Re: [Wikimedia-l] Re-licensing Wikimedia logos on Commons to CC BY-SA 3.0
On Oct 30, 2014 6:06 AM, James Alexander jameso...@gmail.com wrote: On Wed, Oct 29, 2014 at 9:54 PM, Allan J. Aguilar ral...@vmail.me wrote: -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA512 On Wed, 29 Oct 2014 08:15:17 -0500 Yana Welinder ywelin...@wikimedia.org wrote: To address Allan's question, this does not affect the trademark status of the logos as governed by the new trademark policy: https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Trademark_policy. Thank you, Yana. However, as someone who understand little about copyright and trademarks, for me it is difficult to understand how can a logo be used commercially and not at the same time, and how can a logo be edited in any but at the same time it only can be published according to specific visual guidelines. Are the logos Free Cultural Works (as defined by Erik Möller on http://freedomdefined.org) or not? I don't think Erik was completely thinking about trademarks when he wrote that but I would say no, essentially nothing covered by a trademark would completely meet that definition. (and there would be major issues in my mind with not covering our major logos by trademark) Even the Creative Commons logos doesn't (for that matter I don't think the CC Logo is even under a CC License, at least not a by-sa one). The license is clear, and wmf is an expert in these licenses . So a previous trademark is void in the respect where it restricts what is defined in the license? Rupert ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] Re-licensing Wikimedia logos on Commons to CC BY-SA 3.0
On Thu, Oct 30, 2014 at 1:48 AM, rupert THURNER rupert.thur...@gmail.com wrote: The license is clear, and wmf is an expert in these licenses . So a previous trademark is void in the respect where it restricts what is defined in the license? Rupert I'm sorry, I don't completely understand the question but if I understand it correctly: I do in fact believe that they are experts in these licenses and do in fact know what they are doing here. However copyright law and trademark law are completely independent, you can very easily be allowed to do something under copyright law and not allowed to do it under trademark law (and vice versa) these are completely and utterly independent. The relicensing of the logos (under copyright law) does not affect the trademark policy or any of the Wikimedia Foundation's rights under trademark law... at all. This is just like the fact that the coca-cola logo may or may not be Public Domain copyright wise does not mean that someone can make a soda, slap the coca-cola logo on it and be safe (or, in fact, sell almost anything with the coca-cola logo on it because it's so widely recognized that it would be confusing even outside of the soda sphere). Just as an example to be clear: I don't think i've ever seen the foundation send a takedown to someone using our logos under copyright law, they were always sent because someone was abusing the trademark (pretending to be something official for example). Nothing changes about these takedowns, they are still completely enforceable and completely legitimate. There is no doubt that the distinction between copyright and trademark law can confuse (this is one of the reasons most organizations, including Creative Commons as I said earlier, keep the copyright more restricted) especially since they often use very similar terms (license, intellectual property, registration etc) but in the end it's fairly simple: they do not affect each other. Whether something is copyrighted (or even copyrightable) is completely independent, and unrelated, to whether it is trademarked (or trademarkable). James ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikidata-l] Birthday gift: Missing Wikipedia links (was Re: Wikidata turns two!)
Very interesting. I started use it. El 2014-10-29 20:38, Asaf Bartov escribió: This is great, thanks! A. On Wed, Oct 29, 2014 at 11:10 AM, James Forrester jdforres...@gmail.com wrote: On Wed Oct 29 2014 at 10:56:42 Denny Vrandečić vrande...@google.com wrote: There’s a small tool on WMF labs that you can use to verify the links (it displays the articles side by side from a language pair you select, and then you can confirm or contradict the merge): https://tools.wmflabs.org/yichengtry This is really fun, and so useful too. Thank you so much, Denny, Jiang Bian, Si Li, and Yicheng Huang – Denny and the Googlers is a new band name if ever there was one. ___ Wikidata-l mailing list wikidat...@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikidata-l -- Santiago Navarro Sanz Wikimedia España http://www.wikimedia.org.es/ ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Finance Fellows to develop first-ever movement-wide financial report and metrics
Here's mine: Usuario:Wa17gs https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usuario:Wa17gs Walter Gomez Segura *Finance Fellow* *149 New Montgomery St., San Francisco, CA., 94105* www.wikimediafoundation.org wagseg...@wikimedia.org On Wed, Oct 29, 2014 at 6:19 PM, MF-Warburg mfwarb...@googlemail.com wrote: Could you please also add the names of your normal (aka volunteer) accounts? :) Am 30.10.2014 00:16 schrieb Michael Guss mg...