BMC Biology | Full text | From taxonomic literature to cybertaxonomic content

"The call to revitalize taxonomy by embracing the internet has been sounded for more than a decade. The time is ripe to significantly increase the volume of taxonomic information freely available online. But simply posting information online will not automatically reinvigorate taxonomy. There are myriad online sites dedicated to particular taxa or projects. These are useful to users interested in questions within the site's domains. But the greater potential lies in mechanisms for aggregating primary source data in ways that allow users to filter and recombine data easily and flexibly for whatever purposes they imagine.... [T]he goal of taxonomy should not simply be to describe every species on Earth, but to make that information accessible. Understanding biodiversity is such a massive challenge that the traditional approach of working in relative isolation to produce paper publications for colleagues and libraries is simply too inefficient. But there is an alternative model: increase the value of knowledge by giving it away to the world on a massive scale, and empower others to help it grow. More than 250 years after taxonomists began describing and cataloging species, the internet and an ethic of information sharing let us organize biodiversity information in a way that is responsive to the questions and the challenges of our changing world."