I was sort of surprised to learn today that Mediawiki software has had 37
security holes identified:
http://akahele.org/2009/09/false-sense-of-security/
Are most of these patched now, or are they still open? If still open, is
the Foundation making site & user security more of a priority in 2010?
--
Gregory Kohs
Italian Wikimedians are reporting that Wikimedia Italia (the Italian
local chapter) and former chapter president (and former Wikimedia
board member) Frieda Brioschi are being sued for an outrageous sum
over alleged defamation in a (now-deleted) biography on Italian
Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Gianfranco/Wikimedia_Italia_sued_for_20,0…
-Sage
Indeed, what Florence & everyone said -- this year's Wikimania was
fantastic. There were several details that especially shone:
- the great swag; the book was my favorite part
- the welcome dinner and all the nice information for arriving attendees
- the tight moderation & room volunteer team, who kept everything
cracking along on schedule; this team of folks deserves extra applause
- simultaneous translation!!!
- videos of all the talks!!!!
- the great common areas
- coffee all the time :)
I also heard lots of praise for the conference program, and for the
city itself. I also know a lot of work got done, and hundreds of
interesting conversations were had; I hope a lot of good results come
out of this year's conference.
Most of the details I listed above are based on ideas that have come
out of past wikimanias; so I'd encourage everyone to post their
feedback (let's start http://wikimania2009.wikimedia.org/wiki/Feedback
for survey-feedback, as well as
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimania_2011)... and if you're
interested, please help out with the planning for next year and future
conferences if you can.
Thanks again to an organized, dedicated and responsive team that spent
the past 18 months working on this conference; your hard work
definitely paid off.
-- phoebe
On Tue, Sep 1, 2009 at 9:50 PM, Florence Devouard<anthere(a)anthere.org> wrote:
> Nathan wrote:
>> I wasn't there, but I'll echo Erik, Ting and Jerry - from everything
>> I've read, the organizers did a great job and really represented the
>> Wikimedia community well. Thanks for your hard work and
>> congratulations on a job well done.
>>
>> Nathan
>>
> After having been a member of the past 5 Wikimanias, I have to outline
> how nicely organized everything was. Indeed, the bar is raised very very
> high now for the future events.
> Great program, great people, great food, great parties. Even
> unexpectedly warm winter weather. Patricio, you were worried the first
> day about the two event location... that was no trouble whatsoever.
> Thank you as well for the videos and live streaming, and for the
> translation service.
>
> Yeah, all of you guys did a great job !
>
> ant
--
* I use this address for lists; send personal messages to phoebe.ayers
<at> gmail.com *
In the thread "WMF seeking to sub-lease office space?"
On Sat, Sep 5, 2009 at 10:51 AM, Austin Hair<adhair(a)gmail.com> wrote:
(to Gregory Kohs)
[snip]
> I've placed you on indefinite
> moderation with the goal of improving the signal:crazy ratio.
With something like 40 posts made to that thread after Mr. Kohs' last
I think it is clear that the squelching of a (admittedly,
trigger-happy) critic was ineffective at improving the SNB
(signal-to-blah) ratio.
…while at the same time it increased the scent of idea-centric rather
than presentation-centric censorship.
This is doubly a concern when moderation is used against someone who
made an error that any one of us could have made and jumped to some
hasty conclusions.
Certainly there are non-profits which are little more than fronts for
their operators' private gains, ones started for that purpose, and
ones which fall into it after years of normal operation. In some
places and at some scales the kind of self-dealing Mr. Kohs was
concerned about are arguably the norm. I don't believe that they
currently apply to Wikimedia but my confidence is in part derived from
that fact that were there any real evidence of such things the critics
would be all over it. (I do, however, think Wikimedia has done a
worse job than it could have at avoiding the perception of
self-dealing)
Kohs was gleefully pointing at some supposed evidence of
naughty-naughty. He missed a critical detail which made his position
laughably wrong. I have no doubt that it was an honest mistake: in the
end it only made him look silly. It was a mistake anyone could have
made if they didn't begin by assuming good faith but the value of a
critic is that they start with a different set of assumptions and
values.
