Begin forwarded message:
> From: Sue Gardner <sgardner(a)wikimedia.org>
> Date: September 26, 2007 2:08:04 AM GMT+03:30
> To: anthere(a)wikimedia.org
> Cc: Sabine Cretella <scretella(a)wikimedia.org>, Erik Moeller
> <erik(a)wikimedia.org>, Sandra Ordonez <sordonez(a)wikimedia.org>, Cary
> Bass <cbass(a)wikimedia.org>, Hessam Armandeh <armandeh(a)gmail.com>,
> Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen(a)openprogress.org>
> Subject: Re: fa.wikipedia and me wearing two hats this time
>
> Florence Devouard wrote:
>> Sabine Cretella wrote:
>>> Just a short flashback to what happened - Anthere, Erik and
>>> Sandra already know about this, but I don't know if Sue and Cary
>>> know - but since they also deal with the fundraiser I would like
>>> to inform them as well.
>>>
>>> Last year Open Progress received a project for the creation of
>>> contents for fa.wikipedia. Preparation time was very short, so
>>> the only viable way then was to translate articles from
>>> en.wikipedia. This was done. There were of course some
>>> discussions with the community and in a chat with Anthere, Erik,
>>> two of the translators (Kurosh and Reza), Hessam and another
>>> wikipedian from fa.wikipedia, Gerard and me we agreed that the
>>> articles were uploaded in a special namespace on fa.wikipedia.
>>> The articles are there.
>>>
>>> Now we have the situation that we have a donor who would pay an
>>> amount of 10 EUR in donations to the WMF if the community of
>>> fa.wikipedia looks at the articles, changes what needs changing,
>>> adds three incoming links and three outgoing links (blue links) -
>>> for 5 further blue outgoing links 1 EUR per article would be
>>> added. We would like to avoid to work with people who are not in
>>> wikimedia community here - and if possible also in future.
>>> Therefore we believe that this is a way how the community can
>>> freely work on articles without feeling that something is imposed
>>> from outside (like they felt last time) since it is up to them to
>>> decide how these articles are going to be integrated.
>>>
>>> The thought was that people in Iran cannot donate easily to WMF,
>>> but by helping to get these articles right and moving them into
>>> the main namespace we have a double effect: the work done was not
>>> useless, the articles get integrated into fa.wikipedia and the
>>> WMF will get the available money in terms of a donation.
>>>
>>> We are talking about 147 articles - that is approx. 1470 EUR for
>>> the foundation (or 147 EUR more depending on the outgoing links -
>>> or better wikilinks that lead to other articles).
>>>
>>> Eventually in future there could be other contents creation
>>> projects from our first donor - what I would like to do at this
>>> stage is really try to get into a good co-operation with people
>>> from fa.wikipedia who at this very moment probably don't see me
>>> in the best light. Well this can change. I hope they will
>>> understand that we are for involving them to avoid other ways of
>>> doing things and to get the money instead of getting them to
>>> translators to the WMF.
>>>
>>> I wrote first of all Hessam to know his opinion about dealing
>>> with it this way: he would communicate the "adapt and move"
>>> project to the fa.wikipedia community and then we would see how
>>> things go.
>>>
>>> So... this is the first time me wearing two hats ... Wikimedia
>>> Foundation and Open Progress. I know there will be other
>>> circumstances where I will need to do this and it is not always
>>> easy.
>>>
>>> I hope this way of dealing with this meet your approval.
>>>
>>> Hessam: please do not publish for now. I would like to wait two
>>> days if there is any opposition or other proposals by anybody who
>>> is copied in this mail. Thank you for helping :-) that's really
>>> great.
>>>
>>> For now have a nice evening!
>>>
>>> Going to get the kids to bed ...
>>>
>>> Best wishes from Italy,
>>>
>>> Sabine
>>>
>>
>> Hello,
>>
>> I am sorry if I appear a bit obtuse, but I am not sure I fully
>> understand what the proposal is. Can you clarify ?
>>
>> From what I understand
>> 1) 147 articles were translated in farsi, from english wikipedia,
>> by two professional translators, who were paid by Open Progress
>> 2) the translated articles were not put in the main space, but set
>> up in a separate namespace.
>> (this was about a year ago. I remember there were some
>> disagreements from the fa community, who did not want to accept
>> the articles)
>>
>> 3) a donor wants to give 1470 EUR (more or less) to WMF, to make
>> sure the articles would be completed (with links) and moved to the
>> main space
>>
>> What I do not understand is
>> A) do you expect the WMF to pay 10 euros to the translators to
>> move and complete the articles ?
>> B) do you expect the WMF to pay some editors to move and complete
>> the articles ?
>> C) do you expect the move to happen all by itself, and WMF simply
>> keep the donation ?
>> D) something else ?
>>
>> In short, will someone be paid ?
>> By who ?
>> Who will coordinatate the move and completion ?
>> Who will decide the job is well done ?
>> Should the links be "controlled" by the donor ?
>> Who is paying ? Open Progress or WMF ? What is Open Progress role
>> here ?
>>
>> Anthere
> Thanks Florence. I was hesitant to jump in, thinking I am simply
> late to the conversation. But those are the questions I have too :-)