Idaho2000

Wikimedia Membership status

I'm still very much a "newbie", having joined the Wiki community in August 2005. While I generally support the Wikimedia idea, I'm still trying to figure out what it's really all about!

Short Bio

I'm fifty years old, British and I've lived in the Netherlands for the past 25 years. My work experience (as manager and consultant to international companies) includes: Organizational Change Management - Inter-personal and corporate communication - Translation - Learning/Training - Coaching - Human Resource Management - Business Process Management - Quality Management - Corporate IT

My consultancy work for the past few years has been as a "communications consultant" to companies going through organizational change programs. On a very small scale, I have some experience in dealing with some issues that are relevant to Wikimedia, such as: content management and development in a multi-cultural and multi-language environment, deciding priorities based on "user needs" and offers for content contributions, etc.

Personal Interests

My personal interests include: - Psychology & Psychotherapy - Philosophy - Religions - Cultures - History - Photography - Music

Wikipedia Research Interests

I'm still on the very first part of the newbie learning curve and - as I said above - I'm still trying to get a handle on what "Wikimedia" is really about. At the moment, I'm interested in the "mission" and the "market positioning" of Wikimedia. I'm trying to figure out (just for myself) what the "added value" of Wikimedia is in a world already awash with information. Giving contributors the opportunity to add and develop content in which they're interested (and which they think may interest others) is fine with me. On the other hand, I have the feeling that if Wikimedia is to be valuable to the wider community, the needs and priorities of Wikimedia "consumers" should influence Wikimedia's development too. My impression at the moment is that Wikimedia's development is mainly "contributor-driven". I want to find out more about how "market research" into the needs and priorities of Wikimedia "consumers" is done, what the results of this research show and what we do with the results. I'm looking forward to getting involved!