This could go in "Assembling the Team", but I think it's important to make it visible, and want to add a poll, so I've broken it out. And rather than have a wall of text, I'll try to break things up into sections to make it a bit more readable.
Observations of the Current State of Things
Observations of Other Projects
What Next?
Proposal: Council Leadership Structure
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Thoughts? I've hesitated to post this since I don't want it to be taken as usurping WildWeazel's unilateral authority, but after reading more about other Civ-related projects and how they succeeded or didn't, I figured it was better to post this while the forum still had some level of activity.
Observations of the Current State of Things
Spoiler :
We had great momentum in November and the first part of December, and I don't think anyone will argue that the momentum has fallen by the wayside over the past month to month and a half.
IMO, one of the key changes was trying to switch from a "chase shiny things" model to a more structured one. While the motivations were good (ensuring project quality), we may have tried to impose too much structure (notably around code reviews) too quickly. Of course, the holidays provided a distraction too, but at least for me that likely would have been a temporary thing if I were still excited about chasing shiny things.
It's also the case that our de facto project leader has been WildWeazel. He was the one who got this project off the ground, and while there is some standing on the shoulders of giants, organizing the first effort that results in a multi-person coding effort in this direction is enough to make you the leader. Hence, there's been a sense of WildWeazel being the decision-maker, in the same sense that Thunderfall would be considered a/the decision maker at CFC.
However, WildWeazel has not been very active on the boards since coding got started, and more so in the past month. This in itself is not noteworthy; we all have things come up in life that take us away from the forums; I've disappeared for months at a time before.
But projects tend to slow down and stop when they don't have anyone seen as a leader able to make decisions. That's why CFC has other staff, including other admins. If the server goes down or there's some decision that needs to be made and Thunderfall is busy doing real world things, a decision can be made among the other staff.
IMO, one of the key changes was trying to switch from a "chase shiny things" model to a more structured one. While the motivations were good (ensuring project quality), we may have tried to impose too much structure (notably around code reviews) too quickly. Of course, the holidays provided a distraction too, but at least for me that likely would have been a temporary thing if I were still excited about chasing shiny things.
It's also the case that our de facto project leader has been WildWeazel. He was the one who got this project off the ground, and while there is some standing on the shoulders of giants, organizing the first effort that results in a multi-person coding effort in this direction is enough to make you the leader. Hence, there's been a sense of WildWeazel being the decision-maker, in the same sense that Thunderfall would be considered a/the decision maker at CFC.
However, WildWeazel has not been very active on the boards since coding got started, and more so in the past month. This in itself is not noteworthy; we all have things come up in life that take us away from the forums; I've disappeared for months at a time before.
But projects tend to slow down and stop when they don't have anyone seen as a leader able to make decisions. That's why CFC has other staff, including other admins. If the server goes down or there's some decision that needs to be made and Thunderfall is busy doing real world things, a decision can be made among the other staff.
Observations of Other Projects
Spoiler :
I've lately been reading about the fate of some of the non-CFC Civ fansites, notably Creative Design Group (cdgroup) and WePlayCiv. One of the striking things was the importance of having a few people who could focus on the sites.
In the case of CDGroup, the creator/owner was also a modder, of The Balancer scenario for Civ3. This thread, notably post 18, covers the history. In short, The Balancer's development continued, successfully, twice after the former lead either disappeared or stepped back considerably. In the first case, Elucidus became de facto leader when Monkspider disappeared; in the latter case Elucidus did some design work for the Conquests expansion of The Balancer, but stepped back and let others do most of the implementation, which he says they did an outstanding job with. By contrast, with the CDGroup site, his right-hand man in administration wound up being a bad choice in the end, and with him having stepped back for health reasons and not having someone else of a comparable level also in charge while the former right-hand man went rogue, the site wasn't able to maintain its momentum.
In the case of WePlayCiv, there are some interesting posts by Dale (now of Old World fame) and Buster's Uncle near the end of the first page and especially the first part of the second page of this thread. Buster's Uncle argues that the end of the heydey at WPC was in no small part because there weren't people in the administration making sure the lights stayed on.
The main point being that there being a decision-maker (or a group of decision-makers) is more important than the decision maker always making the right decision.
Finally, there are some good posts around this topic at Apolyton here, where the current owner writes,
This falls along the same lines as needing to have someone with both the willingness and the ability to fix problems when they come up.
CFC has arguably become the leading Civ fansite because there have always been enough people in the administration (both actual admins and mods) to keep a minimal level of activity at all times. It has waxed and waned - the home page received few news updates other than PolyCast episodes for years in the mid 2010s, for example - but even at the times when Thunderfall has had a minimal (public) presence, things have kept moving.
One could also look at projects such as the Game of the Month project, where leadership has changed over the years, but there have always been a couple admins, who enlist other members to help out by creating maps, and they've been successful over time in no small part because they've been able to react to changing abilities to commit time to the project while maintaining an overall level of momentum.
In the case of CDGroup, the creator/owner was also a modder, of The Balancer scenario for Civ3. This thread, notably post 18, covers the history. In short, The Balancer's development continued, successfully, twice after the former lead either disappeared or stepped back considerably. In the first case, Elucidus became de facto leader when Monkspider disappeared; in the latter case Elucidus did some design work for the Conquests expansion of The Balancer, but stepped back and let others do most of the implementation, which he says they did an outstanding job with. By contrast, with the CDGroup site, his right-hand man in administration wound up being a bad choice in the end, and with him having stepped back for health reasons and not having someone else of a comparable level also in charge while the former right-hand man went rogue, the site wasn't able to maintain its momentum.
