Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
Sorry if I am not clear. My understanding of the mail I replied to was the
point that the Germans were their usual self in their reaction to the
Visual Editor and were punished for that. THIS is in my opinion not the
case. The argument was about dismissing Pavel in such a way that it cost
tons of money and without any noticable effect..

The fact that the German Wikipedia is not performing well has more to do
with the conservatism of the Wikipedia community and is not attributable to
the chapter. What is happening in Sweden is something that is known to me
but I do not know about any research or other papers that explain what it
is exactly what is happening there.. Such papers would help chip away at
the archaic stance of many German Wikipedians. IMHO they are wrong in many
ways but having papers explaining what it is EXACTLY what they have right
and wrong would be really valuable.
Thanks,
  GerardM

On 24 November 2014 at 07:59, Anders Wennersten 
wrote:

>
> Gerard Meijssen skrev den 2014-11-24 07:18:
>
>> Hoi,
>> This is not at all what is considered.
>>
>
> I wonder where you source for this comes from. I has been a member of FDC
> even if not any longer. The Board stated last December that investment in
> chapter must show clearer impact.   Lila did just a few week issued a
> statement on the importance that impact can be proven in hard figures
>
> WMDE have been acting as a chapter longer than any other and run a lot of
> programs, like educating enormous amount of people and having a huge staff
> of community support people. To then show the biggest decline of editors is
> surely a critical thing in the evaluation of their proposal. And the
> decline  could be seen even before the issue of superprotect right. and
> also worse then can be seen in Austria, also working on dewp.
>
>
>
> Anders
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>  It is about Pavel being dismissed
>> without a good alternative or any practical vision to move forward.
>> Thanks,
>>   GerardM
>>
>> move on
>>
>> On 24 November 2014 at 00:55, Juergen Fenn > >
>> wrote:
>>
>>  2014-11-23 14:59 GMT+01:00 Anders Wennersten :
>>>
>>>  The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community

>>> I would like to say that the German chapter is not really responsible
>>> for the recent decline of editors in German Wikipedia. This is due to
>>> the introduction of the superprotect right. It is Lila Tretikov and
>>> Erik Möller alone who are to be held responsible for that. Many of us
>>> have lost interest in editing much after the scandal, and there is
>>> nothing WMDE can do in order to turn this around. The German-speaking
>>> community will probably not recover from this blow. The ball lies in
>>> the bay area, and it has not been played since September.
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> Jürgen.
>>>
>>> ___
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>>> 
>>>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikimediauk-l] Using list moderation as censorship

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
As there is this constant call for more paper work for chapters, it has to
be understood that this is exactly what kills the productivity of chapters.
There are always more people with their opinion why this that or the other
is amiss. They all have their arguments why they think they are right and
consequently contribute to the noise level that is already way too high.

If anything we should look for ways of appreciating the effect of chapters
that does not make them beholden to every John Dick AND Harry and at the
same time gives them equal space to move as effectively as the Wikimedia
Foundation itself.
Thanks,
  GerardM

On 23 November 2014 at 23:02, svetlana  wrote:

> To clarify: I would like to see a more strong mechanism for review of
> Chapters work. This includes thorough feedback channels about how Chapters
> communicate, how they spend their funding. Including means to dissolve a
> Chapter if a large chunk of people believes it is not working well (such
> as, providing inadequate support to the Wikimedia movement).
>
> This feedback channel is probably not here, but I feel this list could be
> an appropriate place to discuss how the above could be implemented.
>
> On Mon, 24 Nov 2014, at 08:28, svetlana wrote:
> > I disagree, the question raised is relevant to the Wikimedia movement as
> a whole.
> >
> > On Mon, 24 Nov 2014, at 02:37, Austin Hair wrote:
> > > Fae,
> > >
> > > Please do not drag this list into whatever trouble you've found
> > > yourself in on another. Wikimedia-l is neither a court of appeals for
> > > Wikimedia-related lists nor a bullhorn for your personal grievances.
> > >
> > > Austin
> > >
> > >
> > > On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 1:45 PM, Fæ  wrote:
> > > > Hi Darcy,
> > > >
> > > > I am concerned at what appears to be deliberate suppression of
> > > > questions raising governance related issues from the wikimedia UK
> > > > email list. The email below is an example. The list was always
> > > > intended to be independent of the UK chapter, though one of the
> > > > moderators is one of your employees.
> > > >
> > > > Could you please confirm that neither you, nor your employees, are
> > > > manipulating this public list to your political advantage.
> > > >
> > > > Thanks,
> > > > Fae
> > > >
> > > > -- Forwarded message --
> > > > From: Fæ 
> > > > Date: 18 November 2014 at 19:24
> > > > Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] Welcome ro D'Arcy Myers
> > > > To: UK Wikimedia mailing list 
> > > > Cc: geni...@gmail.com, Harry Mitchell 
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > It would be nice to hear from the board how this was discussed before
> > > > offering the interim position. After all, in the several interviews I
> > > > took part in for WMUK staff, pretty much the first basic question was
> > > > along the lines of 'have you ever edited Wikipedia?' as a way of
> > > > assessing what the candidate knows about Wikimedia; so I can not
> > > > believe this would come as a surprise considering how sensitive the
> > > > board is on COI and its perception by our community.
> > > >
> > > > Fae
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > On 18 November 2014 19:13, geni  wrote:
> > > >>
> > > >>
> > > >>
> > > >> On 18 November 2014 18:55, geni  wrote:
> > > >>>
> > > >>>
> > > >>>
> > > >>> [[user:Dcfmyers]] has no other edits.
> > > >>>
> > > >>>
> > > >>
> > > >> whoops missed a couple of deleted ones 2 edits to [[George More
> O'Ferrall]]. A direct copy and paste of
> > > >>
> > > >> http://www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/527160/
> > > >>
> > > >> In fairness copyright is a pretty blameless error for new editors
> > > >>
> > > >>
> > > >> --
> > > >> geni
> > > >>
> > > >> ___
> > > >> Wikimedia UK mailing list
> > > >> wikimediau...@wikimedia.org
> > > >> http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
> > > >> WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > --
> > > > fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > --
> > > > fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
> > > > Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.
> > > >
> > > > ___
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> > >
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Anders Wennersten]

Gerard Meijssen skrev den 2014-11-24 07:18:

Hoi,
This is not at all what is considered.


I wonder where you source for this comes from. I has been a member of 
FDC even if not any longer. The Board stated last December that 
investment in chapter must show clearer impact.   Lila did just a few 
week issued a statement on the importance that impact can be proven in 
hard figures


WMDE have been acting as a chapter longer than any other and run a lot 
of programs, like educating enormous amount of people and having a huge 
staff of community support people. To then show the biggest decline of 
editors is surely a critical thing in the evaluation of their proposal. 
And the decline  could be seen even before the issue of superprotect 
right. and also worse then can be seen in Austria, also working on dewp.




Anders








It is about Pavel being dismissed
without a good alternative or any practical vision to move forward.
Thanks,
  GerardM

move on

On 24 November 2014 at 00:55, Juergen Fenn 
wrote:


2014-11-23 14:59 GMT+01:00 Anders Wennersten :


The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community

I would like to say that the German chapter is not really responsible
for the recent decline of editors in German Wikipedia. This is due to
the introduction of the superprotect right. It is Lila Tretikov and
Erik Möller alone who are to be held responsible for that. Many of us
have lost interest in editing much after the scandal, and there is
nothing WMDE can do in order to turn this around. The German-speaking
community will probably not recover from this blow. The ball lies in
the bay area, and it has not been played since September.

Regards,
Jürgen.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Jens Best]

Well,

you maybe true with the fact that some of it is "hidden", but if you have
to start clearing the mess you inherited for good not every necessary
action you undertake is immediately seen. True on that. Sustainable
Structure and real impact is a little bit more complicated to establish and
to nourish than increasing money numbers and collecting thousands of zombie
members. So, yes, the real work starts now.

best regards

Jens Best

2014-11-24 7:34 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen :

> Hoi,
> Well it is mightely well hidden. Or in other words you are preaching to
> your choir but outside the immediate sphere of influence it is not heard
> far from it, I am really upset by what happened and now the fall out that
> was waiting to happen.
>
> Propaganda.. REALLY ? I am my own man and at that I am a fan of the German
> chapter ie what it DOES.
> Thanks,
>   GerardM
>
> On 24 November 2014 at 07:25, Jens Best  wrote:
>
> > Dear Gerald,
> >
> > you spreading propaganda. Of course there is a practical vision to move
> > forward.
> >
> > And even the Interims-ED is already a better alternative to what was
> > understood under management and leadership by Mr. Richter.
> >
> > Best regards
> >
> > Jens Best
> > Am 24.11.2014 07:19 schrieb "Gerard Meijssen"  >:
> >
> > > Hoi,
> > > This is not at all what is considered. It is about Pavel being
> dismissed
> > > without a good alternative or any practical vision to move forward.
> > > Thanks,
> > >  GerardM
> > >
> > > move on
> > >
> > > On 24 November 2014 at 00:55, Juergen Fenn <
> > schneeschme...@googlemail.com>
> > > wrote:
> > >
> > > > 2014-11-23 14:59 GMT+01:00 Anders Wennersten <
> m...@anderswennersten.se
> > >:
> > > >
> > > > > The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community
> > > >
> > > > I would like to say that the German chapter is not really responsible
> > > > for the recent decline of editors in German Wikipedia. This is due to
> > > > the introduction of the superprotect right. It is Lila Tretikov and
> > > > Erik Möller alone who are to be held responsible for that. Many of us
> > > > have lost interest in editing much after the scandal, and there is
> > > > nothing WMDE can do in order to turn this around. The German-speaking
> > > > community will probably not recover from this blow. The ball lies in
> > > > the bay area, and it has not been played since September.
> > > >
> > > > Regards,
> > > > Jürgen.
> > > >
> > > > ___
> > > > 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,
> > > > 
> > > >
> > > ___
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-- 
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Präsidium
Wikimedia Deutschland e.V.
web: http://www.wikimedia.de
mail: jens.best @wikimedia.de

Wikimedia Deutschland - Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e.V.
Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts
Berlin-Charlottenburg unter der Nummer 23855 B. Als gemeinnützig
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
Well it is mightely well hidden. Or in other words you are preaching to
your choir but outside the immediate sphere of influence it is not heard
far from it, I am really upset by what happened and now the fall out that
was waiting to happen.

Propaganda.. REALLY ? I am my own man and at that I am a fan of the German
chapter ie what it DOES.
Thanks,
  GerardM

On 24 November 2014 at 07:25, Jens Best  wrote:

> Dear Gerald,
>
> you spreading propaganda. Of course there is a practical vision to move
> forward.
>
> And even the Interims-ED is already a better alternative to what was
> understood under management and leadership by Mr. Richter.
>
> Best regards
>
> Jens Best
> Am 24.11.2014 07:19 schrieb "Gerard Meijssen" :
>
> > Hoi,
> > This is not at all what is considered. It is about Pavel being dismissed
> > without a good alternative or any practical vision to move forward.
> > Thanks,
> >  GerardM
> >
> > move on
> >
> > On 24 November 2014 at 00:55, Juergen Fenn <
> schneeschme...@googlemail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > 2014-11-23 14:59 GMT+01:00 Anders Wennersten  >:
> > >
> > > > The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community
> > >
> > > I would like to say that the German chapter is not really responsible
> > > for the recent decline of editors in German Wikipedia. This is due to
> > > the introduction of the superprotect right. It is Lila Tretikov and
> > > Erik Möller alone who are to be held responsible for that. Many of us
> > > have lost interest in editing much after the scandal, and there is
> > > nothing WMDE can do in order to turn this around. The German-speaking
> > > community will probably not recover from this blow. The ball lies in
> > > the bay area, and it has not been played since September.
> > >
> > > Regards,
> > > Jürgen.
> > >
> > > ___
> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
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> > > Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > 
> > >
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Jens Best]

Dear Gerald,

you spreading propaganda. Of course there is a practical vision to move
forward.

