[Foundation-l] WMF Development and Memes

[Mike Godwin]

Gregory Maxwell writes:

> In particular Wikimedia appears to be suffering from a massive
> collapse in it's ability to communicate.  This was especially apparent
> to me on the fundrasing committee mailing list, but I think it is
> apparent to anyone who has been involved deeply in this organization.

I've only been involved with the Foundation since June (only employed  
since July), and in my view, based on experience with other nonprofits  
that have gone through growing pains, what you're seeing is not "a  
massive collapse" but the long-term recovery from institutional  
problems that are not unusual in growing organizations.

> I can't recall a recent conversation about Wikimedia, with staff,
> board members, deeply involved volunteers, or casual contributors
> alike where someone wasn't surprised by something going on.

I'm not sure why this should be troubling in itself.  Every time an  
organization becomes successful and starts to grow, it becomes  
impossible for the original "members of the club" to know everything  
that's going on.  This is not particularly invidious -- in fact, it's  
quite normal, even if it's discomforting.  We can't be a club anymore  
(and haven't been able to be one for quite some time).

> I hope that the causes of my recent disappointment are transitory
> growing pains,  because I would be deeply saddened to see such a
> worthwhile mission impeded by institutional malfunction.

I don't think the Foundation has failed quite yet, Greg.  What I  
actually suspect you're feeling is the shockwave of changes that  
mostly were necessary. Change in the context of huge success and  
growth is uncomfortable -- take it from someone who's been through  
this kind of organizational development stage a few times before I got  
here. The first time I experienced (at EFF) I was hugely pessimistic  
about everything that was changing.  After the next couple of waves of  
change happened and the world didn't end (and indeed we got better at  
what we were doing), I didn't stop worrying (I still worry about  
everything even now), but I lost my overall pessimism. In my view,  
we're doing way better than EFF was when EFF was this far along.

But there are things that cannot be changed unilaterally, even by the  
most successful Foundation management team you can imagine.  And  
that's the extent to which memes that undercut the potential of the  
Foundation and its projects are spread by people who mean well.  For  
example, if you're "surprised" by something you hear in a  
conversation, you may infer (and spread the meme of) lack of  
transparency or dishonesty or whatever.  But most people who are  
involved in all this stuff we're doing aren't dishonest -- they are,  
in fact, idealistic and trying to be helpful. After things get big  
enough, it's harder to keep everything "transparent"  (for example,  
there may be legal constraints on what you can disclose in the  
interests of transparency when you're dealing with employment-law  
issues), but that doesn't mean people value transparency any less.   
Recognizing this is something the whole community has to do jointly --  
it can't be imposed or generated by even the most well-meaning  
competent Foundation you can imagine.

If we're sufficiently jaded, I suppose, we can dispense with the  
Assume Good Faith counter-meme, which I think was designed to remind  
us that the great majority of us mean well, are honest, etc.  But I  
hope you aren't ready to toss it just yet.

I'll close by saying something I've noted before, which is that we  
have created a culture of *editors* here -- people who look at  
everything anyone says or writes with a critical eye -- and so we've  
built in a cultural predisposition to think things are going badly and  
need to be improved or reformed.   I ask that you be aware of this  
cultural predisposition (I suffer from it myself), because I think too  
much pessimism in our culture can turn into a self-fulfilling  
prophecy.  We can do better than that, IMHO.

Sorry for the meme-centrism of this discussion, but it's been my  
paradigm for a long time now.  (See, e.g., <http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.10/godwin.if_pr.html 
 >.)


--Mike