Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On 2/25/16 2:14 AM, Craig Franklin wrote: > One could argue that any action that would injure the movement would also > injure the Foundation by definition. Denny is quite correct that trustees > have a legal obligation to put the Foundation before anything else, however > there's usually a fair

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On 2/25/16 1:08 PM, Milos Rancic wrote: > And the first part, as it wasn't well formatted initially: There is > specific Board culture, transferred from generation to generation of > Board members. The culture of siege, where the community is the > archenemy. As the longest standing member of

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 10:17 AM, Chris Keating wrote: > > > > I have to register disagreement with the idea that the WMF board is > > duty-bound to serve the Foundation over the Wikimedia movement. > > > > I still feel this is more a semantic issue than a practical

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

> > I have to register disagreement with the idea that the WMF board is > duty-bound to serve the Foundation over the Wikimedia movement. > I still feel this is more a semantic issue than a practical one. In UK law trustees are required to put the interests of their charity first when making

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Hi Denny and all, I have to register disagreement with the idea that the WMF board is duty-bound to serve the Foundation over the Wikimedia movement. The whole purpose of the Foundation is to serve the Wikimedia free knowledge movement, as stated in the bylaws. This does not mean that WMF board

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Sorry that somehow went to wrong list. On Feb 25, 2016 9:29 AM, "Brion Vibber" wrote: > > Thanks again for your responses, Denny. I think it really helps to get a clearer perspective on things "on the inside", and that informs the kind of things we need to think and talk

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Thanks to all the answers to my response. I am still reading them, and I probably will not be able to answer to all in a timely manner (I have to work, after all), but I wanted to make a few things clearer, quickly: Milos, I indeed do not care about reelection. And if I have to choose between

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

(I should clarify I don't think the pledge is necessarily wrong; it reads to me like a straightforward affirmation of the conflict of interest policy and I think it can't really be blamed for a notion of siding against the community. But if it's confusing, maybe let's consider clarifying.) --

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 10:43 AM, Milos Rancic wrote: > Thus, not the senate, but assembly is the right form of our > organization: assembly which would select *paid* Board members. > Besides the load, I want Board members to be accountable to > Wikimedians, not to the

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 4:01 PM, Dariusz Jemielniak wrote: > First, my ideas to reform the Board are not incompatible with a > "senate-like" idea. > > Second, I think that I see at least several reasons why a Senate for > WIkimedia movement may not be the best way to

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Denny, with all due respect, I think you have things backwards. https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Pledge_of_personal_commitment "committed to Wikimedia Foundation’s goal to establish and maintain the highest level of public confidence in its accountability" Your interpretation seems to be

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 2:48 PM, Brion Vibber wrote: > What I will disagree on is with the notion that the board has to take the > org's side against the movement by definition. It is my understanding that > the board has the role of oversight of the org -- that is, it's

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 1:53 PM, Florence Devouard wrote: >> responsible for spreading that. What I can't understand is the fact >> that I don't see that too much (s)elected Board members have integrity >> above Jimmy's rumors threshold. > > You are not very clear here Milos.

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Le 25/02/16 13:13, Milos Rancic a écrit : On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 2:23 AM, Denny Vrandecic wrote: - the Board members have duties of care and loyalty to the Foundation - not to the movement. If there is a decision to be made where there is a conflict between the

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 2:23 AM, Denny Vrandecic wrote: > - the Board members have duties of care and loyalty to the Foundation - not > to the movement. If there is a decision to be made where there is a > conflict between the Movement or one of the Communities with the

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Can I suggest that it would be really good to document some of this discussion about the WMF board composition and so on on Meta - that way it will be more apparent in future when people are thinking about this issue. A good place might be to re-open this page:

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

I already proposed a "house of representatives" earlier to represent the stakeholders and take care of the diversity issue, appointing the BoT etc. Regards, Thyge 2016-02-25 10:14 GMT+01:00 Jens Best : > just very short input here on the list: > > A community council or

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Hoi, Sorry the important point is that we should invest where the most benefit is. The Wikipedia community is toxic when you talk functionality. It is much better to spend effort where it makes a difference, where it is welcome and where it does add value. Thanks, GerardM On 25 February 2016

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

I think we agree on the important points. There's a huge potential in Wikidata, and it looks like it's in good hands. Commons could be so much better than it is. Anthony Cole On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 3:08 PM, Gerard Meijssen wrote: > Hoi, > Nice that you prove my

