Hi,
I just came across Google Public Data Explorer
http://www.google.com/publicdata/directory
This could be useful in writing content for Wikipedia
Kindly ignore if this was already shared
-Akshay Agarwal
MediaWiki Volunteer
http://www.livemint.com/articles/2011/08/29214955/Govt-starts-website-to-ex…
*Govt starts website to explain economic terms and concepts*
Remya Nair
The government has started Arthapedia, a website designed on the lines of
Wikipedia, that will act as a source of reference for economic terms and
concepts used in the public policy domain in India.
The website, an attempt by the government to bridge the gap between
policymakers and the general public, was inaugurated on Monday by Planning
Commission deputy chairperson Montek Singh Ahluwalia as a part of the golden
jubilee celebrations of the Indian Economic Service. It will cater to the
requirements of academicians, economists, policy practitioners, journalists,
students and other interested parties, both within India and abroad.
“The objective of this portal is to increase transparency in government by
simplifying indigenous concepts or by introducing domestic institutions to
support the professional development of public policy economists,” the
website says. “It is meant to enrich and enhance citizen-friendly policy
formulation through dialogue and collaborative action.”
A finance ministry official involved in the designing of the website said
government officials may frequently use some terminologies unique to India
such as *panchayati raj* and flagship programmes, such as the Mahatma Gandhi
National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, but their exact scope and
meaning may not be well known to others. “The idea is to explain the meaning
and relevance of the terms in the Indian context. Also, some terms may have
different meanings in different countries. It is important that the Indian
context is explained,” she said.
Besides explaining terms and concepts, the website will also offer detailed
profiles of some of the key Indian policymakers. To begin with, the website
has uploaded five profiles—Prime Minister Manmohan Singh; finance minister
Pranab Mukherjee; C. Rangarajan, chairman of the Economic Advisory Council
to the Prime Minister of India; Ahluwalia; and Reserve Bank of India
governor D. Subbarao.
Users willing to upgrade the text and context of a particular word can open
the text on a virtual mode and edit the same with authentic references. The
edited content is posted after being moderated by the editorial board. In
the initial phase, however, only serving IES officers will be allowed to
write the content of this website and non-IES persons can only post comments
and queries for now.
To be sure, the website has a disclaimer that says the government of India
does not monitor the entries and the views expressed therein are not
necessarily those of the government. “The entries, therefore, must not be
treated as official statements of policy or definitions”.
It will, however, take some time for the website to become a one-stop
destination for all terms, concepts and profiles of eminent personalities.
“Going ahead, the challenge will be to sustain the portal with constant
upgradation,” Kaushik Basu, chief economic adviser in the finance ministry,
said.
--
Sohel Bohra
Co-founder - WikifyIndia <http://www.wikifyindia.com/>
+91-95038 48386
sohel(a)wikifyindia.com
Twitter <http://twitter.com/#%21/WikifyIndia> |
Facebook<http://www.facebook.com/mobileprotection#%21/pages/WikifyIndia/206108042761…>
http://www.facebook.com/groups/oaindia/
For creating more awareness on open access to publicly funded research
in India, a facebook group 'Open Access India' is formed. This group
would be a platform for advocating open access and sharing success
stories of open access movement in the world and India. It invites
anyone who is involved and interested in the open access movement to
discuss and raise issues related to open access in general and in
specific to India. The group would work for influencing the policy
makers, managers, researchers, scholarly societies to adopt open
access policy for their research and to take forward the open access
movement in India. Everyone is invited to join the 'Open Access India'
group at <https://www.facebook.com/groups/oaindia> and interact by
email <oaindia(a)groups.facebook.com> and <oaindia(a)googlegroups.com>
Thanks & Regards
Sridhar
_________________________________________________________________________
Sridhar Gutam PhD, ARS, PG Dip Patent Laws (NALSAR), IP & Biotechnology (WIPO)
Senior Scientist (Plant Physiology) & Joint Secretary, ARSSF
Central Institute for Subtropical Horticulture (CISH)
Rehmankhera, P.O.Kakori, Lucknow 227107, Uttar Pradesh, India
Fax: +91-522-2841025, Phone: +91-522-2841022/23/24
http://www.cishlko.orghttp://works.bepress.com/sridhar_gutam/
Mobile:+91-9005760036, +91-8010033013
On Sep 2, 2011 3:41 PM, "Pranesh Prakash" <the.solipsist(a)gmail.com> wrote:
> The Berne Convention and the TRIPS Agreement (which incorporates the Berne
> Convention), which is the most-ratified international instrument on
> copyright, pegs the term at 25 years for photographs.
