Hi Adam :-) I reckon this list is a pretty good starting point - and although it may seem like everyone is most interested in access rights to the wiki, I think that's probably also just a temporary thing - as you've probably seen, mailing lists can get all focussed on odd things for a while - perhaps getting a topic like this going will channel energies in a good direction too :-) Do you mind me asking where you're based, and roughly what sort of institutions you're interested in contacting? I have in past approached people (and institutions) just by saying 'I'm a wikipedia editor, and I have a few questions, have you got any spare time by any chance?' - there's a page on the wiki detailing some of this stuff here; http://wikimedia.org.au/wiki/Contacting_external_folk If by any chance you're Sydney based, and roughly Uni age - then there's a particular idea maybe worth talking over too... I agree with others that a regular event might help the Chapter a bit, and have been thinking about Manning Bar at Sydney Uni. or the UTS Campus nearer central - we might also be able to talk to some student associations to see if they're interested in hearing more about wiki (to be honest this could be a chapter thing, or a general wiki thing, it's all going in the same direction) - what do you think? Re : your comments about blog.s etc. - personally I quite like the connection that comes from using MediaWiki, although I take your point that it maybe doesn't look so crash hot - there's always the possiblity of using external tools for specific projects, but I don't think we've really got enough resources at the mo to explore this stuff more - our President and Vice President do have whizz bang blogs at http://brianna.modernthings.org/and http://www.wittylama.com/ respectively (there are probably more, but they're a good start!) cheers, Peter, PM.
On Tue, Dec 15, 2009 at 10:12 PM, Adam Karpathakis <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi, I'm a fairly new Wikimedian. I hope this is the right place as there is > two lists. > > I would like to get a discussion started on how to approach institutions. I > am a confident speaker but to senior people to whom I am Mr Joe Blow off the > street, I don't have any firm ideas on gaining trust then commitment from > them. It does not help that Public Perception #1 is Wikipedia = unreliable, > full of useless trivia. Telling them this isn't Wikipedia is likely to > confuse them. > > So what ideas have others tried that have worked or that may work? > > Also as a new member while I received a very nice welcome email, and I am > grateful for that, I think Wikimedia should have a standard pdf email as > well to inform people of relevant contacts in their city, what the org is > and what it stands for and why it exists, etc. This should be simple enough > to show or pass on to potential members. Interesting fact from uni student > associations - New members are your best recruiters, all you have to do is > make it easy for them. > > As everybody seems to be very invested in who should edit the chapter wiki, > which to me is an unimportant issue, I would say only that if you want > people to support you, you have to look professional. Wikis are good for > geekd but discourage tech newbies, so you get very 'filtered' feedback. > People also get upset when their contribs get reverted or written over. The > obvious solution is to start an open access blog - people love blogs, some > of the ones I read attract over 100 comments a day and they are full of > useful feedback and ideas while still being moderated spaces protected from > spam. Visitors will not confuse a blog with the chapter's official website > so you get the best of both worlds. > > Adam > > ------------------------------ > Check out Domain Radar NOW! A world FIRST in property search has > arrived!<http://clk.atdmt.com/NMN/go/157631292/direct/01/> > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimediaau-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaau-l > >
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