In the following I want to present a personal account of events leading to James’ removal as a Board member, as I remember them. It was written while I was still on the Board, and the Board agreed on having it sent. The text was heavily discussed and edited amongst members of the Board, but in the end it remains my personal account. I realize that it potentially includes post-factum sensemaking, affecting my recollection of events.
October 1 and 2 2015, Dariusz, James, Patricio and I received phone calls from a small number of Wikimedia Foundation staff expressing concerns about the Foundation. They asked explicitly for confidentiality. I wanted to approach the whole Board immediately, but due to considerations for confidentiality, the sensitive nature of the topic, and the lack of an HR head at the time, the others decided against at this moment. Effectively, this created a conspiracy within the Board from then on for the following weeks.
With Patricio’s approval, Dariusz and James started to personally collect and ask for reports from staff. Unfortunately, this investigation was not formally approved by the whole Board. It was also conducted in a manner that would not secure a professional and impartial process. After a few weeks, we finally reached out to the rest of Board members. They immediately recognized the necessity for a separate formal task force which was set up very quickly.
The formal task force was created end of October. This task force involved outside legal counsel and conducted professional fact finding. The first request of the task force to the Board members was to ask for all documents and notes pertaining to the case. Unfortunately, although there has been more than a week of time, this has not happened in full.
The task force presented its result at the November Board meeting, where it was discovered during the second day of the Board meeting that the previous investigation has not provided all available information. Thus, the fact finding had to be extended into the Board meeting. At the Board meeting itself, James in particular was repeatedly asked to share his documents, which only happened on the very last day of the retreat and after several, increasingly vigorous requests. Some members of the Board were left with an impression that James was reluctant to cooperate, even though it was expected that since he participated in an investigation done in an improper manner, that he would be more collaborative to make up for these mistakes.
Due to that lack of transparency and information sharing, the Board retreat in November turned out to be extremely ineffective. If we had all information that was gathered available to the Board in due time, and if that information was gathered more openly in the first place, the Board could have acted more effectively.
I was worried that the confidentiality of the Board would not be maintained, and I was particularly worried about James’ lack of understanding of confidential matters, a perception also fueled by his noncooperation and conduct. Some of his behaviour since unfortunately confirmed my worries. I raised this as an issue to the Board.
While discussing the situation, James remained defensive, in my eyes answered questions partially, and, while formally expressing apologies, never conveyed that he really took ownership of his actions or understood what he did wrong. This lead to a malfunctioning Board, and in order to fix the situation I suggested James’ removal.
I voted for James’ removal from the Board because of his perceived reluctance to cooperate with the formal investigation, his withholding of information when asked for, his secrecy towards other Board members, even once the conspiracy was lifted, and him never convincingly taking responsibility for and ownership of his actions and mistakes. This is why I get triggered if he positions himself as an avatar of transparency. The whole topic of the Knowledge Engine - although it played a part in the events that lead to the November meeting - did not, for me, in any way influence the vote on James’ removal. It was solely his conduct during and following the November meeting.
I am glad to see that, since James’ removal until I left, the Board has been functioning better.
I hope that this account helps a little bit towards renewing our culture of transparency, but even more I hope for understanding. The Board consists of volunteers and of humans - they cannot react in real-time to events, as the Board was never set up to do so. Trustees - myself included - made mistakes. By opening up about them, I hope that we can facilitate a faster and more complete healing process, and also have this knowledge and experience available for future Board members and the community.
Denny
Just to be sure I understand the issue: staff members reached out specifically to the four of you and asked for confidentiality, and then the Board demanded 'all documents', presumably including some confidential staff information, and James only very reluctantly shared it?
Michel On 2 May 2016 19:10, "Denny Vrandečić" vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
In the following I want to present a personal account of events leading to James’ removal as a Board member, as I remember them. It was written while I was still on the Board, and the Board agreed on having it sent. The text was heavily discussed and edited amongst members of the Board, but in the end it remains my personal account. I realize that it potentially includes post-factum sensemaking, affecting my recollection of events.
October 1 and 2 2015, Dariusz, James, Patricio and I received phone calls from a small number of Wikimedia Foundation staff expressing concerns about the Foundation. They asked explicitly for confidentiality. I wanted to approach the whole Board immediately, but due to considerations for confidentiality, the sensitive nature of the topic, and the lack of an HR head at the time, the others decided against at this moment. Effectively, this created a conspiracy within the Board from then on for the following weeks.
With Patricio’s approval, Dariusz and James started to personally collect and ask for reports from staff. Unfortunately, this investigation was not formally approved by the whole Board. It was also conducted in a manner that would not secure a professional and impartial process. After a few weeks, we finally reached out to the rest of Board members. They immediately recognized the necessity for a separate formal task force which was set up very quickly.
The formal task force was created end of October. This task force involved outside legal counsel and conducted professional fact finding. The first request of the task force to the Board members was to ask for all documents and notes pertaining to the case. Unfortunately, although there has been more than a week of time, this has not happened in full.
The task force presented its result at the November Board meeting, where it was discovered during the second day of the Board meeting that the previous investigation has not provided all available information. Thus, the fact finding had to be extended into the Board meeting. At the Board meeting itself, James in particular was repeatedly asked to share his documents, which only happened on the very last day of the retreat and after several, increasingly vigorous requests. Some members of the Board were left with an impression that James was reluctant to cooperate, even though it was expected that since he participated in an investigation done in an improper manner, that he would be more collaborative to make up for these mistakes.
Due to that lack of transparency and information sharing, the Board retreat in November turned out to be extremely ineffective. If we had all information that was gathered available to the Board in due time, and if that information was gathered more openly in the first place, the Board could have acted more effectively.
I was worried that the confidentiality of the Board would not be maintained, and I was particularly worried about James’ lack of understanding of confidential matters, a perception also fueled by his noncooperation and conduct. Some of his behaviour since unfortunately confirmed my worries. I raised this as an issue to the Board.
While discussing the situation, James remained defensive, in my eyes answered questions partially, and, while formally expressing apologies, never conveyed that he really took ownership of his actions or understood what he did wrong. This lead to a malfunctioning Board, and in order to fix the situation I suggested James’ removal.
I voted for James’ removal from the Board because of his perceived reluctance to cooperate with the formal investigation, his withholding of information when asked for, his secrecy towards other Board members, even once the conspiracy was lifted, and him never convincingly taking responsibility for and ownership of his actions and mistakes. This is why I get triggered if he positions himself as an avatar of transparency. The whole topic of the Knowledge Engine - although it played a part in the events that lead to the November meeting - did not, for me, in any way influence the vote on James’ removal. It was solely his conduct during and following the November meeting.
I am glad to see that, since James’ removal until I left, the Board has been functioning better.
I hope that this account helps a little bit towards renewing our culture of transparency, but even more I hope for understanding. The Board consists of volunteers and of humans - they cannot react in real-time to events, as the Board was never set up to do so. Trustees - myself included - made mistakes. By opening up about them, I hope that we can facilitate a faster and more complete healing process, and also have this knowledge and experience available for future Board members and the community.
Denny _______________________________________________ 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
What Michel said... This is a very interesting story, but I'm left to imagine some crucial, looming details.
I have no first-hand knowledge of what really happened, but your description of staff contacting a small number of Board members, and asking for confidentiality, strongly indicates that the staff were fearful of some sort of retribution, and each chose Board members who they personally believed would protect them. This is an educated guess, based on our siege mentality at the Foundation last November.
When the four of you were asked to hand over all information about the case, that would naturally include any personal email communications. If I were in your position, I would have respected the agreement of confidence with anyone who had contacted me, up to and maybe even beyond a subpoena, unless I had the authors' permission to release. If there is some legal reason the Board members are not allowed behave according to this standard, we need to make it very clear going forward. I doubt the staff would have had these conversations if this is the case, and they had been informed so.
I'm also concerned that there seems to be a conflation between several incidents--the original "Gang of Four" investigation was clearly a huge mess and I would hope that apologies were made all around for what happened there. However, protecting some sort of possibly compromising or personal information is another thing entirely.
Hoping for more clarity, Adam
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 10:39 AM, Michel Vuijlsteke wikipedia@zog.org wrote:
Just to be sure I understand the issue: staff members reached out specifically to the four of you and asked for confidentiality, and then the Board demanded 'all documents', presumably including some confidential staff information, and James only very reluctantly shared it?
Michel On 2 May 2016 19:10, "Denny Vrandečić" vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
In the following I want to present a personal account of events leading
to
James’ removal as a Board member, as I remember them. It was written
while
I was still on the Board, and the Board agreed on having it sent. The
text
was heavily discussed and edited amongst members of the Board, but in the end it remains my personal account. I realize that it potentially
includes
post-factum sensemaking, affecting my recollection of events.
October 1 and 2 2015, Dariusz, James, Patricio and I received phone calls from a small number of Wikimedia Foundation staff expressing concerns
about
the Foundation. They asked explicitly for confidentiality. I wanted to approach the whole Board immediately, but due to considerations for confidentiality, the sensitive nature of the topic, and the lack of an HR head at the time, the others decided against at this moment. Effectively, this created a conspiracy within the Board from then on for the following weeks.
With Patricio’s approval, Dariusz and James started to personally collect and ask for reports from staff. Unfortunately, this investigation was not formally approved by the whole Board. It was also conducted in a manner that would not secure a professional and impartial process. After a few weeks, we finally reached out to the rest of Board members. They immediately recognized the necessity for a separate formal task force
which
was set up very quickly.
The formal task force was created end of October. This task force
involved
outside legal counsel and conducted professional fact finding. The first request of the task force to the Board members was to ask for all
documents
and notes pertaining to the case. Unfortunately, although there has been more than a week of time, this has not happened in full.
The task force presented its result at the November Board meeting, where
it
was discovered during the second day of the Board meeting that the
previous
investigation has not provided all available information. Thus, the fact finding had to be extended into the Board meeting. At the Board meeting itself, James in particular was repeatedly asked to share his documents, which only happened on the very last day of the retreat and after
several,
increasingly vigorous requests. Some members of the Board were left with
an
impression that James was reluctant to cooperate, even though it was expected that since he participated in an investigation done in an
improper
manner, that he would be more collaborative to make up for these
mistakes.
Due to that lack of transparency and information sharing, the Board
retreat
in November turned out to be extremely ineffective. If we had all information that was gathered available to the Board in due time, and if that information was gathered more openly in the first place, the Board could have acted more effectively.
I was worried that the confidentiality of the Board would not be maintained, and I was particularly worried about James’ lack of understanding of confidential matters, a perception also fueled by his noncooperation and conduct. Some of his behaviour since unfortunately confirmed my worries. I raised this as an issue to the Board.
While discussing the situation, James remained defensive, in my eyes answered questions partially, and, while formally expressing apologies, never conveyed that he really took ownership of his actions or understood what he did wrong. This lead to a malfunctioning Board, and in order to
fix
the situation I suggested James’ removal.
I voted for James’ removal from the Board because of his perceived reluctance to cooperate with the formal investigation, his withholding of information when asked for, his secrecy towards other Board members, even once the conspiracy was lifted, and him never convincingly taking responsibility for and ownership of his actions and mistakes. This is
why I
get triggered if he positions himself as an avatar of transparency. The whole topic of the Knowledge Engine - although it played a part in the events that lead to the November meeting - did not, for me, in any way influence the vote on James’ removal. It was solely his conduct during
and
following the November meeting.
I am glad to see that, since James’ removal until I left, the Board has been functioning better.
I hope that this account helps a little bit towards renewing our culture
of
transparency, but even more I hope for understanding. The Board consists
of
volunteers and of humans - they cannot react in real-time to events, as
the
Board was never set up to do so. Trustees - myself included - made mistakes. By opening up about them, I hope that we can facilitate a
faster
and more complete healing process, and also have this knowledge and experience available for future Board members and the community.
Denny _______________________________________________ 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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The protection of any personal or confidential information was, to the best of my knowledge, at all time guaranteed and has not been compromised. The official task force, set up by the Trustees, worked under the standards of keeping confidentiality, obviously. I thought this goes without saying, but I am explicating it.
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 10:44 AM Adam Wight awight@wikimedia.org wrote:
What Michel said... This is a very interesting story, but I'm left to imagine some crucial, looming details.
I have no first-hand knowledge of what really happened, but your description of staff contacting a small number of Board members, and asking for confidentiality, strongly indicates that the staff were fearful of some sort of retribution, and each chose Board members who they personally believed would protect them. This is an educated guess, based on our siege mentality at the Foundation last November.
When the four of you were asked to hand over all information about the case, that would naturally include any personal email communications. If I were in your position, I would have respected the agreement of confidence with anyone who had contacted me, up to and maybe even beyond a subpoena, unless I had the authors' permission to release. If there is some legal reason the Board members are not allowed behave according to this standard, we need to make it very clear going forward. I doubt the staff would have had these conversations if this is the case, and they had been informed so.
I'm also concerned that there seems to be a conflation between several incidents--the original "Gang of Four" investigation was clearly a huge mess and I would hope that apologies were made all around for what happened there. However, protecting some sort of possibly compromising or personal information is another thing entirely.
Hoping for more clarity, Adam
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 10:39 AM, Michel Vuijlsteke wikipedia@zog.org wrote:
Just to be sure I understand the issue: staff members reached out specifically to the four of you and asked for confidentiality, and then
the
Board demanded 'all documents', presumably including some confidential staff information, and James only very reluctantly shared it?
Michel On 2 May 2016 19:10, "Denny Vrandečić" vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
In the following I want to present a personal account of events leading
to
James’ removal as a Board member, as I remember them. It was written
while
I was still on the Board, and the Board agreed on having it sent. The
text
was heavily discussed and edited amongst members of the Board, but in
the
end it remains my personal account. I realize that it potentially
includes
post-factum sensemaking, affecting my recollection of events.
October 1 and 2 2015, Dariusz, James, Patricio and I received phone
calls
from a small number of Wikimedia Foundation staff expressing concerns
about
the Foundation. They asked explicitly for confidentiality. I wanted to approach the whole Board immediately, but due to considerations for confidentiality, the sensitive nature of the topic, and the lack of an
HR
head at the time, the others decided against at this moment.
Effectively,
this created a conspiracy within the Board from then on for the
following
weeks.
With Patricio’s approval, Dariusz and James started to personally
collect
and ask for reports from staff. Unfortunately, this investigation was
not
formally approved by the whole Board. It was also conducted in a manner that would not secure a professional and impartial process. After a few weeks, we finally reached out to the rest of Board members. They immediately recognized the necessity for a separate formal task force
which
was set up very quickly.
The formal task force was created end of October. This task force
involved
outside legal counsel and conducted professional fact finding. The
first
request of the task force to the Board members was to ask for all
documents
and notes pertaining to the case. Unfortunately, although there has
been
more than a week of time, this has not happened in full.
The task force presented its result at the November Board meeting,
where
it
was discovered during the second day of the Board meeting that the
previous
investigation has not provided all available information. Thus, the
fact
finding had to be extended into the Board meeting. At the Board meeting itself, James in particular was repeatedly asked to share his
documents,
which only happened on the very last day of the retreat and after
several,
increasingly vigorous requests. Some members of the Board were left
with
an
impression that James was reluctant to cooperate, even though it was expected that since he participated in an investigation done in an
improper
manner, that he would be more collaborative to make up for these
mistakes.
Due to that lack of transparency and information sharing, the Board
retreat
in November turned out to be extremely ineffective. If we had all information that was gathered available to the Board in due time, and
if
that information was gathered more openly in the first place, the Board could have acted more effectively.
