Minutes 2010-11-02
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Minutes of the meeting of the Wikimedia UK Board on Skype 19:30 on 2 November 2010.
Present on Skype: Board trustees Andrew Turvey (AT), Mike Peel (MP), Tom Dalton (TD) connected by phone, Steve Virgin (SV), Joseph Seddon (JS) from 20:40; with Charles Matthews (CM) taking notes.
A: Minutes and Reports
A1: Apologies. N/a
A2: Approval of minutes
Two sets of minutes, from 5 October and 22 October (in camera), were considered.
- Minutes of 5 October. TD abstained (not present then). SV noted that the status of Jimmy Wales’s visit to Bristol had changed since that meeting, and was now (for 13 January) an ongoing plan (A44). Minutes were approved after a clarification to this point.
- Minutes of 22 October. SV wished to abstain (not able to read those), and the decision was deferred to Board email.
CM will circulate the minutes to the Office list in future.
A3: Decisions taken by email
Nothing was brought up to ratify.
A4: Reports
A41: Report from AT (includes Office Manager)
Officer Manager's tasks: AT reported on CM's substantive tasks: WMUK member renewal reminders had been brought up to date; newsletter drafts had been circulated; a draft fundraiser press release had been circulated (see B23); work was proceeding on follow-up mails to donors; a draft Request for Proposal for legal services had been written. On the matter of the donor mails and spam, raised by JS and sent round the Board, there might be a mismatch of what CM had researched on data retention and what JS had asked.
AT had contacted the solicitors on the WMF grant matter (2009 fundraiser) – see B111. The other outstanding legal matters were the 2010 fundraiser agreement (B21) and the Charity Commission application. AT is scheduled to meet this week on the fundraiser matters, next week on the charity application; MP asked to be included in the latter meeting and related email correspondence.
Delegation mechanism was discussed. CM was actioned to put his Office wiki userspace To-do list in reverse chronological order. That done, it was agreed:
- Board members can add items to the top of http://office.wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/User:Charles_Matthews/To-do_list
- These will be treated as unprioritised until handled by AT;
- CM to prompt AT on new items;
- CM to continue to work on assigned tasks in priority order per AT.
CM was also actioned to add weekly totals to his daily timesheets.
Britain Loves Wikipedia: AT wished to discuss offline MP's contact with Samuel Klein.
Actions: Solicitors (AT, MP), Samuel Klein (AT, MP), admin (CM)
A42 Report from MP
GLAM-WIKI confererence 26-27 November. Substantive decisions were taken on two matters.
(1) Registration stood at 38. No step will be taken on the registration fee for another week, pending developments. Liam Wyatt has now placed an item in the Culture24 newsletter. ACTION: SV will bring in his pro bono PR contact Julio Romo as soon as possible. With MP, SV will work with the contact on a community and marketing plan, in particular posters. AT expressed a view that the pull-up posters, not being from WMUK stock, were part of Liam's remit.
(2) MP and JS had drafted a grant application to the WMF on two matters, but problems that were procedural and legal were found with the approach. After a discussion of options, it was agreed to proceed on parallel independent tracks. ACTION: MP/JS to apply immediately for £4250 for catering as WMF grant. ACTION: TD to pick up on a 24 August mail from Barry Newstead of the WMF, and pursue the question of whether Liam Wyatt could be employed by them in some fashion as onsite organizer for the conference. It was not clear that Liam Wyatt would be able to act as organizer given the visa issue. A fallback position was required. SV to include an alert and availability check for his PR contact under (1). AT and MP will attend the conference, and CM could be brought in. There had been other applicants for the organizer post, but no decision was taken to go back to them.
(3) It was agreed that a sum could be given as expenses under budget money already allocated for speakers, for a Creative Commons person from the North of England. £150 to be offered.
National Film and Television School interview on November 16: the first arrangement had foundered when they withdrew promised transport. ACTION: CM to contact Aniello De Santi to try to set up on a new basis, callout of CM for one day’s work (overtime for WMUK @ 8 hours standard rate), NFTS to donate to WMUK rather than offer personal fee.
Simple English Wikipedia research proposal: the request for endorsement was not carried at the meeting. MP to correspond further.
An invitation for an event on 18 November ("Is the Big Society Working") will be sent on to the WMUK general email list.
Actions: Grant application to WMF (MP and JS), correspondence with WMF (TD), PR contact (SV), CC person (MP), Simple English (MP), invite (MP), NFTS (CM)
A43 Report from TD
TD had researched SMS donations, the idea being for the fundraiser to include direct appeals to send £5. The overhead was high (40%, due to tax on commercial transactions) particularly in comparison with the WMF limit of 10% costs when averaged out; the breakeven point for the fixed monthly fees came out as 70 donations. JS expressed a concern about cannibalization of donations that might have come in by the online page; perhaps the target audiences are different, though. On the basis that SV will first look further into providers of such services, the meeting supported a trial of this mechanism for a period of three months.
