Hi Alan,
I take no position on whether one option is better than another, and the last thing I want to do is discourage yourself and the others who are actually putting in effort to form the chapter (as opposed to those like myself who have an interest but merely observe and send comments onwards) from continuing your efforts towards the creation of a chapter.
The problem I see here resulted solely from the way you presented the information to everyone on the mailing list:
- We were first introduced to the topic of a change of the mailing list through your rather brief e-mail, stating that the change would happen (3/19 @ 5:46.) This was not really a problem, but the follow ups were probably sent by yourself a bit too hastily.
- When you were asked for a reason for the change, your response(3/19 @ 6:01) was, honestly, insulting. You did not answer any of the actual concerns. “We have up to 23 members” does not answer the question “Why are you switching to Google Docs?” unless this list was limited to 23 members. Nor does “we have no access to manage the list” unless you’re unable to ever gain access, and you would never be able to set up a different mailman list. Your remaining statement “We are transitioning…” also does not answer the question asked.
- You then follow-up by saying “we” think this is best, etc. Subject to what I will be writing at the end of this e-mail, I’m sure you can see how those people who agree with the underlying ideas of Wikipedia may have concern with your statement. You aren’t supporting your decision, you aren’t giving any legitimate reasons to support the change, and you are saying that the decision has already been made by a body of (to us) unknown decision makers.
I think the proper thing for you to do now is to take a bit of a step back, acknowledge that your replies were a bit hasty, and provide the members of this list with a thoughtful analysis of the reasons for your decision. If you and others have legitimately come to the decision to use Google, then I’m confident that it has some significant benefits. I just want to know what they are- whether it’s a better interface, it allows for better archiving, it will result in more frequent use by the members, etc. Taking the time to explain the decision will also help you gain support for your ideas generally in the future, and is in any way, a good practice to have for future decisions. Both of these will be a benefit to you in whatever leadership(or other) role you take with Wikimedia.
Now for those opposed, other than the reasons I mentioned above, are there any other legitimate concerns about the decision to transfer to Google Groups? My thoughts are that we may be slightly misunderstanding or misusing the principles of openness that are the central reason behind our support for Wikipedia. We know that we want the decision making process to be open to anyone, and we will not be sacrificing this tenant. However, it can come about in two ways:
1) Anyone can be part of making decisions.
2) Anyone can be involved with the operations of the Chapter. Anyone involved with the operations of the Chapter is part of making decisions.
Both of those ideas support openness and allowing everyone to be involved, and allowing everyone to contribute the making of decisions. By analogy to wikipedia, method #1 is where anyone can edit a Wikipedia page, even anonymously. Method #2 is a protected page, where anyone but anonymous or newly created users can edit the page. It feels to me that people are demanding we go by method #1 for chapter decisions, but in my view, that’s unreasonable. For something as important as chapter operations, which have a number of pragmatic concerns, as well as requiring interactions with regulatory bodies in the country, etc. we have to make decisions through method #2(or at least a combination of the two.)
As a result, and subject to what anyone else has to say, I would suggest that Alan takes a bit of time and properly justifies the move to Google Groups, and we should wait until after that to comment.
Cheers,
Alex
From: wikimedia-ca-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:wikimedia-ca-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Alan Walker
Sent: Sunday, March 20, 2011 3:20 PM
To: Wikimedia Canada planning list
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-Canada] Moving to new mailing list - how to stay in the loop
Gentlemen, can we tone down the drama. We're moving to a new mailing list that has more features and is easier to manage. Can we drop this please? I think we have much more important issues to discuss on the new mailing list, such as the projects moving forward and bringing everyone on the the new Wiki we have set up. These are exciting times, Canada is finally about to have a real chapter! I welcome all Canadians to join the chapter and tell us how they want things done.
On 20 March 2011 16:24, Mike Cleven <mikecleven@gmail.com> wrote:
"we believe the Google Groups interface will suite us better. "
Who's "we"??
You sound like a politician, Alan....vaguely paternalistic "we know best" etc. Clearly there's not a broadly-based consensus for this, just looking at the number of similar replies.....
MC
On Sun, Mar 20, 2011 at 9:39 AM, Amgine <amgine.saewyc@gmail.com> wrote:
On 03/19/2011 11:49 PM, Alan Walker wrote:
> I thank everyone for expressing their concerns, but we are convinced
> this is the right move for us. I encourage you all to sign up for the
> new mailing list.
Who is 'we', in your first sentence?
Amgine
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