And even the Interims-ED is already a better alternative to what was
understood under management and leadership by Mr. Richter.

Best regards

Jens Best
Am 24.11.2014 07:19 schrieb "Gerard Meijssen" :

> Hoi,
> This is not at all what is considered. It is about Pavel being dismissed
> without a good alternative or any practical vision to move forward.
> Thanks,
>  GerardM
>
> move on
>
> On 24 November 2014 at 00:55, Juergen Fenn 
> wrote:
>
> > 2014-11-23 14:59 GMT+01:00 Anders Wennersten :
> >
> > > The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community
> >
> > I would like to say that the German chapter is not really responsible
> > for the recent decline of editors in German Wikipedia. This is due to
> > the introduction of the superprotect right. It is Lila Tretikov and
> > Erik Möller alone who are to be held responsible for that. Many of us
> > have lost interest in editing much after the scandal, and there is
> > nothing WMDE can do in order to turn this around. The German-speaking
> > community will probably not recover from this blow. The ball lies in
> > the bay area, and it has not been played since September.
> >
> > Regards,
> > Jürgen.
> >
> > ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
This is not at all what is considered. It is about Pavel being dismissed
without a good alternative or any practical vision to move forward.
Thanks,
 GerardM

move on

On 24 November 2014 at 00:55, Juergen Fenn 
wrote:

> 2014-11-23 14:59 GMT+01:00 Anders Wennersten :
>
> > The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community
>
> I would like to say that the German chapter is not really responsible
> for the recent decline of editors in German Wikipedia. This is due to
> the introduction of the superprotect right. It is Lila Tretikov and
> Erik Möller alone who are to be held responsible for that. Many of us
> have lost interest in editing much after the scandal, and there is
> nothing WMDE can do in order to turn this around. The German-speaking
> community will probably not recover from this blow. The ball lies in
> the bay area, and it has not been played since September.
>
> Regards,
> Jürgen.
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
Ever heard of "cherry picking" and of independent organisations ? If I were
to be dependent on this process I would hate it SOOO much.
Thanks,
   GerardM

On 23 November 2014 at 23:30, Dariusz Jemielniak  wrote:

> On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 11:21 PM, pajz  wrote:
>
> >
> > One more question on a somewhat different subject, if you allow: I was
> > wondering about your suggestion (to WMDE in this case, or to other
> chapters
> > as well?) to fund some projects (in this case Wikidata) outside of the
> FDC
> > process. Is this borne out of a general strategic consideration of the
> FDC
> > or is this something specific to the Wikidata project? In WMDE's case it
> > sounds a bit, well, dangerous from the chapter's perspective (obviously
> if
> > one moves the one big "success" out of the ordinary FDC process, this
> gives
> > the FDC completely free hand in setting next year's allocation at no risk
> > of endangering the continued success of Wikidata), but generally speaking
> > it does sound like an interesting approach if you're considering this for
> > other projects as well. I'm just asking because I haven't heard of such a
> > funding scheme before, and it doesn't seem to fit in any of the existing
> > grants programs of the WMF, right?
> >
> > I don't think we're advocating removal of Wikidata from the FDC scheme
> per
> se, but I myself would like for us (as a movement) to be able to target
> best projects and guarantee their  undisturbed financing. This can
> definitely go through the FDC, in a multi-year funding scheme, when it is
> precise enough (this round we've decided that we need more detail for this
> to work). Ideally (and I'm talking about ideas, not a current structure),
> we should be able to say that part (a) of the proposal is excellent and we
> know for sure that should get funding for many years ahead (this could be
> because of operational excellence, like WIkidata, but also even for small,
> mundane and repeatable projects of small chapters, this would also allow
> them to apply e.g. every two years if they basically do the same, proven
> stuff), part (b) is ambiguous and we do not recommend funding it (although
> the chapter can do as they please), part (c) is fine, but should be part of
> a regular, year-to-year application, and part (d) in our view should be
> scratched.
>
> best,
>
> dariusz "pundit"
>
> best,
>
> dj
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[svetlana]

On Mon, 24 Nov 2014, at 10:55, Juergen Fenn wrote:
> 2014-11-23 14:59 GMT+01:00 Anders Wennersten :
> 
> > The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community
> 
> I would like to say that the German chapter is not really responsible
> for the recent decline of editors in German Wikipedia. This is due to
> the introduction of the superprotect right. It is Lila Tretikov and
> Erik Möller alone who are to be held responsible for that. Many of us
> have lost interest in editing much after the scandal, and there is
> nothing WMDE can do in order to turn this around. The German-speaking
> community will probably not recover from this blow. The ball lies in
> the bay area, and it has not been played since September.
> 
> Regards,
> Jürgen.

Were that the case, I'd've expected WM-DE to dissolve in protest. That it 
exists suggests that things would continue to work the same way - with the 
Chapter supporting outreach and similar activities - for another while.

--
svetlana

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[Wikimedia-l] Bids to Host Wikimania 2016 are in

[Ellie Young]

On behalf of the Wikimania Jury Committee,  we would like to let the community 
know that the deadline for receiving bids to host Wikimania in 2016 has passed. 
   Of the 6 unofficial bids that were listed, only two were deemed qualified 
for our review:  Esino Lario, Italy and Manila,
Philippines.

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2016_bids#Bids

Between now and December 3,   the jury committee and community at large has an 
opportunity to reach out to these two bid
teams with feedback and questions. This can be done via the proposal's talk 
page, holding a public meeting with a bidder on IRC (#wikimaniaconnect channel 
on Freenode); or via other personal means as you see fit. 
 
After December 3, the jury committee will further evaluate and discuss the bids 
with the prospective hosts.  
A decision and recommendation will be made by mid-December to the WMF and 
Wikimania Steering Committee. 


Ellie Young
WMF Conference Coordinator

and the Wikimania 2016 Jury Committee

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_2016_jury


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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Juergen Fenn]

2014-11-23 14:59 GMT+01:00 Anders Wennersten :

> The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community

I would like to say that the German chapter is not really responsible
for the recent decline of editors in German Wikipedia. This is due to
the introduction of the superprotect right. It is Lila Tretikov and
Erik Möller alone who are to be held responsible for that. Many of us
have lost interest in editing much after the scandal, and there is
nothing WMDE can do in order to turn this around. The German-speaking
community will probably not recover from this blow. The ball lies in
the bay area, and it has not been played since September.

Regards,
Jürgen.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Dariusz Jemielniak]

On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 11:21 PM, pajz  wrote:

>
> One more question on a somewhat different subject, if you allow: I was
> wondering about your suggestion (to WMDE in this case, or to other chapters
> as well?) to fund some projects (in this case Wikidata) outside of the FDC
> process. Is this borne out of a general strategic consideration of the FDC
> or is this something specific to the Wikidata project? In WMDE's case it
> sounds a bit, well, dangerous from the chapter's perspective (obviously if
> one moves the one big "success" out of the ordinary FDC process, this gives
> the FDC completely free hand in setting next year's allocation at no risk
> of endangering the continued success of Wikidata), but generally speaking
> it does sound like an interesting approach if you're considering this for
> other projects as well. I'm just asking because I haven't heard of such a
> funding scheme before, and it doesn't seem to fit in any of the existing
> grants programs of the WMF, right?
>
> I don't think we're advocating removal of Wikidata from the FDC scheme per
se, but I myself would like for us (as a movement) to be able to target
best projects and guarantee their  undisturbed financing. This can
definitely go through the FDC, in a multi-year funding scheme, when it is
precise enough (this round we've decided that we need more detail for this
to work). Ideally (and I'm talking about ideas, not a current structure),
we should be able to say that part (a) of the proposal is excellent and we
know for sure that should get funding for many years ahead (this could be
because of operational excellence, like WIkidata, but also even for small,
mundane and repeatable projects of small chapters, this would also allow
them to apply e.g. every two years if they basically do the same, proven
stuff), part (b) is ambiguous and we do not recommend funding it (although
the chapter can do as they please), part (c) is fine, but should be part of
a regular, year-to-year application, and part (d) in our view should be
scratched.

best,

dariusz "pundit"

best,

dj
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[pajz]

Hi Dariusz,

On 23 November 2014 at 18:05, Dariusz Jemielniak  wrote:

> All in all, this is
> unrestricted funding scheme - all of our recommendations are basically
> advice, we cannot really make demands on what needs to be expanded, and
> what needs to be shut down.
>

sure, I understand this, but I'm sure that you and the other members are
making such demands anyway (internally); my suggestion is to make that a
part of the deliberation process of the entire committee, and then put a
price tag to individual concerns. The chapter can still make its own
decisions about how to spend their money, but at least it facilitates both
the affected chapter's and the public's understanding of what's going on.

One more question on a somewhat different subject, if you allow: I was
wondering about your suggestion (to WMDE in this case, or to other chapters
as well?) to fund some projects (in this case Wikidata) outside of the FDC
process. Is this borne out of a general strategic consideration of the FDC
or is this something specific to the Wikidata project? In WMDE's case it
sounds a bit, well, dangerous from the chapter's perspective (obviously if
one moves the one big "success" out of the ordinary FDC process, this gives
the FDC completely free hand in setting next year's allocation at no risk
of endangering the continued success of Wikidata), but generally speaking
it does sound like an interesting approach if you're considering this for
other projects as well. I'm just asking because I haven't heard of such a
funding scheme before, and it doesn't seem to fit in any of the existing
grants programs of the WMF, right?

Cheers,
Patrik
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikimediauk-l] Using list moderation as censorship

[David Gerard]

Wikimedia UK doesn't run wikimediauk-l as such. (This is a point many
list members have made very strongly over the years.) It's a list for
UK-related Wikimedia-related things, although that definitely includes
WMUK.

