[WikiFR-l] Re: Mirror of French WP in Paris

Mar 11 Nov 19:15:56 UTC 2003

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Hi Jimbo,

Le Tuesday 11 November 2003 14:27, Jimmy Wales a écrit :

> > Following my demand, the Ouvaton cooperative has offered to host a read
> > only mirror of the French Wikipedia in Paris with a budget of 1000 euros
> > for a year in hardware and bandwidth.
> > Ouvaton is a cooperative of webmasters. It exists since 1999 and has
> > about 2000 members now. cf. http://www.ouvaton.org
> >
> > For that it is necessary that a non profit organisation to be set up in
> > France (or in Europe).
>
> Why is this necessary?  Couldn't ouvaton.org simply host the site for
> us, without a new organization? 

Yes, it is possible for the Wikimedia foundation to be legaly responsible for 
a French mirror hosted at the Ouvaton cooperative.

> What would be required for the
> existing Wikimedia Foundation to register as a French nonprofit, or to
> setup a French affiliate organization.

Set up a French non profit is very simple. You need three people (a president, 
a secretary and a treasurer), to draft some status (many exemples are 
available on the Net) and to pay about 25 euros for registration. I have done 
this already several times.

> > * special links between this French law organisation should have with the
> > Wikimedia foundation;
>
> The Wikimedia Foundation owns all rights to the 'Wikimedia' and
> 'Wikipedia' trademarks, and it is going to be best if this new
> organization is fully 100% under the control of the parent
> organization.  This does not preclude local organization and control
> to an extent, but the Wikimedia Foundation must be the decision maker
> of last resort.
>
> This is necessary to prevent a split in the future that would be bad
> for the project.

I agree totally with that. It just needs to be mentioned in the status.
And the status could mention that you would be ex officio member of the French 
non profit as the founder of Wikipedia.

> I personally think that the idea of a mirror in
> Europe is not a very helpful one, from a technical point of view.  I
> can explain why if you want.

Yes, please.

> On the other hand, I am willing to provide one, at my own expense, if
> it is the consensus of Europeans that it would be a good thing.

The Ouvaton cooperative said that they will provide one.

> > A non profit organisation in France or in Europe could also help to
> > receive tax deductible donations and to ease money transfers.

> Yes.  I would imagine that it's not that difficult to setup an
> affiliate organization there.

> In the U.S., we have Alex who has volunteered to act for free as our
> lawyer, and he is helping me finalize all the bylaws for the US
> organization.  Can you help me look for a French or European lawyer
> who can do the same over there?

Yes, I can, but it is usually not necessary to set up a French non profit.

> --Jimbo

Regards,
Yann

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