Re: [uf-discuss] inappropriate behaviour (was: Discussion of public domain declaration template usage)
On 8/3/07, Ben Buchanan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The informal approach worked well when the community was new and smaller, but now that it's ramping up it doesn't seem to be coping. I'm not claiming there's an easy answer, but we should start by accepting there's a problem. The IETF, that master of rough consensus and running code[1], is often sited as an example of a group that is good at lightweight standards development. And it is. But a closer look shows that lightweight process is not at all the same as no process whatsoever. A quick read through the home page for the The Internet Engineering Steering Group[2] shows that there is quite a lot of hard-won wisdom about how groups of grown-ups[3] cooperate to produce a standard. The IETF process is not without problems, and I'm not suggesting it's something that should be copied, but it is a good example of how some real governance is necessary even for a very results-focused group of engineers. FWIW. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rough_consensus [2] http://www.ietf.org/iesg.html [3] And/or prickly unsocialized prima donna engineers pretending to be grown-ups :-) -- Christopher St. John http://artofsystems.blogspot.com ___ microformats-discuss mailing list microformats-discuss@microformats.org http://microformats.org/mailman/listinfo/microformats-discuss
[uf-discuss] Govermance: RE inappropriate behaviour
Hi Ben, On Aug 2, 2007, at 9:05 PM, Ben Buchanan wrote: The informal approach worked well when the community was new and smaller, but now that it's ramping up it doesn't seem to be coping. I'm not claiming there's an easy answer, but we should start by accepting there's a problem. I strongly encourage you to contribute to the governance-issues wiki page: http://microformats.org/wiki/governance-issues THAT is the appropriate venue for expressing such concerns, and proposing concrete corrective actions. I've taken several stabs at this issue before, but had to pull back since there wasn't strong evidence of broader public concern. If there is a widespread problem, I hope interested parties would be willing to stand up and be counted. Best, -- Ernie P. ___ microformats-discuss mailing list microformats-discuss@microformats.org http://microformats.org/mailman/listinfo/microformats-discuss
Re: [uf-discuss] inappropriate behaviour (was: Discussion of public domain declaration template usage)
To me, the issue was not about freedom of expression or lack thereof. It was about putting a damper on a bilious jackass attitude and behavior. I doubt the actual topic of discussion was in question. Yeah, we all could probably benefit from a good social behavior class (ok, I can't _really_ speak for everyone) , but personal insults, insinuations, and conspiracy-mongering are clearly out of line. :DG On 8/2/07, Ben Buchanan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Once again, there is the impression that microformats fora are being run by an unelected cabal, using arbitrary, personal interpretations of vague and unwritten rules, applied with no sense of even-handedness. Still, I suppose that's easier than actually addressing the governance and rights issues which I and others have raised. Apparently they travel in black helicopters too I don't think we should make light of this point. I've heard several people cite this impression as the reason they don't contribute to microformats. If we can't address the problem then I don't see how we can attract and retain active members. More than once I've observed unresolved discussions cut off with a post saying wiki updated, issue closed. So, why would someone take time out of their day to contribute to a discussion if they expect to be ignored? To put it another way, if the core group is going to do as it pleases regardless of community discussion, why are the rest of us here? The core group is not a defined/invited/elected group so it's not like a W3C discussion list, where people understand they are giving feedback but will not be involved in the final decision. The expectation was that everyone could contribute, but that's not how it actually feels. I am not trying to be troublesome, I am expressing a genuine concern about this community. I don't think it serves anyone's purpose to ignore what many people feel is true. The informal approach worked well when the community was new and smaller, but now that it's ramping up it doesn't seem to be coping. I'm not claiming there's an easy answer, but we should start by accepting there's a problem. cheers, Ben -- --- http://weblog.200ok.com.au/ --- The future has arrived; it's just not --- evenly distributed. - William Gibson ___ microformats-discuss mailing list microformats-discuss@microformats.org http://microformats.org/mailman/listinfo/microformats-discuss ___ microformats-discuss mailing list microformats-discuss@microformats.org http://microformats.org/mailman/listinfo/microformats-discuss
