Dear all,
The next WMF metrics and activities meeting will take place on Thursday,
April 28, 2016, at 6:00 PM UTC (11 AM PDT). The IRC channel is
#wikimedia-office on irc.freenode.net, and the meeting will be broadcast as
a live YouTube stream.
Meeting agenda:
* Welcomes
* Community update
* Transition update
* Review of WMF top-level metrics
* Research presentation
* Product demo
* Questions/discussions
Please review
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Metrics_and_activities_meetings for further
information about the meeting and how to participate.
We’ll post the video recording publicly after the meeting.
Thank you,
Praveena
--
Praveena Maharaj
Executive Assistant to the VP of Product
Wikimedia Foundation \\ www.wikimediafoundation.org
Trillium Corsage apparently tried to address this issue, but their message
has not gotten through email list moderation. I've included it below.
My reaction: I should paid more heed to Trillium's qualifier "basically."
Jimmy Wales didn't commit the egregious error I thought was being reported.
Still, I do feel that Wales' choices about what to say and what not to say
have been erratic (from the perspective of what's best for the movement and
the WMF) and self-serving. I can't think of other examples of an
organization's board members publicly commenting on whether or not they
supported an employee's departure. It seems to me there are very good
reasons not to get into that.
-Pete
[[User:Peteforsyth]]
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Trillium Corsage <trillium2014(a)yandex.com>
Date: Tue, Apr 26, 2016 at 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Open and recorded WMF Board meetings
To: peteforsyth(a)gmail.com, nawrich(a)gmail.com
26.04.2016, 14:32, "Nathan" <nawrich(a)gmail.com>:
> On Mon, Apr 25, 2016 at 8:49 PM, Pete Forsyth <peteforsyth(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
>
>> On Fri, Apr 15, 2016 at 2:42 PM, Trillium Corsage <
trillium2014(a)yandex.com
>> >
>> wrote:
>> >
>> > Jimbo responded to arbitrator GorillaWarfare on this list, basically,
>> > "yes, I supported with sadness the decision to dismiss Lila."
>>
>> Wait -- seriously??
>
> No, it's a false quote. I don't know if Trillium falsified the quote or if
> he/she picked it up from a different source. Asked if he supported her
> departure, he wrote "I supported it with sadness. The whole thing is a sad
> train wreck."
Whoa whoa whoa. I answered this yesterday, but my emails have to be
approved by a moderator and none has done so. Here's the relevant part of
the email:
<begin excerpt>
Craig gave the right link. Here's the exact exchange.
Gorillawarfare: I would love to know whether you supported Lila Tretikov's
departure. It is clear that she did not up and resign on her own, and I
would like to know if you were one of the folks who thought her departure
would be beneficial, or if you preferred she "weather the storm," so to
speak.
Jimbo Wales: I supported it with sadness. The whole thing is a sad train
wreck.
Yeah, it's accurate no-one says the word "dismissal." That was my
interpretation of it based on recollection, I wasn't trying to introduce a
new concept to anything.
<end excerpt>
That was my good-faith memory-based paraphrase of it, not any "false
quote." I'd also argue that the contextual part where Gorilla says "she did
not up and resign on her own" --which is not disputed by Wales-- should
figure into any interpretation of the exchange.
I also said "basically," which clues the reader in that it was paraphrase,
not quote. I didn't do this for any polemic reason either, I just genuinely
didn't have the exchange in front of me.
Pete, I'd appreciate if you'd convey my position on this matter to the list
if my own email doesn't appear by a few hours.
Trillium Corsage
Dear all,
in January WMDE conducted a survey among the German-speaking, active
Wikipedians on the welcome-culture for new editors.
An overwhelming number of 686 community members answered questions on the
culture of openness and commitment to support for new editors.
More information and the results (English version!) are now available on
meta:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Deutschland/Editor_Survey_2016
Hope, it's interesting for you!
Best
Verena
--
Verena Lindner
Projektmanagerin Know-how
Wikimedia Deutschland e. V. | Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24 | 10963 Berlin
Tel. (030) 219 158 26-0
http://wikimedia.de
Stellen Sie sich eine Welt vor, in der jeder Mensch an der Menge allen
Wissens frei teilhaben kann. Helfen Sie uns dabei!
http://spenden.wikimedia.de/
Wikimedia Deutschland - Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e. V.
Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts Berlin-Charlottenburg unter
der Nummer 23855 B. Als gemeinnützig anerkannt durch das Finanzamt für
Körperschaften I Berlin, Steuernummer 27/029/42207.