I was worried that the confidentiality of the Board would not be maintained, and I was particularly worried about James’ lack of understanding of confidential matters, a perception also fueled by his noncooperation and conduct. Some of his behaviour since unfortunately confirmed my worries. I raised this as an issue to the Board.
While discussing the situation, James remained defensive, in my eyes answered questions partially, and, while formally expressing apologies, never conveyed that he really took ownership of his actions or
understood
what he did wrong. This lead to a malfunctioning Board, and in order to
fix
the situation I suggested James’ removal.
I voted for James’ removal from the Board because of his perceived reluctance to cooperate with the formal investigation, his withholding
of
information when asked for, his secrecy towards other Board members,
even
once the conspiracy was lifted, and him never convincingly taking responsibility for and ownership of his actions and mistakes. This is
why I
get triggered if he positions himself as an avatar of transparency. The whole topic of the Knowledge Engine - although it played a part in the events that lead to the November meeting - did not, for me, in any way influence the vote on James’ removal. It was solely his conduct during
and
following the November meeting.
I am glad to see that, since James’ removal until I left, the Board has been functioning better.
I hope that this account helps a little bit towards renewing our
culture
of
transparency, but even more I hope for understanding. The Board
consists
of
volunteers and of humans - they cannot react in real-time to events, as
the
Board was never set up to do so. Trustees - myself included - made mistakes. By opening up about them, I hope that we can facilitate a
faster
and more complete healing process, and also have this knowledge and experience available for future Board members and the community.
Denny _______________________________________________ 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 Mon, May 2, 2016 at 11:07 AM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
The protection of any personal or confidential information was, to the best of my knowledge, at all time guaranteed and has not been compromised. The official task force, set up by the Trustees, worked under the standards of keeping confidentiality, obviously. I thought this goes without saying, but I am explicating it.
Was information passed to people on the task force without the original
sources' consent?
+1 to that question, which is the biggest flag I have here.
"The highest standards of confidentiality" is nice but, as you note, people presumably reached out to these individual Board members, rather than the whole Board, because they felt the individuals could be trusted a lot better than the Board as a whole. Which in my mind is totally understandable.
If people reached out in confidence, demanding that their experiences and information be turned over to the entire Board - without noting that as a caveat when first interacting with the source, or without asking for the source's permission - well, I'd be cagey too. Anyone who has ever dealt with human subject research would be cagey.
if people *did* grant permission, obviously that's an entirely different situation. But if they didn't, James was doing entirely the right thing by refusing to turn over, wholesale, information communicated to him and him alone, to a wider body that was quite clearly not trusted by the people making these reports.
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 4:03 PM, SarahSV sarahsv.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 11:07 AM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
The protection of any personal or confidential information was, to the best of my knowledge, at all time guaranteed and has not been compromised. The official task force, set up by the Trustees, worked under the standards of keeping confidentiality, obviously. I thought this goes without saying, but I am explicating it.
Was information passed to people on the task force without the original
sources' consent?
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WMF staff reached out to a few chosen Board members, including myself, specifically with a request to maintain confidentiality. They were afraid of retribution. We followed with an earnest but incomplete investigation. In early Oct I pushed for moving the investigation from the initial group of 4-6 board members to the entire board. Instead another subsection of five board members were chosen to continue the investigation (a group which included Denny and Patricio but not myself).
I was involved, along with WMF staff, in preparing a summary of relevant details and submitted this to this new board group. Additionally Patricio, and Denny were cc'ed on the majority of my emails regarding the situation in question, and therefore I had the understanding that they would bring this information forwards. The information I shared was a full reflection of what I had learned during my conversations with staff.
As for my willingness to share all communications with the entire board, I believe I managed to communicate all relevant details without violating the explicit confidence requested of me by staff members. (Note that in later conversations I was informed that it may not be legal for board members to promise confidentiality to individual staff, as our ultimate duty is to the WMF as a whole).
On the other hand, I however, had requested multiple times before the November board meeting to see what information those 5 investigation board members were looking at. I was denied access to these details. Some of the documents contained key information I only become aware of in the last couple of months.
That we were not all looking at the same relevant evidence, I would argue, was one reason why the November board meeting was less than a success.
James Heilman
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 11:33 PM, Oliver Keyes ironholds@gmail.com wrote:
+1 to that question, which is the biggest flag I have here.
"The highest standards of confidentiality" is nice but, as you note, people presumably reached out to these individual Board members, rather than the whole Board, because they felt the individuals could be trusted a lot better than the Board as a whole. Which in my mind is totally understandable.
If people reached out in confidence, demanding that their experiences and information be turned over to the entire Board - without noting that as a caveat when first interacting with the source, or without asking for the source's permission - well, I'd be cagey too. Anyone who has ever dealt with human subject research would be cagey.
if people *did* grant permission, obviously that's an entirely different situation. But if they didn't, James was doing entirely the right thing by refusing to turn over, wholesale, information communicated to him and him alone, to a wider body that was quite clearly not trusted by the people making these reports.
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 4:03 PM, SarahSV sarahsv.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 11:07 AM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
The protection of any personal or confidential information was, to the
best
of my knowledge, at all time guaranteed and has not been compromised.
The
official task force, set up by the Trustees, worked under the standards
of
keeping confidentiality, obviously. I thought this goes without saying,
but
I am explicating it.
Was information passed to people on the task force without the original
sources' consent?
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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 2 May 2016 at 23:27, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote: ...
On the other hand, I however, had requested multiple times before the November board meeting to see what information those 5 investigation board members were looking at. I was denied access to these details. Some of the documents contained key information I only become aware of in the last couple of months.
*This* is breathtakingly crappy governance by the WMF board. Trustees are trustees, there's no "grade A" trusted trustees and lesser "grade B" less trusted trustees.
We are overdue to clear out the self-selected "grade A" trustees that have become far too used to claiming that they are irreplaceable and have unique talents. There's a vast pool of community members with fantastic experience to choose from, and who have absolutely no undeclared commercial conflicts of interest, or are seeking to puff up the 'tech' side of their resumeés, so they can charge higher fees for speaking engagements or attract contracts as special advisors for politicians.
Thanks for factually explaining events more clearly James.
Fae
Denny, regarding "The formal task force was created end of October. This task force involved outside legal counsel and conducted professional fact finding."
Who was on the task force, besides you and Patricio? What do you mean by "professional fact finding?"
Regarding, "The official task force, set up by the Trustees, worked under the standards of keeping confidentiality, obviously. I thought this goes without saying, but I am explicating it."
This is still ambiguous. Was the new task force expecting James to share information that was given to him on the understanding he wouldn't share it?
As a general point, crises always start out messy. That you moved from an ad hoc inquiry to a formal one is perfectly normal. Characterising the initial attempt to understand the situation as "unprofessional" and the next (that excluded James) as "professional", if that's what you're doing, strikes me as a bit sly.
Anthony Cole
On Tue, May 3, 2016 at 6:56 AM, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
On 2 May 2016 at 23:27, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote: ...
On the other hand, I however, had requested multiple times before the November board meeting to see what information those 5 investigation
board
members were looking at. I was denied access to these details. Some of
the
documents contained key information I only become aware of in the last couple of months.
*This* is breathtakingly crappy governance by the WMF board. Trustees are trustees, there's no "grade A" trusted trustees and lesser "grade B" less trusted trustees.
We are overdue to clear out the self-selected "grade A" trustees that have become far too used to claiming that they are irreplaceable and have unique talents. There's a vast pool of community members with fantastic experience to choose from, and who have absolutely no undeclared commercial conflicts of interest, or are seeking to puff up the 'tech' side of their resumeés, so they can charge higher fees for speaking engagements or attract contracts as special advisors for politicians.
Thanks for factually explaining events more clearly James.
Fae
faewik@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
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On 03/05/16 08:27, James Heilman wrote:
As for my willingness to share all communications with the entire board, I believe I managed to communicate all relevant details without violating the explicit confidence requested of me by staff members. (Note that in later conversations I was informed that it may not be legal for board members to promise confidentiality to individual staff, as our ultimate duty is to the WMF as a whole).
Board members have a duty to act in the interests of the WMF as a whole, but it does not follow that denying anonymity to whistleblowers is in the best interests of the WMF. In fact, I think this Lila/KF/KE case demonstrates the opposite.
I would encourage the Board to extend the current whistleblower policy to provide protection to employees making anonymous complaints via certain intermediaries (such as active Board members), rather than requiring complaints to be made directly to the Chair of the Board; and to specify that the forwarding of such anonymous reports by Board members to the Chair would be permissible.
If we want to avoid a repeat of this affair, then employees should be encouraged to communicate serious concerns to the Board as early as possible.
-- Tim Starling
Tim Starling wrote:
Board members have a duty to act in the interests of the WMF as a whole, but it does not follow that denying anonymity to whistleblowers is in the best interests of the WMF. In fact, I think this Lila/KF/KE case demonstrates the opposite.
I would encourage the Board to extend the current whistleblower policy to provide protection to employees making anonymous complaints via certain intermediaries (such as active Board members), rather than requiring complaints to be made directly to the Chair of the Board; and to specify that the forwarding of such anonymous reports by Board members to the Chair would be permissible.
If we want to avoid a repeat of this affair, then employees should be encouraged to communicate serious concerns to the Board as early as possible.
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Whistleblower_policy
You mention anonymous complaints and serious concerns, but the current whistleblower policy seems to be pretty clear that it only applies to laws, rules, and regulations. The text of the policy indicates, to me at least, that even alleged violations of other Wikimedia Foundation policies would not be covered by the whistleblower policy. Would you extend the Wikimedia Foundation whistleblower policy to cover regular (i.e., non-legal and non-regulatory) grievances?
My understanding is that the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees sought out and then appointed a tech-minded chief executive, who came from a tech organization, in order to "transform" the Wikimedia Foundation from an educational non-profit to be more like a traditional tech company. Many employees of the Wikimedia Foundation disagreed with this decision and the chief executive made a series of poor hires who ran amok (looking at you, Damon), but I don't think anything rose to the level of illegal behavior.
From my perspective, whether rightfully or wrongfully, the staff mutinied
and ultimately successfully deposed the appointed executive director. I don't see how this whistleblower policy or most variations of it that a typical non-profit would enact would really be applicable here.
MZMcBride
Pardon my naivety, but is it possible that "whistleblowers" didn't want the whole Board to know their identity, because other Board members were very close to Lila?
It's pretty clear to me that there was serious fear of retribution (not implying that retribution was likely, just saying that the *fear* of that was real).
There is no guilt whatsoever in being friend/close with Lila, but it just makes things *much* more complex: given that, whistleblowing staff probably did really want to remain anonymous and speak only with certain Board members.
Am I missing something?
Aubrey
On Wed, May 4, 2016 at 4:02 AM, MZMcBride z@mzmcbride.com wrote:
Tim Starling wrote:
Board members have a duty to act in the interests of the WMF as a whole, but it does not follow that denying anonymity to whistleblowers is in the best interests of the WMF. In fact, I think this Lila/KF/KE case demonstrates the opposite.
I would encourage the Board to extend the current whistleblower policy to provide protection to employees making anonymous complaints via certain intermediaries (such as active Board members), rather than requiring complaints to be made directly to the Chair of the Board; and to specify that the forwarding of such anonymous reports by Board members to the Chair would be permissible.
If we want to avoid a repeat of this affair, then employees should be encouraged to communicate serious concerns to the Board as early as possible.
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Whistleblower_policy
You mention anonymous complaints and serious concerns, but the current whistleblower policy seems to be pretty clear that it only applies to laws, rules, and regulations. The text of the policy indicates, to me at least, that even alleged violations of other Wikimedia Foundation policies would not be covered by the whistleblower policy. Would you extend the Wikimedia Foundation whistleblower policy to cover regular (i.e., non-legal and non-regulatory) grievances?
My understanding is that the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees sought out and then appointed a tech-minded chief executive, who came from a tech organization, in order to "transform" the Wikimedia Foundation from an educational non-profit to be more like a traditional tech company. Many employees of the Wikimedia Foundation disagreed with this decision and the chief executive made a series of poor hires who ran amok (looking at you, Damon), but I don't think anything rose to the level of illegal behavior.
From my perspective, whether rightfully or wrongfully, the staff mutinied and ultimately successfully deposed the appointed executive director. I don't see how this whistleblower policy or most variations of it that a typical non-profit would enact would really be applicable here.
MZMcBride
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On 04/05/16 12:02, MZMcBride wrote:
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Whistleblower_policy
You mention anonymous complaints and serious concerns, but the current whistleblower policy seems to be pretty clear that it only applies to laws, rules, and regulations. The text of the policy indicates, to me at least, that even alleged violations of other Wikimedia Foundation policies would not be covered by the whistleblower policy. Would you extend the Wikimedia Foundation whistleblower policy to cover regular (i.e., non-legal and non-regulatory) grievances?
The third and fourth paragraphs are not so narrow, but otherwise, yes, I think it should be extended.
My understanding is that the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees sought out and then appointed a tech-minded chief executive, who came from a tech organization, in order to "transform" the Wikimedia Foundation from an educational non-profit to be more like a traditional tech company. Many employees of the Wikimedia Foundation disagreed with this decision and the chief executive made a series of poor hires who ran amok (looking at you, Damon), but I don't think anything rose to the level of illegal behavior.
You are just regurgitating Lila's email. No transformation was attempted or executed. The first time I heard about this supposed conflict over strategy was when Lila posted her claims about it to this list, shortly before her resignation.
In fact, employees disagreed with Lila's decision to pursue large restricted grants for a stupid pet project, in secret, supported by almost nobody, without Board knowledge let alone approval. This has nothing to do with education versus technology (if such a dichotomy can even be said to exist).
Damon merely suggested the project in question, he did not "run amok".
-- Tim Starling
It seems to me, that the question of whether or not we should consider extending the scope of the whistleblower policy, can be reduced to a question of whether or not we believe that United States law at any given moment is an ideal representation of unacceptable conduct.
Either way, I would be deeply encouraged to see progress in creating a more robust and predictable connection between the board and WMF staff. Whether that connection ends up being a board liaison or something else, I suspect that well-established lines of communication would go a very long way toward eliminating the possibility that large numbers of staff will feel like they have to disassemble the whistleblower policy in the first place.
-Katie
On Wed, May 4, 2016 at 6:10 PM, Tim Starling tstarling@wikimedia.org wrote:
On 04/05/16 12:02, MZMcBride wrote:
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Whistleblower_policy
You mention anonymous complaints and serious concerns, but the current whistleblower policy seems to be pretty clear that it only applies to laws, rules, and regulations. The text of the policy indicates, to me at least, that even alleged violations of other Wikimedia Foundation
policies
would not be covered by the whistleblower policy. Would you extend the Wikimedia Foundation whistleblower policy to cover regular (i.e., non-legal and non-regulatory) grievances?
The third and fourth paragraphs are not so narrow, but otherwise, yes, I think it should be extended.
My understanding is that the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees
sought
out and then appointed a tech-minded chief executive, who came from a
tech
organization, in order to "transform" the Wikimedia Foundation from an educational non-profit to be more like a traditional tech company. Many employees of the Wikimedia Foundation disagreed with this decision and
the
chief executive made a series of poor hires who ran amok (looking at you, Damon), but I don't think anything rose to the level of illegal behavior.
