Wikimedia User Group of Aotearoa New Zealand/ESEAP 2022

The ESEAP Conference 2022 was a regional conference of Wikimedia Foundation held in Sydney, Australia on 19–20 November 2022.

ESEAP Conference 2022

Representatives

The Wikimedia User Group of Aotearoa New Zealand was represented by:

• Einebillion, President and time supported to attend by her employer Te Papa
• Giantflightlessbirds, Vice-President
• Pakoire, committee member
• Kowhaiarewhana
• Stitchbird2 supported to attend by her employer Te Papa
• Chocmilk03, scholarship receipient
• Beeswaxcandle

ESEAP 2022 was the first time the majority of the group had attended a hub level conference. Only Giantflightlessbirds had attended similar events in the past.

Participation

The User group representatives contributed to the conference with

• Einebillion contributing to the Affiliate Leadership panel and presenting on the present state of the Aotearoa New Zealand User Group (speaker notes available here).
• Giantflightlessbirds ran a session on Wikimedia Commons (session handout here).
• Beeswaxcandle ran a session on Wikisource (participants transcribed the 1910 book Papuan Fairy Tales).

Other attendees contributed to the discussion sessions.

Things learned at the Conference and Discussion results

• Comparison with other affliates. The Aotearoa New Zealand User group is relatively new and in its third year of operation. Comparison with our close neighbour Australia to help benchmark our progress has not been useful as Wikimedia Australia is a chapter and has been in existance significantly longer than New Zealand. It was reassuring to hear from representatives of other affliliates of a similar age to our organisation as a sense check of where we are at and our strategic priorities. The differring strategic priorities and change in practices driven by local conditions was interesting to hear about and gave us much reassurance we are on the right track in how we are progressing as a user group.

• Confidence in applying for funding. Morning and afternoon tea chats were conducted with affiliate representatives around employing assistance for the user groups. The ease at which Wikimedia Australia obtained funding for staffing was a useful benchmark to know about. Our User group was negatively affected by the ESEAP funding decline of Auckland War Memorial Museum's application of what we considered to be an important project likely to increase our editor base in a city that is a strategic focus for our user group. While we had received a briefing from the Wikimedia Foundation ESEAP Senior Programme Officer as to the reasons for the decline (lack of funding to distribute) and this provided some reassurance, this outcome did create a chilling effect within the User group and had grown hesitancy in some when funding applications were proposed within the User Group. ESEAP 2022 attendees from this user group are now in a position to speak authoritatively about the Wikimedia Australia experience and this will combat some of the hesitancy to apply for funding and grow confidence within the wider user group to set up projects requiring additional funding support.

• Conference Reports All of these reports below noted that the conference was inspirational and gave them excellent ideas for possible next projects. A number of key organisers from the Aotearoa New Zealand community attended the conference and are now better connected to the ESEAP hub representatives and Wikimedia Foundationn staff as a result. There is a better understanding of how things work and a greater committment to supporting the ESEAP region and hub in addition to the Aotearoa New Zealand movement. There was a better understanding of the diversity of projects and set ups of projects and how to obtain support and investment into new projects.

• Report by Chocmilk03
• Report by Pakoire and Kowhaiarewhana
• Report by Stitchbird2
• Report by Einebillion
• Report by Giantflightlessbirds

• Encouraging others to attend off shore WikiCons The success of this conference and the inspiration it provided attendees is likely to see participants from Aotearoa New Zealand encouraging other committeed editors and organisers to attend similar Wikicons. Communication about Wikimania 2023 has already begun.

Documentation added post-conference and Improvements

• Affiliate Leadership Session Speaker Notes from Einebillion

Plans after the conference

This mostly involves communication. Communication of the things learned by all 7 of the participants back to the user group is just part of the goal. We'll share not only the discoveries from attending ESEAP 2022 but also encourage greater participation and attendence at future conferences. Communicating the benefits of attending off shore Wikicons in terms of inspiration, project ideas and community development will be important. Looking at feeding this information back to both the Aotearoa New Zealand Online meetup and the Wellington meetup.

Recommendation for future participants and comments/suggestions about the conference

A more detailed programme would have been helpful to plan session attendence. Otherwise the conference was extremely well run, the transport directions were excellent, the food was fantastic and the dinner cruise was enjoyed by all.