Hi Zubin, > As a rare newcomer to the Wikimedia project, I've been thinking of some of > the factors that seem to discourage me from contributing and one of the > primary ones seem to be the fact that the way the administration is > organized and rules enforced is often vague and unclear. The definition and > the method of collection of the vague idea of "Consensus" aren't easily > found and take a lot of digging to get out.
It's interesting you mention this. I was discussing Wikipedia the other week with participants in another online learning community, and it really struck me just how much of a focus Wikipedia has on very dense rules about content, and how little a focus we have on community and positive interactions. There are an immense number of guidelines and policies, but discourse on-wiki is often mainly a string of references to these policies and guidelines - which is baffling for anyone unfamiliar with them, and doubtless a big turnoff for anyone who *isn't* familiar with them who wants to take part (even if you can navigate the technical aspects of talking to people.) By contrast, praise, thanks and encouragement are fairly scarce. Regards, Chris _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
