Greetings, friends,
As you all know, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) meets twice a year to help make decisions about how to effectively allocate movement funds to achieve the Wikimedia movement's mission, vision, and strategy. [1] We recently met in San Francisco to deliberate on the 11 annual plan grant proposals submitted for this round of review. [2] We thank these organizations for their hard work on their annual plans and proposals.
The FDC has now posted our Round 1 2014-2015 recommendations on the annual plan grants to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees: http://goo.gl/Ea7d4I . [3]
With the support of the FDC’s two Board Representatives (Bishakha Datta and Frieda Brioschi), the WMF Board will review the recommendations and then make their decision on them by 1 January 2015.
This round, proposals came from ten chapters and one thematic organization, totaling requests of roughly $4.7 million USD. Before our face-to-face deliberations, which were held from 15-18 November, the FDC reviewed the proposals in careful detail, aided by staff assessments and analysis on impact, finances, and programs, as well as community comments on the proposals. Our conversations were intense and the decisions were not easy; each proposal was carefully considered both in its own context and environment, and strengths and concerned were discussed. We are recommending grants totaling roughly $3.8 million USD.
Now that the recommendations have been published, there is a formal process to submit complaints or appeals to the Board. Here are the steps for both:
Any organization that would like to submit an appeal on the FDC’s Round 1 recommendation should submit it to the Board representatives to the FDC by 23:59 UTC on 8 December 2014 in accordance with the appeal process outlined in the FDC Framework. A formal appeal to challenge the FDC’s recommendation should be in the form of a 500-or-fewer word summary directed to the two non-voting WMF Board representatives to the FDC (Frieda Brioschi and Bishakha Datta). The appeal should be submitted on-wiki, [4] and must be submitted by the Board Chair of a funding-seeking applicant. The Board will publish its decision on this and all recommendations by 1 Jan 2015.
Complaints to the ombudsperson about the FDC process can be filed by anyone with the Ombudsperson and can be made any time. The complaint should be submitted on wiki, as well. [5] The ombudsperson will publicly document the complaint, and investigate as needed.
Please have a look at the calendar [6] to see other upcoming milestones in the annual plan grants / FDC process.
Again, we offer our sincere thanks to the 11 organizations who submitted annual plan grant proposals to the FDC.
On behalf of the FDC,
Dariusz Jemielniak ("pundit", FDC Chair)
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Proposals/2014-2015_round1
[3] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/FDC_portal/FDC_recommendations/20...
[4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Appeals_to_the_Board_on_the_recom...
[5] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Complaints_about_the_FDC_process
Hoi, I am really surprised how little attention this is getting.
I have a few questions, observations. When I read the arguments for cutting the request of the German chapter, I get the impression that the Germans are punished. I also find no considerations to the consequences of NOT providing the requested funding. There are many people employed by the German chapter, are they to be dismissed or is there to be less money for activities? When I read about the Dutch request, they are praised for being prudent and careful planners but they are punished for not being actively involved in fundraising.
The WIkimedia Foundation deliberately excluded the chapters from the fundraising efforts. Enough comments have been made about this recently; it is obvious to many that the WMF seems not to care too much about what funds are raised outside the USA. There is also no relation between fundraising in a country and activities in a country. I am annoyed that the WMF is so two faced in this.
The process of handing out gifts makes beggars of the chapters. They have to comply with the vagaries of what committee members think at a given time. The process of handing out is very much solidified in time and from the impression I get this is true for the chapters but not for the WMF itself. When it finds a need to do whatever, it can. When a chapter finds the same need it cannot.
In my opinion by making chapters second class citizens, the WMF will remain USA and English centred. That does not help our goal of "sharing in the sum of all available knowledge". Thanks, GerardM
PS there are more chapters where I am not happy about the granting of gifts either.
On 21 November 2014 at 17:34, Dariusz Jemielniak darekj@alk.edu.pl wrote:
Greetings, friends,
As you all know, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) meets twice a year to help make decisions about how to effectively allocate movement funds to achieve the Wikimedia movement's mission, vision, and strategy. [1] We recently met in San Francisco to deliberate on the 11 annual plan grant proposals submitted for this round of review. [2] We thank these organizations for their hard work on their annual plans and proposals.
The FDC has now posted our Round 1 2014-2015 recommendations on the annual plan grants to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees: http://goo.gl/Ea7d4I . [3]
With the support of the FDC’s two Board Representatives (Bishakha Datta and Frieda Brioschi), the WMF Board will review the recommendations and then make their decision on them by 1 January 2015.
This round, proposals came from ten chapters and one thematic organization, totaling requests of roughly $4.7 million USD. Before our face-to-face deliberations, which were held from 15-18 November, the FDC reviewed the proposals in careful detail, aided by staff assessments and analysis on impact, finances, and programs, as well as community comments on the proposals. Our conversations were intense and the decisions were not easy; each proposal was carefully considered both in its own context and environment, and strengths and concerned were discussed. We are recommending grants totaling roughly $3.8 million USD.
Now that the recommendations have been published, there is a formal process to submit complaints or appeals to the Board. Here are the steps for both:
Any organization that would like to submit an appeal on the FDC’s Round 1 recommendation should submit it to the Board representatives to the FDC by 23:59 UTC on 8 December 2014 in accordance with the appeal process outlined in the FDC Framework. A formal appeal to challenge the FDC’s recommendation should be in the form of a 500-or-fewer word summary directed to the two non-voting WMF Board representatives to the FDC (Frieda Brioschi and Bishakha Datta). The appeal should be submitted on-wiki, [4] and must be submitted by the Board Chair of a funding-seeking applicant. The Board will publish its decision on this and all recommendations by 1 Jan 2015.
