WIKI UK LTD (WIKIMEDIA UK)
ELECTION OF DIRECTORS

This message contains the following information pertaining to the
election of Directors of Wiki UK Limited (Wikimedia UK):

(1) Statement of Persons Nominated
(2) Electoral Procedure
(3) Questions to candidates
(4) Candidate Statements
(5) Ballot Paper for absentee voting

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(1) Statement of Persons Nominated

At the close of nominations, the following individuals stood validly
nominated for election as Directors of Wiki UK Limited:

Roger Bamkin
John Byrne
Thomas Dalton
Chris Keating
Michael Peel
Martin Poulter
Andrew Turvey
Ashley Van Haeften
Steve Virgin

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(2) Electoral Procedure

The Directors are elected under the approval voting system - for each
candidate, you should write "YES" or "NO" by his name on the ballot
paper.

Candidates will be ranked by the number of "YES" votes they receive. A
ballot paper on which the space by a candidate's name is left blank
shall be treated as though it were a "NO" vote.

The top three candidates will be elected as directors irrespective of
the number of "YES" votes they receive. In addition, a maximum of four
further candidates may be elected, provided that they receive a majority
of "YES" votes.

A Resolution will be put to the AGM to appoint as directors the candidates elected by this election.

All candidates are over 18; therefore, the provisions made in the
Election Rules for candidates under 18 do not apply.

To vote, please email the completed ballot paper below to
tellers@wikimedia.org.uk before 23:59 BST (22:59 UTC) on Friday 15th
April 2011. Alternatively, ballot papers will be available at the AGM,
and members present will be entitled to supersede any electronic vote
they may have cast in advance of the meeting with a paper vote cast at
the meeting.

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(3) Questions to Candidates

Any questions Members may wish to ask candidates before they cast their
vote can be recorded on the Wikimedia UK wiki:
http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meetings/2011_election:_Candidate_questions

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(4) Candidate Statements

Each candidate's date of birth, occupation, former names and UK company
directorships in the last five years is kept on file and will be made
public only if they are elected.


Roger Bamkin

My name is Roger Bamkin and I'm an admin on en:Wikipedia (also active on
Commons, Simple and Wikisource). Historically I was a leading member of
WPSchools and WPDerbyshire. I continue to assist in running the "Did You
Know" project and I have written hundreds of articles, but more
importantly I have nominated for DYK over a hundred articles by other
editors . In real life I trained as a mechanical engineer, systems
analyst and teacher and I have been a senior IT manager controlling
staff and budgets of millions. I have also been a partner in a minor
software company and chaired I.T. standard committees for the UK. I have
written academic papers on RDBMSs, e-commerce, AI and co-written  (and
sold) pantomime scripts.

My interest in Wikipedia deepened last year when I saw an opportunity to
have a free VIP visit to the British Museum via a group called
"Wikimedia UK". I became a leading player in the British Museum
collaboration with Wikimedia and as a consequence I was invited to give
a talk at last years GLAMWIKI conference on the "History of the World in
100 articles" describing the work we did. I was inspired to see if this
British Museum idea could be cloned at smaller museums. That event will
take place on April 9th in Derby. Creating this event has brought me
into contact with other leading Wikimedia players and has resulted in be
asked to talk about the novel work using QR Codes in Bristol recently.

At Wikimedia's 10th anniversary celebrations it was obvious that the
stakes have changed. Peter Mandelson was there - jokes about Wikipedia
are just uninforned bar talk when we have 400 milion users. Every
student in the country is using Wikipedia to help their education -
whether they are allowed to or not. Oxford University is recognising
Wikipedia's qualities. However the German Wikipedia has 20 employees and
last year Wikimedia UK had less than one.

Richard Dawkins recently noted that if he had the original idea for
Wikipedia he would have known that it was not going to work. He was
pleased to see that he was wrong. Wikipedia is an amazing success which
grows in terms of both quality and quantity, but the challenges of being
a more mature institution await. Educational and cultural institutions
are realising that wikimedia projects are where many people do their
initial research. They may go on to look further or use one of
wikipedi's references. Either way, these organisations need to re-engage
with a research process that does include wikimedia projects. They will
need help and we need theirs.

