Building a community

[thilon]

Forum and telegram are just communication tools, there is no good or bad. The key is whether someone manages the content and users and forms a positive interaction

[thilon]

The value of cryptocurrency is different from that of stock. Stock has price earnings ratio. The company behind it can create value and bring capital inflow. Cryptocurrency depends on people’s consensus and emotions. So, first, cryptocurrencies come to a consensus through the community, second is technology

[freigeist]

Not entirely. Blockchain as infrastructure and ecosystem could create value as well.
So for example having applications using blockchain could generate more activity on the blockchain
more transactions and those people holding the token could harvest more fees .

More activity = more fees = token price increase.
There could still be price earning ratio also in cryptocurrency.

[DaveH]

Hi @rb2nem

Sorry the reply took a bit longer than planned, this is great post and its really good to see you both still around and keen to get involved. There feels to be an early group of people with similar feelings which is great to see.

Everything in your post is very sensible, well measured and on point. Couple of specific points to respond on below:

Transparency: to feel involved in a project, people need to know what happens in that project so that they can participate if they so wish

This is something we are trying to achieve as quickly as we can, there will be a few bits that take longer than others but if anyone has questions (forward looking ones) that they want to know, we genuinely encourage them to be asked. Any dev that isn’t out in the open already will be moved into the open as we can, some of it is outsourced and under contract etc so it may not be immediate but will be worked towards.

Openness: there’s no point to be transparent if any and all proposal coming from non-core community member is rejected

This whole section makes complete sense, I’d encourage anyone who has a proposal to put it out the community (as you rightly state, which includes core…and the entities).

Responsivity: People interested to get involved in the community, will probably come to the forum with a simple question

This one is likely be a combination of being open and transparent enough that the community feel they also have the information to answer questions, coupled with responsive support. If anyone spots a topic that isn’t getting answers quick enough, I would encourage them to push it into TG or somewhere as it is very unlikely to be intentional. Its a challenge to have the people with the information be active all the time because it stops them doing things like coding, but its also important that are accessible. I know for the tech questions slack is generally the quickest one for a response. You are right as well - @gevs does a great job of balancing work and being responsive.

And later on, who knows, maybe new leaders will emerge based on their achievements, bringing new and fresh energy to the project

I think this is the panacea/best end game, the intent with these changes is to push the progress forward hard in the short-medium term and ensure we reinvigorate the community at the same time, to make it a welcoming, more active place, with the hope that over time it doesn’t need that extra motivation/reinvigoration. Time will tell if we get there or not, but there feels to be a good energy building from various members of the community.

@Stinghe_Dorian Discord looks to be building well 53 offline and 8 online just now, so I assume that is ~60 in total, about 6x since your message above

Thanks again for your post, and look forward to being part of the community with you

[eddy]

You can join the discord group! Thank you @Stinghe_Dorian
https://discord.gg/7xVnur9

[rb2nem]

Thanks @DaveH for your encouraging answer.

I hope the Core Team and NEM Group are sharing your constructive approach. Every change is challenging, for everyone involved. Those possibly most impacted would be the Core Team, as they currently work in isolation from the rest of the community (that’s my sentiment at least). I imagine there might be fears that opening up to the community could block their decision process. That’s why I wanted to highlight this part of my message:

@rb2nem

Having an active community does not mean no one’s responsible, or that all decisions are collegial, or that decisions have to be justified endlessly. Sometimes people will not agree and possibly be angry. But things can be accepted more easily when these decisions are taken and defended by people respected in the community.

Having a community shouldn’t replace what’s working, but it should augment it where’s it’s lacking.

I hope you guys take the right decisions at this critical point. Don’t hesitate to share your questions, difficulties and fears with the rest of the community. It needn’t be formal. And it could help in several ways: not only help you make better decisions, but also grow the support for these decisions in the rest of the community

[Jaguar0625]

@rb2nem

Those possibly most impacted would be the Core Team, as they currently work in isolation from the rest of the community (that’s my sentiment at least).

