As part of its annual "Wikimania" conference in Alexandria, Egypt, the nonprofit Wikimedia Foundation--parent company of Wikipedia, Wiktionary, and a number of others--announced two new members to its board of trustees. The announcement went out on Friday and is effective immediately.
Taking over from current chair Florence Devouard will be Michael Snow, who has been on the board since February and has been an active member of the Wikipedia community since 2003. A lawyer based in Seattle, Wash., Snow created the "Wikipedia Signpost" community news resource in 2006.
Another Wikimedia Foundation board member has been announced, too: Ting Chen, who has worked on both the German and Chinese editions of Wikipedia. He currently lives in Mainz, Germany and works at IBM.
The Wikimedia Foundation restructured its board in April, formally naming creator Jimmy Wales as "community founder" and expanding the total membership of the board from eight to ten. The nonprofit also received significant donations this spring, including $500,000 from venture capitalist Vinod Khosla and $3 million from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. But things haven't all been sunny: the Wikimedia Foundation has come under fire regarding use of funds on Wales' behalf.