Wikimedia and its UK chapter face a major challenge in the next few
years. Its mission deserves our help.


John Byrne

On Wikipedia I am User:Johnbod, with 87,000 odd edits on English
Wikipedia, few of them automated, made since 2006. I write mostly on art
history, with some history, and a good number of articles are listed on
my user page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Johnbod . I also add
and categorize images on Commons. I have been a major contributor to
seven featured articles, mostly collaborations, and 164 DYKs. Two of the
FAs were connected with the British Museum GLAM (Galleries, Libraries,
Archives and Museums) project last year:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Gold_Cup which I pretty much did myself, and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoxne_Hoard , which was a large
group effort. I also gave a talk at the Wikipedia GLAM conference at the
British Museum in November, and took part in the British Library event
in January, which was partly responsible for leading me to spend much of
my recent editing trying to improve our coverage of Islamic art.

Outside Wikipedia I am a 55 year old qualified (ICSA) Company Secretary,
who has worked mostly in reference publishing; I was Company Secretary
of the Marshall Cavendish Group, and a Trustee of its Pension Fund. Much
of my time was spent dealing with new subsidiaries in Central and
Eastern Europe, several of which experienced the kind of explosive
growth in activity that Wikimedia UK will now be experiencing. I am very
used to dealing with outside advisors of various kinds. I am currently
essentially unemployed, which gives me plenty of time to devote to
Wikipedia and the chapter. I am married with four children and live just
outside London.

Wikimedia UK faces a period of great change, putting the funds that are
now available to good use. We will be transitioning to a registered
charity with employees, and the function of the Board will change to a
much more supervisory one than at present. If we follow the pattern of
the German chapter this very rapid growth will continue for some years.
I have experience of the special challenges of organizations that are
growing rapidly, and a broad range of experience of management issues.

As a Wikipedian I am mainly a content writer, and am very conscious of
the problems we face maintaining and expanding our base of editors. I
believe there are many ways the chapter can help here, and this should
be our main focus for new activities. Last year’s GLAM initiatives were
a very good start here, which have been widely copied by other chapters.
I believe there are other kinds of organizations and groups we should be
trying to address, and am especially keen to reach older potential
editors. We also need to expand chapter membership and involvement,
while accepting that many very active UK Wikipedians prefer only to
engage online. I have met the current board and already knew most of
those potential candidates who came to the “Board interest” meeting in
February, and I believe I can work well as a member of the new board.


Thomas Dalton

I was appointed to the board in January 2010 to fill a newly vacant
seat, having previously served as volunteer Head of Fundraising during
the 2009/10 fundraiser (the chapter's first fundraiser). I was then
re-elected at the AGM in April 2010 and was appointed Treasurer by the
new Board. I have now served as Treasurer for a year, during which
time the role has grown from overseeing a budget of less than £100,000
to overseeing one of more than half a million pounds. I played a key
role in compiling our budget for 2011 and I also drafted the chapter's
first financial controls, helping to ensure that money is spent
appropriately (and can be proven to have been spent appropriately).

Unfortunately, since I've started a new job since the last AGM, I
don't really have the time to spare to continue as treasurer, however
I would like to continue as an ordinary board member. This would
enable me to support my successor as treasurer and to continue guiding
the direction of the chapter. I think the board would benefit greatly
from my experience of having served on the board for over a year and
my experience as a very active member of the chapter before joining
the board (and even before the chapter was founded - I was one of the
people involved with getting the current incarnation of the chapter
started after the previous attempt failed).

My priorities for the chapter over the next year are to move forward
with our plans to hire several new staff members (our first full-time
staff members) and opening an office. I believe these staff members
should serve to facilitate the members of the chapter (and the
Wikimedia community generally) in running their own initiatives by
providing infrastructure and doing a lot of the more tedious work.
They will also free up the board to concentrate on making sure the
chapter is all that it can be, rather than spending a lot of our time
just keeping our heads above water. I also think the chapter should
ork to improve its fundraising in order to increase the amount of
work we can do supporting the Wikimedia movement.

Thank you.


