Re: [Foundation-l] Communicating effectively: Wikimedia needs clear language now
I'd recommend George Orwell's essay on "Politics and the English Language". It's one of the most persuasive arguments to use clear language I've read. http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm We're a multi-lingual movement, and this makes clear English even more important. If something is unclear to a native speaker, it's even more difficult for someone who has English as a second or third language. Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Foundation Mid-Year Presentation to the Board of Trustees
> > 23, 2012 at 8:43 PM, Erik Moeller wrote: > > Hi folks, > > > > on February 3, the Wikimedia Foundation senior staff gave a > > presentation to the Board of Trustees as part of its Board meeting in > > San Francisco, recapping the fiscal year so far (our year begins July > > 1) and looking ahead. The slide deck is now available here: > > > > > https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/File:Wikimedia_Foundation_Mid-Year_Review_February_2012.pdf > > > Thanks for this - very interesting :-) For me, the most reassuring part is at the end. (It feels a bit odd highlighting this, given the amount of cool stuff in the report, but I suppose it's cool stuff I already knew about). I am very glad to hear that these issues are on peoples' minds and I think identifying them is a really helpful step. Everybody at all levels of the WMF needs to stop spending social & political capital accidentally, or on stuff that doesn't matter; ● We need to stop surprising the community: we need to acknowledge that time works differently for volunteers, and they need lots of advance notice for everything. Overtransparency has never harmed us, but lack of transparency has; ● Internally in the organization we need to shift from the assumption that our scarcest resource is money, to the acknowledgement that it's time. We need to get better at conserving energy, focusing and saying no; ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Copyright and cakes...
> > > > > Does the author > > (Jezhotwells) have the ability to release it under a free licence, if > s/he > > wishes? > > No but if they put it on permanent display in a public place the photo > would probably be totally fine under UK freedom of panorama law. I suspect a court would hold that the set of "cakes" is disjoint from the set of "objects on permanent display", and thus that a photograph of cake can never benefit from freedom of panorama. #nomnomnomnomnom Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Copyright and cakes...
On Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 8:45 PM, Mike Christie wrote: > On Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 3:40 PM, Chris Keating >wrote: > > > I suspect a court would hold that the set of "cakes" is disjoint from the > > set of "objects on permanent display", and thus that a photograph of cake > > can never benefit from freedom of panorama. > > > > You mean we can't have the cake and eat it too? That's another corollary ;-) ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia France position on fundraising
On Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 9:37 PM, Arne Klempert wrote: > On Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 6:24 PM, Florence Devouard > wrote: > > Please find on Wikimedia France position regarding chapter fundraising in > > France in the coming years. > > > Wikimedia UK's response to the same set of questions is now on Meta, here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_and_Funds_Dissemination/Questions_for_Wikimedia_UK Regards, Chris Keating, Wikimedia UK Board (User:The Land) ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] [WikiEN-l] Stopping the presses: Britannica to stop printing books
I had a small encyclopedia at home (only one volume, but a massive volume) and there was a copy of Britannica in the local library and, later, at secondary school. But I started getting frustrated with them when I was about 12 or 13, because the shorter articles rarely answered the questions I had, and I never happened t be looking up something with one of the longer articles... (all of this was a good few years the Internet took off...) Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Stopping the presses: Britannica to stop printing books
> I think what you might be remembering is that they used to sell them via a > sales force who went door to door. They announced a few years back that > they were stopping that. > > And, indeed, it was the reliance on the sales force that killed off Britannica in the late-80s/early-90s when Encarta came along... http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/greenstein/images/htm/Research/Cases/EncyclopaediaBritannica.pdf ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Draft charter of the Wikimedia Chapters Association
