Wikimedia Foundation elections/2021/Candidates/CandidateQ&A/Question6/en

How should the Wikimedia Foundation engage with emerging WikiCommunities in the near future (next 2 to 3 years)?

Question received from a community member on Meta

Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)

Emerging communities will get preference when we have data to share. This means for instance that we will provide centrally maintained lists. It will be up to a community to accept it as is or not. That is the way of the Wiki.

Dariusz Jemielniak (Pundit)

The WMF has the responsibility to foster emerging wikicommunities. I think it is much more important to support groups which spontaneously self-organize rather than to try to stimulate something into existence. In the near future, I would like to see the WMF support regional hubs of funds dissemination, as the needs are better known at the lower level. Additionally, I think that it is important that larger affiliates support the emerging communities, and the WMF should provide a dedicated funding for that. One of the ideas I presented in my statement is the leadership program: I believe that we can have our own leaders trained and prepared for important roles in the movement. Such a program (and other initiatives) can tremendously help in making the emerging WikiCommunities grow faster. Pundit (talk) 11:48, 7 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Lionel Scheepmans (Lionel Scheepmans)

Concerning the local or thematic Wiki communities, the foundation could help these local groups and associations to become autonomous both in terms of finances and governance. I also think that, like the editorial projects, it would be good to organize things around the language to facilitate the functioning of the structure while keeping an international dimension. Wikifranca is in this sense a good example which does not prevent state organizations from existing and developing. In terms of editorial projects, I believe that the foundation must be very careful in its interventions, which in any case do not happen without the consent of the communities. The collaboration between the publishing community and the foundation's employees must be very close and always concensual.

Reda Kerbouche (Reda Kerbouche)

No response yet.

Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight (Rosiestep)

Every “emerging WikiCommunity” is unique, so there is no “one size fits all” strategy for Wikimedia Foundation engagement. For example, 2020 saw the start-up of (a) WikiProject COVID-19 in 22 language Wikipedias; (b) a new sister project, Abstract Wikipedia; as well as (c ) several new Affiliates (Wikimedia user groups). The Wikimedia Foundation engaged with each of these new communities, but in different ways. Appropriate and timely communication is the key. I think that once we flesh out the concept of Hubs (Movement Strategy Initiative 25), the wiki movement will find them to be a welcome addition to our "emerging WikiCommunity structure". As always, all of us should be open to “Evaluate, Iterate, and Adapt” (Movement Strategy Recommendation 10). --Rosiestep (talk) 16:06, 12 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Mike Peel (Mike Peel)

Very carefully! Engagement with emerging communities is really important: they need support, both financially and otherwise. However, it needs to be done on their terms. Brazil was a good example of when things go wrong - the negative repercussions of the WMF's intervention there were still visible many years later (e.g., through a fractured community), and it set the Wikimedia community in Brazil back more than it helped it, as did even more recent Brazil-related actions by WMF. However, there are also positive activities that happen there, and should be supported and amplified by the WMF.

In general, devolving decision-making and making funding available (through a stable, decentralised, participatory grant making process) are the best things WMF can do here - which fits in well with the movement strategy. I really hope that positive support for developing communities grows over the next few years, to make Wikimedia even more of a global community. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 10:07, 11 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Adam Wight (Adamw)

No response yet.

Vinicius Siqueira (Vini 175)

This engagement needs to be made from the perspective of Wikimedia communities. Thus, the only way is to foster decentralization of the movement. A step in this direction is the creation of thematic and regional hubs. --Vinicius Siqueira (talk) 00:49, 10 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Yao Eliane Dominique (Yasield)

I really appreciate the next approaches in terms of funding. This will allow the Affiliates and User Groups to be autonomous in order to deploy all their development ideas. This dynamic must continue and be refined as we go along. Similarly, the foundation should get closer to its communities through administrative decentralization.

