Hello all,
It’s with great pleasure that I’m announcing that Terrence (Terry) Chay is
joining the Wikimedia Foundation as Director of Features Engineering.
Terry comes to us from Automattic, where he helped improve the
WordPress.com user experience by implementing an A/B testing framework,
improving the blog domain name registration process (which contributed to
doubling the revenue for WordPress.com), creating better support mechanisms
for fist-time users, and making many other changes. In that role, he was an
individual contributor to the WordPress codebase.
Before Automattic, Terry worked as an engineering manager and software
architect for multiple start-ups and tech companies between 1999 and 2009,
most recently at Tagged and Plaxo. He has a B.S. in Physics from the
California Institute of Technology and an M.S. in Physics from the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC).
If you’ve ever been to OSCON, you may have seen Terry present one of his
infamous PHP talks there (he’s been invited back repeatedly for some
reason). All in, he’s given more than 25 public talks about web
development. He’s also a prolific blogger and photographer (
http://terrychay.com/ ), joining the nascent photography cabal at Wikimedia.
As Director of Features Engineering, Terry will be responsible for helping
ensure the success of some of our key feature teams: the visual editor
team, the editor engagement team (including the article feedback project),
and the fundraising engineering team.
This announcement also means that Alolita Sharma will be transitioning into
a new director-level role at the Wikimedia Foundation. While we’ve not
finalized all details, the role will include responsibility for the
internationalization team, for experimental features projects and
technology evaluation. We’ll announce details about that shortly. I want to
thank Alolita for her track record of excellent leadership at Wikimedia
to-date.
Terry's first day will be February 27. Please join me in welcoming Terry to
the Wikimedia movement. :-)
All best,
Erik
--
Erik Möller
VP of Engineering and Product Development, Wikimedia Foundation
Support Free Knowledge: https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate
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Dear all,
I went through the lists and collated a bunch of questions that have been
asked (without identifying who has asked these).
I have put them on the talk page of the MR letter, so that we can
systematically start considering and addressing them. This is the link:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimedia_affiliation_models#Questions_…
I would be most obliged if you would go through these, add your thoughts,
and more questions that need answering.
I have yet to put up questions on the proposed Affiliations Committee, but
feel free to add these too.
Best
Bishakha
The Board approves the following letter to be sent to the community:
Dear members of the Wikimedia Movement,
As you are probably aware we have been discussing the the future of
fundraising and fund dissemination for the Wikimedia Movement for almost
6 months now. After discussing fundraising and funds dissemination at
this past meeting, the board has drafted the following statement. It our
intention to discuss these matters in the coming weeks to come to a
final decision mid March.
But first we would like to thank everyone who took part in the
discussion so far and spent their valuable time providing us with their
viewpoints which we have of course taken into account in our decision
making process. We hope that you will continue to participate by giving
feedback on this letter.
==Funds dissemination==
The board wants to create a volunteer-driven body to make
recommendations for funding for movement-wide initiatives (Working
title: Funds Dissemination Committee, FDC). The Wikimedia Foundation has
decision-making authority, because it has fiduciary responsibilities to
donors which it legally cannot delegate. The new body will make
recommendations for funds dissemination to the Wikimedia Foundation. We
anticipate a process in which the Wikimedia Foundation will review and
approve all but a small minority of recommendations from the FDC. In the
event that the Wikimedia Foundation does not approve a recommendation
from the FDC, and the FDC and the Wikimedia Foundation aren't
subsequently able to reach agreement, then the FDC can ask the Wikimedia
Foundation Board of Trustees to request the recommendation be reconsidered.
#the FDC will be a diverse body of people from across our movement
(which may include paid staff) with appropriate expertise for this
purpose, whose primary purpose is to disseminate funds to advance the
Wikimedia mission;
#the WMF staff will support and facilitate the work of the FDC
#Proposals can range from one time smaller contributions for small
projects from individuals to larger financing for operational costs of
chapters or associations
The board intends to evaluate this process together with the FDC and see
if it is working.
==Fundraising==
Our thoughts on fundraising are less specific. We have come to the
following two statements which are important
* If and when payment processing is done by chapters, it should be done
primarily for reasons of tax, operational efficiency (including
incentivizing donor cultivation and relations), should not be in
conflict with funds dissemination principles and goals, and should avoid
a perception of entitlement.
