User talk:WWB/Archive 6

question one, possibility of an on-wiki ExecDir nomination thingamabob
Hello Bill-or-William, you can call me 74. Ran across your off-wiki site when I accidentally hit the enter-key too fast in my browser. :-)    It seems you have some interest in the ongoing process to recruit a new ExecDir for WMF, now that Sue is stepping down.  I was thinking about running some kind of RfC-type-of-thing, asking enWiki folks to nominate possible recruits, and then doing a modified  bangvoting system with weekly tallies.  This would require some pretty strict BLPTALK enforcement, but methinks could be helpful.  The WMF-appointed committee and WMF-funded mgmt recruiting firm have been working since May'13, but haven't had success yet; their new somewhat-arbitrary deadline is March 2014.  Does this sound fun to you?  If so, maybe we can get it up and running by the 1st.  I've got a rough-draft process hammered out, but rather than immediately spam you with it, I figured I would give you the broad sketch, and see if you cottoned to the idea, first of all.  Danke.  74.192.84.101 (talk) 02:12, 28 December 2013 (UTC)
 * For maximum confusion, I will reply to your response below up here. :-)    Of course, take your time, WP:DEADLINE applies.  I wish you smooth sailing with minimal turbulence.  Here is the longer proposal for the on-wiki nomination process, if decide you have interest, and want more reading-material for your flight.  User_talk:Ahnoneemoos  It is only a rough draft, and since I'm not sure it's actually a good idea, it can only boast a zero-person-consensus as yet.   Hope this helps, talk to you later.  74.192.84.101 (talk) 17:53, 28 December 2013 (UTC)
 * Hi 74, thanks for your patience (especially as I didn't quite hit my own self-imposed deadline to reply). I'll answer about the WMF executive director position here, and follow up with the other one shortly.


 * Though I obviously haven't seen any other details, I have to say I think the approval voting concept faces some challenges I would consider insurmountable, assuming your goal is to change the course of the search process. First, though you're right that the situation with the official search is anything but clear, it's still months into the process, and I can't see there being political will inside WMF to go another direction at this point; the sunk cost fallacy is very, very difficult to escape. Second, the real problem I see is that WMF and the Wikipedia community (let alone enWP) are entirely different entities. The leader of the former is not necessarily going to be drawn from the latter pool, and I would almost certainly bet against it.


 * Now, to follow up a dangled thought from the start of the previous paragraph: the fact that I don't think it is going to actually work is not a reason not to take it out for a test drive. If you'd be satisfied aiming just to lodge a peaceful protest against the current bureaucratic reality, I think there may be some value in that by itself. What do you think? WWB (talk) 15:12, 3 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Yes, correct assessment, this will almost certainly not change the outcome, and we'll have to be upfront about that fact-of-the-situation with potential participants. It is a "protest-vote", primarily... to say, hey why weren't we invited to the party in the first place... but secondarily, a test-drive, to see how it turns out.  Maybe it will be a shocking failure which the admins close down due to disruption and BLPTALK violations... it might surprise us both and turn out to be a runaway success which sweeps a dark horse candidate into office... but the most likely scenario is that it will be a mixed bag.  Still, if it shows more positives than negatives, and we can work out a mechanism which keeps the system clean & well-run & lucid & productive, we might resurrect the scheme the next time there is a similar find-the-needle-in-the-haystack situation.
 * One important correction: the goal of the on-wiki open-nom isn't to find the best (en)Wikipedian in the "pool" of current editors.  The goal is to make a list of the best-qualified humans, with the only restriction that the humans in question must have a WP:BLP page in mainspace (and even that restriction is subject to WP:IAR override of course... if a person is proposed for nomination that is an excellent candidate yet doesn't have a BLP at present they will not be ejected on a technicality).  What kind of insurmountables are you seeing?  Do you like another kind of voting scheme, or have tweaks to suggest?  What about seed-names, people with a BLP that you think might make reasonable ExecDirs, plus would spark discussion?
 * p.s. No problem about the delays, hope your off-wiki efforts went well, and happy proleptic gregorian increment.  :-)    p.p.s.  I've discussed various aspects of this on-wiki open-nom thing with  via email, and we are somewhat closer in our thinking now.  I'm supposed to strip identifying info and redundancy and such, then post the summary-meeting-minutes to my talkpage.  I'm *also* supposed to email Kat and Gayle, who were recommended to me by User:Ironholds aka User:Okeyes; they might be delighted by the prospect, or the opposite, but I said I would mention it to them before we posted to WP:VPI 74.192.84.101 (talk) 04:16, 5 January 2014 (UTC)


 * I'm curious what you would propose as a series of steps to get this where you want it. Have you written up such a thing? That would make it easier for me to evaluate. Also, I wonder if the better venue for this would be an op-ed in the Signpost. Considering the fact that the Exec Dir search has stretched longer than planned, and no announcement appears to be coming for awhile yet, now is a great time to raise questions. And one other thing for the moment: I'm not sure I understand why these qualified humans would have to be the subject of a WP:BLP? Even if there is an exception, why include that? Surely qualified people need not be WP:NOTABLE themselves, and if not, a bio could be hosted somewhere besides the mainspace. Perhaps even at Drafts... WWB (talk) 14:27, 9 January 2014 (UTC)


