Wikimedia UK regrets to have to announce to the community that the Wikimedia Foundation’s outgoing Executive Director, Sue Gardner, has given us formal notice of her decision under her mandate from the WMF board not to renew our fundraising agreement, thereby excluding us from this year’s fundraiser.
We have written an open letter to Sue about this decision. A copy of our letter to Sue can be found herehttps://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/File:Open_letter_to_Sue_Gardner_regarding_non-renewal.pdf on the Wikimedia UK wiki.
Thanks and regards,
Stevie
We have written an open letter to Sue about this decision. A copy of our letter to Sue can be found here on the Wikimedia UK wiki.
This open letter may have some emotive reason for being produced, but after reviewing it carefully, I can see no strategic value for WMUK by publishing it.
It comes as no surprise for anyone with a reasonable understanding of WMF politics that Sue Gardner has made this decision. The surprise here is that Jon Davies (WMUK CEO) thought he had invested his time over the last two years forming a relationship with the right person within the WMF hierarchy that would take different action, or that he was following effective tactics by using appeasing politics, in order to achieve a different outcome in time for 2014/15.
This official letter criticises the outgoing CEO's judgement (exceedingly pointless), and I read nothing in its content to address how WMUK is making the significant management changes that would convince those that think along Sue's lines to make a difference for coming years. How Jon Davies believes this will impress the new WMF CEO is beyond me.
Hopefully the superb exemplars of WMFR and WMDE in how they have, and continue to, radically change their course is something that the current WMUK board of trustees are taking to heart behind closed doors. Certainly, *they* have said little in public.
Fae
On 21 May 2014 09:56, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
<snip>
It comes as no surprise for anyone with a reasonable understanding of WMF politics that Sue Gardner has made this decision.
<snip>
Hopefully the superb exemplars of WMFR and WMDE in how they have, and continue to, radically change their course is something that the current WMUK board of trustees are taking to heart behind closed doors.
Indeed, the journey from "problem child" to "poster child" is quite arduous, and often not very stylish, given that an airbrush doesn't suffice.
Charles
For those not up on the governance, what are the practical ramifications of this for the chapter?
Thanks, Dan
On 21 May 2014 03:09, Stevie Benton stevie.benton@wikimedia.org.uk wrote:
Wikimedia UK regrets to have to announce to the community that the Wikimedia Foundation’s outgoing Executive Director, Sue Gardner, has given us formal notice of her decision under her mandate from the WMF board not to renew our fundraising agreement, thereby excluding us from this year’s fundraiser.
We have written an open letter to Sue about this decision. A copy of our letter to Sue can be found herehttps://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/File:Open_letter_to_Sue_Gardner_regarding_non-renewal.pdf on the Wikimedia UK wiki.
Thanks and regards,
Stevie
--
Stevie Benton Head of External Relations Wikimedia UK+44 (0) 20 7065 0993 / +44 (0) 7803 505 173 @StevieBenton
Wikimedia UK is a Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and Wales, Registered No. 6741827. Registered Charity No.1144513. Registered Office 4th Floor, Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street, London EC2A 4LT. United Kingdom. Wikimedia UK is the UK chapter of a global Wikimedia movement. 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.*
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
This has been the case for the last two years, so although the decision for this year is disappointing in practice nothing has changed.
The major effects are the movement will still not benefit from the available Gift Aid of perhaps £300,000 annually, and that donor details remain held by the WMF in the US. The charity’s lack of access to donor details hinders us from engaging with UK donors, keeping funds flowing without repeated public appeals, and converting donors into supporters and volunteers.
Best regards
Michael
____________ Michael Maggs Chair, Wikimedia UK
On 21 May 2014, at 14:10, Deskana djgwiki@gmail.com wrote:
For those not up on the governance, what are the practical ramifications of this for the chapter?
Thanks, Dan
On 21 May 2014 03:09, Stevie Benton stevie.benton@wikimedia.org.uk wrote: Wikimedia UK regrets to have to announce to the community that the Wikimedia Foundation’s outgoing Executive Director, Sue Gardner, has given us formal notice of her decision under her mandate from the WMF board not to renew our fundraising agreement, thereby excluding us from this year’s fundraiser.
We have written an open letter to Sue about this decision. A copy of our letter to Sue can be found here on the Wikimedia UK wiki.
Thanks and regards,
Stevie
There are two practical implications:
1. It means that nobody receives Gift Aid on the donations taken by the WMF which originated in the UK. Our donors who wish to make use of Gift Aid are denied the opportunity and the movement as a whole loses around £200,000 - £300,000 which would be claimable from HMRC (obviously monies that are claimed back by WMUK would reduce the amount that we ask for from the FDC).
2. It insulates us from our donors. We have no means of establishing a relationship with the huge donor base in the UK, which prevents us from encouraging them into playing more of a role in the WIkimedia movement.
