[Taxacom] globalnames?

[dipteryx at freeler.nl]

Van: David Patterson [mailto:paddy at eol.org]
Verzonden: wo 16-9-2009 16:42

>Paul

>Your fear is a fair one but needs to be nuanced.  The GN environment does not 
>create NEW data, merely indexes and exposes information that is already out there.  
>It cannot in principle create poor quality raw material, so I don't think you need 
>to be concerned on that front.

***
Well, it is indexing something, but what it indexes is not information, 
just text strings (in many cases not much better than randomly generated). 
In the act of indexing it promotes what it is indexing to become 'data', 
and in that sense, and a very real one it is, it is creating something that 
was not there before; these 'data' are then presented as "18,323,094 names". 
For a project that is presented as "GNI is meant to collect all Scientific Names" 
it pays remarkably little attention to scientific names (and their structure).

Paul