I'm of the view that the further growth and development of Wikimedia
and its family of projects is utterly dependent on having solid,
well-considered, and productively-spoken critics. Internet forums are
highly vulnerable to groupthink: as we work together we become a
family. It's all too easy to avoid thinking critically about your
family and about things you've invested time in. It for this reason,
under other names, that we invite outsiders to serve on our board. A
view from outside of WMF's reality distortion field (and from inside
someone else's RDF) is essential.
Mr. Kohs is frequently not an ideal critic: by being too prone to
extreme positions, and by falling into accusations, he loses
credibility. But even an off-the-wall critic can help make an
environment more conducive to productive criticism. Someone more
moderate may feel more comfortable speaking up when there is a strong
critic handy to take the unreasonably extreme positions and the
resulting heresy-fire and the existence of someone with an extreme
position can help other people find a common ground.
I'd prefer that moderation of this list be used as a last resort to
maintain civil discourse and not as a tool to impose an external view
of the desired traffic volume and especially not in a way which could
be construed as prohibiting criticism. Dealing with criticism,
including occasional off-the-wall criticism and sometimes outright
nutty criticism, is one of the costs of open and transparent
governance.
I make this post with over a year of consideration: had this kind of
(in my view) heavy-handed moderation been effective at improving the
discourse on this list, I would be left with little to say. I don't
think anyone here can say that it has improved. As such, it's time to
try something different.
IRC office hours for the strategy project are upon us again.... Our
next office hours will be: 20:00-21:00 UTC, Tuesday 15 September.
Local timezones can be checked at http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?month=9&day=15&year=20…
Office hours are on IRC (#wikimedia-strategy at freenode)
You can access the chat by going to https://webchat.freenode.net/ and
filling in a username and the channel name (#wikimedia-strategy). You
may be prompted to click through a security warning. It's fine.
Another option is http://chat.wikizine.org.
The discussion about a budget line item being appropriate in one context
and not in the next has been very interesting to me. And especially in
this case as it involves the provision of food, which is one of the most
deeply held cultural norms in many communities.
Frugality is certainly a consideration for the WMF. I can say with my
staff hat on that while we do get generous grants from foundations to
help support your amazing work, everyone here also thinks about the $5
that was donated by a student and feels a responsibility to that student.
However the word and concept of "frugality" differs significantly across
cultures. In my experience with many non-Western cultures, asking people
to bring lunch from home or spend their own money for it would not only
exclude participation, it would insult people. If the purpose is to
encourage participation and commitment to a newly forming organization,
it seems it would be very important not to insult people.
In many cultures I've worked in, if you didn't bring cigarettes, you
couldn't get a goat to listen to you. These may seem to be extreme
cases, but I'm thinking about WMF and the Wikimedia movement as truly
global. So I don't think we should dismiss this concept just because
currently we aren't working with any people who require cigarettes
before thinking about editing a Wikipedia.
I have no idea what the cultural norms for providing food at initial
meetings are in Portugal or many other places. I just add my crumb to
the discussion as a reminder that if we are wearing limited cultural
lenses when we create policy, it will forever limit us to working within
communities who are interested and able to live within those restrictions.
Jennifer Riggs
foundation-l-request(a)lists.wikimedia.org wrote:
> Send foundation-l mailing list submissions to
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>
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>
> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
> than "Re: Contents of foundation-l digest..."
>
>
> Today's Topics:
>
> 1. Re: Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009 (Thomas Dalton)
> 2. Re: Use of moderation (Austin Hair)
> 3. Re: Do we have a complete set of WMF projects? (Mike.lifeguard)
> 4. Re: Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009 (Pharos)
> 5. Re: Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009 (Thomas Dalton)
> 6. Re: Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009 (Thomas Dalton)
> 7. Re: Do we have a complete set of WMF projects? (David Gerard)
> 8. Re: Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009 (Chad)
> 9. Re: Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009 (Thomas Dalton)
> 10. Re: Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009 (Gerard Meijssen)
> 11. Re: Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009 (Thomas Dalton)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 18:41:07 +0100
> From: Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <a4359dff0909101041q3d6d869foe02cb48c012cbcd7(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> 2009/9/10 Sue Gardner <sgardner(a)wikimedia.org>:
>> Hi Thomas!