Taken as a whole, it is clearly part of Sue Gardner's agenda to get rid of chapters - or at least reduce them to impotence. She has never been able to accept that chapters can often do jobs better than a centralised WMF. Despite the hollow words she has uttered over the years, when it comes to practical matters, she makes decisions based on increasing her own little empire at WMF to the detriment of those working for the Wikimedia movement throughout the rest of the world.
On 21 May 2014 14:39, rexx rexx@blueyonder.co.uk wrote:
Taken as a whole, it is clearly part of Sue Gardner's agenda to get rid of chapters - or at least reduce them to impotence. She has never been able to accept that chapters can often do jobs better than a centralised WMF. Despite the hollow words she has uttered over the years, when it comes to practical matters, she makes decisions based on increasing her own little empire at WMF to the detriment of those working for the Wikimedia movement throughout the rest of the world.
Um, you do know she just left?
- d.
Yes, I think that was probably her very last decision.
Michael
On 21 May 2014, at 15:11, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 21 May 2014 14:39, rexx rexx@blueyonder.co.uk wrote:
Taken as a whole, it is clearly part of Sue Gardner's agenda to get rid of chapters - or at least reduce them to impotence. She has never been able to accept that chapters can often do jobs better than a centralised WMF. Despite the hollow words she has uttered over the years, when it comes to practical matters, she makes decisions based on increasing her own little empire at WMF to the detriment of those working for the Wikimedia movement throughout the rest of the world.
Um, you do know she just left?
- d.
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
I believe she leaves at the end of this month.
Thanks, Mike
On 21 May 2014, at 16:13, Michael Maggs Michael@maggs.name wrote:
Yes, I think that was probably her very last decision.
Michael
On 21 May 2014, at 15:11, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 21 May 2014 14:39, rexx rexx@blueyonder.co.uk wrote:
Taken as a whole, it is clearly part of Sue Gardner's agenda to get rid of chapters - or at least reduce them to impotence. She has never been able to accept that chapters can often do jobs better than a centralised WMF. Despite the hollow words she has uttered over the years, when it comes to practical matters, she makes decisions based on increasing her own little empire at WMF to the detriment of those working for the Wikimedia movement throughout the rest of the world.
Um, you do know she just left?
- d.
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
Yes David. Did you know she's staying on as a "special advisor"?
Plus ca change.
On 21 May 2014 14:39, rexx rexx@blueyonder.co.uk wrote: <snip>
Taken as a whole, it is clearly part of Sue Gardner's agenda to get rid of chapters - or at least reduce them to impotence. She has never been able to accept that chapters can often do jobs better than a centralised WMF. Despite the hollow words she has uttered over the years, when it comes to practical matters, she makes decisions based on increasing her own little empire at WMF to the detriment of those working for the Wikimedia movement throughout the rest of the world.
Well, hardly, as shown by the history (at least for those who have paid detailed attention in the past).
By going into the Signpost archive for 2011, and undeleting a redirect that had been officiously deleted on meta, I have pulled up Sue's working document on this issue from 23 March 2011:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement_roles/Feedback/Sue_Gardner
Which happens to be timed almost to the day to the end of the time my contract ended with WMUK (i.e. the moment when I was paying most attention to chapter matters, and was in immediate touch with WMUK's technical fundraising efforts, and governance). I had had only had some summary version of Sue's thinking, up till just now.
I thought then, and still think now, that WMUK was a good example of what she was thinking about.
There is a point about Gift Aid, for sure, but there are a number of ways in which the WMF could add about 2% to their annual income.
WMUK has indeed issues with communicating with potential donors; but it has had greater issues, IMX, with communicating with members (who theoretically run it, though how they were supposed to do that on scanty information remains a mystery to me). If the Board hadn't binned the comms strategy I'd have a bit more sympathy.
The bottom line for me is that I saw WMUK shooting itself in the foot, at least to the point where a biped would have no feet left. So I'd advise not also shooting the messenger, but trying to formulate a case for the next time round, with the new CEO, that actually deals with the history, and what has been done about it.
Charles
A good find, Charles, and as clear an illustration of Sue Gardner's mindset and agenda as has been expressed anywhere.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement_roles/Feedback/Sue_Gardner#Funding
"*In 2010, 12 chapters acted as payments processors for the annual fundraising campaign in their geography*." - how many of those have survived now? When you find ten victims all shot in the foot, you start to suspect that there's a single gunman.
"*Residents of France, Germany and the UK give 10 times as much money to charity overall as do residents of Finland, Austria and Portugal: should those chapters therefore be 10x wealthier?*" Only Sue Gardner has leapt to the conclusion that Chapters will retain income *in proportion to the donations*. Everybody else who's actually gone through the FDC process knows that the income from donations distributed via the FDC depends very strongly on the proposals made for expenditure - and believe me, I know a bit about that process. Was Sue Gardner unaware of how the FDC works, or was this simply a convenient strawman that she set up to justify her actions? WMUK has never, to my knowledge, asked for a percentage of the donations raised in the UK. It has only ever asked for income to meet its programmed and agreed expenditure.
