Wikimedia Foundation elections/Board elections/2005/Candidates

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This page contained the candidate statements for the 2005 elections for the Board of Trustees (see other board elections or candidates by year). For more information, see Board elections/2005.
2005 board elections
Organization


Quick view of candidates[edit]

Candidate acceptance ended. Please list the languages you have made translations into. Thank you.

Candidates' presentations[edit]

Angela Beesley[edit]

Confirmed
Angela at the first UK meetup, 2004

User name: Angela
Real name: Angela Beesley
Location: Berlin, Germany / Colchester, England

User page(s): Meta, English Wikipedia, German Wikipedia, Foundation wiki, Commons, Wikisource, Wikibooks ... etc
Wikimedia participant since: February 2003. Board member since June 2004 (see en:User:Angela/Election for details on my previous election statement).
Projects in which I participate: Mostly English, Meta, Foundation wiki, Wikimania wiki, and Grants wiki. A large part of what I've done over the past year involves communication, within the Board, within the projects, and externally, rather than edits to the wikis. I intend to continue doing this, by detailing all board meetings[1], presenting Wikimedia projects at conferences[2], communicating with the community [3] in order to make decisions which reflect community opinion, responding to the hundreds of queries the board receives in OTRS[4], and making external contacts[5].
Languages in which I participate: I've made over 50,000 edits across 270 Wikimedia projects. Around 80% of those were to the English Wikipedia.
Link to user contribution pages: User:Angela/Timeline shows my non-editing contributions (including attendance at meetings and conferences). Wikipedia contributions: English, Simple English, German, French, Spanish. Meta, Foundation wiki, Wiktionary, Wikisource, Commons, Memorial, Wikibooks, Wikinews ...etc

Candidate statement:

I aim to

  • maintain Wikimedia's charitable aims,
  • secure a stable financial and legal future for the project,
  • respect and maintain our core principles of neutrality, civility, freedom and openness,
  • encourage participation in the Foundation through committees and local chapters,
  • develop new fundraising ideas and avoid dependence on any one source of income,
  • seek sponsorship and external collaboration without losing our independence,
  • maintain focus, not launch projects too early, and consider software changes prior to launching them,
  • expand and encourage peer review and distribution of all content, especially distribution in less developed countries.

The future of the projects lies with the communities involved, and I hope to enable and guide those communities towards growing the smaller projects, content validation, distribution and publication, promotion, improving external contacts, better integration of the sister projects with each other, licensing issues, improvements to the GFDL, moving Wikinews out of beta, expansion into audio formats, and ensuring the projects are easily and globally reusable and that all their software needs are met.

For questions, please post here: User:Angela/Election questions 2005 or en:User:Angela/Election questions 2005

User:Anthere[edit]

Confirmed

User name: Anthere

Real name: Florence Nibart-Devouard
Location: Clermont-Ferrand, France
User page(s): main ones are fr:Anthere, en:Anthere, Commons:Anthere and meta:Anthere
Wikimedia participant since: February 2002. Admin on frwiki (summer 2002), on meta (january 2003), on enwiki (may 2003), on commons (fall 2004), steward (april 2004), member of the mediation committee (january 2004). I was elected board member in june 2004 and am currently vice-chair of the Wikimedia Foundation.

Projects in which I participate: I mostly participated to the French and English wikipedia for more than 2 years. I am also a participant on meta. In the past year, I gave most of my energy to the Foundation (most of the work is done by email, on meta, on WikimediaFoundationWiki, or GrantWiki).
Languages in which I participate: French, English and Google translation machine when required.
Link to user contribution page(s): on en, on meta, on fr ....
In short... :

During this year on the board, I highly appreciated working with all those helping with board related issues. I wish to continue doing so, as a year is very short for sustainable impact.
My values have not changed much and most of what I wrote last year is still valid. I favor a slow but steady development of the organisation, with a board ensuring stability and neutrality while many editors are empowered to participate and promote its expansion.

