h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

>>Editor is a dirty word within the Underguide<<

Err, since when exactly? They even have their own account: U217987

Oh, there you go talking sense again, Bel, and just when I was getting used to saying bullfinch when I meant editor.

I think bullfinch will be fine for the noohootoo, although I can't talk for the UG eds.

Well, I've not EGed or UGed for years, but I like to call a spade a spade, an editor an editor and a small garden bird a grey tit.

I think we should either

Keep the current names because WE understand them

OR

Use names that most nearly match what the roles do on the rest of the web.

Indididdly, if you say "Admin" to me in a website context I think of database and server admins, not community or content admins....

Woah, a hell of a weekend for me to be away from h2g2. I'm so glad you posted, Bel, and you, Jordan. I can type but I can only see the world through my own eyes.

I'll try to make a quick answer to several things.

1. The name of a job and what they do need to be dicussed seperately (as I'm pretty sure we've figured out). I had no idea that these terms were so emotive for people. They have very little significance for me outside of h2g2, and I've always found them to have almost no relevence to the jobs they do inside h2g2. Hence why it bothered me not a jot to change them to whatever seemed to describe the role the best.

2. We have tried look at the jobs that are needed, and create volunteer groups around them rather than taking existing volunteer groups and shoehorning jobs into them. I hope that makes sense.
I also tried to incorporate a lot of the jobs that the current Editors do, like trying to get the Community talking in the Talking Points and provide inspiration for Entries in the Challenge h2g2 forum. If we don't have staff with that job role those jobs need to go somewhere.

3. The volunteer job descriptions contain a lot of instances of the words 'can, may, perhaps, choose' and so on to try and show that a) these are still in development and may change and b) individual members can choose which aspects of these roles they carry out. Nobody should be forced to do something they dislike or they are unskilled in, simply because someone else does.



I'm going to have a look at point 2 first, as I think the rest stems from that.

We have two main options. We either have a volunteer scheme for each job, or we group them together.

For example, thinking of things that involve the Community we could have:

Newbie Welcomers
Collaborative Entry Puller-togethers
Talking Point Creators
Conversation Coolers
Moderators (possibly)

Anyone can join one or all of those groups. These actions all happen at different times, and don't affect each other. This could mean that they don't work together.
Essentially, this is the idea of the generic 'Ace' title. You sign up to be an Ace, but you pick the aspects that appeal to you. Between all the Aces you make sure everything is done. Bel, you may usually welcome newbies role while I stick to coming up with Talking Points (for example), but I fill in for you when you're on holiday. Except with ten(?) of us covering so it's not even as proscribed as that.

With the Editorial process it is even more important that the different roles work together and make sure that they keep the overall process rolling. Nothing would be worse than the person who checks for House Rules taking a holiday for a week and we're stuffed because they only told the other House Rules people, who were off sick. By having one large group that are aware of the overall process and how it fits together, it allows people to manage the process smoothly.

Most importantly, it removes the need for an overall manager who micro-manages each group, parcels out work and generally runs the operation. We don't have them any more. I know ACEs don't have much editor involvement but I'm pretty sure the current Editors hold the reins when it comes to the Sub-Ed allocation, right?



I feel that having a small group of people managing the processes that is where we will create an obvious point where the process can be broken too easily. If we can allow the volunteers to manage that around themselves and built technology around their needs, we will avoid those stopping points more easily.

It might not work. It might be that we acually need to appoint a couple of people to replace the current Edtors, even if they are volunteers and fit it in around work.




Names are hard, especially given the plethora of meaning out there.

Do we just have the Community, Editorial, Showcase and Technical Volunteer groups, and let them decide within themselves what roles they do?

Do we have new names that have zero historical value but describe the job descriptions?

Do we keep historical names, at the risk of confusing newbies who don't know what these terms mean?

Do we given them totally arbitraty names (like the Yellows, Blues and Greens) so nobody assumes anything, old or new?



