[Foundation-l] Re: Power of the Board and wikimedians (was Re: Bounties and expenses)

[Delirium]

Michael Snow wrote:

> This is not a precedent that the Foundation will start paying travel 
> expenses for all meetings, because it is also not a precedent as to 
> how future meetings will be held. I'm sure that Angela, Anthere, and 
> Jimbo will have several more meetings during the year, but they will 
> probably conduct these by telephone or IRC or some other means.

This is not how I understood it.  If it were a single meeting, done 
because of convenient circumstances, that would not be an enormous 
issue.  However, the email introducing this issue (the first one with 
the subject "Funding for the newly elected Board Members") said:

"...I would like to propose that we cover certain key expenses for our 
elected board members relating to their participation in Wikimedia work. 
For instance, telephone calls overseas should be covered by the 
Foundation, and not the elected representatives. A broadband connection 
should be covered by the Foundation as well."

This sounded more like a routine budget than an extraordinary one-time 
expense.  Several other people also do seem to explicitly favor regular 
in-person meetings, with the one in Paris being merely the first of 
many, and even an overhead/expenses budget allowed to run as high as 10% 
of our total income.  Those are different sorts of matters than a single 
one-of-a-kind trip.

-Mark