[Foundation-l] Incubator Wiki for New Wikimedia Projects (was Vote to create Wikiversity Vote)

[Ray Saintonge]

Anthony DiPierro wrote:

>On 11/11/05, Robert Scott Horning <robert_horning at netzero.net> wrote:
>  
>
>>Anthony DiPierro wrote:
>>    
>>
>>>Maybe we need an incubator Wiki for potential new sister projects.
>>>Wikicities is certainly not the solution for that.  Wikicities is a
>>>for-profit project complete with advertising being run by a for-profit
>>>company whose only tie to Wikimedia is that its two founders are on
>>>the board of directors of Wikimedia (one of whom is the founder of
>>>Wikipedia).
>>>      
>>>
>>I would agree that there is a need for an incubator project.  Clearly
>>the jump from minor discussion on this list and a minor writeup on the
>>Meta Wiki to turning on a seperate Wiki domain is much larger than
>>comparable projects on Wikicities, just for instance.  As far as
>>Wikicities not being the correct solution, I would have to in general
>>agree but from everything I've seen that is the current recommended
>>solution with just about everybody strongly pushed onto Wikicities if
>>their content doesn't fit a current Wikimedia project.  Even the new
>>projects proposal page strongly recommends Wikicities.
>>
It's an interesting idea.  My I suggest the name "The Wikubator".  With 
"Wikiwomb" one could imagin a wide assortment of Wikisperm ideas 
frantically navigating through Meta looking for recognition. :-)

To go into this domain a proposal would still need to fulfill criteria 
established by Meta, but they could be less rigid.  New language wikis 
could also go through The Wikubator.  To be born as a full Wiki a 
project would need to meet certain requirements.  Not the least of these 
would be a minimum number of main namespace articles, and where another 
language is involved, the full translation of a predetermined list of 
important pages.  Since we would not want any full Wikimedia wiki to be 
a one man show, there could be a criterion that some minimum number of 
contributors (excluding sockpuppets) must each have started a specified 
number of NEW articles.

A project in The Wikubator could stay there indefinitely as long as 
there is continuing activity.  If no-one has edited anything in such a 
project for six months it could be aborted.  For this purpose editing 
would not include obvious vandalism and its removal.

>I can see recommending Wikicities for projects which aren't applicable
>to Wikimedia at all - a wiki for fictional works for instance.  But
>for proposed Wikimedia projects which just haven't been fleshed out
>enough to stand on their own, I don't think it's appropriate to host
>them on Jimmy and Angela's private server.  You seem to agree with me,
>and that's good.
>
Wikicities could still be used for projects that do not meet Meta's 
insemination criteria.

>>I do want to emphasis, however, that Wikibooks is not the place to do
>>this either.  This is a need for a whole new project altogether.
>>    
>>
>Wikibooks isn't the place for incubation of new projects, I agree. 
>And I can see the argument that Wikiversity goes beyond the original
>scope of Wikibooks.  Essentially I feel that Wikiversity is a superset
>of Wikibooks.  For that reason I don't really feel comfortable saying
>that Wikiversity should be a separate project, I'd rather see
>Wikibooks expanded to include other materials.  But I'd be willing to
>concede that point, in fact I essentially have.
>
>As for Wikijunior, well, I find it hard to see how that's not a book,
>but that's a completely different discussion.
>
The discussions for Wikiversity and Wikijunior have been going on for 
some time already.  Whatever one thinks of them, I don't think that 
their issues are the kind that would be solved in a seed project.  The 
purpose of a seed project would be primarily to see if there is enough 
interest to sustain an otherwise acceptable project.  The problems 
connected with Wikiversity and Wikijunior are different; I have no doubt 
that if started both could easily meet the participation critera..  
Neither project should be a part of this discussion.

>>Are you interested in helping me with organizing that project? The
>>Foundation board has talked about this issue from time to time, but
>>there is a need to really sit down and try to come up with the
>>guidelines for when a project can be started on the incubator/test wiki.
>> This is a policy issue rather than a technical issue.  This is also
>>something that rather than an abstract idea, there needs to be something
>>written as a formal proposal with debate over the principle ideas for
>>how the whole process would work.  Eventually it would also require a
>>change in the New Projects policy as well, with the ability to both
>>create and cull projects from the incubator Wiki.
>>    
>>
>I'd be willing to help.  But in my opinion the guidelines should be
>very minimal, maybe two or three interested sponsors and a one page
>project proposal (which could be modified as the idea gets fleshed
>out).  It's kind of the whole point of the wiki to make the threshold
>very low - unless there's a strong majority sentiment that the project
>could never become a Wikimedia project would I suggest removing
>something (barring a project which took up enormous resources,
>anyway).
>
>And yes, it'd be useful to change the whole policy for new projects to
>basically state that you have to make a test run on the incubator wiki
>first, but that's really a separate issue which could be hashed out
>later.  Along those same lines I'd like to see the more borderline
>AFDs copied over.  If Wikipedia decides to get rid of info about
>Pokemon maybe it could be made into a proposed project there
>(elementary schools which are considered non-notable might be a more
>reasonable candidate).
>
No!!!  It should not be a trash dump for Wikipedia's problems.  I think 
that Wikibooks has complained about taking on that role, and rightly 
so.  The AfDs can cover a very wide range of subjects,  but these are 
individual articles, not projects.  There is nothing in the broad topic 
of Pokémon or elementary schools to suggest that it should belong to a 
new Wiki.  Those problems are only about data inclusion, and could 
easily be solved in a collaborative community.

Ec