I see CC-NC... http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3atext%3a2003.02.0004 Too bad.

On Wikisource. What's stopping them?

I'm not so sure we agree.  I think we're talking about two different things. This thread started out with a discussion of why it is so hard to start new projects within the Wikimedia Foundation.  My stance is that projects like OpenStreetMap.org and OpenLibrary.org are doing fine as they are, and there is no need to duplicate their effort within the WMF.  The example you gave was this:

To me, that sounds exactly as what OpenLibrary already does (or could be doing in the near time), so why even set up a new project that would collaborate with it?  Later you added:

I was talking about the metadata for all books ever published, including the Swedish translations of Mark Twain's works, which are part of Mark Twain's bibliography, of the translator's bibliography, of American literature, and of Swedish language literature.  In OpenLibrary all of these are contained in one project.  In Wikisource, they are split in one section for English and another section for Swedish.  That division makes sense for the contents of the book, but not for the book metadata.

Now you write: That is a change of subject. That sounds just like what Wikisource (or PGDP.net) is about.  OCR cleaning is one thing, but it is an entirely different thing to set up "a wiki for book metadata, with an entry for every published work".  So which of these two project ideas are we talking about?

Every book ever published means more than 10 million records. (It probably means more than 100 million records.) OCR cleaning attracts hundreds or a few thousand volunteers, which is sufficient to take on thousands of books, but not millions.

Google scanned millions of books already, but I haven't heard of any plans for cleaning all that OCR text.

Hello, This discussion is very interesting. I would like to make a summary, so that we can go further. 1. A database of all books ever published is one of the thing still missing. 2. This needs massive collaboration by thousands of volunteers, so a wiki might be appropriate, however... 3. The data needs a structured web site, not a plain wiki like Mediawiki. 4. A big part of this data is already available, but scattered on various databases, in various languages, with various protocols, etc. So a big part of work needs as much database management knowledge as librarian knowledge. 5. What most missing in these existing databases (IMO) is information about translations: nowhere there are a general database of translated works, at least not in English and French. It is very difficult to find if a translation exists for a given work. Wikisource has some of this information with interwiki links between work and author pages, but for a (very) small number of works and authors. 6. It would be best not to duplicate work on several places. Personally I don't find OL very practical. May be I am too much used too Mediawiki. ;oD We still need to create something, attractive to contributors and readers alike. Yann Samuel Klein wrote: -- http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net http://fr.wikisource.org/ | Bibliothèque libre http://wikilivres.info | Documents libres _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

