[WikiEN-l] WP and Deep Web, was Re: Age fabrication and original research

[David Goodman]

Steve,some comments:

1. The best role of a librarian is to teach other people how to do
research, just as Phoebe didi with  Charles Matthews, and Ben Yates
for   her colleagues did with  Charles Matthews, and Ben Yates  in
''How Wikipedia Works''
 (http://howwikipediaworks.com/ the free online version.)

2, Another excellent goal is to help people do their searches,,
because it is not the least trivial to  "formulate search strings."
and have someone else run them on the data bases they have access to.
The art of   a librarian or other proper literature searcher is rather
more complex: selecting the best database to run it , formulating the
proper search statement, evaluating the preliminary  results, and then
repeating the necessary number of iterations until one finds just what
one does want or concludes it isn't there. Myself, even for the
simplest searches to check on refs. for notability on a current topic,
I typically do about 3 or 4 intermediate searches  before I think I
get it right-. If I get it right the first time, it's only because of
many years of knowledge in doing these searches.   We're not
technicians.  (And it does not require a formal library degree--many
people learn either by instruction or experience how to get it right
in their subjects)

3. I do not advise testing how far  AGF gets us with  or some of the
more hostile publishers in law and engineering.

David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG



On Mon, Oct 12, 2009 at 2:31 AM, stevertigo <stvrtg at gmail.com> wrote:
> phoebe ayers <phoebe.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
>> *cough* librarians? *cough*
>> anyway, the way the page above is framed betrays the assumption that
>> finding sources is a much more clear-cut process than it is,
>> and that the only expertise required in neutrally evaluating a wide range of
>> texts about a particular (often obscure) topic is access to a
>> particular database of articles.
>
> Hm. May I also "betray the assumption" that we may want some input
> from those experienced in using some particular copyright access
> search engine? I mean, "clear-cut process" may it may not be.
> Searching through piles of books is certainly never easy, but are you
> saying that searching *cough* online databases of digitized text isn't
> any easier? I have to assume good faith, that people can in a certain
> way act online in a "librarian"-like capacity, or else learn by their
> mistakes how to do so.
>
>> Which is not to say that I wouldn't love to see a broad network of people
>> who love to work on sourcing problems, much in the same way we have a > broad network of copyeditors and speedy-deleters.
>> Perhaps trying to reinvigorate WikiProject Fact & Reference Check would > be a good idea.
>
> You appear to be involved at Project:Resource Exchange, which looks
> like its well on the right track, even though it also seems to be
> somewhat inactive. I and others might have a few ideas for how to
> tweak that project a little bit, and get it up and running. Some of
> the same points I've made above about availability and private
> communications are the obvious requirements -- open availability,
> private requests, code of conduct (works both ways), private returns.
>
> The thing I suggest is to nuke Project:Librarians (which you also
> appear to be involved with) and merge those people into
> Project:Resources (note, move WP:LIB to ~Project:Resources). The
> reason being is that such a well-qualified group of people needs an
> actual purpose. WP:LIB/WP:REX seem like just that.
>
> Also, these people obviously need a name. And "librarians" just might
> work, assuming that this new meaning can be integrated, or else the
> other meaning deprecated.
>
>> It's also worth noting with many commercial library databases that
>> it's the act of doing the search and viewing abstracts that is
>> restricted by license, not just any full-text that may be attached.
>
> Yeah, but private sharing of full copies can also be allowed, and
> different companies have their own rules, etc. There also may be trust
> issues at some point too, but nothing that honest (AGF) people can't
> handle.
>
> -Stevertigo
> "Had to listen, had no choice..
>
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