Complaints to the ombudsperson about the FDC process can be filed by anyone with the Ombudsperson and can be made any time. The complaint should be submitted on wiki, as well. [5] The ombudsperson will publicly document the complaint, and investigate as needed.
Please have a look at the calendar [6] to see other upcoming milestones in the annual plan grants / FDC process.
Again, we offer our sincere thanks to the 11 organizations who submitted annual plan grant proposals to the FDC.
On behalf of the FDC,
Dariusz Jemielniak ("pundit", FDC Chair)
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Proposals/2014-2015_round1
[3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/FDC_portal/FDC_recommendations/20...
[4]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Appeals_to_the_Board_on_the_recom...
[5] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Complaints_about_the_FDC_process
[6] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Calendar _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Gerard,
this is called "narrowing focus" by WMF, you see.
But you wanted a comment on the FDC. The only thing I can say is: To base such a decision on things like "the FDC feels" and "to appear" and "it is likely" (all quotes from their text within a single paragraph) makes me think that they get very poor information and instead of trying to get it richer (for example by talking to *all* relevant people), they make a very poor decision out of it.
Th.
2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
Hoi, I am really surprised how little attention this is getting.
I have a few questions, observations. When I read the arguments for cutting the request of the German chapter, I get the impression that the Germans are punished. I also find no considerations to the consequences of NOT providing the requested funding. There are many people employed by the German chapter, are they to be dismissed or is there to be less money for activities? When I read about the Dutch request, they are praised for being prudent and careful planners but they are punished for not being actively involved in fundraising.
The WIkimedia Foundation deliberately excluded the chapters from the fundraising efforts. Enough comments have been made about this recently; it is obvious to many that the WMF seems not to care too much about what funds are raised outside the USA. There is also no relation between fundraising in a country and activities in a country. I am annoyed that the WMF is so two faced in this.
The process of handing out gifts makes beggars of the chapters. They have to comply with the vagaries of what committee members think at a given time. The process of handing out is very much solidified in time and from the impression I get this is true for the chapters but not for the WMF itself. When it finds a need to do whatever, it can. When a chapter finds the same need it cannot.
In my opinion by making chapters second class citizens, the WMF will remain USA and English centred. That does not help our goal of "sharing in the sum of all available knowledge". Thanks, GerardM
PS there are more chapters where I am not happy about the granting of gifts either.
On 21 November 2014 at 17:34, Dariusz Jemielniak darekj@alk.edu.pl wrote:
Greetings, friends,
As you all know, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) meets twice a
year
to help make decisions about how to effectively allocate movement funds
to
achieve the Wikimedia movement's mission, vision, and strategy. [1] We recently met in San Francisco to deliberate on the 11 annual plan grant proposals submitted for this round of review. [2] We thank these organizations for their hard work on their annual plans and proposals.
The FDC has now posted our Round 1 2014-2015 recommendations on the
annual
plan grants to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees: http://goo.gl/Ea7d4I . [3]
With the support of the FDC’s two Board Representatives (Bishakha Datta
and
Frieda Brioschi), the WMF Board will review the recommendations and then make their decision on them by 1 January 2015.
This round, proposals came from ten chapters and one thematic
organization,
totaling requests of roughly $4.7 million USD. Before our face-to-face deliberations, which were held from 15-18 November, the FDC reviewed the proposals in careful detail, aided by staff assessments and analysis on impact, finances, and programs, as well as community comments on the proposals. Our conversations were intense and the decisions were not
easy;
each proposal was carefully considered both in its own context and environment, and strengths and concerned were discussed. We are recommending grants totaling roughly $3.8 million USD.
Now that the recommendations have been published, there is a formal
process
to submit complaints or appeals to the Board. Here are the steps for
both:
Any organization that would like to submit an appeal on the FDC’s Round 1 recommendation should submit it to the Board representatives to the FDC by 23:59 UTC on 8 December 2014 in accordance with the appeal process outlined in the FDC Framework. A formal appeal to challenge the FDC’s recommendation should be in the form of a 500-or-fewer word summary directed to the two non-voting WMF Board representatives to the FDC (Frieda Brioschi and Bishakha Datta). The appeal should be submitted on-wiki, [4] and must be submitted by the Board Chair of a funding-seeking applicant. The Board
will
publish its decision on this and all recommendations by 1 Jan 2015.
Complaints to the ombudsperson about the FDC process can be filed by
anyone
with the Ombudsperson and can be made any time. The complaint should be submitted on wiki, as well. [5] The ombudsperson will publicly document
the
complaint, and investigate as needed.
Please have a look at the calendar [6] to see other upcoming milestones
in
the annual plan grants / FDC process.
Again, we offer our sincere thanks to the 11 organizations who submitted annual plan grant proposals to the FDC.
On behalf of the FDC,
Dariusz Jemielniak ("pundit", FDC Chair)
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG
[2]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Proposals/2014-2015_round1
[3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/FDC_portal/FDC_recommendations/20...
[4]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Appeals_to_the_Board_on_the_recom...
[5]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Complaints_about_the_FDC_process
[6] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Calendar _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
I can very well understand why people are careful about commenting. Most people who have the insight to make sensible comments on the con located matter have a stake in it. They are active in the wmf, want to run for a committee in which process they might be deemed too opinionated or they fear that it might harm the future applications of their chapter or project. I'm afraid that to a very large extent there are too many interdependencies for a proper public discussion on many issues.