Core Team doesn’t really have any day-to-day project responsibilities. It can be thought of primarily as a grant approving body:

@Jaguar0625

The Core Team reviews proposals approved by the community in order to add an extra layer of due diligence to avoid funding suboptimal activities. As part of the review, the team generally interacts with a proposal team and requests more detailed information in order to better assess the proposal’s impact on the ecosystem. The Core Team retains veto power due to this imbalance of information. Veto power can be used for any reason, but, typically, it is only used when multiple proposals are substantially similar and should be combined or a new proposal is diametrically opposed to a previously funded proposal.

Core Devs already work closely on catapult development with developers across the ecosystem (previously NEM Studios and NEM Foundation, now NEM Group). We don’t really have the bandwidth to lead developer outreach and have expected other entities to do so. Going forward, this should be part of NEM Group’s responsibilities.

@rb2nem

I hope the Core Team and NEM Group are sharing your constructive approach.

@DaveH is a director of NEM Group.

[rb2nem]

Great to see you join the discussion!

@Jaguar0625

Core Devs already work closely on catapult development with developers across the ecosystem (previously NEM Studios and NEM Foundation, now NEM Group). We don’t really have the bandwidth to lead developer outreach and have expected other entities to do so. Going forward, this should be part of NEM Group’s responsibilities.

Your job is certainly not to do developer outreach. But between the current situation where Core Devs are nearly absent from the community, and doing developer outreach, there’s certainly an optimum to be found for the NEM project.

The developers ecosystem should also be open and welcoming, not limited to a well defined group. If we want the community to grow, anyone interested should be able to interact with Core Devs and other developers. They shouldn’t have to be part of the NEM group for that.

Let me compare to the development of the Linux kernel. Does the main developer Linus do developer outreach? No. Is OS development more accessible than blockchain? I don’t think so. Can anyone join the linux kernel mailing list? Yes. Does Linus have to answer every developer question? No, because there are other developers that joined and can answer in his place.

The answer will depend on Core Devs’ preferences, but I think that the distance between the Core Devs and the rest of the community is a problem that should be tackled. A better communication channel could be a good start (mailing list? Dedicated forum?).

@Jaguar0625

@DaveH is a director of NEM Group.

I assume that in an informal discussion as on the forum, @DaveH is giving his own opinion and not talking in name of the whole NEM Group.

[Jaguar0625]

@rb2nem

But between the current situation where Core Devs are nearly absent from the community

I would have to disagree with this. We are all fairly active on nem2.slack.com and most questions are answered well within 24 hours by someone.

@gimre and I also are active on twitter and engage with the community there.

@rb2nem

anyone interested should be able to interact with Core Devs and other developers

I don’t know what is stopping interested parties now?

[DaveH]

@rb2nem

I assume that in an informal discussion as on the forum, @DaveH is giving his own opinion and not talking in name of the whole NEM Group

Depends on the topic, most of the time the two are aligned, its very unlikely my personal opinion differs from the NEM Group one. I will try and flag where it is separate but if you don’t see it deliberately delineated then I have usually discussed it with the others and checked its what everyone agrees with before posting

[rb2nem]

@Jaguar0625

I would have to disagree with this. We are all fairly active on nem2.slack.com and most questions are answered well within 24 hours by someone.

@gimer and I also are active on twitter and engage with the community there.

Getting an answer to questions was (I’ve become much less active now) usually ok, and I certainly don’t want to minimize your efforts regarding that. That’s really positive!

But is slack the Core Devs’ main channel of communication for development discussions? Or do you have a private communication channel not accessible to outsiders? I think that last option would be detrimental to the community building initiative. Having all discussion by default happening in a public channel is a sign of an inclusive community. Private discussions by default much less so.

I also share the opinion that it would be preferable to have technical questions handled in a forum. It accumulates knowledge over time and generates less expectations to have an immediate answer.

@Jaguar0625

I don’t know what is stopping interested parties now?

For example identifying where to go, though I agree that this is not Core Devs’ problem. Telegram is mentioned on https://nem.io/developers/ , but not Slack. The forum is also mentioned, but it was in the past looking as inactive.

I think that to build a successful community, all development matters (including discussions) from core to mobile wallet should be done in the open by default, from the start, and all this should be easily accessible. That lowers the barrier to entry to the community. Current tools or their usage don’t seem to be optimal in that regard.

