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FamilySearch Wiki talk:Consensus: Difference between revisions
More comments about governing board.
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(More comments about governing board.) |
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::Governance on the wiki is complex, but we're leaning more and more to a place where functionality and style are driven by the community. I'd say the community presently has a lot more control over style than functionality right now, as evidenced by the ratio of user-driven to HQ-driven style discussions/changes being made now vs. the ratio of user-driven vs. HQ-driven engineering discussions/changes currently in the pipe. [[User:Franjensen]] and I are working to establish a more democratic approach to usability change procedure. HQ has placed an awfully high priority on engineering changes that will let us integrate this wiki with FamilySearch.org -- and this focus has negatively affected our ability to fix usability concerns raised by the community. | ::Governance on the wiki is complex, but we're leaning more and more to a place where functionality and style are driven by the community. I'd say the community presently has a lot more control over style than functionality right now, as evidenced by the ratio of user-driven to HQ-driven style discussions/changes being made now vs. the ratio of user-driven vs. HQ-driven engineering discussions/changes currently in the pipe. [[User:Franjensen]] and I are working to establish a more democratic approach to usability change procedure. HQ has placed an awfully high priority on engineering changes that will let us integrate this wiki with FamilySearch.org -- and this focus has negatively affected our ability to fix usability concerns raised by the community. | ||
::Style, though, is another issue. We've learned to be democratic with that. I think we're even learning to post and invite the community to stylistic discussions suggested by this or that user long ago -- often in Community Meeting. And we've made it easy for users to champion their own stylistic causes in the Manual of Style talk pages. | ::Style, though, is another issue. We've learned to be democratic with that. I think we're even learning to post and invite the community to stylistic discussions suggested by this or that user long ago -- often in Community Meeting. And we've made it easy for users to champion their own stylistic causes in the Manual of Style talk pages. | ||
::When I hear of a need for a "governing board" on the wiki, it gives me pause. I thought that's what discussion pages were for -- and that the governing body would be anyone who wants to participate in those discussions. I don't like oligarchies or star chambers. I know that's not what you're suggesting, but I guess I need a better understanding of what you are suggesting. And all this may sound disingenuous coming from a founder of this site that has a lot of influence, but I seriously lean toward true democracy rather than representative democracy or oligarchy. I guess I just saw too many abuses of power while spending the first 24 years of my life on the outskirts of Washington, D.C. [[User:Ritcheymt|Ritcheymt]] 04:04, 15 June 2009 (UTC) | ::When I hear of a need for a "governing board" on the wiki, it gives me pause. I thought that's what discussion pages were for -- and that the governing body would be anyone who wants to participate in those discussions. I don't like oligarchies or star chambers. I know that's not what you're suggesting, but I guess I need a better understanding of what you are suggesting. And all this may sound disingenuous coming from a founder of this site that has a lot of influence, but I seriously lean toward true democracy rather than representative democracy or oligarchy. I guess I just saw too many abuses of power while spending the first 24 years of my life on the outskirts of Washington, D.C. In the last month alone, I've probably said 20 times to my colleagues or prominent wiki users "Hey, we should be having this discussion on the wiki" -- meaning we were having some policy, usability, or style discussion in a board room or via e-mail or phone which would be a lot more idea-rich, democratized, consensus-driving, and actionable if we had it on a wiki discussion page instead of in a small, closed group. The idea of a "governing board" gives a feeling of closed-ness from which I think we should be moving away. [[User:Ritcheymt|Ritcheymt]] 04:04, 15 June 2009 (UTC) | ||
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