proposed set of content/directional changes for the JCM

[Paul Orwig]

Hi all,

Dianne and Alice and I have been brainstorming about a set of possible content and directional changes for the JCM. Some will be easier and quicker to implement than others. Nothing is set in stone at this point, so we want to hear from everyone else on the team about these proposed changes:

1. Simplify/Restructure content around different user types. What about if we reduce/consolidate our number of topics and target them directly at different types of users, such as:

•     Developers (current Developer's workbench, Joomla setup, Joomla books, Did you know...?)
•     Designers (current Designer's studio, Joomla books, Did you know...?)
•     Administrators (current Administrator's toolkit Did you know...?)
•     Sitebuilders or users or...? (current Joomla books, Website case studies, Did you know...?, Business matters?)
•     Community (current Joomla Events and Joomla Days, Joomla setup, Volunteer profiles, Feature stories, Leadership connections)
•     Project news (could also be a part of Community, but would consist of a sampling of updates from around the project, Leadership connections)
•     International stories (unchanged from current, or not?)

2. Explicit emphasis on team generated content. I think it's important for the JCM to always be open for contributions from the community, but at this point in the life of the JCM, we are not seeing as many community contributions as we'd hoped. So how about if we make a committment to forming JCM editor teams around each of the consolidated list of topics, and challenge each of those teams to really come up with a vision for their topic and improve integration with other aspects of joomla.org (adding links to the documentation wiki for tutorials, etc.)

3. Improve JCM marketing/promotions. Empower Milena to form a JCM promotions/marketing team that will strengthen the JCM's readership and contributions from the community.

4. Consolidate JCM content with blogs and project announcements. I posted this idea in a recent JPeople thread on "Purposeful JPeople". I think in the long run, things will be simpler and easier for readers/users if what is now the JCM content is merged with some of the content on the community site (leadership and community blogs, JDay announcements) and the www site (project announcements). I have since brought this up in CLT and suggested it might make the most sense for that to all be served from the community site. CLT agrees with the concept, and have asked Sander Potjer and I to take a closer look at how this might be implemented. In my mind, if this happens it will take at a minimum 4-6 months.

Okay I think that's about it for the set of proposed changes. Now it's everyone else's turn-What do you all think of these proposed changes, or what other ideas do you have?

Thanks,

Dianne, Alice, and paul

[Paul Orwig]

Hi all,

I just want to follow up and make sure it's clear to everyone that none of these proposed changes will go in effect before the November issue is released. So for the November issue we are still "business as usual" for all current JCM topics. In fact, the December issue may also be "business as usual", depending on what we end up deciding to do and how much re-design or other work might be needed to support any changes.

Thanks,

paul

[Jonathan Neubauer]

The one part I don't like, or have questions about based on it's wording here, is the consolidation of content from around the Project into the Magazine.  If that's what we're going to do, than why do we have a magazine in the first place?  That would seem to just turn us into a Project RSS Feed without the unique appeal and content we have had.  Of all the Joomla! Properties, the JCM is one that continues to attract more visitors.  While others are flagging in visitors (whether it be because of a restructuring, or a new focus within the project) the JCM is already seeing over 10,000 more visitors per month over last year.  I think that is due in large part to the unique, interesting, and engaging content we offer.  I like the idea of some of these changes enhancing our mission, but diluting our work by slipping it in with other project news and blogs won't help that ... in my opinion :)

Any thoughts?

Respectfully,
Jon Neubauer

[Paul Orwig]

Thanks Jon. I'll respond with more of my thoughts and then I hope you and others will continue to add your thoughts, both on this point as well as the others in the original post in this thread.

When the idea for this iteration of the JCM came up a couple of years ago, the project's leadership supported it, but no one really knew how it would work out or if it would last (there were two previous iterations which didn't last very long). Now, a couple of years later, the JCM is still here and still growing, but our user traffic is still a fraction of what the home pages on the www or community sites get, and an increasingly frequent question being asked is if Joomla has too many different places where users have to go in order to keep up with what's going on in our project (especially for new users who aren't familiar with *.joomla.org).

So the main rationale for the idea to merge content is just to simplify things for end users. I think the real question is if it is a good user experience for Joomla to scatter this kind of semi-related content on three different sites, or if it would it be a better user experience if there was one portal where users could go to get all of that information.

To be honest, a part of me will definitely be bummed if the JCM loses it's distinct identity and our content gets merged into a potential future "project news portal" or whatever it might be called. I'm proud of what our team has built, we are producing some great content, and we have a lot of fun. But I think from an end user's perspective, there's a pretty strong arguement that it makes sense to merge all of this related content into a single portal.

What do others think about this point? Also, are there any more questions or comments about the other points that were originally posted on October 19 but no one has responded to?

Thanks again,

paul

[Jon Neubauer]

Paul,

Thanks for the explanation.

I guess for me there is a fundamental difference between "Project News" and the Joomla! Community Magazine.

I would agree with you that it can be dizzying at times to try to remember where someone posted a crucial guideline or roadmap, or where that interesting leadership post was at, or where important facts were documented.  So I applaud the efforts to consolidate an simplify the dissemination of project news and information.

But, personally, I view the mission and goals of the Joomla! Community Magazine as an all-together different set from "news".  Yes, we publish pieces that would be considered "news" in that we cover Joomla! Events, we have a roundup of important leadership actions, etc.  But we also publish general interest articles - featured content from experts and involved folks in our community.  Those contributions are important - it's something that isn't found anywhere else in the Joomla! Community.  These submissions aren't necessarily "official" or "project news" but they are still part of a unique identity that the Joomla! Community has formed.

