RE: Supplement publication idea

On Monday, September 01, 1997 2:23 PM, Nathan [SMTP:njp@cyberramp.net]
wrote:
<sniP>
> for it.  One method I thought might be a good way to go about it is
this
> (please forgive me if this is something that's been discussed
already):
> 
> 
> Step 1: Writer of Cool New Idea/Background/Ship submits document to a
> review group (or the whole mailing list).
> Step 2: Reviewers of the document send feedback to writer and document
is
> modified accordingly.  Some  playtesting probably might happen here.
> Step 3: Semi-final draft is sent to mailing list/GZG/Jon for OK and
> supplement number.
> Step 4: Final doc is formatted and proofed and post to
> official/semi-official web site.

The issue with step 1 is how you set-up the review group
too many cooks may be unmanageable but people who 
are keen won't like being left out. It will require
tact and diplomacy and some one to self appoint themselves 
as arbiter. It might be better if a rolling
review group existed where those interested
were on a quarterly rota and so that certain 
people didn't dominate it and people could give
a lot of commitment for a short time. 
Just sending it to the list can be patchy review at best.

Step 2 - doing the playtesting would may be a bit thorny 
how do you measure that you have done enough 
and that it was sufficiently objective? You need
to evolve evaluation criterion. However
these sort of things have been done in the past. It
just needs a lot of co-ordination by someone.

Step 3 - I think Jon Tuffley is probably going to be
too busy to review this in any depth, he is at best a 
sporadic poster to this list (for good reason). 

If the first two steps have been done correctly this might 
be OK - but if a lot of effort has already been expended
on the initial work and he says 'Non starter' people 
are going to loose interest quickly.

Step 4 this all requires a high level of commitment.
Which may or may not exist.

I agree with the sentiments of this post but I'm
sceptical that the process will work. I think
that you need OFFICIAL sanction on the idea
at an early stage before you waste effort.
I also think you must find committed dedicated 
people, who can commit for a given period
of time. You also need one person to organise it 
all and chase people, a thankless task at the best 
of times.

My scepticism is due to having done this sort 
of thing trying to get a standard PBEM computer 
format adopted and spending hours working on stuff 
that falls on stony ground I know how frustrating 
it can be. 

At best if someone posts a good idea, reviews it
on the list, correlates the responses and puts
it up their own web page, the rules become a de-facto
standard in their own right, if they are any good. IMHO
Mk's B5 rules may have reached this sort of status. 
It would be nice to get the OFFICIAL stamp, but is it 
realistic?

As many have said we wait for JT to speak...

sincerely
tim jones
--
Its full of stars