Hi Lodewijk, If Wikimania was an entity rather than an event, it would be in the top 5 entities in the movement - a smaller budget than WMF, Wikimedia Deutschland and the Wiki Education Foundation but larger than anything else...
And yet it doesn't have any objectives (or at least, not consistent ones), the governance of it is that there's one staff member, a committee with an ill-defined role that you can only get appointed to by organising a Wikimania, and the only serious discussion about what it's for was one online discussion that reached a conclusion that no-one appears willing to support. And there is very little formal followup and attempting to build on the results (something WMCON, for instance, has been very good at). This isn't to criticise everyone involved in making Wikimania happen, I know it's a huge amount of effort and responsibility and often not very well-supported. And I know there *are* innovations aimed at making the conference more effective (for instance, this year we finally had poster sessions, which are a great idea for sharing thoughts and making connections, because you can fit a lot more into one room and an hour than if you have someone giving an hour-long presentation...) - but I can't help but feel that there would be more things like that happening if there was a clearer idea of purpose and objectives. In a different thread I'm being quite critical of the direction WMCON/Wikimedia Summit is taking. But that's only possible because there *is* a direction, and therefore it's possible to think about whether it's the right direction or not. Chris On Fri, Sep 28, 2018 at 9:55 PM effe iets anders <effeietsand...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Perhaps stating the obvious, but please remember there were some > significant flaws with the consultation by the WMF that you refer to > (especially with regards to the way questions were phrased and options were > limited beforehand, if I recall correctly). > > Wikimania's purpose is mostly pluriform and suits different needs for > different people. That makes it particularly hard to evaluate - I grant you > that. But given the diverse directions that we're trying to bring together, > ranging from individuals to highly professionalized 100+ employee > organizations, this is to be expected. To reduce costs, we have squashed > more and more activities into this one annual event. That further > reinforces the pluriform nature of the event(s). At this point it's hard to > see Wikimania as an event, and it has more become like a piece of > infrastructure that is being used by many events - including the main > conference, but also tons of meetups, preconferences, committee meetings, > strategy processes, consultations and side conferences. > > Lodewijk > > On Fri, Sep 28, 2018 at 5:36 AM Chris Keating <chriskeatingw...@gmail.com> > wrote: > > > > > So it seems that the main rationale for an annual Wikimania brought up > > in > > > > the 2016 meeting was that Wikimania was vital for movement governance > > and > > > > accountability. Which wasn't particularly stressed in the WMF's > > > > consultation, but I can see why that kind of issue was very fresh in > > > > peoples' minds in 2016. > > > > > > > > > > As the facilitator of the 2016 session discussing Wikimania, I don't > > recall > > > the "main rationale" of the discussion being about "governance and > > > accountability" and instead remember many more issues that stood out. > > > > > > For example, the prominent phrases from the first part of the meeting > > > include the following, with most of the notes echoing these themes: > > > - inspiring, and connecting > > > - opportunity for different communities to meet > > > - important to use opportunity to do outreach > > > - empower important volunteers > > > > Sorry, previous email sent half-finished. > > > > Sorry, don't think I expressed myself particularly well. Yes, those > > themes appear to have been present in the meeting, but they were also > > very much present in the WMF's consultation, which concluded that they > > could probably be fulfilled just as well by moving to a > > one-year-in-two rotation between Wikimanias and other regional > > gatherings. > > > > The thing that was present in the in-person meeting, but not from the > > consultation exercise, was the statement from all the chapter chairs > > saying that Wikimania was vital for movement governance and > > accountability. > > > > Then of course there was a lot of enthusiasm about the idea of > > continuing Wikimania from people attending Wikimania who have attended > > many previous Wikimanias. Putting a load of people present at an event > > in a room and saying "should this event continue to happen?" is not > > great for rigorous decision-making. > > > > (BTW, I'm not saying I favour the other option - the regional > > conferences seem to be happening anyway) > > > > > 2. The Wikimedia Conference (WMCON) has pivoted to become the Wikimedia > > > Summit. In the process, they announced "learning and capacity-building > > will > > > not be part of the program." [2] Therefore I'd argue that the onus is > > even > > > *more* on conferences like Wikimania to facilitate this. > > > > That would be good! But it kind of returns to the point that > > Wikimania's purpose is still fairly ill-defined. Personally I would > > really welcome Wikimania becoming explicitly focused on learning and > > capacity-building, because currently its focus changes every year and > > often when a focus is articulated it's not necessarily followed > > through. > > > > Chris > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > > <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe> > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe> _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
