Wikipedia:WikiProject Transport/Maritime transport task force/Brainstorm

Think of this page as a "blackboard" to develop ideas to improve the task force. Don't be shy: if you have an idea, knock yourself out.

Some Scope Examples
A venn diagram illustrating a few examples of how the scope of the three projects differ.

Goals

1. get active editors to watchlist the task force talk page.
2. encourage relevant discussion on the task force talk page
3. begin to invite people interested in the topic area from off-wiki
4. when the project reaches critical mass, let it grow organically according to the members wishes

Outreach

Features and benefits

Why would an editor want to be involved in the task force?

Features: attributes of the task force

Benefits: how the features help the task force member

Desired benefits could include:

• Assists in creating the content the member wants to create
• Gives the member a feeling of recognition/accomplishment
• Helps the member solve problems that arise while editing
• Helps the member improve articles up to FA-class
• Provides a sense of camaraderie
• Helps the member learn about the topic area
• Helps the member learn about wikipedia

Editor outreach

• Construct a message
• Identify potential members
• Send the message
• Periodically look for new potential members

Other items such as userboxes, project barnstars, and so forth are also effective tools of editor outreach. Also Template:Wikipedia_ads.

Ideas for potentially interested editors

• Benea
• Mjroots
• Lugnad

When the task force is in good shape, we can inform folks that have listed themselves on the member list of the news. It may be appropriate to inform members of other maritime-related projects.

Off-wiki outreach

Numerous other internet communities are interested in this topic area. Outreach to them could potentially bring in new editors.

• Construct a message
• Identify potential targets
• Send the message
• Periodically look for new potential targets

Some thoughts off the top of my head:

Online communities

• gcaptain.com
• several others exits

Museums

See Wikipedia:GLAM

• http://www.nauticus.org
• http://www.nmm.ac.uk
• http://www.anmm.gov.au/site/page.cfm

Schools

See Wikipedia:USEDU

U.S.

• Cal Maritime's Marine Transportation dept
• Mass Maritime's Marine Transportation dept
• Maine
• USMMA
• Texas A&M
• Great Lakes
• SUNY

U.K.

• Banff and Buchan College
• Blackpool & the Fylde College (Fleetwood Nautical Campus)
• City of Glasgow College
• Lews Castle College
• Liverpool John Moores University (Lairdside Maritime Centre)
• Lowestoft College
• National Maritime College of Ireland
• North West Kent College of Further Education
• Orkney College
• Shetland School of Nautical Studies
• South Tyneside College
• University of Plymouth
• Warsash Maritime Academy

India

• Tolani Maritime Institute (TMI)
• Samundra Institute of Maritime Studies- Mumbai
• International Maritime Institute (IMI)
• Several others

• See List of maritime colleges for many others

Rough draft

I'm writing on behalf of Wikipedia's Maritime Transport task force. As a maritime transport professional, we thought you might be interested in knowing that there is a community of volunteer editors working to develop Wikipedia's content in your field.

Many individuals enjoy identifying articles of particular interest to them, and moving them up the quality scale from "start class", up to "Good article" status, and some continue to expand and polish articles up to the highest rung on our quality scale: "Featured article" status. If you have ever considered developing an article on Wikipedia, the task force has experienced editors who would be happy to help you get started and assist with any questions or bumps along the road.

Perhaps of more interest to university faculty is the Wikipedia Global Education Program. In this program, an instructor assigns writing assignments to students that enhance selected Wikipedia articles. For example, in a class on ship's business, an instructor might break the class down into groups, and assign groups to work on articles such as "bareboat charter", "demise charter", "time charter", and "voyage charter" to supplement their usual classwork.

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Task force activities

• Tag & assess drive a la WP:MILHIST's?
• DYK of the week?
• Barnstars/WikiBling?

Tag & assess

• Get a bot to tag all articles under Category:Merchant navy

Features to add

• Transport-project-wide peer review mechanism (Haus)
• Transport-project-wide A-class review mechanism (Haus)
• References list
• Suggestions of where to find photos
• Boilerplate articles
• Enhancing and bringing activity to WP:TRANSPORT will yield dividends for the task force, and vice-versa
• Is it desirable to maintain a presence on a transport IRC channel (#wikipedia-en-transport).
• (What else?)