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===Naming=== | ===Naming=== | ||
Due to some potential complexity related to the Sustainapedia domain name, the OpenSustain name was | The initial working name for the effort was Sustainapedia. Due to some potential complexity related to the Sustainapedia domain name (see below), the OpenSustain name was proposed as a working name. OpenSustain is short for OpenSustainabilityNetwork. After recognizing the pitfalls of the situation, the team registered the following domains to assure that this working name is safe in the sense that it is guaranteed to be available if we don't find a better safe option. | ||
*[http://www.opensustain.com opensustain.com] | *[http://www.opensustain.com opensustain.com], [http://www.opensustain.net opensustain.net], [http://www.opensustain.org opensustain.org] | ||
*[http://www.opensustainabilitynetwork.com opensustainabilitynetwork.com], [http://www.opensustainabilitynetwork.org opensustainabilitynetwork.org] | |||
*[http://www.opensustainabilitynetwork.com opensustainabilitynetwork.com] | |||
More recently, the name Appropedia has been proposed as the working name. This was not proposed initially since Appropedia's direction was not initially so closely aligned with the OpenSustain vision, and so it made sense to distinguish between the Appropedia effort and the OpenSustain "new direction". The alignment has grown between the two such that it is hard to distinguish them, and so its quite practical to use Appropedia as the working name. | |||
The Sustainapedia / OpenSustain | ===Domain name ownership=== | ||
The "sustainapedia.org" domain name is owned by Wikia.<ref>Sustainapedia.com is owned by The Web of Hope, a U.K.-based non-profit that the OpenSustain team has had discussions with. They are friendly, but plans or understandings have developed as of this writing. The ownership of the .com domain comes into play because, ideally, the site would have ownership of both the .org and .com domain names.</ref> Wikia has been a participant in the Sustainapedia / OpenSustain conversation since the early days (prior to Appropedia's involvement), and they bought the name as a part of those discussions. Most of the folks not at Wikia believe that the initiative must be owned and managed by a non-profit for many reasons (including the belief that many academic groups can't or won't partner with a for-profit entity). Those same folks believe that the non-profit must own/control the site's operational domain name. This has been discussed with Wikia only relatively recently, and, perhaps not surprisingly, Wikia has thus far made no commitment to transfer control of the sustainapedia.org domain name. | |||
====Advantages of partnering with Wikia==== | |||
Notwithstanding the non-profit control / ownership questions, a strong and close relationship with Wikia is highly desirable. It is the business of Wikia to develop and grow collaborative activity on the web. They participate with a large number of wiki-literate volunteers, and they also have several resources on paid staff that are, to some degree, dedicated to making collaboration work. Much benefit would arise from any relationship with Wikia. In addition, certain advantages would arise from hosting the site at Wikia. Some of advantages would also accrue to Wikia, and they are encouraging the hosting relationship at this point. They have invested some time and resources toward a prototype version of the site. '''See http:/www.sustainapedia.org''' for a sample of the professional quality skin that they are able to put forth simply as a demonstration. | |||
====Hosting concerns==== | |||
Before the specific question of hosting can be resolved, a number of issues must be addressed. | |||
*Who bears the risk of equipment and other costs as traffic accelerates? | |||
*What would the advertising policy be? And who would be the beneficiary? | |||
*What would be the policy regarding migration to another hosting facility in the future if that proved necessary? | |||
*How tightly or loosely coupled would other Wikia wikis be? | |||
*Domain questions | |||
*Search engine optimization questions | |||
*Software options and configuration questions | |||
*Firewall questions, content distribution, various policies | |||
*Etc, etc, etc. | |||
Preliminary discussions of some of these topics are encouraging, but quite a bit of additional work is still required. Watch this page (either manually, or using the "Watch" tab above) for further updates on these matters. | |||
===See also=== | |||
*http://www.sustainapedia.org, a "demo" version of the look and feel developed by Wikia at their owned domain. | |||
*[[OpenSustain-Appropedia Launch Document]], a draft version of ideas that some of the Appropedia admins are testing. It should not be taken as representative of the final agreement. | |||
*[[OpenSustain-Appropedia Launch Plan]], a straw-man plan for rapidly expanding the site. | |||
*[[OpenSustain Pillars and Values]], a preliminary attempt at framing the guiding principles. | |||
*[[OpenSustain Mission and Vision]], a page for capturing what we envision can be accomplished by the initiative | |||
===Footnotes=== | |||
<references/> | |||
[[Category:Organizations]] | [[Category:Organizations]] | ||
Revision as of 23:10, 28 April 2007
OpenSustain is the new working name for an aggressive collaborative sustainability site. Originally this concept was named Sustainapedia by a group of people with a similar vision and much ambition, led by Ryan Legg (On2Leggs), and Jim Harris of Cleantech[1]. The Sustainapedia and Appropedia teams quickly agreed to collaborate, and are now working out the details.
