On Fri, Sep 17, 2021 at 10:12 PM Andreas Kolbe <jayen466(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Željko,
Thanks for your observations.
Andreas - I really wish these were my personal observations and reality is
better. It is not.
Many (if not majority) of HR Wikipedia editors who look at this have
noticed that we were not approached in any way ahead, during or after the
research (literally we do not know if anyone was interviewed by the
researcher as claimed, as not one person confirmed this still). This is
fairly disappointing and hard to imagine why.
Whoever thinks that fixing content of smaller Wikipedias is enough, without
fixing the relations, resources and establishing good practices of
community, is likely just focused on dodging bad PR and would not care for
the Wikimedia as a whole in its full complexity.
How do you feel things are developing in the Croatian
Wikipedia now?
I think very very slowly moving forward. Considering the burnouts in the
past decade, exhausting work in 2020, distrust atmosphere among current
contributors and lack of capacities in the community, I am not too
surprised. Year ago I had a short chat with Asaf about possibilities for
capacity development in HR and sadly WMF just opted then for a more
specialized online training courses as a focus, so I do not expect this
will change much or quickly on WMF side...
My hopes and focus is now with CEE HUB, individual and informal efforts,
but it is an uphill (technocratic) struggle to get support for too many
things.
What has (or hasn't) happened since the report was
published?
There was no quality discussion of collaborating across projects.
There was no influx of new users to HR. Few of us make very strong efforts
right now.
There was also no return of expert users that burned out in the past
decade. Maybe they await an official apology or something more specific
from Wikimedia as a reassurance that this will not happen again and
technocratic excuses for passivity will never be the norm? I was not part
of this generation - just guessing.
There was no follow up step by WMF to explain what, why and how to maybe
act in future in regards to HR.
Maybe we really were just a case study of 'capture' situation...lets see if
the new CEO is more eager to de-center focus and hopefully resources, as
well as to work with and for new generations (and other axes of difference)
of potential Wikimedia contributors.
Best, Z. Blace
Best,
Andreas
On Wed, Sep 15, 2021 at 11:26 AM Željko Blaće <zblace(a)mi2.hr> wrote:
On Mon, Sep 13, 2021 at 6:16 PM Maggie Dennis
<mdennis(a)wikimedia.org>
wrote:
Community “capture” is a real and present threat.
For years, the
movement has been widely aware of challenges in the Croatian Wikipedia,
with documentation going back nearly a decade. The Foundation recently set
up a disinformation team, which is still finding its footing and assessing
the problem, but which began by contracting an external researcher to
review that project and the challenges and help us understand potential
causes and solutions for such situations.[4]
Dear Maggie - thank you for writing this, but I fear it can be wrongly
interpreted *(already did to a few people who got in touch) as it was
worded in a non/explicit way. I would like to point that:
#1 both WMF and Wikimedians were aware of issues with HR Wikipedia and
nothing has been done for a decade, aside from handful last year to remove
4 of right-wing admins*(Wiktionary and Wikisource, are still with rightwing
admin control)...
WMF actions are sadly post-festum and with a very limited scope.
#2 HR was not abducted by some well organized and resourced entity, but
by handful of extreme rightwingers (one unmerried couple + their closest
neo-nazi friend and 3 submissive mediocrats...including 40+ proven but
likely 60+ sock puppets) with silent and passive conservative 'center'
majority of woters.
#3 an external researcher contractor was not really reviewing the full
project, but mainly content *(very little on social dynamics and
capacities) and in doing so failed to understand the challenges of
under-resourced and asocial 'community'... This is why solutions suggested
in findings included impossible language and project merges, rather than
anything that would enable self-governance, expansion of the pool of
contributors and sustainable and ambitious work *(like in Serbia for
example).
Hope with these distinctions it is more obvious the difference between
the two and if /how/when/where the learning is applicable or not...
Thank you for your professional work.
Best Z. Blace
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