So, do I think that the Joomla! Community should absorb or be absorbed into the flow of official project information?  Not really.  I don't think the two fit together, and putting them together just muddles the message of both.

As far as saying that the JCM has a fraction of the traffic, that may be true - but they also had a 3-5 year headstart on us!  The JPeople site, which launched before the magazine, has about half the traffic we do.  We currently have more visitors than the Joomla! Resources site (http://resources.joomla.org/), the Joomla! Showcase site (http://community.joomla.org/showcase/), and the Joomla! People site (http://people.joomla.org/) - and we're quickly coming up on the Joomla! Developer site (http://developer.joomla.org/).  And all of those sites were launched well before us.  So I don't think that a measure of traffic is quite accurate - while strict statistics at a glance might seem to doom us, those same statistics, when taken in context, shows what a fine job the Magazine team has done in a short time.

Anyways - that's my two cents (more like 15 cents huh?) :)

Jon

[Alice Grevet]

Dear Jon,

I love your heartfelt and articulate defense of the JCM! It's important that we keep the points you made in mind as we think about expanding or pulling in more information. We don't want to lose what is unique and special about the magazine. I think it's possible to keep the body of original, editorial and how-to content, while building a hub for other kinds of information as well. In any case I think it's worth a try.

Thanks for identifying the essential qualities of the magazine - they will be a good guide as we start the process of discussing how this whole thing might work.

Best regards,

Alice

[Milena Mitova]

Hey Jon,

I am with you on that:). And my reasons are that in addition, we have good SEO on the JCM site and we will lose all that once we move those articles over; we will lose the backlinks, the twitter/facebook votes and mentions, etc. It's not worth it and it doesn't make sense. I personally think that Joomla! has other more serious priorities to take care of and that we should not try to repair what's not broken.

We could change the template to make it more user friendly, cleaner, more modern - to appeal to the younger audience, because the way it is set up now it appeals to the audience that grew up with printed materials - but we should keep it as a separate entity under the joomla domain. And we should try to popularize it and make it more interactive.

By the way, in my role as a liaison to the CLT, I am required to make sure that your voices and opinions are being heard and communicated to the CLT, so please do be vocal about your feelings:) and do share your feedback:). Transparency is the way to go.

Thanks!

Best,

Milena 

---

From: Alice Grevet <agr...@gmail.com>
To: joomla-commu...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thursday, November 3, 2011 3:30 AM
Subject: Re: [JCM] proposed set of content/directional changes for the JCM

[Paul Orwig]

I don't think that SEO/backlinks/twitter/facebook connections should be one of the primary considerations in trying to figure out what's the best approach to take with how the JCM content fits in with a potential future project "news hub" (for lack of a better term). The main reason I feel that way is due to the simple reality that most of the JCM's content has a fairly short useful shelf life (along with most everyone else publishing content about the internet/technology field). Think about how many of the JCM's current library of articles that are written about Joomla 1.5. What's the true value of those articles after support drops for Joomla 1.5?  Think about how many JCM articles are written about extensions and templates. What's the true value of those articles when the extensions work differently in the future or the templates don't work with the current version of Joomla?

The other reason I don't think SEO, etc. should be a primary consideration is that it would keep us locked us in with K2 in order to keep those URLs intact. Don't misunderstand, I like K2, and Fotis and Chris and Chiarra have done an amazing job with some wonderful customizations, but I don't think we should feel that we have to be locked in with anything (except Joomla) for the JCM.

The JCM's mission has never been about SEO, or page views, or banner ad revenue. The JCM's mission has always been about telling great stories about what's going on with all the different aspects of the Joomla project and our community. And it's also been about empowering members of our community to tell their stories about Joomla. I think that the nice SEO, traffic growth, 2 JOSCARs, etc. that we've seen has all come as a natural result of the great work that this team produces month after month, and a strong focus on telling great stories is where it all starts, and where it needs to stay.

For those who think the JCM should remain as a standalone site, what I would like to see is some wireframes and an information architecture diagram that shows how that would work as part of a really clear, simple, consistent, easy to navigate user experience for all of the content that's under consideration to be merged. I'd be willing to give input on that if someone or a group of us wants to take that on. As I said in the first post in this thread, CLT assigned Sander Potjer and me to take a closer look at the issues around this general idea of merging content. I think if there was a solid set of wireframes and information architecture diagrams that showed a great user experience and also kept the JCM as a standalone site, that would be the single strongest argument to make for keeping the JCM as a standalone site. 

Thanks,

paul

[Jonathan Neubauer]

Seriously??  Now we're the ones having to defend the continued existence of an established magazine in favor of something that admittedly hasn't even been thoroughly thought out yet.  Have you come up with any wireframes or "information architecture diagrams" that would show how a combined information portal would work better??  Instead, we're left defending the magazine - which has already proven itself - against a yet to be defined, nebulous, combined information portal.

If you haven't noticed, the Joomla! Community Magazine is one of the few community oriented properties that is still attracting new visitors, is still steadily growing in readership.  So if anything, the onus should be on whoever is in charge of making the new portal (Paul and Sander) to show how it would work better than the existing magazine.

It appalls me that with all the effort making the magazine into what it is, the ideas you yourself have laid out with exciting possibilities for it's future, and one of the best community teams in the Joomla! Project, we are considering turning the magazine into an amorphous rss feed.