How do people feel about a few of the larger the Chapters funding pilots to
have professional researchers do https://tools.wmflabs.org/citationhunt/en
and a few other main languages?
It would be great to measure the quality of results of different payment
incentive models and rates, but this is not something that the Foundation
could do without some risk of breaching the DMCA safe harbor provisions, as
far as I can see. Even if I am technically wrong about that, the
appearances would be that it's obvious exertion of what would be positive
editorial control, which would still mean a greater likelihood of lawsuits
by disgruntled BLP and corporate subjects who can't win in court but can
waste everyone's money.
But I would rather have multiple measurements administered by different
parties anyway, because there are likely to be large uncontrollable sources
of noise.
>
>
> Gerard Meijssen wrote:
Once we, as in the WMF, start paying for content there is no reasonable
> argument to pay specific work and not pay for other specific work.
I am suggesting a limited experiment by the diverse chapters, not the WMF
proper. I don't think it follows that success would mean there would be no
reason to not pay for new content instead of citations for existing content.
> Why should we pay for additional content in English and not pay for
> content in
> other languages?
CItation Hunt is already translated into six diverse languages, five of
which are in our top 20, and it seems to work in RTL Hebrew.
Research is done that may lead to the use of Wikidata for citations.
I would love to see a link for the state of the art on that.
What is the status of
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Wikipedia_Knowledge_Graph_with_Dee…
and
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IEG/StrepHit:_Wikidata_Statements_Va…
?
There have been no updates on either at all this year, that I've been able
to find, even though at least one of them is supposed to be producing
monthly status reports. I'm not happy with the extent to which Wikidata has
fallen into a meaningless soup of impenetrable data category numbers for
its user interfaces. For a project being pushed as supporting translations,
Wikidata is really difficult for direct use by humans speaking any natural
language, but has been fantastic for search engines displaying summary
information cutting into Foundation pageviews and fundraising.
> We have a project called Wikiquote, why not invest attention into
> Wikiquote.
Because there is real demand and multiple quality-related fundamental
needs for Wikipedia citations which can be easily automated with Citation
Hunt, but all of the demand for Wikiquote expansion is fully addressed by
Mediawiki as-is.
> Really all the basic reasons why work on citations deserves additional
> funding is lacking. It does not explain what it will bring us anything that
> we cannot get in another way.
>
The number of {{citation needed}} tags is growing faster than new articles,
and the rate at which they are addressed is so slow as to be negligible if
you disregard WikiProject improvement drives, which occur less frequently
than they used to.
> As long as there is no obvious benefit, it would destroy what we are and
> how we do things for no obvious benefit.
As long as we don't measure the benefit, we have no way to know whether
it's positive and will forever remain non-obvious.
> On 23 April 2016 at 16:02, James Salsman <jsalsman(a)gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Gerard Meijssen wrote:
> > ...
> >
> >
> > > I categorically oppose paying people for content. Enabling them to
> create
> > > content is different. Citations is content and its quality is relevant
> > > but only that.
> >
> >
> > Why categorically? We already pay hundreds of people for work in support
> of
> > the projects, including reader-facing administrative and content far more
> > prominent than citations. We encourage Wikipedian in Residence programs
> > where third parties pay for all kinds of content development. The PR
> > editing guidelines explicitly recognize that paid content happens anyway,
> > we can't control it, but we can offer best practices. We support editing
> > assigned as part of academic class requirements.
> >
> > What reason is there to flatly rule out paying people to find citations
> > before measuring the quality and cost/benefit ratio of doing so with a
> > variety of both incentive payment models and managers?
> >
> >
> > > > How do people feel about a few of the larger the Chapters funding
> > > pilots to have professional researchers do
> > https://tools.wmflabs.org/citationhunt/en
> > > > and a few other main languages?
> > > >
> > > > It would be great to measure the quality of results of different
> > payment
> > > > incentive models and rates, but this is not something that the
> > Foundation
> > > > could do without some risk of breaching the DMCA safe harbor
> > provisions,
> > > as
> > > > far as I can see. Even if I am technically wrong about that, the
> > > > appearances would be that it's obvious exertion of what would be
> > positive
> > > > editorial control, which would still mean a greater likelihood of
> > > lawsuits
> > > > by disgruntled BLP and corporate subjects who can't win in court but
> > can
> > > > waste everyone's money.
