



Summary of feedback from Draft Committee Session #1 [ edit ]

This refers to: drafts A, G, K

Structural inequalities: Should remember high unemployment, lots of free time, but people often unwilling/unable to spend money (e.g. internet access) and time in order to contribute.

More clarity needed: Drafts talk a lot about inclusion, but we seem to have different usage/definitions? How many regions in the world not part of the movement? What do we mean by being global? Are there indicators that are adaptable to different local contexts (ex: # or editors in Africa, Latin America and Asia)?

Innovation needed: In terms of change, there’s a lot of disruption, we need to move or we will become obsolete.

Keep what we do well: What is the unique value of Wikipedia? a good strategy is aspirational but based on unique value. Starting there is really powerful and lays groundwork for what it is what we should keep and do well.

Logic/story/citation: We need to show where the statements are coming from, how these themes are connected to the participants input. Links, citations, etc.

Strive for simple, inclusive language: Make sure that our content is accessible to as broad a community as possible. Simple language that’s not too self-congratulatory and doesn’t diminish Wikipedia or sister projects.

Stress reliability: Free knowledge is not so uncommon, but free and reliable knowledge is rather uncommon. Envision that people should trust Wikimedia pages to judge whether the news they hear is fake or not.

Global education gap: trends show the gap in access to education will continue to be present by 2030.To be a truly global movement we must focus part of our strategy to be able to incorporate all this mass of the population that will continue without the same opportunities.

Link to the full notes: https://docs.google.com/document/d/10Q3Y-6Msm0wED2sEp2x9_6CKhGgluhTHsLn0ypKdL_E/edit?usp=sharing

SKeith (WW) (talk) 19:24, 21 July 2017 (UTC)

If you use WikiComment, please add a link to this list, since the page is currently undergoing a lot of changes: [1] [2] 09/09/2017

Summary of feedback from Draft Committee Session #2 [ edit ]

Main takeaway: It should be more ambitious, and narrowed in focus, potentially around the idea of “infrastructure for advancing free knowledge.” Needs more sharpness and clarity to emphasize innovation going forward.

Lead with bolder, narrower direction Current text does not rule much out of the things we do now. Our strategy as created in this process lacks ambition . Also there aren't really trade-offs. We stay really in the comfort-zone and are afraid of making a substantial change. "More than Wikipedia" is almost the only time a statement is made that appears to restrict, limit, reduce in importance something we do now, it refers to Wikipedia. I would suggest acknowledging Wikipedia explicitly, e.g. ‘ the huge service of access to knowledge provided via Wikipedia will be the benchmark and inspiration for all our endeavours’, Open Infrastructure as core of direction: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uutIKWpw2tWY2IuV6MKs9P4CZQYVcE64783q0in8K5s/edit That the document starts off with describing the Wikimedia community of our dreams, rather than the Wikimedia product of our dreams, is concerning to me.



Simplify language chopping out the flowery language. Wikimedia projects is jargon and may be confusing for outsiders [Many other comments asking for clarification]



Things that are missing The concept of quality should have more prominence than it has now, I think. Say how we address tension between credibility and inclusiveness by changing the paradigm for knowledge sharing and exchange from close committee decides on truth to everyone deciding what is relevant together. Explicitly acknowledge accommodating or creating an enabling or conducive environment for first time editors cross collaboration across the open movement will increase reach finding a solution to facts that have no citations.



Other In my understanding healthy communities should be our short term goal for 2020. It's a precondition for being truly global (i.e., present locally). And this is a clear, attainable goal for the existing movement. Opportunities that go beyond existing community is more ambitious and inspirational part of movement strategy, with more potential for strategic partnerships. We need a more substantial relationship with our partners



Link to Notes: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_8JHEhUOyAZleyFhhIbmU2wzZd5AfxqFUayYJBvAMbo/edit?usp=sharing

SKeith (WW) (talk) 01:40, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Automation [ edit ]

Congratulation on a great work done! I like most what is in in the draft but react on one phrase: Automation (especially machine learning and translation) is changing how people produce content. Either this statement is a "emtpy statement" as automation will effect our way of working, or else it is too dramaic written as many of our unique strengths will still be critical where ther are more automation tools. I beleivee automation will take a big role in presenting info to users from our data, also in crosschecking etc when we creãte content. But that the need for a human to actually verify that our info is relevant and properly verified will be even more ciritical. So I see auotomation rightly used will enhance our efforts but not threaten the need of our work. And I would like this to be reflected in this passage.Yger (talk) 11:49, 5 August 2017 (UTC)

I think that this assertion should receive more explanation and clarification. I agree with Yger: Psychoslave (talk) 13:12, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Language [ edit ]

Hi! Thanks for making this draft! I'd like to point out to some words and expression that I some doubts about:

"We, the Wikimedia movement" and "we, the constituents of the Wikimedia movement": This language sound very much like the US Constitution, but afaik is not so commons in other countries. It also sounds a bit flamboyant to me, and -probably more important- it might be seen as saying that the whole movement already agrees with this Direction, while we will only know who will sign it in September.

This should be easy to rephrase, shouldn't it? Actually, it seems it's already done in the draft. At least for the former one. For the second one, something like "contributors of the Wikimedia movement who responded to the call to provide feedback". --Psychoslave (talk) 06:14, 18 August 2017 (UTC) I chose to use the translation for "members" rather than "constituents", because constituyentes is not a peaceful concept nowadays in the Spanish-speaking world and could be easily distorted. --Marco (WMF) (talk) 04:09, 8 August 2017 (UTC) Yes - or "participants" maybe, so it might also cover readers and donators. I understand the idea is to create something like "preamble to our constitution" - but in case of constitutions it is clear who are "constituents" - in our case it is not that clear. Polimerek (talk) 10:19, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

"Every human being deserves access to knowledge, and has innate capacity to participate in its creation, curation, and sharing. That is non-negotiable.": This kind of language seems to come from a declaration of human rights. And while we all probably agree with the right to access to knowledge, someone might not agree that those things are "innate" and "non-negotiable". Or they might think in general that there are no "innate" and "non-negotiable" things. Consider e.g. that "non-negotiable" is often use in relation with Catholic values here in Italy, and it could -more generally- be seen as linked to some kind of moral absolutism which I would very much avoid.

For the innate part, it's more related to a metaphysic standpoint which in fact doesn't have much relation or impact on our movement goal as far as I can judge. So it's superfluous here and would introduce unnecessary way to debate endlessly (though progress in cognitive sciences seems to consolidate this assumption). Instead this part could states something like and should be provided with an environment propitious for the fulfillment of their capacity to participate in its creation, curation, and sharing. For the non-negotiable, it's seems more acceptable to my mind as it's more a assumed statement of ethical value. Those said, you might express the same "categorical imperative" using "must" instead of "should" in the previous proposal. So and must be provided with an environment propitious for the fulfillment of their capacity to participate in its creation, curation, and sharing.. If we do have common values, then I think it's good to bring them out and state them firmly, then defend and promote them. That is not so much because our movement have some special ability to expose values which are right in an absolute certainty, but we will have to continue to deal with a world were not everybody share this values (yet), and even include some hostile forces. --Psychoslave (talk) 06:14, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

"The strategic direction of the Wikimedia movement for 2030 is to become the roads, bridges, and villages" and "trusted knowledge in many shapes and colors": Imho those kind of metaphors make the meaning less clear. I would suggest using more straight language. --Jaqen (talk) 06:17, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

Hi, I have similar thoughts about the language. From my point of view the text includes some rather long sentences and it includes many beautiful, but hard to grasp metaphors (one example for this that has already been mentioned is "to become the roads, bridges, and villages".). Since we are a multilingual and multicultural movement, can we rewrite the text to make it easier to understand? This would make it more accessible for people who don't speak English very well, and easier to understand and implement(!) for everybody. Thanks, --Gnom (talk) 10:15, 7 August 2017 (UTC) Both might be given, whether in separated sections (like the fictional contributors in a previous step of this consultation) or mixed side by side. For those who don't understand English well enough, the best would to provide them a good translation. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Psychoslave (talk) 06:14, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Jaqen & Gnom: Language is difficult :) I'm certainly open to changing it if we find something that works better. However, we have to find a balance between exactitude and understandability. "The essential support system for the global free knowledge ecosystem" [3] is more exact and concrete than "the roads, bridges, and villages", but it is also very difficult to understand if you're not familiar with those concepts, if you're not a native speaker of English, or if you're trying to translate this into another language. The current metaphor is less precise but it refers to simpler and more common concepts. Precise language means that a handful of people understand a very specific idea; a metaphor means that many people understand the rough idea in broader but less specific terms. I believe that this kind of metaphor makes the concepts more understandable across languages, not less. With that in mind, I do welcome any suggestions on how you would rephrase this part. Guillaume (WMF) (talk) 22:07, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

"Ecosystem" is a metaphor, not precise at all. Also, "support system" is not clear. --167.58.26.180 18:20, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

(back) I definitely quote Jaqen and I am a bit disappointed. It's not just about the language, but about the content as well.

In my opinion, it's a good example of how a draft, a mission, a strategic statement, or anythig this text aim to be, should not be written. Broadly speaking, I see "a lot of smoke and nothing roasted" (this is a common Italian idiom which means something like "many beautiful words but nothing concrete"). ;-) I just stick to the main statement, which is what should catch us all, with its roaring title "the future we imagine":

The strategic direction of the Wikimedia movement for 2030 is to become the roads, bridges, and villages that support the world's journey towards free knowledge.

Wants Wikimedia "to become a village that supports the world"? What a bizarre metaphor. I can understand "streets and bridges", but what about "villages"? This looks more like a poetical vision or maybe a mission, but it has nothing "strategic" in it. We could instead talk about "building sites", "campus"...