On 23 November 2014 at 21:28, svetlana  wrote:
> I disagree, the question raised is relevant to the Wikimedia movement as a 
> whole.
>
> On Mon, 24 Nov 2014, at 02:37, Austin Hair wrote:
>> Fae,
>>
>> Please do not drag this list into whatever trouble you've found
>> yourself in on another. Wikimedia-l is neither a court of appeals for
>> Wikimedia-related lists nor a bullhorn for your personal grievances.
>>
>> Austin
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 1:45 PM, Fæ  wrote:
>> > Hi Darcy,
>> >
>> > I am concerned at what appears to be deliberate suppression of
>> > questions raising governance related issues from the wikimedia UK
>> > email list. The email below is an example. The list was always
>> > intended to be independent of the UK chapter, though one of the
>> > moderators is one of your employees.
>> >
>> > Could you please confirm that neither you, nor your employees, are
>> > manipulating this public list to your political advantage.
>> >
>> > Thanks,
>> > Fae
>> >
>> > -- Forwarded message --
>> > From: Fæ 
>> > Date: 18 November 2014 at 19:24
>> > Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] Welcome ro D'Arcy Myers
>> > To: UK Wikimedia mailing list 
>> > Cc: geni...@gmail.com, Harry Mitchell 
>> >
>> >
>> > It would be nice to hear from the board how this was discussed before
>> > offering the interim position. After all, in the several interviews I
>> > took part in for WMUK staff, pretty much the first basic question was
>> > along the lines of 'have you ever edited Wikipedia?' as a way of
>> > assessing what the candidate knows about Wikimedia; so I can not
>> > believe this would come as a surprise considering how sensitive the
>> > board is on COI and its perception by our community.
>> >
>> > Fae
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > On 18 November 2014 19:13, geni  wrote:
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> On 18 November 2014 18:55, geni  wrote:
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>> [[user:Dcfmyers]] has no other edits.
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>
>> >> whoops missed a couple of deleted ones 2 edits to [[George More 
>> >> O'Ferrall]]. A direct copy and paste of
>> >>
>> >> http://www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/527160/
>> >>
>> >> In fairness copyright is a pretty blameless error for new editors
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> --
>> >> geni
>> >>
>> >> ___
>> >> Wikimedia UK mailing list
>> >> wikimediau...@wikimedia.org
>> >> http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
>> >> WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > --
>> > fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
>> >
>> >
>> > --
>> > fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
>> > Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.
>> >
>> > ___
>> > 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, 
>> > 
>>
>> ___
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>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
>> Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
>> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, 
>> 
>
> ___
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> 

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikimediauk-l] Using list moderation as censorship

[svetlana]

To clarify: I would like to see a more strong mechanism for review of Chapters 
work. This includes thorough feedback channels about how Chapters communicate, 
how they spend their funding. Including means to dissolve a Chapter if a large 
chunk of people believes it is not working well (such as, providing inadequate 
support to the Wikimedia movement).

This feedback channel is probably not here, but I feel this list could be an 
appropriate place to discuss how the above could be implemented.

On Mon, 24 Nov 2014, at 08:28, svetlana wrote:
> I disagree, the question raised is relevant to the Wikimedia movement as a 
> whole.
> 
> On Mon, 24 Nov 2014, at 02:37, Austin Hair wrote:
> > Fae,
> > 
> > Please do not drag this list into whatever trouble you've found
> > yourself in on another. Wikimedia-l is neither a court of appeals for
> > Wikimedia-related lists nor a bullhorn for your personal grievances.
> > 
> > Austin
> > 
> > 
> > On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 1:45 PM, Fæ  wrote:
> > > Hi Darcy,
> > >
> > > I am concerned at what appears to be deliberate suppression of
> > > questions raising governance related issues from the wikimedia UK
> > > email list. The email below is an example. The list was always
> > > intended to be independent of the UK chapter, though one of the
> > > moderators is one of your employees.
> > >
> > > Could you please confirm that neither you, nor your employees, are
> > > manipulating this public list to your political advantage.
> > >
> > > Thanks,
> > > Fae
> > >
> > > -- Forwarded message --
> > > From: Fæ 
> > > Date: 18 November 2014 at 19:24
> > > Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] Welcome ro D'Arcy Myers
> > > To: UK Wikimedia mailing list 
> > > Cc: geni...@gmail.com, Harry Mitchell 
> > >
> > >
> > > It would be nice to hear from the board how this was discussed before
> > > offering the interim position. After all, in the several interviews I
> > > took part in for WMUK staff, pretty much the first basic question was
> > > along the lines of 'have you ever edited Wikipedia?' as a way of
> > > assessing what the candidate knows about Wikimedia; so I can not
> > > believe this would come as a surprise considering how sensitive the
> > > board is on COI and its perception by our community.
> > >
> > > Fae
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > On 18 November 2014 19:13, geni  wrote:
> > >>
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> On 18 November 2014 18:55, geni  wrote:
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>> [[user:Dcfmyers]] has no other edits.
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>
> > >> whoops missed a couple of deleted ones 2 edits to [[George More 
> > >> O'Ferrall]]. A direct copy and paste of
> > >>
> > >> http://www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/527160/
> > >>
> > >> In fairness copyright is a pretty blameless error for new editors
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> --
> > >> geni
> > >>
> > >> ___
> > >> Wikimedia UK mailing list
> > >> wikimediau...@wikimedia.org
> > >> http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
> > >> WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > --
> > > fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
> > >
> > >
> > > --
> > > fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
> > > Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.
> > >
> > > ___
> > > 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, 
> > > 
> > 
> > ___
> > 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, 
> > 
> 
> ___
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> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, 
> 

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikimediauk-l] Using list moderation as censorship

[svetlana]

I disagree, the question raised is relevant to the Wikimedia movement as a 
whole.

On Mon, 24 Nov 2014, at 02:37, Austin Hair wrote:
> Fae,
> 
> Please do not drag this list into whatever trouble you've found
> yourself in on another. Wikimedia-l is neither a court of appeals for
> Wikimedia-related lists nor a bullhorn for your personal grievances.
> 
> Austin
> 
> 
> On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 1:45 PM, Fæ  wrote:
> > Hi Darcy,
> >
> > I am concerned at what appears to be deliberate suppression of
> > questions raising governance related issues from the wikimedia UK
> > email list. The email below is an example. The list was always
> > intended to be independent of the UK chapter, though one of the
> > moderators is one of your employees.
> >
> > Could you please confirm that neither you, nor your employees, are
> > manipulating this public list to your political advantage.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Fae
> >
> > -- Forwarded message --
> > From: Fæ 
> > Date: 18 November 2014 at 19:24
> > Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] Welcome ro D'Arcy Myers
> > To: UK Wikimedia mailing list 
> > Cc: geni...@gmail.com, Harry Mitchell 
> >
> >
> > It would be nice to hear from the board how this was discussed before
> > offering the interim position. After all, in the several interviews I
> > took part in for WMUK staff, pretty much the first basic question was
> > along the lines of 'have you ever edited Wikipedia?' as a way of
> > assessing what the candidate knows about Wikimedia; so I can not
> > believe this would come as a surprise considering how sensitive the
> > board is on COI and its perception by our community.
> >
> > Fae
> >
> >
> >
> > On 18 November 2014 19:13, geni  wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On 18 November 2014 18:55, geni  wrote:
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> [[user:Dcfmyers]] has no other edits.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >> whoops missed a couple of deleted ones 2 edits to [[George More 
> >> O'Ferrall]]. A direct copy and paste of
> >>
> >> http://www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/527160/
> >>
> >> In fairness copyright is a pretty blameless error for new editors
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> geni
> >>
> >> ___
> >> Wikimedia UK mailing list
> >> wikimediau...@wikimedia.org
> >> http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
> >> WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
> >
> >
> > --
> > fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
> > Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.
> >
> > ___
> > 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, 
> > 
> 
> ___
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> 

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikimediauk-l] Using list moderation as censorship

[Austin Hair]

Fair enough regarding the cross-posting. As for Wikimediauk-l, I'll
leave that issue there.

Austin


On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 7:54 PM, Fæ  wrote:
> I was rather puzzled by this email, then realized I had posted to
> Wikimedia-l rather than Wikimediauk-l as was my intention. Apologies
> for that slip.
>
> Thanks,
> Fae
>
> On 23 November 2014 at 16:37, Austin Hair  wrote:
>> Fae,
>>
>> Please do not drag this list into whatever trouble you've found
>> yourself in on another. Wikimedia-l is neither a court of appeals for
>> Wikimedia-related lists nor a bullhorn for your personal grievances.
>>
>> Austin
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 1:45 PM, Fæ  wrote:
>>> Hi Darcy,
>>>
>>> I am concerned at what appears to be deliberate suppression of
>>> questions raising governance related issues from the wikimedia UK
>>> email list. The email below is an example. The list was always
>>> intended to be independent of the UK chapter, though one of the
>>> moderators is one of your employees.
>>>
>>> Could you please confirm that neither you, nor your employees, are
>>> manipulating this public list to your political advantage.
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Fae
>>>
>>> -- Forwarded message --
>>> From: Fæ 
>>> Date: 18 November 2014 at 19:24
>>> Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] Welcome ro D'Arcy Myers
>>> To: UK Wikimedia mailing list 
>>> Cc: geni...@gmail.com, Harry Mitchell 
>>>
>>>
>>> It would be nice to hear from the board how this was discussed before
>>> offering the interim position. After all, in the several interviews I
>>> took part in for WMUK staff, pretty much the first basic question was
>>> along the lines of 'have you ever edited Wikipedia?' as a way of
>>> assessing what the candidate knows about Wikimedia; so I can not
>>> believe this would come as a surprise considering how sensitive the
>>> board is on COI and its perception by our community.
>>>
>>> Fae
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 18 November 2014 19:13, geni  wrote:



 On 18 November 2014 18:55, geni  wrote:
>
>
>
> [[user:Dcfmyers]] has no other edits.
>
>

 whoops missed a couple of deleted ones 2 edits to [[George More 
 O'Ferrall]]. A direct copy and paste of

 http://www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/527160/

 In fairness copyright is a pretty blameless error for new editors


 --
 geni

 ___
 Wikimedia UK mailing list
 wikimediau...@wikimedia.org
 http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
 WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
>>> Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.
>>>
>>> ___
>>> 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, 
>>> 
>>
>> ___
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>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
>> Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
>> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, 
>> 
>
>
>
> --
> fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
> Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.
>
> ___
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> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikimediauk-l] Using list moderation as censorship

[Fæ]

I was rather puzzled by this email, then realized I had posted to
Wikimedia-l rather than Wikimediauk-l as was my intention. Apologies
for that slip.

Thanks,
Fae

On 23 November 2014 at 16:37, Austin Hair  wrote:
> Fae,
>
> Please do not drag this list into whatever trouble you've found
> yourself in on another. Wikimedia-l is neither a court of appeals for
> Wikimedia-related lists nor a bullhorn for your personal grievances.
>
> Austin
>
>
> On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 1:45 PM, Fæ  wrote:
>> Hi Darcy,
>>
>> I am concerned at what appears to be deliberate suppression of
>> questions raising governance related issues from the wikimedia UK
>> email list. The email below is an example. The list was always
>> intended to be independent of the UK chapter, though one of the
>> moderators is one of your employees.
>>
>> Could you please confirm that neither you, nor your employees, are
>> manipulating this public list to your political advantage.
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Fae
>>
>> -- Forwarded message --
>> From: Fæ 
>> Date: 18 November 2014 at 19:24
>> Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] Welcome ro D'Arcy Myers
>> To: UK Wikimedia mailing list 
>> Cc: geni...@gmail.com, Harry Mitchell 
>>
>>
>> It would be nice to hear from the board how this was discussed before
>> offering the interim position. After all, in the several interviews I
>> took part in for WMUK staff, pretty much the first basic question was
>> along the lines of 'have you ever edited Wikipedia?' as a way of
>> assessing what the candidate knows about Wikimedia; so I can not
>> believe this would come as a surprise considering how sensitive the
>> board is on COI and its perception by our community.
>>
>> Fae
>>
>>
>>
>> On 18 November 2014 19:13, geni  wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 18 November 2014 18:55, geni  wrote:



 [[user:Dcfmyers]] has no other edits.