> > > >
> > > > But I would rather have multiple measurements administered by
> different
> > > > parties anyway, because there are likely to be large uncontrollable
> > > sources
> > > > of noise.
> > >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>
>
On Apr 23, 2016 4:43 PM, "Gerard Meijssen" <gerard.meijssen(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
>
> Hoi,
> Once we, as in the WMF, start paying for content there is no reasonable
> argument to pay specific work and not pay for other specific work.
Sure there is. Prioritization based on movement goals, feasibility,
achieving parity in underserved areas...
>Why
> should we pay for additional content in English and not pay for content in
> other languages?
Because we might care about those things, and factor them into
prioritization above?
-- brion
>
> Research is done that may lead to the use of Wikidata for citations. We
> have a project called Wikiquote, why not invest attention into Wikiquote.
> Really all the basic reasons why work on citations deserves additional
> funding is lacking. It does not explain what it will bring us anything
that
> we cannot get in another way.
>
> As long as there is no obvious benefit, it would destroy what we are and
> how we do things for no obvious benefit.
> Thanks,
> GerardM
>
> On 23 April 2016 at 16:02, James Salsman <jsalsman(a)gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > >
> > > Gerard Meijssen wrote:
> > >
> > ...
> >
> >
> > > I categorically oppose paying people for content. Enabling them to
create
> > > content is different. Citations is content and its quality is relevant
> > but
> > > only that.
> >
> >
> > Why categorically? We already pay hundreds of people for work in
support of
> > the projects, including reader-facing administrative and content far
more
> > prominent than citations. We encourage Wikipedian in Residence programs
> > where third parties pay for all kinds of content development. The PR
> > editing guidelines explicitly recognize that paid content happens
anyway,
> > we can't control it, but we can offer best practices. We support editing
> > assigned as part of academic class requirements.
> >
> > What reason is there to flatly rule out paying people to find citations
> > before measuring the quality and cost/benefit ratio of doing so with a
> > variety of both incentive payment models and managers?
> >
> >
> > > > How do people feel about a few of the larger the Chapters funding
> > > pilots to
> >
> > > have professional researchers do
> > https://tools.wmflabs.org/citationhunt/en
> > > > and a few other main languages?
> > > >
> > > > It would be great to measure the quality of results of different
> > payment
> > > > incentive models and rates, but this is not something that the
> > Foundation
> > > > could do without some risk of breaching the DMCA safe harbor
> > provisions,
> > > as
> > > > far as I can see. Even if I am technically wrong about that, the
> > > > appearances would be that it's obvious exertion of what would be
> > positive
> > > > editorial control, which would still mean a greater likelihood of
> > > lawsuits
> > > > by disgruntled BLP and corporate subjects who can't win in court but
> > can
> > > > waste everyone's money.
> > > >
> > > > But I would rather have multiple measurements administered by
different
> > > > parties anyway, because there are likely to be large uncontrollable
> > > sources
> > > > of noise.
> > >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
> >
> _______________________________________________
> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
> New messages to: Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
<mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
** I already sent this email to the chapters/affiliates mailing list but
I'm not sure all representatives subscribed to the list. Sorry for
cross-posting **
Dear fellow wikimedians,
After a resolution from the board, Wikimédia France has cast its vote for
the Affiliate-Selected Board Seats. We believe we would share our reasoning
behind in this venue.
It was not an easy choice − this year election is blessed with a lot of
strong candidates.
Unsurprisingly (since we endorsed him), we placed Christophe Henner as #1.
A volunteer for 12 years, and a Wikimédia France board member for 10 years,
our current chair has again and again demonstrated his commitment to the
movement and his leadership. Especially, he led the big transformation
which Wikimédia France went through in 2013, in the midst of our governance
crisis. Both as chair of Wikimedia France and now deputy CEO of a large
organization, he acquired the experiences needed to deal with the situation
WMF is going through now. We know he will be an asset to the Board of
Trustees in these trying times.
Our #2 is Nataliia Tymkiv.
Since ~3 years she's in the Board of Wikimedia Ukraine, she proved
abilities to structure her chapter, improve the financial, transparency and
governance processes.
She is also involved in the cooperation between several chapters − we
continue to be thoroughly impressed by the activity in the CEE region, and
we understand that she is a very active leader in this regional cooperation.
Furthermore, her professional experience in NGO appears to us necessary for
the next Board of the Wikimedia Foundation, in order to refocus the WMF on
its commitment and goals about knowledge's free access.
