Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/2024-05-16/News and notes

Wikimedia Foundation 2022–2023 reports
The WMF Annual Report has now been added to the Financial reports page. See notification in the Signpost Newsroom. The new Form 990 is now up as well and can be viewed here. --Andreas JN 466 11:52, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

I guess the article is correct in calling out that the report is not super detailed about what the work in the various expense categories consisted of. But in that, it is not all that different from previous WMF annual reports and indeed from the annual reports of many other US nonprofits. They generally are more focused on storytelling and on selectively highlighting some work areas where attractive progress can be presented - rather than on comprehensive, detailed accountability about the work done by every major department, whether goals were reached or not etc. This is to be expected, as a main audience of these reports is donors and there is also an impetus to keep this kind of document reasonably legible and engaging. (Although one could ask whether the Wikimedia Foundations has followed the National Council of Nonprofit's recommendation to "Be honest and acknowledge both the highs and the lows" in this report - I haven't read it fully myself yet, but perhaps Andreas has an opinion.)

What is different about the Foundation's 2022-23 annual report is that this was the first fiscal year since 2007 where this glossy donor-focused report was not complemented by regular quarterly or monthly activity reports. The Foundation had been publishing such regular updates since 2008, first as monthly and quarterly reports, then in form of slide decks from department-wise quarterly check-ins or "Tuning sessions". This was the place you could go to if you wanted to know what a particular WMF department's main work focus areas were in a particular timespan and what progress they made on their goals from the WMF annual plan (say, the Advancement team in January-March 2022). These updates have also been a source of reporting for the Signpost, and informed various community discussion. In short, they were an important accountability tool.

These regular public department-wise activity reports that WMF had been maintaining since 2008 were discontinued in 2022 (as Andreas himself pointed out at the time), a few months after Maryana Iskander became CEO in January 2022. (There was a "End of year report 2022" which still had some of this kind of per-department information, although in form of less detailed "highlights" and for the entire 2021-22 fiscal year. In 2023, even this kind of annual activity report appears to have been no longer published, at least it is not listed here - CCing NGunasena (WMF) and RAdimer-WMF to confirm, as they published the 2022 version.)

In short, under its current CEO the Wikimedia Foundation has become notably less transparent about how it actually spends its budget, compared to the tenures of the preceding three CEOs/executive directors in the one and a half decades prior.

Regards, HaeB (talk) 13:40, 16 May 2024 (UTC)


 * Hi . The Foundation really is trying to share details about how our work is progressing and about how funds are being allotted and used (more info below). We appreciate your feedback in making this more visible to those who are looking for it.


 * In FY 2022-23, we published several updates by region - Africa (also available in fr and sw), North America, LAC (also available in es and pt), ESEAP (also available in id and ja), South Asia  (also available in hi and bn), North and Western Europe, MENA (also available in ar, de, and fr), CEE and Central Asia and a discussion of the regional focus.


 * So far this FY, we've published our Q1 progress report on Diff (Q2 coming soon) and a snapshot of highlights in our draft 2024-2025 annual plan. We submitted the progress report to the Signpost to share this with more Wikimedians. You can follow updates, and quarterly metrics reports, on the 2023-2024 annual plan reports page.


 * At present, four Foundation-submitted posts are awaiting a response on the Signpost submissions page. The oldest, which was submitted in January, directly discusses work we've done on our Annual Plan goals. Other waiting posts discuss PageTriage updates, Wishlist updates, and the recently-published Form 990.


 * Maryana has regularly shared updates to Wikimedia communities. Through the Talking:2024 project earlier this year, Foundation leadership hosted 130 conversations with community members to learn about their needs and share Foundation progress and plans. You can read about one such meeting in the Signpost. And in March, we launched a new Wikimedia Foundation page on Meta-Wiki, with updated links to resources, reports, and contact information. NGunasena (WMF) (talk) 22:02, 17 May 2024 (UTC)
 * We want hard numbers. We'd like it all presented in one place with accurately-titled breakdowns all the way to the bottom, not couched in the usual vague nonprofit-speak. That's all we're asking for. We don't want to have to attend a ton of Google Meets and Zoom calls and piece together the information bit by bit. I don't attend WMF calls because I have very little free time that coincides with them, and I (and many others like me, I'm sure) would prefer to have everything written down in a single document which can be referred to at any time. Wilhelm Tell DCCXLVI ( talk to me!/my edits ) 13:38, 18 May 2024 (UTC)


 * I just want to say, that acknowledging my RfA was kinda okay. I haven't witnessed how my RfA was closed with a "not now" by an experienced fellow (The recent archive may explain). Going off topic here, I wanted to explain my story. The day I started the RfA, I was expecting positive comments to be made, but in the end, things got a lot worse, with much criticism from many, I then felt that the community does not want me to be a sysop, and the community "hates" me. I was stressed, frustrated, feeling that the community were flogging me to death. I had expressed pain, it was so painful that I wanted to share a rather sad story. The purpose of the story was to raise awareness of the pain I received, and that I would expect them to forgive me. I was so stressed, watching my talk page's history, entry after entry, after which I gave up on seeing the Wikipedia. It caused me a trauma, it was a nightmare for me, and so I never opened Wikipedia the next day, and on that day I refocused on the criticism; I was calming down, forgetting the pain, drank a lot of water, moved a lot, and layed in bed. My soul was telling me to withdraw, but I couldn't, fearing the many messages that would come up to my talk page. My soul was like "Go withdraw now", but I was like "I couldn't". The next day, I was prompted to return to Wikipedia after reading an article while in incognito mode. I've returned back and was greeted by 39 pending notifications, the majority were on my talk page alone, and saw people chatting there. However, I've ran straight to the talk page and immediately made a comment for withdrawal, without reading the content. But soon after, I read the content and was shocked by two DRVs and a critical question from an admin. I was also impressed by the not now closure, and didn't realized so. I was feeling in danger, but after reading the positive comments, I've cooled down. I will agree with a The Signpost interview, and I will accept any comments below or elsewhere. Toadette Edit! 23:52, 16 May 2024 (UTC)