(Sorry for crossposting)
Dear friends,
As you know, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) [1] comprising
seven community members, was established last year to make
recommendations to the Board about how to allocate movement funds to
eligible entities and help achieve Wikimedia’s vision, mission, and
strategies. The first round of FDC funding, of $8.51 million,
supporting the annual plans of eleven entities, was successfully
completed in December 2012.[2] All thanks to the hard work of the
members of the community, the FDC, and FDC staff for helping making
this happen!
We are writing to you today to announce that we are increasing the
community review period for FDC proposals by two weeks. We are doing
this in response to feedback from community members including
applicants, FDC and FDC staff. In consultation with the FDC and the
Board, we (as Board representatives on the FDC) approved this change
to the FDC schedule, in order to allow enough time for the community
to review the proposals, and for the applicants to respond. As a
result, Round 2's schedule (and hereafter all FDC rounds), will have
four weeks of review. This also means that the deadlines for the FDC
recommendations and the Board approval get pushed out by two weeks.
For the FDC Round 2 of 2012-13, the schedule is therefore as follows:
proposals from eligible entities are due on March 1,[3] on the FDC
portal. Any eligibility gaps that are pending need to be closed by
February 15.[4] The community review period will be from March 1 to
March 31. On April 8, the FDC staff will post the staff assessments of
the proposals. The FDC will meet from April 22-24 and make its
recommendation to the Board on May 1.
Please do not hesitate to reach out to the FDC staff
(FDCsupport(a)wikimedia.org) for any clarifications. They will be
sharing more details with you shortly.
Thanks,
Jan Bart and Patricio - Board observers FDC
[1] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal
[2] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/FDC_recommendations/2012-2013_rou…
[3] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/Proposal_process
[4] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/Eligibility_status/Current_round#…
--
Patricio Lorente
Blog: http://www.patriciolorente.com.ar
Identi.ca // Twitter: @patriciolorente
(Sorry for crossposting)
Dear friends,
As you know, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) [1] comprising
seven community members, was established last year to make
recommendations to the Board about how to allocate movement funds to
eligible entities and help achieve Wikimedia’s vision, mission, and
strategies. The first round of FDC funding, of $8.51 million,
supporting the annual plans of eleven entities, was successfully
completed in December 2012.[2] All thanks to the hard work of the
members of the community, the FDC, and FDC staff for helping making
this happen!
We are writing to you today to announce that we are increasing the
community review period for FDC proposals by two weeks. We are doing
this in response to feedback from community members including
applicants, FDC and FDC staff. In consultation with the FDC and the
Board, we (as Board representatives on the FDC) approved this change
to the FDC schedule, in order to allow enough time for the community
to review the proposals, and for the applicants to respond. As a
result, Round 2's schedule (and hereafter all FDC rounds), will have
four weeks of review. This also means that the deadlines for the FDC
recommendations and the Board approval get pushed out by two weeks.
For the FDC Round 2 of 2012-13, the schedule is therefore as follows:
proposals from eligible entities are due on March 1,[3] on the FDC
portal. Any eligibility gaps that are pending need to be closed by
February 15.[4] The community review period will be from March 1 to
March 31. On April 8, the FDC staff will post the staff assessments of
the proposals. The FDC will meet from April 22-24 and make its
recommendation to the Board on May 1.
Please do not hesitate to reach out to the FDC staff
(FDCsupport(a)wikimedia.org) for any clarifications. They will be
sharing more details with you shortly.
Thanks,
Jan Bart and Patricio - Board observers FDC
[1] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal
[2] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/FDC_recommendations/2012-2013_rou…
[3] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/Proposal_process
[4] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/Eligibility_status/Current_round#…
--
Patricio Lorente
Blog: http://www.patriciolorente.com.ar
Identi.ca // Twitter: @patriciolorente
_______________________________________________
Please note: all replies sent to this mailing list will be immediately directed to Wikimedia-l, the public mailing list of the Wikimedia community. For more information about Wikimedia-l:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
_______________________________________________
WikimediaAnnounce-l mailing list
WikimediaAnnounce-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaannounce-l
So when and who authorised non-free formats?
