[Foundation-l] PediaPress

[phoebe ayers]

On Thu, Nov 11, 2010 at 12:47 AM, MZMcBride <z at mzmcbride.com> wrote:

> I also don't understand who would want a printed copy of a Wikipedia
> article. It seems antithetical to the point of the Internet and the creation
> of an online encyclopedia.

The last time I used the Special:Book extension was not on Wikipedia
at all, but on the Strategy wiki, where it is enabled. Before the last
Board meeting, I used the tool to make a collection/pdf of the final
strategy documents, which I then printed out and read on my lunch
break, on the train, etc. -- places where I didn't have a computer and
my aging smartphone just wouldn't cut it. The benefits of doing this,
rather than just printing each page one-off, was that it was nicely
formatted (and thus easier to read), included a de-duped list of
contributors at the end so I could check who worked on the page
without printing off the history as well, and was in a single pdf that
I could both point other people to and also download to my computer,
email to myself, etc. So about a minute of clicking saved me quite a
bit of frustration and work, and made me quite a bit more efficient
when it came to reviewing the strategy proposal.

My only point here is that if you provide the tool people will put it
to surprising and useful purposes. I think Erik clarified that the
extension is something we can and intend to use regardless of
PediaPress (as can any MediaWiki installation -- I intend to install
it on my workplace wiki, when I get around to it) and I think Liam
raises a good point that if there are other organizations doing what
PediaPress does in the printing department we should consider adding
them to the list as well (which we can certainly do, as it is a
non-exclusive partnership).

And yes, the Foundation's mission *is* to help disseminate knowledge,
and specifically to encourage the dissemination of our project
content, in any way that is useful to our readers and potential
audience -- whether that's by DVD, wikireader, OLPC laptop, regular
laptop, printed book, mobile phone... that's why we have a free
license.

-- phoebe