Joint Mozfest session/Open Day proposal

Proposal for an “open day”

One of the outcomes from the session at Mozfest (involving WMUK, Mozilla, Creative Commons, OKF and others) was a commitment to work more closely on a variety of initiatives and products that can serve to develop greater connections and relationships between our various volunteer communities. These will be explored in greater detail over the coming months.

These ideas included establishing an open day for groups working in the open space where we can bring together various volunteer communities (and staff from the relevant organisations) for a series of presentations / workshops where attendees can explore the projects and activities of the various groups. This should lead to the development of collaborative projects across communities, including finding areas of similar interest. This would also help to avoid duplication of efforts and encourage greater integration of data and resources across various projects and platforms.

This seems a sensible project to take forward first as this in itself would make other, further collaborations much easier to facilitate.

A sensible time frame within which to propose the event is around April in order to bridge the gap between MozFest and OKF Festival. The event could be held in London and may also offer an opportunity to road-test some of the things that are being planned for Wikimania and the OKF Festival.

The event would feature a series of presentations from volunteers and staff of several open-related organisations. There would also be workshops and themed break out sessions on issues that have an influence in the open space.

It is anticipated that one day for the event would be sufficient for enough workshops and presentations to provide the essence of the work, motivations and objectives of the various communities. However, it may be that two days would allow for things to develop at a more leisurely pace.

If there is a clear appetite for this event to take place then there should be a deeper discussion about costs, funding, location, timing and programme. I look forward to a constructive discussion of this proposal.