[Foundation-l] Transparency

Sun Jan 13 22:18:47 UTC 2008

Robert Rohde wrote:
> On Jan 9, 2008 3:16 PM, Andrew Whitworth <wknight8111 at gmail.com> wrote:
>   
>> I would disagree. In general, many members of the sister projects have
>> a strong sense of disconnect and disenfranchisement when it comes to
>> the WMF. This is especially true of the smaller projects and the
>> smaller non-english projects. The lines of communication are virtually
>> non-existant for these small projects. If it appears that the only
>> time the WMF cares about a small project is when something is wrong
>> and "action" needs to be taken.
>>     
> While it may be worse for small and non-english projects, I think many
> participants in many of the larger projects also feel disconnected with
> WMF.  Project participants are usually there because they enjoy creating
> something, but from the point of view of project participants the WMF is
> almost never directly involved in creating anything.  The
> WMF mostly provides a behind-the-scenes service to keep the servers running,
> and many people would be perfectly happy if the WMF never, ever got
> involved in the governance of individual projects.  When the WMF does get
> involved, many participants wonder: "Why are you messing with MY work."
It would be unwieldy for WikiCouncil to have representatives from each 
and every project, given that in a one-admin project that person may 
have his hands full just keeping that project going.  WikiCouncil will 
need a ratification policy, even for some of the most obvious policies.  
If WC (with due note of Jimbo's recent English interview) wants all 
projects to adopt the Five Pillars it would need to be subject to 
ratification to avoid the impression that it is nothing more than an 
en:wp policy being imposed on everyone else.

Ec