 * Well, yes, it's written out. It's long.  I pointed you at rough-draft-number-one, above, but the Ahnoneemoos-user-talkpage-boht has already moved draft#1 to an archive, so you prolly never saw it.  User_talk:Ahnoneemoos/Archives/2013/December is the original, in the newly-archived location.  Here below, I'll paste a somewhat-shorter somewhat-sharpened draft#2 of the scheme.
 * To reply to your suggestions, an op-ed in the signpost is not a bad idea, but has the downside that it is non-interactive. I want people to be able to *actively* make nominations, and approve/disapprove of the nominations suggested by others.  Hence, my main goal is to get something put up at WP:VPR (probably first starting with the draft#3 sketch (w/ improvements by WWB :-) of the idea at WP:VPI to get further refinements/feedback before "launch").  There is no reason not to write an op-ed, but I'd much rather the op-ed have a link at the bottom, "click here to vote in the open-nomination on-wiki process Right Now You Lucky Duck."  So I see the op-ed as a way to improve visibility on the general issue, and the VPR discussion-slash-bangvoting as a way to seek consensus on whether *particular* nominees are highly-supported or poorly-supported, according to DahCommuhnity.
 * I'm not sure whether you want a history-lesson (my take on the WMF-search-cmte-efforts-so-far), or just a here-is-the-proposal-draft#2, so I provide both. Skip the first green-boxen if you like.  Thanks much, talk to you later. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 00:28, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

official ExecDir selection
Here is the status of the ExecDir-search-cmte, as of their last public memo that I've seen, 2013-12-09. The Dirty Dozen ... WWB, do you know any of these people? Or can you fill in the qmarks? Sue has officially stepped down as execDir of WMF, as of April 2013, but planned to stay on until November 1st or thereabouts... eight candidates out of ~250 submitted resumes were interviewed, but the WMF interviewers rejected all eight, so Sue is staying in the saddle (longer). Also, methinks vpDev Möller/Eloquence is looking elsewhere (same person is also on execDir-search-cmte) and may already be gone; word as of early December was that this changeover-of-the-VpDev would happen 'now', under Sue, without waiting for the new execDir to be hired.

Main page, which has this subpage as of 9th December. Summary:  they announced Sue was leaving in May, but that she had committed to stay until a replacement was hired and trained. Advertising began during the summer; a mgmt-recruiter m/Oppenheim was contracted, an advert in The Economist was taken out (plus infomercial-interview in the NYT), and so on. The hire was planned for Sept w/ luck, or November if not; later this scheduled slipped (sans announcement?) to the more realistic December-with-luck. By sometime in November, interviews with the 8-out-of-250-or-so candidates on the initial shortlist were completed. The transition-team doing the interviews (see table below) decided nobody was perfect enough, so they made no recommendation to the WMF board, asking for more time to keep interviewing, for a few more months (again Sue was asked to, and agreed to, keep the spot until success).

Job Description. The key criteria being sought are managerial experience ("track record of building successful organizations"), plus "importantly" product-and-engineering background ... but they do not specify if they want any technical skill as a creator/maker/hacker/do-it-yourself-type, which means they are almost certainly counting sales&marketing of software/cars/airplanes/phones as a good enough "product" background for ExecDir. The top candidate-pools are engineering-corporations in general, and big websites in particular. The next candidate-pool is big educational-non-profits and big universities and big museums (because while the Smithsonian and Stanford may not have top-ten-in-the-world websites like Microsoft and Google and eBay, they *do* have seriously awesome websites aimed squarely at collaboratively produced educational content). Along the same lines, somebody famous enough as a leader in free/libre/openSource-software world could qualify, because there is a zeroth qualification: the new ExecDir must share the goals & values of wikipedia, and have the courage and conviction to live up to them every day (quote unquote).

This is the 'old' description from May 2013. Top-down, command-and-control approaches are not appropriate. (Translation: WMF will remain powerless.)   Be ready to shut down programs that don't work. (Translation: this sentence was written before VizEd bombed... so I'm not sure what it refers to.)  WMF is not open to reconsidering its business model; it is a 501(c)3 non-profit, making the majority of our revenue from many small donations from readers... the ExecDir does not have to actively fundraise, all revenue generation is handled by Zack Exley, the CRO. (Translation: will continue pulling in 40M/yr for the staff of ~200 people, and will continue running PBS-style banner-adverts in mainspace... ExecDir's job is to spend that cashflow wisely, not to fundraise.) "FAQ#83: does the WMF want to stay essentially the same, or is it interested in growing substantially, or otherwise changing in a significant way?" A: ''We are very happy with the WMF, and the path it is on, and we don't expect it to fundamentally change. This is not a turnaround job. (Translation: the WMF will remain powerless, and the ExecDir cannot'' spend the 40M/yr bulking up the staff-levels.)  Gardner's salary is 200K  220k including perks. But, that is not a hard ceiling. We do not want salary to be an impediment in our hiring the best possible person for the role. (Translation: the next ExecDir will be pulling in 400k to 800k by their second year in the position... in the ballpark of what Steve Ballmer makes... not sure how to square that with keeping staff-levels basically the same... perhaps they envision donation-levels trending upwards by themselves?)

The only donor-supported site in the top 100... WMF enables a global community of volunteers to collect, develop, and make freely available the sum of humanity's knowledge (aka JimboVision&trade;). ExecDir, reporting to WMF board-of-trustees, and acting in partnership with DahCommuhnity&trade;, 1) provides WMF leadership, 2) sets WMF strategy, and 3) manages day-to-day WMF operations. Specific tasks:  1) modernize UI, 2) nurture/grow/diversify editorCount, 3) various secondary tasks e.g. expand reach of grantmaking program to all countries. There was also something about server-farms, but what aptitude in agriculture has to do with it, I can only guess. This is the "old" job-description from May'13... the new Dec'13 job-description is "narrower" (aka more specific) but not different (changed).

Analysis of job-reqs. Note that task#1 (modern UI) and task#2 (boost editor-count) are tightly intertwined, and further note that although task#2 explicitly includes diversification, this is presumably meant in the market-investment-sense of the verb diversify, and explicily not meant in the politically correct sense of that verb, because there is an explicit caveat aka secondary goal of "enabl[ing] contributor-growth in underrepresented demographics & geographic areas". The primary goal is not to get absolute growth in editor-count, and "economic-style" diversity in editors, which is to say, lose one wikiDragon from Puerto Rico, either to a banhammer or getting run over by a bus (I hereby explicily hope neither ever happens!), we want to have nine other wikiDragons who can fill the gap, just like diversified investment in the stock market helps guarantee ROI... when one stock goes out of business, nine others fill the gap in the portfolio. We'd like to improve the percentage of female muslim Hakka contributors living in Quebec, along the way, but that is a secondary goal to increasing the number of Good Eggs (the primary goal).

