[Local-chapters] My (very incomplete) summary of the "OpenStreetMap chapters and OSM Foundation meet up" at SotM 2018 in Milano

[Ben Abelshausen]

Hi all,

I would suggest we all share what we are doing on github per chapter:

https://github.com/osmfoundation/lcwg/issues/3

About your two points, my personal views on this, getting people to be
involved beyond mapping:

This is still one the most difficult issues we face, there is no obvious
solution but we have some things that sort of work. Some of this was also
in our SOTM talk.

It helps to make sure people identify with being a member of the chapter,
in our case being a member of OSM Belgium needs to be a positive thing, OSM
needs to be fun! It encourages people to contribute to the organization and
not only the map. We also discuss in the open almost everything we do (and
plan) leading to involvement of the core group as to why for example we are
setting up a local chapter, why we are welcoming all new mappers. The
welcoming for example started with pokémon go and people getting annoyed
with new mappers making mistakes or vandalizing, we turned this into
welcoming everyone doing their first edit and checking their work, there
was an incentive to create this workflow & tools.

In my experience, making a decision in the OSM belgium board like 'we need
to welcome all new mappers' and then expecting someone to do this is not
realistic. When making the decision together that this is the way forward,
the changes of someone picking this up is higher. It also makes things more
sustainable because some feels ownership about what they did.

Other things that work is explicitly invite people to do stuff. We invited
Jonathan to be on our board, we invite people to help with mapathons. Some
people won't step forward on their own so easily as others do, and that's
fine but try to figure out who wants to do more and where there is capacity
to do so.

Another thing is that we think the only way to actually complete and update
the map is to get more core mappers. If you get people to understand that
they are also more willing to contribute. Mapping is thé best thing you can
do, but some people can do one better and get 5 other people to also map.

What also helps is valuing (as in give attention and encouragement to) all
kings of contributions, not just coding or mapping. For example someone
doing workshops on OSM or talking to partner organizations is also very
very valuable. Same for someone doing the boring admin stuff. You will end
up with a proper team with diverse skills, exactly what you need.

On funding, we have just started on this but we are looking at a two key
areas:

- Companies sponsoring: We have a few heavy users in Belgium and government
is also a potential source. We have made and proved our case before that a
good OSM map benefits everyone.
- Donations from individuals: This is already happening but informally, we
want to formalize this.
- Crowdfunding for specific projects: We can use this when we want to do
specific projects, let's say something where we map all cycling paths or
walking networks.

We don't ask for a membership fee but we defined membership as a
responsibility to OSM Belgium. This means you need to do *something* or
your membership will expire unless you explicitly say you want to stay in.
Think voting for the board, coming to meetups... we are still working on
refining this. Everyone should be able to become a member and a membership
fee stops some people before they can get to know us better.

I think this is what we should be sharing more and let's do that via this
list or by documenting what we do with a focus on community building in the
github repo.

Cheers,
Ben

On Wed, Aug 8, 2018 at 11:06 PM Rob Nickerson <rob at osmuk.org> wrote:

> Thanks. And sorry for the delay in my response.
>
> I would be more than happy to share ideas and comments here. But what?
> Which areas are people struggling with? And are there areas where a Working
> Group or Board intervention would help.
>
> For OSM UK the main challenges are finding the volunteer time to commit to
> the local chapter. We have lots of people willing to map, but less willing
> to help with promotion (at least via a central group) and some admin tasks.
>
> Our other main challenge is funds. We are small and have very limited
> funds.
>
> Did any discussion about Micro Grants occur at State of the Map?
> Thank you,
> *Rob Nickerson*
> OpenStreetMap United Kingdom
> https://osmuk.org/
> Follow us @osmuk <https://twitter.com/osmuk>
>
>
> On 2018-07-30 10:31, Raphael Das Gupta (das-g) wrote:
>
> Hi all
>
> As already posted in the SotM 2018 Telegram channel:
>
> Local chapters and other local organizations (or unorganizations) shall
> join local-chapters at openstreetmap.org (this list) at
> https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/local-chapters to coordinate
> and help each other.
>
> Also, local chapters should inform the OSMF (or relevant working group)
> if they feel the board, a working group or the foundation can help with
> something. On the other hand, local chapters feel that by working
> together, they (the chapters) may be able to provide more services and
> infrastructure to the community without overloading the the OSMF with
> things that aren't exactly OSM "core business".
>
> There has been discussion about whether to found a working group in
> which local chapters will coordinate. That shall be futher discussed on
> the local-chapters at openstreetmap.org mailing list.
>
> (Note that the previous "local chapters" working group was about
> defining what a local chapter is and has more or less ceased action once
> that was done and the first chapter had been accepted. Accepting new
> local chapters is not done by that working group, but by the OSMF board.)
>
> Cheers,
> Raphael
>
>
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