You are just regurgitating Lila's email. No transformation was attempted or executed. The first time I heard about this supposed conflict over strategy was when Lila posted her claims about it to this list, shortly before her resignation.
In fact, employees disagreed with Lila's decision to pursue large restricted grants for a stupid pet project, in secret, supported by almost nobody, without Board knowledge let alone approval. This has nothing to do with education versus technology (if such a dichotomy can even be said to exist).
Damon merely suggested the project in question, he did not "run amok".
-- Tim Starling
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04.05.2016 22:00 "Katie Horn" khorn@wikimedia.org napisał(a):
Either way, I would be deeply encouraged to see progress in creating a
more
robust and predictable connection between the board and WMF staff. Whether that connection ends up being a board liaison or something else, I suspect that well-established lines of communication would go a very long way toward eliminating the possibility that large numbers of staff will feel like they have to disassemble the whistleblower policy in the first place.
A conversation on how to address (a) connection with the staff and (b) revise the whistleblower policy has started and we will try to address both of these issues in the near future. Best,
Dj
-Katie
On Wed, May 4, 2016 at 6:10 PM, Tim Starling tstarling@wikimedia.org wrote:
On 04/05/16 12:02, MZMcBride wrote:
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Whistleblower_policy
You mention anonymous complaints and serious concerns, but the current whistleblower policy seems to be pretty clear that it only applies to laws, rules, and regulations. The text of the policy indicates, to me
at
least, that even alleged violations of other Wikimedia Foundation
policies
would not be covered by the whistleblower policy. Would you extend the Wikimedia Foundation whistleblower policy to cover regular (i.e., non-legal and non-regulatory) grievances?
The third and fourth paragraphs are not so narrow, but otherwise, yes, I think it should be extended.
My understanding is that the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees
sought
out and then appointed a tech-minded chief executive, who came from a
tech
organization, in order to "transform" the Wikimedia Foundation from an educational non-profit to be more like a traditional tech company.
Many
employees of the Wikimedia Foundation disagreed with this decision and
the
chief executive made a series of poor hires who ran amok (looking at
you,
Damon), but I don't think anything rose to the level of illegal
behavior.
You are just regurgitating Lila's email. No transformation was attempted or executed. The first time I heard about this supposed conflict over strategy was when Lila posted her claims about it to this list, shortly before her resignation.
In fact, employees disagreed with Lila's decision to pursue large restricted grants for a stupid pet project, in secret, supported by almost nobody, without Board knowledge let alone approval. This has nothing to do with education versus technology (if such a dichotomy can even be said to exist).
Damon merely suggested the project in question, he did not "run amok".
-- Tim Starling
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Just a few points of clarification:
* I have, to the best of my memory, passed on information only with the understanding of my sources. If any of my sources disagrees with that, please send me a message - I want to know and understand that I made a mistake there. * We are not talking about the information being shared with the whole Board (this was not clear from my account, sorry). No one was asked to forward information to the whole Board. Instead, external legal counsel was collecting the documents: they were sent to the lawyers, under attorney-client privilege, not to the whole Board or the Task Force. * I am surprised to see James state that he was informed at a later point that his duty as a trustee is towards the WMF, although that explains a few things. He was sitting in the same room when we received legal training at our first Board meeting, and he also signed (and, I assume, read) the same documents I had.
I am rather sad to see so many assumptions of bad faith. I was hoping that by being more open about the events, it would help with transparency and healing. It was not easy to have this account published in the first place, and now I start to see that it was possibly a mistake.
It strengthens my resolution to stay away from Wikimedia politics, and I hope that this will free up the time and energy to get more things done. I am thankful and full of respect for anyone who is willing to deal with that topic in a constructive manner.
On Fri, May 6, 2016 at 3:46 AM Dariusz Jemielniak darekj@alk.edu.pl wrote:
04.05.2016 22:00 "Katie Horn" khorn@wikimedia.org napisał(a):
Either way, I would be deeply encouraged to see progress in creating a
more
robust and predictable connection between the board and WMF staff.
Whether
that connection ends up being a board liaison or something else, I
suspect
that well-established lines of communication would go a very long way toward eliminating the possibility that large numbers of staff will feel like they have to disassemble the whistleblower policy in the first
place.
A conversation on how to address (a) connection with the staff and (b) revise the whistleblower policy has started and we will try to address both of these issues in the near future. Best,
Dj
-Katie
On Wed, May 4, 2016 at 6:10 PM, Tim Starling tstarling@wikimedia.org wrote:
On 04/05/16 12:02, MZMcBride wrote:
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Whistleblower_policy
You mention anonymous complaints and serious concerns, but the
current
whistleblower policy seems to be pretty clear that it only applies to laws, rules, and regulations. The text of the policy indicates, to me
at
least, that even alleged violations of other Wikimedia Foundation
policies
would not be covered by the whistleblower policy. Would you extend
the
Wikimedia Foundation whistleblower policy to cover regular (i.e., non-legal and non-regulatory) grievances?
The third and fourth paragraphs are not so narrow, but otherwise, yes, I think it should be extended.
My understanding is that the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees
sought
out and then appointed a tech-minded chief executive, who came from a
tech
organization, in order to "transform" the Wikimedia Foundation from
an
educational non-profit to be more like a traditional tech company.
Many
employees of the Wikimedia Foundation disagreed with this decision
and
the
chief executive made a series of poor hires who ran amok (looking at
you,
Damon), but I don't think anything rose to the level of illegal
behavior.
You are just regurgitating Lila's email. No transformation was attempted or executed. The first time I heard about this supposed conflict over strategy was when Lila posted her claims about it to this list, shortly before her resignation.
In fact, employees disagreed with Lila's decision to pursue large restricted grants for a stupid pet project, in secret, supported by almost nobody, without Board knowledge let alone approval. This has nothing to do with education versus technology (if such a dichotomy can even be said to exist).
Damon merely suggested the project in question, he did not "run amok".
-- Tim Starling
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On Fri, May 6, 2016 at 12:03 PM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
Just a few points of clarification:
- I have, to the best of my memory, passed on information only with the
understanding of my sources. If any of my sources disagrees with that, please send me a message - I want to know and understand that I made a mistake there.
- We are not talking about the information being shared with the whole
Board (this was not clear from my account, sorry). No one was asked to forward information to the whole Board. Instead, external legal counsel was collecting the documents: they were sent to the lawyers, under attorney-client privilege, not to the whole Board or the Task Force.
- I am surprised to see James state that he was informed at a later point
that his duty as a trustee is towards the WMF, although that explains a few things. He was sitting in the same room when we received legal training at our first Board meeting, and he also signed (and, I assume, read) the same documents I had.
I am rather sad to see so many assumptions of bad faith. I was hoping that by being more open about the events, it would help with transparency and healing. It was not easy to have this account published in the first place, and now I start to see that it was possibly a mistake.
It strengthens my resolution to stay away from Wikimedia politics, and I hope that this will free up the time and energy to get more things done. I am thankful and full of respect for anyone who is willing to deal with that topic in a constructive manner.
Denny, thank you for your summary of events and your willingness to provide information that wasn't widely available. I hope you continue to be willing to do that, even understanding that there is no guarantee that criticism will not be part of the result. Talking through these things brings up points of confusion and misunderstanding and helps clear them up for everyone, and this is a good thing. An example - if the WMF/board hires an outside law firm, the attorney-client privilege is between the WMF and the firm; individual employees are not protected against disclosure of information by the firm to the WMF because the employee is not the client, the WMF is.
Denny I never stated that I "was informed at a later point that [my] duty as a trustee is towards the WMF". I have at all times understood that I have a duty to the WMF and believe I have at all times fulfilled this duty. A duty to the foundation; however, does not permit me to act unethically and one is still required to use their own judgement.
What I did state was "Note that in later conversations I was informed that it may not be legal for board members to promise confidentiality to individual staff, as our ultimate duty is to the WMF as a whole".
James
On Fri, May 6, 2016 at 10:10 AM, Nathan nawrich@gmail.com wrote:
On Fri, May 6, 2016 at 12:03 PM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
Just a few points of clarification:
- I have, to the best of my memory, passed on information only with the
understanding of my sources. If any of my sources disagrees with that, please send me a message - I want to know and understand that I made a mistake there.
- We are not talking about the information being shared with the whole
Board (this was not clear from my account, sorry). No one was asked to forward information to the whole Board. Instead, external legal counsel
was
collecting the documents: they were sent to the lawyers, under attorney-client privilege, not to the whole Board or the Task Force.
- I am surprised to see James state that he was informed at a later point
that his duty as a trustee is towards the WMF, although that explains a
few
things. He was sitting in the same room when we received legal training
at
our first Board meeting, and he also signed (and, I assume, read) the
same
documents I had.
I am rather sad to see so many assumptions of bad faith. I was hoping
that
by being more open about the events, it would help with transparency and healing. It was not easy to have this account published in the first
place,
and now I start to see that it was possibly a mistake.
It strengthens my resolution to stay away from Wikimedia politics, and I hope that this will free up the time and energy to get more things done.
I
am thankful and full of respect for anyone who is willing to deal with
that
topic in a constructive manner.
Denny, thank you for your summary of events and your willingness to provide information that wasn't widely available. I hope you continue to be willing to do that, even understanding that there is no guarantee that criticism will not be part of the result. Talking through these things brings up points of confusion and misunderstanding and helps clear them up for everyone, and this is a good thing. An example - if the WMF/board hires an outside law firm, the attorney-client privilege is between the WMF and the firm; individual employees are not protected against disclosure of information by the firm to the WMF because the employee is not the client, the WMF is. _______________________________________________ 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
I talked to James throughout his trusteeship, and I have no doubt that he for a second believed that his fidicuiary duty was towards anyone other than the WMF. Two very different confidentiality issues have been conflated w/r/t Jame's removal: the appropriate level of of confidentiality regarding the KE, a significant movement engineering project (which is not terribly high, imo,) and the appropriate level of confidentiality regarding the concerns of staff members regarding leadership (which is much higher imo, to the point that if James honestly believed that by disclosing a particular piece of information revealed to him by a staff member he would be endangering the possibility of future staff members approaching him with similar concerns, it may be completely appropriate for James to categorically not reveal that information.)
Fidiciuary duty is, unfortunately, an often misunderstood concept. James' duty was not to act how other board members thought he should act, nor how outside counsel thought he should act. To use an EXTREME example, and to be clear, I have no basis to believe this was the case, if Lila had personally committed severely inappropriate personal acts against an individual staff member and in James' best judgement informing outside counsel of that fact could harm the interests of the WMF- e.g., by not having future whistleblowers' be willing to come forward to him, then it would both be unethical and against Jame's fidicicuary duty as a trustee to reveal this information to anyone - be they fellow board members, outside counsel, etc. James is absolutely 100% correct in stating that any attorney retained by the Wikimedia Foundation, whether in-house (e.g., Geoff, Michelle,) or an outside firm, has, as their client, the Wikimedia Foundation - not the staff members in question. If outside counsel thought that they in turn had a duty to their clients (the WMF) to reveal information that James had revealed to them that he had received from a staff member, outside counsel would be acting unethically if they then didn't do so. Jame's description of his events backs up everything he's said publicly previously, with the exception of me adding "new WMF trustees really need better training, and I can suggest nonprofit consultancies to provide such if needed."
I find it bloody incredible that James, who was involved in figuring out whether a formal task force was needed, was then excluded from it and expected to suborn his personal judgement (which he cannot legally do) to that of other trustees. I know my involvement in Wikipedia-proper has been at a nadir of late, but I've still been closely following events (and expect that nadir to receed soon.) Ignoring Arnon, and other recent poor decisions, I still have incredibly serious issues with the fact that we have a trustee sitting FOR LIFE (Jimmy) who has been committing defamation per se against James' this entire time, who is in his professional role, a doctor. WMF governance needs a VERY through review, and all of the issues involved in this entire situation - including a trustee for life continually failing his fiduciary duty by committing defamation per se against James - needs a TRANSPARENT outside review as soon as possible, or we face a literally existential threat to WMF's survival.
Best, Kevin Gorman
On Sat, May 7, 2016 at 9:47 AM, James Heilman jmh649@gmail.com wrote:
Denny I never stated that I "was informed at a later point that [my] duty as a trustee is towards the WMF". I have at all times understood that I have a duty to the WMF and believe I have at all times fulfilled this duty. A duty to the foundation; however, does not permit me to act unethically and one is still required to use their own judgement.
What I did state was "Note that in later conversations I was informed that it may not be legal for board members to promise confidentiality to individual staff, as our ultimate duty is to the WMF as a whole".
James
On Fri, May 6, 2016 at 10:10 AM, Nathan nawrich@gmail.com wrote:
On Fri, May 6, 2016 at 12:03 PM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
Just a few points of clarification:
- I have, to the best of my memory, passed on information only with the
understanding of my sources. If any of my sources disagrees with that, please send me a message - I want to know and understand that I made a mistake there.
- We are not talking about the information being shared with the whole
Board (this was not clear from my account, sorry). No one was asked to forward information to the whole Board. Instead, external legal counsel
was
collecting the documents: they were sent to the lawyers, under attorney-client privilege, not to the whole Board or the Task Force.
- I am surprised to see James state that he was informed at a later
point
that his duty as a trustee is towards the WMF, although that explains a
few
things. He was sitting in the same room when we received legal training
at
our first Board meeting, and he also signed (and, I assume, read) the
same
documents I had.
I am rather sad to see so many assumptions of bad faith. I was hoping
that
by being more open about the events, it would help with transparency
and
healing. It was not easy to have this account published in the first
place,
and now I start to see that it was possibly a mistake.
It strengthens my resolution to stay away from Wikimedia politics, and
I
hope that this will free up the time and energy to get more things
done.
I
am thankful and full of respect for anyone who is willing to deal with
that
topic in a constructive manner.
Denny, thank you for your summary of events and your willingness to
provide
information that wasn't widely available. I hope you continue to be
willing
to do that, even understanding that there is no guarantee that criticism will not be part of the result. Talking through these things brings up points of confusion and misunderstanding and helps clear them up for everyone, and this is a good thing. An example - if the WMF/board hires
an
outside law firm, the attorney-client privilege is between the WMF and
the
firm; individual employees are not protected against disclosure of information by the firm to the WMF because the employee is not the
client,
the WMF is. _______________________________________________ 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
-- 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
Denny,
I appreciate that you've put forth this account. That's in no way facetious or just a pretext, I am actually very glad to see someone speak to this.
I'd like, however, to suggest what would actually begin the process of healing, since that's your intent. Most of us knew at least more or less what James was accused of.
First, James needs to be restored to the Board, or at very least, his restoration needs to be passed as a referendum to the community. Since you've now posted your side, there's no reason that the community, rather than the Board, shouldn't decide on James' trusteeship. That needs to happen now, not at the next election, and it should have happened to start with.
Second, the Board needs to resolve never to remove a community trustee except by a successful recall referendum to the community. The Board should never, under any circumstances, remove a community trustee without consent of the community that elected them. That was unacceptable and must never happen again. There will be no "healing" without a promise that it will not.
Third, the "founder" seat needs to be eliminated. Jimmy would be, of course, eligible to run for a community seat or be appointed to an expert seat, but he shouldn't be a "member for life". Alternatively, the "founder" seat could be made into an advisory, non-voting position.
