WMF Board reports/July-August, 2011
Resolutions and votes edit
- Donor Privacy Policy
This resolution approved the June 2011 update to the Donor privacy policy, which specifies what information we collect from donors and how we may disclose it. It also affirms that we support the Donor Bill of Rights.
- New chapter
Wikimedia México was approved as the WMF's 35th chapter; congratulations, México!
- Advisory Board re-appointments
Members of the Advisory Board were re-appointed for another year (actually until December 2012, in order to get us to a calendar year re-appointment schedule). Thank you to all the advisors for your service.
- Board appointments
This vote was formal recognition of the community election results, by reappointing Kat Walsh, Samuel Klein and Ting Chen to the Board for two-year terms.
- Letter on fundraising
During the Board's meeting in Haifa, the Board discussed, drafted and released a letter about fundraising principles. There were extensive discussions following this letter, which are ongoing (see October report and m:Fundraising Discussion).
Other Board work edit
- Meetings
- The Board met for its regularly scheduled meeting at Wikimania, in Haifa, Israel on August 3 (minutes). This meeting was followed by a wonderful Wikimania. The Board, as it does every year, sat for a question-and-answer session with the community on the first day of the conference, following a plenary by Sue about the state of the projects (video).
- The Board met for an online (IRC) meeting on August 28 (minutes).
- The next regularly scheduled meeting is October 7-8, in San Francisco.
- Board Governance Committee
The Board Governance Committee (Matt-Chair, Ting, Jan-Bart), at the Haifa meeting, ran officer elections and committee appointments for the upcoming year. Ting was reelected as chair, Stu was re-elected as treasurer, Jan-Bart was elected as vice-chair, and Phoebe was elected as secretary.
Matt led the Trustee "peer and self evaluation" process with BoardSource. This assessment exercise was first conducted last fall. As a part of this process each trustee will be asked to evaluate her/his own performance as a board member and that of her/his peers. This confidential assessment will help us ensure that Wikimedia Foundation has a board that is best prepared to provide the strategic guidance and oversight needed over the next several years. Developmental feedback will be given to each Trustee based on his/her self-evaluation and that of his/her peers on the board. The feedback will also assist the Board Chair and the rest of the Governance Committee in determining whether the board's present and near-term needs are being met by its current Trustees. Assessment results will be one of several factors the Governance Committee will use to make this determination, and synthesized results will be shared with all trustees. BoardSource is acting as an external consultant; they will administer the survey that will be given to each Trustee. The questions can be viewed here.
- Movement roles
Samuel Klein led a movement roles meeting before Wikimania; several other trustees also participated for all or part of the day. Movement roles work is ongoing on meta.
- Audit Committee
Stu led a meeting in August to discuss chapters fundraising questions and review KPMG's audit plan for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2011. Stu was also active in interview process that led to hiring of new Chief of Finance and Administration, Garfield Byrd.
Trustee outreach and other activities edit
Ting went to Zürich to attend the Zürich Wikipedia Sommer Party at August 20th. It was a small community meeting in the center of the city with about 15 attendants (sorrowfully only one female). The attendants come as far as Bonn and Leipzig, Germany. It was a very nice gathering with plenty of food and drinks. The topic ranged from chapter fundraising to different laws about panorama freedoms in the German speaking countries.
Ting went to Dirby to visit the WMUK board meeting at the Dirby Museum at August 27th.
Kat gave a talk at Wikimania entitled "May it please the court", about citations to Wikipedia in court cases (video).
Phoebe led a discussion at Wikimania about events, called "Wikimedia Events: from Wikimania to WikiX and beyond"; the session included a quick overview of events in the Wikimedia-world and discussion around ideas for events.
Jimmy gave the closing keynote at Wikimania; subjects included building the community and streamlining process to make it work for people, not bots (Video). Jimmy also presented the first annual Global Wikipedian award to Rauan Kenzhekhanuly of Kazakhstan.
Samuel and Phoebe visited Ramallah, and met with Bazinga! an open co-working space, tech collective and startup incubator in Ramallah; and then met over dinner with members of Peeks.ps, a tech group in Ramallah, where they gave an informal talk about Wikipedia.
Stu worked with various community members to continue updating Reports.