Hi MZMcBride, They are organisation-specific remarks. :-) The WMF did not apply to the FDC this round, hence why there are no amounts requested/allocated, or a proposal to link to. The FDC felt it necessary to include recommendations about the WMF anyway. It's worth noting that there are two meanings to the word 'project' here - there are the Wikimedia projects, and then there are projects run by the Wikimedia organisations (think of, e.g., GLAM or education projects). It's particularly the latter case that is most relevant to the FDC's work, and in this case Wikidata falls under both meanings. The FDC provides recommendations to the WMF Board, who then decide on them. The FDC doesn't handle funds directly, so in no case does it withhold, or spend, funds, instead it recommends doing so to the WMF Board. Thanks, Mike

On Wed, Nov 25, 2015 at 2:37 PM, MZMcBride <z(a)mzmcbride.com> wrote: Somewhat, yes. The process for community consultations and feedback is in the works, but essentially WMF currently does not undergo the same kind of application as the affiliates. One of the reasons for this is the size of WMF: its huge budget makes it a much more time-consuming and expertise-demanding endeavor to evaluate it, and the FDC is composed of volunteers (believe me, I chaired the FDC for three terms, and just handling the two rounds is lots of work). A separate round would make it easier, and yet it would require three sessions per year, so it would further decrease the poll of available candidates for the FDC, Even with WMDE the analysis is really a challenge, and their budget is significantly smaller than that of WMF - and the quality of feedback and evaluation from the FDC is of highest importance. With budgets this size it is a somewhat different set of skills and experience that is needed than at the level of organizations with budgets roughly 100 times smaller. I hope you realize that the Board has decided to set up the FDC as an advisory body :) The FDC is making recommendations to the Board, it is the Board that makes the allocations. As of know, the Board has not decided to cede the WMF's initial review to the FDC, and it approves the budget by itself. In my personal opinion (which I often voiced during my tenure at the FDC, and which I uphold as a Board member now) it would be reasonable, useful and justified to have some parts of the WMF's budget undergo the FDC process. The WMF's executive team is also generally supportive of this idea and it is my understanding, that the conversation on how to make it happen most effectively is ongoing. We basically need to find a sensible way to do it, to make the best use of the FDC's, staff's, and the Board's time and skills, for the optimal outcome. However, I want to emphasize that even if just for symbolic reasons it is important that the WMF serves as a paragon for other organizations in our movement. TL;DR: I personally would love to make it happen, but I also think it is imperative to make it right. Dariusz Jemielniak "pundit"

For historical reference: I felt that WMF made significant progress with the 2013-2014 budget by opening it to community review and FDC review. Then there was a significant regression with 2014-2015 both in terms of the review period and in terms of WMF's responsiveness to questions; some questions from July 2015 still haven't been answered such as how the 40 new budgeted FTEs align with the overall annual plan. While the compressed review time was a big problem, I'm actually more disappointed with the lack of responses to community questions when there has been plenty of time to respond to them. The change in tone from the WMF after the most recent statement from the FDC is welcome, and I hope that we'll see meaningful improvements in transparency going forward. I appreciate the interest of the Board, the FDC, and Lila in making improvements. Pine On Wed, Nov 25, 2015 at 1:47 PM, Anna Stillwell <astillwell(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:

Hoi, Sorry but "The FDC provides recommendations to the WMF Board, who then decide on them. The FDC doesn't handle funds directly, so in no case does it withhold, or spend, funds, instead it recommends doing so to the WMF Board." qualify as weasel words. You make proposals and hope, expect that they will be accepted. Not taking responsibility for your actions and blaming them is the same as saying "we are only saying and they were not thinking themselves." Not good, not appreciated. Thanks, GerardM On 25 November 2015 at 15:56, Michael Peel <email(a)mikepeel.net> wrote:

Hoi, Some explanations simply read as weasel words. Nothing was lost in translation. You either have an opinion and you accept that people consider responsibility part of the parcel or you do not and that is in my opinion worse. It is not so bad to be wrong, it happens. It is worse to refuse to accept responsibility. Thanks, GerardM On 26 November 2015 at 12:23, Fæ <faewik(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Gerard, They don’t look like weasel words to me. How would you try to describe the FDC's role more accurately? Cheers, P -----Original Message----- From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Gerard Meijssen Sent: Thursday, 26 November 2015 12:58 PM To: Wikimedia Mailing List Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] FDC recommendations for 2015-2016 Round 1 APG grant requests Hoi, Sorry but "The FDC provides recommendations to the WMF Board, who then decide on them. The FDC doesn't handle funds directly, so in no case does it withhold, or spend, funds, instead it recommends doing so to the WMF Board." qualify as weasel words. You make proposals and hope, expect that they will be accepted. Not taking responsibility for your actions and blaming them is the same as saying "we are only saying and they were not thinking themselves." Not good, not appreciated. Thanks, GerardM On 25 November 2015 at 15:56, Michael Peel &lt;email(a)mikepeel.net&gt; wrote: _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe> ----- No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 2016.0.7227 / Virus Database: 4477/11067 - Release Date: 11/26/15

