Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Samuel Klein]

On Wed, Sep 16, 2009 at 11:26 AM, Pharos  wrote:
> On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 11:31 PM, Michael Snow  wrote:
>> John Vandenberg wrote:
>>> On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 10:33 AM, Brian wrote:
>>>
 I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include
 entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need 
 to
 be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by
 attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like
 the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to
 prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time
 will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects
 are likely to succeed and likely to fail.

>>> Brilliant idea.
>> This sounds like a good idea to me.
> This is a brilliant and much-needed idea, on many many levels.
>
> I suggest that we start to work developing such a new system for the
> Incubator at the strategy wiki.




Michael Snow writes:
>> One difference is immediately
>> obvious from the way the incubator works presently, though. Rather than
>> having these projects move out of the incubator based on the decision >> of 
>> the language committee, that issue would have to be considered by
>> the board directly in consultation with the broader community.

We have for years had a 'Board approval' bottleneck for creating new
Projects.  On the other hand, we've only created four since the Board
got started.  We managed somehow before, and I don't see why this
couldn't one day be delegated to something very like the language
committee, dedicated to assessing new project proposals for sufficient
interest and alignment with Wikimedia goals (here goals for free
knowledge coverage, not goals for real language coverage).  Until and
unless such a thing is worked out, review by the board and broader
community is a fine alternative... but it uncomfortably close to
describing the system we have now.

SJ

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Pharos]

On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 11:31 PM, Michael Snow  wrote:
> John Vandenberg wrote:
>> On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 10:33 AM, Brian wrote:
>>
>>> I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include
>>> entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to
>>> be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by
>>> attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like
>>> the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to
>>> prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time
>>> will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects
>>> are likely to succeed and likely to fail.
>>>
>> Brilliant idea.
>>
>> Currently new projects proposed on meta have buckley's chance of ever
>> starting.  Wikiversity wasn't a new project - it was split from
>> wikibooks.
>>
>> We would need a bit of infrastructure around new concepts before they
>> land on the incubator, such as a detailed description of the purpose,
>> and an experienced admin willing to monitor that area of the
>> incubator.
>>
> This sounds like a good idea to me. One difference is immediately
> obvious from the way the incubator works presently, though. Rather than
> having these projects move out of the incubator based on the decision of
> the language committee, that issue would have to be considered by the
> board directly in consultation with the broader community.
>
> --Michael Snow

This is a brilliant and much-needed idea, on many many levels.

I suggest that we start to work developing such a new system for the
Incubator at the strategy wiki.

Thanks,
Richard
(User:Pharos)

>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Samuel Klein]

I find projects to build large catalogs interesting; many of these are
simply not done well online. If you have a free catalog, you can
visaulize its elements on a map / with search; add reviews and images
and comments to what was previously uncommentable.  Some potential
catalogs:


Organizations - O(10M) V [ like wiserearth, whitepages? ]
Books and published works - O(10M) new published pieces a year. [
openlibrary.org ]
Websites - O(10M) V, non-spam sites?  [ aboutus.com ]
People/genealogy - O(1B) verifiable data points.  [ rodovid : O(100k) ]
Locations - O(1B) buildings and urban places.  Fewer identifiable/V
places in nature.
Popular online files - O(1B) V + N (for some defined N), by url + date
Mass-produced objects - O(10B) V, by UPC or other code.  [ no public site ]

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 12:13 PM, Eugene Eric Kim  wrote:
> On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 7:43 PM, Robert Rohde  wrote:
>> Another idea that I encountered somewhere (not currently sure where)
>> was to create a global wiki directory to essentially replace the
>> yellow pages.  Something managed under a wiki model to include the
>> names, addresses, phone numbers, websites, and a short description of
>> any and all local businesses.  Commercial businesses are a fine
>> example of entities that are usually verifiable but not notable from
>> Wikipedia's point of view, and having a central repository of
>> directory information would generally be useful.  A crowd sourced
>> directory would suffer from the general problems of accuracy that all
>> our wikiprojects have to worry about, but probably has the potential
>> to include more comprehensive information than the commercial
>> providers can manage.
>
> WiserEarth  originally intended to do this for
> organizations with social missions. Its emphasis has since expanded to
> become more social network/community-oriented, but its directory data
> still exists, is editable, and is an important part of the site.
>
> =Eugene
>
> --
> ==
> Eugene Eric Kim  http://xri.net/=eekim
> Blue Oxen Associates  http://www.blueoxen.com/
> ==
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Ray Saintonge]

Thomas Dalton wrote:
> 2009/9/8 Pedro Sanchez :
>   
>> Geographical/atlas/map kind ofproject
>>
>> granted, there's wikimapia and other external equivalents
>> but we (Wikimedia) are lacking it
>> 
>
> Is there any point us doing something that already exists? What would
> be better about a Wikimedia version?
>
>   
It would generate competition to the advantage of both sides.  Similarly 
Wikipedia forks would help us by generating competition.  Such a fork 
may, for example, have a different interpretation of NPOV, as would be 
its right on its own site.  Readers would then be more free to draw 
their own conclusions from comparing the two sites.  Another fork could 
choose to limit its scope to certain topics, and adopt editing policies 
that are more tailored to its topics.

Ec

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Anthony]

Hoi,
I can't respond to that question about a particular project on this mailing
list.  But suffice it to say, at least some language Wikipedia's aren't
going to include articles about streets without a reference to a published
source.  "I went there and took this pictures of it" doesn't qualify
as verifiability.

Anthony

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 5:04 PM, jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com <
jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com> wrote:

> I just added the street, and already they want to delete it.
> What should I put as a reason?
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FaradinHoti_(street_in_Prizren,_Kosovo)
>
>
> On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 10:54 PM, Yaroslav M. Blanter 
> wrote:
> >>> Well, ideally we will have wikipedia articles about every street in
> >>> Prizren, and they are going to be illustrated by your pictures (I hope
> >>> there is fop in Kosovo).
> >>
> >> Yes?
> >> I can create them.
> >>
> >> How would I name them?
> >> Prizren/FaradinHoti?
> >>
> >> What would they look like?
> >> Like this?
> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton_Boulevard
> >>
> >> What would the notability be?
> >> Some streets are really not interesting.
> >>
> >> mike
> >>
> > I do not know so well en.wp rules, but do not streets have immanent
> > notability? For instance, FaradinHoti (street in Prizren) or somehow
> else.
> >
> > Cheers
> > Yaroslav
> >
> >
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com]

I just added the street, and already they want to delete it.
What should I put as a reason?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FaradinHoti_(street_in_Prizren,_Kosovo)


On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 10:54 PM, Yaroslav M. Blanter  wrote:
>>> Well, ideally we will have wikipedia articles about every street in
>>> Prizren, and they are going to be illustrated by your pictures (I hope
>>> there is fop in Kosovo).
>>
>> Yes?
>> I can create them.
>>
>> How would I name them?
>> Prizren/FaradinHoti?
>>
>> What would they look like?
>> Like this?
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton_Boulevard
>>
>> What would the notability be?
>> Some streets are really not interesting.
>>
>> mike
>>
> I do not know so well en.wp rules, but do not streets have immanent
> notability? For instance, FaradinHoti (street in Prizren) or somehow else.
>
> Cheers
> Yaroslav
>
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Yaroslav M. Blanter]

>> Well, ideally we will have wikipedia articles about every street in
>> Prizren, and they are going to be illustrated by your pictures (I hope
>> there is fop in Kosovo).
>
> Yes?
> I can create them.
>
> How would I name them?
> Prizren/FaradinHoti?
>
> What would they look like?
> Like this?
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton_Boulevard
>
> What would the notability be?
> Some streets are really not interesting.
>
> mike
>
I do not know so well en.wp rules, but do not streets have immanent
notability? For instance, FaradinHoti (street in Prizren) or somehow else.

Cheers
Yaroslav


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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Anthony]

Now I'm going to get yelled at for posting too much, but better links would
probably be:

http://www.openstreetmap.org/?way=12174465
http://www.openstreetmap.org/?way=6678417

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 4:23 PM, Anthony  wrote:

> http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/way/6678417 (
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacqueline_Kennedy_Onassis_Reservoir)
>
> and
>
> http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/way/12174465 (
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broad_Street_(Philadelphia))
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Anthony]

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 3:48 PM, jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com <
jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com> wrote:

> Just updated http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_du_Change
> has a link to this :
> http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/node/26127031
>
> But realistically, we need to be able to match them together with
> error tolerances.


Using the unique ID is probably better, and works with ways like:

http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/way/6678417 (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacqueline_Kennedy_Onassis_Reservoir)

and

http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/way/12174465 (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broad_Street_(Philadelphia))

which are currently linked in Wikipedia by coordinates.  (Hmm, I guess the
the latter is a problem when the road is split into multiple ways, this
might need some sort of relation.)

