Ilana, restricting wishlist to non-Wikipedia this year is a very sad news.
For many years, wishlist survey was the best way for the community to talk
back to the foundation, and to try to influence its direction. WMF mostly
ignored these wishes, yet it was still a place to express, discuss,
aggregate and vote on what community needed. Big thank-you is due to the
tiny community tech team that tackled the top 10 items, but that's just ~3%
of the foundation's employees.
WMF has been steadily separating itself from the community and loosing
credibility as a guiding force. Take a look at the last election -- almost
every candidate has said "no" to the question if WMF is capable of
deciding/delivering on the direction [1]. In **every** single conversation
I had with the community members, people expressed doubts with the movement
strategy project, in some cases even treating it as a joke.
This is a huge problem, and restricting wishlist kills the last effective
feedback mechanism community had. Now WMF is fully in control of itself,
with nearly no checks & balances from the people who created it.
I still believe that if WMF makes it a priority to align most of its
quarterly/yearly goals with the community wishlist (not just top 10
positions), we could return to the effective community-governance.
Otherwise WMF is risking to mirror Red Cross Haiti story [2] -- hundreds of
millions of $$ donated, and very few buildings actually built.
With great respect to all the people who made Wikis what they are today,
--[[User:Yurik]]
[1]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Affiliate-selected_Board_seats/2019/Questio…
[2]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Red_Cross#Disaster_preparedness_and_…
On Fri, Oct 4, 2019 at 5:18 PM Ilana Fried <ifried(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
> Hello, everyone!
>
> My name is Ilana, and I'm the product manager for the Community Tech team.
> We’re excited to share an update on the Community Tech 2020 Wishlist Survey
> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Wishlist_Survey_2020>. This
> will
> be our fifth annual Community Wishlist Survey, and for this year, we’ve
> decided to take a different approach. In the past, we've invited people to
> write proposals for any features or fixes that they'd like to see, and the
> Community Tech team has addressed the top ten wishes with the most support
> votes. This year, we're just going to focus on the *non-Wikipedia content
> projects* (i.e. Wikibooks, Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Commons, Wikisource,
> Wikiversity, Wikispecies, Wikidata, Wikivoyage, and Wikinews), and we're
> only going to address the top five wishes from this survey. This is a big
> departure from the typical process. In the following year (2021), we’ll
> probably return to the traditional structure.
>
> So, why this change? We’ve been following the same format for years — and,
> generally, it has lots of benefits. We build great tools, provide useful
> improvements, and have an impact on diverse communities. However, the
> nature of the format tends to prioritize the largest project (Wikipedia).
> This makes it harder to serve smaller projects, and many of their wishes
> never make it onto the wishlist. As a community-focused team, we want to
> support *all* projects. Thus, for 2020, we want to shine a light on
> non-Wikipedia projects.
>
> Furthermore, we’ll be accepting five wishes. Over the years, we’ve taken on
> larger wishes (like Global Preferences
> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Tech/Global_preferences> or Who
> Wrote That
> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Tech/Who_Wrote_That_tool>),
> which are awesome projects. At the same time, they tend to be lengthy
> endeavors, requiring extra time for research and development. When we
> looked at the 2019 wishlist, there were still many unresolved wishes.
> Meanwhile, we wanted to make room for the new 2020 wishes. For this reason,
> we’ve decided to take on a shortened list, so we can address as many wishes
> (new and remaining 2019 wishes
> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Wishlist_Survey_2019/Results>)
> as possible.
>
> Overall, we look forward to this year’s survey. We worked with lots of
> folks (engineering, product management, and others) to think about how we
> could support underserved projects, all while preserving the dynamic and
> open nature of the wishlist. *Please let us know your thoughts
> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Community_Wishlist_Survey_2020>*
> related
> to this change. In addition, we’ll begin thinking about the guidelines for
> this new process, so *we want your feedback
> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Community_Wishlist_Survey_2020>* (on
> what sorts of processes/rules we may want to consider). Thank you, and
> we’re very curious to see the wishes in November!
>
>
> Thanks,
>
> Ilana Fried
>
> Product Manager, Community Tech
> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Tech>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Hi everyone!