>>
>> Sorry to top-post, and to be late replying. I believe that all 26
>> proposals are up now on the meta page. Let me know if you can't find
>> it, and I can post the link tonight when I'm back on my laptop.
>
> The proposals are up, but not the details of which were accepted and
> which weren't. It would be useful to have that information when
> considering what to request funding for in future.
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 13:06:20 -0500
> From: Austin Hair <adhair(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Use of moderation
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <e2a50e360909101106m6cc6a0eao51f41424f86c20db(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> On Thu, Sep 10, 2009 at 12:15 AM, Henning Schlottmann
> <h.schlottmann(a)gmx.net> wrote:
>> Austin Hair wrote:
>>> My ideal, personally, is something more like nntp--and while I'm
>>> perfectly happy to turn over the list to some other technology, I
>>> don't know that this is the magic solution, and I agree with Tim that
>>> it risks killing what good we do have with the existing methods.
>> I'm reading and posting to the list using nntp. foundation-l is
>> distributed by gmane.org as the (pseudo) newsgroup
>> news:gemane.org.wikimedia.foundation on the server news.gmane.org along
>> with all the other Wikimedia mailing lists and it is by far the most
>> comfortable way to read the list.
>
> Yes, but as gmane is simply a mail -> news gateway, the fundamental
> operation of the list remains the same. The content management issues
> aren't affected.
>
> Austin
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 3
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 16:18:50 -0300
> From: "Mike.lifeguard" <mike.lifeguard(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID: <4AA9511A.2090902(a)gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> Brion Vibber wrote:
>> IMO we need to do that for the projects we already have before we take
>> on new obligations!
>>
>> We still have very poor software support for:...
>
> Thanks Brion, it is good to know that the tech team is aware of these
> issues and will be expending energy to improve how the software supports
> the non-Wikipedia projects. I'm looking forward in particular to seeing
> how the grant money will be spent for improving Commons' software, and
> what ideas may come about for giving Wikibooks some in-software structure.
>
> - -Mike
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> Version: GnuPG v1.4.9 (GNU/Linux)
>
> iEYEARECAAYFAkqpURcACgkQst0AR/DaKHsIRwCgyQTVbLBnmfvs5VUrPzCO3+0U
> hO8An1O/WILU6r3++zuZ1TqGXKiZcKFX
> =28Ym
> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 4
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 15:27:07 -0400
> From: Pharos <pharosofalexandria(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <ddc4b4860909101227s1701f247ifc8991c82eb939dc(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> On Thu, Sep 10, 2009 at 1:41 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote:
>> 2009/9/10 Sue Gardner <sgardner(a)wikimedia.org>:
>>> Hi Thomas!
>>>
>>> Sorry to top-post, and to be late replying. I believe that all 26
>>> proposals are up now on the meta page. Let me know if you can't find
>>> it, and I can post the link tonight when I'm back on my laptop.
>> The proposals are up, but not the details of which were accepted and
>> which weren't. It would be useful to have that information when
>> considering what to request funding for in future.
>
> There are 21 accepted proposals listed on this page:
>
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants/Reporting_Guid…
>
> Since 26 were accepted in total, I guess this list in not quite
> complete yet; but still it makes for very useful reading.
>
> Thanks,
> Richard
> (User:Pharos)
> Wikimedia NYC-personal view
>
>> _______________________________________________
>> foundation-l mailing list
>> foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 5
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 20:40:32 +0100
> From: Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <a4359dff0909101240w76c3cbf8h152859ce4ee7348e(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> 2009/9/10 Pharos <pharosofalexandria(a)gmail.com>:
>> There are 21 accepted proposals listed on this page:
>>
>> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants/Reporting_Guid…
>
> Ah, well found! I didn't think to check that page - the title doesn't
> suggest it would contain such info.
>
>> Since 26 were accepted in total, I guess this list in not quite
>> complete yet; but still it makes for very useful reading.
>
> They may still be waiting to hear back from the other chapters.