Which is getting a little off topic, since the idea is to include less
notable places that aren't accepted into Wikipedia (the playground around
the corner from my house).  But the same principles will apply.
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com]

Just updated http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_du_Change
has a link to this :
http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/node/26127031

But realistically, we need to be able to match them together with
error tolerances. These two small differences are very small.
see the red dot:
http://yfrog.com/elbildschirmfotoopenstreep

Of course we would have to check them all.
But if you look at the  Satellite photo you will see : it takes up the
whole block:
http://maps.google.de/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Temple+du+Change&sll=46.274834,5.322876&sspn=1.48453,3.466187&ie=UTF8&ll=45.764529,4.828215&spn=0.000732,0.001692&t=h&z=19&iwloc=A

Therefore they are all right, within a tolerance of a building block.

mike

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 9:37 PM, Anthony  wrote:
> On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 3:13 PM, Anthony  wrote:
>>
>> Does OSM maintain a persistent unique ID for every node/way?
>>
>
> Answering my own question, yes.
>
>  changeset="223034" user="FredB" uid="1626" visible="true"
> timestamp="2007-02-24T17:39:12Z">
>  
>  
>  
> 
>
> And http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_du_Change , which locates the temple
> at the rounded 45.76, 4.827778, thus making it difficult to link the two
> points together.
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Anthony]

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 3:13 PM, Anthony  wrote:
>
> Does OSM maintain a persistent unique ID for every node/way?
>

Answering my own question, yes.


  
  
  


And http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_du_Change , which locates the temple
at the rounded 45.76, 4.827778, thus making it difficult to link the two
points together.
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com]

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 9:25 PM, Yaroslav M. Blanter  wrote:
> Well, ideally we will have wikipedia articles about every street in
> Prizren, and they are going to be illustrated by your pictures (I hope
> there is fop in Kosovo).

Yes?
I can create them.

How would I name them?
Prizren/FaradinHoti?

What would they look like?
Like this?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton_Boulevard

What would the notability be?
Some streets are really not interesting.

mike

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Anthony]

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 2:51 PM, jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com <
jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com> wrote:

> On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 8:37 PM, Anthony  wrote:
> > On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 2:17 PM, jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com <
> > jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> You have this directory already!
> >> Just extract all the deleted articles that are not notible.
> >> you will have all the small business that got deleted.
> >>
> >> In fact that is the biggest pain that people face, they get deleted.
> >> We need some way to keep pages from being deleted, but moved.
> >>
> >
> > I think first there needs to be a place to move them to.  OSM has come a
> > long way since I first proposed Wikiteer, which was meant to be a
> > combination of items of local interest which were deleted as non-notable
> > plus the GIS support structure to map them.  Nowadays I'm comfortable
> > letting OSM manage the GIS/mapping aspect and sticking to just the
> > description pages (phone numbers, addresses, websites, operating hours,
> > maybe even some topic specific info like menus or admission prices or
> show
> > schedules).
>
> OSM supports address and websites.
> It could store all the data in fact, it is free form.
> you could have key=price-food-hambuger val=1$ if you want.
>

Addresses, fine.  Websites, maybe (it's kind of redundant putting website=
http://www.publix.com/ on every single store location).  Phone numbers, I'd
say no - that's too transient and not really location based in the first
place.  Prices, absolutely not - way too transient for a GIS.

Basically you can store all the data that google local does in osm.
>

You could, but personally I don't think that'd be very good from a design
perspective.  OSM could, of course, have a separate database for this type
of information, but that seems like the kind of thing that the WMF does
better.

I can pretty much guarantee you that Google Local doesn't put phone numbers
in its GIS database under the nodes table, but puts that stuff in a separate
database (or at least a separate table) and links the two databases/table
together.

This is especially true when it comes to relatively long freeform text
descriptions, both from a perspective of performance (you want this stuff in
separate tables) and editing (I don't want to use Potlatch or JOSM to update
the operating hours of my local library).

Does OSM maintain a persistent unique ID for every node/way?  That's
probably the way to do it.  Also solves to some extent the copyright
problem.  OSM can add nodes using sources its feels comfortable with, and
Wikipedia can geolocate articles using sources its comfortable with, and the
two can be tied together with the OSM node's unique ID - even if the
positions are a few feet different due to different sourcing.
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Yaroslav M. Blanter]

> When I was in Prizren, Kosovo, I took pictures of every street
> intersection.
> There are lots of shops and places that would never make it to the
> wikipedia but would be interesting to someone who wants to visit the
> place.
>
> here are some of my dumps in the archive.org :
> http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren4
> http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren3
> http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren2
> http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren
>
> Also have started to create articles for the most famous religious
> buildings. What would be nice is to put all the streets on there.
> Even to put some streets from OSM in the wiki sure why not?
>

Well, ideally we will have wikipedia articles about every street in
Prizren, and they are going to be illustrated by your pictures (I hope
there is fop in Kosovo).

Cheers
Yaroslav


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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com]

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 8:37 PM, Anthony  wrote:
> On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 2:17 PM, jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com <
> jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>>
>> You have this directory already!
>> Just extract all the deleted articles that are not notible.
>> you will have all the small business that got deleted.
>>
>> In fact that is the biggest pain that people face, they get deleted.
>> We need some way to keep pages from being deleted, but moved.
>>
>
> I think first there needs to be a place to move them to.  OSM has come a
> long way since I first proposed Wikiteer, which was meant to be a
> combination of items of local interest which were deleted as non-notable
> plus the GIS support structure to map them.  Nowadays I'm comfortable
> letting OSM manage the GIS/mapping aspect and sticking to just the
> description pages (phone numbers, addresses, websites, operating hours,
> maybe even some topic specific info like menus or admission prices or show
> schedules).

OSM supports address and websites.
It could store all the data in fact, it is free form.
you could have key=price-food-hambuger val=1$ if you want.

Basically you can store all the data that google local does in osm.

But people want to have a wikipage for themselves. Small business etc.

mike

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Anthony]

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 2:17 PM, jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com <
jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>
> You have this directory already!
> Just extract all the deleted articles that are not notible.
> you will have all the small business that got deleted.
>
> In fact that is the biggest pain that people face, they get deleted.
> We need some way to keep pages from being deleted, but moved.
>

I think first there needs to be a place to move them to.  OSM has come a
long way since I first proposed Wikiteer, which was meant to be a
combination of items of local interest which were deleted as non-notable
plus the GIS support structure to map them.  Nowadays I'm comfortable
letting OSM manage the GIS/mapping aspect and sticking to just the
description pages (phone numbers, addresses, websites, operating hours,
maybe even some topic specific info like menus or admission prices or show
schedules).

Maybe it's finally time to reintroduce the idea.  But I'm going to let
someone else deal with the bureaucracy.
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Anthony]

On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 10:40 PM, jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com
>
> Also there is a big discussion on the idea that wikipedia data can be
> imported into openstreetmap, because supposedly the coordinates from
> Wikipedia are copied from non free sources.:
> http://www.nabble.com/Wikipedia-POI-import--td23392791.html


The biggest legitimate concern they seem to have is UK (and EU?) database
laws regarding "substantial extraction".  It's an interesting predicament.
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com]

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 8:06 PM, Anthony  wrote:
> On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 10:43 PM, Robert Rohde  wrote:
>>
>> Another idea that I encountered somewhere (not currently sure where)
>> was to create a global wiki directory to essentially replace the
>> yellow pages.  Something managed under a wiki model to include the
>> names, addresses, phone numbers, websites, and a short description of
>> any and all local businesses.  Commercial businesses are a fine
>> example of entities that are usually verifiable but not notable from
>> Wikipedia's point of view, and having a central repository of
>> directory information would generally be useful.  A crowd sourced
>> directory would suffer from the general problems of accuracy that all
>> our wikiprojects have to worry about, but probably has the potential
>> to include more comprehensive information than the commercial
>> providers can manage.
>
>
> This would be nice to tie in with OpenStreetMap, so that amenity=fast_food (
> http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:amenity%3Dfast_food) could be
> additionally tagged with something like
> guid=309FAF94-9FC6-11DE-A978-099455D89593, and then
> http://xx.local.wikimedia.org/wiki/309FAF94-9FC6-11DE-A978-099455D89593would
> have the directory information (in the xx language).  The wiki would
> probably contain lots of information not included in OSM (OSM are IMHO a
> little bit overly copyright-paranoid), but in theory one could make a
> smartphone app which lets you find the nearest fast food restaurants (OSM),
> take you to a description page for the nearest one (wiki), provide driving
> directions (OSM)...

You have this directory already!
Just extract all the deleted articles that are not notible.
you will have all the small business that got deleted.

In fact that is the biggest pain that people face, they get deleted.
We need some way to keep pages from being deleted, but moved.

Wikilocal,
Wikiunnotable
Wikitrivia
Wikihometown

these are the types of things that I would like to see.
Something that lowers the notibility and allows clubs, bands and cafes
to become listed, but maintaining the wikipedia level of neutrality.

When I was in Prizren, Kosovo, I took pictures of every street intersection.
There are lots of shops and places that would never make it to the
wikipedia but would be interesting to someone who wants to visit the
place.

here are some of my dumps in the archive.org :
http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren4
http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren3
http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren2
http://www.archive.org/details/KosovoPrizren

Also have started to create articles for the most famous religious
buildings. What would be nice is to put all the streets on there.
Even to put some streets from OSM in the wiki sure why not?

