I agree having all board members engage with the community in their own voice is likely the best way forwards. All of us will take your statements as representing whatever fraction of the board you are unless you state otherwise. There is nothing wrong with a board that disagrees with each other, all I request is that you do not pretend their is "consensus" were their isn't one. We as a community disagree all the time. We however are still able to work together transparently and get a lot done.
One of the roles of the board is to determine "WMF's long term strategy" https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Board_Handbook#Effectiv... I tried to get a discussion going on our internal board wiki. I also hoped to bring the wider community and staff into that discussion so that we could have some shared decision making around where we want to go. This is how one gets buy in and is key in a volunteer movement. We have some amazingly smart people both as staff and as community members. Long term strategy should not be determined by the ED and a couple of board members.
Would be good to see the board leading a collaborative discussion of strategy.
James, regarding "Long term strategy should not be determined by the ED and a couple of board members", why do you say, "a couple of board members"? There are ten board members. Are you saying a couple of them have inordinate influence?
Yes, the board and ED should heed input from the volunteers and the readership, but the final decision needs to be in the board's and ED's hands. Which is fine if you have a board and ED who do listen to those stakeholders.
A few other thoughts:
Until Lila arrived we had a board that was stratospherically out of touch with, at least, the Wikipedia community, and an ED almost exclusively focussed on fundraising and being liked by everybody - especially her employees.
We still have a board, with the exception of Jimmy and Dariusz, who might as well be on the other side of the moon. Jimmy makes himself available on his Wikipedia talk page but, sadly, his incompetence for this job is clear.
Lila should have taken the community along with her as the Knowledge Engine project was evolving. I don't know what was behind her reticence. I presume an element was unwillingness to announce a thing while the thing was shifting and changing from one day to the next. She hasn't engaged any more with the wider volunteer community than Sue did, and that should change - though it's hard to know how.
But since her arrival, the WMF has undergone significant change in its orientation toward the readership and the wider volunteer community:
* The Community Strategy Consultation effectively highlighted the needs and wants of our readers, as well as those of the wider volunteer community, and this has informed the ongoing strategy design process - a process that has deep community input. That strategy, in turn, informs funding decisions.
* The Community Resources Team is in place - it surveyed the community and discussed with them their technical priorities, and tailored their Idea Lab Campaign accordingly.
* The WMF have accepted the FDC's proposal that the WMF submit to the same reporting standard they expect of their chapters.
* There has been a 180 degree shift in the level of respect shown by the WMF staff to the wider volunteer community. Volunteers who actually write content and run Wikipedia all remember the contempt they were shown regularly by all levels of the WMF just two years ago.
The latter is superficial but very important to us volunteers.
The former three points evince profound structural and philosophical change and speak of genuine respect for the stakeholders that matter most. As a Wikipedia volunteer, I'm deeply grateful for all these changes that have happened during Lila's tenure.
I realise the staff must be missing the good old days when Sue was at the helm and the idea of key performance indicators was a distant rumour, and they effectively had a job for life. It must be hard to see popular but incompetent colleagues getting sacked or encouraged to leave, to have accountability forced on you, to have to be respectful to the volunteers, to have a comfortable, plodding 5-year plan taken away from you.
If Sue had done her job, Lila wouldn't have to be doing most of these unpleasant things.
The board needs to stand by its ED, and the ED needs to engage better with her crew. Those who have been demonstrating gross disrespect for the ED over the last few days need to leave.
Anthony Cole
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 1:02 AM, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
I agree having all board members engage with the community in their own voice is likely the best way forwards. All of us will take your statements as representing whatever fraction of the board you are unless you state otherwise. There is nothing wrong with a board that disagrees with each other, all I request is that you do not pretend their is "consensus" were their isn't one. We as a community disagree all the time. We however are still able to work together transparently and get a lot done.
One of the roles of the board is to determine "WMF's long term strategy"
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Board_Handbook#Effectiv... I tried to get a discussion going on our internal board wiki. I also hoped to bring the wider community and staff into that discussion so that we could have some shared decision making around where we want to go. This is how one gets buy in and is key in a volunteer movement. We have some amazingly smart people both as staff and as community members. Long term strategy should not be determined by the ED and a couple of board members.
Would be good to see the board leading a collaborative discussion of strategy. -- James Heilman MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian
The Wikipedia Open Textbook of Medicine www.opentextbookofmedicine.com _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 2:56 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
- The Community Resources Team is in place - it surveyed the community and
discussed with them their technical priorities, and tailored their Idea Lab Campaign accordingly.
FYI, the head of that team is one of those who resigned last week: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/081809.html
-- brion
I know.
Anthony Cole
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 7:17 AM, Brion Vibber bvibber@wikimedia.org wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 2:56 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
- The Community Resources Team is in place - it surveyed the community
and
discussed with them their technical priorities, and tailored their Idea
Lab
Campaign accordingly.
FYI, the head of that team is one of those who resigned last week: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/081809.html
-- brion _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
It is probably best for me not to get into a long count/counterpoint here but I couldn't avoid not responding at all.
As Ori hinted at I hope that everyone can reflect on the idea of causation vs correlation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation. The fact that good things have happened is not necessarily because of, but despite of, current leadership. There is no doubt that there have been a lot of good things to occur in the past while but those are, very frequently, because people have been freed up some to do what they want. A lack of direction or clear strategy can, in fact, have good side effects if you have amazing people on board because they're able to make decisions they've wanted to make for a while. However at the same time it can drive them insane as they strive to keep it on that track and to avoid the taking crazy routes or stop leadership from making decisions they feel would disrupt the projects and the movement too much or go against our morals.
We have a lot of great new hires but much of that was driven by the good people who already existed since it's the older ones who got into more management type roles either officially or unofficially). Even at the executive level it's telling that the 3 most long standing and solid C-levels we have are all pre-lila appointees: Katherine (just before Lila but still before), Lisa and Geoff. Our cycle of c-level replacements since then have been both hires and departures (with, unfortunately, less hires then departures still) including multiple short term hires (in roles that are traditionally very long term).
I am not going to pretend I agreed with Sue at all times, or that every decision she made was right however I at least felt like I knew what they were (In fact I strongly disliked her strategy believing it bad for the org and the movement, but again, I felt I knew what it was/understood it). However I am also not going to accept the idea that Lila has made this place so much better. As someone who saw them happen internally I don't think her finger prints are really on any of the things you mention, they were all 'despite' not 'because' of her and so much more could have been done and wanted to be done. Slight exception possibly for the FDC bit but that happened after all of this started exploding internally in the past couple months and so she knew that she had no trust left internally and all of the staff close to it basically said "we can not defend you on this if you don't go the FDC" so I still don't really see it as a proactive choice on her front.
James [[User:Jamesofur]]/[[User:Jalexander-WMF]]
Personal capacity, as signaled by my email address, but since some complain I don't make it clear my role in WMF when I send this type of email: I am also the Manager of Trust & Safety
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 3:18 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
I know.
Anthony Cole
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 7:17 AM, Brion Vibber bvibber@wikimedia.org wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 2:56 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com
wrote:
- The Community Resources Team is in place - it surveyed the community
and
discussed with them their technical priorities, and tailored their Idea
Lab
Campaign accordingly.
FYI, the head of that team is one of those who resigned last week:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/081809.html
-- brion _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: 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 Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 5:16 PM, James Alexander jamesofur@gmail.com wrote: It is probably best for me not to get into a long count/counterpoint here but I couldn't avoid not responding at all.
James, several staffers have talked about feeling unappreciated and demoralized. But that's how quite a few WMF staff made us feel before Lila arrived. WMF-community relations couldn't have been worse. It certainly looks from the outside as though Lila fixed a lot of that.
The question now is how we move forward, with no more casualties.
The best thing is surely for WMF staff to help Lila weather this storm, which seems to have blown up around mistaken ideas about the Knowledge Engine proposal.
In the longer term we need to brainstorm about how to manage Foundation-community relations. Lila wanted to speak to the community earlier about the Knowledge Engine grant, but was afraid to. Why was that? A lot of the community's suspicion of change stems from us feeling we could be separated from our work at any minute. That conservatism causes a lot of frustration within the WMF. How can it be fixed?
Does the Board give enough support to the ED and leadership to the rest of us? Can something be put in place within the WMF to help staffers so that things like this don't blow up in public? We also ought to discuss asking the WMF to become a membership organization with different bylaws so that we really do elect the Board.
These are the discussions that will move us forward, because the real problem here is not about individuals. It is about structure.
Sarah
SarahSV, the rabbit whole goes far far beyond "mistaken ideas about the Knowledge Engine".
Seddon
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 12:36 AM, SarahSV sarahsv.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 5:16 PM, James Alexander jamesofur@gmail.com wrote: It is probably best for me not to get into a long count/counterpoint here but I couldn't avoid not responding at all.
James, several staffers have talked about feeling unappreciated and demoralized. But that's how quite a few WMF staff made us feel before Lila arrived. WMF-community relations couldn't have been worse. It certainly looks from the outside as though Lila fixed a lot of that.
The question now is how we move forward, with no more casualties.
The best thing is surely for WMF staff to help Lila weather this storm, which seems to have blown up around mistaken ideas about the Knowledge Engine proposal.
In the longer term we need to brainstorm about how to manage Foundation-community relations. Lila wanted to speak to the community earlier about the Knowledge Engine grant, but was afraid to. Why was that? A lot of the community's suspicion of change stems from us feeling we could be separated from our work at any minute. That conservatism causes a lot of frustration within the WMF. How can it be fixed?
Does the Board give enough support to the ED and leadership to the rest of us? Can something be put in place within the WMF to help staffers so that things like this don't blow up in public? We also ought to discuss asking the WMF to become a membership organization with different bylaws so that we really do elect the Board.
These are the discussions that will move us forward, because the real problem here is not about individuals. It is about structure.
Sarah _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
In fact the rabbit whole goes far far deeper down the rabbit hole :P
Seddon
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 12:42 AM, Joseph Seddon jseddon@wikimedia.org wrote:
SarahSV, the rabbit whole goes far far beyond "mistaken ideas about the Knowledge Engine".
Seddon
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 12:36 AM, SarahSV sarahsv.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 5:16 PM, James Alexander jamesofur@gmail.com wrote: It is probably best for me not to get into a long count/counterpoint here but I couldn't avoid not responding at all.
James, several staffers have talked about feeling unappreciated and demoralized. But that's how quite a few WMF staff made us feel before Lila arrived. WMF-community relations couldn't have been worse. It certainly looks from the outside as though Lila fixed a lot of that.
The question now is how we move forward, with no more casualties.
The best thing is surely for WMF staff to help Lila weather this storm, which seems to have blown up around mistaken ideas about the Knowledge Engine proposal.
In the longer term we need to brainstorm about how to manage Foundation-community relations. Lila wanted to speak to the community earlier about the Knowledge Engine grant, but was afraid to. Why was that? A lot of the community's suspicion of change stems from us feeling we could be separated from our work at any minute. That conservatism causes a lot of frustration within the WMF. How can it be fixed?
Does the Board give enough support to the ED and leadership to the rest of us? Can something be put in place within the WMF to help staffers so that things like this don't blow up in public? We also ought to discuss asking the WMF to become a membership organization with different bylaws so that we really do elect the Board.
These are the discussions that will move us forward, because the real problem here is not about individuals. It is about structure.
Sarah _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- Seddon
*Advancement Associate (Community Engagement)* *Wikimedia Foundation*
Thanks James.
I'm not on staff, nor am I part of the inner circle of volunteers in constant touch with staff or the board. From the perspective of the wider community, though, this all looks very dodgy. Lila's arrival marked for us a revolution in the relationship. There is probably nothing either of us can do to change our conflicting views.
Most disturbing to me is the reappearance of some former C-level staff, who I (among many others) was delighted to see the back of, on this list and Wikipedia Weekly, positioning themselves for the new dawn. It's very unseemly seeing the people responsible for the shambles Lila inherited now lighting up the torches.
On Sunday, 21 February 2016, James Alexander jamesofur@gmail.com wrote:
It is probably best for me not to get into a long count/counterpoint here but I couldn't avoid not responding at all.
