Future Melbourne Wiki Participation Policies & Guidelines

The policies listed on this page are standards for participation set by Future Melbourne that all participants should follow. The guidelines are more advisory and represent suggestions that we think will enhance your experience as well as the project's collaborative process. While both policies and guidelines need to be approached with common sense, those who contribute in good faith, are civil and work towards the goal of creating a great plan for Melbourne will find a welcoming environment.

• Note: The policies and guidelines developed at Wikipedia.org over its years of collaborative development and governance have heavily influenced those below. In some cases they have been directly adapted and modified. In accordance with Wikipedia's licensing conditions, the GNU Free Documentation License applies to any such modified Wikipedia material contained on this page, and as a result, all text on this page is available under these same terms. Future Melbourne acknowledges the important role Wikipedia has played in advancing collaborative practice and the evolution of wiki governance.

Policies

Civility

Participate in a respectful and civil way. Do not ignore the positions and conclusions of others. Try to discourage others from being uncivil, and avoid upsetting people wherever possible. We define incivility roughly as, personally-targeted, belligerent behavior and rudeness that results in an atmosphere of conflict and stress.

Our code of civility states plainly that people must act with civility toward one another. It is accepted that participants are human, and a few, minor, isolated incidents are not in themselves a problem. A pattern of gross incivility, however, is highly disruptive, and may result in warnings or blocks. Of course, one single act of incivility can also cross the line if bad enough; for instance, an extreme personal attack, a threat against another person, or severe profanity directed against another contributor are all excessive enough that they may result in a block without any need to consider the pattern.

Criticise ideas, not people

While critical engagement with the plan is strongly encouraged, please do not make personal attacks anywhere on this site. Comment on content, not on the contributor. Personal attacks or criticism of the personal characteristics of participants will not help you make a point; they hurt the Future Melbourne community and deter participants from helping to create a successful city plan.

Vandalism

We respect your creative impulses and even encourage them, however the content on this site must be geared in one way or another towards the development of Melbourne's city plan. There are a great deal of other sites which can accommodate your creative interests should they not be oriented towards this purpose, such as: Drawball.com, Uncyclopedia.org, etc.

If you encounter content which is obviously vandalism, please delete it. If you are unsure, or would rather someone else deal with it, please email the URL and a brief description to futuremelbourneadmin@melbourne.vic.gov.au, or tag the material as offensive and it will be reviewed by the Future Melbourne team.

Spam

Spam will not be tolerated in any form. If you encounter content which is obviously spam, please delete it. If you are unsure, or would rather someone else deal with it, please email the URL and a brief description to futuremelbourneadmin@melbourne.vic.gov.au, or tag the material as offensive and it will be reviewed by the Future Melbourne team.

Consensus

Consensus is an inherent part of the wiki process. Consensus is typically reached as a natural product of the editing process; generally someone makes a change or addition to a page, and then everyone who reads the page has an opportunity to either leave the page as it is or change it. In essence, silence implies consent, if there is adequate exposure to the community. So please speak up if you disagree with something you read on this site.

Use the discussion pages to discuss improvements to the plan, and to form consensus concerning the editing of a page. In cases where consensus is particularly hard to find, there exists further dispute resolution processes which allow you to involve independent participants and ask for more experienced help in the discussion, and to address the problems which prevent a consensus from arising.

No copyright material

Material which infringes other copyrights must not be added. Do not add content to this site if you think that doing so may be a copyright violation. Contributors should take steps to remove any copyright violations that they find. However linking to copyrighted works is encouraged (e.g. sources) and permission is not required.

If you are looking for freely usable media files, there are a number of sites where you can find some, such as:

• Wikimedia Commons
• Creative Commons Search
• Flickr / Creative Commons

Off topic / irrelevant content

Exactly what constitutes off topic or irrelevant material is difficult to describe as considering and planning for Melbourne's future encompasses an extraordinarily large gambit. Nevertheless, if you encounter content which is obviously off topic or irrelevant, please delete it or address it on a discussion page. If you are unsure, or would rather someone else deal with it, please email the URL and a brief description to futuremelbourneadmin@melbourne.vic.gov.au, or tag the material as offensive and it will be reviewed by the Future Melbourne team.

Use your real name

Please use your real name when registering. Future Melbourne encourages open and honest communication without the need for anonymity.

No sock-puppetry

Sock-puppetry is "an online identity used for purposes of deception within an Internet community." Sock-puppetry is not an acceptable form of behaviour on this site and in general, multiple registrations is not allowed. If you believe that one or more participants are sock puppets, please email their username(s) to futuremelbourneadmin@melbourne.vic.gov.au and the matter will be investigated by the Future Melbourne team.

Guidelines

Discussion guidelines

The purpose of this site's discussion pages (notice the tab in the upper right corner of every page) are to provide space for general comments regarding the content of the associated plan page. Discussion is an important part of collaborative editing because it helps all participants to understand the progress and evolution of a work.

