I've had a chance to come back to this and I think we're close to concluding it.
I'll rewind to the beginning for a moment. Three years ago, changes were made to this page. It was an edit by committee, and several folks involved in that process commented as such. In my opinion and many others, the product of that process was good overall but still had some issues, both with style and substance. I took it upon myself to create a draft rewrite of the page, fixing all the issues I saw and adding a few other pieces of information I thought would be helpful to beginners. One advantage of a top-to-bottom scrub is that the page no longer reads like it was written by a committee, and (we hope) has a more consistent message. I posted it here for feedback, and spent at least as much time explaining each change I made and why. I got a range of feedback, some positive and some negative. The loudest feedback I got was that the page simply should not be changed at all - it ain't broke, it was edited "only" three years ago, it was presumptuous for me to think it had any room for improvement. Perhaps not surprisingly, that feedback was almost entirely from the small group of 2-3 who primarily edited it three years ago. It's only human nature to feel an attachment to something we've worked really hard on, so I absolutely understand the resistance, but that's simply not how the wiki works. Pages aren't owned by any one editor, anyone can propose changes at any time, and major changes should not be made until there has been an opportunity for review by others and a "consensus" has been reached. Let's not lose sight of the end goal - to create the most helpful content for the most number of readers - and if changes are proposed by anyone that serve that goal they should be considered.
Despite all that, I went back through this thread, carefully re-reading and summarizing the feedback and opinions from everyone, including the prior authors. I did not see a consensus that would support a full rewrite, so I scaled back the edit dramatically. I reverted almost all the content changes, save for a few that there was a consensus would improve the page. Some of the concerns I raised were shared by other editors; one said the problems with the page were so severe that he doesn't link We eventually reached a consensus that (1) the emergency fund section needed a change to avoid dangerous misunderstandings, (2) the page would be improved by adding a mention of 529's with the appropriate language addressing how much should be saved, and (3) the page is better off mentioning a few less common accounts like ESPP's and 457's, as long as the content was at the bottom of the page where it would not interrupt the flow for the majority of readers, to whom it did not apply. I also made a few non-content changes I described earlier. I get that even these few changes are ruffling the feathers of a few, but I am trying to do what's best for the page, not necessarily anyone one person's feelings. This applies equally to me. I stripped out almost every change I originally proposed, which I spent many hours writing. I still think the page has problems - like vagueness about when readers should pay off a mortgage versus invest in taxable - but I was unsuccessful in building a consensus about any changes beyond these. And I'm not going to completely discount opinions against just because they were authors three years ago. What's currently on the draft page is the bare minimum of changes that had a strong ratio of support to dissent, and I've documented that feedback.
https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/User:Fy ... nvestments
I am ready to publish these changes and conclude this review.
LadyGeek, picking up where we left off -
I tried creating a version of this draft with the "less common account" listed as notes rather than as body text. I don't think it's better than the alternative, for a few reasons. First, notes are really meant to provide some extra information to support a concept already in the main page, not introduce new ideas like descriptions of a new account. Second, in practice the way they link to text within the list is pretty similar; I'm not seeing a style advantage. When you looked at the page a couple days ago, I would guess you immediately scrolled to the bottom and read the new section, where it looked like it was orphaned. Most non-editor readers will start at the top and work their way down, so they will see the links inside the list and click them if they apply. I don't see just having the body text at the bottom as a real problem most of the time. Third, notes are more clumsy for large blocks of text like this. When editing, they appear in-line with the surrounding text, making it hard to visualize how the page will look. And notes seem to have formatting limitations - it wouldn't let me put a CiteWeb reference inside the note text. For all these reasons I lean toward leaving it as body text.
I've done the best I can navigating the strong opinions and emotions surrounding this page. No one is perfectly happy with it, but think my current draft is an improvement on the current page and that's supported by a consensus. I am looking to you to publish and merge the changes. If you want to wait a day or two or three for any additional comments, I'd be fine with it and I can leave that decision to you.
Sometimes the process can be messy but I do believe everyone means well. I truly appreciate all the time and passion everyone has invested in this, so thank you.
