ComDev minutes 2025-02-24

Community Development Committee

Monday 24th February 10 am - 11:30 am (online)

Welcome and apologies

Present: Caroline Ball (CB), Kiran Sahota (KS), Lucy Moore (LM), Kelly Foster.

Staff attending: Sara Thomas, Lucy Crompton-Reid, Rupal Karia (RK) and Chuks Ogbonna (minuting).

Apologies: Daria Cybulska (DC), Sammy Fox, Monica Westin.

Declaration of interests

None

Approval of previous minutes

The Minutes were approved.

Update on Action Points:

ST gave the update; Training related to UCoC guidelines is not currently available, although we hope that it will become so.  However, various resources and pieces of guidance are available on more general Trust & Safety issues, which may be useful to us in the meantime.  

On Wikimedian of the Year, ST reported that RK, RN & ST had met to discuss the Awards. ST explained how the awards have changed over the years and shared some analysis that included a breakdown of the awards over the last 11 years. On the selection committee, she confirmed that ComDev would continue to be invited to the selection committee but should not feel compelled to do so, and that COI guidelines would be made more clear in advance of the 2025 Awards.  She also confirmed that following discussions had with RK & RN, that honorary memberships would / could be announced at the same time as the WoTY awards to give more prominence to one element of long-standing supporter recognition.  There has been some consistency in the number of awards and an increase in entries for selection.

• LCR clarifies that the honorary membership awards are based on contributions to Wikimedia UK and not necessarily to Wikimedia projects.
• KF talked about the nominations, and KF and LM suggested that perhaps the results of the analysis could be shared, or if more prominence could be given to the winners over the years in a blog post or similar, ST will action.

Matters arising (CB)

CB thanked everyone for attending.

Standing Item - any Wiki issues of which we should be aware (remit item 3) (all)

CB asked for members to bring up any on-Wiki issues they may be aware of

• KF raised the conversations about AI, saying she thinks we should be talking about how to support the Foundation. LCR said there will be a conversation by the Foundation about it scheduled for the summer (during June time), and she will share it with us when that happens. CB stressed that there’s a place for using AI for administrative purposes but that it cannot be used for articles and research.
• LM mentioned that there are instances of young people  who use ChatGPT but have no knowledge of Wikipedia
• ST mentioned that we have not had a lot of queries from editathon participants regarding this subject as yet.
• LCR also added that WMUK will have training on AI in the coming weeks that will hopefully help us develop our AI strategy going forward.
• CB added also that we are not really bothered about using AI for our everyday activities to help us sound more formal or otherwise, but the bother with it is the practice of using it to concoct events or articles that are not true.

Standing Item - Update on volunteer grants (remit item 1) (ST)

Since the committee met last, there has been one application for a project grant. Overall, in the 2024/5 period there has been a significant increase in application numbers on previous years.  Staff have continued to publicise the availability of these grants to the community, and will continue to do so.

Editor Safety, in the context of the Heritage Foundation and possible doxxing (LCR)

LCR updated the Committee on current issues regarding editor doxxing and a discussion followed, where the following points were made:

• KF came across a comment about what is happening in France and the fear that this kind of intimidation of editors could happen in more places.
• LM mentioned the increasing risk to personal safety of editors.
• KF - it is always good to be careful and think, considering that the main reason people edit is that they find that something they are interested in isn’t on Wikipedia. She asked ‘How do we create an opportunity to be critical of Wikipedia’?
• CB - there should be a balance and we should be careful to not put people in danger.
• LCR agreed with this, and wouldn’t want to expose anyone to harm; but also felt that it would be a shame to discourage minoritised people to contribute.
• ST confirmed that work on safeguarding editors can be distilled down for addition to standard slides, and that this work can be integrated into training.

Update on planned volunteer engagement activities for 2025 (remit item 4) (ST) [see papers]

Following feedback from the community, there appears to be an appetite (particularly from trainers) to do something that is not running an editathon, and from this we are looking at piloting a Volunteer Led Events programme for peer learning & sharing, drawing on some of our own learning from participation and co-lead of the Volunteer Supporters’ Network.

Another training focus is around editing in difficult spaces.

Also in development is the Volunteer supporters Network hub pilot, which is aimed at those in the movement who support volunteers. Details can be found in the papers.

Mini-Wiki launch (RK) (remit item 4) [see papers]

RK said we had a lot of feedback from the Community Leaders Survey last year. Mini-Wiki was launched in February to encourage those volunteers who are short on time but who still want to contribute to make small edits and a number of tasks were promoted.  So far, we have had 50 edits, and every month, we are going to be showcasing tools and suggesting options for small edits. RK asked for ideas on little tasks that volunteers can get on with, You can get to her through her email (rupal.karia@wikimedia. org.uk).

• CB asked about the crossover, and RK replied that yes, there is quite a lot of crossover among different programmes
• KF thanked RK for her presentation and suggested that she could remind volunteers that edits can be made from any device and at any time.

AOB

Nil

The meeting ended at 11:16 am