[Wikimedia-l] The new narrowed focus by WMF (cleaner version), apology

Fri Oct 26 09:41:13 UTC 2012

Well, I am a former Fellow e.g. there is no chance that I'll get another
Fellowship and I have no connection to the research but wholehartedly agree
with thses programmes continuation.

And your theory of "give  us, [insert you definiton here] more money"
completely breaks down on the Global South support - they don't participate
in this discussion, because they have more important thing to do such as
earning a living in very harsh conditions.

Regards

Victoria

On Fri, Oct 26, 2012 at 10:09 AM, Denny Vrandečić <
denny.vrandecic at wikimedia.de> wrote:

> Just a comment on the discussion:
>
> I would find it refreshing if people were not defending funds that
> apply mostly to themselves. I saw, in discussions of the essay,
> arguments by researchers saying that more money should go to
> researchers, by fellows and want-to-be fellows that the fellowship
> program should not be cut, by chapter associated that funding for
> supporting the chapters should not be cut, and by people who have been
> to Wikimania that the money for supporting Wikimania should not be
> cut.
>
> If we remove all arguments of "I am an X, and money supporting X
> should not be cut" this discussion would become rather short as of
> now.
>
> One of my favorite 20th century philosophers, a specialist on justice
> and fairness, has described an interesting concept, and I would very
> strongly recommend to adopt it during policy and strategic discussions
> like this:
>
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veil_of_ignorance>
>
> Cheers,
> Denny
>
>
> 2012/10/26 David Goodman <dggenwp at gmail.com>:
> > I owe a number of good people an apology. I have worked for several
> > self-protecting bureaucracies myself, and it
> > is possible, though not easy, , for individuals to do good work there.
> >  I never intended to imply that everyone there is incompetent, though
> > it is certainly my opinion that some of the people assigned to some of
> > the programs I have been involved in have been.  I admit that my anger
> > is an inappropriate reflection of my frustration at my inability to
> > work with those in one particular program.
> >
> > On Sun, Oct 21, 2012 at 8:54 PM, David Goodman <dggenwp at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >> One obvious possibility for support is the chapters and the thematic
> >> organizations; even if the WMF continues these fellowships as it
> >> should, the other bodies in the movement should supplement them--it is
> >> good to have more than one source of funds and more than one body
> >> deciding on requests.  But whether their work can be actually
> >> implemented at those levels is another matter.
> >>
> >> The proposal at meta says "the Wikimedia Foundation was never able to
> >> resource the fellowships to the point where they could achieve
> >> significant impact: " I don't think the resource at issue is primarily
> >> money, considering that in all recent years we have had not only
> >> surpluses, but greater than expected surpluses.  The resource which is
> >> lacking is sufficient qualified people at the Foundation to work with
> >> the fellows and help implement their projects. Rather than get such
> >> people--which admittedly would require a change in WMF culture--the
> >> WMF staff finds the easiest thing is to not even attempt to make the
> >> improvements; it is too troublesome to deal with the good ideas of the
> >> community, so the reaction is what one expects of self-protecting
> >> incompetent bureaucracies: diminish the flow of good ideas.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On Sun, Oct 21, 2012 at 7:57 PM, Steven Zhang <cro0016 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >>> In my opinion, the value of fellowships in my opinion is huge, and I
> feel that ceasing to support projects like the Teahouse would be a real
> shame. That said, I do feel there are other ways that individual editors
> could get the support they need to work on critical projects. As long as
> this remains in some capacity, then I think that could work too.
> >>>
> >>> Regards,
> >>>
> >>> Steve Zhang
> >>>
> >>> Sent from my iPhone
> >>>
> >>> On 22/10/2012, at 10:25 AM, Jacob Orlowitz <wikiocaasi at yahoo.com>
> wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> A letter in support of the Community Fellowship program from past,
> >>>> current, and prospective Fellows,
> >>>>
> >>>> The WMF has expanded profoundly over the past decade, and especially
> >>>> in the last few years.  Recently initiatives to streamline and focus
> >>>> the WMF have been undertaken; while these efforts are worthy in spirit
> >>>> and necessary at some level, one useful if not vital program has been
> >>>> caught in that process:  The Community Fellowship program.  We would
> >>>> like to express our strong support of this valuable and important
> >>>> program.
> >>>>
> >>>> The Fellowship program is first and foremost a community-based
> >>>> program.  It selects editors to work on projects -- those which are
> >>>> novel and have yet to be tried, those that have been tried but have
> >>>> not been rigorously developed or tested, and those otherwise that need
> >>>> financial, technical and institutional backing to succeed.  It