Concerns I intend to address:

  • relay the community's concerns to the board
  • inform the community, e.g., by way of Quarto
  • manage the Foundation democratically and with delegation of authority (officers, working teams, Wikicouncil)
  • favor the establishment of local chapters,
  • increase the visibility of the Foundation and its projects (WMF website, presentations, interviews)
  • raise funds, in particular from charitable associations, focusing on Africa and children/women education
  • Further develop the legal framework (juriwiki-l, legal team, privacy, logos uses)
  • Establish parterships according to our goal (no political advocacy). Preserve the independence of the project (multiple partners)
  • preserve the principles of freedom, free of charge, free of ads, openness, civility and collaboration

For questions, please post here:
user:Anthere/WMF2005

Arno Lagrange[edit]

Confirmed
Arno with Jimbo

User : ArnoLagrange
Real name : Arno Lagrange
Location : Bellegarde-du-Razès, Aude, France
User pages : eo:Vikipediisto:ArnoLagrange, fr:Utilisateur:ArnoLagrange, Home page (eo fr)
Wikimedia participant since : december the 19th 2002
Projects in which I participate : eo:Vikipedio, fr:Wikipédia, meta, Vikifontoj (eo Wikisource), fr:Wiktionary, Vikivortaro (eo:Wiktionary), en:Wiktionary
Languages in which I participate: eo, fr, en, de
af | bg | ca | cs | da | de | el | en | es | et | eu | fi | fr | ga | hi | hr | hu | io | is | it | ja | ko | la | lt | nl | no | oc | pl | pt | ro | ru | sk | sl | sq | sr | sv | sw | tr | uk | vo | wa | zh Link to user contribution pages: eo, fr, en, de, meta, wikisource, eo:Wiktionary
Your candidate statement: I am candidate to defend in the board of trustees language equal rights. One must try find the way anybody from any project in any language can participate in discussions and decisions whatever he/she's not a good american-english speaker. See also past year candidature
For questions, please post here:  : Kandidatiĝo ĉe Wikimedia

Jussi-Ville Heiskanen[edit]

Confirmed

User name: Cimon avaro, (someplaces Cimon Avaro)
Real name: Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
Location: Helsinki, Finland
User page(s): en:user:Cimon avaro; fi:user:Cimon Avaro
Wikimedia participant since: April 13, 2003
Projects in which I participate: English Wikipedia, Finnish Wikipedia, (have also edited a bit in Wikiquote and Simple, and made some interlinking in several language projects -- oh, and Meta; of course)
Languages in which I participate: Only Finnish and English, I am afraid.
Link to user contribution page(s): English Wikipedia; Finnish Wikipedia; Meta
Your candidate statement:

My previous candidate statement from 2004 is largely still actual.

  • Now the board needs to evolve more into a body that actively asks for community input.
  • Since the board is now on firm ground, its transparency should increase - where not prevented by legal matters or other things whose premature disclosure would be directly harmful.
  • The wikimedia foundation should concentrate its focus on its core project the wikipedia encyclopaedia, that is our unique project and its continued success will help the other projects too. If the wikipedia projects have problems (with growth for example), the other projects doing well will not help much.
  • The formal institutions of wikipedia (chapters, councils, official positions) must never overwhelm the work done to produce our real work.
  • Slow and natural developement is the best way to avoid overextension, creating institutions only after they are totally necessary, and will envigorate productivity rather than distracting from it.

For questions, please post here: en:user talk:Cimon avaro

Francis Schonken[edit]

Confirmed

User name: Francis Schonken (except on Latin Wiktionary, where it is Gradus 1883)
Real name: Francis Schonken (see e.g. this link)
Location: Ghent, Belgium
User page(s): (Main:) English Wikipedia; (other:) Dutch Wikipedia; French Wikipedia; Meta; Wikisource; Commons; Wikiquote; English Wiktionary; Latin wiktionary
Wikimedia participant since: July 2004
Projects in which I participate: (>400 edits:) English Wikipedia; Dutch Wikipedia
Languages in which I participate: English, Dutch, French, (and a little bit German, Latin)
Link to user contribution page(s): English Wikipedia - Dutch Wikipedia - French Wikipedia - Meta - wikisource - Commons - Wikiquote - English Wiktionary - Latin Wiktionary
Your candidate statement: I like Wikipedia (& all other Wikimedia projects). To other wikimedians, I promote the coherence between WikiMedia projects. To the outer world I promote Wikipedia & all other WikiMedia realisations. This ranges from abstract & practical concepts like NPOV and consensus to the promotion of the MediaWiki software, which I run on my own website (See my user page on that website)
For questions, please post here: en:user talk:Francis Schonken

