[Campaigns-l] We need a short, sweet summary of what we're doing.

[Becky Blackham]

About structuring this wiki? Form follows function. This is what many of 
you are saying with many specific examples, with many ideas of what 
functions CampaignWikia should have.

So, about function...

from Jim Wales'  "Open Letter," July 4th, 2006.
I don't know the right protocol for using the text of Jimbo's letter 
this way. You all know this is his writing broken up into my scratch pad 
form...

I looked for functional elements of the message, adding the logical 
connectors for a "Q & A" format.
------------------------------------------

    We do it; make things happen; hallmark of blog and wiki world.

Make what happen?

1. Making campaigns take notice of the Internet,
    bloggers, wikis, and engage with us in a constructive way.   

For what goal. . . ?

    2. We work to educate and engage campaigns about
     how to stop being broadcast politicians,
     start being community and participatory politicians.

Be participatory in what way?

    3. Force campaigns to use wikis and blogs
     to organize, discuss, manage, lead and be led by
    their volunteers

So that ...?

    4. Have campaigns engaging ordinary people
     in understanding and caring how political
     issues really affect their lives

"This can be the start of the era
of net-driven participatory politics."
--------------------------------------------
Our more intelligent, participatory political system.

Now take my scratch pad text and break it up with more questions. I 
think *these* we need to think about and answer before settling on a 
structure. Form enables and follows function. It's a useful perspective, 
anyway. :)

How do we make campaigns sit up and take notice of blogs and wikis?  How 
do we educate and engage campaigns/politicians?  What would a community 
and participatory politicians and people do using wikis and blogs? How 
do we force campaigns to use wikis and blogs?


Becky


Erik Moeller wrote:
> Currently, the wiki goes very much in the direction of becoming a
> knowledge base about current political issues (primarily US, but we've
> discussed that already). As has been pointed out, Wikipedia already
> has very detailed articles about most of these issues. I would like to
> encourage you to review, for instance:
>
>  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_debate
>
> and in particular the linked to sub-articles. On many controversial
> topics, Wikipedia has a layered structure, where readers can zoom into
> topics that interest them. There are generally very little limits on
> the content, as long as it is verifiable and notable.
>
> Campaigns Wikia could try to break free from the policy impositions of
> Wikipedia by rejecting NPOV and "original research" policies. I'm not
> convinced that this is the way to go for _this_ wiki. Given that the
> call for participation was to a diverse and large group of
> individuals, that would likely only result in chaos and fighting
> (well, there's chaos now, but it would result in _permanent_ chaos
> ;-). Wikis are not well-suited as forums either.
>
> I'm also not convinced that Campaigns Wikia should essentially
> duplicate Wikipedia content with a slightly different structure. While
> it has an impressive community already, Wikipedia has much more
> refined and well-developed policies and processes for developing such
> content. Please take a look at:
>
>  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal%3APolitics
>
> and the various pages linked to from there, such as the "WikiProjects"
> where individuals can collaborate to write about particular political
> topics. Hammering out the same structures and policies all over again
> would be a needless effort.
>
> What, then, can the Campaigns Wikia provide?
>
> My own thinking is that the central campaigns wiki should focus on
> these two elements:
>
> * an overview (!) of existing political campaigns across the world
> (regardless of whether they are driven by political parties, or by
> individuals). By overview I mean that the site should focus on
> _summaries_ of the positions of each campaign, tabular structures, and
> so on, rather than on summarizing debates and arguments
> Wikipedia-style.
> * strategy documents for political campaigners. How to set up a
> netroots campaign -- what tools should be used? What are the benefits
> of blogs, wikis, in a campaigning context? What solutions exist for
> online fundraising? Etc. Here I think we can make an exception to
> Wikipedia's "original research" policies. Past experiences and
> results, even if they are not "notable" by Wikipedia criteria, should
> be documented.
> * starting points and instructions to launch new political campaigns.
> This should include an easy process for creating a new Wikia for a
> particular campaign (which would be decidedly non-neutral).
>
> In this schema, it also makes sense to organize the central site by
> languages, rather than by countries, as it would not so much be a
> campaign in itself, but a descriptive and structural effort.
>
> Now, regarding the process of starting a new campaign: currently Wikia
> is very much built around the idea of openly editable wikis for
> everyone. I'm not convinced this needs to be so for a political
> campaign about a particular issue. I would encourage Jimmy and the
> company to experiment with alternative models. For instance, a
> campaign creator could request a wiki to be initially closed (for an
> agreed upon gestation period), to build a community based on
> invitations that will be prepared to handle an open wiki later on.
>
> I also believe that wikis are currently not well-suited to serve all
> needs of an online political campaign. They are good for developing
> campaign-related documents, such as a platform or a list of "talking
> points". For keeping members up to date, or for discussing issues,
> other tools like blogs or forums seem more appropriate. Perhaps wiki
> technology will evolve to meet these needs, but it currently does not.
>
> Does Wikia want to play a role in providing these additional tools? If
> not, then it would make sense for the central Campaigns Wikia to also
> link to resources where campaigners can easily set up blogs and forums
> (preferably free).
>
> This, in a nutshell, is the direction where I think this project can
> be taken. However, it is also my belief that the project, if it is to
> be successful, will require some clear leadership in its first few
> months. So, if the community agrees upon a particular "action plan",
> perhaps Wikia staff could play the role of leaders for the time being
> in order to move things in that direction.
>
> Erik
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