Re: [Wikimedia-l] internet-in-a-boxs to the refugee camps?

[Simon Knight]

Hi all
https://openideo.com/challenge/refugee-education/brief  may be of interest
looking for innovation around: 'How might we improve education and expand
learning opportunities for refugees around the world? '

The call for that has now closed, but it may be useful to look at how
people intend to actually implement, who people are working with (and who
has submitted proposals), and where Kiwix (or other open knowledge
resources) could be effectively used.

Cheers

Simon

On 12 September 2015 at 15:48, Theo10011  wrote:

> Hiya Lodewijk :)
>
> I apologize if this is going off-topic.
>
> On Sat, Sep 12, 2015, Lodewijk  wrote:
>
> > Interesting. Over here, the 'experts' are adjusting the image exactly the
> > other way around: that smartphones are much more common there than we
> would
> > expect, and that we underestimate the inventivity of people to get access
> > to information/the internet. Especially in the context of people being
> > suspicious of all those refugees being photographed with a smartphone.
> >
>
> Those "experts" seem to be building a narrative, I suppose. There might be
> political motivations or general apathy at play there so I won't know what
> image people are formulating in Europe. There are two groups of refugees at
> the moment, one that are making their way through Europe and fleeing
> constantly and the other, that are stuck in overcrowded refugee camps in
> Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon. The original post seemed directed towards the
> second group. So, those entering through Greece pay as much $2500 per
> person to smugglers, they take huge risks with their lives, and physically
> carry all they own in this world on their backs, in comparison, smartphones
> cost less than $100[1]. It starts becoming a necessity for a family to stay
> together and keep in touch with relatives - phones become quite necessary
> for this group of refugees fleeing across borders. The article does state
> that human rights group in Serbia are setting up free wifi, and UN agencies
> are handing out thousands of free SIMs, similar to what Teemu envisions -
> but you have to remember that is mostly in Europe.
>
> The other group in refugee camps in Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon, which is
> more than half of the total number of refugees, have more dire concerns -
> Food, being the most prominent one[2][3]. They are usually the poorest and
> most vulnerable group of refugees in the situation. Things are getting so
> close to rock bottom in fact that the refugees are considering going back
> to the Warzone in Syria instead of starving in the camps.[2]
>
>
> > I don't know what is the truth, and why this difference of understanding
> > exists - just adding to the noise here.
>
>
> It's certainly a bad situation all around.
>
> Coming back to my on-topic suggestion, Wikipedia Zero is a much better
> alternative. Partnering with other agencies and setting these devices up
> physically in sometimes hostile areas, is a huge undertaking that I believe
> we are not set up for. WP Zero already exists in a dozen markets in the
> developing world, all it needs is a single agreement with a local carrier -
> it just makes access to Wikipedia free for everyone with a phone (smart or
> not). It's a better fit in my opinion.
>
> Kind regards
> Theo
>
>
> [1]
>
> http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/for-syrian-refugees-smartphones-are-a-lifeline-not-a-toy-1.3221349
> [2]
>
> http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/sep/11/destitute-syrian-refugees-jordan-lebanon-may-return-to-warzone
>
> [3] http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-34220590
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Advocacy Advisors] Transparency and right to be forgotten notices from search engines

[Simon Knight]

Bear in mind Pine that the RTBF request need not be from the subject of the 
article (so BLP  NPOV are less relevant), it could be someone mentioned 
peripherally. The link suppression would also only relate to search terms about 
/that/ person, rather than the main subject, just to muddy the waters: It's 
closer to deleting an index term than it is deleting a book (or chapter). The 
pages/chapter would still be indexed, just not against the specific terms 
relating to the requester. Looks like it might be possible to work some of them 
out e.g. 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gerry_Hutch#Removal_from_Google_Search 

Simon

-Original Message-
From: wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org 
[mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Pine W
Sent: 07 August 2014 01:33
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Cc: Advocacy Advisory Group for Wikimedia
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] [Advocacy Advisors] Transparency and right to be 
forgotten notices from search engines

I see how you could read it that way,  but remember that to be included on 
Wikipedia information should be notable and written in NPOV fashion, and the 
BLP policy applies. If someone wants to contest information in their BLP we 
have more subtle tools for handling disputes than pure removal, although 
sometimes we will remove content.

