Requests for Comment/Community portals on new wikis

Discussion and consensus are vital parts of wikis, as we can clearly see here on Miraheze Meta. Unfortunately, many wikis seem to forgo those processes. From what I've been able to observe, that isn't so much because they don't want to discuss things on their wikis but rather because they don't know how to. Communication is a huge issue that plagues communities across the wiki-world and novice wiki administrators not knowing how to communicate with their own editors properly is a big issue that could set them back a lot. For this reason, I propose that all new wikis from now on include a 'community portal' page where editors and administrators can post discussions relating to editorial matters, wiki governance, local elections, and anything which pertains the community.

'Community portals' already exist, in a de-facto manner, on wikis without dedicated Community portal pages. The main page of the talk page (Talk:Main Page) is commonly used to discuss wiki matters such as seeking consensus for a big page change, discussions around wiki governance (i.e. local elections for admin/bureaucrat)) and more. In fact, we usually encourage people seeking to be elected to administrator or bureaucrat on inactive wikis that they set up an election on Talk:Main Page if the wiki has no community portal-esque page, but this poses an issue as wikis grow. The talk page of the main page is usually used for the aforementioned purpose but is also then used to actually discuss the main page itself. This is an issue because these suggestions can easily get buried if a big discussion is the next thread on the talk page. This also clutters it. It feels rather inappropriate to keep using the talk page of the main page as the center of wiki discussions, especially as wikis grow in size.

The lack of community portals sometimes poses an issue for global rights holders who need to post an important notice regarding the entire wiki. On wikis with no community portal-like page, we have to rely on the talk page of the main page but if the community doesn't really have a place they know 'oh, this is where discussions go so I should check this every so often to put it on my watchlist', then they might be unlikely to even look at it. It also poses issues with things like global ban notifications. Policy requires that a notice be posted on community venues where discussions occur but on wikis without such a page, where do we post them? This would help solve that issue on those wikis.

A big part too why I am proposing this is to encourage community discussions. With a dedicated page, administrators may feel more inclined to ask the community for their feedback on things and users may feel more encouraged to ask questions and discuss wiki matters, thus encouraging boldness. This could ultimately help foster a healthy wiki governance system rather than an oligarchy as can be observed on a handful of wikis. This would also help organisation of topics as now there is a dedicated page the community knows it can use to discuss things rather than wondering "Can I or can I not?" when wanting to post a question on the talk page of the main page. Of course, if local administrators would rather not have such a page then they'd be free to delete it but this would be an initiative to help encourage discussions. Agent Isai Talk to me! 19:24, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

Proposal 1 (Community portals)
This page would feature a basic design explaining how to use it, how to add topics, and what it can be used for (discussing wiki matters, elections, etc.) Agent Isai  Talk to me! 19:24, 9 November 2022 (UTC)
 * All new wikis will feature a community portal page located at 'Project : Community portal'

Support

 * 1)  as proposer, per argument in the foreword of the RfC.  Agent Isai  Talk to me! 19:24, 9 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 2)  this can work out for new wikis as they get used to MediaWiki and how to use Miraheze. --The user who loves human heads on alien/animal bodies in cartoons for no reason (talk to me uwu!) 19:27, 9 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 3)  Per the explanation provided above, I think it would be a good idea and a good attempt at improving communication on wikis. Reception123 (talk) ( C ) 19:55, 9 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 4) Yes. OrangeStar (talk) 19:56, 9 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 5) I really like this idea. Why not give it a strong support then - yeah, I’ll do that. And maybe even add it to an existing wiki. Soukupmi  (talk) (✔) 22:54, 12 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 6) Community portals are helpful as it requires proper communication and issues with miscommunication can complicate the growth of new wikis or even being closed due to global policy violations like Content Policy. My new wiki could benefit that only when done properly. TF3RDL (talk &#124; contribs &#124; FANDOM &#124; Wikipedia) 06:06, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 7) Collaboration is a cornerstone of the wiki philosophy and environment. Creating central dedicated spaces for discussion is very beneficial to supporting communicative activity. Default community portal page(s) should be created in a format which permits immediate use and provides a simple process for organization by the project's contributors.  dross  (t • c • g) 12:07, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 8)  As one of those 'new wikis' that didn't know community portal was a thing and finds talk pages clunky, I am in full support of this. --NotAracham (talk • contribs • global) 23:20, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 9)  Per the comments stated above - I have no objections to such a proposal and it would be an interesting experiment to see whether it is successful at achieving its objectives. --DeeM28 (talk) 07:18, 15 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 10) No problems here. --Blad  (talk • contribs • global) 14:46, 20 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 11) I agree Silicona (talk) 11:37, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 12) WE STAN NEW STUFF! PrincessTricktyy197 (talk) 14:32, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 13) Very helpful draft.Miraheze should be kind to new users. by Buel ·Talk·e-mail 10:37, 24 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 14) This is always immensely helpful and could prove useful for community discussions. Thanks - BrandonWM (talk • contribs • global • rights) 19:37, 24 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 15)  Since having a central discussion place on new wikis will contribute more to the discussion of issues on the wiki. LisafBia (talk) 18:16, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

