On 9/22/07, Florence Devouard <Anthere9(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
Anthony wrote:
> On 9/22/07, Florence Devouard <Anthere9(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
>> Anthony wrote:
Wikia is in the San Francisco area. Any chance
they'd be willing to
donate some office space to Wikipedia?
Even if they had, we should not accept it (and I doubt they would
propose).
Why wouldn't they propose? Wikia wouldn't even exist if it wasn't for
the success of Wikipedia [sic]. A donation of some office space is
the least they could do.
They could do it, and never fail to support us during Wikimania. Angela
also very nicely proposed to support the fundraising effort with banners
and announcement on Wikia sites. That is not the issue. They have the
good will. There are friendly terms between us. But Wikia is Wikia. And
WMF is WMF. Period.
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The issue is that we both benefit from staying separate from an
organization point of view, both from fiscal
perspective and from a
communication perspective
This is very very excellently put.
Fiscal: *this* belongs to this organization, *that* belongs to that
organization. From an auditing perspective, having to
identify who
bought the staples is a nightmare (and more seriously, on whether some
inappropriate arrangements are occuring between two organizations).
Communication: we spent the entire past year trying to make it clear
that the two organizations were unrelated. It is not to our benefit to
be confused with Wikia.
It is not easy to raise funds when Wikia just got 1000 millions of
dollars from
Amabon.com.
It is not easy to explain to the press that the search engine has
nothing to do with us.
Jimbo went to great lengths to explain the difference between the two.
People dealing with the press spent HOURS on these topics to get
articles to be corrected.
The message is now beginning to be understood. There is no way we should
do anything that would bring confusion again.
Very deeply agreed on this point as well.
We have gone
through great efforts to fully separate from them
and we now have no more financial/legal/technical
relationships. Only
love relationships, which is just fine.
Well, there still a lot of person-overlap, between the board, the
advisory board, employees, arb com, etc. And there's still the whole
interwiki linking mess. And now, they're gonna be in the same
metropolitan area (which surely will help with the whole
people-overlap part).
Whilst there are two overlaps on the board (with all due COI
documentation, and lack of vote in cases of conflicts), I do not know of
any overlap within the staff (can you cite a name ?). I see not why
Angela being on the advboard implies that there is a relationship.
Last, whether there are people both working at Wikia and at the arbcom
is completely irrelevant to the Foundation itself.
As I said earlier, the days of Michael on the board are counted. He does
not have time for this role any more, so this will no more be an issue.
Jimbo... though at Wikia... is hardly in SF himself. Besides, I see no
reason why he would go to the office on a regular basis. That's not his
role any more. In short, there is no reason for an overlap.
And I would not be in favor of ANY overlap for the reasons above
mentionned.
On the matter of overlaps, I think it is useful to note that there are many
more overlaps/cross-fertilizations going on than meet the eye here.
Just look at the *whole* list of names on the advisory board.
But there has to be blue water between the foundation and any
organization, corporate, charitable, government or otherwise.
I doubt anyone could seriously (or more to the point, successfully)
challenge this precept.
At least this "relationship" would be to the
benefit of the WMF.
I disagree with that statement.
I whole-heartedly agree with the chair on her disagreement. Being
perceived as tied at the hip to Wikia could potentially be disastrous.
--
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen, ~ [[User:Cimon Avaro]]