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Samuel Klein | 1 May 2009 01:11
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Re: More on Wikimedia strategic planning

On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 6:23 PM, Thomas Dalton
<thomas.dalton@...> wrote:
> 2009/4/30 Samuel Klein <meta.sj@...>:
>> I'd like to see Wikimedia as a community take some 300-year stances on
>> knowledge dissemination,
>
> Did you mean 300 years?

Yes.  Considering the stakes and our capacity for history, this seems
to me appropriate and possible.

>>> * There is also a big question about languages. The work will need to
>>> be done in English,
>>
>> Can you elaborate a bit?  Could a group that all speak better French
>> than English not do their work in French and have it translated for
>> others?  I would hope the language issue could be phrased as  "All
>> work will need to be translated into English as a shared working
>> language"...
>
> If, by coincidence, there happens to be a group better able to
> communicate in French than English, then I don't see why they
> shouldn't be able to, but it is pretty unlikely.
<
> I would advise against choosing committees along language lines,

If the goal is creative communication, groups must be able to
communicate effectively with one another.  If we want to benefit from
the excellent ideas everywhere in the community, an active translation
nexus to ensure refined ideas are shared widely, and groups of great
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Thomas Dalton | 1 May 2009 07:24
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Re: More on Wikimedia strategic planning

2009/5/1 Samuel Klein <meta.sj <at> gmail.com>:
> On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 6:23 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton <at> gmail.com> wrote:
>> 2009/4/30 Samuel Klein <meta.sj <at> gmail.com>:
>>> I'd like to see Wikimedia as a community take some 300-year stances on
>>> knowledge dissemination,
>>
>> Did you mean 300 years?
>
> Yes.  Considering the stakes and our capacity for history, this seems
> to me appropriate and possible.

It is impossible to predict what humanity will be like in 300 years,
if it even still exists, so it is completely impossible to predict
what Wikimedia will be like or what challenges it will need to face.

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Jussi-Ville Heiskanen | 1 May 2009 07:27
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Re: More on Wikimedia strategic planning

Samuel Klein wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 6:23 PM, Thomas Dalton
<thomas.dalton@...> wrote:
>   
>> 2009/4/30 Samuel Klein <meta.sj@...>:
>>     
>>> I'd like to see Wikimedia as a community take some 300-year stances on
>>> knowledge dissemination,
>>>       
>> Did you mean 300 years?
>>     
>
> Yes.  Considering the stakes and our capacity for history, this seems
> to me appropriate and possible.
>
>   

Personally on this scope, my personal burning priority would
be off-planet database backups. And I am not joking, one bit,
either.

Not because disaster fears, but more fears of political kinds.
I don't hold with the view that we can rest assured liberal
democratic systems are inherently stable under all conceivable
extra-political real world contexts.

Yours,

Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
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phoebe ayers | 1 May 2009 08:08
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Re: More on Wikimedia strategic planning

On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 10:24 PM, Thomas Dalton
<thomas.dalton@...> wrote:
> 2009/5/1 Samuel Klein <meta.sj@...>:
>> On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 6:23 PM, Thomas Dalton
<thomas.dalton@...> wrote:
>>> 2009/4/30 Samuel Klein <meta.sj@...>:
>>>> I'd like to see Wikimedia as a community take some 300-year stances on
>>>> knowledge dissemination,
>>>
>>> Did you mean 300 years?
>>
>> Yes.  Considering the stakes and our capacity for history, this seems
>> to me appropriate and possible.
>
> It is impossible to predict what humanity will be like in 300 years,
> if it even still exists, so it is completely impossible to predict
> what Wikimedia will be like or what challenges it will need to face.

Can we perhaps split the difference between you two and say: 30 years?
There are all sorts of issues that arise on this time span that are
also useful to consider on much shorter and much longer scales. Some
are considerations of what we would like to become; some are simply
considerations of organizational and project survival. E.g.:

* long-term archival backups, and their distribution, storage and processing
* how our live content interfaces with the rest of the changing
internet and information universe (how do we deal with disappearing
sources, references, languages? project forks? Increasingly available
public domain materials?) How do we advocate for more free content
everywhere?
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Thomas Dalton | 1 May 2009 08:36
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Re: More on Wikimedia strategic planning

