London Wikimania Bid

File:Wikimania 2013 banner skyline 2.png

In a nutshell

• Country: United Kingdom
• City: London
• Venue: Olympic Village
• Proposed dates: 31st July - 4th August
• Planned attendance: Any Wikimedian!
• Contact: Panyd or email us

The London Olympic village in June 2011 (while under construction).

Introduction

Our city

London is the capital city of England and the United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its founding by the Romans, who called it Londinium. London's ancient core, the City of London, largely retains its square-mile mediaeval boundaries.

London is a leading global city, with strengths in the arts, commerce, education, entertainment, fashion, finance, healthcare, media, professional services, research and development, tourism and transport all contributing to its prominence. It is the world's largest financial centre alongside New York City and has the fifth-largest city GDP in the world (and the largest in Europe). It has the most international visitors of any city in the world and London Heathrow is the world's busiest airport. London's 43 universities form the largest concentration of higher education in Europe. In 2012 London will become the first city to host the modern Summer Olympic Games three times.

Our community

The United Kingdom is home to one of the largest Wikimedia communities in the world. The local chapter, Wikimedia UK, which has recently been granted registered charity status, is one of the larger and more experienced Wikimedia chapters. The chapter has supported a wide array of events in the United Kingdom, and has a strong track record of productive collaborations with cultural institutions such as galleries, libraries, archives, and museums (GLAM) as well as in broader outreach and educational projects.

In 2011, Wikimedia UK has supported events at the British Museum and the British Library in London, and a collaboration with the Victoria and Albert Museum is in the works. Outside the capital, events have also been held in Bristol, Coventry, Derby, Manchester, Brighton, Cambridge and Liverpool, as well as Scotland. The chapter has an ambitious schedule of events lined up for 2012 and beyond, including smaller conferences and an OTRS workshop in addition to more GLAM and outreach events.

The Wikimedia community is most active in and around London. The community is tight-knit, and the regular London meetups often attract a good turnout, including Wikipedians from a wide array of on-wiki and off-wiki backgrounds. These meetups are among the most regular and the longest-running Wikimedia meetups in the world (our fiftieth was in October 2011) and are an excellent venue for discussing grand ideas like this one. The fifty-first London meetup, held in November 2011, was attended by Sue Gardner and several other members of Foundation staff, after which Sue went on to give a talk at Imperial College London.

The United Kingdom has yet to hold a Wikimania, although a bid was previously submitted for Oxford. We would like to make Wikimania 2013 the biggest and the best Wikimania ever, and when considering the agreements and support outlined on this page, London is uniquely placed to make it happen.

Our team

Name	Areas of responsibility	Experience/Comments
Panyd	Bid coordinator	Hello! I am an administrator on the English Wikipedia.
Marek69		I am an editor on the English Wikipedia. I have attended Wikimania in 2010 and 2011.
Harry Mitchell	Nominal Deputy Coordinator	English Wikipedia admin, some small-scale event-management experience, can handle some of the logistics, will most likely have attended Wikimania 2012 and some smaller Wikimedia conferences by 2013.
User:ErrantX	Technical	Network sysadmin experience, project management and "fixing things when they break at the last minute" expert
Ed Saperia		I have many years of event experience and a great many useful London contacts and resources. Jimmy entrusted me to organise the London VIP Wikipedia 10th Birthday party.
User:Mike Peel
Chase me ladies, I'm the Cavalry		Where not constrained by conflicts of interest
Rock drum	General help

Our Vision

Here’s a sad reality: Your average person in the street doesn’t even know that the Wikipedia community exists.

They probably know it's a website. If you're lucky, they'll even know that anyone can edit it. But most people don't realise there's an enormous, active and sociable community bubbling away beneath the surface, striving to keep the most loved encyclopedia in the world to the highest possible standard, day in and day out.

We believe Wikimania can change all that. We're proposing an ambitious program with the highest attendance yet—over 1,000 Wikimedians; heavy outreach to the GLAM and technology sectors in a city that is an international leader for culture and tech; world-class, A-list speakers whose presentations will be recorded and spread across the Internet; an outreach day for the public that will educate hundreds of locals.

We hope to make Wikimania a world recognised brand like TED or the World Economic Forum - and along with it, Wikipedia will be recognised worldwide as a community that has achieved something remarkable, a community that is going to continue to change the world, and most importantly of all, a community that anybody can join.

