Battlestar Wiki talk:Think Tank

Please note that I haven't begun work on the Think Tank proposal page template. I am now going to bed. Good night. -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 22:50, 29 June 2006 (CDT)

Sorry for the wait folks. However, things just got hectic at work and I've had to push this back. Feedback is obviously welcome. -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 23:15, 4 July 2006 (CDT)

Admin input

I understand why Joe feels that admin input should be privileged and that all admins should be required to weigh in before enacting a change, and I don't fully disagree with him, but I must raise two concerns:

1. I believe that it is dangerous to privilege admin opinions over non-admin users. In particular, I do not believe that my opinion should outweigh a dedicated long-time contributor such as The Merovingian, whose failure to achieve admin status to date is entirely apart from his competency as a contributor and the validity of his point of view.
2. It may be unrealistic to await a response from all administrators - of the seven current admins, several have fairly sporadic availability. As an alternative, I might propose that we require a quorum (50% + 1) of administrators to weigh in. (On the other hand, major proposals can wait the week or so it would take to round up all admins, but this will become more of a problem as the admin staff grows). --Peter Farago 00:43, 30 June 2006 (CDT)

I agree with both points. As a nitpick, "more than half" is probably a better way of defining quorum. --CalculatinAvatar^(C-T) 01:14, 30 June 2006 (CDT)

Exactly. I certainly dont think that its fair to ignore non administrators but that a minimum number of administrator approvals would be a good idea. There are 6 admins now and so it would be quite easy for several to reply to an issue before a change.--Mercifull ^{(Talk/Contribs)} 08:15, 30 June 2006 (CDT)

Ditto. Best to let our majority shape things as best as possible, although the use of a talk page for doing this WILL SUCK. Does MediaWiki have a user vote feature? Given how people visit the wiki sporadically, I recommend a 1/4 to 1/3 quorum of users or a fixed number, plus a quorum of at least 3 admins. One-half of the user base is really unrealistic, and waiting for such changes may make the progress of approving sweeping changes slower than a glacial event. --Spencerian

I like the talk pages. --Peter Farago 16:58, 30 June 2006 (CDT)

To clarify, I was referring to the "quorum...of administrators," suggesting the adminstrator requirement should be changed from "all" to "more than half," i.e. currently four. I agree that getting half the users to do any one thing is unfeasible. I also like the talk pages for their integration and attributable history. --CalculatinAvatar^(C-T) 01:00, 1 July 2006 (CDT)

Good points, here. I agree that administrators opinions hold the same weight as a regular contributor. The issue here is that this Think Tank will only work if people comment. Otherwise it isn't going to do us any good. Therefore, I would like to propose that any proposal requires a minimum of 10 contributors to comment on said proposal. That way we don't have things that aren't commented upon. Thoughts? -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 09:40, 30 June 2006 (CDT)

I don't like the idea of a ten-comment quota, which may be difficult to meet for the more back-end-ish or esoteric proposals. I think I'd prefer a one-week minimum comment period, after which implementation could procede if no serious objections came up (and provided the above-discussed quorum of admins had weighed in). --Peter Farago 16:51, 30 June 2006 (CDT)

I have made the changes. Are there any other issues that need to be hammered out? -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 23:04, 4 July 2006 (CDT)

I recommend we pin down a minimum time where a proposal sits on the inactive shelf. I think 3 months is enough. This allows others who got to vote too late to see it, for its fan(atic)s to stew about it and hopefully show dedication (in being a routine contributor and not a lurker) by returning later to re-open it for review, and prevents contributors from having to juggle too much. --Spencerian 12:16, 5 July 2006 (CDT)

Major Changes Definition

One item I'd like to propose adding to the "major changes" list is a non-passive change to a template that is in use (not subst'd). That is to say, adding/removing/modifying a template in such a way that requires going to each page that uses the template and making a change. A past example has been additions to the Character template. I think new techniques have been learned that have allowed passive changes to be made, but anything requiring a "cleanup effort" should be discussed, since reverting it (in the case that there isn't consensus for it) would be a cleanup effort of its own (rather than a simple article revert). --Steelviper 07:39, 30 June 2006 (CDT)

In my mind at least, this is a major change, particularly once the template has been implemented. So I agree. What does everyone else have to say about it? -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 08:56, 30 June 2006 (CDT)

Just in terms of a location for those discussions, wouldn't it be better to talk about changes to a template on that template's talk page, rather than here? After a proposal is reached in the Template talk namespace, it could be sent here for final approval. --Peter Farago 18:13, 30 June 2006 (CDT)

The only problem that currently exists with the template talk model is that it can take weeks before anybody responds to a proposal there sometimes. It'd be nice if there was a least a centralized list of links to proposals so that people could know where the "action" is. --Steelviper 15:55, 1 July 2006 (CDT)

That's a good point. Not everyone wants to watch Recent Changes like a hawk. --Peter Farago 17:12, 1 July 2006 (CDT)