2009/5/1 phoebe ayers <phoebe.wiki <at> gmail.com>:
> On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 10:24 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton <at> gmail.com> wrote:
>> 2009/5/1 Samuel Klein <meta.sj <at> gmail.com>:
>>> On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 6:23 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton <at> gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> 2009/4/30 Samuel Klein <meta.sj <at> gmail.com>:
>>>>> I'd like to see Wikimedia as a community take some 300-year stances on
>>>>> knowledge dissemination,
>>>>
>>>> Did you mean 300 years?
>>>
>>> Yes.  Considering the stakes and our capacity for history, this seems
>>> to me appropriate and possible.
>>
>> It is impossible to predict what humanity will be like in 300 years,
>> if it even still exists, so it is completely impossible to predict
>> what Wikimedia will be like or what challenges it will need to face.
>
> Can we perhaps split the difference between you two and say: 30 years?

I think we would be missing an opportunity if we didn't at least
outline some rough ideas for a 30-year timeframe, but much more than
that involves far too much guesswork to be worthwhile.

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phoebe ayers | 1 May 2009 08:18
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Re: More on Wikimedia strategic planning

On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 11:08 PM, phoebe ayers <phoebe.wiki@...> wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 10:24 PM, Thomas Dalton
<thomas.dalton@...> wrote:
>> 2009/5/1 Samuel Klein <meta.sj@...>:
>>> On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 6:23 PM, Thomas Dalton
<thomas.dalton@...> wrote:
>>>> 2009/4/30 Samuel Klein <meta.sj@...>:
>>>>> I'd like to see Wikimedia as a community take some 300-year stances on
>>>>> knowledge dissemination,
>>>>
>>>> Did you mean 300 years?
>>>
>>> Yes.  Considering the stakes and our capacity for history, this seems
>>> to me appropriate and possible.
>>
>> It is impossible to predict what humanity will be like in 300 years,
>> if it even still exists, so it is completely impossible to predict
>> what Wikimedia will be like or what challenges it will need to face.
>
> Can we perhaps split the difference between you two and say: 30 years?
> There are all sorts of issues that arise on this time span that are
> also useful to consider on much shorter and much longer scales.

Besides, this is a (slightly long) generation, which makes a useful
human-scaled measure to think in. I really want my kids, at some
point, to be able to say in exasperation, "Mom, this isn't *your*
Wikipedia anymore!" Or better yet: "Grandma, we are sick and tired of
hearing how you had to write your own markup, both ways in the snow!
We edit through the power of our minds now, OK?! Sheesh!"
(Continue reading)

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Pharos | 1 May 2009 15:19
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Re: Wikipedia Invades La Plata Natural History Museum

I think this is a good idea too.

You can make a pretty template for the images produced that both
briefly explains the project and that also includes the
Category:Wikipedia_Invades_La Plata_Natural_History_Museum.  I can
help you with this if you'd like.

This event documentation category would be added -in addition- to the
encyclopedically-oriented Category:Museo_de_La_Plata.  Possibly in the
future, with a growing archive of items in the museum's collection,
you will even find the need for more specific topical categories, like
Category:Dinosaurs_at_Museo_de_La_Plata.

Thanks,
Pharos

On 4/28/09, emijrp <emijrp@...> wrote:
> Category can be introduced with a beautiful template about the event.
>
> 2009/4/28 emijrp <emijrp@...>
>
> > Perhaps a subcategory "Wikipedia Invades La Plata Natural History Museum" ?
> > It would be easier to follow activities like this. I think this is related
> > with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_loves_art . It is only a
> > suggestion :).
> >
> > 2009/4/28 Patricio Lorente <patricio.lorente@...>
> >
> > 2009/4/28 emijrp <emijrp@...>:
> >> > Please, can all these images be categorized in a common category? Thanks
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Gregory Kohs | 1 May 2009 19:06
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Board statement regarding biographies of living people

The purpose of my question was to examine the carbon impact on our global
environment by holding this meeting in Berlin, which (by my estimation) is
quite a ways off from the point of "least cumulative distance" that could
have been achieved for at least the mandatory attendees.  All of that
additional jet fuel and hotel consumption (laundered sheets, poor recycling
standards, etc.) is something to consider if the polar ice melts and floods
San Francisco one day, thanks to CO2-accelerated warming.  A shorter-haul
Boeing 737 flight burns about 200 pounds of fuel per passenger.  I can only
imagine that a trans-continental flight, plus a trans-Atlantic leg to
Berlin, is likely burning at least 400 pounds of fuel per passenger.  Return
trip makes that 800 pounds of fuel.  I hope each of the San Francisco-based
attendees feel comfortable that their burning of 800 pounds of jet fuel
(about 114 gallons) in order to attend the conference in Berlin (a
conference that, as far as I can tell, had zero "dial-in" conferencing
options offered) was justified?