Jon

[Paul Orwig]

Hi Jon,

I really and truly understand and respect how strongly you feel about the JCM. I feel pretty strongly about it too. I have been involved with the JCM from day one, and I am the founding lead editor for it. I, along with Dianne and Cristina, walked up on the stage at JandBeyond in May to accept two JOSCARs for the JCM. I have made some really good friends through the JCM. I have gotten into lots of discussions/disagreements/arguments/fights over what should or shouldn't be done with people inside and outside the JCM team. I have lost some friends and I have made some enemies because of the JCM. I have sometimes gotten really frustrated with JCM, and I have lost a fair amount of sleep over it. I have sometimes put JCM work ahead of my family and friends and paid clients. I have taken a lot of criticism in public and private for defending the JCM and it's team members. No one has contributed more time and effort or given more of themself to the JCM than I have.

I think that we should look for opportunities to improve in any and every area of the project, and we shouldn't be satisfied with anything less than the best we can envision. If we allow anything to be exempt from that, then we are potentially missing out on an opportunity to do our best. Sometimes even good things may eventually give way to change, if it is felt that change can lead to better things.

All that is happening right now is an idea is being explored, and that idea is that merging the semi-related content that is currently published on three different websites onto a single site may be a better way to present that content to users. I encouraged anyone who wants to work on an alternate approach to do that, in the spirit of trying to help Sander and I more fully explore different possibilities to hopefully help us find the best solution. If you don't want to put more work into supporting your position, that's fine. Sander and I will do our best to come up with the right recommendation to CLT whether or not anyone else wants to help explore this idea. You've made your feelings known, which is good, although I am really sorry that you have taken offense at some of the things that I said.

Thanks,

paul

[Brian P Sullivan]

I am all for consolidating the Joomla.org family of sites.

 

I think that some content from other places on the website, were it to be consolidated to the JCM, might draw more attention to the feature articles that make up the core of our site. Just one example of that might be the Site-of-the-Month from the Joomla! Community Showcase, if that “team” stepped up its game. A section of the magazine that positioned current news would not be a bad thing in my opinion.

 

I think a current growing pain the JCM is experiencing is a bit of atrophy in contributions. When it was launched, I feel like we had a more dynamic and energetic base of contributors than we now do. There are multiple reasons for this, and in no particular order here are a few that occur to me:

 

·         The novelty wore off;

·         The contributor agreement has been cited as too restrictive by some who either now, or wish in the future to, publish their articles elsewhere;

·         Conflicts over editorial policy led to resignations;

·         The Joomla! project in general has shed volunteers who were also contributors to the magazine, and these haven’t been replaced;

·         It is still time consuming and difficult to post code snippets to the magazine, which may chill contributions;

·         The Joomla! project as a whole has lost some momentum (See Johan Janssen’s presentation to Joomla!Day Brazil 2011);

·         The usual interpersonal conflicts, which are to be expected and to which Paul alluded to below;

·         Perhaps recruitment of contributors is not energetic enough or being done in the right places. Please note, I said “Perhaps.” But I am at a loss to explain why we have gone so long without a staff illustrator. It’s also worth noting that the majority of the initial contributors came to JCM via the ATAAW fan site, and JCM has not gone back there (that I’m aware of) to advertise its needs.

·         A great number of the original JCM volunteers have been tapped for more responsibilities elsewhere in the project;

·         Non-English contributions probably require a polyglot to take the helm as a section editor, and that’s a tall order;

·         In my own case, my life got busy and I have not had the hours to donate to the JCM. I’m sure others have experienced the same issues.

 

I do not feel that the JCM template needs massive revision until the Joomla.org overall template is replaced. It can use a tweak here or there (I have heard promises that the paragraph class “info” icon would be revisited for about a year...) but in the constellation of Joomla! sites, we are fortunate to be working with a template designed by one of Europe’s leading web designers and not an outsourced slice and hack job. It might be necessary to consider a new menu box or contributors area in order to make room for new content while we wait for Joomla.org to be redesigned.

 

Thanks everyone for a thoughtful discussion.

 

 

 

From: joomla-commu...@googlegroups.com [mailto:joomla-commu...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Paul Orwig
Sent: Friday, November 04, 2011 2:11 AM
To: joomla-commu...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [JCM] proposed set of content/directional changes for the JCM

 

Hi Jon,

[Milena Mitova]

No, no, Jon. Wait, maybe I have missed something but during that CLT meeting we discussed the jPeople site, and that it's hard to manage and maintain, that users are leaking and that participation has dwindled, and we had a long discussion about that. I don't recall discussing the JCM having issues like that. On the contrary. Maybe I have missed some of the communications - it's a lot to catch up with:). We have a chat, and an email, and then a couple of forums where things are posted - it's easy to miss things. I am not complaining, just a bit confused, silly me:). But I think everyone is very happy with the JCM. No need to justify anything - everyone acknowledges the great job that is being continuously done on the JCM.

Regarding the move, my point is that it's a continuum and that of course we need to do what's best for the project. But I think that before we get all emotional about it, we need to have a rational discussion to evaluate the business rationale behind a decision like that, also, some questions have to be answered, and effectively.What is the vision? How will the JCM be integrated in the community site? Is it going to be in the form of a blog, or forum, will users access it through a menu button, what is the rationale, what software will be used and what architecture? Who will manage the site and the user access? What are we gaining and what are we losing? Is there a really solid and urgent reason for that, how important, priority-wise is this change? Are we hoping that moving it to that site we are gaining more contributors and what else? What is the main goal? What is the timeframe? Today, in 6 months, one year? Maybe we are talking only about moving the content to that joomla install and keeping the same template and format? Maybe we are gaining something else? From experience, even if we try to push something on users, if they are not interested, they won't click, so how are we gaining more users and how will a solid change like that differ from posting a button/banner on the community site linking to the JCM site? 