DGG, I appreciate your points.  Would we be so motivated by this thread if it weren't a complex problem? The fact that all of this is quite new, and that there are so many unknowns and gray areas, actually makes me consider it more likely that a body of wikimedians, experienced with their own form of large-scale authority file coordination, are in a position to say something meaningful about how to achieve something similar for tens of millions of metadata records. In some areas that is certainly so.  In others, Wikimedia communities have useful recent experience.  I hope that those who understand these problems  on both sides recognize the importance of sharing what they know openly -- and  showing others how to understand them as well.  We will not succeed as a global community if we say that this class of problems can only be solved by the limited group of people with an MLS and a few years of focused training.  (how would you name the sort of training you mean here, btw?) SJ On Thu, Aug 13, 2009 at 12:57 AM, David Goodman<dgoodmanny(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Yann & Sam > > The problem is extraordinarily   complex. A database of all "books" > (and other media) ever published is beyond the joint  capabilities of > everyone interested. There are intermediate entities between "books" > and "works", and important subordinate entities, such as "article" , > "chapter" , and those like "poem" which could be at any of several > levels.  This is not a job for amateurs, unless they are prepared to > first learn the actual standards of bibliographic description for > different types of material, and to at least recognize the > inter-relationships, and the many undefined areas. At research > libraries, one allows a few years of training for a newcomer with just > a MLS degree to work with a small subset of this. I have thirty years > of experience in related areas of librarianship, and I know only > enough to be aware of the problems. > For an introduction to the current state of this, see > http://www.rdaonline.org/constituencyreview/Phase1Chp17_11_2_08.pdf. > > The difficulty of merging the many thousands of partial correct and > incorrect sources of available data typically requires the manual > resolution of each of the tens of millions of instances. > > > David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S. > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG > > > > On Wed, Aug 12, 2009 at 1:15 PM, c<yann(a)forget-me.net> wrote: >> Hello, >> >> This discussion is very interesting. I would like to make a summary, so >> that we can go further. >> >> 1. A database of all books ever published is one of the thing still missing. >> 2. This needs massive collaboration by thousands of volunteers, so a >> wiki might be appropriate, however... >> 3. The data needs a structured web site, not a plain wiki like Mediawiki. >> 4. A big part of this data is already available, but scattered on >> various databases, in various languages, with various protocols, etc. So >> a big part of work needs as much database management knowledge as >> librarian knowledge. >> 5. What most missing in these existing databases (IMO) is information >> about translations: nowhere there are a general database of translated >> works, at least not in English and French. It is very difficult to find >> if a translation exists for a given work. Wikisource has some of this >> information with interwiki links between work and author pages, but for >> a (very) small number of works and authors. >> 6. It would be best not to duplicate work on several places. >> >> Personally I don't find OL very practical. May be I am too much used too >> Mediawiki. ;oD >> >> We still need to create something, attractive to contributors and >> readers alike. >> >> Yann >> >> Samuel Klein wrote: >>>> This thread started out with a discussion of why it is so hard to >>>> start new projects within the Wikimedia Foundation.  My stance is >>>> that projects like OpenStreetMap.org and OpenLibrary.org are doing >>>> fine as they are, and there is no need to duplicate their effort >>>> within the WMF.  The example you gave was this: >>> >>> I agree that there's no point in duplicating existing functionality. >>> The best solution is probably for OL to include this explicitly in >>> their scope and add the necessary functionality.   I suggested this on >>> the OL mailing list in March. >>>    http://mail.archive.org/pipermail/ol-discuss/2009-March/000391.html >>> >>>>>>>>> *A wiki for book metadata, with an entry for every published >>>>>>>>> work, statistics about its use and siblings, and discussion >>>>>>>>> about its usefulness as a citation (a collaboration with >>>>>>>>> OpenLibrary, merging WikiCite ideas) >>>> To me, that sounds exactly as what OpenLibrary already does (or >>>> could be doing in the near time), so why even set up a new project >>>> that would collaborate with it?  Later you added: >>> >>> However, this is not what OL or its wiki do now.  And OL is not run by >>> its community, the community helps support the work of a centrally >>> directed group.  So there is only so much I feel I can contribute to >>> the project by making suggestions.  The wiki built into the fiber of >>> OL is intentionally not used for general discussion. >>> >>>> I was talking about the metadata for all books ever published, >>>> including the Swedish translations of Mark Twain's works, which >>>> are part of Mark Twain's bibliography, of the translator's >>>> bibliography, of American literature, and of Swedish language >>>> literature.  In OpenLibrary all of these are contained in one >>>> project.  In Wikisource, they are split in one section for English >>>> and another section for Swedish.  That division makes sense for >>>> the contents of the book, but not for the book metadata. >>> >>> This is a problem that Wikisource needs to address, regardless of >>> where the OpenLibrary metadata goes.  It is similar to the Wiktionary >>> problem of wanting some content - the array of translations of a >>> single definition - to exist in one place and be transcluded in each >>> language. >>> >>>> Now you write: >>>> >>>>> However, the project I have in mind for OCR cleaning and >>>>> translation needs to >>>> That is a change of subject. That sounds just like what Wikisource >>>> (or PGDP.net) is about.  OCR cleaning is one thing, but it is an >>>> entirely different thing to set up "a wiki for book metadata, with >>>> an entry for every published work".  So which of these two project >>>> ideas are we talking about? >>> >>> They are closely related. >>> >>> There needs to be a global authority file for works -- a [set of] >>> universal identifier[s] for a given work in order for wikisource (as >>> it currently stands) to link the German translation of the English >>> transcription of OCR of the 1998 photos of the 1572 Rotterdam Codex... >>> to its metadata entry [or entries]. >>> >>> I would prefer for this authority file to be wiki-like, as the >>> Wikipedia authority file is, so that it supports renames, merges, and >>> splits with version history and minimal overhead; hence I wish to see >>> a wiki for this sort of metadata. >>> >>> Currently OL does not quite provide this authority file, but it could. >>>  I do not know how easily. >>> >>>> Every book ever published means more than 10 million records. >>>> (It probably means more than 100 million records.) OCR cleaning >>>> attracts hundreds or a few thousand volunteers, which is >>>> sufficient to take on thousands of books, but not millions. >>> >>> Focusing efforts on notable works with verifiable OCR, and using the >>> sorts of helper tools that Greg's paper describes, I do not doubt that >>> we could effectively clean and publish OCR for all primary sources >>> that are actively used and referenced in scholarship today (and more >>> besides).  Though 'we' here is the world - certainly more than a few >>> thousand volunteers have at least one book they would like to polish. >>> Most of them are not currently Wikimedia contributors, that much is >>> certain -- we don't provide any tools to make this work convenient or >>> rewarding. >>> >>>> Google scanned millions of books already, but I haven't heard of >>>> any plans for cleaning all that OCR text. >>> >>> Well, Google does not believe in distributed human effort.  (This came >>> up in a recent Knol thread as well.)  I'm not sure that is the best >>> comparison. >>> >>> SJ >> >> -- >> http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence >> http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net >> http://fr.wikisource.org/ | Bibliothèque libre >> http://wikilivres.info | Documents libres >> >> _______________________________________________ >> foundation-l mailing list >> foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org >> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l >> > > _______________________________________________ > foundation-l mailing list > foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l > _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

