In fact, I don't even think that Sydney should be lumped in with Sydney when talking about chapter activity in the last year :-) IIRC the only "official Chaper events" that happened in real life last year were GLAM-WIKI (Canberra), a Backstage Pass (Sydney), Linux-Australia conference booth (Hobart). Effectively Canberra was our hub of activity :-) All of the activities that may make Sydney active and therefore appear to be getting Chapter attention are actually normal meetups that happened quite independently of the chapter - and thank you to the organisers of those events!
So, if there is a concern that the chapter is focusing too much on Sydney (and/or Melbourne), I wouldn't want this to be the perception, off the back of local Wikimedians being particularly interested in hosting meetups. The solution is not to stop Sydney/Melbourne Wikimedians from having meetups but to encourage people in different cities to host their own. The first priority of my election statement <http://wikimedia.org.au/wiki/2009-2010_AGM/Vice_President/Liam_Wyatt>this year was to encourage the formation of a regular series of meetups in (at least) some major cities as a way of galvanising greater local-community activity - beyond the ad-hoc system that currently prevails. It would be fantastic if all Wikimedians in, say, Adelaide knew that the second Saturday of the month at the xyz pub was definitely going to be a meetup. It is the time and place consistency that makes the meetups in London (for example) such a success. To do that however, requires a local organiser. It doesn't necessarily have to be a chapter-led thing (although, as an elected chapter rep. that I would be nice!), but it does need local administration. It might also require some form of official organisation status (in order to book the function room of the city library for example). To that end - would people in some of the cities feeling left out of the action feel empowered to run a more frequent series of meetups (or other more involved activities) if there was a designated "Chapter-approved organiser" in the city? Would it assist in the creation of a feeling of activity and solidarity if there was someone in your city who's chapter-agreed responsibility it was to make local events happen? In the future they may even be able to have a local "events budget", who knows. Moreover, would anyone in these cities like to take on this task? (I would like to suggest that the "local rep" *not* be a member of the committee, such as myself, in an effort to empower more people in the Australian wiki community rather than centralising power). Would this be a good way to empower more local activities around the country? Best, -Liam [[witty lama]] wittylama.com/blog Peace, love & metadata On Sun, Dec 13, 2009 at 1:20 PM, Sarah Ewart <sarahew...@gmail.com> wrote: > Just to say that I also agree with membership concerns and it's something > that's worried me for a long time, just from being aware of the membership > from membership records and it's something that's going to need to be > addressed for the viability of the chapter in the medium-long term. I don't > think there's any quick and easy solutions to the problem though. However, I > don't think it's correct to say the chapter activity has been concentrated > in Melbourne. Melbourne always gets lumped in with Sydney when talking about > the chapter, but really, its probably been as active here as in Queensland > and pretty much anywhere else except Tassie (poor Chuq). > > > On Sun, Dec 13, 2009 at 9:42 PM, Craig Franklin <cr...@halo-17.net> wrote: > >> Hear hear! >> >> >> >> I’d like to add some of my own to cents to this discussion. The turnover >> in Queensland isn’t quite as bad, but based on the secretary’s report and my >> own observations of who’s been showing up to the AGMs, we had a forty >> percent turnover of membership in the last year. As Andrew says, that sort >> of statistic is simply not sustainable in the long term, and it **must** >> be addressed by the committee in 2010. As Andrew says, a lot of this is due >> to the fact that a lot of the chapter activity to date has been concentrated >> in Sydney and Melbourne, while things have been fairly quiet everywhere >> else. >> >> >> >> To a degree, in the case of Brisbane at least, this has partially been our >> own fault; events and perks for members simply are not going to materialise >> out of this air for us. At the same time though, there has to be a >> realistic commitment from those in the southern/eastern states to assist us >> in the northern/western in growing our local communities and membership. I >> note with satisfaction that those I’ve spoken to in the committee seem to >> “get it”, so hopefully there can be some real progress on this front. >> >> >> >> In closing, I think Andrew’s idea is an excellent one, and I’d encourage >> everyone (particularly those of us in Queensland) to get aboard and start >> brainstorming. >> >> >> >> Cheers, >> >> Craig F. >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> *From:* wikimediaau-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto: >> wikimediaau-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] *On Behalf Of *Andrew >> *Sent:* Sunday, 13 December 2009 7:41 PM >> *To:* Wikimedia-au >> *Subject:* [Wikimediaau-l] Membership, regional participation and other >> things >> >> >> >> Fellow members and supporters, >> >> A key priority for 2009-10 has to be building the chapter and make it >> successful. >> >> Before being elected to my present role, I heard lots of people saying >> they felt this chapter was overly Sydney- and Melbourne-focussed not just in >> activity but in priorities. There was also a fair few people saying (both >> among those who stayed/newly joined, and some who lapsed) that the chapter >> was overly focused on central or headline priorities and, in their view, >> gave insufficient support to members. >> >> Using the figures from the secretary's report at the AGM, in regional >> terms our numbers were stable, here in WA we went from 5 to 3 members (I am >> in fact the only original WA member left) and, even more concerningly, >> nationally we lost 2/3 of our initial intake although we actually gained a >> fair number of people. We need to do *far* more to retain members, and to >> give those outside the two biggest cities reasons to join and ways to >> participate - otherwise this chapter will fail. I ran on a platform to that >> effect and got support for it, so I'm hoping that means the members trust me >> to find ways to act on those concerns. >> >> I am happy for people to approach me privately with project ideas they >> want feedback on or support for. I think peer support is vital to keeping >> people's enthusiasm up, and I understand not everyone wants to go public >> with projects before they're ready. I would note in saying so that I can't >> give "official chapter approval" to anything although I can certainly seek >> it on your behalf from the committee if you wish me to. >> >> On the wiki I've been working on an early draft for a regional >> participation drive, and I'd also appreciate comments on that. I'll be >> adding more to it after the first committee meeting on the 20th as I'll know >> then what I have support for. >> >> kindest regards >> Andrew Owens >> (WM-AU committee general member) >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Wikimediaau-l mailing list >> Wikimediaau-l@lists.wikimedia.org >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaau-l >> >> > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimediaau-l mailing list > Wikimediaau-l@lists.wikimedia.org > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaau-l > >
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