I'm very happy to announce that the Affiliations Committee has recognized
[1] the Wikimedians of Saint Petersburg User Group [2] as a Wikimedia User
Group. The group aims to unite Wikimedians living in St. Petersburg, to
support the development of content on topics related to St. Petersburg
across different Wikimedia projects, to promote the Wikimedia projects and
movement in St. Petersburg, and to build partnerships between the Wikimedia
community and cultural, scientific, educational, and media institutions in
St. Petersburg.
Please join me in congratulating the members of this new user group!
Regards,
Kirill Lokshin
Chair, Affiliations Committee
[1]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Affiliations_Committee/Resolutions/Recognit…
[2]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedians_of_Saint_Petersburg_User_Group
Can someone explain how a vandalized version of the Wikipedia article
about Henry Kissinger that was only visible for a rather short time
several days ago, is still being promoted in Google searches
today?[1][2]
The "zombie sex" vandalism was only visible for a few minutes, quickly
fixed by admin El C and the page indefinitely protected. Yet it is
this four day old version that Google searches were using in
preference to either the current version or older versions with more
long term public visibility. In the age of real smart Google AI and
active mirrors of Wikipedia, how is this still our reality? It does
not give me confidence that politically vandalized articles
potentially for the benefit of state sponsored agents are not also
being promoted in searches for several days, regardless of how
fleetingly they are visible on Wikipedia and speedily corrected by
volunteers.
It would be good to have a simple explanation of any improvements to
how this works, and our Wikimedia projects pragmatic relationship with
Google and other search engines.
Thanks!
Links
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Henry_Kissinger&action=history
2. https://twitter.com/Faewik/status/1180847863854706689/photo/1
Fae
--
faewik(a)gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
Den lör 5 okt. 2019 kl 22:46 skrev Chris Keating <chriskeatingwiki(a)gmail.com>:
> the wishlist only reflects
> the needs and perceptions of highly active contributors [at present I think
> it only accepts submissions in English ,which is another obstacle, but that
> could be addressed].
The wishlist has explicitly accepted wishes in any language.
//Johan Jönsson
--
Hi all,
Wikimedia Ukraine is organizing an international Wikipedia writing
challenge aimed to improve worldwide coverage of Ukrainian women —
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/She_Did_It.
The marathon has already started and will run for a week — by the end of
October 11th.
Please help counter the gender content gap on Wikipedia and showcase the
achievements of Ukrainian women. You can create and expand articles in any
language (other than Ukrainian as there's a separate marathon for Ukrainian
Wikipedia).
The rules and the scoring system are inspired by WikiGap Challenge, so they
might be familiar to some of you :) Prizes are premium Grammarly
subscriptions for most active contributors (and, of course, our warm love
and deep gratitude for everyone who participates).
Please join the challenge and, of course, help spread the word about it.
Thanks!
Best Regards
Anton Protsiuk
Project Manager at Wikimedia Ukraine
I don't see a problem with sending several representatives to the Wikimedia
Summit, instead of 1, as would be the case if there was only Wikimedia
Russia (that would be a Wikimedia Summit problem). But cells of Wikimedia
Russia or other national chapters voting for ASBS elections is a different
thing, as it unfairly duplicates the vote of the communities that follow
that strategy.
Paulo
Mārtiņš Bruņenieks <martinsb(a)gmail.com> escreveu no dia quinta, 3/10/2019
à(s) 21:04:
> Hello!
>
> There are different aspects to this trend.
> In upcoming CEE Meeting in Belgrade there will be 9 people from different
> affiliates based in Russia. There are other examples you can explore in
> official participant list from other countries, too [1]
>
> As long as there is no system abuse, I see this as a valid way for Erzya
> language or different Albanian language communities in different countries
> to grow their capacity.
> It might not seem fair, but on the other hand it can seem unfair that in
> the past both large and small affiliates could send 2 representatives each.
>
> Mārtiņš
>
> [1]
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_CEE_Meeting_2019/Participants/List
>
> On Thu, Oct 3, 2019 at 10:46 PM Paulo Santos Perneta <
> paulosperneta(a)gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Why isn't it a department of Wikimedia Russia, if apparently it's
>> basically a cell of Wikimedia Russia?
>>
>> It's a curious precedent.
>>
>> Paulo
>>
>> Asaf Bartov <abartov(a)wikimedia.org> escreveu no dia quinta, 3/10/2019
>> à(s) 20:41:
>>
>>> Ziko: Yes, it is about the major Russian city. And one of its listed
>>> contacts is the longstanding president of Wikimedia Russia itself.