@wikimedia.org: Hi folks, We are the Finance Fellows, a multicultural team consisting of 4 young professionals. We are happy to introduce a 6-month movement-wide project that focuses on the consistency of how we operate, which is explained further in this announcement. *But here's some information about us*: Arda [User:Melmas_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Melmas_(WMF) is from Turkey. He holds a BA in Economics. Lene [User:Lgillis_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Lgillis_(WMF) is from Belgium. She holds a Master's degree in Applied Economics and a Master's degree in Business Communication. Seyi [User:Oolukoya_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Oolukoya_(WMF) is from Nigeria. She holds a Master's in International Business and a BSc in Economics. Walter [User:Wagsegura_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Wagsegura_(WMF) is from Nicaragua. He holds a BA in Applied Economics. *About the project Movement-wide financial report* Driven by the Wikimedia Foundation's guiding principles of transparency and accountability, our goal is to gather data and develop systematic metrics in order to provide a better understanding of financial statements. The aim is to help make financial data and statements more consistent and comparable across all Wikimedia Chapters, Thematic Organizations, and the Wikimedia Foundation, to the benefit of the whole movement. The idea of this project comes from the WMF Board of Trustee's Audit Committee and is supported by the Wikimedia Foundation. An initial quantitative analysis of Wikimedia Chapters and Thematic Organizations https://wikimania2013.wikimedia.org/wiki/Submissions/Chapters_in_Numbers demonstrated at Wikimania 2013 by Michal Buczyński (User:Aegis Maelstrom) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Aegis_Maelstrom, highlighted the importance of meaningful, obtainable and unified data. The Finance Fellows have been formed by WMF to spearhead this project. The intention of this project is to enable Wikimedia Chapters and Thematic Organizations to benchmark activities and costs in a consistent way. We will begin by gathering comparable quantitative financial data about Wikimedia Chapters and Thematic Organizations. Our findings will later be released movement-wide, on Meta-Wiki. Please note that this is not an audit process. We are simply collecting the data and developing global metrics. The metric is an objective measurement that will enable data to be consistent, meaningful and comparable among the Wikimedia Chapters, Thematic Organizations, and the Wikimedia Foundation. We will build on existing data sets and reach out to Chapters and Thematic Organizations if further information is required. After processing the gathered information, we will confirm the data with each organization. In the long run, we envision that this project could be replicated annually. In this attempt to enable Wikimedia Chapters, Thematic Organizations, and the Wikimedia Foundation to help make the movement's financial data more consistent, we rely on the data provided by the organizations. We believe that there is enough data available to make a new attempt on capturing the movement's finances as a whole. A meta page https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement-wide_Financial_Report was created for the project, in order to make the information accessible to everyone and create a space for discussion and/or suggestions. We strongly encourage you to share with us what types of additional information is desired. And of course: This is all an experiment! If it does not work, we will try to apply a modified 'agile' process by iterating, repeating, and trying again based on the feedback we are getting. If this does not seem right, or if it appears we are missing something obvious, please let us know! Thank you, WMF Finance Fellows (User:WMF Finance Fellows) https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:WMF_Finance_Fellows ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
Re: [Wikimedia-l] Re-licensing Wikimedia logos on Commons to CC BY-SA 3.0
Still traveling, but let me see if I can briefly dispel some of the confusion. CC BY-SA 3.0 grants users the right to use an image under copyright law. It does not cover trademark rights. The goal of trademark rights is to protect the logo from being used in a way that confuses the public. Trademark protection only covers certain types of uses, which are not the same as use covered with a copyright license like CC BY-SA 3.0. The Wikimedia trademark policy provides how the logos can be used as trademarks and here is some discussion about why it does that: https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Trademark_policy-purpose#trademark-purpose . So are the logos free under the Free Culture Definition? Yes, because the definition only talks about freedom under copyright law and lists CC BY-SA 3.0 as a free license. The definition does not mean that users have freedom to violate other types of rights. Hope this clarifies! Yana On Wed, Oct 29, 2014 at 11:54 PM, Allan J. Aguilar ral...@vmail.me wrote: -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA512 On Wed, 29 Oct 2014 08:15:17 -0500 Yana Welinder ywelin...@wikimedia.org wrote: To address Allan's question, this does not affect the trademark status of the logos as governed by the new trademark policy: https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Trademark_policy. Thank you, Yana. However, as someone who understand little about copyright and trademarks, for me it is difficult to understand how can a logo be used commercially and not at the same time, and how can a logo be edited in any but at the same time it only can be published according to specific visual guidelines. Are the logos Free Cultural Works (as defined by Erik Möller on http://freedomdefined.org) or not? - -- Allan J. Aguilar ral...@vmail.me - ralgis@freenode - al...@jabber.ccc.de PGP: B387 F3B1 0F2C F46B 36AD FAFF 7BC3 594D F7C0 E1A3 OTR: E95CB6E6 22751983 CA8F3F67 3DFACBFF 0FA3A1BC userralgis@Twitter - User:Ralgis@Wikimedia https://editandowikimedia.wordpress.com https://libredebian.wordpress.com https://revistasifra.wordpress.com/ -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- iQIcBAEBCgAGBQJUUcSBAAoJEHvDWU33wOGjFQMQAKbKFyTy/eTJVZp1N/eRlJaK 2hHUNQVhtUGXWcmRo36bnleEAknhkNUqdO0/J0PdI9UMSTptnUg55WQSmMA5EVuB b+jne6rGspZXd3qJ1h1TLYAfYI86dXMYuqYKRDOPhyWuWJM/XVDsXueCVWu4M9pc 0VD24NKcmRIzjRfwIx972yZUUyv7/xabH2REjBbi0SRpAqmnFKb2/KZHQK0j9l4L HLkO1FXjylAXnLdtZrTy3tvH9XOK/WH/PH2P4uI0aFXvZK8Skw50Iicf2d/6Gn9M pqFiyq0UVozXrRSP/3HKUJPT52Vcxz0+kPxcMhSpUvocbcUvQQGj5/cDur2za7yf BGyvPvCQtaip33YpQK2TDexAD7AxsP273RWc8U654PGnNq11C2Vn+goH5AMXFj13 n+a6q9n4Dw3pO3AjUzIJF+t1nXQfsPCumjVvUTXawF1hEA5qPxAgR+Y3kq69NaPG gMu9hAVSfCf4T/YibKiMHtRKPO4csiJbs1XfpIUFlXVQ7hhR2Urkjccr5RRRM7nw jhXMHCqblfxugGvtORgg3o+SZzQB4FKYhb5QLe6vwev36mGzVRDnzncImaLzo1s+ k3+4yJcPpZONrwAesJ0imC80jiW0IIF0bgRHLCVlh82/f7NN/qmfD2QZUVOdqt+o lx2rVnQe2AlSkeBnwxb5 =Xd7+ -END PGP SIGNATURE- ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe -- Yana Welinder Legal Counsel Wikimedia Foundation 415.839.6885 ext. 6867 @yanatweets https://twitter.com/yanatweets NOTICE: This message may be confidential or legally privileged. If you have received it by accident, please delete it and let us know about the mistake. As an attorney for the Wikimedia Foundation, for legal/ethical reasons I cannot give legal advice to, or serve as a lawyer for, community members, volunteers, or staff members in their personal capacity. For more on what this means, please see our legal disclaimer https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Legal_Disclaimer. ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] Re-licensing Wikimedia logos on Commons to CC BY-SA 3.0