User:Sj[edit]

Confirmed

User name: Sj
Real name: Samuel Klein
Location: Boston, Massachusetts, USA
User page(s): (Main:) English Wikipedia and Meta-Wikimedia.
Wikimedia participant since: January 2004
Projects in which I participate: English Wikipedia and Meta || Wikimania wiki, Grants wiki, and Foundation wiki || Wikinews, Wikibooks, Wikisource, and Commons || Nahuatl Wikipedia and Swahili Wikipedia
Languages in which I participate: I have contributed to 50 different Wikimedia projects. I am fluent in English, and know some German, French, and Spanish. I keep an eye on Wikipedia in Swahili and Nahuatl.
Link to user contribution page(s): on en, on meta, on Wikinews; on Wikibooks; Wikisource; on Commons....
Candidate statement:

The Board is lucky to have two active User Representatives, who encouraged transparency and consideration of community views, even as the Foundation's development accelerated. Please vote for Angela and Anthere, whether or not you vote for me.

I am running for one reason : to empower editors and readers to improve their projects1 in every way2. This means clearly inviting readers to make changes, and not just to article text3. Wikimedia is currently growing faster than its community structures4. Many community members feel powerless to begin new initiatives 5; there is little effort to retain contributors; and millions6 of talented readers, who would gladly help, do not know how7.

Wikimedia has grown out of an environment where all were encouraged to work on new ideas9 — even grandiose ones — without a special title10. It should not lose that strength. Hundreds of key projects need attention (a few examples); each one suited to the talents and interests of some current Wikipedia fans11.

Let us identify our community of supporters and their skills12, and teach them to help guide the projects13, before the projects are defeated by their own success.

For questions, please post here: User talk:Sj

Vote[edit]

If you are eligible to vote from meta, you can vote from here. If not, please vote from the project you are active, including en:Special:Boardvote/vote. You could possibly be back to your project using browser "Back" botton.

Rules for candidates[edit]

English text below is the official one on which all four organizers agreed. If any translated text differs from the English original, the latter will be applied.


In this space, candidates for election to the Wikimedia Board of Trustees can present themselves. Two trustees are to be elected for an appointment of two-years duration.

If you wish to be a candidate, you must have more than 400 edits on one of the Wikimedia projects, the first of which must have been more than 90 days prior to 00:00, 30 May 2005 (UTC).

Also note that it is not possible to hold a Board position anonymously, so please stand only if you are willing to make your real identity known. Candidates will also be required to identify themselves fully to either User:Danny, User:Aphaia, User:BjarteSorensen or User:Datrio, unless this has been done in the previous Board election. We will contact you with further details. Those candidates whose identity has been confirmed by one of the Election Officials will have the word confirmed next to their name.

Please copy the template and fill in the following information. So as not to favor one candidate over another, please list your nomination alphabetically by username, according to the Unicode Collation Algorithm.

You can submit your statement in any language(s), however we recommend that you include one in English. Your statement should not exceed 1,000 characters in length in any language. Volunteer Wikimedia translators will translate your statement to other languages and we will do our best to ensure that all statements are available in as many languages as possible.

And finally if you are so nice as to list your name and all the language(s) of your submitting presentation on #Quick view of candidates section of English page, it will be kind of you for both organizers and voters.

Example[edit]

Please post your candidate information under the "Candidates" section based on the following example:

=== [[User:User name]] ===

'''User name:''' ~~~
'''Real name:''' xxxxx xxxxx
'''Location:''' City, Country
'''User page(s):''' xxxxx
'''Wikimedia participant since:''' xxxx
'''Projects in which I participate:''' xxxxx, xxxxx, xxxxx
'''Languages in which I participate:''' xxxxx, xxxxx, xxxxx
'''Link to user contribution page(s):''' xxxxx, xxxxx, xxxxx
'''Your candidate statement:''' (no more than 1,000 characters please)
'''For questions, please post here:''' xxxxxx