As Ori hinted at I hope that everyone can reflect on the idea of causation vs correlation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation. The fact that good things have happened is not necessarily because of, but despite of, current leadership. There is no doubt that there have been a lot of good things to occur in the past while but those are, very frequently, because people have been freed up some to do what they want. A lack of direction or clear strategy can, in fact, have good side effects if you have amazing people on board because they're able to make decisions they've wanted to make for a while. However at the same time it can drive them insane as they strive to keep it on that track and to avoid the taking crazy routes or stop leadership from making decisions they feel would disrupt the projects and the movement too much or go against our morals.
We have a lot of great new hires but much of that was driven by the good people who already existed since it's the older ones who got into more management type roles either officially or unofficially). Even at the executive level it's telling that the 3 most long standing and solid C-levels we have are all pre-lila appointees: Katherine (just before Lila but still before), Lisa and Geoff. Our cycle of c-level replacements since then have been both hires and departures (with, unfortunately, less hires then departures still) including multiple short term hires (in roles that are traditionally very long term).
I am not going to pretend I agreed with Sue at all times, or that every decision she made was right however I at least felt like I knew what they were (In fact I strongly disliked her strategy believing it bad for the org and the movement, but again, I felt I knew what it was/understood it). However I am also not going to accept the idea that Lila has made this place so much better. As someone who saw them happen internally I don't think her finger prints are really on any of the things you mention, they were all 'despite' not 'because' of her and so much more could have been done and wanted to be done. Slight exception possibly for the FDC bit but that happened after all of this started exploding internally in the past couple months and so she knew that she had no trust left internally and all of the staff close to it basically said "we can not defend you on this if you don't go the FDC" so I still don't really see it as a proactive choice on her front.
James [[User:Jamesofur]]/[[User:Jalexander-WMF]]
Personal capacity, as signaled by my email address, but since some complain I don't make it clear my role in WMF when I send this type of email: I am also the Manager of Trust & Safety
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 3:18 PM, Anthony Cole <ahcoleecu@gmail.com javascript:;> wrote:
I know.
Anthony Cole
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 7:17 AM, Brion Vibber <bvibber@wikimedia.org
wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 2:56 PM, Anthony Cole <ahcoleecu@gmail.com
wrote:
- The Community Resources Team is in place - it surveyed the
community
and
discussed with them their technical priorities, and tailored their
Idea
Lab
Campaign accordingly.
FYI, the head of that team is one of those who resigned last week:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/081809.html
-- brion _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org javascript:; Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org javascript:;
?subject=unsubscribe>
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You know, it's possible that the people who work for the Foundation might understand the situation in a more nuanced way than you do. I know it doesn't seem likely, but dare to dream.
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 5:01 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Thanks James.
I'm not on staff, nor am I part of the inner circle of volunteers in constant touch with staff or the board. From the perspective of the wider community, though, this all looks very dodgy. Lila's arrival marked for us a revolution in the relationship. There is probably nothing either of us can do to change our conflicting views.
Most disturbing to me is the reappearance of some former C-level staff, who I (among many others) was delighted to see the back of, on this list and Wikipedia Weekly, positioning themselves for the new dawn. It's very unseemly seeing the people responsible for the shambles Lila inherited now lighting up the torches.
On Sunday, 21 February 2016, James Alexander jamesofur@gmail.com wrote:
It is probably best for me not to get into a long count/counterpoint here but I couldn't avoid not responding at all.
As Ori hinted at I hope that everyone can reflect on the idea of
causation
vs correlation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation.
The
fact that good things have happened is not necessarily because of, but despite of, current leadership. There is no doubt that there have been a lot of good things to occur in the past while but those are, very frequently, because people have been freed up some to do what they want.
A
lack of direction or clear strategy can, in fact, have good side effects
if
you have amazing people on board because they're able to make decisions they've wanted to make for a while. However at the same time it can drive them insane as they strive to keep it on that track and to avoid the
taking
crazy routes or stop leadership from making decisions they feel would disrupt the projects and the movement too much or go against our morals.
We have a lot of great new hires but much of that was driven by the good people who already existed since it's the older ones who got into more management type roles either officially or unofficially). Even at the executive level it's telling that the 3 most long standing and solid C-levels we have are all pre-lila appointees: Katherine (just before Lila but still before), Lisa and Geoff. Our cycle of c-level replacements
since
then have been both hires and departures (with, unfortunately, less hires then departures still) including multiple short term hires (in roles that are traditionally very long term).
I am not going to pretend I agreed with Sue at all times, or that every decision she made was right however I at least felt like I knew what they were (In fact I strongly disliked her strategy believing it bad for the
org
and the movement, but again, I felt I knew what it was/understood it). However I am also not going to accept the idea that Lila has made this place so much better. As someone who saw them happen internally I don't think her finger prints are really on any of the things you mention, they were all 'despite' not 'because' of her and so much more could have been done and wanted to be done. Slight exception possibly for the FDC bit but that happened after all of this started exploding internally in the past couple months and so she knew that she had no trust left internally and all of the staff close to it basically said "we can not defend you on
this
if you don't go the FDC" so I still don't really see it as a proactive choice on her front.
James [[User:Jamesofur]]/[[User:Jalexander-WMF]]
Personal capacity, as signaled by my email address, but since some
complain
I don't make it clear my role in WMF when I send this type of email: I am also the Manager of Trust & Safety
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 3:18 PM, Anthony Cole <ahcoleecu@gmail.com javascript:;> wrote:
I know.
Anthony Cole
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 7:17 AM, Brion Vibber <bvibber@wikimedia.org
wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 2:56 PM, Anthony Cole <ahcoleecu@gmail.com
wrote:
- The Community Resources Team is in place - it surveyed the
community
and
discussed with them their technical priorities, and tailored their
Idea
Lab
Campaign accordingly.
FYI, the head of that team is one of those who resigned last week:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/081809.html
-- brion _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org javascript:; Unsubscribe:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
<mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org javascript:;
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Danny, don't kid yourself! The folks at Wikipediocracy know everything about everything that's happened at the Foundation and about everything that will EVER happen. They've never been wrong, ever!
I don't understand why we're still talking about this!
On Feb 20, 2016, at 5:29 PM, Danny Horn dhorn@wikimedia.org wrote:
You know, it's possible that the people who work for the Foundation might understand the situation in a more nuanced way than you do. I know it doesn't seem likely, but dare to dream.
--- Brandon Harris :: bharris@gaijin.com :: made of steel wool and whiskey
Ah, Brandon. Thanks for writing me off as "the folks at Wikipediocracy." I'm also the folks at en.Wikipedia and the folks on the board of WikiProject Med Foundation. And I give a shit about Wikipedia.
This push for the removal of the ED is coming from staff. And failed staff. If you want support from the wider editor community, you'll need to bring us with you. I'm making it clear to you that presently you haven't done that yet. Maybe you don't need to.
On Sunday, 21 February 2016, Brandon Harris bharris@gaijin.com wrote:
Danny, don't kid yourself! The folks at Wikipediocracy knoweverything about everything that's happened at the Foundation and about everything that will EVER happen. They've never been wrong, ever!
I don't understand why we're still talking about this!On Feb 20, 2016, at 5:29 PM, Danny Horn <dhorn@wikimedia.org
javascript:;> wrote:
You know, it's possible that the people who work for the Foundation might understand the situation in a more nuanced way than you do. I know it doesn't seem likely, but dare to dream.
Brandon Harris :: bharris@gaijin.com javascript:; :: made of steel wool and whiskey
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Just staff and former staff? Huh. You must be reading wikimedia-that-doesn't-include-liam-fae-former-board-members-or-almost-anyone-else-l. What's it like there?
To Risker's point; "don't beat up on people who have less information than you" is a good principle. But so is "don't call people incompetent when the alternative is that you're missing something". Speaking as both a volunteer and staff, Anthony, I have found your attitude in this conversation and others on the subject to be deeply unproductive. It would be good if you spent more time asking questions and less time dismissing people's concerns.
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 9:39 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Ah, Brandon. Thanks for writing me off as "the folks at Wikipediocracy." I'm also the folks at en.Wikipedia and the folks on the board of WikiProject Med Foundation. And I give a shit about Wikipedia.
This push for the removal of the ED is coming from staff. And failed staff. If you want support from the wider editor community, you'll need to bring us with you. I'm making it clear to you that presently you haven't done that yet. Maybe you don't need to.
On Sunday, 21 February 2016, Brandon Harris bharris@gaijin.com wrote:
Danny, don't kid yourself! The folks at Wikipediocracy knoweverything about everything that's happened at the Foundation and about everything that will EVER happen. They've never been wrong, ever!
I don't understand why we're still talking about this!On Feb 20, 2016, at 5:29 PM, Danny Horn <dhorn@wikimedia.org
javascript:;> wrote:
You know, it's possible that the people who work for the Foundation might understand the situation in a more nuanced way than you do. I know it doesn't seem likely, but dare to dream.
Brandon Harris :: bharris@gaijin.com javascript:; :: made of steel wool and whiskey
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Reading an following this thread makes me feel profoundly sad. And the symptoms indicates for me that there is indeed something "rotten" going on.
I feel deep sympathy for staff whose pain is seems to go very deep, and I would really want to help out to to ease the problems if it was in my capability.
But there is as Risker puts it a deep information asymmetry in this thread.
I am sitting far away from the SF office and have no direct contact with staff and even if I read of the pain, I do not catch any concrete facts what it is all about. The handling of Knowledge engine has not been good, but it can be remedied. The Board is not optimal and perfect, but the members are clever and loyal to our mission and I have no reason to doubt that they will take care of things on their "table", even if somewhat slower pace then people would want.
And even if I feel and sympathize with the frustration of staff I would like to ask the inputs to this thread to be more factual and also show the respect of each others as we are used to in our daily Wikipedia dialogues.
Anders With sympathy and love to all involved in this crisis
Den 2016-02-21 kl. 04:58, skrev Oliver Keyes:
Just staff and former staff? Huh. You must be reading wikimedia-that-doesn't-include-liam-fae-former-board-members-or-almost-anyone-else-l. What's it like there?
To Risker's point; "don't beat up on people who have less information than you" is a good principle. But so is "don't call people incompetent when the alternative is that you're missing something". Speaking as both a volunteer and staff, Anthony, I have found your attitude in this conversation and others on the subject to be deeply unproductive. It would be good if you spent more time asking questions and less time dismissing people's concerns.
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 9:39 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Ah, Brandon. Thanks for writing me off as "the folks at Wikipediocracy." I'm also the folks at en.Wikipedia and the folks on the board of WikiProject Med Foundation. And I give a shit about Wikipedia.
This push for the removal of the ED is coming from staff. And failed staff. If you want support from the wider editor community, you'll need to bring us with you. I'm making it clear to you that presently you haven't done that yet. Maybe you don't need to.
On Sunday, 21 February 2016, Brandon Harris bharris@gaijin.com wrote:
Danny, don't kid yourself! The folks at Wikipediocracy knoweverything about everything that's happened at the Foundation and about everything that will EVER happen. They've never been wrong, ever!
I don't understand why we're still talking about this!On Feb 20, 2016, at 5:29 PM, Danny Horn <dhorn@wikimedia.org
javascript:;> wrote:
You know, it's possible that the people who work for the Foundation might understand the situation in a more nuanced way than you do. I know it doesn't seem likely, but dare to dream.
Brandon Harris :: bharris@gaijin.com javascript:; :: made of steel wool and whiskey
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Despite everything, Anders, it is inappropriate for staff to publicly prosecute Lila. The board is aware of the many issues, quite a few not yet public on any forum. And it is for the board to solve.
A. On Feb 20, 2016 8:20 PM, "Anders Wennersten" mail@anderswennersten.se wrote:
Reading an following this thread makes me feel profoundly sad. And the symptoms indicates for me that there is indeed something "rotten" going on.
I feel deep sympathy for staff whose pain is seems to go very deep, and I would really want to help out to to ease the problems if it was in my capability.
But there is as Risker puts it a deep information asymmetry in this thread.
I am sitting far away from the SF office and have no direct contact with staff and even if I read of the pain, I do not catch any concrete facts what it is all about. The handling of Knowledge engine has not been good, but it can be remedied. The Board is not optimal and perfect, but the members are clever and loyal to our mission and I have no reason to doubt that they will take care of things on their "table", even if somewhat slower pace then people would want.