That said, while I disagree with several things in the advice, such as the somewhat childish and symbolic cut of 2000 USD against wmar, overall I also see various improvements in the level of detail and arguments that ought to be applauded.
Lodewijk On Nov 23, 2014 9:35 AM, "Thomas Goldammer" thogol@gmail.com wrote:
Gerard,
this is called "narrowing focus" by WMF, you see.
But you wanted a comment on the FDC. The only thing I can say is: To base such a decision on things like "the FDC feels" and "to appear" and "it is likely" (all quotes from their text within a single paragraph) makes me think that they get very poor information and instead of trying to get it richer (for example by talking to *all* relevant people), they make a very poor decision out of it.
Th.
2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
Hoi, I am really surprised how little attention this is getting.
I have a few questions, observations. When I read the arguments for
cutting
the request of the German chapter, I get the impression that the Germans are punished. I also find no considerations to the consequences of NOT providing the requested funding. There are many people employed by the German chapter, are they to be dismissed or is there to be less money for activities? When I read about the Dutch request, they are praised for
being
prudent and careful planners but they are punished for not being actively involved in fundraising.
The WIkimedia Foundation deliberately excluded the chapters from the fundraising efforts. Enough comments have been made about this recently;
it
is obvious to many that the WMF seems not to care too much about what
funds
are raised outside the USA. There is also no relation between fundraising in a country and activities in a country. I am annoyed that the WMF is so two faced in this.
The process of handing out gifts makes beggars of the chapters. They have to comply with the vagaries of what committee members think at a given time. The process of handing out is very much solidified in time and from the impression I get this is true for the chapters but not for the WMF itself. When it finds a need to do whatever, it can. When a chapter
finds
the same need it cannot.
In my opinion by making chapters second class citizens, the WMF will
remain
USA and English centred. That does not help our goal of "sharing in the
sum
of all available knowledge". Thanks, GerardM
PS there are more chapters where I am not happy about the granting of
gifts
either.
On 21 November 2014 at 17:34, Dariusz Jemielniak darekj@alk.edu.pl wrote:
Greetings, friends,
As you all know, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) meets twice a
year
to help make decisions about how to effectively allocate movement funds
to
achieve the Wikimedia movement's mission, vision, and strategy. [1] We recently met in San Francisco to deliberate on the 11 annual plan grant proposals submitted for this round of review. [2] We thank these organizations for their hard work on their annual plans and proposals.
The FDC has now posted our Round 1 2014-2015 recommendations on the
annual
plan grants to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees: http://goo.gl/Ea7d4I . [3]
With the support of the FDC’s two Board Representatives (Bishakha Datta
and
Frieda Brioschi), the WMF Board will review the recommendations and
then
make their decision on them by 1 January 2015.
This round, proposals came from ten chapters and one thematic
organization,
totaling requests of roughly $4.7 million USD. Before our face-to-face deliberations, which were held from 15-18 November, the FDC reviewed
the
proposals in careful detail, aided by staff assessments and analysis on impact, finances, and programs, as well as community comments on the proposals. Our conversations were intense and the decisions were not
easy;
each proposal was carefully considered both in its own context and environment, and strengths and concerned were discussed. We are recommending grants totaling roughly $3.8 million USD.
Now that the recommendations have been published, there is a formal
process
to submit complaints or appeals to the Board. Here are the steps for
both:
Any organization that would like to submit an appeal on the FDC’s
Round 1
recommendation should submit it to the Board representatives to the FDC by 23:59 UTC on 8 December 2014 in accordance with the appeal process outlined
in
the FDC Framework. A formal appeal to challenge the FDC’s
recommendation
should be in the form of a 500-or-fewer word summary directed to the
two
non-voting WMF Board representatives to the FDC (Frieda Brioschi and Bishakha Datta). The appeal should be submitted on-wiki, [4] and must
be
submitted by the Board Chair of a funding-seeking applicant. The Board
will
publish its decision on this and all recommendations by 1 Jan 2015.
Complaints to the ombudsperson about the FDC process can be filed by
anyone
with the Ombudsperson and can be made any time. The complaint should be submitted on wiki, as well. [5] The ombudsperson will publicly document
the
complaint, and investigate as needed.
Please have a look at the calendar [6] to see other upcoming milestones
in
the annual plan grants / FDC process.
Again, we offer our sincere thanks to the 11 organizations who
submitted
annual plan grant proposals to the FDC.
On behalf of the FDC,
Dariusz Jemielniak ("pundit", FDC Chair)
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG
[2]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Proposals/2014-2015_round1
[3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/FDC_portal/FDC_recommendations/20...
[4]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Appeals_to_the_Board_on_the_recom...
[5]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Complaints_about_the_FDC_process
[6] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Calendar _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
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Having carefully read through some of the FDC rationales I thought they were appropriately strategic and made it pretty obvious exactly what those chapters that did not get what they were hoping for, need to change in order to bid more successfully. I found them encouraging and a good demonstration of why the FDC is a better process than the 100% WMF directed one that used to exist.
As a long past Chapters Association chairman, who is definitely out of favour with WMF unelected big-wigs due to being controversial, I do not get any impression that this is driven by a WMF-centric agenda. Quite the opposite, most of the comments the FDC have made push us all to be more volunteer centric and away from either pointless centralization, empire-building or becoming scions of the Foundation.
