Gerard, I'm not sure I understood the full context of your e-mail. There is only one thing stopping it from going live in my opinion - developer enthusiasm. I don't think thats how things are supposed to work.
On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 11:04 AM, Gerard Meijssen <[email protected] > wrote: > Hoi, > I think it is correct. There is also nothing in there stopping Semantic > MediaWiki from going live. > Thanks, > GerardM > > 2009/1/19 Brian <[email protected]> > > > This community, which takes quite a bit of effort to communicate with, > > effort which I have not seen from the development team: > > > > > Any changes to the software must be gradual and reversible. We need to > > make > > > sure that any changes contribute positively to the community, as > > ultimately > > > determined by everybody in Wikipedia, in full consultation with the > > > community consensus. -- Jimbo Wales< > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jimbo_Wales> > > > > > > > > > I've been told by a volunteer developer in that this quote is irrelevant. > I > > wonder how many people believe that is true. > > > > On Mon, Jan 19, 2009 at 7:31 AM, Domas Mituzas <[email protected] > > >wrote: > > > > > Hello Brian, > > > > > > thanks for all your insights, bashing and vocal support of your pet > > > ideas. > > > > > > I understand, that SMW is academically interesting concept (though > > > there're contradicting ideas in academia too, suggesting natural > > > language processing as an alternative, and this seems where currently > > > research tries to go too), and it provides "usability" in niche cases > > > (academic data crunching). > > > > > > I fail to see why you associate SMW with general usability we're > > > trying to think about? Is that something we simple mortals cannot > > > understand, or are you simply out of touch from reality? > > > > > > See, our project is special. > > > > > > a) We have mass collaboration at large > > > b) We end up having mass collaboration on individual articles and > topics > > > c) We have mega-mass readership > > > d) We have massive scope and depth > > > > > > And, oh well, we have to run software development to facilitate all > > > that. As you may notice, the above list puts quite some huge > > > constraints on what we can do. > > > All our features end up being incremental, and even though in theory > > > they are easy to revert, it is the mass collaboration that picks it up > > > and moves to a stage where it is not that easy (and that happens > > > everywhere, where lots of work is being done). > > > > > > So, you are attacking templates, which have helped to deal with nearly > > > everything we do (and are tiny, compared to overall content they > > > facilitate), and were part of incremental development of the site and > > > where editing community was going. Of course, there are ways to make > > > some of our template management way better (template catalogues, more > > > visual editing of parameters, less special characters for casual > > > editors), but they generally are how we imagine and do information > > > management. > > > > > > Now, if you want to come up with academic attitudes, and start telling > > > how ontology is important, and all the semantic meanings have to be > > > highlighted, sure, go on, talk to community, they can do it without > > > software support too - by normalizing templates, using templates for > > > tagging relations, then use various external tools to build > > > information overlays on top of that. Make us believe stuff like that > > > has to be deployed by showing initiative in the communities, not by > > > showing initiative by external parties. > > > > > > Once it comes to actual software engineering, we have quite limited > > > resources, and quite important mandate and cause. > > > We have to make sure, that readers will be able to read, editors will > > > be able to edit, and foundation will still be able to support the > > > project. > > > We may not always try to be exceptionally perfect (Tim does ;-), but > > > that is because we do not want to be too stressed either. > > > > > > So, when it comes to reader community, software is doing work for > > > them. Some of readers end up engineering software to make it better. > > > When it comes to editing community, software does the work for them. > > > Some of editors end up engineering software to make it better. > > > > > > Which community are you talking about? > > > > > > BR, > > > -- > > > Domas Mituzas -- http://dammit.lt/ -- [[user:midom]] > > > > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > > foundation-l mailing list > > > [email protected] > > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > foundation-l mailing list > > [email protected] > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l > > > _______________________________________________ > foundation-l mailing list > [email protected] > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l > _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