>>>
>>> Philip: this is not an example of a large country being "split up",
>>> since Wikimedia Russia is still around, and was not broken up. It is also
>>> not the first user group operating within Russia, nor even the first group
>>> with a geographic remit.[1]
>>>
>>> A.
>>>
>>> [1] e.g. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Don_Wikimedians_User_Group
>>>
>>> On Thu, Oct 3, 2019 at 10:34 PM Ziko van Dijk <zvandijk(a)gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Hello Philip,
>>>>
>>>> I was asking the same question - isn't there already a Wikimedia
>>>> Rossiya -
>>>> but I guess this is the User Group of Saint Petersburg in Florida (USA),
>>>> not Sankt Peterburg in Russia.
>>>> Oh wait... this IS about the city in Russia!
>>>>
>>>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedians_of_Saint_Petersburg_User_Group
>>>>
>>>> Kind regards
>>>> Ziko
>>>>
>>>> Am Do., 3. Okt. 2019 um 16:15 Uhr schrieb Philip Kopetzky <
>>>> philip.kopetzky(a)gmail.com>:
>>>>
>>>> > Hi Kirill,
>>>> >
>>>> > so it seems like geographically large countries are being split up
>>>> into
>>>> > different user groups - do you think that this is a viable model for
>>>> the
>>>> > future or just happened because of certain circumstances within the
>>>> Russian
>>>> > community? Would your template allow a User Group from Rome, Paris,
>>>> Munich
>>>> > or Sydney for example?
>>>> >
>>>> > Best,
>>>> > Philip
>>>> >
>>>> > On Thu, 3 Oct 2019 at 12:20, Kirill Lokshin <kirill.lokshin(a)gmail.com
>>>> >
>>>> > wrote:
>>>> >
>>>> > > Hi everyone!
>>>> > >
>>>> > > I'm very happy to announce that the Affiliations Committee has
>>>> recognized
>>>> > > [1] the Wikimedians of Saint Petersburg User Group [2] as a
>>>> Wikimedia
>>>> > User
>>>> > > Group. The group aims to unite Wikimedians living in St.
>>>> Petersburg, to
>>>> > > support the development of content on topics related to St.
>>>> Petersburg
>>>> > > across different Wikimedia projects, to promote the Wikimedia
>>>> projects
>>>> > and
>>>> > > movement in St. Petersburg, and to build partnerships between the
>>>> > Wikimedia
>>>> > > community and cultural, scientific, educational, and media
>>>> institutions
>>>> > in
>>>> > > St. Petersburg.
>>>> > >
>>>> > > Please join me in congratulating the members of this new user group!
>>>> > >
>>>> > > Regards,
>>>> > > Kirill Lokshin
>>>> > > Chair, Affiliations Committee
>>>> > >
>>>> > > [1]
>>>> > >
>>>> >
>>>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Affiliations_Committee/Resolutions/Recognit…
>>>> > > [2]
>>>> > >
>>>> >
>>>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedians_of_Saint_Petersburg_User_Group
>>>> > > _______________________________________________
>>>> > > Affiliates mailing list
>>>> > > Affiliates(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>>>> > > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/affiliates
>>>> > >
>>>> > _______________________________________________
>>>> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
>>>> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
>>>> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
>>>> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>>>> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
>>>> ,
>>>> > <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
>>>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
>>>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
>>>> New messages to: Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>>>> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
>>>> <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Asaf Bartov
>>> Wikimedia Foundation <http://www.wikimediafoundation.org>
>>>
>>> Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share
>>> in the sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality!
>>> https://donate.wikimedia.org
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Affiliates mailing list
>>> Affiliates(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/affiliates
>>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Affiliates mailing list
>> Affiliates(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/affiliates
>>
> _______________________________________________
> Affiliates mailing list
> Affiliates(a)lists.wikimedia.org
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/affiliates
>
Hello, everyone!
My name is Ilana, and I'm the product manager for the Community Tech team.
We’re excited to share an update on the Community Tech 2020 Wishlist Survey
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Wishlist_Survey_2020>. This will
be our fifth annual Community Wishlist Survey, and for this year, we’ve
decided to take a different approach. In the past, we've invited people to
write proposals for any features or fixes that they'd like to see, and the
Community Tech team has addressed the top ten wishes with the most support
votes. This year, we're just going to focus on the *non-Wikipedia content
projects* (i.e. Wikibooks, Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Commons, Wikisource,
Wikiversity, Wikispecies, Wikidata, Wikivoyage, and Wikinews), and we're
only going to address the top five wishes from this survey. This is a big
departure from the typical process. In the following year (2021), we’ll
probably return to the traditional structure.
