Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/2022-08-01/Election guide
Election Compass: Results of community upvoting (confirmed by the Election Committee) edit
The final selection of the 15 statements was confirmed by the Election Committee on August 4.
| Rank | Votes | Question | The last user vote |
|---|---|---|---|
| # 1 | 41 | 1. The Wikimedia Foundation should conduct all of its activities with absolute transparency (excluding where this would cause legal/privacy/security issues) | 2022-08-03 21:08:50 UTC |
| # 2 | 40 | 23. The Wikimedia Foundation should provide more technical support to meet the demand of the community | 2022-08-03 23:10:52 UTC |
| # 3 | 39 | 6. I am uncomfortable with the way the WMF increasingly assigns itself unilateral authority to make decisions about the Wikimedia projects which then affect the community | 2022-08-03 21:09:16 UTC |
| # 4 | 31 | 31. The WMF should continually seek to reduce, rather than expand, its scope of responsibilities, leaving as much as possible to the community's self-organized capacity | 2022-08-03 21:11:47 UTC |
| # 5 | 29 | 4. WMF fundraising is deceptive: it creates a false appearance that the WMF is short of money while it is in fact richer than ever | 2022-08-03 21:14:46 UTC |
| # 6 | 28 | 29. The WMF should generally opt for community-vetted ideas, rather than internal ideas, as the basis for its organizational roadmap | 2022-08-03 21:11:07 UTC |
| # 7 | 28 | 13. The primary activity of the Wikimedia Foundation should be funding the Wikimedia community's efforts. | 2022-08-03 23:09:53 UTC |
| # 8 | 27 | 26. The m:Universal Code of Conduct is a net positive addition to the Wikimedia movement | 2022-08-03 19:54:09 UTC |
| # 9 | 26 | 10. Future community seats of the Board of Trustees should be filled purely by a contributor (editor, volunteer developer, and so on) vote on all nominees | 2022-08-03 21:16:26 UTC |
| #10 | 25 | 5. I am uncomfortable with the way the WMF organization has continuously grown its staff headcount and budget and taken on more and more tasks that are not directly related to the Wikimedia projects and the volunteer communities working on them | 2022-08-03 21:15:04 UTC |
| #11 | 24 | 2. Well over 50 percent of Wikimedia Foundation expenses is spent on salaries in the US; that percentage is too great | 2022-08-03 21:14:11 UTC |
| #12 | 23 | 27. Simplify the Board of Trustees Election Process to keep Community Members interested and engaged | 2022-08-03 20:36:15 UTC |
| #13 | 23 | 11. The Election Committee must be made actively accountable to and selected or elected by the community | 2022-08-03 21:16:35 UTC |
| #14 | 22 | 8. The software development should be focused on constant development and core features instead of short projects and new features. | 2022-08-03 20:35:39 UTC |
| #15 | 22 | 20. The WMF should initiate a participatory budgeting process, in which the editor community participates in the allocation of funds | 2022-08-03 23:50:51 UTC |
| #16 | 21 | 32. The WMF should voluntarily recognize a staff union with proof of support from a majority of eligible unit members | 2022-08-03 21:12:20 UTC |
| #17 | 20 | 25. The Wikimedia Foundation should allocate additional resources to research, documentation, and advocacy of real-world policy issues that affect Wikimedia users and Wikimedia projects (for example, issues of access and free expression) | 2022-08-03 23:11:29 UTC |
| #18 | 18 | 19. The Wikimedia Foundation should allocate a higher percentage of their resources into tasks related to contributing to the projects | 2022-08-03 12:38:34 UTC |
| #19 | 16 | 35. Had I been a member of the Board of Trustees in May 2020, I would have voted in favor of the Brand Project Support resolution | 2022-08-03 20:36:52 UTC |
| #20 | 16 | 33. The WMF should get consensus from respective communities before running fundraising banners on their wiki | 2022-08-03 21:12:34 UTC |
| #21 | 15 | 16. Wikimedia Foundation projects should compete for Movement funds with projects of other Wikimedia organizations (except for keeping the sites up) | 2022-08-03 19:51:28 UTC |
| #22 | 15 | 18. The represented diversity is more important than individual qualifications of members of the Board of Trustees | 2022-08-03 20:35:57 UTC |
| #23 | 15 | 7. I am uncomfortable with the way the Wikimedia Foundation serves the interests of Big Tech (Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft) | 2022-08-03 21:15:38 UTC |
| #24 | 13 | 3. The Wikimedia Foundation does not spend enough money in countries of the "developing world" | 2022-08-03 23:16:14 UTC |
| #25 | 12 | 24. Had I been a member of the Board of Trustees at that time, I would have voted in favor of the Wikimedia Enterprise project | 2022-08-03 20:36:10 UTC |
| #26 | 12 | 30. The community may recall a selected candidate for any reason | 2022-08-03 21:11:25 UTC |
| #27 | 11 | 9. The departures of numerous senior staff members in 2021 indicate a problem at the Wikimedia Foundation | 2022-08-02 19:05:35 UTC |
| #28 | 11 | 22. Regional and Thematic Hubs create more unnecessary hierarchies and complex structures in the Wikimedia Movement | 2022-08-03 09:06:54 UTC |