And even if I feel and sympathize with the frustration of staff I would like to ask the inputs to this thread to be more factual and also show the respect of each others as we are used to in our daily Wikipedia dialogues.
Anders With sympathy and love to all involved in this crisis
Den 2016-02-21 kl. 04:58, skrev Oliver Keyes:
Just staff and former staff? Huh. You must be reading
wikimedia-that-doesn't-include-liam-fae-former-board-members-or-almost-anyone-else-l. What's it like there?
To Risker's point; "don't beat up on people who have less information than you" is a good principle. But so is "don't call people incompetent when the alternative is that you're missing something". Speaking as both a volunteer and staff, Anthony, I have found your attitude in this conversation and others on the subject to be deeply unproductive. It would be good if you spent more time asking questions and less time dismissing people's concerns.
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 9:39 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Ah, Brandon. Thanks for writing me off as "the folks at Wikipediocracy." I'm also the folks at en.Wikipedia and the folks on the board of WikiProject Med Foundation. And I give a shit about Wikipedia.
This push for the removal of the ED is coming from staff. And failed staff. If you want support from the wider editor community, you'll need to bring us with you. I'm making it clear to you that presently you haven't done that yet. Maybe you don't need to.
On Sunday, 21 February 2016, Brandon Harris bharris@gaijin.com wrote:
Danny, don't kid yourself! The folks at Wikipediocracy knoweverything about everything that's happened at the Foundation and about everything that will EVER happen. They've never been wrong, ever!
I don't understand why we're still talking about this!On Feb 20, 2016, at 5:29 PM, Danny Horn <dhorn@wikimedia.org
javascript:;> wrote:
You know, it's possible that the people who work for the Foundation might understand the situation in a more nuanced way than you do. I know it doesn't seem likely, but dare to dream.
Brandon Harris :: bharris@gaijin.com javascript:; :: made of steel wool and whiskey
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-- Anthony Cole _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: 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 Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 9:35 PM, Asaf Bartov abartov@wikimedia.org wrote:
Despite everything, Anders, it is inappropriate for staff to publicly prosecute Lila. The board is aware of the many issues, quite a few not yet public on any forum. And it is for the board to solve.
Asaf, I agree, but it's happening, here and elsewhere. I hope there won't be any more public attacks.
This isn't about how much people know. It's obvious that the KE was just a flashpoint. It's about how to move forward without further casualties. I don't believe that that isn't possible.
Sarah
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 5:43 AM, SarahSV sarahsv.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
This isn't about how much people know. It's obvious that the KE was just a flashpoint. It's about how to move forward without further casualties. I don't believe that that isn't possible.
From the point of person who knows just a tinny bit more than the
non-staff non-Board participant of this list (but definitely far less than staff and Board), I tend to be a misanthrope. You know, the same answer to the question "Why do wars exist?": Because people are morons.
But despite of this, I still share your hope as I tend to believe that Wikimedians are not just ordinary morons.
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:23 PM, Milos Rancic millosh@gmail.com wrote:
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 5:43 AM, SarahSV sarahsv.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
This isn't about how much people know. It's obvious that the KE was just
a
flashpoint. It's about how to move forward without further casualties. I don't believe that that isn't possible.
From the point of person who knows just a tinny bit more than the non-staff non-Board participant of this list (but definitely far less than staff and Board), I tend to be a misanthrope. You know, the same answer to the question "Why do wars exist?": Because people are morons.
But despite of this, I still share your hope as I tend to believe that Wikimedians are not just ordinary morons.
Right. So can't we fix this? Lila is part of the movement too, and everyone is clearly in a lot of pain here.
What can be done to help? Can an outside broker be brought in to hold a meeting with staff and Lila and find solutions?
Perhaps the Board could organize something like this.
Sarah
On 21 February 2016 at 00:43, SarahSV sarahsv.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:23 PM, Milos Rancic millosh@gmail.com wrote:
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 5:43 AM, SarahSV sarahsv.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
This isn't about how much people know. It's obvious that the KE was
just
a
flashpoint. It's about how to move forward without further casualties.
I
don't believe that that isn't possible.
From the point of person who knows just a tinny bit more than the non-staff non-Board participant of this list (but definitely far less than staff and Board), I tend to be a misanthrope. You know, the same answer to the question "Why do wars exist?": Because people are morons.
But despite of this, I still share your hope as I tend to believe that Wikimedians are not just ordinary morons.
Right. So can't we fix this? Lila is part of the movement too, and everyone is clearly in a lot of pain here.
What can be done to help? Can an outside broker be brought in to hold a meeting with staff and Lila and find solutions?
Perhaps the Board could organize something like this.
It is my understanding this was done some months ago.
Risker/Anne
This is a difficult time for everyone. Staff, particularly staff who work out of the San Francisco office, have seen and been through things that are not well known or understood outside of that small group; even "highly involved" volunteers aren't entirely in the loop. Former staff continue to have a knowledge advantage over the vast majority of community members simply because of their continued ties to friends and former colleagues who remain on staff.
I encourage everyone to treat each other with respect, even when disagreeing with the interpretations that other people have made based on the (often comparatively limited) information that they have available. I can honestly say that I know some things that perhaps SarahSV and Anthonyhcole don't know, but I certainly don't know everything - and I have been in the SF offices twice in the last six months as a volunteer and regularly converse with staff in certain areas in my role as a volunteer working on various things.
One of the major barriers is the legitimate concern that many staff have in trying to communicate concerns in a manner that is not destructive, either to the WMF as an organization, or to their own professional reputations. The whistleblower provisions at the WMF are very narrow (essentially only permitting reporting directly to the Board chair/chair of the Audit Committee if there is reason to believe that a law has been broken, not just internal policies no matter how severe), as one example. I've been aware of concerns for about a year now, myself, but I've still found out quite a bit more over the last few weeks. For staff, a lot of those early concerns are practically ancient history, and that knowledge hasn't been disseminated to a much broader community. Not to put too fine a point on it, but the majority of the audience here doesn't know.
Anthony, speaking for myself only, I don't think that your association with Wikipediocracy is particularly relevant; other active members of that site have expressed significantly different opinions, whether within or outside of "WMF-related" locations like this mailing list or Meta or The Signpost. I'd like to discourage anyone from assuming that there are monolithic and unified positions on the current situation amongst any particular group. That includes former and current staff, editors of particular projects, commenters on external blogs or through other non-WMF media or criticism sites, user groups, chapters, etc. There are a lot of different points of view, and a lot of different levels of knowledge and information.
I'm not going to say "let's assume good faith", don't worry. I'm going to say "don't beat up on people who have different levels of information".
Risker/Anne
On 20 February 2016 at 20:31, Brandon Harris bharris@gaijin.com wrote:
Danny, don't kid yourself! The folks at Wikipediocracy knoweverything about everything that's happened at the Foundation and about everything that will EVER happen. They've never been wrong, ever!
I don't understand why we're still talking about this!On Feb 20, 2016, at 5:29 PM, Danny Horn dhorn@wikimedia.org wrote:
You know, it's possible that the people who work for the Foundation might understand the situation in a more nuanced way than you do. I know it doesn't seem likely, but dare to dream.
Brandon Harris :: bharris@gaijin.com :: made of steel wool and whiskey
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Hi Risker,
Information asymmetry is a big issue. For example, in my role there is a lot I cannot say, I have responsibilities to protect people in the organization both current and former. So, for example, if someone is fired, even for cause, I would not say anything about this person that may hurt their chances in the future. We allow people to message their own exits.
When a situation arises that maybe completely unfair to the senior officer or a board member, as long as we are employed (and often if we are not) we will not disclose the details to protect the organization as a whole.
As I am sure you practice all too often in your own professional life this is required in a professional role: to take the heat and the arrows when something goes wrong, and to give away credit for what goes right. I would not have it any other way, but it is something people all too often ignore or forget.
I'd love to have a broader FAQ than the current one for Knowledge Engine to review and help provide transparency into any of the issues I can.
Lila
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 6:54 PM, Risker risker.wp@gmail.com wrote:
This is a difficult time for everyone. Staff, particularly staff who work out of the San Francisco office, have seen and been through things that are not well known or understood outside of that small group; even "highly involved" volunteers aren't entirely in the loop. Former staff continue to have a knowledge advantage over the vast majority of community members simply because of their continued ties to friends and former colleagues who remain on staff.
I encourage everyone to treat each other with respect, even when disagreeing with the interpretations that other people have made based on the (often comparatively limited) information that they have available. I can honestly say that I know some things that perhaps SarahSV and Anthonyhcole don't know, but I certainly don't know everything - and I have been in the SF offices twice in the last six months as a volunteer and regularly converse with staff in certain areas in my role as a volunteer working on various things.
One of the major barriers is the legitimate concern that many staff have in trying to communicate concerns in a manner that is not destructive, either to the WMF as an organization, or to their own professional reputations. The whistleblower provisions at the WMF are very narrow (essentially only permitting reporting directly to the Board chair/chair of the Audit Committee if there is reason to believe that a law has been broken, not just internal policies no matter how severe), as one example. I've been aware of concerns for about a year now, myself, but I've still found out quite a bit more over the last few weeks. For staff, a lot of those early concerns are practically ancient history, and that knowledge hasn't been disseminated to a much broader community. Not to put too fine a point on it, but the majority of the audience here doesn't know.
Anthony, speaking for myself only, I don't think that your association with Wikipediocracy is particularly relevant; other active members of that site have expressed significantly different opinions, whether within or outside of "WMF-related" locations like this mailing list or Meta or The Signpost. I'd like to discourage anyone from assuming that there are monolithic and unified positions on the current situation amongst any particular group. That includes former and current staff, editors of particular projects, commenters on external blogs or through other non-WMF media or criticism sites, user groups, chapters, etc. There are a lot of different points of view, and a lot of different levels of knowledge and information.
I'm not going to say "let's assume good faith", don't worry. I'm going to say "don't beat up on people who have different levels of information".
Risker/Anne
On 20 February 2016 at 20:31, Brandon Harris bharris@gaijin.com wrote:
Danny, don't kid yourself! The folks at Wikipediocracy knoweverything about everything that's happened at the Foundation and about everything that will EVER happen. They've never been wrong, ever!
I don't understand why we're still talking about this!On Feb 20, 2016, at 5:29 PM, Danny Horn dhorn@wikimedia.org wrote:
You know, it's possible that the people who work for the Foundation
might
understand the situation in a more nuanced way than you do. I know it doesn't seem likely, but dare to dream.
Brandon Harris :: bharris@gaijin.com :: made of steel wool and whiskey
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On 2016-02-20 10:36 PM, Lila Tretikov wrote:
Information asymmetry is a big issue. For example, in my role there is a lot I cannot say, I have responsibilities to protect people in the organization both current and former. So, for example, if someone is fired, even for cause, I would not say anything about this person that may hurt their chances in the future.
That is... downright brilliant. Pretend to be caring and responsible, while at the same time make an underhanded implication that the people who left are villains and that you are a poor victim for being unable to speak the Truth. I hope you choke on shame for having the gall to even so much suggest that pillars of the staff and community like Siko, Luis, and Anna left for any reason other than your "exemplary" leadership.
"Information asymmetry" is right, mind you. Staffers have shown extraordinary restraint in keeping thing quiet and civilized so that what has been going on does not reflect too badly on the foundation and - by extension - the movement. After all, as Ori so eloquently pointed out earlier, the Foundation is full of passionate and dedicated people who managed to do a great deal of good things despite all the "fun" of being rudderless, leaderless and without anything resembling a vision.
If you have a single iota of integrity, please leave now before more of the foundation crumbles around you. Even if you were perfectly correct in all you did and everyone else was perfectly wrong, any supposed leader that has no trust from at least 93% of their staff should realize that - if nothing else - they are a bad fit and cannot possibly salvage the situation.
-- Marc / Coren
Okay, this is stepping over several lines. Can we stick to basic human decency if nothing else? :( No one is helped by making vicious personal attacks over assumed interpretations. Let's try to represent the movement's values (including civility, and, if not the assumption of good faith, then at least not assuming the worst) even in difficult times.
