[Bug-gnupedia] Decision Making

[Dan Geiser]

Hello, All,
Sorry about getting everyone's panties in a bunch with that last posting.  I 
didn't realize it was a Pay-Per-Click site.

I'd heard about the first Nupedia sometime back and when I saw the first 
posting about Gnupedia on Slashdot I joined the mailing list that day.  
Later I saw Jimmy Wales' post retracting the original announcement and 
thought everything had been cleared up but then the discussion on this list 
about Gnupedia continued.  I didn't know if anyone had seen it or not 
because their didn't seem to be any real acknowledgment of it.

I do have a couple of basic comments/questions though:

1) Why are the decisions that are being made about what happens next being 
decided by Jimmy Wales and Richard Stallman?  Shouldn't those involved in 
this upswell have a say as well?

2) What is an encyclopedia?  Where does that word come from?  That's mostly 
a rhetorical question but I thought I'd ask it.

Unfortunately I have to entrust this question to Encarta (an encyclopedia) 
but assuming their accuracy..."The term encyclopedia comes from the Greek 
words enkyklios paideia, meaning “comprehensive education” and originally 
signifying instruction in all branches of knowledge, or a comprehensive 
education in a specific subject."

Cambridge.org defines encyclopedia "a book or set of books containing many 
articles arranged in alphabetical order which deal either with the whole of 
human knowledge or with a particular part of it"

Dictionary.com includes "Word History: The word encyclopedia, which to us 
usually means a large set of books, descends from a phrase that involved 
coming to grips with the contents of such books. The Greek phrase is 
enkuklios paideia, made up of enkuklios, “cyclical, periodic, ordinary,” and 
paideia, “education,” and meaning “general education, literally the arts and 
sciences that a person should study to be liberally educated.” Copyists of 
Latin manuscripts took this phrase to be the Greek word enkuklopaedia, with 
the same meaning, and this spurious Greek word became the New Latin word 
encyclopaedia, coming into English with the sense “general course of 
instruction,” first recorded in 1531. In New Latin the word was chosen as 
the title of a reference work covering all knowledge. The first such use in 
English is recorded in 1644."

To me the word Gnupedia is a misnomer.  If -pedia means education then 
Gnupedia would be education related to things Gnu.  Perhaps it would be best 
to decide what exactly it is you wish to create, e.g. body of general 
information, and then from there decided what you are going to call this 
'body of general information' and then further decide how you are going to 
go about creating this 'body of information'.

The range of discussions on this list seem to be getting into the heart of 
the matter, i.e. XML schema, before some basics tenets of the project have 
even been solidified.

Just some thoughts.  No trolling intended.

Take Care!
Dan Geiser <address@hidden>
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