Pine
On Aug 6, 2014 3:05 PM, Trillium Corsage trillium2...@yandex.com wrote:

 I see I am not the only one who noticed what WMF Legal is doing, but I 
 see it a different way than Nathan. I see it as the WMF intimidating 
 and threatening those EU individuals who dare to to exercise their 
 rights under the court's ruling. Brigham and Paulson are basically saying 
 just try it.
 We will Streisand you.

 Trillium Corsage

 06.08.2014, 16:11, Nathan email clipped:
  Thanks very much for this, Stephen and the legal team. I especially 
  appreciate that the WMF has decided to make public the specific 
  notifications of the use of the Right to be forgotten in the 
  EU.[1]
 It's
  interesting that the bulk of the suppression requests have come from 
  a single (ex?) Wikimedian targeting internal process pages of his 
  home
 wiki.
  Not shockingly, the RtF request is now in the top 5 results on a 
  Google search of that persons name.
 
  The NY Times covered the transparency report:
 
 http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/08/06/wikipedia-details-government-
 data-requests/?src=twr
 
  [1]:
 
 https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Notices_received_from_search_engi
 nes
 
  On Wed, Aug 6, 2014 at 6:15 AM, Stephen LaPorte email clipped
  wrote:
   Hi All,
 
   The “right to be forgotten” has been the subject of much 
  discussion and  debate (including on this list),[1] particularly 
  following the May
 European
   Court of Justice judgment ordering Google to delist some links 
  related
 to a
   Spanish citizen.[2] Since then, search engines have been receiving
 requests
   to remove hundreds of thousands of URLs from search results. 
  Google  recently released more information about its right to be 
  forgotten  requests.[3]
 
   The WMF legal team has been watching the “right to be forgotten” 
  issue  closely and considering what legal strategies we should take 
  going
 forward.
   Today, the WMF published its first transparency report[4]—you can 
  read
 more
   in this blog post.[5] WMF held a press briefing announcing our
 strategy of
   advocacy and transparency on link censorship. We will oppose what 
  we
 see as
   a misguided court decision that has resulted in a crude 
  implementation
 of
   the “right to be forgotten.” Lila has also issued a statement,[6] 
  and,  Geoff, WMF’s general counsel, and Michelle Paulson, WMF's 
  legal
 counsel,
   have published a blog on the subject.[7] As the topic is of 
  interest to  this group, we wanted to keep you informed of these 
  recent legal  developments.
 
   Thanks,
   Stephen
 
   [1]
 
 http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/advocacy_advisors/2014-June/00054
 7.html
 ,
 
 
 http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/advocacy_advisors/2014-June/00053
 9.html
   [2]
 http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/ALL/?uri=CELEX:62012CJ0131
   [3]
 
 https://docs.google.com/a/wikimedia.org/file/d/0B8syaai6SSfiT0EwRUFyOE
 NqR3M/edit
   [4] http://transparency.wikimedia.org/
   [5]
 
 https://blog.wikimedia.org/2014/08/06/wikimedia-foundation-releases-fi
 rst-transparency-report/
   [6]
 
 https://blog.wikimedia.org/2014/08/06/european-court-decision-punches-
 holes-in-free-knowledge/
[7]
 
 https://blog.wikimedia.org/2014/08/06/wikipedia-pages-censored-in-euro
 pean-search-results/
 
   --
   Stephen LaPorte
   Legal Counsel
   Wikimedia Foundation
 
   *NOTICE: As an attorney for the Wikimedia Foundation, for legal 
  and  ethical reasons, I cannot give legal advice to, or serve as a 
  lawyer
 for,
   community members, volunteers, or staff members in their personal
 capacity.
   For more on what this means, please see our legal disclaimer
   

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Commons and OCILLA

[Simon Knight]

Hi Matanya
I'm sure there are others with more expertise than me on this list but a) isn't 
Commons the place to start this process, and b) have you looked at Michael 
Maggs' proposal (see email copied below from April) to relax the scope of the 
precautionary principle? That, and the discussion there, might be a good start.

