Hi Tom,
I'm feeling good as I just had a press release from Monmouth County Council and I made the point that it was "Wikimedia UK" they were partnering with - and we should be mentioned. I agree that John Cummings comment is spot on. He isnt a Wikipedia old lag but quite a new Wikipedian. He is the only wikipedian as far as I know in Monmouth. We are going to try and pull off an amazing stunt of taking one Wikipedian and creating 1,000 QR codes in a town that has no other known editors. John cannot do this .... Monmouth and Wikimedia UK can.
Lots of coverage to day from The Next Web et al, BBC Wales Radio and TV and we're on Radio 4 next week. We also have "promises" of longer features. My own target is that we get a TV programme out of this. The story "broke" because John got a bit published in the Monmouth Beacon and the press ran with it. I'm not surprised, this a "meme" of an idea.
The project has not been hidden but I guess it has not occupied much board time as the idea is so simple and everyone I've spoklen to just says "got it .... lets do it". The only investment so far has been persuading "the town" that they want to do it..... and we have had no one say No, nearly everyone has said "yes ... how can we help". We have had a few who wanted to think about it, but we made it clear that this wasn't an option. We already have a university, several societies, 2/3 museums, councillors and civic societies etc committed. Initial funding is agreed.
This is a great chance for Wikimedia UK to show what it can do. It would be great if some of our members searched out some Monmouth articles or looked at the Monmouthpedia project pages and started helping. I would request however that people resist giving "a quick lesson in what you are doing wrong" to a newbie until we have helped them four of five times.
Anybody got some time to assist? It would be great to demonstrate how we collaborate to create something better then any of us can do alone.
I'm (desperately) hoping someone surprises me
Roger
On 30 December 2011 16:10, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton@gmail.com> wrote:_______________________________________________http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-south-east-wales-16359364
I've just seen this article. I'd somehow missed this is the planning stages (I was vaguely aware of some discussion about qr codes, but hadn't realised anything had progressed this far) - it looks like a great idea.
It's a good article too, I particularly like the quote from John about being told he should implement his idea himself - that's exactly the attitude wmuk should have and we should make everyone aware of that.
The only thing I don't like about the article is that it makes it sound like a Wikipedia project, rather than a Wikimedia UK project. It's not a big deal, but we should try and get the chapter's role more emphasis.
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--Roger Bamkin
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