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 7:54 PM, Marc A. Pelletier marc@uberbox.org wrote:
That is... downright brilliant. Pretend to be caring and responsible, while at the same time make an underhanded implication that the people who left are villains and that you are a poor victim for being unable to speak the Truth. I hope you choke on shame for having the gall to even so much suggest that pillars of the staff and community like Siko, Luis, and Anna left for any reason other than your "exemplary" leadership.
"Information asymmetry" is right, mind you. Staffers have shown extraordinary restraint in keeping thing quiet and civilized so that what has been going on does not reflect too badly on the foundation and - by extension - the movement. After all, as Ori so eloquently pointed out earlier, the Foundation is full of passionate and dedicated people who managed to do a great deal of good things despite all the "fun" of being rudderless, leaderless and without anything resembling a vision.
If you have a single iota of integrity, please leave now before more of the foundation crumbles around you. Even if you were perfectly correct in all you did and everyone else was perfectly wrong, any supposed leader that has no trust from at least 93% of their staff should realize that - if nothing else - they are a bad fit and cannot possibly salvage the situation.
Risker thanks for this. I would add that the biggest problem for outsiders is trying to sift through the emails in this thread, looking for valid concerns and first-hand accounts among the cynical and/or ironic comments only understandable to a few players. As more and more of our international community tries to read and follow along on these developments, let's please stick to some ground rules: no irony, no cynicism, no rehashing old mistakes if they are irrelevant. Challenging, but necessary if you want more foreign chapter members to hear or take part in this conversation.
For anyone who has seen the movie Spotlight, I would say this story is currently "buried in Metro" but really needs to hit the front page.
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 9:54 PM, Risker risker.wp@gmail.com wrote:
This is a difficult time for everyone. Staff, particularly staff who work out of the San Francisco office, have seen and been through things that are not well known or understood outside of that small group; even "highly involved" volunteers aren't entirely in the loop. Former staff continue to have a knowledge advantage over the vast majority of community members simply because of their continued ties to friends and former colleagues who remain on staff.
I encourage everyone to treat each other with respect, even when disagreeing with the interpretations that other people have made based on the (often comparatively limited) information that they have available. I can honestly say that I know some things that perhaps SarahSV and Anthonyhcole don't know, but I certainly don't know everything - and I have been in the SF offices twice in the last six months as a volunteer and regularly converse with staff in certain areas in my role as a volunteer working on various things.
One of the major barriers is the legitimate concern that many staff have in trying to communicate concerns in a manner that is not destructive, either to the WMF as an organization, or to their own professional reputations. The whistleblower provisions at the WMF are very narrow (essentially only permitting reporting directly to the Board chair/chair of the Audit Committee if there is reason to believe that a law has been broken, not just internal policies no matter how severe), as one example. I've been aware of concerns for about a year now, myself, but I've still found out quite a bit more over the last few weeks. For staff, a lot of those early concerns are practically ancient history, and that knowledge hasn't been disseminated to a much broader community. Not to put too fine a point on it, but the majority of the audience here doesn't know.
Anthony, speaking for myself only, I don't think that your association with Wikipediocracy is particularly relevant; other active members of that site have expressed significantly different opinions, whether within or outside of "WMF-related" locations like this mailing list or Meta or The Signpost. I'd like to discourage anyone from assuming that there are monolithic and unified positions on the current situation amongst any particular group. That includes former and current staff, editors of particular projects, commenters on external blogs or through other non-WMF media or criticism sites, user groups, chapters, etc. There are a lot of different points of view, and a lot of different levels of knowledge and information.
I'm not going to say "let's assume good faith", don't worry. I'm going to say "don't beat up on people who have different levels of information".
Risker/Anne
On 20 February 2016 at 20:31, Brandon Harris bharris@gaijin.com wrote:
Danny, don't kid yourself! The folks at Wikipediocracy knoweverything about everything that's happened at the Foundation and about everything that will EVER happen. They've never been wrong, ever!
I don't understand why we're still talking about this!On Feb 20, 2016, at 5:29 PM, Danny Horn dhorn@wikimedia.org wrote:
You know, it's possible that the people who work for the Foundation
might
understand the situation in a more nuanced way than you do. I know it doesn't seem likely, but dare to dream.
Brandon Harris :: bharris@gaijin.com :: made of steel wool and whiskey
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On 2016-02-21 09:52, Jane Darnell wrote:
Risker thanks for this. I would add that the biggest problem for outsiders is trying to sift through the emails in this thread, looking for valid concerns and first-hand accounts among the cynical and/or ironic comments only understandable to a few players. As more and more of our international community tries to read and follow along on these developments, let's please stick to some ground rules: no irony, no cynicism, no rehashing old mistakes if they are irrelevant. Challenging, but necessary if you want more foreign chapter members to hear or take part in this conversation.
Let me give my perspective, since I believe an important part of the puzzle is missing or at least underappreciated on this list. I am not going to offer any solutions, I do not pretend I known more than other people know, but I do feel that this piece is needed to understand the big picture.
To give some background, I am just a volunteer. I am, you know, writing articles. I have administrator permissions on four projects (en.wp, ru.voy, Commons, and Wikidata), and I have globally about 200K non-bot edits from my two accounts, which is probably more than for most posters of this thread. I never worked for WMF, I have never been a member of any chapter, but I did participate in some committees and juries and whatever. I interacted with WMF staff in different roles - as WMF staff and also in their roles as volunteers on the projects. I am generally interested in Meta-issues and I am on this list since I believe 2007.
Now, I (and from what I know, other people as well) at some point started to have problems with WMF staff whose tasks were to facilitate our job. Not to say that everything was stellar before and that everything was stellar after, but the most difficult period started around 2013, definitely when Sue was the ED, and ended (or at least things went considerably better) in 2015, long after Lila became the ED. For people who were just writing articles there was nothing to change, but whenever someone wanted to do smth with requied interaction with WMF there was a large amount of red tape. WMF staff members were polite, but I did not get an impression that they listened to what we said - there were just assigned to do some work and they did not care what volunteers thought about it. The first major bell ring for me was when Gayle Karin Young removed the admin rights of all non-staff from the WMF wiki, without even notifying them - and then for several weeks nobody wanted to take responsibility and I believe in the end nobody apologized, and the wiki went into a pitiful state where I believe it still remains, so that this action was not only rude but also counterproductive. I could not easily find when it happened, but definitely before January 2014, when Gayle Karin left WMF. (Note that Lila started in May 2014). This is not such a big deal - in the end of the day, I never edited this wiki, and I am not sure it was needed - but it was a clear sign that you can invest quite some time in doing a good maintenance job which nobody wanted to do, and one day you just get a message "Hey, we have a change of the policy and decided you are no longer welcome here". Other things include superprotect, FLOW, VE early rollout on en.wp, toolserver, and a lot of lower-profile issues. Things started to improve considerably middle of the last year - first we were not just laughed at, and then most of the things (not all of them though - and also for example the Wikimania screwup happened in the end of the year) were reverted or shelved. Now I would define the relations as quasi-normal, with a number of really good things happening.
Again, I do not know who is right and who is wrong here, we have excellent examples of WMF staff work all the time through (let me name Maggie Dennis as an example of someone who is doing excellent work as both WMF staffer and a project volunteer, and there are more examples), but things definitely went suboptimal in that period. Volunteers can any moment, you know, walk away, and without them, WMF projects would die.
Cheers Yaroslav
Again, I do not know who is right and who is wrong here, we have excellent examples of WMF staff work all the time through (let me name Maggie Dennis as an example of someone who is doing excellent work as both WMF staffer and a project volunteer, and there are more examples), but things definitely went suboptimal in that period. Volunteers can any moment, you know, walk away, and without them, WMF projects would die.
Allow me to give one specific limited example that touches on some of the themes you raised here, Yaroslav. My main point is that from the outside, correlation of what happened during Sue's and Lila's leadership might seem to imply causation, but I think the reality is much more complicated.
The pageview API, which is now being integrated into the Graph extension, stats tools, iOS app, and generally making a lot of people happy, has a long history. Various members of the community have been requesting this feature with increasing fervor for over a decade. I started at WMF in 2012 and within 1 year I learned enough to be completely convinced that this was one of the most worthwhile projects we could embark on. However, at this point, we *could not* expose any kind of remotely useful data via a pageview API, for technical reasons. We overcame those reasons in October 2014, at which point it took us about 6 months to prioritize the project to actually do it.
My point is, Sue's support for this project wouldn't have mattered, it wasn't technically possible during her tenure. Sue did give us support for the infrastructure groundwork, and that was key. And Lila's support for it, once we could do it, was not directly gained, we prioritized it internally on my team with no interaction with Lila. She saw it was our goal and didn't reject it, but we spent literally a few minutes talking about it that whole year.
In 2013, I was told by members of the community that us saying "it's not possible to build a Pageview API" was considered "laughing at the community" as you put it, Yaroslav. But I hope, if nothing else, we've proven that we never laughed, we tried our hardest and fought with some big challenges to make it happen. And none of it really had anything to do with our ED. So in this case, establishing causation all the way to the ED would probably be impossible. Logic tells me that this is probably true in a lot of cases where now, in this dark time, we would want to look past that complexity and establish causation that might not be there.
I am not defending or attacking Lila. I am simply saying that, just because we are in this position of questioning our leadership, it does not mean we have to try and neatly package everything that happened under Sue and everything that happened under Lila and try to compare.
The current questioning of leadership is a conversation about very specific issues, of which the board is aware, and which WMF staff, despite all the craziness, has had the restraint and humanity to not mention publicly. I certainly wish the level of discourse here would be less violent, because we have to look at ourselves in the mirror when this is resolved and build our future together.
I rarely like to add "me too" posts, but Dan buried the lead here... The most important thing he said, in the long term, was the last sentence, which I have quoted below.
-- Philippe Beaudette philippe.beaudette@icloud.com
Begin forwarded message:
From: Dan Andreescu dandreescu@wikimedia.org Date: February 21, 2016 at 5:03:01 AM PST To: Wikimedia Mailing List wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] An Open Letter to Wikimedia Foundation BoT Reply-To: Wikimedia Mailing List wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
I certainly wish the level of discourse here would be less violent, because we have to look at ourselves in the mirror when this is resolved and build our future together.
On 2016-02-21 14:03, Dan Andreescu wrote:
Allow me to give one specific limited example that touches on some of the themes you raised here, Yaroslav. My main point is that from the outside, correlation of what happened during Sue's and Lila's leadership might seem to imply causation, but I think the reality is much more complicated.
Hi Dan,
I am not implying causation. It might (or might not) have been reasonable to imply causation if problems started during Sue's tenure and ended right after Lila started. This was certainly not the case. The situation is clearly more complex than that, and I am not accusing anyone, just give my impression (which seem in this part to coincide with the others').
I just feel that this part of the story is less visible to those who did not participate in it directly and needs to be spelled out.
Cheers Yaroslav
Dan Andreescu dandreescu@wikimedia.org wrote:
[…]
The pageview API, which is now being integrated into the Graph extension, stats tools, iOS app, and generally making a lot of people happy, has a long history. Various members of the community have been requesting this feature with increasing fervor for over a decade. I started at WMF in 2012 and within 1 year I learned enough to be completely convinced that this was one of the most worthwhile projects we could embark on. However, at this point, we *could not* expose any kind of remotely useful data via a pageview API, for technical reasons. We overcame those reasons in October 2014, at which point it took us about 6 months to prioritize the project to actually do it.
[…]
I have followed that process, been subscribed to https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T44259 which I just reread and thus rather surprised by your comment. I have never seen any technical reason mentioned in the bug. It would have been very helpful, because someone might have come up with a fix in the two years when it was "on our roadmap" un- til you overcame them.
