A thread to discuss naming threads, board policy, new thread suggestions, and anything else that has to do with board administration and maintenance. Guaranteed to include lively debate and polls. Natter discouraged, but not deleted.
Current Stompy Feet: Jon B, P.M. Marcontell, Liese S., amych, msbelle, shrift, Dana, Laura
Stompy Emerita: ita, DXMachina
I feel like we are getting very close to a post that I think resulted in at least one person leaving the board and a ton of voting measures going forth, but this time the term being used is "core".
IF you are here and participating then I THINK you can take it for granted you would be considered CORE. The problem is there CAN NEVER be a definition of "CORE" that will please everyone.
I do not fear a great lurker overthrow of how things work here, seriously why would they do that? and how would a great minority viewpoint come into play IF WE ALL VOTE!
It bugs if we all think that what we want is the one true way AND the majority opinion, but that we will be thwarted by some loud minority that keep posting. I include myself in that. It is a pretty crazy stance all told.
If you want to change the (our) world, speak up. Vote. Check B'cacy for new posts. Read Press.
It's a clear process. I am short-tempered about the idea that there's much else the participating people have to do to accommodate however many readers we have.
I could probably tell you how many of the 2000 users ever logged in. I couldn't tell you how often. I couldn't tell you how many people read without logging in.
I think theorising ahead of the evidence is perhaps typical for us, but pointless.
If you care, vote. Talk. Something.
If you vote, you're not a lurker. If you don't vote, we don't care what you think!
If you don't vote, we don't care what you think!
And that's democracy in action, right there.
some may care, but what the f are we supposed to do about it.
I think this whole question of "core" members and lurkers is very far off the point.
First of all, Shirky isn't defining core members as regular, active posters. He means the people that organize shit and do the functional stuff. The people who are coding (ita, Jon, DXM, Scola etc.) and doing administrative functions (Jesse) and the people who take the time to set policy (everybody posting here now). We just happen to have a fairly large core because a lot of people take the time to work on policy and procedure in Bureaucracy.
What he's arguing is that any online community will depend upon some people who give a shit about doing the grunt work to make it work, and those people hold the community together. Which he notes is Not Democratic but innate to online communities.
Anyway, I don't think we need to hash that out and everybody worry about their social standing and who gets to vote. People who are registered get to vote. That's how we decided there would be enfranchisement.
But if you don't participate in Bureau or Lightbulbs then you can't put things up to vote.
I think the central question still comes down to this:
Do you believe that splitting up the volume with multiple show threads dilutes or enhances the community?
That's really the only thing we have to determine. If people think it is a problem, then we should find a way to slow down thread creation. If people don't think it's a problem, then we don't have anything to worry about and we can just vote on threads as proposals come up.
I am always glad when lurkers show up and post. Kudos for them to bravery! Almost all the lurkers who have unmasked since I have been on the board have turned out to be Buffistas I am truly glad I have gotten to know. Lurkers who don't post and vote still count as Buffistas to me. They may be shy but still care about the board and all of us. People who register and do nothing else are more like visitors to the Buffistas, rather than Buffistas. I would be happy if they WOULD post and vote, but I think those of us that do either or both of those things are the ones who should set the direction of the board.
In conclusion: Lurkers, come out and play!
Can we just make Jilli our benevolent dictator?
Lurkers issue: I really, really try to keep up with this thread. But I skipped for two days as I was busy, and now I'm hundreds of posts behind. I've skimmed through to now, but haven't digested everything. That's an issue. My issue? Probably. Common across the board? Probably.
Do you believe that splitting up the volume with multiple show threads dilutes or enhances the community?
Enhances.