I get the impression that there is a corporate culture afoot at the
Wikimedia Foundation that stifles any attempts to optimize meetings and
conferences in ways that might be more economical and environmentally
friendly, with innovations such as Skype and video-teleconferencing.  My
sense is that "interesting" and "exotic" places are chosen instead... San
Francisco, the Netherlands, Berlin, Taipei, Alexandria (Egypt, not
Virginia), Buenos Aires, etc.  I suspect it's part of the corporate culture
to get the "backwater" taste of St. Petersburg (Florida, not Russia) out of
everyone's mouth, to select all of these far-flung, non-English-speaking
locales for a Board that consists mostly of North Americans who speak
English, and who are funded mostly by U.S. dollars.

I know that regarding a recent trade conference that was only 124 miles from
our headquarters, my Fortune 100 employer sent down an edict that only one
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Michael Bimmler | 1 May 2009 19:15
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Re: Board statement regarding biographies of living people

On Fri, May 1, 2009 at 10:06 AM, Gregory Kohs <thekohser@...> wrote:
> The purpose of my question was to examine the carbon impact on our global
> environment by holding this meeting in Berlin, which (by my estimation) is
> quite a ways off from the point of "least cumulative distance" that could
> have been achieved for at least the mandatory attendees.  All of that
> additional jet fuel and hotel consumption (laundered sheets, poor recycling
> standards, etc.) is something to consider if the polar ice melts and floods
> San Francisco one day, thanks to CO2-accelerated warming.  A shorter-haul
> Boeing 737 flight burns about 200 pounds of fuel per passenger.  I can only
> imagine that a trans-continental flight, plus a trans-Atlantic leg to
> Berlin, is likely burning at least 400 pounds of fuel per passenger.  Return
> trip makes that 800 pounds of fuel.  I hope each of the San Francisco-based
> attendees feel comfortable that their burning of 800 pounds of jet fuel
> (about 114 gallons) in order to attend the conference in Berlin (a
> conference that, as far as I can tell, had zero "dial-in" conferencing
> options offered) was justified?
>
> I get the impression that there is a corporate culture afoot at the
> Wikimedia Foundation that stifles any attempts to optimize meetings and
> conferences in ways that might be more economical and environmentally
> friendly, with innovations such as Skype and video-teleconferencing.  My
> sense is that "interesting" and "exotic" places are chosen instead... San
> Francisco, the Netherlands, Berlin, Taipei, Alexandria (Egypt, not
> Virginia), Buenos Aires, etc.  I suspect it's part of the corporate culture
> to get the "backwater" taste of St. Petersburg (Florida, not Russia) out of
> everyone's mouth, to select all of these far-flung, non-English-speaking
> locales for a Board that consists mostly of North Americans who speak
> English, and who are funded mostly by U.S. dollars.

You are missing one essential point here: This meeting was designed as
(Continue reading)

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Michael Peel | 1 May 2009 19:47

Re: Board statement regarding biographies of living people

 From the Chapters point of view, Berlin is pretty much as central as  
you can get (restricting locations to those on the surface of the  
planet!). I don't know the distribution of developers, so can't  
comment about that. If you look at the board meeting alone, then yes,  
it would probably make much more sense to hold it elsewhere - but  
combine it with the other meetings, and Berlin is a very sensible  
place to hold it.

Voice and video conferencing have come a long way, but are not even  
close to meeting in person in terms of time-effectiveness or effect  
on relations, especially if the people involved haven't met each  
other before. Until meetings can be held in immersive 3D  
environments, I doubt things will improve (and even then, meeting  
over tea/beer can't happen, which is incredibly useful to get to know  
someone).

The locations that you list for board meetings all tally extremely  
well with places that other events have happened in - mostly  
Wikimanias - and I would assume that the dates are in very good  
agreement. It makes a huge amount of sense for board members to go to  
those events (whose location isn't determined by the board), and once  
they're all together why not hold a board meeting?

Note that within the academic world, far more exotic and far-flung  
places are chosen for conferences. In comparison, the WMF is  
incredibly restrained!

BTW, I trust that, since you are so in favour of being "green", you  
never go on holiday to foreign countries, and avoid making any  
unnecessary trips (be it long or short distance)?
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