User:Rtnf/LCCWG

From OpenStreetMap Wiki
Jump to navigation Jump to search

The Local Chapters and Communities Working Group (LCCWG) is tasked with :

  • finding and implementing ways for the Foundation to support the growth of local communities
  • facilitate a global exchange of ideas and support among Local Chapters and communities
  • potentially encourage established communities to further organise themselves and eventually formally affiliate with the Foundation as one of its Local Chapters
  • review and suggest improvements to the Local Chapters affiliation scheme

The following are the three focus items that the working group will concentrate on :

  • Building local community cohesion : We will explore and develop ideas for the Foundation support the growth of Local Chapters and local communities, including helping mappers communicate or meet up with other local mappers, and working to reduce the challenges created by the fragmented nature of OSM.
  • Facilitating a global exchange of ideas : We will aim to provide Local Chapters and local communities with venues and communication channels to exchange ideas and share best practices in growing their communities.
  • Improving the Local Chapters affiliation scheme : We will review the role of Local Chapters within the Foundation and the interactions between them. Based on our findings we will make recommendations to the Board as to how the affiliation scheme can be improved to provide a stronger case for local communities to eventually become Local Chapters, or possibly suggest creating new affiliation models such as less-formal user groups.

The alternative affiliation scheme

Currently, the OSMF only recognizes geography-based Local Chapters as affiliates of the Foundation. As of writing, the Foundation has now recognized 18 Local Chapters.

It was observed that having Local Chapters as our only affiliation model is too limiting and sometimes provides a high or unreachable burden for various OSM communities worldwide.

Taking a leaf from other open-data and open-knowledge communities, it was recognized that other forms of affiliation model would be good to have to address barriers that OSM local communities face, such as (1) bureaucratic process in registering as a non-profit organization and (2) commercial activities of non-profit organizations viewed as bad when it is a way to fundraise for the organization.

One suggested model is to have a lightweight user group model that can be used in lieu of or as a stepping stone to Local Chapter status. Another model is to also recognize thematic groups or communities such as Youthmappers, GeoChicas, etc.

LCCWG welcome your ideas on how we can improve affiliation scheme in OSMF through this thread and wikipage!

LCCWG highly encourage you to join LCCWG to help us advance this agenda.

Reviews of Affiliation Models from Other Open Communities

Wikimedia Foundation

In the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF), there are several 'formal' affiliation models similar to the OpenStreetMap Foundation’s (OSMF) local chapters, such as chapters (geography-based) and thematic organizations (theme-based) :

  • Chapters : Incorporated independent non-profits representing the Wikimedia movement, focused within a geography. Chapters (national / sub-national) organizations use a name clearly linking them to Wikimedia and are granted use of Wikimedia trademarks for their work, publicity and fundraising.
  • Thematic organizations : Incorporated independent non-profits representing the Wikimedia movement, focused on a specific theme, topic, subject or issue across countries and regions. Thematic organizations use a name clearly linking them to Wikimedia and are granted use of Wikimedia trademarks for their work, publicity and fundraising.

Additionally, there is an established lightweight affiliation model called 'user groups.'

  • User groups : Open membership groups with an established contact person and history of projects, designed to be easy to form. User groups are granted limited use of the Wikimedia marks for publicity related to events and projects. Recognition from the Affiliations Committee allows a group to apply for using the Wikimedia trademarks and to get certain grants. However, recognition is not required to do any of the work typical user groups do or might do. It is an optional extra step with connected benefits and some requirements.

Its main characteristics include required registration, with several key requirements, such as:

  • A minimum of three mature, active accounts with a good track record in the movement,
  • A clear definition of scope and purpose, and
  • Signing several agreements and a code of conduct.

The user group registration proposals are reviewed by the Affiliations Committee liaison team for further evaluation.

The main benefits of this affiliation model are:

  • Public recognition of the group’s affiliation with the Wikimedia Foundation, and
  • Merchandise support for outreach efforts.

Regarding trademark usage, there appears to be a laissez-faire approach. The community can freely use the logo without formal registration, as registration is explicitly optional. Communities are free to operate without registering, and the primary benefit of formal registration is the public recognition of the group’s affiliation. 

Benefits : 
* Use the Wikimedia logos consistent with the Wikimedia Foundation's Trademark Policy without any additional approval. 
* Receive large, but limited, quantities of Wikimedia merchandise for use in activities and outreach efforts.
* Public recognition of the group affiliation with the Wikimedia Foundation.
* Affiliation Committee Liaison support during and after the approval process
* One scholarship to attend the Wikimedia Conference, held annually in Berlin for Wikimedia movement affiliates

Without recognition, groups may still : 
* Utilize the Wikimedia Community logo. Request one-timee use of Wikimedia logos consistent with the Wikimedia Foundation's Trademark Policy pursuant to a trademark license and approval by the legal team.
* Apply for grants

Eligibility requirements :
* Three active Wikimedia editors, with 500 or more contributions to a Wikimedia project in a year preceding the application on a registered account that has existed for at least 6 month. These active members must be in good community standing.
* Agree to Wikimedia user group agreement and code of conduct. 
* Follow the affiliates naming requirements.
* Have a clear scope and purpose
* "Are your two primary contacts willing to identify themselves with the Wikimedia Foundation?"

