Hi community members,
I'm wondering how many people might be interested in having an IRC meeting regarding the community's relationship to WMF and potentially developing our own strategic plan that would be independent of WMF. In the past few days I've heard some defense of WMF but mainly criticism and pessimism, especially people recalling past hurts and feeling powerless to negotiate with WMF. Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options.
Please note that this would be a long-term planning meeting and we are not likely to make major decisions, but we would start brainstorming and laying some foundations.
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
1. Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF for hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
2. Activism at the Board and grassroots levels.
Topics of possible discussion regarding other strategic issues:
3. Internal reform of the community, such as a fresh look at Wikimedia's founding principles and the Five Pillars, including civility.
4. What we can do as a community about our active editor statistics.
I expect this would be an interesting meeting if people are interested in participating, and I hope that we would brainstorm some ideas about how we want to move forward on all of these questions and others if we have time. If there are many participants, which would be *great*, then we may need additional meetings or to move the conversation on-wiki.
If you're interested, you can respond on list but feel free to respond to me off-list also. I'm just trying to get a sense of the interest level of the community. I hear a lot of people being upset but what I feel we need to know is how many people would be interested in creating a long-term strategic plan and brainstorming strategic options.
Thanks,
Pine
On 14/07/14 17:25, Pine W wrote:
Hi community members,
<snip>
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
- Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF for
hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
This idea would split the community to the disadvantage of both 'halves'.
I suspect the majority of editors (and certainly readers) have no idea about these difficulties between the foundation and its volunteers.
I do think the WMF should be paying attention!
Regards, Richard.
I am interested in community strategy but have very different topics in mind *how should we handle the 50-100 projects that today in practice are dead. They are open for anyone (besides vandals that already infest these) to hi-jack *how should we handle the 5-10 projects that are already hi-jacket and spreading info contradictory to our values? (think belarous wikipedia) *Could we find means to help struggling communitiies, there are several having a hard time neutrilizing POV, internal fight and even having problem neutralising vandal attacks *how could we spread best practice to make certain our project do not unnecessary diverge *and the complex of bot generation over several projects - wikidata where efforts for the moment are not harmonized as they ought to etc
Anders
Pine W skrev 2014-07-14 09:25:
Hi community members,
I'm wondering how many people might be interested in having an IRC meeting regarding the community's relationship to WMF and potentially developing our own strategic plan that would be independent of WMF. In the past few days I've heard some defense of WMF but mainly criticism and pessimism, especially people recalling past hurts and feeling powerless to negotiate with WMF. Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options.
Please note that this would be a long-term planning meeting and we are not likely to make major decisions, but we would start brainstorming and laying some foundations.
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
- Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF for
hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
- Activism at the Board and grassroots levels.
Topics of possible discussion regarding other strategic issues:
- Internal reform of the community, such as a fresh look at Wikimedia's
founding principles and the Five Pillars, including civility.
- What we can do as a community about our active editor statistics.
I expect this would be an interesting meeting if people are interested in participating, and I hope that we would brainstorm some ideas about how we want to move forward on all of these questions and others if we have time. If there are many participants, which would be *great*, then we may need additional meetings or to move the conversation on-wiki.
If you're interested, you can respond on list but feel free to respond to me off-list also. I'm just trying to get a sense of the interest level of the community. I hear a lot of people being upset but what I feel we need to know is how many people would be interested in creating a long-term strategic plan and brainstorming strategic options.
