"worst parts of old ideas"
* being a body of electors for determinng the election of board members
This is bad idea which I have said alot about in the archives. I think it is the most useless reason for creating a council.
*the approve/deny level of individual projects on a week to week basis. That's where a Wikicouncil would come in.
Week to week decisions should stay in the hands of the communities. Not be bumped up to some interproject council.
*Wikicouncil as "representative democracy" is closest to what many Wikiretreaters in Frankfurt expressed
Given a scope I agree on; I can support the idea of a self-selecting council, I can support the idea of using existing admin, bcrat or steward structure to somehow build a council, I can grudingly support a simple direct election. I cannot support a representative election. First, I do not believe it will be effective. Second, I am certain it will be the most problamatic method to implement. The point is to get people who really want to do council-work (whatever that ends up being). Not hand out feathers for people to put in their caps.
I don't see this as the community coming together to form a council. I am sorry, I just don't see that when so much of the Wikimedia community is completely unaware of this. I just really feel this is being done backwards. You don't create a council to raise awareness. You raise awareness and then afterwards you see how all the people would like to formalize their participation. There is not much participation right now to formalize.
*But the concept of a group of dedicated, trusted and respected Wikimedians from the community who can thoughtfully deliberate and help lead community matters... I'm willing to hear how people view this as a bad thing.
Who is saying THAT is a bad thing? Why don't you just do it? Start Council meetings with an open invitation. Work at recruiting people from smaller projects. Ask people to list their top problems for a voluntary review. Issue reccomendations. Then once you know how it will work and what people want out of it ... Then get it formalized. If that happens it then it would be "a formalization of what takes place already". I think you should go for it. I think wikicouncil, as a general concept, has potential. I do not think we should trying to come up with a finished concept to write into the by-laws first, however.
Birgitte SB
--- Andrew Lih andrew.lih@gmail.com wrote:
On 11/20/06, Birgitte SB birgitte_sb@yahoo.com wrote:
--- Andrew Lih andrew.lih@gmail.com wrote:
Although there has already been a massive
exchange
in the last 12 hours, I'm going to respond to the initial
question.
One problem is first mover (or first discusser) bias, and the entire conversation has gone down one way, when I think it's best to
start
with a fresh look.
What Damian mentioned about Wikicouncil as "representative democracy" is closest to what many Wikiretreaters in
Frankfurt
expressed - that a body of experienced, learned, informed, engaged
and
knowledgeable Wikimedians from different projects could form a body with real powers to decide on community matters and even for the purpose of being a body of electors for determinng the election of board members.
Wikicouncil folks would be responsible for
things
that that either we (inappropriately) appeal to the "board of
trustees"
to do now, or ask developers to do on the fly. It's not fair to
ask
Brion or Tim to be decisionmaker for community decisions from
random
parts of the Wikimedia universe, and it's traditionally
beyond
the scope of a "Board of Trustees" to be managing down to the approve/deny level of individual projects on a week to week basis.
That's
where a Wikicouncil would come in.
As for the argument that Wikicouncil would not
be a
"direct democracy," I mentioned this to Erik in
Frankfurt,
but I believe there is a less compelling argument for every
Wikimedian
having equal vote as any other Wikimedian for some value of "n"
edits
and "m" months of membership. The idea of every community member getting equal say as in a "true democracy" is not compelling since there
is
no concept of "natural citizenship" in Wikipedia - people join
by
choice, they self-identify for tasks, and they elevate. It is different than a citizen of a country or territory. As Damian
noted,
many folks don't know, nor do they care, for issues related to
higher
level governance or WMF board matters. They're there to write an encyclopedia, create a Wikiversity course, contribute to Commons, etc.
A
Wikicouncil would have the expertise of folks who have put in the time, passion, energy and thought into working with the WMF community matters, while the board would oversee the big picture matters. I believe that the Wikicouncil would clarify and solve many of the problems we have now with the scope of board and executive level
matters.
In this sense, I think the idea of a Wikicouncil
is
quite familiar - I'd imagine a Wikicouncil would be made up most
of
folks you will find right now in Wikiproject leadership, chapter activities, committee involvement, and the like. It would be a formalization of what takes place already, but where there is currently no procedure or authority to act on group consensus.
That is a brief summary of what hopes I saw
people
had in the idea for a Wikicouncil. I cannot speak for all the folks,
so
I invite other folks to chime in on this.
-Andrew
I have not said anything because I am open to this idea being developed in previously undiscussed
ways.
But the above statments I do not understand. How
is
this in any way similar to the ways things take
place
already? It strikes me as anything but familiar.
I am willing to withold critiscism as people brainstorm, but I find the above remarks quite disturbing. It is a few of the worst parts of old ideas about the wikicouncil packaged as simply a formalization of current process. I am sorry
these
ideas are in no way a representation of the way current process works.
Maybe you can enlighten us on the "worst parts of old ideas about the Wikicouncil" because it's unclear what you're referring to.
My point is that the community coming together to decide on what the community should do is familiar, in contrast to a "top down" system of command given the questions we're facing of what role the board and the executive should take. (Anthere or another group at the retreat called it "blob" simply to get away from the historical baggage of the Wikicouncil name. Perhaps that's a good idea.) The Wikicouncil/blob idea would build on what the community already does well but would provide the formal structure to enact decisions with authority. It's no panacea, and there are no specifics yet as to the makeup of or appointment to council members.
But the concept of a group of dedicated, trusted and respected Wikimedians from the community who can thoughtfully deliberate and help lead community matters... I'm willing to hear how people view this as a bad thing.
-Andrew (User:Fuzheado) _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@wikimedia.org
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