Wikimedia Belgium

2015-06-28 Board Meeting

The meeting is open for members.

Logo Wikimedia Belgium
Logo Wikimedia Belgium
DRAFT
  • Date: 28 June 2015
  • Time: 14h
  • Venue: Londenplein, Brussels
  • Present: Alberto, Geert, Maarten, Romaine, Stefano
  • Excused: Antoine, Derek, Dimi, Lionel
  • Members: none

Approval of the minutes of the previous meeting(s)

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The secretary pointed out that we still need to formally approve previous board meeting minutes.

Office

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We were not able to get access to the office. It is proposed that Dimi makes a second key to make accessing the office more easy, in case we need to e.g. organise a board meeting in the absence of Dimi, or if we would need the banner or other material.

Budget and finance

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  • Discussion current H1 budget and planned budget S2;
    • please remit all outstanding expenses claims (tickets, invoices etc..) for budget 2015 H1
    • organising 4 board meetings with public events (WMNL: WikiZaterdag) e.g wiki-cafe
  • Creation of the function of deputy treasurer and its appointment

In order to avoid financial abuse, the board decided that payments should be approved by 2 board members: the treasurer and the deputy treasurer (new role). Romaine was the only board member to present its candidature for the new function. The board nominated Romaine as new deputy treasurer.

New board members

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Maarten proposed to vote for a new board member: Stefano. He is a researcher of ancient history, and it is felt he could contribute to Wikiducation, Europeana, Wikidata, and other cultural projects. All board members approved him as a co-opted board member. The Board decided, for the sake of avoiding unnecessary costs, that the official list of board members will be administratively changed at the occasion of our next Staatsblad publication.

GAC: Stefano will be introduced into the projects and budget approval process.

Communications web site

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  • Proposed User and Showcase website made in Drupal. Transfer of current pages. Requests Derek (hosting, extra email addresses)

The new communications website will be a Drupal web server. We will use it as a way to communicate with our members. We plan to have a module “how to become a member” with automated member management. There will be a Board-member only section with restricted access to board members only. Maarten and Derek are still looking for a hosting server.

All official (and approved) documents will be gathered on this server, with a principle of "single location"; means no redundant location of data/documents.

The bank account numbers will be published on our new website for easy access to our members and partners.

We will have an board member only zone to store restricted access documents.

Volunteer recruitment

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  • The board member that attended WMCON 2015 in Berlin made the oral report of their participation (WMCON 2015 Berlin Report). One conclusion stood up: membership is (very) important. The board decided to increase the WMBE actions to increase our membership by the end 2016
    • phase 1 s2-2016 : actively talking on-wiki to individual users about helping us (in WP or Wiki-projects)
    • phase 2 s2-2016 on wiki survey design to question Belgian users in WP NL WP FR WP EN & WP DE their needs and helping
  • wikipotentials
    • survey design to question schools / youth associations / cultural associations / hobby clubs etc...

Projects

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WLA: We should explain why NC is not good. Translation of documents: request academic persons to translate one or more pages/chapters. We can mention their names.

  • Wikiducation Belgium status report
    • wikiducation pilot projects / volunteers
    • wiki-presentations and workshops
    • proposals for off-wiki volunteer training

WMBE outreach

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SOIMA 2015

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During 3-4 September, KIK/IRPA is organising SOIMA 2015 (ICCROM’s multi-partner programme on Sound and Image Collections Conservation). The conference website is [1]. The conference aims to promote worldwide the sound and image heritage held by diverse and lesser-known cultural and research institutions, as well as individual collectors.

KIK/IRPA reached to WMBE to request a financial support (2500 euro) from Wikimedia Chapters. Considering the amount to be too high for WMBE, the board thanked Romaine for contacting WMFR, WMNL and WM(XX) another country who agreed to contribute 500 euro. Maarten recalled that WM BE has budget available for 'projects' (see S1 budget planning: max 1500€). Given the outstanding relationships with KIK/IRPA and, specially, their support in the organisation of the grant ceremony of WLM Belgium, the board agreed that WMBE will directly contribute 1000 euro.

The board mandated Alberto to contact KIK/IRPA to arrange the SOIMA2015 sponsoring of WM chapters.

CIVIC EPISTEMOLOGIES

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Stefano presented the European project CIVIC EPISTEMOLOGIES which aims to foster the participation of citizens in research on cultural heritage and humanities (http://www.civic-epistemologies.eu/) with conferences in Leuven, Hungary, Berlin.

Open Organisations

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The board discussed the possible participation of WMBE to OpenCon Creative Commons, Open Knowledge, Open Education.

EU-policy group

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  • EU-policy group: Dimi will be asked to better communicate about the EU activities. It is felt that the participating Wikimedia chapters are not sufficiently informed about the progress, or the projects. It would be good if Dimi would publish a timeline and decisions.
  • Freedom of Panorama and the new proposed European copyright rules: the board discussed the on-going discussions at EU level regarding the next Copyright EU directive. It is felt that it would be better to write a (national) Position paper for the 3 language communities (or at least for Vlaanderen, and Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles) about the viewpoint of Wikimedia in those matters. The board felt that this may prove to be more effective that contacting individually politicians. Stefano stated we are a (too) young organisation with a certain lack maturity in this matter. He suggested that we still need to learn and we should rather collaborate with other (sister, or other) organisations. It could be dangerous if (uncoordinated/undiscussed) individual viewpoints are wrongly interpreted e.g. in de Kroeg.

Upcoming conferences

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Any other business (AOB)

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  • Wikipedia training or edit-a-thons require access to fast internet. Most institutions have Wi-Fi available, so this is normally OK. An android tablet with a 4G SIM card, Wi-Fi tethering or a specific 'Mobile Wifi' could be an easy (and cheap) solution when institutions do not have Wi-Fi or internet available. The android tablet could also show the possibilities of the Wikipedia App. The board decided not to invest in mobile internet at this stage.
  • For promotional printed material we might need to request a quote from a printer. The board discussed whether the company that printed the initial founding brochures. In addition, the board that it is important to produce high quality PDF versions of all our printed material for easy distribution via our public website. NL Wikipedia training material will be gathered by Geert, Romaine, and Derek.
  • Derek proposed to buy some promotion gadgets. The board proposes to use the existing remaining stuff. The Board also agreed to request more 'goodies' from the WM Foundation directly. They have done this already in the past.

Next meetings

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  • Next board meeting: 2nd half of August 2015.
  • General assembly in October 2015.
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