Wiki vs Google docs [was: Re: Amarok 2.0 beta 3 announcement]

[Mark Kretschmann]

On Mon, Oct 27, 2008 at 6:02 PM, Lydia Pintscher <lydia at kde.org> wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 27, 2008 at 9:48 AM, Sven Krohlas <sven at asbest-online.de> wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>>> As i know, we're making announcements on docs.google.com
>>> <http://docs.google.com/>. Did it change? I've made the doc for it, and
>>> invited some people ;)
>>
>> Well, that's not carved in stone. In former times we used the Wiki, the
>> people who do the main part of the work atm like Google Docs.
>>
>> And, I have to confess, I put it on the Wiki to start exactly that
>> discussion. So thanks for replying. :-)
>
> ...
>
>> Of course both of them have their pros and cons. This is how I see it:
>>
>> ==Google docs==
>> + collaborative editing
>> - invitations (not open for spontaneous and unregular contributors)
>> - proprietary with all its disadvantages
>>
>> ==Wiki==
>> + completely open, everyone can contribute, espacially those spontaneous
>>  and unregular contributors, who might become very active ones in the
>>  future
>> - no collaborative editing
>>
>> For me being open is the more important thing: we don't have an army of
>> article writers. Collab editing is very cool indeed, but when only two
>> people are editing this can also be managed in the Wiki (editing different
>> paragraphs, for example).
>>
>> And, I don't have a system full of free software just to let it run
>> proprietary code again on a higher level (the browser)...
>>
>> Stallman just recently also talked about that problem from another perspective:
>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/sep/29/cloud.computing.richard.stallman
>>
>> cu
>
>
> Ok here is how I see this:
> I have been writing the last release notes. Sometimes I got help,
> sometimes I didn't. I asked for people to help me with writing them on
> this list and on IRC. I invited those who wanted to help. To be
> completely honest a wiki sucks balls for writing release notes. End of
> story. Some reasons are formatting, collaborative editing and so on
> and so on. I am not going to do it there. Google Docs offers comments,
> simultaneous editing, easy invitation of more contributors and so on
> and so on and is the place where I have a lot of other documents
> anyway.
>
> And sorry I don't really care too much about hit-and-run-contributors
> for our release notes if that means making my work harder.
>
> So unless someone can come up with a solution that gives me all the
> benefits of Google Docs this is not going to change. That solution is
> neither a wiki nor Gobby.

Fully agree: Google Docs are the way to go. I find Sven's arguments
pretty lame and not convincing at all.

-- 
Mark Kretschmann
Amarok Developer
www.kde.org - amarok.kde.org