Brianna Laugher wrote:
Keeping this in mind --
On 15/11/06, Erik Moeller <erik(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
We also developed a mission statement from
scratch. What's the point?
Aside from uniting behind a set of key goals, it helps us to decide
which activities fall within our scope and which ones don't --
something that is not always easy, given the diversity of our existing
projects and communities. Should we launch a WikiFoo project, or is
Foo not part of our mission? Both the vision and mission statement
will be frequently cited in future discussions of this kind, so they
are relevant, and not just organizational fluff.
== Vision Statement ==
'''Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share
in the sum of all knowledge.'''
Comment:
One version from the Retreat contained the phrase "in their own
language" at the end, but we removed that later--I made the argument
that there are different ways to address language barriers, e.g. by
teaching another language like English and then giving access to
learning resources in that language. IMHO we should not explicitly
endorse or reject any particular _strategy_ of knowledge dissemination
in our vision statement. Rather, I suggested we could add a phrase
such as "unimpeded by language barriers, socioeconomic status, or
government censorship". This was seen as too negative. In any case, I
feel that the simple adjective "freely" may be sufficient in order to
convey the idea that we seek to make knowledge as widely available as
possible.
I think some statement of the importance of multilinguality is needed here.
The suggestion that teaching everyone English and offering them
English works is equivalent to offering them works in their own
language is... really appalling. We may as well shut down all the
other languages and just offer Wikibooks "learn English" in x trillion
languages, right? I don't think so...
== Mission Statement ==
'''The mission of the Wikimedia Foundation is to empower and engage
people around the world to collect and develop knowledge under a free
license, and to disseminate it effectively and globally.'''
'''In collaboration with a network of chapters, the Foundation
provides the essential infrastructure and an organizational framework
for the support and development of multilingual wiki projects and
other endeavors which serve this mission. The Foundation is committed
to making and keeping all information from its projects available on
the Internet free of charge, in perpetuity.'''
This just seems like an expanded version of the above. And it doesn't
seem like this: "A vision statement articulates the future of an
organization. The statement should be a rich, meaningful, detailed
description of what an organization hopes to become."
Wouldn't this be a good time to expand on specific visions for each of
the projects? If not here, then where? Nowhere? Or each community can
come up with its own?
Yes. Please develop charters for each project.
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Charte_Wikiquote_FR
Seems like MediaWiki software development would be
worth mentioning as
well, considering how important it is to the projects...
I am not convinced it should, given that MediaWiki developers wish to
maintain a certain independance (whether they succeed doing that is
another issue).
Also seems to be some mention of project communities
vitally missing
here. "People around the world" are not collecting and developing
knowledge in isolation. They are, first, getting welcomed by other
users (ok, or maybe bots :)). They are getting guidance, help and
warnings from more experienced users. They are being invited to help
out with collaborative projects, and being invited to edit in a
consensus-driven way. They are evaluating the quality of material
collectively. They are running for positions of various power and
status, and they are voting on such candidates. Perhaps all this is
implied in the use of the word "wiki"... or perhaps not.
Would that do ?
http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mission%2FUnstable&diff=470…
Anyway my main complaint is that I don't see how
either of these
statements would prevent "wikistalk" being successfully proposed, or
how they explain why video game guides are inappropriate for
Wikibooks. Or why people shouldn't upload ten photos of their friends
and dog at Commons. Or why they shouldn't write about their school
teacher.
Needs some adjective somewhere like EDUCATIONAL.
Ah...
Look Brianna. In french, there is a saying "you can not have the butter
and the money from the butter at the same time".
Editors are telling us all the time that the editorial policy should be
developped by community, NOT by the Foundation.
If in its statement, which is recorded in its *bylaws* the Foundation
somehow clarifies video games guides are not appropriate (I am forcing
the point here on purpose), then, the Foundation is setting up the
editorial policy.
I do not think it should be this way. The way you ask is
The Foundation decides to create a project and the project should follow
these exact rules.
Versus
The community decides to create a project with this goal, and the
Foundation likes the idea and decides to support it (or decide not to).
My suggestion (and this was a collective desire of board retreat
participants) is that each project develop a very detailed charter. That
this charter be adopted by all languages of this project. That new
language starting should adopt this charter. And the Foundation agrees
to support this project, with this charter.
Anthere