Best
Simon

-Original Message-
From: wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org 
[mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Michael Maggs
Sent: 09 April 2014 18:44
To: UK Wikimedia mailing list; Wikimedia Mailing List; 
common...@lists.wikimedia.org; chapt...@wikimedia.ch
Subject: [Wikimedia-l] New Commons RFC on changing the Precautionary principle 
to tackle the URAA problem

I have made a proposal to relax the scope of the Commons so-called 
Precautionary principle to allow the site to host more of the locally public 
domain files that are being deleted because of the US URAA law, and also to 
keep more photos that have freedom of panorama in their home country but which 
might (or might not) be copyright-protected in the US.

This proposal comes out of an extremely long and complicated argument about 
copyright, which you don't necessarily need to get into, but it is an attempt 
to allow Commons to host more media files while at the same time ensuring that 
the site remains fully legal under US law.  We can legally take a much more 
nuanced position than 'Definitely Free' or 'Definitely Unfree', which is pretty 
much what we do at present.

Some editors have suggested ignoring US law, which the WMF simply cannot allow 
to happen, and this is an attempt to allow us to keep more non-US Public Domain 
material while still remaining on the right side of US law.

Put simply, do you agree that Commons should aim to host more files that are 
public domain in their home country even if they *might* still be 
copyright-protected in the US?

Please contribute here:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Review_of_Precautionary_principle

Michael
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-Original Message-
From: wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org 
[mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of matanya
Sent: 08 June 2014 12:21
To: wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Commons and OCILLA

 

Hello, 

Commons licensing policy determines media should be free in source country and 
in US. I want to propose We change the policy to be: free in source country 
only, and to cope with US laws where the servers are hosted found a DMCA take 
down notice Team in OTRS, that will handle requests to remove Items that are 
non-free in the US after verifying proper grounds for the claim. 

This approach to copyright will prevent issues like URAA issues, shorter term 
issues and restored copyright issues. 

It will enrich commons with many files that are FREE (mostly PD) in source 
country, but not on commons due to US laws. Unless the copyright holder (mostly 
Gov's and archives) will not request removal, and they won't since they 
released the media, we will be using those files. 

I'm not a lawyer, so I probably missed most of the legal implication, But I do 
volunteer to found and lead the team, if this idea is accepted and commons 
community would want this policy change. I'm seeking input from copyright 
experienced users and lawyers, before i start an official policy change on 
commons. 

Thanks 

Matanya Moses 

 
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Commons and OCILLA

[Simon Knight]

See 
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Legal_and_Community_Advocacy/Wikimedia_Server_Location_and_Free_Knowledge
 

-Original Message-
From: wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org 
[mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of rupert THURNER
Sent: 08 June 2014 17:27
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Commons and OCILLA

Would it make sense to deploy a server in another country under a domain not 
owned by the foundation? E.g. Switzerland?

Rupert
 Am 08.06.2014 14:10 schrieb Jeevan Jose jkadav...@gmail.com:

 BTW, why we have separate policies for Commons and Wikipedia? I just 
 noticed that photographs deleted from Common per not free in source 
 country are restored by our own (Commons) admins in English Wikipedia.


