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Wikipedia Planning a DVD Version
daria42 writes "The Wikipedia Foundation hopes to sell an English version of Wikipedia on CD-ROM and DVD before the end of the year. A boxed set of the German language version of Wikipedia has been available since last year. An updated version of the German Wikipedia was launched on Amazon.de this week, and the e-commerce site has received 8,000 pre-orders, according to Wikipedia Foundation president Jimmy Wales. Wales said it was easier to put the German version of Wikipedia onto CD as there are significantly less pages than there are for the English language version. He said that English Wikipedia would 'barely fit on 2 DVDs.'"
Last time I checked, the current version of the English wikipedia dump, is around 585MB. It should comfortably fit on one CD. Where did this figure of two DVDs come from?
That was what I thought of as well. Why would you buy the information when you can get it for free. I figured that maybe for computers that are not connected to the net. Also, you could buy it to support wiki.
I thought the whole idea behind wikipedia was that it is constantly changing. Will updated dvds be sold? And if so, will previous buyers get a discount?
I wonder... does this 2-DVD set include all articles from Wikipedia? (As opposed to some just selected somehow...) Also, I wonder if the DVD version will include all the version changes to the articles. If not, then perhaps the best version was picked out somehow?
Hmmm... This is what I think needs to happen: Wait a few more years for Wikipedia to gain even more information, and then put some kind of button on pages that allows users to "vote" for that page to be included in a dead-tree encyclopedia version of Wikipedia. The idea is to put only those articles that have the highest votes into a traditional-style encyclopedia that can rival the likes of commercially made ones. Of course, there would need to be ways to cite sources, to make the encyclopedia worthy of academic research and the like, and preferably there should also be a way for people who want to do other stuff than write articles to submit photographs or whatever kind of artwork, of their own creation and released under the free license of Wikipedia, for inclusion in the articles. For the print version, people might be able to vote for the "best" photographs and artwork for inclusion. At that point, it should be a matter of running some perl script or something to typeset the whole darn thing. This might find its way into libraries and into peoples' homes. Imagine that!
I like the fact that Wikipedia is always current, so I don't know why I'd ever want this on DVD. For example, they had a great article on the pope the other day which was current right up through his death. Since I can just look this up online, why would I want stale information stored on my computer? I have a set of World Books on the shelf, and we keep them around for when you want to do research when "otherwise occupied" (i.e. sitting on the can). Of course now that I have a Zaurus with wireless networking then I don't need the hardcopy any more since I can surf from any room in the house.
If you don't want crime to pay, let the government run it.
How often do existing pages change? Maybe in a case where people catch errors.
I have a spare 20GB lying around that I would install this on, if there was some way to sync it with the current state and have it download new pages and update current ones.
WWJD -- What Would Jimi Do?
(Smash amp, burn guitar, take home the groupies)
...when I say, "two single-layer DVDs, or dual-layer?"
Say what you will about Wikipedia's well know flaws (revert wars, submitters with thinly veiled political agendas and other various sub-vices) but part of the appeal of Wikipedia is simply the form of its current incarnation.
Right now, if I wanted background information on something, I just load up the (usually speedy) bookmark, enter the search and within seconds I have my answer. Why should it then become a more laborious to use resource? 2 DVDs? No only would constantly inserting and removing discs and launching extra applications provide more hassle (not too much more, but enough to make its value as an ultra speedy information center reduced) how would the information be sorted? Imagine half the links on any page requiring you to switch discs? For me, one of the great ways to use Wikipedia is to wander from article to article following the various text links. A multi-disc setup like this would only discourage that method.
Finally, I don't really think Wikipedia is ready to be put onto physical media for distribution. I certainly wouldn't trust it for more than satiating my curiosity, for instance I'd never cite it in an essay as a source. Articles with heavy disputes in their comments abound and many have no easy answers with how to solve an article's problems. So putting it on DVDs is a two fold problem, you don't get the advantage of having your data updated constantly by other users, but you'll also be working with a lot of flawed data that will be flawed forever on the disc. Perhaps I'm exagerating the problems a little, but really, who needs this? It's not like it's a cheapr printed encyclopedia alternativ to Brittanica, and since it'll be in electronic form anyway, why NOT use the web for it, you don't have to store any of it yourself.
The only audiance I can think of that would need this are Wikipedia addicts who spend a lot of time without internet access.
Sorry for being overly negative, I really love using Wikipedia, but I think this move kind of messes up the point...
Yup...
In order to publish and SELL this information on CD/DVD, does the Wikipedia Foundation have to get the permission of all the article writers, or is there, perhaps, a clause on the website that says something like 'we own all the stuff put on here'. What would happen if Slashdot sold versions of article comments on DVD?
Rhymes that keep their secrets will unfold behind the clouds.There upon the rainbow is the answer to a neverending story
It makes sense for laptops which aren't always online. If you're writing a paper on your laptop and want to look something up, but can't easily get to a hotspot.
Because their site is slow, and the search engine always seems to be disabled for "performance reasons". I would consider it if the DVD included an enhanced search feature.
