Mailing List Archive

Angela wrote:

>There are a lot of unanswered questions and issues currently facing
>the board, and I would appreciate your help with these.
>
>If you have any thoughts on the following topics, please see
><http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_agenda/Open_questions> and give
>your answers and suggestions, either on that page, or by email to me
>if you would prefer to reply privately.
>
>1 Hosting
>2 Trademarks
>3 Membership
>4 Money
>5 Developers
>6 Communication
>
>If you feel there are further questions that need to be addressed,
>please add those to the page.
>
>
>
I have just looked at them quickly and was "shocked" to see so many open
questions/issues. I will certainly let my light shine on some of them.

Waerth/Walter van Kalken

( Cc:ing wikipedia-l, since it is important to have broad community feedback.
Also the translators list, because the sidebar of the open-questions
page should be translated. )

That's a great page of questions, Angela. It is a *long* page, but I
hope many people will chime in with their thoughts, particularly
people who do not usually contribute their ideas on meta.

Let me add that our community has an untapped depth of talent in
fields where we currently "need" skilled help. I hope that we work to
find better ways to ask our community of active editors and readers
for help, before deciding that any particular problem cannot be solved
through distributed effort and broad collaboration.

+SJ

On Thu, 24 Mar 2005 12:30:21 +0100, Angela <beesley@gmail.com> wrote:
> There are a lot of unanswered questions and issues currently facing
> the board, and I would appreciate your help with these.
>
> If you have any thoughts on the following topics, please see
> <http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_agenda/Open_questions> and give
> your answers and suggestions, either on that page, or by email to me
> if you would prefer to reply privately.
>
> 1 Hosting
> 2 Trademarks
> 3 Membership
> 4 Money
> 5 Developers
> 6 Communication
>
> If you feel there are further questions that need to be addressed,
> please add those to the page.
>
> Thank you.
>
> Angela.
>
> --
> Angela Beesley
> Not necessarily reflecting the views of the Wikimedia Foundation.
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l@wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


--
+sj+
_ _ :-------.-.--------.--.--------.-.--------.--.--------[...]

I added a short description on open questions on "Wikimedia News" and
"Goings-on" to meta.

On Fri, 25 Mar 2005 02:50:46 -0500, Sj <2.718281828@gmail.com> wrote:
> ( Cc:ing wikipedia-l, since it is important to have broad community feedback.
> Also the translators list, because the sidebar of the open-questions
> page should be translated. )

Nice idea. We could encourage to local communities to submit their
comments in their favorite language and ask ambassadors and/or
translators to translate those inputs into English at least. (So I
would like to add translators-l again to Cc: list.)

By the way I support notafish's proposal we change the name
"ambassador" to another, like "Wikimedia liaison". For reducing
political nuances from those name or avoiding misunderstamding that
they have a sort of right to decide, such a change would be nice.

Once Tomos translated this word into Japanese "¾n¦b­û" literally a staff
working in a foreing area or just a reporter. For the sake of
informative aspects of this position (making a report to Reports on
meta, or for the Board, informing activities and initiatives on other
communities, reporting community decisions and so on) I prefer
"liaison" or "reporter" to the current name "ambassador".

Any other suggestion?
---
Aphaea || Britomartis
email: Aphaia @ gmail (dot) com

Thank you to everyone who replied to my questions at
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_agenda/Open_questions.

A lot of good suggestions and helpful comments were made, and I'm
hoping we will be able to carry out some of these in the near future,
or to at least begin considering them.

Here is a summary of some of the suggestions. The inclusion of these
does not mean there was necessarily agreement on carrying out the
suggestion. Please see [[m:Board agenda/Open questions]] for the full
discussion.

== Hosting ==
* Delegate the management of offers or centralize all hosting offers with Jimbo
* Create a private wiki
* Hire a secretary for Jimbo
* Hire someone to manage grants and partnerships
* Use OTRS more effectively
* Run offers by a legal committee first
* Hire a lawyer to write contracts
* Ask potential partners/hosts whether we can list them among our
"potential partners and hosts" before doing so
* Have a standard response for people making offers
* Be clear about how we could integrate the resources on offer
* Consider placing databases outside the US
* Consider the legal implications of chapters owning servers

== Trademarks ==
* The status of trademark/domain registrations should be listed on the
Foundation website
* A group should be tasked with keeping track of this information
* Get a lawyer to write a contract regarding licensing the logo
* See http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Logo_and_trademark_policy

== Membership ==
* Create a portal that allows the community to pay one another to
produce such tasks
* Revive the membership task
* Hire a programmer
* Specifying tasks properly
* Mixed views on whether membership was worthwhile, but most thought it was.

