Add pinned post in ideas

[adamsilkey]

I don’t have line by line feedback on this, but this reads overly hostile and intimidating to me. It’s also a lot of words. I think you’re broadly going to have three types of responses to this:

1. Some people won’t read the post at all, and they’ll simply just post whatever they feel like.
2. Some people will read this post, get intimidated, and self-censor their ideas.
3. Some people will read the post and put effort into their ideas and post.

If our goal is to try and reduce the number of category 1, then this post won’t do it. And I suspect that category 3 will be a fraction of a fraction, just as it is today.

Beyond that, posts like these always feel less like guides for new users and more like weapons for frequent-users. “Hey, you there, new person! You didn’t follow every one of the sixteen guidelines in the pinned post! How dare you!” That pushes people out of the space. The PR and PEP process already have a ton of rigor to them; do we really need the same level for people inside python-ideas?

It still feels to me like we are diving full-steam ahead on a solution, when we haven’t actually identified the problem we’re trying to solve. If I were Project Managing the updating of the pinned post in Python-Ideas, I’d actually step back first and try and broadly frame the problem before just diving straight ahead.

And in that vein, I want to circle back to something Paul Moore said in the other broad thread about this topic:

@pf_moore

Basically, my problem with it is that it’s becoming a forum for people who want things from Python, as opposed to people who want to contribute to Python. While I appreciate that not everyone has the expertise to contribute (for example) C code to implement a highly optimised data structure into Python’s stdlib, I do expect people to participate with an attitude of “if I’m not willing to do the work myself, what right to I have to expect anyone else to do it for me?” And it’s not necessarily anything specific that I want them to do. It’s just an approach - if someone says “this has come up before” then go and look rather than saying “can you give me a link?” (if they could do so without effort, they would have!)

So in that vein, here’s how I would frame the problems:

1. Python Core Dev participation in Python-Ideas is declining over time.
2. The signal-to-noise ratio in Python-Ideas is increasing over time, i.e. the average quality of posts to python-ideas is low.

Similarly, if I were king of the Python Ideas forum, I would list my goals for the forum to be thus:

1. Increase participation by Python Core Devs.
2. Increase the overall quality of posts and discussions (improve the Signal, reduce the Noise).
3. Provide a welcoming environment to everyone who wants to contribute to the language, new and old.

I think those aren’t mutually exclusive goals.

And again, while I don’t have line-by-line feedback, I don’t think a big bold headline of “Please read this message before posting” is friendly or welcoming. Here’s a draft I just came up with on how I’d introduce a pinned post:

Welcome to Python Ideas!

This is the home for people who want to contribute to Python. Would you like to change something in Python? Then this might be the category for you!

Python’s been around for a long time, and proposing changes to the language can be difficult and intimidating. This category is for well-formed proposals and discussion. If your idea isn’t fully baked, then you might want to start in to get some initial feedback.

How to make a great Python Ideas post

• details

But the larger point remains – we need to be really clear on what problem we’re trying to solve and what our goals are.