[FM Discuss] Reg. publishing visa application procedure as manual

[adam]

hi

So, if we can pitch this as a book about foundations then I have 
already spoken to John Sullivan (FSF CEO) a few months ago in Boston 
about such a book. So, I think I could bring this conversation up with 
him again. I would also be happy writing to the GSoC people, who also 
need to work through visa issues often and have a lot of expertise in 
this area, and perhaps also the Foundations list. We could approach 
each avenue and ask for support in the form of:
1. sending people to the sprint
2. a little bit of $ to host the sprint and pay for people that cant 
pay their way

if this sounds good to you then it would be great if you could write up 
an outline for what you want to cover about visas. I will add this into 
a larger proposal about a book on free software foundations and then we 
start pitching it around. I think there might also be others on this 
list who have contacts that they could pitch the idea to, or perhaps 
even send people along....it would be great, for example, if Sugar or 
CiviCRM, Sourcefabric, KDE - all who are friends of FM and have vast 
experience in running free software foundations, would consider sending 
someone to such a sprint...

adam




On Thu 28 Mar 2013 05:13:59 PM NZDT, Sindhu S wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> Thank you for your responses, it's so good to feel welcomed into the
> community :)
>
> I could not over-stress the importance and value of having such a
> guide for contributors in drafting a visa application that expedites
> the applicant's status with the FLOSS organisation  because many
> embassies do not know about FLOSS culture and communities and the fact
> that these are hobbyist events also makes them tourist events for the
> sake of application, thus validating a requirement for a tourist visa.
>
> However, as contributors often receive sponsorship from
> hosting/participating organisations to come visit (GNOME Foundation
> mentions this in their current invitation letter), any money
> exchanging hands for most embassies seems to qualify for a business
> visa application. Thus the rejection on such applications.
>
> Embassies are unable to understand why some people would be paid to
> travel when they apparently they "volunteer" and most importantly,
> they are unable to grok why or how a software needs volunteering and
> contribution. Rather hard all of this to explain to an officer in a 2
> minute visa interview don't you think?
>
> And talking about the book and book sprint: How would you all suggest
> I go about this? I have never written a book or attended a sprint (the
> irony of it anybody?). How can I help in starting off? How can we
> arrange for more people to volunteer information and content for the
> visa guide?
>
> Anna spoke about FSF having trouble getting their interns to UK, I
> wonder if we could reach RMS or Karen Sandler on the topic and ask if
> they are willing to sponsor a books sprint to do compile information
> for this guide we are all interested in writing?
>
> P.S: I have written a landing page or sorts for this visa application
> procedure so that more people will be interested to see my "Visa Help"
> pages. Here it is
> https://live.gnome.org/sindhus/SchengenVisaGuidelines .

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