Visitor's London

• London's attractions include the British Library, the British Museum and Reading Room (above), the main shopping streets of Oxford Street and Tottenham Court Road, as well as public squares, other museums and a very wide range of restaurants at all price ranges serving all the world's cuisines.
• There are four World Heritage Sites in London

• The Palace of Westminster (cs, de, es, fr, it, he, nl, ja, no, pl, pt, ro, fi, sv, zh )
• The Tower of London (cs, da, de, es, fr, he, nl, ja, no, pl, pt, ru, sk, sl, fi, sv, zh)
• Maritime Greenwich (de, fi, fr, he, la, nl, no, pl, ro, ru, sl, sv, tr)
• Kew Gardens (cs, da, de, es, fi, fr, he, it, ja, nl, no, pt, sv)

• London has 17 national museums across the city.
• There are approximately 6,100 licensed restaurants in London - 22% of the restaurants in the whole of Great Britain. This includes 36 Michelin star rated restaurants and covers over 50 major country cuisines.
• London is a city of green open spaces. In total, it comes to 30% of the London area, including 147 parks and gardens and eight royal parks, including Hyde Park and Regents Park.
• London has 3800 pubs and 233 nightclubs. Many venues are open after midnight.
• You will often hear London described as a collection of villages. Local shops, markets, parks, and leisure venues foster a feeling of local community within a conurbation of seven million people. Some areas have a particularly strong identities and associations making London a world in one city and gives London the largest non-white population of any European city.

Conference

Venue

Our sponsors want us to be the first event held in the Olympic Village after the 2012 London Olympics.

• Olympic Village website

Special events

Parties

Wikimania traditionally hosts two parties, one for attendees (capacity of 450-500) and one for sponsors and VIPs (capacity 100). We would like to hold a third event for chapter heads to discuss issues relevant to them.

• Attendees party(ies) propositions

(location, how to get there, what's cool and relaxed about it)

• Sponsor party(ies) proposition

(location, how to get there, what's chic and high profile about it)

• Chapter Head dinner proposition

(location, how to get there, what's chic and high profile about it)

Logistics

Accomodation

Hotels

The Olympic village has many hotels on site with 17,320 beds in total. There are a wide variety of buildings from luxury to budget.

• Olympic Village accommodation
• Hotels near Olympic Village site
• Visit Britain.com

Getting to the United Kingdom

International travel to the United Kingdom is extensive. Access to the UK is provided by 30 international airports providing travel to 200 destinations, 8 ports with international passenger ferry services to Europe, and a rail link to mainland Europe via the Channel Tunnel.

Train (via Belgium and France)

Eurostar high-speed trains run between London (St Pancras International), Ebbsfleet and Ashford through the Channel Tunnel to Paris (Gare du Nord), Lille and Brussels. During the summer an additional weekly train operates to Avignon and during the winter a weekly service runs a ski service direct to the French Alps. Through tickets and connections are available in Lille, Paris and Brussels from many European cities to most large UK cities.

Journey times average two hours fifteen minutes to and from Paris, and one hour fifty minutes to Brussels. A second class return from Paris to London costs between €85 and €230. While it can be cheaper to fly from London to Paris using a low-cost airline, bear in mind that the journeys to the airports can be expensive and time-consuming.

Ferry

Ferries run from Calais to Dover on a regular basis and a return ticket costs around £40. Journey times average at around an hour and a half. However, there are many other ports in the UK as well and travellers can access British ports from at least seven surrounding countries. Due to the relatively small size of Britain, it is not unfeasible for someone to make the journey from their country to London within 24 hours.

It may be cheaper to fly on a low-budget airline but for the sightseer there are a variety of ways to travel into the country.

Air

• London Heathrow Airport - The busiest airport in the United Kingdom and one of the busiest in the world (depending on measure). LHR serves a vast array of destinations, including long-haul services to Asia, North America, Oceania, the Middle East. For more information on destinations that can be reached from LHR, please see Heathrow Airport: airlines and destinations. The airport is on the edge of Greater London and can be reached by the fast Heathrow Express service, the semi-fast Heathrow Connect or the slower but cheaper London Underground.
• London Gatwick Airport - 30 miles outside of London, Gatwick serves fewer destinations but still has an extremely regular train service into Central London, with a mix of Crossrail services which call at several stations in London (including London Bridge, where attendees can change to the Jubilee Line of the London Underground for the final leg to Stratford); local services to London Victoria; and express services, which also terminate at Victoria. For a list of destinations served by Gatwick, please see Gatwick Airport: airlines and destinations
• London City Airport - The smallest of London's three main airports, but the closest to the conference area, requiring only a short DLR journey to Canning Town, from where Stratford is two stops north on the Jubilee Line. London City Airport's destinations can be found at City Airport: airlines and destinations
• London Luton Airport - Budget airline hub to the north of London; mostly serves destinations in Europe. Regular train service to London St Pancras.
• London Stansted Airport - Also a budget airline hub, also predominantly serves Europe. Direct rail connection to Stratford.