Actions: Further research (SV), implementation (TD)
A44 Report from SV
Campus Ambassadors: An approach having been received from Alex Stinson, involved in the CA scheme in the USA, SV had made contact with administration of the two universities in Bristol.
Electoral Commission: SV has approached concerning their interest in an editing party.
Festival of Idea, Victoria Rooms, University of Bristol: midday January 13. Jimmy Wales has says he will attend, subject though to confirmation of his schedule. A sum of £200 to be granted to the organizers was agreed, subject to JW’s visit going ahead. SV is in contact with BBC Bristol on coverage, and will meet the Bristol Evening Post on 9 November to look at a collaboration. ACTION: subject to JW’s movements, SV may need 150 words for the media, and if so, he is actioned to produce those with MP and CM.
Surveys: SV interested in tying announcement of survey results to the 10th Anniversary date (i.e. 15 January) and so to the previous item. He has five quotes from survey companies for sums of around £5000. See C2 for handling.
Fundraiser press release: MP will work to merge SV’s and CM’s ideas, SV having put his on the report’s talk page.
Actions: Press release, also other media text if needed (SV, CM, MP)
A45 Report from JS
JS's report was passed by the meeting without discussion.
A break was then taken from 21:17 to 21:32.
B: Decisions needed
B1: Budget
Items were taken out of order.
B11: Settlement with WMF for 2009 Fundraiser
Discussion of the figure to grant to the WMF produced a number just over £38,000, derived from the accounting of Tom Holden. The agreed approach was:
- To take this figure, or rather some slight underestimate of it, as the way for AT to respond to the email on the settlement from Barry Newstead of the WMF;
- AT is actioned to go ahead on that basis subject to the legal advice he will have from solicitors;
- AT will handle the dealings with the WMF in the form of a letter from WMUK, and will draft such a letter;
- AT will obtain the legal advice in written form and circulate, in particular to TD;
- The grant to the WMF will be for “general operating costs” and the point of the legal consultation includes a check on the consistency of doing it this way with the purposes of WMUK;
- AT will further draft a form of the agreement with the WMF that can be made public.
ACTION: (this was discussed under B23 during the meeting) The real number to replace the notional £38K+ will depend on the legal fee for the advice being taken. AT and TD to sort out these details.
Actions: Legal situation and drafts (AT), numbers (AT, TD)
B12: Target
After discussion it was agreed that there will be no publicized target for the upcoming fundraiser. WMUK can track the WMF thermometer. On the other hand for internal purposes some idea is needed and a working figure of £200K gross seems reasonable. The requirement for a public figure is tied to the fiscal year rather than the fundraiser period (AT to query of MP).
B13: Expenditure
On the working estimate the outline budget accounts for 80% of projected income, in round terms (TD). Projections of future spending raise issues on reserves and contracts as well as expansion.
B2: Fundraiser
Items were taken out of order.
B21 Fundraiser agreement for 2010-11
AT on behalf of WMUK had raised points on wording and formalities with the WMF.
- End date of fundraiser. This is imposed by the WMF as June 30, uniformly across chapters. It is largely formal in that the fundraiser is set to end February 28. There are, however, some implication on the normal “donate” link.
- Definition of “landing page”. Formally (for us) this is any page managed or hosted by WMUK to solicit donations. No apparently serious implications.
Language on “release of accounts” is still to clarify, as is that on “online funding activities”. The discussion on the percentage grant from WMUK to WMF for this fundraiser, which seems to be agreed in principle, will be taken on further to a conclusion by Board email.
B22 Authority to sign
ACTION: AT and TD to sign the fundraiser agreement for WMUK once Board discussion under B21 is complete.
B23 Fundraiser final arrangements
ACTION: TD and MP to come to a decision on the website this coming weekend, settling on whether it will be an upgrade from 2009 or a text edit of the old site. ACTION: TD to mail CM about banner text for which there is imminent need.
Donor privacy policy: There is a localized WMUK version of the WMF policy, but there needs to be a discussion on its formal adoption. This was referred to Board email for a decision.
Actions: Website (TD and MP), banners (TD, CM)
B3: GLAM-WIKI
The major points had been handled under A42.
B4: Newsletter
Board discussion to take place by email.
C: Any Other Business
C1: Invoices
SV's Bristol invoices for the AGM should go to TD. MP raised also the invoices for the in-person board meeting and Liam Wyatt’s contract (first part), and AT the GLAM-WIKI catering invoice, not yet due to pay.
Actions: Invoices (SV, MP, TD)
C2: Surveys
ACTION: AT to go over the five survey quotes obtained by SV (A44).
Meeting closed 22:30.