 Jee


 On Sun, Jun 8, 2014 at 5:18 PM, geni geni...@gmail.com wrote:

  On 8 June 2014 12:21, matanya mata...@foss.co.il wrote:
 
  
  
   Hello,
  
   Commons licensing policy determines media should be free in source 
   country and in US. I want to propose We change the policy to be: 
   free in source country only, and to cope with US laws where the 
   servers are hosted found a DMCA take down notice Team in OTRS, 
   that will handle requests to remove Items that are non-free in the 
   US after verifying proper grounds for the claim.
  
   This approach to copyright will prevent issues like URAA issues,
 shorter
   term issues and restored copyright issues.
  
 
  No it it won't. UK restored a bunch of copyrights when EU went 
  life+70
 
 
 
  
   It will enrich commons with many files that are FREE (mostly PD) 
   in source country, but not on commons due to US laws. Unless the 
   copyright holder (mostly Gov's and archives) will not request 
   removal, and they won't since they released the media, we will be using 
   those files.
  
 
  If the government held the copyright then you contact them and ask 
  them about their position on potential overseas copyrights.
 
 
   I'm not a lawyer, so I probably missed most of the legal 
   implication, But I do volunteer to found and lead the team, if 
   this idea is accepted and commons community would want this policy 
   change. I'm seeking input from copyright experienced users and 
   lawyers, before i start an
 official
   policy change on commons.
 
 
 
  The main problem that you hit is that  free in source  country and 
  in
 US
  is a pretty good proxy for free pretty much anywhere (well unless 
  the source country is the US but that's a separate problem). For 
  example depending on how you read Saudi law there are a bunch of 
  photos that are free in Saudi Arabia and pretty much nowhere else 
  (Switzerland perhaps)
 but
  unless our resuser know their way around over 100 copyright systems 
  they probably aren't going to know that. Thus from a reuse POV 
  commons goes
 from
  being useful (as long as you allow for US weirdness) to being (from 
  a copyright perspective) a radioactive mess.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Commons and OCILLA

[Simon Knight]

Ah, my apologies! Should have given a closer reading
S

-Original Message-
From: wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org 
[mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of rupert THURNER
Sent: 08 June 2014 18:13
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Commons and OCILLA

Simon, this answers a different question. from wikimedia foundation standpoint, 
domain in its posession, domain registered in the u.s.
Am 08.06.2014 18:29 schrieb Simon Knight sjgkni...@gmail.com:

 See
 https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Legal_and_Community_Advocacy/Wikimedia
 _Server_Location_and_Free_Knowledge

 -Original Message-
 From: wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:
 wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of rupert THURNER
 Sent: 08 June 2014 17:27
 To: Wikimedia Mailing List
 Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Commons and OCILLA

 Would it make sense to deploy a server in another country under a 
 domain not owned by the foundation? E.g. Switzerland?

 Rupert
  Am 08.06.2014 14:10 schrieb Jeevan Jose jkadav...@gmail.com:

  BTW, why we have separate policies for Commons and Wikipedia? I just 
  noticed that photographs deleted from Common per not free in source 
  country are restored by our own (Commons) admins in English Wikipedia.
 
 
  Jee
 
 
  On Sun, Jun 8, 2014 at 5:18 PM, geni geni...@gmail.com wrote:
 
   On 8 June 2014 12:21, matanya mata...@foss.co.il wrote:
  
   
   
Hello,
   
Commons licensing policy determines media should be free in 
source country and in US. I want to propose We change the policy to be:
free in source country only, and to cope with US laws where 
the servers are hosted found a DMCA take down notice Team in 
OTRS, that will handle requests to remove Items that are 
non-free in the US after verifying proper grounds for the claim.
   
This approach to copyright will prevent issues like URAA issues,
  shorter
term issues and restored copyright issues.
   
  
   No it it won't. UK restored a bunch of copyrights when EU went
   life+70
  
  
  
   
It will enrich commons with many files that are FREE (mostly PD) 
in source country, but not on commons due to US laws. Unless the 
copyright holder (mostly Gov's and archives) will not request 
removal, and they won't since they released the media, we will 
be
 using those files.
   