hi Itzik, the idea that we've been discussing for a while has been introducing a part of WMF budget ("non-core") into the FDC process. The whole is not viable for various reasons, but a part - sure. I also agree that the FDC may be a catalyst of introducing more transparency, better and SMARTer goals, strategy, etc. My doubts only refer to the FDC's ability to deal with budgets of this magnitude - and this caution should be exercised for any organization within our movement when it reaches certain size (a good question would e.g. be if WMDE is there yet). best, dj On Thu, Nov 26, 2015 at 10:39 AM, Itzik - Wikimedia Israel < itzik(a)wikimedia.org.il&gt; wrote: -- __________________________ prof. dr hab. Dariusz Jemielniak kierownik katedry Zarządzania Międzynarodowego i grupy badawczej NeRDS Akademia Leona Koźmińskiego http://n <http://www.crow.alk.edu.pl/>wrds.kozminski.edu.pl członek Akademii Młodych Uczonych Polskiej Akademii Nauk członek Komitetu Polityki Naukowej MNiSW Wyszła pierwsza na świecie etnografia Wikipedii "Common Knowledge? An Ethnography of Wikipedia" (2014, Stanford University Press) mojego autorstwa http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=24010 Recenzje Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/fdc/welcome_mjx.shtml Pacific Standard: http://www.psmag.com/navigation/books-and-culture/killed-wikipedia-93777/ Motherboard: http://motherboard.vice.com/read/an-ethnography-of-wikipedia The Wikipedian: http://thewikipedian.net/2014/10/10/dariusz-jemielniak-common-knowledge

Dariusz Jemielniak wrote: Thank you for this context. It definitely helps better understand the current situation and why it is the way it is. It would be nice if we could find a way to link relevant mailing list replies such as this to the round recommendation subpages. It might just be me, but I feel like the important background information is difficult for readers to grasp. I realize that the Funds Dissemination Committee is advisory, but I thought it had been set up by the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees as "all large affiliate requests, including us," not "all large affiliate requests, except us." It seems progress has been ebbing and flowing. For sure. It seems perfectly reasonable to maintain the same standards for yourself that you hold others to. This would likely include guidelines for disaggregated reporting, I think. MZMcBride

Perhaps there should be a new Budget Committee of the board, with a similar composition to the Audit Committee in that the membership would include some WMF board members and some community members. The Budget Committee could do FDC-like reviews of WMF's Annual Plan proposals each year. I personally would prefer to avoid the "core" and "non-core" division of the WMF budget, since I feel that the whole budget and the performance of the whole organization should be reviewed at least annually. The Budget Committee could look at the big picture in more depth than the Board as a whole and the FDC would have the time to do. Thoughts? Pine

On Fri, Nov 27, 2015 at 3:50 AM, Pine W &lt;wiki.pine(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: It is an idea worth considering, but setting up yet another committee gives me goosebumps... I understand this view. My concerns are related to scale (the most common FDC applicant has a budget 1000 smaller than the WMF), FDC's competence to review such budgets with the same professionalism in a highly limited time, and also mixing the cashflows (after all, the FDC's allocation is also part of WMF's budget), but these issues can probably be addressed somehow. In general, I strongly believe that the WMF should lead by example - it will be much easier for other organizations to prepare strategy, goals, budgets, plans, etc., if they have a clear good example set by the WMF. Dariusz

One of the things proposed during our FDC conversation was a 3rd party review of the WMF annual plan. This could avoid the "circular" nature of Board->FDC->WMF and also provide us with another perspective from an organization that has a similar scale. Lila On Fri, Nov 27, 2015 at 5:50 AM, Dariusz Jemielniak &lt;darekj(a)alk.edu.pl&gt; wrote:

The public discussion on the 14-15 Annual Plan was quite limited and the Board didn't publish their deliberations, so I don't believe that the Board's current arrangement is sufficiently transparent, and without that transparency it's impossible to know how detailed their review was. In any case, the WMF published plan was far below the standard of documentation that one would expect of the largest organization in the movement, so I think that a change is in order. It sounds like there is now consensus that there should be change, which itself is progress. The nature and extent of the changes that are acutually made will tell us how serious WMF is about transparency and good governance. Pine On Nov 27, 2015 11:53 AM, "Gregory Varnum" &lt;gregory.varnum(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote:

yes, and I agree that this is a very good idea to ponder. It addresses a couple of problems at once (including a major one, of FDC ability and capacity to tackle WMF as well). dj On Fri, Nov 27, 2015 at 2:19 PM, Lila Tretikov &lt;lila(a)wikimedia.org&gt; wrote: -- __________________________ prof. dr hab. Dariusz Jemielniak kierownik katedry Zarządzania Międzynarodowego i grupy badawczej NeRDS Akademia Leona Koźmińskiego http://n <http://www.crow.alk.edu.pl/>wrds.kozminski.edu.pl członek Akademii Młodych Uczonych Polskiej Akademii Nauk członek Komitetu Polityki Naukowej MNiSW Wyszła pierwsza na świecie etnografia Wikipedii "Common Knowledge? An Ethnography of Wikipedia" (2014, Stanford University Press) mojego autorstwa http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=24010 Recenzje Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/fdc/welcome_mjx.shtml Pacific Standard: http://www.psmag.com/navigation/books-and-culture/killed-wikipedia-93777/ Motherboard: http://motherboard.vice.com/read/an-ethnography-of-wikipedia The Wikipedian: http://thewikipedian.net/2014/10/10/dariusz-jemielniak-common-knowledge

I think the 3rd party review might work, although it might be costly in terms of consulting fees. As a part of the 3rd party review, I hope that there would be an analysis of the costs and benefits of moving WMF to a more economical location than San Francisco. Pine