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Hoi, Nice that you prove my point. My point was that when proper attention would be given to Commons, it would stand proud. Important achievements have been made, because of Commons and its community we have GLAM (just as an example). When it was possible to find images in Commons, it would no

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Hoi, You are wrong. The English Wikipedia is only brutally big. Wikidata is slowly but surely becoming one of the most important resources for data on the Internet. Commons is the biggest dysfunctional repository of freely licensed material. Wikisource is where for many languages much of the books

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

True, Gerard. I'm pretty sure the encyclopaedia is the only successful Wikimedia project though, isn't it? I suppose Wikidata will be a success one day but, for the moment, it's the encyclopaedia that the world loves, it's the encyclopaedia that raises the income, it's the encyclopaedia that is

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Craig Franklin writes: > any action that would injure the movement would also > injure the Foundation by definition. Denny is quite correct that trustees > have a legal obligation to put the Foundation before anything else, however > there's usually a fair bit of

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Wed, Feb 24, 2016 at 5:23 PM, Denny Vrandecic wrote: > I disagree very much with Dariusz on this topic (as he knows). I must say I also disagree with you ;). That is not to say that a community council or membership structure of some sort might not be good (I

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Risker, regarding "why are all of these proposals so focused on people who click the edit button": because people who click the edit button on Wikipedia are the people who make this thing our readers love, the people responsible for the rivers of gold flowing into the WMF's bank account. It's

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Denny Vrandecic wrote: >- the Board members have duties of care and loyalty to the Foundation - >not to the movement. If there is a decision to be made where there is a >conflict between the Movement or one of the Communities with the >Foundation, the Board members have to decide in favor of the

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Out of curiosity, why are all of these proposals so focused on people who click the edit button. The overwhelming percentage of our users (half a billion a month, if I recall correctly) never click that button. The vast majority of our donors never click that button. The massive majority of

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

> On Feb 24, 2016, at 7:01 PM, Anthony Cole wrote: > > George, the WMF, particularly under the Sue/Erik regime - but as best as I > can tell from its very beginning - has had a propensity to privilege its > view of what's best over the community's view. Superprotect.

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Hi Keegan. If the volunteers who make the encyclopaedia shifted their work, en masse, to servers hosted elsewhere, I would hope the WMF would do the right thing with the money they have accumulated - let's face it shall we - either directly via Wikipedia banners or indirectly via the goodwill the

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Wed, Feb 24, 2016 at 9:01 PM, Anthony Cole wrote: > Hopefully we > ​ ​ > could publicly shame them into handing it over. > ​I believe that public shaming as a tool went out of vogue in most civil societies quite a bit ago. I think it should be out of vogue on this list

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

the movement is always going to be broader and more diverse both in backgrounds and interests than any possible board; the foundationis ls going to have more diverse concerns than the roles of almost any of us in the movement. I do not se the fundamental goal of the movement is to create an

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Sorry, the above post is initially addressing Sarah. Anthony Cole On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 11:01 AM, Anthony Cole wrote: > WMF is a technology company. We are an encyclopaedia, an educational > institution. We need them like I need a mechanic to keep my car on the > road.

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

WMF is a technology company. We are an encyclopaedia, an educational institution. We need them like I need a mechanic to keep my car on the road. That they have control of the encyclopaedia's budget is an absurdity. The donors want to donate to (and think they are donating to) the builders of an

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

In an organization where the purpose and Bylaws explicitly (Article II) call for it to be supporting the movement, the Board should be balancing that aspect anyways. Yes, the Board cares for the Foundation, but the Foundation cares for the Movement, and if it stops doing that it's off

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Sarah, I'd prefer to see the "keeping the servers running" role completely separate from the community. As an organised community, if we become dissatisfied with the service being provided by the WMF, we could just sack them (or not renew their contract) and take on a new infrastructure contractor

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

One could argue that any action that would injure the movement would also injure the Foundation by definition. Denny is quite correct that trustees have a legal obligation to put the Foundation before anything else, however there's usually a fair bit of latitude in how that obligation is

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Wed, Feb 24, 2016 at 7:09 PM, Anthony Cole wrote: > Sarah, if the volunteer community was organised and had its own, functional > representative body that had the community's trust and respect, that would, > to some degree, correct the present asymmetry between us and the

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Sarah, if the volunteer community was organised and had its own, functional representative body that had the community's trust and respect, that would, to some degree, correct the present asymmetry between us and the WMF. Our only rights in relation to them are to fork or leave. While we are

