[Foundation-l] The Foundation is not a wiki (was Re: RfC: Key priorities for my work)

[Anthony]

On 9/24/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> Delirium wrote:
> > We have something like tens of thousands of Wikipedians (hundreds of
> > thousands?), so I'm skeptical that the skills we're looking for don't
> > exist anywhere in our community.
>
> Larry Lessig is not a Wikipedian.  Mitch Kapor is a Wikipedian, but not
> very active.  There are other examples of people who are wild about our
> work who could be amazing board members, but who, because their careers
> do not involve editing Wikipedia, have not become members of our
> community.  But they have skills, contacts, connections, experiences
> that we do not have in our community.
>
That explains why a board member need not be an editor of Wikipedia.
But I don't think it's too much to ask that they get involved in some
public aspect of Wikimedia before becoming a board member.  Whatever
skills, contacts, connections, or experiences they have, why is it
that they can't contribute just a bit of them *before* we guarantee
them a seat on the board?

Anthony