  
   If the government held the copyright then you contact them and ask 
   them about their position on potential overseas copyrights.
  
  
I'm not a lawyer, so I probably missed most of the legal 
implication, But I do volunteer to found and lead the team, if 
this idea is accepted and commons community would want this 
policy change. I'm seeking input from copyright experienced 
users and lawyers, before i start an
  official
policy change on commons.
  
  
  
   The main problem that you hit is that  free in source  country 
   and in
  US
   is a pretty good proxy for free pretty much anywhere (well 
   unless the source country is the US but that's a separate 
   problem). For example depending on how you read Saudi law there 
   are a bunch of photos that are free in Saudi Arabia and pretty 
   much nowhere else (Switzerland perhaps)
  but
   unless our resuser know their way around over 100 copyright 
   systems they probably aren't going to know that. Thus from a reuse 
   POV commons goes
  from
   being useful (as long as you allow for US weirdness) to being 
   (from a copyright perspective) a radioactive mess.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Non-renewal of Wikimedia UK fundraiser agreement

[Simon Knight]

To offer a clarification, SORP stands for Statement of Recommended Practice and 
offers a standard for best practice in charitable accounting. 
http://www.charity-commission.gov.uk/Charity_requirements_guidance/Accounting_and_reporting/Preparing_charity_accounts/sorpfront.aspx
 

Cheers
Simon

-Original Message-
From: wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org 
[mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Fæ
Sent: 21 May 2014 14:17
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Non-renewal of Wikimedia UK fundraiser agreement

On 21 May 2014 13:19, Richard Symonds richard.symo...@wikimedia.org.uk wrote:
...
2. Probably not. See

 http://www.charitycommission.gov.uk/frequently-asked-questions/faqs-ab
 out-registering-a-charity/can-i-register-the-uk-branch-of-an-overseas-
 charity/

This means that the WMF would need to establish an independent fundraising 
institution in the UK in order for it to be a registered charity. This would be 
in exactly the same ways as other global charities successfully manage it under 
UK law.

3. I'm not sure where the 50% figure came from, but it is incorrect. The
correct figure for that year is 69%. For this past quarter, the correct
figure is even better, at 80.24%. In addition, our fundraising costs as a
percentage of total spend have dropped from 22% to 10%. If anyone wants
more information on this, our treasurer is happy to discuss it with them by
email.

A strange response from WMUK as Russavia included a link to the analysis in his 
email, so this seems to be a tangent to the issue of the most recent accepted 
and analysed financial report, showing that more than 50% of funds are spent on 
non-project activities. Just in case people missed it, the link was 
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:FDC_portal/Proposals/2013-2014_round1/WMUK/Proposal_form#Programme_5.E2.80.94Finance

The technical way of redefining English words in such a way so that the 
significant expenses of running trustee board meetings with staff support, or 
paying for highly expensive lawyers and management consultants as part of 
governance issues, gets reported as a deliverable open knowledge Wikimedia 
project, is unhelpful as a way to convince the Wikimedia community, or the WMF, 
that the UK charity is efficient compared to WMDE or the WMF. Using words this 
way undermines the value of the reports.

As a bizarre example the SORP way of conveniently redefining English words, I 
could re-employ Jon Davies as a temporary management consultant rather than a 
permanent employee, even giving him twice the income to take home, and yet 
this could be reported as a significant increase in the efficiency of the 
charity, as an expensive line item would move from administration to programme 
costs. I doubt that many Wikimedians are taken in by this management jargon, as 
opposed to common sense or plain English use of words.

4. As for the planes - it is indeed fantastic and a good example of how,
even where we may disagree, we can still all pull together to do great work
for the movement. Speaking personally, it's a shame we don't have something
similar for ships!
...

