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Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand

Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand, or WANZ, is an Incorporated Society and registered charity in New Zealand. It serves the user group of Wikimedians who are interested in organising and participating in outreach activities in New Zealand.

Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand

New Zealand
Location New Zealand
Country codeNZ
Approval date17 December 2019
Official language(s)English, Māori
AffiliationsESEAP
WebsiteWikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand

How to join

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Please view our website: Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand

To apply for membership, please fill in our membership application form. We also recommend people join our FB group where we discuss current issues around Wikimedia projects in relation to Aotearoa and share editing tools and ideas. You're welcome to come along to one of our regular meetups as well.

Entitlements and obligations of being a Member of WANZ Inc

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Becoming a member shows you are dedicated to the mission of the global Wikimedia movement and the vision and mission of Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand. Benefits of membership are outlined in this Google document.

Entitlements: Members of WANZ Inc can

  • stand for election to the Committee
  • vote at the AGM
  • apply for funding from Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand to support Wikimedia-related projects.

Obligations: Members must pay an annual membership fee determined at the AGM, currently NZ$5, in order to retain their entitlements as a member. Members can resign their membership at any time.

Members

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Our Vision and Mission

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We are invested in the vision of the Wikimedia Foundation: Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. That’s our commitment.

Our kaupapa | mission is:

  • To support Wikimedia Foundation’s mission in New Zealand: To empower and engage people to collect and develop educational content under a free licence, so it can be shared and reused freely for any purpose
  • To represent New Zealand Aotearoa contributors to Wikimedia projects
  • To provide qualified support to our members and the public
  • To empower our members and support their activities
  • To develop and maintain long-lasting supportive relationships with New Zealand Aotearoa institutions that share the same or similar goals

Our Strategy 2024-2027

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The committee of Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand developed a strategy for 2024-2027 and incorporated feedback from Wikimedia users who are New Zealanders or residents of Pacific islands without an established chapter. The final and accepted strategy can be read using this link.

Bylaws, Constitution, Incorporation and Committee

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Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand Committee

In 2022 Wikimedia User Group of Aotearoa New Zealand members created a Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand Establishment Working Group, developed our bylaws/constitution, and held a community meeting to approve establishing Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand Incorporated ("WANZ Inc") as an Incorporated Society, approve registering the incorporated society as a charitable entity, and elect a committee. That meeting was held on Thursday 17 March 2022. The Incorporated Society was registered on 7 April 2022, and is also now a registered charity. Our officially registered constitution (as at 21 May 2024) (PDF 345KB) sets out our purpose, what we do, and how we operate.

The current committee of WANZ is:

Contact information for the committee: secretary[at]wikimedia.nz

In September 2023 WANZ hired its first part-time staff member, Dianne Skelton, as an Executive Advisor. She can be contacted at info[at]wikimedia.nz.

In October 2024 WANZ hired our second part-time staff member, Sophie Sparrow, as a Marketing and Communications Coordinator.

Application for Chapter status

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WANZ has submitted an application for recognition by the Wikimedia Foundation as a Chapter. The Application for Chapter Status is open for endorsement by community members.

Our Funding

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Wikimedia Foundation General Support Fund

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Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand has applied for and been granted general support funding for our affiliate for the multiyear period July 2023 to June 2026.

2024/25 Budget and Activities

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The funding request to WMF for the 2024/25 year was submitted by 14 March. This plan includes feedback and suggestions we have received from the community about proposed projects and priorities for the 2024/25 financial year. We received funding in mid July.

Other documentation that the committee created to help with this application includes

Useful information from Wikimedia Foundation on funding

Activity: Providing grants to support programmes and activities

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As a registered charity, WANZ gives grants that assist people to engage with the Wikimedia movement, build capability and expand content. We seek expressions of interest for funding of Wikimedia-related projects. Here are some examples we could consider:

  • Conference attendance: If you wish to speak at or attend a conference to promote the Wikiverse and editing, we could consider providing a travel, accommodation, and registration grant to support you.
  • Travel grants: If you have a project that you wish to undertake, but this would involve significant travel expenses, we could consider making a travel grant to support you in undertaking the project.
  • Hosting an event: If you are interested in hosting an event to support the enhancement of content on Wikimedia platforms, or recruiting and supporting new contributors, we could consider making a grant towards associated expenses including venue hire, catering, and travel expenses.
  • Large scale data, image or document management:. If you have an idea for large scale data, image or document management involving manipulation, import and enriching of large volumes of content in Wikimedia platforms, and where no other sources of funding are available, we could consider making a grant towards costs.
  • Wikimedian-in-residence: If you propose to dedicate a substantial amount of time to engaging with an organisation (eg a national or regional cultural organisation), to improve coverage in Wikimedia platforms and recruit other contributors, we could consider making a grant by way of compensation. For this category, we expect that you will be able to demonstrate significant capability and experience across multiple Wikimedia platforms and prior experience as a communicator and facilitator.

If you are considering submitting a grant application please contact Dianne in the first instance, at info[at]wikimedia.nz. She can provide help and assistance in shaping your application for the best chance of success.

Note: as a general principle, we would not directly fund compensation/ time involved in creating / enhancing content in Wikimedia platforms. The Wikimedian-in-residence concept outlined above is an outreach initiative that is intended to increase engagement with institutions and recruit more contributors. It will include creation of content, but this comes about as a direct part of the outreach and engagement.

Register of grants made by WANZ

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A table of grants made by WANZ is available at this link: [1]

Activity: Annual National WikiConference

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Attendees at Aotearoa New Zealand's WikiConference, Auckland 2021

WikiCon 2025 will be held at the Ara Institute in Christchurch from 16–18 May 2025. The organisers include Giantflightlessbirds, MurielMary, and Dianne Skelton.

Activity: Contracting administrative and activity support

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In order to expand beyond the capacity of the volunteer committee we have contracted an Executive Advisor for a 2 year period until 29 August 2025 to assist the committee in progressing work to deliver on the strategic goals of WANZ. The Executive Advisor is Dianne Skelton dianne[at]wikimedia.nz. We have also recruited a part time Marketing and Communications Coordinator. The Marketing and Communications Coordinator is Sophie Sparrow sophie[at]wikimedia.nz.

Activity: Wikipedian at Large

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Each year we fund a 6-12 month Wikipedian at Large, with the term starting 1 March at the latest. This role is a variant of the Wikipedian in Residence, and was first run in 2018-2019.

The Wikipedian at Large role is a roving advocate for Wikimedia platforms and content projects for groups and organisations around a region or even the whole country - a helping hand with outreach and development and supported by WANZ. Like a Wikipedian in Residence, they can work inside an institution to share content, train staff, and run outreach events.

The role moves quickly, doing shorter projects than a traditional Wikipedian in Residence, with the flexibility to involve different groups in different ways.

About the Wikipedian at Large

Activity: Wikimedian in Residence

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This year we are funding a 12 month Wikimedian in Residence position. This grant was awarded to Auckland War Memorial Museum. This role will continue the museum's successful engagement with Wiki projects and will mentor the students selected for the 2024/25 Summer Students programme as well as focussing on community engagement and, seeking collaboration with other GLAM organisations in the Auckland.[1] More information on how this project is developing is on the Auckland Museum GLAM project page.

Reporting back to Wikimedia Foundation

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There are two separate reporting cycles WANZ must deliver. Affiliate reporting and Grant reporting.

Affiliate Reporting

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WANZ was accepted as an affiliate to Wikimedia Foundation effective from 17 December 2019. Our affiliate reporting cycle is now aligned to the fiscal year of July-June to align it with the affiliate funding cycle. Reports are due in 30 July, a month after the recorded fiscal year. The reports are submitted via the Wikimedia Affiliates Data Portal.

Grant Reporting

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The reporting back to Wikimedia Foundation includes financial and business plan reporting is submitted via the Fluxx portal. The latest reports are:

The application and reporting cycle for General Grants is available to view here.

Community Activity Reporting

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The WANZ community completes its own annual community activity reports. These are used to record activities for the year. Members are encouraged to contribute to the annual community report throughout the reporting year. Reports will be completed annually on a July to June reporting cycle.

