[Foundation-l] CentralNotice use

[Federico Leva (Nemo)]

church.of.emacs.ml, 19/05/2011 10:52:
> There are several ways of minimizing negative effects:
> 1. Display it for logged-in users only. This is especially useful for
> information concerning active Wikimedians, e.g. Wikimania, POTY, etc.
> 2. Reduce weight - don't display a banner on every page view, but only
> on one in ten. (We have to use blank banners to do that, right?[3])
> 3. Reduce duration. (e.g. Don't display banners for a month, only a week)
> 4. Reduce banner size and intrusiveness. Use text banners instead of
> colorful images.

The first thing to do is 4): standard templates like [1] and [2] are ok, 
while the recent "march/may updates"[3] and POTY [4] seem unnecessarily big.
1) is the easiest and most obvious; such banners could also be 
restricted only to users with at least 100/200/whatever number of edits, 
but e.g. I wouldn't know how to do so; some documentation would be useful.
3) is not necessary in itself, but it is so if there are many banners: 
CentralNotice shouldn't be in permanent use, so if there are many 
requests there should be some scheduling.

It should also be considered that the CentralNotice kills local 
community sitenotices, although they are usually more important and 
interesting for local users. Local communities should be able to use the 
sitenotice at least for some periods of the year.

Finally, I wonder how useful are big banners such as the "May update". I 
like it (although I had to hide it a dozen times a day on several 
wikis), but I didn't see any effect. Reading the letter is not so useful 
in itself; it's useful if there's some discussion. There was a long 
discussion on it.wiki when the board resolution was posted on the 
village pump, but nothing after the CentralNotice. A local, very small 
sitenotice with a link to a local discussion is probably much more 
effective; perhaps it would be nice to offer communities to disable the 
CentralNotice if they implement a local sitenotice or other solution.

Nemo

[1] 
<http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:NoticeTemplate/view&template=boardvotecandidates>
[2] 
<http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:NoticeTemplate/view&template=WMDE_community_budget>
[3] 
<http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:NoticeTemplate/view&template=May2011Update>
[4] 
<http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:CentralNotice&method=listNoticeDetail&notice=poty2010>