[Wikimedia-l] WMF employee writing articles for $300

[Fæ]

On 6 January 2014 13:43, Todd Allen <toddmallen at gmail.com> wrote:
> ... The community expects to place more scrutiny on paid editors, not less.

Sarah has yet to give her side of events and confirm how much of this
is true or whether some of it is spoof or spin. Paid editing, of
itself, is not a crime, so this is more a question of understanding
how best practice and transparency should work for this sort of thing
and whether the conflicts of interest for WMF employees or temporary
contractors make it inadvisable and whether there are defined
circumstances that would forbid it. For example it would be a bizarre
hostage to fortune for a full time chief executive or trustee of a
Wikimedia Chapter to be a paid editor and/or paid advocate in their
"spare time".

I have met Sarah in person a couple of times, and we had some good
stories and laughs to swap - having drinks and relaxing over dinner is
a much better way of getting to know someone than by reading about
them second hand. If Sarah is making paid editing work, then as a
leading experienced Wikimedian in Residence and GLAM person, she is
probably in a position to become a case study of what best practice
ought to be. Her GLAM work has been first class and leading edge, so
for what it's worth, I will always give her the benefit of the doubt
and bags of good faith; she is a lovely person, so I would ask others
to do the same and defer judgement and wait for all the facts to be on
the table and put in context.

Odder has raised some reasonable questions and I look forward to Sarah
giving a considered reply. Considering some of the tangential and
points scoring emails funking up this thread, as well as the normal
unpleasantness elsewhere, I suggest she makes any reply under a new
thread if she thinks this list is suitable, or on the English
Wikipedia which is where any evidence really is.

Thanks,
Fae
-- 
faewik at gmail.com http://j.mp/faewm