The Signpost looks back on The Signpost: New reports, conceived in a spirit of collaboration, and dedicated to the proposition of information and, uh, more information for all.
From MFD to CSD, debates are continuing across Wikipedia about which portals should stay and which portals should go. Plus: Wikimedia rebranding and Macedonia naming conventions.
The Wikimedia Foundation publishes the latest fundraising report, convenes over the close of the strategic plan discussion, and moves into a new space.
While the English Wikipedia community produces no new requests for adminhood in June, the Wikimedia Foundation makes changes to the Product and Technology departments.
In biology, the hallmarks of an aggressive cancer include limitless and exponential multiplication of ordinarily beneficial cells, even when the body signals that further multiplication is no longer needed. The Wikipedia page on the wheat and chessboard problem explains that nothing can keep growing exponentially forever. In biology, the unwanted growth usually terminates with the death of the host. Exponential spending increases can often lead to the same undesirable result in organizations. The Wikimedia Foundation's expenses have grown aggressively every year; Wikipedian Guy Macon offers his analysis.
Lila Tretikov this week posted an email to the wikimedia-l mailing list announcing the final publication of the Wikimedia Foundation's 2015 annual plan.
Training the Trainers; VP of Engineering leaves WMF: This week The Center for Internet and Society published a promotional blog post highlighting the heritage of the center's creation of the Train the Trainer program.
Board candidates share their views with the Signpost: Three community-elected seats on the Board of Trustees—the ultimate governing authority of the Wikimedia Foundation—will be decided by Wikimedians in the election to be held 17–31 May.
The Affiliates Committee this week announced the organization of a community referral for comment, currently open on the meta-wiki, to address upcoming changes to the way that the Affiliations Committee will review movement-affiliated user-groups in the future.
2015 will see through the biennial community election for the three community-elected seats on the Board of Trustees—the "ultimate corporate authority" of the Wikimedia Foundation and the level at which the strategic decisions regarding the Wikimedia movement are made.
This process is now entering its long-awaited final phase with the upcoming SUL finalization, scheduled for April 15, less than a month away. ... Wikimedia Foundation chief talent and culture officer Gayle Karen Young announced her retirement from the Foundation this week. Young will be replaced in that role by interim chief operating officer Terry Gilbey. According to the Foundation's job description for the title as it was applied in the past, Gilbey will be in charge of "overall administration and business operations of the Wikimedia Foundation."
In an effort to protect and maintain the privacy of Wikipedia's thousands of editors, the Wikimedia Foundation has filed a lawsuit against the United States' National Security Agency, Department of Justice, and the Attorney General.
Chris Troutman has been a campus ambassador for six classes in the Los Angeles area over the past four consecutive semesters. He is currently a Wikipedia Visiting Scholar at University of California, Riverside.
The Los Angeles Times highlighted a recent Wiki Education Foundation (WEF) course at Pomona College in their article "Wikipedia pops up in bibliographies, and even college curricula". We interviewed Char Booth, the campus ambassador for the course, for additional details.
In her first interview since taking office, Lila Tretikov, the Wikimedia Foundation's new executive director, speaks about grantmaking, the global south, and the gender gap.
In a live video stream on 1 May, the Wikimedia Foundation announced that Lila Tretikov will be replacing Sue Gardner, its executive director. Gardner, who has been in the position since 2007, declared her intention to leave more than a year ago.
The Foundation's new executive director: The Wikimedia Foundation has announced that its new executive director will be Lila Tretikov, until now a chief product officer in Silicon Valley.
One of the first university Wikipedian in residence positions, hosted at Harvard University in 2012, has jumped back into the spotlight amid questions about its ethical integrity.
The Wikimedia Foundation has proposed to modify the Wikimedia projects' Terms of use to specifically ban undisclosed paid editing. ... Dimitris Liourdis, a lawyer in training who moonlights as an administrator on the Greek Wikipedia, is embroiled in a legal dispute with a Greek politician over alleged edits made to his Wikipedia article.
In apparent acknowledgment of the urgency of two issues facing the Wikimedia movement—the need to engage both women and the global south—the WMF Board has appointed Ana Toni as one of its four expert members. Toni will bring rare expertise to the movement, and the Signpost understands that her skills in advocacy and her key roles in international NGOs are likely to be a natural match with the WMF as the hub of disseminating free knowledge around the world.
Late last year, the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) awarded $8.4 million in donors' money to 11 Wikimedia entities, including the Wikimedia Foundation and 10 nationally defined chapters. Under this arrangement, these organisations are required to issue quarterly reports on how far they have progressed towards their declared programmatic and financial goals. The FDC has now announced that all 11 completed and submitted their reports by the 1 April deadline, and have responded to each.
Nominations closed last Friday for the three community-elected seats on the Wikimedia Foundation's (WMF) ten-member Board of Trustees—the ultimate corporate authority of the worldwide WMF. The Board has influential roles and responsibilities over one of the most powerful global information sources on the Internet.
WMF scales back feature after outcry: Numerous Wikimedia Commons editors have chimed in on the Wikimedia Foundation's deployment of a new feature to its mobile website. Allowing anonymous users to register and upload pictures for use in an article, the feature was placed prominently at the top of Wikipedia articles in multiple languages.
Sue Gardner to leave WMF; German Wikipedians spearhead another effort to close Wikinews: Ranked as one of the most powerful women in the world by Forbes, Gardner is widely associated with the rise of the Wikimedia movement as a major custodian of human knowledge and cultural products.
Wikimedia Foundation declares 'victory' in Wikivoyage lawsuit: On February 15, the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) declared 'victory' in its counter-lawsuit against Internet Brands (IB), the owner of Wikitravel and the operator of several online media, community, and e-commerce sites in vertical markets. The lawsuit clears the last remaining hurdles for the WMF's new travel guide project, Wikivoyage.
The movement, now in its second decade, is growing apace in its international reach, cultural and linguistic diversity, technical development, and financial complexity.
On 27 December the Wikimedia Foundation announced the conclusion of their ninth annual fundraiser, which attracted more than 1.2 million donors. The appeal reached its goal of US$25 million, even though fundraising banners ran for only nine days.