Was just playing this online monopoly game, some of our work on OSM in
kosovo is now showing up there :
http://img11.yfrog.com/i/bildschirmfoto1h.png/

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Anthony]

On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 10:43 PM, Robert Rohde  wrote:
>
> Another idea that I encountered somewhere (not currently sure where)
> was to create a global wiki directory to essentially replace the
> yellow pages.  Something managed under a wiki model to include the
> names, addresses, phone numbers, websites, and a short description of
> any and all local businesses.  Commercial businesses are a fine
> example of entities that are usually verifiable but not notable from
> Wikipedia's point of view, and having a central repository of
> directory information would generally be useful.  A crowd sourced
> directory would suffer from the general problems of accuracy that all
> our wikiprojects have to worry about, but probably has the potential
> to include more comprehensive information than the commercial
> providers can manage.


This would be nice to tie in with OpenStreetMap, so that amenity=fast_food (
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:amenity%3Dfast_food) could be
additionally tagged with something like
guid=309FAF94-9FC6-11DE-A978-099455D89593, and then
http://xx.local.wikimedia.org/wiki/309FAF94-9FC6-11DE-A978-099455D89593would
have the directory information (in the xx language).  The wiki would
probably contain lots of information not included in OSM (OSM are IMHO a
little bit overly copyright-paranoid), but in theory one could make a
smartphone app which lets you find the nearest fast food restaurants (OSM),
take you to a description page for the nearest one (wiki), provide driving
directions (OSM)...
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Eugene Eric Kim]

On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 7:43 PM, Robert Rohde  wrote:
> Another idea that I encountered somewhere (not currently sure where)
> was to create a global wiki directory to essentially replace the
> yellow pages.  Something managed under a wiki model to include the
> names, addresses, phone numbers, websites, and a short description of
> any and all local businesses.  Commercial businesses are a fine
> example of entities that are usually verifiable but not notable from
> Wikipedia's point of view, and having a central repository of
> directory information would generally be useful.  A crowd sourced
> directory would suffer from the general problems of accuracy that all
> our wikiprojects have to worry about, but probably has the potential
> to include more comprehensive information than the commercial
> providers can manage.

WiserEarth  originally intended to do this for
organizations with social missions. Its emphasis has since expanded to
become more social network/community-oriented, but its directory data
still exists, is editable, and is an important part of the site.

=Eugene

-- 
==
Eugene Eric Kim  http://xri.net/=eekim
Blue Oxen Associates  http://www.blueoxen.com/
==

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[John Vandenberg]

On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 11:59 PM, Robert Rohde  wrote:
> If we are just throwing out random ideas...
>
> I've long wanted to see an open source project to create a world
> family tree, i.e. document the ancestry and connections between
> everyone ever.  There are a couple high profile closed source / fee
> based projects aiming to do this, but no successful projects that
> really have open access as part of their foundation.  Even if we
> limited such a project to just deceased individuals (as the big
> projects usually do) it would still be a massive undertaking and
> potentially very useful for researchers.
>
> However, while a wiki could work, it would be a suboptimal approach.
> Much like wikispecies, genealogical information has a heavy component
> of structured data that could benefit from dedicated tools designed
> for that data.  As has been suggested elsewhere, it seems that most of
> the things that can be easily done by a wiki are already being done
> either by us or by Wikia and similar third parties.

Robert,

Are you familiar with Rodovid ?

It has been mentioned in this thread by Yann, and is the top project
mentioned here:

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposals_for_new_projects

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Rodovid

--
John Vandenberg

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Robert Rohde]

On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 7:40 PM, jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com
 wrote:


> In my opinion, What is really missing for example is the ability to
> find all the articles that occur in a geographic location.
>
> I would like to see all the articles about Beijing for example, but it
> is not easy. Google provides some of this, but it could be better.



I've seriously thought about implementing this.  Enhancing the
existing coordinate templates by creating a searchable coordinates
table in the database would not be a difficult thing.  It requires a
bit of thought and effort to make it efficient, but the underlying
idea is simple.  Locating nearby articles (and geocoded images) could
have a lot of uses.

-Robert Rohde

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Robert Rohde]

On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 7:20 PM, David Goodman  wrote:
> Perhaps we need a peripheral Wikipedia layer for items meeting V, but
> where N being based on general assumptions:  a level for verifiable
> articles that don't meet current notability standards.
>
> It could be a separate project, Wikidirectory--just as we moved out
> dicdefs, and quotations, and so on, except  that  there are already
> too many projects to keep track of.  Could we do it within Wikipedia,
> perhaps as a namespace?
>
> David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG
>

Another idea that I encountered somewhere (not currently sure where)
was to create a global wiki directory to essentially replace the
yellow pages.  Something managed under a wiki model to include the
names, addresses, phone numbers, websites, and a short description of
any and all local businesses.  Commercial businesses are a fine
example of entities that are usually verifiable but not notable from
Wikipedia's point of view, and having a central repository of
directory information would generally be useful.  A crowd sourced
directory would suffer from the general problems of accuracy that all
our wikiprojects have to worry about, but probably has the potential
to include more comprehensive information than the commercial
providers can manage.

If people truly believe in the "sum of all human knowledge" paradigm,
then eventually we'll have to confront what to do with a wide range of
factual information (like yellow page listings, family trees, sports
almanacs, and other things) that are permanent or semi-permanent and
yet generally not in the scope of projects like Wikipedia because they
aren't very notable.  Wikibooks can vaguely address some of this, but
shoehorning everything into a "book" model doesn't really make sense
either.

-Robert Rohde

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[jamesmikedup...@googlemail.com]

On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 1:00 AM, Brion Vibber  wrote:
> On 9/8/09 3:56 PM, Thomas Dalton wrote:
>> 2009/9/8 Pedro Sanchez:
>>> Geographical/atlas/map kind ofproject
>>>
>>> granted, there's wikimapia and other external equivalents
>>> but we (Wikimedia) are lacking it
>>
>> Is there any point us doing something that already exists? What would
>> be better about a Wikimedia version?
>
> Our current direction is to coordinate with external resources rather
> than create them from scratch, where we've got compatible goals and ideals.
>
> For instance, rather than creating our own map system from scratch we're
> working with OpenStreetMap to integrate mapping, using our own rendering
> servers with a copy of the public data and making it easier to stick
> maps in wiki pages for starters, with easier ways to get into the
> upstream system to improve location name translations and mapping data.

I have been following the map-l and openstreetmap closely.
There was a status report posted just recently:
http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/maps-l/2009-September/000270.html

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/OpenStreetMap

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Geographical_coordinates

Also there is a big discussion on the idea that wikipedia data can be
imported into openstreetmap, because supposedly the coordinates from
Wikipedia are copied from non free sources.:
http://www.nabble.com/Wikipedia-POI-import--td23392791.html

In my opinion, What is really missing for example is the ability to
find all the articles that occur in a geographic location.

I would like to see all the articles about Beijing for example, but it
is not easy. Google provides some of this, but it could be better.

On a different dimension, time not space :

another project that I would like to see it a WikiTimeLine
It would be great to be able to extract all the data references out of
the wikipedia articles and put the on a time line.


mike

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Mdupont

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[David Goodman]

Perhaps we need a peripheral Wikipedia layer for items meeting V, but
where N being based on general assumptions:  a level for verifiable
articles that don't meet current notability standards.

It could be a separate project, Wikidirectory--just as we moved out
dicdefs, and quotations, and so on, except  that  there are already
too many projects to keep track of.  Could we do it within Wikipedia,
perhaps as a namespace?

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



On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 9:59 AM, Robert Rohde  wrote:
> If we are just throwing out random ideas...
>
> I've long wanted to see an open source project to create a world
> family tree, i.e. document the ancestry and connections between
> everyone ever.  There are a couple high profile closed source / fee
> based projects aiming to do this, but no successful projects that
> really have open access as part of their foundation.  Even if we
> limited such a project to just deceased individuals (as the big
> projects usually do) it would still be a massive undertaking and
> potentially very useful for researchers.
>
> However, while a wiki could work, it would be a suboptimal approach.
> Much like wikispecies, genealogical information has a heavy component
> of structured data that could benefit from dedicated tools designed
> for that data.  As has been suggested elsewhere, it seems that most of
> the things that can be easily done by a wiki are already being done
> either by us or by Wikia and similar third parties.
>
> -Robert Rohde
>
> On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 8:24 AM, oscar  wrote:
>> On 9/9/09, Michael Peel  wrote:
>>>
>>> On 2 Sep 2009, at 12:35, David Goodman wrote:
>>>
 There is sufficient missing material in  every Wikipedia, sufficient
 lack of coverage of areas outside the primary language zone and in
 earlier periods, sufficient unsourced material; sufficient need for
 updating  articles, sufficient potentially free media to add,
 sufficient needed imagery to get;  that we have more than enough work
 for all the volunteers we are likely to get.
>>>
>>> I apologise for taking this slightly out of context, but it touches
>>> upon something I've been wondering about recently, which is: do we
>>> have a complete set of WMF projects?
>>
>> great topic :-D
>>
>> in my personal vision, it is rather obvious we should consider the
>> work of the wmf as "perpetually unfinished" just as wikipedia or any
>> of its other projects: an ongoing process, never ever {{done}}
>> completely.
>>
>> to just do a little brainstorm, let me share some ideas as well:
>> * a compendium to wikipedia, collecting each and every complete older
>> encyclopedia (which is no longer copyrighted), thus also giving a peek
>> into the history of knowledge and of encyclopedias (does this really
>> belong in wikisource? maybe)
>> * a wikimusic including a musical dictionary, where one can e.g. look
>> up themes and melodies, find sheet music and recordings, searching by
>> notes etc
>> * i also thought of wikimaps, somebody mentioned this already, imnsho
>> including "all  maps" in detailed resolutions also historical maps,
>> thus also giving a peek into the history of geography and of
>> cartography as well as leaving room for original creations under a
>> free license (new maps)
>>
>> just my 2 cts ;-)
>>
>> all the best,
>> oscar
>>
>> --
>> *edito ergo sum*
>>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Robert Rohde]

If we are just throwing out random ideas...