[uf-discuss] Re: Getting legal help (was: inappropriate behaviour)
At 10:10 PM -0400 8/2/07, Manu Sporny wrote: It is vital to have people that can challenge the status quo, people such as Andy, involved in a community such as this. I agree that challenges to the status quo can be useful, but it is NOT valuable to have members of community who will challenge it in abusive ways-- any more than it is useful to have members who will defend it in abusive ways. (I'm not saying you are such a person, Manu; just pointing out that the need to be non-abusive extends to everyone, regardless of where they stand on any issue.) His replies reflect reservations that several members of this community choose not to express out of fear of retaliation. To date, the administrators-- of which I could be considered an unofficial member, though I've done next to no administrative work since the list was founded-- have not retaliated. Ever. They act to defend and preserve the community's nature, and do so with great reluctance. Too much reluctance, in my opinion, but that's the nature of this community. Andy does not get banned for challenging the status quo or expressing reservations. Andy gets himself temporarily banned from time to time because he can't seem to bring himself to treat other members of the community with respect and civility, nor to avoid borderline trollish behaviors. I think that's a shame, because much of the time I find myself in at least partial agreement with what (I think) he's trying to say. But if that sounds in any way like a defense of Andy's attitude or criticism of the administrators' actions, it is neither. Nobody has the right to poison discourse and damage the community, no matter what they're trying to say. -- Eric A. Meyer ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) Principal, Complex Spiral Consulting http://complexspiral.com/ CSS: The Definitive Guide, CSS2.0 Programmer's Reference, Eric Meyer on CSS, and morehttp://meyerweb.com/eric/books/ ___ microformats-discuss mailing list microformats-discuss@microformats.org http://microformats.org/mailman/listinfo/microformats-discuss
[uf-discuss] Profile/XDMP/GRDDL Critique
Dear all, I've been working on improving the metadata profile for my content management system. (Yes, a CMS that takes metadata seriously at last!) Here's the profile: http://demiblog.org/schemes/metadata?ver=0.2.2 I've attempted to correctly use XDMP and GRDDL, but I'm not 100% confident that I've got it right. Does anyone have any hints on how the document could be improved to make it into a more useful metadata profile? For an example of a site that *uses* the metadata profile, see my sig. Thanks in advance, -- Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS [Geek of HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python/Apache/Linux] [OS: Linux 2.6.12-12mdksmp, up 43 days, 20:09.] Command Line Interfaces, Again http://tobyinkster.co.uk/blog/2007/08/02/command-line-again/ ___ microformats-discuss mailing list microformats-discuss@microformats.org http://microformats.org/mailman/listinfo/microformats-discuss
Re: [uf-discuss] rel-tag links with #
In using hAtom I was interested in populating the @scheme attribute of the Atom category. For example: It's interesting to me to know from where the tag comes, which community or folksonomy is it part of. It's valuable information that gets lost in the rel-tag parse as indicated by the spec today. Then I found that '#' anchors are ignored based on the defacto standards. (http://microformats.org/wiki/rel-tag-issues) What impressed by is that the defacto standards pretty much entail that the last token of the link (/a/b/lastoken) and the label ( ..label/a ) are nearly always the same. This holds for nearly every example I've looked at. The concept of having a label, a visual display for a tag, is completely foreign to my understanding of tagsand yet the rel-tag allows for this. That's so odd, because tags are normally just that...the tag and nothing but the tag. I'd also bring to the discussion the theme of visual human readable data...wherein it seems preferable to have the link, and the tag be the same: a rel=tag href=/mytags/weirdThis is weird and rarely happens/a (although perfectly acceptable by rel-tag) should be: a rel=tag href=/mytags/normalnormal/a (this is the defacto standard, it's not weird like the previous example) and could also be a rel=tag href=/mytags#oktoooktoo/a (still abides by URL standards) What I