To my regret training/apprenticeship does not fit to "everyone can...", "be bold!" set of wikimedia slogans/motto. As to me I would stand behind (vote for) training and apprenticeship. On Sat, Aug 15, 2009 at 12:23 AM, David Goodman<dgoodmanny(a)gmail.com> wrote: _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

(top-posting unravelled) On Sat, Aug 15, 2009 at 1:12 PM, David Goodman<dgoodmanny(a)gmail.com> wrote: The good news is that the broader Wikimedia community is not all like English Wikipedia, where "be bold" is often interpreted as demanding that the worst of anarchy be present in every situation. ;-) Commons and Wikisource are able to build a sensible metadata layer around their collection using plain wiki text.  We also have a project designed to add structure this metadata. http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikicat Either way, wikisource and commons will likely figure out a way to have Dublin Core and MODS records for their collection in the next few years. -- John Vandenberg _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

This discussion is very interesting. I would like to make a summary, so that we can go further. 1. A database of all books ever published is one of the thing still missing.

Personally I don't find OL very practical. May be I am too much used too Mediawiki. ;oD

As I already said, the first steps would be to import existing databases, and Wikimedians are very good at this job.

Lars Aronsson wrote: No, I don't have such a database. There is a copyright on databases in Europe, which makes things complicated. Probably we need to start with libraries which are already collaborating with open content projects. There was a GLAM-wiki meeting in Australia recently: there might be a possibility with an Australian library? But even before that, if we could extract the data from Wikimedia projects, we could create a basic working frame. I have been collecting such data on Wikisource and Wikibooks, but the lack of a structured system is a bottleneck. Examples: 1. Comprehensive bibliography of Gandhi in French http://fr.wikibooks.org/wiki/Bibliographie_de_Gandhi 2. French translations of Russian authors: http://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Discussion_Auteur:L%C3%A9on_Tolsto%C3%AF http://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Discussion_Auteur:F%C3%A9dor_Mikha%C3%AFlovit… Regards, Yann -- http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net http://fr.wikisource.org/ | Bibliothèque libre http://wikilivres.info | Documents libres _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

Interesting, I didn't know that. Is this demo available somewhere?

