On Mon, Dec 20, 2021 at 11:12 PM Dan Szymborski <dszymborski(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
<snip)
The WMF likes the *idea* of this being a community-driven, collaborative
project rather than actually doing the stuff that *makes* it a
community-driven, collaborative project. How many times does this process
have to repeat in identical fashion before we stop pretending that this
*is* a community-driven collaborative project? If the goal is simply to be
another generic top-down Silicon Valley information charity, just one that
has somehow procured a gigantic unpaid workforce that the elites can
command, then just state it outright so that people don't spend their free
hours toiling in the delusion they're part of a movement.
Best,
Dan
There's a misunderstanding here, I think. The Wikimedia movement and the
Wikimedia projects are community-driven and collaborative. The WMF itself
is not and has never been. People who expect the WMF to be managed by
consensus, determined by RfC, are destined to always be disappointed. The
WMF certainly knows many people in the Wikimedia world have that
expectation, and I suppose they considered and rejected the possibility of
engaging in a community process for this policy. My criticism of the policy
itself is that it contains very aspirational statements; I would have
preferred it to be focused on what practical actions the WMF can take, and
build a policy around how and when those actions will be taken.
In any case, the WMF is not a governance experiment. The projects are, to
some extent, although that is not their *purpose*. Expecting every policy
and decision to be workshopped with "the community" is essentially
demanding the WMF be dissolved.