[Wikipedia-l] Re: wikispecies

Thu Sep 16 06:04:25 UTC 2004

--- "Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales" <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> I would put it a different way.  "The needs of a general purpose,
> general audience encyclopedia differ from the needs of a professional
> reference work, so we should move forward in exploring solutions that
> meet the needs of both users while minimizing duplication of efforts."

That could still be interpreted as meaning that [[biology of ...]] and
[[geology of ...]] articles should not be hosted on Wikipedia and instead on
separate projects. I am *very* much against that and don't agree with usage of
the term 'general audience' since that implies (to me at least) a forking of
content based on detail alone. Sidenote: A general encyclopedia is one that is
not specialized; since we don't have size limits that is a statement without
much distinction since we can - and do - go into detail on a great many topics
- just not all on the same page (and with summaries in appropriate places). 

I consider some of my detailed geology articles to be good enough to be
considered professional reference material for geologists while at the same
time being accessible to any reasonably educated (high school or higher) and
interested layperson. But the point that *should* be made is that they are
*encyclopedia articles* - not books, not definitions, not source material and
not quotes. They are also not part of a relational database (ala what
Wikispecies wants to be), which is where I think you were going (and the role I
would like the Commons to perform in a general capacity - just as Wikipedia
performs the function of being an encyclopedia in a general capacity). 

-- mav

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