Seriously cool down.
A group is for grouping discussions around the same topic, if you have a non fitting topic nobody stops you from open a new discussion at top level. A group should only be considered if we experience (not expect!) a lot of discussions around the same topic.
@Jonne: I am not upset. I interpreted groups as you did. I have tried to raise the topic of defining the New Community, and also asking what are the objectives for it? I’m still waiting to hear it. I don’t think I’m alone in this.
My questions seem to get muffled out, so I created a new group specifically to discuss it. This is what I think you mean groups should be used for, yes?
As far as expectations? I’m not sure I agree. Everyone possesses expectations to start a discussion!
But sometimes expectations fall. So let them fall. 
I think you’ve got a misconception here.
The most basic level is a discussion. It is method to group comments or opinions of a specific issue/topic. Like, should dogs be painted red.
Out of such a discussion grow proposals that the participants can utilize to come to a decision. In our example “Dogs shouldn’t be painted at all”, or “Dogs should be painted green”.
Groups are a way to group discussions of similar issues. Our example could be in a group “Dog styling” which is in a subgroup “Pet styling”. “Dog painting” would be bad choice for a group, there’s hardly anything you can split in different discussions there. I might be proven wrong on this and many discussion on dog painting evolve, but I wouldn’t expect it and have a group with a single discussion inside it, creating it later if it’s needed is easy, removing clutter isn’t.
I never saw a discussion started by you for your question before you started the group, just comments on other discussion which might be the reason it didn’t got answered properly, simply being OT.
@Jonne: Well for Dog Painters, there may very well be a lot of branches. Like Dog painters who favor polka dots. Or one’s who like glitter. Then maybe ones who prefer acrylic over oils.
My point is only that I think it is silly to get in arguments on taxonomies and to make starting a new group controversial. I don’t think I’m under any misconception.
I understand your point. When someone has a party, they invite people to come over. People are free not to show up. But there is nothing bad in expecting people to show up.
That we should have telepathy to know we are all about to spontaneously combust into discussion on dog painting at the same time and we better create a group quickly is funny to me.
That we must create a formal vote to start a group seems like censorship. Given the nature of our community, I don’t think many people would like that as a convention. That’s my take, though I could be incorrect.
No, if it were censorship, we’d just flat-out require it without taking a vote.
“There may” is the point here, you don’t know upfront. Creating lots of groups is just clutter a newcomer has to go trough, causes duplicates and overlappings in topics etc. that has all been explained and argued here already.
Can you explain me how preventing you from creating arbitrary groups disallows you to express an opinion or a question? Cause I don’t get it. Again the top groups only topic restriction is that has to relate Diaspora in any way. Subgroups are just for avoiding clutter and organizing, not for expression.
Allowing groups to form naturally is best, I think, because the group structure is organization. It’s not arbitrary. This reflects common practices. For instance, there is no forum that I know of that allows the average user to create sub-forums, because A) there’s no good reason to allow it, and B) it invites abuse.
One forum I go to has a sub-forum for “card games”. Originally, that sub-forum did not exist. They didn’t just put it there at the start, hoping that people would want to talk about card games. As time went on, though, users began to talk about card games more and more, so the admins decided to create a sub-forum dedicated to the topic.
This isn’t censorship, though. Censorship would’ve been saying “No, sorry, you can’t talk about card games here.” What they did was say “Okay, these topics are starting to clutter things up. We need someplace to move them to. Let’s create a new category!”
@Jonne: I think there is a lot of controversy I unintentionally stirred up from starting a “What is Community at Diaspora?” group. Maybe I am misinterpreting the chronology of events. Because there was only one top tier, the “Diaspora Community,” I thought everything below that was considered a group. But I’m seeing that what I started was a subgroup, is that correct?
From my POV, moving to vote whether someone can create a new group is approaching censorship. If the vote is no. It means you can’t have that group. There is no room then for minority voices. There is nothing in the tool that forces pre-approval of groups, unless the admin wants to be heavy handed. All of this is going in the direction of exclusion.
I’m not sure why it’s important to be exclusive here. I can understand that over on Github, or even a wiki. Why not just let people float a group/subgroup/discussion/proposal and if it doesn’t catch fire it doesn’t catch fire.
If it creates cruft, then we advocate to Loom.io that we want to have a way to move or delete cruft. It’s a little bit of housekeeping, but it also promotes freedom for people to speak up and for them not to feel afraid to. We should be welcoming in our community not intimidating.