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 6
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 20:53:49 +0100
> From: Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <a4359dff0909101253w60b72858x4e19ed4ba35b4a60(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> 2009/9/10 Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>:
>> 2009/9/10 Pharos <pharosofalexandria(a)gmail.com>:
>>> There are 21 accepted proposals listed on this page:
>>>
>>> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants/Reporting_Guid…
>> Ah, well found! I didn't think to check that page - the title doesn't
>> suggest it would contain such info.
>
> I must say, I am amazed that this was approved:
>
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants/WM_PT/Start-up
>
> WMUK managed to get set up without paying for any meals and all
> meetings have taken place in pubs or rooms we've got hold of for free.
> Paying nearly $3,500 for that out of charitable donations is patently
> ridiculous.
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 7
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 21:00:16 +0100
> From: David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <fbad4e140909101300i5f3a3289vdbd8acded92d8a26(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> 2009/9/10 Brion Vibber <brion(a)wikimedia.org>:
>
>> IMO we need to do that for the projects we already have before we take
>> on new obligations!
>
>
> Oh yesss.
>
>
>> We still have very poor software support for:
>> * Commons -- We need a sane upload and post-upload workflow (eg review
>> and deletion), and a clean system for handling structured metadata
>> (descriptions, authorship, licence info).
>> Some of this is being worked on now with Michael Dale's video & media
>> work, and the Ford Foundation grant will let us put more resources into
>> the workflow & metadata side, so this is the one I worry the least about. :)
>
>
> Categories as tags with arbitrary Boolean queries? Huh? Huh? Huh?
>
>
> - d.
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 8
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 16:02:22 -0400
> From: Chad <innocentkiller(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <5924f50a0909101302tb9ec3ffv51050b18ca4b6a0b(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> On Thu, Sep 10, 2009 at 3:53 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote:
>> 2009/9/10 Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>:
>>> 2009/9/10 Pharos <pharosofalexandria(a)gmail.com>:
>>>> There are 21 accepted proposals listed on this page:
>>>>
>>>> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants/Reporting_Guid…
>>> Ah, well found! I didn't think to check that page - the title doesn't
>>> suggest it would contain such info.
>> I must say, I am amazed that this was approved:
>>
>> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants/WM_PT/Start-up
>>
>> WMUK managed to get set up without paying for any meals and all
>> meetings have taken place in pubs or rooms we've got hold of for free.
>> Paying nearly $3,500 for that out of charitable donations is patently
>> ridiculous.
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> foundation-l mailing list
>> foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>>
>
> I hadn't read that either. Ridiculous, I agree. I doubt people are donating
> to the WMF for them to send the money to the Portuguese chapter for
> their lunches.
>
> The only part of that budget that makes sense to me is the legal fees, and
> they're certainly not a back-breaking amount either.
>
> -Chad
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 9
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 21:04:40 +0100
> From: Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <a4359dff0909101304s242951b6vf4b45625a2e28d4(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> 2009/9/10 Chad <innocentkiller(a)gmail.com>:
>> I hadn't read that either. Ridiculous, I agree. I doubt people are donating
>> to the WMF for them to send the money to the Portuguese chapter for
>> their lunches.
>>
>> The only part of that budget that makes sense to me is the legal fees, and
>> they're certainly not a back-breaking amount either.
>
> I have no objection, in principle, to travel and admin costs - WMUK
> paid for them out of our first membership fees. We didn't travel that
> much, though - I think there was one face-to-face meeting to actually
> sign things, everything else was done online.
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 10
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 22:12:22 +0200
> From: Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <41a006820909101312m59574349nef27e6bc3c6cbe0e(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> Hoi,
> I think it is not reasonable to judge others by how you do things. Please
> remember that there are different cultures where things are done in
> different ways. I am sure there are things in the history of the WMUK that
> you do not wish onto others.. Everyone has to deal with the local
> environment. This is one reason why we have different chapters ...
> Thanks,
> GerardM
>
> 2009/9/10 Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>
>
>> 2009/9/10 Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>:
>>> 2009/9/10 Pharos <pharosofalexandria(a)gmail.com>:
>>>> There are 21 accepted proposals listed on this page:
>>>>
>>>>
>> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants/Reporting_Guid…
>>> Ah, well found! I didn't think to check that page - the title doesn't
>>> suggest it would contain such info.