And finally, while this part is optional, it wouldn't hurt for the Board to increase the number of community elected ( and not "recommended", elected) seats to a majority. While there's room for "expert" appointed seats and chapter selected seats (and no, chapter selected seats are NOT community selected seats), the community should be in control and have a majority, and the others should be an advisory minority. The community has always been in charge of WMF projects, and this should continue to be the case.
If you want to actually start the healing process, rather than deflect, at the very least the first three things need to be done. If you want to regain trust, all of them need to be. The community needs to be in charge.
Todd
Second, the Board needs to resolve never to remove a community trustee except by a successful recall referendum to the community. The Board
should
never, under any circumstances, remove a community trustee without consent of the community that elected them.
Are you sure about this?
Whatever the rights and wrongs of the situation with James, I think it's a hostage to fortune.
If there were a seriously dysfunctional trustee in future then this would amplify the damage they could do quite a bit, by making them unsackable.
Regards,
Chris
I agree there needs to be a way to remove trustees, but IMO for community elected trustees there needs to be community involvement in the process. Also the ability to remove trustees "without cause" should be rescinded.
J
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 12:38 PM, Chris Keating chriskeatingwiki@gmail.com wrote:
Second, the Board needs to resolve never to remove a community trustee except by a successful recall referendum to the community. The Board
should
never, under any circumstances, remove a community trustee without
consent
of the community that elected them.
Are you sure about this?
Whatever the rights and wrongs of the situation with James, I think it's a hostage to fortune.
If there were a seriously dysfunctional trustee in future then this would amplify the damage they could do quite a bit, by making them unsackable.
Regards,
Chris _______________________________________________ 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 some of you may remember, I was the only trustee who voted against James' removal except himself.
Nevertheless, I still believe that any functioning body as our Board has to have the right to expel a person, whom they feel like not being able to work with.
If a majority of my fellow Board members cannot stand me for whatever reason (including the ones I'd find absurd), that's pretty much it. The Board has to be able to function with trust, delegation, and a certain rapport.
As long as such cases are really very rare, I don't think there needs to be much change from our process. Practically, I don't see how the community could be involved - after all, if a majority of some Board just cannot stand a person or there is a generalized mistrust, there is not much that external insight will change.
However, we need a better process for dealing with vacant community seats for sure. Also, I think it would be fair to always give written reasons to removed members (also to discipline the reasoning of the Board that makes such a drastic decision). About "for cause" or not, I have no opinion, as it is the American legalese I am not and will not be fully proficient in.
Dariusz 08.05.2016 3:02 PM "James Heilman" jmh649@gmail.com napisał(a):
I agree there needs to be a way to remove trustees, but IMO for community elected trustees there needs to be community involvement in the process. Also the ability to remove trustees "without cause" should be rescinded.
J
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 12:38 PM, Chris Keating <chriskeatingwiki@gmail.com
wrote:
Second, the Board needs to resolve never to remove a community trustee except by a successful recall referendum to the community. The Board
should
never, under any circumstances, remove a community trustee without
consent
of the community that elected them.
Are you sure about this?
Whatever the rights and wrongs of the situation with James, I think it's
a
hostage to fortune.
If there were a seriously dysfunctional trustee in future then this would amplify the damage they could do quite a bit, by making them unsackable.
Regards,
Chris _______________________________________________ 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
-- 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
Nevertheless, I still believe that any functioning body as our Board has to have the right to expel a person, whom they feel like not being able to work with.
If a majority of my fellow Board members cannot stand me for whatever reason (including the ones I'd find absurd), that's pretty much it. The Board has to be able to function with trust, delegation, and a certain rapport.
...Also, I think it would be fair to always give written reasons to removed members (also to discipline the reasoning of the Board that makes such a drastic decision).
I think it would be helpful if expectations of Board members and processes to follow if they aren't being met were laid out more clearly.
The WMF doesn't seem to document this much. Compare for instance Wikimedia UK's Trustee Code of Conduct: https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/Trustee_Code_of_Conduct
Something like that would be a useful structure on which to base future conversations and decisions of that nature.
I agree with Dariusz that James's suggestion of formally engaging the community in making these decisions probably wont' work. In my experience the community is very aware of some issues and completely unaware of some others. If it is the latter then it's very difficult to have a meaningful conversation - particularly as some of the issues (e.g. staff matters) may be confidential....
Chris
My proposal was not to bring these sorts of issues to the "entire community" for a vote but for some form of community involvement. I was more thinking a group of functionaries who would be given confidential access to details and provide a bit of a check and balance to internal disagreements.
James
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 2:59 PM, Chris Keating chriskeatingwiki@gmail.com wrote:
Nevertheless, I still believe that any functioning body as our Board has
to
have the right to expel a person, whom they feel like not being able to work with.
If a majority of my fellow Board members cannot stand me for whatever reason (including the ones I'd find absurd), that's pretty much it. The Board has to be able to function with trust, delegation, and a certain rapport.
...Also, I think it would be fair to always give written reasons to removed members (also to discipline the reasoning of the Board that makes such a drastic decision).
I think it would be helpful if expectations of Board members and processes to follow if they aren't being met were laid out more clearly.
The WMF doesn't seem to document this much. Compare for instance Wikimedia UK's Trustee Code of Conduct: https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/Trustee_Code_of_Conduct
Something like that would be a useful structure on which to base future conversations and decisions of that nature.
I agree with Dariusz that James's suggestion of formally engaging the community in making these decisions probably wont' work. In my experience the community is very aware of some issues and completely unaware of some others. If it is the latter then it's very difficult to have a meaningful conversation - particularly as some of the issues (e.g. staff matters) may be confidential....
Chris _______________________________________________ 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
We already have one of those. Cheers, P
-----Original Message----- From: Wikimedia-l [mailto:wikimedia-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Chris Keating Sent: Sunday, 08 May 2016 8:38 PM To: Wikimedia Mailing List Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Account of the events leading to James Heilman's removal
Second, the Board needs to resolve never to remove a community trustee except by a successful recall referendum to the community. The Board
should
never, under any circumstances, remove a community trustee without consent of the community that elected them.
Are you sure about this?
Whatever the rights and wrongs of the situation with James, I think it's a hostage to fortune.
If there were a seriously dysfunctional trustee in future then this would amplify the damage they could do quite a bit, by making them unsackable.
Regards,
Chris _______________________________________________ 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
----- No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 2016.0.7596 / Virus Database: 4565/12191 - Release Date: 05/08/16
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 3:15 PM, Peter Southwood < peter.southwood@telkomsa.net> wrote:
We already have one of those. Cheers, P
Right, okay, whatever.
Combing through WM-l archives for the past six months, there is a pattern:
James is removed from the board - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO Jimmy and James get into it in a public space - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO The Arnon thing happens - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO The Knowledge Engine thing happens - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO The Lila thing happens - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO Denny writes this email - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO
Let's think on that for a bit when we want to talk about the power of politics, and who is playing what game and what side they are on.
Did none of you who replied to this email from Denny with JIMMY MUST GO bother to notice that Jimmy's name isn't even mentioned in this chain of dysfunctional events? I suspect not, because the line has already clearly drawn uncompromising the sand, and it was drawn years ago. If you want to continue to pretend that Jimmy Wales is the root of all that's wrong with the movement, that's your prerogative, but there's a reason why it's only the same people saying it over and over again.
Denny, thank you for sharing your side of the story.
I would venture quite a bit more than 'eight people' are annoyed by the constant and blatant double standard.
And oh, I now anticipate a patronizing mail that starts with 'Hoi,' and ends with 'Thanks' -- it's not just 'the same eight people' that keep repeating their position ad nauseam.
On 8 May 2016 at 23:11, Keegan Peterzell keegan.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 3:15 PM, Peter Southwood < peter.southwood@telkomsa.net> wrote:
We already have one of those. Cheers, P
Right, okay, whatever.
Combing through WM-l archives for the past six months, there is a pattern:
James is removed from the board - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO Jimmy and James get into it in a public space - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO The Arnon thing happens - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO The Knowledge Engine thing happens - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO The Lila thing happens - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO Denny writes this email - the same eight people write JIMMY MUST GO
Let's think on that for a bit when we want to talk about the power of politics, and who is playing what game and what side they are on.
Did none of you who replied to this email from Denny with JIMMY MUST GO bother to notice that Jimmy's name isn't even mentioned in this chain of dysfunctional events? I suspect not, because the line has already clearly drawn uncompromising the sand, and it was drawn years ago. If you want to continue to pretend that Jimmy Wales is the root of all that's wrong with the movement, that's your prerogative, but there's a reason why it's only the same people saying it over and over again.
Denny, thank you for sharing your side of the story.
-- ~Keegan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Keegan
This is my personal email address. Everything sent from this email address is in a personal capacity. _______________________________________________ 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 Sun, May 8, 2016 at 4:28 PM, Michel Vuijlsteke wikipedia@zog.org wrote:
I would venture quite a bit more than 'eight people' are annoyed by the constant and blatant double standard.
And oh, I now anticipate a patronizing mail that starts with 'Hoi,' and ends with 'Thanks' -- it's not just 'the same eight people' that keep repeating their position ad nauseam.
Our general movement mailing list is a cesspool of personal vendettas, fear, uncertainty, and doubt, and people taking advantage of that in the guise of caring about the movement. It's quite embarrassing.
I now anticipate the {{cn}} response, so here it is:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/
Keegan, that may very well be true (though I would say it's certain communication channels, not "our entire movement.")
But stating that has no logical relation whatsoever to whether or not a certain trustee should remain in their position.
Also: If there are eight people who repeat something ad nauseum, doesn't it stand to reason that there might be more than eight who feel the same way, but don't see the benefit in repeating it ad nauseum? Doesn't it stand to reason that there might be more than eight who *cannot* publicly state their view, without risking (in reality or in their imagination) substantial backlash due to their roles?
-Pete [[User:Peteforsyth]]
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 2:31 PM, Keegan Peterzell keegan.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 4:28 PM, Michel Vuijlsteke wikipedia@zog.org wrote:
I would venture quite a bit more than 'eight people' are annoyed by the constant and blatant double standard.
And oh, I now anticipate a patronizing mail that starts with 'Hoi,' and ends with 'Thanks' -- it's not just 'the same eight people' that keep repeating their position ad nauseam.
Our general movement mailing list is a cesspool of personal vendettas, fear, uncertainty, and doubt, and people taking advantage of that in the guise of caring about the movement. It's quite embarrassing.
I now anticipate the {{cn}} response, so here it is:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/
-- ~Keegan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Keegan
This is my personal email address. Everything sent from this email address is in a personal capacity. _______________________________________________ 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 Sun, May 8, 2016 at 4:36 PM, Pete Forsyth peteforsyth@gmail.com wrote:
Keegan, that may very well be true (though I would say it's certain communication channels, not "our entire movement.")
But stating that has no logical relation whatsoever to whether or not a certain trustee should remain in their position.
You are correct, because that's not where I was going with that: Denny's account here has no logical relation as to whether or not Jimmy should be on the board. It's being used to promote a political position.
Also: If there are eight people who repeat something ad nauseum, doesn't it stand to reason that there might be more than eight who feel the same way, but don't see the benefit in repeating it ad nauseum? Doesn't it stand to reason that there might be more than eight who *cannot* publicly state their view, without risking (in reality or in their imagination) substantial backlash due to their roles?
Yes, there is a political camp within the movement that is anti-Jimmy that is larger than eight people. These eight do a fine job speaking up loudly to let us know that there is a political camp that is anti-Jimmy. That's fine to feel that way. To continually hijack important conversations about vision, strategy, and process to have to /always/ talk about a single individual or cause is harmful to our movement. It's simple DivideAndConquer group dynamics, and it should not be supported. I'm not saying that people or groups cannot or should not be criticised - it's very important. But the shell game that Blame Jimmy is not helpful in the least.
Keegan, thank you for clarifying; I understand better now. I agree about the dynamics; I wouldn't say Jimmy Wales' role on the Board is unrelated, though, as Denny's message was intended to shed light on a dynamic that has clearly involved Jimmy Wales in a central role.
All:
It seems (as is often the case) that we have gotten a little off track with some details, where there is some disagreement; but I suspect there is a pretty high degree of agreement on most of the steps Todd recommended above. I'll summarize them again here:
1. Restore James Heilman to the board (in Denny's now vacant seat) 2. Never remove a community trustee 3. Eliminate Founder's Seat, with various future possibilities for Jimmy Wales' role. 4. (expressed as optional) Make Community seats truly elected; increase number.
I pretty much agree with all of this, and I feel it would be helpful if others would briefly state if they do too. My comments:
1. We'd be lucky if James Heilman stays willing to serve. He was a good trustee to begin with, and it seems apparent the reasons for his removal were vastly insufficient. Jimmy and Denny have both made various efforts to justify the decision, which is appreciated, but I find the results entirely lacking. Guy Kawasaki, Frieda Brioschi, Alice Wiegand, and Patricio Lorente remain on the board, but have said almost nothing on the topic. At least one trustee has stated that he "voted with the majority" as though that is compatible with good governance (which it obviously isn't, as no trustee should be able to know others' votes for certain prior to deciding their own); and as though the upgrade from "majority" to "two-thirds majority" (required under Florida law for not-for-cause removal) isn't significant.
2. I agree with both Dariusz and James. I don't see an explicit need for changes to policy, but some articulation of process, or commentary on what kind of things could trigger expulsion could be very helpful.
3. Eliminate Founder's Seat: Yes. The board should vote to remove Jimmy Wales from the Founder's Seat (because there is still more than 2.5 years left in his term), and should vote to eliminate the Founder's Seat. What happens after is a separate question; a special advisory role seems ideal to me. These steps are easily accomplished. It's hard for me to imagine how a trustee could persuade him or herself that Jimmy's continued presence in the privileged Founder's Seat is in the best interests of the Wikimedia Foundation.
By the way, I think the WMF board may have successfully obscured the fact that Jimmy Wales' role has actually *increased* in recent months, not decreased: board minutes that took a long time to publish revealed that he was the first (and to my knowledge only) person selected as a Trustee of the new Endowment. I haven't seen this discussed anywhere.
4. I agree that tinkering with board composition may be valuable, but is secondary to the others. The main thing here is, the board should start to get the very basics of governance right. Any consideration of the structure of the board distracts from the fact that individuals made bad decisions. The main focus should be on correcting those errors, and rebuilding trust.
-Pete [[User:Peteforsyth]]
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 3:19 PM, Keegan Peterzell keegan.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 4:36 PM, Pete Forsyth peteforsyth@gmail.com wrote:
Keegan, that may very well be true (though I would say it's certain communication channels, not "our entire movement.")
But stating that has no logical relation whatsoever to whether or not a certain trustee should remain in their position.
You are correct, because that's not where I was going with that: Denny's account here has no logical relation as to whether or not Jimmy should be on the board. It's being used to promote a political position.
Also: If there are eight people who repeat something ad nauseum, doesn't
it
stand to reason that there might be more than eight who feel the same
way,
but don't see the benefit in repeating it ad nauseum? Doesn't it stand to reason that there might be more than eight who *cannot* publicly state their view, without risking (in reality or in their imagination) substantial backlash due to their roles?
Yes, there is a political camp within the movement that is anti-Jimmy that is larger than eight people. These eight do a fine job speaking up loudly to let us know that there is a political camp that is anti-Jimmy. That's fine to feel that way. To continually hijack important conversations about vision, strategy, and process to have to /always/ talk about a single individual or cause is harmful to our movement. It's simple DivideAndConquer group dynamics, and it should not be supported. I'm not saying that people or groups cannot or should not be criticised - it's very important. But the shell game that Blame Jimmy is not helpful in the least.