I've long wanted to see an open source project to create a world
family tree, i.e. document the ancestry and connections between
everyone ever.  There are a couple high profile closed source / fee
based projects aiming to do this, but no successful projects that
really have open access as part of their foundation.  Even if we
limited such a project to just deceased individuals (as the big
projects usually do) it would still be a massive undertaking and
potentially very useful for researchers.

However, while a wiki could work, it would be a suboptimal approach.
Much like wikispecies, genealogical information has a heavy component
of structured data that could benefit from dedicated tools designed
for that data.  As has been suggested elsewhere, it seems that most of
the things that can be easily done by a wiki are already being done
either by us or by Wikia and similar third parties.

-Robert Rohde

On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 8:24 AM, oscar  wrote:
> On 9/9/09, Michael Peel  wrote:
>>
>> On 2 Sep 2009, at 12:35, David Goodman wrote:
>>
>>> There is sufficient missing material in  every Wikipedia, sufficient
>>> lack of coverage of areas outside the primary language zone and in
>>> earlier periods, sufficient unsourced material; sufficient need for
>>> updating  articles, sufficient potentially free media to add,
>>> sufficient needed imagery to get;  that we have more than enough work
>>> for all the volunteers we are likely to get.
>>
>> I apologise for taking this slightly out of context, but it touches
>> upon something I've been wondering about recently, which is: do we
>> have a complete set of WMF projects?
>
> great topic :-D
>
> in my personal vision, it is rather obvious we should consider the
> work of the wmf as "perpetually unfinished" just as wikipedia or any
> of its other projects: an ongoing process, never ever {{done}}
> completely.
>
> to just do a little brainstorm, let me share some ideas as well:
> * a compendium to wikipedia, collecting each and every complete older
> encyclopedia (which is no longer copyrighted), thus also giving a peek
> into the history of knowledge and of encyclopedias (does this really
> belong in wikisource? maybe)
> * a wikimusic including a musical dictionary, where one can e.g. look
> up themes and melodies, find sheet music and recordings, searching by
> notes etc
> * i also thought of wikimaps, somebody mentioned this already, imnsho
> including "all  maps" in detailed resolutions also historical maps,
> thus also giving a peek into the history of geography and of
> cartography as well as leaving room for original creations under a
> free license (new maps)
>
> just my 2 cts ;-)
>
> all the best,
> oscar
>
> --
> *edito ergo sum*
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Pavlo Shevelo]

> * Wikisource -- better native support for side-by-side translations,
> annotations, and extracting/citing primary source material from the
> other sites like Wikipedia would be very helpful.

Same thing is in need for Wikiquote as well while I do believe
 that
> ... extracting/citing primary source material from the other sites like ...

is extremely useful and very universal thing for any cross-project
'linking' (and even for internal citing)


On Thu, Sep 10, 2009 at 7:07 PM, Brion Vibber  wrote:
> On 9/9/09 9:41 AM, David Gerard wrote:
>> As Erik points out, at a certain point we have to actually write new
>> code to support new ideas. Else "projects we could do at Wikimedia"
>> becomes "projects we can do with a wiki engine."
>
> IMO we need to do that for the projects we already have before we take
> on new obligations!
>
> We still have very poor software support for:
>
> * Commons -- We need a sane upload and post-upload workflow (eg review
> and deletion), and a clean system for handling structured metadata
> (descriptions, authorship, licence info).
>
> Some of this is being worked on now with Michael Dale's video & media
> work, and the Ford Foundation grant will let us put more resources into
> the workflow & metadata side, so this is the one I worry the least about. :)
>
>
> * Wiktionary -- Really needs to be rebuilt as a structured system. It's
> very hard to query Wiktionary or extract its data usefully, and there's
> a lot of duplicated manual work maintaining it.
>
> There was some third-party work done in this direction (Ultimate
> Wiktionary/WiktionaryZ/OmegaWiki) which was very interesting but never
> got the community buy-in to push that work back towards the live Wiktionary.
>
>
> * Wikibooks -- We still have very poor native support for multiple-page
> "books" or "modules", which complicates navigation, search, authoring,
> and downloading.
>
> Tools like the Collection extension are making it easier to download a
> batch of related pages for offline reading, but someone still needs to
> build those collections manually and they don't provide other navigation
> aids.
>
>
> * Wikinews -- Workflow on Wikinews has been aided by tools like
> FlaggedRevs but is still a bit awkward. Native support for things like
> exporting feeds of news articles is still missing, leading to a lot of
> workarounds and manual effort being expended.
>
>
> * Wikisource -- better native support for side-by-side translations,
> annotations, and extracting/citing primary source material from the
> other sites like Wikipedia would be very helpful.
>
> -- brion
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[David Gerard]

2009/9/10 Brion Vibber :

> IMO we need to do that for the projects we already have before we take
> on new obligations!


Oh yesss.


> We still have very poor software support for:
> * Commons -- We need a sane upload and post-upload workflow (eg review
> and deletion), and a clean system for handling structured metadata
> (descriptions, authorship, licence info).
> Some of this is being worked on now with Michael Dale's video & media
> work, and the Ford Foundation grant will let us put more resources into
> the workflow & metadata side, so this is the one I worry the least about. :)


Categories as tags with arbitrary Boolean queries? Huh? Huh? Huh?


- d.

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Mike.lifeguard]

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1

Brion Vibber wrote:
> IMO we need to do that for the projects we already have before we take
> on new obligations!
> 
> We still have very poor software support for:...

Thanks Brion, it is good to know that the tech team is aware of these
issues and will be expending energy to improve how the software supports
the non-Wikipedia projects. I'm looking forward in particular to seeing
how the grant money will be spent for improving Commons' software, and
what ideas may come about for giving Wikibooks some in-software structure.

- -Mike
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Version: GnuPG v1.4.9 (GNU/Linux)

iEYEARECAAYFAkqpURcACgkQst0AR/DaKHsIRwCgyQTVbLBnmfvs5VUrPzCO3+0U
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Brion Vibber]

On 9/9/09 9:41 AM, David Gerard wrote:
> As Erik points out, at a certain point we have to actually write new
> code to support new ideas. Else "projects we could do at Wikimedia"
> becomes "projects we can do with a wiki engine."

IMO we need to do that for the projects we already have before we take 
on new obligations!

We still have very poor software support for:

* Commons -- We need a sane upload and post-upload workflow (eg review 
and deletion), and a clean system for handling structured metadata 
(descriptions, authorship, licence info).

Some of this is being worked on now with Michael Dale's video & media 
work, and the Ford Foundation grant will let us put more resources into 
the workflow & metadata side, so this is the one I worry the least about. :)


* Wiktionary -- Really needs to be rebuilt as a structured system. It's 
very hard to query Wiktionary or extract its data usefully, and there's 
a lot of duplicated manual work maintaining it.

There was some third-party work done in this direction (Ultimate 
Wiktionary/WiktionaryZ/OmegaWiki) which was very interesting but never 
got the community buy-in to push that work back towards the live Wiktionary.


* Wikibooks -- We still have very poor native support for multiple-page 
"books" or "modules", which complicates navigation, search, authoring, 
and downloading.

Tools like the Collection extension are making it easier to download a 
batch of related pages for offline reading, but someone still needs to 
build those collections manually and they don't provide other navigation 
aids.


* Wikinews -- Workflow on Wikinews has been aided by tools like 
FlaggedRevs but is still a bit awkward. Native support for things like 
exporting feeds of news articles is still missing, leading to a lot of 
workarounds and manual effort being expended.


* Wikisource -- better native support for side-by-side translations, 
annotations, and extracting/citing primary source material from the 
other sites like Wikipedia would be very helpful.

-- brion

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[John Vandenberg]

On Thu, Sep 10, 2009 at 9:23 PM, Samuel Klein  wrote:
>
> Great idea.  Where's the right place to suggest this on the Incubator?
>  That's a project where I have regrettably not gotten to know any of
> the local policies yet.

Here is the main project discussion:

http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Incubator:Community_Portal

However I think a meta discussion would be more widely visited.