Also, I do think SEO is a very solid reason to be considered, as well as links, if not for the project's sake, then for the contributors' sake. I bet most of us, the contributors, have linked to to our articles, have posted them and shared them, and feel good about the number of likes and tweets, and comments - good or bad, we have gotten, and the people we have reached with our articles. As volunteers, that's important to us because that is what the reward is for our time and contributions. I know that in the grand scheme of things, some people will say that it doesn't matter, but it does matter to each individual and we need to make sure we make all contributors reasonably happy.

I think that a clear road map is needed and a well thought out plan has to be played out before we all get worked up about something that is perhaps in the stage of ideas and "nice-to-haves". It's a rule of thumb with businesses that no restructuring is implemented before accessing the strengths of said business and what's unique and valuable about it. Many a business reorganizations have resulted in loss of what was unique and valuable about them, many a business reorganizations have gained from consolidation.

I think the reactions here pertain to the ambiguities that a suggestion like that poses. These ambiguities create misunderstandings, hard feelings, unnecessary emotions. I think that we have a great team, and that's unique. We need to think how that will be impacted and if it will be impacted when those changes take place. I am also all for consolidating the project's assets, but we also have to realize that every website caters to different audiences. In marketing, that's called channels. You have different communication channels to reach your different audiences. 

I think that JCM's greatest value is that it is a standalone, and feels as more or less independent communication tool, it's what every company has - a newsletter to retain its existing users/base and maintain communications with them. If a move to the community site will preserve all this, it's great. 

Let's get rational and try to get answers to those questions, let's have a constructive conversation with facts, timetables, everything that a project implementation requires. We are such a great team, I am sure that no matter what gets implemented will be good because we are all passionate, professional, we are good people. 

Sorry for the long email, hope I am not boring all of you. I really appreciate it that Paul is letting us have this great discussion so that we can move forward and be truly successful.

 

---

From: Brian P Sullivan <brian.p....@gmail.com>
To: joomla-commu...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Friday, November 4, 2011 3:17 AM
Subject: RE: [JCM] proposed set of content/directional changes for the JCM

[Paul Orwig]

@Sully - Thanks those are some good insights regarding consolidation. I agree with you about the benefits of consolidation, both in general as well as how it relates to the Joomla project. Consolidation means that wider audience that has fewer places to go in search for updates, and that wider audience gets exposed to a larger variety of content than they might find on their own. There are also some infrastructure and resource benefits to consolidating.

Thanks also for your insights about some of the reasons around the who/how/what/why the JCM has seemed to have lost some momentum and/or energy over the last however X number of months. I think you have identified many of the key reasons, and it's good to look at and understand how we got to where we are, to hopefully learn from it as we look ahead.

@Milena - Thanks, I liked your long email! It shows you care a lot about the JCM and you put a lot of thought into what you wrote. I agree with you that a lot of objective thought needs to go into exploring this idea. On the surface it's a simple question "is it a good idea to merge this content", but there are a *lot* of details to consider. You have asked a lot of great questions, and at this point that's exactly what we need to be doing because at this point it's just an idea. Here are some of my thoughts on some of your questions:

Timeline: At this point there is none, because nothing has been decided. Sander and I have simply been asked to explore this idea in more depth and report back to CLT. There isn't even a timeline for when we should do that, and Sander and I haven't done any work together on it yet. My hunch is that even if there was a decision today to implement this idea, it would probably take another 4-6 months before it would all happen, just because of the complexity of the project and the realities of everyone's availability as volunteers. To that point, even if there is a feeling that consolidating is a good idea, it might not happen simply because it would be too much work.

Rationale: The short version is that over time, Joomla has spawned way too many different communication channels, and it's not a good user experience when users have to go to multiple websites to find similar content. Instead of fragmenting this similar content, it makes more sense to consider consolidating it.

Resources/management: I think that if this idea is implemented, that blogs will still be written by the same people that write blogs now, and project announcements will still be made by the people who do them now. Those tasks are essentially self-managed by the blog and announcement authors. As I see it, JCM team members would continue to do the same work they had been doing, they would just now be publishing their articles on the same site that blogs and project announcements would be published on.

Security/Access: I think this is a big one. If part of the potential future "community news portal" includes accepting community contributions as we do on the JCM (and I hope it will), then it might make sense to keep the community contributions separate from the rest of the site for security reasons. Joomla's new ACL could certainly address this concern, but in the end it might just be seen as simpler and easier to keep the "community contributions" on a separate server. That could end up being a reason for keeping the JCM as a separate site.

Software: No exploration of this has been done, but it's certainly an important question. When the JCM effort began, K2 was chosen primarily because it had a lot of good features that support a multi-author environment, and K2's founder, Fotis, committed to designing and supporting the JCM website. K2's great but it doesn't do everything we'd like, and we have learned a lot about what we want and need in the time since the JCM launched in July 2010. So we should do a thorough survey of other multi-author publishing solutions.

Design/Information Architecture: If this idea continues to gain traction, we need a lot of effort and talent to look at an effective design and information architecture for how all of this content would be presented to users and how they would be able to access and navigate throughout all of the content, as well as how they might opt-in to have some or all of that content pushed to them (email newsletters, RSS feeds, etc.).