Instead, I read for example Toby's comment at Magnus's blog (http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=173#comment-290):
| […]
| We’ve been prioritizing and working on these projects as our | resources allow and it’s important to understand that the | team has not been idle. While we’ve done a less than stel- | lar job in communicating our progress to the community, in- | formation on what we’ve been doing is available via our | planning pages on mediawiki. In the future, we will be more | proactive in communicating with the community regarding our | goals and projects.
as meaning that there were no technical obstacles, but lim- ited resources that were directed to other projects (and ap- parently none that matched the popularity of a pageviews API). My interpretation may have been biased by Magnus's report above that:
| […]
| Like others, I have tried to get the Foundation to provide | the page view data in a more accessible and local (as in | toolserver/Labs) way. Like others, I failed. The last it- | eration was a video meeting with the Analytics team (newly | restarted, as the previous Analytics team didn’t really work | out for a reason; I didn’t inquire too deeply), which ended | with a promise to get this done Real Soon Now™, and the gen- | erous offer to use the page view data from their hadoop | cluster. Except the cluster turned out to be empty; I then | was encouraged to import the view data myself. (No, this is | not a joke. I have the emails to prove it.) As much as I | enjoy working with and around the Wikiverse, I do have nei- | ther the time, the bandwidth, nor the inclination to do your | paid jobs for you, thank you very much.
| […]
which seems to indicate that it was indeed a problem of WMF allocating (human) resources.
Tim
I have followed that process, been subscribed to https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T44259 which I just reread and thus rather surprised by your comment. I have never seen any technical reason mentioned in the bug. It would have been very helpful, because someone might have come up with a fix in the two years when it was "on our roadmap" un- til you overcame them.
It wasn't my intention to dig up this history, just to point out that the real story is always more complex. That applies to whatever explanation I give here, as well. It's from my perspective, and the nuance is endless. Anyway, I'm more than happy to try and shed light, hopefully this helps for future work we do together.
The technical challenge was, basically, moving off of our udp2log based logging infrastructure to Kafka. I think it's fair to say that the Analytics team didn't have the full trust and confidence of WMF until Toby started turning that around. We were submitted to some painful agile coaching and were not allowed to implement the correct solution (Kafka) fully, we were working with a patchwork system that still had single points of failure and data loss. Once we gained that trust, it still took while to sort out how to tune Kafka so it reliably received traffic logs from all of our caching centers, and let us know when it had loss or duplication of data. This work was in really good shape, if memory serves, by the end of summer, 2014. I incorrectly summarized that solely as a technical challenge, it was a pretty tricky technical challenge combined with an organizational one. For the latter, if it helps, Sue and Erik both acknowledged responsibility and things were much smoother after that. (I always had tremendous respect for the two of them, but that acknowledgement was pretty amazing, and unique in my 12 years of experience).
At that point, October 2014, some of us, myself included, wanted to start work on the pageview API. We didn't get push-back as much as a strong push to focus on Event Logging instead. The Event Logging system, developed by Ori, was also experiencing some pretty serious growing pains. Outages were becoming very frequent due to the increased traffic and lack of automated monitoring and management. Over the next few months we improved performance and upgraded it to use Kafka as well, and solved those problems. Looking back, that's still a bittersweet choice for me. This work on Event Logging was absolutely key to the experiments that led to Visual Editor's successful roll-out in 2015. As one of many examples, this dashboard would not have been possible without a stable Event Logging platform: https://edit-analysis.wmflabs.org/compare/. And, perhaps this was Toby's strategic vision that I didn't see at the time, and very important for us to keep our newly gained trust and independence within WMF. But, of course, it meant we had to delay the pageview API yet again. That's the 6 month delay I mentioned. And we didn't leave the community hanging, we made the higher quality raw data available with mobile traffic in this new dataset: http://dumps.wikimedia.org/other/pagecounts-all-sites/ as well as gave Henrik some support with stats.grok.se
Some of these things are mentioned on the epic T44259 https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T44259, but some I didn't even truly understand at the time, and some might have not been constructive to mention. I'm personally all ears at this point. What of this should we have noted on the task? Like I said above, there's lots of detail, but at some point it would feel like I'm a news reporter instead of an engineer :) Also, I'm not sure I would have seen it the same way. Even a few months ago when we released the pageview API I was still a bit bitter that the Event Logging work was prioritized, and now I think that was me being short-sighted to some extent.
Instead, I read for example Toby's comment at Magnus's blog
(http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=173#comment-290):
| […]
| We’ve been prioritizing and working on these projects as our | resources allow and it’s important to understand that the | team has not been idle. While we’ve done a less than stel- | lar job in communicating our progress to the community, in- | formation on what we’ve been doing is available via our | planning pages on mediawiki. In the future, we will be more | proactive in communicating with the community regarding our | goals and projects.
as meaning that there were no technical obstacles, but lim- ited resources that were directed to other projects (and ap- parently none that matched the popularity of a pageviews API).
Both can be true, and are true. The challenge was great, from what I understand what we accomplished took Twitter orders of magnitude more money and people, a fact which makes me look at my teammates with complete awe (they're amazing). And, as I explained above, we also had to prioritize other work.
My interpretation may have been biased by Magnus's report above that:
| […]
| Like others, I have tried to get the Foundation to provide | the page view data in a more accessible and local (as in | toolserver/Labs) way. Like others, I failed. The last it- | eration was a video meeting with the Analytics team (newly | restarted, as the previous Analytics team didn’t really work | out for a reason; I didn’t inquire too deeply), which ended | with a promise to get this done Real Soon Now™, and the gen- | erous offer to use the page view data from their hadoop | cluster. Except the cluster turned out to be empty; I then | was encouraged to import the view data myself. (No, this is | not a joke. I have the emails to prove it.) As much as I | enjoy working with and around the Wikiverse, I do have nei- | ther the time, the bandwidth, nor the inclination to do your | paid jobs for you, thank you very much.
| […]
which seems to indicate that it was indeed a problem of WMF allocating (human) resources.
No, that video call was my fault. I felt like I was sitting on burning hot coals and I couldn't stand having some of the data in the cluster and not being able to make it available publicly any more. So I tried to offer Magnus access to the cluster and dedicate my volunteer time to help him get to the data. This mainly failed because I lost my volunteer time to a personal crisis that I can't get into here (it had absolutely nothing to do with the foundation, it was just unfortunate timing from Magnus's point of view).
I hope that helps. Above all, getting this project done is my proudest professional moment, and I think in some sense the delays only made it better when it finally came out. The members of the Analytics team that are involved in the pageview API now are ten times smarter and more equipped to handle the project than I would have been by myself in October 2014.
Respectfully,
Dan
On Feb 20, 2016 3:18 PM, "Anthony Cole" ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
I know.
I suppose I should be clearer: it is my contention that it is largely the people advocating for and implementing the improvements you cite that we are losing due to the management crisis.
-- brion
Anthony Cole
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 7:17 AM, Brion Vibber bvibber@wikimedia.org
wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 2:56 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com
wrote:
- The Community Resources Team is in place - it surveyed the community
and
discussed with them their technical priorities, and tailored their
Idea
Lab
Campaign accordingly.
FYI, the head of that team is one of those who resigned last week:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/081809.html
-- brion _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
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On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Lila should have taken the community along with her as the Knowledge Engine project was evolving. I don't know what was behind her reticence. I presume an element was unwillingness to announce a thing while the thing was shifting and changing from one day to the next.
It was pointed out to me today that there is a court exhibit, no. 666, made public in 2014 as part of the [[High-Tech Employee Antitrust Litigation]] (the same case Arnnon Geshuri was involved in), which reproduces some correspondence between Sue Gardner, Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg, and various Google managers.[1]
In short, Sheryl Sandberg (who'd formerly worked for Google) helped Sue Gardner by introducing her to senior management at Google. To do so, according to the court exhibit, Sandberg forwarded an email from Sue Gardner to Jonathan Rosenberg (then Senior Vice President of Products) and others at Google:
---o0o---
From: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Saturday, August 09, 2008 7:40 PM
To: Jonathan Rosenberg; Omid Kordestani; David Drummond; Megan Smith
Subject: Fw: Thanks + a request re Google
Jonathan, Omid, David, Megan - I was introduced to Sue by Roger. As you can see below, they would love a better and more senior relationship with Google. Can I email introduce her to one of you?
Please excuse blackberry-caused typos.
-----Original Message-----
From: Sue Gardner
To: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Mon Aug 04 10:02:01 2008
Subject: Thanks + a request re Google
Hi Sheryl,
It was terrific to finally meet you last week :-)
Here's a recap of the Google issue that I raised:
I started as Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation last summer.
A few months after that, Roger McNamee began introducing me to potential Wikipedia donors in the valley. Most of that was great and successful, but in a few cases -including once with a Google board member- I was surprised to be have people cite 'loyalty to Google' as a reason to not give money to Wikipedia.
Their objections, which have been echoed to me several times since then, seem to fall into three categories:
* A belief that Wikia Search is an attempt by Wikipedia to compete with Google. (Many people don't realize the only thing shared between Wikipedia and Wikia is our founder, Jimmy Wales. Nor do they realize that Jimmy has no day-to-day responsibilities at the Wikimedia Foundation.)
* The view that because Wikipedia is non-commercial, it is anti-advertising and anti-Google.
* A belief that Knol is an attempt by Google to compete with Wikipedia.
I personally don't believe any of this: I think Google and Wikipedia can and should have a complementary and positive relationship. And I gather Larry and Sergey feel the same: I believe they've told Jimmy that Google has no ill will towards Wikipedia, and that they'd be willing to make a
donation to us in order to signal that publicly.
I also believe that any real or perceived tensions in the Google/Wikipedia relationship may be being exacerbated at some levels inside Google by their unfulfilled desires to do business with us. Since relocating to the Bay Area in January, we've had plenty of Google folks reach out to us. But -- we have a total staff of 21 people, with just one person responsible for business development, so I am not sure we are even able to politely keep up with their pitches. IMO, rather than spending our time on multiple product-specific pitches, it would probably be more productive for Wikipedia and Google to develop a single umbrella relationship/agreement (obviously within the limits of Wikipedia's non-commercial context).
So. I think a good next step would be some kind of high-level meeting between Wikipedia and Google, to talk through these issues and see if a donation and/or business deal makes sense.
I appreciate your advice on this issue :-)
Thanks,
Sue
---o0o---
Now, some of this isn't earth-shattering news -- it's long been known that relations between Google and Wikipedia have been friendly. The lobbying partnership between Google and Wikipedia may well date back to the meetings that followed that email exchange.
What wasn't known to me was that Sue found people in Silicon Valley unwilling to donate because of their "loyalty to Google". (This reasoning raises questions of its own about Google's influence, but we'll leave that aside.)
Now it has become clear over the past few days that Damon Sicore, to use Jimmy Wales' words at Lila's Knowledge Engine FAQ,[2] "really was advocating for taking a run at Google", and gave "strict orders to keep it top secret".
Sue referred to her wish to have "a single umbrella relationship/agreement" with Google, in part to help with the donation problems she was encountering. If such an agreement ever came into being, then being seen to be planning a campaign against Google behind Google's back, as it were, might well jeopardise that relationship, and be seen as disloyal.
That would have been a compelling reason for continued secrecy, especially if these plans to compete against Google were in the end given up, meaning that any loss of face vis-à-vis Google and its friends would in effect be for nothing.
Of course this is just supposition.
But there are issues here worth reflecting upon. I recall plenty of volunteers over the years saying it was very good that Google seemed to treat Wikipedia favourably. Yet I don't recall the community ever being asked whether they wanted the WMF to seek any kinds of agreements with for-profit players.
At any rate, whatever the facts of this case, it seems to me that maintaining transparency becomes very hard if you pursue such agreements. It becomes very easy to tie yourself into knots.
[1] http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/sandberg.pdf
Andreas,
I am happy to talk to Signpost on-record about anything that has been happening under my watch to minimize misinterpretations of second-hand reports or further conjectures.
Lila
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 9:57 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen466@gmail.com wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Lila should have taken the community along with her as the Knowledge
Engine
project was evolving. I don't know what was behind her reticence. I
presume
an element was unwillingness to announce a thing while the thing was shifting and changing from one day to the next.
