[Foundation-l] Regarding Berkman/Sciences Po study

Sat Dec 10 14:53:06 UTC 2011

Speaking personally, now that it has been more explained and developed, I have no problem with the survey in principle, I understand the value that could be obtained though it and the work and effort that was clearly put in behind the scenes and I have no desire to be a Groucho Marx (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtMV44yoXZ0) against such ideas.

 The principle thing that still concerns me was the way in which this was communicated and the fact that it just popped up with no warning and totally inadequate discussion. The reason that I posted on ANI about it was it was something that looked like an advert, which I had been given no warning about or real opportunity to discuss and which behaved in a way I didn't understand. Other users have said that their first thought was that they had been attacked by a virus or malware, and I think it is fair to say that when you are making your volunteers mistakenly think they have gotten a virus then there has been a communications breakdown!

Anyone who was a little bit active and involved with the wikipedia community would have been able to see at a glance the potential controversy that this campaign would cause if it was not properly co-ordinated and communicated with the community, especially coming on the back of several foundation initiatives which, regardless of their merits and good intentions have been communicated and developed in ways that have left significant numbers of volunteers feeling like they were working to fix a problem that could have been prevented had the foundation moved more cautiously.

Because of this, the biggest take away from this should be in my view, not that we can never risk any such campaigns again in the future - but that the foundation needs to improve its communication and involvement of the community and develop clearer and more transparent ways of proactively soliciting important discussion in advance and addressing concerns before this kind of problem arises, rather than the current approach, which has been in several cases resulted in unnecessary confusion and bad feeling.

-- 
Alasdair

On Saturday, 10 December 2011 at 15:14, Mike Christie wrote:

>  that rule to reinforce
> the point that there are those who, like Gregory and me, did not see any
> problem with the survey. Those who don't like 