I need to stop typing now, I think I have talked enough. That's what happens when you attempt to squeeze three days' worth of posts into one.

Ben: "Keep the current names because WE understand them
OR
Use names that most nearly match what the roles do on the rest of the web."

First, I don't think that any name for the Bullfinch corresponds to the rest of the web. Honestly. We're unique, and we should be proud of this.
Second, it's truly not that difficult to learn to understand a new name. We're proposing many broad changes, we shouldn't be afraid to change a few names because some people may not understand them at first. Those objections don't really seem that important to me.

Vip: My major argument for decreasing the number of volunteer groups, was that I believe there are some volunteers who want to help, but their interests and time constraints are not predictable. I would allow them to be in a group, and perhaps focus on one aspect, while performing a secondary role as and when their interests and time allow them. I know if I was a Bullfinch, I would concentrate on the "Scouting" aspect. But every once in a while, perhaps for a particular entry I'm involved with, I would want to help out with those functions associated with Sub-Eds. If I was an Ace, I might be more interested in helping answer questions (The "Guru" role) but when I find a free moment, maybe only once a month, I can welcome newbies.

So I definitely am on that side of the fence

Look we have to move *on* from the name discussion - people are getting really tired of bull finches, there's even a whole thread on ask about it! Can we PLEASE just use the existing names FOR NOW and then think about changing them later.

F19585?thread=8129740&latest=1

In my capacity as 'The Bloke who came up with the idea for the community bid' I promise we can review the names later, but at the moment it's really getting in the way of discussion.

I make a start by posting the link to my thoughts again:

A82766091

I still don't know what you mean by "existing names", Z.

Exactly which discussion is it getting in the way of?

Sorry Z, we can't, because the old names/job descriptions don't match the job descriptions we are trying to hammer out and that is what is causing part of the overall problem.

Essentially, we can't use the term 'Editor', because the term itself has several meanings. It's blacklisted itself by being too flexible.

So what can we have instead?
The Changers?
The Amenders?
The Editorial Squad?

But what I really want to check is that do people want to keep the job description as it is currently written? The job description is what creates the name, not the other way around.

As HN pointed out, there are many flavours of editor, and we can perhaps create our own.

Jordan, I'm sorry, but I think you are going to have to get over yourself on this. I can see that the word "editor" scrapes on your nerves like nails on a blackboard, but I honestly think that's just you. Or may be just you and Pin.

Copy editor
Sub-editor
Section editor
Pictures editor
Commissioning editor
Subject editor

Mentor
Supporter
Sponsor
Advisor

Talent spotter
A&R spotter
Scout (I do like that)


I'll take a good hard look through the process later in the week, and see what I think. Designing and describing processes is my day job. I think we need to understand what's in the tin at each stage and come up with terms that describe them accurately.

In the mean time it might be worth looking through the UG threads to see what terms were discussed then. I've not got time for that though.

