Laura, It seems unlikely if only based on "We have no notability requirement." Essentially, you've forked, chosen an incompatible core policy.
Fred Bauder > This is a follow up to my proposal that Fan History Wiki join the wMF > family, based on my experiences via e-mail, on the list and on strategy > wiki. This isn't as coherent as I would like. > > To give some back story that might not have been as obvious in our > initial > proposal, we were interested in joining the WMF for several primary > reasons: > > 1) Wikimedia Foundation is a non-profit organization where we > fundamentally > believe in the objectives of the organization. > 2) Wikimedia Foundation has credibility that could be extended to our > project, helping us accomplish our mission. > 3) Fan History and I feel like we have positive relationships with > Wikimedia > Foundation staff, based on our interactions at RecentChangesCamp and in > various chat rooms like #wiki and #mediawiki on irc.freenode.net. > > We have certain things that we want to accomplish that have been detailed > elsewhere. We're in the process of looking for and determining if we > should > partner with some one to accomplish these goals, what we're looking for > in > partnering or being acquired by some one. Our general criteria have > been: > > 1) Non-profit, no-profit or for profit business where the emphasis would > be > on helping us to succeed with our mission. Monetization of the project > is > fine so long as major content focus and creation is focused around > monetizing. We see our project as fundamentally for a greater good, to > preserve and document the history of fan communities, and we don't want > that > made secondary to commercial interests. > 2) Financial issues. In an ideal world, we would want one or two or > three > of our staffers to get some form of compensation for helping to maintain > the > content, enforce policies and helping work towards the mission. We also > want to make sure that the project has the funding to continue > indefinetely. > 3) Fix and improve our back end. Thankfully, it feels like a fair amount > of > this has been addressed in the past two weeks so we're much less stressed > about this than we were. > 4) Increase the visibility and credibility of our project. Get more > people > involved. > > That out of the way, time to discuss the process of trying to get > acquired > by the Wikimedia Foundation. Simply put, there were three basic steps > that > we took: > 1) Contacted members of the Wikimedia Foundation to ask them if they > would > be interested in bringing Fan History into the Wikimedia Foundation > family. > Got directed to other people, told not sure who in the organization this > would be best proposed to, got told that the Foundation itself probably > wouldn't be interest, finally suggested I post this on the list because > if > community consensus is yes than we can go ahead. > 2) Posted the proposal on the mailing list. Good feedback. Suggested I > post it to the Strategy Wiki. > 3) Posted to strategy wiki. > > Step one is fine. The only problem I might have had with step one was > not > getting out right rejected. > > The problem is really when it comes to steps two and three. To my > knowledge, all of the projects that are currently part of the Wikimedia > Foundation are home grown; they did not join as part of any aquisition > process. In this regards, our proposal was unique. Steps two and three > are kind of where we got hung up: What is the timeline? What are the > next > steps to take after these? > > The timeline issue is a big one. For us, this is not that big of a deal > necessarily. We're finacially in a place where we can probably chug > along > for a while in that regards. We're not facing issues of possibly being > shut > down because of legal problems or scripting problems. We do not have > issues > that say this is a last resort option for us to keep us open. In the > future, others may contact Wikipedia where this may be an issue or where > the > founders may see this as the only solution. > > I tried to ask various people to get a feel for the timeline that we were > looking at to, well, know if WMF was interested in acquiring us or > setting > up some sort of official relationship. What I got told by people in the > know on #wikimedia-strategy was that we were looking at three to > eighteen > months before we got some sort of official response back regarding > whether > this was something that the Wikimedia Foundation community was interested > in. I was left with the impression that unless I was basically agitating > and trying to get support on an almost daily basis, the timeline was > actually closer to eighteen months. EIGHTEEN MONTHS. > > And that eighteen months didn't even factor in under what conditions WMF > would want us, what we would have to give up, and if we'd even be willing > to > accept WMF's offer if they made that decision. We couldn't get the > information that we needed to know if we even wanted to work with > Wikimedia > Foundation for that long. > > That puts us in a bind. There are other places we would like to > approach. > (And if you have ideas for who would be a good fit, please get in touch > with > me.) Is it ethical for us to approach other people and organizations > while > we have this on the table with the WMF? If we approach other people in > the > mean time, does that signal that our interest in the WMF is dead? We > just > don't know. Is it fair to the WMF to basically keep us in limbo for > three > to eighteen months? We kind of don't think so. > > Outside of the timeline issue, there is the whole procedural issue. > Proposal is made. It is posted to the appropriate places that WMF > employees > and volunteers have guided us to. What are the next steps? There really > hasn't been any clarity for us on this. When we've asked in the chat, > the > answer is persistence. That's not a step and it isn't particularly > helpful. Persistence how? Post repeatedly to the mailing list? Troll > talk > pages of contributors to Strategy Wiki asking for them to vote yes, Fan > History should be part of the WMF? > > Looking around at other new content proposals, Strategy Wiki looks like a > place where proposals go to die. There are proposals that have been > there a > year, that have no votes, with no comments on them. There doesn't appear > to > be any follow up by 1) the person who posted the proposal, 2) volunteers > for > the WMF, 3) WMF employees who are working on strategy wiki. This is not > encouraging for several reasons. If you are really excited about your > content proposal and it would be a really good fit, you have the time to > basically put full force into launching the project in the next three to > six > months, you've followed the guidelines that I have gotten and the > procedure > on the wiki, time and procedure become a huge issue that are potentially > huge deterrents. > > By deterents, I mean that these projects could end up off WMF and you > could > lose contributors who can't get past the bureaucracy to accomplish their > goals, are not insider enough to push to get things done, are going to > deter > future proposals and may deter future contributions to Wikipedia and > related > projects. > > As some one who has proposed a new project for the WMF (which would > really > probably be an acquisition if it happened), some changes need to be made: > > 1) Clear procedure for what happens step by step in making such a > proposal. > Post proposal. Contact people who support your position to vote in favor > of > it using talk pages on Strategy wiki. After one hundred votes vast in > favor > with no more than half that total in opposition, project moves to > development stages where WMF staff will be in contact with the person > making > the proposal. Something like that. > 2) Clear timeline of what happens and when so that people can plan > accordingly > 3) Expectations regarding exclusivity of proposal to the WMF during the > proposal process. Can people propose it elsewhere or seek acquisition by > others while there is an open proposal on Strategy Wiki? > > As for where Fan History's proposal to join WMF stands now, we're not > sure. > The mailing list conversation died. Strategy wiki's only commentary has > been regarding getting us off the blacklist for Foundation projects. > > Sincerely, > Laura Hale > _______________________________________________ > foundation-l mailing list > [email protected] > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l > _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
