[Foundation-l] Re: Google Donating Bandwidth and Servers to Wikipedia

[Angela]

Delirium wrote:
> I'm not sure I will continue to participate in Wikimedia Foundation
> activities until this is resolved.  In particular, multiple reverts with
> no edit summaries from Jimbo

Jimbo made one revert and I explained to Yann by email why the page was locked.

> and locking pages after removing information is no way to run a Wiki.

The page was locked before that, and was done for reasons of vandalism.


Anthere  wrote:

> However, the article posted on meta
> (http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Google_hosting) is not an official
> statement by the board in any way. Angela very likely posted it to
> clarify questions asked by editors on the irc channels.

I wrote it after it was being asked about on the mailing list. I
thought it was a better idea to have something there as opposed to
nothing but rumors on IRC. The page basically says nothing that wasn't
already on the mailing list.

> I personally discovered the page only
> the next day, following the link from the /. article.

The page was mentioned on this mailing list before it was on Slashdot.

> The fact
> that a board member can post something casually on meta to inform
> editors, and this post is considered a board official announcement...

I believe the fact that a board member did it is irrelevant. Nowhere
this page is reported mentions that it was written by me. In fact,
off-IRC, this is the first time it's been said that I wrote the page.
I doubt, therefore, that the reporters thinking of it as official are
basing this view on who wrote it. Most people wouldn't know to check
the page history. It wouldn't surprise me if they'd have seen any page
on meta as official, regardless of authorship.

> - Did the board wish to make a public announcement ?

No. It would have been phrased as an announcement if that had been the case.

> - If it had done so, would it have been done on meta ?

No. Official things should go on the foundation wiki.

> - Is there a difference between family talk on irc only available on
> editors logs, and statement on a wiki page which can be linked by
> everyone in the world ?

No. Much of the information reported on the mailing list and Slashdot
came from IRC anyway.

> - Does an official non official public statement hurt the likelihood of
> the deal or not ?

Perhaps Jimbo can answer that since he's been in contact with them
since the Slashdot article.

> - Now that most editors consider it official, what if the other board
> members do not fully agree with it ?

What exactly do you not agree with?

> - Now that bloggers and newspapers consider it official, does the
> Foundation have a right to "control" what appears to be official
> statement by itself ?

Perhaps adding a "this is not official" notice would be better?

> All what is above is only my opinion, not an official statement by the
> Foundation :-)

Ditto. 

Angela.