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Wed, Feb 24, 2016 at 6:23 PM, Denny Vrandecic wrote: > To make a few things about the Board of Trustees clear - things that will > be true now matter how much you reorganize it: > > - the Board members have duties of care and loyalty to the Foundation - not > to the

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

I disagree very much with Dariusz on this topic (as he knows). I think that a body that is able to speak for the movement as a whole would be extremely beneficial in order to relieve the current Board of Trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation from that role. It simply cannot - and indeed, legally

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Thank you for the diverse input. A few points to Razmy's proposal. I have trouble with suggestions that state "we can ensure diversity by creating regional seats". First, why these regions? What does each region seat represent? Potential readers? Actual readers? Human population at large? Why not

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

> > This proposal did not attempt to create a developing world-dominated > Board, nor is a developing world-dominated. > "Nor is a developed world-dominated." Sorry, my bad. ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Salam Thank you for your feedback, Josh. This proposal did not attempt to create a developing world-dominated Board, nor is a developing world-dominated. A lack of diversity in current Board composition is of course a discomforting reality while we have a immensely growing and unimaginably

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

I don't really want to generate yet-another-thread, but it seems to me that many people in this conversation don't really understand the need of chapter-elected seats, which to me feels like "I don't understand the need for chapters". I have mixed feeling about this. Of course, I've been in a

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Lane, it’s one thing to have nominees. It’s another to win the election. Global South candidates obviously didn’t win the community-selected seat selection, so I’d approach with some skepticism the possibility that we’ll suddenly have a Board member from those regions of the world as a result

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

I like the idea of reserved seats for the global south. I would prefer to still have some appointed members for expertise, but that number should be diminished to give the community seats a majority. Somewhat controversial: I'd prefer to scrap the affiliate - selected seats. Chapters vary so much

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Salam, I sincerely appreciated any effort to craft a reform for the Board of Trustees membership. Thank you, Dariusz and Todd. Also, apologize for (possibly) flawed English, since it isn't my first language :) As a volunteer from the so-called Global South community, I'm much more concerned

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On 23 February 2016 at 18:22, Todd Allen wrote: > So, five community elected seats, five filled by other means. No Founder > seat. If Jimmy wants to serve, he's of course welcome to run for a > community-elected seat, or seek appointment to one of the appointed seats. >

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Dariusz, It's very good to know that those changes are being considered at all. I do tend to agree with Andreas about two chapter seats being a slight overrepresentation, but I think there should be one. If I were to make my ideal board (and I realize you may have something else in mind, but

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 4:12 PM, Dariusz Jemielniak wrote: > > > On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 11:02 AM, Andreas Kolbe > wrote: > >> >> (1) The most compelling arguments in favour of having appointees as >> voting board members (as opposed to having them as

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 11:02 AM, Andreas Kolbe wrote: > > (1) The most compelling arguments in favour of having appointees as voting > board members (as opposed to having them as advisory board members), > I'm not sure what you're asking. I think that both external experts

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

I think it is an important conversation to have. I am a bit skeptical about creating a parliament-like body, and I am a bit worried that it would advance the disengagement of the board from the community. I am working on a proposal for some reform (in short: I want to increase the number of

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Lane Rasberry, I'm aware of the ongoing election - but in all respect, that has nothing to do with a house of representavtives as I envision it, i.e. being "above" the board. The present structure allows the existing board to decline access to the persons being elected. Regards, Thyge

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

I agree - few complicated problems can be solved once and for all - but it is possible to move in a better direction. "Better" in this context means to improve the existing lack of diversity and WWV (world wide view) of things. I´m fine with outsourcing the search for candidates for the board to

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Hello, Could I remind you all that there is a board election in progress right now for 2 of the 10 seats? Please see details for the 2016 Affiliate-selected board seats election at Amir, you said that you wanted representation

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

We should not have direct elections to the board. We should have a "house of representatives" with X members from each part of the world and charged with electing the board and decide major issues like location of the WMF, changed of bylaws etc. Regards, Thyge 2016-02-23 14:38 GMT+01:00 Yaroslav

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Transition plans for WMF leadership - Board Reform

Well, since someone brought that up, I'd risk asking: Does it make any sense to make the board in some of its future incarnations more representative? More representative of the editors? More representative of the world's lands and languages? More representative of the world's different economic