Hi, Just a note: we can update the license on Commons, but I noticed that the files were copied locally on https://wikimediafoundation.org/ Someone with the right priviledges will have to do it there. Regards, Yann 2014-10-30 17:30 GMT+01:00 Yana Welinder ywelin...@wikimedia.org: Still traveling, but let me see if I can briefly dispel some of the confusion. CC BY-SA 3.0 grants users the right to use an image under copyright law. It does not cover trademark rights. The goal of trademark rights is to protect the logo from being used in a way that confuses the public. Trademark protection only covers certain types of uses, which are not the same as use covered with a copyright license like CC BY-SA 3.0. The Wikimedia trademark policy provides how the logos can be used as trademarks and here is some discussion about why it does that: https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Trademark_policy-purpose#trademark-purpose . So are the logos free under the Free Culture Definition? Yes, because the definition only talks about freedom under copyright law and lists CC BY-SA 3.0 as a free license. The definition does not mean that users have freedom to violate other types of rights. Hope this clarifies! Yana On Wed, Oct 29, 2014 at 11:54 PM, Allan J. Aguilar ral...@vmail.me wrote: -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA512 On Wed, 29 Oct 2014 08:15:17 -0500 Yana Welinder ywelin...@wikimedia.org wrote: To address Allan's question, this does not affect the trademark status of the logos as governed by the new trademark policy: https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Trademark_policy. Thank you, Yana. However, as someone who understand little about copyright and trademarks, for me it is difficult to understand how can a logo be used commercially and not at the same time, and how can a logo be edited in any but at the same time it only can be published according to specific visual guidelines. Are the logos Free Cultural Works (as defined by Erik Möller on http://freedomdefined.org) or not? - -- Allan J. Aguilar ral...@vmail.me - ralgis@freenode - al...@jabber.ccc.de PGP: B387 F3B1 0F2C F46B 36AD FAFF 7BC3 594D F7C0 E1A3 OTR: E95CB6E6 22751983 CA8F3F67 3DFACBFF 0FA3A1BC userralgis@Twitter - User:Ralgis@Wikimedia https://editandowikimedia.wordpress.com https://libredebian.wordpress.com https://revistasifra.wordpress.com/ -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- iQIcBAEBCgAGBQJUUcSBAAoJEHvDWU33wOGjFQMQAKbKFyTy/eTJVZp1N/eRlJaK 2hHUNQVhtUGXWcmRo36bnleEAknhkNUqdO0/J0PdI9UMSTptnUg55WQSmMA5EVuB b+jne6rGspZXd3qJ1h1TLYAfYI86dXMYuqYKRDOPhyWuWJM/XVDsXueCVWu4M9pc 0VD24NKcmRIzjRfwIx972yZUUyv7/xabH2REjBbi0SRpAqmnFKb2/KZHQK0j9l4L HLkO1FXjylAXnLdtZrTy3tvH9XOK/WH/PH2P4uI0aFXvZK8Skw50Iicf2d/6Gn9M pqFiyq0UVozXrRSP/3HKUJPT52Vcxz0+kPxcMhSpUvocbcUvQQGj5/cDur2za7yf BGyvPvCQtaip33YpQK2TDexAD7AxsP273RWc8U654PGnNq11C2Vn+goH5AMXFj13 n+a6q9n4Dw3pO3AjUzIJF+t1nXQfsPCumjVvUTXawF1hEA5qPxAgR+Y3kq69NaPG gMu9hAVSfCf4T/YibKiMHtRKPO4csiJbs1XfpIUFlXVQ7hhR2Urkjccr5RRRM7nw jhXMHCqblfxugGvtORgg3o+SZzQB4FKYhb5QLe6vwev36mGzVRDnzncImaLzo1s+ k3+4yJcPpZONrwAesJ0imC80jiW0IIF0bgRHLCVlh82/f7NN/qmfD2QZUVOdqt+o lx2rVnQe2AlSkeBnwxb5 =Xd7+ -END PGP SIGNATURE- ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe -- Yana Welinder Legal Counsel Wikimedia Foundation 415.839.6885 ext. 6867 @yanatweets https://twitter.com/yanatweets NOTICE: This message may be confidential or legally privileged. If you have received it by accident, please delete it and let us know about the mistake. As an attorney for the Wikimedia Foundation, for legal/ethical reasons I cannot give legal advice to, or serve as a lawyer for, community members, volunteers, or staff members in their personal capacity. For more on what this means, please see our legal disclaimer https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Legal_Disclaimer. ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Finance Fellows to develop first-ever movement-wide financial report and metrics
Hi Michael! This is a bit of a surprise, if I am honest! I applaud the idea but it has come out of the blue and I worry that this extra layer of reporting will increase overheads here - when our overheads are already under scrutiny. I have a few preliminary questions: - Do you have an idea of how much work will be required by movement orgs for this? I worry that your ideal target of 20 January won't be met, as we don't have the resources to help you revalidate your data at that point of our year. December is difficult, as the FDC figures are released then - which is when we need to construct our final budget for next year. January/February is also difficult, as all our staff are already pre-booked working on our financial year end at 31 January - which is also an FDC quarter end - so there's a lot of work to be done! - Has anyone contacted movement orgs already, perhaps a few months ago? If so, I think I've missed the communication - could you resend it to me? - Will you need to talk to treasurers? If so, please let us know as far in advance as you can so we can book dates for meetings! - What happens if movement orgs do not have time to check your data? Will you go ahead with unvalidated data in your report, or will you be able to move your timeline to fit in with ours? - How much input will chapters have in the process? Who will have the final say in the comparisons - presumably the WMF? All the best, Richard Symonds Wikimedia UK 0207 065 0992 Wikimedia UK is a Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and Wales, Registered No. 6741827. Registered Charity No.1144513. Registered Office 4th Floor, Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street, London EC2A 4LT. United Kingdom. Wikimedia UK is the UK chapter of a global Wikimedia movement. The Wikimedia projects are run by the Wikimedia Foundation (who operate Wikipedia, amongst other projects). *Wikimedia UK is an independent non-profit charity with no legal control over Wikipedia nor responsibility for its contents.