Aussie Tech-Focused Wiki Launched 155
daria42 writes "Wikipedia's great for some things — like looking up the in-depth history of 4chan, for example — but not great for others, such as finding out the micro-history of the technology sector in certain countries. That's why Australian technology publication Delimiter has launched a public wiki site purely focused on the Australian technology sector — its personalities, issues, companies, and events. Already the site has better coverage of some areas than Wikipedia, leading to the question of whether more such small wikis should be created for certain verticals."
Re:Notability (Score:5, Informative)
That's not really true. I've personally written articles on obscure German politicians, for example, and gotten no pushback at all. If you write a decent stub, and include a few citations to reputable sources, nobody will even blink at it. The citations don't even have to be in English--- a cite to some mainstream German newspapers, or to the Neue Deutsche Biographie, is plenty.
Already Exists in some ways (Score:4, Informative)
A "wiki for Australian technology" already exists in a way, though mostly focused on the internet: it's the Whirlpool.net Wiki [whirlpool.net.au]. Brilliant resource.
Already done (Score:5, Informative)
Surely Whirlpool's wiki is an 'Aussie tech-focused wikipedia', and it's already got thousands of mature articles, e.g.
A series of articles on working in IT industry in Australia:
http://whirlpool.net.au/wiki/?tag=it_telco
A comprehensive guide to PC parts, prices and specs:
http://whirlpool.net.au/wiki/?tag=rmp_sg_whirlpoolpcs
Re:Australia? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Newsworthy? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Put the word "Wikipedia" in quotes like me... (Score:3, Informative)
Er, what? Eucalypts prove the poster's point. They're so well-suited to surviving Australian bushfires they dominated the continent. If you're going to link wikipedia, I suggest http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eucalyptus [wikipedia.org] which goes into considerably more detail. For a relevant excerpt, "With the arrival of the first humans about 50 thousand years ago, fires became much more frequent and the fire-loving eucalypts soon came to account for roughly 70% of Australian forest."
Re:I want a sum-of-all-knowledge-opedia. (Score:3, Informative)
Talking of Australia, Batman and Wikipedia...
Did you know Melbourne, Australia (or technically the town that became Melbourne) was founded by John Batman [wikipedia.org] and he named the land Batmania. I shit you not.
Re:Two sources of information is better? (Score:3, Informative)
One of the major roadblocks is "NO ORIGINAL RESEARCH" doctrine.
If your sources are not quotable (say, you know some a traditional technique that was passed from father to son), if the sources are obscure (a photo with a name tag, in a school's yearbook, school already closed, yearbook in town's archives), if the sources are volatile (you write the article on a current event as you hear it reported over the radio), if the sources are inaccessible for wider public (you publish an article on ancient text in a dead language, and you publish a full translation you just made yourself, along with the original text), and so on and so on.
Generally, if you know something worthy of Wikipedia, you can't just publish it. You must either find a source or -create- one. And such "second hand wikis" are a good place for creating these sources.
Re:Not notable (Score:4, Informative)
General comments against Wikipedia notability get modded up because most people have had something deleted. Specific comments that specify what got deleted get modded down because most of the time it wasn't actually notable at all.
I'm not all talk, though. If anyone reading this ever actually is the victim of some beaurocrat's arbitrary preferences, leave me a message [wikipedia.org] and I'll make sure any article that passes the inclusion requirements gets to stay. There's a whole Article Rescue Squadron [wikipedia.org] full of people who are willing to do something about the problem instead of just whining about it on Slashdot. Yeah, I get it, "I don't have the time to join a Wikipedia group, Wikipedia can go fuck itself, it's a lost cause"... but you've got plenty of time to complain about it here.