Ben

*puts up her hand*

While I hate to bring this up, I had forgotten one very important aspect of this whole process when I was writing it up. We're losing our BBC Editors, but we're expecting to vote in volunteer Editors to replace them. This was one of the first things that was decided, all the way back in A81133670.

~~~~~~~~

Can we start again? I've started commenting on comments of comments and it isn't productive any more. We've got lost.

Does anyone have problems with this, which is the original (A82271775) but with the titles we currently have applied to it:



1. Author writes Entry and submits it.

2. Comments are made by all Researchers in the Writing Workshop.

3. If the Entry is deemed ready for Approved status, it is voted for inclusion by two Sub-Editors (we'll argue about the name later).

4. The Entry is checked it meets House Standards by an (elected)Editor, and changed to Approved status.

(4a. In exceptional circumstances, the Entry may be changed by a Sub-Editor. This is only done when the author is not able to do this themselves in the Writing Workshop.)

Jobs:
====

Author: Makes all changes needed
All Researchers: Make sure the Entry is original work, is readable, is of high quality etc.
Sub-Eds: Vote for inclusion in the Guide, very occasionally make changes
Editors: Check for House standards, change to Approved status


That's it. There is then the Showcase procedure, but that is seperate to this and hasn't generated any of the problems that this section has.


Aside from the names, which can be changed at a different time, does anyone have comments on the jobs as laid out there above?

I think there is a stage when the links for the current categories, etc are appplied. I've never done any subbing so I don't know who does that or how.

Then there's a stage when it's promoted via the Front Page, or wherever else it's promoted.

It seems to me that it's changed to "Approved" before it's actually finished. Could we have a stage that's, I dunno, "Picked"? Or should it switch from "Approved" to "Published" perhaps?

What do I know? It's years since I've put anything through Peer Review, if you don't count the GBD...

Also, one of the things I hear from a variety of sources is that some entries really do need subbing.

They need subbing because GML is a bitch. They need subbing becuase the passive tense is the author's preferred verb-form. They need subbing because English isn't the author's first language. They need subbing because there are illustrations for the entry.

I think we've two parallel processes, one which basically is the current PR process and one which is the original UG process

Author wants help

Author puts entry into the workshop
Researchers comment
Author makes changes
Rinse and repeat
2 Volunteers (currently Scouts) pick entry
1 Volunteer (currently a Sub Editor) copies and subs entry
1 Volunteer (currently a BBC Editor) applies categories and promotes to front page


Author doesn't want help

As above without the commetn and change cycle.

Ben

I think the real change will be having a mixture of entries in the same review forum. In which case it is up to the author to say what their "intent" is (from the new Guidelines) and how much help they want with thier entry. Then it is up to the commentators to be polite with their suggestions.

I think it's a cultural change/

B

I think* at the moment, it is part of the eds job (the Italics I mean), to put the tags/catogry thinggies onto the entry before it goes live as 'edited'...

Anohter thing to remember, asides the names not being important (they can be changed, can not be changed etc., etc.,), to some extent, the rolls for each 'type' of voluenteer can be flexible too, we can give each a set of dutys and responsibilitys now, but that doesn't necessarily mean, that come three months into us running the site, when multiple people who work in 'volenteer group 6A/1' and all say, ';atually It'd be easyier for us if we tidied up all the HTML before we add the whipped cream, and before we pass it on to people in 'Volenteer group Hamish' who currently tidy up the HTML, as we can put whipped cream onto an entry easier when we've got the HTML right in the first place...
Non of this is set into stone... These are all still just ideas

A81280974
Don't know if you missed anything, I can't check at the moment. But maybe it's of some use.

Current EG procedure is:

Author puts entry in PR

Incubation time is seven days, after which the scouts see a button allowing them to pick the entry

Scout picks entry, entry lingers in scoutsrecommendation page until accepted by the eds.

Entry gets copied by the eds
Entry gets allocated to a sub-ed by the eds
subbed entry goes back to eds and changes status to 'pending'
eds have a last look, add the categories etc, staqtus changes to
'Guide Entry awaiting approval' (usually shortly before publication)
Status chamges to: Edited Guide Entry - shortly after it hit the FP.

I think we're getting a little ahead of ourselves. What we're looking at is extending the roles of the current volunteers, when maybe we should be looking at getting a different group to take on the role of the editors whilst we work out how we want to run the site in the long term.

The first thing could do is to get a group of willing volunteers to take over the functions done by the editors. If there were more volunteers than there were willing we could hold elections.

The Editors would be responsible to the community, so if people didn't like the actions of the editors they could vote them out.

We'd then have h2g2 the way it is now, but we would have control. We could do anything we like with it, if the community agreed. There has been a lot of discussions of what we could do, the Unified Guide Theory, the changes in the roles of the volunteers.

We would get a feel of exactly what work is involved and we'd also get a feel for how many active willing volunteers there are. During that time we'd put together a raft of proposals of how we'd like the site to run, we'd discuss and discuss and discuss, we'd aim to reach as much of a consenus as we could. Once we'd got a consensus we'd vote on it and put it into action if the community agreed.