[OSM-talk] Education and Community Manager @ OSM World

[Frederik Ramm]

Frans,

On 12/10/2011 10:29 PM, Frans Thamura wrote:
> is there community manager or education manager in OSM network?

The OSM project knows no roles like "so-and-so manager". If someone 
wants to e.g. talk to their local schools or government and try to get 
them to use OSM, then what usually happens is the matter gets discussed 
on a suitable (usually local, regional) mailing list and then the person 
just does it.

We do have an "OSM Foundation" to serve as the legal body for some 
aspects of the project (e.g. running the servers). You can become a 
member of OSM Foundation for 15 UK Pounds/year (see www.osmfoundation.org).

The key to success in OSM is a working local, regional, natinal 
community - if you have a community then you can discuss your plans with 
them and come to an understanding about what the best course of action 
could be. OSM functions from the bottom up - first have a community, 
then build other things on top.

This process is not managed in any way; whoever does something good, 
gets to do it. For example, in Germany we have one guy who does all the 
higher-level talking to the various arms of government. Nobody appointed 
him and gave him a business card that says "you are now the 
OpenStreetMap Senior Government Manager for Germany" or so - he just 
does it and because he does it so well, everyone else refers their 
contacts to him.

A vibrant community is essential for this to work because from such a 
community come the ideas, the support, the people to carry forward such 
projects.

A community grows slowly, from people spreading the word, from the 
project slowly getting publicity in the media, from individuals doing 
projects of their own.

We don't have, or need, managers, moderators, or appointed evangelists; 
every OSMer is their own evangelist and you can be too!

If you have good ideas about bringing OSM into education in your 
country, just go ahead - you don't have to ask anyone for permission.

> I am part of OSGeo, which i believe OSGEO-Edu, has been pushed (by me
> in several case), since 5 years ago, and OSGEO just start OSGEO-Edu
> chapter in next FOSS4G, and now setup web conf and virtual meeting
> after see there amazing alot of "things" integrate inside OSM, and
> getting exciting install OSM services here. I believe the OSM++ under
> Education will drive new era of GIS education, which very important in
> esp emerging country.

OSGeo is an organisation that works differently from OSM; it is more 
driven from the head, from people who decide that they want to have a 
XYZ chapter or install an XYZ manager, completely independent of whether 
or not there is a community. This is usually not how OSM works.

> I chated this with Kate, about her LearnOSM, which Kate put under HOT
> umbrella. Education = HOT?

Even though HOT is yet another organisation with different concepts and 
rules, what you describe here is just an example of do-ocracy. In OSM, 
if someone makes something for learning OSM then that's ok, everyone can 
do it and you don't have to found an educational chapter first and 
appoint yourself to a post on that.

> I also discusses with Emir (Kate's team here), about OSM-id community
> program, and "in plan" is the answer.

OSM doesn't "plan" its community. The community just grows by itself. 
OSMF does occasionally make plans for various kinds of outreach but you 
should not expect miracles from anyone. OSM is a do-it-yourself project. 
The community in your country comes from you, and people like you, 
starting something - not from people in Europe or America making big plans.

Bye
Frederik

-- 
Frederik Ramm  ##  eMail frederik at remote.org  ##  N49°00'09" E008°23'33"