Thanks,
Pine _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
I am interested in community strategy to tackle such things as 1) exposing missing, confusing, or outdated local policies by using policy comparisons cross-wiki 2) handling multi-language issues such as highlighting article-for-deletion discussions for each language in which the article exists, not just the local one 3) defining an "embedded system" factor by automatic checking of similarity of metadata of articles across languages and projects 4) how can we emphasize techniques that attract contributions that are 100% non-controversial and fun at the same time? 5) how can we organize local x-language meet-up days across the globe using our international network of chapters? 6) how can we set up a new "Wikicouch" project whereby Wikipedians can couch surf (I mean more group editting rather than sleeping) with other Wikipedians' across the globe
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 12:40 PM, Anders Wennersten < mail@anderswennersten.se> wrote:
I am interested in community strategy but have very different topics in mind *how should we handle the 50-100 projects that today in practice are dead. They are open for anyone (besides vandals that already infest these) to hi-jack *how should we handle the 5-10 projects that are already hi-jacket and spreading info contradictory to our values? (think belarous wikipedia) *Could we find means to help struggling communitiies, there are several having a hard time neutrilizing POV, internal fight and even having problem neutralising vandal attacks *how could we spread best practice to make certain our project do not unnecessary diverge *and the complex of bot generation over several projects - wikidata where efforts for the moment are not harmonized as they ought to etc
Anders
Pine W skrev 2014-07-14 09:25:
Hi community members,
I'm wondering how many people might be interested in having an IRC meeting regarding the community's relationship to WMF and potentially developing our own strategic plan that would be independent of WMF. In the past few days I've heard some defense of WMF but mainly criticism and pessimism, especially people recalling past hurts and feeling powerless to negotiate with WMF. Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options.
Please note that this would be a long-term planning meeting and we are not likely to make major decisions, but we would start brainstorming and laying some foundations.
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
- Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF for
hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
- Activism at the Board and grassroots levels.
Topics of possible discussion regarding other strategic issues:
- Internal reform of the community, such as a fresh look at Wikimedia's
founding principles and the Five Pillars, including civility.
- What we can do as a community about our active editor statistics.
I expect this would be an interesting meeting if people are interested in participating, and I hope that we would brainstorm some ideas about how we want to move forward on all of these questions and others if we have time. If there are many participants, which would be *great*, then we may need additional meetings or to move the conversation on-wiki.
If you're interested, you can respond on list but feel free to respond to me off-list also. I'm just trying to get a sense of the interest level of the community. I hear a lot of people being upset but what I feel we need to know is how many people would be interested in creating a long-term strategic plan and brainstorming strategic options.
Thanks,
Pine _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
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Bear in mind WikiPedia =/= WikiMedia.
Imo all of the below and about 70-80% of the topics previously brough up in this thread can be solved/actioned/discussed/amended/etc by the community solely through Village Pump (or other relevant forums) without a single person involved (ever) from WMF or any of the chapters.
Balazs
1) exposing missing, confusing, or outdated local policies by using policy
comparisons cross-wiki 2) handling multi-language issues such as highlighting article-for-deletion discussions for each language in which the article exists, not just the local one 3) defining an "embedded system" factor by automatic checking of similarity of metadata of articles across languages and projects 4) how can we emphasize techniques that attract contributions that are 100% non-controversial and fun at the same time? 5) how can we organize local x-language meet-up days across the globe using our international network of chapters? 6) how can we set up a new "Wikicouch" project whereby Wikipedians can couch surf (I mean more group editting rather than sleeping) with other Wikipedians' across the globe
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 12:40 PM, Anders Wennersten < mail@anderswennersten.se> wrote:
I am interested in community strategy but have very different topics in mind *how should we handle the 50-100 projects that today in practice are
dead.
They are open for anyone (besides vandals that already infest these) to hi-jack *how should we handle the 5-10 projects that are already hi-jacket and spreading info contradictory to our values? (think belarous wikipedia) *Could we find means to help struggling communitiies, there are several having a hard time neutrilizing POV, internal fight and even having
problem
neutralising vandal attacks *how could we spread best practice to make certain our project do not unnecessary diverge *and the complex of bot generation over several projects - wikidata where efforts for the moment are not harmonized as they ought to etc
Anders
Pine W skrev 2014-07-14 09:25:
Hi community members,
I'm wondering how many people might be interested in having an IRC
meeting
regarding the community's relationship to WMF and potentially developing our own strategic plan that would be independent of WMF. In the past few days I've heard some defense of WMF but mainly criticism and pessimism, especially people recalling past hurts and feeling powerless to
negotiate
with WMF. Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options.
Please note that this would be a long-term planning meeting and we are
not
likely to make major decisions, but we would start brainstorming and laying some foundations.
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
- Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF
for
hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
- Activism at the Board and grassroots levels.
Topics of possible discussion regarding other strategic issues:
- Internal reform of the community, such as a fresh look at Wikimedia's
founding principles and the Five Pillars, including civility.
- What we can do as a community about our active editor statistics.
