Hi all,

It's been an extraordinary day here at Wikimania in several senses of the term. I know there has been some discussion about the perceived directions and timing of communications on the list.

At this point the WMF and our latest funding partner, the Omidyar Network, have both released the great news about this $2mm, 2 year grant. At the same time I have also released a press release with details about the new Board appointments.

The Board Announcement can be found here: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Board_Announcements_Augus...

The Omidyar Network press release can be found here: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Omidyar_Network_Grant_Aug...

And a related Q&A can be found here: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Omidyar_Network_Grant_Aug...

I can absolutely assure you that our intention from the beginning has been to share this great news with the Foundation list before sending out publicly - notably in the form of a communication from the Board, in this case Michael Snow. The timing and fairly significant circumstances this year (most notably some internet connectivity and cellular problems in Buenos Aires) meant that the planned timing of our announcement with the Omidyar Network didn't play out as I would have hoped. I've just now been able to get the news out and also start taking media calls on both of these announcements.

This was also somewhat compounded by the considerable media interest in coverage of some flagged revisions stories (it's important to respond to every request we get - we want to get the story right). We were also strongly focussed on the logistics and planning of this year's press conference leading up to the beginning of tomorrow's events. And we're a small group of responders here on the ground at Wikimania :)

I apologize for any confusion or if the impression was created that we were not intending to share this information with the community in our normal practice. It was not so great timing and mostly technology hiccups.

The good news is that we're seeing some positive coverage of this wonderful and generous grant in the press already - especially as it follows the news of last week's Hewlett Foundation grant. I'm now starting to also see coverage of the new Board appointments, which is also very exciting news here at Wikimania.

And let's not forget, there is a fairly important event taking place in our midst! We had a wonderful turn-out of press from Argentina and from abroad. There are some amazing sessions planned and I'm confident we'll see even more coverage for the good work of Wikimedia in the next few days. I think this is the biggest kind of news week we could hope for - and I'm glad we have lots of positive developments to share.

Thanks,

Jay

Head of Communications WikimediaFoundation.org blog.wikimedia.org +1 (415) 839 6885 x 609, @jansonw