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ESEAP Hub/Meetings/9 January 2021

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ESEAP Virtual General Meeting # 5

January 9, 2021 (Saturday) 02:00 UTC - 03:43 UTC
Moderator: Butch & Gnangarra

Topics

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  • Legal team introduction and Q&A on 2 Auxiliary topics (FOP & Legal Aid on Safety)
  • Regional Hub

Participants

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  1. Allison Davenport (WMF Legal)
  2. Stephen LaPorte (WMF Legal)
  3. Kaarel Vaidla (WMF Strategy)
  4. Mehrdad Pourzaki (WMF Strategy)
  5. Sakti Pramudya (WMF Partnerships)
  6. Ramzy
  7. Alex
  8. Athikhun
  9. Bel
  10. Biyanto
  11. Butch
  12. Dimas
  13. Dody
  14. Gnangarra
  15. Hillun
  16. Ivonee
  17. Jojit
  18. Johnny
  19. Kevin
  20. Kartika
  21. Jamie
  22. Michael
  23. Nazhan
  24. Rahmi
  25. Raisha
  26. Syohei
  27. Takashi
  28. Takeshi
  29. Vanj
  30. Wafiq

Notes

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Intellectual property laws and situations in this region

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  • Stephen: His role on Intellectual property & legal
  • Allison : Law reviews
  • In the Philippines, protecting intellectual property was difficult but has been promoted in recent years. A lot of deadcopy images have been taken down (from where?).
    • Legal does not directly comment on project copyright decisions but we are happy to attend or help prepare for copyright office meeting legal@wikimedia.org
    • Continue the discussion on email.
  • Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) requires member countries to have common IP laws (for copyright protection, 70 years after author’s death) and not all ESEAP countries are members.
    • [Note] Current TPP member countries: NZ, AU, SG, Brunei, Malaysia, VN, Japan, Canada, MX, Peru, Chile.
  • Berne convention has been signed by 177 countries and defines the minimum copyright protection duration as 50 years, but most countries have extended it to 70 years. Universal Copyright Convention set it 25 years but has been signed by only 100 countries.
  • Can legal support other languages, description in english please to assist legal in understanding? Yes
  • Malaysia laws not upto date to how WMF works with a grey area.
  • ok to work in the grey area, keep an eye out when they are closing.

