Well, since someone brought that up, I'd risk asking: Does it make any sense to make the board in some of its future incarnations more representative? More representative of the editors? More representative of the world's lands and languages? More representative of the world's different economic regions? More representative of some relevant professional fields that are relevant for being in the Board of a massively-international-and-multilingual transparent web-oriented education-oriented non-profit?
A thing that always bothered me strongly is that there were very little or zero representation for these countries in the Board, ever: India, China, Russia, Iran, Brazil, Korea, Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia, Arab countries and finally, all of Africa. (I picked these countries by population and roughly, the representation in the list of the world's top spoken languages.) I'll possibly be sorry for bringing this up, but there were no black people on the board, ever. Also, it bothers me somewhat that there were fewer women than men in the board, if you count the whole history at all times. There were 29 board members ever, and 9 of them were women. Not a huge gap, but a gap nevertheless. (I'm very bad with numbers, please slap me if I'm not counting correctly.) Women are 4 out of 9 in the current board, which is nearly a half and maybe it's not a concern any longer, but I wonder whether it's intentional or just a coincidence. I am not saying that it must be intentionally a half, but it's a thing to consider. Finally, why is the board's composition as it is now? I refer to the total number of people on it, and the number of elected and appointed members, and the quasi-permanent founder seat. I'm sorry if these things are obvious to people who learned something about non-profit management; I did not, but I care about this movement and I am curious, and possibly many other people are curious as well. I can find the resolutions about expansion, but they don't do much to explain the rationale behind the numbers. PLEASE, PRETTY PLEASE, correct me if any of my facts are wrong. -- Amir Elisha Aharoni · אָמִיר אֱלִישָׁע אַהֲרוֹנִי http://aharoni.wordpress.com “We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace.” – T. Moore 2016-02-23 14:58 GMT+02:00 WereSpielChequers <werespielchequ...@gmail.com>: > Sydney and Risker make a good point that much of the current board is > already fairly new and simply appointing a whole new board is unlikely to > be the solution we now need. > > Whether any individual board members feel sufficiently responsible for > recent events that they should resign few but they can say. But the > movement is in a serious mess and it is their duty to ensure we get out of > it. > > In the short term the current board vacancy is an opportunity for the > board. Reappointing Doc James would bring back a much respected board > member who already has several months recent WMF board experience. It would > also be a clear signal that the board wanted to start steering the movement > out of the current quagmire. Conversely, not reappointing Doc James risks > leaving the impression that this particular onion has a few more layers yet > to go. > > In the medium term the board could reform it's constitution so that over > the next couple of years we move to an all elected board and a membership > system open to all who volunteer time to the project. There are some > discussions about this here: > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimedia_Foundation_membership_controversy#Time_to_move_to_a_membership_system > > I appreciate there are a lot of threads running on the current kerfuffle, > but I think board reform is worth a new thread. > > WereSpielChequers > > > > > Message-ID: > > <CAPXs8yRT9xu2tvXpP-27BDzx8njuN= > > rm0ovm9sdda9_0yxz...@mail.gmail.com> > > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 > > > > On 22 February 2016 at 22:00, Sydney Poore <sydney.po...@gmail.com> > wrote: > > > > > On Mon, Feb 22, 2016 at 2:08 PM, Pine W <wiki.p...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > >> > > > > I also hope that the current Board members will thoughtfully consider > > > > whether it's in the best interests of the Wikimedia Foundation and > the > > > > larger Wikimedia movement for them to continue as Board members. > > > > > > The instability that would result from large scale resignations of > > > Board members would be devastating to WMF. > > > > > > That aside, under the best of circumstances, the volunteer BoT of WMF > > > are faced with an extremely demanding and challenging work load. And, > > > no volunteer board has the skill set to manage the problems that have > > > come up over the last few months and have escalated out of control. > > > > > > I strongly encourage giving the BoT time to react to the most recent > > > comments, and develop a responsible plan of action. > > > > > > > > > > I also agree with Sydney, and will point out that in the past year, we > have > > had brand new board members in 3 board-selected seats (one of whom only > > participated for a few weeks), and 3 community seats (two of whom remain > in > > place, the third being replaced by a former board member. That is at > least > > five new members in a single year, no matter how one cuts it - and it > > doesn't even take into consideration the ongoing process for > > chapter-selected seats. > > > > This past year has already seen the largest turnover in board membership > > that the Foundation has ever experienced; it was unusual to have more > than > > two seats change incumbents in all the past years. We have already seen > > very significant change in the make-up of the Board, and half the board > is > > still learning the ropes and responsibilities. This level of change is > > likely to be at least partly responsible for some of the unfortunate > > situations we have seen in the last several months. But those who are > > seeking a new board...well, you already have one. > > > > Risker/Anne > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > 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>
