Allentchang~wikimania2007wiki

Userboxes This user is a Volunteer at Wikimania 2007.

Volunteer's notebook

August 2, 2007 (Taipei Time)

Really enjoyed the Citizen Journalism Unconference and met all sorts of people, including people from Taiwan's Public Broadcasting Service, a Chinese who is about to obtain Japanese citizenship, a Wikinews coordinator, someone from Portland, OR, and a 22-year old French representative. Can't say anything else about them to protect their privacy; curiously I led a discussion about Citizen Journalism Passion and Enthusiasm VS. Privacy.

The Wikinews coordinator led a discussion about Citizen Journalism ethics, including the ideal goal of trying to maintain detachment and neutrality; several participants pointed out that detachment and neutrality is inherently an impossible goal.

Helped to move chairs and stick posters before and after the Citizen Journalism Unconference. Will show one of the posters that I created soon . . . . . The only problem with the poster creation was that an "r" was missing, but a "n" was avaliable. Someone ended up tearing the "n" to make it an "r".

I do thank the organizing team to help me enjoy today's conference besides the volunteer work that must be done. Allentchang 11:44, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

July 31, 2007 (Taipei Time)

Writing this in Hsinchu, Taiwan, Republic of China.

Attended the volunteer orientation of the conference site on Sunday. Found a Love Boat Study Tour going on in the conference site with American Born Chinese chatting and practicing Chinese flutes. Who knows if there will still be there during the conference.

Weather hot and humid. Partially cloudy with the sound of thunder. Sound of thunder great because in Taiwan, the sound of thunder scares away the typhoon and forces it to go to Japan instead. Fortunately the rooms are air-conditioned.

There's a coffee shop at the conference site that opens till 22:00. There's also a gift shop that sells KMT-logo goods, pictures of Chiang Kai-shek and his wife, post cards, panpipes, and cheap recorders and other wind instruments.

Received our T-shirts and took "victory photos" together. Also saw the Wikireader introducing Taipei City. Much of it is excerpts from the English Wikipedia. Some of the pictures like Yangminshan and Taroko and some of the passages seem to be awfully familiar as if I had written the passages or took the pictures a few years ago. One or two pictures needed better resolution.

Very jealous that a certain team member got paid vacation for the Wikimania event. I don't get such privlidge with my employer TSMC. Wished that TSMC could sponsor since a considerable amount of equipment in the conference probably has TSMC inside. But I'm just a small potato in the company.

Curiously, many people in TSMC love to use Wikipedia, but few realize that there is a Wikimania in Taipei. Maybe I'm too much of a Wikimaniac that I'm willing to sacrifice two vacation days for the conference. A cetain colleague says I'm wasting my vacation time.

Will certainly post pictures of all sorts of events on my user page. Allentchang 16:48, 30 July 2007 (UTC)