On 6 February 2013 12:23, Stevie Benton stevie.benton@wikimedia.org.uk wrote:
Tom, I don't see where anyone is making excuses.
Try reading this email thread... To use the Wiktionary definition, an excuse is "an explanation designed to avoid or alleviate guilt or negative judgment".
In a statement of the form "We are (not) doing X because of Y" we call Y an "excuse".
As your previous email acknowledges, the review was co-commissioned by Wikimedia UK and the Wikimedia Foundation. We are discussing the review with the Foundation and are in the process of preparing a response. This response needs to be co-ordinated on both sides, discussed, and consensus reached. This doesn't happen immediately. Please do be assured that we are in regular contact with the WMF on this issue, as they are with us.
As I have explained repeatedly, you do not need to discuss a response. The response should simply say that we are now going to have an open discussion with the community and decide where we go from here, and you could have written that months ago. Or have you already decided that you don't care what the community thinks and are just going to make all the decisions about how to respond yourselves?
One other important point I want to address from your email below, too. You say "co-commissioned a report into your own failings". This is inaccurate as there are plenty of things that we do well that the report will also look at.
Well, yes, I would hope you haven't failed at everything. The review was commissioned to look at your failings, though. Obviously, to work out what your failings are, it will have looked at things that turned out to be fine. Trying to deny that this is about your failings is disingenuous.