Improving the self-sufficiency info[edit source]
Chris,
Saw the tweet on improving the Self-Sufficiency page/part of Appropedia.
A couple of observations.
It seems there is lots of interest in self-sufficiency in and out of Appropedia, but self-sufficiency seems to be subordinate to other challenges (light for reading at night, sustainable farming, milling processes, and so on).
There is information within Appropedia that deals with self-sufficiency.
With these observations in mind, I think there needs to be a brief (a week, a month, two months?) asynchronous, moderated discussion about Appropedia and other projects that promote, support, and encourage self-sufficiency. The discussion should seek to discover how contributors and users want to use information (drawn out of existing projects and included separately here, left alone in existing projects, drawn out and linked to each other via a matrix of sorts).
My initial gut feeling is that this page should look at self-sufficiency from a very high level (macro) view that incorporates approaches to and in existing cultures, societal needs for and reasons for self-sufficiency, organizational and personal applications of self-sufficiency.
The macro view could then link to existing materials in and out of Appropedia as appropriate. Such a high level framework might also promote participation, contributions, gap identification, and then a usable interface.
The short, quick solution is to identify existing contributions that meet some level of self-sufficiency and create links to them from this page.
Let me know what you think.
I have very little time available, but I could do some work on this.
Preston
- Perhaps the best place for the discussion is on Global Swadeshi - what do you think?
- Your idea for how to structure it is good. For linking to other materials, I'm thinking about a portal, something like Portal:Green living. But the portal is different from a page that gives background, discusses societal needs etc, so probably both pages linked would be needed. I'm not sure - this is actually a structural issue that affects other pages too, so anything worked out here would be useful for Appropedia as a whole.
- Any time you can spare, long or short, would be great. I'm short of time myself, but I can prioritize this. Thanks Preston! --Chriswaterguy 03:40, 22 May 2009 (UTC)
Chris
- Just spent a few minutes checking out Global Swadeshi. I've not had a chance to observe the ebb and flow of their conservations, but it seems to be a good place for a discussion. I'll sign in and observe for a day or two and then we can pose a question based on the above. The results will help form the portal/page.
- Assuming the discussion participation is good, we might be able to encourage and facilitate discussion between the two sites, promoting Appropedia content and fine tuning the presentation and user interface.
Thanks,