Trains:Press room/14 February 2007

Train Spotting World, the New Wiki Community for Rail Fans

St Valentine's Day, Wednesday, 14th February 2007. Train Spotting World is the first of a family of special interest "Fandoms". It runs on the same software as Wikipedia, from the Wikimedia Foundation, and allows members and non members alike to create articles and reports about the global phenomenon of train spotting and love of railways.

The early articles are drawn from public domain sources around the globe. Spotting World's founders, Bernd Heller and Tim Trent, have spent long hours making careful selections of the initial set of articles, and there will be several thousand already present by the end of Valentine’s week.

Asked "why Train Spotting?", Heller said "A huge number of people have this interest worldwide, but there is nothing that caters for them in this way. Spotting World is designed to give the enthusiast a place to share that enthusiasm with others, and also to provide a wealth of information for anyone who drops in. It's a community, run by the community."

Everything on Spotting World is, just like Wikipedia, released freely under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, a true collaborative effort. But does the Wikipedia look and feel worry the founders? Trent says not. "Spotting World is not an encyclopaedia," Trent said. "Obviously we respect copyrights and decent behaviour, but we don't have the bureaucracy of an encyclopaedia, nor the need for rigorous citations and proofs. Spotting World articles have no particular need of a formal, encyclopaedic tone, no need of neutrality, and may be wholly 'Original Research'. What we’re providing is a virtual place for enthusiasts to share enthusiasm. Of course there is a serious side, but we expect it to be fun and light, too."

As the site says:

"It's not an encyclopaedia. There are no heavy rules or processes except to respect copyrights owned by others and to behave to others as you wish others to behave to you."

"It's what you make it to be. If you want to write reports of a great day at Grand Central Station or at Clapham Junction, great. If you want to upload your pictures of the Flying Scotsman, Mallard or the Golden Arrow great."

http://train.spottingworld.com

Spotting World 30 Redditch Bracknell Berkshire RG12 0TT United Kingdom

press (at) spottingworld (dot) com

Released on St Valentine's Day, 14 February 2007