This seems like a preposterous proposition, if not for the distinct recollection that this might have been insinuated by Ms. Gardner in the discussion leading up to the formation of FDC. It still reads like a poorly thought out attempt at some form of a coup or the making of one. This is as bad an idea, as the actual formation of the FDC.
On Tue, Oct 22, 2013, Dariusz Jemielniak <dar...@alk.edu.pl> wrote: > > I have no idea what gave you this impression. The FDC is composed of > Wikimedia volunteers and serves as an advisory committee by the Board. The > Board itself is not the foundation, neither - it is a body overseeing and > supervising it. > Actually, no. The board and WMF both have a legal existence and basis. FDC as a committee, albeit a board mandated one sits on the same or equal footing as Langcom or Comcom, slightly above OMGcom, as far as I'm concerned. It has little to no real world existence. Second, the WMF board members are volunteers as well, quite like you. Unlike the FDC however, the WMF board has several elected members and has gone through quite a few iterations and external scrutiny. > > If the Board disagrees with the FDC recommendation, it naturally can > overrule it, but how is this possibility relevant? The FDC at no point is > inclined to provide rubber stamps to any entity in the process in general, > and WMF in particular. We use our best judgment, experience, and skills to > give meaningful evaluations. What possible motivation could we have to do > otherwise? I strongly believe that none of the FDC members is driven by an > urge to please anyone (WMF, the Board, the chapters). I quite believe the opposite might be true. > We are motivated to > recommend sensible resources allocation within the entire movement. At no > point do we take part in a popularity contest (and I believe we've shown > that already). Moreover, keep in mind that even though we only prepare > recommendations, and decisions are made by the Board, our responsibility is > to the movement as a whole for our recommendations, and not for what the > Board does with them. If we recommend cuts and the Board overrules them, > the community will decide which of these two bodies went wrong. > So a direct path of conflict with the board. One can assume you'd expect the community to side against the board on some or any occasion and hilarity will ensue. On Tue, Oct 22, 2013, Dariusz Jemielniak <dar...@alk.edu.pl> wrote: > > I'm not saying that the problems you're pointing out are non-existent. > Rather, I'd say that they are likely unavoidable. I'm not certain about > Western Europeans' solidarity anyway - I have serious doubts if any of the > Western European FDC members would have any preference for other Western > European chapters, just as I (coming from Eastern, or, more accurately, > Central Europe) would not perceive other Eastern/Central European chapters > as more suited for funding. If you have any thoughts on how should the > future FDC composition be altered from a systemic point of view (election > criteria, etc.), I'd be very much interested in learning about them - > especially if the changes would only improve the results (rather than bring > other problems on their own). > I have one. Resign. Half the of current FDC should resign and open up the other half to some participation from the larger community - be it through an open election, arbcomm seat, board seats, then you'd need to add Jimmy of course - Hey! we can then have the same structure as the board..... so, another quasi board that really has no legal authority or basis to comment, just disagree and create more conflict when some chapters don't get their way. This entire exercise with FDC has been futile, fixing little and consuming a lot of time and resources. > As of now, all FDC members exclude themselves in the cases when their home > chapters applications are considered, irrespective of their engagement in > the boards. > Those are some high standards right there. -- I'm quite surprised to constantly read FDC is somehow representative of the larger community and accountable to them. Almost all the current members were part of chapter leadership and have been quite active within that circle. I suppose this is the same fiction as chapters inherently being representatives of the larger community. The FDC is sort of a UN-like gathering that yet somehow overlooks the largest and most active community of all. Perhaps you might want to take a look at the dismal rate of actual community participation in FDC discussions. An year or so in to its formation, there isn't exactly a stellar record and high-opinions to go around. I hope I don't need to point to the recent news articles and comments about the FDC and possible issues of corruption, which might have even played a part in.......whatever this is. I also don't understand why FDC alone should have this right to evaluate and offer recommendations. Why not the GAC? Arbcomm? or even individuals, like Risker or Nathan, heck, even my cat should have that right! There is an Auditcomm kicking around still I think. There is also some conflation in the comments over how much authority FDC is looking for- is it to merely offer feedback, suggest increases /decreases - which like feedback, WMF can reject at will or the authority to go head-to-head with the board, as the following comments allude to. The latter is quite preposterous, the former not so much. I suppose sharing the plan with everyone openly, and letting everyone comment might be the quickest solution there. Anyway, of the dozen reasons why this is a bad idea here are a few- -The internal structure - the foundation recently built up and then expanded a grants department, added to the internal finance department including some global work, the executive leadership - it would make somethings redundant, making a whole lot of resources so far wasted. -The external structure - hierarchy between the board, WMF executives, the FDC, auditcommittee, the FDC steering committee (if it's still around), not to mention the external auditors and consultants. Issues of privacy and control are likely to arise. -FDC has no real world existence - in the legal sense. There are legal and fiduciary responsibilities a board and executives have, real world laws about compliance, contracts, hiring and so on - they can't be abandoned or handed over to a completely virtual entity with little prior experience, who live across the world. -The scale is quite relevant here- the chapters have less than a tenth of the revenue and access to those fundraising abilities as the WMF. They have no engineering department, some are starting to hire their first employee and rent an office. -WMF and the board, proposed and created the FDC. They set up a steering committee, dedicated staff, and provided things like the travel budget to get these members under one roof to actually have, an actual FDC. The board has representatives who don't vote present within FDC. But it still poses a whole lot of issues about conflict that might have legal repercussions for non-profit operating in the US. -As Nathan pointed out, the FDC has very limited exposure to US laws and little participation from the US, and by extension the English-speaking majority. Majority of the members also have little exposure to the "flagship" project, presenting a gap of expertise and relevance where it would be needed the most. best, > > Dariusz Jemielniak ("pundit") > my bestest, Theo _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>