[Campaigns-l] Some Thoughts

[bruce boston]

I wonder if we couldn't use a set of forums that went along with the
Wiki.  Wikis seem to do a great job of documenting information, but seem
over complicated for a simple topic debate.  Forums on the other hand are
great for documenting a conversation, and encouraging input in all forms and
from many people.

Just a thought.

-bruce


On 7/5/06, Michael Coupland <mcoupland at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Greetings all.
>
> Here's an initial list of thoughts, concerns, and ideas I've come up with.
> Campaigns being a Wiki, I realize that some of these are things that I could
> just go do on my own, but it seems worthwhile to post them here since
> they're a bit higher level, and I'd like to hear what others have to say
> before rooting around too much. (Not to mention I'm probably not familiar
> enough with Wikis to do it all properly...)
>
> - The direction that Campaigns seems to have started in, and what I'd like
> to see (among other potential functions) is to act as a clearinghouse for
> information regarding various political topics. For any given issue, it
> seems that there should be a few standard sections: off the top of my head
> I'd like to see
>      "The Issue" - an unbiased nonpartisan overview (perhaps a summary of
> a relevant Wikipedia article?)
>      "Viewpoints" - summaries of the major opinions on the issue
>      "Action" - information about prior, pending, and future relevant
> legislation etc.
>      "Resources" - links to outside sources of information, ways to
> contact major players involved (companies, congresspeople)
>
> - To avoid ping-pongy and hard to follow arguments, it might make sense to
> encourage some sort of standard argumentative form, eg. in a given
> discussion follow something like a Lincoln-Douglas form, where each side has
> a limited number of rebuttals. The California voter information guide Tom
> Cross just mentioned seems to have employed this approach.
>
> - It would probably be helpful to have a big link to a "Guide to Reasoned
> Discourse" on the front page, and a small link on every page. This might
> help reduce flaming.
>
> - As Tom mentioned, I know Wikipedia has had problems with vandalism on
> topics that are "controversial." Unfortunately, most pages on Campaigns are
> likely to fall under that classification, so special handling by
> administrators might not be an effective solution. Is there a meta-page in
> Wikipedia discussing the decisions they made and what other options there
> may be?
>
> - I've always admired the site http://www.theyworkforyou.com/ and the way
> it tries to publicize some of the workings of the British government. It's
> probably a good source of inspiration for Campaigns.
>
> - Given the phrasing of the mission statement, I have been assuming that
> this is (for now at least) intended for politics in the United States (and
> relevant international topics...) While I'm all for international discourse,
> I would expect such wide scope is likely to result in chaos. I would propose
> starting off with an restriction to US politics. (Parallel wikis for other
> countries would be suitable, just as Wikipedia has branched into many
> languages.)
>
> I'd love to hear comments on / criticism of the above topics. Thanks!
>
>
>    Michael
>
>
> PS. As with Tom, I feel obligated to give a shout out to BoingBoing for
> leading me here.
>
>
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>
>


-- 
bruce boston
bboston at gmail.com
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