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Proposal: Stack Overflow (in Portuguese)

As this proposal gets dangerously close to the two year mark, I'm wondering what would happen to it if we don't reach 100% by november 05. I've seen other similar proposals closed under the 2 year criteria (like the French and Spanish ones, though they both had <100 committed so far), but I'm not sure whether or not that applies here. Does it? Is the two year period a sufficient condition for closing, or are other factors taken into account as well?

If you look at the graph at the right of the proposal screen (showing the evolution of number of committers through time) you'll see that, while it was slow in the first year, the numbers sharply rose about April/May of this year, and again around July, and keep increasing (though somewhat slowly). Besides, the total number of committers is about 50% higher than the minimum, only a handful of people with 200+ rep in other sites are still needed. IMHO that shows the proposal still has momentum, and as such, should not be closed unless the number of supporters stop growing for some more time.

Also, as noted in a related disussion, the 200+ rep rule is a bit problematic in regards of foreign language proposals, and while I agree that this rule should not be relaxed, at least giving us a little more time to meet the requirements would be a great help. Since SE sites often suffer from the fastest gun in the west problem, people who have English as a second language are in a bit of disadvantage when "competing" for a good and fast answer (at least I feel this way, and I consider myself rather fluent when reading and writing at least).

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Barely squeaking by that two-year mark isn't something you should really fight for. There's such a strong correlation between older proposals struggling with a really poor launch that you should almost welcome a reboot to start over. Certainly some of our most successful sites were those that had a poor first round but roared back with great vigor in record time!

I'm not going to comment about this proposal until I've had a chance to look at it closer, but believe me, you don't want to push this site out at any cost. It will be a long slow struggle to failure.

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    I don't mean to rush the proposal, I'm all for letting it follow the normal course. I just wondered whether or not we were on a tight schedule if we were to avoid a reboot. Contributing to SE sites takes time, especially considering that this proposal's target audience are not native english speakers (believe me, it's really frustrating when you read a SO question, know the answer, but are not able to find the right words to write it down before others jump in). To clarify: I do not want the 200+ rep rule relaxed, I understand the importance of experts in the launch, it's just about deadlines.
    – mgibsonbr
    Oct 5, 2012 at 6:50
  • Hi @RobertCartaino, sorry for pinging you somewhat off-topically (the appropriate thread to talk about such things is for reasons that are beyond me locked!), but I think proposals should not be blindely and mechanically roboclosed without thinking about it just because a year has passed. Popular Science for example has more than enough and increasing in numbers followers, it does just not jet meet the (IMHO way too difficult and unrealistic to fullfill) 10+ upvoted questions criteriom. Can you please reopen?
    – Dilaton
    Aug 17, 2014 at 19:38
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To quote the discussion about the two year mark (the emphases are mine):

On occasion, we have to uproot and close a proposal which has been painfully slow at gaining support. Typically, there is nothing inherently wrong with the subject… but at 2+ years and counting, you have to determine if the proposal still has the support it once had.

It sounds that hitting the two year mark is not enough for closure. As you mentioned yourself, our proposal has clearly been gaining more support lately, and definitely has momentum. So, I don't think it should be closed, and I really don't believe it will be. Anyway, it would be nice to hear a moderator's stand on this issue.

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