There was some discussion recently about WikiMedia paying for user accounts on proprietary source engines, to aid in providing sources to Wikipedia articles. I'm curious as to how that inquiry was dealt with, and how it was resolved.
Seems like a good idea. If feasible, there would presumably be a limited number of assigned accounts given to specific interested users, who would have to commit themselves to assisting others in sourcing particular concepts, statements, and phrases. A common case may be where the Wikipedia author may be writing from knowledge, or may be referencing an inferior source, and can't directly quote from a superior or particular text because it is not readily available to them.
-SV
I could probably negotiate a license with any publisher that would let a medium or large defined number of users to use the material to source articles; I do not think I could obtain a license which would permit a small group to regularly download articles and send them to other people for their use in sourcing articles. Occasional and sporadic, yes; regular & organized, no. If regular and organized is what you have in mind, i doubt I could find a publisher who would agree, nor would I agree if i were a publisher. I would expect payment based upon the actual number of potential end-users.
The question is that if I asked for a license for, say 2,000 or 20,000 users, whether the cost would be affordable. I am not aware of any pricing precedent for ad hoc groups like ours. The general price range price per publisher for packages is on the order of a few dollars per user per year. If anyone at the foundation would like me to ask, I know whom to ask.
But most people at Wikipedia have not even bothered to find out what their public or school library may already be paying for. Almost all of them buy at least some packages.
On Thu, Mar 12, 2009 at 4:55 PM, stevertigo stvrtg@gmail.com wrote:
There was some discussion recently about WikiMedia paying for user accounts on proprietary source engines, to aid in providing sources to Wikipedia articles. I'm curious as to how that inquiry was dealt with, and how it was resolved.
Seems like a good idea. If feasible, there would presumably be a limited number of assigned accounts given to specific interested users, who would have to commit themselves to assisting others in sourcing particular concepts, statements, and phrases. A common case may be where the Wikipedia author may be writing from knowledge, or may be referencing an inferior source, and can't directly quote from a superior or particular text because it is not readily available to them.
-SV
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On Thu, Mar 12, 2009 at 16:30, David Goodman dgoodmanny@gmail.com wrote:
But most people at Wikipedia have not even bothered to find out what their public or school library may already be paying for. Almost all of them buy at least some packages.
This is true. I've found some excellent sources through academic libraries and their database subscriptions.
On Thu, Mar 12, 2009 at 2:30 PM, David Goodman dgoodmanny@gmail.com wrote:
I could probably negotiate a license with any publisher that would let a medium or large defined number of users to use the material to source articles;
Ideas? Which publishers?
I do not think I could obtain a license which would permit a small group to regularly download articles and send them to other people for their use in sourcing articles.
That's not the idea: the idea is that people try to write about a subject as best they can, and see if that expression is in accord with published concepts. We do this anyway; instead of quoting things wholesale we reformulate the concepts expressed in the source into free expressions.
The sourcemonkey only needs to do three things: take requests for sourcing particular statements, find and offer a selection of excised relevant quotations (small), and aid in determining which sources are superior to others (reliability, authorship, date of publication, citations of, etc.)
Occasional and sporadic, yes; regular & organized, no. If regular and organized is what you have in mind, i doubt I could find a publisher who would agree, nor would I agree if i were a publisher. I would expect payment based upon the actual number of potential end-users.
I don't think they would do that, and if they did, we could deal just with the ones that have a better concept. The idea is that the sourcemonkeys would be trusted with 1) complying with publisher's proprietary policies, and 2) aiding Wikipedians in improving public articles. Particular sourcemonkeys may run afoul of either, and be suspended from either, but that should not effect a relationship between publisher and Wikipedia/WikiMedia.
The question is that if I asked for a license for, say 2,000 or 20,000 users, whether the cost would be affordable. I am not aware of any pricing precedent for ad hoc groups like ours.
Ostensibly (just looking at Lexis), we could qualify for either corporate, academic, or (perhaps) legal accounts, or more than one. There are lots of sub-genre account types, though, and the selection of which seems to be more of an issue than affordability. Ideally they would offer a grab-bag for a modest number of accounts. We are not an "ad-hoc group" by the way - we are the most powerful and universal learning and publication institution on the planet. :-)
The general price range price per publisher for packages is on the order of a few dollars per user per year. If anyone at the foundation would like me to ask, I know whom to ask.
That would be great if some foundational someone seconded this.
But most people at Wikipedia have not even bothered to find out what their public or school library may already be paying for. Almost all of them buy at least some packages.
Excellent point. We already have people with access - they just don't know that they can be wikipedia:sourcemonkeys yet; neutrally assisting average Wikipedians in the course of normal everyday article development.
