Voting is continuing in the 2009 Board of Trustees elections for the Wikimedia Foundation. Voting will continue until August 10th. Questions can still be asked of the candidates. Philippe Beaudette, a member of the Elections Committee, reported on August 3rd that nearly 1200 votes had been cast thus far. (see previous story)
Voting in the English Wikipedia CheckUser and Oversight elections is also continuing, until August 10th. (See previous story).
A new wiki for the strategic planning process, strategy.wikimedia.org, was opened last week. It includes a Call for Proposals about what projects or directions the Wikimedia Foundation and Wikimedia movement should take on; anyone is invited to submit a proposal. This proposal process is tentatively scheduled to run through October. Information about the strategic planning process, including the various stages of the project and background, is also included on the wiki. The project planners are also holding weekly IRC office hours on the Freenode #Wikimedia channel.
The Wikimedia Strategic Planning process is a year-long process designed to get wide community involvement in setting the direction of the Wikimedia Foundation over the next five years; the process aims to deliver a "vision paper" for the Wikimedia movement generally, and a five-year strategic plan for the Wikimedia Foundation.
The Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam and Spaarnestad Photo of Haarlem are partnering with WMF to provide content. The Tropenmuseum plans to upload some 100,000 images about Indonesia to Wikimedia Commons and in preparation will upload first a smaller collection about Suriname. Spaarnestad has plans to upload an undisclosed number of files. Gerard Meijssen (User:GerardM), who heads the Open Progress Foundation, has been instrumental to the progress, working in cooperation with the WMF Netherlands chapter.[1][2]
An off-wiki petition has been started, which Wikipedians who are UK residents or British Citizens (irrespective of their residency) are invited to sign. Using the e-petition facility on the 10 Downing Street website, it calls for a review of the copyright status of exact reproductions on 2 dimensional works of art—the same area in which the National Portrait Gallery has recently found itself entangled with the WMF. If there are more than 500 signatures, the Prime Minister's office are obliged to reply. The petition has not at the time of writing been formally endorsed by the Wikimedia Foundation. More details.
Wikimedia UK—the local chapter of the Wikimedia Foundation in the United Kingdom—has been denied charitable tax status by HM Revenue and Customs, according to a report from Charity Finance dated June 2009. The chapter reportedly plans to appeal the decision.
New York Times writer and longtime Wikipedia observer Noam Cohen wrote up a story on a dispute on Rorschach test, which revolves around whether posting the ten original (public domain) inkblot images will cause patients of psychologists to game the test, making it useless. The publisher of Rorschach's work said it was looking into a lawsuit against the Wikimedia Foundation, about which Mike Godwin, the Foundation's general counsel, seemed unconcerned.[1] The story was picked up widely, with coverage ranging from the straightforward[2] to the mocking.[3][4] The Globe and Mail published an extensive account of the kerfuffle,[5] while Newsweek and Science Daily used the controversy to emphasize that the Rorschach test is not considered particularly effective.[6][7] Discussion among Wikipedians is ongoing.
One editor was granted admin status via the Requests for Adminship process this week: ThaddeusB (nom).
Nine articles were promoted to featured status this week: Charles Carroll the Settler (nom), Herrerasaurus (nom), Adrian Cole (RAAF officer) (nom), Fight Club (film) (nom), Charles Stewart (Canadian politician) (nom), Hepatorenal syndrome (nom), The Lucy poems (nom), Mary Toft (nom) and Gol Transportes Aéreos Flight 1907 (nom).
Thirteen lists were promoted to featured status this week: MCW Heavyweight Championship (nom), BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award (nom), List of international cricket centuries by Sourav Ganguly (nom), List of Grade I listed buildings in South Somerset (nom), NWA Wrestling Legends Hall of Heroes (nom), List of Premier League hat-tricks (nom), List of First World War Victoria Cross recipients (nom), List of England national football team hat-tricks (nom), List of Gold Glove Award winners at catcher (nom), List of City University of New York institutions (nom), List of CMLL World Tag Team Champions (nom), List of tallest buildings in Las Vegas (nom) and WCW United States Tag Team Championship (nom).
No topics were promoted to featured status this week.
No portals were promoted to featured status this week.
The following featured articles were displayed on the Main Page this week as Today's featured article: 243 Ida, Augusta, Lady Gregory, Forest Park, Don Tallon, Nagorno-Karabakh War and Michael Gomez.
No articles were delisted this week.
One list was delisted this week: List of number-one Billboard Top Latin Albums of 1999 (nom).
No topics were delisted this week.
The following featured pictures were displayed on the Main Page this week as picture of the day: Sea otter, Black mulberry, Atomic bomb, The Nightwatch, Clyde River, NGC 1300 and Metriorrhynchus rhipidius.
No featured sounds were promoted this week.
No featured pictures were demoted this week.
Ten pictures were promoted to featured status this week and are shown below.
This is a summary of recent technology and site configuration changes that affect the English Wikipedia. Please note that some bug fixes or new features described below have not yet gone live as of press time; the English Wikipedia is currently running version 1.44.0-wmf.4 (a8dd895), and changes to the software with a version number higher than that will not yet be active. Configuration changes and changes to interface messages, however, become active immediately.
2 bots or bot task were approved for operation this week. These were:
The Arbitration Committee passed one motion and closed no cases this week, leaving one case open.
