>Tim Shell, and I guess also Michael Davis, are employees of Jimbo.
>They are in a relationship of economic dependence to him.
Please check your facts before making such a statement - it could lead to a
dangerous misunderstanding. Tim Shell is a co-owner of Bomis and IIRC so is
Michael Davis.
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
Oliver Brown wrote:
>Are these Bylaws official or are they still being finalized? Because
>I have a few suggestions regarding clarifications of the language.
It is my understanding that the initial board met and adopted the by-laws. I
imagine this was needed to get the ball rolling so that elections can be held
for member reps. Please document your suggestions and I'm sure the full board
will consider them soon after the member reps are elected by the membership.
-- Daniel Mayer
There seems to be a serious technical problem with the mailinglist. I,
and at least one other member, didn't get the following mail. I also
can't find it in the archive. Please, could someone look into that? And
is there a way to find out which mails I might also have missed?
Kurt
On Saturday, January 24, 2004 8:38 PM
Jimmy Wales <jwales(a)bomis.com> wrote:
>> In force. However, do keep in mind that they can be amended, so I'm
>> eager to get feedback. I've already got a collection of notes from
>> a variety of people who have proposed changes, and I'm very receptive
>> to all the changes proposed to me so far.
>>
>> Arne Klempert wrote:
>>
>
>>>> On Tuesday, January 20, 2004 12:37 AM
>>>> Jimmy Wales <jwales(a)bomis.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>
>>>>>> Accessible now from
>>>>>> http://www.wikimediafoundation.org/
>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Short question from Germany:
>>>>
>>>> Is this a proposal or are these bylaws in force?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Arne
>>>> [[de:Benutzer:Akl]]
With all the discussion of forming Wikipedia organizations outside the
US, it's pretty clear that it's going to happen. Even if you could turn
back the tide now, it would happen later. As for whether they can
officially use the Wikipedia name or not, I have an idea, as a
suggestion both to Jimbo and to anyone forming such an organization.
The model I would suggest is that of the various organizations (fan
clubs, essentially) that develop for cultural phenomena like Star Wars.
Generally, they're tolerated and passively encouraged, because they help
promote the project. Even though there may be some unauthorized use of
images and logos, it's rarely necessary to interfere unless a group
starts giving the impression that it's official and actually represents
the project (in this case, Wikipedia and the foundation). This fits in
well with Jimbo's Benevolent Dictator model.
If Jimbo is concerned about competing *official* Wikipedia
organizations, I think part of the solution is to register Wikipedia as
a trademark (and Wikimedia, Wiktionary, etc.) belonging to the
foundation. Use of the names already brings some protection, but
trademark registration makes things simpler if there's a dispute.
Registration in the US should be sufficient for now. Check out the Paris
Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, which covers
international trademark protection.
I know registration has been discussed by other people (Kurt in Germany,
for example). Actually, I would recommend that nobody register any
trademarks except the Wikimedia Foundation in its official capacity. Let
Jimbo and the board take care of that; they're quite capable of handling
it, and it will prevent confusion and conflict later on.
--Michael Snow
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . till we *) . . .
Hi wikipedia-l,
the server is extremly slow at the moment, so I move this from the
village pump to here. Eloquence wants to implement a default edit mode
using click-buttons for formating. This doesn't work with a number of
browsers. With some, it just doesn't do anything (browser that don't
support JavaScript). With other browsers which support JavaScript but
not the right kind, it does funny things (as inserting the formating
tags not at the cursors place, but at the end of the edited text). One
of this browsers is Netscape 7.1, and if I understand the discussion at
the village pump correclty, Mozilla won't work correctly, too. Still,
Eloquence wants to make this fancy editing mode the default mode --
which would led to an seemingly unusable wikipedia editing for a number
of browsers. I must admit that I don't like the introduction of fancy
editing at all, but if we introduce it, it either should work with *all*
browsers currently used, or it should be off by default.
What do you think?
