Wikimania 2009/Bids/Karlsruhe/Q&A

Wikimania 2009 official bids:
Brisbane - Buenos Aires - Karlsruhe - Toronto
Questions and Answers:
Brisbane | Buenos Aires | Karlsruhe | Toronto

This page is for questions and answers from the Jury and the public to the Karlsruhe bidding team, to follow the presentation meeting February 3.

Chapter support?

Is this bid officially supported by a local chapter (or future chapter)? Angela 03:46, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

This bid is not yet officially supported by Wikimedia Deutschland e.V. But it will.

In Karlsruhe we have a society called "Bildungsverein Region Karlsruhe", that supports Wikis and that works on this bid. --Kawana 17:19, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Number of people involved?

How many people are actively working on this bid? Has there ever been a meetup of Wikimedians in this city? If so, what is the average number of attendees? Angela 03:46, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

On this bid work about 10 people in Karlsruhe and some remote.

A first meeting is sheduled for February 7th 2008. We have 9+10 registrations. This weekend we have Carnival in Southern Germany. --Kawana 17:19, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Expenses and budget

Rough outline of budget

I know it's way too early to make fair estimations etc, but could you give a rough outline of the expected budget? What order of magnitude do things cost, what do you expect for the exchange rates to happen, how much money do you expect to collect from local sponsors etc. Would you expect to be able to cover all local expenses with local income? Effeietsanders 21:37, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

The conference will be about 150.000 US-$ and will be covered totally by local income.

This is calculated in Euro, I don't know about US-$, but I don't care. --Kawana 07:05, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Does this budget include sleeping, scholarships, food etc? And you say it is in Euro, but at the same time, you mention the USD as a unit. As it currently differs a factor 1,5 , could you please clarify? :) Effeietsanders 13:14, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

This budget does not include sleeping, it does not include the costs everybody has outside the conference. It does include all the costs we have during the conference including lunch, coffee and the social events.

Our calculation is based on Euro. I converted it in US-$ last week, the factor between US$ and € will differ until August 2009 significantly, but it will be stable within €urope, that's why I don't care for US$s future (maybe the word "future" is missing in my first statement).

It will covered locally in Euro. --Kawana 20:29, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Cost of attendance

How much will it cost the average participant to attend? You can leave out travel costs, since those vary, and distinguish between lodging (with a range) and conference fee (with a range that depends on sponsorship). +sj | help with translation |+ 03:46, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

The conference-fee should be less than 100 US-$ (and free on request). Giving all for free will give us to many no-shows. But we can and will discuss this with you and/or WMF.

Lodging will be between 20 and 300 US-$ per night.

Spending money starting at 10 US-$ per day should be okay, if you don't enter the shopping centres near by.--Kawana 07:05, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

there's a huge difference between 20 and 300 USD. Could you please indicate whether it is a we-dont-know-yet it will be in that range, or is it that the cheapest will be 20 USD and the more luxurious will be 300? Effeietsanders 08:47, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

There is no limit for luxury. We will offer rooms in this range. We have no rooms booked right now. I don't get your point.

Let me try an other answer:

A normal price today for 2-star-hotel is about 60 US-$. --Kawana 15:16, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

My main point was, whether the 20-300 would be for every user (ie I would have to pay maybe 300) or that the 20 is for the "poor" people who want to be ok with a non-luxureous room etc, and 300 for the people who want a luxureous room :) Do you reasonably expect any reduction is expectable, is there any dorms-like institution (like there was the Haus der Jugend in Frankfurt)? Effeietsanders 17:41, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

You can choose what ever you like. And yes, we had dorms-like institutions for the LinuxTag in Karlsruhe, and we will try to have them at the Wikimania 2009 too. It's easy to book a conference-hall and some hundred hotel-beds, we did this already.

But it's a bit more complicated to book dorms-like institution for a maybe-event. But they will be available. --Kawana (as 84.163.220.137) 19:40, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

special rates

Please define what these notes from the bid means

1. special rates for public transport (should be)
2. special rates for 350 bicycle to rent

• The special rate for public transport is „free“ – your conference-ticket will be your ticket. --Kawana 07:05, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
• We don't have an offer for the bicycles yet. Standard fee is 4 US-Cent per Minute or 10 US-$ per day. --Kawana 07:05, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

airfare

How much will airfare cost, roughly? See other bids for an example of how to present rates to Karlsruhe from major transportation hubs nearby. +sj | help with translation |+ 03:49, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

done. --Kawana 15:07, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

I've done an update for Berlin and Paris. Using the train is more expensive than using an airplane. Don't ask me why. But I love to travel with trains and added Karlsruhe#Train without prices. --Kawana 12:30, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

Local vs international visitors

What visitors ratio do you aim for and/or do you expect with regard to whether they are coming from "local" (please answer for various definitions of local if appropriate, ie your province, country, continent) vs "interlocal" visitors? Do you plan to focus in your program (partially) on the local visitors, for instance with language, speakers, subjects? Effeietsanders 21:40, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

We have no ratio planed. The conference is in English. We try to give all local informations for the vistiors in English, French, Spanish and German.

If there are requests for workshops in Dutch, Chinese or any other language, we can offer rooms for this. --Kawana 07:14, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Of course you've not got ratio's planned, but I assume you can make an estimate whether the conference will mainly be popular by people from Karlsruhe area, by other Germans, by EU citizens or maybe more people from outside EU? Please try to make (very) rough percentages. It makes quite a difference for the character of the conference if it is attracting 10% Germans or 90% (in the latter case I could for instance imagine to have one full track in German?) Effeietsanders 08:50, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

we discussed this.

25% from Germany, 40% from Europe and 35% from outside Europe. --Kawana 19:11, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Travel scholarships

In the past, Wikimania has offered a number of travel scholarships to community members from around the world. Have you thought about how this would ideally work for a Wikimania in Karlsruhe? Have you made efforts to identify sources for similar scholarships for this event, particularly from local and national organizations? +sj | help with translation |+ 22:35, 13 February 2008 (UT

It's to early to make agreements on scholarships for an potental event 2009. But we have ideas whom to ask at local organizations and we have an local chapter of Wikimedia in Germany as an contact for national and european sponsors. --Kawana 07:14, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Rough timeline

What elements of the preparation and setup do you already know have a timeline component, and what is this timeline? What are the first things that will have to be settled? How far out will you need room counts, deposits for any reservation or rooms, &c? What other major events do you expect to be taking place around the same time as Wikimania? +sj | help with translation |+ 22:34, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

The Konferenzzentrum has to be booked about two years before the event and is therefor already booked.

There is no detailed timeline for the event itself, it will be motivated by the Wikimanias we already have seen and the Wikimania 2008.

Right now, we don't know about any large events, that will take place in 18 months.

The ICM is in 17 months, I know the planing team, they work since last summer for this international conference. --Kawana 07:23, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Visas

For those countries that do require a visa for traveling to Germany, what can you tell us about the process? How expensive is this, how long does it take, how does one go about getting the visa? To what extent does this vary by country of origin? --Michael Snow 17:06, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Visa is about 30 € (about 45 US-$ at time of writing). For detailed informations please see the federal foreign office on Visa regulations--Kawana 19:13, 1 March 2008 (UTC)