The one thing that I would change in Josh's model is just that we are
not thinking of this as a place for public expression ("why I support
Dean") not because we don't want that expression, but because
(1) there are other venues for it, and
(2) it drastically (or almost completely) eviscerates the
moderation/management needs if we don't provide that space--if there is
no "enter your own content here" but all pick and choose and links to
forum, we don't need to vet who enters at ALL which is ideal (this is
the big diff between us and friendster -- we don't have staff who can
routinely check every new person and we don't have people who want to
kill the campaign by posting obscene or harassing posts (that's the big
concern, not dissent).
I built this in after talking with Britt about the idea for future Howard Dean sites to include rotating "volunteer statements" as part of the design. Also, for this to work users need to be at least able to tell other people a little about them.
If you're worried about Trolls (people trying to sabotage the system socially), the best way to deal is to have a "flag for review" button ala Friendster. Let the users do 90% of the moderation for you.
It seems if we can do that and roll it out, we can then add other features like uploading contacts and rating -- but I'm not the programming guru.
Yes, a phased approach is best. I'll turn out some more detail today. Then we start breaking this (and MetaDean) into discreet chunks and handing off the work. You know, the fun part.
cheers -j
