I trust you're not advocating tokenism. On 20 Apr 2011 11:44, "Gordon Joly" <gordon.joly(a)pobox.com> wrote:

There was a bit of a discussion on Twitter on Saturday about the fact that all the candidates were white middle-aged men.* The evidence suggests that most Wikimedians are men (70/30ish?). I had a look at the WMUK membership list to identify gender on the basis of first names and got the impression that the bias in our membership is a bit more skewed than that (85/15ish). My view is that this is something we need to address - and in particular we need to make sure it doesn't become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Hopefully the work the Foundation is doing in this area will be helpful. Hopefully also the work we will do in the coming year will help us engage with a more diverse group of people. It's noticeable that the people we worked with at the CRUK workshop were mainly female and the gender balance at the GLAM-WIKI conference was fairly even if you ignored the Wikimedians. More views would I'm sure be welcome... Chris *NB I am not middle-aged, but accept the overall point....

On Wed, Apr 20, 2011 at 13:06, steve virgin &lt;steve(a)mediafocusuk.com&gt; wrote: There are Girl Geek Dinner groups across Britain: London, Brighton, Nottingham, Manchester, Leeds, Hull, Reading, Bristol, Oxford, Winchester, South Yorkshire, Plymouth, Dorset and Birmingham. I've added that list to the Institutional outreach page: http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Institutional_outreach I've also posted on Twitter saying that WMUK may be interested in doing events/outreach with the London GGD community. Any ideas where we can run Wikimedia Academy events in London? I was talking to someone on IRC who suggested collaborating with coworking spaces. Alternatively, it would be very useful if, especially in London, there were a few standard places we could use to run outreach-focussed Wikimedia Academy/editathon type events. Any ideas? -- Tom Morris <http://tommorris.org/> Please don't print this e-mail out unless you want a hard copy of it. If you do, go ahead. I won't stop you.

We would be very interested in having regular events on campus. We need 2 weeks advanced notice to book rooms and at certain times of the year things are more difficult to do, but we can book rooms in South Kensington, Hammersmith and Acton capacity up to 60 very easily, and more than a 100 with a bit more work needed. ________________________________________ From: wikimediauk-l-bounces(a)lists.wikimedia.org [wikimediauk-l-bounces(a)lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of steve virgin [steve(a)mediafocusuk.com] Sent: 20 April 2011 14:00 To: wikimediauk-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] - a reply and a suggestion on diversity in the membership basis Tom - perhaps get the guys at the Imperial College Wikipedia Society to give you hand, lend you a room or something else? I can ping Vinesh and put you in touch? -----Original Message----- From: wikimediauk-l-bounces(a)lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:wikimediauk-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Tom Morris Sent: 20 April 2011 13:53 To: wikimediauk-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] - a reply and a suggestion on diversity in the membership basis On Wed, Apr 20, 2011 at 13:06, steve virgin &lt;steve(a)mediafocusuk.com&gt; wrote: the our them in There are Girl Geek Dinner groups across Britain: London, Brighton, Nottingham, Manchester, Leeds, Hull, Reading, Bristol, Oxford, Winchester, South Yorkshire, Plymouth, Dorset and Birmingham. I've added that list to the Institutional outreach page: http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Institutional_outreach I've also posted on Twitter saying that WMUK may be interested in doing events/outreach with the London GGD community. Any ideas where we can run Wikimedia Academy events in London? I was talking to someone on IRC who suggested collaborating with coworking spaces. Alternatively, it would be very useful if, especially in London, there were a few standard places we could use to run outreach-focussed Wikimedia Academy/editathon type events. Any ideas? -- Tom Morris <http://tommorris.org/> Please don't print this e-mail out unless you want a hard copy of it. If you do, go ahead. I won't stop you. _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org

On 20 Apr 2011, at 15:29, Fae &lt;faenwp(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: Hah, I didn't realise that—great! That makes me feel a little better, having only just turned 17! Isabell.

On 20/04/2011 17:09, Alex Stinson wrote: I am 55 and "semi-retired". Does that count? Gordo -- Gordon Joly gordon.joly(a)pobox.com http://www.joly.org.uk/ Don't Leave Space To The Professionals!

I've worked with local councillors aged between 20 and 85. All the mediocre ones were middle-aged. ;-) The Wikipedia user survey found that the median age of people using the site was 22, though the median age increased if you looked at only registered users, and even more if you only looked at administrators. So the Wikimedia community in the UK is probably much younger on the whole than the Board is. Regarding Chris's point about age limits - I am no expert but I imagine the legal duties of directors mean they need to be over 18? Chris (The Land)

On 20 April 2011 17:01, Isabell Long &lt;isabell121(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: By current standards, you're past it. (Sam Korn was on the en:wp arbcom at 16 ...) - d.

On 20 April 2011 17:59, Chris McKenna &lt;cmckenna(a)sucs.org&gt; wrote: We changed the ArbCom election rules in (I think?) 2007 to add in an age limit after we had created the CheckUser and OverSight tools and Arbitrators started to get much more significant levels of access to personal information. Before then it was only infrequently that personal information was disclosed to the Committee, and then generally voluntarily by the individuals in question, so it wasn't really an issue. J. -- James D. Forrester jdforrester(a)wikimedia.org | jdforrester(a)gmail.com [[Wikipedia:User:Jdforrester|James F.]]

On 20 April 2011 18:04, Isabell Long &lt;isabell121(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: Though I'd be the last to discourage people from coming to the meetups (and especially "my" meetups in London), they are primarily social affairs and we don't get much done at them. We sometimes discuss doing something, arrange them, or raise awareness of them, but if you're looking to devote time in meat-space for Wikimedia-related things, they are very much the start rather than the end. :-) J. -- James D. Forrester jdforrester(a)wikimedia.org | jdforrester(a)gmail.com [[Wikipedia:User:Jdforrester|James F.]]

On Wed, Apr 20, 2011 at 10:27:53PM +0100, James Forrester wrote: I'm social amongst groups of like-minded people! And the meets (the Sunday ones?) are in a nice, seemingly friendly venue. :-) Thanks James, Isabell.

On 22 Apr 2011, at 11:11, Gordon Joly wrote: The easiest way of getting involved is definitely to come along to Wikimedia events like the wikimeets or backstage passes. There's a UK-focused events list on the WMUK wiki, at: http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Events There's also the on-wiki projects like WP:GLAM/BM, /BL, /DERBY, etc. which have plenty of things on their to-do lists that you can help out with. There are many different ways of being involved more actively, which mostly rely on individuals taking the initiative, either by leading events (organise a wikimeet in your city [they don't just need to be in London!]; talk to local organisations and see if they want a Wikipedia Workshop, or a Backstage Pass event; ...), or putting together online projects (focus on a specific topic; run an online competition; ..), or anything else you can think of. Thanks, Mike

On 20/04/2011 13:06, steve virgin wrote: So far so good. Here is a list.... 1) Gender 2) Ethnicity 3) Age 4) Religion 5) Disability 6) Sexual orientation See for example: http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Governmentcitizensandrights/Yourrightsandrespon… Gordo -- Gordon Joly gordon.joly(a)pobox.com http://www.joly.org.uk/ Don't Leave Space To The Professionals!

On 20/04/2011 17:26, James Forrester wrote: What happened to inside leg measurement? Gordo -- Gordon Joly gordon.joly(a)pobox.com http://www.joly.org.uk/ Don't Leave Space To The Professionals!