Chris Keating

I have been involved with Wikimedia projects since 2004 when I made my
first edits to en.wikipedia as User:The Land. Since then I've become an
administrator on en.wp and have made written or significantly
contributed to four featured articles; I've also contributed to Commons
and Wikisource.

My real-world background is in the voluntary sector. I have experience
of fundraising, building volunteer networks and campaigning in voluntary
organisations both large and small. A particular priority for me is to
improve Wikimedia UK's internal communications. Non-profit organisations
tend to stand or fall by their ability to inspire and reach out to their
supporters, and I believe this is an area where we have a great deal to
do. While my skills are available whether I'm on the Board or not, I
think it's important that there are people on the Board who are engaged
with this work.

A large part of Wikimedia UK's role is to support the community by
making connections. The outgoing Board can be very proud that Britain
leads the world in collaboration in the cultural sector. I was one of
many Wikipedians to be inspired by the British Museum project last
summer, and at time of writing I am working to set up a partnership with
the National Maritime Museum. It is clearly important that we capitalise
on the growing recognition by the cultural sector, by universities and
academics that the Wikimedia movement is worth engaging with.

I also believe my background will be helpful as the new Board implements
the plan to recruit more staff this coming year and make the Chapter a
more professional organisation. It will not necessarily be easy for the
Board to manage this transition, but done well (as it can be) it offers
us the chance to achieve far more.

Please vote for me...


Michael Peel

I have been involved with WMUK since it was rebooted in 2008, serving
first as Membership Secretary and then as Chair, and most recently as
Secretary. My involvement has included organising events (most recently
the [[Cancer Research UK Workshop]]; others include the [[Editathon,
British Library]] and [[Britain Loves Wikipedia]]); talking to the
media; responding to email queries (until our office manager, Charles,
took over this role); talking with partner organisations; and much more.
I have represented the chapter at the Chapters Meeting three times (in
2009, 2010 and 2011), as well as attending other Wikimedia meetings
(e.g. the Multimedia Usability meeting in November 2009, and Wikimania
in 2010), and I've also represented the chapter at non-Wikimedia-focused
meetings.

I have been active on Wikipedia for over 6 years (my first edit was in
March 2005), during which time I've made around 16,000 edits (although
my edit rate has dropped off considerably since being involved with
Wikimedia UK). I'm also active on the Commons, where I have made over
5,000 edits and uploaded over 1,600 images of my own creation. I have
also made over 3,000 edits on Wikisource. In real life, I'm employed as
a postdoctoral researcher at the Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics
(part of the University of Manchester).

This last year has seen fantastic progress for the chapter. We've
organised a series of successful in-person events, a particular
highlight being the [[GLAM-WIKI]] conference at the British Museum
(organised by Liam Wyatt, supervised by myself). The chapter has
participated in a very successful fundraiser, which brought in over half
a million pounds to the Wikimedia movement. And much more.

In order to grow our activity to match our budget, we urgently need to
professionalise the chapter over the coming year - primarily by hiring
full-time employees - in order to scale up the activities and become an
effective organisation. The planning process has been started by the
current board, with 4-5 positions planned over the coming year, and
represents a major transition period for the organisation. I would like
to provide continuity during this process, as well as continuing to
provide input and oversight to make sure that the chapter continues
along the same approaches of transparency and responsibility as it has
thus far, and also involves as many volunteers as possible in all of its
activities. Simultaneously, I believe that the chapter should continue
organising events (both by board members and ordinary members) to the
best of its ability in the interim period, as well as provide funding
for Wikimedia volunteers as necessary for them to pursue their
activities both on- and off-line.

Please don't hesitate to ask me any questions you might have (on my talk
page, or anywhere else you see me around).


Martin Poulter

I am dedicating an increasing amount of time and effort to promoting
Wikimedia's culture and goals by engaging with the wider world. I would
like to be able to do this in an official capacity.

I work 80% part-time in a national teaching support project based at the
University of Bristol, which involves educating academics about Creative
Commons and the wiki approach. Some of my job involves being part of a
close-knit team, and I am involved in bidding for funds, hiring staff,
forming external partnerships and promoting the project around the
country. I frequently bridge between "techies" and "non-techies",
explaining their work to each other.