Chapter boards who are responsible for less successful bids, may need to consider this is a good time to not only take another bite at their strategy, but empower themselves to reconsider how they grow their organization rather than being led by growth alone. Too often we see measure such as employee counts or bigger budgets getting significantly more oxygen as being good things compared to volunteer* support, volunteer leadership, better transparency or even the reduction of programmes that fail to be volunteer centric or deliver healthy volunteer engagement.
* For those chapters that make this an issue by counting volunteers in exceedingly creative ways, by "volunteer" I mean "unpaid volunteers".
Fae
On 23 November 2014 at 10:37, Lodewijk lodewijk@effeietsanders.org wrote:
I can very well understand why people are careful about commenting. Most people who have the insight to make sensible comments on the con located matter have a stake in it. They are active in the wmf, want to run for a committee in which process they might be deemed too opinionated or they fear that it might harm the future applications of their chapter or project. I'm afraid that to a very large extent there are too many interdependencies for a proper public discussion on many issues.
That said, while I disagree with several things in the advice, such as the somewhat childish and symbolic cut of 2000 USD against wmar, overall I also see various improvements in the level of detail and arguments that ought to be applauded.
Lodewijk
On 23 November 2014 at 11:25, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
Having carefully read through some of the FDC rationales I thought they were appropriately strategic and made it pretty obvious exactly what those chapters that did not get what they were hoping for, need to change in order to bid more successfully.
I am not entirely sure about this. My concern is essentially that it is unclear to me how the FDC determines the extent of the cuts it makes and which item(s) of the budget get(s) cut by what amount of money. For instance, when to Committee suggests to reduce the allocation to WMDE by EUR 360,000 vis-à-vis what they requested (-30%), it is not clear to me how the Committee arrived at that amount of money.
There are plenty of possibilities, after all: It could be that they looked at individual items in the budget and found that the chapter overspends on these (in which case the Committee must have some idea of the amount of money they would find justifiable); it could be that the Committee members were generally angry about the alleged poor quality of the proposal and made an across-the-board cut; or it could be a combination of the two. But either way, while the FDC -- righly -- demands from chapters to present their budgets at a high level of detail (particularly if high sums are involved), the same, I would say, also applies to the FDC itself. An uninvolved third party should be able to see why you cut WMDE's budget by EUR 360,000 rather than by 150,000 or 550,000. I'm not seeing this. (Btw, I'm just using WMDE as an example because of the large amount of money involved; I think the issue I'm referring to applies to other proposals as well.)
Patrik
On 23 November 2014 at 22:30, pajz pajzmail@gmail.com wrote:
On 23 November 2014 at 11:25, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
Having carefully read through some of the FDC rationales I thought they were appropriately strategic and made it pretty obvious exactly what those chapters that did not get what they were hoping for, need to change in order to bid more successfully.
I am not entirely sure about this. My concern is essentially that it is unclear to me how the FDC determines the extent of the cuts it makes and which item(s) of the budget get(s) cut by what amount of money. For instance, when to Committee suggests to reduce the allocation to WMDE by EUR 360,000 vis-à-vis what they requested (-30%), it is not clear to me how the Committee arrived at that amount of money.
Just noting here that I think this is an excellent point. It's not entirely clear in some cases why the allocation has been cut by a specific amount. I can appreciate that the FDC has good reasons for not giving an entity what it has asked for, but at the same time it should be able to explain clearly how they arrived at the reduced figure.
The other danger of across the board cuts like this, especially where the rationale is not clear, is that entities may start to inflate their requests, factoring an expected 10% or 20% to be shaved off the top by the FDC, thus leaving them with the figure that they *really *want. If the rationale is clearly explained, this will probably be less of a factor.
Cheers, Craig Franklin
A point of clarification for the people who are not looking at the recommendation chart, the FDC recommends that Wikimedia Argentina (WMAR) receive an increase of 21.14% above their allocation last year. Lodewijk is commenting that the FDC did not recommend the full amount that WMAR requested.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wikipedian in Residence at Cochrane Collaboration
On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 4:37 AM, Lodewijk lodewijk@effeietsanders.org wrote:
I can very well understand why people are careful about commenting. Most people who have the insight to make sensible comments on the con located matter have a stake in it. They are active in the wmf, want to run for a committee in which process they might be deemed too opinionated or they fear that it might harm the future applications of their chapter or project. I'm afraid that to a very large extent there are too many interdependencies for a proper public discussion on many issues.
That said, while I disagree with several things in the advice, such as the somewhat childish and symbolic cut of 2000 USD against wmar, overall I also see various improvements in the level of detail and arguments that ought to be applauded.
Lodewijk On Nov 23, 2014 9:35 AM, "Thomas Goldammer" thogol@gmail.com wrote:
Gerard,
this is called "narrowing focus" by WMF, you see.
But you wanted a comment on the FDC. The only thing I can say is: To base such a decision on things like "the FDC feels" and "to appear" and "it is likely" (all quotes from their text within a single paragraph) makes me think that they get very poor information and instead of trying to get it richer (for example by talking to *all* relevant people), they make a
very
poor decision out of it.
Th.
2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
Hoi, I am really surprised how little attention this is getting.
I have a few questions, observations. When I read the arguments for
cutting
the request of the German chapter, I get the impression that the
Germans
are punished. I also find no considerations to the consequences of NOT providing the requested funding. There are many people employed by the German chapter, are they to be dismissed or is there to be less money
for
activities? When I read about the Dutch request, they are praised for
being
prudent and careful planners but they are punished for not being
actively
involved in fundraising.
