User talk:Philralph

Ideas re 'Towards sustainable wikicities' or similar title, to follow.

Preliminary notes
Not a joke! OK, many maybe not interested in sustainability, maybe don't know or care what it means, maybe it's the wrong way of describing the thing, just a first stab.

To include - a place to share, grow, develop ideas / tips to sustain wikiciities at various possible stages of development.

Idea of adopt a wiki great - but (and with all due respect) slight feeling of better, if at all possible (I don't know if so but just exploring) to support stuff before chance of founder burnt out, etc, rather than after. (something like it's the people and their initial enthusiasms that matter just as much as their creations - emphasising the seeing of wikicities as not just information stores but also communities and potential communities)

If founders and others invest their time and enthusiasm in starting wikis what sort of environment will be best for them to sustain their creations to enable them to reach some sort of self-sustaining maturity?

Possible broad development stages

 * New - created within last 2 months - analogies: just germinated seedlings, hamlet (?)
 * Created 2 to 6 months ago - tender young plants, saplings - need for 'virtual potting shed' or similar which translates (thought of 'nursery' but don't like as sounds patronising), frontierstown (?)
 * Created 6 months to 2 years ago - growing but still not really mature enough to be profoundly and robustly self-sustaining - large town but not yet really a city (?)
 * 2 years plus - potential for self-sustaining (or not) obvious by them? (other possible interests by then - sustaining / enriching the wider wikisphere?) - potential to become virtual equivalents of down town New York, central London, Barcelona, Venice, etc, etc.

Some basic ideas for possibilities
If there's anything in this idea of development stages, are there possibilities for some sort of place / page(s) to explore / focus on ideas / tips for meeting, sharing collaborating on broad basic developmental challenges amongst self-selecting groups of wikicities in those developmental stages? (Self -selecting important - not about creating work for the main people in wikicities, but encouraging mutual self- help)

Maybe just spaces to reinforce / promote existing ideas, eg. sister cities pages, wikinodes, publicity ideas, networking ideas, linking with wikis beyond wikicities, or maybe more possibilities (don't know if we don't ask, explore?) - even if just spaces for discussion with other wikicities at similar developmental stages in the first place?

Deep significance of diversity
Idea of celebrating, encouraging and building on diversity. In nature isn't it diverse ecosystems which last longest? In economics isn't it diverse local economies which are the most robust?

In particular finding ways to empasise that wikicities DOES include potential for (less transient?) kind of stuff than (and again with all due respect to these) Sci Fi (I'm a sci fi fan myself), computing and gaming. Potential to offer something to those who see beyond just wanting instant, or quick results (doesn't a lot of community dvelopment wisdom emphasise that it takes time to build community - why should this be any differnt for virtual community?) By some perspectives even 2 years is a ridiculously short time, may be not quite the perspective of the Long Now Foundation but something in between (?)

request
Would you be willing to post a version of your thoughts (above) at the collaboration wikicity? --JWSchmidt 15:46, 5 Nov 2005 (UTC)