SV
Sometimes its good to create a policy/proposal/essay/jokes page on the Wikipedia itself, rather than just here. Just because. I have thus accomplished it in perfection:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sourcemonkeys
Revert ninjas (silent but deadly) please speedily undo any so-called "changes" to it.
-SV
On Thursday 12 March 2009, David Goodman wrote:
But most people at Wikipedia have not even bothered to find out what their public or school library may already be paying for. Almost all of them buy at least some packages.
As an example, this is what Brooklyn provides, just need your library card number: http://wfxsearch.webfeat.org:80/clients/wfxbrooklyn/brooklynaz.asp?cid=11669
note that JSTOR is only if you physically go to the library -- I will check what sections of it they actually have.
this also applies to ANCESTRY
DIGITAL SANBORN for NY STATE is in the business library only--most cities will have the corresponding maps for their own cities or regions.
naturally, an advantage of actually going to the library is that if you don't find what you want online, they will have some additional things in print. And most reference librarians, at most times of the day, are more likely to be underworked than overworked. We need customers to justify our budgets--almost all libraries keep a count of reference questions for the purpose.
On Fri, Mar 13, 2009 at 8:43 AM, Joseph Reagle reagle@mit.edu wrote:
On Thursday 12 March 2009, David Goodman wrote:
But most people at Wikipedia have not even bothered to find out what their public or school library may already be paying for. Almost all of them buy at least some packages.
As an example, this is what Brooklyn provides, just need your library card number: http://wfxsearch.webfeat.org:80/clients/wfxbrooklyn/brooklynaz.asp?cid=11669
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Libraries already do this for us. At least mine does. There is a health database, for example. It was not what I was looking for. I was looking for a book summarizing the role of elements and vitamins, their greatest natural sources, manufacturing, their purpose in animals --had it in 1996-- quite a bit more interesting than Earl Mindell. Stuff like that is probably in the database, and it is nothing I can sit down and try to remember and then find support for. I probably could not read the whole database now at the library in my lifetime. _______ You can find about 135 hits in pubmed from a search on [[white cabbage ulcer]]. Red cabbage lends a more appealing colour to pineapple smoothies, and the pineapple's flavour completely overpowers the cabbage. Research on cabbage juice obscures the benefit of fibre in a recipe for morning sickness.
"stevertigo" stvrtg@gmail.com wrote in message news:7c402e010903121355h52b76b4ev72bf200b9a0b441@mail.gmail.com...
There was some discussion recently about WikiMedia paying for user accounts on proprietary source engines, to aid in providing sources to Wikipedia articles. I'm curious as to how that inquiry was dealt with, and how it was resolved.
Seems like a good idea. If feasible, there would presumably be a limited number of assigned accounts given to specific interested users, who would have to commit themselves to assisting others in sourcing particular concepts, statements, and phrases. A common case may be where the Wikipedia author may be writing from knowledge, or may be referencing an inferior source, and can't directly quote from a superior or particular text because it is not readily available to them.
-SV
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Yeah, that's true. And TPB works pretty well too. BTW, a t-stub: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Digital_library
and a related t-stub: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Online_database
SV
On Thu, Mar 26, 2009 at 11:26 AM, Jay Litwyn < brewhaha@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca> wrote:
Libraries already do this for us. At least mine does. There is a health database, for example. It was not what I was looking for. I was looking for a book summarizing the role of elements and vitamins, their greatest natural sources, manufacturing, their purpose in animals --had it in 1996-- quite a bit more interesting than Earl Mindell. Stuff like that is probably in the database, and it is nothing I can sit down and try to remember and then find support for. I probably could not read the whole database now at the library in my lifetime. _______ You can find about 135 hits in pubmed from a search on [[white cabbage ulcer]]. Red cabbage lends a more appealing colour to pineapple smoothies, and the pineapple's flavour completely overpowers the cabbage. Research on cabbage juice obscures the benefit of fibre in a recipe for morning sickness.
"stevertigo" stvrtg@gmail.com wrote in message news:7c402e010903121355h52b76b4ev72bf200b9a0b441@mail.gmail.com...
There was some discussion recently about WikiMedia paying for user accounts on proprietary source engines, to aid in providing sources to Wikipedia articles. I'm curious as to how that inquiry was dealt with, and how it was resolved.
Seems like a good idea. If feasible, there would presumably be a limited number of assigned accounts given to specific interested users, who would have to commit themselves to assisting others in sourcing particular concepts, statements, and phrases. A common case may be where the Wikipedia author may be writing from knowledge, or may be referencing an inferior source, and can't directly quote from a superior or particular text because it is not readily available to them.
-SV
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