Talk:Wikimedia Canada/Archive 2008

Update - bylaws

I've started the process of merging and highlighting the differences between the bylaw drafts. As part of this work, I'm going to obtain a reference non-profit bylaw list to ensure we aren't missing something in the process. This should allow us to complete the bylaw consideration and move onto the process of getting the Group founded. v:User:Historybuff 22:45, 30 January 2008

Integration of French and English

Just wanted to ask if there is a way we could get a better flow going with the French and English on this page. I'm not certain the old style of "break down the middle" is best, but having the French lumped in after the English makes it a bit more difficult to pick out and scan in the page. I know this is being worked on, I just thought I'd ping here to see if we have an ETA for a new design, and if we can do anything in the interim. v:User:Historybuff 05:16, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

I was thinking of something like this. This way, you could select your language at the top. Greeves ^{(talk • contribs)} 00:56, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

...and it also localizes the other text (MediaWiki text) and sidebars. :-) Cbrown1023 talk 02:53, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Another long, long term goal

I was looking over our goals, and was thinking that whenever a day comes that we are registered and WP:1.0 is completed, we should consider a campaign to deliver print copies of WP:1.0, possibly with a Canadian focus, to regions of Canada with poor Internet access. --Arctic.gnome 03:49, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

Talk to government about crown copyright

Since we have 100+ people who say that they are interested in helping in some small way, I wonder if we could organize a petition to the federal government to change their licence on crown copyrighted images to something that we can use in our projects. Currently in countries like the US, many government-owned photos, like official photos of Congressmen, seem to be freely usable. In Canada, on the other hand, the government says that we can use such photos, but are unclear about how they can be used for profit, which makes them hard to licence in commons (I first met Alan.ca in a big debate about that licence). It would be great if we could write up a letter requesting that the copyright status be changed and get our 100+ members to send copies to the relevant federal Minister. This could be done even before Wikimedia Canada got officially registered. --Arctic.gnome 15:44, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

I like that idea. I once spent a week arguing with the Ontario Legislature staff about releasing MPP pictures under GFDL. This is one purpose the WMC could serve, a means for us to organize to resolve Canadian government issues. Alan.ca 02:55, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

And this is why for our bylaws I am proposing a more detailed description of our goals than just "supporting Wikimedia projects". Having a line like "to facilitate the collection of reference material under a free licence in Canada" gives us a mandate to be a leading activists for changing laws to help the free licence projects. I see this as being one of the early missions of our Board. --Arctic.gnome 06:50, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Note, however, the strict limits on political activity that charitable status would bring. Padraic 18:27, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

What limits are those? Surely charities can lobby the government if it helps achieve their aims? Tompw (talk) (en) 18:58, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Nope. Charities cannot engage in political activity. (Note that charitable status and being a non-profit corporation are different things, though). Padraic 20:22, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Canadians

Hello,

There are some active Canadians on fr.wikisource. It might be useful to have some information about WM Canada there. Yann 13:19, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

There are some Canadians across all projects in many languages, what information do you propose we put on all of them? Meta is the place generally used to discuss stuff like this. --Arctic.gnome 15:22, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

People there don't even know that a chapter is in the making. Yann 18:59, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

The French-Canadians wikipedians are beginning to organize a local chapter for Eastern Canada in French, but from my opinion, I think it would be preferable to create a bilingual Canadian chapter in order to include them! Best regards. Antaya 10:03, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree, and once that can be done it should be easy to set up sub-chapters for particular geographic areas. Is there a link to where they are discussing this? Eclecticology 09:54, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

I think it would be easier to join forces, English and French. We started a discussion in French here. You can use Gg translator.

Wikimédia Canada - French contribution

• (English) Hello, I'm very interested to get involved actively in a Wikimedia Canada French version. I don't know where you guys need help, but to start, I can help make this chapter bilingual. In the past, there have been several discussions to create a French-Canadian Wikimédia, including francophones from Quebec, Manitoba, Ontario and New Brunswick. Personally, I think it would be much more efficient to create a fully bilingual Wikimedia instead of creating 2 differents chapters, at least to start ... SO, let me know where I can help translating in order to involve other francophones!