* On 29 October 2014 23:15, Michael Guss mg...@wikimedia.org wrote: Hi folks, We are the Finance Fellows, a multicultural team consisting of 4 young professionals. We are happy to introduce a 6-month movement-wide project that focuses on the consistency of how we operate, which is explained further in this announcement. *But here's some information about us*: Arda [User:Melmas_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Melmas_(WMF) is from Turkey. He holds a BA in Economics. Lene [User:Lgillis_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Lgillis_(WMF) is from Belgium. She holds a Master's degree in Applied Economics and a Master's degree in Business Communication. Seyi [User:Oolukoya_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Oolukoya_(WMF) is from Nigeria. She holds a Master's in International Business and a BSc in Economics. Walter [User:Wagsegura_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Wagsegura_(WMF) is from Nicaragua. He holds a BA in Applied Economics. *About the project Movement-wide financial report* Driven by the Wikimedia Foundation's guiding principles of transparency and accountability, our goal is to gather data and develop systematic metrics in order to provide a better understanding of financial statements. The aim is to help make financial data and statements more consistent and comparable across all Wikimedia Chapters, Thematic Organizations, and the Wikimedia Foundation, to the benefit of the whole movement. The idea of this project comes from the WMF Board of Trustee's Audit Committee and is supported by the Wikimedia Foundation. An initial quantitative analysis of Wikimedia Chapters and Thematic Organizations https://wikimania2013.wikimedia.org/wiki/Submissions/Chapters_in_Numbers demonstrated at Wikimania 2013 by Michal Buczyński (User:Aegis Maelstrom) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Aegis_Maelstrom, highlighted the importance of meaningful, obtainable and unified data. The Finance Fellows have been formed by WMF to spearhead this project. The intention of this project is to enable Wikimedia Chapters and Thematic Organizations to benchmark activities and costs in a consistent way. We will begin by gathering comparable quantitative financial data about Wikimedia Chapters and Thematic Organizations. Our findings will later be released movement-wide, on Meta-Wiki. Please note that this is not an audit process. We are simply collecting the data and developing global metrics. The metric is an objective measurement that will enable data to be consistent, meaningful and comparable among the Wikimedia Chapters, Thematic Organizations, and the Wikimedia Foundation. We will build on existing data sets and reach out to Chapters and Thematic Organizations if further information is required. After processing the gathered information, we will confirm the data with each organization. In the long run, we
[Wikimedia-l] WMF Finance Fellows to develop first-ever movement-wide financial report and metrics
Interesting development. Probably a very good idea for transparency and good use of the movement's money, and consistency of reporting to make things comparable is a great goal. I especially think that for smaller chapters there is lots of value in having a dedicated contact person! But I find the self-description of the Fellows as an elite group of global operatives[1] a bit degrading to the rest of us... I presume it's taken a fair while to recruit the team and scope the project too (I see one linkedin profile which says they've been working already for two months[3]). So, I wonder - did the Chapters who have been allocated to each of these new auditors[2] have any notice that this new process was being created before it was announced today - so they were able to make any other time-commitments without being surprised by a new layer of paperwork? Also, I presume that the increased amount of staff/volunteer time needed to comply with new paperwork will be offset by streamlining this with other WMF-compliance paperwork? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Oolukoya_(WMF) [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement-wide_Financial_Report#Who_We_Are [3] http://www.linkedin.com/pub/seyi-olukoya/59/b09/a7 wittylama.com Peace, love metadata -- wittylama.com Peace, love metadata ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
[Wikimedia-l] Invitation to WMF October 2014 Metrics Activities Meeting: Thursday, November 6, 19:00 UTC
Dear all, The next WMF metrics and activities meeting will take place on Thursday, November 6, 2014 at 7 PM UTC (11 AM PST). The IRC channel is #wikimedia-office on irc.freenode.net and the meeting will be broadcast as a live YouTube stream. The current structure of the meeting is: * Welcoming recent hires * Update and QA with the Executive Director, if available * Review of key metrics including the monthly report card, but also specialized reports and analytic * Review of financials * Brief presentations on recent projects, with a focus on highest priority initiatives Please review https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Metrics_and_activities_meetings for further information about how to participate. We’ll post the video recording publicly after the meeting. Thank you, Praveena -- Praveena Maharaj Executive Assistant to the VP of Product Strategy and the VP of Engineering Wikimedia Foundation \\ www.wikimediafoundation.org ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
