EoC-Frequently Asked Questions

Where does the content in the EoC come from?

The Encyclopedia of the Cosmos has content from three different sources:

• Original articles written by EoC authors. These are individuals who are experts in their fields as judged by their peers and by their track record of distinguished research, teaching, writing, training, and public outreach in their field. You can view our current list of authorized contributors.
• Content Partners. These are organizations that have reached a formal agreement with the EoC to have their existing material published in the Encyclopedia. In most cases, such material is published verbatim from the Partner organization, with some editing for style and length to make the entry consistent with EoC guidelines. Remaining consistent with the EoC governance guidelines, once the entry is up on the EoC, authors may then add to or edit that material. Every entry from a Content Partner is assigned to, and must be approved by, at least one Topic Editor.
• Free and Open Content Sources. The typical example here is a government agency whose work rests fully in the public domain, such as many federal government publications. Other examples include non-profit and educational organizations whose copyright allows free use for educational and non-commercial purposes. In most cases, such material is published verbatim from the organization, with some editing for style and length to make the entry consistent with EoC guidelines. Remaining consistent with the EoC governance guidelines, once the entry is up on the EoC, authors may then add to or edit that material. Every entry from a Content Source is assigned to, and must be approved by, at least one Topic Editor.

Every article from a Content Partner or a free and open Content source carries this disclaimer:

This article is taken wholly from, or contains information that was originally published by, the <organization name here>. Topic editors and authors for the Encyclopedia of the Cosmos may have edited its content or added new information. The use of information from the <organization name here> should not be construed as support for or endorsement by that organization for any new information added by EoC personnel, or for any editing of the original content.

Who Publishes the EoC?

The Encyclopedia is published by the Digital Universe Foundation, a 501(c)(3) non-profit, for what will be the Cosmos Information Coalition (CIC). The CIC, the governing body of the Cosmos Portal, will be comprised of a diverse group of respected scientists and educators and the organizations, agencies, and institutions for which they work. The CIC defines the roles and responsibilities for individuals and institutions involved in the Coalition, as well as the editorial guidelines for Cosmos Portal content, including the EoC.

Who decides who can contribute?

The Stewardship Committee of the Cosmos Information Coalition (CIC), the governing body of the Cosmos Portal, will review the qualifications of all applicants to the EoC authors' wiki. The CIC defines the roles and responsibilities for individuals and institutions involved in the Coalition, as well as the editorial guidelines for the EoC. The CIC, in turn, will be governed by its own set of bylaws, a Board of Directors, and an Advisory Board with reknowned scholars from diverse fields.

How do I know I can trust the information in the EoC?

The EoC has a rigorous content review process that insures that its articles are up-to-date, fair, and accurate.

• Authorship is restricted to individuals who have applied to, and been approved by, the Stewardship Committee of the Cosmos Information Coalition.
• The actual content of an article is determined by groups of scientists working together on the wiki. An article may start with an individual or small team, but once up in the wiki, the content can, and will, be edited by other authorized individuals who have an interest in the subject and the motivation to improve the article. An article eventually will have many more topic editors, authors, and copy editors than when it began. This process will produce an article that is far superior to what any single individual could possibly create.
• A Topic Editor must approve an article before it is released to the public. A Topic Editor reviews an article for general content, accuracy, clarity, and adherence to Encyclopedia guidelines. A Topic Editor also resolves content-level disputes authoritatively and coherently, though with input from the contributors, and determines the appropriateness of deleting mediocre work.
• All work in the Encyclopedia is attributed to an individual, not an IP address or a user name. This motivates individuals to do their very best work, as it does in traditional scholarly work, and will discourage the explicit acts of sabotage that plague other electronic resources where anonymity is the norm.

How do articles get written?

Articles are written by authorized authors on a wiki. A wiki is website or similar online resource that allows users to add and edit content collectively, including the ability to change text written by other users. Thus, wikis are well-suited for collaborative authoring. The name derives from the Hawaiian term wiki, meaning "quick", "fast", or "to hasten."

