Re: [Wikimedia-l] Community feedback and next steps on movement brand proposal

[Ferdinando Traversa]

It’ll be a very very important RFC. More than elections, it’s about all global 
identity.
CentralNotice is appropriate.

Ferdinando

> Il giorno 7 set 2019, alle ore 22:06, David Gerard  ha 
> scritto:
> 
> I concur, it sounds sensible.
> 
> (I'll note, I'm not actually against the name change proposal - but
> it's got to be presented to the community properly.)
> 
> On Sat, 7 Sep 2019 at 20:50, Kiril Simeonovski
>  wrote:
>> 
>> HI David,
>> 
>> Yes, it stands to reason to announce on all wikis in a similar way as the
>> announcements about board or steward elections.
>> 
>> Best,
>> Kiril
>> 
>>> On Sat, Sep 7, 2019 at 9:46 PM David Gerard  wrote:
>>> 
>>> On all wikis?
>>> 
>>> On Sat, 7 Sep 2019 at 19:19, Yaroslav Blanter  wrote:
 
 Right.
 
 I guess a central notice about an RfC would be appropriate.
 
 Cheers
 Yaroslav
 
 On Sat, Sep 7, 2019 at 8:16 PM Kiril Simeonovski <
 kiril.simeonov...@gmail.com> wrote:
 
> Hi all,
> 
> It seems like there is a clear consensus to open an RfC on Meta about
>>> this,
> so we can safely move forward with it and close this thread.
>>> Otherwise, we
> will most likely keep up boggling our minds with the 20-per-cent
>>> metric and
> endlessly discuss how unfortunate is this for the global community
>>> when the
> only rational thing we can do is take action and save everyone's time.
> 
> Do you have any concluding remarks or comments regarding the RfC?
> 
> Best regards,
> Kiril
> 
> On Sat, Sep 7, 2019 at 7:57 PM Ferdinando Traversa <
> ferdi.trave...@gmail.com>
> wrote:
> 
>> I’m against and sincerly I don’t trust this datas (80% agrees? Are
>>> you
>> kidding me? I’ve seen the meta discussion). I think a Meta CLEAR
>>> VOTE as
>> suggested here is the best way. Imposing a change like this is a
>>> wrong
>> decision.
>> 
>> Regards.
>> 
>>> Il giorno 6 set 2019, alle ore 05:49, Zack McCune <
> zmcc...@wikimedia.org>
>> ha scritto:
>>> 
>>> *Summary* - We want your help with a voluntary, OPT-IN design
>>> process
> for
>>> movement branding.  Please join the in-depth discussion group, or
>>> watch
>> for
>>> updates on Meta-Wiki.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Hello all,
>>> 
>>> After 4 months of community consultation, spanning dozens of
> affiliates,
>>> several mailing lists, community conferences, and Meta-Wiki, I am
> pleased
>>> to share a summary of feedback on the proposed 2030 movement brand
>> strategy
>>> [1].
>>> 
>>> From more than 319 comments, representing 150 individual
>>> contributors
> and
>>> 63 affiliates, we assessed 6 major themes in feedback:
>>> 
>>>  1.
>>> 
>>>  Reducing confusion
>>>  2.
>>> 
>>>  Protecting reputation
>>>  3.
>>> 
>>>  Supporting sister projects
>>>  4.
>>> 
>>>  Addressing (legal, governmental) risks
>>>  5.
>>> 
>>>  Supporting movement growth
>>>  6.
>>> 
>>>  The process of change
>>> 
>>> Please visit our feedback summary page to learn more [2]. You will
>>> see
>>> examples of comments within each section, along with a rough
>>> indication
>> of
>>> how many of the comments that we received were related to each
>>> theme.
>>> 
>>> The comments sometimes contradict one another, showing that across
>>> our
>> wide
>>> movement’s experience, different points of view are common (and a
>>> sign
> of
>>> health!). To visualize these tensions, we have created “polarity
>>> maps”
>>> which are used to help visualize how different arguments coexist in
>> tension
>>> with each other.
>>> 
>>> Ultimately, the comments provided from you all are very thoughtful
>>> and
>>> useful guidance on what is needed to make our movement’s branding
>>> successful. One can read the 6 themes above as “criteria” for
>>> assessing
>>> branding systems.
>>> 
>>> == Thanks ==
>>> 
>>> I would like to thank the organizers of Iberoconf, Wikipedia
>>> Education
>>> Summit, and the Wikimedia Summit for inviting us to hold
>>> discussions
>> during
>>> their sessions. I would also like to thank my colleagues Elena
>>> Lappen,
>>> Samir Elsharbaty, and Blanca Flores who conducted extensive parts
>>> of
> this
>>> consultation. To the hundreds of people, and dozens of affiliates
>>> commenting, thank you for reviewing the proposal and offering your
>>> perspectives and insights.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> == Next steps and staying involved ==
>>> 
>>> There is considerable support for the brand proposal and general
> appetite
>>> to improve our movement’s branding system. Further, we believe that
>>> critical feedback on the proposal offers direct guidance for
>>> precisely
>> what
>>> branding must do to be 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Update on Wikimedia site and system outages

[RhinosF1]

Well done everyone involved!

