2009/5/2 geni <geniice(a)gmail.com>om>:
2009/5/2 Thomas Dalton
<thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>om>:
What would they spend it on? Talk is cheap, after
all! Having
conversations is easy, having focused conversations that actually
reach useful conclusions is a little harder, but it isn't more
expensive.
Data gathering, test setups whatever. If there isn't a budget there is
little incentive for wikipedians to deal with a a system that even by
wikipedia standards is painfully bureaucratic.
Without a little bureaucracy, this kind of thing doesn't work.
Consider I can spend time messing around with working
groups and
subgroups that are somehow meant to work on the problems of "Reach,
Quality and Participation" with zero budget and annoying bureaucratic
barriers.
Or I could join:
Wikipedia:WikiProject Wikipedia Outreach
Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team
And probably Wikipedia:WikiProject Community
Those are about doing stuff now, this is about planning for the
future. Both are worthy of your time.
With out a budget what can the committees offer that
doesn't appear
through existing channels? Focus talk? Perhaps but there is no way to
enforce that and keeping a group of wikipedians focused on anything
for any length of time is pretty much impossible. Access to foundation
personnel? Doesn't appear to be on offer and it's hard to guarantee
useful access.
Focusing talk is precisely what they are meant to do. I agree it is
not something we are generally very good at, but it is worth making
the effort.
Some active research may be worthwhile for some parts of this process
(and some money for that would be good), but I think talk is the most
important part.