So that's some of my current thoughts on some of those questions you asked and points you raised. I'm sorry for my long email! As you said, it's important for us to have an objective discussion about this. We are the world's leading experts on the JCM content, and that is a major element of this idea. So the more objective input that we can provide, the better the chances become of us ending up with a good final outcome.

Thanks,

paul

[Jen Kramer]

Here goes, specifically to the points on Paul's original email:

1. There isn't enough content in the magazine, at this point, to
segment user audiences. I could see us running very short of content
for developers, for example (who, stereotypically, hate writing
documentation/tutorials).

2. If the problem is community contributions, then why not ask the
community why they don't contribute. That's a simple magazine article
with a poll. I think frustration with the Joomla project remains at an
all-time high, and people are pulling away for a variety of reasons.

My own take on this is it's never enough to ask once. You must keep
asking. Why does any non-profit continually ask for money? Because it
reminds people they are there, that the institution is doing good
work, and your contributions keep it going. In the case of the
magazine, it's about articles and not about money, but we need to
continue asking the community for help. The more specific the
question, the better.

Right now, I see the magazine scrambling to pull in articles around
the 29th of each month. There doesn't seem to be a theme to the
articles to tie them together. In general, the Skype chat is dead
except at the end of the month (at least as far as magazine business
is concerned). I don't see anyone actively approaching community
members for magazine articles. I was asked at one point for an
article, but that was just it.... hey Jen, can you contribute an
article to next month's magazine? There was no guidelines on topic,
length, category, or anything. Just please give us something,
anything.

The next time you receive a mailing from a non-profit asking for
money, look at how it's done. There's a cover letter, explaining the
achievements of the non-profit over the last year (or other point in
time), or some other call for money (defeat/support a piece of
legislation, for example). There's a specific call to donate, with a
form where you can check off a donation amount (something like $20,
$25, $50, $100), or you can enter "other" and write in your own
amount. However, non-profits find that when you ask for a specific
amount, you get it.

Take this model and apply it to the magazine in a thoughtful,
deliberate manner, and you will get results in contributions.
Unfortunately, it takes time on the part of the staff. Once the
initial excitement about a project has worn off, the hard work of
moving it forward begins, and that's where we are.

My suggestions would be:
- have a theme to each issue, announced well in advance (at least 3
months before publication)
- approach specific community members with expertise on the theme to
write an article
- stay on those members to make sure the article is written and
submitted
- offer ongoing "columns" to those who contribute regularly. We have
this for editors but not others.
- ask for specific articles, not just "please give us anything".

And sure, some people will want to write articles that are not "on
theme". That's great. Those can be fit in as appropriate. Some people
want to come up with their own topic and do their own thing, but for
most, if they're given some guidelines, it makes it much easier to
contribute.

3. Marketing: that's tied into contributions. Sully posted something
on Joomla's Facebook page every single working day over the last year.
That drove a ton of traffic to the magazine. We are only told numbers,
i.e. 30K visits, but we are not told where they come from. It would be
interesting to know where those visits are from.

SEO is definitely part of this, and so is cross-channel promotion.
What is preventing us from having the magazine announcement available
on the 1st of every month instead of the 7th, 10th, or later?

What's preventing an email on the 15th of each month asking for
magazine articles on specific topics?

4. Merging content: I have been a tireless advocate for fewer
communications channels for years. I am all for consolidating
channels.

However.

The Community site, specifically, is without clear purpose or goals.
It continues to exist for the following reasons that I can see:

- it's where leadership (and others) post about Joomla issues or
whatever else they like (notable Joomla sites, upcoming Joomla events,
something or other with code, etc). The posts are frequently missed
because they are unpredictable when they will happen. Furthermore,
there's no navigation to find back posts, so it's really hard to read
anything more recent than the last few posts.

- it's where the Joomla user groups and events live -- except there's
a new events.joomla.org under construction. And Joomla user groups are
also in JPeople (not that I'm an advocate for JPeople)

- it's where the Joomla showcase lives

- it has the "JoomlaConnect" RSS feed, which feeds in posts from
various external sites.

There are links here to the magazine and JPeople as well.

The magazine's big differentiator from the other community content is
that it's deadline driven. Every month, on the 1st of the month, a
batch of 12-18 articles is released. Much of it is "evergreen" generic
Joomla content and not time-sensitive. Occasionally some is time-
sensitive, like the reporting on the leadership summit.

What happens when there is no deadline driving content? Nothing, and
you only need to look at the community site to see that. There is no
regular leadership post on the community site, the showcase "site of
the month" is not tied to any date, and other blog posts are sporatic.

What would actually make more sense here is a hybrid solution. Rather
than try to fit the magazine under community as a RSS feed, community
should be fit under the magazine.

The magazine would continue to release its 12-18 articles on the 1st
of each month, very regularly. In a perfect world, someone from
leadership would be tasked to write an update every month as a
magazine article. I really don't think that's a huge amount to ask,
since the job could be rotated among leadership members.

As important things happen over the month, like new Joomla versions,
announcements from leadership on critical issues, and so forth, those
could be posted in a "breaking news" section of the magazine. Those
announcements would be in one place, easy to find, and include
commenting, removing the need to go to the JPeople site to comment.

Joomla needs more deadlines. By switching the release cycle from "when
this list of stuff is done" to every 6 months, there's a sense of the
community moving ahead. Likewise, communications need the same
deadline-driven approach, and a consolidation of their location. By
doing this, we'll have more communication, more regularly, with fewer
places to look for it, and a happier community that feels more in the
loop with what's happening.