Abstain

 * 1) Our wiki already has such a page (one for contacting volunteer "staff"), it doesn't get much use as the core maintainers are a small group. We also have comment streams enabled, that creates comments on the bottom of relevant pages. People seem to prefer to comment on items in-context, on the most relevant page to the topic at hand either using Talk pages, or Comment Streams at the bottom of each page. Centralizing these comments creates sort of a random "conscious stream of thought" type board. While this aggregation is handy for volunteer "staff", it's not very useful for the average user looking for information on a given topic. We've also tried adding a forum extension when independent, and this got no use. I think the necessity of this depends on the wiki. Our wiki covers a game, and the vast majority of users mistake it for an official resource despite posting everywhere its unofficial nature. As a result, the vast majority of comments we use a  template to redirect user comments to the offical game maker site lol. While I like the idea, I'd also like to be able to redirect said page to already established pages for such. We tend to use off-wiki resources for live and asynchronous discussion. |  -- FrozenPlum  (Talk / Email) 07:43, 28 November 2022 (UTC)
 * That's understandable and so that reason, admins can delete or modify the page as they see fit. This proposal doesn't seek to mandate an undeletable page but instead only seeks to establish consensus for the creation of a page on new wikis (not existing ones). If an admin wants to modify the page or delete it then that's fine. Agent Isai  Talk to me! 09:14, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