I expect this would be an interesting meeting if people are interested
in
participating, and I hope that we would brainstorm some ideas about how
we
want to move forward on all of these questions and others if we have
time.
If there are many participants, which would be *great*, then we may need additional meetings or to move the conversation on-wiki.
If you're interested, you can respond on list but feel free to respond
to
me off-list also. I'm just trying to get a sense of the interest level
of
the community. I hear a lot of people being upset but what I feel we
need
to know is how many people would be interested in creating a long-term strategic plan and brainstorming strategic options.
Thanks,
Pine _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
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Balazs, It's interesting that you feel that way, because I disagree entirely. Out of curiosity, have you ever met another Wikipedian in real life, and do you feel that meet-ups are beneficial to the movement? Jane
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 1:53 PM, Balázs Viczián <balazs.viczian@wikimedia.hu
wrote:
Bear in mind WikiPedia =/= WikiMedia.
Imo all of the below and about 70-80% of the topics previously brough up in this thread can be solved/actioned/discussed/amended/etc by the community solely through Village Pump (or other relevant forums) without a single person involved (ever) from WMF or any of the chapters.
Balazs
- exposing missing, confusing, or outdated local policies by using policy
comparisons cross-wiki 2) handling multi-language issues such as highlighting
article-for-deletion
discussions for each language in which the article exists, not just the local one 3) defining an "embedded system" factor by automatic checking of
similarity
of metadata of articles across languages and projects 4) how can we emphasize techniques that attract contributions that are
100%
non-controversial and fun at the same time? 5) how can we organize local x-language meet-up days across the globe
using
our international network of chapters? 6) how can we set up a new "Wikicouch" project whereby Wikipedians can couch surf (I mean more group editting rather than sleeping) with other Wikipedians' across the globe
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 12:40 PM, Anders Wennersten < mail@anderswennersten.se> wrote:
I am interested in community strategy but have very different topics in mind *how should we handle the 50-100 projects that today in practice are
dead.
They are open for anyone (besides vandals that already infest these) to hi-jack *how should we handle the 5-10 projects that are already hi-jacket and spreading info contradictory to our values? (think belarous wikipedia) *Could we find means to help struggling communitiies, there are several having a hard time neutrilizing POV, internal fight and even having
problem
neutralising vandal attacks *how could we spread best practice to make certain our project do not unnecessary diverge *and the complex of bot generation over several projects - wikidata
where
efforts for the moment are not harmonized as they ought to etc
Anders
Pine W skrev 2014-07-14 09:25:
Hi community members,
I'm wondering how many people might be interested in having an IRC
meeting
regarding the community's relationship to WMF and potentially
developing
our own strategic plan that would be independent of WMF. In the past
few
days I've heard some defense of WMF but mainly criticism and
pessimism,
especially people recalling past hurts and feeling powerless to
negotiate
with WMF. Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options.
Please note that this would be a long-term planning meeting and we are
not
likely to make major decisions, but we would start brainstorming and laying some foundations.
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
- Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF
for
hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
- Activism at the Board and grassroots levels.
Topics of possible discussion regarding other strategic issues:
- Internal reform of the community, such as a fresh look at
Wikimedia's
founding principles and the Five Pillars, including civility.
- What we can do as a community about our active editor statistics.
I expect this would be an interesting meeting if people are interested
in
participating, and I hope that we would brainstorm some ideas about
how
we
want to move forward on all of these questions and others if we have
time.
If there are many participants, which would be *great*, then we may
need
additional meetings or to move the conversation on-wiki.
If you're interested, you can respond on list but feel free to respond
to
me off-list also. I'm just trying to get a sense of the interest level
of
the community. I hear a lot of people being upset but what I feel we
need
to know is how many people would be interested in creating a long-term strategic plan and brainstorming strategic options.
Thanks,
Pine _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
,
mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
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On 14/07/2014, Jane Darnell jane023@gmail.com wrote:
Balazs, It's interesting that you feel that way, because I disagree entirely. Out of curiosity, have you ever met another Wikipedian in real life, and do you feel that meet-ups are beneficial to the movement? Jane
Jane,
"Without a single person involved (ever) from WMF or any of the chapters" has nothing to do with meeting other Wikimedians in real life (or Wikipedians for that matter). The comment was about whether strategic discussion automatically means the WMF or Chapters need to be in the middle of it. They don't, even at real life meetings.
