[Foundation-l] What are the assets of the Foundation, anyway?

Thu Apr 19 10:03:28 UTC 2007

On Thu, April 19, 2007 02:28, Kelly Martin wrote:
> I've
> watched the various members of this Board run around like chickens
> reacting to the events of the day.  You can't even decide how to hold
> your meetings or how to present a unified face; it's perfectly
> reasonable to conclude that you've no idea what the threats to the
> organization are.

I have been biting my tongue now for many months (since the pointless
exercise of the meeting in Frankfurt that basically excelled in trying to
suppress dissent and avoid all the difficult questions and answers) and
trying to not burn any bridges but, whilst I would like to believe that
all the present Board (and officers) have the best interests of the
Foundation and projects at heart, it greatly worries me that the majority
of them have absolutely no idea how to run a business.

No concept of what they should - and should not - be doing. No concept of
how important and *urgent* some of these decisions / actions are. No
concept that their public statements are fine examples of "a little bit of
knowledge is a dangerous thing" in spouting something they've read (maybe
on wp itself) regarding some management idea that was ridiculed years ago
and shown to be insufficient.

People, wake up! You are treating WMF/WP/WM/WB/WS/WT etc as some sort of
school project where you keep getting extensions from the tutor instead of
actually doing the work. Many of you seem to be thinking that hardware is
worth a damn in this world. It isn't; it is entirely replaceable. Names
(Domains especially, but trademarks too) are not.

We have the same problem as professional sports clubs do in accounting for
players they find and bring on. They don't appear on the Balance sheet at
a realistic value because that value can only be placed on the asset once
it is sold, no matter how great the player is. Our lead domain name is -
as Kelly correctly points out - worth something in the mid seven figures
or more (even with how low the dollar is presently!) even if the WMF can't
'access' that value.

Please, people, stop the in-fighting, recognise that while your hearts
might be in the right place your heads (or rather skills and experience)
are not suited for the job at hand that *must* be done properly in the
future, and get the WMF and projects into a safe harbour asap.

Alison Wheeler

(and at some point I might really say what I think ...)