>>>
>>> whoops missed a couple of deleted ones 2 edits to [[George More 
>>> O'Ferrall]]. A direct copy and paste of
>>>
>>> http://www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/527160/
>>>
>>> In fairness copyright is a pretty blameless error for new editors
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> geni
>>>
>>> ___
>>> Wikimedia UK mailing list
>>> wikimediau...@wikimedia.org
>>> http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
>>> WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
>>
>>
>> --
>> fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
>> Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.
>>
>> ___
>> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: 
>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
>> Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
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>> 
>
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> 



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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[pajz]

Hi Anders,

On 23 November 2014 at 14:59, Anders Wennersten 
wrote:

> The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community
> *Editors*   *Country*   *Wikipedia* *1 October 2012**1
> October 2013* *1 October 2014*
> All editors Deutschland German  14,740  13,484  12,720
> Active (5+/mo)  5,290   4,661   4,301
>

while, as I said, I have no particular interest in defending WMDE and have
not even read their proposal, let me say that I would find that a
preposterous measure of success/failure. You can't just look at a time
series of the number of editors and say "good trend -> congrats, chapter" /
"bad trend -> oh, guess the chapter did a bad job". What tells you that if
a project is experiencing a 10% decline of its editor base from year 1 to
year 2 that it wouldn't have lost 20% without the chapter's activities?

(I did not have the impression though that this is what FDC staff meant
with "has not demonstrated past impact".)

Patrik
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Dariusz Jemielniak]

well, we do have detailed discussions, as you describe. It is the final
allocation that fundamentally DOES NOT rely on an assumption that it is the
FDC, who should point to what needs to be cut. All in all, this is
unrestricted funding scheme - all of our recommendations are basically
advice, we cannot really make demands on what needs to be expanded, and
what needs to be shut down.

So I believe that the model of decision-making is directly related to the
fact that chapters receive unrestricted funding anyway. There are many
layers of accountability, but indeed a bystander cannot exactly pit each
dollar cut to a particular argument - we only give reasonably detailed
feedback to organizations as a whole, since the total allocation is, again,
unrestricted.

best,

dj "pundit"

On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 5:57 PM, pajz  wrote:

> Thank you, Dariusz, for your explanations. I did not imagine the decision
> to be formed that way. I would have assumed that you look at individual
> proposals / budgets, discuss them, identify potential weaknessess, and then
> go through that list of potential weaknesses and discuss their budgetary
> implications. (Incidentally, someone points out at the German Wikipedia's
> Kurier talk page right now that the FDC's cut to WMCH's proposal is roughly
> equal to the cost of the additional staff intended for the Kiwix project,
> which at least re-assures me that I'm not the only person with that view on
> the process.) Hmm. Well, in this case, of course, the process in
> unaccountable by design, in the sense that if the Committee reports "We
> felt that A," then nobody can ever know how that feeling (as opposed to 10
> other feelings by FDC members) impacted the recommended amount.
>
> I'm not saying this approach is generally "wrong" or anything, I just have
> doubts it is a good one. I personally would fear that such a design fosters
> budget decisions that are based too much on gut feeling as opposed to the
> actual deficiencies of the proposal. And for the affected chapters it's
> basically impossible to make a substantiated appeal, just as it is
> basically impossible for the public to criticize a decision in a
> substantiated way, since I can only criticize your reported findings, but
> never ever know how each of them relates to the actual outcome of the
> process (which, of course, is what matters).
>
> Patrik
>
> On 23 November 2014 at 16:28, Dariusz Jemielniak 
> wrote:
>
>> >
>> >
>> > I'm not quite sure I understand that. Can you maybe explain how the
>> > Committee does currently determine the recommended amount? I mean,
>> > practically speaking. I would have guessed that you do discuss indiviual
>> > aspects and quantify the impact on your recommended allocation.
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> Practically, before our meeting we work on reading the proposals and
>> evaluations, as well as community's feedback, and request additional
>> information, if necessary. Then we make anonymous initial allocations.
>> Then
>> we meet and discuss each case in rounds (at least two per proposal, more
>> or
>> longer if necessary - e.g. we spent definitely more time discussing WMDE
>> proposal than any other one this round). In each round we go into
>> discussing the details of the project. In the first round we typically
>> would end with additional anonymous allocation (each time we also see the
>> results - how they are clustered, the mean, the median, deviation, etc.).
>> After seeing the allocations we discuss WHY each of us proposes a
>> cut/increase/full funding and have a free exchange of arguments. We repeat
>> this process, then we move to "gradients of agreement" tool (allowing to
>> express 7 different shades of agreement/disagreement for a proposed
>> amount). We continue discussions and arguments, including considerations
>> of
>> what will need to be cut in terms of budgetary items, whether there may be
>> need to make staff cuts (which we really try to treat responsibly, we know
>> that people's lives are involved), until we have agreement on a certain
>> allocation. In absolutely most cases the consensus is really high
>> eventually.
>>
>> dariusz "pundit"
>> ___
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>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
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-- 

__
prof. dr hab. Dariusz Jemielniak
kierownik katedry Zarządzania Międzynarodowego
i centrum badawczego CROW
Akademia Leona Koźmińskiego
http://www.crow.alk.edu.pl

członek Akademii Młodych Uczonych Polskiej Akademii Nauk
członek Komitetu Polityki Naukowej MNiSW

Wyszła pierwsza na świecie etnografia Wikipedii "Common Knowledge? An
Ethnography of Wikipedia" (2014, Stanford U

Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[pajz]

Thank you, Dariusz, for your explanations. I did not imagine the decision
to be formed that way. I would have assumed that you look at individual
proposals / budgets, discuss them, identify potential weaknessess, and then
go through that list of potential weaknesses and discuss their budgetary
implications. (Incidentally, someone points out at the German Wikipedia's
Kurier talk page right now that the FDC's cut to WMCH's proposal is roughly
equal to the cost of the additional staff intended for the Kiwix project,
which at least re-assures me that I'm not the only person with that view on
the process.) Hmm. Well, in this case, of course, the process in
unaccountable by design, in the sense that if the Committee reports "We
felt that A," then nobody can ever know how that feeling (as opposed to 10
other feelings by FDC members) impacted the recommended amount.

I'm not saying this approach is generally "wrong" or anything, I just have
doubts it is a good one. I personally would fear that such a design fosters
budget decisions that are based too much on gut feeling as opposed to the
actual deficiencies of the proposal. And for the affected chapters it's
basically impossible to make a substantiated appeal, just as it is
basically impossible for the public to criticize a decision in a
substantiated way, since I can only criticize your reported findings, but
never ever know how each of them relates to the actual outcome of the
process (which, of course, is what matters).

Patrik

On 23 November 2014 at 16:28, Dariusz Jemielniak  wrote:

> >
> >
> > I'm not quite sure I understand that. Can you maybe explain how the
> > Committee does currently determine the recommended amount? I mean,
> > practically speaking. I would have guessed that you do discuss indiviual
> > aspects and quantify the impact on your recommended allocation.
> >
> >
> >
> Practically, before our meeting we work on reading the proposals and
> evaluations, as well as community's feedback, and request additional
> information, if necessary. Then we make anonymous initial allocations. Then
> we meet and discuss each case in rounds (at least two per proposal, more or
> longer if necessary - e.g. we spent definitely more time discussing WMDE
> proposal than any other one this round). In each round we go into
> discussing the details of the project. In the first round we typically
> would end with additional anonymous allocation (each time we also see the
> results - how they are clustered, the mean, the median, deviation, etc.).
> After seeing the allocations we discuss WHY each of us proposes a
> cut/increase/full funding and have a free exchange of arguments. We repeat
> this process, then we move to "gradients of agreement" tool (allowing to
> express 7 different shades of agreement/disagreement for a proposed
> amount). We continue discussions and arguments, including considerations of
> what will need to be cut in terms of budgetary items, whether there may be
> need to make staff cuts (which we really try to treat responsibly, we know
> that people's lives are involved), until we have agreement on a certain
> allocation. In absolutely most cases the consensus is really high
> eventually.
>
> dariusz "pundit"
> ___
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> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
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> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> 
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikimediauk-l] Using list moderation as censorship

[MZMcBride]

Fæ wrote:
>Could you please confirm that neither you, nor your employees, are
>manipulating this public list to your political advantage.

This is unreasonable. We don't require pledges of fealty on-demand from
list moderators.

Austin Hair wrote:
>Please do not drag this list into whatever trouble you've found
>yourself in on another. Wikimedia-l is neither a court of appeals for
>Wikimedia-related lists nor a bullhorn for your personal grievances.

Well said.

MZMcBride



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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Wikimediauk-l] Using list moderation as censorship

[Austin Hair]

Fae,

Please do not drag this list into whatever trouble you've found
yourself in on another. Wikimedia-l is neither a court of appeals for
Wikimedia-related lists nor a bullhorn for your personal grievances.

Austin


On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 1:45 PM, Fæ  wrote:
> Hi Darcy,
>
> I am concerned at what appears to be deliberate suppression of
> questions raising governance related issues from the wikimedia UK
> email list. The email below is an example. The list was always
> intended to be independent of the UK chapter, though one of the
> moderators is one of your employees.
>
> Could you please confirm that neither you, nor your employees, are
> manipulating this public list to your political advantage.
>
> Thanks,
> Fae
>
> -- Forwarded message --
> From: Fæ 
> Date: 18 November 2014 at 19:24
> Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] Welcome ro D'Arcy Myers
> To: UK Wikimedia mailing list 
> Cc: geni...@gmail.com, Harry Mitchell 
>
>
> It would be nice to hear from the board how this was discussed before
> offering the interim position. After all, in the several interviews I
> took part in for WMUK staff, pretty much the first basic question was
> along the lines of 'have you ever edited Wikipedia?' as a way of
> assessing what the candidate knows about Wikimedia; so I can not
> believe this would come as a surprise considering how sensitive the
> board is on COI and its perception by our community.
>
> Fae
>
>
>
> On 18 November 2014 19:13, geni  wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> On 18 November 2014 18:55, geni  wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> [[user:Dcfmyers]] has no other edits.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> whoops missed a couple of deleted ones 2 edits to [[George More O'Ferrall]]. 
>> A direct copy and paste of
>>
>> http://www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/527160/
>>
>> In fairness copyright is a pretty blameless error for new editors
>>
>>
>> --
>> geni
>>
>> ___
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>> wikimediau...@wikimedia.org
>> http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
>> WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
>
>
>
>
> --
> fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
>
>
> --
> fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
> Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.
>
> ___
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> 

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Cristian Consonni]

2014-11-23 14:52 GMT+01:00 Dariusz Jemielniak :
> I am no certain that we could (or should) account for every 10% cut by
> apportioning it to something (10% because of governance, 10% because of
> lack of clarify of proposal, etc.). But of course this is not necessarily
> what you're proposing, you're asking for MORE detail, basically.

Pajz, in addition to what Dariusz said please also note that, for
example in case of Wikimedia Serbia that presented a very detailed
budget this was exactly what was done (but I would rather consider
this to be an exception, see below).

In general, I would like to point out that single-line cuts in budgets
pose other kinds of problems, e.g. difficulty to evaluate the precise
amount taking in consideration the context (then risking to be forced
to say either "keep this" or "reject"), and also the autonomy of the
organisation (if you transform a recommendation in list of "this yes"
and "that other no" then what remains to be decided by the chapter?).

In my view, the role of the FDC is to evaluate the general capacity of
an organisation in organizing projects, deliver what planned, measure
the outputs and the outcomes, adjust its activities based on the
results.

