Hoi,
Once Wikis have started, it is outside the remit of the language committee. As far as I am aware the committee does not seek authority outside of the current remit. Every now and again we are asked to look at a specific project because it is not functioning well, particularly when people find that the language produced is not the language that is advertised. Consequently the policy does not need to be revisited because of projects created before the genesis of the policy and the committee and specifically in the interest of languages we would not approve anyway. 

When the committee had an advisory role, I would look for those areas where the WMF does not make the sum of the data available to us in all supported languages particularly where it easily could. 

In your arguments you seek to redress a potential "unfairness" you seek procedural arguments why the RFC is to be considered. At the time there were two potential scenarios. The one favoured by many people of  the board was to delete dysfunctional projects and not allow for any new projects. The alternative was provided in the creation of the language committee and the language policy. It was considered unfair to remove existing projects and consequently the remit of the committee is proposals for new projects only. Your arguments would increase the remit of the language committee and make it easier for people to ask for the removal of active projects. Arguably the balance created that allows for new projects is unfair when, like you, you want room for projects that is not available. The big difference between dead languages and artificial languages is that for dead languages there is a finite vocabulary and consequently they do not fulfill a mission where we want to share in the sum of all knowledge.

Given the structure of the WMF you may like to know that chosen board members are selected from the communities but they do not represent the communities. Global representation is an objective because it provides a more balanced view within the board. Consequently the notion that the WMF is democratic and representative is false. Nothing new here.
Thanks,
       GerardM

On Mon, 13 Sept 2021 at 20:31, Jim Killock <jim@killock.org.uk> wrote:
Dear Gerard,

I am sorry you feel your time is being wasted. I am also very surprised how much effort this is taking, especially given that the request for policy change in the RFC is very limited, and would help the Committee deal with issues around the ancient language wikis which are not performing well. Furthermore I have no wish to be a nuisance, rather I would like to work with the Committee to help improve the ability of Ancient Language Wikis (ALWs) to meet WM’s mission.

As you say, the policy is clear; the process is now clearer, having found the email archive. This is important, because some members of the Committee want to leave the current policy in place, should the current RFC be rejected.

However, that is only reasonable if the policy you have can be seen to be developed fairly and responsibly, and to have dealt with all of the issues properly, at the time. Looking at the email discussion that led to the change I would observe that:

  1. The change to the status of Ancient Languages was presented as a minor change to the Language proposal policy
  2. The discussion was very short, with just 16 emails sent
  3. Only three issues were raised; being the need to meet the mission; a "need for native speakers"; and the need for a “natural audience”
  4. There were no mitigations or alternatives discussed
  5. There was no mention of a public discussion or consultation, which appears to be a breach of the Committee’s Charter commitment to transparency
  6. There was no discussion of whether qualitative factors (ancient versus constructed languages) could be appropriately combined with different treatment of objective factors (numbers of native speakers) which appears to be in breach of the Committee’s Charter, which commits to using objective factors alone.

Point six in particular is in need of public consultation and a consensus, and should not be the property of the Committee to determine by itself, or via a Board rubber stamp.

All this said, it is easy to say these things in hindsight. I just want to be plain that the current RFC process is already a much more thorough and developed policy process than that in 2007 - quite naturally, given we have 14 years of further experience to apply. A review would be quite natural after this length of time in any case.

So this is not meant as criticism, still less a personal one. I would however like the Committee to approach the current RFC positively, and use it to take a fresh look.

Thank you again for your time,

Jim

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