Jen

On Oct 19, 3:05 pm, Paul Orwig <paul.or...@community.joomla.org>
wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> Dianne and Alice and I have been brainstorming about a set of possible
> content and directional changes for the JCM. Some will be easier and quicker
> to implement than others. Nothing is set in stone at this point, so we want
> to hear from everyone else on the team about these proposed changes:

> *
> 1. Simplify/Restructure content around different user types.* What about if

> we reduce/consolidate our number of topics and target them directly at
> different types of users, such as:
>

>    -     Developers (current Developer's workbench, Joomla setup, Joomla
>    books, Did you know...?)
>    -     Designers (current Designer's studio, Joomla books, Did you
>    know...?)
>    -     Administrators (current Administrator's toolkit Did you know...?)
>    -     Sitebuilders or users or...? (current Joomla books, Website case

>    studies, Did you know...?, Business matters?)

>    -     Community (current Joomla Events and Joomla Days, Joomla setup,

>    Volunteer profiles, Feature stories, Leadership connections)

>    -     Project news (could also be a part of Community, but would consist

>    of a sampling of updates from around the project, Leadership connections)

>    -     International stories (unchanged from current, or not?)
>
> *
> 2. Explicit emphasis on team generated content.* I think it's important for

> the JCM to always be open for contributions from the community, but at this
> point in the life of the JCM, we are not seeing as many community
> contributions as we'd hoped. So how about if we make a committment to
> forming JCM editor teams around each of the consolidated list of topics, and
> challenge each of those teams to really come up with a vision for their
> topic and improve integration with other aspects of joomla.org (adding links
> to the documentation wiki for tutorials, etc.)

> *
> 3. Improve JCM marketing/promotions.* Empower Milena to form a JCM

> promotions/marketing team that will strengthen the JCM's readership and
> contributions from the community.
>

> *4. Consolidate JCM content with blogs and project announcements.* I posted

[Milena Mitova]

Hi everyone,

responding to some of Jen's comments:

1. regarding the announcement - I now have access to joomla.org and per discussion with Paul have committed to posting immediately upon getting the new issue live. Please be patient with me on this one - I am working on it, and as it is my first time, it will be out today - my bad, learning curve.

2. Regarding marketing - I have a plan I am working on that I would like to share with all of you as metioned in my previous email, I would like to have a discussion where we hammer out action points and put them in writing and hopefully stick to them - they will cover many of the points Jen made, as I suggested many of those things about 6-7 months ago:).

3. I really think we are in a good place, we need to put some structure is all, and have a plan of action on how to get more contributors, market the magazine, etc.

Thank you all for your patience with me:)

Peace:))

---

From: Jen Kramer <focus...@gmail.com>
To: Joomla Community Magazine <joomla-commu...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Friday, November 4, 2011 11:15 AM
Subject: [JCM] Re: proposed set of content/directional changes for the JCM

[Paul Orwig]

Thanks Jen for the time and effort you put into sharing all of your suggestions! I agree with a lot of them. As Milena has said, she'll be sharing more about the ideas that have been on the marketing/promotions list as soon as she can.

Here are some of my thoughts in response to some of what you've written:

JK:

1. There isn't enough content in the magazine, at this point, to
segment user audiences. I could see us running very short of content
for developers, for example (who, stereotypically, hate writing
documentation/tutorials).

po:
Part of the rationale for proposing to create author/editor teams for those different user segments is to increase both the quality and quantity of content for those different user segments.

JK:

Right now, I see the magazine scrambling to pull in articles around
the 29th of each month. There doesn't seem to be a theme to the
articles to tie them together. In general, the Skype chat is dead
except at the end of the month (at least as far as magazine business
is concerned). I don't see anyone actively approaching community
members for magazine articles. I was asked at one point for an
article, but that was just it.... hey Jen, can you contribute an
article to next month's magazine? There was no guidelines on topic,
length, category, or anything. Just please give us something,
anything.

po:
For a long time, we have had a pretty clear official workflow along with a spreadsheet that ties in with it for keeping track of planned submissions for the next issue and future issues. The problem has been that hardly anyone was following the workflow or updating the spreadsheet. So to me, there was a choice to either constantly nag our volunteers about it, or to not constantly nag and about it and instead just accept whatever came in. I've opted for the latter approach, but I would be much happier if JCM team members would commit to our official workflow.

I'm sorry to hear it if the person who invited you to contribute to the JCM didn't give you any guidelines, etc. We've got a lot of content about that published on the JCM site in our Authors Resources section. If I had known you were looking for more direction I would have been happy to offer it.

JK:

My suggestions would be:
- have a theme to each issue, announced well in advance (at least 3
months before publication)

po:
The theme idea has come up many times before, and in the past I have been consistently against it. When we were trying to get most of our content from community contributions, I didn't think it made sense for us to have themes because I didn't want us to do anything that would appear to constrain or limit contributions. Now that we've proposed to create author/editor teams and look to them for the creation of most JCM content, I think it gives us a better chance of being successful with the theme idea. I think Dianne and Alice support the theme idea too. I still have some reservations about how easy it's going to be to get volunteers to write about a theme they might not be too interested in, and I also think if we put an emphasis on themes we run the risk of turning some readers away ("Oh I don't care about that theme, so just I won't bother to check out the JCM this month"). But I'm ready to give the theme idea a try.