Cristian

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Dariusz Jemielniak]

>
>
> I'm not quite sure I understand that. Can you maybe explain how the
> Committee does currently determine the recommended amount? I mean,
> practically speaking. I would have guessed that you do discuss indiviual
> aspects and quantify the impact on your recommended allocation.
>
>
>
Practically, before our meeting we work on reading the proposals and
evaluations, as well as community's feedback, and request additional
information, if necessary. Then we make anonymous initial allocations. Then
we meet and discuss each case in rounds (at least two per proposal, more or
longer if necessary - e.g. we spent definitely more time discussing WMDE
proposal than any other one this round). In each round we go into
discussing the details of the project. In the first round we typically
would end with additional anonymous allocation (each time we also see the
results - how they are clustered, the mean, the median, deviation, etc.).
After seeing the allocations we discuss WHY each of us proposes a
cut/increase/full funding and have a free exchange of arguments. We repeat
this process, then we move to "gradients of agreement" tool (allowing to
express 7 different shades of agreement/disagreement for a proposed
amount). We continue discussions and arguments, including considerations of
what will need to be cut in terms of budgetary items, whether there may be
need to make staff cuts (which we really try to treat responsibly, we know
that people's lives are involved), until we have agreement on a certain
allocation. In absolutely most cases the consensus is really high
eventually.

dariusz "pundit"
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Anders Wennersten]

rupert THURNER skrev den 2014-11-23 15:19:

Anders, what are the comparable numbers out of Sweden? Not generated by
bots. What is the link for this?

Rupert
*Editors* 	*Country* 	*Wikipedia* 	*1 October 2012* 	*1 October 2013* 
*1 October 2014*

All editors Sweden  Swedish 2,289   2,289   2,227
Active (5+/mo)  701 647 747


so somewhat down a year ago and up this autumn. And without the 
activities from WMSE I estimate we would have seen a decline of 10-15%. 
Glam initiatives and education support programs from WMSE does not only 
bring in new editors and edits but also boost the morale of the oldies 
(as also good reports in media (thx WMSE) and the botgeneration does)


Anders





  On Nov 23, 2014 2:59 PM, "Anders Wennersten" 
wrote:


I beleive you can find part of what you ask for in the staff assessment
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Proposals/
2014-2015_round1/Wikimedia_Deutschland_e.V./Staff_proposal_assessment


The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community
*Editors*   *Country*   *Wikipedia* *1 October 2012**1
October 2013* *1 October 2014*
All editors Deutschland German  14,740  13,484  12,720
Active (5+/mo)  5,290   4,661   4,301

WMDE is continuing its expensive community support work that has not
demonstrated past impact and in its current design does not seem likely to
generate significant future impact commensurate with costs.
WMDE's budget is disproportionally focused on its community support
program, which does not have commensurate impact.

Anders


pajz skrev den 2014-11-23 14:43:


Hi Dariusz,

On 23 November 2014 at 14:04, Dariusz Jemielniak 
wrote:

  the current framework ONLY allows to make across the board cuts. Sadly.

We
would very much rather have a possibility to recommend some projects to
be
funded or not, but these are unrestricted funds.

  While the latter may be true, I do not see why that would be a

requirement
to what I suggested. It is nonetheless possible to lay down transparently
why an entity's proposed budget was considered too big and which parts of
it you do not find worth funding. As far as I can see, this is not by any
means affected by the Committee's inability to impose binding restrictions
on the use of allocated funds.

My point is this: What I think the Committee currently provides is a) a
list of things that the FDC members like, b) a list of things that the FDC
members don't like, and c) some recommended amount of money. What's
missing
is a link between a)/b) and c). If I were to vandalize the page tonight
and
reduce WMDE's the recommended amount by EUR 300,000, would anybody notice
a
discrepancy? I don't think so. I'm not saying, by the way, that the FDC
should only be able to make cuts to specific items in the budget. This is
sometimes not possible, and that's fine. But I do think that this should
be
made explicit ("We reduced the total amount by 10% due to concerns about
governance.") At the same time, there are arguments that only seem to
jusitfy item-specific cuts. When you say that a certain programme doesn't
generate sufficient results or is for other reasons not something you feel
comfortable funding, then I could imagine something like "We do not think
that programme xy should be funded, so we reduced the recommended amount
by
that amount."

Finally, I would argue that this is also an important issue of
accountability. If you think it through, the way you present these cuts
make it effectively impossible to appeal a decision by the FDC. If you
give
six reasons why a chapter should get EUR 360,000 less than requested,
without putting numbers to it or even making a priorization, how is the
chapter supposed to appeal that decision? If they say "Well, your third
argument isn't really correct," you can always say "But look, there a five
others!".

Best wishes,
Patrik
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Cristian Consonni]

2014-11-23 13:50 GMT+01:00 Federico Leva (Nemo) :
> Finally, I see hostility towards attempts at technological decentralisation
> (e.g. Kiwix). But here I hope I'm mistaken.

You are:
«Wikimedia CH has been very successful in offline activities/Kiwix,
and is effectively developing tools for broader activities extending
beyond their community, for example in GLAM. It is creating tools and
content that can have impact on a global scale. The offline work done
by the chapter is a very good example of collaboration and
cross-coordination among different movement groups for creation of a
universal tool and its implementation (e.g, the work with Wikimedia
South Africa to implement offline tools).»

C

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Cristian Consonni]

Hi,

apologies for the lengthy answer.

2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen :
> I have a few questions, observations. When I read the arguments for cutting
> the request of the German chapter, I get the impression that the Germans
> are punished.

Can you please elaborate on where you get this feeling from, Gerard?

2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen :
> I also find no considerations to the consequences of NOT
> providing the requested funding.

Possible scenarios have been discussed, the final decision is, of
course, in the hands of the upcoming WMDE's board. I think that the
recommendation given highlights some strong and some week points to
work on (and I think this is the point of the recommendation).

2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen :
> When I read about the Dutch request, they are praised for being
prudent and careful planners but they are punished for not being actively
involved in fundraising.

On one hand the need of diversifying the sources of funding is for
sure something that the FDC want to push organisations on, I want this
to be as clear as possible on this point.
I can say that all FDC members are aware that this message has not
been given clearly in the past and that fundraising is a difficult
endeavor where capacity needs to be built and result can not expected
to be immediate.
The main point is that "diversification of funds and resources
mitigate risks and maintain sustainability, and also allow
organizations to build meaningful local partnerships and shared
ownership around goals."

On the other hand we considered the fact that WMNL has a significant
amount of reserves, while some reserves are definitely a good thing,
we have to consider the fact that this money are, in some sense,
frozen in their use. We can not ignore this fact. Also remember the
the medium size of IEG is 7500 $[1] (but I recalled an even lower
figure).

> The WIkimedia Foundation deliberately excluded the chapters from the
> fundraising efforts.

As Dariusz noted, the so-called "payment processing" from the websites
does not necessarily equate fundraising /tout court/.

> Enough comments have been made about this recently; it
> is obvious to many that the WMF seems not to care too much about what funds
> are raised outside the USA.

I disagree on this, but I may add that if this would be the case it
would be one more reason to develop a local fundraising strategy.

> The process of handing out gifts makes beggars of the chapters.

I disagree. Basically *all* the non-profit organisations in the world
raise funds in a number of ways, including applying for grants to
different organisations (at a local, national and international
level), and I can assure you (through personal experience, i.e.
projects done with Wikimedia Italia) that for doing such a thing you
are required to present a (project) proposal, to prepare reports and
basically do all the steps that are part of the FDC process.

> They have
> to comply with the vagaries of what committee members think at a given
> time.

This is a risk associated with any fundraising activity other then
having a very large number of direct small donors.
I can also point out that you have to face the vagaries of the Board,
too ("6. We should ensure the diversification of funding for our
movement, and not rely solely on movement resources through our annual
fundraiser.")[2].

In the recommendation for Wikimedia Foundation in May, the FDC asked
for the start of the new strategic process. The Wikimedia Foundation
as an organisation needs its own strategy, I do not know at the moment
if this will be called "the Wikimedia movement strategy" or not. I do
not know at the moment if this two strategies are better being one or
not. The point is, whatever the Wikimedia Foundation's strategy will
be this will affect the whole movement with a magnitude much greater
than the strategy of every single other Wikimedia entity or group.

One point of this is: make sure that WMF strategy is sensible for what
you as a chapter want to do, or make sure that we have a movement
strategy we agree on. The other point is: "WMF strategy will affect
all of us, whether we like it or not" (cit. Delphine, I hope you don't
mind me quoting this in public), so participate in the WMF strategy
process when the time comes.

> In my opinion by making chapters second class citizens, the WMF will remain
> USA and English centred. That does not help our goal of "sharing in the sum
> of all available knowledge".

I don't think chapters are second class citizens and I think that all
committee members are aware of the fact that "sharing in the sum of
all available knowledge" goes beyond English (for 7 out of 9 members
English is not the native/primary language) and goes beyond Wikipedia,
this even goes beyond online since many of the very cool projects the
chapters do need a significant offline activity.

> PS there are more chapters where I am not happy about the granting of gifts
> either.

(as in

Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[MZMcBride]

Gerard Meijssen wrote:
>I am really surprised how little attention this is getting.

Don't worry, I'm paying attention.

https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=10611792#About_the_FDC

When I look at the composition of the Funds Dissemination Committee, it's
difficult for me to get too upset. It's a fairly diverse group of
Wikimedians that I respect and trust. The recommendations themselves seem
considered and measured (punintentional). Based on my limited
observations, the FDC is doing an acceptable and thankless job.

I found the comparison chart provided in this report somewhat lacking, so
I created my own that adds a few columns:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=10618176#Comparison

Wikimedia Deutschland requested more money ($1,575,600) than any other
requesting entity (the next highest was Wikimedia UK's request of
$672,381). That's a pretty big difference.

Wikimedia Deutschland was not really exceptional in seeing a large
difference between amount requested and amount recommended: DE -->
-30.185%, CH --> -30.147%, UK --> -22.663%, etc.

And the report was pretty explicit about the reason for Wikimedia
Deutschland receiving less money:


The FDC is very concerned that there is so little detail in the proposal
about both budget and programs for an organization of this size,
especially when compared to other proposals. With this recommendation to
cut their allocation, it is the sincere hope of the FDC that significant
concerns around the lack of focus in activities and large expenses for
many of Wikimedia Deutschland’s programs will be recognised and acted upon.

[...]

Considering Wikimedia Deutschland’s size and budget, the lack of details
and depth in this proposal and budget, compounded by vagueness, is a
serious concern and is simply not acceptable. The FDC does not find a
focused rationale behind its budget, which is serious considering that
Wikimedia Deutschland is making the largest APG funding request overall
and it is requesting more than 25% of the total funds available. The costs
of each program are not sufficiently detailed, making it hard to determine
if amounts allocated for each program are reasonable or not. From the
information available, the FDC considers administration costs included in
this proposal to be extremely and unusually high, especially those related
to the Board.


I'm not sure how the FDC could have been any clearer here.

A smart response from Wikimedia Deutschland would be "we understand we
fell short and we'll seek to address these issues for the next round."
Becoming combative and talking about how the Wikimedia movement is too
U.S. and Europe-centric (which is a funny view considering how the UK, CH,
DE, and NL chapters fared in this round of funding...) is neither helpful
nor productive, in my opinion.

And while centralized fundraising certainly creates unusual political and
power dynamics, it's vastly preferable to the former practice of simply
having a few small (in size) chapters get an excessively high amount of
money that they didn't have the resources to properly manage or allocate.
That was the past reality and we are improving and I'm grateful for that.

