[Foundation-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] Announcement: Building a new Legal and Community Advocacy Department & Promotion of Philippe Beaudette

[Craig Franklin]

Hi All,

Firstly, congratulations to Phillipe on a very richly deserved promotion!
 I'm sure that you will do very well in your new role.

However, I must concur with Lodewijk in stating that the idea behind the
new department is still not entirely clear to me.  It's not about advocacy
and lobbying (except when it is), but I'm not sure what else it is supposed
to do or why it's organisationally near the legal department?  If the
purpose is primarily to advocate on behalf of the community internally
within WMF, would that be because you feel that the voice of the community
has not been heard clearly in the Foundation previously?  If so, this is a
step forward but it's regrettable that input from the community hasn't been
something that's been institutionally considered in the past.

Cheers,
Craig




> From: Lodewijk <lodewijk at effeietsanders.org>
> To: philippe at wikimedia.org
> Cc: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
>        <foundation-l at lists.wikimedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] Announcement:
>        Building a new Legal and Community Advocacy Department & Promotion
> of
>        Philippe Beaudette
> Message-ID:
>        <CACf6BesiWT8F+4JsdV_=yf++DO-JhSzHxMztaR-fAVG-VYPTGw at mail.gmail.com
> >
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> Hi Philippe,
>
> it sounds great. Awesome. But still, it doesn't make much sense to me,
> sorry.
>
> Saying people can 'edit' is of course bound to cheer people up - but if you
> don't understand *what* you're editing, it is also bound to either become a
> mess, or either just become what you pick it to become. I can't suggest
> changes to team or actions if I am unable to grasp behind the very broadly
> stated goals. Right now it is clear who is in the team, but honestly I
> don't know you guys well enough to derive from that what you should be
> doing.
>
> Lodewijk
>
>