-- ~Keegan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Keegan
This is my personal email address. Everything sent from this email address is in a personal capacity. _______________________________________________ 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
Hoi, Sorry Pete, there is not. Thanks, GerardM
On 9 May 2016 at 01:30, Pete Forsyth peteforsyth@gmail.com wrote:
Keegan, thank you for clarifying; I understand better now. I agree about the dynamics; I wouldn't say Jimmy Wales' role on the Board is unrelated, though, as Denny's message was intended to shed light on a dynamic that has clearly involved Jimmy Wales in a central role.
All:
It seems (as is often the case) that we have gotten a little off track with some details, where there is some disagreement; but I suspect there is a pretty high degree of agreement on most of the steps Todd recommended above. I'll summarize them again here:
- Restore James Heilman to the board (in Denny's now vacant seat)
- Never remove a community trustee
- Eliminate Founder's Seat, with various future possibilities for Jimmy
Wales' role. 4. (expressed as optional) Make Community seats truly elected; increase number.
I pretty much agree with all of this, and I feel it would be helpful if others would briefly state if they do too. My comments:
- We'd be lucky if James Heilman stays willing to serve. He was a good
trustee to begin with, and it seems apparent the reasons for his removal were vastly insufficient. Jimmy and Denny have both made various efforts to justify the decision, which is appreciated, but I find the results entirely lacking. Guy Kawasaki, Frieda Brioschi, Alice Wiegand, and Patricio Lorente remain on the board, but have said almost nothing on the topic. At least one trustee has stated that he "voted with the majority" as though that is compatible with good governance (which it obviously isn't, as no trustee should be able to know others' votes for certain prior to deciding their own); and as though the upgrade from "majority" to "two-thirds majority" (required under Florida law for not-for-cause removal) isn't significant.
- I agree with both Dariusz and James. I don't see an explicit need for
changes to policy, but some articulation of process, or commentary on what kind of things could trigger expulsion could be very helpful.
- Eliminate Founder's Seat: Yes. The board should vote to remove Jimmy
Wales from the Founder's Seat (because there is still more than 2.5 years left in his term), and should vote to eliminate the Founder's Seat. What happens after is a separate question; a special advisory role seems ideal to me. These steps are easily accomplished. It's hard for me to imagine how a trustee could persuade him or herself that Jimmy's continued presence in the privileged Founder's Seat is in the best interests of the Wikimedia Foundation.
By the way, I think the WMF board may have successfully obscured the fact that Jimmy Wales' role has actually *increased* in recent months, not decreased: board minutes that took a long time to publish revealed that he was the first (and to my knowledge only) person selected as a Trustee of the new Endowment. I haven't seen this discussed anywhere.
- I agree that tinkering with board composition may be valuable, but is
secondary to the others. The main thing here is, the board should start to get the very basics of governance right. Any consideration of the structure of the board distracts from the fact that individuals made bad decisions. The main focus should be on correcting those errors, and rebuilding trust.
-Pete [[User:Peteforsyth]]
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 3:19 PM, Keegan Peterzell keegan.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 4:36 PM, Pete Forsyth peteforsyth@gmail.com wrote:
Keegan, that may very well be true (though I would say it's certain communication channels, not "our entire movement.")
But stating that has no logical relation whatsoever to whether or not a certain trustee should remain in their position.
You are correct, because that's not where I was going with that: Denny's account here has no logical relation as to whether or not Jimmy should be on the board. It's being used to promote a political position.
Also: If there are eight people who repeat something ad nauseum,
doesn't
it
stand to reason that there might be more than eight who feel the same
way,
but don't see the benefit in repeating it ad nauseum? Doesn't it stand
to
reason that there might be more than eight who *cannot* publicly state their view, without risking (in reality or in their imagination) substantial backlash due to their roles?
Yes, there is a political camp within the movement that is anti-Jimmy
that
is larger than eight people. These eight do a fine job speaking up loudly to let us know that there is a political camp that is anti-Jimmy. That's fine to feel that way. To continually hijack important conversations
about
vision, strategy, and process to have to /always/ talk about a single individual or cause is harmful to our movement. It's simple DivideAndConquer group dynamics, and it should not be supported. I'm not saying that people or groups cannot or should not be criticised - it's
very
important. But the shell game that Blame Jimmy is not helpful in the
least.
-- ~Keegan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Keegan
This is my personal email address. Everything sent from this email
address
is in a personal capacity. _______________________________________________ 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
Nope, I don't have the feeling there is such broad agreement on those four points indeed. The only thing I heard broad agreement on, is that the removal of James was painful, and clumsily handled. Probably there is also broad agreement that with the facts on the table as they are, others would not quickly agree with that decision.
But after all that has passed, I'm really not sure how constructive it would be to reappoint James to the board at this point. This is a different decision than the one to remove someone. You can disagree with removal, and then also disagree with reappointment. I don't say it /shouldn't/ happen, but I'm rather unsure about it. What we need right now at the WMF is a functional board of trustees, and forcing someone down their throat would probably take away energy and attention to what they should really focus on.
I also don't think there is any agreement on 'never remove a community trustee'. I do feel there is agreement that the process is flawed, and needs improvement. There are many people who asked for an additional step in that process. I'm not so sure if that is legally possible without turning the structure of the WMF upside down.
The elimination of the Founder seat, I'm also not so certain there is broad agreement. There are doubts though, for sure. And there is also no broad agreement to keep the seat as it is.
And finally, yes, I do think there are many people who want to 'truly elect' community representatives. But again, I'm uncertain whether that is legally possible without turning the structure of the WMF upside down. In a foundation, the board has the ultimate authority, so to include a rule that delegates that authority to an vaguely defined group of people is... tricky.
As many of these points are tricky, legally speaking, I would rather suggest to re-evaluate the setup of the WMF in general, and take these points as part of that process. Lets do that after the ED search is at least well underway. These processes tend to take more energy than you expect. And there's no board approval necessary to make a proposal from community input of course!
Lodewijk
2016-05-09 5:41 GMT+02:00 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
Hoi, Sorry Pete, there is not. Thanks, GerardM
On 9 May 2016 at 01:30, Pete Forsyth peteforsyth@gmail.com wrote:
Keegan, thank you for clarifying; I understand better now. I agree about the dynamics; I wouldn't say Jimmy Wales' role on the Board is unrelated, though, as Denny's message was intended to shed light on a dynamic that
has
clearly involved Jimmy Wales in a central role.
All:
It seems (as is often the case) that we have gotten a little off track
with
some details, where there is some disagreement; but I suspect there is a pretty high degree of agreement on most of the steps Todd recommended above. I'll summarize them again here:
- Restore James Heilman to the board (in Denny's now vacant seat)
- Never remove a community trustee
- Eliminate Founder's Seat, with various future possibilities for
Jimmy
Wales' role. 4. (expressed as optional) Make Community seats truly elected;
increase
number.
I pretty much agree with all of this, and I feel it would be helpful if others would briefly state if they do too. My comments:
- We'd be lucky if James Heilman stays willing to serve. He was a good
trustee to begin with, and it seems apparent the reasons for his removal were vastly insufficient. Jimmy and Denny have both made various efforts
to
justify the decision, which is appreciated, but I find the results
entirely
lacking. Guy Kawasaki, Frieda Brioschi, Alice Wiegand, and Patricio
Lorente
remain on the board, but have said almost nothing on the topic. At least one trustee has stated that he "voted with the majority" as though that
is
compatible with good governance (which it obviously isn't, as no trustee should be able to know others' votes for certain prior to deciding their own); and as though the upgrade from "majority" to "two-thirds majority" (required under Florida law for not-for-cause removal) isn't significant.
- I agree with both Dariusz and James. I don't see an explicit need for
changes to policy, but some articulation of process, or commentary on
what
kind of things could trigger expulsion could be very helpful.
- Eliminate Founder's Seat: Yes. The board should vote to remove Jimmy
Wales from the Founder's Seat (because there is still more than 2.5 years left in his term), and should vote to eliminate the Founder's Seat. What happens after is a separate question; a special advisory role seems ideal to me. These steps are easily accomplished. It's hard for me to imagine
how
a trustee could persuade him or herself that Jimmy's continued presence
in
the privileged Founder's Seat is in the best interests of the Wikimedia Foundation.
By the way, I think the WMF board may have successfully obscured the fact that Jimmy Wales' role has actually *increased* in recent months, not decreased: board minutes that took a long time to publish revealed that
he
was the first (and to my knowledge only) person selected as a Trustee of the new Endowment. I haven't seen this discussed anywhere.
- I agree that tinkering with board composition may be valuable, but is
secondary to the others. The main thing here is, the board should start
to
get the very basics of governance right. Any consideration of the
structure
of the board distracts from the fact that individuals made bad decisions. The main focus should be on correcting those errors, and rebuilding
trust.
-Pete [[User:Peteforsyth]]
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 3:19 PM, Keegan Peterzell keegan.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Sun, May 8, 2016 at 4:36 PM, Pete Forsyth peteforsyth@gmail.com wrote:
Keegan, that may very well be true (though I would say it's certain communication channels, not "our entire movement.")
But stating that has no logical relation whatsoever to whether or
not a
certain trustee should remain in their position.
You are correct, because that's not where I was going with that:
Denny's
account here has no logical relation as to whether or not Jimmy should
be
on the board. It's being used to promote a political position.
Also: If there are eight people who repeat something ad nauseum,
doesn't
it
stand to reason that there might be more than eight who feel the same
way,
but don't see the benefit in repeating it ad nauseum? Doesn't it
stand
to
reason that there might be more than eight who *cannot* publicly
state
their view, without risking (in reality or in their imagination) substantial backlash due to their roles?
Yes, there is a political camp within the movement that is anti-Jimmy
that
is larger than eight people. These eight do a fine job speaking up
loudly
to let us know that there is a political camp that is anti-Jimmy.
That's
fine to feel that way. To continually hijack important conversations
about
vision, strategy, and process to have to /always/ talk about a single individual or cause is harmful to our movement. It's simple DivideAndConquer group dynamics, and it should not be supported. I'm
not
saying that people or groups cannot or should not be criticised - it's
very
important. But the shell game that Blame Jimmy is not helpful in the
least.
-- ~Keegan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Keegan
This is my personal email address. Everything sent from this email
address
is in a personal capacity. _______________________________________________ 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 9 May 2016 at 08:19, Lodewijk lodewijk@effeietsanders.org wrote: ...
The elimination of the Founder seat, I'm also not so certain there is broad agreement. There are doubts though, for sure. And there is also no broad agreement to keep the seat as it is.
It's simple enough to test "broad agreement" by having a public vote open for all Wikimedians. Maybe you can kick one off?
And finally, yes, I do think there are many people who want to 'truly elect' community representatives. But again, I'm uncertain whether that is legally possible without turning the structure of the WMF upside down. In a foundation, the board has the ultimate authority, so to include a rule that delegates that authority to an vaguely defined group of people is... tricky.
Not tricky at all. There are *plenty* of other similar organizations that have elections for their trustees to their boards, including several Wikimedia chapters/affiliates where their boards have oversite of many employees and significant sums of money. There is no need to turn improvement of democratic governance of the WMF board into a challenging drama that turns the "WMF upside down".
Perhaps we should stop looking for hypothetical excuses to avoid changing the way the WMF board governs itself, and start to set targets for the WMF board so that board members take an active part in leading basic improvement to transparency and accountability in public, rather than alluding to confidential political horse-trading in back-rooms. The WMF is not a heated political party, or a fuddy-duddy old-boys club for people who don't understand simple legal words, neither should becoming a trustee be seen as a personal honour that means that asking difficult questions or holding a trustee to account for their action or inaction is batted away as a personal attack.
The WMF board is locked into a infectious mind-set that is overripe for modernization and the removal of ego driven politics. It would be refreshing to see selfless inspiring board leadership that meets the public expectations for free open knowledge in the 21st century.
Fae
Hoi, And then there are all those people who wonder why you keep harping on the same subject..
Sigh.. Who is that community in your image? Thanks, GerardM
On 10 May 2016 at 13:14, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
On 9 May 2016 at 08:19, Lodewijk lodewijk@effeietsanders.org wrote: ...
The elimination of the Founder seat, I'm also not so certain there is
broad
agreement. There are doubts though, for sure. And there is also no broad agreement to keep the seat as it is.
It's simple enough to test "broad agreement" by having a public vote open for all Wikimedians. Maybe you can kick one off?
And finally, yes, I do think there are many people who want to 'truly elect' community representatives. But again, I'm uncertain whether that
is
legally possible without turning the structure of the WMF upside down.
In a
foundation, the board has the ultimate authority, so to include a rule
that
delegates that authority to an vaguely defined group of people is... tricky.
Not tricky at all. There are *plenty* of other similar organizations that have elections for their trustees to their boards, including several Wikimedia chapters/affiliates where their boards have oversite of many employees and significant sums of money. There is no need to turn improvement of democratic governance of the WMF board into a challenging drama that turns the "WMF upside down".
Perhaps we should stop looking for hypothetical excuses to avoid changing the way the WMF board governs itself, and start to set targets for the WMF board so that board members take an active part in leading basic improvement to transparency and accountability in public, rather than alluding to confidential political horse-trading in back-rooms. The WMF is not a heated political party, or a fuddy-duddy old-boys club for people who don't understand simple legal words, neither should becoming a trustee be seen as a personal honour that means that asking difficult questions or holding a trustee to account for their action or inaction is batted away as a personal attack.
The WMF board is locked into a infectious mind-set that is overripe for modernization and the removal of ego driven politics. It would be refreshing to see selfless inspiring board leadership that meets the public expectations for free open knowledge in the 21st century.
Fae
faewik@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
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Hoi,
Congratulations Gerard! You have remained in top position, dominating this list by making the most posts for the last six months.[1]
Sigh.. thank goodness the community is in absolutely no doubt about your opinion, thank you so much for investing all your time in repeating yourself and ensuring that your voice remains number one. Thank you so much for your personal criticism of any voice that disagrees with yours.
Thanks, Fae
Links 1. https://stats.wikimedia.org/mail-lists/wikimedia-l.html
On 10 May 2016 at 14:29, Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com wrote:
Hoi, And then there are all those people who wonder why you keep harping on the same subject..
Sigh.. Who is that community in your image? Thanks, GerardM
On 10 May 2016 at 13:14, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
On 9 May 2016 at 08:19, Lodewijk lodewijk@effeietsanders.org wrote: ...
The elimination of the Founder seat, I'm also not so certain there is
broad
agreement. There are doubts though, for sure. And there is also no broad agreement to keep the seat as it is.
It's simple enough to test "broad agreement" by having a public vote open for all Wikimedians. Maybe you can kick one off?
And finally, yes, I do think there are many people who want to 'truly elect' community representatives. But again, I'm uncertain whether that
is
legally possible without turning the structure of the WMF upside down.
In a
foundation, the board has the ultimate authority, so to include a rule
that
delegates that authority to an vaguely defined group of people is... tricky.
Not tricky at all. There are *plenty* of other similar organizations that have elections for their trustees to their boards, including several Wikimedia chapters/affiliates where their boards have oversite of many employees and significant sums of money. There is no need to turn improvement of democratic governance of the WMF board into a challenging drama that turns the "WMF upside down".