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Michael Dale <mdale(a)wikimedia.org>
Date: 2 February 2013 16:25
Subject: Re: [Wikitech-l] Audio derivatives, turning on MP3/AAC &
mobile app feature request.
To: Wikimedia developers <wikitech-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Cc: Jan Gerber <j(a)thing.net>
+correct content-type this time ;) Note this has already been merged,
but still worth mention for visibility.
On 2/1/13 12:10 PM, Michael Dale wrote:
>
> We are about to merge in support for audio derivatives to Timed Media Handler (TMH). The big value here, I think is encoding to AAC or MP3 and adding a /listen to this article/ feature to the mobile app.
> https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/#/c/39363/
>
> This can really help with improving accessibility of Wiktionary pronunciation media files as well.
>
> Also AAC / m4v ingestion, could make audio recordings a lot easier to import into the site, i.e a "record a reading of this article" mobile app feature #2 ;)
>
> There are already thousands of spoken articles, with some promotion their could probably be a lot be more:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Spoken_articles
>
> The software patent situation for mp3 is sad, considering how long the mp3 format has been around:
> http://www.tunequest.org/a-big-list-of-mp3-patents/20070226/
>
> I think AAC is a similar situation, encoder wise:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Audio_Coding#Licensing_and_patents
>
> But fundamentally Wikimedia is not "distributing" these encoders and there are no royalties for media distribution. Likewise we are not shipping decoders ( the decoders are in browser or the mobile OS )
>
> I don't know why Wikimedia's commitment to being accessible in royalty free formats, somehow also precludes making content accessible for folks on platforms that ~don't~ decode royalty free formats. But hopefully we can change that over time.
>
> Not sure if this is the right forum for this, but I hope we could come out of this thread with rough consensus to enable these formats to help increase the reach of audio works.
>
> peace,
> --michael
_______________________________________________
Wikitech-l mailing list
Wikitech-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
The Wikimedia OTRS team[1] is receiving an increasing number of
emails, with almost 55,000 general information and permissions tickets
responded to in 2012 alone.[2] We are greatly in need of more
volunteers to catch up and help prevent continued backlog. OTRS
volunteers have the benefit of choosing how much time they'd like to
commit and share a wide variety of tools to help when responding to
inquires. Your private information would not be exposed to the public;
replies are issued from a shared Wikimedia email address.
We are looking especially for people who are strong in any or all of
the following areas:
* Familiar with processes on any Wikimedia project and able to answer
routine questions about them (some common responses include reference
desk referrals; explanations of deletion processes or how to edit. The
kind of thing you might run into at the Teahouse or Help desks);
* Familiar with acceptable licenses for images and text and willing to
handle correspondence related to permissions (many routine, but some
issues include unclear statements of permission or permissions issued
by people who can't be clearly connected to the source);
* Familiar with policies regarding living people and organizations and
able to assist article subjects with lightweight needs (updating
logos, correcting small information) or serious concerns (allegations
of gross inaccuracy; bias).
For more information about volunteering, please see the recruiting
page[3] on Meta. Being a member of the OTRS team is a great chance to
be part of the public face of Wikimedia. We can't always help people,
but we do our best to leave them impressed with our professionalism
and responsiveness. If this sounds like something you'd be interested
in, we encourage you to consider applying[4].
While the English queues are the busiest, the info queues for all
languages could use help, and we are always looking for new
volunteers. Please translate this message and pass the word along to
those in your local communities who may wish to apply.
We look forward to seeing your applications on Meta-Wiki. If you have
any questions, please feel free to contact myself or any other
administrator of the system.[5]
For the OTRS admins,
Casey Brown
[1]https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/OTRS
[2]https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/OTRS/Reports/2012
[3]https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/OTRS/Recruiting
[4]https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/OTRS/Volunteering
[5]https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/OTRS#OTRS_administrators
--
Casey Brown (Cbrown1023)
caseybrown.org
*Hello, everyone.
