This week, the Signpost covers the opening of candidacies for the 2008 Board elections.

Candidate entries for the Wikimedia Board of Trustees election opened on Sunday. One (1) one-year seat will be filled in the election. As of press time, three users had presented themselves as candidates.

Candidates are being accepted through 23:59 UTC on 22 May. This year, voting will run for three weeks, from 1 June through 21 June (last year's election ran for just ten days). While the rules of the election are largely completed, some minor changes may still be introduced. Under discussion currently is a proposal to send an official e-mail to all eligible voters regarding the election, and the voting system to be used; both of these proposals are contingent upon their technical feasibility.

These rules, and any other election-related tasks, are being handled by the Board Election committee, a seven-person panel consisting of the following users:

• Philippe Beaudette
• Arria Belli
• Daniel Bryant
• Kwan Ting Chan
• Jesse Plamondon-Willard
• Mark Ryan
• Jon Harald Søby

Incumbent board member and current Board Chairperson Florence Devouard has not yet stated whether she plans to run in this election. Devouard has been a member of the Board since the first elections in 2004. Before the restructuring of the Board of Trustees in April, the seats of Michael Snow and Domas Mituzas, both of whom were appointed in February, would have come up for confirmation in this election. Instead, they will remain in their seats until Wikimedia chapters choose their own selections for the seats.

This week, Harel (Harel Cain), Sarcasticidealist (Steve Smith), and Skenmy (Paul Williams) entered the race. These three users are the only users standing for election as of press time; last year, 15 candidates ran for three open seats.

Multilingual editors are encouraged to consider translating various election notices, candidate presentations, and other pages into as many languages as possible.

Next week: The Signpost will examine the election rules and regulations.