Yann Forget wrote: Again, I don't understand why.  What exactly is missing in OpenLibrary?  Why does it need to be a new, joint project? The page says "There is currently no database of all books ever published freely available."  But OpenLibrary is a project already working towards exactly that goal.  It's not done yet, and its methods are not yet fully developed.  But neither would your new "joint" project be, for a very long time. Wikipedia is also far from complete, far from containing "the sum of all human knowledge".  But that doesn't create a need to start entirely new encyclopedia projects.  It only means more contributors are needed in the existing Wikipedia. --  Lars Aronsson (lars(a)aronsson.se)  Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

Hello, I have already answered some of these arguments earlier. David Goodman wrote: The issue is not if OpenLibrary is "doing it perfect well without us", even if that were true. Currently what OpenLibrary does is not very useful for Wikimedia, and partly duplicate what we do. Wikimedia has also important assets which OL doesn't have, and therefore a collaboration seems obviously beneficial for both. It is clear that you didn't even read my proposal. Please do before emitting objections. http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposal:Building_a_database_of_all_book… I specifically wrote that my proposal is not necessarily starting a new project. I agree that working with Open Library is necessary for such project, but I also say if Wikimedia gets involved, it would be much more successful. What you say here is completely the opposite how Wikimedia projects work, i.e. openness, and that's just what is missing in Open Library. Regards, Yann -- http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net http://fr.wikisource.org/ | Bibliothèque libre http://wikilivres.info | Documents libres _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

David Goodman wrote: That's all the point that it needs to be join project: database gurus with librarians. What I see is that OpenLibrary lacks some basic features that Wikimedia projects have since a long time (in Internet scale): easy redirects, interwikis, mergings, deletion process, etc. Some of these are planned for the next version of their software, but I still feel that sometimes they try to reinvent the wheel we already have. OL claims to have 23 million book and author entries. However many entries are duplicates of the same edition, not to mention the same book, so the real number of unique entries is much lower. I also see that Wikisource has data which are not included in their database (and certainly also Wikipedia, but I didn't really check). Yes, but I think we should fo further than that. OpenLibrary has an API which would allow any relevant wiki article to be dynamically linked to their data, or that an entry could be created every time new relevant data is added to a Wikipedia projects. This is all about avoiding duplicate work between Wikimedia and OpenLibrary. It could also increase accuracy by double checking facts (dates, name and title spelling, etc.) between our projects. That's another possible benefit: automatic list of works/editions/translations in a Wikipedia article. You could add {{OpenLibrary|author=Jules Verne|lang=English}} and you have a list of English translations of Jules Verne's works directly imported from their database. The problem is that, right now, Wikimedia projects have often more accurate and more detailed information than OpenLibrary. Regards, Yann -- http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net http://fr.wikisource.org/ | Bibliothèque libre http://wikilivres.info | Documents libres _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

You two seem to be talking past each other.  Might I suggest that perhaps the quality of information on OPL and/or Wikipdia/Wikisource sites is rather different depending on whether you are reading in French or English?  I don't know if this is the case but it could explain the discrepancies between your experiences.

... For example, a new project might download the database dump from OpenLibrary and start to weed out the "junk records". But that junk sorting could also take place inside OpenLibrary. Why not?

If a new project goes to a library to ask for a copy of their catalog, they might get the question "we already gave (or didn't give) that to OpenLibrary, so how is your project any different?" And what should the new project answer to that?

I want to encourage wikipedians and wikisourcerers to join the OpenLibrary project, just like you should also join OpenStreetMap and other good projects for free knowledge and information. Bring your experience. If you get tired of one project, as I do sometimes, work on another one for a while.