We, the Wikimedia movement, will forge the tools and build the foundations for creating and accessing trusted knowledge in many shapes and colors.

"Reliable knowledge in many shapes and colors?" What's this? Is it edible? Seriously: is it really necessary to put so much poetry and novel style in there? But much more concretely: the "foundations" are already here. They are those built in the last 15 years and the ones on which the whole movement and this very same strategic direction should rely on (the text dosen't talk about "building new foundations", but about "building the foundations", so it's assumed that now we don't have any).

As a movement, we will assemble through strong, sustainable communities that motivate us to contribute. We will welcome people from everywhere to grow fields of knowledge that represent human diversity. In doing so, we will contribute to human progress, and to a better understanding of the world and of ourselves.

I see this as a perfect example of how to lower the interest and attention of a reader. "We will contribute to human progress, and to a better understanding of the world and of ourselves". This looks more as a consequence of a mission, or a hope, not a strategic direction. And, honestly, it's too close to the mission contained in the Bible and the Quran, or in the whole science in itself. I would keep it all a bit more humble and straight to the point.

It encourages us to expand our horizons, and builds on existing projects and contributors to add new knowledge and new ways to participate. It asks us to be bold and experiment in the future, as we did in the past.

There's no need to talk about "what we did in the past" in a text about the future (it looks like sort of a "self—glorification" that we as a movement don't need). And then again: "new knowledge", "new ways", "new things"... It looks like the whole statement could be summarized in: "We will do new beautiful things, better, without betraying the tradition". Which is much more concrete but unfortunately means everything and nothing at the same time.

To sum up, in my opinion this text strongly discourage the urge to participate, even to those who would, and it's not clear. Furthermore, this strategic direction looks exactly the same as the one that we carried on up until now: to spread free knowledge with new tools. --Lucas (talk) 16:04, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Here is a reply to whole current section as a whole. Globally, the feedback of fuzziness in statements seems relevant to me. Now, to be more accurate, I'm not against the use of metaphor with all lyrical stuff that the contributor which is writing them would like to include. But they should be backed with more concrete statements. If some metaphor can't hold the translation, then the translator should adapts them or find someone able to help to do it, because yes that's part of the difficult art of translation. Now on the more broad topic of language, I mean the object that is studied in linguistic, not the way one might phrase its sentences. As we are asked to be bold, then here is a bold question: why sticking with English as our main language when it comes to our international communication? If I well remember, that's an official guideline. It's great that here one is supposed to be able to answer in whatever its native language is, but more broadly, we do use English as our lingua franca. Last year when I talked to a developer of a project of internationalization of programming languages, I was asked what was wrong with English. My answer was, to sum it up, this was a bad question. Of course there is nothing wrong with English nor any other human language per se (or if you prefer you might find an infinity of inconvenience in any language). However, there is a problem with the hegemony of English (as there would be with any "customary" language). To quote The Hegemony of English and Strategies for Linguistic Pluralism: Proposing the Ecology of Language Paradigm by Yukio Tsuda "the dominance of English causes serious consequences which include: (1) linguistic and communicative inequality to a great disadvantage of the speakers of languages other than English; (2) discrimination against the non-English-speaking people and those who are not proficient in English; and (3) colonization of the consciousness of the non-English-speakers, causing them to develop linguistic, cultural, and psychological dependency upon, and identification with, the English, its culture and people." Focusing on the two first points is enough to raise a concern about the use of English as main language for international communication I guess. So I wonder how our community is feeling about that, and whether it is feeling like we might do something about that by 2030 to respond to this concern. Because, yes, there are other solutions, such as Esperanto, which do not include this linguistic and communicative inequality and discrimination against the non-speaker of the hegemonic-langage-of-the-day. Furthermore, at least in case of Esperanto, there are solutions which are far easier to learn and have propaedeutic values for learning other languages. So what about launching a consultation about (1) moving away from English in our international communication and (2) elect an other solution which fit more our value of equity? --Psychoslave (talk) 06:14, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

"Knowlege" and "free knowledge" [ edit ]

I would like to thank Guillaume for writing this draft. Honestly, I found the "knowledge" and "free knowledge" concepts bothersome and troubling. Are we still thinking Wikipedia? If so, "free knowledge"... how "free" is knowledge? Also, at Wikipedia, we can provide knowledge but cannot provide thought and creativity as Wikiversity, Wikibooks, and WikiJournal have been doing lately. Rules of English Wikipedia discourage and disallow original research, bias, and inaccuracy, yet en.wp still provides knowledge but not fully.

If we are not thinking Wikipedia, how would "knowledge" concept apply to other sister projects? Wikinews doesn't provide knowledge but provides information instead. It doesn't help readers gain much knowledge but helps readers be informed about what's going on right now. Its creativity is promising but requires a deadline, hindering potential creativity. ...Maybe I was thinking English Wikinews. However, older articles are barely read every day.

Wikiquote provides readers a lot of intriguing quotes, but one can wonder why the whole collection of quotes is considered "knowledge", like Taxi Driver, Rocky, and Friends. Wikivoyage has a lot of information about places, like cities. However, does it improve readers' knowledge about certain places? Other projects can provide knowledge: Wiktionary, Wikiversity, and Wikibooks. Wiktionary, Wikisource and Wikispecies prove the existences of things, but can they provide knowledge?

If "knowledge" is not the best word to stick with, how about changing from "knowledge" to "open-source" or something? If not, toward what direction should we head? --George Ho (talk) 11:30, 7 August 2017 (UTC); amended, 06:22, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

Now I realize that one of the themes of this movement is.... "knowledge", isn't it? Is "knowledge" also the main theme of this movement? --George Ho (talk) 05:55, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

"Wikinews doesn't provide knowledge but provides information instead" - The distinction between those terms is not easy to understand. Let's keep at knowledge. --167.58.26.180 18:22, 11 August 2017 (UTC) I'll rephrase what I said about Wikinews: how does Wikinews fit the description of the direction? How does Wikinews provide knowledge if its mission is just providing news? --George Ho (talk) 19:33, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Well, the fact that in English the concept of knowledge is already less precise than in some other languages (see Knowledge by acquaintance) might help or handicap here, depending how you take it. What our community produce within wikis is intellectual works (work as Werk in German or œuvre in French). As for knowledge, work seems also more polysemic in English, but is probably still preferable to content for example, as pseudo-random data generation can just as well product meaningless content. And it works (mind you, "it also operates") just as well for wikinews, wikipedia, and whatever wiki you might come with. Now, as a community we produce not only intellectual works, but also interpersonal relations, values and all that folklores that emerge when you let people interact. So please, provide your feedback on a proposal to use "intellectual works" rather than "knowledge" or any other proposal it might inspire. --Psychoslave (talk) 08:51, 18 August 2017 (UTC) Honestly, Psychoslave... I don't know what to say about the "intellectual works" direction. However, it looks as if we are heading towards the "creativity" direction, which is meant for mainly Wikibooks, Wikiversity, and WikiJournal. Wikipedia collects whatever is important/notable to readers, but past encyclopedias do insert questions and some opinions made by experts (that's "creative", right?), something that English Wikipedia disallows under rules. en:Category:Intellectual works is worth browsing and surfing; "intellectual work" redirects to w:en:creative work. Maybe heading toward "intellectual works" would mean creating more sister projects, which is IMHO a better direction than "knowledge" direction (of any kind), but I'm unsure whether the WMF would go for that direction. If neither "knowledge" nor "intellectual (or creative) work" is a suitable theme of the movement, there must a better theme than those two. --George Ho (talk) 21:05, 18 August 2017 (UTC) Well, at least "knowledge" should be given some definition here, if there is any intent to build more than fuzzy meaningless logorrhoea within this consultation. Depending on definition you might say every single knowledge is the resultant of the creative interaction between a mind and its environment, or that there isn't any knowledge which is creative, or even that knowledge is a void sign which don't reflect any actual event but result from some mental confusion in denoting operations (but there is no pretension of exhaustiveness in this list). I don't see what would be the danger in having more projects, as we already have a rather clear path for them to raise up or die/stagnate silently within the incubator. Really, the only limit we should be careful about regarding wiki experiments is legality and conformity to our fundamental values (free/libre license, inclusivity, transparacy…). It's not to say there are easy topics to deal with, but I would be interested to know if there would be any other concern about such a multiplication within the community and the WMF. --Psychoslave (talk) 15:06, 20 August 2017 (UTC) I don't see what's wrong with creating another sister project either. I'll clarify that I'm uncertain/unconfident that WMF would head for the "intellectual works" direction or theme. I guess "knowledge" would also allow another sister project creation, right? --George Ho (talk) 22:59, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

This is so rich and i appreciate being part of the Wikimedia foundation, i say it again, I'm proud of this free encyclopedia Mrniger (talk) 00:17, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

– The devil is in the details. We often leave facts, but express opinions. We like things, people, or don’t. Emotions trigger writing, knowledge per se is silent. I personally have found Wikipedia, especially some German authors, to be driven by opinions, less by plausibility or (un)importance of details. In Wikipedia the opinions then hide behind quotes from published media, leaving aside factual probability, but purposely influencing the opinion of the reader. Is this knowledge? Especially when it comes to separate say art from the artist or intention from effect the thin ice of knowledge breaks – expressed in your flowerly language. Are insinuations knowledge? “Renowned historian Soandso wrote this’nthat” is taken for knowledge. Especially when describing persons or trends we should be way more stringent. Sometimes less “knowledge” would be wiser and improve this encyclopedia. And how about “practical” knowledge? Who’s our audience? The student or the professor? Start with the student: Knowledge without structure is a mess, so how do we cope with the alphabetization of knowledge? Sorry for all these questions, but please concentrate on clear directions rather than pompous statements, sorry to say. – Fritz Jörn (talk) 09:24, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

