Collaboration between WMIN and CIS-A2K

A Joint statement on collaboration between WMIN and CIS-A2K

Representatives from WMIN and CIS-A2K met during the Train the Trainer Workshop that was held in Bengaluru on February 28, 2015.

The meeting was productive and paves the way for a long lasting partnership between the two organizations. It was decided in the meeting that WMIN and CIS-A2K teams shall work closely and contribute to each other’s activities and growth. Following are the points towards collaborative engagement that WMIN and CIS-A2K will work towards:


 * CIS-A2K and WMIN will revive quarterly team hangouts to enable better communication and coordination between them. The meeting that happened on February 28th, 2015 is the first in this series of regular meetings planned.
 * As a first step to signal the collaborative nature of WMIN and CIS-A2K, we will sign a joint MoU with a leading academic institution that will provide access to many language computing tools including OCR. We are already at an advanced stage of discussion.
 * WMIN will work together with CIS-A2K for conducting the proposed MediaWiki TTT in May 2015.
 * Setting up a public calendar to keep all communities, CIS-A2K and WMIN informed about various movement related activities and events.
 * A strategy will be put in place to revive the Bengaluru Wiki Community meetups which were very active in the past. This will be a community led initiative facilitated by CIS-A2K and WMIN.
 * The synergy between the two organizations will also extend beyond Wikimedia domain. For example, close coordination will be seen in Creative Commons India related activities.
 * CIS-A2K team will be working closely with the WMIN team towards developing its next round of FDC proposal.
 * Both CIS-A2K and WMIN acknowledge the role of India Community Consultation 2014 facilitated by WMF that paved the way for better understanding between the organizations.

We plan to keep the community updated about the progress on these agreements. We will also inform when new activities are planned.

We kindly request the community to extend their support for these initiatives.

Thanks.

Released on behalf of Wikimedia India and CIS-A2K.

Bengaluru

March 4, 2015