[Foundation-l] Proposing New Projects (was Proposal for a new project: Wikisomething)

[Robert Scott Horning]

Dan Grey wrote:

>On 23/09/05, Robert Scott Horning <robert_horning at netzero.net> wrote:
>  
>
>>If there are genuine technical issues that need to be addressed so that
>>starting en.wikiversity.org is somehow harder than to.wikibooks.org, I
>>would like to know what those issues are that developers seem to be
>>screaming about.
>>    
>>
>
>Can you show me where developers have objected?
>
>
>Dan
>  
>
I'll post some comments from the Wikiversity vote page to start with:

* This project doesn't seem well focused, we need first to stabilize our 
current projects before starting new ones, and solve technical 
bottlenecks. Yann <http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Yann> 15:51, 16 
September 2005 (UTC)
*Rgf <http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Rgf&action=edit> 
19:37, 20 September 2005 (UTC) Too early. We must mature the other 
projects before thinking in something so big.
*Micru <http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Micru> 16:52, 22 September 
2005 (UTC) We're spreading too thin. Other projects still haven't 
consolidated, so it's too early for starting another one. Please, wait 
at least a year, and solve the technical issues in the meanwhile.

I'll also bring up a comment by Brian Vibber on this mailing list:

"Our software was written for Wikipedia; our development team has
primarily gotten into it from and for Wikipedia, and we haven't really
seen much specialized software development coming from the communities
for these other projects. "

"I would generally recommend against tossing in _yet more_ different new
projects when our existing ones are so poorly supported, without a
better idea of who's going to support them and with what. "

My reply is:  What are the specific issues that need to be addressed?  I 
think the problems are more social than technical.  In other words, it 
is not the technical difficulty of trying to turn on a wiki portal for a 
particular project but rather the social aspect of trying to get people 
organized to help support the projects.  Some of these projects, like 
Wikibooks or Wiktionary are still tyring to recruit people to join the 
project and get a critical mass necessary to get the project running 
smoothly.  In terms of what is needed to get some technically inclined 
people to help write the necessary specialized software needed for each 
project, that will come in time.  

Wikipedia has developed a number of unique tools that are already well 
developed, and for the most part each other sister project takes 
advantage of those tools as well as they can.  Categories, for instance, 
are all but absent from Wikibooks and are not really appropriate.  This 
is one thing that does need to be revisited for Wikibooks, as an 
example.  On the other hand, Commons uses categories extensively and 
very few images don't have at least one category, and often have several.

I'm not saying that there are any organized efforts on the part of 
developers, but when people are saying that we need to "wait a year" 
(I've seen that repeated over and over again elsewhere) before starting 
any new project, I would like to know what kind of technical issue is a 
problem.  In the case of Wikiversity, is 125 people a sufficient kernel 
of support to get it going?  Is that not enough people that would be 
able to form a good stable community?  From the stand point of those who 
are objecting to new projects being started, I don't thing 1000 people 
supporting a new project is going to be sufficient in terms of people 
willing to do the heavy lifting to get the new project started.

Of course, this is up to the board to decide on their own, and the 
polling is just a way to attempt to guage general community sentiment. 
 They are free to do whatever they want (the board), but there certainly 
are a bunch of people who are shooting down every proposal, no matter 
how well thought out and how much support it may have.  When objections 
describe technical issues may be a problem, they seem to be speaking on 
behalf of the developers even if that may not be the case.

-- 
Robert Scott Horning