Links for 14-01-2008
Grab bag of links, some of them are not new but just new to me.
- GPS mapping court case n Singapore. ‘‘The central issue in the case is to what extent Virtual Map used SLA’s maps in creating its own maps.’‘ Could be a bad harbinger for friends such as Open Street Map (CC-BY-SA).
- Inkscape ‘about’ screen contests – awesome combination of coders and artists. Pity there’s no decent sized gallery.
- Interview with the founder of the Swedish Pirate Party. Quote:
In short, you cannot stop file sharing with any less than undoing digital communications and/or monitoring all of it. The Internet was created as the world’s largest copying machine, as the makers of Steal This Film II put it so succinctly. File sharing happens simply because it is possible, as sharing knowledge and culture has always been, although with different media.
What really upsets me, though, is how politicians are humming along with the copyright industry’s every demand. The industry lobby is just doing their job, basically: demanding better conditions for their industry, at the expense of other parts of society. It is the politicians which have failed abysmally at understanding the big picture of their demands.
- BitNami ‘easy install’ MediaWiki package. Tempting. Anyone tried it?
- PublicDomainReprints.org. (For Wikisource they say ‘‘Take a look at PediaPress as an alternative.’‘ Since it’s all free content there’s nothing actually stopping them doing this as well, is there?)
- Some pretty MW skins. I assume they’re GPL?
And from the mailing lists:
- Interesting discussion on wikisource-l about different language Wikisources’ attitudes to scanned-texts-as-references.
- Excellent State of technology: 2007 summary by Domas Mituzas
- WMF staff update by Sue
- Looks like Wikimania 2009 bids are now closed.
- Bogotá (Colombia, South America)
- Toronto (Ontario, Canada)
- Kathmandu (Kathmandu, Nepal)
- Buenos Aires (Argentina, South America)
- Brisbane (Queensland, Australia)
- Karlsruhe (Germany, Europe)
Of these, Bogotá, Kathmandu, Karlsruhe and Brisbane will be knocked out quickly. That leaves as serious bids, Toronto and Buenos Aires.
Toronto has 16 people signed up on its bid page as organisers, although it’s hard to tell how committed they really are. Buenos Aires has Wikimedia Argentina behind it, which should be good for organisational reasons. Argentinians also seem to love open source so it would be a good fit. Whoever wins, the North Americans will be happy, since although Toronto would be a lot cheaper airfare than Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires would still be in the realm of reasonableness, and other costs such as accommodation could be expected to be lower. Whichever way it goes, they both look like competent bids, so best of luck.
PS, if you use del.icio.us, please feel free to share me interesting links. :)
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