Submission to the ICZN Commission, and Google for Internet Database of all life

[David Shorthouse]

Robin,

There's no need to persuade Google to do this unless they were to create
some sort of "species pages" portal. Their bots sift through web pages with
taxonomic material like any other. uBio has already been doing a great job
of this, GBIF is well on its way, DiscoverLife is another, and iSpecies is
an interesting approach (http://ispecies.org).

David P. Shorthouse
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Department of Biological Sciences
CW-403, Biological Sciences Centre
University of Alberta
Edmonton, AB   T6G 2E9
Phone: 1-780-492-3080
mailto:dps1 at ualberta.ca
http://canadianarachnology.webhop.net
http://arachnidforum.webhop.net
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>Hi Taxacomers,
>
>There is a second article in the March 2006 Discover Magazine that
>is very pertinent to us.
>
>Antsy in Madagascar: a bushwhacking biologist unearths six-legged
>vampires, cannibals, and silk weavers in the quest to bring every ant
>on the planet into your home.  By Richard Conniff, pages 44-51.
>
>The ant guy is Brian Fisher of the California Academy of Sciences.
>You can access the database so far at www.antweb.org.
>
>But perhaps the most interesting thought of Brian Fisher's is to
>persuade GOOGLE to partner with the scientific community to
>create an Internet Database of all life on Earth.
>
>This means that anyone on Earth with Internet can access the database.
>Sounds like a plan to me.
>
>Robin Leech
>