PPG meeting notes 2023-01-31

• 100 + people engaged so far

• googlegroups seems to work fine in China (at least people received/sent emails ok)

• Format/template for proposals

  • Joel has a draft template in place in the issue functionality in github

• Capturing discussion, maintaining in perpetuity

  • Need a format that won't disappear
    • Could use the github "issue" tracking functionality. Any user with a github account can comment on each proposal (each issue).
    • Need some instructions for the discussion? Maybe it'll work ok without guidance
    • This format wouldn't work well for actually voting, in part because anyone could vote–it wouldn't be restricted to PPG
    • For PPG members who are averse to git, someone else could make comments on their part

• method for proposals

  • joel's template (refine, expand)
  • individuals make the proposals
  • have Harald's list in the background somewhere, and keep track of which proposals are made so that none slip between the tracks

• Method for "voting"

  • Have a voting mechanism in googleSurveys or somesuch
  • ask the community for how the basics will work – will it be majority-rule?
  • google form and a parallel spreadsheet for folks that can't google

• Method for handling "dissenting opinions"

  • Do this in the publication? What threshold would qualify as being worthy of mention. A "dissenting opinion" component (would need to figure out who would write that?)
  • Some flagging system to highlight areas where there is more disagreement

• Species-level stuff

  • Have "regional editors"? Someone is the lead on each genus, and then there's a committee to make sure that nothing goes too far off the rails?
  • Do we want some sort of circumscription information included somehow?
  • Do we need some over-arching "philosophy" for treating cytotypes, etc?
  • Need to decide what sort of data to include with the species-level taxa

How to run PPG

• How to determine membership in "core team"

  • organic vs. voting
  • keep it with the four of us for the "update" part; find way of expanding for the species level work?

• Responsibilities of "core team"

  • Actually maintain database
  • but not taxonomic decisions (that is done by community)

• Granularity of taxonomic decisions

  • How do we decide what is suitable for a vote?

Next steps

• notify mailing list of github system for tracking proposals [Eric]
• setup system for voting
• work on "update" template (ie, for proposals for higher taxa) [Carl]
• work on instructions document [Joel, others?]
• work on protocol for discussion timing, etc. – when would we vote
• work on proposal to the group, outlining the github approach, voting, etc, and asking for comments [Eric]
• get the database in shape [Joel]

to-do by next meeting

Eric: draft email about workflow and voting system

Joel: work on database, github documentation, send template to Carl

Carl: help with template and instructions