Travel costs

With many budget airlines and flag carriers flying in to London, flights are relatively cheap from most of the world.

The City of London is one of the world's largest financial centres alongside New York City.

From Costs Europe Amsterdam £64 Athens £128 Dublin £33 Frankfurt £56 Istanbul £82 Lisbon £70 Madrid £72 Moscow £139 Oslo £59 Paris £49 Rome £87 Vienna £59 Warsaw £79

From Costs North America Chicago £507 (indirect) Houston £556 Los Angeles £550 (indirect) Mexico City £732 (indirect) Miami £411 New York £431 San Francisco £540 Toronto £466 Vancouver £625 South America Bogotá £813 (indirect) Buenos Aires £683 (indirect) Caracas £685 (indirect) Rio de Janeiro £550 (indirect) Santiago £853 (indirect)

From Costs Oceania Melbourne £849 (indirect) Sydney £805 (indirect) Auckland £798 (indirect) Africa Cairo £298 Johannesburg £372 (indirect) Nairobi £380 (indirect) Asia Bangkok £533 (indirect) Delhi £403 (indirect) Hong Kong £538 (indirect) Jakarta £564 (indirect) Seoul £593 (indirect) Singapore £499 (indirect) Taipei £773 (indirect) Tel Aviv £189 Tokyo £598 (indirect)

The prices listed include all taxes and duties and are for a return flight to London leaving the city on Wednesday 11th July 2012, and returning Monday 16th July 2012

Visa issues

EU member states
Special visa-free provisions (Schengen treaty, EEA, OCT or other)
Visa-free access to the UK for 6 months
Visa required to enter the UK, transit without visa
Visa required to enter the UK and for transit through the UK
Visa-status unknown

The United Kingdom is a member country of the European Union. This means that all citizens of EU member states with a valid travel document (passport or European ID card) are allowed to travel freely within the European Union (including the UK) for up to 3 months.

Given the high throughput of air traffic, the UK is a highly accessible country with those travelling from within the EU, North America, Japan, South Africa, Australasia or most of Latin America not requiring a visa to visit the UK.

Many people from other regions will also be able to visit the UK without a visa. To determine whether you will need a visa to visit the UK, go to www.ukvisas.gov.uk. The nature of any visa required will depend on your nationality and your current country of residence. The typical cost for a VISA for a short visit to the UK is £76. Wikimedia UK may be able to act as a sponsor for those that require one in order to get a visa.

The following individuals can enter the United Kingdom without a visa:

As of right

• Citizens of Commonwealth countries who have the right of abode in the United Kingdom under the Immigration Act 1971
• Citizens of European Union member states
• Citizens of non-EU member states of the European Economic Area (Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein) and Switzerland
• British Nationals (whether they have the right of abode in the United Kingdom or not) of the following categories:
  • British citizens
  • British Overseas Territories citizens
  • British National (Overseas)
  • British Overseas citizens
  • British protected persons
  • British subjects

All the countries below have visa-free access to the EU for at least 90 days.

30 St Mary Axe, also known as the Gherkin

Andorra Argentina Australia Austria* Bahamas Belgium* Brazil Bulgaria* Canada Chile Costa Rica Croatia Cyprus* Czech Republic* Denmark* El Salvador Estonia* Finland* France* Germany*

Greece* Guatemala Honduras Hungary* Ireland* Israel Italy* Japan Latvia* Liechtenstein Lithuania* Luxembourg* Macedonia Malaysia Malta* Mexico Monaco Netherlands* New Zealand Nicaragua

Norway Panama Paraguay Poland* Portugal* Romania* San Marino Singapore Slovakia* Slovenia* Republic of Korea Spain* Sweden* Switzerland United Kingdom* United States Uruguay Vatican City State Venezuela

* - European Union member states

Getting to London

Buckingham Palace

Bus

• National Express operate coach services from Victoria Coach Station and other points to destinations across the UK. The company operates direct services to Stratford station from Cambridge and Stansted Airport.
• Stratford station is a major bus hub, and is served by routes 25, 69, 86, 104, 108, 158, 238, 241, 257, 262, 276, 308, 425, 473, 678, D8, N8 and N86.
• London Bus routes 97 and 339 stop in Stratford itself but not at the station.

