Re: WG Scope

Hey Evan:

Thanks for pushing on this, I heartily agree that however the WG(s) get
scoped, it is crucial to stagger and manage parallel work openly and
publicly. I opened a PR that I hope speeds up discussion on this kind of
workflow mechanism, and will extend it to the other proposals once I've
gotten some feedback, approvals, and/or competing PRs! The clock is
ticking, though, so timely review would be appreciated from the CG.

Hastily,
__juan

On Fri, Mar 21, 2025 at 8:19 PM Evan Prodromou <evan@prodromou.name> wrote:

> I added an issue to the potential-charters repository with a proposal for
> managing scope for the WG:
>
> https://github.com/swicg/potential-charters/issues/83
>
> I think we should consider *all* the Social Web Working Group
> recommendations as in-scope for the new WG, but let the new WG set its own
> schedule and prioritisation for maintaining those documents.
>
> I think this would balance the need to maintain all the existing documents
> on the one hand against the limited time and attention of the working group
> on the other.
>
> As an example of how this could work (and *not a proposal for an actual
> work schedule, please do not at me*), imagine that, almost immediately,
> the workgroup starts with these document revisions:
>
>
>
>    - Activity Streams 2.1 (core and vocabulary) - incorporate errata,
>    improve clarity
>    - ActivityPub 1.1 - incorporate errata, expand media upload, define
>    replies maintenance, etc.
>
>
> As this work winds down, and these documents move into the final stages of
> recommendation, the WG might take on more work:
>
>
>    - WebSub 1.1 - errata and clarifications
>    - LOLA 1.0 - define LOLA
>
>
> (Again, this is just an example schedule. I don't know if WebSub needs a
> 1.1 update or if that's the highest priority change.) As these were
> completed and moved into PR and TR stage, the group might then take on
> additional streams of work:
>
>
>    - Activity Streams 2.2 (vocabulary) - expand vocabulary with new terms
>    - ActivityPub E2EE Messaging - example of new functionality and new
>    document
>    - Micropub 1.1 - errata
>
> In this example, the WG is keeping a healthy and productive 2-3 parallel
> document pace, but is still covering multiple documents over the period.
>
> The WG could set its own heuristics for initiating new work, such as
> having N editors for each active document; having N chairs per active
> document workstream; staging work initiated in the SocialCG; community and
> implementer demand; and so on.
>
> I think that as a more mature WG doing iterative updates to existing work,
> with occasional extensions to that work, it would not be under the same
> time pressure as the previous Social Web WG was. If we want, we can set
> more healthy and realistic expectations for deliverables, and still take
> responsibility for all the docs published by the previous Social Web WG.
>
> Evan
>