Meh... I'm done [ edit ]

I started reading this and saw little of the community discussions I have been following since January. As this process gets further along it appears more and more like marketing copy from WMF to the community, and feels like it is going the same route as the previous strategy project: to be completely hijacked and rewritten to find and say what the Foundation wanted. I do not have time or interest to be the target audience of a propaganda campaign. - Amgine/meta wikt wnews blog wmf-blog goog news 16:30, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

I... don't know how to respond to your "propaganda" assertions, Amgine. I had wished that you were wrong, but now I'm not so sure anymore. I can't conclude that you're right yet. I believe that the "movement" and its direction would impact all existing and proposed Wikimedia projects. Do you believe so as well? --George Ho (talk) 06:14, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

I can't find the community discussions that were held from January to June 2017, in which I participated. I spent time and energy discussing with other Wikipedia editors what the 2030 vision/strategy might be. We were specific, discussed pros and cons of machine-enable editing, anti-spam tools like ORES and lots of other stuff. There was lively debate and most important, plenty of specific details with external sources cited as evidence. I can't find any of this now! I looked through my edit history, to no avail. All I see now is this propaganda-sounding shtick that reads like ad copy, just as Amgine wrote. I am discouraged and not feeling inclined toward any further engagement.--FeralOink (talk) 22:18, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

Thank you @Amgine: for noticing us about your feeling. I hope you won't give up though, and encourage you to further feeding feed back, especially your most concrete applicable goals. None of our community contributor voice should be smothered by a feeling of failure to listen and to take full account by any part of the community. --Psychoslave (talk) 09:02, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Whether to endorse the direction in September [ edit ]

Karen, are we allowed to endorse or not endorse the direction? Also, the above comment by Amgine indicates that the user cannot endorse this direction. --George Ho (talk) 19:59, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

Could you please clarify what you mean by "user cannot endorse this direction"? Which user? Do you mean "contributors might be discouraged to contribute any longer" or "contributors should be able to vote against direction proposals"? --Psychoslave (talk) 09:16, 18 August 2017 (UTC) When I said user, I should have said "Amgine", but that was before another user FeralOink responded with agreement. I'll rephrase, Psychoslave: "Are we allowed to vote against the direction of the movement? Some users like FeralOink and Amgine seem to be against the direction for various reasons, like not sourcing or acknowledging the opinions of the community. If voting in opposition toward the finalized direction is not allowed, then they are less compelled to contribute further to this movement." I'll clarify further if I didn't make any sense to you. --George Ho (talk) 09:37, 18 August 2017 (UTC) Anyone will be able to endorse the direction, although the logistics haven't been completely worked out yet. This isn't a vote, so it's not "support/oppose". If you generally agree with the direction, you will be encouraged to endorse it with your signature. If you strongly disagree with it, then you simply don't sign it, and you carry on your contributions as usual. It's similar in spirit to the w:Paris Agreement. Also, keep in mind that this text is still changing in response to comments here and elsewhere; the decision to endorse should be made on the final text in a few weeks. Guillaume (WMF) (talk) 12:03, 18 August 2017 (UTC) Thank you George Ho: Guillaume (WMF): Psychoslave (talk) 13:01, 18 August 2017 (UTC) @Guillaume: may the opponents at least comment on the finalized direction in the talk page instead in September? --George Ho (talk) 19:23, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Most spoken languages assertion not in citation given [ edit ]

"in the next 15 years, the languages that will be the most spoken are primarily those that currently lack good content and strong Wikimedia communities"

This is sourced to a table indicating Chinese and Spanish will be more widely spoken than English, labeled, "Most Widely Spoken Languages, Projected by 2050," (which is in 38 years, not 15) which is in turn sourced to this Google doc which doesn't include information in the table or the 2050 date, and not the quote in its citation. The table is clearly incorrect. Where is it from? English is already widely dominant world-wide and its rate of growth suggests it could be the second language of a full majority of the global population by 2030.

Is there any support for the assertion quoted above? 89.47.15.41 18:36, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

Out of the top 5 languages according to that source, only the Hindi Wikipedia has relatively few articles and editors. So the phrase is clearly wrong. --NaBUru38 (talk) 16:44, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

A chart listing the 50 languages with the largest number of speakers and the highlighting those with over 100,000 Wikipedia articles (as of August 2017) in green and those with over 1,000,000 Wikipedia articles in orange.

::Predicting future language growth is complex, but this chart gives a deeper look at where we stand now. The small Wikipedias (<100,000 articles) are concentrated in South Asia, Africa, and Southeast Asia, all places with higher than average population growth rates. Note that many of the largest Wikipedias (Swedish, Dutch, Cebuano, Waray) aren't in the top 50 list here.--Carwil (talk) 01:48, 13 August 2017 (UTC)

Cebuano and Waray-Waray have single-digit amount of administrators and very few or several active non-bot users doing more than 40 edits within last 30 days. Nevertheless, they have millions of articles. --George Ho (talk) 04:33, 13 August 2017 (UTC)

I agree with the claim that predictions are difficult, especially about future event. ;) But sure you might find many futurologists out there to sell you all the projection you want (here is one for French as most spoken language by 2050). Personally I would be more concerned on providing more resources to languages with the less speakers out there, as those with more people will already benefit from that actual numerical superiority. Languages are dying at an alarming rate. Anything we can we do in favor of language diversity is worth trying. --Psychoslave (talk) 13:24, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Throw it out and start over [ edit ]

From the very first sentence this draft makes its intention clear, and not in a good way.

The strategic direction of the Wikimedia movement for 2030 is to become the roads, bridges, and villages that support the world's journey towards free knowledge.

Even as a native English speaker, this comes across as somehow worse than the crap I delete every day as advertising.

Wikipedia soon became much more than its origin story, and today it is considered by many as a source for information whose role is to collect knowledge.

False. Wikipedia, by design, excludes certain knowledge (and "knowledge"). Even in an ideal world, the sum of all Wikimedia projects excludes knowledge by design (e.g. what $CELEBRITY had for dinner last night). Our audience failing to realize this is a problem.

Limits of Wikimedia: What we should improve (second paragraph) We will break down the social and technical barriers preventing people from accessing and contributing to our shared knowledge.

Some of the non-problems in this section arise from the desire to improve quality. To build high-quality free knowledge, we must EXCLUDE certain people. Earth to WMF: while anyone can edit, not everybody is capable of contributing constructively or is motivated to do so. Competence and clue are required, hence the need for barriers to entry. As quality improves, the barriers become higher. Do you seriously want Wikipedia to be overrun by hoards from the third world who have no idea what an encyclopedia is, and can't be bothered to find out? The specific competencies may be different for other WMF projects, but the logic is the same (at some point, crappy smartphone pictures become inadequate, for instance).

We will create a participatory culture that is enjoyable, rewarding, and supportive of anyone who wants to contribute in good faith.

See above. Good faith is necessary, but not sufficient. I'm here to build an encyclopedia, not to hand out remedial English lessons.

I've spent enough time critiquing this document. To put it bluntly, this draft is yet another example of idealistic, ignorant, vapid bullshit from the WMF leadership. Throw it out and start over, this time actually paying attention to what the community actually had to say -- there was a heavy emphasis on quality, yet this accounts for less than 5% of the draft document -- instead of selectively quoting the consultation and your own research to support your own predetermined vision. MER-C (talk) 07:09, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

Hi MER-C, while I do see some interesting points in your post, you should really rewrite it from scratch in order to be part of a constructive discussion. --Gnom (talk) Let's make Wikipedia green! 11:00, 9 August 2017 (UTC) You mean, Gnom, that we can overhaul the whole draft and change the direction? If so, sweet! :) --George Ho (talk) 16:49, 9 August 2017 (UTC) "To build high-quality free knowledge, we must EXCLUDE certain people. Earth to WMF: while anyone can edit, not everybody is capable of contributing constructively or is motivated to do so. Competence and clue are required, hence the need for barriers to entry. As quality improves, the barriers become higher. Do you seriously want Wikipedia to be overrun by hoards from the third world who have no idea what an encyclopedia is, and can't be bothered to find out?" Dear Gnom, the motto of Wikimedia is that people can learn. Therefore we have different people, resources and activities to teach people to contribute. You assume otherwise. You sound like you want to exclude people beforehand. If a contribution is poor, we can easily remove it. But you seem to propose to have an introductory exam to become a licensed editor. And I disagree with that. --NaBUru38 (talk) 17:03, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

Hi, MER-C: To build high-quality free knowledge, we must EXCLUDE certain people. Earth to WMF: while anyone can edit, not everybody is capable of contributing constructively or is motivated to do so. Competence and clue are required, hence the need for barriers to entry. As quality improves, the barriers become higher. Do you seriously want Wikipedia to be overrun by hoards from the third world who have no idea what an encyclopedia is, and can't be bothered to find out? The specific competencies may be different for other WMF projects, but the logic is the same (at some point, crappy smartphone pictures become inadequate, for instance). Here I strongly disagree with your statement that we should exclude certain people. Some contributions are unwelcome when they are added in inappropriate spaces, and the community should have tools to temporarily prevent a specific person to contribute to a more or less large set of our contribution spaces. But we don't exclude a priori multiple people, especially not because they are suspected to belong to some ethnic/regional/religious/whatever group. What is discussed here is how to best accompany still underrepresented language versions, where you will most probably will never contribute yourself (except if you are an exceptional being proficient in hundred languages?), so you really should have any fear of a sudden flock of new contributors willing to drive the project in direction you personally dislike. If by chance we might have such a large arrival of new contributors which aren't interested in writing encyclopedic articles, we might lead them to more appropriate contribution spaces – should we create them for that occasion – then later maybe they might be interested to also write encyclopedic articles while already having acquired useful skills regarding policies and tools we provide to do so. Regarding crappy smartphone pictures, as far as I know our current infrastructure is able to store more than we receive and as long as it is the case an a posteriori sort/deletion is the best policy, isn't it? For the rest of you critics of lake of inclusion from previous feedback, they seem to find a general resonance and so your feedback seems worth listening to (although I doubt that the way you formulate it favour anything but blurring the content in its form). --Psychoslave (talk) 14:08, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Some language conerns [ edit ]