As an example, in the UK our Wiki-meets are not the domain of Wikimedia UK, they are independent. Keeping them that way ensures that if the community of UK Wikimedians have issues with their local Chapter or WMF funding, then we are not in the bizarre position of only being able to talk to each other at chapter/WMF sponsored and controlled events or in chapter/WMF controlled forums. If this were the case then it would rapidly only become possible to talk about "Public Relations positive" affairs.
Volunteer community independence and associated free speech are generally thought to be a good thing for the purposes of governance, though not everyone agrees, or at least, by their actions support this philosophy when faced with "Public Relations non-positive" subjects.
Fae
Balázs Viczián, 14/07/2014 13:53:
Imo all of the below and about 70-80% of the topics previously brough up in this thread can be solved/actioned/discussed/amended/etc by the community
So you're confirming that they're on topic for the proposal :) which was «Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options». Interestingly, no topic so far was mentioned by more than one person among those who replied so far. Such a list of topics would therefore result in everyone talking past each other. To avoid that, maybe topic proposals should be about generic issues and medium/long-term goals rather than about your pet peeve or pet proposal. As a reminder, thousands of such "atomic" items are already best collected on our wikis, for instance * https://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Proposals * https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Issues * https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Proposals where I encourage you to add stubs for each idea you have. The problem is always identifying a common ground where to actually meet and build a shared understanding of the way forward. (Or even just a self-consistent summary of all opinions.) Read https://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Task_force subpages again, 5 years later, if you doubt.
Nemo
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 3:25 AM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi community members,
I'm wondering how many people might be interested in having an IRC meeting regarding the community's relationship to WMF and potentially developing our own strategic plan that would be independent of WMF. In the past few days I've heard some defense of WMF but mainly criticism and pessimism, especially people recalling past hurts and feeling powerless to negotiate with WMF. Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options.
Please note that this would be a long-term planning meeting and we are not likely to make major decisions, but we would start brainstorming and laying some foundations.
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
- Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF for
hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
- Activism at the Board and grassroots levels.
Topics of possible discussion regarding other strategic issues:
- Internal reform of the community, such as a fresh look at Wikimedia's
founding principles and the Five Pillars, including civility.
- What we can do as a community about our active editor statistics.
I expect this would be an interesting meeting if people are interested in participating, and I hope that we would brainstorm some ideas about how we want to move forward on all of these questions and others if we have time. If there are many participants, which would be *great*, then we may need additional meetings or to move the conversation on-wiki.
If you're interested, you can respond on list but feel free to respond to me off-list also. I'm just trying to get a sense of the interest level of the community. I hear a lot of people being upset but what I feel we need to know is how many people would be interested in creating a long-term strategic plan and brainstorming strategic options.
Thanks,
Pine
It seems like there are a number of more relevant strategic issues than who hosts the sites. I know that the "power struggle" between some people on the English Wikipedia and the WMF has captivated your attention for some time, but it is a minor issue compared to the other challenges the movement faces in achieving its mission.
Pine,
We need more of
- decentralized development so that people can write new gadgets and extensions easier like firefox jetpack for example.. Each project needs its own editing and feedback tools that it would happily design on wiki in collaborative fashion
- means to encourage more content work from community with less noise and drama
I could expect wmf to do the former but the latter is up to us all, you and me...
As people replied, & please mind that you do not know the situation in other projects and languages - proper feedback or outreach software is needed here and community can shape a spec at least, which the wmf can code or fund through its Ieg grants program. I am sure you could draft the idea and help it evolve, then apply for a grant and hire someone to do it.
The brainstorming might be too early, I am yet to see any proper analysis of what the users /really/ need or have trouble with (no, not learning the markup or getting articles or uploads in, unlike the current focuses). We need a lot more information/feedback here than a brainstorming session...
Gryllida.
On Mon, 14 Jul 2014, at 17:25, Pine W wrote:
Hi community members,
I'm wondering how many people might be interested in having an IRC meeting regarding the community's relationship to WMF and potentially developing our own strategic plan that would be independent of WMF. In the past few days I've heard some defense of WMF but mainly criticism and pessimism, especially people recalling past hurts and feeling powerless to negotiate with WMF. Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options.
