One Place Studies - Project Status

Question

I know there were some discussions a month or so ago, but what is the current status of the One Place Studies Project?

It appears that a member has decided to restart the project via Space pages instead of working with the community to revive the Project page itself. Has there been any discussions related to this change that I could review or get caught up on?

Answer 1

Great News! Eowyn Langholf has confirmed that a leader has come forward and offered to take on the One Place Study project and things are starting to go into motion. 

I look forward to working with the new project leader to make the One Place Studies project one of the very best.

Martin W

Answer 2

No, there have been no discussions at all.  He went ahead and did this off his own bat.

Answer 3

I found the his new FAQ page by going to Martin White's activity feed--just a guess since he's the one who asked about the project getting another leader. Since I'm currently actively working on 4 one place studies, I'm curious about where this leaves them.  It seems as though we need a lot more discussion--or any discussion at all. So good job asking the question.

Answer 4

Hi Steven,

I did raise the question about the high-level One Place Studies project as you know as I was concerned it had stalled. After the initial responses things went quiet and I heard nothing further. However I noticed that the earlier G2G invitation asking if members wanted to join the project was then closed with a message saying the project was dormant. I was disappointed to see this.

I therefore started looking to resurrect the project via FSPs. I have been putting together comprehensive indexes, information, guidance etc. and I intend launching the new project on 1 August 2018 with a G2G invitation to everyone interested in one place studies to join the project and help drive it forward. Anyone reading this is welcome to join me now.

Best regards, Martin

[Edited to remove link that is no longer needed]

Comments

Martin, something like this should really not happen without further communication, discussion and approval with the community. The OPS is an official Project that is backed by WikiTree, and that decision to go dormant was made by the Coordinators/Leaders - whether or not we like or agree with that decision. I also find it rather disheartening that you attempted to start editing the official project page before the Leader had officially resigned, especially since the Project pages should only be edited by the Leaders or their designees.

So some of the issues we have now is that the main Project page (the official page) still exists, and you are now trying to push members over to your FSP's - effectively creating duplicate (and possibly different) information and instructions. You have also indicated through one of your pages that WT users are participants/members of your project simply by association to the official project, or by simply having a OPS page - which is very incorrect and misleading.

In either case, the preferred steps would be to engage the community here in G2G, determine the interest in keeping the project active, finding new Leaders, and moving towards that goal.

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Steven - the project was made dormant - no Leaders had come forward to keep it active - I have put in place a mechanism to keep One Place Studies active though a free space profile project - members can join me in that project if they wish and help shape it - I used the term 'Participants' when referring to those undertaking One Place Studies - all pages are under construction and are fluid with regards terminology and content - also all pages I have been working on have included links with my details and you could have contacted me directly to raise any concerns - I do hope you will join the project - kind regards - Martin

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Martin, unfortunately I will not be joining the project. My concern is that you are currently working on your own without the community collaboration that WikiTree relies and strives on, while also linking to and advertising your own non-WikiTree website. As it has already been mentioned previously, it no longer makes sense for the One Place Studies to be deemed a Project when:

None of the functions of a WikiTree Project apply to the OPS project. The "leaders" of the OPSs are the managers of the individual OPS free-space pages, and they do just fine on their own. There doesn't need to be a project overseeing them.

Your best course of action at this point would be to start a discussion in G2G about the future of the official project. If enough members would like to keep the official project active, you could enlist assistance from the Volunteer Coordinators, such as Eowyn Langholf, in getting the project back on track and running - retaining the official status and not having to start over again as you are doing now.

It may even turn out that the general consensus is to remove the official OPS from Active Projects, design a Help page for the general creation and setup of an OPS, then dole out the remaining aspects to the place projects who have more experience and can offer more assistance to their users than an OPS project could. You could offer to be involved in helping to setup this Help page, providing general assistance, etc.

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Hi Martin,

There is a leader who has come forward and offered to take on the One Place Study project and things are starting to go into motion.  

This is why it's important to work within the community on these things because it seems you've unfortunately done a lot of work without needing to and which is why we asked you to hold off.

Maybe when they are ready,  you can work with the new project leader to get the OPS project out of dormancy.

Thanks!

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Steven - just for the record, on your 'advertising' point, I have previously posted about the One Place Studies Directory website in G2G - the link to it from WikiTree has been in place on the One Place Studies Project page since that posting – the site directs people to WikiTree and a number of people with one place studies have joined WikiTree as a result – regards, Martin

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That's good news, Eowyn. Thank you.