[Foundation-l] Board restructuring and community

[Domas Mituzas]

Hello,

I have stated multiple time, that I'm non-contributing user of  
Wikipedia. It is quite unpopular here, I know.
I could never vote in elections, unless exclusions were done ( I  
don't have 400 edits on any project  ).
My English writing skills are satisfactory for technical  
communication, can get worse for various other prose and poems, and  
usually aligns with writing style of last book read. :)

Now that I can't comfortably spend my hours and days and years  
editing Wikipedia, I end up working on technology instead - and used  
to do baby sitting of the cluster.
Heck, stress levels used to be so high, I'd wake up at night and go  
check if everything was running well (actually, once hit a power  
outage that way :).

I used to hear multiple times back then, I hear same nowadays - I'm  
supposed to work for editors.
Replies to what I say on IRC come back with the fact that I work for  
editors, replies to what I write in mailing lists tell I'm supposed  
to work for editors.

And, by the way, I don't. I'm entirely value centric. I work for our  
mission and our values, and editors are my peers. I don't work for  
editors, editors don't work for me. We help each other to achieve the  
common goal.

Actually, Community and Foundation should be acting as peers too.
Board is not seen as governing body of Community.
Foundation should be seen as facilitator, "encouraging  the growth,  
development and distribution of free, multilingual content, and to  
providing the full content of these wiki-based projects to the public  
free of charge".
Board should ensure, that Foundation does what it is supposed to do.

Still, there're multiple issues in what Foundation does -  
multilingual content goes beyond borders of enwiki, free of charge  
requires sustainability of operations, growth needs outreach besides  
editing, development and distribution asks for partnerships too.

So far, chapters have been doing great job (and showing even more  
potential) in outreach and partnerships. Though it is commonly seen  
that we provide power to them, we merely ask for their experience.
Board is not a senate, where representation matters entirely and most  
of politics at senates are about composition of factions. Board is a  
working group, that strives to work on consensus, bringing experience  
from all parties, to assist operating the organization.
And, let me remind, organization that does not govern the Community,  
but acts as a peer, providing legal, tech, communications  
infrastructure for community.

If Community or Communities need it, of course it is possible to  
raise Volunteer Council, or any other body to facilitate cross- 
project governance or communication or anything else needed.
Foundation should stay encouraging and assisting, not managing  
communities.

There were suggestions here that board members should have hands-on  
experience editing the site.
If I'd be sarcastic, I'd sure reply that they also need hands-on  
experience on fundraising, software development, performance  
engineering, technology operations, accounting, legal, PR, etc , and  
that would leave us with just few people from this list.

Still, our broader community is everyone who invests their time and  
emotions into success of our mission.
I consider myself part of such community, and if I'd picky, I'd feel  
underrepresented by election process.

Still, folks, though our mission is great and important, one of key  
issues in success is satisfaction in what we're all doing. That  
includes good faith.

BR,
-- 
Domas Mituzas -- http://dammit.lt/ -- [[user:midom]]