[Foundation-l] Meta:MetaProject to Overhaul Meta

David Gerard dgerard at gmail.com
Wed Mar 29 12:12:14 UTC 2006


On 28/03/06, Alex Schenck <linuxbeak at gmail.com> wrote:

> Despite praise from various sources, several other Meta people have
> complained that this project is doing more harm than good. While I of course
> completely disagree with that notion, I feel that I ought to let out some
> steam.
> Meta right now is horrible. Really, it is. People need to stop kidding
> themselves and understand that the way that it is in right now is akin to a
> trash heap. Sure, there are some good things on Meta, but the vast majority
> is unorganized rubbish that could probably be put away in an archive and
> forgotten about until cyber-archaeologists come along and sift through it
> and thing that they're artifacts. I mean, come on. Sure, this place has a
> lot of history of Wikimedia, but if things need to be kept, why can't they
> be kept in a more orderly fashion?


I've just put some notes on

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meta_talk:MetaProject_to_Overhaul_Meta#How_not_to_piss_people_off

I asked on m:RFA "What is the local community? There isn't one."
Anthere answered with a *long* paragraph which didn't answer that
question, answered several I didn't ask and accused me of all sorts of
things ... I've asked again and await an answer.

But the long paragraph answering questions I didn't ask and accusing
me of things indicates deep, if inchoate, suspicion over motives and a
fear of change.

The essential conflict appears to be between:

   1. Those who want Meta to be a good repository of historical documents
   2. Those who want Meta to be usable as an active work wiki.

The impetus for this project is that the first function is actively
hampering the second. The piles of historical stuff masquerade as
currently useful documents and get in the way of doing work. You don't
archive paper documents in your in-tray!

The main thing that is pissing off the advocates of the first function
(what exists of a "meta community" appear to be in the first group,
the museum staff) is the sweeping deletions. So we need to avoid that.

I suggest that rather than delete anything as part of this project for
now, we cordon it off by putting it in an appropriate category.
Category:Apparently irrelevant, Category:Possible deletia,
Category:Historical (or Category:Archive - we appear to be using
both), Category:Move to Mediawiki.org (most of the help pages should
be on that wiki), etc.


> For the meantime, I will continue this project, but I would like to propose
> a solution: an archive wiki of Meta. Move *everything* on Meta over to this
> archive. Start fresh. The archive will contain all things that Meta used to
> have, so nothing will just disappear, and someone else can go through the
> archive if they really feel like it and find whatever they're looking for. I
> promise I won't touch that archive.


This idea has strong merit.

For now, I suggest appropriate categorisation and tagging (e.g.
{{historical}} ) will do for the moment. Deletion really isn't urgent
- it can wait as long as we like for the museum staff to go over the
artifacts carefully dusting and categorising them further.

Does this sound workable to all?


- d.



More information about the foundation-l mailing list