pcplantdb

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <lfl@intrex.net>]

Richard Morris wrote:

> > In previous work [Krowne, 2004], I identified one of the key
> attributes of CBPP as the authority model. The authority model of a CBPP
> system governs who has permissions to access and modify which artifacts,
> when, and in what workflow sequence.

> > In that study, I outlined two authority models, the free-form model,
> and the owner-centric model. The free-form model, which Wikipedia
> employs, allows anyone to edit any entry at any time. Changes can of
> course be rolled-back, but they can also be re-applied. The ultimate
> guard against malicious behaviour is therefore the administrators of the
> site. However, ne'er-do-wells typically lose interest long before it is
> necessary to resort to administrative powers.

The Wired article describes Angela Beesley's role vandal-proofing Wikipedia
in "Directing a 'deletion' bot from Essex, England, Beesley wages war on 
vandals
and helps direct the WikiCities project with Wales".

> > PlanetMath is an example of a CBPP project, which is organized in a
 > way that addresses concerns about integrating expertise.
> > My own project, PlanetMath, employs the owner-centric model by
> default. In this model, there is an owner of each entry - initially the
> entry's creator. Other users may suggest changes to each entry, but only
> the owner can apply these changes. If the owner comes to trust
> individual users enough, he or she can grant these specific users "edit"
> access to the entry.

This might be the scheme of choice for record entry and record editing.
Every user maintains his own array of records containing plant data,
allowing suggestions for edits or permission to edit to other users.
With multiple data entries for the same plant, each user's entries could
be ranked on an excellence scale (maybe a poll or voting system) with
a winning entry picked each month to represent the "official" data on
any particular plant. This could change, month to month. This could become fun
competition for all and would help build a cohesive, friendly PIW user 
community.
Maybe even monthly prizes awarded to the month's best 12 entries; packets of 
seeds
donated by some supporting seed company, or books, magazine subscriptions.

> > These two models have different assumptions and effects. The free-form
> model connotes more of a sense that all users are on the "same level,"
> and that expertise will be universally recognized and deferred to. As a
> result, the creator of an entry is spared the trouble of reviewing every
> change before it is integrated, as well as the need to perform the
> integration. By contrast, the owner-centric authority model assumes the
> owner is the de facto expert in the topic at hand, above all others, and
> all others must defer to them. Because of this arrangement, the owner
> must review all modification proposals, and take the time to integrate
> the good ones. However, no non-expert will ever be allowed to "damage"
> an entry, and therefore resorting to administrative powers is
> vanishingly rare.

> > It is likely that these models have secondary consequences. A natural
> result of the free-form model may be that entries lack some cohesion,
> and perhaps may even be of lower overall quality, despite having high
> coverage. On the flip side of the coin, the owner-centric model can be
> expected to foster a high level of cohesion quality, but may actually
> lag in coverage due to higher barriers to individual contribution.

LL
--
L.F.London
lfl@intrex.net
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