I'll rewind to the beginning for a moment. Three years ago, changes were made to this page. It was an edit by committee, and several folks involved in that process commented as such. In my opinion and many others, the product of that process was good overall but still had some issues, both with style and substance. I took it upon myself to create a draft rewrite of the page, fixing all the issues I saw and adding a few other pieces of information I thought would be helpful to beginners. One advantage of a top-to-bottom scrub is that the page no longer reads like it was written by a committee, and (we hope) has a more consistent message. I posted it here for feedback, and spent at least as much time explaining each change I made and why. I got a range of feedback, some positive and some negative. The loudest feedback I got was that the page simply should not be changed at all - it ain't broke, it was edited "only" three years ago, it was presumptuous for me to think it had any room for improvement. Perhaps not surprisingly, that feedback was almost entirely from the small group of 2-3 who primarily edited it three years ago. It's only human nature to feel an attachment to something we've worked really hard on, so I absolutely understand the resistance, but that's simply not how the wiki works. Pages aren't owned by any one editor, anyone can propose changes at any time, and major changes should not be made until there has been an opportunity for review by others and a "consensus" has been reached. Let's not lose sight of the end goal - to create the most helpful content for the most number of readers - and if changes are proposed by anyone that serve that goal they should be considered.
Despite all that, I went back through this thread, carefully re-reading and summarizing the feedback and opinions from everyone, including the prior authors. I did not see a consensus that would support a full rewrite, so I scaled back the edit dramatically. I reverted almost all the content changes, save for a few that there was a consensus would improve the page. Some of the concerns I raised were shared by other editors; one said the problems with the page were so severe that he doesn't link We eventually reached a consensus that (1) the emergency fund section needed a change to avoid dangerous misunderstandings, (2) the page would be improved by adding a mention of 529's with the appropriate language addressing how much should be saved, and (3) the page is better off mentioning a few less common accounts like ESPP's and 457's, as long as the content was at the bottom of the page where it would not interrupt the flow for the majority of readers, to whom it did not apply. I also made a few non-content changes I described earlier. I get that even these few changes are ruffling the feathers of a few, but I am trying to do what's best for the page, not necessarily anyone one person's feelings. This applies equally to me. I stripped out almost every change I originally proposed, which I spent many hours writing. I still think the page has problems - like vagueness about when readers should pay off a mortgage versus invest in taxable - but I was unsuccessful in building a consensus about any changes beyond these. And I'm not going to completely discount opinions against just because they were authors three years ago. What's currently on the draft page is the bare minimum of changes that had a strong ratio of support to dissent, and I've documented that feedback.
https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/User:Fy ... nvestments
I am ready to publish these changes and conclude this review.
LadyGeek, picking up where we left off -
I tried creating a version of this draft with the "less common account" listed as notes rather than as body text. I don't think it's better than the alternative, for a few reasons. First, notes are really meant to provide some extra information to support a concept already in the main page, not introduce new ideas like descriptions of a new account. Second, in practice the way they link to text within the list is pretty similar; I'm not seeing a style advantage. When you looked at the page a couple days ago, I would guess you immediately scrolled to the bottom and read the new section, where it looked like it was orphaned. Most non-editor readers will start at the top and work their way down, so they will see the links inside the list and click them if they apply. I don't see just having the body text at the bottom as a real problem most of the time. Third, notes are more clumsy for large blocks of text like this. When editing, they appear in-line with the surrounding text, making it hard to visualize how the page will look. And notes seem to have formatting limitations - it wouldn't let me put a CiteWeb reference inside the note text. For all these reasons I lean toward leaving it as body text.
I've done the best I can navigating the strong opinions and emotions surrounding this page. No one is perfectly happy with it, but think my current draft is an improvement on the current page and that's supported by a consensus. I am looking to you to publish and merge the changes. If you want to wait a day or two or three for any additional comments, I'd be fine with it and I can leave that decision to you.
Sometimes the process can be messy but I do believe everyone means well. I truly appreciate all the time and passion everyone has invested in this, so thank you.
Statistics: Posted by fyre4ce — Sat Aug 31, 2024 7:20 pm