> So a group of chapters, reacting against a perceived effort to centralize > the movement, create a brand new central body with an extensive (and > apparently, expensive) bureaucracy? Are there really a lot of people that > think this is a good idea? Yes, there are lots of people that think this is a good idea. Currently, there are 3 things not happening, which are causing us problems: 1) There's not really anyone to help chapters develop. If you have a group of Wikipedians who want to set up a chapter, there are lots of challenges but not many resources to help you do it. The resources there are are quite informal. And once you're going, there's not a great deal of help in offer to help you grow and get more active. 2) Equally, there isn't really a very good way of assessing chapters' performance. There is an element of formal regulation in that if a Chapter doesn't stick to the Chapter Agreement is could be de-chaptered. And for chapters with a strong membership base and good links to the project communities, there is a very important role for oversight by members/communities. But apart from the tripwire of the Chapter Agreement, and the important but fairly uneven scrutiny of different memberships, there isn't really a mechanism for review and feedback - which is actually part of the same problem as 1). 3) Finally, there are problems of communication between the Wikimedia Foundation and the Chapters.There is no good mechanism for sounding Chapters' views corporately. When the Foundation asks "What do chapters think about X"? they find that half-a-dozen people will argue at length on an email list, without necessarily being representative of anyone, and probably without proposing anything useful. Communication fragments, gets heated, and becomes unproductive quickly. If we can find solutions to these three problems, it will be well worth the investment. Obviously setting up a new body is not guaranteed to succeed, and there are lots of details to be worked out, many of them important - but it is worth doing. Chris (Wikimedia UK board, speaking personally) ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Draft charter of the Wikimedia Chapters Association
> > > This could be much more usefully addressed with a cooperative assistance > group, rather than some sort of super-governance association. Somehow lots > of chapters managed to form themselves without the existence of an > international governing body. If technical assistance is what you are > looking to offer, develop a technical assistance group and resource that. > Yes, this is a co-operative assistance group. And equally, if there weren't any other needs to fill, then it could be only such a group. But there are. > In what way will this new organization be able to "de-chapter" an > organization, It won't (and just to be clear, I didn't suggest it would). > when the chapter designation (and the attendant authorization > to use Wikimedia marks) is controlled by the WMF? Since funding coming from > the WMF - or the FDC - will still need to involve WMF oversight and > accountability, what this organization does is duplicate those > responsibilities to yet another organization. There are different sorts of oversight and accountability. The WMF does not currently have the capacity (and nor really the inclination) to go through chapters' procedures or programme plans saying things like "so why is this aspect of your plan such a high priority? Is there a community process behind this? Have you seen how Y did a similar programme, do you think it's worth speaking to them about it?". So in terms of this kind of "soft" oversight, which I would describe as a constructive challenge to the Chapter executive bodies, the Chapters Council would do things that no-one currently does. It may also end up playing a role in the "hard" oversight functions alongside the Foundation, local regulators, and external auditors. It's not impossible that a Chapter Council led peer-review would help give the Foundation greater confidence in the workings of a chapter - the Foundation does not appear keen to spend more time and effort scrutinising chapters than it currently does, so this may well be welcome to the Foundation. > So your solution is to have the chapters argue amongst themselves, pursue a > bureaucratic process to arrive at a common decision, and then present that > to the WMF. Yes, though minus your loaded language, and restricted to areas where there is a reasonable degree of agreement. >From my point of view this will be very helpful. It's certainly more useful for communication than diffuse angry thoughts. > This despite the fact that the WMF has, and will continue to > have, direct organizational links to each chapter. You make it sound like > the ChapAss will supplant the Foundation in its role, but that's > impossible. This will strengthen those direct links by separating the "politics" of the relationship between a Chapter and the Foundation from the communication about operational matters. Btw, nice turn of phrase with "ChapAss", I can see you thought about that one! :-) > ... It seems like a pretty easy case to make > that the added bureaucracy is at least an inefficient if not outright > wasteful use of donated funds.. I'd look at it as a cost-effective way of building our global outreach capacity, personally, but your mileage may vary. Chris Wikimedia UK board (speaking personally) ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] [WikiEN-l] Stopping the presses:, Britannica to stop printing books
> > > > It is socially and historically interesting to compare very old edition of > Brittanica to a newer edition. For example: an entry on battleships would > evolve from a discussion of wooden ships powered by sail that enforced > seapower of an empire to sidewheelers, to iron ships fired by coal to the > current thinking that battleships are too expensive. In an online > encyclopedia it is possible to include all these articles side by side into > a section on the evolution of battleships. Well, I'm glad to see someone's reading those articles :-) Chris (the main author of the English Wikipedia articles on Battleship, Ironclad warship, Pre-Dreadnought, and Dreadnought) ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] Fwd: Announcement: New editor engagement experiments team!