The WIkimedia Foundation deliberately excluded the chapters from the fundraising efforts. Enough comments have been made about this
recently;
it
is obvious to many that the WMF seems not to care too much about what
funds
are raised outside the USA. There is also no relation between
fundraising
in a country and activities in a country. I am annoyed that the WMF is
so
two faced in this.
The process of handing out gifts makes beggars of the chapters. They
have
to comply with the vagaries of what committee members think at a given time. The process of handing out is very much solidified in time and
from
the impression I get this is true for the chapters but not for the WMF itself. When it finds a need to do whatever, it can. When a chapter
finds
the same need it cannot.
In my opinion by making chapters second class citizens, the WMF will
remain
USA and English centred. That does not help our goal of "sharing in the
sum
of all available knowledge". Thanks, GerardM
PS there are more chapters where I am not happy about the granting of
gifts
either.
On 21 November 2014 at 17:34, Dariusz Jemielniak darekj@alk.edu.pl wrote:
Greetings, friends,
As you all know, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) meets twice
a
year
to help make decisions about how to effectively allocate movement
funds
to
achieve the Wikimedia movement's mission, vision, and strategy. [1]
We
recently met in San Francisco to deliberate on the 11 annual plan
grant
proposals submitted for this round of review. [2] We thank these organizations for their hard work on their annual plans and
proposals.
The FDC has now posted our Round 1 2014-2015 recommendations on the
annual
plan grants to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees: http://goo.gl/Ea7d4I . [3]
With the support of the FDC’s two Board Representatives (Bishakha
Datta
and
Frieda Brioschi), the WMF Board will review the recommendations and
then
make their decision on them by 1 January 2015.
This round, proposals came from ten chapters and one thematic
organization,
totaling requests of roughly $4.7 million USD. Before our
face-to-face
deliberations, which were held from 15-18 November, the FDC reviewed
the
proposals in careful detail, aided by staff assessments and analysis
on
impact, finances, and programs, as well as community comments on the proposals. Our conversations were intense and the decisions were not
easy;
each proposal was carefully considered both in its own context and environment, and strengths and concerned were discussed. We are recommending grants totaling roughly $3.8 million USD.
Now that the recommendations have been published, there is a formal
process
to submit complaints or appeals to the Board. Here are the steps for
both:
Any organization that would like to submit an appeal on the FDC’s
Round 1
recommendation should submit it to the Board representatives to the FDC by 23:59 UTC on 8 December 2014 in accordance with the appeal process outlined
in
the FDC Framework. A formal appeal to challenge the FDC’s
recommendation
should be in the form of a 500-or-fewer word summary directed to the
two
non-voting WMF Board representatives to the FDC (Frieda Brioschi and Bishakha Datta). The appeal should be submitted on-wiki, [4] and must
be
submitted by the Board Chair of a funding-seeking applicant. The
Board
will
publish its decision on this and all recommendations by 1 Jan 2015.
Complaints to the ombudsperson about the FDC process can be filed by
anyone
with the Ombudsperson and can be made any time. The complaint should
be
submitted on wiki, as well. [5] The ombudsperson will publicly
document
the
complaint, and investigate as needed.
Please have a look at the calendar [6] to see other upcoming
milestones
in
the annual plan grants / FDC process.
Again, we offer our sincere thanks to the 11 organizations who
submitted
annual plan grant proposals to the FDC.
On behalf of the FDC,
Dariusz Jemielniak ("pundit", FDC Chair)
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG
[2]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Proposals/2014-2015_round1
[3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/FDC_portal/FDC_recommendations/20...
[4]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Appeals_to_the_Board_on_the_recom...
[5]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Complaints_about_the_FDC_process
[6] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Calendar _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe:
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Hi,
apologies for the lengthy answer.
2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
I have a few questions, observations. When I read the arguments for cutting the request of the German chapter, I get the impression that the Germans are punished.
Can you please elaborate on where you get this feeling from, Gerard?
2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
I also find no considerations to the consequences of NOT providing the requested funding.
Possible scenarios have been discussed, the final decision is, of course, in the hands of the upcoming WMDE's board. I think that the recommendation given highlights some strong and some week points to work on (and I think this is the point of the recommendation).
2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
When I read about the Dutch request, they are praised for being
prudent and careful planners but they are punished for not being actively involved in fundraising.
On one hand the need of diversifying the sources of funding is for sure something that the FDC want to push organisations on, I want this to be as clear as possible on this point. I can say that all FDC members are aware that this message has not been given clearly in the past and that fundraising is a difficult endeavor where capacity needs to be built and result can not expected to be immediate. The main point is that "diversification of funds and resources mitigate risks and maintain sustainability, and also allow organizations to build meaningful local partnerships and shared ownership around goals."
On the other hand we considered the fact that WMNL has a significant amount of reserves, while some reserves are definitely a good thing, we have to consider the fact that this money are, in some sense, frozen in their use. We can not ignore this fact. Also remember the the medium size of IEG is 7500 $[1] (but I recalled an even lower figure).
The WIkimedia Foundation deliberately excluded the chapters from the fundraising efforts.
As Dariusz noted, the so-called "payment processing" from the websites does not necessarily equate fundraising /tout court/.
Enough comments have been made about this recently; it is obvious to many that the WMF seems not to care too much about what funds are raised outside the USA.
I disagree on this, but I may add that if this would be the case it would be one more reason to develop a local fundraising strategy.
