mysterious codes? All that is needed is knowing how to indent and sign. David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG On Sat, Dec 19, 2009 at 1:17 PM, William Pietri <william(a)scissor.com> wrote:

On 12/19/2009 10:54 AM, David Goodman wrote: For a person with a PhD in molecular biology, a master's degree in Library Science, and 3 years experience on Wikipedia, I'm sure it all seems pretty transparent. As somebody who played with punch card machines in kindergarten and was coding well before my voice changed, it sure looks that way to me. But we're pretty far out on a few different bell curves. I haven't seen an actual usability study on our current discussion system, but I have seen and done plenty of other usability studies, and my guess is that you'd get a combined drop-out plus failure rate of over 80% for first-time users. Followed by predictable reactions: discouragement, feeling dumb, and taking both the system and our community as hostile or unwelcoming. Whether we want to attract less technical and/or less persistent users is a reasonable question. (My view: we should.) But from the usability experts I've worked with, I think the nicest reaction they'd give to our current discussion system is politely disguised horror. If people are skeptical of that, I'd encourage them to reach out to our very sharp usability team; I'm sure they have opinions on this, and possibly some data. William

On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 1:36 AM, David Goodman <dgoodmanny(a)gmail.com> wrote: David, the part William quoted was his own prior post. I think he was replying to what you had actually written, but neglected to include it in his quote. ~Nathan

On Sat, Dec 19, 2009 at 9:25 AM, Teofilo <teofilowiki(a)gmail.com> wrote: I'm very sorry that you've had trouble with LiquidThreads. If we want participation, then the software has to work, and when it doesn't work, that defeats our purpose. I made the decision to use LiquidThreads on the strategy wiki, knowing full well that it was beta software and that it would have warts. For those of you who have found LiquidThreads to be a barrier, I take full responsibility for that, and I'm doing everything I can to address that. For the rest of you, I thank you. Andrew Garrett, the author of LiquidThreads, has been incredibly diligent in fixing problems and improving the software since installation. Everyone who has contributed to strategy has been very patient in reporting problems, learning the nuances of the tool, and most importantly, using the tool to engage in strategic discussion, which is ultimately what this whole thing is about. To take this discussion onto a more constructive path, I think there are two interesting followup threads: 1. If our goal was to broaden and improve participation on strategy, was LiquidThreads the right decision? 2. How should the decisions to try new things be made? I'm going to make a few points here, and I encourage people to continue the discussion at: http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/LiquidThreads First, was LiquidThreads the right decision? The goal was to broaden and improve participation. There have been hiccups, as Teofilo and Ziko have noted here, and as others have noted on the wiki. On the other hand, in the two months LiquidThreads has been running, there have been almost 200 unique contributors to the discussion, many of whom were new to strategy wiki and some of whom were entirely new to wikis period. There have been 2,000 total posts, for an average of about 30 a day. Additionally, overall contributions to strategy wiki continues to rise. Most importantly, the quality of the discourse overall has been outstanding. Contributors have been doing productive work with the help of voices that may otherwise have not participated. Participation on strategy has been very good since LiquidThreads was installed. It's impossible to be scientific about the causal role that LiquidThreads has played in this, but the notion that LiquidThreads is disastrous, as some have attempted to paint it, is completely ludicrous. Based on actual experience, we can make a strong case that LiquidThreads has been beneficial to this process. Second, how should the decisions to try new things be made? One of the themes that has emerged from the strategic planning process is that there seems to be a community-wide paralysis when it comes to trying new things. People fear backlash. Some have espoused the view that every decision should be put up to vote before being made. I find this ironic and sad and scary, because what makes wikis wonderful is that they are empowering, and the enemy of ongoing success is stagnation. Ours is the first and best example of doacracy-at-scale. Why is this? Wikis are permissive. (Has there ever been anything more empowering than, "Edit this page"?) Wikis are also forgiving. (They have this beautiful feature called, "Revert.") Permission and forgiveness are what allow innovation to happen and beautiful things to emerge. If we want to retain this original spirit (which seems to be waning), we first need to acknowledge and honor it. We then need to think about how we can support it. What social and technical infrastructure could be put into place to better support experimentation? Who should be empowered to make these kinds of decisions? How can we as a community learn how to build up rather than tear down? The Movement Roles Task Force is exploring questions like this, and I would strongly encourage everyone to post their thoughts there: http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Task_force/Movement_Roles That discussion is using LiquidThreads, so if you haven't tried it yet, that would be an excellent place to start. :-) =Eugene -- ====================================================================== Eugene Eric Kim ................................ http://xri.net/=eekim Blue Oxen Associates ........................ http://www.blueoxen.com/ ======================================================================