>> I must say, I am amazed that this was approved:
>>
>> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants/WM_PT/Start-up
>>
>> WMUK managed to get set up without paying for any meals and all
>> meetings have taken place in pubs or rooms we've got hold of for free.
>> Paying nearly $3,500 for that out of charitable donations is patently
>> ridiculous.
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> foundation-l mailing list
>> foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 11
> Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2009 21:21:07 +0100
> From: Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Report to the Board of Trustees June 2009
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
> <a4359dff0909101321i684d792cv888608a70a5b2205(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> 2009/9/10 Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen(a)gmail.com>:
>> Hoi,
>> I think it is not reasonable to judge others by how you do things. Please
>> remember that there are different cultures where things are done in
>> different ways. I am sure there are things in the history of the WMUK that
>> you do not wish onto others.. Everyone has to deal with the local
>> environment. This is one reason why we have different chapters ...
>
> Nonsense. If British Wikimedians can afford their own food, so can
> Portuguese Wikimedians. They can bring a packed lunch from home if
> they want - they would be eating anyway.
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>
>
> End of foundation-l Digest, Vol 66, Issue 38
> ********************************************
> Date: Sat, 29 Aug 2009 11:46:36 -0400
> From: Anthony <wikimail(a)inbox.org>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] moderate this list
>
> There needs to be place for dozens of back-and-forth-over-minor-details
> discussion. Long detailed emails have their place, but after they are
> posted there needs to be room for a question and answer session. Limiting
> these Q&A sessions so that each person can merely make a single comment and
> then receive a single response severely limits the ability of people to
> engage in useful discussion, and forcing people to have any back and forth
> discussions off-list severely limits the usefulness of the list for
> brainstorming and for refining ideas.
>
> If you want a separate list for long, well-thought-out emails, I'm fine with
> that. But we need a place for brainstorming and refining ideas. We need a
> place for back-and-forth discussion.
>
> Am I in the minority in believing that?
>
>
This issue of moderation comes up with great regularity, though not
always about the same individuals. Anthony and Thomas have
well-established credentials as pains in the ass ... so too has a shot
of penicillin. I have frequently disagreed with them, but even when my
personal opinion has been that they have reached their most idiotic I
have never sought to throttle them. I have a much easier option: the
delete key on my keyboard.
To those who consider them trolls: Why are you feeding them with
requests for moderation? Has that oft repeated simple advice never had
any effect upon you? If you view them as part of the problem, must you
too become a part of the problem by promoting an equally inane series of
messages about moderation?
The protection of free speech does not begin with laws on the matter,
but with our own personal responses to what we regard as objectionable.
Ec
Report to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees
Covering: June 2009
Prepared by: Sue Gardner, Executive Director, Wikimedia Foundation
Prepared for: Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees
MILESTONES FROM JUNE
1. Finalization and approval of the 2009-10 Annual Plan and staff goals
2. 2008-09 staff performance reviews
3. Hiring interviews for the Strategy Project
KEY PRIORITIES FOR JULY
1. Finalization of staff hiring for Strategy Project
2. Advisory Board member Wayne Mackintosh will visit the Wikimedia
Foundation for meetings related to strategy, technology and outreach
3. Proposals from public relations firms will be reviewed for the
2009-10 communications campaign
THIS PAST MONTH
In June, Facebook overtook the Wikimedia Foundation sites as the
fourth-most-popular in the world, with Wikimedia dropping to number
five, serving 302 million global unique visitors according to comScore
Media Metrix. Currently, the most popular web properties in the world
are 1. Google sites, 2. Microsoft sites, 3. Yahoo sites, 4.
Facebook.com, and 5. Wikimedia sites.