The process of handing out gifts makes beggars of the chapters.
I disagree. Basically *all* the non-profit organisations in the world raise funds in a number of ways, including applying for grants to different organisations (at a local, national and international level), and I can assure you (through personal experience, i.e. projects done with Wikimedia Italia) that for doing such a thing you are required to present a (project) proposal, to prepare reports and basically do all the steps that are part of the FDC process.
They have to comply with the vagaries of what committee members think at a given time.
This is a risk associated with any fundraising activity other then having a very large number of direct small donors. I can also point out that you have to face the vagaries of the Board, too ("6. We should ensure the diversification of funding for our movement, and not rely solely on movement resources through our annual fundraiser.")[2].
In the recommendation for Wikimedia Foundation in May, the FDC asked for the start of the new strategic process. The Wikimedia Foundation as an organisation needs its own strategy, I do not know at the moment if this will be called "the Wikimedia movement strategy" or not. I do not know at the moment if this two strategies are better being one or not. The point is, whatever the Wikimedia Foundation's strategy will be this will affect the whole movement with a magnitude much greater than the strategy of every single other Wikimedia entity or group.
One point of this is: make sure that WMF strategy is sensible for what you as a chapter want to do, or make sure that we have a movement strategy we agree on. The other point is: "WMF strategy will affect all of us, whether we like it or not" (cit. Delphine, I hope you don't mind me quoting this in public), so participate in the WMF strategy process when the time comes.
In my opinion by making chapters second class citizens, the WMF will remain USA and English centred. That does not help our goal of "sharing in the sum of all available knowledge".
I don't think chapters are second class citizens and I think that all committee members are aware of the fact that "sharing in the sum of all available knowledge" goes beyond English (for 7 out of 9 members English is not the native/primary language) and goes beyond Wikipedia, this even goes beyond online since many of the very cool projects the chapters do need a significant offline activity.
PS there are more chapters where I am not happy about the granting of gifts either.
(as in?)
2014-11-23 9:34 GMT+01:00 Thomas Goldammer thogol@gmail.com:
But you wanted a comment on the FDC. The only thing I can say is: To base such a decision on things like "the FDC feels" and "to appear" and "it is likely" (all quotes from their text within a single paragraph) makes me think that they get very poor information and instead of trying to get it richer (for example by talking to *all* relevant people), they make a very poor decision out of it.
Thomas, I think that what you are pointing out is just a matter of prose.
2014-11-23 10:37 GMT+01:00 Lodewijk lodewijk@effeietsanders.org:
They are active in the wmf, want to run for a committee in which process they might be deemed too opinionated or they fear that it might harm the future applications of their chapter or project.
I am not sure I understand this sentence, Lodewijk, it sounds like retaliation to me, and there is no such thing. If there is no feedback, this process is pointless.
C [1] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Grantmaking_Impact_Assessment,_2013-... [2] https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Minutes/2013-04-18#Guidance_for_the_FDC
I would really introduce some kind of *coherence* in any statement. I am reading long emails (really long) reporting a long inside discussion but a lot of incoherence.
Statement: The sources should be diversified because this will reduce the risk.
A risk management is a consequence of a risk evaluation. It's not possible to put some "words" all together to give a coherent answer. What is the real risk you would reduce? What is the result of the risk evaluation.
Risk evaluation: I suppose that you would reduce the risk to don't have a fundraising able to cover all costs. Is not it?
In this case the biggest risk is inside Wikimedia Foundation, because if the WMF will not collect sufficient funds, they can generate a big risk because they don't diversify. Basically there may be a risk but the solution of the risk is not well addressed.
The solution to diversify to reduce the risks is not well addressed because the comments addressed to the chapters should be addressed before to WMF multiplied per 100.
If you don't address this request to WMF probably the statement of "risk reduction" is incoherent and, like this, it's wrong.
Best regards
On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 4:14 PM, Cristian Consonni kikkocristian@gmail.com wrote:
2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
I also find no considerations to the consequences of NOT providing the requested funding.
Possible scenarios have been discussed, the final decision is, of course, in the hands of the upcoming WMDE's board. I think that the recommendation given highlights some strong and some week points to work on (and I think this is the point of the recommendation).
2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
When I read about the Dutch request, they are praised for being
prudent and careful planners but they are punished for not being actively involved in fundraising.
On one hand the need of diversifying the sources of funding is for sure something that the FDC want to push organisations on, I want this to be as clear as possible on this point. I can say that all FDC members are aware that this message has not been given clearly in the past and that fundraising is a difficult endeavor where capacity needs to be built and result can not expected to be immediate. The main point is that "diversification of funds and resources mitigate risks and maintain sustainability, and also allow organizations to build meaningful local partnerships and shared ownership around goals."
hi Gerard,
you seem to mix two things: one is the FDC, the other is WMF and its funds processing practices. I can only speak for my part in the FDC (but I generally agree that funding scheme and policies require thinking over, and I definitely do not think there should be a "second class citizenship" approach).
I am confident that none of the FDC members wanted to "punish" WMDE. However, we did have very serious concerns about governance, frugality, effectiveness of the programs. Is it your view that we should not reduce our recommendations based on these in any case, when staff or activities reductions would follow?
Similarly, no-one is "punishing" the Dutch chapter. The FDC would only like to encourage more efforts in fundraising (and often just making an effort will be fine, results may be a bit contingent, as we all know), just so that we have more diversification of sources. This is valuable for our movement as a whole, as we should not assume that the current model of funding will certainly stay with us forever (many other organizations, including F/L/OSS ones, face trouble in global fundraising; if there are possibilities to get some local support, it is better to check them when the times are still good).
