[Foundation-l] LiquidThreads almost ready for deployment

Sat Dec 19 18:17:40 UTC 2009

On 12/19/2009 09:25 AM, Teofilo wrote:
> Wiki talk pages as they are now are good. Don't kill them.
>    

Having not used LiquidThreads yet, I can't speak to your experience with 
it. But the existing discussion system is a usability nightmare.

As a software developer, I'm perfectly comfortable dealing with its dark 
mysteries. I've spent tens of thousands of hours typing mysterious codes 
into giant files interpreted by unforgiving machines. But for the 98% of 
humanity that doesn't have much technical background, our discussion 
system comes across as somewhere between perplexing and actively hostile.

For proof, just look at how many software packages have copied our 
approach to discussions. As far as I know, the number is zero. The 
common solutions seen in forums, blogs, and community sites across the 
internet have a lot in common with one another, and are rightly nothing 
like what we have.

I have no idea whether LiquidThreads is the right solution, but if we 
want to broaden participation, increase the number of active editors, 
and improve our image, we definitely need something better than what we 
have. Hopefully we can do that in a way that keeps the benefits of the 
current system, but I think it's vital to mitigate the many and glaring 
current flaws.

William