There are so many potential ways of recruiting new high-quality editors. However, at the moment almost all of them founder (at least on the English Wikipedia) on the likely reception of peoples' first edits. Take, for the sake of argument, Wikimedia UK's donor list. There are 50,000 people who care enough about Wikipedia to have put their hands in their pockets to donate to it, and who are on the whole very well-educated - in short, just what you want for "high-quality" contributors. (If someone has given money to support Wikipedia, it's unlikely that if they tried to edit it, they would be consciously trying to damage it). It would be relatively easy to get 1% - maybe 10% - of them to try editing with a well-written email or two. However, at the moment, most of them probably wouldn't find it a positive experience if they did, which is a shame... Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] resolution on voting transparency
> During the Board of Trustees meeting today we passed a resolution on > Trustee voting transparency: > > http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Resolution:Board_of_Trustees_Voting_Transparency > > asking that in future resolutions we publish the names of trustees > with their votes for each resolution. > > best, > Phoebe > > Thank you! A very helpful step forward, and I'm glad the Board felt able to take this step. Regards, Chris Wikimedia UK ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Board Resolutions from March 30th 2012
On Sat, Mar 31, 2012 at 5:56 AM, John Vandenberg wrote: > On Sat, Mar 31, 2012 at 12:18 PM, Thomas Dalton > wrote: > > On 31 March 2012 02:03, John Vandenberg wrote: > >> I expect that the minutes will explain the varied positions of the > >> board. If not, then the board should put in place procedures to > >> prevent abuse of abstains. > > > > Could you elaborate on what you mean by "abuse of abstains"? > > An abstention is a refusal to vote. By doing this, a trustee must > have a good reason, such as conflict of interest, and it should be > minuted why, or they are refusing the duties of their appointment and > should be removed. > > I have never heard of this idea before - where did you get it from? People with votes on all kinds of bodies abstain on things all the time, for all kinds of valid reasons. The most prominent recent example I can think of is that Sivlio Berlusconi's government in Italy was brought down by MPs he expected to support him abstaining instead. We don't know why Arne and Bishakka abstained, or why SJ voted against - it is only evident they did not feel able to support the motion as it stood. Regards, Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] EFF & Bitcoins
> Actually, it is. I expect Wikipedia to outlast the U.S. Dollar at least in > some form, or at least stick around as long as literature like "The Oddessy" > and "The Epic of Gilgamesh" and be a part of human culture longer than the > civilizations that produced that literature. Why would it be otherwise? > Something like Bitcoin may outlast these other world currencies too. > There is a big difference between an encyclopedia and a currency. Specifically, an encyclopedia can survive in many different ways. If an archaeologist of the future stumbles across a locked safe in some ruins and finds it's stuffed full of CD-ROMS containing a Wikipedia backup, they can recreate Wikipedia. If the safe is full of dollar bills, he can't re-create the US economy. If it's full of bitcoin software he might be able to recreate the bitcoin software, but he can't recreate the system of exchange... ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] It Is not Us
> > > > > http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-facebook-vs-the-rest-of-the-web-2011-6 > > So some guy has proved that Facebook is growing faster than the web - at least, in the USA, why would anyone care about anywhere else? - so long as you ignore the bits of the web that are growing like mobile and video. Profound insight this isn't. Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] It Is not Us
> Facebook, and Twitter, big with Black folk, gives people something they > can relate to. Wikipedia is as dry as reading, or writing, an > encyclopedia. > > In a sense they ate our lunch, but millions of Facebook-like user pages > can hardly be justified as a basis for charitable donations. Are you saying Wikipedia should be less like an encyclopedia and more like a social network? ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Merge wikis
Yes, by all means, let's fold some of the different wikis back into one. Every day I seem to bump into a new wiki which someone is expecting me to keep track of. The proliferation of different wikis creates confusion, frustration and generally sub-optimal user journeys. Also, if it was possible to use access levels in a more sophisticated way, we could further reduce the number of wikis we are expected to remember... Chris WMUK ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] Musopen & Open Music
