Movement Charter/Community Consultations/2022/DCW

Movement Charter

FAQ

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Community Consultation

Drafting Committee

This is the final and detailed feedback based on our learnings outlined on the DCW Movement Charter Discourses. We hope that our voice is heard and considered. On behalf of the DCW and Indic-Urdu Community. ─ The Aafī ^(talk) 04:22, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

General Information

• Feedback channels: Online and offline meetings.

• Number of participants: 15

Feedback

Preamble

• Hindustanilanguage notes:
  • "The Wikimedia movement is focused... availability of free knowledge."
  • It should be availability of free and fair use knowledge (e.g. referenced information and fair use images).
  • "The Wikimedia Movement Charter exists to define the Wikimedia movement, its core values and principles."
  • It should be "evolving" core values and principles - reflecting the dynamic and changing scenario.
• Another participant notes,
  • Consider replacing "specific matters or geographic regions" with "subjects" in the third para.
  • The 'infrastructure' is not explained simply enough for a newbie to understand. Consider including more concrete details on what it is and how it works.
• Preamble makes a mention of communities. What are these communities because the page on community itself is an "outdated essay" in our opinion. Can there be a consensus on what makes a community first? Is every local project a community or is every affiliate/chapter/thematic organization a community? This must have an explanation at the least in a footnote form.
• What is meant by technical spaces? This should have an explanation as well.
• Footnote in the following sentence should be moved to the end as it badly affects translation.The projects are largely self-governed, with respect to content creation and management,[1] as well as community conduct. The same was suggested earlier in this thread.
• It does not contain anything about "its violation". Preamble should have a sentence discussing its violation explicitly. What house of law is going to be considered if this is a legal document? The Charter's binding or non-binding nature should be addressed as well in the Preamble.

Values & Principles

• Hindustanilanguage notes:
  • "Equity" section should include steps to safeguard individual contributors in the movement, such as examining admin highhandedness, uncalled for blocks, disruptive / unproductive behavior, etc.
• Another participant opined, Maybe its my cynicism after having read a lot of corporate mission statements but this language kinda makes me roll my eyes. Resilience header can be changed to 'Perpetual Innovation'.
• The usage of "Resilience" was highly flagged by our community members.
• What is the relation of innovation and experimentation with resilience? Please, we are not caretakers of a corporate world, was comment made by a certain participant. It should be changed to either innovation or experimentation or to "Perpetual innovation".
• Privacy is one of the major things associated with our movement. It has been entirely missed.

Roles & Responsibilities

• Hindustanilanguage notes:
  • MCDC full form should be mentioned on the page, at least once.
• Another participant noted that, There isn't anything there but I look forward to the content.
• Our community was happy with the comments and recommendations of WMDE, but declined to comment subject to absence of the actual content. Several participants noted that, all in all the things done in a hurry are problematic. MCDC should take more time and give us more time to reflect.
• The idea of Hubs and Global Council looks helpful. As such can thematic user-groups like that of DCW be eligible to be regarded as "hubs"? We are looking forward to the definition and structure of hubs for more clarity.

Miscellaneous feedback

• Even if there is a consensus on using a certain specific word for anything, for example, "Hubs", the community suggested, it cannot work for us - if we speak for Urdu. Such words don't sound okay. We will incline to use relevant and more-accurate Urdu-language terms instead - for instance, markaz. Are we allowed to do that?
• The Charter should be as simplified as much it can be. If certain difficult words are used - those should be explained in simple footnotes.
• Sentences containing several breaks and commas should be rephrased/reworded and modified into more simpler sentences.
• The program although appreciated was criticized as well for the limitations of time. As mentioned here, "The Ambassador's Program was started all of a sudden and the process of feedback was made difficult. What is the value and status of a cursory opinion and comment? If the Movement Charter is such high-level and movement-wide most important document, a few days or weeks are very less to give a feedback on it." The community seeks more time.
• Would there be a room for those affiliates that do not wish to adopt the Movement Charter?
• Does the Charter have anything that solves the problems of fundings that arise due to regulatory concerns like FCRA since the draft does say, "Along with equity in the representation of knowledge, we enable equity of resources." How does this solve the puzzle?