Please note that this would be a long-term planning meeting and we are not likely to make major decisions, but we would start brainstorming and laying some foundations.
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
- Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF for
hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
- Activism at the Board and grassroots levels.
Topics of possible discussion regarding other strategic issues:
- Internal reform of the community, such as a fresh look at Wikimedia's
founding principles and the Five Pillars, including civility.
- What we can do as a community about our active editor statistics.
I expect this would be an interesting meeting if people are interested in participating, and I hope that we would brainstorm some ideas about how we want to move forward on all of these questions and others if we have time. If there are many participants, which would be *great*, then we may need additional meetings or to move the conversation on-wiki.
If you're interested, you can respond on list but feel free to respond to me off-list also. I'm just trying to get a sense of the interest level of the community. I hear a lot of people being upset but what I feel we need to know is how many people would be interested in creating a long-term strategic plan and brainstorming strategic options.
Thanks,
Pine _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Well maybe all of you are independently wealthy, have laptop and and will travel, but as I see it, for the rest of us, without travel budget facilitated by WMF and chapters, I don't see how we can achieve meetups to do any brainstorming at all. And poring over lists of ideas tucked away in the recesses of the deep dark Meta is not my idea of a good time (but as ever, thanks for the links Nemo)
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 4:11 PM, Gryllida gryllida@fastmail.fm wrote:
Pine,
We need more of
- decentralized development so that people can write new gadgets and
extensions easier like firefox jetpack for example.. Each project needs its own editing and feedback tools that it would happily design on wiki in collaborative fashion
- means to encourage more content work from community with less noise and
drama
I could expect wmf to do the former but the latter is up to us all, you and me...
As people replied, & please mind that you do not know the situation in other projects and languages - proper feedback or outreach software is needed here and community can shape a spec at least, which the wmf can code or fund through its Ieg grants program. I am sure you could draft the idea and help it evolve, then apply for a grant and hire someone to do it.
The brainstorming might be too early, I am yet to see any proper analysis of what the users /really/ need or have trouble with (no, not learning the markup or getting articles or uploads in, unlike the current focuses). We need a lot more information/feedback here than a brainstorming session...
Gryllida.
On Mon, 14 Jul 2014, at 17:25, Pine W wrote:
Hi community members,
I'm wondering how many people might be interested in having an IRC
meeting
regarding the community's relationship to WMF and potentially developing our own strategic plan that would be independent of WMF. In the past few days I've heard some defense of WMF but mainly criticism and pessimism, especially people recalling past hurts and feeling powerless to negotiate with WMF. Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options.
Please note that this would be a long-term planning meeting and we are
not
likely to make major decisions, but we would start brainstorming and
laying
some foundations.
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
- Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF
for
hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
- Activism at the Board and grassroots levels.
Topics of possible discussion regarding other strategic issues:
- Internal reform of the community, such as a fresh look at Wikimedia's
founding principles and the Five Pillars, including civility.
- What we can do as a community about our active editor statistics.
I expect this would be an interesting meeting if people are interested in participating, and I hope that we would brainstorm some ideas about how
we
want to move forward on all of these questions and others if we have
time.
If there are many participants, which would be *great*, then we may need additional meetings or to move the conversation on-wiki.
If you're interested, you can respond on list but feel free to respond to me off-list also. I'm just trying to get a sense of the interest level of the community. I hear a lot of people being upset but what I feel we need to know is how many people would be interested in creating a long-term strategic plan and brainstorming strategic options.
Thanks,
Pine _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
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On 14/07/2014, Jane Darnell jane023@gmail.com wrote:
Well maybe all of you are independently wealthy, have laptop and and will travel, but as I see it, for the rest of us, without travel budget facilitated by WMF and chapters, I don't see how we can achieve meetups to do any brainstorming at all. And poring over lists of ideas tucked away in the recesses of the deep dark Meta is not my idea of a good time (but as ever, thanks for the links Nemo)
We have very different views of the world. I have no expectation that Wikimedia donations should pay for me to go to local Wikimeets/meet-ups (which cost me about £3 in bus travel). Similarly, as a member of the Steering Group for the GWToolset, I was happy to have several significant strategy meetings via Google Hangout, which cost the participants precisely nothing and Wikimedia nothing in expenses, even though we were deciding how to invest a few hundred thousand euros.
