[Foundation-l] To make it easy to fork and leave

[Ray Saintonge]

On 08/15/11 10:00 AM, WereSpielChequers wrote:
> A successful fork needs more than just the content, software and sufficient
> hardware, it also needs a community.

Indeed, but the right to fork also includes the right to fail.  If I 
chose to start a fork I'm sure that I would have enough technical 
incompetence to bring about failure. If one or more persons choose to 
exercise their right to fork they will be in charge of administrative 
and editorial decisions regarding the new site.  They will decide on the 
nature of the community, including the decision to be a community of 
one. If such decisions are disastrous to their own intent that's their 
problem.

> If we are serious about having a right to fork we need to make it easy for
> editors to keep their account, and possibly even userrights in both forks,
> otherwise whichever fork you have to create a new account for is at a huge
> disadvantage. But for privacy/security reasons I don't think that WMF should
> give the fork a copy of the databases that includes the userids and their
> logins. Perhaps this could be finessed by having the WMF create a bridge to
> allow wikimedians to activate their existing account at the forked wiki, and
> the forked wiki would presumably not allow editors to otherwise create
> accounts using names that had edits imported from Wikimedia.

I think you make it more complicated than it should be. A fork would 
presumably exist on some other server where users could use whatever 
name they choose, including ones identical to their current names in 
Wikimedia. It would be an autonomous entity.  There is no question in my 
mind of exporting private data. Beyond the potential mischief for small 
segments of that data, I suspect that most new administrators would find 
most of it unmanageable.

If a new fork imports selected Wikipedia articles, that carries certain 
CC obligations and rights.  Notably it has an obligation to credit its 
source linking back to the chosen Wikipedia version, and it has the 
right to edit that article to take it in a chosen direction, which, for 
example, could include more relaxed rules on reliable sources or NPOV.

> BTW I'm not advocating a fork at this juncture. The only scenario I can see
> in the short term that might lead to a fork is the clash between the
> Foundation's policy on openness and the contrary decisions taken by certain
> parts of the community, - for example EN wiki deciding to restrict new
> article creation to Autoconfirmed users. Presumably the Foundation will get
> the devs to code the change requested by EN wiki even if it does make us
> less open. But it could quite legitimately say "That clashes with our core
> values so we won't do that here, but if some of you want to create a more
> deletionist wiki you do of course have the right to fork."

I don't even presume to read the minds of these forkers.

Managing a pure deletionist wiki should be trivial. ;-)

Ray