On Sun, Nov 4, 2012 at 7:23 AM, Russ Nelson <nel...@crynwr.com> wrote:
> > People like simple rules because they're simple. But when you go to > figure out what the rules mean, you have to interpret them. What is > "agreement"? Agreement with you and your buddies as to how to tag? > Agreement with existing tags? Agrement with the documentation in the > wiki? Agreement with some book that somebody wrote once? Agreement > with Steve Coast (all hail the master)? > > If you don't start with good rules, you'll have to invent them, under > pressure and with people yelling at you. Which is kinda what we're > doing here, now. > > Agreement should mean among all relevant parties. That said, I think the key is more in the "pursue" than the specific "agreement." If you're *pursuing* agreement... then you're doing all the things you've mentioned... checking the wiki, checking with others, checking IRC, documenting what you're doing so that people can understand why you did what you did, entering into an agreement with the willingness to accept that your way may not be the way that the community accepts. And, in those cases, you're still free to make your own tags, etc., just don't harm other peoples' (and the community's) efforts. The other positive attribute of pursuing agreement is that it mitigates a bully's ability to use pursuit of the truth as a cudgel for braining other mappers. Other things about the rules you've suggested - if the first rule involves the acronym DWG, then we're probably off to the wrong start. It implies that you need to be ready to escalate to the highest levels, rather than seeking more distributed and federated agreement. The second rule is too specific - what about disputes between 2 local mappers or between 2 remote mappers? I do agree, however, that sometimes, inventing rules under pressure can be the way to go. I do hope we can do it without yelling! (whoops) : )
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