| #29 | 10 | 28. The details of the evaluation of each candidate done by the Analysis Committee should be shared with the community | 2022-08-02 19:07:18 UTC |
| #30 | 9 | 12. Wikimedia Foundation spending by country must be prominently reported | 2022-08-03 19:50:17 UTC |
| #31 | 8 | 21. The "Global Council", recommended in the Movement Strategy recommendations, will not fulfill the goal of equitable representation in global decision-making | 2022-08-02 20:30:23 UTC |
| #32 | 7 | 15. Staff of the Wikimedia Foundation should be totally excluded from organizing the Board of Trustee elections | 2022-08-02 06:21:39 UTC |
| #33 | 7 | 14. Grantmaking to Wikimedia editors and community affiliates in the Global South should be increased to 5% of gross Wikimedia Foundation annual budget | 2022-08-03 12:37:26 UTC |
| #34 | 7 | 17. Regional quotas for grants/funding and participation (e.g. to Wikimania) should be removed | 2022-08-03 20:35:52 UTC |
| #35 | 6 | 34. Nowadays, it is practically impossible for Wikimedia user groups to be recognized as a Wikimedia chapter | 2022-08-03 20:36:35 UTC |
Candidate participation edit
Just fyi for those not following things on meta, it seems like there is a thread on meta at meta:Talk:Wikimedia Foundation elections/2022/Community Voting/Questions for Candidates suggesting that the election committee is discouraging candidates from participating over here. I find that bizarre and sad, as what is the point of an election where the candidates are discouraged from (not allowed to?) talk to the electorate. Bawolff (talk) 02:29, 5 August 2022 (UTC)
- This note confirms that the Editors-in-Chief are aware of this situation, and that we have been contacted privately as well. Coverage will be added in the September issue. 🐶 EpicPupper (he/him | talk) 06:43, 5 August 2022 (UTC)
Comment from candidates edit
Thank you to the Signpost team for writing this article. We are collectively writing here to clarify a few issues.
We were first asked to contribute to this by email on the 25th July, with a deadline of 30 July (in a period where other election activities are ongoing). When we as candidates were discussing this amongst ourselves, there was a consensus from five of us to respond to the Signpost with a request to follow a different procedure: instead of asking us to write new text, we requested that they used existing materials, and followed an equal process for all candidates. The one candidate who did not support this was the one who suggested to the Signpost that they ask us op-eds, without consulting others beforehand. We were hoping for an equal and fair process for all, which respects the existing election process.
We are disappointed that the Signpost did not follow this proposal, instead publishing one op-ed, and not making it clear why the others of us requested that they reuse existing materials. We also did not agree to answer questions as part of this article (although some of us may choose to answer anyway) - instead suggesting an alternative of an online discussion session with all of us. The Election Committee has designed a defined way to ask questions of candidates, which takes into account that we don't have unlimited time to contribute to the election process, and makes the process as inclusive and as equitable as possible, including embedding translations into the process.
We do not ask the Signpost to change things at this point, we simply want to point out these issues with this comment, with the hope that this situation does not arise again in future elections. On behalf of Shani, Farah, Mike, Tobechukwu, Michał. Mike Peel (talk) 08:31, 5 August 2022 (UTC)
- Hi Mike Peel, could you clarify why you requested they reuse existing materials? I see your "equal and fair process for all", but your message here does not seem to expand beyond that, aside from noting time committments and translations, which I understand but question as to why that would preclude prospective Board members from communicating with the people they hope to represent outside of Election Committee-designated areas. Vermont (🐿️—🏳️🌈) 15:19, 5 August 2022 (UTC)
- @Vermont: We've already put a lot of work into the existing text, particularly those that aren't native speakers. Asking for more text on very short notice (while everything else is also happening) was really not very feasible. We are communicating, but we can't spend all of our time communicating - we have other things (like editing!) we want to get on with as well. :-) Also, see the election committee's comments at meta:Talk:Wikimedia_Foundation_elections/2022/Community_Voting/Questions_for_Candidates, which also answer your question. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 17:45, 5 August 2022 (UTC)
Video answers posted edit
The WMF board candidates' video answers to six questions proposed and selected by the community have been posted on Meta-Wiki.
Written answers to additional community questions that were proposed but did not make it into the top six can be found here (further answers may still be added to this page in the days ahead, so do check back). Andreas JN466 07:54, 21 August 2022 (UTC)