Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

US National Archives Will Upload All Its Holdings To Wikipedia

Posted by timothy on from the promise-or-threat dept.

An anonymous reader writes The U.S. National Archives has revealed to Wikipedia newspaper The Signpost that it will be uploading all of its holdings to the Wikimedia Commons. Dominic McDevitt-Parks told the Signpost that "The records we have uploaded so far contain some of the most high-value holdings ... However, we are not limiting ourselves ... Our approach has always been simply to upload as much as possible ... to make them as widely accessible to the public as possible."

4 of 108 comments (clear)

  1. Deleted by wisnoskij · · Score: 5, Funny

    If Wikimedia Commons works anything like Wikipedia, it will probably all be deleted in a week as "not important enough".

    --
    Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
    1. Re:Deleted by DG · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Where Wikipedia fails HARD though is the article deletion process.

      There are people out there who get a weird thrill from deleting articles.

      An article that has been in place for *10 years* can be snuffed out just because a motivated moderator decides it isn't "notable" and sets up a "speedy delete".

      Notice 6 months after the fact, try and put it back, and the whole friggin' WORLD descends on you.

      Wikipedia is ruled by a group of petty, self-nominated bureaucrats. And the system - as horribly broken as it is - cannot be reformed, because there are too many vested interests who want to see it STAY broken.

       

      --
      Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
  2. Re:Are they safe there? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    So far the comments have been nothing but ignorant.
    Wikimedia Commons is a repository of free (as in freedom) media. Mostly photos, but lots of other stuff too.
    The National Archives and Records Administration, according to Wikipedia, "is an independent agency of the United States government charged with preserving and documenting government and historical records and with increasing public access to those documents".

    These are federal government records and documents, so automatically in the public domain. Wikimedia Commons is the perfect place to mirror them.

  3. Re:why? by tepples · · Score: 5, Insightful

    To use a US Government-created, pre-1923, or otherwise free image in a Wikipedia article, you need to upload it to Commons first. The National Archives doing this on its own will save people a step.