FooBar/Fedora Journal/FWN Future

[Adam Batkin]

I have been editing the Planet beat in FWN for about 7.5 months now, and 
I've noticed a few things. Given the recent discussions about the future 
of FWN, creating a Fedora Journal/Magazine and Project FooBar, this may 
be a good time to share some ideas that have been ruminating in my head 
for a while.

The Planet beat is unique in that it represents a fairly broad 
cross-section of not only the people in the Fedora community 
(developers, contributors, users, etc...) but also a diverse selection 
of topics. Many (most?) of the linked posts cover themes also reported 
by other beats. It isn't a complete duplication of effort, as topics are 
usually covered from different angles, but it does mean that in order to 
get the full picture about anything, you really need to check all of the 
FWN beats to see what else might have happened.

So now my [potentially heretical, definitely radical] thoughts: Would it 
be worth discussing the format of FWN itself? What would FWN look like 
if it was organized around "topics" instead of "sources" (what we 
currently call a Beat)?

(As a sidenote: The Developments beat is probably the most 
complicated/time consuming beat, and I'm not surprised that no one has 
stepped up. The bar--and the barriers to entry--are incredibly high, and 
it was a valuable source of information, taken from an incredibly busy 
mailing list that understandably can be difficult to stay on top of. 
What I'm proposing may also make filling this hole in FWN a little easier.)

I'm not suggesting that FWN be thrown out, or even that tomorrow we turn 
around and redesign the whole format. But in the wider context of the 
FooBar discussions, and in particular the possibility of finding 
software that can support new workflows, this may be the best time for 
any sort of change, if that is something that would work. I'm really 
only trying to start a bigger discussion, and the above ideas are just a 
starting point (i.e. feel free to throw them out). But in the long run, 
what is FWN's purpose? I would sum it up as "summarize and share 
information relevant to the Fedora community" so we should do that as 
best we can.

-Adam Batkin