Voting

Is a vote always required, or only when objections are raised? --Peter Farago 08:30, 5 July 2006 (CDT)

"Should a vote be necessary to determine consensus"

The way it reads to me, if there is a clear consensus a vote wouldn't be required. However, a minimum timeframe for even "clear consensus" scenarios would be wise (a day or two, or so?) to prevent something getting "rushed" through the process while all of its supporters are on before any potential objectors get a chance to read it. Unless we require a vote for them all (in which case we should rephrase that bit).--Steelviper 09:59, 5 July 2006 (CDT)

I'll clear it up after we've discussed it a bit more.... However, if consensus is clear within a week of the idea being proposed, then a vote isn't necessary. (That's my idea anyway.) -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 11:40, 5 July 2006 (CDT)

Done

As far as the initial construction you had in mind, Joe, is this thing done? I have a reletively small change that I'd like to dicuss, but it's to the Main Page, so I think it would go well here. If you're ready for it, then I'd like to go ahead and test this baby out. --Day ^{(Talk - Admin)} 00:45, 7 July 2006 (CDT)

Just want to big a give kudos to everyone who helped put this together so quickly. I'm really optimistic about this process. --Peter Farago 03:10, 7 July 2006 (CDT)

When this is declared "complete" and ready to go live, is it going to be a project (or a policy... or a podcast)? --Steelviper 10:46, 7 July 2006 (CDT)

I think it will be a pie. Or else a paratrooper. Those also start with P. *wink* I think Project is good. --Day ^{(Talk - Admin)} 23:50, 7 July 2006 (CDT)

I apologize for my lack of appearances on the Wiki, but I've been working for more than 7 days straight... Anyway, unless there are any other objections, I'd consider this thing done and ready to be test-run. -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 21:05, 8 July 2006 (CDT)

I would like to propose an episode standardization project. Is that appropriate for a test? --FrankieG 22:54, 8 July 2006 (CDT)

Absolutely. Fire away. :-) -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 23:00, 8 July 2006 (CDT)

Template thoughts

The think tank template was a good idea, but it's kind of difficult to read the proposals when they're sliced up and to the right of all the questions. I'd probably rather see proposals in a more narrative/paragraph form, with the template questions just being a checklist for things that you should address somewhere within your proposal. --Steelviper 07:23, 13 July 2006 (CDT)

It's better that way. All the questions were meant to do is aid in writing in paragraph form.... I guess that point needs to be made clearer. -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 09:16, 13 July 2006 (CDT)

Yeah. Monosyllabic answers are all well and good for smallish projects, but it bothers me to have to go to the talk page to get a solid idea of what a project means. Maybe we should make the questions commented out in the template and just say, "Make sure to answer these in the description of your peoject". --Day ^{(Talk - Admin)} 13:48, 13 July 2006 (CDT)

Input on Prodecures

Ok. This is a good idea but there are flaws in the system already, and it is really bugging me. For this example, I am using the episode standerization project creation as the example.

1. It's been more than seven days for people to get their comment in.
2. At the time, Steel has request a vote on the "creation of the project"
3. Merv has objected tot he voting process for "26 hours" - for reasons unknown.

There have been more than seven days to hear any objections. If something keeps getting pushed back just because a user (any user) wasn't able to get in their say before the seven days, nothing will get foward. We can wait 26 hours after merv is done, and then if another user has an objection to it will just keep getting pushed back and this project of "Think Tank" will become useless.

Also, in the actual proposal, was to start a project called episode standerization, to form it's pages and work on the ideas on it's pages. The overall questions was to find out why he request we create a project called episode standerization. If the project were created, I am sure he would be posting his ideas along with every one elses idea on that page than the discussion of "Why the project should be created." the question was not "Why the project should be created and what are the ideas so as soon as they are approved here they can happen.". That's not what he asked.

with Peter now on vacation, we have no idea on his availability, and there should also be a note if an admin can not vote, he can not be consideed as the "group of admins". If he is gone for 4 weeks... well.. that could be a problem. the idea for the tank was to give projects two weeks. 1 week to create and hash out ideas and 1 week to vote. Not 2 weeks for each. --Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 13:42, 17 July 2006 (CDT)

You are once again demonstrating your tendency to want to slave to the absolute letter of the law. I consider a week for discussion a bit fast, personally. I might only get to look at the Wiki three or four times (maybe less, but let's say average) in that time and most often late at night, when I am not very mentally alert (like right now, it's after midnight here). The idea of the Think Tank was not to give projects two weeks... It was to allow for reasonable discussion and deliberation of a project followed by concensus gathering. The time-table is secondary. I've not looked it up, but I bet if you went and looked up how long it took us to deliberate over and then gather consensus on the current spoiler policy, you would see that it was more than two weeks. --Day ^{(Talk - Admin - SotS)} 00:15, 18 July 2006 (CDT)