User:Soni/BoT 2024 guide

This is my evaluation of all candidates in the 2024 WMF Board of Trustees elections. I will keep updating this page as more information arrives.

General Metrics

For each subcategory, I plan to put roughly 4 candidates in Support and 2-4 candidates in Neutral. Elections are zero sum, and I would like to reward candidates that strongly align with my criteria much more than those who weakly align with everything.

For the overall ordering, I am also considering my own opinions and how well the candidates align with them.

Experience with Wikimedia Movement

When judging experience I care about (in that order) -

1. Significant experience within any Wikimedia project or higher roles (sysop/bureaucrat/Arbitration Committee)
2. Clear work with offwiki projects or initiatives (Affliates or hubs, hosting events)
3. Other roles within the movement that require experience (BoT, committees)

I am not counting any experience outside the Wikimedia movement; it's hard to evaluate and not relevant to me. The WMF already appoints board members with outside perspectives, so I believe the community and affliates should nominate those with significant experience within our projects.

All candidates are ordered by roughly my order of preference.

1. Maciej Artur Nadzikiewicz -  Support. Clear long term experience with editing, admin on Polish Wikipedia. Significant experience organising offwiki events. Some committee experience.
2. Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight -  Support. Significant experience onwiki and admin on English Wikipedia. Significant experience organising offwiki events. Some committee experience, sitting Board of Trustees member.
3. Victoria Doronina -  Support. Admin and former Arbitration Committee member on Russian Wikipedia. Sitting Board of Trustees member, and some other movement experience.
4. Lane Rasberry -  Support. Significant long term experience onwiki. Strong offwiki organising credentials. Some other experience across the movement.
5. Lorenzo Losa - Neutral. Admin on Italian Wikipedia. Some affliate experience. Sitting Board of Trustees member.
6. Christel Steigenberger - Neutral. Admin on Commons, former admin on German Wikipedia. Experience as WMF employee, which I do not value as strongly.
7. Farah Jack Mustaklem - Neutral. Clear experience on affliate side of things. I cannot offhand evaluate them all, but founding new offwiki communities is a strong positive.
8. Deon Steyn - Neutral. Strong onwiki experience and Admin on Afrikaans Wikipedia. Little offwiki experience.
9. Bobby Shabangu -  Oppose. Not great experience onwiki. Some experience with offwiki and affliates.
10. Mohammed Awal Alhassan -  Oppose. No significant onwiki experience (Despite Admin at Dagaare Wikipedia). Not significant offwiki experience.
11. Tesleemah Abdulkareem -  Oppose. I would Oppose them if they applied for sysop in their home project (English Wikipedia). There is no significant offwiki experience to offset these.
12. Erik Hanberg -  Oppose. Nobody with <100 global edits should be in any higher roles in any project, forget the Board of Trustees.

Answers

Each candidate was expected to answer five questions - Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5

All answers collected together can be found here.

When judging answers I care about (in that order) -

1. Clear answer that "gets" the question (as opposed to generic corporate-speak)
2. Any specific stance they stand for (as opposed to candidates with no own opinions)
3. Unique insights from candidate (as opposed to same ideas as anyone)

All candidates are ordered by roughly my order of preference.

1. Maciej Artur Nadzikiewicz -  Support. A1 was a unique perspective and clearly explained all the reasonings. A2 was the level of depth I expect from a BoT candidate. A3 was solid. A4 has a clear stance, even if I don't agree with it all. A5 was solid. Candidate voluntarily chose to answer all community questions at another location, a very strong positive in my eyes.
2. Lane Rasberry -  Support. A1 is exactly the level of insight I expect from a trustee. A2 is solid. A3 is another unique and insightful take I support. A4, I don't fully support but they have a clearly articulated stance. A5 is the commitment to transparency I prefer from all trustees.
3. Victoria Doronina -  Support A1 has a clear reasoned take but I disagree with the facts as written. A2 was solid and the level of depth I expect from a BoT member. A3 is solid and reasonable. A4 had unique insights and clear language I appreciate. A5 explained all its stances well and had a clear take. No answers have corporate speak, and all have insights.
4. Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight -  Support. A1 had a clear consistent take. A2 was well written but lacking in depth I expect from a sitting BoT member. A3 had a clear take, but felt generic. A4 was solid and clearly written. A5 was solid and the level of experience I expect from a BoT member.
5. Lorenzo Losa - Neutral A1 was well worded but somewhat lacking in insights from a sitting member of BoT. A2 was well worded. A3 was solid and made new clear cut points. A4, while not quite "bold", clearly demonstrated solid understanding of our Movement. A5 was too generic.
6. Deon Steyn - Neutral. A1 was well written and spoke about specifics. A2 felt slightly generic. A3 was very generic. A4 was bold; while I didn't agree with everything, every point had some reasoning. A5 was solid.
7. Mohammed Awal Alhassan - Neutral. This one is hard to judge because I suspect the candidate is not a native English speaker. A1 was too verbose and felt generic despite some valid points. A2 had more insights but felt similar. A3 had a clearer stance though I disagree. A4 had a clear understandable take with valid points. A5 was solid. Overall had many new points of view, but not confident on their depth.
8. Bobby Shabangu -  Oppose. A1 was unique but did not fill me with confidence. A2, A3 were solid. A4 was filled with corporate speak. A5 was well answered, and engaged with the question.
9. Christel Steigenberger -  Oppose. A1 was well written, but didn't really answer the question. A2 was also quite generic. A3 did not answer anything. A4 was a non-answer filled with politician-speak. A5 was more solid, but still quite a non-answer.
10. Tesleemah Abdulkareem -  Oppose. Their level of English is not sufficient for most lesser roles, forget a Board Member. This makes their answers hard to understand. This would not be a problem usually; except the candidate's "home project" is English Wikipedia.
11. Erik Hanberg -  Oppose. No answer to Q1. If a board candidate cannot answer all community questions, I do not trust them to be accountable to the community.
12. Farah Jack Mustaklem -  Oppose. Late answers. If a board candidate cannot devote enough time to answer all community questions, I do not trust them to be accountable to the community. They later put their answers on their talk page; I found them mostly solid.