> >>>> represents a direct line of support from the WMF to
> >>>> community-organized, community-driven, and community-maintained
> >>>> projects.
> >>>>
> >>>> We strongly believe that the Fellowship program is a great way to jump
> >>>> start many projects cheaply, efficiently, and with low-risk.  Most
> >>>> importantly, because Fellowship projects are community-organized,
> >>>> there is high potential for their broad community support.
> >>>>
> >>>> We recognize that the Wikimedia Foundation’s allocation of funding
> >>>> must reflect the priorities of the Foundation’s annual and strategic
> >>>> plans, and we understand that the future of the Fellowship program is
> >>>> at risk under the justification that it does not fit within those
> >>>> plans.
> >>>>
> >>>> The Fellowship program of course has a cost, but it is one we believe
> >>>> is well justified by its impact.  The following reasons explain why we
> >>>> think the program is a worthwhile asset to the WMF and one that will
> >>>> ultimately help it succeed in its strategic goals:
> >>>>
> >>>> 1) The program has a track record of producing successful projects,
> >>>> with promising upcoming efforts that would be interrupted by a loss of
> >>>> funding.  Most recently a new-editor community called the Teahouse was
> >>>> developed directly through the Fellowship program.  The Teahouse, as
> >>>> well as other projects have targeted goals which often match up with
> >>>> those identified by the Foundation as urgent, such as new editor
> >>>> engagement and editor retention.  Other projects besides the Teahouse
> >>>> have worked on improving our dispute resolution processes, our small
> >>>> language wiki development, improving the usability of help
> >>>> documentation, and facilitating cross-wiki translation efforts.
> >>>> GLAM/Wikipedian-in-Residence positions were pioneered under the
> >>>> Fellowship program as were studies in long term editor trends through
> >>>> Wikimedia Summer of Research.  (See the full list of past projects).
> >>>> These projects are of great value and exist in areas that the
> >>>> community had or has not made sufficient advances in on its own.
> >>>>
> >>>> In the works are projects to create a sense of community around the
> >>>> sorely lacking female demographic, to build a game which would ease
> >>>> new editors through the maze of skills needed to be effective, a
> >>>> Wikipedia Library initiative which would outfit our most experienced
> >>>> editors with access to high quality resources through a single sign-on
> >>>> portal, and a Badges experiment to employ a proven approach to
> >>>> recognizing, motivating, and rewarding the efforts of our users.
> >>>> Without the Community Fellowship program, those efforts may stall or
> >>>> collapse.
> >>>>
> >>>> 2) The Fellowship program's core strength is as a laboratory of agile,
> >>>> community-driven creativity and innovation.  The program has nurtured
> >>>> projects that require more investment and organization than the
> >>>> community alone can support, but that innovate in areas of importance
> >>>> to both the community and the Foundation.  The Fellowship program has
> >>>> the asset of targeted flexibility and cost-effective implementation.
> >>>> Fellowship projects require few if any development resources,
> >>>> substantially reducing their burden on the Foundation.  Through its
> >>>> varied portfolio of projects the Fellowship program can address any
> >>>> number of key goals, and do so in a lightweight but meaningful way.
> >>>>
> >>>> 3) The Fellowship program is committed to demonstrating results and
> >>>> making data-driven recommendations that help meet Foundation targets.
> >>>> Fellowship research projects have set and maintained a high standard
> >>>> for reporting results and making actionable recommendations.  The
> >>>> Teahouse pilot reports and metrics reports, the dispute resolution
> >>>> survey results, and the template A/B testing projects are excellent
> >>>> examples of this commitment to transparency and accountability.  The
> >>>> Foundation has benefitted from these data: results from fellowship
> >>>> projects have been featured at Wikimania.  Deputy Director Eric
> >>>> Moeller’s presentation on supporting Wikiprojects drew extensively on
> >>>> Fellowship project findings, and E3’s template testing presentation
> >>>> was based substantially on Fellowship research.  Fellowship research
> >>>> has been a frequent feature on the Wikimedia blog, and has generated
> >>>> good press for the Foundation.
> >>>>
> >>>> 4) The Fellowship program been instrumental to our understanding of
> >>>> the editor decline, and how to stop it.  Fellowship projects have
> >>>> yielded many valuable & actionable insights into the editor decline:
> >>>> such as the negative impact of the gradual increase in newcomer
> >>>> warnings and newcomer reverts, and the recent decline in participation
> >>>> in community processes by newer groups of editors.  Fellowship
> >>>> research has also refuted several prominent decline theories, such as
> >>>> the theory that the quality of new editors has decreased over time, or
> >>>> that the workload of vandal fighters has increased.  In short,
> >>>> Fellowship research allows Wikimedia to prioritize promising work and
