Wikimania:Expressions of Interest/be-tarask

The Wikimania Steering Committee is seeking expressions of interest from community groups to host the 2024 Wikimania in-real-life. We hope to announce the host location by 1 April 2023 to create learning and collaboration between current and future organizing teams. Continue reading to learn more. The Diff announcement with 2024, 2025 and 2026 venues was published 24th of September, 2023.

Expressions of interest for 2024, 2025, and beyond

Interested community groups do not need to have a venue selected, contracts drafted or sponsors lined up. The Wikimania Steering Committee and Wikimedia Foundation staff are here to help. The points below give some idea of minimum requirements for hosting Wikimania and some of the responsibilities of the hosting team/organization. We will be taking into account various factors about potential sites and hosts, especially the cost, accessibility, security, global rotation of Wikimania, and the strength of the organizing team.

If a group is interested in hosting Wikimania, but may not be ready for 2024, we will consider expressions of interest for 2025 and even beyond, let us know. Kindly consult your community first before making a submission. We discourage a single person expression of interest.

If a region is interested in hosting Wikimania, you can express interest for multiple cities. Submitted entries are placed under Category:Wikimania 2024 expressions of interest.

Графік

• The call for the Expression of Interest remains open from Oct.31 to Dec. 16, 2022 January 8, 2023 CLOSED
• Initial reviews: January 2023
• Second, expanded call with short-listed candidates: February 2023
• Selection announced: March 2023
• Observing and learning with Singapore organizers: April to August, 2023

Патрабаваньні

Rotation

• Keep in mind previous cities and regions
  • We love to bring Wikimedians together in different parts of the world to connect with diverse cultures and local communities, sharing the sum of our knowledge and the magic of Wikimania at different destinations. We also aim to leave a lasting legacy of projects and partnerships wherever we go.
  • We have hosted Wikimania since 2005 in the following locations. It might be time for your region to welcome the world: Frankfurt (Western Europe), Boston (North America), Taipei (East Asia), Alexandria (North Africa), Buenos Aires (Latin America), Gdansk (Central & Eastern Europe), Haifa (West Asia), Washington DC (North America), Hong Kong (East Asia), London (Western Europe), Mexico City (Latin America), Esino Lario (Western Europe), Montreal (North America), Cape Town (Sub-Saharan Africa), Stockholm (Northern Europe), and Singapore (South East Asia).
• We encourage expressions of interest from regions who have not recently hosted Wikimania.

Venue + lodging

• It is ideal for the venue to be close to an international airport and not require extensive travel upon arrival.
• Wikimania should be held in a venue that is reasonably priced and ideally near the lodging and/or with easy transportation options.
• Lodging should be reasonably priced.
• The venue should be able to handle approximately 1000 participants in person.
• In addition to a large auditorium for plenary sessions, the venue should have meeting spaces that can accommodate multiple tracks of events and meetings.
• Nice to have: Meeting space that supports socializing and is close to restaurants :)

Travel and visas

• An easy, accessible visa process is key to international participation.
• This could mean few visa restrictions, accessible electronic visas, or embassies / agencies found in many global cities Wikimedians would be traveling from.

Safety and security

• Personal safety of participants is of highest priority. This means environments welcoming of people’s different identities, expressions, affiliations, races, genders and abilities.
• Freedom of expression; local legislation and government policies should not put any participants at an unacceptable risk due to their activities with the movement.

Alternate locations

• Do indicate the alternate countries and cities you find best to hold Wikimania should an unexpected event happened in the original location.

Facilities + services

• Accessible healthcare infrastructure including medical facilities and well-practiced COVID-19 protocols.
• Plans for a reliable, fast internet infrastructure, especially enterprise grade wireless networks at all Wikimania facilities.

Timeframe

• Wikimania is usually held in July and August.

Organizers

• A core team of local or regional volunteers heavily involved with the Wikimedia movement will be responsible for organizing the conference.
• This team will be supported by the Wikimania Steering Committee, the Wikimedia Foundation, and professional event organizers.

Format

• Seamless virtual integration with in-person components is a high priority for a hybrid conference.
• Wikimedians should equally be able to remotely participate at Wikimania.

Additional

• A goal and vision for how the conference might leverage a project or an issue that is of importance to the hosting team, country or region.
• List any previous experience in hosting events.

List of submitted expressions of interest

2024

• Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
• Dubai, UAE
• Istanbul, Türkiye
• Kigali, Rwanda
• London, United Kingdom
• Mexico or Guadalajara, Mexico
• Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia

2024 or 2025

• Cracow, Poland – selected for 2024

2025

• Nairobi, Kenya - selected for 2025
• New York City, United States
• Paris, France - selected for 2026

The Wikimania Steering Committee

The Wikimania Steering Committee is the steward of the Wikimedia movement’s largest global gathering. We ensure the event remains community-led and community focused. Most of us are past organizers of Wikimania or seasoned attendees, and passionate about what we can achieve when we come together. We will soon put out a call for interested community members to join the committee. Beyond Wikimedia knowledge, we very much welcome event management skills. If bringing Wikimania to life interests you, please let us know.

More information

The social side of our movement

As a distributed, global, socio-technological movement, we have learned over the years how important it is for us to come together – collaborations flourish, communities strengthen, grievances dissolve, and lifelong connections are forged. Wikimania is the largest event of the Wikimedia movement. All over the movement, people are celebrating reconnecting again as the COVID-19 global response has evolved. The last in-person Wikimania was in 2019 in Stockholm. Singapore will be our first in-person Wikimania in four years, and we are all excited for this reunion. You can learn more about how Singapore was chosen as well as ways to take part without traveling, a legacy from the two most recent virtual Wikimanias. If you are interested in hosting the 2024 Wikimania, we’d love to hear from you – you can express your interest on wiki, talk to us, email us at wikimaniawikimedia.org.

A hybrid legacy

When Wikimania 2020 was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, new possibilities had to be explored. In 2021, an international Core Organizing Team was created to host the first ever virtual Wikimania. The virtual format welcomed participation from many newcomers and diverse community groups—particularly people held back by visa requirements, mobility barriers, or travel difficulties—and facilitated multilingual support and live interpretation. You can learn more by reviewing the Wikimania 2021 evaluation report. In 2022, additional hybrid features were piloted with watch parties and various small in-person convenings made possible by grants. We will continue to support virtual and hybrid participation in future Wikimanias.

Singapore, why and how?

When Bangkok was originally chosen as the host of Wikimania 2020, we were excited by the prospects of a regional collaboration– Wikimedia communities in the ESEAP region–hosting the conference. However, Wikimania 2020 was canceled due to the pandemic. When conditions allowed for an in-person Wikimania in 2023, we returned to where we had left: ESEAP. After a risk assessment of potential locations in the region and over the course of multiple calls and on-wiki discussions, the ESEAP community selected Singapore as the host of Wikimania 2023.