I was thinking the other day about the (relative) lack of open sound and music files on Wikimedia projects I happened to browse on to MusOpen - http://www.musopen.org/blog/ Does anyone here happen to know them or anything about them? Thanks Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] SEOs :((((
> Someone just pointed me this link : > http://webmasterformat.com/blog/destroy-wikipedia-serp-ranking > > Fails at step 13 when the site owners with a clue about how Wikipedia works spot a scumbag and laugh at them. ;-) Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] SEOs :((((
How about a Wikipedia: namespace essay with the same title? Am sure we could get it some inbound links : On Monday, August 1, 2011, Mono mium wrote: > One moment please... > > I'm writing a how-to guide for sinking that website to the bottom. It > involves many of their own techniques. > > I'll post it soon. > > On Mon, Aug 1, 2011 at 11:06 AM, Rui Correia wrote: > >> The responses so far are encouraging! ;-) >> >> 2011/8/1 Chris Keating >> >> > > Someone just pointed me this link : >> > > http://webmasterformat.com/blog/destroy-wikipedia-serp-ranking >> > > >> > > >> > Fails at step 13 when the site owners with a clue about how Wikipedia >> works >> > spot a scumbag and laugh at them. ;-) >> > >> > Chris >> > ___ >> > foundation-l mailing list >> > foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org >> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l >> > >> >> >> >> -- >> _ >> Mobile Number in Namibia +264 81 445 1308 >> Número de Telemóvel na Namíbia +264 81 445 1308 >> >> I am away from Johannesburg - you cannot contact me on my South African >> numbers >> Estou fora de Joanesburgo - não poderá entrar em contacto comigo através >> dos >> meus números sul-africanos >> >> Rui Correia >> Advocacy, Human Rights, Media and Language Consultant >> Angola Liaison Consultant >> >> ___ >> ___ >> foundation-l mailing list >> foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org >> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l >> > ___ > foundation-l mailing list > foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l > ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Board letter about fundraising and chapters
The more I read the Board's letter the more difficult I find it to interpret. There's one reading on which it says only a few (albeit important) things that aren't already in the 2011 Fundraising Agreements. There is another reading in which it says that actually no chapters will be participating in this Autumn's fundraiser, as actually none of them have hit every single deadline from the 2010 agreement. (For the sake of balance - the WMF also missed one of its own deadlines ;-) ) So thank you Phoebe for your insight on the Board's thinking, but more insight would be good. However there are four particular points I would mention: 1) *Transparency and accountability by chapters*. I wholeheartedly agree that Chapters' performance in terms of reporting and accountability has not been great on the whole. There also seem to be a number of chapters who participated in the 2010 Fundraiser for whom it is very difficult to find any indication of how much has been raised during 2011 or what the money has been spent on. Simply in my role as a member of the community, this is concerning, and I agree that the Foundation board needs to take this issue seriously. 2) *New chapters and funds*. I also agree that a small, new chapter has better things to do than spend its time working out how to handle online payments and hold donor data. There is in any case a threshold in the Fundraising Agreement on how much a chapter can seek to raise if it is taking part in the fundraiser for the first time - $50,000 if I remember rightly. To be honest the prospect of a $50,000 grant from the Foundation for much less work than participating in the fundraiser would be attractive. (Though of course this alternative grant system isn't actually set up, which makes it difficult to examine it) 3) *Tax-deductibility.* There is a significant change in the Foundation board's language between the Fundraising Agreement - which says chapters must be tax-deductible non-profits "where applicable and obtainable" - and the language in this letter. Some chapters operate in countries which have no concept of tax-deductibility. Some operate in countries where it's impossible to reconcile tax-deductibility with being a Chapter. I think it would be a very serious mistake for the Foundation to unilaterally decide that no chapter in one of these countries will ever participate in the Fundraiser. If that is what the Foundation have decided then I think that is going far beyond the action the Foundation needs to take to exercise its duty of care towards donors. I also think that it would fundamentally alter the relationship between the Foundation and the chapters, and not in a good way. 4) *The value of donors.