Boundaries and Rules

[mark_up]

How about, if someone creates a group (for whatever purpose) they create the rules for that group

I like this... but only if it applied to a specific category of groups. All company groups (if they aren't banned by the end of this discussion) as well as extension-specific groups would fall into this self-moderating, make-your-own-rules category.

Official Working Group groups, JED, the JUG groups, location-centric user groups, Events groups, etc would need to be subject to a set of simple rules to ensure fairness.

[nant]

Perhaps I missed this ... if so please be kind enough to correct me ...

Is there a mission statement for the people.joomla.org site?

If there is not, I would think there should be one before discussing boundaries and rules.

[NHRADeuce]

As I read through all of these posts, I had the same thought Nant just posted - what is the mission statement for p.j.o? How can anyone recommend rules if we don't even know what the purpose of the site is. If the purpose is to bring the people of Joomla together in one place, then let the community decide what it wants and doesn't want.

It's pretty simple really. If the users want a certain kind of group, they will join and participate in that group. If it is perceived as spam or unwanted, then they will not join the group and participate. Group will be successful or fail on their own merits, let the community work.

[Codingfish]

Hi all,

it took me hours to read all this

I think to stop the group approval was basically OK to clearify first what should be allowed and what not.

Well, now(?) they start thinking about what should be allowed and what not? Isn't that a bit late?
I do understand people getting upset because their groups are not getting approved.
They see all the "usual suspects" having their groups and now the approval process of groups is stopped.
If you stop to approve groups now then you have to stop using the already approved groups as well. Same rules for all.
Now people start to feel treated unfair.

What's the problem of having groups for extensions and/or companies?
If I am not interested I will not join their group. It's that simple.

Completely disagree. A horse can always be called back

Nope. It won't hear you if it's already to far away

Surely if it is not in the JED then that is because it has failed one of the approval criteria and the people site should not be supporting/promoting it in any way.

This assumption is wrong Brian. If an extension is not in the JED it does not necessarily mean that it has been banned or that it fails the approval criterias. The developer might just have decided not to list it there.

Maybe it's time to let the "Community" be a "Community".

Exactly.


Best regards

Achim

[David-Andrew]

Maybe it's time to let the "Community" be a "Community".

Exactly.

Could not agree more.

We should accept that our community has a large "commercial" back bone, and it's part of the reason Joomla! is Joomla!. Because a large, strong, and partly commercial 3PD group. And we should not have any sections in Joomla! (like people.joomla.org) where certain groups are not present, because it would not be 100% Joomla!.

Of course, the opposers of commercialism often have a large mouth compared to the people that don't oppose commercialism in Joomla!. Like some of the comments on Dries ( the Drupal dictator) latest blog that had the idea "Joomla! sucks because extensions (might) cost money". [off topic] What do these people do for a living? They don't eat of the street, right? [/off topic]

But the thousands that use and love the commercial extensions (not even talking about templates) they by at jXTENDED, Dioscouri and others, buy in silence, but are happy that they can purchase quality, supported extensions.

We should set some rules regarding open en constant spamming, but we should not (I believe) block all commercialism. That's part of Joomla!, part of it's power. People that want to block all commercialism should know: most companies are also communities, and also want to connect.

I have a small company group "Chill Creations", and it's not because I want to spam, it's because my company and our users, are a mini community/group inside Joomla!. And just like we like to show we are from the Netherlands (in the Dutch group), we want to show we are using certain extensions (in a company group).

So again: Let the "Community" be a "Community".

[mandville]

Can i ad something into the mix. (some i know covered already )
no group can be created that would replicate or replace any of the current core joomla sites.
eg Extensions sharing, joomla core security or how to hack , showcase your links,

[darb]

And we should not have any sections in Joomla! (like people.joomla.org) where certain groups are not present, because it would not be 100% Joomla!.

Why not?

This is about p e o p l e connecting as many have pointed out, not for promoting products or services. Its about the people that want to be part of the Joomla community. Not for the company that want to sell their products or services. But you can create you own profile and be part of the people community with links to your company. Will see how the exact rules will be.

So you can create a group about Joomla newsletter solution bcs thats a topic of interest for people to discuss a Joomla solutions but you can not create a group where you promote your own newsletter Joomla addon or your own service.

If you want to promote your ccletter commercial component you list your product in the resource directory where people can find your 3pd addon.

Maybe there could be a commercial part of the people.joomla.org part but then why not separate it so we not get this groups mess into the people.joomla.org site.

Maybe something like: addons.joomla.org or ...?

But its ok for me to have banner adds like Google ads or 3pds adds on the people.joomla.org page

[brad]

But its ok for me to have banner adds like Google ads or 3pds adds on the people.joomla.org page

Can you explain what you mean here? There are no banner ads on people.joomla.org and like this forum, if there were in the future, logged in users would probably not see them.

[NHRADeuce]

I'm not sure I understand the resistance to company groups or extension specific groups. If you don't want to participate in that type of group, don't. Community sites are very much by democracy. The users vote with their participation. Take a quick look at the groups that are gaining the most members - the extension specific groups seem to be the largest by a wide margin.

If the community wants to talk about certain developers or extensions, why wouldn't we allow that? Keep in mind that company participation is very much a double edged sword. One can ruin their reputation very quickly if their group is not managed to the liking of the community.

[Beat]

Matt Herron just published at SixRevisions an excellent, short, up-to-the-point blog post about How Social Media Works and the Role of the Intelligent User

[David-Andrew]

And we should not have any sections in Joomla! (like people.joomla.org) where certain groups are not present, because it would not be 100% Joomla!.