OpenLibrary has author pages for 6.5 million author names. Some of these are "junk" duplicates that should be merged, but still there are quite a large number of authors there. These have a field for a Wikipedia URL, but only 1100 records have a value. Connecting author pages in OpenLibrary to Wikipedia biographies is just one way where we can do a lot, without needing to start a new project.

John Vandenberg wrote: Are you suggesting that in addition to collecting free texts, Wikisource should also collect information about texts, free and nonfree, like OpenLibrary does? If so, that is a very interesting suggestion, and I support it.

There is sufficient missing material in every Wikipedia, sufficient lack of coverage of areas outside the primary language zone and in earlier periods, sufficient unsourced material; sufficient need for updating articles, sufficient potentially free media to add, sufficient needed imagery to get; that we have more than enough work for all the volunteers we are likely to get.

On 2 Sep 2009, at 12:35, David Goodman wrote: I apologise for taking this slightly out of context, but it touches upon something I've been wondering about recently, which is: do we have a complete set of WMF projects? David focuses on Wikipedia, which is the main project, and also touches on Wikimedia Commons. We also have (in no particular order) WikiBooks, WikiSource, WikiNews, Wikiversity, Wiktionary, Wikiquote and WikiSpecies, in all their various languages. Each of these has essentially its own set of volunteers (so I disagree with David's assertion at the end of his paragraph - different work brings in different volunteers). The latest* one of these projects is Wikiversity, which opened on 15 September 2006. That's almost 3 years ago. In terms of internet time, that's practically a generation ago. Do we now have all of the projects running now that we could have running? Are all of the gaps in our project coverage already done sufficiently well by someone else that we couldn't improve on matters by having our own?

My personal feeling is that there's plenty of scope for new Wikimedia projects. There have been plenty mentioned on this mailing list, or on the various wikis, etc.** A wiki version of OpenLibrary is a good example of something we could try; even if it failed then it wouldn't be time wasted, as the result could be fed into OpenLibrary. So, I think the answer to my question is "no". What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects? Could it be the presence of Wikia? Are we stuck in the mindset of just Wikipedia + supporting projects? Is the technical side of things too moribund to easily establish new projects? Are we afraid of trying new things (or worse, unable to try new things)? Do we lack the leadership to make new projects successful? Is it a limitation of not being able to make a living from working on Wikimedia projects? Wikimedia is big enough that it can launch new projects very publicly, and get a lot of support (both volunteer and financial) very quickly. It's widespread enough that you can ask a group of people in any room if they know of Wikipedia, and over half of them will.*** Actually editing Wikipedia might not appeal to them, but working on a different project could, especially if it's in their speciality. One final question: do we need to start looking for project donations - i.e. absorbing projects started elsewhere? Mike PS: my questions here are posed to be provocative. Please don't take them as accurately representing my viewpoints. * Note that increasing the number of languages that these projects use doesn't in my mind count as a new project. ** A few of my favourite examples: WikiJournal, publishing scholarly works; WikiReview, providing in-depth reviews of subjects; WikiWrite, where fiction can be written collaboratively; etc. *** Country-dependent. Your language may vary. _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

2009/9/8 Pedro Sanchez<pdsanchez(a)gmail.com>om>: Is there any point us doing something that already exists? What would be better about a Wikimedia version?

In my opinion, What is really missing for example is the ability to find all the articles that occur in a geographic location. I would like to see all the articles about Beijing for example, but it is not easy. Google provides some of this, but it could be better.

2009/9/8 Pedro Sanchez <pdsanchez(a)gmail.com>om>: Is there any point us doing something that already exists? What would be better about a Wikimedia version?

** A few of my favourite examples: WikiJournal, publishing scholarly works;

WikiReview, providing in-depth reviews of subjects;

WikiWrite, where fiction can be written collaboratively; etc.

Michael Peel wrote: These works are welcomed on Wikisource, if they are under a free license, of course. I think this can be hosted on Wikibooks or Wikiversity for the most part.