Current 2014 plan. "...why we haven't found anyone yet. We think it's just a tricky hire. Everybody believes their organization is special, but Wikimedia really is. We're highly unusual, and it makes sense to us therefore that it'll take us time to find the right person..." The board of the WMF was consulted at the November meeting, and agreed to keep on looking another N months (purposely left vague this time... but the "arbitrary section break" when the rolling interviews are expected to end is March). Somebody was also supposed to update the public job-description anew, but nobody has yet *actually* done so, that I could find as of late Dec... maybe one exists now? . Sue/Jimbo/etc are now personally wining and dining specific targets... presumably ones who didn't interview during phase one. 

Misc links, might be relevant.

So, lest we be doomed to repeat it, what does history teach us?


 * 1)  The WMF folks have known since before April that Sue was leaving
 * 2)  They spent a bunch of money during summer 2013 on paid-adverts (NYT + The Economist) && mgmt-recruiter-firms (SFO)
 * 3)  They asked "connectors" aka the high-caste members of DahCommunity (plus friends of WMF folks) for nominations
 * 4)  At the end of the summer they had a couple hundred people, and shortlisted 8, which got board-interviews plus cmte-interviews
 * 5)  End result:  six months May/June/July/Aug/Sep/Oct, but no hire, for all the money & effort
 * 6)  Current status:  same cmte and same high-caste-connectors are doing the same thing during Nov/Dec/Jan/Feb/Mar/Apr.
 * 7)  Changed for the better:  Jimbo/Sue are now *personally* pre-interviewing candidates over dinner
 * 8)  Changed for the better:  instead of full-board then full-cmte, rolling interviews, with just two interviewers (picked from the 'dirty dozen' cmte-folks methinks)
 * 9)  Unchanged:  nomination-process, and candidate-assessment-process, is still being conducted sekretly

"Considering the fact that the Exec Dir search has stretched longer than planned, and no announcement appears to be coming for awhile yet, now is a great time to raise questions." Correct. But actually, I don't want to *just* raise questions, so much as, I want to present a better alternative. Well, to clarify, okay, not really "alternative" as in a replacement approach, but "parallel alternative mechanism" as in a complementary orthogonal search-system. Currently we have the top folks in the WMF searching for a new ExecDir: the current execDir Sue, the  founder Jimbo, the current VpDev Möller, the wmf-trustees-chair Jan-Bart, the head wmf lawyer Geoff... plus several other Very Important People. And there's nothing wrong with this, per se, except that it is not the wiki way. The way of the wiki is beboldo, the encylopedia anyone can edit. Why should the search for the new ExecDir be any different?

Well, actually, it has to be different. There are some practical constraints. The WMF dirty-dozen is in a position to keep things sekret... any sort of on-wiki open-nominations process, that would not be possible. The trouble isn't that the WMF wants to keep who they are interviewing secret from DahCommuhnity, the trouble is the interviewees want to keep the fact they are looking into quitting their current job, secret from their current shareholders/employees! On-wiki nominations, don't let that happen. Along the same sort of lines, there is private personal information about the candidates, which the WMF legally needs to hire them (I-9 form and W-2 form and home address and cell number ... not to mention previous salary and other such stuff) which the WMF can keep sekret, but which most interviewees wouldn't like to see posted on-wiki. There are other reasons, too, i.e. Jimbo and Geoff and Jan-Bart and the rest will have to be personally working with the new ExecDir, so it makes sense that they should have some say in *who* the new ExecDir is... we want the WMF to function well as a team, and that means the other team-members should have a veto.

So there's a need for the sekret-cmte-stuff. But that doesn't mean, by any stretch of the imagination, that we cannot also run an on-wiki open-nominations open-assessments search-by-DahCommuhnity, in parallel, simultaneously. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 00:28, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

unofficial ExecDir selection
For one thing, we know what sort of person the WMF is looking for: see job-description history-lesson. For another thing, we know as wikipedians what sort of ExecDir we would like. And last but not least, there are tens of thousands of vox populi wikipedians, versus a few hundred high-caste-connectors. This matters, because we already *know* that the search is a needle in a haystack: the dirty dozen found eight people in eight months of searching, but ended up rejecting all eight! Therefore, my suggestion is that we create an on-wiki open-nom mechanism, and ask DahCommuhnity who they would want as a new-ExecDir, who they think is worth 300k+/yr of WMF donation-moolah, and who ain't.

We'll probably get a lot of nominees who are *not* suitable. We'll probably get a lot of nominees who wouldn't *take* the job, first of all, because they're happy with their current work, or don't want to move to California, or whatever. Some of the nominees will be humourous, or no longer alive (I'd vote for Leibniz and Jefferson), or whatever. That's okay, as long as we have a way of sorting the wheat from the chaff. My suggestion is that we create a sortable multi-column table of nominees, with the names drawn from the open-wiki suggestions, and the sort-order in the table determined by bangvoting. Kind of like the multi-seat ArbCom election, but specific to the goal of picking out a new ExecDir, and therefore having both a different sort of criteria, and a different bangvoting-mechanism. Here's draft#2 of the mechanism and criteria, which will eventually become the proposal-text for TBD-WP:VPI/WP:VPR/WP:RfC efforts. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 00:28, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

open-nom on-wiki ExecDir-selection: implementation details, rough draft#2
TLDR: based on some minimal criteria for inclusions, TheList is a set of potential open-nomination candidates for ExecDir of the WMF:  this person will be in charge of modernizing the UI, increasing editor-count, and spending the millions of dollars in donations wisely (they also personally get ~300k/yr of that donation-money for themselves). For each of the named candidates on TheList, every wikipedian can have as many approve-bangvotes as they wish, and one single NoWay-bangvote (best used against an otherwise-popular candidate which the bangvoter believe is wrong for wikipedia). Additionally, bangvoters can optionally suffix *one* of their approve-bangvotes as being approve-as-honest-first-choice, and also *one* (perhaps the same) of their approve-bangvotes as being approve-honestly-as-likely-winner. Bangvoters can adjust their voting, at any time (but cannot retroactively adjust previous tally-totals). To keep clutter to a minimum, commentary on TheList is restricted to 99-chars-max, one comment (or vote-with-comment) per wikipedian (per candidate). If you have a lot to say about some particular candidate, leave a link to an appropriate subsection of your user-talkpage, embedded in your 99-chars-max area for that candidate on TheList. At the end of each voting-round (weekly probably), all the votes on TheList are tallied up, and then TheList is sorted according to arbcom-ordering: percentage-ratio of approves/approves+NoWays. The number of weeks is unbounded, but will probably end two weeks *after* the actual new ExecDir has started running things at the WMF; that way, we can add them to the list retroactively, if necessary. See all the gory details, inside the green box.

Rationale:


 * 1)  about a dozen WMF people are trying hard to find and hire a new ExecDir... but other folks on-wiki might be interested in this process, methinks
 * 2)  the official WMF search-committee (with unofficial help from Jimbo et al) has failed to find a replacement ExecDir, so far
 * 3)  this is a tricky hire, a needle-in-a-haystack search, which is an optimal scenario for effective crowd-sourcing
 * 4)  the new ExecDir is tasked with modernizing the editing-UI, and with increasing the editor-count, and spending our donations to do so
 * 5)  such efforts, if done wisely, will  improve wikipedia... but if done unwisely, could really screw up the wikiverse
 * 6)  therefore, it makes sense for DahCommuhnity&trade; to get a chance at providing (non-binding!) input on who the new ExecDir ought be

Goals:


 * 1)  to create TheList, a set of names that are people who could conceivably serve as the ExecDir of the WMF
 * 2)  unlike the official WMF search-committee short-list and rolling-interview-list, TheList&trade; will be open, posted on-wiki
 * 3)  candidate-names will be added to TheList, when nominated by a wikipedian
 * 4)  TheList will be periodically sorted (likely once a week), with the most-approved candidate-names up top, and the least-approved at the bottom
 * 5)  the sorting-mechanism is based on bangvoting:  wikipedians can look over TheList, and specify their 1st-choice, 2nd-choice, and so on (details below)
 * 6)  over time, TheList will grow (more names added), and the sort-order will change (named bangvoted up and/or down)
 * 7)  but at any given time, TheList will represent a rough measure of WP:LOCALCONSENSUS, showing which openly-nominated humans the bangvoting wikipedians approve of most
 * 8)  it is not expected that every name on the list will be ready and willing and qualified to be ExecDir
 * 9)  rather, it is expected that the *sort-ordering* is the most valuable aspect, for the work of the official search-committee
 * 10)  even if the members of the official shortlist do not happen to be on TheList, somebody similar will be, and the search-commitee can take that under advisement
 * 11)  last but not least, it is worth noting explicitly that TheList cannot replace the official search-committee (asymmetric information is at play here)
 * 12)  therefore, the point of TheList is not to replace the search-committee's hard work, but to orthogonally complement that ongoing work, simultaneously and in parallel

Mechanism for adding names (potential ExecDir candidate nominations) to TheList:


 * 1)  initially, TheList consists only of a few seed-names (intended mostly as a means to spark further fruitful discussion), chosen by WP:TINC methods
 * 2)  any wikipedian (those with 1+ non-reverted edits to mainspace) can nominate a new name for TheList, probably in some sort of talkpage-like-area
 * 3)  because it is important to keep TheList reasonably short (since TheList also serves as a multi-bangvoting-ballot!), we may need to place some restrictions on who can be nominated
 * 4)  my current instinct says that, once a name is mentioned at the talkpage-like-area, it should not be added to TheList until and unless it gets N approve-votes *on* that talkpage, where N==5 or N==9 or something
 * 5)  there might be some absolute restrictions on who can be nominated... i.e. they must be currently alive (no Diderot?  no Einstein? hmmmm), older than age 12, a member of the homo sapiens sapiens species
 * 6)  there *might* be some further restrictions on who can be nominated... for instance, insisting nominees already have a dedicated BLP article about them, might help cut down on silly self-noms and such
 * 7)  the rule that only people, who currently have a BLP, are eligible to be nominated, also has the advantage that a neutral overview of that person exists (as a sort of "bangvoter's guide")
 * 8)  however, other than some reasonably straightforward restrictions (minimum popularity-check and minimum must-be-a-human-adult-requirements), I'm against putting any *job-criteria* restrictions on TheList
 * 9)  for instance, I don't want a restriction that the nominee must have made N edits to enWiki, I don't want a restriction they must have worked in the Fortune500, I don't want they must have graduated from a top college, etc.
 * 10)  candidates w/ 10k edits, author-credit on 100 bestsellers, acting CEO/COO of three billion-dollar internet startups, Stanford/MIT EECS PhD *plus* Harvard MBA *plus* Cambridge/Oxford philosophy degree... such folks *will* sort to the top, naturally, via overwhelmingly-approving bangvotes.  No need to force that result by fiat, with pre-emptive restrictions!

Mechanism for sorting TheList, so as to put GoodCandidates near the top, and NotSoGoodCandidates near the bottom:


 * 1)  any wikipedian (those with 1+ non-reverted edits to mainspace) can bangvote for as many of the names on TheList  as they wish, similar to how multi-seat arbcom elections work
 * 2)  because of the specialized nature of TheList, and the purpose/goals thereof, I propose using a custom  voting-system
 * 3)  there will be many candidates on TheList, presumably, and if we only allow one single !support per wikipedian, the sort-ordering will suffer from the spoiler effect / dark horse / split vote.  Bad!
 * 4)  I suggest we use a variation on approval voting, modelled somewhat similarly to the way that multi-seat multi-candidate arbcom elections work
 * 5)  As with most bangvoting systems, there are three basic ways each wikipedian can bangvote for a candidate:  approve/yea, silent/abstain, and NoWay/nay.
 * 6)  Since there are likely to be tens or hundreds of candidates on TheList, wikipedians are encouraged (but not WP:REQUIRED) to bangvote top-down, using a *sorted* version of TheList
 * 7)  For each candidate-nominee, the bangvoter can either mark the name as approve, if they think the person would make a good ExecDir, or stay silent (aka abstain) about that particular candidate
 * 8)  After marking approve, the bangvoter may optionally leave their argument in favor of this candidate, or their approve-rationale:  maximum of 99 rendered character-glyphs!  Links to detailed arguments on user-talkpages are also fine
 * 9)  Similarly, if the candidate is not one the bangvoter wished to mark as approved, they are free to leave one (1) max-99-char  about the candidate, subject to WP:BLPTALK and WP:NICE of course
 * 10)  Therefore, bangvoters can have as many approve-bangvotes as they wish:  popular candidates will get plenty of approve-bangvotes, unpopular ones will get fewer, and the ever-changing-candidate-count won't screw anything up
 * 11)  However, it is necessary to also permit bangvoters to have the NoWay-bangvote at their disposal.  This is a bit tricky.
 * 12)  First of all, unlimited-NoWay-voting is a bad idea:  it will lead to tactical voting, where many perfectly reasonable candidates get "NoWay" bangvotes (tearing down the competition to build up one's real preference).
 * 13)  This is no theoretical worry:  cf mudslinging during Clinton vs Obama 2008, mudslinging during Bush versus McCain 2000... per WP:BLPTALK and WP:NICE we best forestall any mudslinging, by using a voting-system which tends to limit it.
 * 14)  Therefore, my proposal is that we permit each wikipedian (no WP:PUPPETs of course!) to have as many honest-approve-bangvotes as they wish, but exactly one and only one tactical-NoWay-bangvote.
 * 15)  Because there is only one NoWay-bangvote, the 'correct' way to get  maximum use out of it, is to give one's single NoWay-bangvote to the highest-listed candidate of which one does not approve.
 * 16)  Alternatively, rather than voting against the highest-listed-unapproved-candidate, one can give their NoWay-bangvote to the truly worst candidate on the list... but a candidate that bad, is probably already at the bottom, so this use of the NowWay-bangvote will not effect the sorting-outcome (and is thus not recommended).
 * 17)  That is basically it.  Every bangvoter gets as many approve-bangvotes as they wish to make (max one per candidate :-) plus as many comments as they wish to make (max one per candidate), plus one single tactical NoWay-bangvote.
 * 18)  As a frill, it makes sense to me that we should allow each bangvoter one single approve-as-honest-first-choice.  It will not change the sort-ordering, or the approve-tallies, but it will give some indication of who their true favorite was, amongst all their approve-bangvotes.
 * 19)  As a frill, it might make sense to allow each bangvoter one single approve-honestly-as-likely-winner.  Again, this will change nothing... but gives us some indication of a candidate they approve-of, whom they think *others* will also approve-of.  This frill can be "doubled up" with the honest-first-choice frill, if the bangvoter believes their honest-first-choice is simultaneously the likely-winner.
 * 20)  No other frills, though; this dern thing is already complex enough.  No multiple-first-choice-ties, no second-and-third-choices, no first-choice-except, no conditional-approve.  If you've used up your single NoWay, but you also want to mark Hitler as being a bad person for the ExecDir position, you can simply  "no way too genocidal to be the execdir", using unbolded plaintext rather than waste your one tactical-NoWay-bangvote.

The end. There are some clerk-duties left unspecified here as yet, and some rules about how to enforce the rules (if a bangvoter marks more than one NoWay then some clerk eliminates all but the top-sorted-NoWay and leaves a user-talkpage note for the bangvoter to that effect). But fundamentally, I expect that this scheme will result in a very well-tuned sort-ordering of TheList, with ideal candidates near the top, and less-ideal ones somewhere below the halfway-point.

This is roughly what I would post over at WP:VPI, but I've never done that before, so I'm not sure if 1) that's the best place for it, and 2) this is the best format for that place. Hope this helps, thanks for improving wikipedia folks. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 00:28, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

thoughts on rough draft#2 implementation-proposal
The custom voting-system explained here was specifically designed so that *only* the top of the list is relatively-well-sorted... really bad candidates are as likely to be near the halfway point (maybe even above average!) as they are to be sorted at the bottom. Therefore, there will not be much risk of BLPTALK violations against off-wiki people, or of hurt feelings against on-wiki people. The competition is designed to center entirely around which of the top N candidates is best: pretty much a wikiLove-fest, in other words.

Will the scheme give us a decent shortlist for selecting the WMF dictator-for-life plus Lord of VisualEditor and Duke of WP:FLOW in charge of wisely spending USD$40M/yr? Not sure, that depends on what sort of participants we draw with the VPI and the RfC... we might end up with Mickey Mouse or even Vermin Supreme at the top of the list (who guarantees a free WP:PONY to every wikipedian if they are elected ExecDir).

If we *do* manage to collaboratively create a half-decent top-ten-candidates-for-ExecDir, does that mean that the official WMF search-committee will pay any attention whatsoever? Again, not sure... it depends. Too many factors. But as I've mentioned before, and will hammer home again, even if the WMF had *already* hired a new ExecDir, I'd still want to try out this scheme, because we need to start opening up the WMF elections, reforming RfA bangvoting, and similar such things. The best way to test out a complex system, is to deploy it in the real world, and work out the bugs. And if the WMF hires some not-on-TheList person at the end of the day, we can *still* add that person to the list retroactively, and hold a couple more rounds of bangvoting, to see where that person would have fallen, if they were added to TheList. Influencing this particular ExecDir-selection-process would be nice, but it would be the gravy, not the meat.

I haven't mentioned much about the layout and format of TheList itself. There are actually *multiple* forms of TheList... depending on what one is doing. Above, I speak mostly of TheList as a metaphor, meaning, the-current-list-of-all-candidates-and-all-bangvotes-with-best-candidates-up-near-the-top-in-sorted-arbcom-election-style-ordering. But there are actually a few variants on TheList we might want to consider, when setting things up.


