Does the Wikipedia have an annual print edition, or something similar? I am assuming that it almost definately does not. The reason I ask is that a History professor would not allow me to cite the Wikipedia on the grounds that there was no print edition available, grouping it right in with fobidden Geocities sites.
Not yet, but I hope that such will exist someday sooner rather than later. But to move from our current format to print is a big undertaking, and I'm not sure we're ready yet to devote a lot of energy to it.
At some point, this could be the "focal point" of a "sifter" project. That is, the sifter project could aim to create a paper version of a particular length (in pages) and use that as a criterion for determining what goes in and what doesn't.
Jesse Alter wrote:
Does the Wikipedia have an annual print edition, or something similar? I am assuming that it almost definately does not. The reason I ask is that a History professor would not allow me to cite the Wikipedia on the grounds that there was no print edition available, grouping it right in with fobidden Geocities sites.
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@wikipedia.org http://www.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
On Thu, Feb 13, 2003 at 07:58:07AM -0800, Jimmy Wales wrote:
Not yet, but I hope that such will exist someday sooner rather than later. But to move from our current format to print is a big undertaking, and I'm not sure we're ready yet to devote a lot of energy to it.
It'd be nice if somebody had a few minutes to write a script to dump the articles from the database into a text file, run it through something like a2ps, and count approximately how many A4 pages the encylopedia would run to if printed.
On ĵaŭ, 2003-02-13 at 08:20, Jason Williams wrote:
It'd be nice if somebody had a few minutes to write a script to dump the articles from the database into a text file, run it through something like a2ps, and count approximately how many A4 pages the encylopedia would run to if printed.
Someone at Enciclopedia Libre (our estranged Spanish cousin) has done exactly this, I'm sure they'll show you the script if you ask: http://linuxopensource.com.mx/enciclopedia/
Make sure you've got plenty of paper and a few spare toner carts. :)
-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
Jimmy Wales wrote:
Not yet, but I hope that such will exist someday sooner rather than later. But to move from our current format to print is a big undertaking, and I'm not sure we're ready yet to devote a lot of energy to it.
Jesse Alter wrote:
Does the Wikipedia have an annual print edition, or something similar? I am assuming that it almost definately does not. The reason I ask is that a History professor would not allow me to cite the Wikipedia on the grounds that there was no print edition available, grouping it right in with fobidden Geocities sites.
It seems to me that the professor is the one that is narrow and offside here. There are many things that are on paper that are just as incredible as some of the things that are on the Net.
A paper edition would be a terribly expensive undertaking, and I don't know if we can create enough of a market to make it self-sustaining. I forsee the CD version as a more practical goal. If these were sold for production costs + shipping costs + a small markup to keep the project capitalized it could be reasonably priced to the public. CD's are of no use in the third world where very few people have computers, but once established they may become a marketting tool for the paper edition.
A published version (whether print or CD) should also have a favourable effect in protecting copyrights. I've mentioned before that I see the biggest long term problem around copyrights will not be about Wikipedians who copy material belonging to others, but about others who (over the next 95 years) try to copyright Wikipedia material as if it were their own. Some version published outside the Net could be used as evidence that it was published when it was published in that medium. One of the difficulties faced by projects which put material directly into the public domain or into any kind of open licensing (however that may be most broadly defined) is that nobody has enough of a vested interest to defend the material over an extended period of time. Altruism often withers in the face of determined self-interest.
Eclecticology