== Money ==
* Developer committee should advise on what to buy
* Budget should be documented
* Hire programmers for Wikispecies and have them write a decent UI

== Promotion ==
* Appoint a multi-lingual PR coordinator
* Have an explicit PR budget
* Have an unofficial PR committee
* Spend more on promotion (not all agreed with this)
* Outreach programs to educational institutions

== Grants ==
* Hire a full-time grants coordinator
* Find a way of getting more community involvement with grants

== Developers ==
* Appoint a developer liaison and possibly a separate server liaison
* Encourage and empower the developer committee

== Communication ==
* Clarify the relationship between the Board and the community
* Global message notification and translation
* More regular letters from the board
* More regular/more often meetings
* More formal involvement between chapters and the board
* Reform the OTRS procedures
* Reinvigorat the system of embassies, with elected ambassadors

--
Angela.

That's a lot of suggestions on hiring and spending money. Can we make sure
that the act of getting more money doesn't bankrupt the foundation? I would
hope some funds are set aside for hosting and rainy days.

On Apr 4, 2005 8:48 PM, Angela <beesley@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Thank you to everyone who replied to my questions at
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_agenda/Open_questions.
>
> A lot of good suggestions and helpful comments were made, and I'm
> hoping we will be able to carry out some of these in the near future,
> or to at least begin considering them.
>
> Here is a summary of some of the suggestions. The inclusion of these
> does not mean there was necessarily agreement on carrying out the
> suggestion. Please see [[m:Board agenda/Open questions]] for the full
> discussion.
>
> == Hosting ==
> * Delegate the management of offers or centralize all hosting offers with
> Jimbo
> * Create a private wiki
> * Hire a secretary for Jimbo
> * Hire someone to manage grants and partnerships
> * Use OTRS more effectively
> * Run offers by a legal committee first
> * Hire a lawyer to write contracts
> * Ask potential partners/hosts whether we can list them among our
> "potential partners and hosts" before doing so
> * Have a standard response for people making offers
> * Be clear about how we could integrate the resources on offer
> * Consider placing databases outside the US
> * Consider the legal implications of chapters owning servers
>
> == Trademarks ==
> * The status of trademark/domain registrations should be listed on the
> Foundation website
> * A group should be tasked with keeping track of this information
> * Get a lawyer to write a contract regarding licensing the logo
> * See http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Logo_and_trademark_policy
>
> == Membership ==
> * Create a portal that allows the community to pay one another to
> produce such tasks
> * Revive the membership task
> * Hire a programmer
> * Specifying tasks properly
> * Mixed views on whether membership was worthwhile, but most thought it
> was.
>
> == Money ==
> * Developer committee should advise on what to buy
> * Budget should be documented
> * Hire programmers for Wikispecies and have them write a decent UI
>
> == Promotion ==
> * Appoint a multi-lingual PR coordinator
> * Have an explicit PR budget
> * Have an unofficial PR committee
> * Spend more on promotion (not all agreed with this)
> * Outreach programs to educational institutions
>
> == Grants ==
> * Hire a full-time grants coordinator
> * Find a way of getting more community involvement with grants
>
> == Developers ==
> * Appoint a developer liaison and possibly a separate server liaison
> * Encourage and empower the developer committee
>
> == Communication ==
> * Clarify the relationship between the Board and the community
> * Global message notification and translation
> * More regular letters from the board
> * More regular/more often meetings
> * More formal involvement between chapters and the board
> * Reform the OTRS procedures
> * Reinvigorat the system of embassies, with elected ambassadors
>
> --
> Angela.
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l@wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>

Though there are many suggestions on hiring and
spending money, that does not mean we will follow all
these suggestions. Some editors favored spending money
to improve technical issues. Others to improve
communication. Others to improve the grant area. Or
the legal area.

