Hi Illario,
Apologies, I probably explained myself poorly. I never said that a chapter is a representative of the Wikimedia community, rather I was trying to explain that João’s claimed experience (emphasis on claimed) in management and conflict resolution was a major factor in him being elected to the Board. At the time, WMPT thought that that could be very valuable to the chapter. So, we agree, a heterogeneous board is absolutely an advantage, but in this case the issue was not one of diversity, but rather of competence and alignment to the movement goals and principles.
In practice, he did not contribute to the management of the chapter, and he was not prepared to an increase of the chapter activities. He very quickly started demonstrating uneasiness with any procedural decision he did not personally vet (which are imperative in volunteer-based, collaborative projects), and soon after, without any previous warning, started sending legal threats going as far as using a lawyer to intimidate one of our most active members on behalf of WMPT (without discussing it with anyone beforehand), and resigned.
We have no intention to expose João even more in this public mailing list, so we will not provide a comprehensive list of the problems we found with his term on the board. But to make it clear, when this whole issue began to be addressed, even though we did not ask him to stay on the Board, we did invite him to continue on the chapter, working with us, as AffCom can confirm. Just not in any role with legal responsibilities.
Cheers, Gonçalo Themudo
*Presidente* *Wikimedia Portugal* *Email: *goethe.wiki@gmail.com *Website: *http://pt.wikimedia.org https://sites.google.com/view/themudo *Imagine um mundo onde cada ser humano pode partilhar livremente a soma de todo o conhecimento, na sua própria língua.*
The pro forma statement bout what a chapter is is valuable, but I think many of us kinda got the idea that the problem was not the starting point (otherwise why electing him?) but came later. It's possible that someone else with more community experience would have never behaved such way, but that's speculation.
Statistically, in this scenario this lack of community view probably did not help. Whatever his skills in "management and conflict resolution" were, even assuming they were correctly stated based on previous expertise in other fields, they were not the best ones to handle the conflicts that later emerged. Also, considering the resolution we see now, which is not a great resolution. The point is that in all these disputes (I think about Brazil few months ago) it looks like the AffCom position sounds like "you are both wrong". Now, this is never a healthy long-term strategy. If it occurs again, it gives more and more the idea that whoever is in the less correct position can hold still because if the matter arrives to the AffCom everybody pays equally. I am sure the situation is more multifaceted, but let's try to grasp the general vibe here.
This is not wise. King Solomon solved the issue bluffing and spotting the real mother, he never actually cut the baby in two halves ... But wisdom comes also with experience. Il giovedì 11 ottobre 2018, 15:43:01 CEST, GoEthe.wiki goethe.wiki@gmail.com ha scritto:
Hi Illario,
Apologies, I probably explained myself poorly. I never said that a chapter is a representative of the Wikimedia community, rather I was trying to explain that João’s claimed experience (emphasis on claimed) in management and conflict resolution was a major factor in him being elected to the Board. At the time, WMPT thought that that could be very valuable to the chapter. So, we agree, a heterogeneous board is absolutely an advantage, but in this case the issue was not one of diversity, but rather of competence and alignment to the movement goals and principles.
In practice, he did not contribute to the management of the chapter, and he was not prepared to an increase of the chapter activities. He very quickly started demonstrating uneasiness with any procedural decision he did not personally vet (which are imperative in volunteer-based, collaborative projects), and soon after, without any previous warning, started sending legal threats going as far as using a lawyer to intimidate one of our most active members on behalf of WMPT (without discussing it with anyone beforehand), and resigned.
We have no intention to expose João even more in this public mailing list, so we will not provide a comprehensive list of the problems we found with his term on the board. But to make it clear, when this whole issue began to be addressed, even though we did not ask him to stay on the Board, we did invite him to continue on the chapter, working with us, as AffCom can confirm. Just not in any role with legal responsibilities.
Cheers, Gonçalo Themudo
*Presidente* *Wikimedia Portugal* *Email: *goethe.wiki@gmail.com *Website: *http://pt.wikimedia.org https://sites.google.com/view/themudo *Imagine um mundo onde cada ser humano pode partilhar livremente a soma de todo o conhecimento, na sua própria língua.* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l 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
Just a quick message to clarify that the only conflict that ever existed in Wikimedia Portugal, as far as I know, was with João Vasconcelos himself.
Paulo
Alessandro Marchetti via Wikimedia-l wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org escreveu no dia quinta, 11/10/2018 à(s) 15:38:
The pro forma statement bout what a chapter is is valuable, but I think many of us kinda got the idea that the problem was not the starting point (otherwise why electing him?) but came later. It's possible that someone else with more community experience would have never behaved such way, but that's speculation.
Statistically, in this scenario this lack of community view probably did not help. Whatever his skills in "management and conflict resolution" were, even assuming they were correctly stated based on previous expertise in other fields, they were not the best ones to handle the conflicts that later emerged. Also, considering the resolution we see now, which is not a great resolution. The point is that in all these disputes (I think about Brazil few months ago) it looks like the AffCom position sounds like "you are both wrong". Now, this is never a healthy long-term strategy. If it occurs again, it gives more and more the idea that whoever is in the less correct position can hold still because if the matter arrives to the AffCom everybody pays equally. I am sure the situation is more multifaceted, but let's try to grasp the general vibe here.
This is not wise. King Solomon solved the issue bluffing and spotting the real mother, he never actually cut the baby in two halves ... But wisdom comes also with experience. Il giovedì 11 ottobre 2018, 15:43:01 CEST, GoEthe.wiki < goethe.wiki@gmail.com> ha scritto:
Hi Illario,
Apologies, I probably explained myself poorly. I never said that a chapter is a representative of the Wikimedia community, rather I was trying to explain that João’s claimed experience (emphasis on claimed) in management and conflict resolution was a major factor in him being elected to the Board. At the time, WMPT thought that that could be very valuable to the chapter. So, we agree, a heterogeneous board is absolutely an advantage, but in this case the issue was not one of diversity, but rather of competence and alignment to the movement goals and principles.
In practice, he did not contribute to the management of the chapter, and he was not prepared to an increase of the chapter activities. He very quickly started demonstrating uneasiness with any procedural decision he did not personally vet (which are imperative in volunteer-based, collaborative projects), and soon after, without any previous warning, started sending legal threats going as far as using a lawyer to intimidate one of our most active members on behalf of WMPT (without discussing it with anyone beforehand), and resigned.
We have no intention to expose João even more in this public mailing list, so we will not provide a comprehensive list of the problems we found with his term on the board. But to make it clear, when this whole issue began to be addressed, even though we did not ask him to stay on the Board, we did invite him to continue on the chapter, working with us, as AffCom can confirm. Just not in any role with legal responsibilities.
Cheers, Gonçalo Themudo
*Presidente* *Wikimedia Portugal* *Email: *goethe.wiki@gmail.com *Website: *http://pt.wikimedia.org https://sites.google.com/view/themudo *Imagine um mundo onde cada ser humano pode partilhar livremente a soma de todo o conhecimento, na sua própria língua.* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l 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 and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l 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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