--
John Vandenberg

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Samuel Klein]

On 9/8/09, Brian  wrote:
> On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM, Erik Moeller  wrote:
>
>  > 2009/9/8 Michael Peel :
>  > > What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects?
>  >
>  > Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex
>  > and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely
>  > to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often
>  > proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians.
>  > Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians to
>  > adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval?

That would be a nice idea.   Three steps : propose a process and find
supporters (somewhat defined on meta, can be refined), find an
established Wikimedian to mentor/adopt it  (define a new process and
people willing to mentor), work towards approval (define a new process
involving the incubator).


>  > I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore
>  > in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but IMO
>  > we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary
>  > want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller
>  > semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family,
>  > and that would make sense as part of it.

Yes.  Rodovid and Wikikids come to mind as projects that have asked at
one point, though they may no longer have such an interest.  Rodovid
is certainly the largest multilingual project to make such a
request... but afaict there simply wasn't a clear way for that to be
considered at the time.

>  > For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community
>  > of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because
>  > a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire
>  > community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could only
>  > form after the categorization functionality was developed.

Yes and yes.  I remember the people who wondered if articles would
ever be usefully categorized, or if it was just a cute side project
that would never impact wikipedia.  And the fascinating debates about
the meta-category structure... which might [have] serve[d] as material
for an entire thesis in librarianship.

>  > That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate
>  > wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I
>  > would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project
>  > has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful

It is a sign of stagnation.  The ecosystem is nowhere near saturated
with free knowledge projects; WP is dazzlingly successful; we or
others should at least be considering similar projects to cover every
type and format of knowledge, and for every audience -- in our case,
to explicitly say 'out of scope [yet]' if nothing else.

But as you note, there are other signs of growth which counterbalance it.


Brian writes:
> I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include
>  entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to
>  be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by
>  attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like
>  the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to
>  prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time
>  will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects
>  are likely to succeed and likely to fail.

Great idea.  Where's the right place to suggest this on the Incubator?
  That's a project where I have regrettably not gotten to know any of
the local policies yet.

SJ

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Brian]

On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 7:10 AM, Robin P.  wrote:

> In the past there were several project proposals on incubator, but we
> deleted them because they were not active. Since then, tests for new WMF
> projects are not allowed. If they were still allowed, Incubator would be
> full of inactive projects. Even now, there are inactive test projects for
> new languages, because the procedure is difficult and takes a very long
> time. I assume requests for creating entirely new projects would require
> even more difficult and longer procedures, resulting in an Incubator full
> of
> inactive tests.
>

I don't think that deleting them is a good idea,. Perhaps you can "archive"
them after a certain period of inactivity, but the incubator should allow
project ideas to be revived and should give projects plenty of time to
become active. There must be a carrot of course - the WMF should make some
sort of statement about how successful a project should become, and what
sorts of vision it might have, for them to commit more resources to it.
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[David Gerard]

As Erik points out, at a certain point we have to actually write new
code to support new ideas. Else "projects we could do at Wikimedia"
becomes "projects we can do with a wiki engine."

e.g. OpenStreetMap would have been a natural for WMF, but it would
have required a whole new software infrastructure. And we have no
shortage of content editors, but developers appear rather rarer.

Proposals I recall seeing for new projects either fit into a current
project (e.g. Wikibooks - really, Wikipedia is a book, too) or haven't
been neutral (e.g. the victims of Soviet repression proposal, which I
think is a great idea but also think just would have been way too
intrinsically non-neutral for WMF; the reviews wiki). Any proposal
that's "hey, let's start a wiki" will, I suspect, fall into one of
those two.

We're either not thinking outside the box enough or need to build new
boxes. Or both.

What interesting new engines are there out there for gathering content
from masses of Internet users that aren't wikis as we know them? What
could we use them for besides their original purpose?


[cc'd to wikitech-l for comment as well]


- d.

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Nathan]

On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 11:45 AM, Michael Peel  wrote:
>
> There's a big difference between starting a new section of something,
> and starting something completely new and fresh. With the former, you
> get all of the baggage of that project so far - e.g. if you want to
> start something slightly different on the English Wikipedia, then you
> have to modify huge numbers of policies, argue with many thousands of
> people, etc. Sometimes it's easier to split something off and do it
> seperately - as WikiSpecies has been doing, for example.
>
> There's also a big difference between testing a project and launching
> a project. Tests are normally small-scale, aimed at just trying
> something out, rather than actually doing a project. It's very
> difficult to establish critical mass with that approach. Launching a
> project involves announcing it loudly to the world, and getting the
> attention of lots of people. As long as the basic idea is sound, you
> then get a large influx of people who want to try it out. Perhaps
> they don't all stick around - but some of them will.
>
> Of course, you can't do either very often, otherwise people will stop
> paying any attention. But for some projects, it could work very well.
> Especially if there's the backing of e.g. a funding body, which could
> easily be attracted now that Wikimedia is so large and popular.
>
> Mike
>

I think you can test a project in the incubator, get an idea of how it
will work, set up the initial structure and *then* launch it publicly.
The publicity part is the simplest. We've got a built-in megaphone;
any launch that is incorporated with the fundraising drive, or given a
similar level of extended publicity on Wikimedia pages, would reach
many millions of people who already appreciate free collaborative
projects. That would require a somewhat different philosophy from the
current approach to "advertising" (not in the commercial sense) the
fundraising drive, which emphasizes minimal intrusion and a
once-a-year limit. Perhaps the community would be more amenable to
Wikimedia-wide publicity if it promoted projects?

I'd like to see a role like that in launches for future projects; the
foundation hasn't been involved in promoting or fostering new projects
in a deep way in the past, from my understanding, and real support
from the moment of establishment would go a long way towards
protecting promising ideas from abandonment in the incubator. Erik's
point is well made, that developing many promising projects beyond the
idea point requires the commitment of resources that remain scarce.
But there are lots of avenues the Foundation can take in this
direction that don't require the direct allocation of foundation
money; a "lesson plan / course material" wiki, or a "student wiki"
designed for collaborative use by students could be developed jointly
with innovative school systems or teacher groups, or even partnerships
between schools in different countries aimed at allowing international
cooperative learning. We may not be able to organically generate the
Wikimedia community interest and expertise necessary for building the
content these projects would need, but with the Foundation as
technological facilitator and enthusiastic booster...

Nathan

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Michael Peel]

On 9 Sep 2009, at 00:42, Yann Forget wrote:

> Michael Peel wrote:
>> ** A few of my favourite examples: WikiJournal, publishing scholarly
>> works;
>
> These works are welcomed on Wikisource, if they are under a free
> license, of course.
>
>> WikiReview, providing in-depth reviews of subjects;
>
> I think this can be hosted on Wikibooks or Wikiversity for the most  
> part.

There's a big difference between starting a new section of something,  
and starting something completely new and fresh. With the former, you  
get all of the baggage of that project so far - e.g. if you want to  
start something slightly different on the English Wikipedia, then you  
have to modify huge numbers of policies, argue with many thousands of  
people, etc. Sometimes it's easier to split something off and do it  
seperately - as WikiSpecies has been doing, for example.

There's also a big difference between testing a project and launching  
a project. Tests are normally small-scale, aimed at just trying  
something out, rather than actually doing a project. It's very  
difficult to establish critical mass with that approach. Launching a  
project involves announcing it loudly to the world, and getting the  
attention of lots of people. As long as the basic idea is sound, you  
then get a large influx of people who want to try it out. Perhaps  
they don't all stick around - but some of them will.

Of course, you can't do either very often, otherwise people will stop  
paying any attention. But for some projects, it could work very well.  
Especially if there's the backing of e.g. a funding body, which could  
easily be attracted now that Wikimedia is so large and popular.

Mike

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[oscar]

On 9/9/09, Michael Peel  wrote:
>
> On 2 Sep 2009, at 12:35, David Goodman wrote:
>
>> There is sufficient missing material in  every Wikipedia, sufficient
>> lack of coverage of areas outside the primary language zone and in
>> earlier periods, sufficient unsourced material; sufficient need for
>> updating  articles, sufficient potentially free media to add,
>> sufficient needed imagery to get;  that we have more than enough work
>> for all the volunteers we are likely to get.
>
> I apologise for taking this slightly out of context, but it touches
> upon something I've been wondering about recently, which is: do we
> have a complete set of WMF projects?

great topic :-D

in my personal vision, it is rather obvious we should consider the
work of the wmf as "perpetually unfinished" just as wikipedia or any
of its other projects: an ongoing process, never ever {{done}}
completely.

to just do a little brainstorm, let me share some ideas as well:
* a compendium to wikipedia, collecting each and every complete older
encyclopedia (which is no longer copyrighted), thus also giving a peek
into the history of knowledge and of encyclopedias (does this really
belong in wikisource? maybe)
* a wikimusic including a musical dictionary, where one can e.g. look
up themes and melodies, find sheet music and recordings, searching by
notes etc
* i also thought of wikimaps, somebody mentioned this already, imnsho
including "all  maps" in detailed resolutions also historical maps,
thus also giving a peek into the history of geography and of
cartography as well as leaving room for original creations under a
free license (new maps)

just my 2 cts ;-)

all the best,
oscar

-- 
*edito ergo sum*

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Robin P.]

