Dear all,
I am happy to share with you that the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees has passed a new resolution on the topic of branding [1].
Some context
As you may remember, last year the Board paused all work under the 2030 Movement Brand Project, in order to rethink and improve the Foundation’s approach to community participation and decision making around renaming. After year-long work, attentive listening and thoughtful conversation between the Board, Wikimedia Foundation staff, and community advisors, the committee has come up with a recommendation for next steps. The recommendation was unanimously approved by the Board and captured in the above mentioned resolution. The Wikimedia Foundation will therefore be resuming its role to steward and protect Wikimedia brands, in partnership with our broader movement, and the ad hoc Brand Committee concludes its work .
What are the main aspects of the resolution?
Importantly, this resolution extends the Board’s decision that the Wikimedia Foundation should not pursue renaming work for this fiscal year (until at least July 2022). Instead, it directs the Foundation to support the Wikimedia movement through three main areas of brand work that protect and support Wikimedia’s reputation throughout the world. Please read more about this decision on the Diff Blog [2].
Next steps?
Wikimedia Foundation teams intend to share more information on new projects, including their plans for engaging our community, in the coming weeks. In the meantime, Foundation staff and I are available to answer clarifying questions on the Wikimedia brand / 2030 movement brand project talk page on Meta [3]. You are also welcome to join the Board’s Open Meeting on October 20th, where you will be able to ask questions and hear from the team directly [4].
Special thanks
On behalf of the Board, I would like to thank the community advisors to the Brand Committee. This group has worked with us since February 2021, lending their time and expertise. Their input to the process has been invaluable and we appreciate their commitment to help us find a productive way forward. Thank you -- Lucy Crompton-Reid, Joao Alexandre Peschanski, Megan Wacha, Justice Okai-Allotey, Rachmat Wahidi, Erlan Vega Rios, Richard Knipel, Phoebe Ayers and Jeffrey Keefer!
I would also like to thank our Brand Studio team at the Wikimedia Foundation for their hard work, dedication, professionalism, flexibility, openness, and vision they brought to our joint work on the future of branding.
Together, we made sure that the next steps for brand work are closely connected to our 2030 strategic goals and we have no doubt they will be an important service to the Wikimedia movement. I look forward to watching these plans come to life and invite the community to actively participate in these discussions and decisions as they unfold.
Sincerely,
Shani Evenstein Sigalov
Chair, Brand Committee
Board of Trustees, Wikimedia Foundation
[1]:
https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Resolution:Next_Steps_for_Brand_Work,_2021
[2]:
[3]:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Communications/Wikimedia_brands/2030_movement_brand_project
[4]: