[Foundation-l] communicaton from noise

Mon Jan 28 20:29:08 UTC 2008

Guys (particularly Jay),

You will know that this Foundation elist, like all the others, is an
antiquated attempt at sharing communication. They have outlived their
usefulness. As an attempt to discuss and share a conclusion about the issues
affecting WMF projects, they divide insiders from newbies, project community
from project community, and often just generate noise.

Let me prove it to you. Go back to this thread’s archival index and compare
it to this. 

HYPERLINK
"http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/wiki/foundation/"http://www.gossamer-
threads.com/lists/wiki/foundation/

Please note that I simply found this. I have nothing to do with its
conception. 

It will help you make sense of the past noise, even if it won’t help us do
the same with the future stuff. For that, we would need to change, and use
some piece of forum software that keeps a discussion on one thread, forever,
as opposed to this threading process, which encourages the attention spans
of gnats, and small fish to stay in a small pond.

I ask you to consider that the strength of Wikmedia projects is that, by
keeping one group of definitions on one page, which never moves, the serious
library builder must classify their thoughts about a subject and keep them
in one spot. The point of their initial communication becomes their archive,
and a point of reference for others with the same thoughts who are looking
for definition. This is what I call “the wiki formula”. It’s about building
libraries of references. 

It is no different with our immediate communication, apart from the fact
that a NPOV policy will have us doing nothing new; neutral knowledge having
no interest in its applications. So if this elist IS MEANT to be simply
communication about yesterday, and a place where only opinions can be shared
and decisions never reached, that’s fine. I’m out of here.

But if it’s an attempt to work through the many issues and challenges facing
us as we try and get our heads around interactive media, could we just
attempt to use more (modern) appropriate tools - “appropriate” being the
ones which offer GLOBAL GROUPS ways to find their peers and do things
quicker, easier and cheaper. Building libraries is all very fine, but anyone
can do that, and they all are. We have nothing but inflating global
libraries everywhere.  

But knowledge is more about coming to some understanding about pieces of
information, so we need the virtual classrooms in which it may be reached. A
forum like wikiback, which keeps the threads of a discussion together,
counts its posts and readership, and never closes or shifts position, is a
good start. But like a wiki. it needs to be adapted to its communities

Regards, simon

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