Report to the Board (March)

[Sue Gardner-2]

Weeks of: March 1 to March 31, 2008
Prepared by: Sue Gardner
Prepared for: Wikimedia Board of Trustees


MY CURRENT PRIORITIES
last updated April 13

1. Finalization of fundraising strategy
2. Launch of preliminary foundation investigations
3. Establishment of the new SF headquarters, including set-up of meeting
schedules, etc.
4. Bits and pieces (990 wrap-up, further hires, potential partnerships,
etc.)
5. Goal setting for final two quarters of FY 07-08
6. Continuation of major donor initiatives already underway


RECENT WEEKS

FUNDRAISING

On March 4, we invited a group of friends and potential supporters to
visit the San Francisco office. This event was professionally planned
and executed, including lighting, real-time data displays, catering,
music (courtesy of Pandora), a wiki-guestbook, etc.

On March 25, 2008, the Sloan Foundation announced it would award USD 3
million of support to the Wikimedia Foundation. The funding will be
received over three years, at one million dollars per year. It is
“institutional funding” - and will go towards the Wikimedia Foundation's
key goals, including its continued organizational development. One
specific initiative it will support is the FlaggedRevs revision-tagging
technology, which we hope to deploy across projects in order to allow
project communities to systematically assess the quality of specific
article revisions. It will also help support the expansion of outreach
initiatives such as Wikipedia Academy, and the distribution of
educational content from Wikipedia and its sister projects in
non-web-based formats such as DVDs and books, to reach people who are
not online.

On March 27, 2008, we announced that we have received a $500,000
unrestricted donation from philanthropists Vinod and Neeru Khosla.

During March, we developed our new fundraising strategy. It focuses on
targeting multiple revenue streams to achieve stability and
sustainability, including a balance of major donors, “smaller”
donations, grants from foundations, and earned income. Work is ongoing
developing a list of major donor prospects, implementing standardized
fundraising procedures, and acknowledging both past and current gifts.
And, several staff members have received fundraising training.

BOARD MEETING PREPARATION

A Board meeting is scheduled for April 5-7, the first to take place in
San Francisco. Preparation for the Board meeting included development of
the agenda, making arrangements for Board travel and accommodation, the
scheduling of meetings with candidates for the position of board
treasurer, and the development and presentation of the following documents:

* A presentation summarizing key achievements since the last
face-to-face Board meeting in October 2007; describing revenue and
hiring plans, and summarizing the Wikimedia Foundation staff goals
development process and the 2008 goals.
* A postmortem document analyzing the organization's response to recent
media events and making recommendations for the future
* An update on the Wikimania security situation
* The IRS form 990 for FY 06-07
* The FY 06-07 audit firm “management letter”
* A draft non-disparagement agreement and pledge of personal commitment
* A draft resolution on data retention
* Update on progress towards revamping the privacy policy.

Thanks to everyone who participated in preparations for the meeting.

ACCOUNTING TRANSITIONS TO SAN FRANCISCO

On March 7, we announced the hiring of Mary Lou Secoquian, our new
accountant in the San Francisco office. Mary Lou has a degree in
accounting, and more than 20 years experience with financial
recordkeeping, management reporting, partnership reporting, payroll,
audit and tax work. Mary Lou replaces Oleta McHenry, our St. Petersburg
accountant. We are enormously grateful to Oleta for her dedication and
hard work on behalf of the Foundation.

HIRING

In mid-March, we announced that Frank Schulenburg has agreed to lead the
Wikimedia Foundation’s public outreach initiatives. Frank is well-known
as the founder of Wikipedia Academy and vice chair of Wikimedia
Deutschland. In his role as public outreach coordinator, Frank will
stage more Wikipedia Academies, and will develop and implement other
strategies designed to encourage contributions from targeted
underrepresented groups – which may include, for example, small-language
speakers, people in developing nations, and older people. (Our general
survey, in development with UNU-Merit, will help us solidify the
demographics we want to target.) Frank will also design other outreach
events, templates and support materials aimed at raising public
awareness and understanding of Wikimedia projects. In all of this, he
will work closely with the chapters.

We've identified a candidate for a software developer position, and will
re-advertise the junior developer / IT support position.

We've also developed draft job descriptions for all fundraising
positions, and hope to begin hiring for these in April.

MEDIA

Significant staff energy was spent developing responses to various media
and blog coverage (Marsden/Wool/Merkey). The Los Angeles Times and the
New York Times covered Wikimedia's fundraising plans, resulting in a
brief spike of public support. We identified and announced the 10
millionth Wikipedia article, a biography of English painter Nicholas
Hilliard from the Hungarian Wikipedia. Preparations were made for the
launch of an official Wikimedia Foundation blog.

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT

All existing deals are being reassessed, and some contracts cancelled
because they have been under-valued. The live feed service in particular
has been evaluated in some detail, with review of documentation and
quality of service, and initial planning regarding the future nature of
the service. The business development strategy is being developed, and
will be finalized in June.