Why not?

1)
This is about p e o p l e connecting as many have pointed out, not for promoting products or services. Its about the people that want to be part of the Joomla community. Not for the company that want to sell their products or services. But you can create you own profile and be part of the people community with links to your company. Will see how the exact rules will be.

2)
So you can create a group about Joomla newsletter solution bcs thats a topic of interest for people to discuss a Joomla solutions but you can not create a group where you promote your own newsletter Joomla addon or your own service.

3)
If you want to promote your ccletter commercial component you list your product in the resource directory where people can find your 3pd addon.

Maybe something like: addons.joomla.org or ...?

ccNewsletter and ccVMDashboard are not commercial.

1) Well, that does sound logical, Ill give you that. But as a person, I want to connect with people that use my extensions (and we can use our site for that, correct). I said "connect with people that use my extensions" and not "sell my commercial extensions to earn some money" I don't want to sell or promote on people.joomla.org. Check out my group, it does not "sell", does it:
http://people.joomla.org/groups/viewgro ... tions.html

I do understand that others will try to sell and promote, so we do need regulations. And if it is decided that company groups are not allowed, sure, I won't like it, but I will def. understand and respect it.

2) Great idea, just created a "Joomla! Newsletters" group

3) No, we already have the JED for that right? And as Brian said, extensions dev's have their own sites for that also.

[David-Andrew]

Got an idea: just created the groups "Joomla! Newsletters" and "Joomla! Invoicing" because I am interested in those subjects (we build a newsletter and invoice extension) and again, want to connect to others that are also interested in those subjects.

Self promotion is a big no, no. So I will not be ding that.

But, this is the idea: make it mandatory that if one "extension developer" created a general group like "Joomla! E-commerce" or "Joomla! Newsletters", he has to accept all other extension developers that want to join and also be admin for that group.

So, not one will have control.

[brad]

But, this is the idea: make it mandatory that if one "extension developer" created a general group like "Joomla! E-commerce" or "Joomla! Newsletters", he has to accept all other extension developers that want to join and also be admin for that group.

So, not one will have control.

I think earlier in this thread Phillipe posted this exact proposal.

[mark_up]

But, this is the idea: make it mandatory that if one "extension developer" created a general group like "Joomla! E-commerce" or "Joomla! Newsletters", he has to accept all other extension developers that want to join and also be admin for that group.

So, not one will have control.

I had this exact concern immediately on joining my first group, Joomla Templates. It was created and administered by the owner of a template club. Noting that two other template clubs were represented in the group by their owners, I posted on the wall requesting they be made admins and the creator of the group obliged.

I like your idea of making it mandatory.

[brad]

See Phillipe's last proposal that to me includes this principle: http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?p ... 6#p2142986

I'm looking forward to seeing a newer, updated proposal soon that responds to some of the community feedback received here.

[masterchief]

The more I think about it now, the more I think that the rules should be extremely light and you just let things happen very organically. You let people run groups the way they want (as long as the global rules are maintained) - if people don't like it, they fork the group So what.

For commercial stuff, I really think now that the "no commercial advertising" rule is all that is necessary. If companies want to create fan groups, go for it. This site is about people and if 1000 people sign up for a fan group of company XYZ, who has the right to say they can't or there should be a rule against? Don't sign up yourself I don't think we need to moderate group approval, rather let the community report them if inappropriate (otherwise you really have to moderate events and goodness knows what else). The only exception to this could be that the project has final say over some group names that they might want to reverse for official working group purposes.

For events, if you really want to post your birthday ... does it really matter? Do we really need a rule about that?

Regarding duplication of Joomla resources, that was an interesting post from Claire. I initially thought, yeah good point, but then I thought does it really matter if someone creates a group that duplicates the showcase for example. Either it will be well attended or not. And if it is well attended, the problem is not the group, the problem is why haven't we given the person doing it a job

Regarding spam, the only thing that's starting to irk me are the email invites to join a group. I don't consider the activity logs "spam" by definition, but there is certainly a signal-to-noise ratio and ultimately that comes down to personal preference as to what is acceptable or not. No amount of rules are going to help satisfy everyone. The solution is to continue to improve the technology so that you can keep the signal strength high (that is, the stuff you are *really* interested in) and the noise low (you can't cancel it out completely).

Anyway, I think the rules are as tight as they need to be for now. Fine tuning might be needed down the track obviously, but overall the groove seems to be quite good.

[masterchief]

See Phillipe's last proposal that to me includes this principle: http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?p ... 6#p2142986

Yeah, wordsmithing aside, I'd be pretty happy with something like that.

[brian]

Pretty sure that once the rush to sign up has died down that the signal-noise ratio on the activity logs will alter although personaly I would prefer it if the x is a friend of y stuff wasnt in the activity log

[zorkhh]

I would prefer it if the x is a friend of y stuff wasnt in the activity log

Agree 100%

[OnTheMarkDesign]

Some of the websites I've joined in the recent past have it mandatory that you upload an profile picture to complete your user registration.

I wonder if that's possible on the People.Joomla.org website?

There are people starting groups who don't have an profile picture yet, and they expect someone to join their group. It should be at least mandatory for someone who starts a group to have an profile picture. If they don't have a profile picture, no approval on group!

[magnoliaweb]

I have posted under a new thread, the new Guidelines, taken from all of the helpful comments in this thread. You may review them http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?f=576&t=516993 or in living color at http://people.joomla.org/community-guidelines.html

Thank you for all of your input. I am now going to lock this thread.