Well Tom, you have to remember that I write here as old Rexx, the dinosaur,
wikimedian volunteer. I don't speak for the WMUK Board, and I sometimes
wonder if I have to put a disclaimer on everything I write as a result.
Would you prefer that? It sounds like just the sort of bureaucracy that
will encourage others to stand as trustees in future.
I stand by my view that future projects will always have the potential to
do great good for the movement, as well as do harm if things go wrong. The
view that the Wikimedia community in the UK should be paralysed into
inaction for fear of doing something wrong is simply untenable. I seriously
hope that's not what you're suggesting.
Please feel free to tell us how you'd handle a future request for a new
wiki-town. Even better, there's going to be a call for new trustees, both
elected and coopted in the near future. WMUK could certainly do with having
the benefit of your wisdom on the Board, and I'd vote for you.
--
Rexx
Expressing my personal opinion only.
On 12 February 2013 16:31, Tom Morris <tom(a)tommorris.org> wrote:
On Tuesday, 12 February 2013 at 15:56, rexx wrote:
For example, Monmouthpedia generated many new
articles in multiple
languages as well as new photographs; the volunteers'
efforts have helped
vitalise the Welsh Wikipedia; the contacts made are leading to a shift in
attitude of the Welsh Government and academia towards free and open
licensing of work that they create or are custodians of.
Gibraltarpedia has the potential to involve the whole area from
Gibraltar into
North Africa and create links between British, Spanish and
North African wikimedians - perhaps even help to establish new communities
of wikimedians where they do not yet exist.
Andreas' concerns are clearly genuinely held, and we should never fear
honest
scrutiny and criticism. I'm looking forward to seeing new
initiatives in the future and I'd welcome everyone's input on how best to
ensure that they meet the vision of our wiki-movement. Contributions from
our sternest critics are potentially the most valuable.
Let's be fair here, it's not just Andreas' concerns. It's not just a
concern for self-styled Wikipedia critics. Lots and lots of people thought
that Gibraltarpedia was problematic, myself included.* I think it's a clear
case of WMUK collectively not having a good intuitive grasp of what the
community on-wiki will and won't tolerate from chapters or chapter board
members.
It's not even about the rights and wrongs of what went on, it's about
being able to make sane judgement calls about about whether one can get the
community to buy-in to grand plans for outreach (whether clearly good
things like working with GLAMs to more problematic things which skirt close
to the edge of paid editing like the Gibraltar stuff). It's about realising
that one has to think through the politics of these things and to have the
cleanest possible hands in dealing with COI.
Despite negative press coverage, negative reaction on-wiki and a
governance review, based on Rexx's email, I'm starting to think that nobody
at WMUK has actually learned anything useful from the Gibraltarpedia
affair. Which is a shame.
* See
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/Wikipedia:G…
--
Tom Morris
<http://tommorris.org/>
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