I think in all these cases, we first need to really
make sure we do not host the resources amongst
ourselves. We obviously can not fund all of them right
now.

There is one thing which is certain though. There is a
lot to do, and we are currently stretched to the limit
of our availabilities. One answer could be to try to
get more editors involved in meta issues.

Ant

Dori a écrit:
> That's a lot of suggestions on hiring and spending
money. Can we make sure
> that the act of getting more money doesn't bankrupt
the foundation? I would
> hope some funds are set aside for hosting and rainy
days.
>
> On Apr 4, 2005 8:48 PM, Angela
<beesley-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
>



__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Make Yahoo! your home page
http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs

Though there are many suggestions on hiring and spending money, that
does not mean we will follow all these suggestions. Some editors favored
spending money to improve technical issues. Others to improve
communication. Others to improve the grant area. Or the legal area.

I think in all these cases, we first need to really make sure we do not
host the resources amongst ourselves. We obviously can not fund all of
them right now.

There is one thing which is certain though. There is a lot to do, and we
are currently stretched to the limit of our availabilities. One answer
could be to try to get more editors involved in meta issues.

Ant

Dori a écrit:
> That's a lot of suggestions on hiring and spending money. Can we make sure
> that the act of getting more money doesn't bankrupt the foundation? I would
> hope some funds are set aside for hosting and rainy days.
>
> On Apr 4, 2005 8:48 PM, Angela <beesley@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>Thank you to everyone who replied to my questions at
>>http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_agenda/Open_questions.
>>
>>A lot of good suggestions and helpful comments were made, and I'm
>>hoping we will be able to carry out some of these in the near future,
>>or to at least begin considering them.
>>
>>Here is a summary of some of the suggestions. The inclusion of these
>>does not mean there was necessarily agreement on carrying out the
>>suggestion. Please see [[m:Board agenda/Open questions]] for the full
>>discussion.
>>
>>== Hosting ==
>>* Delegate the management of offers or centralize all hosting offers with
>>Jimbo
>>* Create a private wiki
>>* Hire a secretary for Jimbo
>>* Hire someone to manage grants and partnerships
>>* Use OTRS more effectively
>>* Run offers by a legal committee first
>>* Hire a lawyer to write contracts
>>* Ask potential partners/hosts whether we can list them among our
>>"potential partners and hosts" before doing so
>>* Have a standard response for people making offers
>>* Be clear about how we could integrate the resources on offer
>>* Consider placing databases outside the US
>>* Consider the legal implications of chapters owning servers
>>
>>== Trademarks ==
>>* The status of trademark/domain registrations should be listed on the
>>Foundation website
>>* A group should be tasked with keeping track of this information
>>* Get a lawyer to write a contract regarding licensing the logo
>>* See http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Logo_and_trademark_policy
>>
>>== Membership ==
>>* Create a portal that allows the community to pay one another to
>>produce such tasks
>>* Revive the membership task
>>* Hire a programmer
>>* Specifying tasks properly
>>* Mixed views on whether membership was worthwhile, but most thought it
>>was.
>>
>>== Money ==
>>* Developer committee should advise on what to buy
>>* Budget should be documented
>>* Hire programmers for Wikispecies and have them write a decent UI
>>
>>== Promotion ==
>>* Appoint a multi-lingual PR coordinator
>>* Have an explicit PR budget
>>* Have an unofficial PR committee
>>* Spend more on promotion (not all agreed with this)
>>* Outreach programs to educational institutions
>>
>>== Grants ==
>>* Hire a full-time grants coordinator
>>* Find a way of getting more community involvement with grants
>>
>>== Developers ==
>>* Appoint a developer liaison and possibly a separate server liaison
>>* Encourage and empower the developer committee
>>
>>== Communication ==
>>* Clarify the relationship between the Board and the community
>>* Global message notification and translation
>>* More regular letters from the board
>>* More regular/more often meetings
>>* More formal involvement between chapters and the board
>>* Reform the OTRS procedures
>>* Reinvigorat the system of embassies, with elected ambassadors
>>
>>--
>>Angela.
>>_______________________________________________
>>foundation-l mailing list
>>foundation-l@wikimedia.org
>>http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>>
>