I would also like to introduce myself to the list. I am Gregory Kohs,
a director of market research for a Fortune 100 media corporation. I
am also the founder of MyWikiBiz.com. In my experience, I have found
several personnel and community members of the Wikimedia sphere to be
unethical and irresponsible. In light of that, I've become something
of a non-stop critic of many things related to Wikimedia Foundation
activities.
I bear no animosity or grudge against this "Communications Project",
but I thought it would be fair to introduce myself and kind of gird
you for the perspective I will be bringing to the table, if I am
allowed to contribute. (On some Wikimedia projects, the immediate
response is to block me from contributing, so we'll see if that is
also the Communications Project's response.)
To get a rough summary of my thoughts about the Wikimedia Foundation
and about its founder, I offer the following links:
http://tinyurl.com/WMF-mythshttp://tinyurl.com/Jimbo-criticism
If anyone has any questions or concerns that you feel I might bring a
fresh perspective, please contact me directly, or here on the list.
Best regards,
Greg
--
Gregory Kohs
Cell: 302.463.1354
Hello there,
As newly joined to the Communication Project Group, I would like to first of
all test if it's works normally for me to post on the mailing list from now
on, and also introducing a bit myself.
I am a Hong Konger as also a Wikipedian since 2007, although for some reason
living in Belfast this moment, whatever. I would be interested to
participated on any sorts of general assistances works as well as some of
translation works involves English - Chinese translation.
Finally just hope that I can co-ordinate with you all as well as possible.
:)
As for instant contact in case of need, my skype account is " jz3138 ".
--
Samuel Chan
Administrative Assistant
Communications Commission
Wikimedia Hong Kong
User:CX257
MSN : saikung792(a)yahoo.com.hk
Please use MSN e-mail for urgent contacts.
Geachte,
Mijn naam is akindele odunayo 710118547-23 ik probeer mijn te doen dus het is zo moielijk voor mij,ik heb contact gemaakt met vershillende organisatie heir in oostende niemand kan mij helpen , ik heb contact gemaakt met directeur generaal vdab, ook directie caw, het is zo moielijk en elke dag krijk ik factuur om zo veel te betalen, nu eddy van brugge dreigdt om al mijn goederen te parken ,eddy is deurwaarden van brugge astublieft ik weet niet wat ik moet doen ik ziet echt in moielijke situatie nu.
akindele odunayo
I would like to start a new audio-recorded "show" that would be a spin-off
from the "Wikivoices" project. Whereas the Wikivoices team refuses to
release the Episode #45 (board of trustees candidate roundtable), and
whereas you can get banned for complaining about how that audio file was
mishandled; and since Episode #51 is a "by invitation only" event; and
whereas the Wikivoices team has refused to authorize episode production by a
certain "banned-from-one-and-only-one-
WMF-project" contributor...
I hereby would like to create the "WikiVices" project, as part of the Meta
Communications Project Group. The purpose of this audio broadcast would be
to give voice to the marginalized and victimized members of the WMF project
communities. Per the instructions:
++++++
*Seek help for your own communications project* - You should send an email
directly to the ComProj email list. A member will create the project page
and/or help you get orientated.
++++++
...I am looking forward to having the project page created for me.
Thank you,
Gregory Kohs
WMF volunteer
The Wiktionary infrastructure and organization can be used for a broader scope and become an R&D material very hard to gather otherwise.
In essence, it is about to collect word representations in different electronic media expressions: text, drawings, sound(music), video.
In other words, someone will be able to associate a word with what is a personal best rendering or associated mental representation. It is even interesting to ask for more than one “multi-media definition”.
Having the characteristics for the persons willing to participate and locations all over the world there is possible to develop very sophisticated tools to interpret the results as well as simple viewers for everybody's delight.
I have been thinking for some time and even defined a database at my web site Yahoo hosting account but the organization is already in place at Wiktionary and you can farther the idea.
Guys,
I do check this list from time to time, and stay across the conversations at
the foundation- l list although, like so many others I'd never go there. But
we are starting to see something approaching a strategy now, so can I bring
up what Samuel was saying earlier about the proliferation of mail lists, and
Guillaume Came back with about "the foundation forgetting their volunteer
basis".
We seem to be stuck in this limbo, even while people make the obvious points
continuously. E.g I had the pleasure of meeting Sue Garner at the GLAMwiki
in Australia. You might know that we've got some recommendations that will
apply in other countries as well as Australia (just by the by)
http://wikimedia.org.au/wiki/GLAM. The main one being Publish stable and
clean URLs for individual item records in collections, incorporating
persistent identifiers.
The other main one is, Use a "free-culture" Creative Commons license (either
CC-by or CC-by-SA) for content on GLAM websites. I think it will require a
Minister to create a policy for this, and I'm working on that, not just for
Wikimedia project but others. In the meantime , you can see wikiaus are
trying to coordinate with the GLAM's over here, and around the globe
(because GLAMs have global communities like wikimedians, for much longer
periods of time).
So we need to coordinate our activities with other people in other
countries; many of whom have asked for a moderated web forum ever since I
came here years ago. I seen others set up forums on the side, which
disappeared after a while because they were strategically ignored by head
office. Hey, I can't figure out why the culture closed down over the years.
I take it there are a million emails going backwards and forwards to and
from San Fran, below the radar, all duplicating similar messages ad
infinitum. Just read through this mail list to get some idea. (The GT tool
helps to make sense of an overpopulated email list. (with entries not
people). I'll point you at an entry by Tim, as he's usually so quiet,
knowledgeable and patient.)
http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/wiki/foundation/177857#177857
Now I'm not a young man, and my eyes are poor, and twitter is out of the
questions, because i need time to think what needs to be done all the way
through. So IRC is OK for my younger peers but nothing I can communicate
with, and emails are scattered around a hundred lists. So my 30 years of
starting and running companies is nothing which I might contribute to WMF's
strategy. Like Samuel, I need some modicum of structure. So let me just
point at two web forums. http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/ and
http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/ The content isn't important, just the
design. I'm sure others would have their suggestions, which I'd like to
hear. All I can suggest is that HO might give forums a try, like so may have
ask for continuously over the years. If you see how these two communities
moderate, they rarely delete, they just move distractions and repetitions to
a 'room's thread, where people can talk through what's on their mind, as
loudly and as passionately as they like. And keep the record of a subject
where it can be found, easily.
With regard to the "real time" stuff, well that's something I'm working on
as well, again, not just for wikimedians but for people who they might want
to collaborate with. It's hampered primarily because no telcos are designing
cheapo conferencing tools for global communities, and unis don't (seem to)
have relationships with the WMF, and are funded nationally, so we can't get
serious about running a few globally distributed conferences.
http://www.accessgrid.org/nodes
So you ask for projects, and these are two. But please, don't include them
in a long drawn out strategy. Cast your mind back a long way before the WMF
got professional, when we didn't have people abiding by what they were
taught in an educational institutions. Cause that IS the problem. In
Australia, we used to say, "just have a go" and often people would. But you
know how it is. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG9CE55wbtY
BTW Eugene. We're using this tool in an open gov initiative, which you might
find useful. http://gov2taskforce.ideascale.com/ And please give my regards
to Sue.