Pete,
According to his Signpost piece three weeks ago[1], James Heilman emailed
the board in mid-October about the Knight Foundation grant to warn the
board, and I quote –
*"4) There is a serious lack of transparency around this new "sister
project". This has not been discussed with our communities as far as I am
aware. Please correct me if I am wrong. As such it has the potential to
worsen WMF / community relations. Starting a new sister site without
community discussion is not the wiki way."*
No board member has come forward to deny that James sent this email. In the
same piece, James also said:
*"I emailed the board list offering to write up an overview of these ideas
for the Signpost, which was met with negative comments by some board
members."*
Nobody has denied that that happened, either. Now, Jimmy said on-wiki[2]
two days ago, and I quote:
*"I didn't see anything particularly unusual or controversial about the
concepts being presented to us about the evolving ideas around improving
search and discover, and I simply assumed that there was community
discussion and consultation **[...] had we **understood that a disconnect
was going on, and that the community was not being consulted, we absolutely
would have pushed harder for community engagement sooner. As it is, I think
most likely other board members, like me, simply assumed that it was being
talked about and not treated as some kind of super top secret thing. Is
that helpful?"*
Can you help me figure out how Jimmy and the board could have "assumed"
that there was community discussion and consultation about the Knowledge
Engine project when James Heilman
1. had started a board discussion in mid-October specifically to point out
that there was no community discussion and consultation,
2. had offered to write an article for the Signpost about the project to
inform the community,
3. was told by his colleagues on the board that the idea of a Signpost
article was not welcome?
I'm finding it impossible to reconcile. And like Sarah, I am struck by the
fact that so far, everything James Heilman has said about this turned out
to be true.
Andreas
[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2016-02-03/In_fo…
[2]
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Jimbo_Wales&diff=7…
Quote in full:
*"The board has broadly encouraged open discussion and disclosure, and I'm
unaware of anyone individually giving her advice to hide anything about
long term strategy. Going into slightly more depth than that, I didn't see
anything particularly unusual or controversial about the concepts being
presented to us about the evolving ideas around improving search and
discover, and I simply assumed that there was community discussion and
consultation about it. The grander concept which, as I now understand,
Damon was pitching via cloak-and-dagger PGP encrypted files (one employee
told me that he had to give his PGP key on a USB stick because Damon didn't
trust the public keyservers), didn't really get traction and was quickly
abandoned. By the time of the board meeting in Mexico City, we specifically
discussed that this would not be anything like a "Google competitor". As to
the exact details of every single discussion with funders, obviously the
board is not privy to those as a practical matter. Certainly had we
understood that a disconnect was going on, and that the community was not
being consulted, we absolutely would have pushed harder for community
engagement sooner. As it is, I think most likely other board members, like
me, simply assumed that it was being talked about and not treated as some
kind of super top secret thing. Is that helpful?--Jimbo Wales
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jimbo_Wales>(talk
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Jimbo_Wales#top>) 23:25, 27
February 2016 (UTC)"*
On Mon, Feb 29, 2016 at 6:53 AM, Pete Forsyth <peteforsyth(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Jimmy and James, I'm glad to see you both agreeing
on some facts. That's
encouraging. But IMO you should both put some careful thought into this
part:
On Sun, Feb 28, 2016 at 9:36 PM, James Heilman <jmh649(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Finally facts are not determined by a vote. That
you got unanimity for
"The
board.. has offered no objections to any board
member discussing long
term
strategy with the community at any time"
should make all of us worry. I
have provided evidence that refutes this claim here
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2016-02-03/In_fo…
As somebody who's following this, but who's not locked in a dispute, it
seems there is a very natural explanation for this, that should not
especially make us worry:
Different people, reasonable people, can reasonably disagree about what
constitutes "discussing long term strategy" and what does not.
For the entire board to agree to a statement like that does not strike me
as especially bad; perhaps there was a dominant idea of what constituted
strategy and what didn't, and everybody voted with that idea in mind,
without insisting on a clearer definition in the text of the statement. Not
ideal, I think -- but also not the end of the world.
But Jimmy, you have repeatedly claimed that vote as evidence that James
told a lie.
That claim introduces a lot of drama into the discussion -- and does
exactly something you stated you didn't want to do, which is publicly
assaulting James' reputation.
I would suggest you both stop accusing each other of lying, long enough to
figure out what facts you *can* agree on. You're both Wikipedians, we do
this all the time. It might involve getting out of some of the language
patterns you've been using, e.g. getting away from abstract notions like
"long term strategy."
A skilled, professional mediator, facilitator, or ombudsman can be an
excellent resource for working through stuff like this.
-Pete
[[User:Peteforsyth]]
_______________________________________________
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
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>