(Sorry for crossposting)

Dear friends,

As you know, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) [1] comprising seven community members, was established last year to make recommendations to the Board about how to allocate movement funds to eligible entities and help achieve Wikimedia’s vision, mission, and strategies. The first round of FDC funding, of $8.51 million, supporting the annual plans of eleven entities, was successfully completed in December 2012.[2] All thanks to the hard work of the members of the community, the FDC, and FDC staff for helping making this happen!

We are writing to you today to announce that we are increasing the community review period for FDC proposals by two weeks. We are doing this in response to feedback from community members including applicants, FDC and FDC staff. In consultation with the FDC and the Board, we (as Board representatives on the FDC) approved this change to the FDC schedule, in order to allow enough time for the community to review the proposals, and for the applicants to respond. As a result, Round 2's schedule (and hereafter all FDC rounds), will have four weeks of review. This also means that the deadlines for the FDC recommendations and the Board approval get pushed out by two weeks.

For the FDC Round 2 of 2012-13, the schedule is therefore as follows: proposals from eligible entities are due on March 1,[3] on the FDC portal. Any eligibility gaps that are pending need to be closed by February 15.[4] The community review period will be from March 1 to March 31. On April 8, the FDC staff will post the staff assessments of the proposals. The FDC will meet from April 22-24 and make its recommendation to the Board on May 1.

Please do not hesitate to reach out to the FDC staff (FDCsupport@wikimedia.org) for any clarifications. They will be sharing more details with you shortly.

Thanks, Jan Bart and Patricio - Board observers FDC

[1] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal [2] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/FDC_recommendations/2012-2013_roun... [3] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/Proposal_process [4] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/Eligibility_status/Current_round#f...

-- Patricio Lorente Blog: http://www.patriciolorente.com.ar Identi.ca // Twitter: @patriciolorente