[OSM-talk] Make Messaging public, or other changes?

[Sebastian Hohmann]

Frederik Ramm schrieb:
> Hi,
> 
>      I'd like to ask for a quick show of hands on the idea of making the
> whole built-in OSM messaging system public (not retroactively of course,
> but change it so that anyone can ready any message written in the future).
> 
> I am not sure whether this is a good idea myself, that's why I ask. The
> rationale behind this is the following: We suspect that there is quite a
> bit of "new user intimidation" going on here in Germany, where people
> sometimes almost obsessively "protect" their area against changes and
> might, sometimes rather impolitely, challenge newcomers.
> 
> Since this is not happening in public, the newcomer has nobody to help
> him, and anyone can basically say anything ("Haven't you read that
> pelican crossings are deprecated?") without someone else noticing. Being
> what he is, the newcomer will of course take everything at face value
> and go down a path of trouble.
> 
> If all intra-OSM messaging were public (somewhat like a Wiki "talk"
> page), then even if only few people took the time to actually read other
> people's conversations, it would be easier for the community as a whole
> to get involved and protect its interests against individuals causing
> trouble, and knowing that what oen writes is public, people might also
> exercise some restraint when choosing their words.
> 
> Another thing one could to if public messaging does not find favour is
> posting a caveat immediately over the "write message" text area,
> something along the lines of "if you're about to criticize someone whom
> you don't know, think twice and always assume good faith", whatever.
> 
> Bye
> Frederik
> 

I don't think that making the messaging system public is a good idea. It 
all has the feel of private messaging, that should still be possible.

I would, however, suggest a different approach. Reduce the need for 
private messages, by carrying most regional-based discussions to a 
public level. At the moment you have to look up the user, open his page 
and send a private message. If more than one user is involved in an area 
you want to talk about, you have to repeat that for all users.

With a system much like openstreetbugs, you could go to you area on the 
slippy map, click the 'discuss'-tab (e.g.) and set a marker on the map. 
That marker creates a discussion topic that can be viewed an edited on a 
different page (could be the wiki or a dedicated system). Mappers 
interested in a discussion in a certain region could just look for the 
markers in that area. Discussion could also be shown as a list for the 
current bounding box, to make it easier to find or follow them. There 
could also be a rss-feed or email notification.

Either way, the point is that many discussions are region-based (why did 
you tag that way this way, how will we map this or that). Some 
discussions could be hold on the appropriate wiki page for the 
city/region, but not everyone always watches all relevant wiki-pages all 
the time and it's not always easy to find the correct one.

Greetings,
Sebastian