By the way, since I know you and I are not the only ones who feel, to be charitable to both sides, that WMUK's focus on large projects and residencies has squeezed out the smaller projects, why don't we set something else up? Not a chapter but a society of Wikimedians focusing on small projects that have a smaller but more immediate impact on editors and projects (for example editathons, field trips, events with small local history groups etc, experience-sharing events for experienced editors). There's no reason such a society couldn't dovetail with WMUK; it could even perhaps apply for some modest funding (low four figures at the very most) from WMUK or the WMF.

Wikimedians are very good at disagreeing with each other over the best way to provide and enhance open knowledge, but at the end of the day we all share that same goal. Perhaps we should make a new year's resolution to remember that more often?   

Harry Mitchell
+44 (0) 7507 536 971
Skype: harry_j_mitchell


On Mon, Jan 7, 2019 at 10:09 PM Fæ <faewik@gmail.com> wrote:
Seems negative Harry. This is surely the outcome that everyone
expected when the WMUK board was professionalised by going from
volunteer led, to appointing trustees without even minimal Wikimedia
project experience. Add to this a significant reduction in
transparency and reducing elections, while claiming improved
governance, means that volunteers are disengaged and uninformed. We
all saw this happening a long time ago.

As evidence that something is amiss, the last AGM failed to be
quorate, but this was spun as a great success. Underpinning this was
the weirdness over membership numbers, which I guess is not important
as members no longer have access to any regular reports of membership,
so we cannot really make any comment about it.

WMUK is a very different organisation from the one we established, and
its function appears to be mostly as a funding partner for GLAMs to
set up residential programmes, with a few editathons, rather than
fostering a creative community of open knowledge volunteers doing new
and different stuff. If us unpaid volunteers think we need
coordination rather than just acting individually, then it makes sense
that we go back to the way things used to work before 2010 and
coordinate ourselves as a free society, rather than waiting for a
charity which no longer has those skills, and certainly will not
allocate the employee time, to do it to us.

P.S. before someone sends me a haranguing email telling me what a
terrible person I am, I refuse to feel bad about spending my volunteer
time supporting open knowledge, or my lack of interest in covering
every issue with soft soap.

Thanks, and I hope everyone is planning lots of fun stuff for the New
Year, not just talking about Brexit,
Fae
--
faewik@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae

On Mon, 7 Jan 2019 at 20:49, Harry Mitchell <hjmwiki@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> The Wikimedia UK wiki used to see a lot of activity. It was never coherently organised, but the staff and volunteers who were running projects used it as a sort of filing cabinet for documentation of events etc, and a small group of us used to keep an eye on the recent changes for spam and other rubbish but those days seem to be long gone.
>
> With the key functions of the wiki non-functioning, it is close to useless as a coordination hub and discussion venue and therefore the WMUK community, such as it is (a smaller subset of the community on this mailing list with a more specific function) is essentially homeless. That this does not seem to be a high priority, much less cause for alarm, is in my opinion a reflection on the fact that there is nobody in any senior position at WMUK with any deep background on the Wikimedia projects - something it's hard to shake the feeling is a deliberate hiring decision.
>
> Harry Mitchell
> http://enwp.org/User:HJ
> +44 (0) 7507 536 971
> Skype: harry_j_mitchell
>
>
> On Sun, Jan 6, 2019 at 10:09 PM Lucy Crompton-Reid <lucy.crompton-reid@wikimedia.org.uk> wrote:
>>
>> Thanks Chris, and apologies that these issues are still not resolved -  I appreciate that this is very frustrating. I'll need to look into this over the next few days and get back to you, but just wanted to acknowledge your message in the meantime. Cheers, Lucy
>>
>> On Sun, 6 Jan 2019 at 17:27, Chris McKenna <cmckenna@sucs.org> wrote:
>>>
>>> This issue was raised on the wiki and this mailing list at the end of
>>> November. We were assured then that the problem, apparently also affecting
>>> QRpedia among other things, and action was in hand to resolve this problem
>>> and prevent similar issues in the future.
>>>
>>> However, over a month later (albeit with Christmas in the way) there is no
>>> evidence that anything has happened (I have made two edits to the sandbox
>>> today, should anyone wish to do their own testing).
>>>
>>> This leads to some questions:
>>> -Is it really the case that there is only a single volunteer who can fix
>>> the wiki?
>>> -If so, how and why has this been allowed to happen?
>>> -What contingency plans does WMUK have in case this volunteer dies or
>>> otherwise becomes permanently (or long term) unvailable, with or without
>>> warning?
>>> -If not, why has the problem not been fixed yet?
>>> In either case:
>>> -What is the timescale for fixing the problems?
>>> -What concrete actions have been undertaken since November to prevent this
>>> happening again?
>>> -What concrete actions are pl

Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.anned
to be undertaken in the future to
>>> prevent this happening again (short and long term), and what is the
>>> timescale for them happening?
>>>
>>> ----
>>> Chris McKenna
>>>
>>> cmckenna@sucs.org
>>> www.sucs.org/~cmckenna
>>>
>>>
>>> The essential things in life are seen not with the eyes,
>>> but with the heart
>>>
>>> Antoine de Saint Exupery
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Wikimedia UK mailing list
>>> wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org
>>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
>>> WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Lucy Crompton-Reid
>> Chief Executive
>> Wikimedia UK
>> +44 (0) 203 372 0762
>>
>> Wikimedia UK is the national chapter for the global Wikimedia open knowledge movement, and a registered charity. We rely on donations from individuals to support our work to make knowledge open for all. Have you considered supporting Wikimedia? https://donate.wikimedia.org.uk
>>
>> Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and Wales, Registered No. 6741827
>> Registered Charity No.1144513
>> Registered Office Ground Floor, Europoint, 5 - 11 Lavington Street, London SE1 0NZ
>>
>> The Wikimedia projects are run by the Wikimedia Foundation (who operate Wikipedia, amongst other projects). Wikimedia UK is an independent non-profit charity with no legal control over Wikipedia nor responsibility for its contents.

Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.
>> _______________________________________________
>> Wikimedia UK mailing list
>> wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org
>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
>> WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikimedia UK mailing list
> wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
> WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk

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