> > "What *was* at issue here is how we treat new users; the discussion was > approached (on the part of our editors) either as a battleground/fight, or > in a quite patronising way. The issue here was that someone was put off > from raising the issues." > > The "expertise" that is most valued at Wikipedia is expertise in Wikipedia > itself - its policies, procedures, technology, etc - rather than expertise > in the content. That's a fundamental cultural flaw if the project is to > succeed. >
In a sense; though, as one academic pointed out to me, writing an encyclopaedia is a skill in itself. And just because one is a topic area expert does not immediately make them the most capable of writing the article (in some respects it makes them less capable than an interested layman). > In reference to other comments here about the treatment of new editors, > there has been a noticeable (to me at least) shift away from the role of > administrators and "senior editors" from helping newcomers overcome the > challenges to finding them a nuisance. I don't think this is an issue of sysops or "senior editors" - it is ingrained in the vast majority of the community. For example we know it is common in newer/younger editors to "bite" or otherwise apply policy too strongly - because with regularity we have to deal with the fall out (i.e. mentor them). I see the same issues with content editors as well; with resistance to anyone trying to add content to articles they've invested in (I don't just mean subject matter experts). Realistically *we are all part of the problem*. You, me, etc. because the problem is the entire ecosystem. Even stuff we think is polite and sensible might be incomprehensible to a newbie. Simple things like linking to, or quoting, parts of policy instead of taking time to write a simple explanation. The use of templates. The resistance to listen to arguments. It all adds up into a confusing user experience. This is not a new problem; many online communities suffer, and have suffered, from it. All of the things I mentioned are useful once your dealing with editors aware of the workings - it's not "new and scary" at that point and acts as a useful shortcut to streamline our interaction. The key thing to work on, I think, is easing newbies into that process without bombarding them with too much of it at once. Tom _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
