A bit of general background: The Collection/"Book creator" feature allows managing, organizing and exporting content in PDF and in OpenDocument (the latter is still very buggy). We're planning to work with PediaPress to add OpenZIM support (useful for offline readers like Kiwix); EPUB is a possibility. The feature supports pulling specific article revisions, or the current revision, and it has some nice features like automatic suggestion of articles, easy addition of articles to collections while browsing, etc.
Although PediaPress are the developers behind the feature, it's completely separate from their services (providing printed books). If PediaPress were to disappear tomorrow, we'd continue providing the remaining functionality. In fact, at this point in time, uses of the feature for digital offline distributions are more interesting to us from a strategic point of view than print distribution. Because images and other media quickly inflate any offline export, content selections may often be the more viable method to create digital offline distributions of WP content. The 1,400 selections already compiled using the Collection extension provide a great starting point for this. It's also conceivable to work with "validation partners" to create trusted selections of content for schools etc. We have a non-exclusive business partnership with PediaPress (a small for-profit company) with regard to their provision of print services, which is commission-based. From a mission standpoint, it's nice for both our audience and our contributors to have the print options available, which is supported by demand (about 2,000 per quarter -- we'll soon have a WikiStats report on book sales) and user feedback. It can also be great outreach tool. In fact, as Tim pointed out, the idea of printed selections is a very old idea that very many Wikipedians have worked on over the years. The goal of the relationship with PediaPress was to have an open toolset that any and all efforts towards print or other export formats could build upon. PediaPress has been a model partner -- they're super-responsive, and interact directly with the community to service all aspects of the technology. I'm personally very pleased that the hardcover and color options are now available. There are so many fantastic photos and illustrations in Wikimedia projects that the black/white books really didn't do them justice. It's certainly not for everyone, but for those of us who like to show our family and friends what this whole Wikipedia thing we spend so much time on is all about, it can be pretty awesome. Kindle or not, a printed book gives a very tangible reality to our efforts. -- Erik Möller Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