Thomas:
On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 9:34 AM, Thomas Goldammer thogol@gmail.com wrote:
But you wanted a comment on the FDC. The only thing I can say is: To base such a decision on things like "the FDC feels" and "to appear" and "it is likely" (all quotes from their text within a single paragraph) makes me think that they get very poor information and instead of trying to get it richer (for example by talking to *all* relevant people), they make a very poor decision out of it.
I am puzzled that you assume that we based our recommendations on poor information just because of polite wording. Not making definitive, absolute statements about reality does not indicate our uncertainty about data. In previous rounds whenever we felt the need to get more data, we reached out to get it (and sometimes even received it from chapters in time).
However, I have insist that it should be primarily the responsibility of the people preparing projects to make them as detailed as needed. In this respect, I have to really commend and appreciate many of the projects in this round - as a volunteer myself, I really can recognize the amount of work needed to prepare detailed budgets and projects. This is particularly impressive when compared to projects developed by large, "professional" chapters, which at least in theory should be light years ahead in terms of detail and accuracy.
best,
dariusz "pundit"
Gerard Meijssen, 23/11/2014 08:27:
I am really surprised how little attention this is getting.
It seems to me that there isn't much to say; I see political decisions, they are what they are. One of them is "detail detail detail"; while WMF can just throw a slogan on paper and get millions for it. Another is that they know how to e.g. select/replace an ED, or even write bylaws (!), better than the bodies legally entrusted with those duties.
Finally, I see hostility towards attempts at technological decentralisation (e.g. Kiwix). But here I hope I'm mistaken.
Nemo
2014-11-23 13:50 GMT+01:00 Federico Leva (Nemo) nemowiki@gmail.com:
Finally, I see hostility towards attempts at technological decentralisation (e.g. Kiwix). But here I hope I'm mistaken.
You are: «Wikimedia CH has been very successful in offline activities/Kiwix, and is effectively developing tools for broader activities extending beyond their community, for example in GLAM. It is creating tools and content that can have impact on a global scale. The offline work done by the chapter is a very good example of collaboration and cross-coordination among different movement groups for creation of a universal tool and its implementation (e.g, the work with Wikimedia South Africa to implement offline tools).»
C
Gerard Meijssen wrote:
I am really surprised how little attention this is getting.
Don't worry, I'm paying attention.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=10611792#About_the_FDC
When I look at the composition of the Funds Dissemination Committee, it's difficult for me to get too upset. It's a fairly diverse group of Wikimedians that I respect and trust. The recommendations themselves seem considered and measured (punintentional). Based on my limited observations, the FDC is doing an acceptable and thankless job.
I found the comparison chart provided in this report somewhat lacking, so I created my own that adds a few columns: https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=10618176#Comparison
Wikimedia Deutschland requested more money ($1,575,600) than any other requesting entity (the next highest was Wikimedia UK's request of $672,381). That's a pretty big difference.
Wikimedia Deutschland was not really exceptional in seeing a large difference between amount requested and amount recommended: DE --> -30.185%, CH --> -30.147%, UK --> -22.663%, etc.
And the report was pretty explicit about the reason for Wikimedia Deutschland receiving less money:
---- The FDC is very concerned that there is so little detail in the proposal about both budget and programs for an organization of this size, especially when compared to other proposals. With this recommendation to cut their allocation, it is the sincere hope of the FDC that significant concerns around the lack of focus in activities and large expenses for many of Wikimedia Deutschland’s programs will be recognised and acted upon.
[...]
Considering Wikimedia Deutschland’s size and budget, the lack of details and depth in this proposal and budget, compounded by vagueness, is a serious concern and is simply not acceptable. The FDC does not find a focused rationale behind its budget, which is serious considering that Wikimedia Deutschland is making the largest APG funding request overall and it is requesting more than 25% of the total funds available. The costs of each program are not sufficiently detailed, making it hard to determine if amounts allocated for each program are reasonable or not. From the information available, the FDC considers administration costs included in this proposal to be extremely and unusually high, especially those related to the Board. ----
I'm not sure how the FDC could have been any clearer here.
A smart response from Wikimedia Deutschland would be "we understand we fell short and we'll seek to address these issues for the next round." Becoming combative and talking about how the Wikimedia movement is too U.S. and Europe-centric (which is a funny view considering how the UK, CH, DE, and NL chapters fared in this round of funding...) is neither helpful nor productive, in my opinion.
And while centralized fundraising certainly creates unusual political and power dynamics, it's vastly preferable to the former practice of simply having a few small (in size) chapters get an excessively high amount of money that they didn't have the resources to properly manage or allocate. That was the past reality and we are improving and I'm grateful for that.
We're increasing funds dissemination accountability and we're being more financially prudent with donor resources. What, exactly, is upsetting?
MZMcBride
Hello dear all,
this is not a response to any specific mails on this thread, just a few thoughts from my side.
I am not very heavily involved in the FDC process, what I did was, well, as one of the board member decided to create this process and one of the advisory group member observed the feedbacks, and I read a few of the mails in this thread. By all means, I would not call myself expert in this matter. I have a very high respect for those people who apply for funds throw the FDC process and I have a very high respect for the FDC members. I know most of these people (both the applicants and the FDC members) and I believe in their good will, their honest, their belief that what they are doing is helping the movement and the effort they invested.