* The Foundation talks a lot about donor stewardship, but stewardship goes far beyond accountability and transparency. What we as a movement ought to be doing is building an ongoing relationship with the people who are generous enough to give us money, and sharing the Wikimedia vision with them. This means having the kind of donor communication programme that almost any nonprofit can tell you about. Currently I don't believe the Foundation tries to do this - it ought to - but I think it is actually something which is much better done by chapters where those chapters have the resources to do so. The benefits of this kind of "active stewardship" are several... - more people who "get" Wikimedia rather than just responding to a banner they see on Wikipedia - more recurring income for the movement not linked to the annual fundraiser (all nonprofits love recurring income because it's consistent and reliable - though the mechanics of actually giving recurring gifts are quite specific to individual nations) - outreach - when WMUK sent an email to our 2010 donors a month or two ago, we got dozens of responses from people interested in getting involved (even though we hadn't really asked!) - including one from a curator at a key museum we were trying to get links to for our GLAM outreach programme. So basically our donors are a massive and under-used resource for the movement in both financial and non-financial terms. I get the impression that some people think the only benefit of Chapters handling donor data is that donors get tax receipts. That is definitely not the case and it if that's the only thing we care about then that is a massive missed opportunity for the movement. Regards, Chris Keating User:The Land Wikimedia UK Board member & fundraising lead ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Chapters
> > > Funding chapters by grants from WMF so that they all use the money in the > > same WMF approved way is a systematically bad idea in the same way > sending > > shoes to Africa is a bad idea. Redefining the chapters who participated > in > > a joint fundraiser with WMF as WMF's "payment processors" is straight-up > > insulting. > > > Well, let's be clear here: in what sense are the chapters "participating" > in > the fundraiser, rather than merely being its beneficiaries? The underlying > fundraising work -- the actual solicitation of donations, in other words -- > is performed by WMF staff directly. The chapters do provide some level of > administrative and accounting support, obviously; but that could just as > easily be done by the WMF as well, and likely at lower cost. The only real > advantage a chapter's involvement can provide over a fully WMF-operated > fundraiser is the availability of tax benefits in a particular > jurisdiction; > and, given the small size of the average donation, it's unclear to what > extent such tax benefits are a significant consideration for the average > donor. > The other benefits are; * chapters can take advantage of local payment systems, which donors may be more accustomed to - not just credit cards * the chapter can probably make better subsequent use of the data on donors * if the chapter has a greater stake in the fundraiser, they are more likely to care about providing effective messages that work well So I simply do not accept that the right thing for the movement is for donations to be received by the Foundation and then passed on to the chapters. Chapters in my view have an important role to play in maximising the fundraising potential of the Wikimedia movement. Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] a funny story about wikipedia's strange power
Just occasionally this Python sketch feels very relevant to Wikipedia; M: Ah. I'd like to have an argument, please. R:Certainly sir. Have you been here before? M: No, I haven't, this is my first time. R: I see. Well, do you want to have just one argument, or were you thinking of taking a course? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Argument_Sketch ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Hypothetical project rebranding Wikimedia
> Does rebranding change anything then the "name" or "appearance"? > > Or better asked: Does it help to solve any of our real problems? > > I might compare this to throwing cat's around. A rather useless feature, > since anyone knows how to edit and a personal message worth 100% more > then a template. Branding, effectively used, can be a very powerful tool (ask McDonalds or Coca-Cola) It is interesting that this agency picked up a number of things that I would tend to agree with; "The site offers a brilliantly simple user experience, has clear strategic goals and is driven by the objectives laid out in its Five Pillars. However, it fails to communicate its own story, its offer and its role in capturing, building and disseminating global knowledge." "This work informed the brand narrative, the story at the heart of the brand that aligned the brand’s offer, vision and moral principals. We looked at the brand architecture, and how the 8 sister sites could be better integrated and used to leverage Wikipedia’s potential as the world’s learning resource. I would say that the current brand (such as it is) is good at communicating the value proposition for the reader, but not so much the contributor or the donor. However, I thought the logo that the agency came up with sucked. :-) Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] George Orwell: "Why I Write"