Yes.
Btw, if we had a deadline, what should we do when a project reaches the
deadline? The most logical is deleting it. The problem with that, however,
is that nobody would contribute to a test project knowing that it will be
deleted when it reaches the deadline. If there is interest again, it would
then have to be undeleted. That would be also too much work for nothing.
So not really a solution.

2009/9/9 Jiri Hofman 

> Are inactive project in incubator really such a big problem? Could not be
> strict deadlines given to new projects in incubator the solution of this
> problem?
>
> Jiri
>
> On Wednesday, 09. September 2009 16:10:26 Robin P. wrote:
> > In the past there were several project proposals on incubator, but we
> > deleted them because they were not active. Since then, tests for new WMF
> > projects are not allowed. If they were still allowed, Incubator would be
> > full of inactive projects. Even now, there are inactive test projects for
> > new languages, because the procedure is difficult and takes a very long
> > time. I assume requests for creating entirely new projects would require
> > even more difficult and longer procedures, resulting in an Incubator full
> of
> > inactive tests.
> >
> > 2009/9/9 Brian 
> >
> > > On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM, Erik Moeller 
> wrote:
> > >
> > > > 2009/9/8 Michael Peel :
> > > > > What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects?
> > > >
> > > > Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so
> complex
> > > > and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be
> likely
> > > > to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often
> > > > proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians.
> > > > Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians
> to
> > > > adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval? In
> > > > any event, if you want to add to the Wikimedia family, my guess is
> > > > that it's currently a commitment of 2-3 months of several hours per
> > > > week to get to that point, provided it's achievable to begin with.
> > > >
> > > > I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore
> > > > in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but
> IMO
> > > > we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary
> > > > want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller
> > > > semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family,
> > > > and that would make sense as part of it.
> > > >
> > > > I would also make the point that adding capabilities to existing
> > > > projects can be just as effective at cultivating new communities of
> > > > participants as creating an entirely new wiki, and sometimes more so.
> > > > For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community
> > > > of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because
> > > > a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire
> > > > community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could
> only
> > > > form after the categorization functionality was developed.
> > > >
> > > > Because the Wikipedia community is so vast, adding capabilities that
> > > > engage more people on Wikipedia specifically, or improving access to
> > > > the existing capabilities, can have dramatically greater impact than
> > > > creating a blank-slate wiki.
> > > >
> > > > That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate
> > > > wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I
> > > > would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project
> > > > has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful
> > > > capabilities have been created in the existing Wikimedia ecosystem in
> > > > that same time period, some of them with dramatic positive impact.
> > > > --
> > > > Erik Möller
> > > > Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation
> > > >
> > > > Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate
> > > >
> > > >
> > > I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include
> > > entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't
> need
> > > to
> > > be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by
> > > attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more
> like
> > > the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way
> to
> > > prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over
> time
> > > will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to
> projects
> > > are likely to succeed and likely to fail.
> > > ___
> > > foundation-l mailing list
> > > foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
> > >
> > ___
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> >

Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Jiri Hofman]

Are inactive project in incubator really such a big problem? Could not be 
strict deadlines given to new projects in incubator the solution of this 
problem?

Jiri

On Wednesday, 09. September 2009 16:10:26 Robin P. wrote:
> In the past there were several project proposals on incubator, but we
> deleted them because they were not active. Since then, tests for new WMF
> projects are not allowed. If they were still allowed, Incubator would be
> full of inactive projects. Even now, there are inactive test projects for
> new languages, because the procedure is difficult and takes a very long
> time. I assume requests for creating entirely new projects would require
> even more difficult and longer procedures, resulting in an Incubator full of
> inactive tests.
> 
> 2009/9/9 Brian 
> 
> > On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM, Erik Moeller  wrote:
> >
> > > 2009/9/8 Michael Peel :
> > > > What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects?
> > >
> > > Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex
> > > and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely
> > > to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often
> > > proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians.
> > > Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians to
> > > adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval? In
> > > any event, if you want to add to the Wikimedia family, my guess is
> > > that it's currently a commitment of 2-3 months of several hours per
> > > week to get to that point, provided it's achievable to begin with.
> > >
> > > I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore
> > > in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but IMO
> > > we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary
> > > want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller
> > > semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family,
> > > and that would make sense as part of it.
> > >
> > > I would also make the point that adding capabilities to existing
> > > projects can be just as effective at cultivating new communities of
> > > participants as creating an entirely new wiki, and sometimes more so.
> > > For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community
> > > of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because
> > > a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire
> > > community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could only
> > > form after the categorization functionality was developed.
> > >
> > > Because the Wikipedia community is so vast, adding capabilities that
> > > engage more people on Wikipedia specifically, or improving access to
> > > the existing capabilities, can have dramatically greater impact than
> > > creating a blank-slate wiki.
> > >
> > > That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate
> > > wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I
> > > would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project
> > > has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful
> > > capabilities have been created in the existing Wikimedia ecosystem in
> > > that same time period, some of them with dramatic positive impact.
> > > --
> > > Erik Möller
> > > Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation
> > >
> > > Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate
> > >
> > >
> > I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include
> > entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need
> > to
> > be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by
> > attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like
> > the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to
> > prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time
> > will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects
> > are likely to succeed and likely to fail.
> > ___
> > foundation-l mailing list
> > foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
> >
> ___
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> foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org
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> 



-- 

    *
       .
         .
           .                             ...
              .                       M45 ..
  M1            .
 #                .
* .                  .                  Jiri Hofman
       .                .    Opiskelijankatu 38 B28
             .            *                 Tampere
                   .       **                 33720
                       ¤.     .             Finland
                          **. *
                                .
            

Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Robin P.]

In the past there were several project proposals on incubator, but we
deleted them because they were not active. Since then, tests for new WMF
projects are not allowed. If they were still allowed, Incubator would be
full of inactive projects. Even now, there are inactive test projects for
new languages, because the procedure is difficult and takes a very long
time. I assume requests for creating entirely new projects would require
even more difficult and longer procedures, resulting in an Incubator full of
inactive tests.

2009/9/9 Brian 

> On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM, Erik Moeller  wrote:
>
> > 2009/9/8 Michael Peel :
> > > What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects?
> >
> > Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex
> > and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely
> > to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often
> > proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians.
> > Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians to
> > adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval? In
> > any event, if you want to add to the Wikimedia family, my guess is
> > that it's currently a commitment of 2-3 months of several hours per
> > week to get to that point, provided it's achievable to begin with.
> >
> > I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore
> > in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but IMO
> > we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary
> > want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller
> > semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family,
> > and that would make sense as part of it.
> >
> > I would also make the point that adding capabilities to existing
> > projects can be just as effective at cultivating new communities of
> > participants as creating an entirely new wiki, and sometimes more so.
> > For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community
> > of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because
> > a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire
> > community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could only
> > form after the categorization functionality was developed.
> >
> > Because the Wikipedia community is so vast, adding capabilities that
> > engage more people on Wikipedia specifically, or improving access to
> > the existing capabilities, can have dramatically greater impact than
> > creating a blank-slate wiki.
> >
> > That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate
> > wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I
> > would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project
> > has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful
> > capabilities have been created in the existing Wikimedia ecosystem in
> > that same time period, some of them with dramatic positive impact.
> > --
> > Erik Möller
> > Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation
> >
> > Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate
> >
> >
> I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include
> entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need
> to
> be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by
> attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like
> the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to
> prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time
> will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects
> are likely to succeed and likely to fail.
> ___
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
I am glad that this is seen as obvious. The language committee has never
involved itself in assessing new project proposals. It does not have the
inclination to do so and I am glad that this is understood.
Thanks,
  GerardM

2009/9/9 Michael Snow 

> John Vandenberg wrote:
> > On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 10:33 AM, Brian wrote:
> >
> >> I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include
> >> entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't
> need to
> >> be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by
> >> attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more
> like
> >> the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way
> to
> >> prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time
> >> will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to
> projects
> >> are likely to succeed and likely to fail.
> >>
> > Brilliant idea.
> >
> > Currently new projects proposed on meta have buckley's chance of ever
> > starting.  Wikiversity wasn't a new project - it was split from
> > wikibooks.
> >
> > We would need a bit of infrastructure around new concepts before they
> > land on the incubator, such as a detailed description of the purpose,
> > and an experienced admin willing to monitor that area of the
> > incubator.
> >
> This sounds like a good idea to me. One difference is immediately
> obvious from the way the incubator works presently, though. Rather than
> having these projects move out of the incubator based on the decision of
> the language committee, that issue would have to be considered by the
> board directly in consultation with the broader community.
>
> --Michael Snow
>
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Michael Snow]

John Vandenberg wrote:
> On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 10:33 AM, Brian wrote:
>   
>> I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include
>> entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to
>> be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by
>> attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like
>> the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to
>> prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time
>> will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects
>> are likely to succeed and likely to fail.
>> 
> Brilliant idea.
>
> Currently new projects proposed on meta have buckley's chance of ever
> starting.  Wikiversity wasn't a new project - it was split from
> wikibooks.
>
> We would need a bit of infrastructure around new concepts before they
> land on the incubator, such as a detailed description of the purpose,
> and an experienced admin willing to monitor that area of the
> incubator.
>   
This sounds like a good idea to me. One difference is immediately 
obvious from the way the incubator works presently, though. Rather than 
having these projects move out of the incubator based on the decision of 
the language committee, that issue would have to be considered by the 
board directly in consultation with the broader community.