There has been no movement in Sue Gardner's anti-chapter position for the past three years. In 2012 I challenged Gardner to outline the steps needed for WMUK to take in order to have fund-processing restored, and she ignored the question. At the time, I said that no matter what WMUK did to address the concerns that were being raised, there would be no return of fund processing, *because that was the sole item on her agenda.* Those so-called concerns were just an excuse to remove fund-processing and I'm sorry to have been proven right on each count.
On 21 May 2014 16:18, rexx rexx@blueyonder.co.uk wrote:
<snip>
There has been no movement in Sue Gardner's anti-chapter position for the past three years. In 2012 I challenged Gardner to outline the steps needed for WMUK to take in order to have fund-processing restored, and she ignored the question. At the time, I said that no matter what WMUK did to address the concerns that were being raised, there would be no return of fund processing, *because that was the sole item on her agenda.* Those so-called concerns were just an excuse to remove fund-processing and I'm sorry to have been proven right on each count.
Historical analogy: the WMF stopped adding sister projects after
Wikispecies. Then there was a pause. Then Wikidata and Wikivoyage came along, with two different and good arguments for being in the "portfolio".
This is a type of management that is comprehensible, even for those who don't agree with the conclusions. And its application is not down to Sue alone, you can be sure about that.
I actually predicted something like the FDC, in correspondence with a future trustee, also in the first quarter of 2011. (I have no idea why, now. Not my field of expertise at all. Just must have made sense in context.) The WMUK Board at that point thought being legalistic about the position was the right ploy, and it totally wasn't. I thought something drastic was needed, actually: an immediate EGM.
Here's an argument on your side of the case, though: the feedback from the fundraiser, particularly from old dears who have sent a cheque "because Wikipedia is the best thing on the Internet", is motivating like little else.
Of course it would be an improvement if WMUK did payment processing, but, as I must have said before (on the wiki), not going to happen simply by playing the "autonomy" card, because that has been done.
Charles
On 21.05.2014 03:09, Stevie Benton wrote:
Wikimedia UK regrets to have to announce to the community that the Wikimedia Foundation’s outgoing Executive Director, Sue Gardner, has given us formal notice of her decision under her mandate from the WMF board not to renew our fundraising agreement, thereby excluding us from this year’s fundraiser.
On 21.05.2014 09:37, Michael Maggs wrote:
This has been the case for the last two years, so although the decision for this year is disappointing in practice nothing has changed.
We have written an open letter to Sue about this decision. A copy of our letter to Sue can be found here [1] on the Wikimedia UK wiki. [1] https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/File:Open_letter_to_Sue_Gardner_regarding_non-...
On 21.05.2014 09:10, Deskana wrote:
For those not up on the governance, what are the practical ramifications of this for the chapter?
On 21.05.2014 09:37, Michael Maggs wrote:
The major effects are the movement will still not benefit from the available Gift Aid of perhaps £300,000 annually, and that donor details remain held by the WMF in the US. The charity’s lack of access to donor details hinders us from engaging with UK donors, keeping funds flowing without repeated public appeals, and converting donors into supporters and volunteers.
On 21.05.2014 09:39, rexx wrote:
There are two practical implications:
- It means that nobody receives Gift Aid on the donations taken by
the WMF which originated in the UK. Our donors who wish to make use of Gift Aid are denied the opportunity and the movement as a whole loses around £200,000 - £300,000 which would be claimable from HMRC
Given we're not a <cough> 'large multinational online retailer' <cough>, what's claimed can't exactly be taken and spent outside the country.
(obviously monies that are claimed back by WMUK would reduce the amount that we ask for from the FDC).
Perhaps 'chump change' in-comparison, but in-country processing is fractionally cheaper. Once set up, it is less-likely to put 'fraud prevention' hurdles in front of potential donors.
- It insulates us from our donors. We have no means of establishing
a relationship with the huge donor base in the UK, which prevents us from encouraging them into playing more of a role in the Wikimedia movement.
This is the most-damaging aspect of not trusting WMUK to act as a fund processor.
On 21.05.2014 11:43, Charles Matthews wrote:
Heres an argument on your side of the case, though: the feedback from the fundraiser, particularly from old dears who have sent a cheque "because Wikipedia is the best thing on the Internet", is motivating like little else.
Of course it would be an improvement if WMUK did payment processing, but, as I must have said before (on the wiki), not going to happen simply by playing the "autonomy" card, because that has been done.
I think the 'open letter' is the only reasonable response Wikimedia UK, as a registered charity, can give. They can hardly boycott Wikimania in protest, can they?
The Charities Commission can't help here either; all they can do is stand on the sidelines, shaking their heads, as the WMF rejects hundreds of thousands of pounds of British taxpayers' money. Money that, given the rich multicultural nature of our society, could be used to help increase contributors across poorly-served languages.
I hope the WMF are keeping their fingers, and toes, crossed about none of the UK's capricious press picking this up and running with it. All I can see are the highly-negative ways in which they could spin it, and damage public goodwill towards the movement.
Brian McNeil
wikimediauk-l@lists.wikimedia.org