Anthere wrote:
> Christopher Mahan wrote:
>
>> I too wish to express my misgivings at getting the grant. There's
>> always strings attached, and targets have to be met, and so on. Who's
>> gonna run it? Who's gonna keep track of the money, the milestones,
>> etc...
>>
>> I would rather mav publish a monthly budget and post that to the
>> front page, like this:
>>
>> This month, we need $4000 to meet expenses. So far, users have
>> contributed $2800. Thank you!
>>
>> If budget is met, then you write:
>> This month's budget has been met. Thank you!
>>
>>
>> It needs to be updated daily.
>
> I strongly disagree with this.
> A budget is not something you balance week per week or even month per
> month. We must plan it. In advance. A budget is something you have to
> organise, to take into account structural needs, contingencies, and
> see how to best use the remaining.
With respect to budgets, and also with respect to the financial
management involved in running a grant, Anthere is quite right. The
people who have to do the actual work cannot get the job done if they
have to spend half or more of their time keeping everyone constantly
updated on what they're doing.
However, it would be nice to see more frequent updates just about
fundraising progress, which is what this suggestion focuses on. Those
who are particularly interested in this should be encouraged to donate
the funds necessary so that we can start paying Mav a salary. Otherwise,
it's unfair to expect anyone to assume that burden.
--Michael Snow
As you may know, a number of us are trying to get a two-year NEH grant for
the Wikimedia Foundation. This is a grant for anything from $80-700,000 for the
development of resource materials. Gentgeen has spoken with them, they are
familiar with Wikipedia, and they encouraged us to apply for the grant.
We are asking for $500,000. This is a lot of money, but we believe that it
will cover our operating costs for 2 years, including the purchase of new
servers, etc. We can do some amazing things with half a million dollars, and really
help Wikipedia and the other projects to soar.
To do this, however, requires a lot of help. The grant deadline is July 15,
and it is already July 3. It must be in their office by then, so that means it
will have to go out by Fedex from somewhere by July 13 at the latest. The
proposal is complicated, and requires all sorts of documentation. No one will just
give us money for the asking, and the complete proposal has to be written and
approved by the community.
That said, I appeal to everyone to give us a hand with this. Pick a section
you want to write or edit, submit ideas, help Mav with the budget, argue about
it, discuss it. This is a chance to take Wikipedia to an exciting new stage,
and it is one that we should not miss.
For more information, a good place to start is:
http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/NEH_Reference_materials_grant_application
Looking forward to your insights and contributions to this effort,
Danny
This problem with the adress wikilegal-l being
inserted in some messages has been going on for a
while now;
It is a problem with gname, and I have no idea how to
fix it.
I just know that it makes all those prefixed messages
refused by the mailing list system.
I suggested that those still posting to wikilegal-l
remove the adress from their mails, and only post to
foundation-l, so that it does not break the gname
system. But ... :-(
Would anyone caring for mailing list has an idea how
to fix this problem ?
-----
my answer to Michael is at the end of this message :-)
ant
--- Mail Delivery System
<MAILER-DAEMON(a)mail.wikimedia.org> wrote:
> Date: Fri, 9 Jul 2004 06:11:37 +0000 (UTC)
> From: MAILER-DAEMON(a)mail.wikimedia.org (Mail
> Delivery System)
> Subject: Undelivered Mail Returned to Sender
> To: gowl-wikilegal-l(a)m.gmane.org
>
> This is the Postfix program at host
> mail.wikimedia.org.
>
> I'm sorry to have to inform you that the message
> returned
> below could not be delivered to one or more
> destinations.
>
> For further assistance, please send mail to
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>
> If you do so, please include this problem report.
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>
> The Postfix program
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> <wikilegal-l(a)wikimedia.org>: unknown user:
> "wikilegal-l"
>
> ATTACHMENT part 2 message/delivery-status
> ATTACHMENT part 3 message/rfc822
> To: wikilegal-l(a)wikimedia.org
> From: Anthere <anthere9(a)yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Re: NEH grant
> Date: Fri, 09 Jul 2004 08:13:05 +0200
> CC: foundation-l(a)wikimedia.org
>
>
>
> Michael Snow wrote:
> > Anthere wrote:
> >
> >> Christopher Mahan wrote:
> >>
> >>> I too wish to express my misgivings at getting
> the grant. There's
> >>> always strings attached, and targets have to be
> met, and so on. Who's
> >>> gonna run it? Who's gonna keep track of the
> money, the milestones,
> >>> etc...
> >>>
> >>> I would rather mav publish a monthly budget and
> post that to the
> >>> front page, like this:
> >>>
> >>> This month, we need $4000 to meet expenses. So
> far, users have
> >>> contributed $2800. Thank you!
> >>>
> >>> If budget is met, then you write:
> >>> This month's budget has been met. Thank you!
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> It needs to be updated daily.
