QUOTE(Somey @ Sun 16th January 2011, 12:38am)
Of course, that's just my opinion and I could always be wrong... but since the WMF doesn't seem to even have a plan for determining what it is that keeps women from participating, much less actually change the internal culture accordingly, I honestly just don't see it.
Okay, let's start at the beginning. This is how little self awareness Sue Gardner has. Prepare for:
Fact: Sue Gardner has a degree in journalism. According to her BLP she "worked for more than a decade as a producer, reporter and documentary-maker." She was traired as a writer and can write. She has written numerous newspaper articles, and has a personal blog.
Fact: She registered as editer
Sue GardnerÂ
(T-C-L-K-R-D)
in August 2006. Yes, 4 and a half years ago, and more than a year before becoming WMF executive director in Nov., 2007.
Fact: In that time, this is how many edits Gardner has on WP: a total of 154,000.
Wups, no that's wrong. I mean 154.
In more than 4 years as an editor and more than 3 years as WMF's CEO. On an active day when she edits, she averages 2 edits a day.
Most days, obviously she does not edit at all.
Fact: The only article Sue has edited more than her own userpage is the BLP of
Pat Barker, a contemporary English novelist. On which she is the second-ranked editor. That BLP has a monthly view rate of about 3,000.
http://stats.grok.se/en/201010/Pat%20Barker. Compare with an article like
California, a standard encyclopedia type article which is viewed 500,000 times a month, or the article on Jupiter (250,000/month). Several hundred thousand page-views a month is typical for encyclopedia subjects typically tackled by "white male nerds" of the type that Ms. Gardner says she can spot 100 feet away. Even the article on feminism (supposedly a subject of interest to Gardner) gets 150,000 page views a month. Just for reference.
So, Sue Gardner doesn't edit much, despite that fact she she is ABLE to edit, she
has edited, and the encyclopedia contains plenty of subjects of interest to her (so she says).
Now, Sue claims to be interested in the subject of why more women don't edit WP and why the women who do, don't edit more.
It seems to me that any person with an iota of genuine curiosity about this, were they female, might start out with the following bit of introspection:
"Hey, I MYSELF am a woman!! So, perhaps I could examine why *I* don't edit, and that would tell me more about why OTHER women don't edit!
Sue has not done this. Apparently the reason is NOT that she cannot get time away from her busy life of soccer-momming. And yes, she has a full time day job, but so also do a lot of the white male nerds she deprecates. And so, presumably, do a lot of the women Sue wants to edit for her on WP. Nope, that's not it.
Sue has actually been asked this. From her userpage FAQ:
QUOTE
Q. Do you edit the Wikimedia projects, and if so, do you have any special status? How are other editors supposed to treat your edits?
A. I occasionally edit articles here on the English Wikipedia. My Wikipedia editing is purely opportunistic and reactive: while using Wikipedia, if I see a mistake or problem, I sometimes try to fix it. When I edit, I am in no way acting as an official representative of the Wikimedia Foundation, and my edits should be treated like anyone else's.
COMMENT: That's nice of you to let us know that, Sue, but where's your drive to get out there and write content? You yourself are behaving completely passively about WP. It's almost as though your burning desire to get women to edit is just the politically correct claptrap you spin out as part of your dayjob, and is
no way part of your private life, or your real interests. For those, you apparently blog. A blog on which you have total control....
So, as one of those white male nerds who has helped actually write that 5th most visited site that you're the CEO of, and that more than half of Americans use, I have a message for you, Ms. Gardner:
Personally, I don't take you and what you say, a bit seriously. And it's not due to your gender. It's due to your quite obvious hypocrisy. Your actions speak louder than your words.