locality-based wiki to pool knowledge

[lrcg]

After spending some time writing up detailed descriptions of safe routes in and out of my city, I realised that my profile is not the proper place for such information. It would be better to have that sort of thing in a wiki since it applies to all other hosts in the area. Likewise, the shared knowledge of bicycle shops, campgrounds, etc, etc, would be better pooled into locality-based pages. A wiki format would help ensure information stays current. I imagine hosts would be the primary content contributors to the pages, but cyclists may add or correct information if the process is simple enough. If it is done well and enough people join in, then WarmShowers.org could serve dual roles: hospitality exchange and cyclotouring information repository.

[rfay]

This seems like a big order :-) It's outside the current scope of Warmshowers.org, but Warmshowers might be a good place for it. Nice to hear from you @myqlarson !

[lrcg]

Big order, but given the existence of forums on the site and my proposed focus, I don't think it's that far out of scope. Personally, I think it may be more useful than forums, especially for cyclists already on the road.

Additionally, given the growing popularity of other hospitality clubs and exchanges, both gratis and paid (i.e. AirBnB), it would be important to keep WS relevant and competitive. The audience is inherently limited as it is and without a critical mass of sustaining members, it risks slowly sliding into obscurity like the original email-based list did. I was actually a member of Gravel's email-based list many years ago and had completely forgotten about it because there was never much traffic. I would hate WS to meet the same fate. Maybe the historical analytics don't justify this concern at the moment; I'm not sure.

Anyway, as an intermediate step, perhaps modify the forums to include threads which are focused on resources cyclists need to know about in each area sort of like Region and Country-Specific Information, but the format would need to be different so that one could quickly locate the locality of interest.

[rfay]

While doing the Great Divide this summer I was thinking extensively about Warmshowers developing a service with full info about routes, including gpx, the ability to post current info, etc. That would fit nicely with what you're talking about.

One thing Drupal does really well is called Taxonomy, the ability to tag things with hierarchical tags (works really well for geography). It might be possible to build a sparse taxonomy, where people put info in about an area and geotagged it as well.

Member growth hasn't abated at this point, https://www.warmshowers.org/country_count, but your point is still valid. All this space changes rapidly.

[lrcg]

I think my proposal is not far off from what you describe. In fact, I think mine is a subset of yours but the difference would be that yours seems to rely on cyclists contributing information, whereas my focus is on hosts. I feel that the latter are more likely to put in the time it takes to add content whereas travellers less so, at least not while on the road when the information is freshest and most memorable.

Anyway, if Drupal can filter based on tags, an interim step may be to add a local information field to host profiles such that someone searching for an area could see all fields tagged with that area. There may be a lot of overlap in the output, but it would be much easier and faster than trolling through the forums for information.

WRT growth, I'd like to see metrics such as requests for hosts per month or something that would indicate use rather than just sign ups. Looking at a plot of the membership data (below), unless there is a large surge in memberships in the next 60 days or so, exponential growth has ended as of this year, so there should be a concerted effort on ensuring that members stay active and continue to derive some sort of value from the organisation. It's pretty good so far, much better than the email-based list ever was (IMHO), but the pace of change in the distributed/social/exchange/what-have-you space is breathtaking. I've hosted a few cyclists in the past 6-12 months who have been relying on multiple apps for finding accommodation, even meta-apps which search several clubs at the same time. If cyclists indiscriminately searching for free accommodation becomes the norm, then the value inherent in cyclists hosting cyclists begins to deteriorate and the value to hosts, who actually pay in terms of their time and hospitality, becomes less valuable. Maybe not, but it could be.

[rfay]

On stats: I'm planning to do a fairly extensive writeup on everything I can think of this year for the annual meeting (https://github.com/warmshowers/Warmshowers.org/issues/425). The proxies we have for hosting events are feedback, but we don't know what percentage of hosting events get feedback. But it's not hard to query them, and also iniitial messages and answered messages may be a proxy for requests. There's a discussion at https://www.warmshowers.org/node/75032 and a member has done some work with a sanitized db. If you'd like to explore, I can make the sanitized db available to you as well.

On other networks: I'm pretty sure there's always been a large crossover with Couchsurfing.

You say "If cyclists indiscriminately searching for free accommodation becomes the norm, then the value inherent in cyclists hosting cyclists begins to deteriorate and the value to hosts, who actually pay in terms of their time and hospitality, becomes less valuable." - I think that's a very real potential problem, and as hospitality has gotten easier (the site is larger) there may be a very few people who use it far more than was ever intended. Most of us see it as a free way to break up a long string of camping nights, but there may be those who are trying to get a free place and a meal every night.

Love your thoughtfulness and encourage you to continue on this track.

Would you be interested in doing the statistics writeup this year? In past years we've only done a small writeup in the annual report. https://tr.warmshowers.org/forums/site-administratorsdesigngovernancevolunteers/leadership-council - All we have to work with is the db and a few established queries and the reports on the site. https://github.com/warmshowers/Warmshowers.org/wiki/Database-Trickery---hints-and-tips;-combining-user-accounts,-etc.

[lrcg]

@rfay Let's take this discussion to a more appropriate place since it's generally about site development and future rather than this issue. How about a new wiki page for recording issues and ideas for the 2015 Annual Newsletter/Meeting? Or forum thread? You select the best channel and I'll transfer the main ideas from this issue which are unrelated to the locality-based wiki to there. Others could get involved as well.

[rfay]

Well done @myqlarson, excellent. I created a new forum Future features and initiatives on the site and would love to carry on there. Your ideas are excellent. I also created a warmshowers/shared_assets repo here for assets that are shared among the various projects.

[rfay]

@myqlarson's important post on Warmshowers: https://www.warmshowers.org/node/77729