We're increasing funds dissemination accountability and we're being more
financially prudent with donor resources. What, exactly, is upsetting?

MZMcBride



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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[pajz]

Hi Dariusz,

thanks for the quick response.

On 23 November 2014 at 14:52, Dariusz Jemielniak  wrote:

> I am no certain that we could (or should) account for every 10% cut by
> apportioning it to something (10% because of governance, 10% because of
> lack of clarify of proposal, etc.). But of course this is not necessarily
> what you're proposing, you're asking for MORE detail, basically.
>

I'll comment on that at the end of my email.


> Please, observe that we did recommend Wikidata to be fully sustained.
>

Just to be clear -- I am not affiliated with WMDE. I've kept out of
chapter-related issues since I started contributing to the Wikimedia
projects in 2007, and I do not feel a need to change that. So when I'm
exemplifying a point here with the German chapter's proposal, that is not
due to my desire to argue their case, but I'm weighing in because I truly
believe that the process itself should be reflected. The fact that you
recommend to secure funding for Wikidata is therefore of relevance to the
German chapter, but not really something that matters to the case I'm
arguing.

Also, remember, that all appeals are not going to the FDC at all - we will
> not have ANY opportunity to argue one way or another in case of all
> appeals. The Board will consider them, and will base not only on our
> recommendations, but also on the notes from confidential proceedings of the
> FDC committee (two Board members are non-voting observers). There is also
> an ombudsperson overseeing the whole process formally.
>

Ok. What I mean is that you can't make a substantiated complaint about the
FDC's allocation if the Committee doesn't indicate how it arrived at that
figure.

In any case, I understand that it would be more desirable to see every
> dollar cut connected to one item of our feedback. I am not certain, though,
> if we will be able to do so in the future in all cases (but we may try,
> when possible).
>

I'm not quite sure I understand that. Can you maybe explain how the
Committee does currently determine the recommended amount? I mean,
practically speaking. I would have guessed that you do discuss indiviual
aspects and quantify the impact on your recommended allocation.

Patrik
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[rupert THURNER]

Anders, what are the comparable numbers out of Sweden? Not generated by
bots. What is the link for this?

Rupert
 On Nov 23, 2014 2:59 PM, "Anders Wennersten" 
wrote:

> I beleive you can find part of what you ask for in the staff assessment
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Proposals/
> 2014-2015_round1/Wikimedia_Deutschland_e.V./Staff_proposal_assessment
>
>
> The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community
> *Editors*   *Country*   *Wikipedia* *1 October 2012**1
> October 2013* *1 October 2014*
> All editors Deutschland German  14,740  13,484  12,720
> Active (5+/mo)  5,290   4,661   4,301
>
> WMDE is continuing its expensive community support work that has not
> demonstrated past impact and in its current design does not seem likely to
> generate significant future impact commensurate with costs.
> WMDE's budget is disproportionally focused on its community support
> program, which does not have commensurate impact.
>
> Anders
>
>
> pajz skrev den 2014-11-23 14:43:
>
>> Hi Dariusz,
>>
>> On 23 November 2014 at 14:04, Dariusz Jemielniak 
>> wrote:
>>
>>  the current framework ONLY allows to make across the board cuts. Sadly.
>>> We
>>> would very much rather have a possibility to recommend some projects to
>>> be
>>> funded or not, but these are unrestricted funds.
>>>
>>>  While the latter may be true, I do not see why that would be a
>> requirement
>> to what I suggested. It is nonetheless possible to lay down transparently
>> why an entity's proposed budget was considered too big and which parts of
>> it you do not find worth funding. As far as I can see, this is not by any
>> means affected by the Committee's inability to impose binding restrictions
>> on the use of allocated funds.
>>
>> My point is this: What I think the Committee currently provides is a) a
>> list of things that the FDC members like, b) a list of things that the FDC
>> members don't like, and c) some recommended amount of money. What's
>> missing
>> is a link between a)/b) and c). If I were to vandalize the page tonight
>> and
>> reduce WMDE's the recommended amount by EUR 300,000, would anybody notice
>> a
>> discrepancy? I don't think so. I'm not saying, by the way, that the FDC
>> should only be able to make cuts to specific items in the budget. This is
>> sometimes not possible, and that's fine. But I do think that this should
>> be
>> made explicit ("We reduced the total amount by 10% due to concerns about
>> governance.") At the same time, there are arguments that only seem to
>> jusitfy item-specific cuts. When you say that a certain programme doesn't
>> generate sufficient results or is for other reasons not something you feel
>> comfortable funding, then I could imagine something like "We do not think
>> that programme xy should be funded, so we reduced the recommended amount
>> by
>> that amount."
>>
>> Finally, I would argue that this is also an important issue of
>> accountability. If you think it through, the way you present these cuts
>> make it effectively impossible to appeal a decision by the FDC. If you
>> give
>> six reasons why a chapter should get EUR 360,000 less than requested,
>> without putting numbers to it or even making a priorization, how is the
>> chapter supposed to appeal that decision? If they say "Well, your third
>> argument isn't really correct," you can always say "But look, there a five
>> others!".
>>
>> Best wishes,
>> Patrik
>> ___
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Ilario Valdelli]

It's important to know the timeline.

Probably paying someone to be a member of the wikipedian community would 
produce more *statistical impact* in short time but less *real impact* 
in longtime.


The problem is to know if the aim is to have numbers or to have a real 
and lontime impact.


regards

On 23.11.2014 14:59, Anders Wennersten wrote:

I beleive you can find part of what you ask for in the staff assessment
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Proposals/2014-2015_round1/Wikimedia_Deutschland_e.V./Staff_proposal_assessment 




The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community
*Editors* *Country* *Wikipedia* *1 October 2012* *1 
October 2013* *1 October 2014*

All editors Deutschland German 14,740 13,484 12,720
Active (5+/mo) 5,290 4,661 4,301

WMDE is continuing its expensive community support work that has not 
demonstrated past impact and in its current design does not seem 
likely to generate significant future impact commensurate with costs.
WMDE's budget is disproportionally focused on its community support 
program, which does not have commensurate impact.


Anders






--
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
Tel: +41764821371
http://www.wikimedia.ch


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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Anders Wennersten]

I beleive you can find part of what you ask for in the staff assessment
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:APG/Proposals/2014-2015_round1/Wikimedia_Deutschland_e.V./Staff_proposal_assessment


The decline in editors are among the steepest of any community
*Editors* 	*Country* 	*Wikipedia* 	*1 October 2012* 	*1 October 2013* 
*1 October 2014*

All editors Deutschland German  14,740  13,484  12,720
Active (5+/mo)  5,290   4,661   4,301

WMDE is continuing its expensive community support work that has not 
demonstrated past impact and in its current design does not seem likely 
to generate significant future impact commensurate with costs.
WMDE's budget is disproportionally focused on its community support 
program, which does not have commensurate impact.


Anders


pajz skrev den 2014-11-23 14:43:

Hi Dariusz,

On 23 November 2014 at 14:04, Dariusz Jemielniak  wrote:


the current framework ONLY allows to make across the board cuts. Sadly. We
would very much rather have a possibility to recommend some projects to be
funded or not, but these are unrestricted funds.


While the latter may be true, I do not see why that would be a requirement
to what I suggested. It is nonetheless possible to lay down transparently
why an entity's proposed budget was considered too big and which parts of
it you do not find worth funding. As far as I can see, this is not by any
means affected by the Committee's inability to impose binding restrictions
on the use of allocated funds.

My point is this: What I think the Committee currently provides is a) a
list of things that the FDC members like, b) a list of things that the FDC
members don't like, and c) some recommended amount of money. What's missing
is a link between a)/b) and c). If I were to vandalize the page tonight and
reduce WMDE's the recommended amount by EUR 300,000, would anybody notice a
discrepancy? I don't think so. I'm not saying, by the way, that the FDC
should only be able to make cuts to specific items in the budget. This is
sometimes not possible, and that's fine. But I do think that this should be
made explicit ("We reduced the total amount by 10% due to concerns about
governance.") At the same time, there are arguments that only seem to
jusitfy item-specific cuts. When you say that a certain programme doesn't
generate sufficient results or is for other reasons not something you feel
comfortable funding, then I could imagine something like "We do not think
that programme xy should be funded, so we reduced the recommended amount by
that amount."

Finally, I would argue that this is also an important issue of
accountability. If you think it through, the way you present these cuts
make it effectively impossible to appeal a decision by the FDC. If you give
six reasons why a chapter should get EUR 360,000 less than requested,
without putting numbers to it or even making a priorization, how is the
chapter supposed to appeal that decision? If they say "Well, your third
argument isn't really correct," you can always say "But look, there a five
others!".

Best wishes,
Patrik
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Dariusz Jemielniak]

hi,

I am no certain that we could (or should) account for every 10% cut by
apportioning it to something (10% because of governance, 10% because of
lack of clarify of proposal, etc.). But of course this is not necessarily
what you're proposing, you're asking for MORE detail, basically.

Please, observe that we did recommend Wikidata to be fully sustained.

Also, remember, that all appeals are not going to the FDC at all - we will
not have ANY opportunity to argue one way or another in case of all
appeals. The Board will consider them, and will base not only on our
recommendations, but also on the notes from confidential proceedings of the
FDC committee (two Board members are non-voting observers). There is also
an ombudsperson overseeing the whole process formally.

In any case, I understand that it would be more desirable to see every
dollar cut connected to one item of our feedback. I am not certain, though,
if we will be able to do so in the future in all cases (but we may try,
when possible).

best,

dariusz "pundit"

On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 2:43 PM, pajz  wrote:

> Hi Dariusz,
>
> On 23 November 2014 at 14:04, Dariusz Jemielniak 
> wrote:
>
>> the current framework ONLY allows to make across the board cuts. Sadly. We
>> would very much rather have a possibility to recommend some projects to be
>> funded or not, but these are unrestricted funds.
>>
>
> While the latter may be true, I do not see why that would be a requirement
> to what I suggested. It is nonetheless possible to lay down transparently
> why an entity's proposed budget was considered too big and which parts of
> it you do not find worth funding. As far as I can see, this is not by any
> means affected by the Committee's inability to impose binding restrictions
> on the use of allocated funds.
>
> My point is this: What I think the Committee currently provides is a) a
> list of things that the FDC members like, b) a list of things that the FDC
> members don't like, and c) some recommended amount of money. What's missing
> is a link between a)/b) and c). If I were to vandalize the page tonight and
> reduce WMDE's the recommended amount by EUR 300,000, would anybody notice a
> discrepancy? I don't think so. I'm not saying, by the way, that the FDC
> should only be able to make cuts to specific items in the budget. This is
> sometimes not possible, and that's fine. But I do think that this should be
> made explicit ("We reduced the total amount by 10% due to concerns about
> governance.") At the same time, there are arguments that only seem to
> jusitfy item-specific cuts. When you say that a certain programme doesn't
> generate sufficient results or is for other reasons not something you feel
> comfortable funding, then I could imagine something like "We do not think
> that programme xy should be funded, so we reduced the recommended amount by
> that amount."
>
> Finally, I would argue that this is also an important issue of
> accountability. If you think it through, the way you present these cuts
> make it effectively impossible to appeal a decision by the FDC. If you give
> six reasons why a chapter should get EUR 360,000 less than requested,
> without putting numbers to it or even making a priorization, how is the
> chapter supposed to appeal that decision? If they say "Well, your third
> argument isn't really correct," you can always say "But look, there a five
> others!".
>
> Best wishes,
> Patrik
>



-- 

__
prof. dr hab. Dariusz Jemielniak
kierownik katedry Zarządzania Międzynarodowego
i centrum badawczego CROW
Akademia Leona Koźmińskiego
http://www.crow.alk.edu.pl

członek Akademii Młodych Uczonych Polskiej Akademii Nauk
członek Komitetu Polityki Naukowej MNiSW

Wyszła pierwsza na świecie etnografia Wikipedii "Common Knowledge? An
Ethnography of Wikipedia" (2014, Stanford University Press) mojego
autorstwa http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=24010

Recenzje
Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/fdc/welcome_mjx.shtml
Pacific Standard:
http://www.psmag.com/navigation/books-and-culture/killed-wikipedia-93777/
Motherboard: http://motherboard.vice.com/read/an-ethnography-of-wikipedia
The Wikipedian:
http://thewikipedian.net/2014/10/10/dariusz-jemielniak-common-knowledge
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[pajz]

Hi Dariusz,

On 23 November 2014 at 14:04, Dariusz Jemielniak  wrote:

> the current framework ONLY allows to make across the board cuts. Sadly. We
> would very much rather have a possibility to recommend some projects to be
> funded or not, but these are unrestricted funds.
>

While the latter may be true, I do not see why that would be a requirement
to what I suggested. It is nonetheless possible to lay down transparently
why an entity's proposed budget was considered too big and which parts of
it you do not find worth funding. As far as I can see, this is not by any
means affected by the Committee's inability to impose binding restrictions
on the use of allocated funds.

