity-online-through-a-rotating-twitter-account/
  • https://rising.globalvoices.org/campaigns/twitter-digiafricanlang-2019/
  • https://rising.globalvoices.org/blog/2019/04/09/meet-ursula-zage-the-host-of-the-digiafricanlang-twitter-account-for-april-10-16/
• Global Voices are running a campaign as part of the International Year of Indigenous Languages
• Not aimed directly at WMZA, but contacts in circle
• Can add content such as Ian's blogs, Michael's dissertation
• If we were planning a translate-a-thon, can contribute (it's on for the whole year)
• Michael will share on WMZA mailing list

Wiki Meetup

• Douglas to organise next meetup, Adri to assist
• Suggestion for change of venue
• Look at getting a roller banner for use at our meetups

Douglas Affiliate nomination

• WMZA in support of Douglas's application
• If Douglas is expected to step down from the board (as well as president), we need to do a better job of continuing to use his knowledge
• When Dumi stepped down, he became an advisor to the board, but we haven't used his skills particularly well
• Agree that it's not ideal for the board to be seen to be overly dependent on one member, this will be beneficial in that regard
• Douglas expresses confidence that the board will continue to function well
• Issue about a conflict of interest between a candidate being on the Affiliates selection committee and applying herself as well.
• People were unhappy with this situation, suggestion to remove this conflict of interest (and require chapter board members to step down)
• Outcome of this will be announced in Wikimania Stockholm in August
• Bobby has added WMZA endorsement, final edits can be given to him after this meeting

Next board meeting

• Adri to schedule next meeting. Aim for Tuesdays, which most of us can meet.

Mascot

• Douglas has adopted a new mascot, proposes that it be the WMZA mascot to be taken to meetings
• Needs a name
• Douglas will share the image and ask for suggestions for names