> >>
> >>
> >> I strongly disagree with this.
> >> A budget is not something you balance week per
> week or even month per
> >> month. We must plan it. In advance. A budget is
> something you have to
> >> organise, to take into account structural needs,
> contingencies, and
> >> see how to best use the remaining.
> >
> >
> > With respect to budgets, and also with respect to
> the financial
> > management involved in running a grant, Anthere is
> quite right. The
> > people who have to do the actual work cannot get
> the job done if they
> > have to spend half or more of their time keeping
> everyone constantly
> > updated on what they're doing.
> >
> > However, it would be nice to see more frequent
> updates just about
> > fundraising progress, which is what this
> suggestion focuses on.
>
> I agree.
> This is planned to be on the new fundation website,
> as part of the
> feedback the organisation can provide donors.
>
> For more information about the new website content,
> see
> http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_website
>
> Please add to the page :-)
>
>
>
__________________________________
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Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales wrote:
>I am just now getting back into the swing of things. Are there
>people who may agree or disagree with SJ's opinions here.
>
>Keep in mind that I have not yet reviewed the proposed grant
>application, nor the requirements of the grant, etc.
>
While this particular grant does seem unrealistically ambitious to me at
this point, just working on it is good experience for us. I don't know
if we should actually submit this one, but I do expect we will
eventually submit other grant applications. If this is a practice run,
then it will help generate basic material for us to use again later.
I've briefly looked around to get an idea of the kinds of grants we
might apply for (i.e. the kind whose purpose is to foster knowledge and
education generally, rather than those with an agenda to promote some
particular kind of information). At least in the US, it generally seems
to be required for us to qualify as a 501(c)(3) organization. I don't
know much about grant-making organizations in other countries, they may
or may not have similar expectations. I suppose it's possible that some
places might accept an application with the assurance that we're in the
process of qualifying, but I think it would be best if we can get that
issue taken care of first.
--Michael Snow
The Wikimedia Board would like to announce that Tim Starling has been
appointed to the official position of developer liaison.
Brion Vibber is currently on a wikibreak, but it is expected than he
might also hold an official position related to development tasks when
he is back.
The Board would like to encourage the creation of a developer
committee whereby certain developers are assigned responsibility for
ensuring that tasks, such as buying servers, are carried out in an
efficient and timely way. It is expected that a number of non-official
positions will be created by this committee, and that particular
developers can be named in certain roles if the committee feel that
would be beneficial.
Tim Starling's role would include documenting the activities of this
committee so the community are aware of who to contact about different
issues, and to ensure smooth communication between developers.
The title is not meant to imply they Tim Starling does, or is expected
to do, more development work than anyone else. He will be the first
point of contact between the developers and the Board. The aim of this
position is to improve communication, both within the development
team, and between them, the Board and the community.
Angela Beesley
On behalf on the Wikimedia Foundation
I note on http://wikimediafoundation.org/fundraising that you encourage
recurring donations. I've searched about but found no mention of where
to set up a subscription donation, such as through Paypal.
I donate through a Paypal subscription to the FreeNetProject on a
monthly basis and would like to set up the same for WikiMedia.
I'd post the question to the wiki, but I think this is something that a
financial admin would have to do, so I'm posting here. Redirect me if
need be.
Thanks for all your work,
Alan Shields
Hello dear all,
Regardless of the way we decide to spent money, we have some in bank. It comes in. It comes out.
So, we need some people to take care of financial issues.
Mav has renewed his interest in taking care of this after the elections. Angela and I are favorable to this. I will not speak up for Jimbo... as he is on holidays :-)
Mav has been taking care of Wikimedia accounting for several months as far as I can remember. I did not hear there were any problems. He also is interested in working on the budget.
However, we wish that you have time to express disagreement if there is need to. So, if one doubts this is a wise decision, please say it so and *provide arguments*.
This is not meant to be a top-down decision, it is mostly that Mav said he was interested to do it, had done it well for many months, we trust him, and no one else has ever (afaik) said he would be willing to do it as well. My apologies if someone did and we did not realise :-)
Other people might be interested as well to participate in financial issues. In particular, the perspective of a professionnal on legal issues or on accounting would be most welcome. I think we should thrive to have teams as much as possible, and people with various perspectives, as it is more productive and usually more successful. A group of 3-5 people would be neat :-)
So, if someone is interested in being part of the financial committee, please speak up :-)
Criticism and/or nomination may be public or private.
Ant/Flo
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Thanks, Anthere
I have one comment, however, about Article IV, Section IV. It states that a
quorum consists of at least 3 directors. Could this be amended to say, "A
quorum consists of at least three members, one of whom is an elected member (either
Contributing Active User Representative or Volunteer User Representative)."
I believe that this will inspire greater confidence among the users who
participated in the election, that their voice cannot be automatically overruled.
Danny