On Sun, 8 Sep 2019 at 00:26, Heather Walls  wrote:

> Hello everyone,
>
> By now you are likely aware that the Wikimedia sites suffered from a
> relatively significant botnet driven DDOS attack on September 6th, taking
> them offline in several countries throughout the day. This primarily
> affected Wikipedia access in Europe and the Middle East. We posted a short
> update of the event on our website.[1]
>
> I would like to thank everyone who stepped up to support the restoration of
> our projects, including the fast reporting of community members throughout
> the world and our security and engineering teams who worked long hours to
> address many complex issues surrounding the attack and our response—the
> Site Reliability Engineering team in particular.
>
> The Wikimedia Foundation leadership team is proud to work with such
> talented and dedicated staff and supporters.
>
> Yours,
> Heather
>
>
> 1.
>
> https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2019/09/07/malicious-attack-on-wikipedia-what-we-know-and-what-were-doing/
>
> "Today, Wikipedia was hit with a malicious attack that has taken it offline
> in several countries for intermittent periods. The attack is ongoing and
> our Site Reliability Engineering team is working hard to stop it and
> restore access to the site.
>
> As one of the world’s most popular sites, Wikipedia sometimes attracts “bad
> faith” actors. Along with the rest of the web, we operate in an
> increasingly sophisticated and complex environment where threats are
> continuously evolving. Because of this, the Wikimedia communities and
> Wikimedia Foundation have created dedicated systems and staff to regularly
> monitor and address risks. If a problem occurs, we learn, we improve, and
> we prepare to be better for next time.
>
> We condemn these sorts of attacks. They’re not just about taking Wikipedia
> offline. Takedown attacks threaten everyone’s fundamental rights to freely
> access and share information. We in the Wikimedia movement and Foundation
> are committed to protecting these rights for everyone.
>
> Right now, we’re continuing to work to restore access wherever you might be
> reading Wikipedia in the world. We’ll keep you posted."
>
>
> --
>
> Heather Walls (she/her)
>
> Chief Creative Officer
> Wikimedia Foundation
> https://wikimediafoundation.org
> ___
> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
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> 

-- 
RhinosF1
Miraheze Volunteer
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Community feedback and next steps on movement brand proposal

[Adrian Raddatz]

Their approach hasn't changed. There are maybe just more ongoing projects
than there were in the past. But yes, it can't be fun for anyone involved.

I briefly discussed some of this above, but I'll list a few options that
the WMF could take to make this process less consistently bad:
1. Determine benefits of any project to the editing and reading community.
If there are none, that may be fine, but consider balancing it out with a
concurrent project that is providing benefit to those communities. *Frame
any project in terms of the desired benefits*.
2. Find allies and adopt a joint approach. If you are running projects that
will benefit some part of the editing and reading community, find people
who would benefit, involve them in the entire project lifecycle, and
utilize them in communications and consultations to move the conversation
away from community vs. WMF.
3. Engage much earlier than is currently done. Rather than always bringing
"solutions" to the community (that the community invariably doesn't like),
bring problems to the community and ask how these problems could be solved.
You can even structure the problem statement and questions in a way that
will get at your ideal solution. Again though, it depends on whether this
is actually a problem for the editing/reading communities.
4. Do more for your primary stakeholders! Every area of the projects has
outstanding technical and social issues that the communities want solved
and that haven't been worked on for years. In my area of interest, we have
been asking for better CAPTCHAs for years. Dial back the grants program a
bit and use the money to provide services for the communities that you are
supposed to be serving. If you do this, then the community appetite to
accept some WMF-initiated changes will be greater once we think that you
are actually on our side.
5. Bring the community, or select community members, into project
governance structures. Make a steering committee, host elections for
community seats, use a combination appointed/elected model, etc for major
program areas. This is what the community-selected board seats should do,
except the organization is too large for the board to function in that way.