So, why this change? We’ve been following the same format for years — and,
generally, it has lots of benefits. We build great tools, provide useful
improvements, and have an impact on diverse communities. However, the
nature of the format tends to prioritize the largest project (Wikipedia).
This makes it harder to serve smaller projects, and many of their wishes
never make it onto the wishlist. As a community-focused team, we want to
support *all* projects. Thus, for 2020, we want to shine a light on
non-Wikipedia projects.
Furthermore, we’ll be accepting five wishes. Over the years, we’ve taken on
larger wishes (like Global Preferences
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Tech/Global_preferences> or Who
Wrote That
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Tech/Who_Wrote_That_tool>),
which are awesome projects. At the same time, they tend to be lengthy
endeavors, requiring extra time for research and development. When we
looked at the 2019 wishlist, there were still many unresolved wishes.
Meanwhile, we wanted to make room for the new 2020 wishes. For this reason,
we’ve decided to take on a shortened list, so we can address as many wishes
(new and remaining 2019 wishes
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Wishlist_Survey_2019/Results>)
as possible.
Overall, we look forward to this year’s survey. We worked with lots of
folks (engineering, product management, and others) to think about how we
could support underserved projects, all while preserving the dynamic and
open nature of the wishlist. *Please let us know your thoughts
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Community_Wishlist_Survey_2020>* related
to this change. In addition, we’ll begin thinking about the guidelines for
this new process, so *we want your feedback
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Community_Wishlist_Survey_2020>* (on
what sorts of processes/rules we may want to consider). Thank you, and
we’re very curious to see the wishes in November!
Thanks,
Ilana Fried
Product Manager, Community Tech
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Tech>
>From a Harvard biology list, via my friend Chris: a newly named species of
Viola <https://species.wikimedia.org/wiki/Viola_wikipedia>!
/SJ
====== Forwarded message =======
Many of you may use Wikipedia.
Here is a plant name (*Viola Wikipedia*), which may be first name to honor
Wikipedia.
Viola wikipedia J.M.Watson & A.R.Flores, Int. Rock Gard. 117: 47. 2019
P. 47: http://www.srgc.org.uk/logs/logdir/2019Sep261569525649IRG117.pdf
<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.srgc.org.uk_logs_lo…>
The authors gave a detailed explanation for their choice of the epithet
Wikipedia.
“Etymology: We Watsons investigate and write up all our publications at
home. We are retired on small pensions, belong to no institution, and work
privately on a largely self-funded basis. In the past, we have visited the
herbaria and libraries at K and SGO regularly, and once or occasionally B,
CONC, LIL, MERL, P, SI, and ULS as well. But for various reasons we are
very seldom able to travel to any these days, and have only managed two
such visits in the last five years. So now, at the very apogee of our
'publication era', we are totally dependent on our indispensable home
library and ... the Internet. Without the latter, we could literally
achieve nothing of scientific relevance. It provides information from such
a wide number of reference sources and personal contacts that it is
impossible to even begin to think about listing them all. However, one is
particularly outstanding in that we consult it constantly for information
on a wide variety of subjects related to our work - Wikipedia, as cited
herein for example. The best token return we can think of is to name a
plant accordingly, so it therefore gives us pleasure to record our
gratitude via the replacement epithet of this species, as a noun in
apposition.”
--
Samuel Klein @metasj w:user:sj +1 617 529 4266
Hi everyone!
I'm very happy to announce that the Affiliations Committee has recognized
[1] the Wikimedia Stewards User Group [2] as a Wikimedia User Group. The
group aims to coordinate and enable the growth of the steward team and the
involvement of stewards in Wikimedia governance; to ensure steward
participation across the Wikimedia movement; to support the development of
tools relevant to stewards; and to provide a forum for retaining and
accessing institutional knowledge from past stewards.
Please join me in congratulating the members of this new user group!
Regards,
Kirill Lokshin
Chair, Affiliations Committee
[1]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Affiliations_Committee/Resolutions/Recognit…
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Stewards_User_Group
.jpg){kind=link}