As Erik points out, at a certain point we have to actually write new code to support new ideas. Else "projects we could do at Wikimedia" becomes "projects we can do with a wiki engine."

IMO we need to do that for the projects we already have before we take on new obligations!

We still have very poor software support for: * Commons -- We need a sane upload and post-upload workflow (eg review and deletion), and a clean system for handling structured metadata (descriptions, authorship, licence info). Some of this is being worked on now with Michael Dale's video & media work, and the Ford Foundation grant will let us put more resources into the workflow & metadata side, so this is the one I worry the least about. :)

2009/9/8 Michael Peel <email(a)mikepeel.net>et>: Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians. Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians to adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval? In any event, if you want to add to the Wikimedia family, my guess is that it's currently a commitment of 2-3 months of several hours per week to get to that point, provided it's achievable to begin with. I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but IMO we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family, and that would make sense as part of it. I would also make the point that adding capabilities to existing projects can be just as effective at cultivating new communities of participants as creating an entirely new wiki, and sometimes more so. For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could only form after the categorization functionality was developed. Because the Wikipedia community is so vast, adding capabilities that engage more people on Wikipedia specifically, or improving access to the existing capabilities, can have dramatically greater impact than creating a blank-slate wiki. That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful capabilities have been created in the existing Wikimedia ecosystem in that same time period, some of them with dramatic positive impact. -- Erik Möller Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate

On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 10:33 AM, Brian<Brian.Mingus(a)colorado.edu> wrote: Brilliant idea. Currently new projects proposed on meta have buckley's chance of ever starting. Wikiversity wasn't a new project - it was split from wikibooks. We would need a bit of infrastructure around new concepts before they land on the incubator, such as a detailed description of the purpose, and an experienced admin willing to monitor that area of the incubator.

John Vandenberg wrote: This sounds like a good idea to me. One difference is immediately obvious from the way the incubator works presently, though. Rather than having these projects move out of the incubator based on the decision of the language committee, that issue would have to be considered by the board directly in consultation with the broader community. --Michael Snow

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On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM, Erik Moeller <erik(a)wikimedia.org> wrote: I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects are likely to succeed and likely to fail. _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

Are inactive project in incubator really such a big problem? Could not be strict deadlines given to new projects in incubator the solution of this problem? Jiri On Wednesday, 09. September 2009 16:10:26 Robin P. wrote: of wrote: complex likely to IMO only need like to time projects -- * . . . ... . M45 .. M1 . # . * . . Jiri Hofman . . Opiskelijankatu 38 B28 . * Tampere . ** 33720 ¤. . Finland **. * . . . . * * . . . * . . . * . * * . * gsm: +358504661860 . . +358504384197 * . http://www.aldebaran.cz/~hofmanj <http://www.aldebaran.cz/%7Ehofmanj> . * _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM, Erik Moeller &lt;erik(a)wikimedia.org&gt; wrote: > 2009/9/8 Michael Peel &lt;email(a)mikepeel.net&gt;et>: > > What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects? > > Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex > and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely > to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often > proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians. > Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians to > adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval?

> I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore > in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but IMO > we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary > want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller > semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family, > and that would make sense as part of it.

> For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community > of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because > a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire > community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could only > form after the categorization functionality was developed.

> That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate > wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I > would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project > has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful

I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects are likely to succeed and likely to fail.

Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely to engage in

On 9/9/09, Michael Peel &lt;email(a)mikepeel.net&gt; wrote: great topic :-D in my personal vision, it is rather obvious we should consider the work of the wmf as "perpetually unfinished" just as wikipedia or any of its other projects: an ongoing process, never ever {{done}} completely. to just do a little brainstorm, let me share some ideas as well: * a compendium to wikipedia, collecting each and every complete older encyclopedia (which is no longer copyrighted), thus also giving a peek into the history of knowledge and of encyclopedias (does this really belong in wikisource? maybe) * a wikimusic including a musical dictionary, where one can e.g. look up themes and melodies, find sheet music and recordings, searching by notes etc * i also thought of wikimaps, somebody mentioned this already, imnsho including "all  maps" in detailed resolutions also historical maps, thus also giving a peek into the history of geography and of cartography as well as leaving room for original creations under a free license (new maps) just my 2 cts ;-) all the best, oscar -- *edito ergo sum* _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

