Encyclopedic Knowledge in the Mobile Age

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Encyclopedic Knowledge in the Mobile Age

• Agnes Kukulska-Hulme
• Institute of Educational Technology, 14 November
  2007

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The mobile mantra anytime, anywhere

• Anything? Anyhow?
• How knowledge is conceived, created,
• represented, used
• and its connections with mobility, travel and
• cross-cultural communication

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Themes

• Shared knowledge
• Cross-cultural communication
• Travel
• Location, narrative and personal meanings

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An abiding fascination with encyclopedic knowledge

• Encyclopedia Britannica
• Since 1768.. the world's most famous and
  authoritative source of information

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Not A Walking Encyclopedia Random musings on
books, film, cats, quilting and anything
relevant. Now with recipes and original art.
Blog by Candy Schultz http//www.not-a-walking-en
cyclopedia.blogspot.com/
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Knowledge sharing

• Wiki wiki Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons,
  Wikibooks, Wiktionary, Wikiversity etc
• An alternative Citizendium - we will avoid
  calling it an "encyclopedia" until the
  project's editors feel comfortable putting their
  reputations behind that description.
• WikiAnswers - forum for community-grown QA
  http//wiki.answers.com/
• Wikispecies and alternatives
• Encyclopedia of Life project a web page for
  every species http//www.eol.org/
• Biodiversity Observatory project data on
  wildlife from the public, surveys, learning
  communities http//www.open.ac.uk/science/outreach
  /outreach-projects/biodiversity-observatory.php

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Building knowledge collaboratively

• InnoCentive seekers and solvers financial
  rewards for best solution to open challenges in
  engineering, sciences etc. http//www.innocentive.
  com/

Google Language Tools translate, mouse over text
to view original language, suggest a better
translation
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Chinese Wikipedia

• Baidu Baike Chinese online encyclopedia
  modelled on Wikipedia, launched in 2006
• Welcome to Baidu Wikipedia! This is a written
  jointly by all users of the encyclopedia Now
  join the bar, personally experience the successes
  and written encyclopedia joy!
• Google automatic translation

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China to Digitize World's Earliest Encyclopedia

• The National Library of China is digitizing the
  Great Encyclopedia of Yongle
• Compiled 1403-1407, it contained 11,095 books.
  Only around 400 books remain
• Will be published on the Internet

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LEncyclopédie de Diderot et dAlembert 1751-1777

• Published on the Internet - anyone can volunteer
  to translate it from French into English -
  http//quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?cdi
  dccdidrgnmainviewtextidnodid2222.0000.169
• the aim of this encyclopedia was to "change the
  common way of thinking" through the expansion of
  knowledge and the development of critical thought

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LEncyclopédie de Diderot et dAlembert

• The 32 volumes contain 21 volumes of text.
• The remaining 11 volumes contain beautiful
  illustrations

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LEncyclopédie Travel

• famous travelers would go to Egypt in order
  to profit from the conversation of the priests of
  the region, who alone possessed the reflective
  sciences
• Travelers develop and raise the level of the
  mind, enrich it through knowledge, and cure it of
  national prejudices
• Such study cannot be replaced by books or by the
  tales told by others. Men, places, and things one
  has to judge by oneself

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http//www.discoverhongkong.com/pda
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The mobile phone is fast becoming a security
blanket. Especially if it can work overseas ..
and if it can provide multilingual support
overseas (Jaokar Fish, Mobile Web 2.0, 2006)
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What multilingual support is needed here?
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A different kind of challenge
Vires acquirit eundo a local motto,
Melbourne Search pages written in English
translate into Chinese
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A World in Three Aisles
Finally

• Letter from San Francisco, by G. Lewis-Kraus, 2007

• Prelinger Library a small private collection
  an out of the way corner of perhaps the worlds
  most wired city
• A landscape-related project books often filed
  according to a local place they relate to, local
  understandings
• the library is in a constant state of
  associative refinement
• browsability within a narrative structure
• ambition to help you find what you are not
  looking for

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Prelinger Library A place where ideas are
shared because books are held The best way
for libraries to move forward is to take several
thoughtful steps back.
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Institute of Educational TechnologyThe Open
University
Thank you!

• www.open.ac.uk