[Foundation-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] Note from the Board Chair

[phoebe ayers]

On Thu, Jul 8, 2010 at 1:41 PM, Ting Chen <tchen at wikimedia.org> wrote:
> Dear friends,
>
> Today, here in Gdansk,  at the meeting of the Board of Trustees during the sixth annual Wikimania Conference, the Board made some important changes. I'm pleased to share this news with you.  The Foundation will be issuing a public announcement shortly as well.
>
> Every year at Wikimania, the Wikimedia Board appoints its officers for the coming year.  This year we have changes to each of the Officer roles. As of today's meeting, I was fortunate to be appointed Chair of the Board - and I'm grateful to have the support of the Board in this new role.. Stuart West was appointed Vice-chair (and continues as Board Treasurer), and Samuel Klein becomes Board Secretary.
>
> Also, the Wikimedia chapters have made their selections for the two chapters-selected Board seats. Arne Klempert has been reappointed to his seat, and Phoebe Ayers has also been appointed to join the Board.
>
> This means that Michael Snow will be leaving the Board: he has been invited to join the Advisory Board, and the Board warmly thanks him for his service.
>
> Michael Snow has been a tireless and dedicated leader of this Board, and the whole Wikimedia movement, over the past two years. I want to express my sincere thanks to him on behalf of the Board and all of the Wikimedia community.  I am also excited to congratulate and welcome Phoebe Ayers to the Board, and also to congratulate Arne Klempert for his re-appoitment to the Board in a Chapter-appointed seat.
>
> There are 10 seats on the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees and according to the Foundation's bylaws, three members are elected by the Wikimedia community, two members are selected by the Wikimedia chapters, a Community Founder seat held by Jimmy Wales, and four members appointed by the Board itself to provide additional, specific expertise. Currently all seats on the Board of Trustees are filled.
>
> This is the first time that the official Chapters selection process has been carried out. Members of Wikimedia's global chapters, made a call for nominations for new members and voted to elect their two members. In this year's election nine candidates from the Wikimedia community originally stepped forward. Two of those candidates stepped out of the process, leaving seven candidates for selection by the Chapters.
>
> All of the officer appointments are effective immediately, and we are pleased to welcome Phoebe to the Board right away.
>
> I'd like to thank the Chapters for their thoughtful work in convening a process and carrying out their voting process.  I would also like to thank all of the candidates who stepped forward for with their nominations.
>
> I'm looking forward to an incredible year ahead. We have an ambitious plan for the Foundation and the projects over the next year, and we have a tremendous group to tackle a busy year ahead.
>
> Sincerely,
> Ting

Thanks Ting.

I am now back home after Wikimania, and can finally sit down to write
this note. I am honored and humbled to be selected as a Trustee; it's
a big responsibility, and I am looking forward to the challenge.

Thank you to the chapters for selecting me, and to Michael for his
great leadership over the past couple of years. This change has
happened rather quickly, in that we were all informed of the chapters'
decision the day before Wikimania began, while the Board was in the
middle of their annual meeting (meanwhile, I was busy running WikiSym
across town, which led to quite a hectic day for me!) But everyone has
been absolutely professional and welcoming during this transition, and
as a community member and now new board member I am very glad to see a
functional process in action for choosing new board members and
officers; congratulations to Ting on becoming chair.

One unfortunate side effect however of standing for a
chapters-selected seat, rather than running in the community
elections, is that community members don't generally have a chance to
ask questions of the candidate or engage in discussion with them. To
try and remedy this I did make my candidate statement and answers
public [1]; and I welcome further questions, thoughts, criticism and
discussion. I'm glad to chat any time, and I'm always especially glad
to meet Wikimedians I don't already know, so please feel free to
introduce yourself to me and share your thoughts about Wikimedia.

I do not promise, of course, to have ready swift or simple answers to
hard questions. This is a tremendously complex and exciting time for
Wikimedia, with a great deal of experimentation and new projects going
on, and there's a lot that I need to learn very quickly. But I do hope
to bring a strong community perspective to the Board's ongoing work of
strategic leadership. In all of my projects within Wikimedia to date,
from organizing Wikimania to doing outreach to writing documentation,
I have tried to focus on improving communication and building
community, and I hope that I can continue to do so on the Board.

Going to Wikimania, as I have done six times now, and meeting so many
new people -- from new and curious contributors to devoted Wikimedians
-- always gives me a thrill, and reminds me why I want to be involved
in this organization. I am excited to have the chance to work with
such a dynamic, thoughtful group of people during this period in
Wikimedia's history, and I intend to do the very best job I can in
this new role to help keep Wikimedia awesome.

best,
phoebe

1. http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Phoebe/board_questions


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