Hi, This is maybe the problem that I am not native English speaker, but some problems I encounter during translation to Polish (which might be an issue for other languages as well):

"What we have accomplished in our first 16 years of existence is a testament to the success of this approach." - actually "testement" is normally used as equivalent to "last will" you write before you die: w:Testament, which I guess is not the intention here, but rather using this in "biblical" sense (an agreement between God and people about some basic things) - but the biblical meaning is too much christian related, so it might be hard to translate to Arabic or Mandarin, and the coincidence with "last will" is not particularly good idea, as hopefully, the direction is not going to be our last will :-) You should take testatement as a synonym of proof/evidence/testimonial. Maybe one of this word might actually be used in the draft itself. --Psychoslave (talk) 15:25, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

"People everywhere will feel as though they have a role to play in advancing free and open knowledge. Community will be more broadly defined to include many forms of contributors, from editors to donors to organizers." - I guess it is "to donors and organizers" or "from editors, through donors to organizers" ?

"We will recognize the strength of distributed and diverse local communities as powerful tools for adaptation and innovation, and as counters to influence on our neutrality." - Using people as a tools doesn't sounds good - also, the word "counter" mean either "an apparatus used for counting." or "to speak or act in opposition to." - I guess what we want to say here is - that we believe that local communities can help achieve better neutrality; to "counter to influence on our neutrality" - might be understood that the communities are either trying to force their POV or block efforts to make our neutrality better by countering other influencers? Anyway it is very messy statement. If we let to "influence our neutrality" or "counter to influence..." too much - we won't be neutral any longer..

"We will balance self sufficiency and autonomy with intention and values we all share." - This is also very messy - first of all - we want to be self sufficient in order to not to trade off our values, so why does this must be "balanced" with our values? The more we are self sufficent the less there is danger for any trade offs regarding our values. And - above all - are we really about to balance our values with anything? Our values are who we are - so there is no room to "balance" it with anything? Anyway the idea of "balancing our values" - doesn't sound good.

Polimerek (talk) 11:05, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

I agree with Polimerek. People shouldn't be treated as tools, and our values should never be balanced with anything. --167.58.26.180 18:25, 11 August 2017 (UTC) I also agree with the feeling I guess behind indignation concern raised here. Even when thinking in a systemic overview, people feelings should be kept in mind. --Psychoslave (talk) 15:25, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

What about future of sister projects? [ edit ]

I have a feeling that the direction completely ignores existing sister projects - at least I see no any word about them, as Wikipedia is mentioned quite often. There is a one sentence which address somehow the issue but in very messy way:

"As we include other forms of free knowledge, we will aim for these projects to be as successful as Wikipedia." - what kind of projects? A new ones? or existing? and by "projects" we understand here what exactly - sister wikis or something beyond wiki? Anyway the goal is very ambitious and if we really believe it is achievable - if we believe that we can make anything new or existing as successful as Wikipedia - we should call it more openly and more precisely, what we believe it might be.

Polimerek (talk) 11:18, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

Indeed. "An encyclopedia, and so much more" feels so 2002, as if we didn't have anything else. All the recommendations seem to be about Wikipedia, including the mention of Wikidata. Instead we need to focus on what has a bigger growth potential, if the desire for growth and "Different forms of participation" is real. --Nemo 13:42, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

Pegasovagante on Italian is suggesting to change the paragraph this way (his addition in bold): We will adapt to our changing world to offer knowledge in the most effective ways, strengthening Wikimedia projects across digital formats, devices, and experiences. We will adapt our communities and technology to the needs of the people we serve. As we include and further develop other forms of free knowledge, we will aim for these sister projects to be as successful as Wikipedia. Source. --Niccolò "Jaqen" Caranti (WMF) (talk) 13:52, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

I like this suggestion to change the paragraph. This way, it would make much more sense to me, and it goes along with themes B and E from cycle 2. --Pakeha (talk) 16:17, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure how to provide feedback on this, so I'm just going to leave this message here.

The language is far too flowery. Ideally it should be in en:Plain English so that it's easy for everyone to understand and easy to translate.

As a result of the floweriness, it's difficult to immediately spot a solid direction here. It's not there in the emboldened statement, which I assume is the one we're supposed to look at (unless we're going to start building roads, bridges, and villages?). It is more there in the second through to the sixth sentence, but you still have to parse the floweriness before you can see the points (which might almost be better as separate bullet points at the moment). You could almost remove the first sentence and not lose anything as it stands.

"creating ... trusted knowledge" is quite different from what we do at the moment. Does this imply that we would start funding scientific research, for example?

The third paragraph looks like it belongs in the reasoning, not in the direction. It's similar with the last paragraph, but that does fit in a bit more than the third one.

Hope that helps - and feel free to disregard this if it doesn't. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 23:04, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

Recommendations [ edit ]

As a starting point, these are copied from the previous strategy recommendations at Recommendations:

Build and implement an ongoing, community communications plan

Increase transparency about the Foundation’s programs and budgets

Leverage the network effect of the whole community (Foundation, chapters, partners, contributors)

Develop a contributor relationship-management program based on member life cycle

Encourage more participation, offset known hurdles that prevent deeper engagement

Offer recognition and feedback loops

Connect to mentors or mentor community (more experienced Wikimedians and content experts), based on content interest or location

Introduce inexpensive, geographically-specific opportunities for more in-person interaction

Automatically offer personalized recommendations for content to contribute, based on selected areas of interest and past contributions

Offer opt-in email communications to create cohorts for outreach and more support based on life stage

Create different UIs, features, and levels of support for different levels of engagement (EWP) to better overcome the steep learning curve

Reading stage: easy ways to encourage switch to editor mode

Stage 1: First-time editor - limited capabilities (minor edits, contributions directly on requested items) with simple, easy-to-understand how-to tutorials

Stage 2: Casual editor - more capabilities, more advanced tutorials

Stage 3: Prominent editor - all capabilities and advanced features, advanced tutorials

Review product enhancements requested in the consultation, mainly

Simplify editor/contributor interface and tools

Improve language translation tools

Improve Wikidata and connections between wikis

Develop more relationships with GLAMs (Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums)

Build easier ways to verify and cite sources, More connections to services

Better define the development life stages of a wiki

so that “lessons learned” could be shared more easily and typical obstacles could be overcome

Review suggestions for improving community engagement noted in the consultation, mainly

Incentives, feedback loops, ongoing recognition

Gamification of edits/contributions

Simplified tools and tutorials to onboard new editors

They flew away [ edit ]

Previously I did not participate in public discussions, I was confined to reading (and participation in the real world discussion at the conference), but this time I will write something. "The strategic direction of the Wikimedia movement for 2030 is to become the roads, bridges, and villages that support the world's journey towards free knowledge." Really? "We, the Wikimedia movement, will forge the tools and build the foundations for creating and accessing trusted knowledge in many shapes and colors." "Experts" from WMF have really flew away. I do not even want to read it any further. From the introduction and the first section that I read, there is nothing concrete, so "we will be the most honest, the most open, the strongest and the best". If there is anything more meaningful, I would be glad if I was briefed. Regards, PiotrekD (talk) 13:58, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, I lost it too at "knowledge in many shapes and colors". Yaron Koren (talk) 15:25, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Trust structures, both social and technical, are what we must develop to increase the reliability of our content. [ edit ]

This is... intriguing. Two questions:

a) What is a "trust structure" b) what does whatever that is, have to do with improving reliability?

I am very invested in maintaining and improving reliability of content - most of what i do in en-WP is maintenance (something WMF doesn't talk about nearly enough).

Overall this sounds like w:Nupedia/w:Citizendium but surely that is not what is mind. So do tell. Jytdog (talk) 11:33, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

To me, trust is a social thing. People trust or don't. There's no such thing as a structure. --167.58.26.180 18:28, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

asking again, what the heck does this mean? Jytdog (talk) 07:50, 27 August 2017 (UTC) Looks like PR-speak, a well known phenomenon, sometimes also called bullshit. · · · Peter (Southwood) (talk): 20:50, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

The best technology avalaible today for implementing trust structures is the w:blockchain, the transaction storage infrastructure backing Bitcoin. It provides a criptographically secure infrastructure for trust by consensus algorithms, but it is also a decentralized storage where every computer that is part of the blockchain stores all or part of the information stored in the blockchain. IMHO, this technology, running on top of a distributed file system, like w:HDFS or, more likely, w:IPFS is just what Wikipedia needs. It will solve storage, trust, and change tracking issues. However, it is a very disruptive change to undergo. (Pieraco) 17:18, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

The Wikimedia Foundation should stop presumptively speaking for the Wikimedia movement [ edit ]

The Wikimedia Foundation should stop presumptively speaking for the Wikimedia movement.

The Foundation is free to set whatever strategy it wants to. The movement is not obligated to follow that strategy. It's difficult to organize an anarchy to follow any strategy, see wikt:herd cats.