Now back to the matter.
One of the issue that the advisory group reviewed in May this year was that the FDC is a very hard and, because of this, a very expensive process. Every partner organization that apply for FDC has an annual planning, this alone is an organizational effort that eat up fund that do not go into program. I know from the WMF that the annual planning is very expensive. The whole organization is involved and the entire process lasted (anyway when I was in board) half a year. One can do a rough estimation of manhours invested into this process and then put a price on it. My rough estimation would go into 4 digits, maybe five. Partner organizations have less (alone because they have less C-level management), but I believe the proportion would be the same. Atop of this partner organizations who apply for FDC have to do an extra effort. I cannot say how much this extra effort is, but from my remote observation and my impression from the frustration and accounts in the list I would say it is not a small one. I have a guess, but it is totally subjective. Maybe one of the chapters can provide an example of insight? All these costs go into organization and off from program. The anual planning part is unavoidable, the FDC part is atop. This makes a malignant feedback: More organizational cost makes the efficiency worse, and that makes it more necessary to make more effort in the presentation and reasoning, which means more FDC effort.
We need to break up this circle. The advisory group made two recommendations this spring: The first one is to make repeating applications easier, and the other is to allow applications for more than one year. My impression from this thread is that either these recommendations didn't catch, or they were not implemented in this round. If the last case is true (not implemented) I would like to ask FDC to take these recommendations seriously and implement them. If the first case is true (implemented but doesn't catch), then I would think that we need to think about this again. Can someone clarify which case is more the reality?
One of the critics about the fund dissimination as a total that catchs my eyes again is "how unbalanced the distribution is". As I said I know most of the people who expressed their frustration here. I know that they are all reasonable people. So, if let's say the total funding is declining, I believe that the outcry would not be so loud as that we currently have the situation that the total sum of the funding is increasing and the partner organizations feel that they are being cut off from that increase. The total amount that the FDC can distribute is not determined by FDC. So, since as I said most of the people are reasonbale and rational, I would like to call the Foundation to take this point really really seriously. It remains one of the biggest problem between the Foundation and the partner organizations.
Greetings. Ting
Hi all, this is to inform you that I just placed an official reaction to the FDC funds allocation recommendation for WMNL on: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:APG/FDC_portal/FDC_recommendatio... I'd like to add here that, contrary to many opinions on this list, we find that the FDC has done a good job. The recommendations were thoughtful and we will take their advice seriously.
Frans
*Frans Grijzenhout*, voorzitter / chair +31 6 5333 9499 http://www.wikimedia.nl/
*Vereniging Wikimedia Nederland* *Postadres*: *Bezoekadres:* Postbus 167 Mariaplaats 3 3500 AD Utrecht 3511 LH Utrecht Kamer van Koophandel 17189036
2014-11-27 8:15 GMT+01:00 Ting Chen wing.philopp@gmx.de:
Hello dear all,
this is not a response to any specific mails on this thread, just a few thoughts from my side.
I am not very heavily involved in the FDC process, what I did was, well, as one of the board member decided to create this process and one of the advisory group member observed the feedbacks, and I read a few of the mails in this thread. By all means, I would not call myself expert in this matter. I have a very high respect for those people who apply for funds throw the FDC process and I have a very high respect for the FDC members. I know most of these people (both the applicants and the FDC members) and I believe in their good will, their honest, their belief that what they are doing is helping the movement and the effort they invested.
Now back to the matter.
One of the issue that the advisory group reviewed in May this year was that the FDC is a very hard and, because of this, a very expensive process. Every partner organization that apply for FDC has an annual planning, this alone is an organizational effort that eat up fund that do not go into program. I know from the WMF that the annual planning is very expensive. The whole organization is involved and the entire process lasted (anyway when I was in board) half a year. One can do a rough estimation of manhours invested into this process and then put a price on it. My rough estimation would go into 4 digits, maybe five. Partner organizations have less (alone because they have less C-level management), but I believe the proportion would be the same. Atop of this partner organizations who apply for FDC have to do an extra effort. I cannot say how much this extra effort is, but from my remote observation and my impression from the frustration and accounts in the list I would say it is not a small one. I have a guess, but it is totally subjective. Maybe one of the chapters can provide an example of insight? All these costs go into organization and off from program. The anual planning part is unavoidable, the FDC part is atop. This makes a malignant feedback: More organizational cost makes the efficiency worse, and that makes it more necessary to make more effort in the presentation and reasoning, which means more FDC effort.
We need to break up this circle. The advisory group made two recommendations this spring: The first one is to make repeating applications easier, and the other is to allow applications for more than one year. My impression from this thread is that either these recommendations didn't catch, or they were not implemented in this round. If the last case is true (not implemented) I would like to ask FDC to take these recommendations seriously and implement them. If the first case is true (implemented but doesn't catch), then I would think that we need to think about this again. Can someone clarify which case is more the reality?
One of the critics about the fund dissimination as a total that catchs my eyes again is "how unbalanced the distribution is". As I said I know most of the people who expressed their frustration here. I know that they are all reasonable people. So, if let's say the total funding is declining, I believe that the outcry would not be so loud as that we currently have the situation that the total sum of the funding is increasing and the partner organizations feel that they are being cut off from that increase. The total amount that the FDC can distribute is not determined by FDC. So, since as I said most of the people are reasonbale and rational, I would like to call the Foundation to take this point really really seriously. It remains one of the biggest problem between the Foundation and the partner organizations.
Greetings. Ting
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