[Cz-biology] Auto-created articles about genes

[Larry Sanger]

Dear biologists,

Dr. Andrew Su, who works for the Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research
Foundation, wishes to run a "bot" (a computer script that emulates human
behavior on the wiki) which would automatically create thousands of articles
about genes.  Geneticists could then add to the bare articles, and the
resulting information clusters, e.g., 

http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/APP 

would be free.  Andrew's group insists that, if they are to be involved,
*these* articles must be available under a free license, either GNU FDL or
CC-by-sa, that would allow commercial reuse.  I.e., that's the offer on the
table; I personally am comfortable with that condition.

Andrew says the bot is ready to start testing.  Since we're getting close to
the point where these articles could be created, I would like the biologists
*in particular* to examine the example Andrew has uploaded.

As a philosopher and Internet guy, of course I can't make heads or tails of
it.  (I see lots of pretty pictures!)  But I can recognize several issues
that will need discussion:

* Is the information actually *useful* to biologists and biology students?
Would they ever visit these CZ pages (after adequate development)--or would
they always look elsewhere for such data?

* Are the external links provided appropriate?  Do they unfairly benefit one
resource over another?

* Does the "value added" by Andrew's organization actually justify our
releasing these articles under a free license that permits commercial reuse,
perhaps contrary to a decision we'll make about our larger body of articles
in a few months?

If you are interested in discussing these issues, won't you please do so on
the cz-biology list, here:

http://mail.citizendium.org/mailman/listinfo/cz-biology

I will be listening closely to our own biologists on cz-biology.

Editors, if you want, I can forward comments from you to the biology list,
to make sure they receive them.

--Larry

-----
Lawrence M. Sanger, Ph.D. | http://www.larrysanger.org/ 
Editor-in-Chief, Citizendium | http://www.citizendium.org/ 
sanger at citizendium.org