Process: discussion of questions

Process: discussion of questions

Task force mandates include (or consist primarily of) questions to be addressed (TFQ). Most of these questions also appear, in one form or another, in pages indexed at Questions that need answers (QNA) where discussion is solicited by the current sitenotice. The TFQ are often better framed than their QNA versions and/or consolidate them into broader issues or, conversely, occasionally break out particulars not found there. However, some TFQ also relate to proposals, analyses or research that are not specifically mentioned in QNA.

This organic development poses some hazard for duplication and fragmentation of discussion as the task forces get oriented and begin their work in earnest.

  1. Should all of the TFQ as stated be cross listed at QNA? Would this serve to keep discussion at QNA open-ended while facilitating direct relevance to the focus of task forces? Would this only exacerbate duplication as task force work proceeds elsewhere?
  2. Should discussion of QNA that are also TFQ (or are taken up by a task force) migrate to task force pages? Should migrated discussions be moved with (soft) redirects, or marked "continued elsewhere" with links? Would this only exacerbate fragmentation when QNA are similar or related to TFQ but not quite the same?
  3. Would extensive cross-linking be sufficient by itself to mitigate problems of fragmentation, or would it exacerbate them by enabling further divergence? Would this be an appropriate band-aid while the project transitions from woolgathering to task-oriented activity?
  4. Other ideas? If being duplicative but more focused is a Good Thing™ in the drive toward deliverables, then what is the best way to avoid fragmenting participation and orphaning input – especially new input – that bears on an existing area of focus or could become a fruitful area of focus?

As the newly forming task forces begin focusing on their TFQ, it may be prudent to make some preliminary choices before divergence accelerates.

Ningauble20:42, 30 October 2009

It's been a few weeks since you posted this, and we're starting to see patterns that may help us answer these questions. First, activity on the QNA pages has basically stopped. Most of the discussion is happening on the Task Force Talk pages.

The Task Force discussions are in desperate need of refactoring and organizing. We could take advantage of LiquidThread's summarize feature as one way to do this. Another way would be to reintegrate Task Force discussions back into these question pages.

Thoughts?

Eekim00:44, 18 November 2009

Refactoring – Some refactoring between task force "project" pages (work product such as research findings, draft proposals, etc.) and "discussion" pages would probably help, together with another "Next steps" outreach. Once the TFs get oriented, goal-directed development of project pages could help move things along. (I have only been watching a couple of the TFs, but in those ones it seems to be just TF members participating. I have been waiting for the TF whose QNAs I commented about to get organized before commenting further.)

QNA – At this point, I lean toward option 2 above. The QNA were fine for stimulating thought, but the types of questions are very heterogeneous (stub proposals, research topics, rhetorical questions, etc.). After the initial woolgathering, I think they need to be adopted in a result oriented context, i.e. a TF or a Proposal, to achieve closure (or orphaned if they are moot). I also suspect that the heavily templatized structure of QNA pages is a bit of a barrier to participation. Picture someone who hasn't a clue about templates trying to pose a question, and notice that even a very experienced wikimedian didn't immediately catch on to the setup when rephrasing some questions.

LQT – At least one task force has struggled with LQT because the familiar MediaWiki way of structuring a discussion doesn't work on that platform. It is a little challenging to learn an unfamiliar interface, alpha test an implementation in progress, and be productive at the same time. But one has to love a challenge to undertake strategic planning anyway....

Ningauble22:20, 18 November 2009

I copied the QNA questions and answers for the local language project to the local language task force talk page in order to try to get that task force running. Hope none disagrees.

Dafer4521:22, 19 November 2009

Awesome, thank you Dafer45!

Eekim16:18, 20 November 2009