On each Wikipedia article, there should be a button where users can vote an article as being "worthy" for academic research and the like. Articles that receive high votes would actually get published in a monthly (or even by-weekly) magazine... So, for example, each month, subscribers would receive the magazine in the mail, and it would contain, in addition to paid advertising like any other magazine, something like ten or fifteen articles randomly chosen from Wikipedia. These would cover a broad range of topics. One month, you might receive a magazine with articles about Argentina, transaxles, grep, electromagnetism, George Washington, the Berlin wall, Apollo 9, goldfish, ballpoint pens, and cow manure. Some subscribers will already be familiar with some of the topics; others might not be interested in some of the topics; but chances are that if you pick up this magazine and read it, even for a few minutes a month, you'll learn some interesting new facts here and there, usually about topics that you'd never consider reading about in any serious manner, but which you're reading because the Wikipedia Magazine happens to be there.
Links at the bottom of articles would direct the reader to the article online. This would serve an additional purpose: People who find something missing or something that could be improved in an article would perhaps be more likely to find out about it and then go online and fix it, thereby improving the quality of the entire Wikipedia.
Money from subscriptions; money from advertisers in all fields (not just technical, and perhaps based on the content of that month's magazine) would finance the magazine and help finance Wikipedia. I see this as an opportunity to make quite a profit on something that is free, while mainly benefiting the community by doing so.
You know, Wikipedia is ripe for a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy treatment.
Put it in a little handheld, stick an Ipod hard drive in it, give it a usb port so it can grab updates, and presto.
As for Wiki itself, "At least where it is inaccurate, it is definitively inaccurate." -Douglas Adams
First, to "lock in" decent versions of controversial articles. But second and more importantly, to be able to produce a stable, constant "edition" that can be referenced and cited to. How do you cite Wikipedia, when the content is always changing? Now you could write a paper and cite something like Person, Random, "Wikipedia Article," Wikipedia 2d ed. (2006). Very, very, important if WP is to become a legitimate source of information.
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
... maybe the zealots who use Wikipedia as their ideological battleground (e.g. this, this, or this) can host their own wikipediae, with their own versions of The Truth, and thus the revision wars on the original Wikipedia will stop.
Or not.
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
I wouldn't expect the "multitudes" to buy this.
At least one example of usefulness for this product would be low-cost educational computer labs. I purchased 4 X-terms each with 21" displays for $1.00 on eBay, and picked them up in person to save shipping. My thought was that with a medium power PC serving them, it would make a great low-cost computer lab for a local, under-funded school.
Not needing an internet connection to access this massive amount of information means reduced cost to the previously mentioned under funded schools, for which a connection might not even be available at a reasonable price.
As well, despite it being outdated quite soon in many cases, local-server searches and content could be lightning fast compared to the bogged down Wikipedia servers, or slow Internet connections.
The problem with voting for the best articles is the same problem that other elections can face--ballot stuffing. What is to stop people with some sort of agenda from voting many times to promote certain articles or coordinating groups of people to vote?
This would probably be a factor only with ideologically divisive topics. The problem is that the votes engendered by the controversial articles might end up dwarfing the numbers for interesting but obscure subjects. I for one wouldn't want a hypothetical Wikipedia magazine reduced to a compendium of hot-button articles.
I know that this is a pessimistic view of how article voting might work. Don't get me wrong, I like Wikipedia and I enjoy it a lot. I just don't quite trust it.
Anakin Simpson: If you're not with me, then you're my enemy--ooh, donuts!
They should publish this in the form of a mobile device with the cover saying "DONT PANIC". It would be as cool as hell, and quite useful on certain ocasions when a laptop is too large, or you dont want to risk it being stolen. Anyone thought of making their iPod (mabey its too small) into The Guide?
A) Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. If you're out of high school, you never need to cite an encyclopedia, because everything in it qualifies as common knowledge. About the only reason to cite Wikipedia is because they have a particularly interesting way to say something.
c k&oldid=332169
c k&oldid=11993073
B) Wikipedia keeps revert logs, meaning that you can cite a particular version of a page. For example, here's what "Mr. Spock" looked like in October of 2002: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mr._Spo
Compare that to Mr. Spock from March: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mr._Spo
C) As another user pointed out, you should always put the date of access in your internet citations.
Mediawiki 1.5 (which should be out soon - a couple of months, probably) will include a versioning system. Someone can mark a version as 'good', which in theory means no vandalism and no POV (point of view) issues. (who this is has not yet been determined - I suspect it will probably an admin)
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
There are already mobile versions that you can get for Palms and Pocket PCs. The database files are over 500MB, so you need an expansion card with that much room. Visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:TomeRaider_ database
Personally, I'm hanging out for someone to find a way to only retrieve the top 50% of articles by relevance/importance/popularity and put that on a 256MB or even 128MB database, so that mere mortals can also have Wikipedia on our Palms.
Meanwhile, h2g2, the official Guide project, was contemplating a mobile version, but broadcasting regulations meant that the BBC couldn't follow through on it.
I hope the take the history of Mathworld as a warning as what can happen in the publishing world.
If the content would only fit on 2 DVDs (mostly due to media other than text I suppose) I wonder how will they solve the problem of minimizing the number of times users have to change DVDs? Do algorithms exist that will solve this, in reasonable time on reasonable hardware, for something the size of en.wikipedia?
I know I for one would find it incredibly annoying if it turns out I would need to play DJ a lot to go from "Gautama" to "India" to "Bhopal", say, which is precisely the kind of loosely coupled chain I find myself browsing for the fun of it. The links go everywhere, and I would argue the topology is at least as valuable as the content itself..
I expect you could isolate some "clouds" of articles mostly referring to each other, but anyone want to guess as to the percentage of "cross-DVD" links?
Gosh, thanks. That must be why the other ships call me Meatfucker -- GCU Grey Area (Eccentric)