I was reading Orwell's essay last night (in the old-fashioned paper form, while in the bath). I thought it was an interesting analysis which could apply to peoples' motivations for contributing to the Wikimedia projects, from those who edit "from the desire to see things as they are" to those who write for "sheer egoism", and just a few "who may feel strongly about typography, width of margins, etc" (or possibly hyphens ;-) ) Not sure an editor survey couched in quite these terms would get a useful result though. Orwell's full text is available here: http://orwell.ru/library/essays/wiw/english/e_wiw but this is the key bit; Chris -- I think there are four great motives for writing, at any rate for writing prose. They exist in different degrees in every writer, and in any one writer the proportions will vary from time to time, according to the atmosphere in which he is living. They are: *(i) Sheer egoism.* Desire to seem clever, to be talked about, to be remembered after death, to get your own back on the grown-ups who snubbed you in childhood, etc., etc. It is humbug to pretend this is not a motive, and a strong one. Writers share this characteristic with scientists, artists, politicians, lawyers, soldiers, successful businessmen — in short, with the whole top crust of humanity. The great mass of human beings are not acutely selfish. After the age of about thirty they almost abandon the sense of being individuals at all — and live chiefly for others, or are simply smothered under drudgery. But there is also the minority of gifted, willful people who are determined to live their own lives to the end, and writers belong in this class. Serious writers, I should say, are on the whole more vain and self-centered than journalists, though less interested in money. *(ii) Aesthetic enthusiasm.* Perception of beauty in the external world, or, on the other hand, in words and their right arrangement. Pleasure in the impact of one sound on another, in the firmness of good prose or the rhythm of a good story. Desire to share an experience which one feels is valuable and ought not to be missed. The aesthetic motive is very feeble in a lot of writers, but even a pamphleteer or writer of textbooks will have pet words and phrases which appeal to him for non-utilitarian reasons; or he may feel strongly about typography, width of margins, etc. Above the level of a railway guide, no book is quite free from aesthetic considerations. *(iii) Historical impulse.* Desire to see things as they are, to find out true facts and store them up for the use of posterity. *(iv) Political purpose.* — Using the word ‘political’ in the widest possible sense. Desire to push the world in a certain direction, to alter other peoples’ idea of the kind of society that they should strive after. Once again, no book is genuinely free from political bias. The opinion that art should have nothing to do with politics is itself a political attitude. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] CC by-sa upheld in Germany, over a Commons photo
On Thu, Sep 15, 2011 at 9:18 PM, David Gerard wrote: > http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/28644 > > FLAWLESS VICTORY! [*] > > > Well done to Nina Gerlach, Till Jaeger and the others involved n the process for the success so far (I remember Matthias talking about the possibilitiy of proceedings at the GLAM-WIKI Conference last November) The judgement is a preliminary injunction prior to a hearing. Presumably the respondents will present a case at the hearing - do we know if they will present arguments that the CC-By-SA license is somehow unenforceable? However, the description of the injunction does suggest that the court would take some persuading that the plaintiff's rights have not been infringed Chris (User:The Land) ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Dead Sea Scrolls
> > > > Finally, the Dead Sea Scrolls[1] have copyright[2]. Courtesy of The Israel > Museum. Congratulations. If the Dead Sea Scrolls were divinely inspired, like other Biblical texts, then there is an argument that the author is still alive ;-) (c) God, 2011 ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] Welcoming Jon Davies as our new Chief Executive
Dear all, Wikimedia UK is very pleased to announce that after a very thorough recruitment process we have appointed Jon Davies as our first Chief Executive, starting next Monday. Jon has extensive experience in the non-profit sector in the UK, and this will be his first Wikimedia role. Many people in the UK community met Jon at the most recent London wikimeet, and the whole Wikimedia UK board is very pleased that he is joining us. I am sure Jon will be along to introduce himself in the next few days. More details from Andrew Turvey at; http://blog.wikimedia.org.uk/2011/09/welcoming-our-new-chief-executive/ Regards, Chris Keating (User:The Land) Wikimedia UK ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Given that we have won, can we turn Italian Wikipedia back on now?
