On Tue, Jul 13, 2010 at 2:36 AM, Carcharoth carcharothwp@googlemail.comwrote:
On Tue, Jul 13, 2010 at 7:21 AM, Gwern Branwen gwern0@gmail.com wrote:
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/09/wikipedia-foundation-plans-expansio...
The foundation that runs the Wikipedia Web site plans to add 44
employees in the next year — roughly doubling the size of its current professional staff — and to raise $20 million to support a much-enhanced vision for the volunteer-created encyclopedia that nearly anyone can edit.
<snip>
Well, I suppose as long as the technical side doesn't suffer starvation and they actually can raise that much...
That does sound like quite a big expansion, actually. I think I may have seen a precursor to that sort of presentation when Sue Gardner attended a London meetup earlier in the year, which included those involved in Wikimedia UK. It will be interesting to see how things develop.
Carcharoth
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It will be. If you haven't taken a gander at the annual plan you should ( http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/2010-2011_Annual_Plan_Questions_and_Answ...) , it's an interesting read.* *I believe Sue's keynote should be up relatively soon as well (as well as the other talks from Wikimania) and is another good watch because she explains some of it.
The actual # of tech staff is jumping a bunch with the approximates being 16 tech, 17 other (which is I believe solely the newly merged community department with Reader Relations/Volunteers/Public Outreach/Education etc) and the BRAND new global development group), 7 administrative (like the administrative assistant jobs on the job opportunities page now) and 2 fundraising (which is in the community department but looks to be separated out, which is nice. The "other" is (I believe) solely the new Community department (Reader Relations/Volunteers/Public Outreach/Education etc) and the BRAND new Global Development department which I think is the one that will be doing a lot of the big work coming up in the "global south" focus area that they are working on including staff in India (and I think Brazil and a 3rd spot) earlish next year.
That lowers the percentage of technical staff a bit but I'm not sure I mind given 1. the increase in actual tech staff and 2. The global development staff which I think is really important. I'll fully admit that the large increase worries me a bit but I'm comforted by the fact that both the Annual Plan on paper (well "paper") and Sue/the Board have said multiple times that they plan to be careful and that 44 new jobs may become 20 something and that they very well may underspend (especially given the newness of the departments and their chiefs).
I think the added staff could be very good to be honest as long as they are used appropriately which will be the question obviously. I think they know what needs to be done which is good, I think staff that can interact, be part of and support the community/volunteers can do enormous good but getting the right balance isn't easy because you don't want them to REPLACE volunteers.
On a related note: someone brought this Times article to the meetup in Boston Monday http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/12/business/media/12link.html. There is some truth to it I think and the staffing changes reflect that some with a larger focus on development outside en.
James Alexander james.alexander@rochester.edu jamesofur@gmail.com