Talk:Meetings/2009-05-05/Agenda
Notes for the meeting on HMRC charity rejection. From the CC website:
"just giving people information is not necessarily educating them. The key is whether it is provided in such a way (however structured) that it is capable of educating them, rather than just adding to factual information. This is a difficult distinction"
Charity Commission already recognises "museums, galleries, libraries, scientific institutes as "advancing education" because:
"The provision of factual information in a library is capable of being education because, in that case, the information forms part of a structured arrangement of accessible resources for broader educational activities"
See page 10
Can we get evidence of people using accessing Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects for broader educational activities?? AndrewRT 15:38, 3 May 2009 (UTC)
- If they are recognising museums and galleries, we could bolster our involvement in Commons and whatnot, especially through "Wikipedia Loves Art" and similar activities. Libraries fits into Wikibooks (which has some very educational material). We *need* to use our involvement with the sister projects to our advantage here. --Skenmy 12:26, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
- I'm not sure to what extend that will help. We need to prove ourselves to be *entirely* charitable. That some of the things we do are charitable isn't enough. I think writing a free encyclopaedia (and supporting the writing of such) is educational. An encyclopaedia article is far more than just a list of facts. Writing a sports almanac would not be educational, writing an encyclopaedia is. We need to get HMRC (and CC) to realise that. Some of the sister projects are probably more of a problem than Wikipedia - I'm not sure Wikinews, any perhaps Wiktionary, are charitable. They would certainly be a more difficult case to argue than Wikipedia. --Tango 14:06, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
- Point taken, Skemny, although I would second Tango's response that we need to be exclusively charitable. I think in practice people reading our application are going to zero in on the projects that are most widely known which they have heard of themselves. We can't ignore Wikipedia and I think we'd be making a mistake if we tried to go down that route. Having said that, using examples from outside Wikipedia - as you said, Commons, WikiBooks, Wikiversity - would, I think, be a good idea. AndrewRT 16:58, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
- I'm not sure to what extend that will help. We need to prove ourselves to be *entirely* charitable. That some of the things we do are charitable isn't enough. I think writing a free encyclopaedia (and supporting the writing of such) is educational. An encyclopaedia article is far more than just a list of facts. Writing a sports almanac would not be educational, writing an encyclopaedia is. We need to get HMRC (and CC) to realise that. Some of the sister projects are probably more of a problem than Wikipedia - I'm not sure Wikinews, any perhaps Wiktionary, are charitable. They would certainly be a more difficult case to argue than Wikipedia. --Tango 14:06, 4 May 2009 (UTC)