Perhaps we should stop looking for hypothetical excuses to avoid changing the way the WMF board governs itself, and start to set targets for the WMF board so that board members take an active part in leading basic improvement to transparency and accountability in public, rather than alluding to confidential political horse-trading in back-rooms. The WMF is not a heated political party, or a fuddy-duddy old-boys club for people who don't understand simple legal words, neither should becoming a trustee be seen as a personal honour that means that asking difficult questions or holding a trustee to account for their action or inaction is batted away as a personal attack.
The WMF board is locked into a infectious mind-set that is overripe for modernization and the removal of ego driven politics. It would be refreshing to see selfless inspiring board leadership that meets the public expectations for free open knowledge in the 21st century.
Fae
faewik@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
Hi Fae,
On Tue, May 10, 2016 at 1:14 PM, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
Not tricky at all. There are *plenty* of other similar organizations that have elections for their trustees to their boards, including several Wikimedia chapters/affiliates where their boards have oversite of many employees and significant sums of money.
can you share a few examples of organizations where board members are appointed in a binding election and members of the electorate do not have to identify themselves to the organization?
Or are you suggesting that the WMF should turn into a membership organization and Wikimedians who are unwilling to share personally identifying information with the WMF should not be allowed to vote?
On Wed, May 11, 2016 at 4:48 PM, Gergő Tisza gtisza@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Fae,
On Tue, May 10, 2016 at 1:14 PM, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
Not tricky at all. There are *plenty* of other similar organizations that have elections for their trustees to their boards, including several Wikimedia chapters/affiliates where their boards have oversite of many employees and significant sums of money.
can you share a few examples of organizations where board members are appointed in a binding election and members of the electorate do not have to identify themselves to the organization?
Or are you suggesting that the WMF should turn into a membership organization and Wikimedians who are unwilling to share personally identifying information with the WMF should not be allowed to vote?
I dont see how the voting method is particularly relevant to this thread..? It seems this thread is more about governance by post-appointment trustees, who have been properly vetted before being appointed.
I dont recall that we've had any serious incidents of the board election outcome being disrupted because we use a voting process that includes non-identified people.
-- John Vandenberg
On Wed, May 11, 2016 at 5:21 PM, John Mark Vandenberg jayvdb@gmail.com wrote:
On Wed, May 11, 2016 at 4:48 PM, Gergő Tisza gtisza@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Fae,
On Tue, May 10, 2016 at 1:14 PM, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
Not tricky at all. There are *plenty* of other similar organizations that have elections for their trustees to their boards, including several Wikimedia chapters/affiliates where their boards have oversite of many employees and significant sums of money.
can you share a few examples of organizations where board members are appointed in a binding election and members of the electorate do not have to identify themselves to the organization?
Or are you suggesting that the WMF should turn into a membership organization and Wikimedians who are unwilling to share personally identifying information with the WMF should not be allowed to vote?
I dont see how the voting method is particularly relevant to this thread..? It seems this thread is more about governance by post-appointment trustees, who have been properly vetted before being appointed.
I dont recall that we've had any serious incidents of the board election outcome being disrupted because we use a voting process that includes non-identified people.
i.e. I think we , the community, selected *three* **great** Trustees in the last community election, and the issues that caused us to loose two of them are post-appointment and we should be looking into the governance post-appointment to prevent it happening again.
Hi,
I second everything said below. Yann
2016-05-08 5:20 GMT+02:00 Todd Allen toddmallen@gmail.com:
Denny,
I appreciate that you've put forth this account. That's in no way facetious or just a pretext, I am actually very glad to see someone speak to this.
I'd like, however, to suggest what would actually begin the process of healing, since that's your intent. Most of us knew at least more or less what James was accused of.
First, James needs to be restored to the Board, or at very least, his restoration needs to be passed as a referendum to the community. Since you've now posted your side, there's no reason that the community, rather than the Board, shouldn't decide on James' trusteeship. That needs to happen now, not at the next election, and it should have happened to start with.
Second, the Board needs to resolve never to remove a community trustee except by a successful recall referendum to the community. The Board should never, under any circumstances, remove a community trustee without consent of the community that elected them. That was unacceptable and must never happen again. There will be no "healing" without a promise that it will not.
Third, the "founder" seat needs to be eliminated. Jimmy would be, of course, eligible to run for a community seat or be appointed to an expert seat, but he shouldn't be a "member for life". Alternatively, the "founder" seat could be made into an advisory, non-voting position.
And finally, while this part is optional, it wouldn't hurt for the Board to increase the number of community elected ( and not "recommended", elected) seats to a majority. While there's room for "expert" appointed seats and chapter selected seats (and no, chapter selected seats are NOT community selected seats), the community should be in control and have a majority, and the others should be an advisory minority. The community has always been in charge of WMF projects, and this should continue to be the case.
If you want to actually start the healing process, rather than deflect, at the very least the first three things need to be done. If you want to regain trust, all of them need to be. The community needs to be in charge.
Todd
I don't support that statement from Todd , that is not how a board of a foundantion works .. please refer to the statutory (bylaws) provisions, that might be how todd ideally would like things to function but that is not much more then wishfull thinking .
Derek
On 10-05-16 01:46, Yann Forget wrote:
Hi,
I second everything said below. Yann
2016-05-08 5:20 GMT+02:00 Todd Allen toddmallen@gmail.com:
Denny,
I appreciate that you've put forth this account. That's in no way facetious or just a pretext, I am actually very glad to see someone speak to this.
I'd like, however, to suggest what would actually begin the process of healing, since that's your intent. Most of us knew at least more or less what James was accused of.
First, James needs to be restored to the Board, or at very least, his restoration needs to be passed as a referendum to the community. Since you've now posted your side, there's no reason that the community, rather than the Board, shouldn't decide on James' trusteeship. That needs to happen now, not at the next election, and it should have happened to start with.
Second, the Board needs to resolve never to remove a community trustee except by a successful recall referendum to the community. The Board should never, under any circumstances, remove a community trustee without consent of the community that elected them. That was unacceptable and must never happen again. There will be no "healing" without a promise that it will not.
Third, the "founder" seat needs to be eliminated. Jimmy would be, of course, eligible to run for a community seat or be appointed to an expert seat, but he shouldn't be a "member for life". Alternatively, the "founder" seat could be made into an advisory, non-voting position.
And finally, while this part is optional, it wouldn't hurt for the Board to increase the number of community elected ( and not "recommended", elected) seats to a majority. While there's room for "expert" appointed seats and chapter selected seats (and no, chapter selected seats are NOT community selected seats), the community should be in control and have a majority, and the others should be an advisory minority. The community has always been in charge of WMF projects, and this should continue to be the case.
If you want to actually start the healing process, rather than deflect, at the very least the first three things need to be done. If you want to regain trust, all of them need to be. The community needs to be in charge.
Todd
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Denny,
Like Todd and others, I appreciate your candid exposition of how things went. It's important to have clarity about what happened here, and your contributions are very helpful toward that end. Thank you.
However, these words ring hollow:
On Fri, May 6, 2016 at 9:03 AM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
It strengthens my resolution to stay away from Wikimedia politics
You have also told us that you, a community-(s)elected trustee, played a key role in the removal another community-(s)elected trustee:
Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
I suggested James’ removal.
In so doing, you perpetrated perhaps the most brazen and unjustified *political *act in the history of the Wikimedia Foundation. What could be more political than pursuing the removal of your fellow appointee?
Your claim to want to avoid politics rings hollow. If you want to be a political operative, that's fine -- there is no shame in that. Own it, and do it. Follow your conscience, and act in your political capacity to the best of your ability. But don't then denounce the very tool you used. That's beneath you, and it does nothing to advance the discussion.
I know you are smarter than this. I endorsed your candidacy http://wikistrategies.net/wikimedia-board-candidate-recommendations/ -- for the political position of Trustee -- because I believed in your ability to grasp the values of the Wikimedia community, build consensus, and lead us all in a better direction. You demonstrated your ability to do so through your efforts with Wikidata. But your more recent actions have led to the premature departure of not one, but *two *people (including yourself) entrusted by Wikimedia volunteers to carry this movement forward.
Politics is a tool. It's not good or bad, it just is. When people with varying points of view want to work together, you end up with politics. Politics can be handled in a way that moves things forward smoothly with extensive buy-in, or they can be handled in a way that produces pain and impedes progress.
It is becoming vividly clear that Doc James was working in the best interests of Wikimedia and WMF throughout his short tenure as a Trustee. His efforts may not have been perfect, but they were clearly sincere, well-intentioned, and in fact more reflective of reality than any of his peers, including yourself.
And yet you led an effort to remove him.
I am disappointed.
-Pete [[User:Peteforsyth]]
In an effort to offer resolution to what Pete said below regarding Doc James’ removal, along with extending some form of compensation to Doc James and those of us in the community who elected him, I strongly believe his Board position should be immediately reinstated citing wrongful dismissal. Doing so will serve two good faith purposes: (1) it will restore Doc’s credibility in the few instances where questions might have arisen, and (2) it will demonstrate good will on behalf of the Board for their mistake, and it should happen without delay. I see no reason why it should have to go back through the voting process because doing so may be misconstrued as an evasion of responsibility by the Board for their actions.
Betty Wills (Atsme)
On May 8, 2016, at 12:34 PM, Pete Forsyth peteforsyth@gmail.com wrote:
Denny,
Like Todd and others, I appreciate your candid exposition of how things went. It's important to have clarity about what happened here, and your contributions are very helpful toward that end. Thank you.
However, these words ring hollow:
On Fri, May 6, 2016 at 9:03 AM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
It strengthens my resolution to stay away from Wikimedia politics
You have also told us that you, a community-(s)elected trustee, played a key role in the removal another community-(s)elected trustee:
Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
I suggested James’ removal.
In so doing, you perpetrated perhaps the most brazen and unjustified *political *act in the history of the Wikimedia Foundation. What could be more political than pursuing the removal of your fellow appointee?
Your claim to want to avoid politics rings hollow. If you want to be a political operative, that's fine -- there is no shame in that. Own it, and do it. Follow your conscience, and act in your political capacity to the best of your ability. But don't then denounce the very tool you used. That's beneath you, and it does nothing to advance the discussion.
I know you are smarter than this. I endorsed your candidacy http://wikistrategies.net/wikimedia-board-candidate-recommendations/ -- for the political position of Trustee -- because I believed in your ability to grasp the values of the Wikimedia community, build consensus, and lead us all in a better direction. You demonstrated your ability to do so through your efforts with Wikidata. But your more recent actions have led to the premature departure of not one, but *two *people (including yourself) entrusted by Wikimedia volunteers to carry this movement forward.
Politics is a tool. It's not good or bad, it just is. When people with varying points of view want to work together, you end up with politics. Politics can be handled in a way that moves things forward smoothly with extensive buy-in, or they can be handled in a way that produces pain and impedes progress.
It is becoming vividly clear that Doc James was working in the best interests of Wikimedia and WMF throughout his short tenure as a Trustee. His efforts may not have been perfect, but they were clearly sincere, well-intentioned, and in fact more reflective of reality than any of his peers, including yourself.
And yet you led an effort to remove him.
I am disappointed.
-Pete [[User:Peteforsyth]] _______________________________________________ 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 05/05/16 11:10, Tim Starling wrote:
In fact, employees disagreed with Lila's decision to pursue large restricted grants for a stupid pet project, in secret, supported by almost nobody, without Board knowledge let alone approval. This has nothing to do with education versus technology (if such a dichotomy can even be said to exist).
It's likely that at some point, someone said to Lila "I don't think building a new Internet search engine to take on Google is within our (educational) mission". Perhaps that's where her "strategic conflict" story came from. It's a good point, but it's certainly not the only problem with the proposal, and it wasn't the subject of the complaints made against her. The conflict between Lila and the rest of the staff was over process, not strategy.
-- Tim Starling
I will make a suggestion that I have made previously: that there should be an external firm, probably a law firm experienced with nonprofit governance, brought in to examine and publicize the facts regarding the Foundation's Board governance and to make recommendations for changes to policies and practices. Particular areas of concern are the facts surrounding James' departure, the Board's supervision of Lila, and the Amnon Geshuri situation from start to finish. There was a similar inquiry with WMUK's Board a few years ago, and it seems to me that a similar inquiry should happen at WMF.
The continuing public disputes among current and former board members serve to illustrate that there is a major problem, and that the credibility of the Board as an effective institution remains in doubt. A partial remedy for this is a full and public accounting by a knowledgeable, experienced, and impartial inquiry. I feel that this would be in WMF's best interest in the long term.
Pine
I like that, Pine. I would add, procedure to disclose and manage conflicts of interest that board members might have, in our context. That would bring in the matters around Denny's departure. Those four things.
On Wed, May 4, 2016 at 11:13 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
I will make a suggestion that I have made previously: that there should be an external firm, probably a law firm experienced with nonprofit governance, brought in to examine and publicize the facts regarding the Foundation's Board governance and to make recommendations for changes to policies and practices. Particular areas of concern are the facts surrounding James' departure, the Board's supervision of Lila, and the Amnon Geshuri situation from start to finish. There was a similar inquiry with WMUK's Board a few years ago, and it seems to me that a similar inquiry should happen at WMF.
The continuing public disputes among current and former board members serve to illustrate that there is a major problem, and that the credibility of the Board as an effective institution remains in doubt. A partial remedy for this is a full and public accounting by a knowledgeable, experienced, and impartial inquiry. I feel that this would be in WMF's best interest in the long term.
Pine _______________________________________________ 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
Tim Starling wrote:
On 04/05/16 12:02, MZMcBride wrote:
My understanding is that the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees sought out and then appointed a tech-minded chief executive, who came from a tech organization, in order to "transform" the Wikimedia Foundation from an educational non-profit to be more like a traditional tech company. Many employees of the Wikimedia Foundation disagreed with this decision and the chief executive made a series of poor hires who ran amok (looking at you, Damon), but I don't think anything rose to the level of illegal behavior.
You are just regurgitating Lila's email. No transformation was attempted or executed. The first time I heard about this supposed conflict over strategy was when Lila posted her claims about it to this list, shortly before her resignation.
Here's an April 2015 e-mail from Lila announcing a large reorganization of the Wikimedia Foundation's engineering team: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2015-April/077619.html
I think a transformation was both attempted and executed. I'm citing a specific example, but there are others from Lila's two-year stint. As http://mollywhite.net/wikimedia-timeline/ notes, "The reorganization is later described as poorly handled, and it is criticized for being based on assumptions of an impractically large budget increase." When people were making a case for removing Lila as Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation, this departmental reorganization was repeatedly mentioned.
Comments from individual Board members and community members lead me to believe that there continues to be an enormous amount of uncertainty about the direction and strategy of the Wikimedia Foundation and the Wikimedia movement. How large should the Wikimedia Foundation be, in terms of full-time staff and in terms of annual budget? How much and what work should the Wikimedia Foundation be doing this year and over the next five years? The Wikimedia Foundation's previous strategic plan expired at the end of 2015. In my opinion, there's unquestionably ongoing, unresolved conflict over strategy, among Wikimedia Foundation staff, Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees members, and among the Wikimedia community.
In my view, a previous iteration of the Board of Trustees and Wikimedia Foundation leadership, in choosing Lila to head the Wikimedia Foundation, made a decision, perhaps implicitly and obliquely, about at least the short-term future of the Wikimedia Foundation. I don't believe Sue and members of the Board of Trustees were unaware of Lila's background or how she would likely influence the direction of the organization.
