The Wikimedia-pedia [1] is a treasure, thank you Philippe for linking! I'd love to see this content migrated to a public wiki, where maybe it can come to life again.
Nearly every time I'm involved in onboarding, I find a chance to mention the Visual Editor rollout, Wikimedia's origins and the Foundation's transformation away from being a membership organization, and other formative episodes from our rich history. It's great to see this historical enculturation process explicitly called out, I support any efforts to write about our history.
However, it would be a mistake to hire an official WMF staff historian, there's a clear conflict of interest. Even the most conscientious staff historian would have strong motivations to accomplish organizational goals ("spin"), and would be less likely to cover embarrassing bits such as the wiki first emerging from under a porn company. But maybe we can still get professional help, for example through an external grant funding an editor-in-residence?
- [[mw:User:Adamw]]
(Views here are my own and do not represent my employer, WMDE.)