> I made seven suggestions. Only one was about actually dissolving the > office, and I acknowledged that it might be extreme. What about the > others? Why does the private IRC chat need to exist, for example? > Why can't we have clear official statements that everything should be > as public as possible and that volunteer developers should be treated > as peers? Why can't teleconferences be replaced by public-logged IRC > chats? Are these also too extreme? >
Aryeh, I think many volunteer and more casual developers share your concern. I in principle agree with your proposals, although of course no-one can be forced to abandon private communication, and private means of communication are always going to exist. I have raised similar concerns about volunteers not knowing what is going on by not being on secret channels of communication, in person, to a couple of members of staff during last two wikimanias and developer meetings, and I had the feeling they agreed with me. The community needs to be nurtured, and I think all new employees of the WMF need to be aware of it, and at first interview informed that they will *need* to interact with the community and with volunteer developers. I think many programmers who have worked in programming companies are too used to just talking and listening to their team leaders and no-one else. It should be made clear that this is not how things (should) work in WMF, and this should be an official position from however is hiring. Or maybe it is utopia and we do need to have a more stereotypical corporate setup, but I really hope not because wikipedia is fueled by enthusiasm. Finally, speaking as a volunteer who is not on any secret IRC channels, mailing lists or payrolls I want to share my experience in WMF software development. Back in 2006 I wanted to make search better, and if then it wasn't for Tim Starling to give me shell access and a couple of test servers to play with, I think we would not have the new search, or at least not developed by me. An act of kindness, but also a sign that a core developer cares about what a relatively unknown volunteer is trying to do and achieve. As for code review, I know the foundation knows how important this task is, and that it is no 9-5 job, but one that requires an extremely dedicated person with a great knowledge of the mediawiki codebase and ability to comment on virtually every programming issue. The foundation better pay this person well and not just hope for someone to fill in this place in their spare time. Cheers, Robert _______________________________________________ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
