James Heilman, 03/01/2012 17:36:
I am not suggesting that we use just a simple banner.
We need to
create something with a picture of a Wikipedian with text like "join
us in improving the world leading encyclopedia, click here to learn
how."
Than when people click it will ask them "what sort of subject area are
you interested in" with options like medicine and
grammar/copyrediting, etc.
After which it would displace important thing people need to now for
the topic area or task they have shown interest in. For medicine they
would be given guidelines on what are appropriate references and a
link to WikiProject medicine where they can post comments.
I'm quite sure this would scare them off.
What about professional video instructions on fundamentals, like WMIT
WikiGuides? <http://wikimedia.it/index.php/WikiGuide/en>
They've been promoted only with very, very small sitenotices; perhaps
the appeal from editor + video model (thested thouroughly by WMDE I
think) could work, and because the video is ready it could be tested
easily on it.wiki.
This effort would be supported by the number crunchers
at the WMF who
would determine which messages received more clicks and which messages
resulted in more editors. The banner shown could also be subject area
specific where we could test if having a medical student request
someone joins us is more effective than having someone with a
significant medical condition etc.
Nemo