On Thu, Feb 18, 2016 at 3:19 PM, Lodewijk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Thanks, it is a step in the right direction indeed. Although a bit more > breakdown would be helpful, I am working on that.... > I'm guessing this also highly fluctuates year > by year. > Some observations: > > A huge amount of money goes into flying WMF around the world (321k resp. > 383k), which doesn't even take into account (I'm assuming) all the hours > invested into it. > The expenses related to staff time to attend and other staff support within the Foundation is not accounted for here. (We have included my time, and contract staff support that we pay to assist the local team.) > I'm assuming 'donations' includes sponsorships. That amount is less than I > would have expected/hoped. Not sure what you mean by 'donations'. Donors to WMF do support Wikimania since we heavily subsidize the event (registration fees are VERY low and don't cover the costs... that has been a policy to keep it very affordable. Sponsorships are from corporate sponsors like ask.com, google, wikihow, etc. These relationships are managed by me The local host team also is involved in trying to get sponsorships, which is often very difficult. I'd welcome more suggestions and help in finding more sponsors. > Registration income is low, as expected (the > burden would just be moved to a different part of our movement: the > community) > > 'wikimania direct' is quite expensive, to be honest, and much more than I > would have expected. However, it does include catering, which is always an > expensive chunk (5days * 1000 people will even at a quite low 30 dollar per > day easily give 150k, not even counting the parties etc). > Catering is usually our highest direct cost. In London Wikimania '14, it was the rental of the Barbican Centre venue. > > Many of these costs would still exist if you split the event up in multiple > events spread out. WMF would still want to fly everywhere (board has to > meet anyway, WMF staff wants to engage anyway, committees have to meet > somewhere), catering won't be much cheaper if spread over multiple events, > and don't underestimate the manpower it would take to organise all those > events - relatively it may be even more. > I do think we could consider some different models for how we produce conferences that would be more reasonable cost-wise. And yes, there might be additional expense for staffing, but this could be offset depending on the format, location and size of the conference. > > So looking at these figures, I can agree that it should be possible to do > it for less, I'm less certain though whether the proposed splitting up > would significantly reduce the total costs for everything that is included > here. > Maybe we should do the "experiment" as suggested and see! > > Lodewijk > > > > On Thu, Feb 18, 2016 at 11:52 PM, Sam Klein <[email protected]> > wrote: > > > That's most helpful, thank you both. > > > > On Wed, Feb 17, 2016 at 5:14 PM, Pharos <[email protected]> > > wrote: > > > > > Thanks, Ellie and Chris, this historical experience should be very > > helpful > > > for future discussions! > > > > > > Best, > > > Pharos > > > > > > On Wed, Feb 17, 2016 at 5:06 PM, Chris Schilling < > > [email protected] > > > > > > > wrote: > > > > > > > Hey folks, > > > > > > > > Ellie has put together a summarized budget including revenue and > > expenses > > > > from Wikimania 2014 in London[1] and Wikimania 2015[2], which I've > gone > > > > ahead and posted to the summary pages of these conferences on meta. > > > > > > > > Thanks, > > > > > > > > Chris > > > > > > > > [1] <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2014> > > > > [2] <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2015> > > > > > > > > On Wed, Feb 10, 2016 at 1:15 PM, Samuel Klein <[email protected]> > > wrote: > > > > > > > > > Itzik writes: > > > > > > > > > > > If we want to talk about the cost of Wikimania it will be great > if > > > the > > > > > WMF and the local team will share the costs. > > > > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2014/Budget > > > > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2015/Budget > > > > > > Maybe I missed something, but it's strange that such discussion > > takes > > > > > place without a real budget breakdown. > > > > > > To summarize 2 huge event to "1$ million USD" does not make > sense. > > > > > > > > > > Agreed 1million%. It would be important to see a rough cost > > > breakdown, & > > > > > compare that to the best-budgeted Wikimanias. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > On Wed, Feb 10, 2016 at 9:52 AM, Tomasz Ganicz < > [email protected]> > > > > > wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > 2016-02-10 6:06 GMT+01:00 Samuel Klein <[email protected]>: > > > > > > > > > > > > > FUDCons > > > > > > > > > > > > Also it is hard to compare Wikimanias with FUDCons as it is > > > > > > a) much smaller (usually bo more than 200 attendees) > > > > > > b) divided by regions - for example in 2015 there were 3 FUDCons > > > > > > (Argentina, India, Spain) and 2 Flocks (NY and Kraków) - so they > > are > > > > > > rather like our Iberecop or CEE meetings than the global > > conferences. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Thanks. Similar to regional events perhaps, not Wikimania. Still > > > worth > > > > > comparing budgets perhaps, if available. > > > > > > > > > > But I was wondering about the trend over time: whether extensive > > > funding > > > > > during the RedHat days made the events less useful, in the years > > after > > > > that > > > > > funding was reduced. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > And also Fedora developers have many potential sources of > external > > > > > funding > > > > > > - mainly from IT companies which uses free software and want to > > apply > > > > for > > > > > > their specific needs and for whom they quite often work. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > True. But attendees to GLAM or education conferences also tend to > > have > > > > > many potential sources of funding - mainly from archives or > > educational > > > > or > > > > > technical companies who curate knowledge or develop education > tools. > > > And > > > > we > > > > > have IT industry partners who are similarly willing to support > > > > Wikimanias. > > > > > Not entirely dissimilar. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > But anyway, Fedora offers scholarships for attendees, see: > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Yes, wiki conferences should as well - that part of conference > > funding > > > is > > > > > important. Even early Wikimanias with almost no WMF support had > > > > > significant scholarship pools. > > > > > > > > > > S > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > > > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > > > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > > > > > New messages to: [email protected] > > > > > Unsubscribe: > > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > > > > > <mailto:[email protected] > ?subject=unsubscribe> > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > -- > > > > Chris "Jethro" Schilling > > > > I JethroBT (WMF) < > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:I_JethroBT_(WMF)> > > > > Community Organizer, Wikimedia Foundation > > > > <https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Home> > > > > _______________________________________________ > > > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > > > > New messages to: [email protected] > > > > Unsubscribe: > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > > > > <mailto:[email protected]?subject=unsubscribe> > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > > > New messages to: [email protected] > > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > > > <mailto:[email protected]?subject=unsubscribe> > > > > > > > > > > > -- > > Samuel Klein @metasj w:user:sj +1 617 529 > 4266 > > _______________________________________________ > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > > New messages to: [email protected] > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > > <mailto:[email protected]?subject=unsubscribe> > > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > New messages to: [email protected] > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > <mailto:[email protected]?subject=unsubscribe> > -- Ellie Young Events Manager Wikimedia Foundation [email protected] c. 510 701 8649 _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:[email protected]?subject=unsubscribe>
