Apologies for the broken formatting in my original message! I forgot how Mailman handles HTML in messages. Please see below for (hopefully) a more legible version of the announcement: -----------
Hello all,
I am happy to announce the new and returning members of the 2018 Ombudsman Commission (OC), the small group of volunteers who investigate complaints about violations of the privacy policy, and in particular concerning the use of CheckUser and Oversight[1] tools, on any Wikimedia project for the Board of Trustees.
[1] https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Resolution:Amending_the_Scope_of_the_Om...
I apologize for the length of the announcement. :)
The application period for new commissioners for 2018 recently closed. The Wikimedia Foundation is extremely grateful to the many experienced and insightful volunteers who offered to assist with this work. This year we received applications representing the widest variety of languages, projects, and regions I’ve seen since I started working with the committee three years ago.
Given the increasing caseload OC has been handing year over year, we have decided to take advantage of the opportunity the diverse candidate pool afforded us and expand the committee by one seat; this year’s OC will consist of eight, rather than seven, members, with a two-member advisory team who will guide the new commission.
I am pleased to announce the composition of the 2018 OC. First, the *new members* are:
*Billinghurst* Billinghurst (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Billinghurst) is a long-term Metapedian/Wikimedian who served as a steward from 2012 to 2016 and still serves as a global sysop. He considers his home wiki to be the English Wikisource where he's performed over 260,000 edits and focuses on transcribing biographical reference data from the 19th and early 20thC. In addition, however, to serving as a local administrator on Wikisource he also holds the sysop hat on Commons, Meta and the English Wikipedia racking up almost 700,000 edits across the projects with almost a million edits when you count his bot. He claims to still have a bit of wisdom and knowledge to give.
*Jamie Tubers* Sam, who edits as Jamie Tubers (< https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Jamie_Tubers%3E), joined the English language Wikipedia community in 2011 and has over the years expanded his activities into a wide range of movement activities including co-founding the Wikimedia user group Nigeria and helping to organize events like Wiki Loves Africa and Wiki Loves Women. He is dedicated to correcting our content gaps and biases related to Africa and raising awareness of the projects on the continent.
*Dyolf77* Habib (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Dyolf77) started editing in 2010 and has been heavily engaged in community affairs, both onwiki and as part of user groups, for years. A native of Tunisia, he has been a free-culture advocate on a wide range of issues in and beyond the movement. Onwiki, you can mainly find him helping out on Commons, where he is a sysop, as well as the Arabic and French language editions of Wikipedia.
*Saileshpat* Saileshpat (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Saileshpat) started editing Wikipedia in 2012 and soon became deeply involved in the Odia community. He has helped organize outreach events and worked to spread awareness in his region. In addition he was one of the co-organizers of WikiConference India 2016. Saileshpat has helped in a content relicensing process, where the Government of Odisha decided to release content under Creative Commons licenses. Online he is mainly active on the Odia Wikipedia and Commons.
*Elmacenderesi* Elmacenderesi (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Elmacenderesi) has been working on Wikimedia projects since 2007, primarily on the Turkish Wikipedia. There, he has been a CheckUser and a Bureaucrat since 2008 and an Oversighter since 2011. He is also a member of Wikimedia OTRS and serves as a global outreach coordinator, working with academic institutions and GLAMs, for The Wikipedia Library.
*Teles* Lucas (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Teles) became a Wikipedian in 2007 and started to engage with CheckUser rights in 2009, when he became a local CU on the Portuguese Wikipedia. He held both Oversight and Checkuser rights on Ptwiki between 2015 and 2017, when his term with the rights expired. He is currently an administrator on Commons. His traditional main focus has been on anti-vandalism work. In 2012, the global community elected him as a steward, a position he has held since.
In addition, experienced OC members Lankiveil and Góngora will be *returning as members of the Ombuds Commission*:
*Lankiveil* Lankiveil (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Lankiveil) is a long-term user, admin, and oversighter on the English Wikipedia, having made his first edits in 2004. He served on the Ombuds Commission in 2017, and is also an OTRS volunteer. He also sometimes edits at Irish Wikipedia, and Wikidata. He is a native speaker of Australian English and is a member of Wikimedia Australia.
