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Creation of an official Discord server for the Node.js project #872
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I'm +1 on the incorperation of a Discord server, as like you mentioned, it gives the community a quicker way to connect, as not everyone will want to make new Slack account / download an IRC client
Not to rush things, but if we were to do this, we should probably reach out to Discord's legal team and get
https://discord.com/invite/nodejsFWIW I'd be unlikely to move over to Discord -- it would be an additional communication platform and I wouldn't create a new account there (or anywhere else) just for Node.js.
Reacted by Tobias NießenFWIW I'd be unlikely to move over to Discord -- it would be an additional communication platform and I wouldn't create a new account there (or anywhere else) just for Node.js.
No one is forcing you there 🙏; You don't need to be there if you don't want to, and I agree yet another platform, but that would be for the community 👀
We definitely don't need all collaborators to be there. And to be honest this could be a pilot program to see how it succeeds.
Reacted by Aviv Keller, Carl Vitullo and CodeM.The third "goal" mentions potentially shutting down Slack, or is that specifically the non-OpenJS Foundation one?
The third "goal" mentions potentially shutting down Slack, or is that specifically the non-OpenJS Foundation one?
It was an idea to slowly phase out the "Node Slackers" slack server that Jordan maintains by himself, but he said that he is not interested in shutting in down so that's fine 🤷
But we would be able to let the OppenJS Foundation Slack at least for Node.js to be more for collaborators and contributors and less for asking support/help. Which it is also not used much for that, but still some people ask support there.
Reacted by Richard LauThis doesn't sound like an improvement to me. We already have the official Slack workspace, and GitHub of course. Adding another official channel means yet another place to check.
Reacted by Claudio WunderGrowing a community on Discord is useful. The official OpenJS slack is for our communication, while Discord would be for end users.
I think it would become quite popular, too. It's also a great marketing channel, and what I would set up today instead of the unofficial Node.js slack.
The fundamental question is who will moderate this and provide Node.js knowledge to the users.
Reacted by Claudio Wunder, Benjamin Gruenbaum and Joyee CheungI agree that growing a community is useful. There are probably already existing communities, though, so we would kind of be in competition with them.
As a user, if I found and invested myself in an existing Node.js-focused Discord community, with well-defined rules and many moderators and helpers, I would need a very convincing argument to switch to an "official" one (what does the official stamp change?).Reacted by Tobias NießenThis doesn't sound like an improvement to me. We already have the official Slack workspace, and GitHub of course. Adding another official channel means yet another place to check.
Each one has different roles. It's agreeable that we see users asking/seeking help on the help repository and other platforms, including OpenJS Slack. The idea is that people will naturally switch over to Discord over time. It's ridiculous how popular Discord is nowadays for hosting tech communities.
I still believe many users would use our help repository, but I can see many of them going over Discord.
The fundamental question is who will moderate this and provide Node.js knowledge to the users.
I don't mind if we ask for volunteers to set it up (I wouldn't mind at all). Still, ultimately, I believe the Moderation team would be responsible for moderating it + some volunteers. We can draft something more concrete. There's some energy lift in setting it up.
As a user, if I found and invested myself in an existing Node.js-focused Discord community, with well-defined rules and many moderators and helpers, I would need a very convincing argument to switch to an "official" one (what does the official stamp change?).
For better or for worse, I haven't found any big community. That said, smaller-ish multi-purpose communities might focus on Node or more considerable general-purpose programming Discord servers with channels for Node.js. (The only community that comes to mind is Nodeiflux. Which has 14K members)
The main difference between the official one and the other is that the former is an official community consisting of collaborators, ambassadors, streams, announcements, etc. People tend to go to official communities because they are official.
Since there's no official JavaScript Discord server, I can see people with JavaScript interests going over our Discord. After all, it is also the most popular language (JavaScript) among teenagers, young adults, and even folks who code Discord Bots 🤷
Reacted by Michaël ZassoThere are also benefits in being an official community, as Discord gives some perks to Community servers.
Reacted by Michaël Zasso and Aviv KellerI am all in for that!
Reacted by Claudio Wunder33 remaining items
That said, if the moderation team agrees I think it would be an effective body in enforcing the CoC.
I don’t think the concerns from #872 (comment) have been addressed yet? Namely, what the plan is for moderation of the new space and whether @nodejs/moderation has the capacity to take this on.
As a new member of the moderation team, I doubt I'll have dedicated time to monitor a Discord.
If there are no remaining concerns
I don’t think the concerns from #872 (comment) have been addressed yet? Namely, what the plan is for moderation of the new space and whether @nodejs/moderation has the capacity to take this on.
We did address those concerns, yes. Pretty much the plan is (as stated in previous comments):
- Some TSC/Moderation team members get moderation privileges on the Discord server
- The current moderators/staff of the discord server keep also enforcing moderation there (we can add extra volunteers only to moderate there)
- Our Moderation team is not required to moderate that space but can do so if they wish
- Discord Server moderators have a Slack channel with us (moderation team) so that we can quickly sync in case of emergencies and for weekly syncs from their side (maybe?)