> >>>> make decisions about which decline theories to address based on actual
> >>>> data, rather than anecdotes, accepted wisdom, or intuition.
> >>>>
> >>>> 5) The Fellowship program builds good will between the WMF and the
> >>>> community by spotlighting and bootstrapping community-driven
> >>>> initiatives.  Fellowships are devised by community members, endorsed
> >>>> by community members, implemented with community involvement--and the
> >>>> community reaps the benefits of those initiatives.  The Foundation
> >>>> gets to play the vital role of supporting projects that otherwise may
> >>>> have floundered, sat idle, or been ignored completely.  The community
> >>>> appreciates this and recognizes the Foundation’s pivotal part in
> >>>> making these projects happen.  Also, not continuing the program would
> >>>> mean not just removing funding from the recipients of Fellowships and
> >>>> their projects, but also losing the community infrastructure and
> >>>> networks that have been developed as a result.  The Foundation is the
> >>>> keystone to continuing this progress.
> >>>>
> >>>> 6) The Fellowship program gives the Wikimedia Foundation one of the
> >>>> only channels to directly fund individual editors.  And not just any
> >>>> editors but some of the most active, engaged, driven, and enthusiastic
> >>>> editors Wikipedia has.  Funding those editors directly enables them to
> >>>> devote a degree of focus and commitment to Wikipedia that they might
> >>>> not otherwise be able to balance while meeting other constraints in
> >>>> their lives.  The Foundation has become a recipient of a great amount
> >>>> of donations, but much of that financial support is unavailable to
> >>>> individual editors.  There is not yet a grant-making process which
> >>>> doesn't run through Chapters.  The Fellowship program is one lifeline
> >>>> to those editors, and it is a good one.
> >>>>
> >>>> 7) The Fellowship program provides a pipeline of trusted and
> >>>> knowledgeable editors to contribute to the Foundation's efforts.  Many
> >>>> of those editors would be ideal candidates for positions within the
> >>>> Foundation, and the Fellowship program is a great way to identify,
> >>>> enlist, and onboard those individuals.  Maryana Pinchuck and Steven
> >>>> Walling were Fellows, as were Liam Wyatt, Lennart Guldbrandsson,
> >>>> Stuart Geiger, Diederik van Liere, Giovanni Luca Ciampaglia, Melanie
> >>>> Kill, Aaron Halfaker, Achal Prabhala, Jonathan Morgan, and James
> >>>> Alexander.  While being a training ground for future Foundation
> >>>> staffers, advisors, or researchers is not the stated purpose of the
> >>>> Fellowship program, it is nonetheless a positive side-effect.
> >>>>
> >>>> 8) The Fellowship program partners with and complements other WMF
> >>>> initiatives.  The fellowship program enhances programs such as Editor
> >>>> Engagement Experiments by experimenting with community features rather
> >>>> than just interface features.  Creating new spaces for new editors to
> >>>> find help and build community, identifying pain-points in existing
> >>>> community processes by surveying editors, and organizing cross-wiki
> >>>> translation efforts are excellent ways of improving the editor
> >>>> experience on Wikipedia.  Fellowship projects have also benefitted
> >>>> existing WMF initiatives by providing necessary services: for
> >>>> instance, the Teahouse has served the needs of students enrolled in
> >>>> Global Education programs that do not have access to Classroom
> >>>> Ambassadors.  The impact of the Fellowship program scales and exceeds
> >>>> the scope of the individual projects to numerous other forums and
> >>>> facets of the community.
> >>>>
> >>>> For these reasons, we urge the Wikimedia Foundation to reevaluate the
> >>>> worth of the Community Fellowship program and to continue it in its
> >>>> original or a similar capacity.   The Fellowship program is an
> >>>> impactful, flexible laboratory of creativity which connects the
> >>>> Foundation and the community's best and most passionate editors.
> >>>> Having it has been a huge gain, and losing it would be a significant
> >>>> loss.
> >>>>
> >>>> Sincerely,
> >>>>
> >>>> * Anya Shyrokova User:Anyashy, prospective Fellow
> >>>> * Jake Orlowitz User:Ocaasi, prospective Fellow
> >>>> * Jon Harald Søby User:Jon Harald Søby, former Community Fellow
> >>>> * Jonathan Morgan User:Jtmorgan, former Research Fellow
> >>>> * Liam Wyatt  User:Wittylama, former Cultural Partnerships Fellow
> >>>> * R.  Stuart Geiger  User:Staeiou, former Wikimedia Research Fellow
> >>>> * Peter Coombe User:The wub, Community Fellow
> >>>> * Steven Zhang User:Steven Zhang, Community Fellow
> >>>> * Tanvir Rahman User:Tanvir Rahman, Community Fellow
> >>>>
> >>>> _______________________________________________
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> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> David Goodman
> >>
> >> DGG at the enWP
> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:DGG
> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > David Goodman
> >
> > DGG at the enWP
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:DGG
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG
> >
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