> in my experience it almost always required fighting with people with huge egos following arcane rules and procedures which they certainly took a lot of time to design and develop but which don't seem like productive use of my time
This echoed my experience before I left a Wikipedia project (one of its language variant). I have been vocal with the direction one of its most active admin is trying to head the project to, as well as the not-so-positive treatment of inexperienced users. Many of the legitimate complaints against this admin was pretty much ignored or stalled. Ultimately, I decided that it's not worth my efforts to try to push for a more friendly environment, and I have decided to leave. I still help with some offline activities and movement-related function, but chances for me to return to being the contributors again are slim.
This echoed my experience before I left a Wikipedia project (one of its language variant). I have been vocal with the direction one of its most active admin is trying to head the project to, as well as the not-so-positive treatment of inexperienced users. Many of the legitimate complaints against this admin was pretty much ignored or stalled. Ultimately, I decided that it's not worth my efforts to try to push for a more friendly environment, and I have decided to leave. I still help with some offline activities and movement-related function, but chances for me to return to being the contributors again are slim.