Tube

• Heathrow Airport has a direct connection to the Piccadilly Line of the London Underground, which is considerably slower but considerably cheaper than the Heathrow Express (see below). Passengers will need to change to the Central Line at Holborn, which will take them to Stratford.
• All but one of Central London's rail termini have a direct connection to the London Underground. Different stations are on different lines, but all lines intersect, and Stratford can be reached from every inner-London Tube station without needing to change more than once.
• Although not part of the London Underground network, the Docklands Light Railway (DLR) and London Overground are both marked on the Tube Map and both serve Stratford Regional station.
• The Tube Map provides a colour-coded schematic of the London Underground, London Overground, and DLR networks. Copies are available for free at every Tube station and most Tourist Information Centres in London, as well as on the Transport for London website.

Train

• Stratford has two railway stations, Stratford International and Stratford Regional (known as such to prevent confusion between the international station 400 yards away and with Stratford-upon-Avon, but officially designated "Straford"). Stratford International is served by high-speed services from London St Pancras (journey time ~10 minutes) and from towns to the south-east of London; ironically it does not currently have an international train service at present, but the government are discussing the possibility of Eurostar services between ST Pancras and Belgium/France stopping at Stratford International after the 2012 Olympics. Services operate from Stratford Regional into Central London and parts of Essex and the Home Counties including an hourly direct service to Stansted Airport. Stratford is also served by London Overground services towards Clapham Junction, London Underground Services on the Central Line as well as serving as the terminus of the London Underground Jubilee Line and the Docklands Light Railway (both of which provide slower but cheaper methods of getting into Central London).
• Central London has 13 terminal stations. Most passengers travelling by rail from within the UK will arrive at one of these and would be advised to change to the London Underground to complete their journey.
• Heathrow and Gatwick airports both have dedicated express train services that run non-stop into Paddington and Victoria respectively, where passengers can change to the London Underground for the final leg to Stratford.
• Eurostar operates high-speed services from Paris and Brussels to London St Pancras.

Taxi

A more expensive option than public transport, especially for those travelling from the airports. There are companies that specialise in private hire between airports and Central London which may be cheaper, but these usually require pre-booking.

Financial

Canary Wharf is a major business and financial centre

Budget

London Wikimania Bid/Budget

Sponsorship

Sponsorship Levels

Gold

Silver

Bronze

Supporting

Confirmed Sponsors

Tech City TechCity is the government’s initiative to make London an international centre for innovation. Eric Van Der Kleij, TechCity’s CEO, has adopted Wikimania 2013 to be the flagship event of the reopening of the Olympic Village after the Olympic Games in 2012. He has pledged a free or heavily discounted venue rate, and to organise a roundtable meeting with heads of industry to help fundraise.

Potential Sponsors

Visa, Google, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Mozilla, Nominet, BT or Telefonica

Miscellaneous

Tourism opportunities

London is one of the greenest and most scenic major cities in the world. Famous landmarks in Central London include (in no particular order) St Paul's Cathedral, Big Ben, the Palace of Westminster, Buckingham Palace, Nelson's Column/Trafalgar Square, the Tower of London, Tower Bridge, the London Eye and "the Gherkin". Open-top buses operate sight-seeing tours constantly, especially during the summer, and organising one as a breakout event for Wikimania should be no trouble. More specialised tours include boat trips on the River Thames and buses that can operate as boats ("duck tours").

Wikimeda UK already has good relations with several cultural institutions in London, including the British Museum, and so a cultural event for those interested in GLAM could easily be arranged.

Currency

The pound sterling (ISO 4217: GBP), known locally as the pound (£) is the currency of the United Kingdom, divided into one hundred pence (p).

Currency exchange desks are available at all London airports, as well as at the Post Office and most banks and travel agents. Australian Dollars, Canadian Dollars, Euros, Japanese Yen, Polish Złoty, Swedish Krona and United States Dollars are all widely exchanged; other currencies are usually exchangeable at the airports.