> > Not so easy. Yesterday an amendment has been officially proposed, not > approved. It will be discussed into the parliament camera, then into the > parliament senate. Only if both will accept it without modifications it'll > be valid. > > Also, the government may ask for trust at the parliament about this law, > and > in the case it will be approved in its original form, without amendments. > > Maybe your countries are more slender, but in Itlay we are very very > burocratics. > > That's simply a step, not the goal I agree with this. It's very easy for politicians to say "Yes, we've heard what you have said and your views are very important to us. We'll definitely think very hard about taking your views into account." - and then completely ignore you. Don't trust them :-) Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Global Fundraiser Test
> > > > On *2011-10-18* (today)*@ 20:00 - 21:30 UTC*, we are running a global > campaign for an hour and a half to test our ability to and strategy for > handling donations coming from *every country*! Hello Charles, Hopefully you are not doing this in the countries which have chapters that are participating in the fundraiser as payment processors. Please let us know ASAP. Regards, Chris Wikimedia UK ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Global Fundraiser Test
> Sorry for the confusion. No we are not testing in*US, AU, DE, FR, CH, GB.* > > Thanks for clearing that up. Good luck with the test. :-) Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Global Fundraiser Test
> > > http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2011 and don't forget to check > the discussion page for more places to discuss the fundraiser. As for a > time-line, the fundraiser is scheduled to start within the first two weeks > of November. I will see about adding some sort of time-line to the > fundraising page. > I heard back in June that it was November 1st. Since we're now two weeks away, perhaps we could have a confirmed start date ? Chris Wikimedia UK ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Board Resolution: Openness
> I just tried editing an article on en:wp on my shiny new BlackBerry > 9300. (Which can browse Wikipedia just fine.) It was ridiculously > annoying and I'm not sure I'd bother fixing typos I spotted in casual > reading. > > (At least Vector worked in that version of the BlackBerry browser ...) > > Does anyone here edit any of the WMF wikis, or any other wiki, on > their phone much? What's it like, and what's the phone? I've edited the occasional talk page on en.wp from my Android. However, it's really difficult - the size of the pages means there's loads of scrolling, it's difficult to find the right place, and Wiki markup requires lots of fiddly special characters which are difficult to locate on a mobile touch keyboard. To be honest, these are all problems that affect editing from a desktop as well, unless you're used to it. Wiki markup is simple if the article contains only headings and text. But if the article contains images, conversion templates, infoboxes and reference tags it can easily appear to be a barrage of incomprehensible code. And we rely heavily on square and curly brackets, pipe characters and tildes which most people probably never otherwise use on their keyboards. Chris(The Land) ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] A designer? (was: Better user experience and retention through e-mail notifications)
On Tue, Apr 19, 2011 at 10:38 AM, Milos Rancic wrote: > MZMcBride's email about emails reminded me that every automated email > from Wikimedia servers looks like a bunch of programming code. > > The first idea was that it would be better to have some better formatted > emails with some more information (for example, I would like to see diff > inside of my email when I get notification about changing my talk page). > > But, then I've realized that we don't have a designer. By "designer" I > mean a person who is employed by WMF and who is constantly working on > improving MediaWiki look and feel. > > While a lot of us may be completely fine with reading Wikipedia articles > through links, there are people who care about look and feel. Indeed. As the rest of the web gets prettier and prettier, MediaWiki risks starting to look like an ugly duckling... ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] A designer? (was: Better user experience and retention through e-mail notifications)