Douglas Ian Scott (Discott)

Each community has its own preferred medium of communication. In southern Africa we tend to communicate through mailing lists, digital meetups, and Wiki project portal pages. Other communities prefer communicating using other platforms. It is the responsibility of the WMF to reach out and communicate with each community on their preferred platform. I would however always encourage the WMF to also communicate with them on their respective Wikipedia platform such as on the village pump page for each language version of Wikipedia (which, for example, is Afrikaans Wikipedia’s preferred platform for dialogue) or on the thematic portal pages. This ensures that the online editing community will always be included in addition to the affiliates.

I would also suggest directly communicating with emerging communities at Wikimania and the regional conferences we have. As a community member from an emerging WikiCommunity I have found these events to be very important platform for engagement with the WMF and broader movement.--Discott (talk) 13:29, 19 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Pascale Camus-Walter (Waltercolor)

For all WikiCommunities, not only the emerging one, there should be first an assessment of what already exists and which are the characteristics of any community (langage, region, thematic, number of members, type of structures...). This should lead to a real-time mapping to see where there is growth, a need for a structure, bridges that could be established between similar language or same region communities, etc... Clear communication about the dynamic of the communities and the support given to them should encourage people to participate in emerging WikiCommunities as they will feel part of the same big movement. There should also be specific programs with training, contests, labels and awards for people participating in projects via emerging WikiCommunities. When people make the effort to participate, they must be rewarded and we should communicate about this. --Waltercolor (talk) 10:24, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Iván Martínez (ProtoplasmaKid)

A fundamental issue is to broaden the social base of the foundation itself, for which a strategy of decentralization and diversity in the hiring of staff is urgently needed, to the extent possible. Sometimes "emerging" can fall into a different definition depending on the background of the people, therefore, a spirit of openness both in the direction of the WMF and in its public communications can generate greater understanding and empathy within the volunteer communities, know which ones have that "emerging" character and, above all, go at their pace'.

Likewise, the foundation must permanently understand, when trying to connect with communities, the asymmetries of the world; since the metrics for measuring success as a movement in Western Europe are not the same as in Central America. It also happens with the stories that are communicated outwardly from the Wikimedia Foundation, which tend to be individualistic and not about community achievements.

Victoria Doronina (Victoria)

I think that emerging WikiCommunities need more help. If they have a “big sister” community, who can help them technically, they thrive. For example, Russian wikimedians help emerging communities in the languages of the Russian Federation (Chuvash, for example). Wikimedia.RU helps them to organise. But if the “ big sister” is English, communities with just a couple of founding members are struggling to be heard. So we need dedicated people whose job will be to help the emerging communities.

Lorenzo Losa (Laurentius)

The Wikimedia Foundation should support the emerging communities, giving them space to grow but without pushing them in any particular direction. Among the biggest mistakes made in the history of the Wikimedia Foundation, there are the attempts to artificially grow communities (we still remember the problems in Brazil more than ten years ago). The Wikimedia Foundation should also remember that supporting emerging communities does not only mean providing money. Providing money is easy and very visible, and very often asked for, but it is not enough.

Moreover, in addition to the support from the Wikimedia Foundation, it is also important the support from peers: other volunteers that are in the region, or that work in similar projects. The regional hubs that are being planned could be of great value - but it is still hard to tell, since they do not exist yet.

Raavi Mohanty (Raavimohantydelhi)

In my vision, entities like WikiCommunities are working like pseudopodia of WMF. Rather, these communities should have more prominent and existable capabilities. What we need is a hub placed for all entities nationwide across the world. In the future, these hubs will fill the interstices between the foundation and communities. A strategy should be made with a working system and equipped with adequate facilities with road maps for communities. Foundation has to collect the issues, problems, complaints, from communities through these central working units and troubleshoot them. All requirements of communities should be thoroughly judged and fulfilled within the foundation protocols. Community members should be trained in more of the ways where they get forged highly to face challenges to make everything ahead.

Have seen, communities are crippled at some of the situations and points. To avoid such conditions, WMF should provide financial support to all communities. Some communities and user groups are not in foundation's scope of reach. Such entities have to get their existence officially.