[Wikimedia-l] Foundation of Wikimedia Belgium
We have the honour of inviting you to the celebration of the official constitution of Wikimedia Belgium asbl/vzw. Wikimedia Belgium asbl/vzw has been recognised by the worldwide Wikimedia Foundation as an official chapter, that supports the quest for and promotes a universal and freely accessible source of free information. The celebration will take place in the drawing rooms of the president of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives, Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat 12 on Wednesday 19th of November 2014 at 15 p.m. Please confirm your presence by e-mail via w...@wikimedia.org We hope to meet you there. On behalf of the board of Wikimedia Belgium, Romaine PS: The entrance to the drawing rooms of the president is for visitors at the rear of the building at the Rue de Louvain/Leuvenseweg. Foundation of Wikimedia Belgium: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Foundation_of_Wikimedia_Belgium Become a member: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Be_a_member_of_Wikimedia_Belgium Our website: http://www.wikimedia.be ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] Foundation of Wikimedia Belgium
To clarify, Romaine is talking about an event to be held in Brussels. A. On Thu, Oct 30, 2014 at 1:18 PM, Romaine Wiki romaine.w...@gmail.com wrote: We have the honour of inviting you to the celebration of the official constitution of Wikimedia Belgium asbl/vzw. Wikimedia Belgium asbl/vzw has been recognised by the worldwide Wikimedia Foundation as an official chapter, that supports the quest for and promotes a universal and freely accessible source of free information. The celebration will take place in the drawing rooms of the president of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives, Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat 12 on Wednesday 19th of November 2014 at 15 p.m. Please confirm your presence by e-mail via w...@wikimedia.org We hope to meet you there. On behalf of the board of Wikimedia Belgium, Romaine PS: The entrance to the drawing rooms of the president is for visitors at the rear of the building at the Rue de Louvain/Leuvenseweg. Foundation of Wikimedia Belgium: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Foundation_of_Wikimedia_Belgium Become a member: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Be_a_member_of_Wikimedia_Belgium Our website: http://www.wikimedia.be ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe -- Asaf Bartov Wikimedia Foundation http://www.wikimediafoundation.org Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality! https://donate.wikimedia.org ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Finance Fellows to develop first-ever movement-wide financial report and metrics
Hello WMF Finance Fellows and welcome to the wikimedia movement, I'm pleased to see this project and look forward to following your work. I left a comment/question of the talk page. Please move it to the main page if you think it is more appropriate. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Movement-wide_Financial_Report I'll look for the response on meta. Sydney Poore User:FloNight Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wikipedian in Residence at Cochrane Collaboration On Wed, Oct 29, 2014 at 7:15 PM, Michael Guss mg...@wikimedia.org wrote: Hi folks, We are the Finance Fellows, a multicultural team consisting of 4 young professionals. We are happy to introduce a 6-month movement-wide project that focuses on the consistency of how we operate, which is explained further in this announcement. *But here's some information about us*: Arda [User:Melmas_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Melmas_(WMF) is from Turkey. He holds a BA in Economics. Lene [User:Lgillis_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Lgillis_(WMF) is from Belgium. She holds a Master's degree in Applied Economics and a Master's degree in Business Communication. Seyi [User:Oolukoya_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Oolukoya_(WMF) is from Nigeria. She holds a Master's in International Business and a BSc in Economics. Walter [User:Wagsegura_(WMF)] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Wagsegura_(WMF) is from Nicaragua. He holds a BA in Applied Economics. *About the project Movement-wide financial report* Driven by the Wikimedia Foundation's guiding principles of transparency and accountability, our goal is to gather data and develop systematic metrics in order to provide a better understanding of financial statements. The aim is to help make financial data and statements more consistent and comparable across all Wikimedia Chapters, Thematic Organizations, and the Wikimedia Foundation, to the benefit of the whole movement. The idea of this project comes from the WMF Board of Trustee's Audit Committee and is supported by the Wikimedia Foundation. An initial quantitative analysis of Wikimedia Chapters and Thematic Organizations https://wikimania2013.wikimedia.org/wiki/Submissions/Chapters_in_Numbers demonstrated at Wikimania 2013 by Michal Buczyński (User:Aegis Maelstrom) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Aegis_Maelstrom, highlighted the importance of meaningful, obtainable and unified data. The Finance Fellows have been formed by WMF to spearhead this project. The intention of this project is to enable Wikimedia Chapters and Thematic Organizations to benchmark activities and costs in a consistent way. We will begin by gathering comparable quantitative financial data about Wikimedia Chapters and Thematic Organizations. Our findings will later be released movement-wide, on Meta-Wiki. Please note that this is not an audit process. We are simply collecting the data and developing global metrics. The metric is an objective measurement that will enable data to be consistent, meaningful and comparable among the Wikimedia Chapters, Thematic Organizations, and the Wikimedia Foundation. We will build on existing data sets and reach out to Chapters and Thematic