@Brent: I guess I don’t know the differences between starting a group naturally and starting a group unnaturally?
Don’t all groups form naturally?
@Everybody This block is unresolvable, madamephilo can’t or don’t want to get the point, no one is on her side. Continuing is just wasting time. I’d say ignore it.
@madamephilo don’t take it personally, we’re getting into a loop here because I can’t answer to what you’ve said without repeating what has been said. The difference between a group has been explained, that a not existing group doesn’t prevent talk about a topic has been explained.
First “madamephilo can’t or don’t want to get the point”, followed by “don’t take it personally”
@Jonne, I thought we were just discussing? I am not taking opening up discussion personally? Are you?
I don’t think discussion happens like a computer algorithm. I’m sorry you feel your time is wasted. Personally… I don’t think you understand my point. But that is OK with me!
@Everybody: I did not get the impression you were “against me.” I thought we were just talking this over.
During the time we have discussed this further, I see that what people may have had different ideas about what is a group vs what is a subgroup. I’m not sure.
Regardless, I remain with my vote of block. I don’t want that to be interpreted as a nuclear vote, but to say I feel strongly that we should not REQUIRE a proposal (and therefore a vote) to start a new group. I want to register that as my vote.
No one has persuaded me (yet) why we need to do that. Sorry.
I suppose though, if such a convention is adopted here and it makes people unhappy enough, then there is nothing stopping anyone from starting another Diaspora-related Loom.io presence that doesn’t make that requirement and just lets people say what they want.
Wow interesting thread. I just wanted to throw a couple of points into the mix from a Loomio perspective:
The way we use the tool in the groups I’m in, is as a dynamic flexible system for building shared understanding, as opposed to a majority rules voting system. It’s like a face-to-face conversation instead of a polling booth: the graph indicates the general feeling of the group instead of being completely black-and-white.
The most important thing about the graph is that it gives the group an indication of any concerns that need to be addressed, which focusses the conversation on resolving those concerns.
In my experience participating in a couple hundred proposals, we’ve never seen a single one that had an unresolvable block. It can take a lot of deliberation and a few iterations on the proposal, but it is an effort worth going to if you want to make decisions that leave no one alienated.
From an outsider’s perspective, it seems to me that everyone in this group has the same intent: for the community to organised and inclusive. The only divergence is on the interpretation of how to achieve that vision, of how formalised or organic to make that process.
Loomio is probably set up better for organic as opposed to formal processes. If you want to be formal, you could certainly use the tool to get shared understanding and establish each point of process one by one, but you should expect this to take a fair amount of time if you want the outcome to balance the need for inclusion with the need to get things done.
There’s no easy answer, but I’ve found it useful to focus on identifying shared understanding, and moving forward together to expand it. Personally, I prefer to avoid formalising anything unless it is absolutely necessary. The alternative is to make decisions on a case by case basis, and identify patterns over time.
It seems to me the reason you’re all giving so much energy to these conversations is because you all agree on the shared vision of the Diaspora project, and it is a genuinely inspiring vision. The priority as I see it is to collaboratively figure out a strategy for moving towards that vision together.
Expect it to take some time!
Guess I’ve to explain myself: I see no point in continuing a discussion if you’re about to rephrase what have been said a third or fourth time, it just adds noise and takes a lot of time for new participants to join and understand and add to it.
As a developer I rather spend the time on the code instead of arguing with someone with who I can’t even agree on the definition between what’s a group and what’s a discussion. Or who throws in the censorship argument because he has no better one. Without even making a good point on why that prevents anyone from saying anything. That’s insane. I don’t want to spend 5 hours of a 10 hour time frame to reading through tons of repetitive arguing just to get a sense what I should develop in the other 5 hours. I rather spend the time making what I should more awesome and stable.
Jonne, then my question is, what are you doing in this group? And, why are you explaining yourself?
Did you read anything of what Rich wrote? Or is it to long and time consuming for you?
Because I want to encourage you to not create the noise I would’ve to go through 
And of course I want to be able to influence the directions Diaspora is going to take, being a unheard workhorse is what made me stop actively contributing to Diaspora.
Sure I did, that was largely in response to it. Long texts are okay as long as they aren’t repetitive in any way or the points couldn’t be made shorter. Nothing against clarifications btw.
@Jonne: But did you read what Richard wrote?
Oh, sorry to hear that. Then you know how it feels like when people do not listen.