Citizendium Local Library Storm!

[Tom Morris]

I had an idea last night to help build the Citizendium which would be similar to the Write-A-Thon. Here's how it would work. A group of CZ authors get together in a city, storm a library*, work on writing for Citizendium for a day, then go and eat, drink, be merry etc.

The library could perhaps provide a room for the Citizendium authors to work in, and provide reference access for the day.

The purpose is to get librarians and the Citizendium project to talk to one another (and to try and get local people involved in CZ), and to help Citizendium authors meet and collaborate, and learn new things about subjects they never thought they would take an interest in.

If people are interested, I'd be happy to try and organise on in London, perhaps on the same day as a Geek Dinner event or other social event - perhaps at the British Library or the University of London Library.

If a group of CZ authors were interested in a specific topic, they could also go to specific research libraries on that topic. Perhaps London-based people in the Philosophy and Religion workgroups would like to go to one of the few specialist philosophy and religion libraries in the city.

Anyone think this is a good idea or maybe want to try and get people involved on a local level? The idea of local people in real life getting together would seem to have a certain resonance with the idea of real people, real qualifications and acting like grown ups - which are the values of the CZ community.

* Okay, poetic license. More like, visit a library.

[Chris Day]

This reminds me of "flash event". I like the idea of a library since many good references would be readily available.

[Robert_W_King]

I had an idea last night to help build the Citizendium which would be similar to the Write-A-Thon. Here's how it would work. A group of CZ authors get together in a city, storm a library*, work on writing for Citizendium for a day, then go and eat, drink, be merry etc.

The library could perhaps provide a room for the Citizendium authors to work in, and provide reference access for the day.

The purpose is to get librarians and the Citizendium project to talk to one another (and to try and get local people involved in CZ), and to help Citizendium authors meet and collaborate, and learn new things about subjects they never thought they would take an interest in.

If people are interested, I'd be happy to try and organise on in London, perhaps on the same day as a Geek Dinner event or other social event - perhaps at the British Library or the University of London Library.

If a group of CZ authors were interested in a specific topic, they could also go to specific research libraries on that topic. Perhaps London-based people in the Philosophy and Religion workgroups would like to go to one of the few specialist philosophy and religion libraries in the city.

Anyone think this is a good idea or maybe want to try and get people involved on a local level? The idea of local people in real life getting together would seem to have a certain resonance with the idea of real people, real qualifications and acting like grown ups - which are the values of the CZ community.

* Okay, poetic license. More like, visit a library.

I've thought of using http://meetup.com and establishing a "Wiki-writers group" for my area.  I may even do it.

[Aleta Curry]

I had an idea last night to help build the Citizendium which would be similar to the Write-A-Thon. Here's how it would work. A group of CZ authors get together in a city, storm a library*, work on writing for Citizendium for a day, then go and eat, drink, be merry etc.

The library could perhaps provide a room for the Citizendium authors to work in, and provide reference access for the day.

Oh, that sounds absolutely *brillo pads* to me, Tom.

(And I like the idea of STORM A LIBRARY--bwah, ha, ha....)

I like the idea of eating and drinking after even more.

Oh, it's really too bad!  The Tallong Storm a Library Day would be a bit light on participants!

Also, Tom, would you be so kind as to link to your userpage in your signature?  Thanks.

[Larry Sanger]

Tom, this is a great idea!  But as with all great ideas, it comes down to execution.  Whether it gets more than, say, one or two people depends entirely on how widely you circulate the idea.  There are many ways to get the word out effectively (e.g., with MeetUp, Citizendium-L, searching the User: namespace for mentions of 'London', etc., etc.), and if you spend an hour or two getting the word out, that would probably spell the difference between moderate success (which I think is as much as you can expect at this point) and total failure.

DO let me know how it turns out.

[Brian P Long]

I like Tom's idea for getting together in person, though it occurred to me that it might be just as meaningful to have meetings about a specific article on-line at a certain time.