2009-10 ANNUAL PLAN
In June, following months of consultation and planning, Sue Gardner
and Veronique Kessler finalized the 2009-10 Annual Plan and presented
it for approval to the Board of Trustees at a special IRC meeting June
16. The Board voted unanimously in support of the plan. The 2009-10
Annual Plan and an FAQ are at:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/2009-2010_Annual_Plan_Questions_and_Ans…
STRATEGY PROJECT
During June, interviews began for the Strategy Project team. The
Wikimedia Foundation received more than 200 applications for the
Project Manager position, most from people with project manager
experience in for-profit technology companies. Sue, Erik Moeller and
Jennifer Riggs interviewed seven candidates for the Project Manager
role. More than one hundred people applied for the Facilitator
position, including many people with professional backgrounds in
facilitation and organizational development, as well as several
Wikimedia community members: Sue, Erik and Jennifer interviewed five
candidates. More than one hundred people applied for the Research
Analyst position. Sue, Erik and Erik Zachte interviewed six candidates
for the Research Analyst role. Hiring decisions will be announced by
mid-July.
OUTREACH & PROGRAMS
During June, Jennifer Riggs and Frank Schulenburg worked with a
volunteer team to finalize nearly nine months of preparations for a
July Wikipedia Academy staged in partnership with the National
Institute of Health. This event is intended to model new strategies
for welcoming new editors and sustaining their participation.
Jennifer worked with Sue, Erik Moeller and Veronique to review and
evaluate proposals submitted through the Chapters Funding Request
process. Twenty-six of thirty proposals received were approved.
Recipients will be posting descriptions of their events and lessons
learned on Meta, linked from
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_chapters/WMF_grants
Sara Crouse and Cary Bass continued to support the Wikimania
scholarships committee and coordinate travel bookings for scholarship
recipients.
Cary recruited a volunteer team to conduct an analysis of the
efficiency, effectiveness and levels of customer service provided
through the current OTRS customer service ticket system.
COMMUNICATIONS
Major coverage during June revolved around the following stories:
1. Keeping news of kidnapping off Wikipedia (June 28): Reports of the
freeing of kidnapped NY Times journalist David Rohde by the Taliban in
late June drew international coverage, much relating to Rohde's
Wikipedia page. News of Rohde's kidnapping had been kept off Wikipedia
by Jimmy Wales and other volunteers through careful application of
Wikipedia's policies on reliable sourcing and biographies of living
persons. Coverage was mostly positive: the intent was applauded, but
some onlookers felt it set a worrying precedent.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/techchron/detail?&entry_id=42811http://features.csmonitor.com/innovation/2009/06/29/was-wikipedia-correct-t…http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/29/technology/internet/29wiki.html
2. Michael Jackson's death “breaks the internet,” sets a record for
Wikipedia (June 26):
News of Michael Jackson's death caused traffic to surge on some big
sites including Wikipedia, with over one million hits to Jackson's
Wikipedia article in a single one hour period.
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/TECH/06/26/michael.jackson.internet/http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/techchron/detail?blogid=19&entry_id=425…http://www.mirror.co.uk/celebs/news/2009/06/26/michael-jackson-is-dead-news…
3.Wired editor and prominent author Chris Anderson apologized
following criticisms that his new book "Free" contained unattributed
text from Wikipedia (June 25):
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/arts/la-et-free25-2009jun25,0,322…http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/24/editor-of-wired-apologizes…http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/chris-dannen/techwatch/chris-andersons-free…
4. Wikipedia picks green data center (June 23): Significant tech-media
coverage of Evoswitch's donation of hosting space for cache servers in
Amsterdam.
http://www.eweekeurope.co.uk/news/wikimedia-moves-into-green-european-data-…http://www.thewhir.com/web-hosting-news/062309_EvoSwitch_Hosts_the_Wikimedi…
5. Google News picks up Wikipedia (June 21): Bloggers and media
reporters reported that Google News nows includes Wikipedia articles.
Google initially tested the technology quietly, but later publicly
announced that Wikipedia articles would now appear alongside other
news and information results.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/22/technology/internet/22wiki.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/09/AR200906090…
6. Wikipedia preps for video (June 19): An MIT Technology review
interview with Erik and Michael Dale shed light on the ongoing video
editing / uploading development work led by Michael in partnership
with Kaltura.
http://www.technologyreview.com/web/22900/http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/wikipedia_getting_video_within_months.…http://news.cnet.com/8301-13506_3-10269308-17.html
7. Wikipedia turned into a book (June 18, and earlier)
Never underestimate the power of an image. Designer Rob Matthews'
sculpture creation of a book containing over 5,000 pages based on 473
featured WP articles initially caused a wave of twitter coverage,
followed by hundreds of blog posts and considerable conventional media
coverage.