As we approach the end of the year, we'd love to hear about the projects and events you've been involved in over the past six months. What topics have captured your interest? What initiatives have you contributed to? Sharing experiences not only helps us highlight your work in our Annual Community Activity Report but also showcases your contributions to the wider community. We also use this information to prepare our annual report.

Please take a moment to share your updates via the link below. Your input is invaluable.

2024/25 Current Annual Community Activity Report in Draft

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DRAFT Annual Community Activity Report for July 2024 - June 2025

Past Community Activity Annual Reports

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Communication

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WANZ community members contribute to the Wiki-GLAM newsletter and in Diff blog posts. WANZ also has

Wikimedia Foundation Conferences and WANZ Events 2023

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Meetings

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There are regular meetings around New Zealand including in Wellington, Christchurch, Ara Institute of Canterbury City Campus and online. There are irregular meetings in other cities across the country too.

For more information, please see the relevant pages on English Wikipedia:

Process Documents

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Affiliations Committee resolutions

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History

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There was an attempt to create a local chapter around 2006. One of the goals that drove the formation of this group was to renew a discussion about creating a chapter in the future. Before we can make a chapter, we need to have run a User Group with a range of well-documented activities for two years, so establishing this group was the first step.

From June 2018 to June 2019 Mike Dickison ran activities as the New Zealand Wikipedian at Large. Mike was keen to see a user group start, and created a mailing list of potential members.

A Wellington physical meetup was established on 22 June 2019. This group went online during the first New Zealand COVID lockdown. This resulted in more coordinated communication across New Zealand and an increase in participation in User Group activities.

The user group was formally recognised by the Wikimedia Foundation on 17 December 2019.

2020 Projects and events

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2021 priorities

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The Wikimedia Foundation has asked the User Group of Aotearoa New Zealand to identify which of the movement's strategy recommendations are our priorities for implementation in 2021 and what ideas from the Movement Strategy recommendations respond to our needs and will have an impact in the movement. The aim of prioritization is to create an 18-month implementation plan to take some of the initiatives forward starting in 2021. The 10 recommendations are described here

The attendees of the Aotearoa New Zealand Online Meetup 4 decided on

  • Improve User Experience
  • Invest in Skills and Leadership Development
  • Provide for Safety and Inclusion.

2021 conference / training / GLAM outreach and inclusion events

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In October 2020 the User group started work on developing a forward program of weekend events for 2021. The organising committee are:

There were three WikiCon weekends planned for 2021. The locations were Hokitika in 19-21 March, Auckland in 16-18 July and Wellington in November. For further information please see the WikiCon pages.

Rolling Meeting Notes and action points (Google docs): https://docs.google.com/document/d/15CbPZIxDz-zfx53g2okZ9okBDfYGGIjcaIGfmdEHmSo/edit?usp=sharing

Wikipedia Rapid grant funding report for Auckland WikiCon: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:Project/Rapid/MurielMary/Auckland_Museum_Editathon/Report

Wikipedia Rapid grant funding application for Auckland WikiCon: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:Project/Rapid/MurielMary/Auckland_Museum_Editathon -

Planning document (Google docs) for West Coast WikiCon: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1agm1PwoyHpdu_DGBzt6O7jYrUIdUqnvAJDDgdWA6aes/edit?usp=sharing

Wikipedia Rapid grant funding application for West Coast WikiCon: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:Project/Rapid/MurielMary/Aotearoa_New_Zealand_Wikipedia_20_Event

Wikipedia Rapid grant funding application for Wellington WikiCon:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:Project/Rapid/MurielMary/WikiCon_Wellington_2021

Draft InternetNZ grant application text: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Om6EtOAj2kXw8xd6LGWV1l6EM4D2dE8FNSRPtYLCKGI/edit?usp=sharing

2022 Funding Applications

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Rapid Fund funding application for March 2022

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WANZ sought and was granted rapid grant funding to allow the new board of the incorporated society Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand to run an in person facilitated strategy weekend. The strategy weekend occurred on the weekend of 28/29 May 2022 and was very successful.

General Fund funding grant for 2022/23

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WANZ sought and was granted general support funding for the period June 2022 to June 2023

A Mid Year (due 15 Jan 2023) and End of Year report (due 31 July 2023) was drafted and submitted in the Fluxx Wikimedia Foundation Funds Portal detailing activities, metrics and budget spend. The report refered to the activities documented in the inital application and submited the updated budget with final spend.