(Some of the items above I just came up with as ideas)
Reacted by Brian Muenzenmeyer, Matteo Collina, Carl Vitullo and Aviv KellerHi everyone,
I have a few clarifying questions:
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Currently, the project use Slack and GitHub Discussions for our topics. However, I find GitHub Discussions can be challenging because conversations often go off-topic, and resolved issues remain open. I think it might be beneficial to direct users to ask their questions on Discord instead (Not a replacement, but a "hey, we also have Discord, you can ask questions there, any they might gain more traction"). This could help common issues gain more visibility and traction. Would this be acceptable?
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Additionally, if the project starts using Discord for user questions, I believe the triage team should be a part of answering them. While we don't need special permissions, I think it would be helpful to have the same recognition as GitHub Member badge shows. Demonstrating credibility is crucial for effectively resolving issues, and this recognition could aid in resolving issues more efficiently and accurately.
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Additionally, if the project starts using Discord for user questions, I believe the triage team should be a part of answering them. While we don't need special permissions, I think it would be helpful to have the same recognition as GitHub Member badge shows. Demonstrating credibility is crucial for effectively resolving issues, and this recognition could aid in resolving issues more efficiently and accurately.
I believe Node.js Collaborators could be given a "Node.js Collaborator" role and triagers a "Node.js Triager" role. This was already something I wanted to do.
Additionally, if the project starts using Discord for user questions, I believe the triage team should be a part of answering them. While we don't need special permissions, I think it would be helpful to have the same recognition as GitHub Member badge shows. Demonstrating credibility is crucial for effectively resolving issues, and this recognition could aid in resolving issues more efficiently and accurately.
I'm not sure about that. Although I believe we could disable GitHub Discussions as they are rarely monitored/viewed and moderated anyways. Discord has a better platform for making Discussion/Help threads. cc @nodejs/tsc
Reacted by Aviv Keller, Tobias Nießen and Carl VitulloI think it might be beneficial to direct users to ask their questions on Discord instead (Not a replacement, but a "hey, we also have Discord, you can ask questions there, any they might gain more traction"). This could help common issues gain more visibility and traction. Would this be acceptable?
An upside of using GitHub is that org members can ping collaborators or teams when it seems appropriate, and we can also get folks from libuv and V8 involved rather easily. Some of the most knowledgeable contributors almost exclusively interact through GitHub, so directing users away from GitHub might be directing users away from those.
Reacted by Claudio WunderFWIW I was specifically referring to GitHub Discussions
My response also applies to GitHub Discussions :)
Reacted by Aviv KellerSome of the most knowledgeable contributors almost exclusively interact through GitHub, so directing users away from GitHub might be directing users away from those.
But I assume that Discussions was used for general chat. I assume help requests can still be directed to node/help and feature requests/bugs to node/node
So I assume, it would still make sense to disable Discussions, maybe? IDK 🤷 I'm fine either ways, but I'm fond of reducing the number of parallel platforms we have for people to write something. And if GitHub Discussions are mostly used for general discussions, Discord is an ideal place... I know there's a tradeoff of "but it's all on GitHub, no extra account needed", and I'd say yeah. I think in the end it boils down to, "do we really want to have GitHub Discussions?" has anything important happened there for the last X period of time?
Reacted by Aviv KellerFrom the discussion so far, my understanding was that the Discord effort was around providing support for those that already use Discord as their communication channel. I don't think we should anything that would require Node.js collaborators to join Discord in order to be involved in day-to-day work of the project.
I guess I'm just agreeing with what @tniessen said in part. For any discussion where we want project collaborators to be involved, we should not push those discussions to Discord.
Reacted by Tobias Nießen and Carl VitulloFrom the discussion so far, my understanding was that the Discord effort was around providing support for those that already use Discord as their communication channel. I don't think we should anything that would require Node.js collaborators to join Discord in order to be involved in day-to-day work of the project.
I guess I'm just agreeing with what @tniessen said in part. For any discussion where we want project collaborators to be involved, we should not push those discussions to Discord.
That is a correct assessment. My point was unrelated (somewhat) and more an open question: Do we need GitHub discussions? Are we using them? Do they serve for some specific purpose?
And no, we won't require collaborators to join Discord although they are more than welcome and invited to join :)
Reacted by Aviv KellerFYI, we've started drafting a temporary "Beta" server to use as a template and then apply to the existing Discord server.
I'll follow-up with more updates once I have.
Reacted by Aviv Keller and Benjamin GruenbaumAs many have noticed, we released the Discord server! https://nodejs.org/en/blog/announcements/official-discord-launch-announcement
Here is also a link with follow-up tasks: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ED-P6vAUswelxqvlKE3iZ-NPHnBZpVP3I8vbygPnGMI/edit?usp=sharing
Discord is a massive hub for collaboration, communication, and projects to reach their audiences.
It's becoming trendy for massive open-source projects and tech companies to have Discord Servers (ie, Cloudflare, Sentry, GitHub Education, etc.)
The upcoming Ambassador Program gives us even more reason for allowing users to interact with Node.js ambassadors and take a closer part of the community.
The goals of such a Discord server are simple:
Running a Discord server could be better for our community and our ability to reach the outer layers of our community.