* The board is sharpening the criteria for payment processing. Payment
processing is not a natural path to growth for a chapter; and payment
processing will likely be an exception -- most chapters will not do so.
The Wikimedia Board of Trustees
NB: Please note that rather than spend a LOT of time on wording at this
time, the board preferred to amend the above text if necessary when
moving towards a resolution. This letter indicates our intent, and we
may "wordsmith as needed" in our final resolutions.
--
Ting Chen
Member of the Board of Trustees
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
E-Mail: tchen(a)wikimedia.org
> From: Florence Devouard <anthere9(a)yahoo.com>
>
> > Regarding Amical my personal opinion is that they are highly flexible.
> > First they proposed a transnational chapter operating in 4 countries,
> later
> > they sent a mail to the board saying they would have a national chapter
> for
> > Andorra, later they proposed a sub-national chapter in Spain. Now
> probably
> > they can fit in the Partner Organization model.
> >
> > You know they are highly thankful to you because you find a place for
> them
> > to participate in Wikilovemsonuments.[1] I think Partner Organization can
> > be a solution for them like when you invented the therm ?Local area? They
> > were not interested in any name nor position in the list their only
> > interest where participating in Wikilovesmonuments with the same tools
> and
> > same freedom than any body else.
> >
> > They are not interested in any kind of exclusivity, they are not
> interested
> > in the name ?National Chapter?, their only interest is being able to
> > support and promote the Catalan projects with the same tools and same
> > freedom you have to promote French ones.
>
> I am surprised by your use of "they"
>
This is just an old trick to make you do this question and have opportunity
of saying that if you where so kind of accepting being a honorary member of
Amical then I could use “we”.
Reminder that the deadline to apply for a Wikimania 2012 travel scholarship
is February 16 (23:59 UTC). We encourage you to apply!
http://wikimania2012.wikimedia.org/wiki/Scholarships
Full travel scholarships, funded by the Wikimedia Foundation and chapters
(France, UK, Israel, Austria), will cover transportation, hostel
accommodations, and conference registration. Partial scholarships are also
offered by WMF (and Wikimedia Hungary).
Wikimania 2012 will take place July 12-15 at the George Washington
University in Washington, DC. The call for participation is also open now
(deadline: March 18), and registration is open.
Cheers,
Katie
--
President, Wikimedia District of Columbia
http://wikimediadc.org
@wikimediadc / @wikimania2012
> From: Lodewijk <lodewijk(a)effeietsanders.org>
> To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> <foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Movement roles letter, Feb 2012
> Message-ID:
> <CACf6Bev=Wv-N89LB4b3DAY05RDYp9qhd4UVTGZeX3u=HvVhh5g(a)mail.gmail.com
> >
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> Hiya all,
>
> It would be great if we can have this discussion without making sarcastic
> remarks like this - I know it is a sensitive topic, but I also know that
> we're in a suboptimal situation here right now. In the past discussions we
> have talked about how we should try to engage volunteers and let them do
> what they are best at - I still stand behind that. That however also means
> that we should recognize that the chapters model will not work for every
> single person or group of persons.
>
> This does not necessarily have to correlate with a 'shift of power' or
> disengaging chapters - it *should* be about engaging more volunteers, and
> allowing them to do great work with the best tools available. So let us
> focus on that.
>
> I think there are two types of organizations within the Wikimedia movement
> relevant here besides the chapters and the WMF:
> 1) Organizations that will ideally grow into a chapter some day
> 2) Organizations that explicitely do not want to or cannot grow into a
> chapter
>
> The group 1) will probably mainly be the case because of either legal
> reasons or because there is not enough critical mass yet. I don't think
> anyone disagrees we should give them the space they need. This includes for
> example Wikimedia Croatia, Kazachstan and Georgia.
>
> The group 2) will in my expectation consist of groups that are indeed more
> aligned along cultural ideas. To mind come Amical (as discussed) and
> Esperantists. Now this is where things apparently become complicated,
> because somehow things can get conflicting when they start to compete with
> chapters. There are a few things relevant here in the recognition process
> by X-committee:
> * What will be the rights will determine to large extent how high the
> threshold will be
> * If there is a geographical component (explicit or not) there should,
> imho, be a consultation with the relevant other organizations overlapping
> with that component. I don't know if it is realistic to go as far as a
> veto, but it should definitely be a very serious part of the process. This
> should probably be reciprocal - if a chapter is to be recognized other
> groups in that area should be consulted, too.