Your idea jogged something else loose that had occurred to me, which was that we could have a one-off, get-out-the-word day, where everyone on the project tries to tell a librarian, a K-12 teacher and an academic about Citizendium. The only reason I hadn't brought it up before was that I worry that snooty academics and jaded librarians might look down their noses at our measly page count and our handful of approved articles. Maybe we want to wait until the project is a little better developed-- or at least until there are approved articles in most major fields, so that we can show other folks how the system works with specific examples.

-Brian

[Tom Morris]

I've been phoning around a few academic and research libraries in London today - specifically, the University of London Library (Senate House), the British Library and the London Library. The people I've spoken to have been tremendously helpful, even if the result has been disappointing. The British Library will allow access to their collection, although attendees to a Library Storm would need to get a pass, which requires ID. The same is true for Senate House, which said that the passes would be £5 a person, and they'd need an attendee list up front, otherwise there would be delays getting in. The London Library said that passes would be £10 a person, and there is no area for collaborative, non-quiet work.

I'm going to do some e-mail followup this evening with them, and then am planning to phone a few more libraries tomorrow. I've got a very useful book called Book Lovers' London (published by Metro Publications) which contains a list of bookshops, specialist and academic libraries. I'm planning to focus on the academic libraries - Greenwich, Westminster, Metropolitan and the various U. of L. college libraries. I'm trying to find libraries with wide collections. There are lots and lots of interesting libraries covering everything from on everything from cricket through Charles Dickens. That said, I might phone the Imperial War Museum library and the Lambeth Palace library, since war and religion cover a fairly significant amount of human history.

I'm also planning to invite non-CZ people to get involved. I know lots of people within geeky circles in London, and am trying to get people interested who aren't already CZ authors. It'd be helpful if we were to have a speedy approval process for people at Library Storms, so they could turn up on the day and start writing without having to wait long for approval. Basically, this would mean having Constables online during the event. They will already have to prove their identity to get access to the library, so we could have it so that myself or other authors could expedite their membership.

When phoning the libraries I generally say something broadly along the following lines:

I'm calling as a contributing author to an online encyclopedia project called Citizendium - which is a new, expert-driven project similar in scope to Wikipedia - and am looking at the possibility of running a research day in London, where ten to twenty people would work together on research to improve and write new articles for Citizendium. I'm wondering whether it would be possible for [library name] to allow us access as a group to the collection.

Right, off to take the dogs for a walk, then time to write some e-mails, then maybe write some more pages for CZ.

[Tom Morris]

Just thought I'd dump these links from the Wikimedia Meta wiki up on here, since they have some relevance to what we could be doing with a Library Storm (or 'Research Day' to be more polite):

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Evangelism
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_New_York_City/Outreach_Projects
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Outreach
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Possible_projects_of_Wikimedia_UK
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Marketing
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Cheatsheet
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Editing_Weekend
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Edit_Wikipedia_Week

[Aleta Curry]

If push comes to shove, how about a local library branch?  One big enough to have a private room.  Even if you don't have access to a good/large/specific reference collection, you could still do a Library Storm by all working together based on your collective knowledge.  If you got a few good articles or meaty stubs together with no particular references or citations, what's the biggie--that's what the rest of us are here for...no?

[Tom Morris]

I've put up a page in my user space called 'London Research Day' (Library Storm is cute, but Research Day is easier to explain to normal, literal-minded people). In the morning, more libraries to call and e-mails to write. I'm also going to follow your suggestion, Larry, and go through everyone in User who lists the word 'London' on their profile and leave a note on their User Talk.

If something like this takes off anywhere (I think it's possible here in London, and worth it), may I suggest that a subforum or mailing list be set up?

Also, despite not being a frequent contributor on the Other Site, anyone think it particularly unwise to go along to the London Wikipedia Meetup and promote both CZ and Research Days?