+1 "That language is an instrument of human reason, and not merely a medium for
the expression of thought, is a truth generally admitted."
- George Boole, quoted in Iverson's Turing Award Lecture
From: Rohini Lakshané <rohini.laksh...@gmail.com>
To: Wikimedia Chapter India Google group <wmin-memb...@googlegroups.com>
Cc: Wikimedia India Community list <wikimediaindia-l@lists.wikimedia.org>
Sent: Tuesday, March 3, 2015 11:09 PM
Subject: Re: [WMIN-Members] Concerns regarding a user's Wikimedia activities
and use of movement funds
This is truly appalling!
Sibi, the way you have phrased this and supported your claims is commendable.
These mailing lists have often seen serious matters reduced to mud-slinging and
personal remarks.
| |
| Rohini Lakshané about.me/rohini |
| |
| |
2015-03-03 16:20 GMT+05:30 sibi kanagaraj <civil.si...@gmail.com>:
Hi all ,
This is to bring to the attention of the larger Wikimedia Community about
concerns regarding Abhishek Surywanshi’s ( User profile
-https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ACentralAuth&target=AbhiSuryawanshi
) wikimedia activities and use of movement funds.
While edit counts are not the only way to assess the value of a contributor and
people are encourage to do outreach, I am seeing a clear pattern that he has
been very active consistently only in offline activities that involve large
scale funds.
History of programs or events where he has used or applied to use movement
funds:
1)A Travel and Participation grant request for travel to US from India for
Wikimedia Outreach in US -
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:TPS/AbhiSuryawanshi/NASA_LARSS_program
. The community and EC members of Wikimedia India disapproved of this grant
request.
2)Wikipedia Summit Pune -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Summit_Pune . How much was
spent and how? Where is the expenses report? Following failure to abide by
terms regarding financial transactions, Wikimedia India banned supporting him
financially and passed a resolution regarding this. ( As per
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/Talk:Grants/WikiConnect_Pilot_-_January_2015 )
3)Various (mostly flight) travel and stay to many different conferences /
meetups across India in the recent past. Community approval for these are not
clearly seen. *Swatantra conference 2014
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Access_To_Knowledge/Requests/Swatantra_2014/Participation#Request_for_Support
(On behalf of which community?) *India Community Consultation 201 4 -
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Community_Consultation_2014#Hindi
(Self-nomination (?) on behalf of Hindi Community where he has made 425
edits.Bengali Wikipedia 10 years celebration in Kolkatta during Jan 2015 (On
behalf of which community?)
Following are some of his proposed activities that will need a grant made in
near future:
1)Wikipedia Summit India in Pune during 2015 -
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/WikipediaSummitIndia
2)Travel and participation grant request for 1125 US dollars for round trip
travel from Pune to United States for conducting Indic outreach in United
states -
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:TPS/Harvard_India_Conference_and_Wiki_Workshop
3)WikiConnect - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiConnect - No idea
about the budget. The pilot he is doing in Nashik needs 6100 INR for a cake
itself and reimbursement for 15 days of his stay and food.
4)Further outreach in US -
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Indic_Language_Wikipedia_Outreach_in_United_States
Some of the concerns:
1.He is using and proposes to keep using movement funds in large scale with
questionable impact which are against the learnings already documented at
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:Evaluation
2.He is using fictitious and misleading titles like Ambassador, Wikipedia to
establish non-transparent relationships with numerous organizations in and
outside India -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiConnect/Pilot_Project#mediaviewer/File:Wikipedia_Nashik_Workshop_Participants_January_2015.jpg
. This has the risk of damaging goodwill and brand name for Wikipedia.
4)When a current GAC member and former Wikimedia India EC member seeks details
regarding his grant request and reminds the current EC about the ban, he is
hinting legal action against chapter (As per
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/Talk:Grants/WikiConnect_Pilot_-_January_2015 )
As a community member, I request the funding agencies in the movement to take
stock of this situation and implement intense scrutiny for funding requests
with proper evaluation of program design and due process for having community
approval by experienced Wikimedians.
Please donot proceed ahead without community discussion or approval.
Executive decisions circumventing community approval will never help the
movement.
-Sibi Kanagaraj
User:Commons Sibi (
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ACentralAuth&target=Commons+sibi
)
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