Priorities updated for 2022

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  • Consolidate our communication channels into an email database.
An email database has been collated by Giantflightlessbirds. Please contact Giantflightlessbirds to be added to this mailing list to receive a regular User Group newsletter.Einebillion (talk) 02:38, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
A 15 minute timeslot at the Aotearoa Online Meetup has been reserved to discuss User Group business.Einebillion (talk) 02:38, 6 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep organising editathons in Wellington, monthly meetings in Christchurch and provide support for our Auckland editors to start regular meetings in our biggest city.
Established and regular meetups are occurring online and in Wellington, Christchurch and the West Coast. As at 9 April 2022 Auckland is holding its first meeting after a COVID hiatus.
  • Run and document activities for 2–3 years
See section on annual reporting
  • Set up a legal structure
Options described here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KyR_-c02d8UfcMFvxPJkp1u4QKSHWJ2H/view?usp=sharing
Members discussed the proposal to incorporate at the 2021 WikiCons and during the Aotearoa New Zealand Online meetups and agreed that incorporation and registration as a Charity was the priority for 2022.
The advances we've made on creating an incorporated society is detailed in this section.
  • Apply for funding from Wikimedia Foundation that would allow us to cover our running costs including traveling to different cities for appropriate events like book festivals and library conferences where we’d like to promote Wikimedia's projects and WMF mission in New Zealand.
This group has successfully applied for Rapid Grant funding bids for the 2021 WikiCons and project funding bids have been submitted by individual members of this group.
The user group is seeking administrative funding for the period June 2022 to December 2023 from the General Grant Fund. See draft application This funding is intended to pay for costs of administering and advancing the organisation and incorporation of the Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand incorporated society.
  • Find and connect with more active members within the local community
  • We'd also like to reach out to users of te reo Māori and encourage the revitalisation of Wikipedia Māori
  • Eventually, we'd like to create a regular chapter that would serve not only contributors from New Zealand but the whole South Pacific including Niue, Samoa, Cook Islands, Tonga or Fiji. New Zealand has strong ties with the Pacific Islands and it’s widely seen as the main center of the Southern Pacific with large Pacific Island populations living in New Zealand. We'd like our chapter to be no different. This is a big vision for us and we know we have a long way to go, but as editors who have been involved with Wikimedia’s movement for many years, we have learned that with patience and hard, consistent work we can reach our goals.

2022-23 progress

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The WANZ Committee committed to:

  • gathering 15 signatures for the application for incorporation - completed
  • submitting the application to the Registrar of Incorporated Societies - completed
The incorporation of WANZ was approved by the New Zealand Companies Office on 7 April 2022. The constitution is available as a pdf on this website.
  • assembling an application for Wikimedia Foundation funding for the April 2022 round to enable the Society to provide funding for outreach activites and administration purposes - completed
The User Group was successful in seeking a General Support grant from Wikimedia Foundation for operational funds and was allocated funds totalling $NZ 45,754.35 for 2022/23.
  • applying for registration as a charity with Charities Services - completed
The Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand Incorporated society was registered as a charity in New Zealand on 21 April 2022.
  • establishing a bank account for the incorporated society and transferring funds - completed
  • applying for an IRD number with Inland Revenue - completed
  • working with WMF on next steps for organisational name change - progressing
  • reviewing and endorsing a set of Standard Operating Procedures. These SOPs will cover the everyday running of WANZ including things like Role Descriptions for Committee Members, a committment to open and transparent record keeping, comms platform selection etc. - progressing
  • holding an AGM in April 2023 - completed

2022 Events

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2023/24 Funding and Activities

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The 2023/24 funds have arrived in the bank account of the society and is being used to fund the core activities of WANZ.

Activity: Annual National WikiConference

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The national WikiCon for 2024 was held in Auckland over the weekend of 23–24 March 2024. See information about the presentations on the event page.

Activity: Website

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Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand's website is live. We are online at https://www.wikimedia.nz/.

  1. ↑ https://www.wikimedia.nz/wikipedian-in-residence/
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