On this, we can agree. The Avionics Project represents less than 0.1% of funds 
handled by the UK charity, yet these volunteer centric and cheap-as-chips 
projects now represent the significant majority of tangible outcomes for 
Wikimedia Commons, if one, say, counts the actual number of media files 
uploaded to Wikimedia Commons, rather than soft (so-called narrative) 
measures, or internal facing measures of success like supporting the Wikimania 
conference. As for ships, I have uploaded many thousands of historic images of 
ships to Commons which are highly valued by other unpaid Wikimedia volunteers, 
however these were not supported by Wikimedia UK due to previous concerns 
raised about my volunteer uploads from a potential partner institution that 
might have employed a WIR and might have done something similar. If the charity 
wishes to extend the project to media such as this, the trustees know how to 
find me.

PS For those unfamiliar with my background, I was previously a trustee of 
Wikimedia UK and even served time as the Chairman, until I resigned after lots 
of political unpleasantness. My awareness of WMUK figures comes from that 
hands-on experience, not so long ago.

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

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Timothy Sandole and (apparently) $53, 690 of WMF funding

[Simon Knight]

Bear in mind her email address has now changed as she's moved to 
@wikiedfoundation.org

E.g. this link re: quality 
http://blog.wikimedia.org/2012/10/04/spring-2012-wikipedia-education-program-quality/
 but I've seen more recent stuff

Simon

-Original Message-
From: wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org 
[mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Anthony Cole
Sent: 19 April 2014 15:15
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Timothy Sandole and (apparently) $53, 690 of WMF 
funding

Sorry. I just realised what the heading of this thread is. I'll email LiAnna 
directly.

Anthony Cole http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Anthonyhcole



On Sat, Apr 19, 2014 at 10:12 PM, Anthony Cole ahcole...@gmail.com wrote:

 The press release, signed by LiAnna Davis, Head of Communications and 
 External Relations, that Andreas links to in his comment says, The 
 program, in which students write Wikipedia articles in place of 
 traditional term papers, created the equivalent of more than 7,000 
 printed pages of new, high-quality content during the fall term of 
 2013 and the equivalent of more than 36,000 printed pages of content since 
 its start in 2010.

 Can anybody point to a source for the 7,000 printed pages of new, 
 high-quality content during the fall term - particularly the evidence 
 for the high quality of that content?


 Anthony Cole http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Anthonyhcole



 On Wed, Apr 16, 2014 at 10:56 PM, Fæ fae...@gmail.com wrote:

 On 16 April 2014 15:19, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote:
 ...
  Apparently, Tim Sandole complains of not having been managed 
  properly by anybody, saying, The person I dealt with at Wikimedia 
  didn't seem to
 know
  anything about Wikipedia.

 I believe it was clear from Sue's frank report and Pete's more 
 detailed report, that knowledge of Wikipedia was not required by the 
 manager within the Foundation that Sandole was reporting to. It is no 
 surprise that someone within the Funding department might not be an 
 expert in English Wikipedia policies or guidelines for editors.

 Does anyone know of any positive action taken yet by the Foundation 
 as a result of this governance failure, beyond Sue's report?

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

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] United Nation of Wikimedia

[Simon Knight]

This is very interesting Ting just to reply to one (fairly minor!) part re:
WMUK  WMDE strategy, I agree further sharing and coordination would be a
good thing (indeed, we did try to look to other chapters/organisations for
guidance) but I also think thinking about localisation of strategy is
important, and within the spirit of distribution. Im hoping we can discuss
both of these aspects - co-ordination, and localisation - at wmcon in
Berlin this week and would welcome thoughts on this element (on a new
thread probably).

Best

Simon
On 7 Apr 2014 16:49, Cristian Consonni kikkocrist...@gmail.com wrote:

 Hi Ting,

 Thank you for sharing your view. It is interesting in many aspects,
 and I think that I support its spirit but I feel obliged to add a
 couple of points.