> * We should have clear to what extent trademarks and fundraising rights go
> - both for chapters and non-chapter organizations.
> * We have to remain very careful about political statements. I am
> personally a bit hesistant with recognizing any organization which is
> politically oriented. Hence, this analysis should also be part of the
> recognition process of any movement organization. To give an entirely
> obvious example: I would not feel comfortable if any organization would be
> founded based on ethnically oriented principles, or would be discriminating
> in its membership based on principles that would be considered illegal in
> most countries (even if it is not illegal in that specific country).
> Another obvious example: I would feel extremely uncomfortable if any of
> these organizations would only allow men to vote in their assemblies or if
> there are religious requirements.
> * In general I would like to find a way to ensure that relations are good
> between the organization and the communities and relevant other
> organizations. I doubt we ever can formalize that into a demand, but all
> efforts should go into this of course.
>
> Probably there are some more criteria which are currently already checked
> upon (although not formally in a checklist) by the recognition of chapters
> that should be part of this. I think it would be helpful if chapcom can
> tackle that issue in it's berlin meeting.
>
> Anyway, just some thoughts. As a final remark, I sincerely hope that we
> will not fall in the trap of building policies around a single case - but
> rather focus on the big picture and then afterwards test that picture on
> the single scenario.
+1
> Amical is a complicated case, and it would be very
> easy to loose ourselves in who's at fault, the details and what solutions
> do not work in their case.
>
You are disappointing me Lodewijk. You are a man who always find the way to
say things without offending but without hiding the problems. If Amical has
done something you believe is wrong please go ahead and complain. Up to now
our discussion page is empty.[1]
It is not fair to say in a public list that we are a complicated case and
insinuate that somebody is at fault without explaining which complications
we have created to you.
[1]
http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Associaci%C3%B3_Amical_Viq…
Hi folks - you may have seen some media coverage recently about
Wikimedia's intentions around GoDaddy. It is true that WMF is still
planning to move 100% away from GoDaddy for all of its domain name
services.
I've been informed that we're currently working with MarkMonitor to
carry out a full switch-over, which as many of you will appreciate,
takes time. WMF is going to post to the blog and generally share this
information as soon as the process is complete. Until then, it does
mean that you'll see in some of our DNS registrations that GoDaddy is
still listed. We're working on it :)
Thanks - and stay tuned for more news in the next week.
--
Jay Walsh
Head of Communications
WikimediaFoundation.orgblog.wikimedia.org
+1 (415) 839 6885 x 6609, @jansonw
Hello all,
Has there been any attempt to start a Wikimedia project focusing on free 3D models?
I think, right now it would be the right timing for it. The prices of 3D printers and other computer controlled machines are coming down [1] and there are growing network of FabLabs around the world providing access for public to design and fabricate their own objects.[2]
I have contacts to the European Fablab folks and we probably could start with them a project on an Incubator.
Best regards,
- Teemu
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3D_printer
2. http://fab.cba.mit.edu/about/faq/
PS. FYI: We had a chat about this with Erik Möller in the Wikimania in Haifa - So, this was probably his idea originally. This came in to my mind now when I am involved in starting a FabLab in Helsinki.
----------------------------------------------
Teemu Leinonen
http://www.uiah.fi/~tleinone/
+358 50 351 6796
Media Lab
http://mlab.uiah.fi
Aalto University
School of Art and Design
----------------------------------------------
Greetings,
The Wikimedia Foundation is planning to upgrade MediaWiki, the
software powering Wikipedia and its sister sites, to its latest
version.
The upgrade will happen in several stages over the month, starting this week.
You can still help to test it before it is enabled, to avoid
disruption and breakage.
More information:
* Announcement on the Wikimedia blog:
https://blog.wikimedia.org/2012/02/11/mediawiki-1-19-deployment/
* The announcement in other languages:
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki_1.19/Deployment_announcement
Thank you for your understanding.
--
Guillaume Paumier
Technical Communications Manager — Wikimedia Foundation