In the case of WePlayCiv, there are some interesting posts by Dale (now of Old World fame) and Buster's Uncle near the end of the first page and especially the first part of the second page of this thread. Buster's Uncle argues that the end of the heydey at WPC was in no small part because there weren't people in the administration making sure the lights stayed on.
Buster's Uncle said:Well, I'll tell you straight, sir; I think they're walking dead without you. I've been saying so behind your back for quite a while now.
Whatever else you did, there was someone there willing to moderate people, usually before things escalated into crisises. There was someone visibly active and in charge, putting a face on the management. The frogs don't want/need Old King Log and Old King Log. You drew a certain kind of trouble, given your history, and made mistakes, given your temperment, but there was someone there, visible, and taking care of business. Absentee Landlord is not a viable management style.
The main point being that there being a decision-maker (or a group of decision-makers) is more important than the decision maker always making the right decision.
Finally, there are some good posts around this topic at Apolyton here, where the current owner writes,
Ming said:This site lost it's lead when it didn't cater to the modding crowd... when it was next to impossible to upload and download files. The very heart of the community left, and made CFC what it is today. The owners did nothing to stop people from leaving, never fixed the technical issues. By the time the WPC "group" split, the traffic was way down already
This falls along the same lines as needing to have someone with both the willingness and the ability to fix problems when they come up.
CFC has arguably become the leading Civ fansite because there have always been enough people in the administration (both actual admins and mods) to keep a minimal level of activity at all times. It has waxed and waned - the home page received few news updates other than PolyCast episodes for years in the mid 2010s, for example - but even at the times when Thunderfall has had a minimal (public) presence, things have kept moving.
One could also look at projects such as the Game of the Month project, where leadership has changed over the years, but there have always been a couple admins, who enlist other members to help out by creating maps, and they've been successful over time in no small part because they've been able to react to changing abilities to commit time to the project while maintaining an overall level of momentum.
What Next?
Spoiler :
If we're going to ever make it to the Carthage milestone and beyond, then we need to maximize the chances of creative revivals happening after a lull in activity. Right now, that mainly means maximizing the chances of technical progress.
We're now at a stage where things are getting more complicated. Architectural decisions have to be made. New members need to be integrated. We've already been having debates about quality versus speed. Decisions about direction will have to be made (do we add multiplayer code? should we try to add X before Y?). We'll make mistakes, and will need to be able to correct them.
Meanwhile, members will come and go. This project isn't anyone's main responsibility in life. It will be cut if they need more time for other things, or if it just seems less interesting than other things. An argument could be made that that is the core problem that has doomed previous Civ III compatible/inspired projects - life events happened, the one person involved moved on, and there was no one able to take up the baton. An awareness of that is why this is an open source project, but it's still very possible for an open source project to lose all contributors and go stagnant, and how many such projects get revived in practice?
We're now at a stage where things are getting more complicated. Architectural decisions have to be made. New members need to be integrated. We've already been having debates about quality versus speed. Decisions about direction will have to be made (do we add multiplayer code? should we try to add X before Y?). We'll make mistakes, and will need to be able to correct them.
Meanwhile, members will come and go. This project isn't anyone's main responsibility in life. It will be cut if they need more time for other things, or if it just seems less interesting than other things. An argument could be made that that is the core problem that has doomed previous Civ III compatible/inspired projects - life events happened, the one person involved moved on, and there was no one able to take up the baton. An awareness of that is why this is an open source project, but it's still very possible for an open source project to lose all contributors and go stagnant, and how many such projects get revived in practice?
Proposal: Council Leadership Structure
Spoiler :
In lieu of insider knowledge on how CFC handles this challenge internally, I'll propose that we make a technical council who can vote on technical practices in events where they're needed. This should, in practice, include core contributors. Currently, I would consider these to be WildWeazel, Puppeteer, Flintlock, Caro-Kann, and myself.
On topics that require some form of consensus, each such member could have a vote. The majority decision would be chosen, and I'd set the quorum at two, for now (maybe more later, but my thinking is one person is too few, but if we require too many it could paralyze the decision-making process).
Adding more members to the technical leadership (when is someone a core contributor?) could itself be decided by the existing technical leadership.
Deciding when to release another milestone could also be a technical leadership decision (and eventually project manager/non-technical leadership would need to be involved as well). We had some stated desire to have a second milestone in December and that didn't happen, which to me is another indication that we need to have an ability for a sub-set of the team to make such decisions even if some are unavailable. Maybe the decision would have been "not yet", but as it was we never made a decision.
As of right now, my best idea for how to stage these decisions is a CFC thread with a poll, with votes publicly visible as right now we have no way to limit who votes, so anyone at CFC could in theory vote.
On topics that require some form of consensus, each such member could have a vote. The majority decision would be chosen, and I'd set the quorum at two, for now (maybe more later, but my thinking is one person is too few, but if we require too many it could paralyze the decision-making process).
Adding more members to the technical leadership (when is someone a core contributor?) could itself be decided by the existing technical leadership.
Deciding when to release another milestone could also be a technical leadership decision (and eventually project manager/non-technical leadership would need to be involved as well). We had some stated desire to have a second milestone in December and that didn't happen, which to me is another indication that we need to have an ability for a sub-set of the team to make such decisions even if some are unavailable. Maybe the decision would have been "not yet", but as it was we never made a decision.
As of right now, my best idea for how to stage these decisions is a CFC thread with a poll, with votes publicly visible as right now we have no way to limit who votes, so anyone at CFC could in theory vote.
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Thoughts? I've hesitated to post this since I don't want it to be taken as usurping WildWeazel's unilateral authority, but after reading more about other Civ-related projects and how they succeeded or didn't, I figured it was better to post this while the forum still had some level of activity.