Just because content is free, that doesn't necessarily mean it's always accessible. The Wikimedia Foundation, which includes popular, wiki-based programs such as Wikipedia, Wikinews, and Wikiversity, has established a reputation of providing the full content of its projects, free-of-charge. The non-profit organization also aims to expand the accessibility and distribution of its content in order to educate those in the developing world. However, providing access to these countries--which, many argue, need information the most--means that content needs to be translated into many different languages.

The Wikimedia Foundation, founded in 2003, has created several past programs aimed at tackling the language barrier so that learning can thrive in the developing world. And, in mid-November, the foundation will continue its quest by co-hosting several Wikipedia Academies in South Africa with iCommons, an organization that collaborates with open education, open access publishing, and free software companies, in order to provide learning opportunities around the world. The goal of the Wikipedia Academies is to increase the number of Wikipedias in African languages, and thereby broaden the knowledge base. "Currently, Wikipedia has 250 language versions," says Sandra Ordonez, communications manager for the Wikimedia Foundation. "However, there are around 7,000 languages worldwide, so we have a lot of work in front of us."

In the past, the foundation has had several partnerships with other organizations that share the common goal of extending learning in disadvantaged communities. Most recently, the SOS Children's Village--the largest orphan charity in the world--created a CD/DVD version of Wikipedia that was child-friendly and complemented the UK curriculum, which is implemented by schools throughout the world. The CD/DVD was then distributed to schools within developing areas. Says Ordonez, "The project was a great success."

And, if past efforts are any indication of what's to come, the foundation's charitable mission to South Africa has the potential to change the face of learning--in a case where a "facelift" is essential. Wikipedia's content model also means that individuals have the freedom to take the content and mold it to their specific needs. "In many disadvantaged communities," says Ordonez, "individuals have little, if any, access to educational resources. As such, Wikipedia's free content can be used to create a variety of free educational tools, such as textbooks."

The Wikipedia project collects knowledge from all corners of the world in order to educate others. The impending Wikipedia Academies in South Africa aim to extend the reach of Wikipedia by preserving languages such as Maori and Swahili. Jimmy Wales, founder of the Wikimedia Foundation, says: "We believe that everyone in the world should have access to education, regardless of race, nationality, gender, age, or economic background. We also believe that everyone has knowledge to contribute. Through the public's support and the foundation's continued efforts, we expect to have a similar impact on communities in the most remote areas of the world as we have in more developed parts of the globe. It’s an exciting, moving, and very real opportunity."

According to Alexa, a web information company, Wikipedia is one of the ten most-trafficked websites in the United States, and around the world. Says Ordonez, "The Wikimedia Foundation's goal is to empower world citizens to share in the sum of all human knowledge." With the help of the Wikipedia Academies in South Africa, the foundation is working towards its goal of individual empowerment by providing greater access to an unlimited supply of collective knowledge.

(www.wikimedia.org)

MediaNews Group, Inc. announced that The Hearst Corporation completed its investment in MediaNews on October 19, 2007. The purchase price paid by Hearst for the equity investment was approximately $317 million, of which approximately $290 million was used to pay the purchase price of The Monterey County Herald, the Pioneer Press (St. Paul) and the Daily Breeze (Torrance, CA), and the remaining $27 million was paid to MediaNews in cash. Hearst received a 31% interest in the non-Bay Area business of MediaNews and did not receive any governance or economic rights or interest in MediaNews' publications in the San Francisco Bay area. MediaNews is the nation's fourth largest newspaper company, with headquarters in Denver, CO.

(www.medianewsgroup.com, www.hearst.com)

National Geographic Maps and MetaCarta, Inc., a provider of geographic search and referencing solutions, announced CartaLens, a geospatial digital asset management solution for georeferencing, managing, retrieving, and delivering digital assets. CartaLens is able to search and retrieve location-based information from both structured content and a broad base of digital content such as photos, video, audio, and documents, enabling users to fuse digital assets with maps and metadata in a collaborative and interactive viewing environment. CartaLens enables users to drag and drop assets on to a map, which automatically geo-tags the asset for a future geographic search. Its interface enables users to identify, locate, and access location-aware information by using a map, media thumbnails, or by querying the asset's metadata.

(www.metacarta.com, www.nationalgeographic.com)

Nokia Research Center (NRC) and Reuters are working together on a mobile journalism project intended to transform the way journalists file news reports when on the move. The new mobile application centers around a lightweight toolkit that provides everything journalists need to file and publish stories from even the most remote regions of the world. The mobile journalism application uses the multimedia capabilities already available in existing smart phones and combines these to produce a toolkit that fits with the way in which journalists want to use it. The toolkit comprises multimedia capabilities, text editing tools, and live video streaming and is accessed using a user interface. Metadata facilities automatically combine every piece of information the device already has about the context for the story--location, time, date and so on. Reuters has developed a mobile editorial interface that links the toolkit developed by NRC to the in-house editorial process, allowing stories to be published almost instantly from the field.

