User:Mehman/Reports/Wikimedia Summit 2019

Wikimedia Summit 2019

Wikimedia Summit 2019 – the same and formerly known as "Wikimedia Conference", which took place in Berlin during 29–31 March 2019.

In short, we can say that: The Wikimedia Summit focused on the Movement Strategy Process and movement governance for the organized part of the movement in general. The program was designed according to the status and needs of the ongoing Movement Strategy Process and its Working Groups. A diverse group of participants gathered, and was working, discussing, and thinking together. To reflect this change we decided to rename the event to "Wikimedia Summit".

This year (2019) Wikimedia UG Georgia was represented at the summit by me — Mehman Ibragimov.

Main topics

The main topics of discussion and work at the summit were two, this is the strategic direction and the upcoming elections to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees, where the two seats are vacant and should be chosen by the Wikimedia Foundation chapters.

Over the strategic direction of the Wikimedia Foundation, active working groups are working, in which volunteers of Wikimedia projects from all projects from different regions and countries of the world. Working Groups are at the center of process; they are the agents of change. Each Working Group has dedicated itself to one of nine key thematic areas of the movement, which members are putting under the microscope, exploring how it could look Wikimedia in 2030 and finalizing a set of guiding questions. The answers to these questions will form the basis of recommendations for structural changes so that we can successfully and strongly advance in our Strategic Direction.

The second main topic at the summit was the election of two members of the Board of Trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF). With the help of innovation, the Wikimedia Foundation wants all foundation affiliations to participate in the management of the WMF.

My activity

Wiki Loves Caucasus

During the discussion with the representatives of Wikimedia Russia, Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia (me), we came to the conclusion that it is necessary to hold regional competitions that unite the region as a single system. We decided to hold contests in Wikipedia in the languages of the Caucasus (Armenian, Azerbaijani, Georgian, Russian, Lezgi, Chechenian and etc.), the first such competition will be the "Wiki Loves Caucasus". Competition will be held in other languages that don't belong to the Caucasus region, they will composes an international level. The theme of the first competition will be the topic of GLAM. The competition according to the plan will be held in September-October of this year, there will be different prizes for the winners.

Caucasus and Central Asia Conference

The second main issue discussed by representatives of the Caucasian Wikimedian is the organization of a regional conference (Caucasus + Central Asia). In this region there are many languages on most of which Wikipedia also exist. It's important, that these Wikipedia's developed, unfortunately the growth rate of content in these Wikipedia's is very weak, not counting some of Wikipedia.

During the discussion, we agreed to organize such a conference in the coming years.

Cooperation with Wikimedia Russia

With representatives of Wikimedia Russia talked about the organization of joint projects in Wikimedia projects and about further cooperation. Soon we will organize a general competition, and will also cooperate in this area.

Wikimedia CEE Meeting 2020 in Tbilisi

March 29, at the Wikimedia Summit 2019 in Berlin, an CEE meetup took place. At the meeting we discussed "CEE Spring 2019" competition held this year and all the issues related to the competition, it was noted that the nature of the competition is different in different countries. Then, the representative of the Wikimedia Serbia provided us with information about the upcoming Wikimedia CEE Meeting in Belgrade, where he presented us the details of the meeting. Discussed also other projects carried out in our region.

One of the topics we discussed was where the Wikimedia CEE meeting will be held in 2020. The proposal came from Wikimedia Armenia, which offered to hold a meeting in Armenia for the second time. After that, for a variety of meetings on a geographical basis, I proposed to hold Wikimedia CEE Meeting 2020 in Georgia, on behalf of Wikimedia UG Georgia. I confirmed our interest and our plan for holding the meeting in 2020 will be presented soon.

Conversation with the chair AffCom

During the summit in Berlin, I, a representative of the Wikimedia UG Azerbaijan, Iran and Ghana met and talked to the chairman of AffCom, Kirill Lokshin. The main topic of our meeting and conversation was how to develop the user group to the chapter. As representatives of user groups, it was important for us to find out what we need to do in order to receive chapter status from the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF). Kirill Lokshin told us in detail what we should undertake for further organizational development, as well as what procedure we will have to go through to confirm the change of our status from the user group to the chapter.

Online training program for Wikipedia

We began to discuss this project last year, but the details didn't discuss what we done this year. During the Summit, a representative of the Wikimedia Algeria, Reda Kerbush agreed on a joint project, through which the Georgian Wikipedia will be able to increase its contingent of editors. Implementation of the project will begin in August this year.

Result

Wikimedia Summit 2019 in Berlin was for me and my organization one of the productive meetings. During this summit, I learned a lot about the development of the Wikimedia movement and took into account all the benefits from it for my local movement. At this summit, I and my colleagues from other Wikimedia organizations agreed on joint projects and meetings, created a single basis for further cooperation. I was also able to bring all the agendas of our local organization to the global level.

I tried to briefly talk about my activity at the summit. Thanks for attention.