On 05/03/2008, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Do we want WMF
to be the "Red Cross for information"? Or just the
glorified web-host? It seems to me the community has implicitly
accepted the Red Cross route, because the Foundation has massively
expanded and professionalised (not to mention moved across the
country) without uproarious complaint. The glorified web-host wouldn't
need to do these things.
Shouldn't the WMF figure out what it is supposed to be, rather than
us?
Why would you say that?
WMF grew from the community. Half or more of the board is from the
community. Its vision and mission statements were developed in close
consultation with the community. It makes (some) resolutions based on
community prompting.
So are they wishy-washy for consulting or arrogant and out-of-touch for not?
If the foundation is going to be some sort of "red cross for
information" then it should be making the same
advocacy efforts that
the Red Cross does, like making reports on the freedom of information
in countries (similar to the red crosses reports on health standards),
criticize countries that censor information (the same way the red
cross criticizes that violate human rights of their citizens) and such.
You must be thinking of Amnesty International. The Red Cross is
explicitly not about advocacy. I guess perhaps the Electronic Frontier
Foundation is more the information advocacy equivalent of AI. Maybe
there is some element of that appropriate to WMF too, given people's
keenness for WMF to publicly denounce the proposed UK copyright
extensions.
But I think no answer would make you happy today. The Foundation
wastes money on travel. But wait, they should be investigating and
reporting on the situation of countries around the world.
Sue has only been in the job a few months and they are only now
gathering the staff and institutional experience to be a serious
contender for actively pushing the Wikimedia vision. I think to say
they should be doing things that similar organisations have achieved
over 50 (AI) or 100 (RC) year histories is... impatient.
To say of
Wikimedia "this is an internet site" is a big disservice to
volunteers. "An internet site" is only the beginning of what it is.
It's the single largest part of what it is, dwarfing the non-internet
aspects of the site. How many hits a day do the combined Wikipedias
get? Compare that to the reach of the print and offline versions.
Fundamentally, it is a wiki, and that means internet.
It also means community, which means people, which is what I was thinking of.
I am grateful
and pleased that the Foundation takes its commitment to
being a worldwide organisation seriously. It really shows respect for
the community. That's necessarily going to mean more travel than other
not for profits that don't have such a global angle.
To be clear, the foundation (that is not in the most secure of
financial positions) giving grants for people to attend a conference
is respect for the community/commitment to being a worldwide
organization? I'd think things like having projects in every possible
language, greater translational support etc, are better metrics of a
commitment to being a worldwide organization. The Wikipedia Academies
in Africa are a commitment to being a worldwide organization. I fail
to see how paying for people to go to Wikimania is the same thing.
I was not thinking of Wikimania scholarships (and as Phoebe and
Michael Snow pointed out, they money does not come from general
funds). I was thinking that they accept Board members, & staff,
worldwide. They think of their domain as the world and consequently
act worldwide. Potential friends and allies are everywhere, not just
the US.
So the travel funds may be
Board <-> Board
Board <-> Staff
Board/Staff <-> Donors
Board/Staff <-> Chapters
(I am not saying all of these even happen. I have no idea. But these
are potential ones I could think of.)
Board: France, US, Italy. [Does Domas live in Italy?]
Staff: US, Germany, Australia, maybe other places.
Donors: ...
Chapters: much of Europe, Taiwan, Israel, Argentina, many in planning.
If they gave the attitude "really, you should live in North America to
apply for Board/staff", we would probably have significantly cheaper
travel costs. But we would lose the benefits of the diversity we have.
It's not just lip service.
And while the
Foundation has a big travel budget, it's still a small
fraction of the total budget, which is dominated by Acceptable Tech
Stuff.
That "tech stuff" still dominates travel, should be a sign that the
foundation is still primarily internet based organization.
I can only imagine the dramatics that would ensue if travel was larger
than tech stuff. :)
regards,
Brianna
--
They've just been waiting in a mountain for the right moment:
http://modernthings.org/