On 21 March 2014 00:56, Erik Moeller <erik(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
...
This project was not funded through the individual
donations of the general public but rather through a third party
foundation that had an interest in seeing this happen, so from an
ethical perspective, it's reasonable that the standards of
accountability differ
...
There may be a massive cultural gap between Europe and North America,
but no, no, no.
The WMF officially endorsed this project in the same year that the WMF
was stomping down with its hobnail boots on Wikimedia UK so hard on
matters of ethics and accountability, that it threatened to destroy
the organization (literally, based on my personal experience). Just
because a well known second party organization is providing funds for
the project does not obviate the WMF from ensuring that programmes
that it officially endorses meet precisely the same ethical standards
that it enforces so firmly on all other Wikimedia organizations.
Eric, in this thread you are officially speaking for the WMF. Does the
WMF really want to say it is "ethical" to have different
accountability rules for funding organizations that want to use the
Wikimedia brand because there are different rules for the rich? On
that basis, WMUK should be free to do a deal to offer the Wikimedia
brand to officially endorse (or be a "fiscal sponsor") for a
Conservative Party or Catholic Church programme of paid editing
directed to "fix" Wikipedia to match their world view, and the WMF
would have nothing to criticise as the Chapter could wash its hands as
it did not directly handle the payments.
The Wikimedia brand value was not spontaneously created by the
Foundation, but by unpaid volunteers like me that create the content
of our projects. If the WMF wants to retain the hearts and minds of
the community of volunteers, it cannot afford to have fluid ethics
that conveniently shift to cover up any embarrassingly bad decisions
it makes.
Fae