more ideas about how to attract more fans to edit

[ratcreature]

I commented in that discussion linked here earlier with some thoughts I had about what would make contributing more attractive: I think that maybe a "focus on" feature would be nice. I think it is more fun to contribute when others are working on related articles at the same time (for example "focus on fandom X" or a genre or a fanactivity, like "focus on conventions" or costuming, even recurring popular kerfuffles that could be tracked through fandoms or whatever), because then there is more opportunity for discussion and feedback, talk about what article structure would best, and you learn interesting stuff from other fans in the process or can reminiscence about how kerfuffle such and so was on mailing list X, so then there is less of that feeling of toiling in the wilderness full of frustration. Also newbies wouldn't have such a steep learning curve because they'd co-edit with more familiar people, so they wouldn't have to know or find the code for templates or advanced formatting on their own, but would just have to say "it would be cool to have this as a table/have a gallery here/get an infobox/..." And even if you didn't know anyone personally you'd be still in a group. It would be easier for people familiar with the fanlore to remember to talk to newbies too, because there'd be a common topic.

Comments

[sophinisba]

I like that idea. That discussion made me feel like going back to it after many months away, but I don't want to work on something all by myself, and the edits on the Recent Changes page these days are all about things I've never heard of. I think it would be nice to pick a theme for a week and have a parallel discussion going on here at the comm, so it's a format that's more accessible for more people to comment, whether they're getting involved with the wiki directly or not.

[kass]

I like this idea very much.