I'm writing with information about the Ombudsman Commission (OC), the small
group of volunteers who investigate complaints about violations of the
privacy policy, and in particular concerning the use of CheckUser tools, on
any Wikimedia project for the Board of Trustees. The Board of Trustees has
delegated some of the decisions about the OC (including composition and
size) to the Wikimedia Foundation staff.
The application period for new commissioners for 2013 has recently closed.
We are extremely grateful to the many dedicated and knowledgeable
volunteers who offered to assist with this work. Before announcing the
composition of the 2013 commission, however, I would like to let you all
know about a trial change in the OC. Although the OC is kept intentionally
small due to the high level of trust required of its members, this year we
are expanding the commission (on a trial basis) from five members to seven.
This expansion has two primary purposes. First, the commission bears a
heavy responsibility of ensuring that users are granted the privacy that is
their due under the Wikimedia Foundation's privacy policy. We hope that an
expansion of the commission will help them remain swiftly responsive to
issues sent to them even when some of the commissioners have pressing
matters beyond their volunteer work. Second, commissioners have
traditionally been asked to surrender their CheckUser functions on their
home wikis during their term on the commission, a request that helps to
reduce the potential for conflict of interest between the roles but which
may also place an undue burden on smaller projects that have fewer
CheckUsers to assist. With a larger commission, we expect that
commissioners will be able to continue in this also critical function, only
recusing if issues are raised relating to their direct colleagues.
It's important that we carefully balance the need to keep this group small
against the requirements that they remain flexible and available. At the
end of the year, we will explore the impact of this expansion to ensure
that the benefit is sufficient to the functioning of the OC to warrant the
growth.
In addition, the Wikimedia Foundation is committing to more closely work
with the Commission this year, in an attempt to learn how we can more fully
support their work. We will also be working with them to generate more
regular reporting to the community in the form of at least an annual report
on case load (of course, non-specific due to privacy considerations).
With that in mind, we are pleased to announce the composition of the 2013
OC.
Returning to the commission are three members who have served since 2011:*
*
*User:FloNight, who primarily edits Wikipedia en (where she is an
administrator and a former member of the Arbitration Committee) but who has
also contributed to Commons.She is newly editing Wikivoyage and involved
with US GLAM. She is also one of the initial members of the Funds
Dissemination Committee.
*User:Sir48, who primarily edits Wikipedia da (where he has been a
CheckUser), but is also active on Commons and Meta (particularly in
translations) along with a number of other language Wikipedias. He took
part in vandalfighting initiatives a few years back.
*User:Thogo, who primarily Wikipedia de (where he is currently an
administrator and is a former arbitrator). but who has also contributed
substantially to Wiktionary de and Meta. He is formerly a steward as well
as having served as an administrator on several other projects.
We appreciate their willingness to remain, to bring their familiarity with
processes and experiences to the new arrivals.
Joining them are*
*
*User:Deskana, who primarily edits Wikipedia en. There, he is an
administrator, CheckUser and bureaucrat. He is also a former arbitrator.
*User:Erzbischof, who primarily edits Wikipedia de, where he is currently
an administrator and formerly an arbitrator.
*User:Huji, who primarily edits Wikipedia fa, where he is an administrator,
CheckUser and bureaucrat. He has also contributed substantially to Simple
Wikipedia, Wikipedia en and Meta, and is a Wikimedia developer.
*User:Levg, who primarily edits Wikipedia ru, where he is an administrator,
oversighter and bureaucrat and where he has twice served as an arbitrator.
Please join me in thanking the following volunteers, who have given
substantially of their time to serve on the commission the past years, and
who are not returning:*
*
* User:Mwpnl
*
** User:Dweller
I'd also like to say a hearty thank you to those returning and those coming
aboard for a first time, as well as to all those who applied. Again, it was
an extremely knowledgeable group of volunteers, and while we believe that
this mix of users may best serve the need for this year, I hope that those
who applied will consider applying again for future commissions.
Maggie
*
--
Maggie Dennis
Community Liaison
WikimediaFoundation.org