[Foundation-l] Advertisement and service at the same time

[phoebe ayers]

On Fri, Mar 21, 2008 at 5:30 PM, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
> Andrew Gray wrote:
>  > On 20/03/2008, Florence Devouard <anthere at anthere.org> wrote:
>  >
>  >
>  >
>  >>  I ask the question because my husband opinion is very clear on the
>  >>  matter. When he reads an article about a BOOK, he would like that we
>  >>  provide as a service, a link to a website where he can directly buy the
>  >>  book. Typically, an Amazon link.
>  >>
>  >
>  > I make a practice of removing well-meaning Amazon links, because we
>  > currently have a structure to do this trivially, automatically, and
>  > with a lot broader scope.
>  >
>  > [The following is as it works on enwp - I believe many other projects
>  > have the extension, but I wouldn't want to claim to know how they
>  > handle it! The model should be similar, though.]
>  >
>  > Any text string of the form "ISBN xxx", where xxx is a ten-digit or
>  > thirteen-digit valid ISBN or ISBN-13 string, will link to a page at
>  > [[Special:Booksources]]. It will create, automatically, a set of
>  > deeplinks into the pages of a wide variety of online booksellers
>  > (including Amazon) - but also to a wide range of library catalogues,
>  > book exchange sites, etc.
>  >
>  I agree a generic interface is the right way to go, but the main problem
>  I have with it is that it seems almost purposely designed to make it
>  hard to find a link to a bookseller.

There's been a recurring debate in the library world about how to
handle this exact question in library catalogs. When you pull up a
book in your local library catalog (or on worldcat etc) it seems
helpful for the reader to also provide a link to a commercial site to
buy the book if they wish, or to get more information. (This is a
"service" the way Florence refers to it). The ideal and obvious thing
is to direct them to the publisher's site, but this is not always
possible, especially for older materials. So there's a big question
about a) *whether* to send patrons to commercial sites, and b) *where*
to send them -- since the library, as a non-profit NPOV institution,
generally does not want to *endorse* any particular reseller. As a
library, we have no stake in Amazon versus Powells (a large
independent bookseller in the U.S.) versus Blackwells versus your
corner bookshop etc., and we don't especially want to endorse one over
the other.

It seems to me that Wikimedia is in exactly the same position. Let's
not forget, from the point of view of Amazon a direct and easy link to
Amazon from Wikipedia would be an *amazing* windfall, a simultaneous
endorsement and direct channel of people to purchase materials (and
because of Amazon's nasty habit of retaining your browsing habits if
you're a customer, they might well even know *which* wikipedia
articles with amazon ads you'd been browsing, and be able to use that
information). Other booksellers, however, would be disenfranchised
simply because they don't have the reach or the money to pay for ads
the way Amazon does. And what if we don't think Amazon is a good
company, or don't want to support them, or simply want to avoid
entangling ourselves with any commercial service?

I am very much in favor of sharing metadata and improving our link-out
mechanisms so it's easier to find out more about the books and other
topics on Wikipedia. If someone wants to improve special:booksources
so it's easier to use (perhaps as a javascript menu -- choose your
location, choose libraries vs booksellers?), that would be fantastic.
I am not, however, in favor of directly or obviously linking to a
handful of commercial sites.

-- phoebe