Thank you for the report, Laura. It sounds like there were some very
productive discussions.
I look forward to seeing the list of reasons women don't participate on
Wiki(p)(m)edia projects.
I would encourage caution about the mailing list, for the same reasons as
Nathan indicated, and would indeed encourage further discussion with
SlimVirgin and perhaps a few other people who were involved (pro and con)
in the prior private mailing list.
Speaking as someone who moderates several non-public WMF-based mailing
lists, I'm familiar with the very significant level of distrust within
various communities with respect to even those lists that discuss private
information (with "private" defined the same way as the WMF privacy
policy). I'd encourage those participating on such a mailing list to
consider a few points, such as how to persuade those excluded from the list
that it is a net positive for the projects involved; how to determine who
does and does not get access to the list; and how to ensure that there are
always people available to respond to requests in a timely manner. I note
that this list, despite all its subscribers, often has posts that receive
no responses for days, even if they are bringing a substantive issue to the
table.
I like the idea of Wikimedians supporting each other, in many different
ways, so I hope that good planning will help this list become a reality in
a form that helps women to participate in one or more of our projects.
Risker/Anne