[Foundation-l] Wikimedia chapters' raison d'être?

[Teofilo]

Wikimedia chapters are not only an example of what should not be seen
in Wikimedia projects (an "institution[...], of any kind, [...]
claiming to represent [...] individuals" [1]) they also absorb funds
and hire people, pushing with more weight the goal to make money (a
salaried person expects his/her salary to be increased by X % each
year) which is different from what a volunteer based project should
be.

They aslo are de facto put in a position where people expect them to
perform decision making. It is already bad that they deprive the
communities of a decision making of their own, and take volunteer
seats at the WMF board of trustees, but they don't do the job. See
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template_talk:CC-AR-Presidency#Bad_template_for_new_files
. If the chapters showed that they are helpful in doing things better
than what volunteer communities alone can do, they could prove that
they are useful. But I am afraid they are not doing this. If they are
not present when we need them...

[1] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/2010_Wikimedia_Study_of_Controversial_Content#7._Wikimedia_Projects_serve_the_Information_Needs_of_Individuals.2C_Not_Groups