Yes, some people may get scholarships to travel to Wikimania or other conferences, however my understanding is that this would be limited to those presenting.
A lot can be done using virtual tools, and we should all be experts in making this work well. I would much rather virtual discussion be used for maximum effect and the default choice, so that flying people around the planet is kept for special events with high measurable returns for the money spent. I still regret that for every Wikimania so far, we have not cracked the virtual participation problem by live-streaming and accepting questions via live-chat or similar. Anyway, this is a bit tangential...
Fae
On 07/14/2014 01:25 PM, Fæ wrote:
Yes, some people may get scholarships to travel to Wikimania or other conferences, however my understanding is that this would be limited to those presenting.
Scholarships are also made available to attendees, specifically to allow those who would not otherwise have the financial resources to do so the opportunity to participate in those events.
Remote collaboration is perfectly workable; most of the ops team is remote and we do the vast bulk of our communication online, though email, on IRC and in hangouts.
But there /is/ value in the opportunity to connect physically with peers and colleagues - even if infrequently. Virtual participation also has value (and I agree with you that we should strive to increase it especially for big events like Wikimania) but they do not replace meatspace entirely.
-- Marc
I expect this would be an interesting meeting if people are interested in participating, and I hope that we would brainstorm some ideas about how we want to move forward on all of these questions and others if we have time.
Hi Pine,
I think it would be much more productive to think about these kinds of issues (and indeed those that Jane and Anders have brought up) inside a Wikimedia movement strategic planning process, rather than trying to set up a separate one (even more so, a separate one with an implicit assumption of creating a project fork, which I think is what you're proposing).
I think your suggested solution is actually at a different scale to the problem you're having. I can certainly see there are upset people. But I think the way to move things forward would be to have more conversation about "How quickly do technical developments from WMF need to go?" and "How can we get a smoother relationship between WMF product developers and long-term editors?". I think those are much more sensible conversations to have, rather than either "Should MediaViewer be on or off by default?" (that's been answered) or "How can I replace the Wikimedia Foundation with something I like more?" (which is unlikely to achieve very much).
Regards,
Chris
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 9:25 AM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi community members,
I'm wondering how many people might be interested in having an IRC meeting regarding the community's relationship to WMF and potentially developing our own strategic plan that would be independent of WMF. In the past few days I've heard some defense of WMF but mainly criticism and pessimism, especially people recalling past hurts and feeling powerless to negotiate with WMF. Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options.
Please note that this would be a long-term planning meeting and we are not likely to make major decisions, but we would start brainstorming and laying some foundations.
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
- Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF for
hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
I think this isn't as mad as it may sound. It seems some editors of the English Wikipedia have a strong dislike for many of the WMF decisions, and distrust the WMF staff to make the calls that are best for our shared goals, and vice versa. It's been often said that competition would be good for the project. It would lead to duplicated effort, yes. It also gives the opportunity to learn from each other. I have always believed, and I still believe, that the success of English Wikipedia hinges on the ability of the community to generate content, and that that's the absolutely most important part of English Wikipedia - all else, including consumption by end users - follows from that. A fork where one project is more content creation focused, and one more end-user presentation focused, with strong cooperation between the two projects would IMO be absolutely great. Who has the keys to the servers is less important IMO (which also keeps the option open for an "in-house fork").
As an aside, I don't think there is such a thing as "community values". I sincerely doubt there is even such a thing as a "community", or "community consensus", even for a single project (though it might (still) exist for smaller projects), and certainly not for the WikiMedia movement as a whole.
-- Martijn
On 07/14/2014 10:39 AM, Martijn Hoekstra wrote:
I still believe, that the success of English Wikipedia hinges on the ability of the community to generate content, and that that's the absolutely most important part of English Wikipedia - all else, including consumption by end users - follows from that.
I don't believe that's where the value lies. While I am certain we have a number of contributors who write for the sake of writing; ultimately we are *all* beholden to the readers. Collecting the world's knowledge and making it available only has value insofar as it is, in fact, used as such.
