[Commons-l] State of the projects and other tips on how to make sure projects are well known (was: All about Wikimania...)

[Delphine Ménard]

I like clear threads.

On 8/12/07, Brianna Laugher <brianna.laugher at gmail.com> wrote:

> know about Wikipedia, so they ignore the rest. So then the thing to do
> is change the journalists. :)

As Florence mentionned, this has been done, especially in countries where
1) there is a chapter
2) there is a strong figure in one of the projects but no chapter
3) there is both

In short, it takes people on the ground to change the journalists,
it's not something that happens on a top down basis. Most European
press has now learned to address either the chapter/the community
members responsible for press or the Foundation depending on the
nature of the article they want to write. And if not, it should be a
very clear things for the chapters as well as for the Foundation to
direct them to the right people, "on the ground".

> On 12/08/07, Florence Devouard <Anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > What would be real cool would be to try to keep a written state of each
> > project, what is hot, what is working, what is not working, technical
> > wish list, biggest issues, big figures etc....  so that all participants
> > could "follow" what is going on. I know all this is actually available,
> > but only in a very dispersed manner, so not so easy to find out.
>
[snip]

On 8/12/07, Brianna Laugher <brianna.laugher at gmail.com> wrote:

> OK here is an idea for Florence. Write a post to foundation-l
> addressing all projects (e.g. enwikipedia, frwikisource). Ask them to
> put together a 'state of the wiki' report, with the things you
> mentioned:
> * progress reports on pages, users, admins, policies
> * success of any special projects like printed material, wikiprojects
> * any special policy or practice that they have developed, that is not
> seen on other projects
> * technical wishlist
> * "perennial debates" - controversies that often come up in the community
>
> Tell them it's optional to submit a report, and they have a month to write it.
>
> If nothing else it would make for seriously interesting reading. :)
> And the Board can just, you know, publish it on the foundation wiki.
> They don't have to do anything else with it. But just having this kind
> of 'official' request may make people think about these kind of
> things.

This is, unfortunately, not a new idea. Quarto [1] lived and died a
beautiful death and was exactly about that. Making sure that all
projects had a place to express themselves, raise their issues, tell
about the state of their project.

So let me try a different approach. Rather than waiting for Florence
to try again something that she and other people have tried before, or
for "the Foundation " to issue a dealdine, why don't you, Brianna,
come up with a "state of commons" that you broadcast across lists and
projects and ask for the same from other projects, just because you're
interested?

I am a fervent believer that top down has its limits, and that a call
from a "fellow community member" might be better heard altogether. My
take being that an "official" request is not always the answer to
everything, on the contrary.


Delphine

[1]http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Quarto
-- 
~notafish

La critique, art aisé, se doit d'être constructive. -- Boris Vian in
*Chroniques du menteur*

NB. This address is used for mailing lists. Personal emails sent to
this address will probably get lost.
NB. Cette adresse est utilisée pour les listes de diffusion. Tout
email personnel envoyé à cette adresse sera probablement perdu.