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Local Chapters Congress

During State of the Map 2019, the Local Chapters Congress was on the official schedule for the first time. We had a very high participation: there were people from 22 different countries, with people from 6+1 official Local Chapters.

The informal organisation, combined with so many people, made for a somewhat chaotic meeting. Some of the notes we took during the meeting are below

Why Local Chapters?

These are things participants said about the value of having a Local Chapter:

  • make sure there are no local hi-jackers of the brand
  • broaden the visibility of OSM(F)
  • Give a counter weight on the OSMF advisory board to corporate members
  • Local point of contact for Organisations/Governments in reference to open data. Organisations prefer to talk to organisations.
  • Communicate what is happening in the OSM universe to the local mappers
  • Be the organiser of meetups, seminars and country SOTMs
  • Be a contact point/coordination point for bulk uploads
    * Profit V not-for-profit (note: scratched out because I don't know what it means)

Criteria for LC

The Board started a conversation about the minimum criteria for Local Chapters not long before SotM. We chatted about this too.

  • We made it clear that it does not have to be limited by international or ethnic boundaries
  • The organization should be bigger than its people. This means that we should expect Local Chapters to be more permanent than the people running them at this time.
  • But the current high threshold makes for a percieved need to have some status for "User Groups" - whether or not those would need to have Board approval is an open question

Mutual help / common issues

Local Chapters operate in a diversity of national legal frameworks and cultural contexts. Still there are recurring issues, which means we can learn from each other. This is part of the reason for the re-launch of the LCWG as the Local Chapters and Communities Working Group (LCCWG). There are of course other ways too, to keep the communication channels open. Sepcific topics were:

  • finding a fitting structure for the chapter
  • Guidance on subgroups reporting to the LC
  • complying with trademark regulations
  • Child protection policy, or policy guideline from OSMF (since each chapter will have different national laws)

Raw notes below

Present

  • Wikimedia Italia (LC)
  • OSM-US
  • OSM-Japan
  • OSM-UK (LC)
  • OSM Belgium (LC)
  • Brasil
  • FLOSS Kosovo
  • OSM DRC
  • OSM Spain
  • OSM Ireland (applied to LC)
  • Turkey
  • OSGEO Oceania
  • FOSSGIS (LC)
  • OSM Uganda / OSM Africa
  • Philippines
  • OSM Mali
  • OSM France (LC)
  • Croatia
  • OSM Indonesia
  • China
  • Swiss OpenStreetMap Association (LC)
  • Canada

22!

What is new since last year?

  • renewed interest
  • relaunch of LCWG as Local chapters & Communities Working Group
  • Local Chapters Congress in the official SotM program

Why Local Chapters?

  • make sure there are no local hi-jackers of the brand
  • Broaden the visibility of OSM(F)
  • Give a counter weight on the OSMF advisory board to corporate members
  • Local point of contact for Organisations/Governments in reference to open data
  • Communicate what is happening in the OSM universe
  • Be the organiser of meetups, seminars and country SOTMs
  • Be a contact point/coordination point for bulk uploads
  • Profit V not-for-profit

Pending applications

  • Ireland

Role of LC in the OSMF?

Criteria for LC

  • Does not have to be limited by international or ethnic boundaries, clearer idea of a community being diverse
  • The organization should be bigger than its people
    • but maybe we need a LC-light status?
  • New status "User Group"
    • Board approval?

Mutual help / common issues

  • keep communication channels open
  • finding a fitting structure for the chapter
  • Guidance on subgroups reporting to the LC
  • complying with trademark regulations
  • Child protection policy, or policy guideline from OSMF (since each chapter will have different national laws)