The servers running, the editors editing, the coders coding are all necessary components but all, in the end, subservient to the actual objective of serving the readers. Everything else is replacable.
In my long stint on the meta-side of the biggest project (and keeping abreast of what goes on elsewhere) I saw a very great deal of self-important navel gazing, but very little actual consideration that the "community" (if there is such a thing) is only a means to the actual end. The WMF certainly does not do everything perfectly, but at the very least it actually /attempts/ to keep an eye on the prize.
-- Marc
Hi all,
OK, I've been reading this plus the emails that I got off-list. It seems that there are a lot of diverse ideas and priorities, and probably the best way to gather and prioritize them is through a strategic planning process somewhat like what WMF and the community did in the last time around. I'm not sensing a lot of appetite for strategic change that involves moving away from the WMF hosting model, although am sensing interest in ongoing conversations with WMF about expectations for how WMF behaves toward the community especially around software deployments, and interest in a number of other Meta-level issues. As probably could be expected, a lot of people say "I'm upset about X" or "I want to change Y" but the level of interest in walking through the steps that it takes to actually do something about X or Y beyond talking about them is limited to a relatively small number of people. I want to thank those who spoke up and hope that everyone stays active in the already underway WMF-led strategic planning process as that goes forward, and that we keep our ideas ready for when the right time comes to provide input into that process.
Thanks again. This is of course not the end of the discussion about strategic issues, so please continue talking if you wish. (:
Pine
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 10:58 AM, Marc A. Pelletier marc@uberbox.org wrote:
On 07/14/2014 10:39 AM, Martijn Hoekstra wrote:
I still believe, that the success of English Wikipedia hinges on the ability of
the
community to generate content, and that that's the absolutely most important part of English Wikipedia - all else, including consumption by end users - follows from that.
I don't believe that's where the value lies. While I am certain we have a number of contributors who write for the sake of writing; ultimately we are *all* beholden to the readers. Collecting the world's knowledge and making it available only has value insofar as it is, in fact, used as such.
The servers running, the editors editing, the coders coding are all necessary components but all, in the end, subservient to the actual objective of serving the readers. Everything else is replacable.
In my long stint on the meta-side of the biggest project (and keeping abreast of what goes on elsewhere) I saw a very great deal of self-important navel gazing, but very little actual consideration that the "community" (if there is such a thing) is only a means to the actual end. The WMF certainly does not do everything perfectly, but at the very least it actually /attempts/ to keep an eye on the prize.
-- Marc
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I'm too lazy to read all above and below but I think we might try. Wikicommunities blackouted wikis protest to some political laws in some countries which is beyond not-a-soapbox pillar but they can't stand WMF's pressure. Should be vice versa IMHO. --Base
14.07.2014 10:25, Pine W написав(ла):
Hi community members,
I'm wondering how many people might be interested in having an IRC meeting regarding the community's relationship to WMF and potentially developing our own strategic plan that would be independent of WMF. In the past few days I've heard some defense of WMF but mainly criticism and pessimism, especially people recalling past hurts and feeling powerless to negotiate with WMF. Perhaps it's time that we in the community create our own strategic plan and develop strategic options.
Please note that this would be a long-term planning meeting and we are not likely to make major decisions, but we would start brainstorming and laying some foundations.
Topics of possible discussion regarding our relationship with WMF:
- Strategic options, such as finding alternative organizations to WMF for
hosting Wikimedia sites or creating a new hosting organization that is aligned with community values.
- Activism at the Board and grassroots levels.
Topics of possible discussion regarding other strategic issues:
- Internal reform of the community, such as a fresh look at Wikimedia's
founding principles and the Five Pillars, including civility.
- What we can do as a community about our active editor statistics.
I expect this would be an interesting meeting if people are interested in participating, and I hope that we would brainstorm some ideas about how we want to move forward on all of these questions and others if we have time. If there are many participants, which would be *great*, then we may need additional meetings or to move the conversation on-wiki.
If you're interested, you can respond on list but feel free to respond to me off-list also. I'm just trying to get a sense of the interest level of the community. I hear a lot of people being upset but what I feel we need to know is how many people would be interested in creating a long-term strategic plan and brainstorming strategic options.
Thanks,
Pine _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
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