 2014-04-07 15:39 GMT+02:00 Ting Chen wing.phil...@gmx.de:
 [...]
  Even though the Foundation had increased its legal
  department and had tentatively tried to work out an approach to support
 its
  community in legal conflict basically it is still working with the old
  strategy: In case there is a legal case in a foreign country the
 Foundation
  will avoid the call of the court while the Chapter will deny any
  responsibility for the content. This leaves in the end all potential
 hazards
  to the volunteer who contributed the content. In case of a court suit he
 is
  probably the one that have the worse legal support and had to take the
  charge privately, even if he handled legally and in good will.

 I can confirm that, this is precisely what Wikimedia italia is doing
 right now (and rightly so) for the infamous 20 million EURO lawsuit[1]
 you should already know about. Plus, the fact that we do not have any
 responsibility over the projects nor we want to intervene or
 manage them is in our bylaws[2] too.

 It is worth adding that following the law and jurisprudence in Italy
 (but mind that IANAL) the mere possession of servers can be enough for
 an Italian judge to consider you responsible of the contents. That's
 why Wikimedia Italia does not want any server.

 Moreover, the association itself is not a legal person and its rights
 and duties are exercised in the person of his legal representative,
 that is the chair (in Italian, presidente) So in the aforementioned
 case the lawsuit is on the shoulders and head of Frieda herself (which
 was the chair and legal representative at the time).
 You can imagine that in no way we can think that a single person
 accepts this kind of burden (I mean, we have already received a 20M EURO
 lawsuit and we don't even have any servers!).

 [...]

  This also means that the chapters, as far as there is one, should be
 able to
  take the responsibility for the content and the hosting of those servers
 in
  their country. They should be obliged to provide legal consultation and
  defense to the community, which means a distribution of the legal defense
  from a central point into the world, to the chapters and directly to the
  communities. Indeed the legal consultation and protection of the
 community
  is in my opinion one of the most missed duty of the chapters and the
  Foundation to the movement.

 Well, Wikimedia Italia is providing assistance to Frieda since day 1,
 of course. it is also worth mentioning that the case should reach its
 end sometimes this year (it needed only 5 years)

 Cristian
 (speaking in my personal capacity)

 [1]
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Jimbo_Wales/Archive_50#Wikimedia_Italia_in_trouble
 [2] {{it}} http://wiki.wikimedia.it/wiki/Statuto
 These are probably outdated:
 https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Italia/bylaws
 We have modified our bylaws in 2009 to become a registered non-profit:

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Cost of Wikimedia Conference 2014

[Simon Knight]

The additional trustee is also talking so Jon's points stand.  It's great that 
Wikimania representatives will be there, and that a WMUK member will also be 
there as part of the FDC. However, while I certainly hope those individuals are 
happy to represent WMUK, they're really not relevant to your point - they are 
there for other (international movement) purposes and not funded by WMUK. 

Best
Simon

-Original Message-
From: wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org 
[mailto:wikimedia-l-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Fæ
Sent: 31 March 2014 17:00
To: Wikimedia Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia-l] Cost of Wikimedia Conference 2014

On 31 March 2014 16:23, Jon Davies jon.dav...@wikimedia.org.uk wrote:
...
 For the record we have people going for four reasons:

- CEO and Chair as standard
- Two staff and one trustee who are invited to do presentations on areas
of strength in the chapter.
- Two trustees (we are guessing KR might actually be a misnamed Kate
West) who will be using this as part of their induction as trustees - a
great chance to meet other people and learn about the community.
- Everyone can promote Wikimania London and learn about people's ideas
and expectations.

I was going to step back from this, however a correction needs to be made here 
for the record, There are 8 people being funded not 7. Named as going are the 
CEO, 2 additional full time employees and 5 trustees representing Wikimedia UK 
at the conference.

This excludes two other active members of Wikimedia UK who are representing the 
London Wikimania Programme and a member of the FDC.

Fae

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