Grants:TPS/Aegis Maelstrom/Wikimania/2014/Report

Welcome back from Wikimania 2014!

Participant

Aegis Maelstrom

home wiki - pl:

Outcome

Option 1: Shared Experience: What is one way you shared something from your experience with your community (either locally or globally), after the event?

Add a link here to a blog post or newsletter you wrote about your participation afterwards, or to a meet-up you organized to share your experience with your local community.

London Wikimania was my first Wikimania focused on Wikimedia work and activities among the WM bodies like WMF and chapters: partially because of dedicated meetings for WM grants' evaluators, programme evaluators, as well as many meetings with particular chapters, orgs and Wikimedians sharing their ideas, feedback etc.

Following months resulted in deepening of my involvement in the "institutional" work, FDC candidacy - and winning the seat. This resulted in strong feedback disseminated further: both to my Board etc. on various meetings, and to the general audience, e.g. Przewodnik po Wikimedia Foundation – Aegis Maelstrom item on the next national conference of WMPL.

See: https://pl.wikimedia.org/wiki/Konferencja_Wikimedia_Polska_2015/program

Further result was my activity in FDC - I think that, without the WMF training there and other discussions, I would not candidate.

Option 2: Learning Pattern: What is one useful learning pattern you can share with the Wikimedia movement?

Add a link to a learning pattern - either a new pattern you created with insights from your participation, or an existing pattern to which you added your endorsement and some significant new "considerations" or “examples” from your experience.

Option 3: New Creation: What was one useful outcome that was created at the event for the Wikimedia movement?

Add a link to something new that was created as a result of your participation in this event (for example, you might link to a new tool that you and your co-participants worked on at the Hackathon, or to pages created in a workshop you participated in).

Wikimania in London started a great tradition of workshop sessions run by Lodewijk. I certainly remember heated discussions on a role of the admins and the bot article creation (which was strong on Polish Wikipedia but resulted with a lot of tension in some communities). Please see: Wikimania Programme page, Etherpad 4a, Etherpad 4b.

Connections

This Wikimania was extremely busy and filled with both expected and made in promptu meetings, from pre-conference to unconference. I found a grantmaking workhop with an opportunity to meet WMF staff and discuss issues very important, as well as other meetings regarding programme design and evaluation, boards' members trainings, regional co-operation etc. It was good to meet and talk about possible partnerships with partners I already knew, e.g. from WMDE, as well as meet knew people and learn new perspectives, e.g. about Belarussian wikis from Olya. This opportunity to meet fellow Wikimedians is a vital part of the whole conference.

These meetings proved to be pretty important for my further work in the Movement, not only as a Wikipedian, but mostly as a Board member and a FDC member.