Hello from a hotel room in Naarm Melbourne. I have been in town this week working with Ana Tiquia and the SLV Lab team on the Speculative Policy Lab – a project exploring the policy context of AI for GLAMs (galleries, libraries, archives and museums). It’s part of a broader AI ethics and policy project the Library is doing to support ‘a radically thoughtful, research-driven approach to develop a framework of ethics and policy around responsible engagement with artificial intelligence (AI) technologies.’ Between that and giving a talk at SLV about the new orphan works scheme, it has been a busy week – so please forgive the shorter newsletter and the late arrival. Better late than never is something someone said once, and it is fitting here.
This week a job spill and redistribution of community-led technology requests in the Wikimedia Foundation has led to a potential stoush with the wiki contributing community. A petition and calls for an editing boycott foreshadow concerns of union busting and pulling away from the community by the Foundation. If it plays out, the situation could be more detrimental to the wiki platforms than Elon Musk, Donald Trump and AI.
Also, Australia is consulting on extending its right to repair legislation. Even so, many people don't know much about it or the role that VHS and Napster played in copyright law restricting the circumvention of digital content locks. Now's your chance to brush up.
And, the UK Parliament has called on the competition regulator to urgently investigate Live Nation and Ticketmaster and the ‘climate of fear’ they have created in the local live entertainment industry.
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Rapid-fire
A short list of other things:
- The Australian Government is consulting on expanding Australia’s right to repair legislation. Shoot through
- In a innovation move no one knew we needed, Coca-Cola have announced a reinvented soda dispenser that is modular, connected and ready to pour any new drinks trend. Shoot through
What’s been going on?
Here's WTF happened this week:
Staff layoffs and restructures pit the Wikimedia Foundation against the Wikimedia movement
Concern is rising over recent Wikimedia Foundation layoffs of the Community Tech team and restructuring of the Community Wishlist to a multi-team delivery model that has the community concerned of union busting, loss of knowledge and technical skills and signs the Foundation is pulling away from its community. A petition and proposed editorial strike is gaining momentum but a standoff between the Wikimedia movement and the Wikimedia Foundation could be highly damaging for the wiki projects.
This has not been reported in any news outlet ⟨ yet. Or not that I have seen at least… ⟩ but concern is mounting in the Wikimedia movement about recent layoffs of the Community Development Team that service community tech requests and a restructuring in the Wikimedia Foundation to disperse community requests across multiple teams. The community has responded in solidarity with staff and recent unionising efforts, concern that community requests have been deprioritised and a lack of confidence in the Foundation’s leadership and the organisation’s values.
