Hey Manuel, Thank you for the response.

Transparency is always good - and this case really shows why.

While Ellie didn't respond and answered the question how people been elected, and summarize her answer to: "We have a system that works for jury selection." Your side and answer shows a whole different point of view. The system seem far away from working correctly.

The fact that above the movement biggest *community* event there is a jury who most his members are paid staff, who been selected by a WMF staffer. This is not a decision by a committee, as the committee, as you describe is only been asked for feedback - and that should be clear.

I hope next year process will be much more community and much more transparent.

Itzik

*Regards,Itzik Edri* Chairperson, Wikimedia Israel +972-(0)-54-5878078 | http://www.wikimedia.org.il Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. That's our commitment!

On Wed, Oct 1, 2014 at 12:46 PM, Manuel Schneider < manuel.schneider@wikimedia.ch> wrote:

Hi Itzik et al,

I think I should weigh in, having been part of this selection. I am just currently travelling, so I don't follow the mailinglists at the moment.

In the past the jury was selected by a moderator - we had Joseph Seddon, James Forrester and others sending out the invitations and reminders, collecting the applications, making a selection and announcing it. From that point on the jury took on the work.

Now we have a Wikimania Committee which so far has not yet found its mode to work - it only took one decision so far, and that was re-defining the bidding schedule to give more time to organise - Ellie and me were looking to move forward with the coming bidding process. The only process we actually had was said reviewed and rescheduled timeline.

As we were actually already approaching the approved deadlines without anyone acting up, I took initiative to put the new timeline together on Meta, send out and invitation and had all applications going to Ellie. I also sent out reminders before the deadline, so everyone should have been informed and was invited to participate.

Ellie made a pre-selection which I reviewed and discussed with her, after some slight adjustments I brought the selection forward the Wikimania Committee, asking for feedback. We received one response from someone who wanted to be included which Ellie denied with good arguments as we need this person take responsibility in other areas (eg. strengthen the Committee).

After all selected persons agreed to become the new Jury I sent out the announcement.

I agree that we need a better process but I do not see that this year's process was any worse than before, in the opposite - there have been more people involved and able to voice their opinions.

What we actually need is a Wikimania Committee which lives up to its expectations, actually have meetings (and minutes), which can define such processes. There have been several changes, also with Ellie coming in, and everything is done on a volunteer basis. Things are slow. What I do not accept are critisms on processes from people who didn't actually participate in the same, even though they were invited to do so.

Regards,

Manuel

Manuel Schneider - Chief Information Officer Wikimedia CH - Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens Lausanne, +41 (21) 340 66 22 - www.wikimedia.ch

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