Ekopedia.org Encyclopedia for eco-solutions, in French & other languages
Ekopedia is a free (Free Art License), collaborative (wiki), and multilingual encyclopedia project dedicated in providing answers and spreading practical knowledge related to environmental sustainability. Their goal is to help everyone become more independent and establish the foundation necessary to build a better world.
History
Created in Quebec in December 2002 under the name of Newlimits.org, the project was initially in French. It was using TWiki wiki application for collaborative edition and in 2004, community decided to migrate to MediaWiki.
The project got over 1000 articles December, 10 2006. In February 2007, English and Esperanto Projects were created. Italian, German and Polish were created in February and March 2008 and the Spanish in November 2008. Ekopedia has about 2500 articles (> 1 800 in French).
The Ekopedia Foundation was created in September 19, 2007.
Project details
Ekopedia gives people solutions and practical knowledge in order to act in a more environmentally sound way. Ekopedia is a wiki-based website (like Wikipedia) using MediaWiki. Ekopedia is licensed in Free Art License in every languages except for English witch use double licensing Free Art License + GFDL and Ekopedia will soon be moving to double licensing Free Art License + Creative Commons CC-BY-SA-3.0.
Ekopedia is developed mainly in French, Polish, and Italian. In 2008, French Project received 2,3 millions uniques visitors and each day, an average of 11,000 people come to visit and participate in the project, which makes Ekopedia the most visited French website focused on ecology and sustainability issues.
Ekopedia articles are organized around 12 topics in order to meet the basics needs of people : Birth, Education, Food, Lodging, Clothing, Art and craft, Thinking, Living together, Health and care, Travel, Play and Communication. There are thus many articles on green building, washable diapers, seasonal vegetables, electric vehicles or even tofu manufacturing.
Ekopedia is different to Wikipedia as certain types of content and collaboration are not suitable for Wikipedia. In contrast to Wikipedia, Ekopedia content requires a different approach in selecting and writing articles.
Since the end of 2008, Appropedia.org and Ekopedia.org Projects are in active collaboration that could lead to a projects merge.
Press references
Here is a list of some press references:
- January 15, 2009: Article "Ekopedia: Une encyclopédie pour construire un monde meilleur" by Virginie Roy from Canoe.
- January 2 2009: Interview of Jean-Luc Henry at radio Première heure on Radio-Canada. Listen in mp3 or ogg
- April 2008: Reportage about Ekopedia on radio le Mouv des campus on Radio-France. Listen in (mp3 or ogg).
- April 10, 2008: Reportage about Ekopedia on radio Vous Etes Ici on RadioCanada. Listen in (mp3 or ogg)
- January 11, 2007: the newspaper Metro wrote Ekopedia, le Wikipedia écolo.
- December 2, 2006: Magazine Télérama n° 2968 published Critique Internet Ekopedia
- April 2006 : the book Wikipédia, comprendre et participer wrote about Ekopedia.
- January 2006 : magazine "Micro Hebdo" (01net) published "http://fr.ekopedia.org : l'encyclo écolo"
- December 2005: Liberation Newspaper published Ekopedia: L'encyclopédie des alternatives.
Other references could also be found on Ekopedia Foundation Website.
External links
- Ekopedia portal
- Appropedia Project
- http://www.fondationekopedia.org Ekopedia Foundation Web site.
- 2008 Ekopedia.org Project Results
