New subject: "The Foundation does not care so much of the French-speaking contributors"

15 Sep 2019

      "*The Foundation does not care so much of the French-speaking contributors*".
This harsh sentence is the translation of a statement in French, I've just
said in a conversation a week ago at the Francophone Wikiconvention held
last weekend in Brussels. The statement may seem excessive, because the
Foundation does things for the Francophone community as well as for other
communities (and its website is fairly well translated into French). But it
reflected my feeling, shared by my three interlocutors, all non-French,
facing that no Foundation high-level members were present to this
Wikiconvention: no executive director, nor members of the Board, nor any
level-C staff. In an another conversation, where the subject came up over
again, someone said this absence was offensive. I do not know if it
reflects the majority of attendees feelings but with varying degrees, I
would said it was widely shared.
In 2017, for the Francophone Wikiconvention in Strasbourg we had a very
quick visit of Katherine Maher, in 2018, a simple video message and in 2019
... nothing. At the same time, the Francophone Wikiconvention has stepped
up with ever more participants, always more countries represented. This
year, it brought together more than 220 Francophones, Algerian, Belgian,
Beninese, Cameroonian, Canadian, French, Guinean, Ivorian, Swiss and
Tunisian contributors, and I may forget some, with varied and enriching
conferences and meetings. A huge success, very well organized by employees
but also by several volunteers, who dedicated time and energy. This
Wikiconvention and the projects and achievements submitted have shown the
French-speaking Wikimedia community vitality, which will continue to grow.
FYI, French is foreseen, thanks to Africa, to be the most rapidly growing
languages in the next twenty years and will be the mother tongue or the
language used for communication for more than 8% of the world's population
in thirty years' time. But my reaction would have been the same if I had
attended an Arabic, Chinese, Spanish, Swahili-speaking or any other
important languages Wikiconvention.
So yes, this Wikiconvention is not in English. Fortunately, not all
Wikimedia meetings are in English. In a previous discussion on this mailing
list about the question of whether or not it is appropriate to continue
Wimania, one of the participants argued that unlike other Wikimedia
meetings, anyone could attend Wikmania. It may be obvious for those who
have English as a mother tongue or for Northern Europeans for whom English
is almost a second mother tongue but this is false: English is spoken only
by a small minority in the world, less than one human in six. So only one
human in six or seven could attend Wikimania or any other english-speaking
conferences or meetings (the case of the vast majority of global Wikimedia
conferences). I do not deny a common working language usefulness but a
Wikiconvention in French, as I hope other languages ones will be more to
come soon, allows all non-English speaking Francophones to participate in
the Wikimedia movement and above all, help them to meet our common goal of
spread freeknowledge.The movement talks a lot about its efforts to overcome
differents gaps (gender, LGBT,...) and it's rightly pointed, these topics
are important. But it simply forget the language gap and the almost
exclusive use of English excludes a very large majority.
So why no high level Foundation members in Brussels ?
I was told that Valerie D'Costa, the new Chief of Community Engagement,
should initially be there but finally told she will not. But then, no other
member could then replace her and why only one Foundation representant
given the part of French language in the WM projects ? Perhaps no Foundation
Board or high level member speaks French or feels she/he speaks good enough.
But with more than 220 attendants at the FWC, it would have been easy to
find volonteers with a good level of English to provide simultaneous
translation in discussions with other non-English speaking participants or to
translate conferences.A higher-level representation would have helped the
Foundation top level to gain more insight into Wikimedian French-speaking
community and enabled this community to have a direct access to the
Foundation, like in Wikimania. That would have helped bridging the gap
between these "two worlds". Because this gap is real. In the 2011 Finance
Meeting in Paris, during workshops where a Board member was in each
group (Jan-Bart
de Vreede for mine), me and another non english-speaking chapter head (she/he
will recognize her/himself) had made the comment that we had the impression
in our relation with the Foundation of "*colliding with an Anglo-Saxon wall*".
I notice that despite more Foundation staff diversity in recent years,
French speaking organizations would probably still have the same feeling
and clearly many French-speaking wikimedians feel that gap.
It is sad that the Foundation, which is very demanding with Francophone
chapters, does not apply itself to these demands with the Francophone
community. FYI the next French-speaking Wikconvention will be held on WE 31
october/1 November 2019 in Tunis. Save the date.
Regards
-- 
Thierry

PS.  Assas, Diane and Benoit (for those I met) don't take this personaly.
Your presence was appreciate and you avoid the Foundation relationship with
French Community of a total Bérézina as we said in France.