Naming
The initial working name for the effort was Sustainapedia. Due to some potential complexity related to the Sustainapedia domain name (see below), the OpenSustain name was proposed as a working name. OpenSustain is short for OpenSustainabilityNetwork. After recognizing the pitfalls of the situation, the team registered the following domains to assure that this working name is safe in the sense that it is guaranteed to be available if we don't find a better safe option.
- opensustain.com, opensustain.net, opensustain.org
- opensustainabilitynetwork.com, opensustainabilitynetwork.org
More recently, the name Appropedia has been proposed as the working name. This was not proposed initially since Appropedia's direction was not initially so closely aligned with the OpenSustain vision, and so it made sense to distinguish between the Appropedia effort and the OpenSustain "new direction". The alignment has grown between the two such that it is hard to distinguish them, and so its quite practical to use Appropedia as the working name.
Domain name ownership
The "sustainapedia.org" domain name is owned by Wikia.[1] Wikia has been a participant in the Sustainapedia / OpenSustain conversation since the early days (prior to Appropedia's involvement), and they bought the name as a part of those discussions. Most of the folks not at Wikia believe that the initiative must be owned and managed by a non-profit for many reasons (including the belief that many academic groups can't or won't partner with a for-profit entity). Those same folks believe that the non-profit must own/control the site's operational domain name. This has been discussed with Wikia only relatively recently, and, perhaps not surprisingly, Wikia has thus far made no commitment to transfer control of the sustainapedia.org domain name.
Advantages of partnering with Wikia
Notwithstanding the non-profit control / ownership questions, a strong and close relationship with Wikia is highly desirable. It is the business of Wikia to develop and grow collaborative activity on the web. They participate with a large number of wiki-literate volunteers, and they also have several resources on paid staff that are, to some degree, dedicated to making collaboration work. Much benefit would arise from any relationship with Wikia. In addition, certain advantages would arise from hosting the site at Wikia. Some of advantages would also accrue to Wikia, and they are encouraging the hosting relationship at this point. They have invested some time and resources toward a prototype version of the site. See http:/www.sustainapedia.org for a sample of the professional quality skin that they are able to put forth simply as a demonstration.
Hosting concerns
Before the specific question of hosting can be resolved, a number of issues must be addressed.
- Who bears the risk of equipment and other costs as traffic accelerates?
- What would the advertising policy be? And who would be the beneficiary?
- What would be the policy regarding migration to another hosting facility in the future if that proved necessary?
- How tightly or loosely coupled would other Wikia wikis be?
- Domain questions
- Search engine optimization questions
- Software options and configuration questions
- Firewall questions, content distribution, various policies
- Etc, etc, etc.
Preliminary discussions of some of these topics are encouraging, but quite a bit of additional work is still required. Watch this page (either manually, or using the "Watch" tab above) for further updates on these matters.
See also
- http://www.sustainapedia.org, a "demo" version of the look and feel developed by Wikia at their owned domain.
- OpenSustain-Appropedia Launch Document, a draft version of ideas that some of the Appropedia admins are testing. It should not be taken as representative of the final agreement.
- OpenSustain-Appropedia Launch Plan, a straw-man plan for rapidly expanding the site.
- OpenSustain Pillars and Values, a preliminary attempt at framing the guiding principles.
- OpenSustain Mission and Vision, a page for capturing what we envision can be accomplished by the initiative
Footnotes
- ↑ Sustainapedia.com is owned by The Web of Hope, a U.K.-based non-profit that the OpenSustain team has had discussions with. They are friendly, but plans or understandings have developed as of this writing. The ownership of the .com domain comes into play because, ideally, the site would have ownership of both the .org and .com domain names.