The strategic direction of Goodfellow's Restaurant for 2030 is to become the forks, knives, and spoons that support the world's journey towards nutritional nourishment. That's what Goodfellow's marketing department tells the world, but we know better. The strategic direction of Goodfellow's Restaurant is to maximize revenues and profits. Wbm1058 (talk) 20:13, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Hello, this strategy document is supposed to show what the community has said in the past strategy discussions. Do you think it doesn't? --NaBUru38 (talk) 17:07, 12 August 2017 (UTC) Summarizing the recent discussions isn't an easy task, but this sounds like a strategy that could have been written 15 years ago. It's so vague as to be rendered virtually meaningless in terms of any actionable items or change in direction from what the movement has been doing for the past 15 years. I think #Summary of comments below is a good assessment. Wbm1058 (talk) 17:24, 13 August 2017 (UTC)

Let's deepen our description of how we will grow free knowledge [ edit ]

The Direction section looks strong and inspiring to me, but I'm concerned that major strategic pieces of carrying it out aren't in the later sections. I draw particular attention to these parts of the direction:

"Our networks of people and systems will connect with individuals and institutions to share knowledge through open standards and structures, and support them on the journey to openness and collaboration. We will be a leading advocate and partner for increasing the sharing, curation, and participation in free and open knowledge."

"We will welcome people from everywhere to grow fields of knowledge that represent human diversity."

This are great goals, but we need to lay out some of the aspirations and broad kinds of individuals and institutions we will bring in. Let me suggest the following:

Academics and researchers : 1. The Wikimedia movement will engage with the academic and research community to make the new findings and evolving understandings they produce accessible to everyone, free. 2. The Wikimedia movement will support and host efforts to make the data underlying scientific research freely shareable, to facilitate verification of scientific findings and communication across the research community. 3. The Wikimedia movement will assist the open access movement to make academically produced knowledge freely available.

: 1. The Wikimedia movement will engage with the academic and research community to make the new findings and evolving understandings they produce accessible to everyone, free. 2. The Wikimedia movement will support and host efforts to make the data underlying scientific research freely shareable, to facilitate verification of scientific findings and communication across the research community. 3. The Wikimedia movement will assist the open access movement to make academically produced knowledge freely available. Cultural heritage institutions : The Wikimedia movement will engage with cultural institutions of all types to make the history and culture of all peoples freely available wherever possible.

: The Wikimedia movement will engage with cultural institutions of all types to make the history and culture of all peoples freely available wherever possible. Oral cultures and traditional knowledge : The Wikipedia movement will think and act strategically about how to make the broad variety of forms of cultural knowledge accessible.

: The Wikipedia movement will think and act strategically about how to make the broad variety of forms of cultural knowledge accessible. Translation and spreading of knowledge: The Wikipedia movement's sites will become an important site for the spreading of knowledge across barriers of language, form of communication, and level of education. We will become a site where the body of human knowledge is translated and presented into multiple forms so that all humans can have access to it.

--Carwil (talk) 16:31, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

Nicely phrased :) --NaBUru38 (talk) 17:07, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

Support to Carwil, great text. ;) --Lucas (talk) 09:46, 13 August 2017 (UTC)

Below is an early and incomplete summary of the comments I have seen and heard at Wikimania. More structured documentation will be posted shortly but I want to start integrating this into the draft now, so that Wikimania attendees can discuss the changes. Guillaume (WMF) (talk) 12:29, 13 August 2017 (UTC)

Comment How to address Both the text in the green box and the whole document are still too long / too complex / difficult to translate. Further trimming down and simplication is underway in the drafting space. The metaphors are too vague. There is too much poetry / romanticism / PR speak. Removing the metaphors in the drafting space. Lack of clear direction / We are still trying to do everything and will therefore fail at everything / No indication of what we won't do. Guillaume is attempting a clearer direction in the drafting space. It is unclear how individual contributors can participate in this; it feels too focused on affiliates and Foundation. It doesn't clearly differentiate between knowledge and information / It doesn't clearly define what knowledge is.

References [ edit ]

The page has 33 Cite errors: Invalid now. Please fix. --Gereon Kalkuhl (WMF) (talk) 13:45, 13 August 2017 (UTC)

Post-Wikimania 2017 thoughts [ edit ]

I attended some strategy sessions in the Wikimania. Thanks for organising them. I wrote a short blog text about the topic. You will find in from here:

Wikimedia 2030: Enlightenment and Education in the digital world --Teemu (talk) 12:19, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

Wikimedia isn't about local communities that anybody can join [ edit ]

"By 2030, we won't yet reach “the sum of all knowledge”, but we will make it possible for anyone to join us in this effort."

No. We don't want to give 10 year olds the possibility to take part in editing Wikidata. Editing Wikipedia comes with certain responsibilities and there's are a variety of reasons why certain people don't qualify for holding those responsibilities. That's okay. Focusing on building on our strengths would be a better strategic direction than focusing on trying to win anybody.

"This direction builds on our movement's greatest strength, our local communities."

That feels like an insult to the online community. At the beginning, Wikipedia grew a lot because the Wiki technology allowed for an online community that isn't bound to any locale. In the time in which the Wikimedia Foundation had the money to fund local community events the amount of Wikipedia editors went down. Calling local communities instead of our online projects the prime strength shown priority that are completely wrong.

As far as insulting content goes, it's worth noting that the only time Wikipedia is mentioned in the document it's mentioned in the context that other Wikimedia projects should become as successful as Wikipedia.

On a more meta-level I don't see how this document is a reflection of the community discussion. It feels like an external document or a WMF document but not a community document in which attention was paid to listen to the existing community. ChristianKl (talk) 20:15, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

We must concur with most of the above, the sum of all human knowledge if a fine ideal, assuming good faith also a fine ideal (even if an unknown high percentage of edits are infact vandalism and nonsense). but you only need to view the contribution log of any schools ip address to realise that the sum of any local community's contribution is to rag at wikipedians about 'notability' and 'verifiable content' and this leads to a fundamental problem.

wikipedia is only the sum of all previously published knowledge.

Simply put, there is nothing the average 'local community' can do to expand the sum of human knowledge, unless they happen to have significant news coverage and/or notable books published about anything they might want to add, in which case anybody could add the information, making local communities distanced. This also is biased towards cultures which have not got the wealth of written information or notable news coverage, such news coverage may not represent a fair view for some cultures due to political issues or other constraints.

To achieve the ideals stated we have already identified some issues in Limits of Wikimedia: What we should improve. We are still far from having collected the sum of all knowledge. Most of the content we have created is in the form of long-text, unstructured encyclopedia articles and still images,[citation needed] which leaves out many other types of knowledge. Our current communities don't represent the diversity of the human population,[citation needed] which has created gaps of knowledge[12][13] and systemic biases.[14] Readers often question the reliability of the content we create,[15] notably because it is not accurate, not comprehensive, not neutral, or because they don't understand how it is produced, and by whom.

The way Wikipedia collects information is in itself systemically biased against poorer and more illiterate society and cultures who do not publish all their knowledge in written form. Aboriginal culture in Australia for example, has no written references of its own, it is other cultures observations of them that are used as reference here. This needs to be balanced against reliability, but it has to be dealt with in a fair way for everyone first. Language is also a problem, we recently saw an almost successful attempt to delete the article on Confucius's lineage from the en Wikipedia, a very important topic in china, but seemingly in conflict with a rule called WP:NOT which narrowly defines the scope of all subjects according to a rigid western ideal. to be more inclusive, the guidelines need to be flexible to allow all people from all cultures to participate in their own way.

Most of what we are saying is mostly relevant to Wikipedia, but we believe that inclusiveness though flexibility is important throughout the project, especially when setting what is in effect the primary rules. Aguyintobooks (talk) 20:54, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

Misleading banner is spamming me [ edit ]

When I visited my home Wiki (English Wikipedia) today, I got a banner message inviting me to participate in the 2030 strategy discussion for the Wikimedia movement, see here. I clicked, and arrived on a page that said The following discussion is closed. There was still a banner on the page inviting me to participate, so I clicked on THAT, and was directed to another page, that also said the discussion was closed! I think that was the content page for this talk page, here on meta.

It isn't inclusive to distract editors with banners that take me from en:wiki to meta, then tell me I can't participate, then do it again. Please remove the banner or direct it to the appropriate place.--FeralOink (talk) 22:23, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

Hi FeralOink: the page. The banners should be fixed soon. SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 09:02, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

Thank you, SGrabarczuk (WMF): FeralOink (talk) 02:50, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

My response to "Knowledge equity" direction [ edit ]

Overall review



The "Knowledge equity" direction seems... I don't know what words to explain it. I'm not thrilled with the "equity" part. What is "knowledge equity"? Must all knowledge be equal, the same, or what, regardless of differences?

"[C]reating knowledge that fully represents human diversity": "human diversity"... Is the movement more concerned about humanity and civilization? Why can't the movement extend to flora and fauna? Why not also extend to topics related to the universe and galaxy? Hmm... Maybe knowledge about the universe and galaxy might not reach further than knowledge representing "human diversity". Still, putting "human diversity" above all else seems... too human-centric, isn't it?

About "human diversity" itself... Would that result in mass production of biographical pages and other pages about civilization and humanity? I have edited biographical articles for years, and I've seen drama produced from the editing atmosphere when biographies are involved. Drama extends to events primarily related to civilization especially current events, which can ignite or provoke reactions, especially when such articles about them are created.

Back to fauna, a Wikinews article about cheetahs will dishearten everyone, even when cheetahs are one of carnivorous species and big felines.

