This is a very positive development in the manner by which new features are given some visibility, tested and measured. Making new features *opt-in*, and making it easy to return back is a healthy way of getting wider usage and feedback IMO. Also, the ability for a user to chose to automatically receive all new Beta functions, or to manually select the individual elements that they like, is a nice touch too. I think that, culturally as much as technologically, having a "beta track" for ALL new elements is a good procedure to have. It will provide consistent and clear expectations of what's happening (and a clear place to provide feedback that is actually answered) - not having that is a large factor IMHO in the negative reaction many features have previously received.

I always really liked the manner in which the "Usability Initiative" (which developed the vector skin a few years back) measured their success - the proportion of people who turned "on" AND continued using new features. If I recall correctly that was the first time the WMF used the "beta" concept and I believe that the way it was rolled-out was the best practice example of the WMF making a major change in a calm, clearly communicated, responsive way. Interestingly, the things that caused controversy on the day that that program's work became the default were the elements that were added in at the at the last minute and therefore were not part of the Beta - the v.2 logo, the 'collapsed' inter-language links box in the sidebar.

-Liam / Wittylama

wittylama.com Peace, love & metadata

On 22 November 2013 10:30, Fabrice Florin fflorin@wikimedia.org wrote:

Hi folks,

We're happy to let you know that the first version of Beta Features (1) has now been deployed worldwide on all wikis.

Beta Features is a new program that lets you test new features on Wikipedia and other Wikimedia sites before they are released widely. Think of it as a digital laboratory where community members can preview upcoming changes and help designers and engineers make improvements based on their feedback.

This first worldwide release includes these features:

• Media Viewer — view images in large size (2) (7)
• Typography Refresh — make text more readable (3)
• Near this page — see what other pages are nearby (4)
• VisualEditor Opt-in — edit pages without having to learn wiki code (5 -

see below)

• VisualEditor Formulæ — edit algebra or equations on your pages (6 - see

below) (Note that Visual Editor Opt-in is only on a couple hundred sites where it was already available, but not enabled by default.)

We invite you to test these new features on your sites and let us know what you think. You can share your feedback about this Beta Features program on its discussion page (8) -- or about individual features on their respective discussion pages (see links 2-6 below). And if you find any technical bugs, please report them on Bugzilla (9).

We also invite you to join tomorrow's office hours IRC chat, this Friday, 22 November, 2013 at 18:00 UTC. (10)

Many thanks to all the community and team members who made this program possible! We hope it can help us improve Wikipedia together and provide a better experience for all our users around the world.

Enjoy,

Fabrice -- on behalf of the Multimedia, Visual Editor and Design teams

(1) About Beta Features: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Multimedia/About_Media_Viewer

(2) About Media Viewer v0.1: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Multimedia/About_Media_Viewer

(3) About Typography Refresh: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Typography_Update

(4) About Nearby Pages: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Beta_Features/Nearby_Pages

(5) About Visual Editor Opt-in: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/VisualEditor/Beta_Features/General

(6) About VisualEditor Formulæ: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/VisualEditor/Beta_Features/Formulae

(7) Media Viewer - New Version 0.2: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Lightbox_demo (This new version displays larger images, for a more immersive experience. It is now on MediaWiki.org only and will be released to all wikis in early December.)

(8) Discuss Beta Features: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:About_Beta_Features

(9) Report a Bug:

https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/enter_bug.cgi?product=MediaWiki%20extensions&...

(10) Office hours IRC chat - Friday, 22 November at 18:00 UTC: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/IRC_office_hours#Upcoming_office_hours

P.S.: If any community member would like to hide the 'Beta' link in their personal menu, they can easily remove it by going to their personal style page [[Special:MyPage/common.css]] and pasting in this CSS rule on a line by itself: "#pt-betafeatures { display: none; }" (do not include the quotes).

---

Fabrice Florin Product Manager, Multimedia Wikimedia Foundation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Fabrice_Florin_(WMF)

---

Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe

Hi folks,

We'd like to invite you to join our discussion of Beta Features (1), which we just deployed worldwide yesterday.

Our office hours IRC chat starts in a half-hour, today at 18:00 UTC. (2)

If you cannot join this chat, we invite you to try out Beta Features and share your feedback on one of the pages below (3-8)

And if you find any technical bugs, please report them on Bugzilla (9).

Beta Features is a new program that lets you test new features on Wikipedia and other Wikimedia sites before they are released widely.

We hope it can help us improve Wikipedia together and provide a better experience for all our users around the world.

Hope to speak with you soon,

Fabrice -- on behalf of the Multimedia, Visual Editor and Design teams

(1) About Beta Features: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/About_Beta_Features

(2) Today's Office Hours IRC Chat: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Office_hours#Upcoming_office_hours

(3) Discuss Beta Features: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:About_Beta_Features

(4) About Media Viewer v0.1: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Multimedia/About_Media_Viewer

(5) About Typography Refresh: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Typography_Update

(6) About Nearby Pages: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Beta_Features/Nearby_Pages

(7) About Visual Editor Opt-in: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/VisualEditor/Beta_Features/General

(8) About VisualEditor Formulæ: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/VisualEditor/Beta_Features/Formulae

(9) Report a Bug: https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/enter_bug.cgi?product=MediaWiki%20extensions&...

P.S.: If you are interested in Media Viewer, we invite you to test the new version v0.2 on MediaWiki.org: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Lightbox_demo

This new version displays larger images, for a more immersive experience. It is now on MediaWiki.org only and will be released to all wikis in early December. Please share your feedback about this new version on this page:

https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Multimedia/About_Media_Viewer