Ashwin Baindur (AshLin)

The Grantsmaking Community has defined for their use a working interim definition of emerging communities as: the set of projects, languages, and countries where:

there is great potential for increase in quantity and quality of Wikimedia work, and where there is, locally, insufficient capacity to realize that potential, and where there is an existing active core of self-motivated volunteers, which therefore WMF could effectively devote some proactive resources to support and nurture.

In my view, this definition is adequate but not sufficient, because of its lower bound, because of which already challenged communities could get discriminated due to subjective interpretation of whether they satisfy these criteria of emerging communities or not.

In my view of the Global South, any language community, any project community, any part of humanity which has to overcome additional challenges in any form to access the knowledge that the Wikimedia global community creates, needs supporting. How and when this happens, and priority/forms of support and intervention needs to be done after careful study and analysis, not by rough and ready subjective criteria. Otherwise, we would be creating a class of communities and projects which don't get supported just because we are interested in economic efficiency.

That aside, once emerging communities are defined, how should the Foundation help? The means and forms of support should be examined in detail, and in consultation with community, a detailed, deliberate, well thought out programme of support should be devised tailor-made to the conditions and requirements of the community. Emerging communities need various kinds of help - access to funds and resources, help with MediaWiki and stewardship/administrative advice, skill development, help in recruiting volunteers, access to knowledge resources and academic expertise, etc.

WMF help to communities should come about in two clear ways, in my opinion. The first is where, an emerging community identifies a critical need and approaches WMF for help, which it would consider whether and how to help. The other should involve community engagement where WMF staff help emerging communities to get to a firm footing, and where by engagement and consensus, a program of help would be agreed upon and carried out.

The procedure for help requests from any emerging community should be easy and without barriers. WMF should be sympathetic and attentive to the communities, especially as there is large asymmetry between the power and resources of the Foundation and the requesting emergent community.

A significant part of WMF's reputation depends upon the way it interacts with those who are in positions of lesser advantage to them and it's really important that the WMF be friendly and accommodative and be seen to be so, as well.

It would take time for the Global Council and hubs (which would be given a budget) to come about. Once that happens, emerging communities would have structures within the Community itself to approach. Till that happens, however, emerging communities would be looking for WMF to engage with emerging communities in a holistic manner, without bias or prejudice, and with consideration and equity.

Pavan Santhosh Surampudi (Pavan santhosh.s)

As a candidate who is from and worked with emerging communities, I believe, there is a great potential to work on these communities in terms of quality, quantity and community growth aspects. My ideas about working towards supporting emerging communities are:

  • As I mentioned in my candidate page (Top 3 Movement Strategy priorities), Investing in Skills and leadership development is crucial. This is even more crucial for emerging communities. Without communities taking ownership of various activities needed to improve themselves, nothing good is going to come. That ownership can only come from local leadership.
  • Understanding the complexities and diversities of these communities is important. The context and history of the Wikimedia movement in each of these emerging communities is different.
  • Empowering stakeholders across the movement by supporting regional level decision making is another important aspect step in this direction. Providing resources towards the growth of these communities and projects should be coincided with improving capacity and sense of ownership in local communities in spending those resources efficiently.

Ravishankar Ayyakkannu (Ravidreams)

Through our movement strategy exercise, we have a clear roadmap for the next 10 years. So, I do not expect any major changes or programs to be initiated just for the sake of the next two or three years. However, I have a keen interest in ensuring that the foundation allocates more funds and it reaches the emerging communities without burdening them with administrative issues. I would support more Simple and Rapid grants supporting the emerging communities in the immediate timeframe.

Farah Jack Mustaklem (Fjmustak)

The Wikimedia Foundation (hopefully through regional hubs) should focus on supporting the emerging wiki communities by providing training, training material, and funding. The introduction of regional hubs should help in improving communication, as well as understanding the regional differences in how these emerging communities can be supported. What works in one region may not work in another. --Fjmustak (talk) 23:37, 31 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]