Stephen Streater wrote
If this project becomes boring, interesting people won't contribute.
There is a general distrust of dynamism, and this is a cultural flaw here which I am happy to do my bit to neutralise.
There is something to this. We still need 'be bold!'. There are probably still substantial areas of content to open up, and the pioneers need something less plodding than just mumbling policy as a mantra.
Charles
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On 8 Oct 2006, at 21:32, charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com wrote:
Stephen Streater wrote
If this project becomes boring, interesting people won't contribute.
There is a general distrust of dynamism, and this is a cultural flaw here which I am happy to do my bit to neutralise.
There is something to this. We still need 'be bold!'. There are probably still substantial areas of content to open up, and the pioneers need something less plodding than just mumbling policy as a mantra.
I'd like something along the lines of: an editor should expect to come across the existence of one existing policy or guideline for the first time every 100 or so edits.
If we have too steep or long a learning curve - by for example needing to know fifty pages of policy, guidelines and process to get started - content people will be put off at the expense of process people. It's easy for long timers to forget that the system was much simpler when they joined.
On 08/10/06, Stephen Streater sbstreater@mac.com wrote:
If we have too steep or long a learning curve - by for example needing to know fifty pages of policy, guidelines and process to get started - content people will be put off at the expense of process people. It's easy for long timers to forget that the system was much simpler when they joined.
I came along in early 2004 and am reluctant to call myself a "long timer", but I seem to be compared to many. It seemed a lot simpler.
Policy and process has to be trivially derivable from the very few fundamental processes, or people won't be able to remember it. NPOV, NOR, V, AGF, NPA. And let's add BITE. That's six pieces of jargon, but six is enough to remember. Six fundamental policies, you could write above your monitor for continuous reference.
- d.
You know, it's not that hard to just SPELL THINGS OUT.
Can't stand these acronyms. Never could, never will.
What the hell is BITE?
--an old timer
On 10/8/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 08/10/06, Stephen Streater sbstreater@mac.com wrote:
If we have too steep or long a learning curve - by for example needing to know fifty pages of policy, guidelines and process to get started - content people will be put off at the expense of process people. It's easy for long timers to forget that the system was much simpler when they joined.
I came along in early 2004 and am reluctant to call myself a "long timer", but I seem to be compared to many. It seemed a lot simpler.
Policy and process has to be trivially derivable from the very few fundamental processes, or people won't be able to remember it. NPOV, NOR, V, AGF, NPA. And let's add BITE. That's six pieces of jargon, but six is enough to remember. Six fundamental policies, you could write above your monitor for continuous reference.
- d.
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On Oct 24, 2006, at 4:29 PM, The Cunctator wrote:
You know, it's not that hard to just SPELL THINGS OUT.
Can't stand these acronyms. Never could, never will.
What the hell is BITE?
Don't bite the newbies.
Our one non-acronymed policy. ;)
-Phil
On 10/24/06, Phil Sandifer Snowspinner@gmail.com wrote:
Don't bite the newbies.
Our one non-acronymed policy. ;)
-Phil
OWN?
Fortunely typeing WP:whatever will normaly tell you what the person means.
Of course there are a few odities such as [[WP:WTF]] and [[WP:ORLY]]
There are new ones being invented all the time. I've been around not quite as long as Cunc, but share his view on acronyms. I often have to ask myself whether it's worth knowing what each one is. Abbreviations, like complicated templates can. They're like a set of secret codes that one needs to know in order to join the cabal. That's very unfriendly to newbies who just want to add content, and don't have Cunc's thick skin.
Ec
The Cunctator wrote:
You know, it's not that hard to just SPELL THINGS OUT.
Can't stand these acronyms. Never could, never will.
What the hell is BITE?
--an old timer
On 10/8/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 08/10/06, Stephen Streater sbstreater@mac.com wrote:
If we have too steep or long a learning curve - by for example needing to know fifty pages of policy, guidelines and process to get started - content people will be put off at the expense of process people. It's easy for long timers to forget that the system was much simpler when they joined.
I came along in early 2004 and am reluctant to call myself a "long timer", but I seem to be compared to many. It seemed a lot simpler.
Policy and process has to be trivially derivable from the very few fundamental processes, or people won't be able to remember it. NPOV, NOR, V, AGF, NPA. And let's add BITE. That's six pieces of jargon, but six is enough to remember. Six fundamental policies, you could write above your monitor for continuous reference.
On 10/8/06, charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com wrote:
Stephen Streater wrote
If this project becomes boring, interesting people won't contribute.
There is a general distrust of dynamism, and this is a cultural flaw here which I am happy to do my bit to neutralise.
There is something to this. We still need 'be bold!'. There are probably still substantial areas of content to open up, and the pioneers need something less plodding than just mumbling policy as a mantra.
I agree that there are large areas of content to open up which still remain. Materials science and engineering are areas I didn't really know were as weak as they are until relatively recently (I didn't really look at them all that much, i have all the reference books memorized...), for one example. I'm sure that others are noticing such things around the edges.
Putting content in isn't boring me; the stress of some of the "administrative stuff" is boring me, and I can't get away from paying attention to that because things keep coming up which are arguably important.