http://livenews.com.au/entertainment/wikipedia-converted-into-gigantic-book…http://www.rob-matthews.com/index.php?/project/wikipedia/
8. Scientology row stirs a war on words (June 1): June kicked off with
major coverage of the English Wikipedia's Arbitration Committee
decision to block a group of editors associated with the hundreds of
Scientology articles on Wikipedia. Some onlookers criticized the
decision as censorship, while others lauded it as preserving
neutrality on Wikipedia.
http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2009/06/01/wikipedia-bans-scientology-churchs-e…http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/08/technology/internet/08link.htmlhttp://articles.latimes.com/2009/jun/05/business/fi-wikipedia-scientology5http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/229645/june-04-2009/…
During June, the Wikimedia Foundation participated in interviews with
Australian daily newspaper The Age (Melbourne, Australia); Newsweek
magazine (New York City, USA); the Canadian Press news agency (Ottawa,
Canada and Vancouver, Canada); the San Francisco Chronicle daily
newspaper (San Francisco, USA); the Washington Post (Washington DC,
USA); PR Week Magazine (New York City, USA); National Public Radio
(Baltimore, USA); the Toronto Star (Toronto, Canada); The Municipalist
(Washington DC, USA); the Courier Post (Cherry Hill, New Jersey, USA);
the Spanish daily newspaper Publico (Madrid, Spain); Ha'aretz Business
(Tel Aviv, Israel); the International Regional Magazine Association;
the New York Times (New York City, USA); the Houston Chronicle
(Houston, Texas, USA); NBC 6 (South Florida, USA); Hot Press Magazine
(Dublin, Ireland); NBC News (Miami, Florida, USA); BBC Radio News
(London, UK); the Rockford Register Star (Rockford, Illinois, USA);
and Human Events (Washington DC, USA).
During June, the Wikimedia Foundation released one press release,
announcing its signing of a contract with EvoSwitch, the
carrier-neutral data center in Amsterdam that operates fully
CO2-neutral. As part of the contract, Evoswitch is providing more than
EUR 300,000 of in-kind support in the form of bandwidth and hosting
services. Wikimedia will use the Amsterdam site as its HUB for Europe.
“Wikimedia Selects Green Data Center EvoSwitch as Internet HUB for
Europe.” http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Wikimedia_Selects_EvoSwi…
TECHNOLOGY
The technology department began their month upgrading the search
services to allow the Wikimedia Foundation sites to switch in advanced
search features such as spelling correction. Previously these
advanced features were limited to only a few of the Wikimedia sites.
The technology team officially launched the new mobile gate way
(http://m.wikipedia.org/), with automatic redirection from the regular
website for some popular devices, especially iPhones, for the English
Wikipedia.
The release of the Mozilla Firefox 3.5 web browser was an important
milestone to improve usability of video and audio in Wikipedia. Thanks
to built-in support for the HTML5 <audio> and <video> tags, and the
Ogg Theora and Ogg Vorbis file formats, videos and audio files from
Wikimedia project sites can be played without any additional plug-ins.
Wikimedia uses the Ogg Vorbis and Theora formats because they are
unencumbered by software patents and can therefore be freely used by
anyone for any purpose.
In June Steve Kent joined the Wikimedia Foundation team as the Head of
Office IT Support. Steve comes to the Foundation with more than 20
years of IT systems management experience. He has been in similar
roles with several organizations including: RR Donnelley, Charrette
LLC, Communicomp and CMP Media. Steve was most recently the Director
of Information Technology for Sandbox Studios located in San
Francisco. Once Steve is fully oriented in his new position Ariel
Glenn will return to software development on a full-time basis.