Organizations if further information is required. After processing the gathered information, we will confirm the data with each organization. In the long run, we envision that this project could be replicated annually. In this attempt to enable Wikimedia Chapters, Thematic Organizations, and the Wikimedia Foundation to help make the movement's financial data more consistent, we rely on the data provided by the organizations. We believe that there is enough data available to make a new attempt on capturing the movement's finances as a whole. A meta page https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement-wide_Financial_Report was created for the project, in order to make the information accessible to everyone and create a space for discussion and/or suggestions. We strongly encourage you to share with us what types of additional information is desired. And of course: This is all an experiment! If it does not work, we will try to apply a modified 'agile' process by iterating, repeating, and trying again based on the feedback we are getting. If this does not seem right, or if it appears we are missing something obvious, please let us know! Thank you, WMF Finance Fellows (User:WMF Finance Fellows) https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:WMF_Finance_Fellows ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
Re: [Wikimedia-l] Foundation of Wikimedia Belgium
Hi Romaine, good news. Considering that the event is connected with the official recognition, I suppose you have a bylaws but in the website I can find any. Regards On Thu, Oct 30, 2014 at 9:18 PM, Romaine Wiki romaine.w...@gmail.com wrote: We have the honour of inviting you to the celebration of the official constitution of Wikimedia Belgium asbl/vzw. Wikimedia Belgium asbl/vzw has been recognised by the worldwide Wikimedia Foundation as an official chapter, that supports the quest for and promotes a universal and freely accessible source of free information. The celebration will take place in the drawing rooms of the president of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives, Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat 12 on Wednesday 19th of November 2014 at 15 p.m. Please confirm your presence by e-mail via w...@wikimedia.org We hope to meet you there. On behalf of the board of Wikimedia Belgium, Romaine PS: The entrance to the drawing rooms of the president is for visitors at the rear of the building at the Rue de Louvain/Leuvenseweg. Foundation of Wikimedia Belgium: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Foundation_of_Wikimedia_Belgium Become a member: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Be_a_member_of_Wikimedia_Belgium Our website: http://www.wikimedia.be ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe -- Ilario Valdelli Wikimedia CH Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens Association pour l’avancement des connaissances libre Associazione per il sostegno alla conoscenza libera Switzerland - 8008 Zürich Wikipedia: Ilario https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Ilario Skype: valdelli Facebook: Ilario Valdelli https://www.facebook.com/ivaldelli Twitter: Ilario Valdelli https://twitter.com/ilariovaldelli Linkedin: Ilario Valdelli http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=6724469 Tel: +41764821371 http://www.wikimedia.ch ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Finance Fellows to develop first-ever movement-wide financial report and metrics
Liam: My apologies for the language you noted, it was not our intent to, even inadvertently, to degrade anyone. We fully appreciate the abilities of our community and I know from my meetings with members of our community how smart and engaged they are in a variety of issues impacting the Wikimedia movement. I want to clarify that these Fellows are not auditors. They will be working from data as presented by the movement entities. The project has been designed so that the fellows will be using existing data provided by movement entities and the Fellows will only be reaching out to movement entities with clarifying questions. So there should be no material increase in staff/volunteer time to provide information for this project. If this not the case, please let me know. Best regards, Garfield On Thu, Oct 30, 2014 at 11:10 AM, Liam Wyatt liamwy...@gmail.com wrote: Interesting development. Probably a very good idea for transparency and good use of the movement's money, and consistency of reporting to make things comparable is a great goal. I especially think that for smaller chapters there is lots of value in having a dedicated contact person! But I find the self-description of the Fellows as an elite group of global operatives[1] a bit degrading to the rest of us... I presume it's taken a fair while to recruit the team and scope the project too (I see one linkedin profile which says they've been working already for two months[3]). So, I wonder - did the Chapters who have been allocated to each of these new auditors[2] have any notice that this new process was being created before it was announced today - so they were able to make any other time-commitments without being surprised by a new layer of paperwork? Also, I presume that the increased amount of staff/volunteer time needed to comply with new paperwork will be offset by streamlining this with other WMF-compliance paperwork? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Oolukoya_(WMF) [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement-wide_Financial_Report#Who_We_Are [3] http://www.linkedin.com/pub/seyi-olukoya/59/b09/a7 wittylama.com Peace, love metadata -- wittylama.com Peace, love metadata ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe -- Garfield Byrd Chief of Finance and Administration Wikimedia Foundation 415.839.6885 ext 6787 415.882.0495 (fax) www.wikimediafoundation.org Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality! *https://donate.wikimedia.org https://donate.wikimedia.org/* ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikidata-l] Birthday gift: Missing Wikipedia links (was Re: Wikidata turns two!)
