Daniel Vainsencher daniel.vainsencher@gmail.com wrote:

Like I said the last time you posted this list, the barrier against these people under SqP is practically non-existent. Just make them users, certify them, and send them their password. With about 20 minutes of your time, the problem is solved. Let me know, I'll certify people I know from that list.

You describe here a theoretical way to define the community using Squeak People. It remains theoretical, though. Squeak People has had over a year in action now and has yet to provide any reputation at all for the majority of people I have collaborated with on Squeak projects. Most dramatically, it doesn't even give a reputation to the guy who formed the project.

How much tweaking will it require? How much work will people have to put into making reputation designations?

Further, why is the reputation system approach preferable, even if we can tweak it up enough? Membership and rank will fluctuate as the reputation flows shift around. If the system is anything like the current algorithm, then applicants will get their rank depending on a 20 off-the-cuff reviews instead of 1-3 careful ones. And that's at best -- it is still theoretical whether a reputation system will work even to give cursory rankings that are in the ball park.

Also, there is still no answer on a critical question for SqP's algorithm: who gets the initial root reputations that then flow through the system? I guess that, right now, Cees has simply hand picked some people?

On who proposes referenda, a seconding mechanism would be a fine alternative. So one person proposes, one seconds? Proposer gets to set the date?

And a critical matter - do we need a lower bound on voter turnabout for a proposal to pass? if not, we probably want a lower bound on voting time.

A mere seconding might be enough, but it's impossible to say until we try.

An additional requirement that seems helpful is to require d weeks of discussion (2 weeks? 4 weeks?) before a proposal can be submitted for real. Assuming full members play nice with each other (and in the end, we have to make that assumption to some extent!), a preliminary fielding on a mailing list would frequently make it pretty clear whether it is worth a vote.

Regarding time, a minimum time seems important--one month, perhaps? Referenda are fundamentally slow; it's not a mechanism for fast turnaround, anyway....

-Lex