Oppose

 * 1) This is not cool. Pre-creating pages is a page out of the Fandom book. People can create it themself if they want. And there's nothing wrong with using Talk:Main Page unless the local community needs otherwise, in which case, it can be handled locally. What I might support is a Wikimedia-like system which has arrays of pages for various purposes which point to specific pages for purposes (as not all wikis have the same pages, either because they're in different languages or are structured differently). If you create Community portal, where does the list of pages that could potentially be useful stop? There's no need to automatically insert this, and "they can delete it" doesn't help, because they can also create a page that doesn't exist. Naleksuh (talk) 03:38, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
 * Again, this RfC is being proposed because communities want to discuss things but don't know how. They could easily create a page, but they don't know if that's the proper venue. This would solve that for them, and allow them to be able to discuss. Thanks - BrandonWM (talk • contribs • global • rights) 04:52, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
 * What Fandom does is something extreme like populating the entire Help namespace and Template namespace. This seeks to only create one page for adequate discussions. Agent Isai  Talk to me! 17:29, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 1) Why we cannot just edit text that is inserted to created Main Page? Something like "How to start discussion on my new wiki?".--MrJaroslavik (talk) 09:15, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 0.001% of people would put any effort into creating such a page even if they did agree communication is important. This seeks to make it easy to make discussions and encourage them by already having a page there that exists for the purpose. Agent Isai  Talk to me! 17:29, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 1)  per above
 * 2)  Using the main page talk already exists, why autocreate this page if the farm is (and I quote Agent) "100% vanilla MediaWiki"? The page should be made if there is clear need, not because not all wikis are like Meta where talk pages are used to change x, some use talk pages differently and operate differently. --  Bukkit  [ cetacean needed ] 23:39, 27 November 2022 (UTC)
 * The entire foreword lays out the whole argument against using the talk page of the main page. This farm attempts to have an as vanilla as possible experience but, wherever I said what you quote I said, it's certainly wrong. Us enabling over 40 extensions by default on all wikis is certainly not making this be a 100% vanilla experience. Or us changing the default main page either. What about our use of custom system messages? Or our use of CentralAuth, GlobalPreferences, GlobalBlocking and GlobalUserPage. And what about the behavior on private wikis where the main page is viewable by default? That's certainly not vanilla of us. You cannot say that this would make the farm not a 100% vanilla farm if we aren't 100% vanilla to begin with. Kindly point out where this proposal states that it wants all wikis to be like Meta. Not all wikis are like Meta and that's fine. This proposal only seeks to encourage communication because about 95% of wikis lack communication, the number is probably 99.9% on smaller wikis. If a wiki doesn't want it then no problem, delete it and voila. If you don't want it on your own wikis then the delete button exists and no reprocussions would occur. Agent Isai  Talk to me! 23:58, 27 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 1)  My experience has taught me that creating more topics is a bad idea unless someone can maintain it.  I have never been very social.  I love the idea of community portals, but if I am the only active editor for my wiki, I'd be concerned about being absent for extended periods of time.  Contributors don't always respect what they find and knowing that the page is representative of "Community" this will only make more work on editors to monitor their own sites (as in monitor diplomatically - as in spending additional time to say things in a way that will not be viewed as offensive in response to new community comments).  I for one don't want to spend that much time checking community portals.  I especially do not want to monitor my own community portal or to learn to set one up especially if the portal must meet standards.  It helps when there are many eyes but when there are only a few sets of eyes, this is so much more work than I'd like to add to my to do list.  If I misunderstand the actual cost of construction of the community portal, please correct me.  It has been my experience that community portals require active engagement/discourse to be effective.  Imamy (talk) 05:39, 28 November 2022 (UTC)
 * There are no standards being established by this proposal, this proposal only seeks to establish a page that's created by default on new wikis. Community portals may not fit all communities which is fine, admins can delete it. This initiative seeks to encourage discussion but if you're the only editor on a wiki and would rather not, then you can always delete the page. This proposal is moreso here to encourage discussion on projects with multiple users rather than wikis with few/one editor and to encourage topic organisation versus using the talk page of the main page as 50% of people do which is usually a mess. Agent Isai  Talk to me! 09:09, 28 November 2022 (UTC)
 * I feel less opposed but it is still work to make it work. The idea of deleting a page is not much better.  I know that the talk page isn't the best way to communicate but adding a community portal page won't improve the way a wiki is managed if those who manage the wikis are slobs (I fall into this category hence my opposition).  Sometimes people just want to be invisible.  There's also Discord.  I may be wrong about it but I feel that offering more ways to discuss will only make it harder to find all the social sections or to find all their comments.  Everything requires learning and that's one of the reasons i picked Miraheze.  I can create wiki pages without learning to use a special editor.  sometimes there is just too many options and too many things to try that no one can find anyone.  it would be better if the option was provided to add an optional community portal feature rather than to delete a built in default feature.  i prefer to start with barebones and then grow.  But shrinking myself doesn't feel good esp if i came on one day and saw that something was missing.  how would i ask to get it back?  i barely know what it was called and now after it is gone, no one would understand what i was referring to.  it doesn't make any sense.

Comments

 * 1) The only component that bugs me is exactly how this will be executed, especially in considering the different needs of various communities which may (or may not) have existing concepts on doing this. I mean this beyond the immediate answer 'if you have something you want to do just replace it'. I'm just advocating having as much of an 'open book' formula that avoids unnecessary complexity as far as it is possible. I can't realistically vote on a plan with a very uncertain execution. --Raidarr (talk) 12:13, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
 * This is exactly what this proposal seeks. I sent you a draft of my proposed community portal design a few days ago and I plan to publish it for community input once this passes. Agent Isai  Talk to me! 15:07, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
 * 1) I'm wondering, how do we really execute this proposal if it passes. I have some querries like, is the CreateWiki process going to be used to create this page, just like it was used to create the Main page? In terms of languages, how would you have have the page on a new Chinese language wiki, I presume the default community portal page is going to be in English language, so if a user requests a new Chinese wiki, would the English language version be used or is there a way that a translated version of the page would be used for such wikis? --   Joseph  TB  CT  CA   08:31, 24 November 2022 (UTC)