In fact, employees disagreed with Lila's decision to pursue large restricted grants for a stupid pet project, in secret, supported by almost nobody, without Board knowledge let alone approval. This has nothing to do with education versus technology (if such a dichotomy can even be said to exist).
In most contexts, that's the nature of having a boss and working for an organization. You won't agree with every decision, in substance, in execution, in visibility and transparency. In the specific case of the Knight Foundation grant, the Board of Trustees both knew about it and specifically approved it. This is noted at https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Minutes/2015-11. Are there other stupid pet projects or grant applications you're referring to?
The point I was making with the specific whistleblower policy and policies similar to it is that they are explicitly not intended to be used to subvert authority or promote insubordination among staff who disagree with a decision of the head of the organization.
Damon merely suggested the project in question, he did not "run amok".
I used the phrase "run amok" based on comments at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Engine/FAQ. Specifically, Brion Vibber writes:
"Former VP of Engineering Damon Sicore, who as far as I know conceived the 'knowledge engine', shopped the idea around in secret (to the point of GPG-encrypting emails about it) with the idea that Google/etc form an 'existential threat' to Wikipedia in the long term by co-opting our traffic, potentially reducing the inflow of new contributors via the 'reader -> editor' pipeline. [...]"
Jimmy Wales replies:
"It is important, most likely, that people know that Damon's secrecy was not something that was known to me or the rest of the board. I've only yesterday been sent, by a longtime member of staff who prefers to remain anonymous, the document that Damon was passing around GPG-encrypted with strict orders to keep it top secret. Apparently, he (and he alone, as far as I can tell) really was advocating for taking a run at Google. [...]"
These same individuals posted to this mailing list: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/082150.html https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-March/083163.html
This reported secrecy and cloak-and-dagger behavior is what I'm referring to when I say Damon ran amok. I suppose we can leave it as an exercise to the reader whether "run amok" is accurate phrasing given the evidence presented. Upon reading the previous comments that Damon, not Lila, was responsible for the secrecy, I'm perplexed by your recent comment regarding "Lila's decision." What am I missing?
MZMcBride
On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 5:00 AM, MZMcBride z@mzmcbride.com wrote:
I used the phrase "run amok" based on comments at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Engine/FAQ. Specifically, Brion Vibber writes:
"Former VP of Engineering Damon Sicore, who as far as I know conceived the 'knowledge engine', shopped the idea around in secret (to the point of GPG-encrypting emails about it) with the idea that Google/etc form an 'existential threat' to Wikipedia in the long term by co-opting our traffic, potentially reducing the inflow of new contributors via the 'reader -> editor' pipeline. [...]"
Jimmy Wales replies:
"It is important, most likely, that people know that Damon's secrecy was not something that was known to me or the rest of the board. I've only yesterday been sent, by a longtime member of staff who prefers to remain anonymous, the document that Damon was passing around GPG-encrypted with strict orders to keep it top secret. Apparently, he (and he alone, as far as I can tell) really was advocating for taking a run at Google. [...]"
I find it interesting to compare Damon's purported concerns with those voiced by Jimmy Wales in his October emails to James Heilman, as made available to the Signpost:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2016-04-24/Op-ed
There we read that Wales said:
<quote> Right now the page at www.wikipedia.org is pretty useless. There's no question it could be improved. Is your concern that if we improve it and it starts to look like a "search engine" in the first definition this could cause us problems?
Are you concerned that in due course we might expand beyond just internal search (across all our properties)?
Right now when I type "Queen Elizabeth II" I am taken to the article about her. I'm not told about any other resources we may have about her.
If I type a search term for which there is no Wikipedia entry, I'm taken to our wikipedia search results page – which is pretty bad.
Here's an example: search for 'how old is tom cruise?'
It returns 10 different articles, none of which are Tom Cruise!
When I search in Google – I'm just told the answer to the question. Google got this answer from us, I'm quite sure.
So, yes, this would include Google graph type of functionality. Why is that alarming to you?
...
I don't agree that there's a serious gulf between what we have been told and what funders are being told.
...
Imagine if we could handle a wide range of questions that are easy enough to do by using wikidata / data embedded in templates / textual analysis.
"How old is Tom Cruise?"
"Is Tom Cruise married?"
"How many children does Tom Cruise have?"
The reason this is relevant is that we are falling behind what users expect. 5 years ago, questions like that simple returned Wikipedia as the first result at Google. Now, Google just tells the answer and the users don't come to us. <end of quote>
When told that there clearly had been an attempt to fund a massive project to build a search engine that was then "scoped down to a $250k exploration for a fully developed plan", Wales replied:
<quote> In my opinion: There was and there is and there will be. I strongly support the effort, and I'm writing up a public blog post on that topic today. Our entire fundraising future is at stake. <end of quote>
Wales's concerns don't sound all that different from Sicore's to me.
Both seem to have perceived developments at Google as an existential threat, because users get their answers there without having to navigate to Wikipedia or Wikidata (which are among the sources from which Google takes its answers).
Nor do I think these concerns are entirely unfounded. By opting for a CC licence allowing full commercial re-use, years ago, Wikipedia set itself up to be cannibalised in precisely that way.
For better or worse, it relinquished all control over how and by whom its knowledge would be presented. It should hardly come as a surprise that commercial operators then step up to exploit that vacuum, set up commercial operations based on Wikimedia content, and eventually draw users away.
Moreover, the current search function does suck. Anyone looking for a picture on Commons for example is better off using Google than the internal search function.
What I don't understand is why all the secrecy and double-talk was necessary.
These same individuals posted to this mailing list: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/082150.html https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-March/083163.html
This reported secrecy and cloak-and-dagger behavior is what I'm referring to when I say Damon ran amok. I suppose we can leave it as an exercise to the reader whether "run amok" is accurate phrasing given the evidence presented. Upon reading the previous comments that Damon, not Lila, was responsible for the secrecy, I'm perplexed by your recent comment regarding "Lila's decision." What am I missing?
Damon left in July 2015. Secrecy around the Knowledge Engine project and the Knight grant lasted until February 2016. Perhaps this no longer involved GPG encryption, but as late as 29 January 2016 Lila still led the community to believe that "donor privacy" issues were the reason why the board didn't publish the Knight Foundation grant agreement:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:LilaTretikov_(WMF)/Archive_12#Why_...
Yet the donor was in favour of full transparency ...
One very serious element of this decision-making really should be the fact that Google is blatantly violating the CCA-SA by reusing Wikipedia content without making their derivative work open.
- *Share Alike*—If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you may distribute the resulting work only under the same, similar or a compatible license.
On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 9:58 AM, Andreas Kolbe jayen466@gmail.com wrote:
On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 5:00 AM, MZMcBride z@mzmcbride.com wrote:
I used the phrase "run amok" based on comments at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Engine/FAQ. Specifically, Brion Vibber writes:
"Former VP of Engineering Damon Sicore, who as far as I know conceived
the
'knowledge engine', shopped the idea around in secret (to the point of GPG-encrypting emails about it) with the idea that Google/etc form an 'existential threat' to Wikipedia in the long term by co-opting our traffic, potentially reducing the inflow of new contributors via the 'reader -> editor' pipeline. [...]"
Jimmy Wales replies:
"It is important, most likely, that people know that Damon's secrecy was not something that was known to me or the rest of the board. I've only yesterday been sent, by a longtime member of staff who prefers to remain anonymous, the document that Damon was passing around GPG-encrypted with strict orders to keep it top secret. Apparently, he (and he alone, as far as I can tell) really was advocating for taking a run at Google. [...]"
I find it interesting to compare Damon's purported concerns with those voiced by Jimmy Wales in his October emails to James Heilman, as made available to the Signpost:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2016-04-24/Op-ed
There we read that Wales said:
<quote> Right now the page at www.wikipedia.org is pretty useless. There's no question it could be improved. Is your concern that if we improve it and it starts to look like a "search engine" in the first definition this could cause us problems?
Are you concerned that in due course we might expand beyond just internal search (across all our properties)?
Right now when I type "Queen Elizabeth II" I am taken to the article about her. I'm not told about any other resources we may have about her.
If I type a search term for which there is no Wikipedia entry, I'm taken to our wikipedia search results page – which is pretty bad.
Here's an example: search for 'how old is tom cruise?'
It returns 10 different articles, none of which are Tom Cruise!
When I search in Google – I'm just told the answer to the question. Google got this answer from us, I'm quite sure.
So, yes, this would include Google graph type of functionality. Why is that alarming to you?
...
I don't agree that there's a serious gulf between what we have been told and what funders are being told.
...
Imagine if we could handle a wide range of questions that are easy enough to do by using wikidata / data embedded in templates / textual analysis.
"How old is Tom Cruise?"
"Is Tom Cruise married?"
"How many children does Tom Cruise have?"
The reason this is relevant is that we are falling behind what users expect. 5 years ago, questions like that simple returned Wikipedia as the first result at Google. Now, Google just tells the answer and the users don't come to us.
<end of quote>
When told that there clearly had been an attempt to fund a massive project to build a search engine that was then "scoped down to a $250k exploration for a fully developed plan", Wales replied:
<quote> In my opinion: There was and there is and there will be. I strongly support the effort, and I'm writing up a public blog post on that topic today. Our entire fundraising future is at stake. <end of quote>
Wales's concerns don't sound all that different from Sicore's to me.
Both seem to have perceived developments at Google as an existential threat, because users get their answers there without having to navigate to Wikipedia or Wikidata (which are among the sources from which Google takes its answers).
Nor do I think these concerns are entirely unfounded. By opting for a CC licence allowing full commercial re-use, years ago, Wikipedia set itself up to be cannibalised in precisely that way.
For better or worse, it relinquished all control over how and by whom its knowledge would be presented. It should hardly come as a surprise that commercial operators then step up to exploit that vacuum, set up commercial operations based on Wikimedia content, and eventually draw users away.
Moreover, the current search function does suck. Anyone looking for a picture on Commons for example is better off using Google than the internal search function.
What I don't understand is why all the secrecy and double-talk was necessary.
These same individuals posted to this mailing list:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-February/082150.html
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-March/083163.html
This reported secrecy and cloak-and-dagger behavior is what I'm referring to when I say Damon ran amok. I suppose we can leave it as an exercise to the reader whether "run amok" is accurate phrasing given the evidence presented. Upon reading the previous comments that Damon, not Lila, was responsible for the secrecy, I'm perplexed by your recent comment regarding "Lila's decision." What am I missing?
Damon left in July 2015. Secrecy around the Knowledge Engine project and the Knight grant lasted until February 2016. Perhaps this no longer involved GPG encryption, but as late as 29 January 2016 Lila still led the community to believe that "donor privacy" issues were the reason why the board didn't publish the Knight Foundation grant agreement:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:LilaTretikov_(WMF)/Archive_12#Why_...
Yet the donor was in favour of full transparency ... _______________________________________________ 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 10 May 2016 at 15:35, The Cunctator cunctator@gmail.com wrote:
One very serious element of this decision-making really should be the fact that Google is blatantly violating the CCA-SA by reusing Wikipedia content without making their derivative work open.
- *Share Alike*—If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you
may distribute the resulting work only under the same, similar or a compatible license.
They would argue that they are using the facts not the presentation of those facts and facts are not subject to copyright.
1. Restore James Heilman to the board (in Denny's now vacant seat) Yes. Although there should be a process for removing community trustees, there's 0 question that the process used to remove James was inappropriate. Even if this harms somewhat the functioning the board until the next election... Board doesn't seem too functional as it is right now, but at the same time, I've definitely seen more dysfunctional boards manage orgs of similar size.
2. Never remove a community trustee There should be a way to remove a community trustee, but it requires community feedback. In an 'emergency' situation, I'd be happy if even a subset of stewards and functionaries were involved, with the issue later being brought forth before the community for a satisfactory explanation - not the claptrap found in the FAQ about James (some of which is downright wrong.)
3. Eliminate Founder's Seat, with various future possibilities for Jimmy Wales' role.
I'm pretty sure that I was getting counted in the "anti-Jimmy" camp mentioned earlier, but the funny thing is, I'm not anti-Jimmy. I've explicitly reached out to him to ask for his assistance on a number of issues before, including a few issues where he was the only person likely to be willing to help. Ex: with Wiki-PR breaking, WMF legal and comms did not want to issue a strong statement because they realized some of the information I had given them had come from someone violating an NDA (FWIW: NDA's in California are unenforceable without compensation, and the person in question was an unpaid intern; the NDA was invalid.) Jimmy (along with James Hare) issued strong public condemnations of the situation in a move that helped us not look like complete shit in the media. What has concerned me most about Jimmy's involvement in the current situation (ignoring a general feeling that he should be coming less involved, not more involved, in the day to day running of WMF, as well as feeling that we shouldn't have a trustee for life) is that he has consistently made statements that, even in California, constitute defamation per se against James Heilman - and I put a lot of thought in to it before stating that for the first time. 99% of the time my role is to convince people that statements made against them are *not* defamatory in California, let alone constitute defamation per se - but Jimmy's statements have really crossed a line. He has repeatedly, without evidence, and in the direct face of comments made by his own staff, including some of his own most senior staff, made claims about James' behavior that he had not backed up with evidence, including the claim that James is unable to hold a confidence. As James is quite literally a medical doctor, these statements are... well... worse than they otherwise would be. I again really doubt that James' would sue, but it's not okay that we have a trustee *for life* putting himself and likely the Foundation at risk of monetary and reputational harm. I know some people have compiled partial diff lists already, but tomorrow I'm going to start to diff dive for defamatory statements Jimmy has made against James, and explicitly call for some sort of restorative justice process (which requires Jimmy's active involvement and willingness to acknowledge wrongdoing,) and if no progress is made in a week, start an open letter summarizing the issue and asking Jimmy to either step aside or the board to take action. I'm pretty confident that a well-written open letter with a significant number of signatories will come to the attention of the press, and I'd much rather have this resolved before it gets that far.
4. (expressed as optional) Make Community seats truly elected; increase number.
Making them truly elected poses problems revising the governance documents, but I never imagined they would be treated as recommendations carrying at best about as much weight as an average undergrad letter of recommmendation, which seems to be about what they're at now. This can be done with changes in practice, rather than actual revisions to the governing documents. And I strongly support increasing their number.
Adding on:
5. WMF BOT needs to undergo a full governance review, and they need to undergo one starting soon. If needed, I can start recommending firms that specialize in NPO governance reviews. There's just an amazing amount going wrong at the same time, which points to broken underlying processes - and the exact reason nonprofit governance consultants exist is that the same broken practices tend to appear in organization after organization. There is no shame in looking to others before us to better ourselves, and we certainly have the reserves to commission a full review. We made WMUK undergo a similar (though different scoped review) for far more minor problems, there's no way that it's acceptable or a good idea for WMF BOT to avoid public review of their practices when this much has happened this quickly. If we can improve the functioning of the BoT for what is, in terms of our budget and reserves, a minor amount of money, how can we justify NOT doing so?
---- Kevin Gorman
On Tue, May 10, 2016 at 4:18 PM, geni geniice@gmail.com wrote:
On 10 May 2016 at 15:35, The Cunctator cunctator@gmail.com wrote:
One very serious element of this decision-making really should be the
fact
that Google is blatantly violating the CCA-SA by reusing Wikipedia
content
without making their derivative work open.
- *Share Alike*—If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you
may distribute the resulting work only under the same, similar or a compatible license.
They would argue that they are using the facts not the presentation of those facts and facts are not subject to copyright.
-- geni
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On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 5:33 PM, Oliver Keyes ironholds@gmail.com wrote:
+1 to that question, which is the biggest flag I have here.
