[Foundation-l] Re: Forking the Wiki

[Michael Snow]

David Gerard wrote:

>Fred Bauder (fredbaud at ctelco.net) [050106 22:37]:
>  
>
>>While there are families, and certain ethnic groups who are into this kind
>>of thing, indeed almost a mass movement, those folks are already doing their
>>thing in other established venues and may not come over to our new project
>>in sufficient numbers to make it viable.
>>    
>>
>How about pointing some of these genealogists at Wikicities, if they're
>willing to use GFDL? Then the stuff could be ported to a future Wikipeople
>if it looks workable.
>  
>
Actually, since genealogy focuses almost exclusively on factual 
information (family relationships, dates and places of birth, marriage, 
death, etc.) the use of a given license is not particularly an issue. At 
least under US law, this material is no more susceptible to copyright 
than a telephone directory. (The content of written memorials, variously 
proposed for inclusion in Wikipeople, would be a different matter legally.)

Besides the fact that "free as in speech" is less applicable, another 
challenge for the idea generally is the fact that vast amounts of it are 
already available for free (the other kind of freedom), including on the 
internet. So while it might fit in with our mission philosophically, the 
necessity for us to get involved is much less.

Where information is needed in the genealogical field, it is more often 
because it was never generated as public records, or because such 
records were destroyed or have yet to be uncovered. And filling these 
gaps runs into the "original research" territory that we largely avoid.

--Michael Snow