[WikiToLearn] Important: 1 hr for helping - WikiToLearn outside Italy

[Carl Symons]

Just saw an article this morning that might interest the wikitolearn team...

http://opencontent.org/blog/archives/4015

Carl

On Monday, October 12, 2015 01:14:12 AM Riccardo Iaconelli wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> first, some good news, Luca has finally managed to create some scripts which
> bring upgrade downtime below the second, and the national press talks of
> us:
> 
> https://www.facebook.com/263066497148006/posts/829880123799971/
> 
> it's not the most accurate article, but it's way more than I expected... and
> a good reference for the future. ;-)
> 
> now, to the real topic of this e-mail... I am really hearing little feedback
> from the non italian community: how are things doing? Or, as a more general
> question, is there anything you feel we should do to improve communication
> from the italian group and spread non-italian initiatives?
> 
> To sumarize the past events, in Italy we've invested a few hours in active
> promotion of WikiToLearn in academical environments and that paid off to be
> a great success: we've today passed the line of 25 active contributors
> (from the 3 of August and 13 of the Sprint)... But I am feeling close to
> zero traction from other countries and languages, even from developers who
> showed a lot of interest. This is a pity!
> 
> From what we've seen the project requires very little promotion work in
> order to kickstart succesfully in an existing community, but the local
> presence is *essential* for this to work. One hour talking to the right
> person will multiply to many hours of work on the content, but we must
> invest in the initial communication. Concretely speaking, it's usually just
> a matter of getting people to contribute/publish their ALREADY existing
> material, or explaining the WikiToLearn philosophy to interested students
> (either personally, or by posting on facebook groups where they meet, or
> similar communication channels...).
> 
> I want to change this: for my part I am willing to spend all the necessary
> time to ensure we can promote WikiToLearn efficiently in non-italian
> environments, including mentoring, producing artwork, or anything else I can
> help you guys with. But for this to work YOU are essential, with your
> attention and (existing or potential) contacts.
> 
> We built an amazing momentum, and we must be careful not to loose it. I have
> seen some competing efforts starting from commercial entities, who are
> moving in a direction similar to ours, but without the freedom aspects. It
> is important not to loose the time battle, in order to bring together
> convenience AND freedom. This is *the* time to push on the accelerator to
> make sure knowledge gets produced and consumed in the open and under free
> license.
> 
> It is for this reason that I would like to ask you, just once and when it
> suits you best, one hour of your KDE time in the next couple of weeks, to
> simply look into this topic. Send an e-mail, or get an initial contact, even
> with one person, but with whoever you think might be more interested. We
> are more than 50 in this mailing list, that means 50 hours of promotion,
> more than we've done here in Italy. By just this little action you will do
> an immense job for our common cause. If you need any kind of help... please
> speak, we're all here to help each other, and I will personally support you
> as much as I can! :-)
> 
> Bye,
> -Riccardo
> 
> P.S. CC'ing Carl as this mail answers a couple of questions he had for the
> dot article...