Adrian Raddatz


On Mon, Sep 9, 2019 at 7:51 AM Paulo Santos Perneta 
wrote:

> I only started following WMF stuff more closely around 2 years ago, but I
> don't remember it being this permanent state of crisis as it is now, with
> an ever increasing - now, apparently at an accelerating pace too -
> detachment from the onwiki communities.
> This is tiresome and distracting for those of us who are volunteers at the
> Wikimedia projects, but it's certainly painful too for the WMF staff.
>
> What's going on with the WMF?
>
> Paulo
>
> Pine W  escreveu no dia segunda, 9/09/2019 à(s)
> 07:59:
>
> > It crosses my mind that I would think that some of the WMF office staff
> > would also be getting tired of crisis, conflict, and unwelcome surprises.
> > These types of problems are unlikely to ever be fully prevented, but I
> > would think that the parade of difficulties in the past few months would
> > also be testing the patience of at least some people inside of WMF who
> > might like to not have a new earthquake to deal with on what seems like a
> > biweekly basis.
> >
> > Pine
> >
> > ( https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Pine )
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On Sun, Sep 8, 2019, 17:59 Yair Rand  wrote:
> >
> > > The broad proposal was clearly rejected. The community has not
> authorized
> > > the Wikimedia Foundation to let any organization speak under
> Wikipedia's
> > > name. If a formal RfC is to be held to make a final decision (perhaps
> > with
> > > the question subdivided, per Pine), I recommend delaying it for a while
> > so
> > > we might have a chance for some respite from permanent crisis mode.
> > >
> > > The summary, in my opinion, is not adequate, and skips many of the most
> > > significant arguments. (The talk page itself skips some, after the WMF
> > had
> > > a large portion of the talk page moved to a different page, including a
> > > string of "strong oppose"s. Those who participated in the removed
> > sections
> > > were not counted in the WMF's count, for some reason.)
> > >
> > > I do not understand what is going on within the Foundation regarding
> > KPIs,
> > > but I get the impression that groups were required to establish metrics
> > of
> > > some kind, without any actual oversight on how those metrics would
> work.
> > > Thus, we get things like the branding proposal's "anything less than
> 1800
> > > users posting statements in opposition will be considered strong
> support,
> > > 1800-2700 will be considered substantial support, 2700-3600 opposed
> will
> > be
> > > considered moderate support". Similar things have been happening
> > elsewhere,
> > > eg, for the WMF's "Space" project. (Speaking of which, holding a
> > discussion
> > > on a private off-wiki forum is not a valid method of community decision
> > > making, for 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Community feedback and next steps on movement brand proposal

[Paulo Santos Perneta]

I only started following WMF stuff more closely around 2 years ago, but I
don't remember it being this permanent state of crisis as it is now, with
an ever increasing - now, apparently at an accelerating pace too -
detachment from the onwiki communities.
This is tiresome and distracting for those of us who are volunteers at the
Wikimedia projects, but it's certainly painful too for the WMF staff.

What's going on with the WMF?

Paulo

Pine W  escreveu no dia segunda, 9/09/2019 à(s) 07:59:

> It crosses my mind that I would think that some of the WMF office staff
> would also be getting tired of crisis, conflict, and unwelcome surprises.
> These types of problems are unlikely to ever be fully prevented, but I
> would think that the parade of difficulties in the past few months would
> also be testing the patience of at least some people inside of WMF who
> might like to not have a new earthquake to deal with on what seems like a
> biweekly basis.
>
> Pine
>
> ( https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Pine )
>
>
>
>
> On Sun, Sep 8, 2019, 17:59 Yair Rand  wrote:
>
> > The broad proposal was clearly rejected. The community has not authorized
> > the Wikimedia Foundation to let any organization speak under Wikipedia's
> > name. If a formal RfC is to be held to make a final decision (perhaps
> with
> > the question subdivided, per Pine), I recommend delaying it for a while
> so
> > we might have a chance for some respite from permanent crisis mode.
> >
> > The summary, in my opinion, is not adequate, and skips many of the most
> > significant arguments. (The talk page itself skips some, after the WMF
> had
> > a large portion of the talk page moved to a different page, including a
> > string of "strong oppose"s. Those who participated in the removed
> sections
> > were not counted in the WMF's count, for some reason.)
> >
> > I do not understand what is going on within the Foundation regarding
> KPIs,
> > but I get the impression that groups were required to establish metrics
> of
> > some kind, without any actual oversight on how those metrics would work.
> > Thus, we get things like the branding proposal's "anything less than 1800
> > users posting statements in opposition will be considered strong support,
> > 1800-2700 will be considered substantial support, 2700-3600 opposed will
> be
> > considered moderate support". Similar things have been happening
> elsewhere,
> > eg, for the WMF's "Space" project. (Speaking of which, holding a
> discussion
> > on a private off-wiki forum is not a valid method of community decision
> > making, for branding or otherwise.)
> >
> > -- Yair Rand
> >
> >
> >
> > ‫בתאריך שבת, 7 בספט׳ 2019 ב-20:54 מאת ‪Pine W‬‏ <‪wiki.p...@gmail.com
> ‬‏>:‬
> >
> > >  I too think that an RfC is a good option here. I suggest having
> multiple
> > > questions in the RfC. Questions could include, "What should the
> > > organization that is currently known as the Wikimedia Foundation be
> > > named?", "Should there be a unifying brand for the online projects such
> > as
> > > Wikipedia, Wikidata, and Wikimedia Commons?", "If there is a unifying
> > brand
> > > for the online projects then what should it be?", "Should there be a
> > > unifying brand for affiliates?", and "If there is a unifying brand for
> > > affiliates then what should it be?"
> > >
> > > Overall I think that the report on Meta
> > > <
> > >
> >
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications/Wikimedia_brands/2030_research_and_planning/community_review/results
> > > >
> > > makes for good reading as background information for an RfC.
> > >
> > > I want to caution against trying to make too many big decisions at
> once.
> > > There is already a strategy process underway which has consumed a
> > > considerable number of volunteer hours, and the community has precious
> > > little capacity relative to normal operational demands without this
> > ongoing
> > > strategy process being piled on top of everything else that people want
> > the
> > > community to do. There seems to be infinite demand for free skilled
> > labor,
> > > but a finite supply of that same labor. I encourage both WMF and the
> > > community to think carefully about which questions to prioritize so
> that
> > we
> > > are not all overstretched and a significant number of problems slip
> > through
> > > the cracks because collectively there were not adequate human resources
> > to
> > > thoughtfully address so many questions in a narrow period of time and
> > > develop consensus regarding how to move forward.
> > >
> > > Pine
> > > ( https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Pine )
> > > ___
> > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > > 