*Góngora* Góngora, J. Gustavo Góngora-Goloubintseff, (< https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:G%C3%B3ngora%3E) primarily edits Spanish Wikipedia, Catalan Wikipedia and Norwegian bokmål Wikipedia. He has been an administrator and bureaucrat on the Spanish Wikipedia since 2007, and an administrator on the Catalan Wikipedia from 2010 until 2017, where he is also a CheckUser. He was a member of the Spanish Arbitration Committee in 2008, before it was dismantled. He was a board member of Wikimedia España in 2011. He is currently a member of both Wikimedia España and Wikimedia Norge.
And the following experienced OC members will be returning as *advisors to the commission* (this advisory role provides expertise when needed, but does not participate in all discussions):
*Pajz* Pajz (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Pajz) has edited the Wikimedia projects since 2005. He was a Wikipedia administrator between 2007 to 2016 and is a member of the Volunteer Response Team. He served as one of the OTRS administrators from 2013 to 2015, before being first appointed to the Ombudsman Commission in 2016.
*Krd* Krd (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Krd), who is primarily active on German Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons, and also serves at the Volunteer Response Team as an agent and OTRS admin, and was a prior member of German Wikipedia Arbitration Committee for more than three years. He joined the OC in 2017.
And finally, please join me in *thanking the following outgoing volunteers*, who have given substantially of their time to serve the commission:
*Vogone* Vogone (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Vogone) has contributed to Wikimedia projects since early 2012. While they began their involvement on the German Wikipedia, they quickly branched out to Wikibooks, Wikisource, Wikivoyage, and Wikiversity. They were the first bureaucrat on the Wikidata project. Vogone has worked heavily assisting our smaller projects as a global rollbacker, global sysop, and member of the Small Wiki Monitoring Team. They have experience in translation administration, both on Meta and translatewiki.net. Vogone has shown a keen interest in the technical side of user privacy, including contributing to MediaWiki software around edit suppression. Vogone joined OC in 2017.
*Richwales* Richwales (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Richwales) has been an active Wikimedian since 2005. He is an administrator, oversighter, and sockpuppet investigation clerk on the English Wikipedia. Richwales also served on the now-defunct Audit subcommittee, which served a similar role to the Ombudsman Commission. Rich joined the OC in 2017.
*Alan* Alan (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Alan) has been a registered Wikimedian for more than three years, but an anonymous editor since 2006, working primarily across Spanish language projects. He is a global sysop and global rollbacker, an administrator on Commons, as well as having been an OTRS volunteer for ~4 years. In the past he has served as an administrator and bureaucrat on Spanish Wikivoyage. He joined the OC in 2016.
*Rubin16* Rubin16 (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Rubin16) primarily edits the Russian Wikipedia, where he is a bureaucrat and administrator. He is formerly a member of their Arbitration Committee. He is an administrator on Wikimedia Commons and is a Central Notice and translation admin on Meta. (He is also a translation admin on Commons.) He is a member of Wikimedia Russia. He joined the OC in 2015.
*Polimerek* Polimerek (https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Polimerek) primarily edits Polish Wikipedia (where he is an admin and former arbitrator), Polish Wikibooks and Wikimedia Commons. He also serves the Wikimedia movement as the president of Wikimedia Poland and on the Grant Advisory Committee. He is a former CheckUser. Polimerek joined the OC in 2014.
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I'd also like to offer a huge “thank you” to those returning and those coming aboard for the first time, as well as to all those applied. The applications we received this year showed us an extremely able group of volunteers across a diverse array of languages and projects, and while this appointed mix of users may best serve the need for this year, I hope that those who applied and were not appointed will consider applying again in future years.
Yours, Karen Brown
On Wed, Jan 31, 2018 at 6:29 PM, Karen Brown kbrown@wikimedia.org wrote:
*Hello all,*
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