 * 1)  The full huge version of TheList.  This would basically be one long talkpage-subsection, with one sub-subsection for each candidate on TheList, and each bangvoter putting their comment/approve/noway into that sub-subsection (one numbered group of noway-bangvotes / another separate numbered group of approve-bangvotes / and finally an asterisk-starred group of comments for those who abstained on this candidate).  Up at the top, each candidate would have their official shortname, usually their lastname so that somebody can have a shortcut to their entry like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:ExecDir2014#Torvalds ... when we have multiple candidates with the same lastname, we make a disambiguation-sub-subsection and then give the candidates shortnames like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:ExecDir2014#Wales1 for JimboWales and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:ExecDir2014#Wales2 for RichWales, for example.  Besides their official-shortname, each candidate would have a short synopsis about that candidate; my preference is that we standardize, and list the first two sentences of their wikipedia-entry, backdated to the version that existed as of 2013-12-25, to avoid gaming the system.  "Linus Torvalds is the inventor of the Linux kernel and would make an awesome WMF ExecDir" ... not something we want to start finding in mainspace!  We might also list something like the candidate's current age, and their last two job-positions (organization plus job-title plus years in the position).  The top-ten candidates each week, can be invited to make a 100-word statement if they wish... perhaps a shermanesque statement in some cases... which gets added to their 'profile' subsection.
 * 2)  The summarized aka tabulated version of TheList... aka the arbcom-style-shortlist... which means, instead of *showing* all the raw bangvotes, we add up the numbers, and condense them into a total.  Assuming we do this tallying-work every weekend, there will be a short-version of TheList for Sunday 2013-01-19, a different short-version for Sunday 2013-01-26, and so on.  Each datestamped short-version of TheList would have, for each candidate...


 * Note that, to keep somebody with one approve... their own... and zero NoWays from leaping to the top of TheList, we give *every* candidate one single phantom-NoWay vote. This also prevents division-by-zero-errors (zero approves divided by the sum of zero approves plus zero noWays plus one phantomNoWay).

Finally, there is a third variation, the weighted-arbcom-style-shortlist. In *this* version, instead of simply counting noses as we do in the arbcom-style-shortlist, the tallies in the weighted-arbcom-style-shortlist are calculated by first multiplying each bangvote by the enWiki-mainspace-editcountitis-score of the bangvoter. So, if you have eleven approve-bangvotes by 11 wikipedians who each have 1 edit to enWiki-mainspace, and two single NoWay-bangvotes by 2 wikipedian each with 22 enWiki-mainspace edits, then the weighted-score for this candidate would be (11*1 / (11*1 + 2*22 + 1phantom)) == 20% which is going to be near the bottom. Flipping the situation around, if the two bangvoters with 22 edits vote approve whilst the eleven bangvoters with 1 edit all vote NoWay then we have (2*22 / (2*22 + 11*1 + 1phantom)) == 79% which is *still* not going to be very competitive. Because editcountitis is a disease we don't want to encourage, and because weighting-by-editcountitis is dramatically more susceptible to nefarious tactical voting schemes involving nigh-undetectable-collusion, this weighted-arbcom-style-shortlist will always be *super-unofficial* methinks.

Speaking of enWiki-mainspace... at first methinks this will purely be an enWiki operation. If we manage to generate enough interest here, and bullet-proof the voting-system during the first couple of weeks, then the system can be exported to other wikis, who can perform their own voting, with the own local tallies. At the end of the whole deal, all the wiki-tables can be collected together, and we can get a super-total. But for the moment, I'm concentrating on getting this up and running on at least *one* wiki before I worry about non-enWiki bangvoters. :-)    That said, maybe instead of trying to set up an RfC here on enWiki *and* housing TheList here on enWiki, maybe we can have the RfC here on enWiki, but house TheList over on meta.wikipedia.org for centrality?  That way, non-enWiki bangvoters would not need to set up their own voting-system.  I'm not sure if meta would have us, though.   Hmmmm.  I'll ping  who is used to wading through my wall-o-texts.   Maybe they have an opinion on this particular facet of the scheme, or on the whole shebang?

"...why these qualified humans would have to be the subject of a BLP?" This is just a suggestion, to help pre-emptively weed out some of the chaff. But I think it may help focus discussion on *likely* ExecDir candidates, not just "nice people" who are not actually qualified to operate the $30m/yr 200-employee WMF, on a day-to-day basis. My further reasoning is, that the ExecDir is the figurehead of the WMF specifically, in much the way that Jimbo is the overall figurehead of TheMovement&trade; generally. The new ExecDir doesn't *have* to already be wikiNotable, let alone famous, but it will absolutely help if they are, right? Part of the ExecDir's job is to boost editor-count, and being famous already will definitely help. It is the difference between having Linus Torvalds, or Bill Gates, or Oprah Winfrey, or Hillary Clinton, or Mitt Romney, as the new ExecDir... versus some WP:Randy from Boise who is equally qualified perhaps, besides not already being famous. But I'd like to get somebody who is already famous, *if* they are famous for the right reasons, and in the right way. Rumour has it Al Gore invented the internet, but is prolly not a good choice for the new ExecDir. We don't want to get somebody infamous like Charles Manson as our new ExecDir. Nor do we want somebody like Steve Ballmer. We want somebody that shares the wikipedian values. For instance, what about Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky; they're between gigs right now, do you think they'd make a good ExecDir? I can guarantee the search-cmte never interviewed them. And what *about* Linus, if they would be willing to take the job? Approve, or nay? 74.192.84.101 (talk) 00:28, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

next steps for open-nom on-wiki ExecDir-selection
"...steps to get this where you want it." See above. But to sum up, what I want is an on-wiki open-nom mechanism, which has been both documented and tested. I want the mechanism to produce a tabulated result, once per week, in the form of a sorted list of Good People that could conceivably serve as the new ExecDir, with the most-approved-least-evil-candidates up near the top of the list. I want foolish and spurious and bad candidates to either be excluded from the list, or sorted to near the bottom. I think this mechanism would be a useful thing for seeking an ExecDir, right now today, as a parallel-orthogonal-complementary process, which enriches the currently-running-in-sekret WMF-approved ExecDir-search-committee effort. But thinking long-term, I think the mechanism (once debugged via trial-by-fire) could be useful more generally, for electing distant-future WMF board-members, distant-future ArbCom members, and similar such bangvoting exercises. One of my motives, is I'd like to have RfA be less poisonous, and having a running weekly tally of *all* conceivable candidates, seems way less poisonous than the current military-grade-obstacle-course-slash-gauntlet that we use today.