Perhaps we need a peripheral Wikipedia layer for items meeting V, but where N being based on general assumptions:  a level for verifiable articles that don't meet current notability standards. It could be a separate project, Wikidirectory--just as we moved out dicdefs, and quotations, and so on, except  that  there are already too many projects to keep track of.  Could we do it within Wikipedia, perhaps as a namespace? David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG

On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 7:43 PM, Robert Rohde &lt;rarohde(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: WiserEarth <http://wiserearth.org/> originally intended to do this for organizations with social missions. Its emphasis has since expanded to become more social network/community-oriented, but its directory data still exists, is editable, and is an important part of the site. =Eugene -- ====================================================================== Eugene Eric Kim ................................ http://xri.net/=eekim Blue Oxen Associates ........................ http://www.blueoxen.com/ ====================================================================== _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 10:43 PM, Robert Rohde &lt;rarohde(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: This would be nice to tie in with OpenStreetMap, so that amenity=fast_food ( http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:amenity%3Dfast_food) could be additionally tagged with something like guid=309FAF94-9FC6-11DE-A978-099455D89593, and then http://xx.local.wikimedia.org/wiki/309FAF94-9FC6-11DE-A978-099455D89593would have the directory information (in the xx language).  The wiki would probably contain lots of information not included in OSM (OSM are IMHO a little bit overly copyright-paranoid), but in theory one could make a smartphone app which lets you find the nearest fast food restaurants (OSM), take you to a description page for the nearest one (wiki), provide driving directions (OSM)...

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 2:17 PM, jamesmikedupont(a)googlemail.com < jamesmikedupont(a)googlemail.com&gt; wrote: I think first there needs to be a place to move them to.  OSM has come a long way since I first proposed Wikiteer, which was meant to be a combination of items of local interest which were deleted as non-notable plus the GIS support structure to map them.  Nowadays I'm comfortable letting OSM manage the GIS/mapping aspect and sticking to just the description pages (phone numbers, addresses, websites, operating hours, maybe even some topic specific info like menus or admission prices or show schedules).

Does OSM maintain a persistent unique ID for every node/way?

Just updated http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_du_Change has a link to this : http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/node/26127031 But realistically, we need to be able to match them together with error tolerances.

When I was in Prizren, Kosovo, I took pictures of every street intersection. There are lots of shops and places that would never make it to the wikipedia but would be interesting to someone who wants to visit the place. here are some of my dumps in the archive.org : http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren4 http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren3 http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren2 http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren Also have started to create articles for the most famous religious buildings. What would be nice is to put all the streets on there. Even to put some streets from OSM in the wiki sure why not?

Yes? I can create them. How would I name them? Prizren/FaradinHoti? What would they look like? Like this? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton_Boulevard What would the notability be? Some streets are really not interesting. mike

I just added the street, and already they want to delete it. What should I put as a reason? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FaradinHoti_(street_in_Prizren,_Kosovo) On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 10:54 PM, Yaroslav M. Blanter &lt;putevod(a)mccme.ru&gt; wrote: else. _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

Yann Forget wrote: Again, I don't understand why. What exactly is missing in OpenLibrary? Why does it need to be a new, joint project? The page says "There is currently no database of all books ever published freely available." But OpenLibrary is a project already working towards exactly that goal. It's not done yet, and its methods are not yet fully developed. But neither would your new "joint" project be, for a very long time. Wikipedia is also far from complete, far from containing "the sum of all human knowledge". But that doesn't create a need to start entirely new encyclopedia projects. It only means more contributors are needed in the existing Wikipedia.