User:Whiteghost.ink/Wikimania report

WIKIMANIA 2012 Report

Receiving the WM-Au scholarship made it possible for me to attend Wikimania 2012 and so I would like to express my appreciation for it. As written in my application, I tried to learn as much as I could while I was there, in particular about Gender Gap and GLAM as well as from Chapters whose experiences might be applicable here.I also contributed where I could during the conference sessions and met people with whom I had been working online.

Gender Gap

On the days before Wikimania, (July 10–11) I attended the invitation-only event Ada Camp[1], where I met Australian Mary Gardiner, co-founder of the Ada Initiative and also keynote speaker at Wikimania. During the conference, my article on Jessie Ackermann[2], appeared (as planned) as a DYK. I attended the Wikimania WikiWomen’s lunch and engaged in the discussion afterwards about running such an event for an increasingly large number of participants.[3]

GLAM

There were many sessions and people involved in GLAM, among them, the panel of National GLAM coordinators,[4] and the debate about legal aspects of fair use, were informative. The QRpedia workshop showed the Australian example (my own) of a QRpedia code in use.

People

Some wiki people I sought out and/or had helpful discussions with:

  • Australian Wikimedians: Chuq, Graham87, Gnangarra, Juttavd, Werdna
  • WMF staff: Sue Gardner (about leadership); User:ASengupta (about global projects); James Forrester (about technology developments)
  • User: Peteforsyth (about community involvement)
  • User Hannibal (about policies and manuals)[5]
  • User: Rock drum (about This Month in GLAM)
  • User: PigsontheWing (about QRpedia coding)
  • User: Wadewitz (about academic articles)
  • User: Johnbod (about art articles);
  • User: Beat Easterman (about older Wikimedians, following up from Haifa presentation)
  • User: Adrienne Alix (Director of Wikimedia France)
  • User: Trizek (French Wikimedian and former Wikipedian-in-residence)
  • User: Antaya (French Canadian, about “Wikipedia takes” events, and also Chapters, especially about the comparability of the Canadian situation – large land mass, small number of Wikimedians).
  • User: Jon Davies (about GLAM in the UK).

Chapter development

I was invited to the Francophone meetup, where improving intra-Chapter communication was a major topic.

Fundraising

I participated in an extensive interview with Victor Grigas on behalf of the WMF Fund Raising Team.

Wikimania planning

Following recent discussions among members of Wm-Au, I was particularly interested to learn what resources are required for organising a Wikimania. So I followed this up with User:Deror Avi (General Manager and member of the local team for the Haifa 2011 Wikimania and adviser to Wikimania 2012), who provided the following figures on what is needed:

People: Four core team members are necessary, as well as a hired event manager, 20 part time volunteers, and 80 on site volunteers.

Time (effort): the programme team (4 members) worked about a total of 100 hours each. Sorting out the lecture schedule needed about 40 hours for each of them.

Time (duration):

  • First three months - about 4 hours a week (* 4)
  • Next three months - about 6 - 8 hours a week (*4)
  • Next three months - about 2 hours a day (* 4)
  • Next month - about 3 hours a day (*4)
  • Next Month - about 4 hours a day (* 4)
  • Last two weeks - full time job (*4)
  • During the conference it is a full-time job for 20 people, and 24 hours a day for (*4).

Following this up, I asked Deror to clarify the figures. Explaining that there were different teams, he said:

"As to the math - it is the programme team - the programme team (4 members) worked about a total of 100 hours each - not the core team. Programme is usually international team and one member of the core team - and is not part of the logistics. The table I gave is the logistics team. so programme work is between Aapril - May before the conference - during which the core team works about 1- 2 hours a day (about 8-16 hours a week per person). So the person in charge of programme may not assist much with the logistics work."

Skill development

One of the more unusual experiences the conference gave me was being invited to be a bouncer for the GLAM Night Out. This task required several hours of surprisingly concentrated effort. The role was a "first" for me and although I believe I improved as the evening passed (and the congregated excluded people increased in number and clamourousness), I do not think this is a career that I will pursue in the future.

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