Current wiki access status

[Gunnar Hjalmarsson]

On 2016-06-05 01:10, Elizabeth K. Joseph wrote:
> The wikis are locked down to only two teams: ~ubuntu-members and a 
> Canonical team.
> 
> We had to remove ~ubuntu-etherpad some time ago because it had:
> 
> 1. Some teams that were open (like some LoCos), so spammers joined 
> those teams en masse to gain access. As a result, the wiki got
> spammed and those real teams got filled with spam accounts. Very
> frustrating.
> 
> 2. The administrative burden of combating spammers who requested to 
> join was turning into a ridiculous full time job. The spammers kept 
> getting more clever so their accounts looked real.

You also elaborated on the topic in other threads, mostly the
"Noticeboard?" thread at the ubuntu-doc list. Thanks, both Elisabeth and
Pasi, for the further explanations you gave. It gave at least me some
insight on the magnitude of the problem which I didn't have before.

> On Thursday popey proposed a new team that he and a few others have 
> volunteered to be moderators of. It's not created yet, but it will 
> likely be a fully moderated team so the admins don't get flooded
> with join requests again, and people have to explicitly request
> access from the admins and justify their request (possibly by sharing
> some legitimate prior work they've done in the community if we don't
> know them already).

Sounds like some kind of "Ubuntu membership light". Show that you are
trustworthy, and you'll get edit access. May put out the fire in the
short term. As others have said, I agree it seems to be the best we can
do at the moment.

But whatever the solution will be, the requirements/criteria must be
clearly disclosed IMNSHO. Just like the requirements for Ubuntu
membership and membership of other moderated teams which give you access
to various things.


I can't help thinking of a consequence of this, which hasn't been
mentioned yet. The community help wiki is huge, and one well known
problem is that it contains a lot of outdated information.

Sometimes we get requests for changes - via bug reports or mailing lists
- to help wiki pages. Personally I have more often than not and up to
now replied to such requests with: "It's a wiki. If you know how it can
be improved, please go ahead and do it." How should we respond to such
requests going forward?

A wiki is a wiki is a wiki. As opposed to peer reviewed official
documentation. But the community help wiki is not truly a wiki any
longer, is it? And if not, what is it?

What comes to mind is that it's suddenly even more important than
previously to launch a plan for dropping outdated/unmaintained contents
from the community help wiki. I'm assuming that it would be unrealistic
that a small team of volunteers would have the time and knowledge
necessary to keep help wiki pages, which were long ago abandoned by
their creators, up to date.

-- 
Gunnar Hjalmarsson
https://launchpad.net/~gunnarhj