TECHNOLOGY

[At this time, the monthly report only covers work done by paid staff,
and a lot of technology work is done by volunteers. A good way to track
key technical changes is to read the Wikipedia Signpost's weekly
“B.R.I.O.N.” report:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost ]

Erik and Mark met with Kennisnet in the Netherlands to discuss the
future of the Kennisnet/Wikimedia partnership. Mark continues to explore
additional sponsorship options in Europe. Erik also met with Erik Zachte
to discuss Wikistats and other data analysis and visualization projects.

Test wikis for the FlaggedRevs extension have been deployed in English
and German, and an announcement has been distributed in many languages.
The German community in particular has very actively pushed the
extension, and deployment on the German Wikipedia is expected to follow
in April.

The first stage of Single User Login has been deployed. Administrators
on all Wikimedia projects can migrate their user accounts to the new
global login system. For now, sessions are still separate, i.e., it's
necessary to log into each project separately. After appropriate
testing, access to the migration tools will be given to non-administrators.

The PediaPress PDF library and collection manager are in local testing;
first report available at:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/PDF_generation_tests%2C_March_2008 -
first real world deployment to happen in April.

The search engine has been improved: the front-end has been
standardized, and the search now supports media thumbnails, which is
particularly valuable for Wikimedia Commons.

The WAP mobile phone gateway has been improved, and Brion has
implemented an experimental location-based Wikipedia search.

ORIENTATION AND NEW OFFICE SET-UP CONTINUES

Health insurance for North American staff will be in place in early
April. We are beginning to set up schedules of meetings, such as a
weekly revenue meeting, fundraising meetings, technology meetings, and
so on. Many people's goals for the current fiscal year have been
finalized. The office is starting to become not just usable but in fact
a friendly and pleasant, collaborative space. Photos of and by
Wikimedians are very present, creating a sense of immersion in the
volunteer community.

PARTNERSHIPS

Work on the UNU-Merit survey is ongoing and a first round of feedback on
the draft survey questions has been exchanged.

ALSO

Wikimania 2009 will take place in Buenos Aires, Argentina –
congratulations to the bidding team!
Planning for Wikimania 2008 continues
Planning towards the chapters meeting in the Netherlands continues

COMING WEEKS

Hiring for software developer, fundraising, partnerships positions
UNU-Merit survey questions to be finalized and distributed for translation
Early meetings with grant-giving foundations
Major donor cultivation and stewardship
Analysis and consolidation of fundraising data from past fundraisers
Phasing out old 32-bit machines from server farm
Migration to new version of Asterisk for office phone system
Further deployment and testing of FlaggedRevs, PediaPress PDF library
Security of Intranet wikis to be increased
Major hardware order and deployment, including a dedicated server for
Wikistats
Permanent set-up of data displays in the office and other prettification
efforts

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[Thomas Dalton]

Once again, thank you very much for this update. It looks like a lot
of good work is going on.

One question: What does this mean?

"2. Launch of preliminary foundation investigations"

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[David Gerard-2]

On 14/04/2008, Sue Gardner <sgardner@...> wrote:

>  TECHNOLOGY
>  [At this time, the monthly report only covers work done by paid staff,
>  and a lot of technology work is done by volunteers. A good way to track
>  key technical changes is to read the Wikipedia Signpost's weekly
>  "B.R.I.O.N." report:
>  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost ]


Heh. Does Ral315 know that the Signpost is the endorsed channel for
technical information?


- d.

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[Erik Moeller-4]

On 4/14/08, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton@...> wrote:
> Once again, thank you very much for this update. It looks like a lot
>  of good work is going on.
>
>  One question: What does this mean?
>
>
>  "2. Launch of preliminary foundation investigations"

This refers to systematic research into grant-giving organizations and
related funding opportunities, similar to the grant we received from
the Sloan Foundation.
--
Erik Möller
Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation

Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate

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[Thomas Dalton]

On 14/04/2008, Erik Moeller <erik@...> wrote:

> On 4/14/08, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton@...> wrote:
>  > Once again, thank you very much for this update. It looks like a lot
>  >  of good work is going on.
>  >
>  >  One question: What does this mean?
>  >
>  >
>  >  "2. Launch of preliminary foundation investigations"
>
>
> This refers to systematic research into grant-giving organizations and
>  related funding opportunities, similar to the grant we received from
>  the Sloan Foundation.

Thank you!

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[mike.lifeguard]

-----Original Message-----
From: Sue Gardner [mailto:sgardner@...]
>It will also help support the expansion of outreach
>initiatives such as Wikipedia Academy, and the distribution of
>educational content from Wikipedia and its sister projects in
>non-web-based formats such as DVDs and books, to reach people who are
>not online.
----


I'm glad to see this mentioned in your report, as I've wondered for some
time what initiatives the Foundation is taking to expand our impact beyond
the internet. If our mission is to bring the collected knowledge of the
world to everyone (or however you parse it), then we have to recognize that
the internet is a limited means to do so, and we'll need to do much more
beyond it to reach that goal, or anything close to it.