James, I have a question. Should you merge the items or the tool will do it? El 2014-10-29 19:10, James Forrester escribió: On Wed Oct 29 2014 at 10:56:42 Denny Vrandečić vrande...@google.com wrote: There’s a small tool on WMF labs that you can use to verify the links (it displays the articles side by side from a language pair you select, and then you can confirm or contradict the merge): https://tools.wmflabs.org/yichengtry This is really fun, and so useful too. Thank you so much, Denny, Jiang Bian, Si Li, and Yicheng Huang – Denny and the Googlers is a new band name if ever there was one. ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe -- Santiago Navarro Sanz Wikimedia España http://www.wikimedia.org.es/ ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] Foundation of Wikimedia Belgium
Hello Ilario, You can find our statutes from this page: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Chapter_Statutes_%26_Bylaws Greetings, Romaine Foundation of Wikimedia Belgium: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Foundation_of_Wikimedia_Belgium Become a member: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Be_a_member_of_Wikimedia_Belgium Our website: http://www.wikimedia.be 2014-10-30 23:30 GMT+01:00 Ilario Valdelli valde...@gmail.com: Hi Romaine, good news. Considering that the event is connected with the official recognition, I suppose you have a bylaws but in the website I can find any. Regards On Thu, Oct 30, 2014 at 9:18 PM, Romaine Wiki romaine.w...@gmail.com wrote: We have the honour of inviting you to the celebration of the official constitution of Wikimedia Belgium asbl/vzw. Wikimedia Belgium asbl/vzw has been recognised by the worldwide Wikimedia Foundation as an official chapter, that supports the quest for and promotes a universal and freely accessible source of free information. The celebration will take place in the drawing rooms of the president of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives, Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat 12 on Wednesday 19th of November 2014 at 15 p.m. Please confirm your presence by e-mail via w...@wikimedia.org We hope to meet you there. On behalf of the board of Wikimedia Belgium, Romaine PS: The entrance to the drawing rooms of the president is for visitors at the rear of the building at the Rue de Louvain/Leuvenseweg. Foundation of Wikimedia Belgium: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Foundation_of_Wikimedia_Belgium Become a member: https://be.wikimedia.org/wiki/Be_a_member_of_Wikimedia_Belgium Our website: http://www.wikimedia.be ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe -- Ilario Valdelli Wikimedia CH Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens Association pour l’avancement des connaissances libre Associazione per il sostegno alla conoscenza libera Switzerland - 8008 Zürich Wikipedia: Ilario https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Ilario Skype: valdelli Facebook: Ilario Valdelli https://www.facebook.com/ivaldelli Twitter: Ilario Valdelli https://twitter.com/ilariovaldelli Linkedin: Ilario Valdelli http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=6724469 Tel: +41764821371 http://www.wikimedia.ch ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Finance Fellows to develop first-ever movement-wide financial report and metrics
Michael Guss wrote:s A meta page https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement-wide_Financial_Report was created for the project, in order to make the information accessible to everyone and create a space for discussion and/or suggestions. We strongly encourage you to share with us what types of additional information is desired. This sounds like an interesting project. :-) WMF Finance Fellows (User:WMF Finance Fellows) https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:WMF_Finance_Fellows Meta-Wiki is reporting that user account 'WMF Finance Fellows' is not registered. It's fine to have a shared account exclusively for Special:EmailUser capability, but the account must not be used to edit the projects, of course. A group founded on the basis of increasing accountability project can't be above reproach, if you know what I mean. MZMcBride ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Re: [Wikimedia-l] Chapters and GLAM tooling
Erik Moeller wrote: On Sat, Oct 25, 2014 at 7:16 AM, MZMcBride z...@mzmcbride.com wrote: Labs is a playground and Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums are serious enough to warrant a proper investment of resources, in my view. Magnus and many others develop magnificent tools, but my sense is that they're largely proofs of concept, not final implementations. Far from being treated as mere proofs of concept, Magnus' GLAM tools [1] have been used to measure and report success in the context of project grant and annual plan proposals and reports, ongoing project performance measurements, blog posts and press releases, etc. Daniel Mietchen has, to my knowledge, been the main person doing any systematic auditing or verification of the reports generated by these tools, and results can be found in his tool testing reports, the last one of which is unfortunately more than a year old. [2] It's funny that you mention This Month in GLAM as my now-defunct bot delivered its monthly newsletter for quite some time. The MassMessage MediaWiki extension is a pretty great case study of exactly what I'm discussing here: turning a proof-of-concept script into a supported and maintained tool that's integrated with MediaWiki. :-) While it's