(Closed) Proposal to switch from Loomio to Reddit
Kris
Public
Seen by 46
# Proposer
## Proposer (name, handle, etc.):
@Kris
## Proposer’s role:
I do things.
# The advice process
## Information gathered before posting
Drunken conversations at bars. A week spent with some of the developers of Loomio on a farm in Sweden. Proprietary information about what Reddit is planning. Reading lots of self-organizy (anarchist) shit. Having been using the Internet since dial-up.
## People/roles most affected by this proposal
The seven people here on talk.kiezburn.org.
## People/roles with the most knowledge and experience relevant to this proposal:
- Me
- Talk guides
- @Purzel, @Kate, formerly @Veroca R. Sala @Professor Kaos
# The proposal
## Background
Our needs for collaboration tools are:
* A way to disemmenate news
* A place to have discussions
* A way to make decisions
* A store of knowledge
* A way to coordinate
* A place to hang out
Lately we've started using Discord which I think is great, and fulfills the last two points on the list very well.
News disimmenation is the newsletter and Telegram, which also seems to be going well.
Talk/Loomio is supposed to fulfill the discussions and decisions parts. We do not have a store of knowledge, as information discovery on this platform is near impossible.
#### Loomio as a place to have discussions
The moderation tools on here are abysmal, and most "discussions" seem to be very long posts taking at each other. Happy to elaborate if somebody actually needs more reasons.
#### Loomio as a place to make decisions
Without good discussions there are no good decisions.
#### Loomio as a chore
Recently there was a security thing where data got lost. It needs to be upgraded. It probably has some nasty bugs waiting to be discovered.
## The proposal
We sunset Loomio and keep it as a historical document.
We adopt the r/kiezburn wiki, "Decided" advice procesees are copied to the wiki together with other "static" information like the kiez guide.
We move all activity from here over to r/kiezburn, using badges and tags to organisie threads.
APs are kept in their current format, but on a different platform (using a badge to filter them). There's been talk of changing them, but that's out of scope here.
## How would the proposal be implemented
We set up redirections from Loomio over to Reddit, and announce on our usual channels. We set up a mod team that can make the subreddit nice.
## Who would implement this proposal
You and me <3 Together.
## When would this proposal be implemented
I can do it now.
## What would be the cost (time, money, effort, etc.) of this proposal
It's a lot less effort than keeping Loomio. The danger is slight loss of control over user accounts, but we're not taking advantage of that anyway.
## What are the advantages of this proposal (relative to the current situation and/or counter-proposals)
The opportunity to make a nice place online for us.
## What are the disadvantages of this proposal (relative to the current situation and/or counter-proposals)
We relinquish some control compared to other alternatives discussed (like moving to some regular forum software), but we gain much more in features.
# Decision
Not doing it, have a better idea that also involves setting this website on fire.
Kris Fri 4 Mar 2022 12:32PM
I hear that you don't want to spend energy on this.
I'm not sure if the timing matters a lot, does Loomio become more critical closer to the event? It seems most things move over to Telegram/Discord then since we need to be snappy.
It does sound like Loomio was a pain to get into and you assume other platforms are the same. I'd posit that other platforms are easier to pick up and that we have to think of all the new people that can skip the pain of onboarding to Loomio.
Kris Mon 14 Mar 2022 3:22PM
The event is not actually that far away. I'd rather have a decision on this with the caveat that we don't go do comms around until after the event, but that enables us to start the preparations since it's not a trivial thing to do.
Kitt Fri 4 Mar 2022 11:24AM
Thanks Kaos, I perhaps awkwardly worded some things in there. >_>
Alex Kaos Fri 4 Mar 2022 10:05AM
I don't believe the proposal is suggesting to move away from Discord. It's just a Loomio->Reddit switch.
Alex Kaos Sun 6 Mar 2022 12:26PM
I would be inclined to agree that a full transfer is too late now. But it's good that the conversation started.
I would re-iterate the idea of certain teams trialing reddit as a substitute platform would be very helpful for reviewing this proposal after the event, when we could instigate a slow migration.
So area leads, just keep it in mind.
Kitt Thu 7 Apr 2022 10:45PM
Don't know what you mean by 'bullshit state' but sounds good to open this after KB 2022, looking forward to the discussion then <3
Kris Fri 8 Apr 2022 2:45AM
There's a list of potential states for APs in the guidance (I think). "Paused" doesn't make any sense, you're either gathering advice or not (and yes, I am miffed that someone just went ahead and put "paused" on there). I've thrown in a topic about this at the unconference (sorry, I mean KiezCon 22) with a different angle that's hopefully more constructive.
Kris Sun 10 Apr 2022 3:24AM
Thanks :) I was part of that discussion at BL and have thought long and hard about it - and it's better, but I don't think Discord is good enough.
I have a proposal that I need to write. I want to bring a "from first principles" approach to solving this at KiezCon.
Kris Sun 27 Feb 2022 12:03PM
They are miles ahead of each other though. We seem to successfully be migrating from Facebook and Telegram to Discord, I’m sorry it’s exhausting but it does make a difference.
The posts being long is just an example, there are plenty of other things wrong - like discoverability. Moving to Reddit would have an immediate effect on post length I think, because with the default settings it’s easier to determine the value of a long post.
Kitt · Fri 4 Mar 2022 1:55AM
I think Burning Nest uses Loomio pretty well...and I would say the transparency of Talk is helpful as someone who reads everything about the event. I know I can ignore facebook telegram (and probably discord) as long as I read Talk and the survival guide (and the newsletter,) then I will know probably 95% of what has been an issue, what is going to happen, and who to ask about what.