Re: Web Platform Public Involvement

I don't think we need to drop everything and install Discourse. But we 
should be aware that the mailing list is a barrier to casual 
participation in discussions. Something to keep in mind as we evolve the 
platform.

That's a great point about the Twitter account. It would be great to 
have more than one person monitoring it, and responding to mentions.

--Janet


On 6/6/13 5:10 PM, Jonathan Garbee wrote:
> I'm not a fan of having yet-another piece of software installed for 
> people to need to go to and have an account for. I believe we are 
> already complicated enough when it comes to accounts and software, 
> plus it is Ruby on Rails based which I don't think most here are 
> familiar with, which adds more things to the mix.
>
> However, I do agree with the idea of intermediaries. It really doesn't 
> end up like a game of telephone, someone simply voices their issue to 
> someone in a group of people and they can be pretty sure that it will 
> be looked into. I can see now from one of the recent tweets there are 
> some people who asked valid questions in response, but never got a 
> response from @webplatform. Having some "relations" people who you 
> could target with that (and who would also have access to the 
> @webplatform Twitter account and other social platforms) could be very 
> useful in aiding contributions.
>
>
> On Thu, Jun 6, 2013 at 5:50 PM, Janet Swisher <jswisher@mozilla.com 
> <mailto:jswisher@mozilla.com>> wrote:
>
>     On 6/6/13 4:14 PM, Nic da Costa wrote:
>>     Hey Everyone
>>
>>     I have been chatting with some folks over in IRC about general
>>     public involvement and how we can look at improving this aspect
>>     and one of the ideas that came up was to setup a sort of "Dev
>>     Rel" team. The aim of the team would be to be the main interface
>>     with the public, sort of a buffer or intermediate for those
>>     people who do not wish to take part in the mailing list but have
>>     ideas to bounce around. The aim of this would be to try and
>>     improve our channel of communication with the general public, to
>>     get more involvement, even if it is for some base ideas. The team
>>     could then report on people's behalf and carry on any discussions
>>     that need to take place.
>>
>>     They could also act as an entry point and help any new comers on
>>     how to get started, even if it means pointing them in the right
>>     direction or telling them who would be best to speak to.
>
>     I like the idea of having "welcomers" who help people get started
>     and connect them to appropriate other people. I don't like the
>     idea of such people becoming intermediaries who end up having
>     extended games of "telephone" between the list and others. That
>     doesn't seem like it would be good for anyone involved.
>
>     It sounds like the mailing list is a barrier to entry. Casual
>     participation is discouraged by having to subscribe to the mailing
>     list (and implicitly, receive all of the list traffic in your
>     inbox) in order to post something. Maybe we should move towards a
>     communication channel that is easier to drop into, like a
>     web-based discussion forum (for example, Discourse,
>     http://www.discourse.org/).
>
>     We previously had a Q&A forum, but that was geared toward support
>     rather than discussion. (BTW, the forum link on this page:
>     http://talk.webplatform.org/ no longer works.) I thought we were
>     keeping it around, but hidden, but maybe I misunderstood. In any
>     case, it would not really be suitable as a replacement for the
>     mailing list.
>
>
>     -- 
>     Janet Swisher <mailto:jREMOVEswisher@mozilla.com>
>     Mozilla Developer Network <https://developer.mozilla.org>
>     Developer Engagement Community Organizer
>
>


-- 
Janet Swisher <mailto:jREMOVEswisher@mozilla.com>
Mozilla Developer Network <https://developer.mozilla.org>
Developer Engagement Community Organizer