About "good faith" throughout the whole page... Assuming good faith was attempted to be promoted from guideline to policy in English Wikipedia, but that failed because the whole overwhelming majority, if not unanimous, opposed it as against common sense to be suspicious about some people. There are essays about assuming good faith and concerning the assumption; they are good reads, even when they are just essays. I would like to come up with something better than "good faith" (or bona fides), but it's harder than I thought. Meanwhile, I'll still assume good faith on people, even when I could be somewhat suspicious, but I won't lose good faith... I hope I don't. --George Ho (talk) 00:03, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Changing direction

Maybe change from "Knowledge equity" to "Knowledge diversity" or "Knowledge creativity" or "Knowledge infinity". "Knowledge diversity" may allow all different branches/types of "knowledge", like traditional knowledge, inert knowledge, common knowledge, and descriptive knowledge. "Knowledge creativity" is based on creativity of "knowledge" because... we have created "knowledge" for centuries. "Knowledge infinity" would refer to infinite amounts of knowledge and eternity/longevity of knowledge. That's all I can think of, but I think any or all of the three are better choices than "Knowledge equity", aren't they? --George Ho (talk) 05:15, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Follow-up review

I felt that the "knowledge equity" direction alongside "knowledge that represents human diversity" is an encouragement to create more biographies and human-related articles, some of which would be problematic and dubious. Isn't it? Must we create more articles about women from the past or the present? Is feminism not fully achieved yet? Is our quota of articles too low right now?

I am not confident that the direction as is would create positive results. Rather either people wanting to create such articles and/or people wanting to preserve the integrity of Wikipedia would be affected. I can imaging newbies being scrutinized, scolded, and humiliated. I can imagine veterans leaving the projects or getting scrutinized. Maybe I'm wrong about everyone being affected. However, would "welcom[ing] people from every background to build strong and diverse communities" and/or "break[ing] down the social, political, and technical barriers preventing people from accessing and contributing to our shared knowledge" make new generation of newbies more motivated into becoming veteran editors? --George Ho (talk) 06:50, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

Still, putting "human diversity" above all else seems... too human-centric, isn't it? That's a very interesting point, thank you for highlighting it George Ho: libre knowledge. Clearly, any editorial guideline will come with a set of basic assumptions which give a general shape and bias regarding "what matter". For example we use the antonomastic formulation Pythagorean theorem. This is (at least in the western tradition) how it's named generally. Thus said, like any antonomasia, this term create more obfuscation (as it doesn't give any clue about its topic), while introducing a huge distortion of it's discovery in history (attestations of other far earlier proofs exist). Also, this might be interpreted as a way to firmly subsume an anthropocentric ontological status of mathematical knowledge. The anthropocentric Promethean cult is omnipresent in scientific knowledge fields, and while you might use commutative group rather than abelian group, it's harder to bypass something like the fact that the International System of Units use the term newton to name its unit of force (though it's not a base unit). One might come easily with general rule to avoid such a practice to bias so hugely knowledge we spread, like stating that a the main term used in an article to name its topic should never an antonomasia (except for biographies obviously), and that this kind of relation should be restrained in a dedicated and maybe enumerated in the chapeau of the article along other known used terms. But surely such a rule would accouter huge disagreement and would be rejected as POV (ironically) and original research (far more defensible). Now on a maybe less controversial topic, I think we should also improve the way people can be served with relevant information with non-text-based requests. That is, one go for a walk, see a tree, and wonder what knownledg is accessible about this tree within Wikimedia projects. Its envisionable that such a person would take a picture of the tree, and send it to some Wikimedia search service which would reply with information about this tree. Now, should Wikimedia projects keep information about individual trees, or only limit its knowledge to "abstract tree" and reply with things like taxonomic name, life expectancy, average size, and so on. Because the sum of all (gatherable) knowledge would direct us to the first option. Gathering as exhaustive data set as it's possible would surely be more relevant when pursuing the sum of all knowledge, after all you can always classify and filter later but once you lost the opportunity to collect data, there is no way back. Actually having regular input data about as many tree as we can would enable to provide more accurate data about life expectancy, average size and so on. And collecting as many data as possible about any individual life that Wikimedians might encounter could even have impact nomenclature schemes (or not), who knows? --12:10, 22 August 2017 (UTC) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Psychoslave (talk)

You have something important to say. You want to say it well. What to do? [ edit ]

NOTE: I am commenting on the page as of 09:19, 14 August 2017.



QUIZ

QUESTION: You have something important to say. You want to say it well. What do you do?

a) Write it yourself. It will be better than the Gettysburg Address because you're that good.

b) Put it off until tomorrow. When tomorrow comes, repeat.

c) Ask for help from people who write exceptionally well.

ANSWER: c

I suspect that the message about the introduction (Direction: The future we imagine) has been received. If not, here it is: Delete it and start over.

So, hopefully the lesson here is clear. If you are not widely regarded as a superb writer, ask for help. For example, you might ask for assistance from the good folks at The Guild of Copy Editors. The Guild is a WikiProject on the English Wikipedia. Here's what they say about themselves:

"This WikiProject is dedicated to improving the quality of writing in articles on the English Wikipedia. The Guild welcomes new and experienced editors alike to join our project, participate in its activities, and copy edit Wikipedia articles to make them clear, correct, concise, comprehensible, and consistent; to make them say what they mean and mean what they say.

On a related note: If the we write the English Strategic Direction well, I suspect it will facilitate easier translations.







I am not a member of The Guild, but I decided I should be constructive and offer a rewrite. My edit is for the five paragraphs that precede the Table of Contents - the prologue one might call it - which I think is actually pretty good as it is--much better than the flowery 'The future we imagine'. Here is the prologue as written, followed by my rewrite:

In January 2017, we, the constituents of the Wikimedia movement, started an ambitious discussion about our collective future. We decided to reflect on our past sixteen years together, and imagine the impact we could have in the world in the next decades. Our aim was to identify a common strategic direction that would unite and inspire people across our movement on our way to 2030, and help us make decisions. From on-wiki discussions, to large conferences, to small meetups, to expert interviews, to deep research,[1] the process has been exhaustive, messy, and fascinating. It didn’t take long to confirm that the greatest strength of the Wikimedia movement is the talent, dedication, and integrity of its members. Any successful strategy must accommodate the diversity of the people in our communities, including our particular interests, motivations, and contributions. Some of us write encyclopedia articles. Some of us develop software. Some of us donate money, time, or expertise. Some curate data, sources, or media. Some organize events, advocate for copyright reform, or remix artwork. Some are community organizers, educators, or wikignomes. Some are just very curious people. Some of us do all of the above, and more. What brings us together is not what we do; it’s why we do it. We are all part of this movement because we share a belief that free knowledge makes the world a better place. Every human being deserves access to knowledge, and has innate capacity to participate in its creation, curation, and sharing. That is non-negotiable. Therefore, it is natural that this shared vision is the basis of the direction that has emerged. The direction goes beyond, though, and invites us to focus on the infrastructures we need to move closer to that vision.

My rewrite:

In January 2017, volunteer editors for Wikipedia and sister projects, initiated an ambitious discussion about our collective future. We reflected on our past sixteen years together and considered the worldwide impact we could have over the next 12 years. We discussed a strategic direction designed to help people around the world readily access high-quality, reliable, trustworthy knowledge. From on-wiki discussions, to large conferences, to small meetups, to expert interviews, to research,[1] the process has been exhaustive, messy, and fascinating. It did not take long to reaffirm the Wikimedia Movement's greatest strength: Our members' diverse talents, determination, and integrity. We agreed that our strategic direction must accommodate the diversity of the people in our communities, including our particular interests, motivations, and contributions. Some of us write encyclopedia articles. Some of us develop software. Some of us donate money. Some curate data, sources, or media. Some organize events, advocate for copyright reform, or remix artwork. Some are community organizers, educators, or wikignomes. Some of us do all of the above, and more. What brings us together is not what we do, it is why we do it. We are all part of this movement because we share a belief that free knowledge makes the world a better place. Every human being deserves easy access to knowledge. And every human being should have an opportunity to participate in knowledge curation and its efficient dissemination.

--Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) 03:02, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Make it clear in the beginning of the page that there is a Drafting Space [ edit ]

I just noticed the Drafting space, which contains a complete rewrite of the much-criticized Direction: The future we imagine.

I bet I am not the only one who missed the Drafting Space. Please add a sentence notifying readers of this fact, preferably at the very beginning, i.e., along with:

This page is currently a draft. More information pertaining to this may be available on the talk page. Translation admins: Normally, drafts should not be marked for translation.