In the immediate-term short-run, I think this on-wiki open-nom mechanism is useful right now, specifically for the ExecDir search (at least potentially), even though it doesn't replace the ExecDir-search-committee... it *enriches* the committee's efforts, and it gives DahCommuhnity some semblance of direct input. Whether that input will result in a useful candidate-list, which is reasonably well sorted-from-Good-to-NotSoGood, remains to be seen. But I have hope. :-)

The steps are therefore:


 * 1)  you and  read over draft#2
 * 2)  together we all write up draft#3, including some seed-noms (a few names for the list... to get the ball rolling)
 * 3)  email Kat and Gayle, to see if they are horrified by the scheme
 * 4)  create WP:VPI discussion, to produce draft#4
 * 5)  submit draft#4 at WP:VPR
 * 6)  create a place for TheList to reside, and open an RfC to attract people thereto
 * 7)  start accepting open-noms, dynamically adding them to WP:TheList... or more likely User:WWB/sandbox/TheList... wherever we end up storing TheList of potential 2014 ExecDir candidates
 * 8)  start accepting bangvotes, where wikipedians can distribute their approve-1st-choice, approve-2nd-choice, approve-others, and NoWay-choice
 * 9)  once a week (say), tabulate TheList into sorted-form, with most-approve'd-fewest-noway'd candidates right up top

Then, keep on running week-long bangvoting sessions, until two weeks *after* the actual future ExecDir has been running things. That way, if perchance the WMF cmte hires somebody who wasn't on TheList, folks have a couple chances to bangvote on the *actual* choice for new ExecDir. Ideally, the new ExecDir would end up at the top of the sorted final copy of TheList (or near the top anyways... right underneath Einstein and MotherTeresa perhaps). This will give us a good indication of how predictive the bangvoting system is, a couple years from now. Make sense? Sound fun? &mdash; 74.192.84.101 (talk) 00:28, 14 January 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the recent history—I was familiar with the broad strokes, but not in that kind of detail, so I appreciate the rundown. Now, this time I am afraid I cannot say I have read all of what you've put forth, and I am replying in many fewer words, based entirely on external time constraints and, I assure you, not because I don't find it interesting in itself.


 * To quote Homer Simpson: "Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter." But I don't have the time to ingest all of this, chew the linguistic cud, and give you a thoughtful response. Understanding that you want to do this for real, and not just write up something for the Signpost, my advice is purely practical: you gots to write this shorter, man, or measure out your explanations for those who have less time. Likewise, much as I enjoy your writing style for its literary qualities, in order for this to get liftoff you'd have to write it more in "CSWE" to be taken seriously.


 * If you can do that, where would you mount the project? Would you circulate the idea on WMF email-lists? I'd be intrigued to participate in the bangvoting, but I'm not really sure where I fit into the whole project. Thanks, and more on the below at a later point, as soon as I can find the time. Best, WWB (talk) 05:27, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

March 2014
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Hello!
I just discovered that you are the Wikipedian I had been talking to on Twitter during the WikiConUSA last weekend. Nice to meet you! Maybe one day I'll come down to a DC event and we'll meet in person. All the best, Liz  Read! Talk! 21:52, 2 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Aha, it didn't even occur to me that @nwjerseyliz might be you! Very cool. If you come on down to the District for a meet up, let me know! Cheers, WWB (talk) 02:39, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

COI advice and review Draft:Maryann Krieglstein
Hi WWB, I'm looking for some feedback on a draft article I put together about my own mother. I've thought for a while the she is WP:Notable, but avoided making the article myself. Recently, it occurred to me that the whole "draft" process might be a proper way for me be create the article. A process I've only recently become aware of. So, three questions:
 * 1) From your perspective and background in COI issues; is this draft route a proper move or still a COI fail?
 * 2) Since I have a huge COI, would you mind assessing whether she is actually WP:Notable, and writing your review on the talk page?
 * 3) If you have the time and are interested, I would be very grateful if you could review the whole article and edit/publish it...if it is worthy.

Thanks as always, -- D kriegls  ( talk to me! ) 20:29, 14 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Hey Dkriegls, good to hear from you! I had a cursory glance this weekend, and looks very promising. I don't have any questions about notability, especially when one considers WP:ACADEMIC. My only questions then would be whether it's NPOV, and whether the information in the article is supported by the sources. Now, I'm about to head off on vacation through the end of June, but I will try to give it a closer look tomorrow. One question: I really haven't used the Draft namespace yet, so I'm not familiar with procedures. Am I OK just to move it if I think it fits the criteria? If I have suggestions, should I put them on the draft's Talk page? More from me soon! WWB (talk) 21:05, 16 June 2014 (UTC)
 * That is how I understand it. Just learning about 'draft' myself. It seems to be a way to submit articles for review by any experienced editor. No special process other than review, just like the peer review process. They also seem to be extremely backed up (like most projects) so any editor stepping in and taking responsibility is probably appreciated as far as I can tell. I did a few reviews myself when I submitted. Thank you so much for the review. If someone hasn't taken a look before you get back, any help is appreciated. If you feel comfortable reviewing key claims and them moving it into the main space when you get back, where it can be further reviewed (but keeping the NPOV tag), I am comfortable with that. Thanks a bunch and enjoy your vacation! D kriegls  ( talk to me! ) 01:00, 17 June 2014 (UTC)

Suggestion on what to rename Notability standards
I saw your statements over on the Notability standards talk page.

