[Wikimediaau-l] Fwd: Wikimedia Australian set-up

Tue Jun 27 01:46:24 UTC 2006

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Con Zymaris <conz at cyber.com.au>
Date: 27-Jun-2006 11:43
Subject: Re: Wikimedia Australian set-up
To: Brianna Laugher <brianna.laugher at gmail.com>

> As I mentioned on Wednesday I'm one of a bunch of people interested in
> starting an Australian branch of Wikimedia (
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Australia ). The Wikimedia
> Foundation ( http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Home ) runs Wikipedia
> as well several sister projects: Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikibooks
> (textbooks), Wikisource (public domain source texts), Wikinews,
> Wikimedia Commons (media repository) and Wikispecies. The Foundation
> is based in the US but has branch chapters set up in the UK and
> another half-dozen odd European countries. The German one has been the
> most successful, selling DVDs and creating partnerships with
> organisations willing to donate content.
>
> So we are interesting in promoting the WMF in particular and wikis
> more generally in Australia. My personal interest in setting up an
> Australian branch was to gain tax deductability status for Australian
> donations made to WMF, but it appears that's difficult at best. We are
> interested in promoting wikis in education (I noticed Open Source
> Victoria is, too!). We would also expect to act as a port of call for
> local press comments about Wikipedia.
>
> At the moment there is a couple of dozen people interested, with
> varying levels of interest. We are enthusiastic but somewhat at a loss
> as how to proceed, for example what kind of legal structure we
> require, if it's important which state we register in and how that
> affects our fundraising capabilities, committee structure, etc. A
> majority of our would-be members are in Victoria, but we are not
> adverse to basing ourselves elsewhere if it proves cheaper/less
> red-tape/more useful.
>
> Anyway I am certain you have some more experience in these matters
> than I do, or at least know people who do, and I would certainly be
> grateful for any advice you or they could offer at this juncture. :)
>
> Thanks, and cheers,
>
> Brianna Laugher

Righto. Here's my suggestion.

Figure out exactly what it is that you want to accomplish and what is
possible to accomplish - these aren't the same thing necessarily ;-)

If it's mostly one of co-ordination and of evangelism, you don't need a
legal body to achieve this. OSV is not a legal entity, per-se.

If you want to do more, then you might need to incorporate. This isn't
trivial and would cost $1,000 or more, plus an annual fee for financial
paperwork submissions to ASIC etc. OSIA, due to its requirements, is a
non-profit corporation, using this model.

I recommend you go light and easy, first up. Only invoke more
heavyweight machinery when you are absolutely sure you need its value.

You can do a great deal with just a loose affilliation of like-minded
people.

Cheers,

Con Zymaris

- CEO, Cybersource Pty. Ltd.
- Director, Open Source Industry Australia, Limited.
- Convenor, Open Source Victoria (A Government-funded industry cluster.)
--
___________________________________________________________________________
Con Zymaris <conz at cyber.com.au> Level 4, 10 Queen St, Melbourne, Australia
Cybersource: Australia's Leading Linux and Open Source Solutions Company
Web: http://www.cyber.com.au/  Phone: 03 9621 2377   Fax: 03 9621 2477