Thanks! --Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) 03:01, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Competency to edit [ edit ]

My main concern is good editing. Just because "anyone can edit wikipedia" does not mean that "anyone SHOULD edit ANYTHING in wikipedia" - I think editors should only edit, what they have the competency for to edit. I think that this should be made a guiding principle or norm in wiki protocols. --User:Jurriaan2 (talk)15:00 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Well said. Don't we have consensus on this point? Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) 17:03, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Who will decide who is competent? Doesn't that fly in the face of the fundamental strategic goal of "we will make it possible for anyone to join us in this effort." ?? Once you start limiting who can contribute, people will just migrate to another platform. I agree that there needs to be some method to vet the information presented and that this has not always been done well in the past. If you want to turn Wiki into just another on line encyclopedia then that is what it will become. Wiki now is a wonderful resource but I do not permit my college students to use it as a source because it is, by fundamental design, a crowd sourced resource and therefore not reliable as a scholarly resource. If you start limiting who can make edits, who will watch the watchmen? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 207.224.18.210 (talk) 06:01, 16 ago 2017

That's a good point Unsigned|207.224.18.210. Colleges and Universities are not allowing Wikipedia as a source because Wikipedia is not a reliable scholarly source. I don't really contribute to Wikipedia much anymore because I was told that my POV on things that I am an expert on are not neutral; I have a bias. I felt like I wasn't being valued for my expertise and I just stopped editing Wikipedia pages altogether because I found it to be a waste of time to try and edit something that would never be accepted. Your point that "Once you start limiting who can contribute, people will just migrate to another platform." is valid and correct. I know of some articles that are not factual and aren't telling the real truth, but I can't do anything about those articles. I like Wikipedia and it's a good source of information, but it's not factual. Wikipedia simply gives a general idea and/or starting point on a topic so that people can find factual information. Qewr4231 (talk) 08:58, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

How does Wikipedia determine who an expert is and who is qualified to edit a Wikipedia article? Qewr4231 (talk) 09:03, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with the idea that "making it possible for anyone to join us" implies between the time they have become competent to do so and until they lose competency through dementia etc. Writing an encylopaedia, or a wiktionary, or most perhaps all of our projects is an inherently geeky hobby. Yes we have roles for everyone regardless of ability, aside from giving money, there are things like categorising pictures - if I can do that the competency bar is a low one. But it would be good if our strategy reflected that geeky nature of our core community. We seek geeks everywhere regardless of gender, age, location, shape and background. WereSpielChequers (talk) 19:45, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

Nice Initiative [ edit ]

This is a nice step forward in order to reach every nook and corner of the world but i never understand the projects that are initiated by Wikipedia. Frankly speaking, i never saw any change happening but did see the strategy invites. The change that we are talking about is massive but there are many problems that we will be facing. Are we ready about them? are we aware about them? maybe not but we need to know them and understand them rather than just calling our half achievement a achievement later on. We need to realize that a big portion of globe still doesn't have access to either internet or Computer or awareness about Wikipedia. I hope that we succeed. Rest I am In for the movement.--Jeromeenriquez (talk) 16:25, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

Definitely a step in a more accurate direction. I do think the word "diversity" scares/off-puts some people. Though it shouldn't. I think Wikipedia should just simply strive for accuracy. And accuracy will allow for diversity of knowledge and perspective. A commitment to accuracy will naturally address human blindspots/biases, so long as those who edit those blindspots aren't attacked/dismissed for including accurate information. Right now, accurate information can be easily dismissed by editors for personal/political reasons. There's got to be a way to mitigate against this, and doing so will only strengthen the information on Wikipedia...as well as the value of the overall project. History books/encyclopedias have been rife with inaccuracies because they only reflect one perspective/worldview. So a lot gets left out, glossed over, or reimagined. If members of the community really value Wikipedia as a public resource for accurate knowledge...then we should welcome taking steps that guide the project in this direction. Justbean (talk) 22:17, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

Obsolete because of brackets [ edit ]

In German it is normal to seperate enumerations with letters. "has three components: creating a body" gets translated as "drei Komponenten: a) ein Gebilde von Wissen". However, when doing so, the translation will remain as marked in a different colo(u)r with a warning, because the number of brackets is uneven. How can I circumvent this? --Gereon Kalkuhl (WMF) (talk) 22:13, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

Solved by stjn with a). --Gereon Kalkuhl (WMF) (talk) 10:42, 26 August 2017 (UTC)

Please stop your association with Minassian Media, Inc. until you've cleaned up the cabals on en.wp [ edit ]

Most folks are unaware of the fact that the Clinton Foundation's Chief Communications Officer's side company (he works 50 hours a week for the Clinton Foundation according to recent CF 990 forms) has been doing contract work for the WMF for the past several years. Their Communications Audit was completed several months prior to the 2016 US General Election and was not published by the WMF until after the election. This timing may be the reason that nobody noted the conflict of interest inherent in allowing a close ally of a presidential candidate to be in charge of the WMF's public relations / communications strategy. Of course those who are familiar with the gatekeeping on articles like en:Clinton_Foundation, en:Share_Blue, en:Hillary_Clinton_presidential_campaign,_2016 will be less surprised with this close association. (There are many examples; these are just among the most obvious examples of gatekeeping associated with the Clinton Foundation / campaign while Minassian Media was being paid by the WMF (2014-present)).

There are many more details concerning the WMF's plan to continue using the Clinton Foundation CCO's company for its communications work on the talk page of the 2017-2018 annual plan (though this information is actually quite well hidden in the report). It should be noted that Craig Minassian is a regular donor to the WMF.

A very important goal for the Wikimedia Movement is breaking up the tolerance of the cabals on en.wp as these cabals have been draining the project of credibility. Another goal will be to undo the influence of the current Communications team which seeks to conflate legitimate criticism (of these cabals) with "harassment". Multiple documents on meta and on en.wp have language that repeats the word "harassment" obsessively in virtually every sentence and studiously avoids the word "criticism". (On en.wp an excellent example is en:WP:LINKLOVE, on meta an example is the grant proposal for an investigative toolbox described here with 78 occurrences of the root "harass" and only 3 uses of the root "critic"). SashiRolls (talk) 22:38, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Start with the Advisory Board [ edit ]

Several members of the Wikimedia Foundation Advisory Board are members of the Open Society Institute, a PR agency that works for multiple governments. The Open Society Institute's head George Soros is one of the leading financiers of the Democratic Party and is in business with the Muslim Brotherhood's Wadah Khanfar. Not coincidentally, the Open Society Institute has a project to reduce Western support for the War on Terror by suppressing information about the Muslim Brotherhood's ideology and operations and smearing the analysts who study them. Two PR operatives hired for this Soros/Khanfar project are Faiz Shakir and Wajahat Ali of the Center for American Progress, the Democratic Party's main think tank. Funds for this project also went to the Proteus Fund which hosts Anita Sarkeesian's Feminist Frequency.

Another member of the WMF Advisory Board has a business relationship with Purpose co-founder Jon Huggett. Purpose is also known as Avaaz, MoveOn.org, Res Publica, GetUp, 350.org, and several other corporations that share executive staff. It is an international PR agency that works for the Democratic Party and has also worked to promote military intervention on behalf of the Muslim Brotherhood in Libya and Syria.

Another member of the WMF Advisory Board has a business relationship with former CIA Clandestine Services director Michael Sulik and a relationship with Muna AbuSulayman of Saudi Kingdom Holdings whose director Alwaleed bin Talal has funded Muslim Brotherhood operations in the United States.

Several members of the WMF Advisory Board are part of the PR ring Data and Society Research Institute hosted by the MacArthur Foundation that is designed to insert disinformation into Wikipedia from faked news reports in participating media (The Guardian, Financial Times, New York Times, Washington Post, National Geographic, Gawker, Huffington Post, Vice, Buzzfeed, Wired, many more) and faked academic research produced by Columbia University's Institute for Women and Gender (which ran the mattress hoax), the USC Annenberg Center for Communications, the MIT Media Lab, the Berkman Center for Internet and Society which is staffed by former Clinton, Obama, Kerry, and Dean campaign operatives, and other university affiliates. This PR ring includes executive staff of the Democratic Party's campaign organizations Blue State Digital, Color of Change, and New Organizing Institute. The PR ring's financiers include a Chinese billionaire, the United Arab Emirates Enterprises Group / HSBC Middle East, the aforementioned Wadah Khanfar, and the United Nations projects UN Women and UN Alliance of Civilizations.

Why do we allow PR agencies to have this much influence on Wikipedia?107.209.19.163 16:20, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

Note, this comment seems informed by the mud machine operating against certain human rights organisations, like the Hungarian government against Soros. Cf. European Parliament resolution and European Commission view. It's a reminder of the hostile environment Wikimedia faces in certain countries and contexts which have (currently) little tolerance for our values. --Nemo 06:40, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

In principle, "our" values do not include propaganda and suppression of dissenting opinion; yet in fact this is what often happens on en.wp. If you listen to Wadah Khanfar speaking on Democracy Now! after the release of the Downing street memo (which suggested Bush wanted to blow up Al Jazeera), you'll see that the idea he espouses is giving voice to multiple perspectives, not in enforcing a house POV to the exclusion of all others. SashiRolls (talk) 00:53, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

Wikignomes [ edit ]

Wikignomes is a great term for an important group of contributors. Still, the term isn't used in many projects besides en:wp. In the draft the term can be found in the first section in an enumeration of different kinds of users. Since it is very en specific, it is hard to translate, especially for translators who are not familiar with the usage in en:wp. Maybe a more general term or just a different example would be better. Alice Wiegand (talk) 08:08, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Wikignomes should not be listed at the end of the list, almost as an afterthought. They are far, far more important to actual encyclopedia-building than community organizers and educators who are peripheral to content creation and management. Wbm1058 (talk) 16:09, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

"In January 2017, we, the constituents of the Wikimedia movement, started an ambitious discussion about our collective future. We decided to reflect on our past sixteen years together, and imagine the impact we could have in the world in the next decades. Our aim was to identify a common strategic direction that would unite and inspire people across our movement on our way to 2030, and help us make decisions.

"From on-wiki discussions, to large conferences, to small meetups, to expert interviews, to deep research, the process has been exhaustive, messy, and fascinating. It didn’t take long to confirm that the greatest strength of the Wikimedia movement is the talent, dedication, and integrity of its members. Any successful strategy must accommodate the diversity of the people in our communities, including our particular interests, motivations, and contributions. Some of us write encyclopedia articles. Some of us edit encyclopedia articles so that they conform to community policies and guidelines, and manage the infrastructure, such as disambiguation pages, that help readers find what they're looking for. Some of us manage workflow processes. Some of us regulate community behavior. Some of us develop software. Some of us donate money, time, or expertise. Some curate data, sources, or media. Some organize events, advocate for copyright reform, or remix artwork. Some are community organizers or educators. , or wikignomes. Some are just very curious people. Some of us do all of the above, and more."