The authors' version of the Encyclopedia of the Cosmos is a restricted access wiki that uses the MediaWikisoftware. This software enables collaborative article development by a community of scholars, as well as the content review process described above. Once an author is given access to the author's wiki, she is free to add any entries that lie within her area of expertise, or edit existing articles in those subject areas. Articles are in a constant state of expansion, revision and enhancement as new authors join and as existing authors update their work.

A restricted access wiki is an excellent tool to produce an information resource that:

• is completely Web-based;
  
• covers an enormous range of topics related to the environment;
  
• is kept constantly up-to-date across diverse fields;
  
• is completely free to the public;
  
• includes input from scores of traditional disciplines and professions, and thousands of qualified contributors; and
  
• openly attributes all significant contributions to individuals and their institutions.

What's the difference between an article on the author's wiki and the one at this site?

When an author feels that an article is ready to be published, a Topic Editor is notified and then reviews the article. If it is of sufficiently high quality, the Topic Editor then moves the article to the public site. After initial publication, the article on the author's wiki continues to be expanded, revised, and improved. When an author feels that the wiki version is superior to the public version, he may ask a Topic Editor to repeat the review and publication process, following which the revised article replaces the previous one at the public site.

What about controversial topics?

The EoC has an explicit policy regarding neutrality and fairness. In a nutshell, the policy requires that:

• EoC articles, when touching upon any issue of controversy, must represent every different view on a subject that attracts a significant portion of informed and qualified adherents, with each such view and its arguments or evidence being expressed as fairly and sympathetically as possible.
• The EoC itself does not advocate positions; it is both non-partisan and non-sectarian.
• The EoC does not use phraseology or tone that elevates or deprecates particular perspectives or people holding a particular perspective.
• The EoC recognizes uncertainties in data,assumptions, interpretation, and understanding.
• As access to the broadest array of knowledge has many salutary effects, the Encyclopedia of the Cosmos shall be strongly disposed to include rather than exclude content.
• When some content both has no discernible and unique benefit to the advancement of knowledge, and has significant potential to harm the health or moral character of individuals, of human society at large, or of the environment, it may be excluded.

Can I use material published in the EoC?

The text in the Encyclopedia of the Cosmos is meant to be freely available to users who may copy, modify and distribute that content, so long as the new version grants the same freedoms to others and attributes the content to the authors of the Encyclopedia of the Cosmos article used. To achieve this goal, the text contained in the Encyclopedia of the Cosmos is licensed to the public under the Creative Commons license known as Attribution-ShareAlike. This license permits anyone to (1) copy, distribute, and display your work, (2) work remix, tweak, and build upon your work, and to make commercial use of your work, subject to these conditions:

• Attribution. You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor.
• Share Alike. If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you may distribute the resulting work only under a license identical to this one.

The full text of the Creative Commons license is here.

How is the EoC different than Wikipedia?

1. Virtually anyone can add, delete, or change content in Wikipedia. In the EoC, this privilege is restricted to individuals judged by their peers to be experts in their fields.
2. Content on Wikipedia] is determined by the equally-weighted voices of all those who want and choose to contribute. The EoC is part scholarly-democracy and part rigorous-meritocracy. The EoC is democratic in the sense that many content and governance decisions are made with input from diverse scholars. But, the EoC is also a rigorous meritocracy in the sense that important, overreaching editorial decisions are made by the DUF Editors and the Topic Editor and applied to each and every article.
3. In Wikipedia there is a view that the involvement of experts is unnecessary. The EoC is based on the premise that input from experts is essential to produce trustworthy information.
4. Authorship in Wikipedia is anonymous. All work in the EoC is attributed to the individual who did it.
5. Changes to Wikipedia articles are viewable by the public instantly. Changes to the EoC are viewable instantly by participants in a workspace area, but article versions must be approved by a Topic Editor prior to being published to the public web site.