It was pointed out to me today that there is a court exhibit, no. 666, made public in 2014 as part of the [[High-Tech Employee Antitrust Litigation]] (the same case Arnnon Geshuri was involved in), which reproduces some correspondence between Sue Gardner, Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg, and various Google managers.[1]
In short, Sheryl Sandberg (who'd formerly worked for Google) helped Sue Gardner by introducing her to senior management at Google. To do so, according to the court exhibit, Sandberg forwarded an email from Sue Gardner to Jonathan Rosenberg (then Senior Vice President of Products) and others at Google:
---o0o---
From: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Saturday, August 09, 2008 7:40 PM
To: Jonathan Rosenberg; Omid Kordestani; David Drummond; Megan Smith
Subject: Fw: Thanks + a request re Google
Jonathan, Omid, David, Megan - I was introduced to Sue by Roger. As you can see below, they would love a better and more senior relationship with Google. Can I email introduce her to one of you?
Please excuse blackberry-caused typos.
-----Original Message-----
From: Sue Gardner
To: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Mon Aug 04 10:02:01 2008
Subject: Thanks + a request re Google
Hi Sheryl,
It was terrific to finally meet you last week :-)
Here's a recap of the Google issue that I raised:
I started as Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation last summer.
A few months after that, Roger McNamee began introducing me to potential Wikipedia donors in the valley. Most of that was great and successful, but in a few cases -including once with a Google board member- I was surprised to be have people cite 'loyalty to Google' as a reason to not give money to Wikipedia.
Their objections, which have been echoed to me several times since then, seem to fall into three categories:
- A belief that Wikia Search is an attempt by Wikipedia to compete with
Google. (Many people don't realize the only thing shared between Wikipedia and Wikia is our founder, Jimmy Wales. Nor do they realize that Jimmy has no day-to-day responsibilities at the Wikimedia Foundation.)
- The view that because Wikipedia is non-commercial, it is anti-advertising
and anti-Google.
- A belief that Knol is an attempt by Google to compete with Wikipedia.
I personally don't believe any of this: I think Google and Wikipedia can and should have a complementary and positive relationship. And I gather Larry and Sergey feel the same: I believe they've told Jimmy that Google has no ill will towards Wikipedia, and that they'd be willing to make a
donation to us in order to signal that publicly.
I also believe that any real or perceived tensions in the Google/Wikipedia relationship may be being exacerbated at some levels inside Google by their unfulfilled desires to do business with us. Since relocating to the Bay Area in January, we've had plenty of Google folks reach out to us. But -- we have a total staff of 21 people, with just one person responsible for business development, so I am not sure we are even able to politely keep up with their pitches. IMO, rather than spending our time on multiple product-specific pitches, it would probably be more productive for Wikipedia and Google to develop a single umbrella relationship/agreement (obviously within the limits of Wikipedia's non-commercial context).
So. I think a good next step would be some kind of high-level meeting between Wikipedia and Google, to talk through these issues and see if a donation and/or business deal makes sense.
I appreciate your advice on this issue :-)
Thanks,
Sue
---o0o---
Now, some of this isn't earth-shattering news -- it's long been known that relations between Google and Wikipedia have been friendly. The lobbying partnership between Google and Wikipedia may well date back to the meetings that followed that email exchange.
What wasn't known to me was that Sue found people in Silicon Valley unwilling to donate because of their "loyalty to Google". (This reasoning raises questions of its own about Google's influence, but we'll leave that aside.)
Now it has become clear over the past few days that Damon Sicore, to use Jimmy Wales' words at Lila's Knowledge Engine FAQ,[2] "really was advocating for taking a run at Google", and gave "strict orders to keep it top secret".
Sue referred to her wish to have "a single umbrella relationship/agreement" with Google, in part to help with the donation problems she was encountering. If such an agreement ever came into being, then being seen to be planning a campaign against Google behind Google's back, as it were, might well jeopardise that relationship, and be seen as disloyal.
That would have been a compelling reason for continued secrecy, especially if these plans to compete against Google were in the end given up, meaning that any loss of face vis-à-vis Google and its friends would in effect be for nothing.
Of course this is just supposition.
But there are issues here worth reflecting upon. I recall plenty of volunteers over the years saying it was very good that Google seemed to treat Wikipedia favourably. Yet I don't recall the community ever being asked whether they wanted the WMF to seek any kinds of agreements with for-profit players.
At any rate, whatever the facts of this case, it seems to me that maintaining transparency becomes very hard if you pursue such agreements. It becomes very easy to tie yourself into knots.
[1] http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/sandberg.pdf
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Engine/FAQ _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
An unusually immediate comment from Wikimedia leadership following Andreas' admittedly speculative comments.
It's not about the relevance to the movement. It's not about the relevance to the organization. It's about an individual's role.
This just got fascinating (and a little more depressing).
-Pete
[[User:Peteforsyth]]
I am happy to talk to Signpost on-record about anything that has been happening under my watch to minimize misinterpretations of second-hand reports or further conjectures.
Lila
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 9:57 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen466@gmail.com wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Lila should have taken the community along with her as the Knowledge
Engine
project was evolving. I don't know what was behind her reticence. I
presume
an element was unwillingness to announce a thing while the thing was shifting and changing from one day to the next.
It was pointed out to me today that there is a court exhibit, no. 666,
made
public in 2014 as part of the [[High-Tech Employee Antitrust Litigation]] (the same case Arnnon Geshuri was involved in), which reproduces some correspondence between Sue Gardner, Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg, and
various
Google managers.[1]
In short, Sheryl Sandberg (who'd formerly worked for Google) helped Sue Gardner by introducing her to senior management at Google. To do so, according to the court exhibit, Sandberg forwarded an email from Sue Gardner to Jonathan Rosenberg (then Senior Vice President of Products)
and
others at Google:
---o0o---
From: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Saturday, August 09, 2008 7:40 PM
To: Jonathan Rosenberg; Omid Kordestani; David Drummond; Megan Smith
Subject: Fw: Thanks + a request re Google
Jonathan, Omid, David, Megan - I was introduced to Sue by Roger. As you
can
see below, they would love a better and more senior relationship with Google. Can I email introduce her to one of you?
Please excuse blackberry-caused typos.
-----Original Message-----
From: Sue Gardner
To: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Mon Aug 04 10:02:01 2008
Subject: Thanks + a request re Google
Hi Sheryl,
It was terrific to finally meet you last week :-)
Here's a recap of the Google issue that I raised:
I started as Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation last summer.
A few months after that, Roger McNamee began introducing me to potential Wikipedia donors in the valley. Most of that was great and successful,
but
in a few cases -including once with a Google board member- I was
surprised
to be have people cite 'loyalty to Google' as a reason to not give money
to
Wikipedia.
Their objections, which have been echoed to me several times since then, seem to fall into three categories:
- A belief that Wikia Search is an attempt by Wikipedia to compete with
Google. (Many people don't realize the only thing shared between
Wikipedia
and Wikia is our founder, Jimmy Wales. Nor do they realize that Jimmy has no day-to-day responsibilities at the Wikimedia Foundation.)
- The view that because Wikipedia is non-commercial, it is
anti-advertising
and anti-Google.
- A belief that Knol is an attempt by Google to compete with Wikipedia.
I personally don't believe any of this: I think Google and Wikipedia can and should have a complementary and positive relationship. And I gather Larry and Sergey feel the same: I believe they've told Jimmy that Google has no ill will towards Wikipedia, and that they'd be willing to make a
donation to us in order to signal that publicly.
I also believe that any real or perceived tensions in the
Google/Wikipedia
relationship may be being exacerbated at some levels inside Google by
their
unfulfilled desires to do business with us. Since relocating to the Bay Area in January, we've had plenty of Google folks reach out to us. But -- we have a total staff of 21 people, with just one person responsible for business development, so I am not sure we are even able to politely keep
up
with their pitches. IMO, rather than spending our time on multiple product-specific pitches, it would probably be more productive for Wikipedia and Google to develop a single umbrella relationship/agreement (obviously within the limits of Wikipedia's non-commercial context).
So. I think a good next step would be some kind of high-level meeting between Wikipedia and Google, to talk through these issues and see if a donation and/or business deal makes sense.
I appreciate your advice on this issue :-)
Thanks,
Sue
---o0o---
Now, some of this isn't earth-shattering news -- it's long been known
that
relations between Google and Wikipedia have been friendly. The lobbying partnership between Google and Wikipedia may well date back to the
meetings
that followed that email exchange.
What wasn't known to me was that Sue found people in Silicon Valley unwilling to donate because of their "loyalty to Google". (This reasoning raises questions of its own about Google's influence, but we'll leave
that
aside.)
Now it has become clear over the past few days that Damon Sicore, to use Jimmy Wales' words at Lila's Knowledge Engine FAQ,[2] "really was advocating for taking a run at Google", and gave "strict orders to keep
it
top secret".
Sue referred to her wish to have "a single umbrella
relationship/agreement"
with Google, in part to help with the donation problems she was encountering. If such an agreement ever came into being, then being seen
to
be planning a campaign against Google behind Google's back, as it were, might well jeopardise that relationship, and be seen as disloyal.
That would have been a compelling reason for continued secrecy,
especially
if these plans to compete against Google were in the end given up,
meaning
that any loss of face vis-à-vis Google and its friends would in effect be for nothing.
Of course this is just supposition.
But there are issues here worth reflecting upon. I recall plenty of volunteers over the years saying it was very good that Google seemed to treat Wikipedia favourably. Yet I don't recall the community ever being asked whether they wanted the WMF to seek any kinds of agreements with for-profit players.
At any rate, whatever the facts of this case, it seems to me that maintaining transparency becomes very hard if you pursue such agreements. It becomes very easy to tie yourself into knots.
[1] http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/sandberg.pdf
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Engine/FAQ _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- Lila Tretikov Wikimedia Foundation
*“Be bold and mighty forces will come to your aid.”* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Hi Pete, I proposed an interview to Andreas this morning in a private email, actually.
Also, I want to explain myself as a human being, not only as an ED. Without filters.
L
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Pete Forsyth peteforsyth@gmail.com wrote:
An unusually immediate comment from Wikimedia leadership following Andreas' admittedly speculative comments.
It's not about the relevance to the movement. It's not about the relevance to the organization. It's about an individual's role.
This just got fascinating (and a little more depressing).
-Pete
[[User:Peteforsyth]]
I am happy to talk to Signpost on-record about anything that has been happening under my watch to minimize misinterpretations of second-hand reports or further conjectures.
Lila
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 9:57 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen466@gmail.com
wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Lila should have taken the community along with her as the Knowledge
Engine
project was evolving. I don't know what was behind her reticence. I
presume
an element was unwillingness to announce a thing while the thing was shifting and changing from one day to the next.
It was pointed out to me today that there is a court exhibit, no. 666,
made
public in 2014 as part of the [[High-Tech Employee Antitrust
Litigation]]
(the same case Arnnon Geshuri was involved in), which reproduces some correspondence between Sue Gardner, Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg, and
various
Google managers.[1]
In short, Sheryl Sandberg (who'd formerly worked for Google) helped Sue Gardner by introducing her to senior management at Google. To do so, according to the court exhibit, Sandberg forwarded an email from Sue Gardner to Jonathan Rosenberg (then Senior Vice President of Products)
and
others at Google:
---o0o---
From: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Saturday, August 09, 2008 7:40 PM
To: Jonathan Rosenberg; Omid Kordestani; David Drummond; Megan Smith
Subject: Fw: Thanks + a request re Google
Jonathan, Omid, David, Megan - I was introduced to Sue by Roger. As you
can
see below, they would love a better and more senior relationship with Google. Can I email introduce her to one of you?
Please excuse blackberry-caused typos.
-----Original Message-----
From: Sue Gardner
To: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Mon Aug 04 10:02:01 2008
Subject: Thanks + a request re Google
Hi Sheryl,
It was terrific to finally meet you last week :-)
Here's a recap of the Google issue that I raised:
I started as Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation last
summer.
A few months after that, Roger McNamee began introducing me to
potential
Wikipedia donors in the valley. Most of that was great and successful,
but
in a few cases -including once with a Google board member- I was
surprised
to be have people cite 'loyalty to Google' as a reason to not give
money
to
Wikipedia.
Their objections, which have been echoed to me several times since
then,
seem to fall into three categories:
- A belief that Wikia Search is an attempt by Wikipedia to compete with
Google. (Many people don't realize the only thing shared between
Wikipedia
and Wikia is our founder, Jimmy Wales. Nor do they realize that Jimmy
has
no day-to-day responsibilities at the Wikimedia Foundation.)