>
> One should remember that originally photographs, being mechanical capture
of
> an existing image, wasn't even granted any copyright. It wasn't seen as
> being a truly creative activity, unlike creating music or writing *
> literature*!
>
> --
> Sent from my phone
> On Sep 2, 2011 2:12 PM, "CherianTinu Abraham" <tinucherian(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
>> Thank you Pranesh for sharing this. This interests the Wikimedians , many
> of
>> us regularly uploads copyright expired images to Wikimedia Commons.
>> I have also supported the petition.
>> But do you really think the international standard is 25 years ? I really
>> doubt !
>>
>> -TC
>>
>> On Fri, Sep 2, 2011 at 8:28 AM, Gautam John <gautam(a)prathambooks.org>
> wrote:
>>
>>> Thank you, Pranesh.
>>>
>>> I hope you will consider supporting this petition.
>>>
>>> Best,
>>>
>>> Gautam
>>> ________
>>> http://blog.prathambooks.org/p/social-media.html
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 2 September 2011 04:49, Pranesh Prakash <pranesh(a)cis-india.org>
wrote:
>>> > Dear all,
>>> > On Friday the Rajya Sabha is due to debate the Copyright Amendment
> Bill,
>>> > which (amongst many things) increases term of copyright in photographs
>>> > from 60 years from publication of the photo to 60 years after death of
>>> > the photographer (while the international standard is 25 years from
>>> > publication).
>>> >
>>> > Please oppose this by e-mailing your Rajya Sabha representative:
>>> > http://goo.gl/6CMXC
>>> >
>>> > I apologize for the horrible formatting of that selection form (which
>>> > should get fixed soon to ensure that your states' RS MPs alone are
>>> > shown). Since time is of the essence, we decided to go ahead any way.
>>> >
>>> > Regards,
>>> > Pranesh
>>> >
>>> > --
>>> > Pranesh Prakash
>>> > Programme Manager
>>> > Centre for Internet and Society
>>> > W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 40926283
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > _______________________________________________
>>> > Wikimediaindia-l mailing list
>>> > Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>>> > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l
>>> >
>>> >
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Wikimediaindia-l mailing list
>>> Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l
>>>
On Sep 2, 2011 3:42 PM, the.solipsist(a)gmail.com wrote:
> Rajya Sabha got adjourned early today, and this is now due to be taken up
on
> Monday.
>
> Please spread this! Thanks.
>
> --
> Sent from my phone
> On Sep 2, 2011 1:40 PM, "Pradeep Mohandas" <pradeep.mohandas(a)gmail.com>
> wrote:
>> hi,
>>
>> Today (Sept 2, for those who read this later) was a Friday. Was the
>> bill discussed in the Rajya Sabha today?
>>
>> If so, any updates on what happened?
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Pradeep
>> Sent from my Nokia E63
>>
>> On 02/09/2011, Pranesh Prakash <pranesh(a)cis-india.org> wrote:
>>> Dear all,
>>> On Friday the Rajya Sabha is due to debate the Copyright Amendment Bill,
>>> which (amongst many things) increases term of copyright in photographs
>>> from 60 years from publication of the photo to 60 years after death of
>>> the photographer (while the international standard is 25 years from
>>> publication).
>>>
>>> Please oppose this by e-mailing your Rajya Sabha representative:
>>> http://goo.gl/6CMXC
>>>
>>> I apologize for the horrible formatting of that selection form (which
>>> should get fixed soon to ensure that your states' RS MPs alone are
>>> shown). Since time is of the essence, we decided to go ahead any way.
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> Pranesh
>>>
>>> --
>>> Pranesh Prakash
>>> Programme Manager
>>> Centre for Internet and Society
>>> W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 40926283
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Pradeep Mohandas
>> How Pradeep uses email - http://goo.gl/6v1I9
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Wikimediaindia-l mailing list
>> Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l
Dear all,
On Friday the Rajya Sabha is due to debate the Copyright Amendment Bill,
which (amongst many things) increases term of copyright in photographs
from 60 years from publication of the photo to 60 years after death of
the photographer (while the international standard is 25 years from
publication).
