Anyone interested in working on a China Bike Wiki project?

[zacstewart]

UPDATE: Here's the link http://cb.apocryphalpublishing.com/

So I have enormously unnecessary amounts of storage and monthly transfer on my web host, so I was thinking of useful ways to utilize that space the other night while at work.

I thought maybe we could work on collectively compiling a wiki of useful information about China Bikes. I love the MediaWiki program, and I've used it for various other projects so I know how it works pretty well. My question is, would anyone else be interested in it?

We have a ton of great information here on this board, so I know there's plenty of potential contributors. The reason I suggest a wiki is because they are so genius for organizing large amounts of information and they tend to grow so very well.

We could have write-ups for various bikes, how-to guides, everything...

I've already installed MediaWiki on a subdomain on my server, but I don't want to seem like I'm link spamming myself, so I'll wait and see if you guys thinks it's a good idea and then I'll post the link. If people seem interested and it works well I'll go ahead and get another domain.

(Note to Frostbite: this is no attempt to steal your crowd :). I just think it would be a good idea.)

[katoranger]

I picked choice "c". Feel free to use any pictures in my gallery and anything I have posted about my bike. I would be willing to get any info about I can find too.

Allen

[zacstewart]

C as in what's a wiki? If so, a wiki is a site which is collectively written by whoever visits and decides to click the "edit" button on the page they are viewing. So pretty much, you write something, someone else edits it and adds to it, someone else edits that, someone else edits that, etc and eventually you have some really informative pages, and all the edit information, such as who did it as well as a mirror of all the previous "versions" gets saved so you can see the progress of it.

Generally everything on a wiki is licensed under some sort of "Open Source" license, such as Creative Commons or GNU Free Document License, so everything on them can be redistributed freely.

Thanks a lot for the generous offer of pictures :), but I'd like to see you edit the wiki even more. If you're worried about it being difficult, it isn't at all. You don't have to know any HTML or anything.

[katoranger]

You have a link to a wiki? Wikipedia?

I don't mind sharing my pictures as long as someone is using them to make money. If they are used for a free info source that is fine.

Allen

[zacstewart]

http://cb.apocryphalpublishing.com is the link. Everything is licensed under GFDL, but you can chose what to license any image you upload under. The license you're describing is Creative Commons, Attribution, Non-Commercial, Share alike. Long, I know, but that's it. Go ahead and edit whatever you want and upload pictures! This will be great. I'll show you how to add the license to an image.

[frostbite]

Sounds like good idea to me.

[katoranger]

I think I can handle that. I am not the most computer savvy person. I have a question that you may know the answer too. Is wikipedia a version of something like this? I have found it to be a good source of information that was very accurate.

Zac, I will try to ride my Lifan up to Dahlonega sometime. We can meet up.

Allen

[zacstewart]

Cool. If I'm ever not working, and I get my Roketa working again ( :( ) I can show you the national forestry roads. They are a lot of fun. Just smooth easy riding for miles with a lot to see.

Wikipedia is a version of these, so to speak. Mediawiki is the "wiki" software. It's just a program (like a message board or anything else interactive online) that lets users create and edit pages. Wikipedia is the most popular site using Mediawiki, but there are a lot of other sites that use the software for other purposes. I'm a member on a semi-popular wiki that is focused on hitchhiking, and another that me and a friend are working on getting started that focuses on the effects of consumerism, with information on "green" companies and biofuels and all that sort of stuff.

[katoranger]

Not trying to be off topic, but I am planning on a ride on the USFS roads up there in August continueing on to TN, NC, and SC hopefully. I may trailer to a central spot and go from there.

I will see if I can add to the china bike wiki.

Thanks, Allen