(www.reuters.com, www.nokia.com)

PaperThin, Inc., a mid-market content management software vendor, announced the release of CommonSpot Version 5.0. This latest release introduces a host of new features, including a new authoring interface; RSS feeds, blogs, and wikis; and XML publishing and rendering capabilities. CommonSpot 5.0 is intended to empower business users to be self-sufficient and productive, build interactive communities, and achieve faster time-to-market; and it is meant to allow IT and site administrators to adapt the system to meet their complex needs. New features in CommonSpot Version 5.0 include: RSS, atom, and podcasting feeds; new XML capabilities; custom application development framework; and improved authoring interface.

(www.paperthin.com)

SkillSoft PLC, a provider of elearning and performance support solutions for global enterprises, government, education, and small- to medium-sized businesses, announced the availability of the KnowledgeCenter Editor and the expansion of its KnowledgeCenter Portals offering. SkillSoft currently offers 17 KnowledgeCenters, which are pre-packaged, user-friendly targeted learning portals that are intended to allow learners instant access to trusted, targeted content. Each KnowledgeCenter is a product of the SkillSoft Innovation Labs that includes material specifically chosen to help learners build knowledge around a targeted subject as quickly as possible. Assets include Books24x7; access to SkillSoft courseware, organized into Learning Roadmaps that allow learners to locate the most appropriate courses; simulations (through SkillSim simulations, practice labs, or the Project Center); mentoring services (for IT KnowledgeCenters and the PMI KnowledgeCenter); and featured topic spotlights, refreshed regularly, to provide an in-depth focus on particular topical areas.

(www.skillsoft.com)

Centennial Software, a developer of network security and IT asset management solutions, announced the latest version of its DeviceWall endpoint security solution, DeviceWall CAE (Content Aware Edition). The new product is designed to help organizations prevent sensitive files from leaving the network and to stop malicious code from being introduced onto mission-critical IT systems through individual PCs. In addition to its ability to manage access to devices such as USB sticks, portable hard drives, smart phones, and MP3 players, DeviceWall CAE is the introduces content filtering technology.

(www.centennial-software.com)

Ovid, part of Wolters Kluwer Health, and a provider of customizable electronic research information for the medical, healthcare, and academic markets, announced the release of OvidSP, its new electronic information search platform. OvidSP is the next of Ovid's two existing platforms, Ovid Web Gateway and SilverPlatter WEBSPIRS, and is intended to make searching high-quality scholarly and professional content faster, simpler, and more efficient for all users. All Ovid customers will be able to access the new platform beginning immediately. OvidSP is designed to streamline the search and discovery process with a simple interface, precision search technology, and user workflow tools.

(www.wolterskluwer.com, www.ovid.com)
 

Elsevier, a publisher of science, technology, and medical (STM) information, announced that it has collaborated with academic libraries to offer new supportive tools for researchers. The company has embraced Web 2.0 approaches to launch a new free research tool and additional features to existing products ScienceDirect, Scopus, and Scirus. These developments are intended to help librarians and researchers better utilize the wide range of information resources available in today's networked world.

(www.elsevier.com)

InQuira, Inc., a provider of integrated software applications for intelligent search, knowledge management, analytics, and user experience, announced that Serena Software, an independent software company, will be implementing the InQuira Customer Experience Platform to power its search and knowledge management (KM) initiatives. Serena is leveraging InQuira Information Manager in an attempt to enhance its knowledge base, and InQuira Intelligent Search to make the knowledge base accessible by both support professionals and customers using Serena's web self-service capabilities.

(www.serena.com, www.inquira.com)

ISYS Search Software, a global supplier of enterprise search solutions for business and government, announced the availability of an ECI Adapter to enable customers of EMC Corporation's Documentum Enterprise Content Integration Services (ECI Services) to access data indexed by ISYS:web and to federate ISYS:web's search results. ECI Services is a federation engine that processes and distributes queries to corporate content already indexed by various third-party search tools; it then normalizes and displays the consolidated results. This level of functionality provides end-users with a comprehensive access point to search all of a corporation's content repositories from a single window. ISYS now provides ECI Services customers with a search engine, enabling customers to include ISYS:web indexes in their searches, as well as providing administrators with the ability to incorporate content not already indexed by other tools.

(www.isys-search.com)

Pixsy Corporation, a media search platform that powers private label video and image search engines, announced an agreement with online travel and leisure retailer lastminute.com. Under the terms of the partnership, lastminute.com will utilize Pixsy's media search technology to operate a travel focused video and image search engine. Pixsy's media search technology enables lastminute.com to operate a vertical multimedia search engine, giving users the ability to search millions of travel photos and videos while simultaneously shopping for travel services.

(www.pixsy.com, www.lastminute.com)