- The view that because Wikipedia is non-commercial, it is
anti-advertising
and anti-Google.
- A belief that Knol is an attempt by Google to compete with Wikipedia.
I personally don't believe any of this: I think Google and Wikipedia
can
and should have a complementary and positive relationship. And I gather Larry and Sergey feel the same: I believe they've told Jimmy that
has no ill will towards Wikipedia, and that they'd be willing to make a
donation to us in order to signal that publicly.
I also believe that any real or perceived tensions in the
Google/Wikipedia
relationship may be being exacerbated at some levels inside Google by
their
unfulfilled desires to do business with us. Since relocating to the Bay Area in January, we've had plenty of Google folks reach out to us. But
--
we have a total staff of 21 people, with just one person responsible
for
business development, so I am not sure we are even able to politely
keep
up
with their pitches. IMO, rather than spending our time on multiple product-specific pitches, it would probably be more productive for Wikipedia and Google to develop a single umbrella
relationship/agreement
(obviously within the limits of Wikipedia's non-commercial context).
So. I think a good next step would be some kind of high-level meeting between Wikipedia and Google, to talk through these issues and see if a donation and/or business deal makes sense.
I appreciate your advice on this issue :-)
Thanks,
Sue
---o0o---
Now, some of this isn't earth-shattering news -- it's long been known
that
relations between Google and Wikipedia have been friendly. The lobbying partnership between Google and Wikipedia may well date back to the
meetings
that followed that email exchange.
What wasn't known to me was that Sue found people in Silicon Valley unwilling to donate because of their "loyalty to Google". (This
reasoning
raises questions of its own about Google's influence, but we'll leave
that
aside.)
Now it has become clear over the past few days that Damon Sicore, to
use
Jimmy Wales' words at Lila's Knowledge Engine FAQ,[2] "really was advocating for taking a run at Google", and gave "strict orders to keep
it
top secret".
Sue referred to her wish to have "a single umbrella
relationship/agreement"
with Google, in part to help with the donation problems she was encountering. If such an agreement ever came into being, then being
seen
to
be planning a campaign against Google behind Google's back, as it were, might well jeopardise that relationship, and be seen as disloyal.
That would have been a compelling reason for continued secrecy,
especially
if these plans to compete against Google were in the end given up,
meaning
that any loss of face vis-à-vis Google and its friends would in effect
be
for nothing.
Of course this is just supposition.
But there are issues here worth reflecting upon. I recall plenty of volunteers over the years saying it was very good that Google seemed to treat Wikipedia favourably. Yet I don't recall the community ever being asked whether they wanted the WMF to seek any kinds of agreements with for-profit players.
At any rate, whatever the facts of this case, it seems to me that maintaining transparency becomes very hard if you pursue such
agreements.
It becomes very easy to tie yourself into knots.
[1] http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/sandberg.pdf
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Engine/FAQ _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- Lila Tretikov Wikimedia Foundation
*“Be bold and mighty forces will come to your aid.”* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Hi Lila,
Tony is the one who does interviews for the Signpost (I'm neither good at interviewing, nor have the right equipment), and he requested an interview with you last Wednesday, via Katherine Maher. We had a confirmation from Juliet on Friday that the request had been received, but nothing further since then.
Best, Andreas
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 7:32 AM, Lila Tretikov lila@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hi Pete, I proposed an interview to Andreas this morning in a private email, actually.
Also, I want to explain myself as a human being, not only as an ED. Without filters.
L
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Pete Forsyth peteforsyth@gmail.com wrote:
An unusually immediate comment from Wikimedia leadership following
Andreas'
admittedly speculative comments.
It's not about the relevance to the movement. It's not about the
relevance
to the organization. It's about an individual's role.
This just got fascinating (and a little more depressing).
-Pete
[[User:Peteforsyth]]
I am happy to talk to Signpost on-record about anything that has been happening under my watch to minimize misinterpretations of second-hand reports or further conjectures.
Lila
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 9:57 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen466@gmail.com
wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Lila should have taken the community along with her as the
Knowledge
Engine
project was evolving. I don't know what was behind her reticence. I
presume
an element was unwillingness to announce a thing while the thing
was
shifting and changing from one day to the next.
It was pointed out to me today that there is a court exhibit, no.
666,
made
public in 2014 as part of the [[High-Tech Employee Antitrust
Litigation]]
(the same case Arnnon Geshuri was involved in), which reproduces some correspondence between Sue Gardner, Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg, and
various
Google managers.[1]
In short, Sheryl Sandberg (who'd formerly worked for Google) helped
Sue
Gardner by introducing her to senior management at Google. To do so, according to the court exhibit, Sandberg forwarded an email from Sue Gardner to Jonathan Rosenberg (then Senior Vice President of
Products)
and
others at Google:
---o0o---
From: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Saturday, August 09, 2008 7:40 PM
To: Jonathan Rosenberg; Omid Kordestani; David Drummond; Megan Smith
Subject: Fw: Thanks + a request re Google
Jonathan, Omid, David, Megan - I was introduced to Sue by Roger. As
you
can
see below, they would love a better and more senior relationship with Google. Can I email introduce her to one of you?
Please excuse blackberry-caused typos.
-----Original Message-----
From: Sue Gardner
To: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Mon Aug 04 10:02:01 2008
Subject: Thanks + a request re Google
Hi Sheryl,
It was terrific to finally meet you last week :-)
Here's a recap of the Google issue that I raised:
I started as Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation last
summer.
A few months after that, Roger McNamee began introducing me to
potential
Wikipedia donors in the valley. Most of that was great and
successful,
but
in a few cases -including once with a Google board member- I was
surprised
to be have people cite 'loyalty to Google' as a reason to not give
money
to
Wikipedia.
Their objections, which have been echoed to me several times since
then,
seem to fall into three categories:
- A belief that Wikia Search is an attempt by Wikipedia to compete
with
Google. (Many people don't realize the only thing shared between
Wikipedia
and Wikia is our founder, Jimmy Wales. Nor do they realize that Jimmy
has
no day-to-day responsibilities at the Wikimedia Foundation.)
- The view that because Wikipedia is non-commercial, it is
anti-advertising
and anti-Google.
- A belief that Knol is an attempt by Google to compete with
Wikipedia.
I personally don't believe any of this: I think Google and Wikipedia
can
and should have a complementary and positive relationship. And I
gather
Larry and Sergey feel the same: I believe they've told Jimmy that
has no ill will towards Wikipedia, and that they'd be willing to
make a
donation to us in order to signal that publicly.
I also believe that any real or perceived tensions in the
Google/Wikipedia
relationship may be being exacerbated at some levels inside Google by
their
unfulfilled desires to do business with us. Since relocating to the
Bay
Area in January, we've had plenty of Google folks reach out to us.
But
--
we have a total staff of 21 people, with just one person responsible
for
business development, so I am not sure we are even able to politely
keep
up
with their pitches. IMO, rather than spending our time on multiple product-specific pitches, it would probably be more productive for Wikipedia and Google to develop a single umbrella
relationship/agreement
(obviously within the limits of Wikipedia's non-commercial context).
So. I think a good next step would be some kind of high-level meeting between Wikipedia and Google, to talk through these issues and see
if a
donation and/or business deal makes sense.
I appreciate your advice on this issue :-)
Thanks,
Sue
---o0o---
Now, some of this isn't earth-shattering news -- it's long been known
that
relations between Google and Wikipedia have been friendly. The
lobbying
partnership between Google and Wikipedia may well date back to the
meetings
that followed that email exchange.
What wasn't known to me was that Sue found people in Silicon Valley unwilling to donate because of their "loyalty to Google". (This
reasoning
raises questions of its own about Google's influence, but we'll leave
that
aside.)
Now it has become clear over the past few days that Damon Sicore, to
use
Jimmy Wales' words at Lila's Knowledge Engine FAQ,[2] "really was advocating for taking a run at Google", and gave "strict orders to
keep
it
top secret".
Sue referred to her wish to have "a single umbrella
relationship/agreement"
with Google, in part to help with the donation problems she was encountering. If such an agreement ever came into being, then being
seen
to
be planning a campaign against Google behind Google's back, as it
were,
might well jeopardise that relationship, and be seen as disloyal.
That would have been a compelling reason for continued secrecy,
especially
if these plans to compete against Google were in the end given up,
meaning
that any loss of face vis-à-vis Google and its friends would in
effect
be
for nothing.
Of course this is just supposition.
But there are issues here worth reflecting upon. I recall plenty of volunteers over the years saying it was very good that Google seemed
to
treat Wikipedia favourably. Yet I don't recall the community ever
being
asked whether they wanted the WMF to seek any kinds of agreements
with
for-profit players.
At any rate, whatever the facts of this case, it seems to me that maintaining transparency becomes very hard if you pursue such
agreements.
It becomes very easy to tie yourself into knots.
[1] http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/sandberg.pdf
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Engine/FAQ _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- Lila Tretikov Wikimedia Foundation
*“Be bold and mighty forces will come to your aid.”* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- Lila Tretikov Wikimedia Foundation
*“Be bold and mighty forces will come to your aid.”* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Though my intent was neither ironic nor cynical, Jane is right -- my email last night was probably not as clear as it could have been.
As I see it, senior leadership (the board and the executive director) have a special responsibility to help us all keep track of the bigger picture. But senior leadership has been pretty silent lately, even as many staff and community members talk about the bigger picture. Lila did write a blog post last week,[1] but it was utterly unrelated to most of the concerns expressed by community members. It seems likely to me that she did not avail herself of the talents of her Communications team, which I imagine could have told her that particular blog post would not help anything, and could have steered her in a more productive direction. Instead, it fell to two engineers (in the comment thread [2]) to offer the kind of commentary that is actually helpful.
Andreas sent a message which is either (a) curious but not especially useful, or (b) offers insight into where the organization has been trying to go since 2008. If there should be any comment from senior leadership at all, I would expect it to address (b); no comment at all might be appropriate if (a).
But the *immediate* reply comes from somebody who has only been involved since 2014 (rather than, say, Jimmy or Alice, who could speak more readily to what has been going on since 2008). More significantly, it includes the words "on my watch," which suggests to me that something unhealthy is going on. We should not be in a state where leaders are more concerned about their individual reputations, than about broad consideration of Wikimedia's relationship with Google.
I find it fascinating because it is so very different from what I would expect in professional communication, and depressing because it suggests that the WMF has simply lost touch with what is important.
-Pete [[User:Peteforsyth]]
[1] http://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/02/16/wikimedia-search-future/ [2] http://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/02/16/wikimedia-search-future/#comment-25102 and http://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/02/16/wikimedia-search-future/#comment-25092
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Pete Forsyth peteforsyth@gmail.com wrote:
An unusually immediate comment from Wikimedia leadership following Andreas' admittedly speculative comments.
It's not about the relevance to the movement. It's not about the relevance to the organization. It's about an individual's role.
This just got fascinating (and a little more depressing).
-Pete
[[User:Peteforsyth]]
I am happy to talk to Signpost on-record about anything that has been happening under my watch to minimize misinterpretations of second-hand reports or further conjectures.
Lila
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 9:57 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen466@gmail.com wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Lila should have taken the community along with her as the Knowledge
Engine
project was evolving. I don't know what was behind her reticence. I
presume
an element was unwillingness to announce a thing while the thing was shifting and changing from one day to the next.
It was pointed out to me today that there is a court exhibit, no. 666,
made
public in 2014 as part of the [[High-Tech Employee Antitrust
Litigation]]
(the same case Arnnon Geshuri was involved in), which reproduces some correspondence between Sue Gardner, Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg, and
various
Google managers.[1]
In short, Sheryl Sandberg (who'd formerly worked for Google) helped Sue Gardner by introducing her to senior management at Google. To do so, according to the court exhibit, Sandberg forwarded an email from Sue Gardner to Jonathan Rosenberg (then Senior Vice President of Products)
and
others at Google:
---o0o---
From: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Saturday, August 09, 2008 7:40 PM
To: Jonathan Rosenberg; Omid Kordestani; David Drummond; Megan Smith
Subject: Fw: Thanks + a request re Google
Jonathan, Omid, David, Megan - I was introduced to Sue by Roger. As you
can
see below, they would love a better and more senior relationship with Google. Can I email introduce her to one of you?
