[uf-discuss] Bioformats - microformats for biology

[Manu Sporny]

lists at ben-ward.co.uk wrote:
> This community very intentionally doesn't try create specifications for
> everything. Previous pure-science efforts such as species died because
> it fell way outside the area of active interest of most of this
> community's participants. 

I don't think that's the defining reason (Andy's banning, as Toby
stated, is probably the primary reason that the species uF is currently
not under development).

While I do agree that it's important that this community is careful
about what it works on, we shouldn't be exclusive and we shouldn't
assume that we know where certain community members want to focus their
attention. If a couple of people want to come into the Microformats
community to develop their vocabularies, we shouldn't say that there
isn't a place for them.

I, for one, would be interested to see how a bioformats discussion would
evolve *ba-dum-bum* =P. We're talking about the bits and pieces that
make us who we are! Allowing us to identify and process that information
could help us better understand how we're connected to each other as a
species. That seems like a fairly noble endeavor.

Ever played around with 23andme.com[1]? Being able to mark up your
personal genome on 23andme and have the browser cross-link against
SNPedia[2] automatically would be really awesome.

In short, we could help them work through some of the more subtle
language and vocabulary issues while helping an initiative that could
very well benefit the human condition. The discussion may come to
nothing, but let's give it a chance before shutting it down prematurely.

-- manu

[1] https://www.23andme.com/about/
[1] http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/SNPedia

-- 
Manu Sporny
President/CEO - Digital Bazaar, Inc.
blog: Bitmunk 3.1 Website Launch
http://blog.digitalbazaar.com/2009/01/16/bitmunk-3-1-website-launch