"...And so if you think about what [that goal] means, it means a lot more
than just building a cool website; we're really interested in all the issues
of the digital divide, poverty worldwide, empowering people everywhere to
have the information that they need to make good decisions. And so we're
gonna have to do a lot of work that goes beyond just the internet..." [1]

The last time I mentioned this, I was pointed toward localization of
MediaWiki as one way we're doing this... I don't see how localizing a
website reaches beyond the internet. To be fair, there have been efforts in
the past to actually go beyond the internet:
*I think we had some partnership with OLPC [2] at some point; that might
have been Wikibooks-specific [3] (and it might be simply a free association
of volunteers with nothing higher-level happening)
*There are other groups who print (on paper/CDs/DVDs) Wikipedia content, but
are not involved with us, so far as I know

I haven't seen the Foundation take the lead on anything of the sort until
now. If I'm just not seeing it, feel free to turn this into a learning
opportunity for me, as I'd be interested in getting involved if there are
things happening that I've missed. Otherwise, I look forward to seeing where
this leads, now that we have some funding.

In particular, the Wikibooks project and it's Wikijuior "sub-project" are
excellent candidates for publishing, for obvious reasons, and I hope the
various language communities of Wikibooks in particular will put some
thought into how they can effect the goal of reaching "beyond just the
internet."

Mike.lifeguard

[1] TED Talks. Jimmy Wales: How a ragtag band created Wikipedia.
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/37
[2] http://laptop.org/
[3] http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Wikibooks



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[Sebastian Moleski]

On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 4:09 PM, mike.lifeguard <mike.lifeguard@...>
wrote:

>
> The last time I mentioned this, I was pointed toward localization of
> MediaWiki as one way we're doing this... I don't see how localizing a
> website reaches beyond the internet. To be fair, there have been efforts
> in
> the past to actually go beyond the internet:
> *I think we had some partnership with OLPC [2] at some point; that might
> have been Wikibooks-specific [3] (and it might be simply a free
> association
> of volunteers with nothing higher-level happening)
> *There are other groups who print (on paper/CDs/DVDs) Wikipedia content,
> but
> are not involved with us, so far as I know
>

The Wikipedia CD and DVD published in Germany as well as the WikiPress books
were produced in cooperation with Wikimedia Deutschland. There are also
initiatives under way to expand on the offline distribution of Wikipedia
content. I would expect some more information as soon as commercial
negotiations are finished.

Sebastian
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[Florence Devouard-3]

Sebastian Moleski wrote:

> On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 4:09 PM, mike.lifeguard <mike.lifeguard@...>
> wrote:
>
>> The last time I mentioned this, I was pointed toward localization of
>> MediaWiki as one way we're doing this... I don't see how localizing a
>> website reaches beyond the internet. To be fair, there have been efforts
>> in
>> the past to actually go beyond the internet:
>> *I think we had some partnership with OLPC [2] at some point; that might
>> have been Wikibooks-specific [3] (and it might be simply a free
>> association
>> of volunteers with nothing higher-level happening)
>> *There are other groups who print (on paper/CDs/DVDs) Wikipedia content,
>> but
>> are not involved with us, so far as I know
>>
>
> The Wikipedia CD and DVD published in Germany as well as the WikiPress books
> were produced in cooperation with Wikimedia Deutschland. There are also
> initiatives under way to expand on the offline distribution of Wikipedia
> content. I would expect some more information as soon as commercial
> negotiations are finished.
>
> Sebastian

Absolutely.

I will also mention that in April 17, 2007 the Wikimedia Foundation and
Linterweb announced the release of Wikipedia Version 0.5, a compact disc
collection of approximately 2,000 articles from the English Wikipedia.
The project paves the way for many such collections, with larger
releases planned in a variety of languages.

Wikimedia France was at the forefront of bringing the CD collection to
fruition, and securing the deal with Linterweb, a French technology
company. In the future, Wikimedia France also aims to produce a French
language CD through Linterweb. The French/English collaboration has
proved very successful, and the two groups continue to share ideas and
resources.

Please see further details at:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Version_.5

Ant


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[David Gerard-2]

On 15/04/2008, Florence Devouard <Anthere9@...> wrote:

>  I will also mention that in April 17, 2007 the Wikimedia Foundation and
>  Linterweb announced the release of Wikipedia Version 0.5, a compact disc
>  collection of approximately 2,000 articles from the English Wikipedia.
>  The project paves the way for many such collections, with larger
>  releases planned in a variety of languages.


And the SOS Children Wikipedia Selection For Schools, which was done
by SOS Children for their own needs but is done on the SOS side by
Andrew Cates, aka [[:en:User:BozMo]]. The SOS Children DVD is
particularly interesting as it's a downstream distributor using
Wikipedia content as raw material for something it's producing for a
use.


- d.

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[Brian J Mingus]

On Mon, Apr 14, 2008 at 4:15 PM, Sue Gardner <sgardner@...> wrote:

> including a dedicated server for Wikistats


awesome!
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[Pharos-3]

On Mon, Apr 14, 2008 at 6:15 PM, Sue Gardner <sgardner@...> wrote:
>  Permanent set-up of data displays in the office and other prettification
>  efforts

Remember to include WikiPediaVision:

http://www.lkozma.net/wpv/index.html

Thanks,
Pharos

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