--Michael Snow


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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Mike.lifeguard]

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1

Erik Moeller wrote:
> Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex
> and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely
> to engage in

Another issue is that all our projects use the MediaWiki platform (and
really, the MediaWiki platform is the only tool we use for the content).
So, if it's not something that is conducive to being built on a
MediaWiki wiki, it's not something Wikimedia can accomplish.

- -Mike
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[John Vandenberg]

On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 10:33 AM, Brian wrote:
>
> I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include
> entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to
> be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by
> attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like
> the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to
> prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time
> will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects
> are likely to succeed and likely to fail.

Brilliant idea.

Currently new projects proposed on meta have buckley's chance of ever
starting.  Wikiversity wasn't a new project - it was split from
wikibooks.

We would need a bit of infrastructure around new concepts before they
land on the incubator, such as a detailed description of the purpose,
and an experienced admin willing to monitor that area of the
incubator.

--
John Vandenberg

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[John Vandenberg]

On Wed, Sep 9, 2009 at 9:42 AM, Yann Forget wrote:
> Michael Peel wrote:
> [cut]
>
>> ** A few of my favourite examples: WikiJournal, publishing scholarly
>> works;
>
> These works are welcomed on Wikisource, if they are under a free
> license, of course.

And if they are beyond the scope of Wikisource, they would be suitable
on Wikiversity.

>> WikiReview, providing in-depth reviews of subjects;
>
> I think this can be hosted on Wikibooks or Wikiversity for the most part.

"reviews" are a mine field.  If they are educational, they can
probably go on Wikibooks, or even Wikipedia if written using existing
sources.

Wikinews may also be interested in publishing reviews.

>> WikiWrite, where fiction can be written collaboratively; etc.
>
> I don't think this fits very well in the Wikimedia mission.

If the objective is to learn, Wikiversity courses could be constructed
around fiction writing.

Wikinews may be interested in collaboratively composed cartoons and fiction.

> In the sum of all human knowledge, there are two projects which would be
>  nice complement to the Wikimedia family:
>
> 1. A database of all books. This is actually what OpenLibrary tries to
> do, with mitigated success, IMO. As you said, if we try and fail,
> nothing would be lost, as the result could be imported to OpenLibrary.
> We wouldn't need to start from scratch as the content of OpenLibrary is
> available and free.

I agree this is necessary.  This task is extremely large and complex,
and it does not hurt to have multiple "competing" open projects.
OpenLibrary publishes their data store, and our wiki would be
available as well, so the result will be cross pollination between
OpenLibrary and our project until they are more or less in sync and
the task is done.

> 2. A database of all people, i.e. genealogy. There is one project which
> is IMO a great technical success in this field: Rodovid
> (http://rodovid.org/).

Bringing Rodovid under the WMF umbrella would be great, and would
encourage more genealogy people to become involved Wikimedia.

--
John Vandenberg

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Brian]

On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM, Erik Moeller  wrote:

> 2009/9/8 Michael Peel :
> > What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects?
>
> Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex
> and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely
> to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often
> proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians.
> Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians to
> adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval? In
> any event, if you want to add to the Wikimedia family, my guess is
> that it's currently a commitment of 2-3 months of several hours per
> week to get to that point, provided it's achievable to begin with.
>
> I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore
> in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but IMO
> we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary
> want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller
> semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family,
> and that would make sense as part of it.
>
> I would also make the point that adding capabilities to existing
> projects can be just as effective at cultivating new communities of
> participants as creating an entirely new wiki, and sometimes more so.
> For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community
> of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because
> a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire
> community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could only
> form after the categorization functionality was developed.
>
> Because the Wikipedia community is so vast, adding capabilities that
> engage more people on Wikipedia specifically, or improving access to
> the existing capabilities, can have dramatically greater impact than
> creating a blank-slate wiki.
>
> That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate
> wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I
> would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project
> has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful
> capabilities have been created in the existing Wikimedia ecosystem in
> that same time period, some of them with dramatic positive impact.
> --
> Erik Möller
> Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation
>
> Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate
>
>
I propose expanding the notion of the Wikimedia Incubator to include
entirely new projects that are very, very easy to create. They don't need to
be approved by the WMF - they just need to demonstrate their value by
attracting a community and creating great content. This would be more like
the Apache Incubator, but even more open. This gives people an easy way to
prototype their ideas for new projects, to advertise them, and over time
will give an overview of what kinds of projects and approaches to projects
are likely to succeed and likely to fail.
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Erik Moeller]

2009/9/8 Michael Peel :
> What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects?

Certainly the process for getting a new project underway is so complex
and exhausting that it's not something that many people will be likely
to engage in - especially considering that project ideas are often
proposed by people who aren't currently very active Wikimedians.
Perhaps we need to set up a formal system for long-time Wikimedians to
adopt ideas they're excited about, to help push them to approval? In
any event, if you want to add to the Wikimedia family, my guess is
that it's currently a commitment of 2-3 months of several hours per
week to get to that point, provided it's achievable to begin with.

I do think that project adoption is something that we should explore
in the right circumstances; it's not something we've ever done but IMO
we should be open to it. I don't think OpenStreetMap or OpenLibrary
want or need to be adopted. ;-) But there may be other smaller
semi-successful projects that would like to join our project family,
and that would make sense as part of it.

I would also make the point that adding capabilities to existing
projects can be just as effective at cultivating new communities of
participants as creating an entirely new wiki, and sometimes more so.
For example, as of a few weeks ago, there's now a fledgling community
of people on Wikimedia Commons who add annotations to images, because
a volunteer developed a cool image annotation tool. The entire
community of people adding categories to Wikipedia articles could only
form after the categorization functionality was developed.

Because the Wikipedia community is so vast, adding capabilities that
engage more people on Wikipedia specifically, or improving access to
the existing capabilities, can have dramatically greater impact than
creating a blank-slate wiki.

That is not to say that I think there should be no new blank-slate
wikis, or wikis with custom software, for specific purposes. But I
would also not see the fact that no new top-level Wikimedia project
has been created in recent years as a sign of stagnation - wonderful
capabilities have been created in the existing Wikimedia ecosystem in
that same time period, some of them with dramatic positive impact.
-- 
Erik Möller
Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation

Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Anthony]

Software programs (including smartphone apps), products (with UPC codes),
companies, organizations, restaurants, movies, books, video games, web
sites, libraries, elementary schools, points of interest.  All the things
removed from Wikipedia by those mean old deletionists.  Original research.
 But yeah, not going to happen.

OpenStreetMap seems to be doing a good enough job at maps.
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Yann Forget]

Michael Peel wrote:
[cut]

> ** A few of my favourite examples: WikiJournal, publishing scholarly  
> works;

These works are welcomed on Wikisource, if they are under a free
license, of course.

> WikiReview, providing in-depth reviews of subjects;

I think this can be hosted on Wikibooks or Wikiversity for the most part.

> WikiWrite, where fiction can be written collaboratively; etc.

I don't think this fits very well in the Wikimedia mission.

In the sum of all human knowledge, there are two projects which would be
 nice complement to the Wikimedia family:

1. A database of all books. This is actually what OpenLibrary tries to
do, with mitigated success, IMO. As you said, if we try and fail,
nothing would be lost, as the result could be imported to OpenLibrary.
We wouldn't need to start from scratch as the content of OpenLibrary is
available and free.

2. A database of all people, i.e. genealogy. There is one project which
is IMO a great technical success in this field: Rodovid
(http://rodovid.org/).

I like very much how the trees are displayed:
http://fr.rodovid.org/wk/Personne:29004 (Philippe the 3rd of France,
1245-1285). It show very well how the French and English monarchies are
related to each other. You can see the complete tree, but it takes ages
to load because of the size: more than 7000 people
(http://fr.rodovid.org/wk/Special:Tree/29004)

See also Elizabeth II: http://en.rodovid.org/wk/Special:Tree/29818
Complete tree: http://en.rodovid.org/wk/Special:Tree/29818

The Rodovid project has asked to be hosted by Wikimedia Foundation,
although I don't know if it still does.
It is based on an adapted version of Mediawiki, so it would be an easy
integration with current projects.

Regards,

Yann
-- 
http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence
http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net
http://fr.wikisource.org/ | Bibliothèque libre
http://wikilivres.info | Documents libres

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Nathan]

Thanks for bringing this up, Mike. I think WikiReview sounds like a
great idea, WikiJournal sounds like it would suffer from a number of
very serious flaws, WikiWrite could be interesting, and that there are
probably a number of other project ideas that are equally interesting
but not necessarily ideal for Wikimedia expansion.