Hubs discussion

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  • Question regarding the formality of setting up the hub.
  • The concept of ESEAP hub is rather developed.
  • Overall the conversations are open.
  • Examples from other areas
  • Iberocoop does a mapping work
  • Europe is starting with exchange project
  • It all depends what are the needs and expectations of the ESEAP
  • It might make sense to try out some of these functions before moving ahead with formal registering to see what makes sense.
  • Decide the function first and then discuss formalization and if an entity is needed
  • There could be a resource person or it could be multiple affiliates coming together
  • Functions to decide between: Community development, governance and legal, capacity and skill development, communication, events, etc.
  • From legal perspective establishing an entity is an expensive process, it costs both time and money, mostly volunteer time spent is notable
  • Action and need first, then structure to fit that
  • Situations that may need an entity may arise from taking on larger financial activities (e.g. bank account for resourcing, employees, etc.)
  • An option is to consider fiscal sponsorship through existing organizations
  • Establishing charters and agreements, including shared goals as multiple organizations - group charter or MOU that can be repurposed and used for the ESEAP region
  • Here is the template Memorandum of Understanding: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meta:Partnerships_%26_Resource_Development/Memorandum_of_understanding_sample_template It's usually used for partnerships with external organizations, but with some creativity you may be able to use it for establishing an effort among Wikimedia organizations.
  • Question regarding the support from WMF to the hub and ESEAP collaboration.
  • E.g. one of the plans is to increase community capacity, which is expensive in an insular region
  • At the moment we are understanding priorities for the whole movement and planning and budgeting around that. Hubs is a very popular concept and therefore we are looking into resourcing that.
  • The ESEAP hub is an interesting proposal that could facilitate collaboration. There is a good value proposition.
  • It probably doesn’t make sense to establish all the hubs at once, but rather in “batches” so we can learn from them and adapt for the second iteration so energy and resources are being invested in the right way
  • Overall the Foundation is committed to responding to needs, especially to support collaboration in the communities
  • It would be helpful to understand (1) function, (2) planned activities in the near future, (3) what are the resource needs, from the Foundation and the affiliates, (4) and what will the workload be like, and (5) what is the price tag for the planned activities
  • The above will be planned into the Foundation’s annual budget and as these proposals are being planned, we can estimate what they are
  • What are the hubs that need only backbone support and others that need a more significant investment
  • Some hubs can be self-sufficient based on the existing resources of the affiliates - no need for external funding, but rather reorganizing how they work together, more about peer support
  • Other hubs there might be need for added support and compensation - define what you are doing and what the needed resources are, what are the planned initiatives
  • Possible functions / needs
  • What are the other experiences that could be used for the hub?
    • E.g. peer-to-peer exchange is one of the things, but what are the activities
    • Helping smaller language communities and supporting them in areas where they lack skill sets, e.g. funding applications.
    • Seek out specific help where it is needed
    • Sharing success stories and making use of lessons learned as there are many commonalities in the region
  • Example of a cross-cultural project “Reading Wikipedia in the classroom”
  • Good to have cross-cultural project that is scalable from one country to another, i.e. possible to pilot it in other countries following the initial pilot
    • Example from chat: I'm thinking of Heritage Asia or Vintage Asia community project Mehrdad. Like documenting heritage culture that seems to vanish due to modernization. We started an activity putting up Philippine heirloom/ heritage recipes on Wikicommons and Wikibooks. And we wish to expand it to other areas of heritage culture not only in the PH but across other countries.
  • There is interest in establishing partnerships with affiliates in the region. It would be helpful in ensuring that there is a proper counterpart for partnerships in the region.
    • E.g. global corporations that are operating in the different countries in the region can have the direct connection with the hub, instead of working with different affiliates in the region
  • It could also possibly help the countries that don’t have affiliates, e.g. Cambodia, Papua-New Guinea. It is dependent on the capacity building and could happen through the hub.
  • Question to different countries / communities - what is the role of ESEAP and the hubs and how is the local community's reception on it?
    • Japan - no chapter and small community in Japan. An example of finding Wikipedia in university and a request for Wikipedian in residence in the university library and having a course on Wikipedia in the library, however it was rejected.
    • Taiwan - Looking for cooperation with others as it has been done previously with Wikimedia Indonesia. There are new people joining the Taiwanese community and it would be good to know what can be learned from others.
    • Hong Kong - More cooperation in cross-regional activities and fostering smaller and indigenous languages communities to have them gain visibility. More support to the communities in governance and capacity building.
    • Australia - Aware of the ESEAP and keen to help the region. Probably not so many needs from the hub, but happy to support the regional collaboration.
    • Malaysia - Community has developed with collaboration in mind. Have met up with Singapore, Indonesia and Thailand. Every aspect of work is always about regional collaboration. At the same time there is pessimism regarding what can be done. Promotion and outreach (to editors and partners). Doing more outreach locally and as the community grows there is more support available also to collaboration and hub.
    • Philippines - Very diverse country and so it is difficult to represent the whole community. Wikimedia Philippines forked into many groups. Personally readiness to collaborate with anyone who is interested in partnership. Experience in edit-a-thons.
      • Example of publishing information of the work done in the Philippines in a journal in Taiwan. This only happened because of help from Wikimedia Taiwan.
      • Purpose of the particular discussion feels to be discussion on the regional level. It is not so much about the cost, but rather the impact.
      • E.g. advocacy - Any kind of chapter intervention is not going to be helpful, because professional legal support needs.
      • It would be possible to have a functional secretariat that could handle the matters beyond the scope of the affiliates.
      • Comparing notes is not accomplishing much, which can happen on an inter-affiliate level. That is why a higher body is needed.
    • Indonesia - ESEAP has been a valuable resource for going forward with the work. For next steps of intellectual property issues the next step probably is to look into a network of professionals. It might be useful to have an ad hoc working group for this.
    • Thailand - Having an ESEAP regional hub leads to more collaborations and engagements among affiliates. It means we are moving forward as one in the same direction towards the same goals.
  • ESEAP should be a safe and comfortable place for Wikimedians to share their thoughts. There are many different languages in the region and there is a language barrier. ESEAP should manage the language barrier to nurture the collaboration. Many contributors have thoughts and they are hesitant to participate, because they are not confident enough, because of language skills.
  • ESEAP hub could function as a lobby group for legal issues like Freedom of Panorama. It could also be representative for community voices in the Wikimedia Foundation.
  • Hub can create the feeling of belonging and also a platform for learning from each other. It could also provide technical skills building.
  • There seems to be general agreement of developing the general idea.
  • Demonstrated value of the ESEAP regional collaboration. Also some of the needs have been highlighted.
  • Perhaps it would be helpful to have a basic survey put forward some of the functions that have been shared.
  • There will be one follow-up discussion for hubs on the global level, so ESEAP could enter that conversation with preparatory work.
  • Deciding between 23/24 January or the weekend of 30/31 January.
  • If there are follow-up conversations regarding legal questions, don’t hesitate to reach out.
  • What will the change be? ESEAP has existed informally and has had high and low activity times. What would having a hub change? This also depends on the functions that will go forward.
    • The legal aspect seems to be a high need, e.g. professional support, safety
    • Capacity and skills development on different levels is another area that is coming up - something more structured
    • Partnerships to develop them at a regional level
  • Options to collect community input and validate:
    • Collective work, e.g. in a Google Doc or Jamboard
    • Survey
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