We believe these two candidates are complementary and can bring useful
(soft)skills, backgrounds and experiences. Last but not least, both are
supporters of the Wikimedia Cuteness Association and are commited to foster
Cuteness in the movement!
Other candidates seemed to us qualified for the job too and we discussed at
length on how many candidates we should support. We finally chose to vote
for only two candidates as there are two seats.
What is often see as a crisis is also an opportunity for our movement. An
opportunity to step back and consider who we are, what needs to be done to
finally become the movement we all dream of. In our opinion, Nataliia and
Christophe are the right fits to help us go down that road. To make our
movement as great as the individuals who make it.
Best regards,
--
Emeric Vallespi
Vice President
Wikimédia France
www.wikimedia.fr | Twitter: @Wikimedia_Fr
Mob. +33 6 61 15 13 12 <+33%206%2061%2015%2013%2012> |
emeric.vallespi(a)wikimedia.fr
Twitter: @evallespi
Dear all,
I’m thrilled to share with you something very unusual:
This is a call for participation to all Wikipedians all over the world.
Today, we set up a global community discussion about taking Wikipedia to
the Moon – yes, in the literal sense. It is a special birthday gift in the
year of Wikipedia’s 15th anniversary. Please find all the details on
Meta-Wiki <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_to_the_Moon>[1], where
you can also contribute immediately and on-wiki. The following is a
nutshell of the project, containing some additional information regarding
communications:
At Wikimedia Deutschland’s we’ve been contacted by Berlin-based Google
Lunar XPRIZE competitor “Part-Time Scientists”, who are among the few
remaining teams preparing to send their own lunar vehicles to the Moon by
2017. They’ve asked us for support, because they love Wikipedia and would
like to include it in their Moon rover’s scientific payload as a gift.
According to the rules of the Lunar challenge, their rover must make it
safely to the Moon surface, drive 500 meters and transmit images to earth.
However, the Part-Time Scientists, whose motto is “Hell yeah, it’s rocket
science!”, thought it would be even cooler to also preserve the sum of all
knowledge on the Moon. So that’s why they’ve offered Wikimedia Deutschland
20GB of disc space on a ceramic-made medium, provided that we handle the
selection of Wikipedia content. That, however, is something we feel we
cannot do on our own/alone:
After 15 years of free knowledge, approaching 40 million articles in almost
300 languages, it wouldn’t be easy for anyone to take the responsibility
and decide on a selection of the work of tens of thousands of volunteers.
We believe that any preparation of Wikipedia content for such a symbolic
purpose ought to be community-driven, and necessarily even on a global
level: This is bigger than single language communities or single groups or
organizations within our vast movement. So we’ve decided to be bold and
make every step of the process open for anyone who wants to contribute. It
is up to the international community of editors how to move forward. Again,
please find more information on Meta-Wiki (and all the links)[1].
Today we are kicking off the initial discussion of possible scenarios. It
will be open until June 3. In order to match payload deadlines we need to
prepare our data long before the actual launch date. Our goal is to finish
the Wikipedia anniversary year with a successful Moon project on
International Volunteers Day, December 5.
Wikimedia Deutschland’s spokesperson Jan Apel will be handling press
inquiries and media planning with the Part-Time Scientists here in Germany.
We’ve been in contact with the WMF Communications team (thanks guys for
your support!) and hereby extend a warm invitation to communications people
all over the movement to join in[2]. It would be great to coordinate
internationally, serving as many language communities as possible.
Beginning at Wikimedia Conference, we’ll reach out and coordinate in
person, but you can sign up right away on Meta-Wiki and become part of the
Moon team yourselves.
Let’s take Wikipedia to the Moon together!
Michael
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_to_the_Moon
[2]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_to_the_Moon/About#Press_contacts.…
--
Michael Jahn
Leiter Kommunikation & Partnerschaften
Head of Communications & Partnerships
Wikimedia Deutschland e.V. | Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24 | 10963 Berlin
Tel. (030) 219 158 260
http://wikimedia.de <http://www.wikimedia.de>
Stellen Sie sich eine Welt vor, in der jeder Mensch freien Zugang zu der
Gesamtheit des Wissens der Menschheit hat. Helfen Sie uns dabei!
Wikimedia Deutschland - Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e.V.
Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts Berlin-Charlottenburg unter
der Nummer 23855 B. Als gemeinnützig anerkannt durch das Finanzamt für
Körperschaften I Berlin, Steuernummer 27/029/42207.