That's not a bad idea actually! But I imagine people would be baying for blood quite quickly ;)
Joe On 19 Jul 2012, at 23:22, Lodewijk wrote: > Something I would personally appreciate as an improvement, is a block of 2 > hour around lunch with NO INTERNET! That ought to improve the mingling :) > > Also speeddating seems to be an effective method (there are many ways to > accomplish that). > > Lodewijk > > 2012/7/19 Katherine Casey <[email protected]> > I agree with Florence's comment about being sad that Wikimania is no longer a > giant meetup. For all that the talks and lectures are very informative, I > sort of wish that we had the GLAM track lecture, the Dev track, the > [whatever] track, AND the "I just want to hang out with people" track. Give > those of us who show up mostly because we want to meet and talk to other > Wikimanians a big room, and maybe a lot of beer or snacks, and see what > develops! We end up ad-hoc-ing this oftentimes by using the ballroom, or the > lobby, or whatever large space, but even those are often set up in a way that > makes me think it never occurred to anyone that some of us would spend most > of our time there if we could. Lack of seating or enough outlets, the > tendency Florence mentions for people to clump off at tables by their > affiliation, and lack of central location for the hang-out space are some of > the pitfalls I've noticed happening in the past two wikimaniae. If I ran the > world, every Wikimania would have a large room full of abundant couches (not > tables to sit around, and not rows of chairs) and electrical outlets where > people would be encouraged to just hang out and meet new people. > > -Fluffernutter > > > On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 5:57 AM, Florence Devouard <[email protected]> > wrote: > https://wikimania2012.wikimedia.org/wiki/Feedback > > I dropped my comments over there. > > There are three things on which I would like to specifically insist upon > > The first is that I see a trend in seeing Wikimania as a "conference" rather > than a sort of "giant meetup". I regret it. > I was particularly sensible this year to the fact we had "factions". I could > see the French speaking guys hanging together here. And the German chapter > people hanging there. And in another corner the editing community of the > English Wikipedia. And over there, the Glam people. And though there were > naturally bridges between those groups, there was not much mixing and bonding. > Seeing Wikimania as a conference is not really helping closing the gap. We > get 4 or 5 sessions in parallel. Glam group goes there in the session related > to Glam. Editing community goes there listening to the session related to > arbitration. Chapter group here goes to listen to legal risks. And so on. The > more sessions we have in parallel, the more chance that each group stick to > its habits. > Adding side events does not necessarily help. When wandering in the street, > we could meet with a group of iberocoop people sticking together or a group > of WMF staff members heading to that restaurant. Even the wikichix meeting > could have been done differently. Such as giving the time to each women of > ONE table to present to each other rather than all of us to each other. And > making sure that women do not sit by their friends but with new women. > The side meeting probably helping the most are actually visits (such as the > visit to the Capitol) since these are smaller groups of various origins. > But there is this tendency to group with people you already know because it > is always tough to get to new people you know little about. > In the past, I remember events that helped create more bonding. For example, > sleeping in one area rather than dozen. For example, breaking a wikiball > together. For example, hosting lightning talks in the main lobby all along > the conference. > I think we need to think of Wikimania more as a networking event than it is > right now. And give more chance to isolated people to connect and more chance > to groups to break and bridge with other groups. > I hope there can be discussions on how to achieve that (looking at how > networking groups do is a good direction) and that next year team will have > that at heart. > > > The second is that I was actually surprised to see the organizing team put > itself so much "in the background". > I did not feel very satisfied that the team was essentially listed on a slide > at the beginning and end of the conference and that we see a group of people > on stage during 1 mn at the closing. If only because I will hardly remember > any of the team member besides James, Aude and Danny. James as the leader. > Aude and Danny because I already know them. But others ? Unfortunately not. > Their names were plastered on an slide (since I didnot know them, it did not > help me to recognise their face afterwards). In a regular conference, this is > normal. We just thank the organizers and give them a one minute fame. > But at Wikimania, the team should be special. It should be leader and at the > heart of the event. We should know who they are and at the end of the > conference, I feel we should feel like hugging them like mad for what they > did (or hate them :)). There are various ways to do that. Such as at least > presenting each of them at the beginning so that we have a face in front of > the name. Putting a big wall in the lobby with the face and name, their role, > and their favorite food (or whatever). Setting up a 10 mn presentation at the > beginning of the day. Having a contest with them on stage. A banner to sign. > A tower in lego to destroy. Anything. > > > The third is.... WMF board. The Q&A is a tradition; but I feel traditions > ought to change sometimes. It probably made more sense to have a board Q&A > when we had no staff at all. Now, the staff is providing one keynote (Sue) > plus many talks (not far from half of Wikimania talks I think) and providing > plenty of input during three days. So the board Q&A is getting boring and not > very useful anyway. Plus, as I told Jay, the concept of having a WMF staff > select and ask the questions is setting up a barrier, thus increasing the > distance between board and wikimedians. To be fair, I find it odd that most > wikimedians have next to no idea of what the individual board members think > on a specific topic. And most answers to board does not succeed to fix that. > It should be clarified if the goal of this "event" is to help members > understand better what individual members think OR if it is to understand > better board strategy OR if it is to better understand certain issues. But if > these issues are operational in nature, the questions should go to staff, not > board. > I think it is time to have another format. I wonder if it might not make > sense to rather select one hot topic per year and have board give their > opinion on that very topic in details and with individual position rather > than having them give short, bland answers to 10 random questions. > > > Florence > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimania-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l > > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimania-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l > > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimania-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l
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