Please oppose this by e-mailing your Rajya Sabha representative:
http://goo.gl/6CMXC
I apologize for the horrible formatting of that selection form (which
should get fixed soon to ensure that your states' RS MPs alone are
shown). Since time is of the essence, we decided to go ahead any way.
Regards,
Pranesh
--
Pranesh Prakash
Programme Manager
Centre for Internet and Society
W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 40926283
I'm User:Walkerma from the English Wikipedia. I've been working for some
time on producing offline collections of Wikipedia content from the
English
Wikipedia. We're currently looking at the possibility of subject-based
books (e.g., on topics such as mammals or chemistry) for schools, using an
affordable local printer.
Working with PediaPress I put together a "taster" example on chemistry,
which is available here:
http://pediapress.com/files/schoolbooks/chemistry.pdf
though I'd like to expand it. This one is aligned to the English schools
GCSE, but others could be designed around the curricula of different
countries or provinces. I would see this just as a start - we would want
to cover other subjects, other countries and other languages if it was
successful.
My questions:
*Would anyone here be interested in working with me on developing this
further?
*Would English language books be useful in schools, or could we only use
ones in Hindi, etc?
*If these books are useful, does anyone here have contacts with a
provincial or local ministry/board of education that might support an
initiative like this?
Thanks for your time,
Martin
Martin A. Walker
Department of Chemistry
SUNY College at Potsdam
Potsdam, NY 13676 USA
+1 (315) 267-2271
Hi Folks
I'm writing to update you that the selection process of 2 more team members of the India Programs team has commenced. (As I mentioned a few weeks ago, we've selected Shiju & Nitika for our efforts on Indic languages and Participation.) The 2 positions I'm referring to in this mail are the remaining members of the team:
Communications. This person will manage all communications, public relations/media, social media & digital outreach.
Team Support. This person will manage all the backend (but essential) operations of the team - such as office administration and basic accounting and personnel management.
Details on the positions as well as the application process are available on the Wikimedia Foundation site :-
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/RFP/Consultant,_Communications_-_India_…http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/RFP/Consultant,_Team_Support_-_India_Pr…
Similar to the process that we followed for the earlier selections, these have been posted on linkedin. (I'll be cross posting this mail on local wikimedia mailing lists, as well as the main FOSS India mailing list.)
Can I request the following from as many of you as possible:
We'd love to have existing Wikimedians on board. Please do apply if you're interested!
Please share this mail with anyone you know who might be interested.
Pls broadcast these links on your social networks, mailing lists, bulletin boards, etc.
fyi, last date is 10 September.
Please do not hesitate to contact me for any clarifications.
Many thanks.
Hisham Mundol
Wikimedia India Programs
skype : hisham.wikimedia
gtalk : hmundol(a)wikimedia.org
twitter : @mundol
Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality!
Hi Folks
I'm writing to update you that the selection process of 2 more team members of the India Programs team has commenced. (As I mentioned a few weeks ago, we've selected Shiju & Nitika for our efforts on Indic languages and Participation.) The 2 positions I'm referring to in this mail are the remaining members of the team:
Communications. This person will manage all communications, public relations/media, social media & digital outreach.
Team Support. This person will manage all the backend (but essential) operations of the team - such as office administration and basic accounting and personnel management.
Details on the positions as well as the application process are available on the Wikimedia Foundation site :-
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/RFP/Consultant,_Communications_-_India_…http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/RFP/Consultant,_Team_Support_-_India_Pr…
Similar to the process that we followed for the earlier selections, these have been posted on linkedin. (I'll be cross posting this mail on local wikimedia mailing lists, as well as the main FOSS India mailing list.
Can I request the following from as many of you as possible:
We'd love to have existing Wikimedians on board. Please do apply if you're interested!
Please share this mail with anyone you know who might be interested.
Pls broadcast these links on your social networks, mailing lists, bulletin boards, etc.
Please do not hesitate to contact me for any clarifications.
Many thanks.
Hisham Mundol
Wikimedia India Programs
skype : hisham.wikimedia
gtalk : hmundol(a)wikimedia.org
twitter : @mundol
Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality!