Q: How can we be assured that the elected board is truly representative? A: (Jimmy) Choose wisely.
Q: The foundation charter is showing its age. Going to revisit it? A: Yes. We're having a Board planning retreat.
Q: What about Africa and the African languages? A: (Jimmy) Thoughtful, slow steps. Talking with people on the ground there.
Q: What do you do about potential board members who can't afford the travel, etc.? Pay them? A: We'd cover travel, but this is not a paying position.
Q: Why is Angela leaving the board? She says it's become less collaborative. How? A: (Angela) E.g., we vote on a wiki rather than having discussions.
Q: Upcoming conflict between validating by experts and celebrating the read-write culture. Should the board push a strategy or let it be settled by the community? A: (Jimmy) The conflict between quality and openness is an illusion. It comes about when our tools won't let us achieve what we want to. E.g., the stable version will remove almost all the need for semi-protection; we can leave the pages open while ensuring the public sees quality pages. The board shouldn't get involved in deciding detailed questions such as "What counts as a personal attack?"
Q: Will social sharing ever be more powerful than money? Can the Board start the campaign? A: (Brad) People are more powerful than money or social sharing.
Q: We don't know much about the finances... A: (Jimmy) They're looking good. The audit process is underway.
A: (Michael) For the first time, we've had a steady stream of donations from the "Please help" button. We're not as constrained as we used to be. We have a bit of a buffer in the bank, about $500K. Small donations are coming in at about $30K/month. We're getting more donations from corporate sponsors as well.
but theyn we don't want to look as though we're not doing anything.
jw : traditionally , that's been the furtherst fomr the prolbems we've had.
'i think one thing to emphasize re: board eletions : it is not about community issyues in en:wp, not about changing the 3rr.
if we cohose wisely, we'll have fantastic pboard membesr; if we choose poorly, we'll have people drift away from the project... whoich would be unforutnate.
alih : if you were here earlier for anthere's talk, q's from that presentation are also relevant yere, and you can aswk them.
ant : did you look at my presentation? the answer is there.
alih : can you give a quick summary?
ant : brad helped draft new bylaws; there are parts that are not satisfactory, but there's nobody to discuss it. I voted on it but nobody else did.
I'l lbe free in august for that; perhaps we can have new bylaws in september and people to vote on them.
and willing to put ints muscle there to make sure we can particuplarly in the aftrican context?
jw : this is something I want to reitreat (from my keynote) : my support for that idea.
ask the question in a sewrious way : what can we effectively do to fulful our charitable mission a free encyclopedia for everyone on the planet?
yes, 100%, that's the direction we should go.
that's why we shouldn't just plunge into things that sound good. thoughtful slow steps - what do we need, how can we help you.
we genrally fall into 9-11 board members; I wonder if you couldt alk about how you're thinking of expanding; each chapter having a board member automatically? paying board memberS?
for the past serveral years. I was the coordiantor of the3 boston social forum; there's the babels? of transalationvolunteers; which allowed us to do on/offline translation in 12 langs here in boston alone.
the next wsf is in nairobi, so there will be a lot of majorsafrican langs represented.
jw : I'm going to ansewr part and turn this over to brad for another.
in terms of how large to make the board, how to make that expansion go... there rae several factors that immediately come to mind.
as to paying membe, Ihave no interest in being paid; I'd have worries about msiconceptions re: what ti means to be a board member.
<brad> we're in one place that's been around sinc the early 17th c. in tihs country, that's a big deal... in europe, not. but it's big for us in this country. it points to this... there are whole areas o flegal concept soabout why np corps are such, and not other kinds of orgs.
<anthere> may I ask a question to the room?
tis is the sam e each time I travle. this isn't conisdered a cost; that's all.
obvoiusly wmf is a growing phenomenon, noone konws where it's going.
when it started as a hoobby, this was easyto deal with as an ad hoc basis. is the future of wmf as an entrerprise, a staffed one, or something run by volunteers, who will fitgure out how to get more volunteres involved in managemnet and those activities?
and really helped me through that process. <applause> every board ember will have a slightlfy diferent take on this q of what type of org we should be.
butI don' thitnk theyre's anyone here on the board who would say "forget the vols we're going to hire 200 peopl eon staff to do this stuff"
and I don't think there's anyone who says "what are all these staff for, we used to have volunteers for this"
that I'm not aware has ever been discussed in this concentrated way.
som this thing tat has emerged continues to do what it has doine around the world. what a fantastic prolem to have!
so what does the board see as the right medium?
I think that statement has been revised at least one in the history; and will be revised again.
ant: I like the current statement b/c it can be a common statement b/t the ound'n and chaptesr.
then we can adfd our own little poiece to it.
<_sj_>	<alih> I'm going to employ what I'll call Kapor's Law : is there a question?
<_sj_>	<jw> one of the things aobut NPOV is that it is a term,and the community fills it with meaning over time,.
<_sj_>	no term is porefect; respectufl pov could be construed as "we always have to adocate all points of view at all times"
<_sj_>	<new q> do you think social sharing will ever become more powerful than money; and if so will you ever launch an empowerment campaign to start this revolution?
<_sj_>	<bradp> I disagree with the premise : I think people are the most powerful force.
<_sj_>	without reaching out to each of you to beg for you to support the projects.
<_sj_>	and get away from the pass-the-hat around this room (of editors) that we had initially.
<_sj_>	the communitys houdl start thinkgning about : ew've always been financially constrained, barely ahead of the traffic growth curve. we should think about what could we do if we had resources?
<_sj_>	we needeed to buy 3 srevers and that was a big hardship to tihs org.
<_sj_>	now it's tim to think about those bigger projects an dieas.
<_sj_>	as they say, there are good probs and bad probs... I see a lot of good probs here. I hope to see you all next year; go off to lunch!
This page was last edited on 6 August 2006, at 20:35.