Communications committee

The Communications committee (ComCom) is one of several committees within the Wikimedia Foundation. It was authorized by a resolution of the Wikimedia Board of Trustees in January 2006, and its initial members were confirmed in February of that year.

[edit] Statement of scope

The statement of scope and areas of responsibility below has been approved by the Board of Trustees. [resolution]

• Coordinating communications with the press, including press releases, interviews, and inquiries.
• Supporting communication between the Wikimedia Foundation and project communities.
• Organizing and coordinating publicity and outreach.
• Supporting and overseeing communication with the general public.
• Maintaining a Wikimedia style guide.
• Reporting on core Wikimedia statistics.

[edit] Function

The aim of the Communications committee is to facilitate communication between the Wikimedia Foundation and the public. This includes the general public, the media, and the "internal" public comprising the communities of the various Wikimedia projects.

[edit] Current responsibilities

• Interacting with the OTRS team.
• Coordinating the work of local press teams and production of press releases on Wikimedia projects as well as helping draft and distribute Wikimedia Foundation press releases.
• Maintaining a list of people willing to be contacted by the media for interviews.
• Contacting editors and publishers of Wikipedia press coverage to request that corrections be published as needed.

[edit] Contacting the committee

The committee can be reached by sending email to its mailing list: wmfcc-lmail.wikimedia.org (note that to deal with spam, posts by non-members to the list are moderated). Messages may also be left for the committee on the "Notifications" subpage.

[edit] Subcommittees

To best focus on specific elements of Communications for the Wikimedia Foundation, Communications subcommittees are formed around tasks and needs. The individual subcommittee workspaces may be found there.

[edit] Membership

The committee is designated as a staff committee working with the Head of Communications for the Wikimedia Foundation, Jay Walsh. Participants in chapters who act as press contacts or spokespersons should be part of the committee. Additional members may be added as it seems helpful.

Other committee members include: Michael Snow, Angela Beesley, Nicholas Moreau, David Gerard, Kat Walsh, Walter Vermeir, Mathias Schindler, Mark Pellegrini, Sabine Cretella, Elian, Akl, AlisonW, Zuirdj, Chb, Avatar, Sean Whitton, Swatjester, Htchien, Itzik Edri, Brianmc, Shizhao, Cbrown1023, and Yuyu.

Previously various communications subcommittees were also created to work on specific areas of emphasis. If you are interested in joining the committee or helping with one of these areas, please contact Jay or Wikimedia's Volunteer Coordinator, Cary Bass.

[edit] Working tools

The committee has a private mailing list where media coverage and responses are discussed. Other tools used by the committee include:

• The press & translation queues in otrs
• The press release distribution and archive software on wikimedia.de

In the past, IRC meetings were held, but with the number of people to coordinate, this has largely lapsed. Agendas from previous meetings can be found in the archives.

[edit] See also

• Wikimedia:Press room
• People working with ComCom: OTRS, Communication Projects Group