Hi all,
It's been an extraordinary day here at Wikimania in several senses of
the term. I know there has been some discussion about the perceived
directions and timing of communications on the list.
At this point the WMF and our latest funding partner, the Omidyar
Network, have both released the great news about this $2mm, 2 year
grant. At the same time I have also released a press release with
details about the new Board appointments.
The Board Announcement can be found here:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Board_Announcements_Augu…
The Omidyar Network press release can be found here:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Omidyar_Network_Grant_Au…
And a related Q&A can be found here:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Omidyar_Network_Grant_Au…
I can absolutely assure you that our intention from the beginning has
been to share this great news with the Foundation list before sending
out publicly - notably in the form of a communication from the Board,
in this case Michael Snow. The timing and fairly significant
circumstances this year (most notably some internet connectivity and
cellular problems in Buenos Aires) meant that the planned timing of
our announcement with the Omidyar Network didn't play out as I would
have hoped. I've just now been able to get the news out and also
start taking media calls on both of these announcements.
This was also somewhat compounded by the considerable media interest
in coverage of some flagged revisions stories (it's important to
respond to every request we get - we want to get the story right). We
were also strongly focussed on the logistics and planning of this
year's press conference leading up to the beginning of tomorrow's
events. And we're a small group of responders here on the ground at
Wikimania :)
I apologize for any confusion or if the impression was created that we
were not intending to share this information with the community in our
normal practice. It was not so great timing and mostly technology
hiccups.
The good news is that we're seeing some positive coverage of this
wonderful and generous grant in the press already - especially as it
follows the news of last week's Hewlett Foundation grant. I'm now
starting to also see coverage of the new Board appointments, which is
also very exciting news here at Wikimania.
And let's not forget, there is a fairly important event taking place
in our midst! We had a wonderful turn-out of press from Argentina and
from abroad. There are some amazing sessions planned and I'm
confident we'll see even more coverage for the good work of Wikimedia
in the next few days. I think this is the biggest kind of news week
we could hope for - and I'm glad we have lots of positive developments
to share.
Thanks,
Jay
Head of Communications
WikimediaFoundation.org
blog.wikimedia.org
+1 (415) 839 6885 x 609, @jansonw