As User:MartinPoulter, I have just over 5000 edits on English Wikipedia,
mainly improving articles related to real and fake psychology. My
background includes a Philosophy and Psychology degree from Oxford
University and a PhD in the Philosophy of Science from the University of
Bristol, where for six years I was also a teaching assistant. Apart from
Wikimedia, my other "mission" in life is promoting critical thnking.
This involves frequent public speaking: a list of talks can be found via
my personal site, infobomb.org . Over the years I have had more than
thirty appearances in press, radio or TV.

My recent outreach work in support of Wikimedia UK includes co-
organising the Bristol Wiki Academy, negotiating towards a content
partnership (details of which are not public at the time of writing),
supporting Steve Virgin at meetings with local partner organisations,
training new users at the Cancer Research UK Workshop organised by Mike
Peel (and contributing to the press release), speaking about Wikimedia
UK within the University, putting the World Service in contact with Rod
Ward for an interview about wikipedian academics, and an interview in
the Times that was brought about by Gemma Griffiths.

I hope and expect to see Wikimedia UK rapidly raise its profile and
effectiveness. The board and wider community have done impressive work
so far working with the GLAM sector, with other national bodies and with
local outreach in different areas. This is only a start. There are many
potential partner organisations and individuals who can benefit from
working with us to improve the encyclopedia and other projects. We still
have to overcome misconceptions about - and consequent hostility to -
Wikipedia. We have to get Wikimedia UK and its goals more widely known
in their own right. My experience with events so far is that once we get
a chance to give people our message, we can win them over. Getting to
that point is the difficult bit, and requires a larger team talking to a
wider range of partners.

I am happy to answer questions about this nomination, preferably via my
English Wikipedia talk page.


Andrew Turvey

I have been on the board of WIkimedia UK for three terms now and would
like to run for a fourth so that the new board has continuity.

As Chair and Company Secretary, I have worked hard this last year, as
have the other board members, to fulfill our plans. My particular
contributions have included:
- the board interest day, which I hope will lead to the largest influx
of new directors since we started three years ago
- changing the way the board operates, with fewer meetings overall,
but more in person meetings and more decision making by email
- progressing our charity application
- establishing the legal arrangements that allowed us to participate
in the fundraiser
- completing our first set of accounts, which will soon be joined by the
second!
- recruiting our first member of staff, our pro-bono Head of PR and
developing plans to recruit more staff

Not everything has been plain sailing, and I haven't managed to do as
much as I would have liked. It hasn't been easy to fit everything in
alongside work and family commitments. In particular:
- we weren't able to manage board members' workload as well as we
should, and lost another board member this year as a result
- the board hasn't always been pushing in the same direction, working
together with a single vision
- our relationship with the Foundation has suffered some knocks
- not as much progress as we had hoped has been made with our charity
application or the recruitment of staff
- we didn't acheive the plans we set out in our budget at the start or
the year
- and, of course, our reputation was affected by our late accounts

Much of this is being addressed by the board, particularly through
professionalising the chapter. I hope the new board will focus on
these issues and, if I'm re-elected, they will certainly be a priority
for me. However, there are also lots of positive opportunities coming
up for the chapter:

- we have a developing track record and pipeline of events with
museums and the "GLAM" sector
- the promising "Campus Ambassador" programme
- a healthy budget of £200,000 to support activities
- a much more positive media commentary on us in recent months
- an ambitious programme of staff recruitment
- a new split of responsibilities between an executive committee and
the full board

I am looking forward to doing what I can, if re-elected, to contribute
to all of this.


Ashley Van Haeften

I am a heavy contributor to GLAM collaborations and as an 'ambassador'
I am acting as a default point of contact for our the relationships
with the British Library and British Museum and have recently started
contact with the Wellcome Trust and English Heritage. At an
international level our expectations for how such collaborations is
maturing and I sit on the GLAM steering committee to keep an eye on
(and a hand in) how our common understanding develops. I am concious
of the importance of other UK projects that have recently been
receiving less attention - Wiki Loves Monuments, non-English outreach
and the new editor experience - finding ways of WMUK staying focussed
on the strategic level and new ways of delegating project execution
will be critical to ramping up all these activities in parallel.

