The future of contributing content is here – Post Forking in WordPress with Git.

1 October, 2012

Home » Blog » News » The future of contributing content is here – Post Forking in WordPress with Git.

A week ago I watched a great TED talk about how Git(hub) is changing the world as we know it. Yes, I said world. I remember watching it and wondering how some of Clay Shirkey’s point could find its way to WordPress. We’re one week later and what do you know, Ben Balter was already busy creating just that and released a plugin today; a mix of Git and WordPress Posts. I’m really excited about this because of the possibilities it opens. From the site:

WordPress Post Forking allows users to “fork” or create an alternate version of content and in doing so, sets out to foster a more collaborative approach to WordPress content curation. This can be used, for example, to allow external users (such as visitors to your site) or internal users (such as other authors) with the ability to submit proposed revisions.

Do check out the post (and its resources) and let us know what you think. For good measure, here’s the presentation on what Git could do:

So having seen that and having looked at the plugin, are you as excited as I am?

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8 responses to “The future of contributing content is here – Post Forking in WordPress with Git.”

Jeroen

1 October, 2012

Great TEDtalk indeed. Clay knows!

Reply
Jeroen

1 October, 2012

Great TEDtalk indeed. Clay knows!

Reply
juan Sarmiento

2 October, 2012

This is amazing, however, is it not the same concept behind a wiki ? collaborative revisions between several users ?
I really like to use this concept in my next project…

Reply
1. JackYu
  
  3 October, 2012
  
  Github has similarities to a Wiki (or Google docs for that matter). It is more powerful though. With a Wiki you can log in, revise the article, save it and your out. With Github you can download an entire repository (a bunch of files and folders), edit them locally, upload the changes and they can then be managed by the owner. It allows to collaboratively edit much more complex projects than just a single article.
  
  The talk is indeed great. I am not sure if the scenario Clay draws can be achieved with Github though. The entire concept is focused on geeks. The one slide he presents with the lawyers and people with a github account says it all. I don’t think that the two circles with eventually overlap, but might be merged on another platform that uses the concept of a git but focuses on other user groups.
  
  Don’t get me wrong, I really like Github and use it after work on a (nearly) daily basis. But after all, being a CEO of a company that does not work with code, the one reason why I don’t try out github for work is that is doesn’t work well with other files than text files. Lawyers and most other professionals (outside of web development) work with .doc, .xls or .ppt files. Once there is a simple and non-proprietaty platform that works similarly easy with these files, I am sure it will be used more broadly by those people.
  
  Reply
  1. Juan Sarmiento
    
    3 October, 2012
    
    Jack, thanks for the clarification, if you are interested in content revision you could also take a look to Revisionary: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/revisionary/
    
    Reply
juan Sarmiento

2 October, 2012

This is amazing, however, is it not the same concept behind a wiki ? collaborative revisions between several users ?
I really like to use this concept in my next project…

Reply
1. JackYu
  
  3 October, 2012
  
  Github has similarities to a Wiki (or Google docs for that matter). It is more powerful though. With a Wiki you can log in, revise the article, save it and your out. With Github you can download an entire repository (a bunch of files and folders), edit them locally, upload the changes and they can then be managed by the owner. It allows to collaboratively edit much more complex projects than just a single article.
  
  The talk is indeed great. I am not sure if the scenario Clay draws can be achieved with Github though. The entire concept is focused on geeks. The one slide he presents with the lawyers and people with a github account says it all. I don’t think that the two circles with eventually overlap, but might be merged on another platform that uses the concept of a git but focuses on other user groups.
  
  Don’t get me wrong, I really like Github and use it after work on a (nearly) daily basis. But after all, being a CEO of a company that does not work with code, the one reason why I don’t try out github for work is that is doesn’t work well with other files than text files. Lawyers and most other professionals (outside of web development) work with .doc, .xls or .ppt files. Once there is a simple and non-proprietaty platform that works similarly easy with these files, I am sure it will be used more broadly by those people.
  
  Reply
  1. Juan Sarmiento
    
    3 October, 2012
    
    Jack, thanks for the clarification, if you are interested in content revision you could also take a look to Revisionary: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/revisionary/
    
    Reply