On Mon, Apr 25, 2011 at 5:37 PM, Dan Collins wrote: > On Apr 19, 2011 8:20 AM, "Tim Starling" wrote: > > > > On 19/04/11 19:38, Milos Rancic wrote: > > > MZMcBride's email about emails reminded me that every automated email > > > from Wikimedia servers looks like a bunch of programming code. > > > > > > The first idea was that it would be better to have some better > formatted > > > emails with some more information (for example, I would like to see > diff > > > inside of my email when I get notification about changing my talk > page). > > > > The main problem is that they are plain text instead of HTML. > > This is most certainly /not/ a problem. What would be a problem would be if > MediaWiki chose to jump on the bandwagon of embedding huge external images > in emails to users. Bandwidth? Tracking? Smaller screens (mobile)? Text > interfaces? > > Every HTML email should come with an embedded plaintext version which will display in the event the HTML is unrenderable. Explanation here: http://kb.mailchimp.com/article/why-bother-with-plain-text-emails/ Looking at my most recent email from LinkedIn, it provides a list of updates from the people I know, each illustrated with a thumbnail picture of them, along with new connections which have been made in my network and posts people have made. The marketing reason for this is to get people to interact with the site by telling them interesting things that have happened. That is actually almost identical to a selection of changes to watched pages, new pages, and watched talk pages. We also have quite a powerful reason to remind people to get involved with our projects - we know new editors are unlikely to come back. So should we take a leaf from LinkedIn's book here? Chris (User:The Land) ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Interesting legal action
> > > A footballer protected by one of the British "superinjunctions" is > > suing Twitter and persons unknown after he was alleged on Twitter to > > have had an affair. Something that could have repercussions for > > Wikipedia. > > > > > > > http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/may/20/twitter-sued-by-footballer-over-privacy > > > > > Speaking as someone who's been in the middle of this exact issue from the > Wikipedia perspective, edits similar to the one described to have been made > on Twitter were removed multiple times from our own site over an extended > period: not because of the injunction, but because it was contentious and > negative information that could not be reliably sourced. Our BLP policy > has > worked. > > It won't be too long before a reputable news source covers the whole issue - or indeed a British Parliamentarian raises it under parliamentary privilege. Then, of course, the material will be in the article even if there is still an outstanding superinjunction > Risker/Anne > ___ > foundation-l mailing list > foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l > ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Interesting legal action
Well, the CTB Superinjunction is now broken in a number of places on en.wikipedia. So there we go. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Interesting legal action
Also rather interestingly, it appears that a Scottish newspaper has revealed the identity of the footballer in question, on the grounds that English superinjunctions don't apply in Scotland. Perhaps the WMF should open an office in Edinburgh, if London is too risky ;-) Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Interesting legal action
Regarding the original point about superinjunctions, an MP has named Ryan Giggs in the House of Commons and this is being widely reported in the British media. The superinjunction will be gone by the end of the afternoon. http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/UK-News/Video-MP-Names-Footballer-At-Centre-Of-Gagging-Order-In-House-Of-Commons/Article/201105415997439?lpos=UK_News_Carousel_Region_1&lid=ARTICLE_15997439_Video%3A_MP_Names_Footballer_At_Centre_Of_Gagging_Order_In_House_Of_Commons ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Wikipedia Editor and Google Chrome
On Wed, Jun 8, 2011 at 6:39 AM, Mono mium wrote: > Really? That's never happened for me. I can also report no problems editing while using Chrome. Though I don't tend to use the built-in browser tools. Chris ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
