Dear Board,
dear community;
I hereby resign in my official position as Chief Research Officer. We
have reached a point where a fruitful collaboration is no longer
possible due to personal differences and a fundamental disagreement
about the nature and scope of the role.
On the level of substantial disagreements:
I see MediaWiki and the software it will spawn as an analog to the Linux
kernel for the free content movement. As is the case with the kernel, I
would like to see many outside companies and institutions participating
in its development. I saw it as part of my role as CRO to bring these
people together and to coordinate their activities. Members of the Board
feel that this role must be limited to waiting for others to establish
agreements first (or at least, that it should be limited in that way if
_I_ hold it).
This makes it impossible to respond to the question "What can we do to
help?" in any other way but by saying "Talk to this other person", which
puts me in a dependency situation which I find unworkable. Furthermore,
being frequently invited to conferences and generally a social person,
it strikes me as an unnatural separation of responsibilities. I believe
that stagnation and bad decisions in large organizations are often the
result of distinctions like the one which is made a condition of my
continued work as CRO.
I have now sent a list of about 30 contacts to the Board. These were
just the ones I could immediately find: companies, institutions and
individuals who would like to work with us. I would have liked to push
these cooperations forward. Not being allowed to do so is like being
hired as a typist but having one hand tied behind your back.
Essentially, I feel that officers should be allowed to operate within
the scope of an agreed upon strategy in their field of expertise, rather
than having to deal with communication bottlenecks. My field of
expertise was "Research & Outside Development", and not being allowed to
actually be a "first point of contact" and "guide and motivate outside
developers", as the position was defined, alters this role in a way
which I consider unwise and unnecessary.
Truthfully, the limitation of the role in this way would probably not be
necessary if it wasn't for a breakdown of trust between me and
individual members of the Board. So, I hope that someone else will
eventually be able to continue where I left off.
Why did this breakdown happen? Due to conflicts of personality and
goals, and in my belief, due to the fact that I *do* operate openly,
document what I do, and enter discussions -- and when I enter
discussions, refuse to just accept that someone else is correct based on
their position in the food chain or the volume of their voice. It is
easy to avoid controversy by operating in the dark, forming secret
clubs, deceiving people about your intentions, and sucking up to the
ones above you. I have never done so and do not intend to start.
On the level of personal disagreements:
I see the ideal Board/Officer relationship as one which is just as
oriented towards consensus as the remaining wiki process, where the
hierarchy doesn't generally come into play. This appears to be changing,
at least from my point of view. I am not accustomed to taking orders. I
question them, and for volunteer work, I want to have a substantial
influence on the nature of that work, rather than having this being
entirely defined by others.
I will not deny that there is also the personality conflict between me
and Anthere which has led to many public disagreements between us over
the last few years. Without assigning blame, I will just say that it
makes it very difficult for us to work together without constant fights.
Taking this position was a last effort to try to overcome this conflict.
It has failed.
As for me and Jimmy, I feel that the project can only tolerate one
person with an ego the size of a planet, and he was there first. ;-)
The truth is that Jimmy has put his life into this project, and the main
thing he expects in return is recognition and the continued leading
influence over its direction. I know that he has often perceived me as a
major threat to this goal, as someone who might try to undermine or
replace him, and this, too, has made cooperation sometimes difficult.
Recognizing all this, it is clear to me that the best solution is for me
to leave and live a life outside wiki.
On my personal future:
I will drastically limit my contributions to Wikimedia on all levels. I
will no longer be associated with the Research Network. I will stop
maintaining my Commons File Upload Service bot. I will no longer
moderate any mailing lists. I will no longer read wikipedia-l,
foundation-l, wikien-l, and most other mailing lists, with
the exception of wikitech-l. I will not be seen much on IRC. The best
way to reach me will be by e-mail to moeller (@) scireview (.) de.
I hope the Research Network will continue to exist, although I am sure
that its logo will be quietly disposed of now that I'm no longer there
to watch over it :-). As a person handling "pure" research, I think
James Forrester would be an excellent choice, due to his solid technical
understanding, good people skills and creative thinking. But I think the
Board should clearly define the position before a new officer is
appointed to it.
I will continue to work on Wikidata and Ultimate Wiktionary to the point
that we can release it to the world, and that people can improve it,
expand it and build new applications with it. I have not yet decided
whether I will have a significant future involvement with Wikinews.
Beyond that, we will see. I am thinking about ideas to financially
support free content creation. And then there's my belief in global
direct democracy enabled by quality information. Both of these are
projects which never have had much of a future within Wikimedia, so I
will pursue them on my own.
I wish Wikimedia no harm. It will grow beyound our imagination. But when
I feel that I can no longer realize my ambitions within an environment,
I move on. My small role in the history of Wikimedia is largely over.
All best,
Erik