OpenWetWare talk:Steering committee/Long term planning discussion

General thoughts

• RS 14:34, 10 May 2006 (EDT): I think that this is a critical issue to be discussing given that many of the most active OWW users are graduate students and postdocs at various institutions who have quick turnover rates. So it's great that the issue is being raised. However, I would hesitate to make any fast decisions simply because of a particular funding deadline. The basis of most wiki sites, including OWW, is community consensus and I think it is worth spending the time to build that consensus about how OWW should proceed. Now that being said, it might be worth writing up a skeleton of a grant applications regardless since such a document could probably be retooled for whatever funding body we chose to pursue. Even if we choose not to apply for external funding, such a document might provide a nice summary of OWW and its mission, goals and long-term plan. It would also provide a mechanism by which we could come to a consensus.

Publication

• RS 15:41, 10 May 2006 (EDT): One suggestion that Tom had, was if we are serious about applying for grants, we might want to publish a paper about OpenWetWare somewhere. Thus, we'd be creating a peer-reviewed, referencable document about OpenWetWare. It is pretty standard to do this for biological databases. This might be useful to the OWW community because it would
  1. provide advertising
  2. document OpenWetWare
  3. provide a publication record
  4. legitimize OpenWetWare as a community resource.
• Given the talk about Web2.0 and the impact of such technologies on science, such a publication might be well-received. The paper might include
  1. Description of OWW
  2. How it differs from similar endeavors (like Protocols-Online)
  3. The community-driven, wiki culture
  4. Info on statistics and usage
• It could be argued that such a paper ought to be written prior to a grant application. (I am undecided on this subject.) I am not sure if OpenWetWare has the resources to do both in parallel.

I second the idea of writing up a paper. It would really help.. -Karthik 22:31, 30 June 2006 (EDT)

Wikimania 2006

• Wikimania 2006, the second annual international Wikimedia conference, will be held August 4–6 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, within the Harvard Law School campus. Both a scientific conference and a community event, Wikimania brings together members of the various Wikimedia projects in order to exchange ideas, build relationships, and report on research and project efforts. It also provides an opportunity for Wikimedians and the general public alike to meet and share ideas about free and open source software, free knowledge initiatives, and wiki projects worldwide. (from Wikimania homepage)
• I guess it is a bit late for giving a long talk or a presentation. However, I do think there is an option to give a lightning presentation of abt 5 min. I hope someone from OWW could easily drop in and do that.

-Karthik 22:31, 30 June 2006 (EDT)