• (French) Bonjour, je suis très intéressé à m'impliquer activement dans un Wikimédia Canada version en français. Je ne sais pas où vous avez besoin d'aide, mais pour débuter, je pourrais aider à rendre ce chapitre bilingue. Dans le passé, il y a eu plusieurs discussions pour créer un Wikimédia Canadien-français, incluant les francophones du Québec, du Manitoba, de l'Ontario et du Nouveau-Brunswick. Personnellement, je crois qu'il serait beaucoup plus efficace de créer un Wikimedia entièrement bilingue que de créer 2 chapitres différent, en tout cas pour débuter ... ALORS, dites-moi où je peux aider à traduire dans le but d'impliquer les autres francophones!

--Antaya 11:25, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Excellent! It would be really sad if we had to break up into two projects. We've been trying to have translated versions of pages when we can, so any other translations you could do would be helpful. Once we finish the bylaws, we'll also need someone to translate them (if you can do French legalese) and to talk to any Francophones who come here with questions. We are also looking into how to ensure regional diversity in the executive, so any opinions about how to make sure we always have francophone representation would be nice. --Arctic.gnome 18:17, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes very sad to break up our forces; the more we are, the best we can be! French Canadians, especially those in Quebec but also in New Brunswick, are very involved in WM-fr projects and their help here is undeniable. So what I did first, I've restructured the French version in order to convince them to take part of WMC... like you've said, ensuring regional diversity is the best way to make this thing happen. Canada is wide!

Now I would also like to restructure the English pages to make them look a little better and updated!... but my English is not that good so feel free to correct my mistakes! For "French legalese", no problem, but I'm not a lawyer; maybe I can get some help from my wikipedian collegues. Have a nice one! Antaya 08:59, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Wikimedia_Canada_logo

These were in images uncategorized as of June 21 2008? I put them in a Category in Commons. Have these ever been voted on? I would like to use one of them on my Wikimedia website. WayneRay 22:15, 10 December 2008 (UTC)WayneRay

I was under the impression that the WMF won't let us use anything other than the official version of the logo. --Arctic.gnome 02:39, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

For the official logo that is probably true but I don't see the problem with using the other logo as well for some things, such as for linking to it from other websites. (This is just my opinion, it may be completely wrong) Anonymous101 18:32, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

This is the first time that I have seen these images, even though they were uploaded last February. I don't know of any vote about them, since it is not clear who would be entitled to vote. WMF would have authority under trademark law to prevent our using their logos or variations upon them, but using entirely new logos is a different matter in the absence of a contractual agreement. For the time being Wikimedia Canada only exists as a dream, so it is in no position to adopt sny logo at all. Discussions about logos may be had, but are mostly premature. If these proposals for a logo are serious, rights to the logo would best be protected by deleting them from Commons until we are incorporated. Eclecticology 08:10, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

What the hell? We never discussed logos that is anywhere close to those on Commons.OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 03:10, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

It was brought up many times at the meetings. But we decided to do as Arctic.gnome said, use the official logo. Cbrown1023 talk 17:00, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

Good! It's too early to talk about logos anyway. I will also be deleting the proposal for a "seal" from the by-laws. It seems to be rooted in a complete misunderstanding about what a seal is. Putting that in would require that someone go out and have one made so that it can be embossed in the margin of the document. Eclecticology 07:22, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm late on that one (and premature), but I think we should use the official logo to avoid any kind of confusion to enactment and for the future. They are beautiful these logos, very creative, but there is no need to confuse other parties somehow. Even if it's premature to talk about this right now, we should use the official logo at anytime and anywhere, even if WMC is not incorporate yet (for instance). This applies also to the logo of Québec sub-chapter; the little flags are nice, but overused and useless in the mean time. Best regards. Antaya 05:56, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

A meeting in January 2009 ?

Hello! I was wondering if it would be useful to do a meeting in January? Is there enough points to be discussed to organize one? The non-official Québec's chapter will have their first meeting at Laval University in Quebec City on January 10th or 17th and I'll be there to see what can we do for WMC. Perhaps, our WMC online meeting would be a good opportunity to discuss the latest proposal-laws, to have a summary of Québec's meeting and also to know each other! Let me know if you are interested. Best ragards. --Antaya 07:01, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I would attend an online meeting. I've suggested that we submit the bylaws to the WMF on February 15, so an online meeting in mid January should let us iron out what we have to get done by then. --Arctic.gnome 20:00, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Same here. I would attend an online meeting. Ktsquare 00:31, 22 January 2009 (UTC)