CZ Talk:Personnel

Future thought

I think that while we should value hard working editors for the time being (b/c Citizendium is so small) & that we should consider/respect them, I think that Citizendium should consider merits as well as edit counts in forming this panel later on.

I've seen so many forums degenerate with people posting the most amount of garbage holding some sort of influence - these forums give bonus for posting more & give higher rankings, so some people try to make as many posts as possible.

And in discussions on topics such as global warming & economy, these same ppl may argue against someone else & "win" no matter how right that other person is just b/c they turn the discussion into a bunch of "no"s and "yes"s that cancel/neutralize each other & at the end the people side with the ones with the most edits. The main cause of such phenomenon is that those people who do in fact edit/post for the sake of editing & posting are arrogant & refuse to make the intellectual leap to understand & realize the other person's points - no matter how right that other person is. (Chunbum Park 10:55, 22 March 2008 (CDT))

"I think that Citizendium should consider merits as well as edit counts in forming this panel later on." -- Which panel are you referring to? There are a number of groups, panels, etc. mentioned on the primary page. If you're referring to the "Executive Committee", we're certainly not having any discussions such as you hypothesize, nor is that what it was set up to do. Hayford Peirce 11:41, 22 March 2008 (CDT)

I was referring to the Executive Committee. I'm not talking about the discussions that the Executive Committee are having. This mode of selection based on edit counts can serve as a framework to foster such an environment - in the same way that the bonuses of such forums weren't brought about under such intents but they indirectly bring about people who edit for the sake of editing & begin to view CZ as an RPG (as in Wikipedia) - in the larger picture. Even then, there doesn't need to be a specific instance of abuse to support my assertion. I don't think that my point that soon or later the Executive Committee should consider merits as well as the edit counts in selecting its members is anything bad or unachievable. (Chunbum Park 17:44, 22 March 2008 (CDT))

I like the fact that CZ users generally don't broadcast their number of edits on their userpage. On Wikipedia it seems to be some sort of status symbol. (Not sure if this was even related) Denis Cavanagh 18:04, 22 March 2008 (CDT)

I think you've completely misunderstood the purpose of this executive group and how it was chosen. It was not chosen democratically -- it was chosen exclusively by the Editor-in-Chief, and its sole purpose is to offer him *informal* advice by off-line email. As Larry says on the page, the members were chosen "from among the most active". Not the 15 most active, simply "among" the most active. So he is not doing a count. Moreover, you seem to feel that he chose them regardless of merit. Why on earth would he do that? Suppose that there was someone who had made 2,000 edits in the previous month but that privately Larry thought she was a cantankerous imbecile whose presence he barely tolerated in CZ? Do you think Larry would chose *her* to be on his executive committee? Of course not. First he obviously looked at those people who had made enough edits to demonstate the fact that they were *interested* in CZ. Then he almost certainly asked himself: which among these people do I find to be intelligent, knowledgeable, congenial, and with their feet on the ground so that they can offer some *practical* suggestions from time to time? At any point at all, Larry can simply shut down the group, or expand it, or ignore it. It's up to him, just as it's up to me to decide what I want for dinner tonight. If he finds it useful to him, he'll continue it and he may well find completely new criteria for the choice of members -- but it's entirely up to him.... Hayford Peirce 19:09, 22 March 2008 (CDT)