The Updating Scheme - a simple guide
Created | Updated Mar 3, 2003
Please note this is work in progress. That having been said all comments are welcome.
You can read previous thoughts on the need for an updating scheme by many Researchers compiled by Anna, Increase Mathers and Frankie Roberto.
Update Review Forum
After a look at a number of options for an updating scheme, we are proposing to take the Collaborative Writing Workshop and turn it into the Update Review Forum. This will function in a similar way to Peer Review and will be the hub of the Updating scheme. This would allow other members of the Community to comment on the proposed updates. The scheme and the review forum would be administered by a group of volunteers, who, like Scouts, would 'recommend' entries to be updated depending upon the feedback in the threads. The criteria for recommending an entry would be:
Are facts incorrect in an entry?
Is the entry out of date?
Is there newer, better information in the threads that should be included?
The Volunteer Scheme
The new volunteer scheme will be called the Updaters. We have decided that the Scouts and the Subs already do so much hard work that another volunteer scheme was needed. Some Researchers have a particular passion for updating, and if that's the case, they are welcome become an Updater and use their enthusiasm. Updaters could have had experience of being a Scout or a Sub, but not necessarily. The job could very well stand alone, independent of other schemes.
Yes but how would it actually work?
If a Researcher wishes to update an entry, they should access the Guide ML using the Test URL and copy it into a new entry. They should then make their changes, incorporating any relevant information included in the threads.
They should then submit this new entry to the Update Review Forum, incorporating the comments of any other Researchers who had commented on it.
The Updaters then pick articles they think are reading much as Scouts pick from PR.
These entries go out to the Updaters for updating, like the entries go to Subs for updating.
Anna has calculated that if we were to have, say, five updates a week going up on the front page, that's 20 entries every four weeks. Allowing one entry in every 21 as natural slippage, we would need a group of seven volunteers picking/processing three entries every four weeks. Initially the scheme will be soft launched with us aiming for one entry a week to see how it works and iron out any wrinkles.
Crediting Entries and Old Text
The problem with updating Edited entries is what do we do with the original text and who do we credit? If entries are updated regularly, who do we credit where? Anna had previously suggested that Subs who have previously worked on an entry can be added to the Researcher list, but they didn't write the piece and didn't research it. So, strictly speaking adding them to the Researcher list is inaccurate. Equally we could put a text link - "The original entry 'Monopoly - the Board Game' was written by The Green Cheese and edited by the Smallest One". This would allow us to put the Guide ML for the old entry in a new entry and put the updated text into the existing entry.
These are all quick patches, but at some point in the future it would be appropriate to implement a proper superseding system. This would work by creating an edit 'crumb trail' for each Edited Entry, so that if entry A70091 has been updated and a new version found at A200034, any incidences of A70091 in the Guide would automatically take you to the latest update at A200034. More about this can be read in Anna's updating document.