One word that I would like to suggest that we might consider as an alternative to "Notability" would be "Independence." An article which does not meet independence standards could be considered for inclusion as a dependent subsection of another, independent article. Dependency is not a term which will immediately be considered as an attack by anyone but the most thin-skinned persons.

Either "Independent" or "dependent" exactly describe the states of all topics within Wikipedia. Either a topic is independent and capable of having it's own article on it's own merits, or it's dependent as a part of a larger article. Matthewhburch (talk) 15:34, 21 September 2014 (UTC)

Wikimedia DC Annual Meeting and more!




Hello, fellow Wikipedian!

I am excited to announce the upcoming Wikimedia DC Annual Meeting at the National Archives! We'll have free lunch, an introduction by Archivist of the United States David Ferriero, and a discussion featuring Ed Summers, the creator of CongressEdits. Join your fellow DC-area Wikipedians on Saturday, October 18 from 12 to 4:30 PM. RSVP today!

Also coming up we have the Human Origins edit-a-thon on October 17 and the WikiSalon on October 22. Hope to see you at our upcoming events!

Best,

James Hare

(To unsubscribe, remove your username here.) 08:09, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Draft:Maryann Krieglstein
Hi WBB. I've taken a good ax and citation pen to the article. If you have some time to spare, I would much appreciate if you could look over it again and see if there is anything lacking for a move-to-main-space action? -- D kriegls  ( talk to me! ) 10:38, 14 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi Dkriegls, apologies for the delay—I've been traveling this past week. I'll take a look here soon and get back with you. Stay tuned! WWB (talk) 21:25, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

End-of-the-year meetups


Hello,

You're invited to the end-of-the-year meetup at Busboys and Poets on Sunday, December 14 at 6 PM. There is Wi-Fi, so bring your computer if you want!

You are also invited to our WikiSalon on Thursday, December 18 at 7 PM.

Hope to see you at our upcoming events!

Best,

James Hare

(To unsubscribe, remove your username here.) 02:22, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Museum hacks and museum edits
 Hello there!

Upcoming events:


 * February 6–8: The third annual ArtBytes Hackathon at the Walters Art Museum! This year Wikimedia DC is partnering with the Walters for a hack-a-thon at the intersection of art and technology, and I would like to see Wikimedia well represented.
 * February 11: The monthly WikiSalon, same place as usual. RSVP on Meetup or just show up!
 * February 15: Wiki Loves Small Museums in Ocean City. Mary Mark Ockerbloom, with support from Wikimedia DC, will be leading a workshop at the Small Museum Association Conference on how they can contribute to Wikipedia. Tons of representatives from GLAM institutions will be present, and we are looking for volunteers. If you would like to help out, check out "Information for Volunteers".

I am also pleased to announce events for Wikimedia DC Black History Month with Howard University and NPR. Details on those events soon.

If you have any questions or have any requests, please email me at james.hare@undefinedwikimediadc.org.

See you there! – James Hare

(To unsubscribe, remove your username here.) 03:12, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

Wikimedia DC celebrates Black History Month, and more!
 Hello again!

Not even a week ago I sent out a message talking about upcoming events in DC. Guess what? There are more events coming up in February.

First, as a reminder, there is a WikiSalon on February 11 (RSVP here or just show up) and Wiki Loves Small Museums at the Small Museum Association Conference on February 15 (more information here).

Now, I am very pleased to announce:


 * Tuesday, February 17 from 10 AM to 3 PM there will be #WikiTurgy at the University of Maryland. Join fellow theatre enthusiasts for a “mass act of public dramaturgy!”
 * Thursday, February 19 from 10 AM to 4 PM we are hosting the Howard University Black History Edit-a-Thon. We are working in partnership with the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center to improve Wikipedia’s coverage of African-American and African diasporic history.
 * Tuesday, February 24 from 6 PM to 8 PM we have the Black History Month “First Edit” at NPR. Help improve Wikipedia and help others make their first edit to Wikipedia!
 * Finally, our monthly dinner meetup is on Saturday, February 28.

There is going to be a lot going on, and I hope you can come to some of the events!

If you have any questions or need any special accommodations, please let me know.

Regards,

James Hare

(To unsubscribe, remove your username here.) 18:20, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Editing for Women's History in March
 Hello,

I am very excited to announce this month’s events, focused on Women’s History Month:


 * Sunday, March 8: Women in the Arts 2015 Edit-a-thon – 10 AM to 4 PM
 * Women in the Arts and ArtAndFeminism Wikipedia Edit-a-thon at the National Museum of Women in the Arts. Free coffee and lunch served!
 * More information • RSVP on Meetup
 * Wednesday, March 11: March WikiSalon – 7 PM to 9 PM
 * An evening gathering with free-flowing conversation and free pizza.
 * More information • RSVP on Meetup (or just show up!)
 * Friday, March 13: NIH Women's History Month Edit-a-Thon – 9 AM to 4 PM
 * In honor of Women’s History Month, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is organizing and hosting an edit-a-thon to improve coverage of women in science in Wikipedia. Free coffee and lunch served!
 * More information • RSVP on Meetup
 * Saturday, March 21: Women in STEM Edit-a-Thon at DCPL – 12 PM
 * Celebrate Women's History Month by building, editing, and expanding articles about women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields during DC Public Library's first full-day edit-a-thon.
 * More information • RSVP on Meetup
 * Friday, March 27: She Blinded Me with Science, Part III – 10 AM to 4 PM
 * Smithsonian Institution Archives Groundbreaking Women in Science Wikipedia Edit-a-thon. Free lunch courtesy of Wikimedia DC!
 * More information • RSVP on Meetup
 * Saturday, March 28: March Dinner Meetup – 6 PM
 * Dinner and drinks with your fellow Wikipedians!
 * More information • RSVP on Meetup

Hope you can make it to an event! If you have any questions or require any special accommodations, please let me know.

Thanks,

James Hare

To unsubscribe from this newsletter, remove your name from this list. 02:25, 2 March 2015 (UTC)