Wikimania Presentations

During Wikimania, each candidate presented a 3-min speech ([Link to start of sessions (1:49:52)).

When judging the presentations, I value -

1. Coherence - I value candidates whose ideas come across clearly to the audience (As opposed to meandering statements)
2. Messaging - I value candidates whose presentation has a clear message (Their credentials, their goals for the BoT, etc)

These votes are sorted by my rough preference order. I also link the timestamp when they start their presentation.

1. Lane Rasberry (2:10:03)-  Support Very strong message, clear ideals and goals for what needs to change in BoT. Well presented, and established credentials.
2. Victoria Doronina (2:29:00) -  Support Credentials are clearcut, goals are very clear. Presentation goes in depth on various points.
3. Farah Jack Mustaklem (2:06:33) -  Support Established credentials well, clear goals as a prospective BoT member.
4. Maciej Artur Nadzikiewicz (2:16:31) -  Support Well presented, their goals and credentials are very clear.
5. Bobby Shabangu (1:55:07) -  Support The presentation felt honest and authentic; it was packed with their unique perspective.
6. Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight (2:22:54) - Neutral Very clear credentials, could not present any goals
7. Christel Steigenberger (1:58:10)- Neutral The presentation discussed her credentials, but felt lacking in discussing the Wiki projects.
8. Tesleemah Abdulkareem (2:26:17) - Neutral Well presented, but no BoT goals or Wikipedian perspective.
9. Lorenzo Losa (2:13:07) - Neutral Bit more generic than I prefer.
10. Deon Steyn (2:01:24)-  Oppose. The goals were rambling and not related to Wikimedia closely enough. There was clarity issues through the presentation.
11. Mohammed Awal Alhassan (2:19:30) -  Oppose No clear goals, no clear credentials.
12. Erik Hanberg (2:04:15)-  Oppose The presentation did not talk about Wikimedia projects, which I value way more than his discussion about Non Profits.

Final Tally

For the overall ordering, I am also considering my own opinions and how well the candidates align with them. This is effectively "my ballot" for the BoT elections.

All columns are sortable by my preference order.

My vote #	Candidate	Global user link	Experience	Answers	Wikimania presentation	Overall	Personal Notes
1	Lane Rasberry	Bluerasberry (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Support	Support	Support	Support	I strongly value more transparency and accountability. Bluerasberry's history and answers convince me the most on holding the Board and the rest of WMF accountable.
2	Maciej Artur Nadzikiewicz	Nadzik (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Support	Support	Support	Support	I disagree with Nadzik on Movement Charter, but I appreciate their engagement with the community. Their voluntary answers to all asked questions were frank and impressive, and something I hope more BoT candidates do.
3	Victoria Doronina	Victoria (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Support	Support	Support	Support	Her responses to the Movement charter vote make me very impressed. I value BoT members who are frank and open with the community.
4	Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight	Rosiestep (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Support	Support	Neutral	Support
5	Lorenzo Losa	Laurentius (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Neutral	Neutral	Neutral	Neutral
6	Farah Jack Mustaklem	Fjmustak (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Neutral	Oppose	Support	Neutral
7	Christel Steigenberger	Kritzolina (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Neutral	Oppose	Neutral	Neutral
8	Deon Steyn	Oesjaar (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Neutral	Neutral	Oppose	Neutral
9	Bobby Shabangu	Bobbyshabangu (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Oppose	Oppose	Support	Oppose
10	Mohammed Awal Alhassan	Alhassan Mohammed Awal (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Oppose	Neutral	Oppose	Oppose
11	Tesleemah Abdulkareem	Tesleemah (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Oppose	Oppose	Neutral	Oppose
12	Erik Hanberg	Erikemery (talk • meta edits • global user summary • CA)	Oppose	Oppose	Oppose	Oppose