SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Landon (45)
The Fine Print: The following are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Wednesday February 19, 14
05:09 AM
Greetings from your IRC overlord!
As those of you in ##AltSlashdot have noticed by now, we've got a new IRC network (many thanks to xlefay and MrBluze!). However, in my excitement to get the new network up and running, I didn't do the best job of gathering feedback on the direction IRC is headed. Let's use this discussion to mold the network how we want to see it.
The Current Vision for IRC
My main inspiration is Barrabas' vision that Soylent News will be one of the top tech sites. To support that vision, IRC will not draw focus from the main site, but will serve to enhance it. In order to not poach from the main site, I think it's best to keep IRC low key, for example, we don't need channels linked to from every article. However, with this real time format, I think we can do some really fun stuff. One activity that I'd like to get up and running ASAP is having guided discussions and tech talks with interesting people. Something along the lines of the O'Reilly webcasts or the Slashdot IRC forums would be ideal.
Now that I've talked about what IRC would be great for, let's talk about what shouldn't go on inside our awesome network. Spam. Warez. Porn. Simple as that. I assume some trolling comes with the territory, so there will be room for ops/admins to respond to user complaints, but those are the ones that I intend to restrict without consideration.
"Ok, Landon, but why do we need our own network?" I suppose we don't _need_ our own network, but it does leave us more flexible to:
As those of you in ##AltSlashdot have noticed by now, we've got a new IRC network (many thanks to xlefay and MrBluze!). However, in my excitement to get the new network up and running, I didn't do the best job of gathering feedback on the direction IRC is headed. Let's use this discussion to mold the network how we want to see it.
The Current Vision for IRC
My main inspiration is Barrabas' vision that Soylent News will be one of the top tech sites. To support that vision, IRC will not draw focus from the main site, but will serve to enhance it. In order to not poach from the main site, I think it's best to keep IRC low key, for example, we don't need channels linked to from every article. However, with this real time format, I think we can do some really fun stuff. One activity that I'd like to get up and running ASAP is having guided discussions and tech talks with interesting people. Something along the lines of the O'Reilly webcasts or the Slashdot IRC forums would be ideal.
Now that I've talked about what IRC would be great for, let's talk about what shouldn't go on inside our awesome network. Spam. Warez. Porn. Simple as that. I assume some trolling comes with the territory, so there will be room for ops/admins to respond to user complaints, but those are the ones that I intend to restrict without consideration.
"Ok, Landon, but why do we need our own network?" I suppose we don't _need_ our own network, but it does leave us more flexible to:
- Integrate with the site (host cloaks for registered users, maybe voice privileges for good karma users during the previously mentioned discussions)
- Have control over the services, so you guys can create any channels necessary. One of the freenode policies is that #-channels must relate to open source projects, but ##-channels are less restricted. This can be confusing for new users. One of the things I noticed in ##AltSlashdot was the high number of people who don't have a regular IRC network.
Lastly,
I'm sure I've forgotten to cover something, so help me out, I want to hear your questions and comments about the network. Should we keep moving forward with this or cancel and head back to Freenode? Is there anything in particular you want to see?
Come join us at irc.soylentnews.org #Soylent (or on webchat at http://chat.soylentnews.org)
You all are also welcome to send private concerns to chat@SoylentNews.org
I think that I shall never see
A billboard lovely as a tree.
Indeed, unless the billboards fall
I'll never see a tree at all.
-- Ogden Nash
