[Foundation-l] Would you consider being on the Board?

[Michael R. Irwin]

Jimmy Wales wrote:

>Michael R. Irwin wrote:
>  
>
>>I have been eagerly awaiting Wikiversity for about three years now as it 
>>was an obvious synergistic project.   I would be curious as to what the 
>>real holdup is with it.   Are we afraid of hardware or bandwidth 
>>limitations?  Are a bunch of self motivated learners to potentially 
>>radical and threatening to the status quo?
>>    
>>
>
>Perhaps the irony is that the board has deliberately chosen not to
>engage in "top down management" and to let this community "manage
>itself".  This has a lot to recommend it, because the wikiversity
>proposal is a lot stronger for it.
>
>But if you are really upset that this community-driven process takes so
>long, then instead of clamoring for the board to not micromanage, you
>should perhaps ask us to do so.  I am quite sure that we could get
>Wikiversity approved and up and running in 2-3 weeks time, if we chose
>to run roughshod over the community to do it.
>
>This is actually a very typical scenario, of course.
>
>  
>
Ever consider activating the URLs which we ... sorry God King, you 
control via the Foundation?

The initial development and prototyping could proceed effectively we 
could be attracting participation and the Board could make it clear that 
if the Wikimedia Foundation, or God King, or Community whoever is really 
the driving force and final say around the Wikimedia organization and 
community decided against it .... then the database would be backed up 
and burned on CD or posted for download for any and all who wish to 
pursue the concept elsewhere.   Then a nice clean deactivation and 
delete of the prototype space could occur.

I am quite sure given the proven talent of our developments and some of 
your employee something like this is possible on servers the Wikimeda 
Board of Developers controls.

If it is not possible I would be interested in any perspectives from the 
Board or the employees or the developers regarding why not.  It will be 
helpful to any future attempts to initialize an equivalent project 
elsewhere on other assets.

A calender year is not a trivial asset to retirees or people nearing 
retirement in the U.S. with the kind of expertise we need to succeed 
with Wikiversity.   The average U.S. male kick offs within a few years 
of retirement.   It would be nice if we could keep them around for a few 
years working for us creating free knowledge content that could be 
delivered to the rest of the world.

Further, a calender year is not trivial to a starving entrepreneur 
anywhere on this planet that just needed some information to succeed and 
feed his family or a sufficient grounding in some relevant area of 
knowledge or information to get gainful employment in a sweatshop paying 
something instead of nothing.

As the previously designated troll and not on the current committee 
appointed by the Board of Directors of the Wikimedia Foundation I hearby 
request that you direct Brion to active the wiki and URL at the domain 
wikiversity.org currently controlled by the Wikimedia Foundation at his 
earliest efficient time on a time and material available no impact to 
the rest of the operation basis with the clear understanding that if the 
project is declined for support by the Wikimedia Foundation it will be 
backed up, posted for download in whatever appropriate compressed format 
is effective and available, and deleted from Wikimeda Foundation servers.

There.   You have a request for action from the bottom.  An easy 
demonstration of bottom up methods in our peer based community and a 
full CYA for later if the surging naysayers manage to convince the 
community at large and/or the responsible controlling board members that 
Wikiversity must not be operated by the Wikimedia Foundation and/or 
community for whatever prevailing reasons or conclusion that dominate 
that decision making process.

Finally.  We are on parallel top down design, bottom up optimization, 
experimentation, and initiative destined to meet in the middle under the 
final say of the Board and/or prevailing factions of the community at large.

Have a nice day.

regards,
lazyquaser