My point is this: What I think the Committee currently provides is a) a
list of things that the FDC members like, b) a list of things that the FDC
members don't like, and c) some recommended amount of money. What's missing
is a link between a)/b) and c). If I were to vandalize the page tonight and
reduce WMDE's the recommended amount by EUR 300,000, would anybody notice a
discrepancy? I don't think so. I'm not saying, by the way, that the FDC
should only be able to make cuts to specific items in the budget. This is
sometimes not possible, and that's fine. But I do think that this should be
made explicit ("We reduced the total amount by 10% due to concerns about
governance.") At the same time, there are arguments that only seem to
jusitfy item-specific cuts. When you say that a certain programme doesn't
generate sufficient results or is for other reasons not something you feel
comfortable funding, then I could imagine something like "We do not think
that programme xy should be funded, so we reduced the recommended amount by
that amount."

Finally, I would argue that this is also an important issue of
accountability. If you think it through, the way you present these cuts
make it effectively impossible to appeal a decision by the FDC. If you give
six reasons why a chapter should get EUR 360,000 less than requested,
without putting numbers to it or even making a priorization, how is the
chapter supposed to appeal that decision? If they say "Well, your third
argument isn't really correct," you can always say "But look, there a five
others!".

Best wishes,
Patrik
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Dariusz Jemielniak]

Craig, Patrik,

On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 1:40 PM, Craig Franklin 
 wrote:

>
> The other danger of across the board cuts like this, especially where the
> rationale is not clear,  is that entities may start to inflate their
> requests, factoring an expected 10% or 20% to be shaved off the top by the
> FDC, thus leaving them with the figure that they *really *want.  If the
> rationale is clearly explained, this will probably be less of a factor.
>
>
the current framework ONLY allows to make across the board cuts. Sadly. We
would very much rather have a possibility to recommend some projects to be
funded or not, but these are unrestricted funds. In the case of WMDE, I
think we did make it abundantly clear that Wikidata is an excellent project
that should receive more funding. It would also be really valuable if the
Board considered multi-year funding for this particular project separately.

While we strive to be as detailed as possible in our recommendations, I
hope it is understandable that there is a difference in detail of reasoning
for a budget requested on the one hand, and for a recommended amount on the
other. For starters, as a committee, we may differ initially in recommended
allocations - it is the end result that is a consensus we worked out,
basing on different rationales. We have used many approaches and lenses to
see this (expense-side, project-side, staff-side, diversification of other
funding-side, etc.), but ultimately, our belief was that WMDE may need to
reflect on their role in the movement and how it spends the movement's
resources. Also, our recommendation was based on the quality of proposals
(judged comparatively, taking the amounts into account). Finally, we did
have to reflect on the fact that the total amounts of requests exceeded our
overall budget (but this consideration was not driving our decisionmaking,
we in fact were discussing a possibility of recommending budget increase,
if all projects were outstanding).

Nemo: absolutely no hostility meant towards technological decentralization!
Speaking only for myself, I believe that the more our movement is relying
on various resources (including technologies) the better.

best,

dariusz "pundit"


-- 

__
prof. dr hab. Dariusz Jemielniak
kierownik katedry Zarządzania Międzynarodowego
i centrum badawczego CROW
Akademia Leona Koźmińskiego
http://www.crow.alk.edu.pl

członek Akademii Młodych Uczonych Polskiej Akademii Nauk
członek Komitetu Polityki Naukowej MNiSW

Wyszła pierwsza na świecie etnografia Wikipedii "Common Knowledge? An
Ethnography of Wikipedia" (2014, Stanford University Press) mojego
autorstwa http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=24010

Recenzje
Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/fdc/welcome_mjx.shtml
Pacific Standard:
http://www.psmag.com/navigation/books-and-culture/killed-wikipedia-93777/
Motherboard: http://motherboard.vice.com/read/an-ethnography-of-wikipedia
The Wikipedian:
http://thewikipedian.net/2014/10/10/dariusz-jemielniak-common-knowledge
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Federico Leva (Nemo)]

Gerard Meijssen, 23/11/2014 08:27:

I am really surprised how little attention this is getting.


It seems to me that there isn't much to say; I see political decisions, 
they are what they are. One of them is "detail detail detail"; while WMF 
can just throw a slogan on paper and get millions for it. Another is 
that they know how to e.g. select/replace an ED, or even write bylaws 
(!), better than the bodies legally entrusted with those duties.


Finally, I see hostility towards attempts at technological 
decentralisation (e.g. Kiwix). But here I hope I'm mistaken.


Nemo

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[Wikimedia-l] [Wikimediauk-l] Using list moderation as censorship

[Fæ]

Hi Darcy,

I am concerned at what appears to be deliberate suppression of
questions raising governance related issues from the wikimedia UK
email list. The email below is an example. The list was always
intended to be independent of the UK chapter, though one of the
moderators is one of your employees.

Could you please confirm that neither you, nor your employees, are
manipulating this public list to your political advantage.

Thanks,
Fae

-- Forwarded message --
From: Fæ 
Date: 18 November 2014 at 19:24
Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] Welcome ro D'Arcy Myers
To: UK Wikimedia mailing list 
Cc: geni...@gmail.com, Harry Mitchell 


It would be nice to hear from the board how this was discussed before
offering the interim position. After all, in the several interviews I
took part in for WMUK staff, pretty much the first basic question was
along the lines of 'have you ever edited Wikipedia?' as a way of
assessing what the candidate knows about Wikimedia; so I can not
believe this would come as a surprise considering how sensitive the
board is on COI and its perception by our community.

Fae



On 18 November 2014 19:13, geni  wrote:
>
>
>
> On 18 November 2014 18:55, geni  wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> [[user:Dcfmyers]] has no other edits.
>>
>>
>
> whoops missed a couple of deleted ones 2 edits to [[George More O'Ferrall]]. 
> A direct copy and paste of
>
> http://www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/527160/
>
> In fairness copyright is a pretty blameless error for new editors
>
>
> --
> geni
>
> ___
> Wikimedia UK mailing list
> wikimediau...@wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l
> WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk




--
fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae


-- 
fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae
Personal and confidential, please do not circulate or re-quote.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Craig Franklin]

On 23 November 2014 at 22:30, pajz  wrote:

> On 23 November 2014 at 11:25, Fæ  wrote:
>
> > Having carefully read through some of the FDC rationales I thought
> > they were appropriately strategic and made it pretty obvious exactly
> > what those chapters that did not get what they were hoping for, need
> > to change in order to bid more successfully.
> >
>
> I am not entirely sure about this. My concern is essentially that it is
> unclear to me how the FDC determines the extent of the cuts it makes and
> which item(s) of the budget get(s) cut by what amount of money. For
> instance, when to Committee suggests to reduce the allocation to WMDE by
> EUR 360,000 vis-à-vis what they requested (-30%), it is not clear to me how
> the Committee arrived at that amount of money.
>

Just noting here that I think this is an excellent point.  It's not
entirely clear in some cases why the allocation has been cut by a specific
amount.  I can appreciate that the FDC has good reasons for not giving an
entity what it has asked for, but at the same time it should be able to
explain clearly how they arrived at the reduced figure.

The other danger of across the board cuts like this, especially where the
rationale is not clear,  is that entities may start to inflate their
requests, factoring an expected 10% or 20% to be shaved off the top by the
FDC, thus leaving them with the figure that they *really *want.  If the
rationale is clearly explained, this will probably be less of a factor.

Cheers,
Craig Franklin
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[pajz]

On 23 November 2014 at 11:25, Fæ  wrote:

> Having carefully read through some of the FDC rationales I thought
> they were appropriately strategic and made it pretty obvious exactly
> what those chapters that did not get what they were hoping for, need
> to change in order to bid more successfully.
>

I am not entirely sure about this. My concern is essentially that it is
unclear to me how the FDC determines the extent of the cuts it makes and
which item(s) of the budget get(s) cut by what amount of money. For
instance, when to Committee suggests to reduce the allocation to WMDE by
EUR 360,000 vis-à-vis what they requested (-30%), it is not clear to me how
the Committee arrived at that amount of money.

There are plenty of possibilities, after all: It could be that they looked
at individual items in the budget and found that the chapter overspends on
these (in which case the Committee must have some idea of the amount of
money they would find justifiable); it could be that the Committee members
were generally angry about the alleged poor quality of the proposal and
made an across-the-board cut; or it could be a combination of the two. But
either way, while the FDC -- righly -- demands from chapters to present
their budgets at a high level of detail (particularly if high sums are
involved), the same, I would say, also applies to the FDC itself. An
uninvolved third party should be able to see why you cut WMDE's budget by
EUR 360,000 rather than by 150,000 or 550,000. I'm not seeing this. (Btw,
I'm just using WMDE as an example because of the large amount of money
involved; I think the issue I'm referring to applies to other proposals as
well.)

Patrik
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Dariusz Jemielniak]

hi Gerard,

you seem to mix two things: one is the FDC, the other is WMF and its funds
processing practices. I can only speak for my part in the FDC (but  I
generally agree that funding scheme and policies require thinking over, and
I definitely do not think there should be a "second class citizenship"
approach).

I am confident that none of the FDC members wanted to "punish" WMDE.
However, we did have very serious concerns about governance, frugality,
effectiveness of the programs. Is it your view that we should not reduce
our recommendations based on these in any case, when staff or activities
reductions would follow?

Similarly, no-one is "punishing" the Dutch chapter. The FDC would only like
to encourage more efforts in fundraising (and often just making an effort
will be fine, results may be a bit contingent, as we all know), just so
that we have more diversification of sources. This is valuable for our
movement as a whole, as we should not assume that the current model of
funding will certainly stay with us forever (many other organizations,
including F/L/OSS ones, face trouble in global fundraising; if there are
possibilities to get some local support, it is better to check them when
the times are still good).



