Hi Damon, looking forward to meeting you. I'd like to welcome you not only to WMF, but to the wikimedia-l list. I encourage you to join the discussions here, even if you feel like you don't have the deep expertise and broad community context that a lot of the big shots who post here may have. I don't, and that hasn't stopped me. :) I'm sure everyone will be happy to help you get up to speed. No doubt others here would agree with me when I say that your active participation in the community is at least as important as your responsibilities within the WMF. In short, the WMF and our community are not sold separately. They are the yang yin that have made the Wikimedia projects what they are today, and one can't exist without the other.
I'm not one to tip-toe around taboos, so I'll directly address something that's important but rarely discussed on this list. Sometimes people get upset and post things here or onwiki that hurt feelings or come off as confrontational. In fact, you'll see the occasional post that has no purpose beyond putting people down and/or making them feel unwelcome. It has been directed at one time or another to pretty much every highly active and/or high-profile Wikipedian. Please understand that this is a natural behavior for passionate volunteers who have done something extraordinary and want to make sure that their hard work continues to have a positive impact in our world. Our community members have set the bar pretty high by providing content that the entire world depends on, and their high expectations from the WMF and the Mediawiki team to provide the best tools possible for displaying and manipulating that content are well deserved. When I've found myself in the crosshairs, this thought puts me back in the big picture and helps me find a productive path forward. I hope this helps, and I'm looking forward to your first post on this list. I'm numbering myself among those who are looking forward to your first post. Best. ,Wil On Mon, Sep 29, 2014 at 10:38 AM, Lila Tretikov <l...@wikimedia.org> wrote: > Dear all, > > We are excited to announce that the Wikimedia Foundation now has a Vice > President of Engineering. Damon Sicore will be filling this vital role. > Please join us in welcoming him to the team. > > The VPE role will be crucial to further developing and maintaining the > technology that supports the very core of the Wikimedia movement, and > ensuring the development, scale, and stability of the MediaWiki > architecture. > > > Damon joins us as part of planned growth of our product and engineering > teams, first announced in November 2012. As we have grown, we need > dedicated focus on product and engineering as separate departments, to > ensure development of best practices like performance engineering, > continuous delivery, A/B testing, software re-architecture, UI/UX work, and > user research. Erik Moeller, who filled the role of VP for both product and > engineering since 2011, led in the creation of this new role and was > essential to the search process. From today onward, Erik will focus on his > role as VP of Product and Strategy and Deputy Director of the WMF, while > Damon will take over leadership of the Engineering team; both will report > to me as part of the c-level team. > > Damon has a unique track record of managing large platform rollouts using > distributed teams like ours, while understanding the essential role of > community contributions and working in a transparent, open source > environment. These skills and experiences will be invaluable in his work > here at the Foundation. It’s unusual to find someone who understands us so > well, and so I want to thank the many people from across the organization, > especially in the engineering, product, and human resources teams, who have > been involved in making this search successful. > > We are very happy to have Damon on board. His proven track record of > managing large platform rollouts using distributed teams like ours, while > understanding the essential role of community contributions and working in > a transparent, open source environment, is unique and invaluable as part of > our movement. > > We’ll be sending around a copy of the press release shortly. You’ll also be > be able to meet Damon, and ask him questions, this Thursday at our monthly > Metrics Meeting > <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WMF_Metrics_and_activities_meetings>. > Please join us there! > > Please join me in welcoming Damon. > > Lila > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe> _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