Exchange rates as of 18 November 2011 (x-rates.com)
Currency	Equivalent of GB£1	Equivalent in GB£
Australian Dollar	1.56	0.63
Canadian Dollar	1.61	0.71
Euro	1.17	0.85
Japanese Yen	121.49	0.0082
Swedish Krona	10.74	0.082
United States Dollar	1.57	0.63

Climate

London has a temperate oceanic climate, and interestingly receives less precipitation (with 601 mm in a year), than Rome at 834 mm, Bordeaux at 923 mm, Toulouse at 668 mm, and Naples at 1,006 mm per year. Summers are warm and sometimes hot, the heat being boosted by the "Urban Heat Island Effect" making the centre of London at times 5 degrees Celsius warmer than the suburbs and outskirts. London's summer average is a comfortable 24 degrees Celsius.

Telecommunications

Timeline

• Rough draft budget - December 2011
• Venue Viewing - December 2011
• Creation of Budget, Bid documents, venue selection, approaching potential sponsors etc - Now-January 2012
• Start working on bid page and forming wikimedia volunteer bid team - Yesterday - We have User:EdSaperia, User:Panyd, User:HJ Mitchell, User:Marek69 and User:ErrantX working on this
• Bidding officially opens - January 2011
• Bidding closes and winner announced - May 2012
• Conference - July/August 2013

Self-evaluation

• Strengths of the proposed location

1. Openness to all

   London is a city where all nationalities, religions, and sexualities are welcome to visit without threat or worry about the possibility of 'issues' with the local population, police or security services. London is the most cosmopolitan city in the world with every nationality, culture and language represented in our schools and everyday lives, (and which also gives us the widest range of cuisine at all prices!) Similarly lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people will find a safe and public welcome here without any risks from their public or private actions, just as there are facilities for all creeds. This is a country that welcomes and supports free speech and free expression.

2. Ease of access

   London is the crossroads of the world. Heathrow is the busiest international airport in the world and with five international airports - each with integrated onward fast train or tube services to the Wikimania venue - and an international highspeed railway service from Europe we are probably the easiest place for people to get to no matter where they start. And that multiplicity of travel routes usually means cheaper prices from the competition, indeed our checking of flight prices has shown we are the cheapest destination from just about everywhere.

   London itself has excellent transport connections to the entire world by air, and by road and rail to the rest of the UK and to Continental Europe; the venue can be reached in less than an hour from all three of London's main airports

3. Opportunities to learn, explore, meet and enjoy

   Coming to Wikimania is not just about sharing our thoughts and ideas about Wikimedia, Wikinews, Wikisource, Wiktionary and the other projects in every language, but also to meet other editors socially and to have a brief visit to a new place at the same time. Wikimania London 2008 will not only provide facilities 'on campus' throughout the conference for these to happen but will also encourage visitors to take in the sights, the history and culture of London and the nightlife

4. Brand new, high profile venue

   The Olympic Village is a brand new, high-profile development with excellent facilities which are more than capable of holding the number of people we need

5. One of the largest contributing communities to Wikipedia

   The UK is the country which contributes the third most edits to Wikipedia as a whole. (some rough statistics), making its editors the most active from a country which has not yet hosted Wikimania.

• Weaknesses of the proposed location ...and how to overcome those weaknesses

1. Expense- London can be expensive city at the best of times.

   Proposed solution - Attempt to have whatever we can subsidised by our sponsors. This may mean donations in kind rather than monetary donations.

2. Most attendees will have to change trains or change to the London Underground to complete their journey

   Lay on coaches from major transport hubs like Heathrow? Negotiate with Transport for London about placing signs at Tube stations where people will change (for example at Holborn, for those taking the Tube from Heathrow)? Email attendees a Tube Map and/or directions from their point of arrival in the UK to the station? Have staff/volunteers in highly visible, Wikimania-branded clothing on hand at airports/major public transport interchanges to provide directions and assistance to attendees (or to collect groups of people and take them to the venue)?

3. The ticketing system for British public transport system (especially the trains) is baffling, even to those who use it regularly

   Give attendees the option, when registering online, to request their tickets in advance? Have staff/volunteers on hand to give out pre-booked tickets and/or assist attendees in purchasing tickets on the day? Dedicated tickets/Oyster cards for attendees (would require discussion with TfL and possibly the government)?

4. WiFi—the WiFi in place at the Olympic Village will not have been designed with hundreds of Wikipedians in mind

   Given that this has been an issue at every previous Wikimania, we should look at hiring a company to temporarily provide enhanced WiFi.