On 09/02/2014 01:35 PM, pi zero wrote:
(1) It's very easy to use.
(2) it naturally promotes incremental learning.
I'm sorry, but both of those assertions are not only wrong, but
profoundly misguided.
Wikimarkup, and templates, are /relatively/ easy to use for someone who
has at least a passing understanding of markup, and at least some
familiarity with common computer science idioms (things like separators,
arguments, substitution).
That set of someones used to be a very high fraction of the original
batch of editors (who were, almost by necessity, highly-computer
litterate geeks). I would be surprised if it represented even a tenth
of a percent of today's Internet users.
The typical user, upon seeing {{something|with|stuff}}, will simply turn
away saying something along the lines of "I don't know how to program".
The only reason templates were a success[1] is because the original
wikipedian self-selected by their ability to grok and manipulate those
concepts.
-- Marc
[1] Furthermore, even /whether/ templates were a success is highly
debatable. If I look at the current mess, and the troubles caused by
it, I doubt it. I'd argue that we did great things /despite/ templates
as a mechanism, not because of it.