[rb2nem]

@DaveH

Depends on the topic, most of the time the two are aligned, its very unlikely my personal opinion differs from the NEM Group one. I will try and flag where it is separate but if you don’t see it deliberately delineated then I have usually discussed it with the others and checked its what everyone agrees with before posting

thanks for the clarification! Your constructive answer is even more great than I thought then

Looking forward to seeing the community re-engagement initiative! Let’s hope you guys find the right balance for everyone in the community

[Jaguar0625]

@rb2nem

But is slack the Core Devs’ main channel of communication for development discussions? Or do you have a private communication channel not accessible to outsiders?

For product and feature discussions, slack is the preferred location. For day-to-day development discussions, we have a separate place where the three of us chat. We cannot use slack for the latter due to its message limit.

[thilon]

You are right, but the forum is also a public place. Apart from communication, it is important to show the world what has been done and what is doing. Maybe people in NEM has had a heated discussion in some place, but the people outside don’t know.People outside or on the forum will think that nothing has happened or done.

[rb2nem]

@Jaguar0625

For day-to-day development discussions, we have a separate place where the three of us chat. We cannot use slack for the latter due to its message limit.

I didn’t raise this point until now as we focused on the approach to build a community, and not the tools. But I think self-hosting of communication tools has a big added value. Slack’s limit of searchable messages only exacerbates the problems of realtime chat platforms for knowledge sharing compared to a forum.

I’m sure there’s a lot to learn from your discussions, and it’s a pity that knowledge is inaccessible to others. I hope you’ll consider moving this private channel to a community platform.

I know keeping up the tools requires an effort, but I’m not sure that in the long term Slack’s cost in knowledge loss is lower. I’ve heard Mattermost is easy to maintain ( but there are others like Zulip which plans a feature of read access without an account).

[Stinghe_Dorian]

Receiving information is one thing, understanding it and interpreting it correctly is another. To be honest, I only find it right and natural that core devs exchange information calmly and outside of our perception. Otherwise there are numerous opportunities to participate in various discussions. You can also go that far and ask questions personally, politely. Most people in the ecosystem offer the opportunity for personal contact here or on other platforms. Whether everyone will / can answer is largely up to them.
CoreDevs often take part in discussions, across platforms. Even if Jaguar is sometimes cryptic on Twitter . I am sure that everyone with a more balanced mind than me, and with the right technical talent and expertise, will be able to access these closed working groups .

[rb2nem]

@Stinghe_Dorian

Receiving information is one thing, understanding it and interpreting it correctly is another. To be honest, I only find it right and natural that core devs exchange information calmly and outside of our perception.

As I mentioned earlier, It doesn’t prevent private discussion to take place if needed. But having the default as public is the way to go if you want to build and grow a community.

@Stinghe_Dorian

Otherwise there are numerous opportunities to participate in various discussions. You can also go that far and ask questions personally, politely. Most people in the ecosystem offer the opportunity for personal contact here or on other platforms.

There are opportunities, but the point here is to get rid of barriers and inefficiencies. How can you grow a community if communication happens privately? Imagine if I had sent these messages to @Jaguar0625 and @DaveH privately: you wouldn’t have had the opportunity to react. It would have been easier for me to avoid having someone jumping in the discussion to oppose my views. But would that have been beneficial to the community or the discussion? Of course not.

[Stinghe_Dorian]

I don’t think your ideas are bad. I’m sorry if it comes across like this. It is also generally unlikely that I can change someone’s mind. But what is definitely in my power is to share an idea or an approach. That you can take into account or not.

[rb2nem]

@Stinghe_Dorian

I don’t think your ideas are bad. I’m sorry if it comes across like this.

I didn’t take it like that, sorry if my message was unclear regarding that.

@Stinghe_Dorian

But what is definitely in my power is to share an idea or an approach. That you can take into account or not.

Here we clearly agree
That’s what makes a discussion interesting: the different point of views. And that’s actually what I wanted to say about the Core Devs’ discussion channel. By making it private, it takes away that power to share an idea or an approach. Having a public discussion empowers member of the community to jump in if they have a meaningful idea, but Core Devs would still be free to take it into account or not.