Thomas:

On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 9:34 AM, Thomas Goldammer  wrote:

> But you wanted a comment on the FDC. The only thing I can say is: To base
> such a decision on things like "the FDC feels" and "to appear" and "it is
> likely" (all quotes from their text within a single paragraph) makes me
> think that they get very poor information and instead of trying to get it
> richer (for example by talking to *all* relevant people), they make a very
> poor decision out of it.
>

I am puzzled that you assume that we based our recommendations on poor
information just because of polite wording. Not making definitive, absolute
statements about reality does not indicate our uncertainty about data. In
previous rounds whenever we felt the need to get more data, we reached out
to get it (and sometimes even received it from chapters in time).

However, I have insist that it should be primarily the responsibility of
the people preparing projects to make them as detailed as needed. In this
respect, I have to really commend and appreciate many of the projects in
this round - as a volunteer myself, I really can recognize the amount of
work needed to prepare detailed budgets and projects. This is particularly
impressive when compared to projects developed by large, "professional"
chapters, which at least in theory should be light years ahead in terms of
detail and accuracy.

best,

dariusz "pundit"
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Fæ]

Having carefully read through some of the FDC rationales I thought
they were appropriately strategic and made it pretty obvious exactly
what those chapters that did not get what they were hoping for, need
to change in order to bid more successfully. I found them encouraging
and a good demonstration of why the FDC is a better process than the
100% WMF directed one that used to exist.

As a long past Chapters Association chairman, who is definitely out of
favour with WMF unelected big-wigs due to being controversial, I do
not get any impression that this is driven by a WMF-centric agenda.
Quite the opposite, most of the comments the FDC have made push us all
to be more volunteer centric and away from either pointless
centralization, empire-building or becoming scions of the Foundation.

Chapter boards who are responsible for less successful bids, may need
to consider this is a good time to not only take another bite at their
strategy, but empower themselves to reconsider how they grow their
organization rather than being led by growth alone. Too often we see
measure such as employee counts or bigger budgets getting
significantly more oxygen as being good things compared to volunteer*
support, volunteer leadership, better transparency or even the
reduction of programmes that fail to be volunteer centric or deliver
healthy volunteer engagement.

* For those chapters that make this an issue by counting volunteers in
exceedingly creative ways, by "volunteer" I mean "unpaid volunteers".

Fae

On 23 November 2014 at 10:37, Lodewijk  wrote:
> I can very well understand why people are careful about commenting. Most
> people who have the insight to make sensible comments on the con located
> matter have a stake in it. They are active in the wmf, want to run for a
> committee in which process they might be deemed too opinionated or they
> fear that it might harm the future applications of their chapter or
> project. I'm afraid that to a very large extent there are too many
> interdependencies for a proper public discussion on many issues.
>
> That said, while I disagree with several things in the advice, such as the
> somewhat childish and symbolic cut of 2000 USD against wmar, overall I also
> see various improvements in the level of detail and arguments that ought to
> be applauded.
>
> Lodewijk

-- 
fae...@gmail.com https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Lodewijk]

I can very well understand why people are careful about commenting. Most
people who have the insight to make sensible comments on the con located
matter have a stake in it. They are active in the wmf, want to run for a
committee in which process they might be deemed too opinionated or they
fear that it might harm the future applications of their chapter or
project. I'm afraid that to a very large extent there are too many
interdependencies for a proper public discussion on many issues.

That said, while I disagree with several things in the advice, such as the
somewhat childish and symbolic cut of 2000 USD against wmar, overall I also
see various improvements in the level of detail and arguments that ought to
be applauded.

Lodewijk
On Nov 23, 2014 9:35 AM, "Thomas Goldammer"  wrote:

> Gerard,
>
> this is called "narrowing focus" by WMF, you see.
>
> But you wanted a comment on the FDC. The only thing I can say is: To base
> such a decision on things like "the FDC feels" and "to appear" and "it is
> likely" (all quotes from their text within a single paragraph) makes me
> think that they get very poor information and instead of trying to get it
> richer (for example by talking to *all* relevant people), they make a very
> poor decision out of it.
>
> Th.
>
> 2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen :
>
> > Hoi,
> > I am really surprised how little attention this is getting.
> >
> > I have a few questions, observations. When I read the arguments for
> cutting
> > the request of the German chapter, I get the impression that the Germans
> > are punished. I also find no considerations to the consequences of NOT
> > providing the requested funding. There are many people employed by the
> > German chapter, are they to be dismissed or is there to be less money for
> > activities? When I read about the Dutch request, they are praised for
> being
> > prudent and careful planners but they are punished for not being actively
> > involved in fundraising.
> >
> > The WIkimedia Foundation deliberately excluded the chapters from the
> > fundraising efforts. Enough comments have been made about this recently;
> it
> > is obvious to many that the WMF seems not to care too much about what
> funds
> > are raised outside the USA. There is also no relation between fundraising
> > in a country and activities in a country. I am annoyed that the WMF is so
> > two faced in this.
> >
> > The process of handing out gifts makes beggars of the chapters. They have
> > to comply with the vagaries of what committee members think at a given
> > time. The process of handing out is very much solidified in time and from
> > the impression I get this is true for the chapters but not for the WMF
> > itself.  When it finds a need to do whatever, it can. When a chapter
> finds
> > the same need it cannot.
> >
> > In my opinion by making chapters second class citizens, the WMF will
> remain
> > USA and English centred. That does not help our goal of "sharing in the
> sum
> > of all available knowledge".
> > Thanks,
> >  GerardM
> >
> > PS there are more chapters where I am not happy about the granting of
> gifts
> > either.
> >
> > On 21 November 2014 at 17:34, Dariusz Jemielniak 
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Greetings, friends,
> > >
> > > As you all know, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) meets twice a
> > year
> > > to help make decisions about how to effectively allocate movement funds
> > to
> > > achieve the Wikimedia movement's mission, vision, and strategy. [1] We
> > > recently met in San Francisco to deliberate on the 11 annual plan grant
> > > proposals submitted for this round of review. [2] We thank these
> > > organizations for their hard work on their annual plans and proposals.
> > >
> > > The FDC has now posted our Round 1 2014-2015 recommendations on the
> > annual
> > > plan grants to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees:
> > > http://goo.gl/Ea7d4I . [3]
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > With the support of the FDC’s two Board Representatives (Bishakha Datta
> > and
> > > Frieda Brioschi), the WMF Board will review the recommendations and
> then
> > > make their decision on them by 1 January 2015.
> > >
> > > This round, proposals came from ten chapters and one thematic
> > organization,
> > > totaling requests of roughly $4.7 million USD.  Before our face-to-face
> > > deliberations, which were held from 15-18 November, the FDC reviewed
> the
> > > proposals in careful detail, aided by staff assessments and analysis on
> > > impact, finances, and programs, as well as community comments on the
> > > proposals. Our conversations were intense and the decisions were not
> > easy;
> > > each proposal was carefully considered both in its own context and
> > > environment, and strengths and concerned were discussed.  We are
> > > recommending grants totaling roughly $3.8 million USD.
> > >
> > > Now that the recommendations have been published, there is a formal
> > process
> > > to submit complaints or appeals to the Board. Here are

Re: [Wikimedia-l] FDC funds allocation recommendation is up

[Thomas Goldammer]

Gerard,

this is called "narrowing focus" by WMF, you see.

But you wanted a comment on the FDC. The only thing I can say is: To base
such a decision on things like "the FDC feels" and "to appear" and "it is
likely" (all quotes from their text within a single paragraph) makes me
think that they get very poor information and instead of trying to get it
richer (for example by talking to *all* relevant people), they make a very
poor decision out of it.

Th.

2014-11-23 8:27 GMT+01:00 Gerard Meijssen :

> Hoi,
> I am really surprised how little attention this is getting.
>
> I have a few questions, observations. When I read the arguments for cutting
> the request of the German chapter, I get the impression that the Germans
> are punished. I also find no considerations to the consequences of NOT
> providing the requested funding. There are many people employed by the
> German chapter, are they to be dismissed or is there to be less money for
> activities? When I read about the Dutch request, they are praised for being
> prudent and careful planners but they are punished for not being actively
> involved in fundraising.
>
> The WIkimedia Foundation deliberately excluded the chapters from the
> fundraising efforts. Enough comments have been made about this recently; it
> is obvious to many that the WMF seems not to care too much about what funds
> are raised outside the USA. There is also no relation between fundraising
> in a country and activities in a country. I am annoyed that the WMF is so
> two faced in this.
>
> The process of handing out gifts makes beggars of the chapters. They have
> to comply with the vagaries of what committee members think at a given
> time. The process of handing out is very much solidified in time and from
> the impression I get this is true for the chapters but not for the WMF
> itself.  When it finds a need to do whatever, it can. When a chapter finds
> the same need it cannot.
>
> In my opinion by making chapters second class citizens, the WMF will remain
> USA and English centred. That does not help our goal of "sharing in the sum
> of all available knowledge".
> Thanks,
>  GerardM
>
> PS there are more chapters where I am not happy about the granting of gifts
> either.
>
> On 21 November 2014 at 17:34, Dariusz Jemielniak 
> wrote:
>
> > Greetings, friends,
> >
> > As you all know, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) meets twice a
> year
> > to help make decisions about how to effectively allocate movement funds
> to
> > achieve the Wikimedia movement's mission, vision, and strategy. [1] We
> > recently met in San Francisco to deliberate on the 11 annual plan grant
> > proposals submitted for this round of review. [2] We thank these
> > organizations for their hard work on their annual plans and proposals.
> >
> > The FDC has now posted our Round 1 2014-2015 recommendations on the
> annual
> > plan grants to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees:
> > http://goo.gl/Ea7d4I . [3]
> >
> >
> >
> > With the support of the FDC’s two Board Representatives (Bishakha Datta
> and
> > Frieda Brioschi), the WMF Board will review the recommendations and then
> > make their decision on them by 1 January 2015.
> >
> > This round, proposals came from ten chapters and one thematic
> organization,
> > totaling requests of roughly $4.7 million USD.  Before our face-to-face
> > deliberations, which were held from 15-18 November, the FDC reviewed the
> > proposals in careful detail, aided by staff assessments and analysis on
> > impact, finances, and programs, as well as community comments on the
> > proposals. Our conversations were intense and the decisions were not
> easy;
> > each proposal was carefully considered both in its own context and
> > environment, and strengths and concerned were discussed.  We are
> > recommending grants totaling roughly $3.8 million USD.
> >
> > Now that the recommendations have been published, there is a formal
> process
> > to submit complaints or appeals to the Board. Here are the steps for
> both:
> >
> > Any organization that would like to submit an appeal on the FDC’s Round 1
> > recommendation should submit it to the Board representatives to the
> > FDC by 23:59
> > UTC on 8 December 2014 in accordance with the appeal process outlined in
> > the FDC Framework. A formal appeal to challenge the FDC’s recommendation
> > should be in the form of a 500-or-fewer word summary directed to the two
> > non-voting WMF Board representatives to the FDC (Frieda Brioschi and
> > Bishakha Datta). The appeal should be submitted on-wiki, [4] and must be
> > submitted by the Board Chair of a funding-seeking applicant. The Board
> will
> > publish its decision on this and all recommendations by 1 Jan 2015.
> >
> > Complaints to the ombudsperson about the FDC process can be filed by
> anyone
> > with the Ombudsperson and can be made any time. The complaint should be
> > submitted on wiki, as well. [5] The ombudsperson will publicly document
> the
> > complaint, and i