Wikimedia Foundation elections/Board elections/2007/Candidates/Danny/questions

Sharing accounts

What is your opinion on family members/close friends using another person's Wiki account? Would you vouch not to allow other people use your account as <unnamed> board member did? MatthewFenton 16:56, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

I am completely opposed to that. Having an account means having the responsibility that comes with an account, and it should not be taken lightly. If a family member wants to comment, they should create their own account. Danny 17:41, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Fair-use

What is your stance on fair-use? Should we use it? How much fair-use should we use? MatthewFenton 16:56, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

I am opposed to the preponderance of Fair Use in the English Wikipedia and some other languages. Fair Use may be acceptable under very limited circumstances, but I think that we have failed to explore all of the creative ways that we can avoid this. This goes beyond simply taking more photographs. An organization of our size can obtain alternative images, pressure organizations to release images, and come up with innovative ideas to replace existing fair use images with completely free ones. Only if all other avenues have been explored, and there is no alternative to an image which is vital to the integrity of an article, should Fair Use be exploited. Danny 17:41, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Core issues

You mentioned that you think the Board should focus on core issues. What are those core issues?--Shanel 17:05, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

I believe I hinted at some of these in my statement: "Where is the fundraising strategy? Where is the technical road map? What is the plan for sustainability?" I believe that ensuring the longterm sustainability of the Foundation is the primary goal at this juncture. Running servers costs money (c. $60,000 a month), salaries cost money, office expenses cost money, so that it is reasonable to guess we are paying about $100,000 a month on operating costs, without considering special costs, such as travel, Wikimania, etc. In other words, we can go through a million bucks in less than a year--and we are growing. I think it is unreasonable and unwise to have that come just from small donations from our readers.

This leads to my second point--fiduciary responsibility--the primary responsibility of the Board. As an employee, I questioned whether money was always spent wisely. As a board member, I would like to see the appointment of an independent ombudsman for the foundation to examine the finances and ensure that the money is spent within proportion to our means. I would like to cut down on excessive travel costs (and would like the Board to report to the community how much each Board member spent on travel in the past year.) We are paying a lot of salaries today: in previous positions I held, I was subject to an annual performance review, and would like to see that implemented in the Foundation as well. I would also like to know whether salaries are commensurate with the market value of the particular staff member in that position. Are people being paid too much for too little output, or alternately, are we underpaying people, thereby putting ourselves in a position where we can lose core members of our team.

Finally, I would like to see the introduction of more professional Board members, to include true "captains of industry and academia," who have no personal ties to the individual projects, who can oversee the projects from a necessary distance, help the community to decide on new directions, and provide us with the much-needed financial sustainabililty. Danny 17:59, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Non-membership organization

Last December, the Wikimedia Foundation revised its bylaws to change itself from a membership organization to a non-membership organization. In a membership organization, the trustees are directly responsible to the membership; in a non-membership organization, the trustees are ultimately responsible only to one another (and indirectly to donors, who presumably will not donate if they feel the trustees are not being responsible). Do you feel that the Foundation, constituted as it is as a non-membership organization, provides sufficient structural checks and balances to ensure that the trustees observe their fiduciary responsibilities appropriately? Would a return to a membership structure, with the ability of members to bring policy proposals themselves at the annual meeting or by other methods, to remove board members by appropriate vote, and to sue the Foundation under certain conditions limit the ability of the Trustees to do what they need to do? If you do support a return to a membership structure, how would you determine who the voting members are? Kelly Martin 18:31, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

While I cannot comment fully on the legal ramifications of a membership organization, I believe that this option should be reinvestigated and formal membership be created if at all possible. The reason is precisely as you stated above--it would foster greater responsibility of the Board to its constituents. Rather than limit what the Board could do, it would actually enhance their abilities, because they would be operating in greater compliance with the will of the community of members. Above I proposed the idea of an independent ombudsman as one means of providing checks and balances. I think that membership is yet another such means. As for what membership requirements are, I have no doubt that it would entail paying a membership dues, however, I think we should investigate the possibility of combining dues with some other, non-financial contribution to the Foundation. For instance, annual membership could cost $50 and 1,000 edits. This latter step will ensure that the Foundation is not controlled by a vested party, which does not participate in the projects. Danny 18:45, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Ads

You mentioned above that you believe it is necessary to pursue other methods of raising money than small donations by readers. Do you believe that advertisements (or optional advertisements) should be added to raise money? Should we go after donations from large corporations? Do you have any other ideas for raising money? —METS501 (talk) 19:52, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

The first thing we have to realize is that money is not a dirty word, even though that sometimes seems to be the prevalent feeling among some of our editors. The second thing to realize is that running a website our size requires money--lots of money. Going on the basis of our average donation being $25, it would take 2,400 donations--80 donations a day--just to keep the servers running for a month. Just processing that amount of donations required a signicant amount of work. Last I checked, selling t-shirts brings us in about 600 dollars a month, so that in 100 months, we have enough t-shirt money to pay for one month of server costs, provided we do not grow and we do not buy anymore hardware. I think it's kind of obvious that we need some new strategies for the long run.

Advertising is one such strategy, which should be considered. Ads do not need to be obtrusive. We can control their content, size, etc. We can make them optional for registered users. I believe that they should be reconsidered. But that is not the only way to raise money. Just before I left, I brought a small boutique branding company to present itself to the board. Branding products with our logo can be a very lucrative source of income that might even eliminate any need for advertising. Unfortunately, the meeting did not go as well as planned. The evening before, another staff member made an unfortunate public scene, somewhat tarnishing our name before this company. After the presentation, the Board promised to get back to them within two weeks, but that did not happen, further tarnishing our name. To me, that is utterly unacceptable. Perhaps there are other companies, but have they been adequately explored? Or have we just tossed an opportunity away.

Let's face it. There are many companies who have made offers that could have provided us with a steady stream of income. We must do much more to take advantage of those opportunities while they are available. This is the business side of running a corporation, and it is essential, whether it is branding agreements, live feeds, or other opportunities.

Last but not least, the money that we raise can do so much to help us further our mission, and not just pay for bandwidth and hosting. Jimmy once asked on one of the mailing lists for us to imagine what we could do if we had $100 million at our disposal. There were some great ideas there to obtain, liberate, foster, and promote free content and free knowledge. Those are the kinds of things that money will make possible. Rather than asking ourselves "Should we have advertising?" we should ponder, "What is it costing us not to have it?" Danny 20:40, 16 June 2007 (UTC)