The technology team has started to use the tech blog
<http://techblog.wikimedia.org> more actively to explain and analyze
site events and issues, e.g. with regard to the Michael Jackson
traffic spike: http://techblog.wikimedia.org/2009/06/current-events/
USABILITY
The focus of the usability team in June was to continue developing the
first release of usability improvements, to collect feedback from the
community, and to address any technical or linguistic issues before
the production deployment. The feedback from the community was
positives and the community took a great part in stabilizing the
software. The first release called Acai was deployed to production as
one of user preferences to all Wikimedia projects except
right-to-left-languages. The support for the right-to-left languages
will be available early August. More information about the Acai
release:
http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Acai
The design team, Parul Vora and Hannes Tank, put together design
concepts and mock-ups for the next round of usability improvements and
shared them internally. The concept designs are now shared publicly:
http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Babaco_Designs
An intensive interviewing and evaluation process took place to fill
two software developer positions, however two final candidates fell
though at the last stage of hiring.
The work of the usability initiative was described in a blog post on
Read Write Web, and the team was interviewed by the Wikipedia Weekly
podcast:
http://www.readwriteweb.com/enterprise/2009/06/can-890000-make-mediawiki-us…http://wikipediaweekly.org/2009/07/09/episode-76-usability/
FUNDRAISING, GRANTS & PARTNERSHIPS
During June, the Wikimedia Foundation received 901 donations, with a
combined total dollar value of USD 91,693. This brings the 2008-09
year total to USD 5,720,713 in donations, 43% above the full-year
target of USD 4,000,000.
BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT
Kul Wadhwa secured five corporate sponsorships for Wikimania 2009,
with Telefonica (Premier Sponsor), Answers.com (Benefactor), Kaltura
(Benefactor), Wikihow (Supporter), and Wikia (Supporter).
LEGAL
The Wikimedia Foundation licensing update was implemented in all
relevant Wikimedia projects and languages:
http://blog.wikimedia.org/2009/06/30/licensing-update-rolled-out-in-all-wik…
Mike worked on completing consolidation of the Wikimedia Foundation's
trademark portfolio and providing the portfolio to the international
law firm, Squire Sanders. This puts Wikimedia in a better position
going forward to negotiate business partnerships and rationalize our
handling and licensing of trademarks for non-business partnerships.
Mike is continuing to revise a draft trademark policy pursuant to the
Board's April trademark resolution, using the new draft Mozilla
trademark policy, which provides expressly for non-commercial partner
use of the trademarks, as a model for our own. Mike is continuing to
discuss trademark policy generally with Mozilla's in-house counsel
with the general aim of creating model standards of trademark policy
for free-culture projects.
FINANCE AND ADMINISTRATION
After finalizing and receiving Board approval for the 2009-10 Annual
Plan, Veronique met individually with each department head to review
their approved budget for the upcoming fiscal year. She also worked
with Daniel Phelps to solve some challenges related to hiring non-US
citizens, and to refine the policy on background checks for
contractors. Additionally, Veronique and Daniel finalized and
released the first official employee handbook, which was distributed
to all staff.
Veronique also worked with KPMG, the Wikimedia Foundation's audit
firm, to determine the most appropriate definition of conditional
gifts vs. restricted gifts. Veronique also worked with Jennifer on
efforts to create the most efficient and financially protected process
for the Wikimedia Foundation to provide grants to chapters and
community members.
Also in June, all Wikimedia Foundation staff had 2008-09 performance
assessment meetings with their immediate supervisors, and finalized
their 2009-10 goals.
CONFERENCES AND TRAVEL
Sue attended a Knight Foundation News Challenge conference at MIT in
Boston. Erik attended the Open Video Conference in New York. Ariel
attended the Open Translation Tools conference in Amsterdam.
--
Sue Gardner
Executive Director
Wikimedia Foundation
415 839 6885 office
415 816 9967 cell
Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in
the sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality!
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate
For the record, I am one of those who did not speak up yet
(ref Austin) who would hope some of our power posters felt
less need to share every thought with the rest of us.
In a public debate few people with a firm stance can be
convinced to change their mind, so most polemical posts
can only hope to win over undecided onlookers.
Changes that that will happen also diminish fast as more
and more readers lose interest in a discussion.
I even fear that a new point of view after 20 replies
on a thread has less change of getting across
as many people already went their way.
There was a time when I tried to see all sides of debate.
Nowadays I tend to selectively read replies from people
who might have something to contribute.
To me that sounds like a bad signal to noise ratio.
Erik Zachte