From: Douglas Livingstone <rampant@...>
Date: 2005-01-21T10:35:46+09:00
Subject: Re: Best ways to accelerate Ruby's popularity

> Trust tends to come from a network effect.  If I determine one site to
> be trustworthy (say, ruby-lang.org), and it links to another site
> (rubyforge.org), I can infer that that other site is probably worthwhile.

True, branding and linking are both things which are important. The
network effect is reduced when it feels like you are moving from one
network to another - there is no link on the ruby-lang.org front page
to ruby-doc.org. Instead, ruby-doc is listed on the "Downloadable
documents" page. The network effect is active here too: above
ruby-doc, there is a link to Ruby 1.4.6 documentation, and a notice
that the "reference manual for Ruby 1.6 is not yet prepared", while on
the front page there is a download link for Ruby 1.8.2! Does this mean
that ruby-doc is more out of date than either of those two?

> I don't see any shortcuts for people to figure out what sites are
> reliable sources and which aren't. A stamp of approval won't do it.

You are right, naturally, putting a stamp on something doesn't make
the contents more correct. OTOH, the new user doesn't know what
"correct" is - the only way they can tell is by perception of value.
To increase the perceived value, you need the positive networking and
visual harmony.

Removing dead links on the ruby-lang site would be a good first step.

On: http://www.ruby-lang.org/en/20020103.html

The link to "Ruby 1.4 Reference Manual" gives a "Not Found" error
The link to "The article in Dr. Dobb's Journal Jan. 2001" says "We are
updating our site's registration system."
The link to "The web page for Dave and Andy's book " is "does not
exist on this server."
"Dr. Dobb's Journal Jan. 2001: Programming in Ruby" is repeated, and
still doesn't work
The link "InformIT: The Ruby Programming Language " says "Error 404 -
Page Not Found"
"IBM DeveloperWorks: Ruby: An open source gem from Japan" says "Our apologies"
"SunWorld Online Jan. 2000" says something about Unix, I don't see
anything on Ruby
"SunWorld Online Feb. 1999 " is the same Unix page, still nothing on Ruby

On the menu on the left, if you click "What's Ruby?" then "Matz's
presentation at JAOO" you end up at
"http://www.ruby-lang.org/en/20010919.html"

The link to the "Slides" says "Not Found"

Again, on the menu, when you click "Ruby's License" you get sent to a
text file. It would be nice if there was at least warning that it was
a text file, rather than an integral part of the site. Perhaps a "this
is what you can do under the Ruby licence in human language" page,
with a link to the "real" licence would probably be more useful for
common people. (See what the creative commons people are doing, and
the multitude of sites explaining the GPL.)

That's just the start - I've not even gotten onto the visual cohesion
problems between sites. You are right, a stamp of approval won't do
it. We need something to put the stamp on first.

Douglas