I'm thinking similarly in terms of distributing tasks broadly among an array of Wikimedia affiliates instead of concentrating so many of them in a single entity. Recent events have highlighted the systemic problems that happen when WMF takes a stance against its volunteer communities (such as with VisualEditor and Superprotect) or has governance, management, or integrity issues (as with the situations with James, Jimbo, and Arnnon).
Transitioning to a federated model of Wikimedia infrastructure and funding may be tricky. I the long term I am thinking that a federated model would increase the resilience of the ecosystem as a whole because the systemic risk from a problem in any one affiliate would be much lower than the risks that we have with so much centralization in a single organization, particularly when I personally feel that its WMF Board is misaligned with the values of the movement that it was intended so support. Pine On Thu, Feb 4, 2016 at 1:21 AM, rupert THURNER <rupert.thur...@gmail.com> wrote: > ha, i read the thread and i did not notice the core question :) lets > start from the annual plan then: > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Annual_Plan/2015-16 > > there are 280 persons working for the WMF, all departments are > growing. money given to somebody else is shrinking below 10%. the word > "fun" is mentioned zero time, and innovation gets one important > sentence: > "We will create spaces for future community-led innovations and new > knowledge creation." > and after that innovation is mentioned in the *legal* and > *communications* paragraph. but - there is no money attached to it. > except maybe paying employees. > > one could strive to allocate money differently, in the line of "30% > goes into grants to improve or develop new technology". making sure > that the innovation money is going to all regions of this planet > should be self evident. or one could clearly define that community > money is spent through local organisations, not central. one could > also suppose community money goes to members of the community, not > employees taking care about the community. this btw is also a major > fundraising problem - people have no problem to give money to > community members. but they have a problem if such money is spent on > employees. > > to play the devils advocate, this increasing money spent not within > the WMF from <10% to 50% means, in reverse, WMF needs to shrink from > 280 persons to 180 persons. one could even advocate for an upper limit > of 200 persons for central functions no matter of the income. as food > for thought, FIFA has a staff of 300. there are 250 million people > playing association football worldwide. > > best, > rupert > > > On Wed, Feb 3, 2016 at 9:33 PM, Lodewijk <lodew...@effeietsanders.org> > wrote: > > Potato potato - availability can be interpreted in many different ways. > > Thanks to the free license, we've covered a big part of that by design. > > > > What activities the WMF should be doing wasn't quite the core of the > > discussion though, but rather how big the WMF should be. > > > > Lodewijk > > > > On Wed, Feb 3, 2016 at 5:00 PM, Tim Landscheidt <t...@tim-landscheidt.de> > > wrote: > > > >> (anonymous) wrote: > >> > >> > […] > >> > >> > But 'getting big' is maybe not the most important thing in the world. > >> > Working on our mission, is. And part of that, is security. The WMF is > not > >> > in this world to play the odds, but rather to ensure that knowledge is > >> > freed, and stays free - most specifically by securing Wikipedia's > >> continued > >> > availability (at least, that is what our deck of cards looks like > now). > >> > >> > Fully focussing on one sigle stream of money may indeed allow you to > get > >> > more out of it. But the question here is rather, how to you tackle the > >> > situation when that stream dries up? And for that question, > >> diversification > >> > is actually key. > >> > >> > […] > >> > >> I don't agree with that. From the Library of Alexandria to > >> the Duchess Anna Amalia Library it has always been a mistake > >> to keep knowledge in one place and try really hard to keep > >> it from falling apart. The biggest advancement in that > >> field probably came from Gutenberg's press which allowed > >> knowledge to be spread around and resist attempts of censor- > >> ship. > >> > >> When cinema and television came along, the ancient pattern > >> repeated: Cultural goods are lost today because the broad- > >> casters put them in one vault and then did not maintain the > >> fire alarm properly. > >> > >> We have the same issue now with streaming services: During > >> dictatorships, you could hide books and jazz records. Net- > >> flix or YouTube just stops serving videos some entity does > >> not like, and Amazon can wipe your Kindle clean of anything. > >> > >> So the diversification for the purpose of the advancement of > >> knowledge should not lie in making WMF immortal, but ensur- > >> ing that it survives WMF's death. > >> > >> Tim > >> > >> > >> _______________________________________________ > >> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > >> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > >> New messages to: 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 > > New messages to: 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 > New messages to: 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 New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
