Wikinews:Water cooler/miscellaneous/archives/2014/April


08:00, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

Memorial fund in Ashley-Nelson and Adrianne Wadewitz's honor?

Would it be possible as a community to see about setting up a paypal or similar account where we can gather donations for any women who participate on any language Wikinews to do original reporting about women in technology? It can be set up as a memorial fund in Cindy Ashley-Nelson and Adrianne Wadewitz's honor and administered by members of the Wikinews community or we can see if we can ask the WMF to administer any funds as a restricted donation. --LauraHale (talk) 14:32, 12 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • This is a great idea. Perhaps making it something offering grants for original reporting/research on any project? Wikiversity does OR as well, and it could apply to getting media for Commons too. Basically something for original content in their honour. BRS (Talk) (Contribs) 15:08, 12 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • I would be comfortable to making it only available to women doing original reporting on Wikinews because I would like this to come out of our project, be supported by our sister project and support getting more women involved in our project, ideally covering women. I am fine with making it more broard, and not just women in technology if it comes to that. (I think we could get a chapter to handle the gathering of funds on behalf of Wikinews.)--LauraHale (talk) 15:25, 12 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Having it at just technology is, I think, probably too narrow for the Wikinewses. Sadly. Extending could work, though; the possibilities if we add sport, politics, the arts.... Yes, that would work. BRS (Talk) (Contribs) 15:50, 12 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I would be fine with it being open to anyone doing original reporting on women (technology, sports, politics, health) or women doing original reporting on any topic. The question becomes who handles the money and how do we get it distributed. --LauraHale (talk) 15:55, 12 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Seeting up a memorial bank account for donations does not look like it would be that hard to do. I'd be happy to see about setting that up if people thought it was worth doing. --LauraHale (talk) 17:35, 12 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • As I understand, donations to any Wikimedia project go to the WMF. Additionally, WMF and individual chapters can distribute grants as they see fit. What I'm concerned about is whether such fund has been run by community before, in any project, any language.
How would the fund be used?
Additionally, such topic choice looks a bit narrow. Gryllida 22:40, 12 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Randomly, it was pointed out to me that we should contact the familes for permission before we do anything. This is just a random note for future thought. --LauraHale (talk) 23:44, 12 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I believe the WMF has been anguishing over the concept of having an endowment, which I suspect would be on a far-larger scale than this proposal. However, this might-well be a good opportunity to look at such things on a far smaller scale. --Brian McNeil / talk 07:14, 13 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

While we're making random notes: As a matter of prudence, we need to be clear on who controls the purse strings. Reportage financial support controlled by the foundation could create political pressure on the publication process, unhealthily for Wikinews independence and therefore neutrality. En.wn has a robust review process with which to resist political pressure; Wikinewses with less robust review would be less able to resist. And though we could resist, it's unwise to systemically invite confrontations. --Pi zero (talk) 11:28, 13 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

07:18, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

08:34, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

07:22, 28 April 2014 (UTC)