find most ironic is that the defacto standards mentioned on the wiki, flickr and del.icio.us, don't even use rel-tag (or at least not yet). the HREF is valuable as a link to more information about the tag, from whence it came, related items, and the value of the a tag should contain the tag itself, as is the defacto standard and ESTABLISHED PRACTICE on both flickr and del.icio.us. I propose at the very least that '#' be allowed in the rel-tag spec...if we're writing weird parsers to snip of that last term based on '/', we might as well add '#' as a delimiter, and it would even be better if the spec can be reconciled with how tags are really used on the web, ie, the display text defines the tag. Taylor Choose the right car based on your needs. Check out Yahoo! Autos new Car Finder tool. http://autos.yahoo.com/carfinder/ ___ microformats-discuss mailing list microformats-discuss@microformats.org http://microformats.org/mailman/listinfo/microformats-discuss
Re: [uf-discuss] rel-tag links with #
On Aug 3, 2007 12:23 PM, Taylor Cowan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In using hAtom I was interested in populating the @scheme attribute of the Atom category. For example: It's interesting to me to know from where the tag comes, which community or folksonomy is it part of. It's valuable information that gets lost in the rel-tag parse as indicated by the spec today. That is the tagspace part for the URL, eg for htttp://technorati.com/tag/goat 'goat' is the tag and 'htttp://technorati.com/tag/' is the tagspace. This maps to the Atom scheme directly. Then I found that '#' anchors are ignored based on the defacto standards. (http://microformats.org/wiki/rel-tag-issues) This is by design. What impressed by is that the defacto standards pretty much entail that the last token of the link (/a/b/lastoken) and the label ( ..label/a ) are nearly always the same. This holds for nearly every example I've looked at. The concept of having a label, a visual display for a tag, is completely foreign to my understanding of tagsand yet the rel-tag allows for this. That's so odd, because tags are normally just that...the tag and nothing but the tag. I'd also bring to the discussion the theme of visual human readable data...wherein it seems preferable to have the link, and the tag be the same: a rel=tag href=/mytags/weirdThis is weird and rarely happens/a (although perfectly acceptable by rel-tag) should be: a rel=tag href=/mytags/normalnormal/a (this is the defacto standard, it's not weird like the previous example) and could also be a rel=tag href=/mytags#oktoooktoo/a (still abides by URL standards) no, this is tagging it 'mytags' The Display text allows a human-readable tag where the underlying url is less so eg a href=http://flickr.com/photos/tantek/tags/sanfrancisco; rel=tagSan Francisco/a What I find most ironic is that the defacto standards mentioned on the wiki, flickr and del.icio.us, don't even use rel-tag (or at least not yet). the HREF is valuable as a link to more information about the tag, from whence it came, related items, and the value of the a tag should contain the tag itself, as is the defacto standard and ESTABLISHED PRACTICE on both flickr and del.icio.us. I propose at the very least that '#' be allowed in the rel-tag spec...if we're writing weird parsers to snip of that last term based on '/', we might as well add '#' as a delimiter, and it would even be better if the spec can be reconciled with how tags are really used on the web, ie, the display text defines the tag. The reason we chose path component was a) this was existing practice and b) it provides some protection against using totally arbitrary URLs as tagspaces, which creates spam jeopardy. You need to link to a real tagspace that behaves sensibly if someone clicks on it. ___ microformats-discuss mailing list microformats-discuss@microformats.org http://microformats.org/mailman/listinfo/microformats-discuss
[uf-discuss] Re: rel-tag links with #
Taylor Cowan wrote: a rel=tag href=/mytags/weirdThis is weird and rarely happens/a (although perfectly acceptable by rel-tag) It rarely happens, but it would be good if it happened more. That way, people whouldn't need to have an explicit list of tags at the end of the article -- the tag links would be scattered throughout the text as appropriate, which is more human-friendly. -- Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS [Geek of HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python/Apache/Linux] [OS: Linux 2.6.12-12mdksmp, up 44 days, 1:03.] Command Line Interfaces, Again http://tobyinkster.co.uk/blog/2007/08/02/command-line-again/ ___ microformats-discuss mailing list microformats-discuss@microformats.org http://microformats.org/mailman/listinfo/microformats-discuss