JK:

approach specific community members with expertise on the theme to
write an article
- stay on those members to make sure the article is written and
submitted
- offer ongoing "columns" to those who contribute regularly. We have
this for editors but not others.
- ask for specific articles, not just "please give us anything".

po: These are good suggestions, but the catch is that they all require a greater level of time/effort/committment from JCM team members than we have gotten. I have always hoped that the JCM editors for each topic would have a vision/mission for their topic and be the main evangelists for building/growing their topics. For the most part that hope just hasn't happened, as with a lot of areas where the JCM can improve, I think it's at least partly a consequence of balancing JCM volunteer time with everything else in people's lives. I hope a stronger level of committment with a more spread out workload will be part of what comes out of these new proposed author/editor teams.

JK:

4. Merging content: I have been a tireless advocate for fewer
communications channels for years. I am all for consolidating
channels.

However.

The Community site, specifically, is without clear purpose or goals.
It continues to exist for the following reasons that I can see:

PO:
Part of the rationale for the merging content idea includes helping to  give the Community site a clearer focus on project news and updates.

JK:

What would actually make more sense here is a hybrid solution. Rather
than try to fit the magazine under community as a RSS feed, community
should be fit under the magazine.

The magazine would continue to release its 12-18 articles on the 1st
of each month, very regularly. In a perfect world, someone from
leadership would be tasked to write an update every month as a
magazine article. I really don't think that's a huge amount to ask,
since the job could be rotated among leadership members.

po:
What you're suggesting is pretty similar to what the proposed content merging idea consists of, except the idea proposes to merge content into the community site instead of the JCM.

The focus of the community site is something that would be addressed in the implementation of the idea. Events and JUGs also tie in with the same general theme of "project news and updates" and that content is also currently hosted on the community site. The community site currently gets more than 4x the traffic of the JCM, and the statistics show that the JCM hasn't gained significant ground vs the community site since the JCM launched. So those are some of the reasons why the proposed content merging idea has the community site as the most natural point of consolidation rather than the JCM.

On your suggestion to have leadership contributions each month, that was actually part of the original purpose of the "Leadership Connections" topic, but unfortunately we weren't able to get the level of participation that we hoped for.

JK:

What happens when there is no deadline driving content? Nothing, and
you only need to look at the community site to see that. There is no
regular leadership post on the community site, the showcase "site of
the month" is not tied to any date, and other blog posts are sporatic.

po:
I really like this insight you have made! Some in the community aren't in favor of the JCM's "old style print oriented release cycle", and have instead have suggested that we should adopt more of a "new internet style just in time release cycle". I don't think it's as simple as that, and I think there are pro's and con's to both approaches. In addition to your "no deadline, no content" insight, the other points I like about our deadline oriented release cycle are that each issue feels like a gift from the JCM to the community, and we have hopefully established the idea in readers minds that on the first of the month, they should go check out what's in the new JCM.

To me, part of the appeal of the merging content idea is that it can give a balance of both monthly deadline driven content (JCM style) and more frequent content updates (project announcements and blogs). I think that will give readers more reasons to keep coming back to the point of consolidation, which will end up increasing exposure for all content.

JK:

Joomla needs more deadlines. By switching the release cycle from "when
this list of stuff is done" to every 6 months, there's a sense of the
community moving ahead. Likewise, communications need the same
deadline-driven approach, and a consolidation of their location. By
doing this, we'll have more communication, more regularly, with fewer
places to look for it, and a happier community that feels more in the
loop with what's happening.

po:
I agree! I think that actually spills over into the subject of leadership structure/oversight and accountability, but I'll save that for another thread(s).

Thanks again Jen for sharing all of your thoughts and suggestions!

paul

[Mark W Bender]

> Dianne and Alice and I have been brainstorming about a set of possible
> content and directional changes for the JCM. Some will be easier and quicker
> to implement than others. Nothing is set in stone at this point, so we want
> to hear from everyone else on the team about these proposed changes:

> *
> 1. Simplify/Restructure content around different user types.* What about if

> we reduce/consolidate our number of topics and target them directly at
> different types of users, such as:
>

>    -     Developers (current Developer's workbench, Joomla setup, Joomla
>    books, Did you know...?)
>    -     Designers (current Designer's studio, Joomla books, Did you
>    know...?)
>    -     Administrators (current Administrator's toolkit Did you know...?)
>    -     Sitebuilders or users or...? (current Joomla books, Website case

>    studies, Did you know...?, Business matters?)

>    -     Community (current Joomla Events and Joomla Days, Joomla setup,

>    Volunteer profiles, Feature stories, Leadership connections)

>    -     Project news (could also be a part of Community, but would consist

>    of a sampling of updates from around the project, Leadership connections)

>    -     International stories (unchanged from current, or not?)

"Implementers" might be a user type that fits into Administrators and
Developers.
Maybe we could make Implementers a "main user group" and put Admins
and Site Builders as
a "subset" of that group.

With Nicholaa's Akeeba work keeping him very busy, I haven't had any
Admin. Toolkit articles
since spring time. I haven't pursued new article submissions for that
category, so if anyone
knows of writers (articles) that would fit into that category, feel
free to have them contact me
via my JCM project profile.

If anyone needs some editorial help, feel free to contact me.
> *
> 2. Explicit emphasis on team generated content.* I think it's important for

> the JCM to always be open for contributions from the community, but at this
> point in the life of the JCM, we are not seeing as many community
> contributions as we'd hoped. So how about if we make a committment to
> forming JCM editor teams around each of the consolidated list of topics, and
> challenge each of those teams to really come up with a vision for their
> topic and improve integration with other aspects of joomla.org (adding links
> to the documentation wiki for tutorials, etc.)

