[Foundation-l] Fundraising ideas - using what we've already got

Wed Jun 7 15:51:09 UTC 2006

On 6/7/06, Brianna Laugher <brianna.laugher at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 08/06/06, GerardM <gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Hoi,
> > What would be really cool if we can make a contest out of creating
> > these pictures. When we want to provide pictures in certain categories
> > for EVERY country, we can use it to stimulate interest in these
> > countries.. when the "enemy" has a face, it becomes more like a
> > "friend".
>
> Hm... Featured Pictures is already quite a contest, and not such a
> friendly one. God forbid you nominate yet another sunset. :) I am not
> sure that encouraging generic-type images is such a great idea. It
> tends to be better if we have images created for a specific purpose,
> that happen to be beautiful and awesome and wallpapery.

Why are they such a fierce contest? Probably because there are only so
many days in a month. We have precious little material illustrating
many countries. And when we get great quality expressive pictures, not
necessarily beautiful and wallpapery but certainly awesome it will
stimulate the articles we are lacking. Yes, there is some notion of an
article on every locality in the USA but do we have the same for Iran
of the Ivory Coast?

> Or if you mean encourage it just for specific countries, that's
> probably a good idea (save half a dozen countries which are probably
> already overrepresented).

When we have a contest and we exclude the Netherlands, the USA or the
UK we will have many people call foul. The rules of the contest can be
such that the photos that we have are part in a category are part of
the quality demands for a winning picture. When we have many GREAT
pictures for the USA, the price winning pictures have to truly add
something that was not there before...

> > Even when a contest costs us money (a T-shirt a Certificate with the
> > name of the photographer and the picture on it) it also helps us raise
> > awareness of Commons. When we make this an anual event it will only be
> > bigger next year.
>
> CafePress also does prints. We have some amazing panoramas that would
> go perfectly on your corporate boardroom wall.... or your parents'
> hallway.
>
> Didn't Wikimania have several photo competitions last time, or was
> that something else? Is Wikimania doing that this year?
>
> Also I don't know if cash is even necessary - we're talking about
> wikicontributors, after all. Prestige and bragging rights tend to be a
> big drawcard.

Bragging rights, do you have a T-shirt saying that you are a winner of
the Wikimedia Photo challenge? A T-shirt does not cost much but it can
be a really attractive item. I would only talk prices as in money when
a sponsor takes up the tab.

Thanks,
    GerardM