Wikilabs
From Meta, a Wikimedia project coordination wiki
This proposal seems to be termed, as there is an incubator wiki now; see incubator.wikimedia.org.
| Wikikernel |
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Project proposal Discussion Older proposals |
- See also the newer page at Wikikernel.
Wikilabs would be Wikimedia's playground for new ideas; an umbrella for the early development of approved Wikimedia Foundation project proposals.
[edit] Scope
Wikimedia's goal is the spread and promotion of knowledge. New project proposals are constantly been made in an effort to increasingly live up to this goal.
Similar to the idea of Google Labs [1] (akin to a directory page that links to all Google technologies under development or in beta that have not yet been made widely available) Wikilabs would be a section on wikimedia.org or a domain in itself (wikilabs.org) where approved project proposals could be developed in their early stages.
See New project proposals for examples of proposed projects and New project policy for what constitutes an approved project proposal.
Wikilabs would provide a place for the initial growth of new projects before deciding certain difficult issues such as 1) how they are licensed, 2) what standards they will use for naming, namespaces, and classification, 3) how they will be internationalised. It would allow for more structured discussion of the goals and viability of new projects before they were stamped with a domain-level seal of approval.
- Disclaimers about the alpha/beta nature of the projects could be explained once for the entire site.
- Wikilabs could be PD, containing only links to other CC/GFDL content that would be in the project proper, making transition to a different license easy.
- Discussions about how to license contributions, and how to comply explicitly with licenses or related content, would be important for each project. Reaching consensus on these matters could be expected before a project forged off on its own (cf. Wikicommons, Wikispecies, Wikinews). Legal scholars could visit this single site to weigh in on these related discussions; discussions about copyright would not die simply because those interested in a particular new project did not have the right expertise.
- Discussion of standardization, how to comply with / interact with / reference existing standards, and citation, would also be important for each project. Comparisons to existing reference works on related subjects, existing projects with similar goals, and existing classification methods, could likewise be expected before a project took on its own domain (cf. Wikispecies, Wikipeople*, Wikibuilder*).
- Wikilabs could be like meta, multilingual on a single wiki, with unified discussion of which projects should be how multilingual when. Initial interest in a new project is often focused in one or two languages, and the first hundred people interested in the project are not necessarily interested in such decisions (cf. Wikisource, Wikispecies, 911-wiki)
[edit] Why?
Wikimedia needs a place where, by leveraging its reputation for projects already underway, attention can be drawn to and focused on ideas that have been approved for development.
[edit] See also
- Proposals for new projects#Wikilabs (add your name here to register interest)
- New project proposals
- New project policy
- Seed wiki