Great idea, especially of using the "vision" to improve integration
with other
parts of the project.

> 3. Improve JCM marketing/promotions.* Empower Milena to form a JCM

> promotions/marketing team that will strengthen the JCM's readership and
> contributions from the community.

Anything that is done to help promote the project is great. Sully's
hard work on
FB in the past year easy shined over all other CMS's in the Water &
Stone report.

Problem is "what channel" does the project use without "over kill".
I've heard/read some
in the community pondering "how many channels" is enough to reach our
community?
JCM IMHO has earned to the respect of our community, and should be one
of those channels.
Where JCM is "located" is a whole different discussion. We fought for
magazine.joomla.org
and what to me is the most appropriated url for JCM no matter we are
"located" inside of the Joomla! Project.

> *4. Consolidate JCM content with blogs and project announcements.* I posted

> this idea in a recent JPeople thread on "Purposeful JPeople". I think in the
> long run, things will be simpler and easier for readers/users if what is now
> the JCM content is merged with some of the content on the community site
> (leadership and community blogs, JDay announcements) and the www site
> (project announcements). I have since brought this up in CLT and suggested
> it might make the most sense for that to all be served from the community
> site. CLT agrees with the concept, and have asked Sander Potjer and I to
> take a closer look at how this might be implemented. In my mind, if this
> happens it will take at a minimum 4-6 months.

This is the "Ark of the Covenant" in the "How many Channels?"
discussion

>
> Okay I think that's about it for the set of proposed changes. Now it's
> everyone else's turn-What do you all think of these proposed changes, or
> what other ideas do you have?

With some of the contributors leaving the JCM team this past year,
helping get the word
out about our need for contributors to JCM has become an important
aspect.

I'm not sure what effect the forum section and the JCM articles have
had regarding interest,
but "Rome wasn't built a day" either. Does the Joomla! Project have a
"volunteer recruiter team"?
At least the forum and JCM are 2 newer avenues to help get the word
out.

Perhaps what we learn about the JCM "recruiting process" can be shared
with others inside of the project to
help them for their teams.

Mark

[Paul Orwig]

Thanks Mark for adding your thoughts to this discussion.

I think this thread is a really important one for two reasons:

1. It represents some important potential directional changes for the JCM content, based on what we have learned since we launched 18 months ago.
2. It is a good way to help get our newer team members involved and identify roles that they are interested in filling.

One of the points in the original post that has gotten a lot of attention in this discussion is the idea of merging the JCM content into the Community site. That feedback was important. Dianne and Alice and I heard all of it and then we brainstormed some more about an alternative approach that was presented to CLT a few weeks ago. The short version of that approach is to keep the JCM as a standalone site, but to re-design the home page of the community site so that it incorporates some links to JCM articles, along with blog links, project news announcements, and JUGs/events updates. There hasn't been any feedback from CLT on that alternate approach, but the the idea of merging/consolidating content has been chosen as one of CLT's 2012 goals. I expect that the community will have input into the decision making process about that. I think that subject is an important one and merits it's own separate JCM email list thread. So I propose that we do that (start a separate thread for that subject) and that we focus this thread's discussion on the other proposed content changes for the JCM.

I encourage our new team members to go back and read through this entire thread, but here is my summary of the ideas that have come up with in this discussion about proposed content changes:

A. Simplify/restructure JCM content, primarily around different user types. The different ideas that have come up around this are:
 - Developers
 - Designers
 - Administrators
 - Sitebuilders
 - Implementers (as proposed could also be a merging of "Developers" and "Administrators")
 - Businesses (needs a better label, and might also include non-profits, schools, etc.)

   A set of more general topics has also been proposed:
 - Community (Events, JDays, JUGs, Volunteer profiles, etc.)
 - Project News
 - Feature stories
 - International stories (non-english language articles)

B. Move to an emphasis on JCM team generated content. Continue to accept contributions from the community, but form new JCM author/editor teams around each of the consolidated list of topics, and challenge each of those teams to really come up with a vision for their topic and improve integration with other aspects of joomla.org (adding links to the documentation wiki for tutorials, etc.).

C. Incorporate the idea of themes for different JCM issues. Publish these ideas at least 3 months in advance to give community members and JCM team members enough time to submit content for those themes.

D. Strengthen JCM Marketing/Promotions. A lot of ideas have come up on this subject in this discussion. Milena as the leader of the JCM's Marketing/Promotions team is preparing a presentation with a followup meeting about her vision for these important functions.

E. Update the JCM's design to improve usability and aesthetics, while remaining consistent with the new joomla.org look and feel.

F. Revisit the international stories section and make adjustments based on what we've learned.

Here are what Dianne, Alice and I see as our next steps:
1. We need to discuss and then decide what the right number of topics will be and what the labels for those topics should be. Let's focus on that first in this thread.
2. All JCM team members need to find a role or roles for the area(s) that they want to contribute in, and volunteer for those roles. Those who have volunteered as illustrators, webmasters, and developers will be in overall support roles for the JCM. We might also consider forming some other support teams, such as for updating and improving Documentation and Author/Editor resources.
3. Implement the content-centric changes from the two previous steps.
4. Implement the JCM redesign.
5. Implement international stories changes.

Now, we'd like to hear thoughts about this from the rest of the team!

Thanks,

paul
with Dianne and Alice