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Community feedback and next steps on movement brand proposal

[Pine W]

It crosses my mind that I would think that some of the WMF office staff
would also be getting tired of crisis, conflict, and unwelcome surprises.
These types of problems are unlikely to ever be fully prevented, but I
would think that the parade of difficulties in the past few months would
also be testing the patience of at least some people inside of WMF who
might like to not have a new earthquake to deal with on what seems like a
biweekly basis.

Pine

( https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Pine )




On Sun, Sep 8, 2019, 17:59 Yair Rand  wrote:

> The broad proposal was clearly rejected. The community has not authorized
> the Wikimedia Foundation to let any organization speak under Wikipedia's
> name. If a formal RfC is to be held to make a final decision (perhaps with
> the question subdivided, per Pine), I recommend delaying it for a while so
> we might have a chance for some respite from permanent crisis mode.
>
> The summary, in my opinion, is not adequate, and skips many of the most
> significant arguments. (The talk page itself skips some, after the WMF had
> a large portion of the talk page moved to a different page, including a
> string of "strong oppose"s. Those who participated in the removed sections
> were not counted in the WMF's count, for some reason.)
>
> I do not understand what is going on within the Foundation regarding KPIs,
> but I get the impression that groups were required to establish metrics of
> some kind, without any actual oversight on how those metrics would work.
> Thus, we get things like the branding proposal's "anything less than 1800
> users posting statements in opposition will be considered strong support,
> 1800-2700 will be considered substantial support, 2700-3600 opposed will be
> considered moderate support". Similar things have been happening elsewhere,
> eg, for the WMF's "Space" project. (Speaking of which, holding a discussion
> on a private off-wiki forum is not a valid method of community decision
> making, for branding or otherwise.)
>
> -- Yair Rand
>
>
>
> ‫בתאריך שבת, 7 בספט׳ 2019 ב-20:54 מאת ‪Pine W‬‏ <‪wiki.p...@gmail.com‬‏>:‬
>
> >  I too think that an RfC is a good option here. I suggest having multiple
> > questions in the RfC. Questions could include, "What should the
> > organization that is currently known as the Wikimedia Foundation be
> > named?", "Should there be a unifying brand for the online projects such
> as
> > Wikipedia, Wikidata, and Wikimedia Commons?", "If there is a unifying
> brand
> > for the online projects then what should it be?", "Should there be a
> > unifying brand for affiliates?", and "If there is a unifying brand for
> > affiliates then what should it be?"
> >
> > Overall I think that the report on Meta
> > <
> >
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications/Wikimedia_brands/2030_research_and_planning/community_review/results
> > >
> > makes for good reading as background information for an RfC.
> >
> > I want to caution against trying to make too many big decisions at once.
> > There is already a strategy process underway which has consumed a
> > considerable number of volunteer hours, and the community has precious
> > little capacity relative to normal operational demands without this
> ongoing
> > strategy process being piled on top of everything else that people want
> the
> > community to do. There seems to be infinite demand for free skilled
> labor,
> > but a finite supply of that same labor. I encourage both WMF and the
> > community to think carefully about which questions to prioritize so that
> we
> > are not all overstretched and a significant number of problems slip
> through
> > the cracks because collectively there were not adequate human resources
> to
> > thoughtfully address so many questions in a narrow period of time and
> > develop consensus regarding how to move forward.
> >
> > Pine
> > ( https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Pine )
> > ___
> > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l
> > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> > 
> ___
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> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l,
> 
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