LSS/foundation-l-archives/2007 week 1

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This issue covers (roughly) 2007 January 1-7

Threads

• [1] Waerth informs the list that he was blocked from nl.WP along with all IP's out of Thailand; where all ISP's use open proxies. He asks where the decision was made to block open proxies. [2] Jerome suggests that open proxies can be blocked for anonymous editors while still allowing registered editors as a solution. [3] Luna informs the list of Meta:No open proxies. [4] Walter suggests that the this topic is local to nl.wiki and is off-topic for foundation-l. [5] Johan informs the list that Waerth was unblocked.
• [6] Anthere informs the list of her four wishes for WMF in the new year. Two major priorities of sustainability and reliability; two minor priorities of outreach and being recognized as a charitable organization. The previous message is hard to summarize consider reading it in full [7]schiste suggests the message is missing a chapters report and Aphaia suggests all of the Committees should prepare a New Year's report.
• [8] Robert Scott Horning informs the list of a message left at en.Wikibooks offering to donate a university level lecture on Calculus. He asks for help deciding which sister project would be the best host and if what the current consensus is on the hosting of video files in general. Some general discussion about the pros and cons of different methods for hosting large files follows. [9] Erik encourages Robert Scott Horning to take the lead in reviewing this content and suggests that WMF should collaborate with Internet Archive on hosting files over 100 MB. Discussion on whether collaborating with Internet archive was a good idea or not and whether or not WMF should consider hosting video as outside it's core mission follows. Later discussion also covers how videos could be made compliant with the terms of the GFDL.
• General discussion over the acknowledgement of Virgin Unite's donation, and whether it was or was not an advertisment, continues from last week. [10] Pat Gunn informs the list of his departure because his concerns over the commercial nature these recent events are not being addressed by WMF. [11] Brion explains that the values of free content are the primary values of WMF. And he suggests that WMF should try to balence between the extreme pro-commercial and anti-commercial ideals based on the needs and goals of WMF instead of what may make people with certain views angry when they hear it.
• [12] teun informs the list of a number of ideas suggested at nl.wiki as alternatives to traditional fundraising. [13] Anthere responds to some of these ideas, in particular inviting volunteers to help ask for subsidies from UN, EU and individual states. [14] Anthere later responds to the suggestion for making deals with clones by explaining the need for volunteer coordinators in the biggest languages to hunt the web for commercial mirrors and then contact them with a OTRS template. Discussion follows about an idea for splitting off some popular culture Wikipedia articles into an advertisment sister website, "fanapedia", and using to money to support WMF.
• [15] Danny re-examines the root of the WMF (Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. That's our commitment.) in response to several recent discussions. The previous message is hard to summarize consider reading in full Discussion follows about whether an anti-advertising stance iss incompatible with this statement and about whether this statement should be interpreted as encouraging the WMF to pay for translators for languages with little content.
• [16] David Gerard informs the list of a discussion about changing the message at MediaWiki:Copyright to explain in detail that WMF is a non-profit charitable organization. Discussion follows about what the best wording is for clarity and ease of translation.
• Another daughter thread born of the dispute over the Virgin Unite matching funds sitenotice. [17] Michael Snow, as chair of the Communications Committee, apologizes for the difficulties in communication between the Wikimedia Foundation and the community. He explains that a general lack of resources and lack of feedback from the community during planning discussions contributed to these difficulties. He informs the list that the volunteer efforts to answer communications from the public are frequently overloaded and invites anyone with good customer service skils who is willing to help with this for a few months to please contact User:UninvitedCompany, the chair of the OTRS subcommittee, or else the OTRS contact for their particular language. He reminds the list that the combined efforts of Wikimedia contributers (YOU!) to spread information are the only way WMF can ever effectively communicate with its projects. Michael also asks for a volunteer willing to coordinate public speaking assignments, both handling requests and organizing a pool of available speakers, and reminds anyone who has made a presentation on WMF or its projects to update the information at Presentations. [18] Gatto Nero disputes many of Michaels points on the advertising issue and asks for a discussion of WMF's communication problems starting from "Communication Committee totally failed in internal communication." [19] Michael Snow clarifes his earlier message and invites anyone who wants to try to resurrect the Wikimedia Quarto or do something similar to be bold. [20] Anthere informs the list of how Transcom has had difficulty dealing with the fundraiser notices and suggests there is a need for backup on the committee. Aphaia, the translation coordinator, agrees and suggests that there should be three more translation coordinators in seperate timezones.
• [21] Nicholas Moreau informs the list that the Academy Awards, SAG Awards, and Golden Globes all rejected his efforts to place a free-content photographer on their red carpets despite having a Rolling Stone photographer as a volunteer. He also asks for any British photographers willing to volunteer for a similar effort aimed at British awards show to contact him.
• [22] Erik asks if there are objections to ratifing Mission/Unstable and Vision/Unstable without the proposed community poll due to the lack of community feedback in the editing phase. A few suggestions are made regarding the further improvement of the Mission Statement. There is also disscusion about how neither statement mentions the issue of advertising.
• [23]Mihai Floran informs the list that the Romanian Wikipedia has reached 50,000 articles.