tedious to get an extension deployed, the (ideal) result is that it has documentation, it's gone through series of review (performance, security, architecture, and design) and we know where the source code is and how to build it. That's not nothing! Integration with MediaWiki should IMO not be viewed as a runway that all useful developments must be pushed towards. Rather, we should seek to establish clearer criteria by which to decide that functionality benefits from this level of integration, to such an extent that it justifies the cost. Functionality that is not integrated in this manner should, then, not be dismissed as proofs of concept but rather judged on its own merits. Sure, I agree with this in principle. When I consider Labs (or Tool Labs), I think of the Toolserver: https://toolserver.org/~magnus/. My point was that GLAMs should be taken seriously. The Wikimedia Foundation's historical track record with regard to GLAM support isn't great. And from the perspective of these institutions, I continue to believe that it makes sense to invest in long-term solutions, even if they're more costly in terms of time and money. Wikimedia DC has been hosting meet-ups at the National Archives lately. The National Archives has been in the free content business a lot longer than the Wikimedia Foundation, eh. ;-) They know that hacking together a few scripts on Labs isn't going to integrate their enormous collection of accumulated holdings that we want in our projects and that they want to share with the world. Labs _is_ a playground, just as the Toolserver was. Volunteers created some incredible scripts and tools, but how many are still around today? I maintained many scripts and bots for years, but eventually you lose interest, you have other priorities, life moves on, and yet the need for such tools has only grown. As noted before, for tools like the ones used for GLAM reporting to get better, WMF has its role to play in providing more datasets and improved infrastructure. But there's nothing inherent in the development of those tools that forces them to live in production land, or that requires large development teams to move them forward. If these tools want to be around in five or ten years from now, then I disagree. I've spent far too long watching far too many people walk away, abandoning their previous pet projects. That's certainly their prerogative as volunteers and I don't blame the Wikimedia Foundation or anyone else for their departure, but that doesn't mean there's not a real issue here in terms of creating lasting, sustainable software. This isn't to say that every MediaWiki extension is some garden of Eden where there's no code rot. But at least the current extension process creates a much higher likelihood of long-term success than the alternatives. I wouldn't be so quick to discount it. MediaWiki _is_ the platform, in my view. I wonder: if we relabeled MediaWiki extensions and started calling them apps, would it be easier to sell everyone on the idea of the need for more of them? - Improved software and infrastructure support for A/B testing, possibly including adoption of existing open source tooling such as Facebook's PlanOut library/interpreter [14]. I'll split this out into a separate thread. In general, the point of my original message was this: All organizations that seek to improve Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia projects ultimately depend on technology to do so; to view WMF as the sole tech provider does not scale. Larger, well-funded chapters can take on big, hairy challenges like Wikidata; smaller, less-funded orgs are better positioned to work on specialized technical support for programmatic work. Sure, I agree with this as well. And
[Wikimedia-l] Experimenting on Wikimedians
Hi. Splitting this out from the GLAMs/Chapters thread, I continue to regularly wonder whether we need stricter guidelines and guidance in the area of experimenting on Wikimedians. Erik mentioned trying to further implement A/B testing in software development, but to me that quickly raises consent and trust issues. My view is that Wikimedians should be treated as colleagues, not customers. Of course the stark reality is that A/B testing on users (typically readers, not editors) during the annual Wikimedia Foundation fundraiser has been a major component of the Wikimedia Foundation's growth. Worth repeating, from https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Experiments: --- Current practices in Web analytics reflect their commercial origins. For better or worse, the greatest motor behind the use of Web analytics has been the profit interests of online retailers and social networks, for whom the user is a commodity. These profit interests have profoundly shaped the discourse of Web analytics, setting both the tenor and the tone of debate (consider the values implicit in funnels, a term of art). A thoughtless application of Web analytics to Wikimedia wikis would import a moral outlook that is incompatible with (and, indeed, rightfully offensive to) its community. It also wouldn't work well, because neither Wikimedia wikis nor their editing communities are for sale. It is therefore crucial that technical efforts be accompanied by a process of reflection, the goal of which should be to articulate criteria for Web analytics that express and promote the broader ambitions of the Wikimedia movement and the moral commitments that underlie it. --- I think this about sums it up better than I ever could. MZMcBride ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