Community discussion

Hello OSM community. Opening this thread for your ideas on how we can improve affiliation scheme in OSMF!

Early this year, we prioritized updating the Local Chapters process and documentation and tabled this topic for Local Chapters Congress as well as in other spaces.

Informal online-based groups

Introducing a simplified community group registration process to accommodate contributors from all backgrounds and circumstances is something that I’ve seen working really well in other open source communities (such as Mozilla), where historically only one group was recognized at a country or language level.

I gave the Mozilla system a look, leaving away the fluff, it is literally just creating a community category on the Mozilla forum system, simply with a lot less bureaucratic overhead than doing the equivalent here.

In conjunction with improving the affiliation scheme, I think it is critical to pair the improvement of soft and hard infrastructure for OSM communities. OSMF, and specifically LCCWG, might consider sponsoring and/or investing in projects like OSM Teams and OpenStreetMap Calendar to build a solid foundation for Local Chapters and beyond.

Arguments on formal incorporation

In practical terms that boils down to a contract with clear rights and responsibilities with somebody/something having to be in place. It is a good example of why you want to have the paper work in place before you bestow explicit or implicit special status on a partner organisation.

I was just referring to the run of the mill every day stuff like people going AWOL for one reason or the other, corruption, fraud, embezzlement and all the other stuff that actually happens.

Any agreement has to be between two entities. If there isn’t something that can agree to the LC terms, who is the OSMF entering a contract with? The only way for a group of people to enter a contract is via incorporation.

In some countries, incorporation is expensive and involves a significant bureaucratic process. This may be one of the major reasons why some communities have not yet joined the LC program.

How about a city/region-wide local chapter then (but without the burden of establishing a non-profit incorporated entity)?

The main goal is :

  • Uniting mappers in the area to establish a region-specific consensus on how things should be mapped and to collaborate in addressing local vandalism.
  • Providing formal representation to local government, organizations, or institutions.
  • Ensuring that local data users adhere to OpenStreetMap’s licensing and attribution requirements. (For example, I have seen many local government applications here use OSM layers without proper attribution, and we probably need a reporting mechanism for such cases)

I propose that region-wide local chapters be empowered by OSMF to function as local judges and enforcers, maintaining order within their regions. This power would include authority over actions like blocking, banning, temporary bans, and editing restrictions on sensitive OSM data. Recently, local government organizations have increasingly become OSM data users but struggle to effectively communicate with OSM representatives, particularly when enforcing local mapping regulations. A local chapter would serve as an official OSM ambassador, bridging this gap and ensuring better coordination.

This city or region-wide local chapter is just an extension of the online-based volunteer work typically done in OpenStreetMap. Therefore, there should be no financial transfers from OpenStreetMap (or any group) to this city/region-wide local chapter at this stage. This limitation simplifies management, as there’s no need to establish a formal legal entity.

TLDR: It’s a lightweight version of a local chapter, without incorporation (and no money either, but I guess they’re really fine with that. Acknowledgment alone is more than enough for them).

P.S : Sure, there are still several drawbacks to this idea. Such as… What if the members go AWOL? (Perhaps we should establish a mechanism to revoke the LC status once its main members have ceased to exist.) Additionally, what if the LC actually damages the OpenStreetMap brand as a whole? (Maybe, once again, we should consider implementing a mechanism to revoke their status.)

Risks towards the OSMF

What a tremendously good idea it is to entice people that are already engaging in a extremely risky activity to do so in an organized fashion so that the OSMF can get some brownie points out of it.

Risks towards the community

I’m reminded of the time that French security officials interrogated a Wikipedia administrator about the contents of a geographical article that they didn’t even write. It could well have been a mapper instead. That said, OSMF doesn’t provide formal legal protection to even its bona fide local chapters, so less formal affiliates wouldn’t be able to expect this benefit anyways.

“”The Pierre-sur-Haute military radio station is a French military communications site that has been in use since 1913.

In March 2013, the French interior intelligence agency DCRI made a request for deletion of the French-language Wikipedia article about the site. The Wikimedia Foundation then asked the DCRI which parts of the article were causing a problem, noting that the article closely reflected information in a 2004 documentary made by Télévision Loire 7, a French local television station, a film not only freely available online but made with the cooperation of the French Air Force.

The DCRI then forced Rémi Mathis, a volunteer administrator of the French-language Wikipedia and president of Wikimedia France, under threat of detention and arrest, to delete the article.

Disputes within a local community can sometimes harm the overall local mapping ecosystem. As a result, establishing a formal community might be considered a net negative for the movement. In such cases, mapping individually, as a lone wolf without interaction, may prove to be a better approach in the long run. Issues that could contribute to such conflicts include tagging and boundary disputes, data ownership disagreements, and internal power struggles.

Benefits towards the community

The question is what benefit both parties would get from “recognition” and what are the downsides?

