OpenGeofiction
# Community-owned vs. privately-owned collaboratives
From this point forward, we wish to introduce some collaboratives that are community-owned, where ‘admin’ is listed as the owner and will appoint a user (or users) to serve as the territory’s coordinator(s).
A coordinator for a community-owned collaborative:
- must develop the territory for the benefit of the community, working as a team with other active mappers there;
- cannot make the territory private, closed, etc;
- should find ways to include any well-qualified mappers who wish to participate;
- will consult with admin before any major changes (decisions can be vetoed by admin); and
- may be replaced by admin if necessary.
Official vs. unofficial collaboratives
In addition to distinguishing between community-owned and privately-owned collaboratives, we will also distinguish between official and unofficial collaboratives.
In a community of limited size, there’s only a limited amount of collaborative ‘energy’ available. So if there are too many projects advertised as collaborative, then that energy may be dispersed to such an extent that most such countries are simply inactive, and true collaborative experiences (multiple active users working closely together) can become hard to find.
Therefore, although anyone may unilaterally declare their country to be ‘collaborative’ and invite others to map there; only a limited number of collaboratives will be recognized as official, i.e. marked purple on the overview map and territory list, and included in the collaboration directory.
Official collaborations must:
- have a basic wiki article that describes the country for collaborators to understand;
- have a wiki talk page for collaboration;
- have an owner or coordinator who is actively engaged in the project; and
- receive approval from the admin team.
Official collaborations are not meant for:
- inactive users trying to get help from active users;
- users trying to get help when they’ve chosen a country too big to handle;
- other overwhelmed users trying to get help;
- lazy users trying to maintain control of a country without having to map very much;
- absent users putting a country ‘on hold’ while they take a break; or
- users trying to avoid responsibility for a country when they don’t want to map it anymore.
All community-owned collaborations will be official. Privately-owned collaborations may or may not be officially recognized, depending on their merits.
Look for these changes coming soon. Any questions, feel free to ask below.
Discussion
Comment from Alessa on 4 March 2017 at 15:42
I like the distinction here a lot. I think, in practice, not much changes other than clarifying the role of certain things. Am I correct in assuming the blue countries will be subsumed into the official/community category, and most purples will be in official/private? Beyond that, I think the only “addition” is the idea of an unofficial collaborative project that might arise between some local users that are looking to work together to some degree for varying reasons.
I do have to ask what this means for all the blue countries, however. Perhaps this goes beyond the purview of this thought, but Commonia, Midistland, and Rhododactylia are in far different shape than Gobrassanya. Does this classification system open the door to have Gobrassanya or any other blue/purple country be reclassified to preserve the high-level mapping and continued collaboration for more advanced users while not acting like a sandbox? (If it doesn’t fit the topic, feel free to ignore this question.)
Comment from bhj867 on 4 March 2017 at 17:21
Time to create a talk page for the PFS. Interested in getting more people involved there.
Comment from isleño on 4 March 2017 at 18:24
For now, all collaboratives from the overview map can be found on the ‘official’ page, until their status can be better evaluated and the list can be shortened a bit. Collaboratives which were added to “OGF:List of collaborations” but not the overview map, can be found on a page of ‘unofficial’ collaboratives. Blue countries are unaffected. I imagine the ‘community-owned’ status will be especially useful for large future collaboratives such as UL099, AR120, possibly areas of Commonia, etc.
Comment from deltanz on 4 March 2017 at 22:26
I didn’t quite get the difference between a privately owned and a community-owned territory when it comes to the role of the owner versus the role of the coordinator. In Khaiwoon, for example, the authority to edit comes from isleño, who is listed as the coordinator, or from the “admin” team as a whole, who is listed as the owner? Who should I talk to in such a country? I thought this was a change to organize blue countries and put someone in charge of overseeing them, but they are still listed as “no owner”.
Comment from isleño on 4 March 2017 at 23:14
@deltanz: In a community-owned collaborative, you would talk to the coordinator, not the admin team. A privately-owned collaborative is one established on the owner’s private land, where they retain absolute control.
Blue territories are unaffected, but the ‘community-owned collaborative’ option provides a possible path for some blue territories to transition into more organized projects in the future, without falling into private ownership.