Best regards,
Till
__ .
/ / / / ... Till Westermayer - till we *)
. .
. mailto:till@tillwe.de . www.westermayer.de/till/ . icq 320393072
. Habsburgerstr. 82 . 79104 Freiburg . 0761 55697152 . 0160 96619179
. . . . .
Lars wrote:
>..
>I strongly recommend that you all look at how the German chapter
>of ISOC (which is an "e.V.", see www.isoc.de) has solved this. I
>assume they have a working model already, that could be copied.
>In fact, the ISOC chapter model could be copied for more countries
>than Germany, if Wikipedians want to form local chapters in their area.
I agree - we should look into that. I also agree that a chapter system would
be the best way to go. Then, if needed, we could have an affiliate in Europe
that would coordinate national or lower level chapters in Europe (or we could
just have chapters).
Their "Primer for Creating a Local ISOC Chapter"
http://www.isoc.org/isoc/chapters/application/primer.shtml also mentions
incorporation as one of the final steps of chapter formation and how the ISOC
needs to sign-off on that (before that it mentions that the ISOC needs to
approve the chapter's bylaws). So a chapter so formed (assuming it was
incorporated as a tax-exempt non-profit) would have tax-deductible status and
would firmly be part of the Wikimedia Foundation.
IMO, creating "sister" organizations is a bad idea for the reasons Jimbo gave.
Plenty of organizations are international in nature so we should put our
efforts into making Wikimedia into an international organization.
Please everybody be patient though - the bylaws were only recently adopted and
for all practical purposes the foundation is still just Jimbo. So until we
have a full board of trustees things will continue to move slowly - Jimbo is
only one person.
I would suggest then for people to start to think about who they want to be on
the board. I assume we will be having elections for that in the next month or
so.
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
"Wikimedia ????"
Date: Fri, 23 Jan 2004 13:32:15 -0800
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Evan Prodromou wrote:
>So. I think it's a great idea to have this kind of club
>organization. Wikimedia Editors Groups could be a cool way to enjoy
>the process. Why not? Sounds like a fun thing to do -- meet up,
>promote the 'pedias, go to events (book fairs would be cool!),
>etc. It's worked great for Linux and other Free Software.
No reason not to include readers and cheerleaders, IMO. I kinda like the idea
of having Wikipedia User Groups (WUGs). :)
>But I think trying to extend this idea to create a tax haven and
>legal shield for the Wikimedia Foundation -- without much of a plan
>as to how that would happen, nor the consent of the Foundation
>itself -- is probably ill-advised.
I agree -- that is why I support setting up a chapter system like other
international organizations.
http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2004-January/013905.html
Under that set-up the German WUG would be a Wikimedia chapter. When there are
several chapters in Europe, they could form a Wikimedia regional body in
Europe that each chapter must send delegates to in order to be part of.
Regional bodies would be full-blown affiliates (and thus may have their own
rep on the Wikimedia board).
Just some ideas.
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
Ivo Köthnig wrote:
>...
>If we talk about making stickers or button to dispense them (may for
>free to promote wikipedia), you would not start to ask people to donate
>that 100 € you need for this. You would look in the cash box and decide
>wether you have left only 50 € to make 100 Buttons or if you have the
>100 € to make 200 Buttons. And the best case would always be to have
>enough money to fullfill those small ideas.
Many large organizations have local chapters that collect chapter dues and/or
have fundraisers (like bake sales, selling shirts, hosting events, etc.). I
see nothing wrong with that so long as it is not confused with or otherwise
limits money generated for the Wikimedia Foundation.
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
Jason wrote:
>Sorry for the trouble. Thank you for your patience.
I just want to say how much I (and I assume everybody else) appreciates the
work you have done for Wikimedia. I know Jimbo pays you, but I also know that
the Wikimedia server work you do isn't very glamorous but is still very
important.
Of course Brion and the whole MediaWiki team also deserve Kudos.
I don't think we thank you guys enough. :-)
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)