Even a nominal affiliation to the OSMF could be beneficial to some groups. There’s value in merely being able to call yourself “OpenStreetMap _____, an OpenStreetMap Foundation affiliate” when attempting to partner with a university, apply for a grant, or access government data. OSMUS certainly experienced some of that before becoming an official local chapter.

Financing issues

On the side, the LC documentation on the OSMF site is missing a statement that LCs need to be self financing, potentially creating the impression that this is where the big handouts are.

The meeting minutes show the case of MapUganda (aka “OpenStreetMap Uganda”) was brought up, It has applied for, and declined, Local Chapter status in Feb 2022 (I was one of the No votes).

I’m disappointed to see the story of “LCs aren’t allowed make money“.

The majority of their income came from paid collection of map data for a local authority, and the data was kept closed source. The LC Agreement says you must uphold the idea of open geo data. ie “LCs are allowed make money. LCs are not allowed to encourage & profit from closed geo data.”

History

OpenStreetMap is a global project and mappers are self-organising at the local level to collaborate with each other and to hold events such as workshops, mapathons, and mapping parties.

As an organisation with a global mission, the Foundation may not always be best placed to reach and support such mappers, especially people speaking in languages other than English. This is the reason why the Foundation set up the Local Chapters Working Group in 2011 to formulate an affiliation scheme to recognise Local Chapters. This task was finally done in August 2014 when the Board approved the template agreement that is signed between recognised Local Chapters and the Foundation, and the working group then became inactive.

Since then, several Local Chapters have been approved by the Foundation and some interested OSMF members have reconvened (pivotally, during State of the Map 2018) with the intention of restarting the working group as the Local Chapters and Communities Working Group.

Regular meetings started in September 2019 and the Board approved the relaunch of the LCCWG as an official Foundation working group.

2020 Survey

In 2020, LCCWG initiated a survey targeted at local OSM communities and Local Chapters with the goal of improving relationship between the OSM Foundation, Local Chapters and OSM communities. Five current Local Chapters, six communities that are in the process of becoming a Local Chapter and nine that are not at this time seeking Local Chapter status responded to the survey.

Here is the section/key takeways/recommendations as well as 2024 updates on the suggestion actions.

Creation

This section looked at the chapter creation process. Organizations still in the process of applying were encouraged to respond.

  • Having list of possible things that local chapters should be doing
  • Have a group of people (WG) liaise on our application relentlessly once we have written to osmf, instead of it being left to an individual.
  • Support for website and membership management.
  • Funding is not a big issue. The Microgrant program will help going forward. LCCWG has an approved budget for Microgrant in 2024. However, it was not conceptualized and implemented.

Responsibilities

This section asked about Local Chapter's responsibility to the OSM Foundation and vice versa. The goal is to see if improvements can be made to the Local Chapter Agreement.

  • Reporting requirements are not actively followed up by OSMF.
    • Compiled reports were published in the OSM Blog in 2023 and it took 7months. Some LCs still did not respond. Should be enforced by the OSMF Board. (e.g. Secretary, maybe with help of LCCWG?)
  • Need stronger ties. One suggestion is to make it a formal requirement for the Foundation to get input from the Local Chapters.
  • The Advisory Board could be strengthened (60% of respondents felt that the OSMF was not making good use of the Advisory Board)

Improvements

This section looks at how to improve the Local Chapter relationship with the Foundation.

  • Tickets to SOTM
  • Microgrants
  • LC signup on osm.org
  • Participating in a LCCWG meeting
  • Tools to replace Meetup (suggestion: osmcal.org)
  • Make Local Chapters and communities more prominent on osm.org (https://www.openstreetmap.org/communities)
  • Negotiate agreement with HOTOSM to become LC (HOT became corporate sponsor in 2023)
  • Community support and IT Infrastructure received the top votes for financial support from OSMF followed by Conference Planning and Hosting of OSMF Servers.
  • Limited responses for financial support for chapters. The need for financial support may be dependent on the ability of the LC to raise funds locally.

Demographics

  • Five organizations have a Code of Conduct, six are in the process of implementing a Code of Conduct and six do not have a Code of Conduct.
  • Large variation in LC size. Seven LC report membership growth, two with slight increase. Reasons for growth include : better internet availability, reduced cost to attend LC SotM and funding for outreach.
  • Top methods used to attract new members include : directly asking individuals, social media and mailing lists, signups at local events
  • Administrative duties are mostly performed by volunteers. This places a burden on some of the smaller organizations.
  • Two organizations report poor financial health, whilst seven report fair financial health. The rest report good or excellent. 56% of respondents indicated financial health that is less than good.
  • Whilst many have an annual budget in the magnitude of hundreds of Euros, five groups have an annual budget of over 25,000 EUR. Major Expenses (in descending order): IT Infrastructure, Conference, Contracted Services, Employees, Community Projects

Final question

What is the one thing OSMF should change to be more useful for you and other local chapters and communities?

  • More support for Local Chapters and communities. (Revisioning LC application process and reqt in 2023)
  • OSMF needs Code of Conduct
Retrieved from "https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/w/index.php?title=User:Rtnf/LCCWG&oldid=2779478"