Wikimedia Chapters Association/Glossary
The WCA/Glossary helps to understand the Wikimedia movement better; it is a kind of guide through the jungle of abbreviations, names and terms. Feel free to add an item here, as long as it is about something important for the movement and not only a personal thing.
AffCom, see Affiliations Committee
Affiliations Committee: The AffCom is the WMF committee that deals with chapters, thematic organisations and user groups. It makes recommendations to the WMF board of trustees.
Amical Viquipèdia: This organisation is the first and (by now) only thematic organisation; it is actually a special case. It represents Catalan speaking Wikimedians, and as there are already chapters in the countries where Catalan is spoken, it did not become a chapter.
Ashur, Tomer: Chair of Wikimedia Israel, in 2012 leader of the steering committee that supported the establishment of the WCA between the Berlin Wikimedia Conference (April) and Wikimania in Washington (July).
Association, see Wikimedia Chapters Association
Board of the Foundation, see WMF Board of trustees
Chapter report: A chapter is supposed to write regularly a report about its activities and events. The reports appear on Meta Wiki.
Chapter selected board member: The chapters together select every two years two people as member of the WMF board of trustees. The last time, in 2012, these people were Alice Wiegand (Germany) and Patricio Lorente (Argentina).
Chapter: A chapter is a national organisation to support the Wikimedia movement and the wiki volunteers in a specific country. Usually, a chapter is a non profit organisation based on individual membership.
Chapters Dialogue: A 2013 initiative of Wikimedia Deutschland to learn more about the chapters.
Chapters-l: A closed mailing list for the chapters. Its problem is that not all chapters seem to be reached by this list, and its closed character leads to suspicions. Also, mails on this list do not necessarily remain "secret".
Charter, see WCA Charter
Chen, Ting: Former chair of the WMF board of trustees.
Community: Usually, the communities of the Wikipedia language versions. Council, see WCA Council
Dijk, Ziko van: Chair of Wikimedia Nederland, since 2012 deputy chair of the WCA Council.
Donations, see specified donations
Entity: An organisation within the movement. Usually, the chapters, thematic organisations and user groups are those "entities", but actually also the WMF is an entity within the movement.
Fae, see Haeften, Ashley van
FDC, see Funds Dissemination Committee
Foundation, see Wikimedia Foundation
Fundraiser, fundraising: Term usually referring to the annual fundraiser (call for donations) of the movement.
Funds Dissemination Committee: A WMF committee to find out how much money a Wikimedia organisation needs for the next year to reach its goals. The FDC makes recommendations to the WMF board of trustees, and usually the WMF board of trustees follows those recommendations.
Funds, see Funds Dissemination Committee
Gardner, Sue: The executive director of the WMF, chief of the staff. It has been announced that she will leave the WMF this year. The WMF is looking for a new executive director.
General counsel: An employee of the WMF who handles legal issues.
Glaser, Markus: Since 2013 the WCA Council chair.
Grant: A Wikimedia organisation or an individual can ask money from the WMF, with a maximum of 50,000 dollars.
Haeften, Ashley van: Former chair of Wikimedia UK, in 2012/2013 the first WCA Council chair.
Haifa letter: On Wikimedia 2011 in Haifa, the WMF board of trustees issued a letter about the fundraising via Wikipedia. Chapters should not longer do the fundraising in their countries, with the exception of WMDE, WMUK, WMFR and WMCH. Only WMDE and WMCH left of these.
Iberocoop: The chapters from Spanish speaking countries have a network of their own. It includes also people and organisations from e.g. Portugese speaking countries. Image filter: In 2011, the WMF board of trustees decided to introduce a filter for controversial content. Later, the idea was abandoned after negative response from the community.
Journal, see WCA/Journal
Legal counsel, see general counsel
Lorente, Patricio: The head of Wikimania 2009 in Buenos Aires. In 2012, he was one of the chapter selected board members.
Lyzzy, see Wiegand, Alice
Meta Wiki: Wiki for the whole, international Wikimedia movement. Here you find information about the WMF, WCA, etc.
Meta, see Meta Wiki
Moleski, Sebastian: Former chair of Wikimedia Deutschland, influential contributor to the WCA Charter.
Movement, see Wikimedia movement
Office: Some organisations in the movement have an office, for example the Wikimedia Foundation ("San Francisco", in short) and several chapters. In the office, the staff of the organisation works, but it is often also used as a "community space" where members and wiki volunteers meet.
Resolution: The WMF board of trustees and the WCA Council issue resolutions, i.d. decisions or statements.
Richter, Pavel: Director of Wikimedia Deutschland.
San Francisco: The WMF office is located in San Francisco, USA.
Signpost: An editorial written newspaper of Wikipedia in English, appears once a week.
Specified donations: Donations in the movement are specified or unspecified. A specified donation is a donation to a specific organisation, e.g. to the WMF or to a chapter. Other donations are unspecified, they are usually coming in via the Wikipedia fundraiser. These other (unspecified) donations are disseminated based on the recomendations of the FDC.
Thematic organisation: An organisation within the movement. While a chapter is based in one country, a thematic organisation is based on a subject or topic. Also, it has to be a legal (incorporated, registered) organisation, while a user group does not have to be.
Thorg, see thematic organisation
Trademarks: "Wikipedia", "Wikimedia" etc. are trademarks of the WMF. Note that "wiki" is not a trademark.
User group: A group of people who are occupied with a specific (Wikimedia-related) topic. It does not have to be a legal organisation.
Wales, Jimmy: The founder of Wikipedia (or, together with his employee Larry Sanger, the co-founder). In 2003 he founded the Wikimedia Foundation, and since then he is a member of the WMF board of trustees.
Walsh, Kate: Chair of the WMF board of trustees since 2012.
WCA Charter: The bylaws of the WCA, accepted by many chapters in Berlin, April 2012. In 2013 it has been changed to open the Association for the thematic organisations (and partially user groups).
WCA Council: The Council is the most important organ of the WCA. Every member organisation of the WCA can appoint one Council Member.
WCA-announcements: A mailing list used by the WCA Council chair informs about the Associaiton. Everyone can join the list.
WCA, see Wikimedia Chapters Association
WCA/Journal: The place on Meta Wiki where you can read about the movement. News can be added immediately, by everyone.
Wiegand, Alice (user name: Lyzzy): Former board member of Wikimedia Deutschland, and since 2012 a chapter selected board member of the WMF.
Wiki loves monuments: An international photo contest of the movement, originally from the Netherlands.
Wiki: A wiki is a website that can be edited by (theoretically) "everyone". Some wikis have the goal to create content (such as Wikipedia), others help to organise (such as Meta Wiki). The Wikimedia wikis (often called "Wikimedia projects") are those wikis owned by the Wikimedia Foundation. Some organisational wikis are owned by chapters.
Wikimania: the main international annual conference of the movement. Every year in a different country; it is the goal to have it in turns on different continents. In 2011 (Haifa, Israel) it attracted 600 people, in 2012 (Washington, USA) 1,400.
Wikimedia Chapters Association: The WCA is an international non-governmental organisation. Its members are chapters, but also thematic organisations can join. Every member can send one person to the WCA Council. The chair of the Council is Markus Glaser.
Wikimedia Conference: The annual conference of the chapters and other organisations. After it took place in the Netherlands in 2008 for the first time as "chapters conference", it moved to Berlin in the following years. In April 2013 it happened in Milan, Italy. The weekend conference is attended by most chapters, some other organisations and also by people from the WMF.
Wikimedia Foundation: An international non profit organisation that is the owner of the Wikimedia wikis such as Wikipedia. The legal or statutory seat is in Florida, the office in San Francisco.
Wikimedia movement: The entire network of organisations and individuals who support the goals of the Wikimedia Foundation.
Wikimedia project, see wiki
Wikimedia user groups, see user groups
Wikimedia-l: The main mailing list of the movement, former "Foundation-l".
Wikivoyage: The first WMF wiki that has been founded not by the movement but outside of it. In 2012, the wiki together with its supporting association Wikivoyage e.V. joined the movement. Wikivoyage e.V. is a Germany based association that is interested to become a thematic organisation. WLM, see Wiki loves monuments
WMF Board of trustees: The WMF has an organ that consists of ten members (one of them is Jimmy Wales). It decides on guidelines for the whole movement and installs an executive director.
WMF, see Wikimedia Foundation