This page is meant to highlight the new format of Wikimania Esino Lario.
Area
New
Strengths
Critical
Location
An event organized in a mountain village and not in a major city or university.
An entire village hosting the event. A very unusual atmosphere for a conference.
An entire territory involved in the event (the village, the province, the region, the Ticino Italian-speaking Switzerland and Italy - with a campaign for Wiki Loves Monuments and the Italian cultural heritage on the Wikimedia projects)
A truly collaborative project. Truly collaborative because the event would have been impossible without the collaboration of all the people and institutions involved.
A community based event and a wide volunteer effort.
A crazy project which echoes the spirit of Wikipedia.
Great media coverage and visibility.
The event has produced an important and new experience which can support other Wikimedia and free knowledge events.
A legacy for the village and the territory.
A very (very!) complex event.
A very high risk managed thanks to the deep involvement and commitment of a team of people with experience and expertise in many different fields.
A programme built with 4 different systems to include different kind of invitations: double blind peer review (critical issues), invitations (user digests and workshops), committee (discussions), direct application (meetups and training - we requested for training that at least 3 people were committed in attending it).
Working sessions which state their target - advanced (critical issues) or without background knowledge (user digests and some training and discussions).
A building and a lot of time devoted to structured discussions, a format initiated in 2014 in London.
We organized guided tours to Wikimania which were successful in allowing people to understand what was going on and to meet some of the members of Wikimedia.
We devoted a specific time for meetups.
We requested Wikimedia Foundation to follow the same procedures to include its activities in the programme.
A programme with a certain variety of content and formats to address different interests and kind of participants.
We strongly suggest to repeat the guided tours to Wikimania; it is a nice format also to introduce new people in our community
Discussions appear to be liked by participants with a longer history of involvement in the Wikimedia movement.
Some user digest sessions were not sufficiently simple.
Wikimedia Foundation appeared reticent in supporting a legacy on a territory, so its funds went specifically for the conference. The support of local grant-makers went specifically to produce a legacy.
The legacy can be simply the capacity of the event to drive attention to free knowledge and the Wikimedia projects.
Having Wikimania producing a legacy (i.e. better connectivity and knowledge of the Wikimedia projects and involvement in free knowledge) should be considered an extremely important criteria to evaluate the success of Wikimania. It is the best way to invest money and it provide a true reason to have an itinerant conference. The conference should be designed to have an impact at a regional and national scale.
Producing a legacy requires the event to be conceived as a project (of at least 2-3 years) and it changes its organizational model.
Participants
An event planned for 1'000 participants (we expected 700). We involved 1365 registered participants.
Scholarships
A series of changes in the structure of the scholarships.
Changes in Wikimania calendar to assure we have enough time to get visa.
We wanted people to have an idea of Wikimania programme or to be involved in its programme, before applying for a scholarship.
It is essential that people understand that for attendees from the majority of the countries of the world (which means the world expect Europe, US, Australia, New Zealand, Japan), either you have a scholarship or you will never get to Wikimania. Because attending the event is too expensive or because it is almost impossible to get a visa unless you are fully endowed by a scholarship.
Procedures to allow institutions and companies supporting the event to use rapidly the Wikimania logo (quick license).
Procedure to include the cc by-sa licenses as default license of the event and to make sure images and content produced by the team was available under cc by-sa.
It would be important to strengthen the capacity of Wikimedia chapters to respond promptly to opportunities of collaboration and of supporting their Wikimedia volunteers.
Budget
The Wikimania with the smallest contribution from the Wikimedia Foundation (200'000 euro) and Wikimedia Foundation was not the unique or major supporter of the event.
The registration fee was to cover lunch, accommodation and the welcome pack; to simply attend the conference the cost was 1 euro (to join the association Comitato Wikimania Esino Lario 2016 which guaranteed the insurance).
The Wikimania with the biggest budget. Thanks to the fundraising we activated, we collected for infrastructures and a wide programme of events something like 1.4 million euro. Please note that the Wikimania Esino Lario team even provided 20'000 euro to Wikimedia Italia to implement Wikimedia activities in the Lombardy Region and it has established a financed 2-years Wikimedia programme for schools, libraries, museums and city councils)
A domino effect in the involvement and support of people and institutions.
A very strong and positive collaboration with sponsors. Companies supporting Wikimania have truly embraced the project and collaborated for its success. Astonishing the support of Eolo and Elmec.
Wikimania has won the price Sodalitas for multistakeholders support (prize given to the company Elmec which is also liked to Eolo)
A very long and complex fundraising. We started the fundraising before we even have the confirmation of the support from the Wikimedia Foundation.
For the fundraising (but also for the implementation on time of the interventions) we had to prepare very technical and executive documentation.