Please excuse blackberry-caused typos.
-----Original Message-----
From: Sue Gardner
To: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Mon Aug 04 10:02:01 2008
Subject: Thanks + a request re Google
Hi Sheryl,
It was terrific to finally meet you last week :-)
Here's a recap of the Google issue that I raised:
I started as Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation last summer.
A few months after that, Roger McNamee began introducing me to potential Wikipedia donors in the valley. Most of that was great and successful,
but
in a few cases -including once with a Google board member- I was
surprised
to be have people cite 'loyalty to Google' as a reason to not give
money to
Wikipedia.
Their objections, which have been echoed to me several times since then, seem to fall into three categories:
- A belief that Wikia Search is an attempt by Wikipedia to compete with
Google. (Many people don't realize the only thing shared between
Wikipedia
and Wikia is our founder, Jimmy Wales. Nor do they realize that Jimmy
has
no day-to-day responsibilities at the Wikimedia Foundation.)
- The view that because Wikipedia is non-commercial, it is
anti-advertising
and anti-Google.
- A belief that Knol is an attempt by Google to compete with Wikipedia.
I personally don't believe any of this: I think Google and Wikipedia can and should have a complementary and positive relationship. And I gather Larry and Sergey feel the same: I believe they've told Jimmy that Google has no ill will towards Wikipedia, and that they'd be willing to make a
donation to us in order to signal that publicly.
I also believe that any real or perceived tensions in the
Google/Wikipedia
relationship may be being exacerbated at some levels inside Google by
their
unfulfilled desires to do business with us. Since relocating to the Bay Area in January, we've had plenty of Google folks reach out to us. But
--
we have a total staff of 21 people, with just one person responsible for business development, so I am not sure we are even able to politely
keep up
with their pitches. IMO, rather than spending our time on multiple product-specific pitches, it would probably be more productive for Wikipedia and Google to develop a single umbrella relationship/agreement (obviously within the limits of Wikipedia's non-commercial context).
So. I think a good next step would be some kind of high-level meeting between Wikipedia and Google, to talk through these issues and see if a donation and/or business deal makes sense.
I appreciate your advice on this issue :-)
Thanks,
Sue
---o0o---
Now, some of this isn't earth-shattering news -- it's long been known
that
relations between Google and Wikipedia have been friendly. The lobbying partnership between Google and Wikipedia may well date back to the
meetings
that followed that email exchange.
What wasn't known to me was that Sue found people in Silicon Valley unwilling to donate because of their "loyalty to Google". (This
reasoning
raises questions of its own about Google's influence, but we'll leave
that
aside.)
Now it has become clear over the past few days that Damon Sicore, to use Jimmy Wales' words at Lila's Knowledge Engine FAQ,[2] "really was advocating for taking a run at Google", and gave "strict orders to keep
it
top secret".
Sue referred to her wish to have "a single umbrella
relationship/agreement"
with Google, in part to help with the donation problems she was encountering. If such an agreement ever came into being, then being
seen to
be planning a campaign against Google behind Google's back, as it were, might well jeopardise that relationship, and be seen as disloyal.
That would have been a compelling reason for continued secrecy,
especially
if these plans to compete against Google were in the end given up,
meaning
that any loss of face vis-à-vis Google and its friends would in effect
be
for nothing.
Of course this is just supposition.
But there are issues here worth reflecting upon. I recall plenty of volunteers over the years saying it was very good that Google seemed to treat Wikipedia favourably. Yet I don't recall the community ever being asked whether they wanted the WMF to seek any kinds of agreements with for-profit players.
At any rate, whatever the facts of this case, it seems to me that maintaining transparency becomes very hard if you pursue such
agreements.
It becomes very easy to tie yourself into knots.
[1] http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/sandberg.pdf
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Engine/FAQ _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- Lila Tretikov Wikimedia Foundation
*“Be bold and mighty forces will come to your aid.”* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
As I see it, there are 2 large issues here.
The staff morale and distrust being the first. The exodus of a good chunk of staff was expected at the beginning - Erik and a few others were too much a part of Sue's leadership and it seemed natural. New leadership would entail, a new leadership style, new staff and getting rid of some of the old. This wasn't a surprise - in the beginning. What became evident was the revolving door of new hires as well, departure of quite prominent ones and oldhands who had been vetted by the community, in community-facing positions. All the while very important high level management positions have remain vacant. If there was a staff reorganisation planned, it should have been the priority before anything else to make it quick and painless as possible. This was a big failing for Lila in terms of her priorities - this should have been the first task before anything else.
I also don't understand why people think Sue's tenure was especially rosy. Her start was quite rocky and we had a lot of bumps along the way. No doubt, Lila's start has been far worse but the difference there might not be as large. I see a lot of shortcomings in communication - there were a lot of issues Sue kept contained (as a few would know), and certainly increasing the staff to twice or thrice the size, isn't going to be easy to monitor - bringing back the idea of making WMF smaller.
The simplest solution right now would be hiring a* new deputy*. I think Lila needs a buffer. Someone much more closer to the staff that can fill the community and staff facing requirements. Given the HR history, I also think this task should be carried out by the board directly, and that too, at the earliest. The task of replacing an ED is a long and public one. Depending on how you look at it, we already need a deputy, it would be filling a vacancy. The future direction can be decided once we stop the hemorrhaging of talent and trust.
Second issue, is the KE. I don't know if Lila still thinks there are any perceived benefit left with pursuing this ill-advised venture. Finding out that Damon conceived it to take on Google along with his colorful paranioa as brion put it, and the cryptic email last month - I have no faith in this project along with most others on the list. If you separate the buzzwords and corporate speak from the description on the FAQ page, KE seems like a new search engine that will integrate OSM and other data, to reside at the main domain. A smaller and better search that focused on improvements, would have gone under the radar until you had a prototype or more of an idea what exactly you wanted. But instead you filed a grant request from another organisation - their lack of interest should have been an early indicator here. The $250 K grant everyone thinks is a smoking gun would be the tip of the iceberg, and ultimately irrelevant, if the figures I saw on the FAQ page were true. This grant wouldn't cover development for 2 months of a multi-year project - Ask yourself, was it worth it?
There are a lot of really smart people trying to tell you this is not a good idea. Not to mention, the implication of designing in an open culture - you can spend 32 million or 50 or 60, owing to our ethos we would have to make it accessible and open - for anyone to copy and improve as they see fit. And If Google remotely wanted something like this, those numbers are a drop in the bucket - they have paid more for parking and transportation of their employees than the entire budget of this project. This is only going to be a sad mistake that can ruin an important relationship and hurt our credibility. This is similar to the whole Arnon's debacle if the board is listening, you can drag your feet, resist, ignore, hope it goes away but you know the end. So, whether you do it now, or the next ED, or it happens in an year by either one, the outcome is probably going to be the same - junk it and move on. This already costed you and everyone else much more than just money.
Regards Theo
P.S. Andreas, you are one of the smartest commentators I read on this list. You have great points and new information but really, there is an obsession here with Google. There are real problems right now that are quite unrelated to what Sue said in 2008. The donor agreement and relationship as imagined by Sue 8 years ago has only tangential relationship to the management issues right now and the lack of clarity related to KE. I can't see the relationship you are trying to allude to here. I say this with great respect, and appreciation for your opinions.
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016, Andreas Kolbe jayen466@gmail.com wrote:
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016, Anthony Cole ahcoleecu@gmail.com wrote:
Lila should have taken the community along with her as the Knowledge
Engine
project was evolving. I don't know what was behind her reticence. I
presume
an element was unwillingness to announce a thing while the thing was shifting and changing from one day to the next.
It was pointed out to me today that there is a court exhibit, no. 666, made public in 2014 as part of the [[High-Tech Employee Antitrust Litigation]] (the same case Arnnon Geshuri was involved in), which reproduces some correspondence between Sue Gardner, Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg, and various Google managers.[1]
In short, Sheryl Sandberg (who'd formerly worked for Google) helped Sue Gardner by introducing her to senior management at Google. To do so, according to the court exhibit, Sandberg forwarded an email from Sue Gardner to Jonathan Rosenberg (then Senior Vice President of Products) and others at Google:
---o0o---
From: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Saturday, August 09, 2008 7:40 PM
To: Jonathan Rosenberg; Omid Kordestani; David Drummond; Megan Smith
Subject: Fw: Thanks + a request re Google
Jonathan, Omid, David, Megan - I was introduced to Sue by Roger. As you can see below, they would love a better and more senior relationship with Google. Can I email introduce her to one of you?
Please excuse blackberry-caused typos.
-----Original Message-----
From: Sue Gardner
To: Sheryl Sandberg
Sent: Mon Aug 04 10:02:01 2008
Subject: Thanks + a request re Google
Hi Sheryl,
It was terrific to finally meet you last week :-)
Here's a recap of the Google issue that I raised:
I started as Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation last summer.
A few months after that, Roger McNamee began introducing me to potential Wikipedia donors in the valley. Most of that was great and successful, but in a few cases -including once with a Google board member- I was surprised to be have people cite 'loyalty to Google' as a reason to not give money to Wikipedia.
Their objections, which have been echoed to me several times since then, seem to fall into three categories:
- A belief that Wikia Search is an attempt by Wikipedia to compete with
Google. (Many people don't realize the only thing shared between Wikipedia and Wikia is our founder, Jimmy Wales. Nor do they realize that Jimmy has no day-to-day responsibilities at the Wikimedia Foundation.)
- The view that because Wikipedia is non-commercial, it is anti-advertising
and anti-Google.
- A belief that Knol is an attempt by Google to compete with Wikipedia.
I personally don't believe any of this: I think Google and Wikipedia can and should have a complementary and positive relationship. And I gather Larry and Sergey feel the same: I believe they've told Jimmy that Google has no ill will towards Wikipedia, and that they'd be willing to make a
donation to us in order to signal that publicly.
I also believe that any real or perceived tensions in the Google/Wikipedia relationship may be being exacerbated at some levels inside Google by their unfulfilled desires to do business with us. Since relocating to the Bay Area in January, we've had plenty of Google folks reach out to us. But -- we have a total staff of 21 people, with just one person responsible for business development, so I am not sure we are even able to politely keep up with their pitches. IMO, rather than spending our time on multiple product-specific pitches, it would probably be more productive for Wikipedia and Google to develop a single umbrella relationship/agreement (obviously within the limits of Wikipedia's non-commercial context).
So. I think a good next step would be some kind of high-level meeting between Wikipedia and Google, to talk through these issues and see if a donation and/or business deal makes sense.
I appreciate your advice on this issue :-)
Thanks,
Sue
---o0o---
Now, some of this isn't earth-shattering news -- it's long been known that relations between Google and Wikipedia have been friendly. The lobbying partnership between Google and Wikipedia may well date back to the meetings that followed that email exchange.
What wasn't known to me was that Sue found people in Silicon Valley unwilling to donate because of their "loyalty to Google". (This reasoning raises questions of its own about Google's influence, but we'll leave that aside.)
Now it has become clear over the past few days that Damon Sicore, to use Jimmy Wales' words at Lila's Knowledge Engine FAQ,[2] "really was advocating for taking a run at Google", and gave "strict orders to keep it top secret".
Sue referred to her wish to have "a single umbrella relationship/agreement" with Google, in part to help with the donation problems she was encountering. If such an agreement ever came into being, then being seen to be planning a campaign against Google behind Google's back, as it were, might well jeopardise that relationship, and be seen as disloyal.
That would have been a compelling reason for continued secrecy, especially if these plans to compete against Google were in the end given up, meaning that any loss of face vis-à-vis Google and its friends would in effect be for nothing.
Of course this is just supposition.
But there are issues here worth reflecting upon. I recall plenty of volunteers over the years saying it was very good that Google seemed to treat Wikipedia favourably. Yet I don't recall the community ever being asked whether they wanted the WMF to seek any kinds of agreements with for-profit players.
At any rate, whatever the facts of this case, it seems to me that maintaining transparency becomes very hard if you pursue such agreements. It becomes very easy to tie yourself into knots.
[1] http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/sandberg.pdf
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Engine/FAQ _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: 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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