Thank you Garfield for your quick reply - and with welcome news in it. I am heartened to see your clarification/confirmation that this project is specifically intending to re-use existing documentation and not to increase the "red tape" or compliance-requirements of chapters. Also, as mentioned in my first email, I would like to reiterate my support for the idea that (especially smaller/newer) chapters have a dedicated contact person. This will be very helpful for many.
On the other note I raised, could you/anyone also address whether the chapters had prior-awareness of this new project's existence or planned creation before this email announcement? On Friday, 31 October 2014, Garfield Byrd <[email protected]> wrote: > Liam: > > My apologies for the language you noted, it was not our intent to, even > inadvertently, to degrade anyone. We fully appreciate the abilities of our > community and I know from my meetings with members of our community how > smart and engaged they are in a variety of issues impacting the Wikimedia > movement. > > > I want to clarify that these Fellows are not auditors. They will be > working from data as presented by the movement entities. The project has > been designed so that the fellows will be using existing data provided by > movement entities and the Fellows will only be reaching out to movement > entities with clarifying questions. So there should be no material > increase in staff/volunteer time to provide information for this project. > If this not the case, please let me know. > > Best regards, > > Garfield > > On Thu, Oct 30, 2014 at 11:10 AM, Liam Wyatt <[email protected] > <javascript:;>> wrote: > > > Interesting development. Probably a very good idea for transparency and > > good use of the movement's money, and consistency of reporting to make > > things comparable is a great goal. I especially think that for smaller > > chapters there is lots of value in having a dedicated contact person! > > > > But I find the self-description of the Fellows as "an elite group of > global > > operatives"[1] a bit degrading to the rest of us... > > > > I presume it's taken a fair while to recruit the team and scope the > project > > too (I see one linkedin profile which says they've been working already > for > > two months[3]). So, I wonder - did the Chapters who have been allocated > to > > each of these new auditors[2] have any notice that this new process was > > being created before it was announced today - so they were able to make > any > > other time-commitments without being surprised by a new layer of > paperwork? > > > > Also, I presume that the increased amount of staff/volunteer time needed > to > > comply with new paperwork will be offset by streamlining this with other > > WMF-compliance paperwork? > > > > [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Oolukoya_(WMF) > > [2] > > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement-wide_Financial_Report#Who_We_Are > > [3] http://www.linkedin.com/pub/seyi-olukoya/59/b09/a7 > > > > wittylama.com > > Peace, love & metadata > > > > > > > > -- > > wittylama.com > > Peace, love & metadata > > _______________________________________________ > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > > [email protected] <javascript:;> > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > > <mailto:[email protected] <javascript:;> > ?subject=unsubscribe> > > > > > > -- > Garfield Byrd > Chief of Finance and Administration > Wikimedia Foundation > 415.839.6885 ext 6787 > 415.882.0495 (fax) > www.wikimediafoundation.org > > Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in > the sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality! > > *https://donate.wikimedia.org <https://donate.wikimedia.org/>* > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > [email protected] > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > <mailto:[email protected] <javascript:;> > ?subject=unsubscribe> -- wittylama.com Peace, love & metadata _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:[email protected]?subject=unsubscribe>