If you are unsure whether or not your thoughts are relevant or warrant contribution, go ahead and post them anyway in the spirit of participation - if there happens to be a more appropriate location for your ideas, it is likely someone will notice and let you know (this collaboration environment works best when the community works together to organise its content). Remember when writing that this is a public site and that everything communicated in this space should be suitable for a general audience.

Contribution on discussion pages may take the form of (but are not limited to):

• Opinions and discussion regarding the content of the associated plan page.
• Suggestions of possible changes, modifications or developments of its associated plan page.
• Notification and or discussion of changes to its associated plan page.
• Links to other online material relevant to the associated plan page's content.

Layout for Discussion pages

1. Start new points at the bottom of the topic: if you put a post at the top it is confusing and can also get easily overlooked. The latest discussion point should be the one at the bottom of the topic. Then the next post will go underneath yours and so on. This makes it easy to see the chronological order of posts.
2. Use a headings (level 2) to indicate new discussion points. Be sure to read over the existing discussion to make sure that the point hasn't already been introduced. If it has, simply join in that discussion by adding your thoughts under the last contribution, or, by inserting your contribution using a bullet point so that it will stand out from the existing content. (This is also called 'threading' the discussion, enabling it to branch in different directions in a way that is easy to read.)
3. Sign your posts. Signing your post is important for many reasons - it helps indicate where one voice begins and ends and helps provides context for that point of view. It is also easy to do, simply copy and paste the signature line that appears at the bottom of the edit window frame every time you are in edit mode to the bottom of your entry, separated by an empty line. Edits on plan pages should not be signed - the article is a shared work based on the contributions of many people and one participant should not be singled out above others.

Be bold

Future Melbourne encourages participants to be bold when editing pages. If you see something that can be improved, or have an idea, do not hesitate to add it. You do not need to read any rules before contributing to Future Melbourne. If you do what seems sensible, it will likely be right, and if it's not right, don't worry - every mistake can be easily corrected: older versions of a page remain in the revision history and can be restored. And if we disagree with your changes, we will talk about it on the discussion pages and figure out what to do.

Mass collaborative projects such as this one develop faster when everybody helps to fix problems, correct grammar, add facts and make sure the wording is accurate - every edit is important no matter how small because they all add up! And, of course, others here will edit what you write too. Please do not take it personally. They, like all of us, just want to make Melbourne's city plan as good as it can possibly be. So don't worry. Be bold, and enjoy helping to build a vision of Melbourne's future!

Connect with others

The strength of a wiki is that it provides a means for many people to come together around a common objective. This collection of people is a valuable asset - there are a great many knowledgeable people working on this plan and communicating with other participants is strongly encouraged. Don't hesitate to post questions and enter into discussion with others on the discussion topics (that's what they're there for).

Future Melbourne highly values collaborative work and in recognising that group work is an invaluable means of developing complex ideas, we will assist you in connecting with others where possible. If you are interested in connecting with others and participating in special interest group activities, please visit How you can participate.

Build the web

'Build the Web' is the concept of connecting relevant ideas on one page to other pages within the plan, as well as to external sites, by means of hyper links. For example, a link to An international city could be added to the text "Around a quarter of these people will be national and international visitors." on the Great place to visit page, becoming: "Around a quarter of these people will be national and international visitors."

For more on creating links, see Help, or, click the 'Edit help' link in the upper left hand corner of your screen when in edit mode.

Dispute Resolution

Listed in order of escalation:

1. Focus on content & discuss with the other party

If you disagree with what you read, use the relevant discussion page (not a plan content page) to explain your perspective and explore the ideas behind your objection (or support) for a contribution. Engage in friendly debate (see Civility and Criticise ideas, not people) and strive to find a solution which represents as many perspectives as possible.

2. Request a comment

If you are discussing an issue with another contributor and are having difficulty resolving your differences, you can ask for expert opinion. You can do this by emailing futuremelbourneadmin@melbourne.vic.gov.au and the Future Melbourne team will do its best to refer an expert to your discussion. However you should only expect a brief comment and it may take several days for a response, so please be patient.

3. Mediation

If tempers are running hot, and or an expert's comment fails to resolve the issue, you can ask the Future Melbourne team to mediate the discussion by emailing futuremelbourneadmin@melbourne.vic.gov.au. In this case, the Future Melbourne team will do its best to facilitate an equitable outcome.

4. Arbitration

In extreme cases where discussion fails to resolve a dispute, and where the dispute is disrupting the process or project's objectives, the Future Melbourne team may arbitrate. In such circumstances the Future Melbourne team will consider the issues at stake and issue a decision in consultation with expert opinion. If the issue is decided by arbitration, you will be expected to abide by the result.