"The highest standards of confidentiality" is nice but, as you note, people presumably reached out to these individual Board members, rather than the whole Board, because they felt the individuals could be trusted a lot better than the Board as a whole. Which in my mind is totally understandable.
If people reached out in confidence, demanding that their experiences and information be turned over to the entire Board - without noting that as a caveat when first interacting with the source, or without asking for the source's permission - well, I'd be cagey too. Anyone who has ever dealt with human subject research would be cagey.
The perspective of human subjects research makes a lot of sense here. A
lot of research studies are asking the question, can we share data between studies now that we have the "cloud" technology to do it? In every case I've seen, researchers have to explicitly ask for two consents, one to collect the data from the subject, another to share it. I would expect anyone in the medical profession to operate the way James has.
Most internal review boards won't even allow you to ask human subjects for the broad ability to share their data, you have to identify the specific place it will be shared, before you collect it. In the US, these rules come from Institutional Review Boards. These IRBs function in a similar way to the Board, by providing an independent level of oversight to medical research, and are given a wide latitude to go as far as halt research studies and punish misconduct, even though they are not medical researchers themselves.
I wish the Board had the same respect of confidential data that James has shown, and that Institutional Review Boards throughout the research community have when it comes to human data. IRB members aren't necessarily medical professionals, they are the same people you would find sitting on any board. So I think it's reasonable for us to ask the Board to treat confidential data in the same way any IRB would, the same way James has.
-Justin
if people *did* grant permission, obviously that's an entirely different situation. But if they didn't, James was doing entirely the right thing by refusing to turn over, wholesale, information communicated to him and him alone, to a wider body that was quite clearly not trusted by the people making these reports.
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 4:03 PM, SarahSV sarahsv.wiki@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 11:07 AM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
The protection of any personal or confidential information was, to the
best
of my knowledge, at all time guaranteed and has not been compromised.
The
official task force, set up by the Trustees, worked under the standards
of
keeping confidentiality, obviously. I thought this goes without saying,
but
I am explicating it.
Was information passed to people on the task force without the original
sources' consent?
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On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 10:11 PM, Justin Senseney jsensene@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 5:33 PM, Oliver Keyes ironholds@gmail.com wrote:
+1 to that question, which is the biggest flag I have here.
"The highest standards of confidentiality" is nice but, as you note, people presumably reached out to these individual Board members, rather than the whole Board, because they felt the individuals could be trusted a lot better than the Board as a whole. Which in my mind is totally understandable.
If people reached out in confidence, demanding that their experiences and information be turned over to the entire Board - without noting that as a caveat when first interacting with the source, or without asking for the source's permission - well, I'd be cagey too. Anyone who has ever dealt with human subject research would be cagey.
The perspective of human subjects research makes a lot of sense here. A
lot of research studies are asking the question, can we share data between studies now that we have the "cloud" technology to do it? In every case I've seen, researchers have to explicitly ask for two consents, one to collect the data from the subject, another to share it. I would expect anyone in the medical profession to operate the way James has.
Most internal review boards won't even allow you to ask human subjects for the broad ability to share their data, you have to identify the specific place it will be shared, before you collect it. In the US, these rules come from Institutional Review Boards. These IRBs function in a similar way to the Board, by providing an independent level of oversight to medical research, and are given a wide latitude to go as far as halt research studies and punish misconduct, even though they are not medical researchers themselves.
I wish the Board had the same respect of confidential data that James has shown, and that Institutional Review Boards throughout the research community have when it comes to human data. IRB members aren't necessarily medical professionals, they are the same people you would find sitting on any board. So I think it's reasonable for us to ask the Board to treat confidential data in the same way any IRB would, the same way James has.
-Justin
Justin - many of these elements of current research ethics, enforced in some instances by IRBs, have grown in no small part due to the regulatory environment around personal health information. The legal framework for information held by a corporate board member is very different. It may be that James' approach to confidentiality is drawn from his experience as a physician, but it perhaps speaks to inadequate board training that he discovered the import of the different legal environment only after things fell apart.
While *some* of research ethics comes from the medical world - particularly from the Belmont report and the Western-centric research atrocities of the last century - much of it does not. Things like the Zimbardo and Milgram experiments have had a marked impact on our conceptualisation of appropriate ethics and IRBs, and it is not unusual for institutions to even separate out behavioural and social studies from medical studies in training, IRB composition and expected practices.
And yet the social sciences contain the same duties and responsibilities around ethical principles that medical studies do. The principles of confidentiality, of transparency to the participant, of the participant taking the lead in defining what is and is not acceptable. Ethical principles along these lines are a common and core part of the IRB process, if you're involving humans, regardless of the nature of that involvement. And I note that the current board contains (not to single him out, but simply because he is the best example Dariusz Jemielniak, full name *Dr* Dariusz Jemielniak, who is an _ethnographer_, one of the social fields of study that pays very close attention to these things.
So it is not as simple as "James's experiences were shaped by his medical background, other people did not have that". The need for ethical principles is enshrined in a lot of fields, including not just medicine, but those several other board members have as a background. This should have been a known. I agree that there is apparently an inadequacy in Board training, but I'm mostly amazed (and disappointed) that the people who wrote Denny's statement didn't twig that, actually, ethics in these areas are both paramount and much more complicated than just "well my legal duty says..." for the participants involved.
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 10:44 PM, Nathan nawrich@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 10:11 PM, Justin Senseney jsensene@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 5:33 PM, Oliver Keyes ironholds@gmail.com wrote:
+1 to that question, which is the biggest flag I have here.
"The highest standards of confidentiality" is nice but, as you note, people presumably reached out to these individual Board members, rather than the whole Board, because they felt the individuals could be trusted a lot better than the Board as a whole. Which in my mind is totally understandable.
If people reached out in confidence, demanding that their experiences and information be turned over to the entire Board - without noting that as a caveat when first interacting with the source, or without asking for the source's permission - well, I'd be cagey too. Anyone who has ever dealt with human subject research would be cagey.
The perspective of human subjects research makes a lot of sense here. A
lot of research studies are asking the question, can we share data between studies now that we have the "cloud" technology to do it? In every case I've seen, researchers have to explicitly ask for two consents, one to collect the data from the subject, another to share it. I would expect anyone in the medical profession to operate the way James has.
Most internal review boards won't even allow you to ask human subjects for the broad ability to share their data, you have to identify the specific place it will be shared, before you collect it. In the US, these rules come from Institutional Review Boards. These IRBs function in a similar way to the Board, by providing an independent level of oversight to medical research, and are given a wide latitude to go as far as halt research studies and punish misconduct, even though they are not medical researchers themselves.
I wish the Board had the same respect of confidential data that James has shown, and that Institutional Review Boards throughout the research community have when it comes to human data. IRB members aren't necessarily medical professionals, they are the same people you would find sitting on any board. So I think it's reasonable for us to ask the Board to treat confidential data in the same way any IRB would, the same way James has.
-Justin
Justin - many of these elements of current research ethics, enforced in some instances by IRBs, have grown in no small part due to the regulatory environment around personal health information. The legal framework for information held by a corporate board member is very different. It may be that James' approach to confidentiality is drawn from his experience as a physician, but it perhaps speaks to inadequate board training that he discovered the import of the different legal environment only after things fell apart. _______________________________________________ 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 Mon, May 2, 2016 at 10:56 PM, Oliver Keyes ironholds@gmail.com wrote:
While *some* of research ethics comes from the medical world - particularly from the Belmont report and the Western-centric research atrocities of the last century - much of it does not. Things like the Zimbardo and Milgram experiments have had a marked impact on our conceptualisation of appropriate ethics and IRBs, and it is not unusual for institutions to even separate out behavioural and social studies from medical studies in training, IRB composition and expected practices.
And yet the social sciences contain the same duties and responsibilities around ethical principles that medical studies do. The principles of confidentiality, of transparency to the participant, of the participant taking the lead in defining what is and is not acceptable. Ethical principles along these lines are a common and core part of the IRB process, if you're involving humans, regardless of the nature of that involvement. And I note that the current board contains (not to single him out, but simply because he is the best example Dariusz Jemielniak, full name *Dr* Dariusz Jemielniak, who is an _ethnographer_, one of the social fields of study that pays very close attention to these things.
So it is not as simple as "James's experiences were shaped by his medical background, other people did not have that". The need for ethical principles is enshrined in a lot of fields, including not just medicine, but those several other board members have as a background. This should have been a known. I agree that there is apparently an inadequacy in Board training, but I'm mostly amazed (and disappointed) that the people who wrote Denny's statement didn't twig that, actually, ethics in these areas are both paramount and much more complicated than just "well my legal duty says..." for the participants involved.
Please forgive me if it seemed like I was suggesting that research ethics - and the centrality of the needs of subjects - were solely sourced from the medical world. My point is that confidentiality of sensitive information is an iron law in medicine, where the critical duty is owed to the person who is the subject of the information. [My familiarity with these laws comes from the U.S.; I am not specifically trained in the medical confidentiality regime in Canada, but I suspect its laws are equivalent or stronger.] I would expect this to be his initial frame of reference when it comes to respecting the desire of confidentiality from a source providing sensitive information.
The key point here is that the critical duty that James' owed as a board member was to the WMF; this duty is is not (solely) a matter of ethics but a matter of law. That this was not apparent to all board members upon joining the board is a flaw in the board training process. I can see how a misunderstanding or disagreement on the nature of this duty could lead to difficulty between board members, but it still is a bit of a mystery to me how it rose to the level of kicking James off the board altogether.
Denny, you wrote: "I was particularly worried about James’ lack of understanding of confidential matters ..." But you seem to be saying that James wanted to respect the confidentiality that had been promised to staff.
Sarah
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 10:39 AM, Michel Vuijlsteke wikipedia@zog.org wrote:
Just to be sure I understand the issue: staff members reached out specifically to the four of you and asked for confidentiality, and then the Board demanded 'all documents', presumably including some confidential staff information, and James only very reluctantly shared it?
Michel
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 6:10 PM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
The formal task force was created end of October. This task force involved outside legal counsel and conducted professional fact finding.
What were the prime motivations for involving outside legal counsel, and how much money did this cost the Foundation?
Hoi, What is the point of this question. As if money is an issue in matters like this.
When is it enough, why is it for you to want more and more and in the process make it less a Wikipedia thing and more something personal to you. The board decided on a quality team including outside council that is in their remit. Thanks, GerardM
On 3 May 2016 at 06:57, Andreas Kolbe jayen466@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 6:10 PM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
The formal task force was created end of October. This task force
involved
outside legal counsel and conducted professional fact finding.
What were the prime motivations for involving outside legal counsel, and how much money did this cost the Foundation? _______________________________________________ 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 Mon, May 2, 2016 at 9:57 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen466@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, May 2, 2016 at 6:10 PM, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
The formal task force was created end of October. This task force
involved
outside legal counsel and conducted professional fact finding.
What were the prime motivations for involving outside legal counsel, and how much money did this cost the Foundation? _______________________________________________
And why was James excluded from the task force?
Sarah
There are several important issues that people have raised here already - notably the question of confidentiality of information; the question of the membership of this "task force"; and the question of whether the whistleblower process was effective/sufficient.
However, I'd like to refer to this point in particular:
On 2 May 2016 at 19:10, Denny Vrandečić vrandecic@gmail.com wrote:
This task force involved outside legal counsel and conducted professional fact finding. The first request of the task force to the Board members was to ask for all documents and notes pertaining to the case.
I'd like to ask about *who* this "professional fact finding" process talked to? I'm not asking to "name specific names" but more about which groups of people. In particular:
- I assume that the C-level [senior] staff were interviewed, but were any non-executive staff interviewed as well? This question speaks to the level of detail/depth that this investigation was expecting to have... I would think that if the "task force" was serious then it would be interested in hearing from across the organisation at all levels, and directly from the people affected. However, if it only spoke with people in the executive of the organisation then it would only be hearing views that either had already been relayed to [some] members of the board by the executive, or the views of the executive themselves. Obviously the C-Level staff themselves should have been interviewed, but ALSO other staff so that, at the very least, it didn't appear to be just a token-effort at investigating claims.
- Were the Knight Foundation spoken with? Given that the apparent disparity between what was in the grant document and what (some) on the board thought was being build in the "knowledge engine" project, it seems important to know if the Knight Foundation genuinely was of the same understanding as the Board? This disparity also seems to have been a core issue to the concerns raised by by the staff, and in the concerns that were held by James, so it seems particularly pertinent to be checking what the the Knight Foundation's perspective actually was.
-Liam
wittylama.com Peace, love & metadata
I'd like to ask about *who* this "professional fact finding" process talked to? I'm not asking to "name specific names" but more about which groups of people.
I also wonder about this - I am sort of assuming that the people who were coming forward to raise grievances were included in the fact-finding. It would be odd not to ;)
- Were the Knight Foundation spoken with?
It might also be worth clarifying whether this was substantially related to the Knowledge Engine issue, or whether it was a largely separate set of grievances.
While I'm using the word "grievance" - other people have talked about the "whistleblowing" policy - but what is being described here is what would in the UK be treated as a "workplace grievance". I.e. a staff member being concerned that, while their manager or another senior staff member isn't doing anything actually fraudulent or illegal, they do feel that the conduct of the manager concerned is having a serious impact on their own ability to do their job.
Most UK employers have a formal grievance policy which sets out how staff should address these issues - including in the event that staff have a grievance about the chief executive or board members. Often these set out expectations about confidentiality and things like appeal processes. (Confidentiality can be a tricky one as a grievance is by its nature a communication from a staff member to their employer, and individual mangers or trustees actually can't promise to hear this stuff in confidence...)
I don't know if WMF has one of these - perhaps is should?
Hoi, I would assume that people who spoke in confidence were ASKED if they wanted to be included. It would be really bad to approach it in any other way.
As to the knowledge engine. Can we please put it to rest. It has always been a big misunderstanding. It is not and has never been what the WMF is looking for and at the same time we could do so much better at search (having said that we are doing so much better than we did before.
If there is one thing a knowledge engine would be good for is serving our customers needs. THAT is scary; it is not about "us", the editing community.. woopedie woo !! Thanks, GerardM
On 4 May 2016 at 12:24, Chris Keating chriskeatingwiki@gmail.com wrote:
I'd like to ask about *who* this "professional fact finding" process
talked
to? I'm not asking to "name specific names" but more about which groups
of
people.
I also wonder about this - I am sort of assuming that the people who were coming forward to raise grievances were included in the fact-finding. It would be odd not to ;)
- Were the Knight Foundation spoken with?
It might also be worth clarifying whether this was substantially related to the Knowledge Engine issue, or whether it was a largely separate set of grievances.
While I'm using the word "grievance" - other people have talked about the "whistleblowing" policy - but what is being described here is what would in the UK be treated as a "workplace grievance". I.e. a staff member being concerned that, while their manager or another senior staff member isn't doing anything actually fraudulent or illegal, they do feel that the conduct of the manager concerned is having a serious impact on their own ability to do their job.
Most UK employers have a formal grievance policy which sets out how staff should address these issues - including in the event that staff have a grievance about the chief executive or board members. Often these set out expectations about confidentiality and things like appeal processes. (Confidentiality can be a tricky one as a grievance is by its nature a communication from a staff member to their employer, and individual mangers or trustees actually can't promise to hear this stuff in confidence...)
I don't know if WMF has one of these - perhaps is should? _______________________________________________ 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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