My reply to Wikimedia Movement Strategic Plan

I had written a paper on this subject before but after handing them to other ppl, they told me it was too brutal, too offensive. I try to remain calm now and try to argue about the paper in a decent matter.

Sue Gardner and others want to increase the total number of people served to 1 billion. Why? And why do we have to increase the number of Wikipedia articles to 50 million? And why do we have to increase the number of female editors to 25 percent and the number of Global South editors to 37 percent?

Does wikimedia not consist of wikis? That is, a collection of pages to which anyone who is willing can contribute. So, people not willing to contribute will not do that.

The wikimedia pages are made by volunteers and supported by volunteers. So they are the ones that make wikimedia. They decide what is in it or not. Are there dissatified women? Great, let them complain.

There is one thing though that struck a chord in me and that was the number of active editors. I could relate to that.

Ever tried to upload a svg-file to wikimedia commons, for example? No? Then try it. It will give you headaches by trying to do so. There will be some difficulties that you will encounter. Not that no information is out there telling you how to make a proper svg suitable for wikimedia commons. It is just that the pages are all dispersed over wikimedia.

I have two suggestions in order to create more order in the chaos that editing now is:

1. What needs to be done is to create more pages like the welcome-template. In one single page there is information and, more important, links to other pages. So, there should be pages like welcome svg, welcome edit, welcome templates. There should be templates that point to important pages, so that in one view one has a complete view.
2. Create youtube-videos about editing wikipedia-pages.

Any sincere answer will be read and answered.

I believe that there are multiple works in progress to improve the welcome and training of new editors. You'll find one such project here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ocaasi/The_Wikipedia_Game. You'd be welcome join the conversation on the discussion page. Pine _(GreenPine) ^t 02:21, 4 June 2011 (UTC)