Hello water warriors.
First off, I have to apologize for going AWOL on this space for several weeks now. My prelim reading is catching up with me and I've been death-bed ill for the last couple weeks, which squashed all productivity.
On the bright side, my prelim reading on digital pedagogy has gotten me thinking more and more about this site. Besides the original trio of founders I don't think we've had any other contributions, have we? I had an online chat with MMC about his participation and he hasn't jumped in due to time constraints (which I think we can all understand) and also some hesitancy to contribute due to the complex storyline that's evolving and worrying about getting something wrong.
Random thoughts:
1) I'm wondering if it would be useful to have an encyclopedia-type entry that encompasses the water wars as a whole; for example, the first three paragraphs of the WWII entry on wikipedia. This would at least put a superstructure in place that would outline the major factions, major events and dates and provide tons of jumping off points for other narratives.
2) I'm also wondering if the MacMannus Encyclopedia and Directory shouldn't be dismantled with each entry having its own page. This would bring it in more in line with the "wiki" structure; for example, Wikipedia doesn't have a page for all its entries! By creating separate pages for each entry, this might provide more points of entry for other contributors. The Hales Domes Exhibits maybe too? (and yes, I realize these are mostly if not entirely my contributions!)
3) I'd love to see different kinds of media on the site.
I guess what I'm throwing out there is whether the structure of the site should be more wiki-like, using Wikipedia's framing of major conflicts as our guide:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_I
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_war
Note how the dates, locations, belligerents, commanders, etc. are all listed and linked from the columns.
Thoughts?