I believe there are three key challenges for WMUK over the coming year:
- achieving charity status
- maximizing the engagement with museums and archives that has
successfully generated high levels of interest and goodwill
- delivering large and uniquely UK focussed projects to improve
engagement and diversity of content

My professional background is as a management and organizational
specialist which fits well with the prospect of the next 12 months
being a time of continued rapid growth and tricky change for the UK
chapter.


Steve Virgin

I am standing because I would relish the chance to help finish the job
the last two Boards have begun and see achieving Charitable Status,
building a network of successful outreach projects and helping to move
the Chapter's communications with the media onto the front foot. The
transformation to a professionally-led Chapter over the next 12 months
requires careful management on the part of the Board, not only in terms
of recruitment (with at least four new full time roles likely to be
appointed & a new office opened) but also in terms of the new full-time
team getting up to speed in their roles. This will mean 2011-2012 is a
‘transitional Board’ and that is why I think I have a role to play in
ensuring a smooth and successful transition.


Achievements during the last 12 months:

I have organised these events on behalf of the Board:

The Annual Fund Raising Summit – 3 days in May 2010 – held in Bristol
http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/2010_Fundraising_Summit
Sponsored by HP Labs, Bristol City Council & The Watershed – the meeting
facilitated fund raising discussions for the winter 2010 fund raiser
between six national chapters and the Wikimedia Foundation over 3 days.

Wikipedia’s 10th Birthday celebrations – sponsored by HP Labs,
University of Bristol, Bristol Festival of Ideas & Bristol City Council
http://ten.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol
Jimmy Wales spoke at a 700-strong event at the University of Bristol
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YR7CPQrHkUQ (6’ version produced by BBC)
Jimmy Wales spoke at the Bristol Cathedral School
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Chs7Q3xJoBc (locally produced version)

Jimmy Wales’ talk led to several hundred news stories on the event being
available on Google News the next morning. There were 3000 people
watching the University of Bristol event live online & the live stream
shot by BBC Anchor Project, local Wikipedians & Bristol City Council has
had around 25,000 hits since the event.

More recently – in conjunction with local Bristol-based Wikipedian
trainers we held a successful Wikipedia Academy
http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Bristol_Wiki_Academy_1

And today’s AGM
http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/WikiConference_UK_2011


I have built a successful relationship with the BBC & hope to take this
national. The BBC has now donated something to Wikimedia UK under a
Public Domain licence for the first time ever (its record of Jimmy
Wales’ talk at Bristol University). Having a precedent for a donation to
WMUK will make it easier to persuade the BBC to share more content. I am
a regular speaker at events on behalf of Wikimedia UK – some national
(CIPR & Kaizo) and some regional (University of Gloucester, BRRISM,
Bristol City Council & IGNITE).

Finally, there are advanced on-going discussions with possible global
content partners in the environmental sector. I also  have strong
interest from local Universities & schools in working alongside us on
the Campus Ambassador program and on a range of other outreach
initiatives. I would like to help finish the job of ‘professionalising
the Chapter’ and see next year’s Board able to concentrate on the
strategic bigger picture rather than operational details – which have
held us back a little over the last two years.



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(5) Ballot Paper


If you wish to cast your vote before the AGM, please send the following
ballot paper to tellers@wikimedia.org.uk before 23:59 BST on Friday 15th
April 2011.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
WIKI UK LIMITED (WIKIMEDIA UK)
ELECTION OF DIRECTORS

Name:
Membership number:


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ballot Paper

Write "YES" or "NO" beside name of each candidate.

Roger Bamkin       [   ]
John Byrne         [   ]
Thomas Dalton      [   ]
Chris Keating      [   ]
Michael Peel       [   ]
Martin Poulter     [   ]
Andrew Turvey      [   ]
Ashley Van Haeften [   ]
Steve Virgin       [   ]

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As ever, any questions about the elections should be directed to
tellers@wikimedia.org.uk.



James Farrar
Teller, Wikimedia UK