Text size [ edit ]

I started reading this document attentively, with the intention to read it from beginning to end.

I immediately realized that it's very hard, even though its formatting is almost the same as that of a Wikipedia article. People sometimes say that I'm crazy and I'm ruining my eyesight, but I am usually comfortably with very small text size. But it was not actually comfortable for me here. And then I realized that I very rarely read a Wikipedia article attentively from beginning to end. I open Wikipedia articles very frequently —as an actual reader, not as an editor or a MediaWiki developer—, but usually it's just for finding a particular quick fact, and not for reading the whole thing from beginning to end.

To actually be able to read this important document completely and comfortably, I used Firefox's "Reading mode" feature. It's a little book icon in the address bar. It works on both desktop and mobile versions of Firefox. It removes formatting that is unnecessary for reading the main article content, and increases the text size. The page immediately became much more readable.

I'm writing all this not as a complaint about the page, but as a kind of a self-demonstrating proof that the visual formatting of Wikipedia needs big-time rethinking. I absolutely don't think that the format of a long prose article with lots of stories, facts, footnotes, quotations, images, tables, and all those other elements is outdated, as some people inf the strategy discussions claim. It is relevant and alive, and will remain relevant and alive for the foreseeable future. But its presentation's design must be updated ASAP. --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 16:45, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Define "community" [ edit ]

This document uses the word "community" many times.

For example, "As a movement, we will assemble through strong, sustainable communities that motivate us to contribute".

What does the word "community" mean?

Sorry for being very picky about words, but this document is important, and English is not the native language for myself and for a lot of other people who express their thoughts here, so let's make sure that we agree about the meaning of each word and sentence.

For example, about the sentence I quoted above: Aren't we already assembled in communities? Or are we assembled in communities that are not sustainable? Or is it something else that motivates, and we think that it is desirable that communities motivate us rather than something else? If the latter is correct, then why is it desirable? I, for one, am motivated by the idea expressed near the top of the document: the belief that free knowledge makes the world a better place. Not necessarily by any community. I am happy that there are people who share this belief and that we help each other, but it's not the same as motivation.

But I digress.

So what is "community"?

unified body of individuals? people with common interests? an interacting population of various kinds of individuals? a group of people with a common characteristic or interest? a group linked by a common policy a body of persons [...] having a common history? a body of persons of common and especially professional interests scattered through a larger society?

The above is an abridged list of definitions of "community" from Merriam-Webster.

Or is it a "community" in the American sense of community organizing? That would be a whole other thing altogether.

(I'll tell you what we really shouldn't be: "a body of persons having a common history". We definitely have a common history—a history of wiki syntax bugs, inside jokes, Wikimanias, etc. And it's OK to have this common history, but it must really not be the only thing we have.)

So, to sum up this long braindump—We keep using the word "community", and I don't think it means what we think it means. And if each of us understands it differently, then maybe we shouldn't use it at all. --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 17:49, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

In the context of this document, 'community' actually holds all these meanings. the fact everybody can take a different meaning from it, depending on their social affiliation or normal type of social interaction, is evidence that this is well written. Aguyintobooks (talk) 21:52, 17 August 2017 (UTC) If it indeed means all of these things, then it's not well-written. I suspect that it's closer to the truth that either: It means one thing, or a small set of things, to the people who wrote and who will interpret it, making decisions about budgets, products, etc. I'm just not sure which thing it is, and I'd love to see it made more focused.

It means a different thing for each of the persons who were involved in writing this, and yet something else to the people who will interpret it. This, sadly, is more likely. --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 13:29, 20 August 2017 (UTC) I don't think that defining "community" is necessarily a good thing. A strict definition would be a strong exercise of power, because it would necessarily let somebody out; and nobody has (or maybe should have) this power, except maybe by some ultra-large referendum among Wikimedia contributors won by some very high qualified majority. It's good to have imprecision in founding documents, because that gives a way for evolution. One can get some hints on the topic from w:Living Constitution (very USA-centric article; there are piles and piles of literature on the topic from German and other European scholars). I always recommend reading Hannah Arendt, she explains many things we see even in Wikimedia (for instance in The Origins of Totalitarianism). A short summary might be available in UNHCR's Nationality and Statelessness: A Handbook for Parliamentarians, which has a quotation «To be stripped of citizenship is to be stripped of worldliness; it is like returning to a wilderness as cavemen or savages... A man who is nothing but a man has lost the very qualities which make it possible for other people to treat him as a fellow man... they could live and die without leaving any trace, without having contributed anything to the common world.» --Nemo 07:15, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

Searching wikis is the main problem [ edit ]

In my opinion the main problem is searching WMF content. Users searching for some knowledge almost never come to wikimedia projects to find knowledge. They rely on external search engines that optimize their results based on their activity (in shops, in social networks etc.) and (...) based on prepaid ads. These engines provide them with specific results, not based on what reader "really" wants, but on what might want (or, sometimes, "should" want). This is a very bad way to find knowledge we struggle to collect here. Creating an open source search-wikimedia engine will be much much useful. --Xoristzatziki (talk) 05:38, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Independent scientists [ edit ]

Independent scientists that after their study start their career in industry or in a non-science related organization may encounter problems when they want to publish scientific documents. This also holds for retired scientists. Often these authors write unconventional and controversial papers. Such papers do not easily pass a peer review boundary. Open access publishing is free for readers but far from free for authors. Usually, a strict registration is required. A disadvantage of most publishing services is that they do not support a revision service. Arxiv and vixra are exceptions. For an independent researcher, the initiation and maintenance of a Wikiversity project is a very favorable way of free publication that enables open access to both readers and participants. Wikiversity projects are not ideally suited for discussion and debating, but very suitable alternatives exist, for example in the form of a ResearchGate project. I have initiated the https://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Hilbert_Book_Model_Project and the corresponding https://www.researchgate.net/project/The-Hilbert-Book-Model-Project. This combination represents a very powerful new way of science spreading via the internet.--HansVanLeunen (talk) 13:02, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

That's interesting HansVanLeunen: Psychoslave (talk) 20:05, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

@Psychslave, All of the recognized publishing media require support or endorsement of a recognized institution or person. In most cases, individual scientists lack such support because they do not have actual relations to such institutions or persons. Further, the peer reviewers are usually biased and they are certainly not omniscient. Therefore, the documents of the independent or retired authors do not pass the barriers that publishing media have constructed. In addition, the regular publishing media do not support the revision of published documents. From my own experience, I know that my insights regularly change (I hope they improve). That is why I prefer publication facilities that allow revision. Arxiv and Vixra provide and efficient revision service. Wikiversity also allows adaptation of published pages. Wikiversity does not require endorsement or support from a recognized institution. Instead, it allows the cooperation of a group of individual researchers on a scientific project in an openly accessible way. This opportunity is new and promising. It allows a group of individual researchers to jointly perform a research project. The Hilbert Book Model is an example. It dives deep into the unexplored lower levels of the structure of reality and invites everybody in joining and completing that exploration.--HansVanLeunen (talk) 08:56, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

Like you, HansVanLeunen: Psychoslave (talk) 12:23, 22 August 2017 (UTC) I'd be very sceptical about publishing scientific research in a wiki simply because it cannot be accepted in a peer reviewed journal. I think that poses a high risk of publishing fringe or pseudoscience. Any wiki-based science publication should adhere strictly to rigorous peer review (e.g. the WikiJournal of Medicine). There are reasons why a wiki might make a good publishing outlet (free, open access model and easy integration with Wikipedia) but using it to bypass traditional scientific publishing would be counterproductive. (I also posted this on the cycle 3 discussion, so apologies for the repetition). T.Shafee(Evo﹠Evo)talk 05:57, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

"We will carry on creating content as we have done in the past." [ edit ]

We will carry on creating content as we have done in the past. I was hoping for something better than this. Wbm1058 (talk) 16:45, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

We will continue our endeavor to create even better content than we already have.

We will work to improve content quality and breadth

We will work to improve editor behavior

Corporate language [ edit ]

It sounds like a distorted advertising leaflet. Communion, banal, pious wishes given in the propaganda sauce of success. However, it must be said that some passages are fun. "The strategic direction of the Wikimedia movement for 2030 is to become the roads, bridges, and villages that support the world's journey towards free knowledge." Ah, that direction, which becomes a road, a bridge and even a village! "In this way we become roads, bridges and villages that support the world's journey to free knowledge." - I see that someone really liked these roads and bridges. "People everywhere will feel as though they have a role to play in advancing free and open knowledge." - it sounds pretty sarcastic (implicitly "... while in reality they will have no role"). Well, in truth, I was expecting something like that. So much good that we dealt with some things, maybe something locally implemented. --Teukros (talk) 20:28, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Hi, Teukros. You may want to read the revised direction "Knowledge equity" saying: " The goal of the Wikimedia movement for 2030 is to make it possible for anyone in good faith to join us in our quest for free knowledge. " (Polish version "Sprawiedliwość wiedzy": Celem ruchu Wikimedia do 2030 r. jest umożliwienie każdemu w dobrej wierze przyłączenia się do nas w poszukiwaniu wolnej wiedzy. ) One of the WMF staff is still re-working the draft. --George Ho (talk) 20:35, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Distributed and diverse local communities [ edit ]

Continuing the topic I started above, at the section Define "community", I'd like to ask about this part:

We will recognize the strength of distributed and diverse local communities as powerful tools for adaptation and innovation

Mmm... how can communities be both local and distributed at once?

Does it mean that there will be a distributed Wikimedia meta-community, with many tighter local communities around the globe? Is it something that will be recognized? That's, more or less, is the case already, isn't it? Stronger communities in some places, weaker in others.

Or is each of the plural communities distributed?

Sorry if I'm 