Encyclopedia of Life

[TheLorax]

Although I have no idea how the Encyclopedia of Life will ensure the accuracy of entries, the Encyclopedia of Life was launched. I believe it has an outstanding chance of "evolving" over the years to come.

Here is a direct link to Encyclopedia of Life site-
http://www.eol.org/

Comprehensive, collaborative, ever-growing, and personalized, the Encyclopedia of Life is an ecosystem of websites that makes all key information about life on Earth accessible to anyone, anywhere in the world. Our goal is to create a constantly evolving encyclopedia that lives on the Internet, with contributions from scientists and amateurs alike. To transform the science of biology, and inspire a new generation of scientists, by aggregating all known data about every living species. And ultimately, to increase our collective understanding of life on Earth, and safeguard the richest possible spectrum of biodiversity.

Overall, they are doing a great job based on what little I've had time to read over there. I anticipate many great things from The Encyclopedia of Life in the future and I particularly like that the site is for scientists and amateurs alike.

Many thanks to those who provided the 25 million dollars of "seed" money for this project. I believe this site is well on its way to becoming an invaluable resource.

[WNYwillieB]

The evolution of EoL will probably be slow, at first. I believe they recruit experts to do entries, so it is not like Wikipedia, where any schmo can add whatever they want to an article. I like the EoL will be moderated by certified? experts.

[TheLorax]

Yes, Wikipedia has its limitations. That's for sure. I'm one of those schmos who has gone in and edited a few entries and added citations because that whole set up is somewhat of a free for all. Some of the entries I edited must have been created by people smoking whacky tobacky.

So far, I'm seeing no entries like that at EoL so they're doing something very right over there.

[doccat5]

Agreed, I too am one of the schmos who's done some editing at Wiki.....and you're right Lorax.......some of them folks are flat "strange". LOL

[Chomp]

We use the encyclopedia of life at school. It is very cool.

[gloria125]

Yep. I am a wiki schmo also.

[trout lily]

What is the difference between www.discoverlife.org and www.eol.org? Perhaps 2 revered Harvard professors are in a friendly competition; EOL has Edward O. Wilson as their honorary head; Discover Life has Ernst Mayr. In Wilson's autobiography The Naturalist he wryly relates different faculty rivalries at Harvard. He wrote that such rivalry was understandable since money for independent research is always tight.
trout lily

[TheLorax]

http://www.tdwg.org/proceedings/issue/printout/12

eol

When completed, www.eol.org will serve as a global biodiversity tool, providing scientists, policy-makers, students, and citizens the information they need to discover and protect the planet and encourage learning and conservation. An Advisory Board of 12 distinguished individuals from 5 countries will help guide the Encyclopedia.

discoverlife

mission is “to assemble and share knowledge in order to improve education, health, agriculture, economic development, and conservation throughout the world”. With nearly 1.2 million species represented, its major strengths include mapping and on-line illustrated identification tools. Mapping of taxa, specimens, and collections is in collaboration with TopoZone.com. As with GBIF, Discover Life (DL) does not take ownership of data provided to it, but attributes it back to its source either by drilling back to a provider’s database or denoting its ownership throughout the display process.

This plays into the equation too, "such rivalry was understandable since money for independent research is always tight".

[Sage]

I might be a Wiki-schmo too - my photos are there!

And thanks, Lorax, for the eol info. Looks great. I've been on Flickr for quite a while but I just joined EoL's Flickr group so maybe some of my photos will be seen there next year.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/vickispix/

[TheLorax]

I knew it! It's you! It is you! You are the person who has the photo of the baby squirrels at the top of that one forum! You are reeeeeeeeeealy good.