Product and Technology Advisory Council
 | PTAC convenes in a virtual meeting every quarter. Latest key notes and agenda. Contact PTAC via its talk page. |
This council supports the Movement Strategy recommendation to the WMF to "Coordinate Across Stakeholders" by addressing the initiative to form a Technology Council. Its goal is to bring together technical contributors, affiliate representatives, WMF staff, and board members to advise on long-term product and technical priorities for the Wikimedia movement. The activities of this council are governed by the PTAC Charter.
Operation
[edit]The PTAC will focus less on making discrete decisions (for example, approving an extension), and more on ambiguous problems such as prioritizing newcomer or experienced editor growth, or platform improvements versus user-facing feature development. They will also discuss and provide feedback to the WMF about necessary tradeoffs and strategies to ensure the movement’s success. The PTAC will occasionally publish community-validated recommendations that can serve as a blueprint for product and technical success.
The WMF does not anticipate this group to operate in a vacuum. PTAC members are encouraged to engage with their respective communities about the PTAC’s discussion and recommendations. In addition, we will invite stakeholders across the communities to engage with the PTAC.
Members
[edit]PTAC consists of members with a breadth of experience, expertise, and representation across the Wikimedia movement. This includes WMF Product and Technology staff representatives, the Chief Product and Technology Officer, WMF board representatives, representatives of affiliates engaging in technical development, and volunteer representatives.
The PTAC pilot consists of the following members:
- 3 WMF: Selena Deckelmann, Rita Ho, Sonja Perry
- 7 Volunteer representatives:
- 3 Affiliate representatives: Éder Porto (Wikimedia Brasil), Lena Meintrup (WMDE), Mohammad Heidarzadeh (CEE Hub).
- 1 members of the WMF board: Michał Buczyński
- Marzanne Collins and Kadeem Khan from WMF support the PTAC as facilitators.
Former members included:
- WMF: Birgit Müller
- Volunteer representatives: Lahi
- Affiliate representatives: Jonathan Fraine (WMDE)
- WMF Board: Laurentius, Luis Bitencourt-Emilio
- WMF facilitators: Matt Thompson
Timeline
[edit]| Documents | Status | Time |
|---|---|---|
| Initial proposal | Historical | June 2024 |
| Mobile editing recommendation | Adopted | February 2025 |
| Communication and experimentation recommendation | Adopted | August 2025 |
| Year 1 reflections and proposed way forward | Adopted | January 2026 |
| 2026-27 Annual plan response | – | February 2026 |
| PTAC Charter | – | – |
| Affiliate technical contributions recommendation | Community feedback recieved | May 2026 |
Historical activities
[edit]Proposed in July 2024, the WMF received 63 applications and interviewed 22 candidates for 8 volunteer slots. Candidates selected for the full interview series met with Jack Wheeler, the then Lead Community Tech Manager, Selena Deckelmann, Chief Product and Technology Officer, and WMF Board member, Lorenzo Losa. It was not an easy process; many candidates were qualified for the PTAC. The WMF ultimately selected a group of applicants that had a breadth of experience and expertise in the technical ecosystem, while maintaining representation across the Wikimedia movement.
In October 2024, the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) introduced the Product and Tech Advisory Council (PTAC) and its members as a one-year pilot. The PTAC kicked off in a virtual session and meets quarterly (with key notes and agenda shared afterward). In addition, the group met in January 2025 to collaborate and discuss technical challenges and opportunities to advance the movement. The product of that meeting is the February 2025 draft PTAC recommendation for feedback.
Later in the year, following the Simple Summaries discussion, the council publish a set of recommendations on improving WMF-community communications surrounding Product and Technology. The council also facilitated the creation of the Unsupported Tools Working Group, a working group which will help in prioritizing and reviewing requests for support of unsupported extensions, gadgets, bots, and tools.
At the end of 2025, members of the PTAC, upon the completion of the period, met to discuss PTAC's progress and made a joint decision to continue the program.