My sense has been that some of the newer projects, including
Wikiversity, tend to have limited readership and limited
participation. I'd be happy if someone could provide some data to
stack against this sense.[1] I think that without making a major
splash early on, new Wikimedia projects tend to languish. While
projects without widespread popularity are still useful, particularly
if they are highly specialized, projects like WikiReview/Journal/Write
would depend on public consciousness and participation levels to
achieve relevance.

We'll agree, I think, that relevance isn't a nice benefit, its
essential in order to attract readers and editors. Any new project
must meet a heretofore unmet need significant enough to draw an active
and self-perpetuating community. It isn't enough, then, to offer a
cc-by-sa alternative to a proprietary but sufficient source - we have
to be able to do whatever it is better.[2] Wikimedia has done this
with fantastic success with Wikipedia, other projects fill smaller but
vibrant niches - but we have some that don't meet this sort of
criteria, and any new project ought to.

Lastly, can we reconsider the naming scheme for future projects? The
"wiki-" prefix shouldn't be mandatory. Something like
"writereviews.org, a project of the Wikimedia Foundation" could be an
interesting alternative to "wikiwrite.org" or "wikireviews.org" that
doesn't immediately bring to mind the proliferation of personal wikis
on the web.

Nathan

[1]: The English Wikiversity, for example, has less than 12k "content
pages", while the German Wikiversity has only 1800. En.wikiversity has
175k registered users, but only 25 administrators. The English
WikiSource, with roughly the same number of users and administrators
as en.wikiversity, has ten times as many content pages.
[2]: A limited resource of uneven quality is not a preferable
substitute for an easily accessible, free-to-use and reliable resource
that is owned by a for-profit corporation.

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Brion Vibber]

On 9/8/09 3:56 PM, Thomas Dalton wrote:
> 2009/9/8 Pedro Sanchez:
>> Geographical/atlas/map kind ofproject
>>
>> granted, there's wikimapia and other external equivalents
>> but we (Wikimedia) are lacking it
>
> Is there any point us doing something that already exists? What would
> be better about a Wikimedia version?

Our current direction is to coordinate with external resources rather 
than create them from scratch, where we've got compatible goals and ideals.

For instance, rather than creating our own map system from scratch we're 
working with OpenStreetMap to integrate mapping, using our own rendering 
servers with a copy of the public data and making it easier to stick 
maps in wiki pages for starters, with easier ways to get into the 
upstream system to improve location name translations and mapping data.

-- brion

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Thomas Dalton]

2009/9/8 Pedro Sanchez :
> Geographical/atlas/map kind ofproject
>
> granted, there's wikimapia and other external equivalents
> but we (Wikimedia) are lacking it

Is there any point us doing something that already exists? What would
be better about a Wikimedia version?

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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Pedro Sanchez]

On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 5:32 PM, Michael Peel  wrote:

>
> On 2 Sep 2009, at 12:35, David Goodman wrote:
>
> > There is sufficient missing material in  every Wikipedia, sufficient
> > lack of coverage of areas outside the primary language zone and in
> > earlier periods, sufficient unsourced material; sufficient need for
> > updating  articles, sufficient potentially free media to add,
> > sufficient needed imagery to get;  that we have more than enough work
> > for all the volunteers we are likely to get.
>
> I apologise for taking this slightly out of context, but it touches
> upon something I've been wondering about recently, which is: do we
> have a complete set of WMF projects?
>
> David focuses on Wikipedia, which is the main project, and also
> touches on Wikimedia Commons. We also have (in no particular order)
> WikiBooks, WikiSource, WikiNews, Wikiversity, Wiktionary, Wikiquote
> and WikiSpecies, in all their various languages. Each of these has
> essentially its own set of volunteers (so I disagree with David's
> assertion at the end of his paragraph - different work brings in
> different volunteers).
>
> The latest* one of these projects is Wikiversity, which opened on 15
> September 2006. That's almost 3 years ago. In terms of internet time,
> that's practically a generation ago.
>
> Do we now have all of the projects running now that we could have
> running? Are all of the gaps in our project coverage already done
> sufficiently well by someone else that we couldn't improve on matters
> by having our own?
>
>
Geographical/atlas/map kind ofproject

granted, there's wikimapia and other external equivalents
but we (Wikimedia) are lacking it



> My personal feeling is that there's plenty of scope for new Wikimedia
> projects. There have been plenty mentioned on this mailing list, or
> on the various wikis, etc.** A wiki version of OpenLibrary is a good
> example of something we could try; even if it failed then it wouldn't
> be time wasted, as the result could be fed into OpenLibrary. So, I
> think the answer to my question is "no".
>
> What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects?
>
> Could it be the presence of Wikia?
>
> Are we stuck in the mindset of just Wikipedia + supporting projects?
>
> Is the technical side of things too moribund to easily establish new
> projects?
>
> Are we afraid of trying new things (or worse, unable to try new things)?
>
> Do we lack the leadership to make new projects successful?
>
> Is it a limitation of not being able to make a living from working on
> Wikimedia projects?
>
> Wikimedia is big enough that it can launch new projects very
> publicly, and get a lot of support (both volunteer and financial)
> very quickly. It's widespread enough that you can ask a group of
> people in any room if they know of Wikipedia, and over half of them
> will.*** Actually editing Wikipedia might not appeal to them, but
> working on a different project could, especially if it's in their
> speciality.
>
> One final question: do we need to start looking for project donations
> - i.e. absorbing projects started elsewhere?
>
> Mike
>
> PS: my questions here are posed to be provocative. Please don't take
> them as accurately representing my viewpoints.
>
> * Note that increasing the number of languages that these projects
> use doesn't in my mind count as a new project.
> ** A few of my favourite examples: WikiJournal, publishing scholarly
> works; WikiReview, providing in-depth reviews of subjects; WikiWrite,
> where fiction can be written collaboratively; etc.
> *** Country-dependent. Your language may vary.
>
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Re: [Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Thomas Dalton]

The question isn't "Is there more we could do?" because there most
certainly is. The question is "Is there more we want to do?" We need
to decide what really is the scope of the Wikimedia movement. We never
really made that decision before starting the existing projects and
just started any project that had enough support to be viable (which
resulted in some mistakes, such as the 9/11 memorial wiki). We still
haven't made that decision but now we work as if the decision has been
made to restrict ourselves to the existing projects, which, obviously,
means we don't open any new projects. We need to stop and actually
make that decision - I think the big strategy plan that we are just
starting is a good framework to do that within.

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[Foundation-l] Do we have a complete set of WMF projects?

[Michael Peel]

On 2 Sep 2009, at 12:35, David Goodman wrote:

> There is sufficient missing material in  every Wikipedia, sufficient
> lack of coverage of areas outside the primary language zone and in
> earlier periods, sufficient unsourced material; sufficient need for
> updating  articles, sufficient potentially free media to add,
> sufficient needed imagery to get;  that we have more than enough work
> for all the volunteers we are likely to get.

I apologise for taking this slightly out of context, but it touches  
upon something I've been wondering about recently, which is: do we  
have a complete set of WMF projects?

David focuses on Wikipedia, which is the main project, and also  
touches on Wikimedia Commons. We also have (in no particular order)  
WikiBooks, WikiSource, WikiNews, Wikiversity, Wiktionary, Wikiquote  
and WikiSpecies, in all their various languages. Each of these has  
essentially its own set of volunteers (so I disagree with David's  
assertion at the end of his paragraph - different work brings in  
different volunteers).

The latest* one of these projects is Wikiversity, which opened on 15  
September 2006. That's almost 3 years ago. In terms of internet time,  
that's practically a generation ago.

Do we now have all of the projects running now that we could have  
running? Are all of the gaps in our project coverage already done  
sufficiently well by someone else that we couldn't improve on matters  
by having our own?

My personal feeling is that there's plenty of scope for new Wikimedia  
projects. There have been plenty mentioned on this mailing list, or  
on the various wikis, etc.** A wiki version of OpenLibrary is a good  
example of something we could try; even if it failed then it wouldn't  
be time wasted, as the result could be fed into OpenLibrary. So, I  
think the answer to my question is "no".

What could be the cause of this recent dearth of new projects?

Could it be the presence of Wikia?

Are we stuck in the mindset of just Wikipedia + supporting projects?

Is the technical side of things too moribund to easily establish new  
projects?

Are we afraid of trying new things (or worse, unable to try new things)?

Do we lack the leadership to make new projects successful?

Is it a limitation of not being able to make a living from working on  
Wikimedia projects?

Wikimedia is big enough that it can launch new projects very  
publicly, and get a lot of support (both volunteer and financial)  
very quickly. It's widespread enough that you can ask a group of  
people in any room if they know of Wikipedia, and over half of them  
will.*** Actually editing Wikipedia might not appeal to them, but  
working on a different project could, especially if it's in their  
speciality.

One final question: do we need to start looking for project donations  
- i.e. absorbing projects started elsewhere?

Mike

PS: my questions here are posed to be provocative. Please don't take  
them as accurately representing my viewpoints.

* Note that increasing the number of languages that these projects  
use doesn't in my mind count as a new project.
** A few of my favourite examples: WikiJournal, publishing scholarly  
works; WikiReview, providing in-depth reviews of subjects; WikiWrite,  
where fiction can be written collaboratively; etc.
*** Country-dependent. Your language may vary.

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