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BESG starting a mirror site

on 4th July 2012

The BESG website is now under the control of the Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research, Faculty of Science, National University of Singapore. Eventually a stable mirror site will develop. This major move is courtesy of Prof Peter KL Ng, Director of RMBR (below left). N Sivasothi (below centre-left), Kenneth Pinto and Chua Keng Soon (below centre-right) are providing the expertise for the move.

Prof Ng made the announcement this afternoon at the official Launch of “Private Lives: An Exposé of Singapore’s Rainforests” and the “Digital Nature Archive of Singapore” with the Minister of Information, Communications and the Arts, Dr Yaacob Ibrahim was in attendance as Guest-of-Honour.

This move is necessary to ensure stability and continuity of the website. Since its establishment in July 2007 the website has posted nearly 2,500 accounts of bird behaviour and related subjects. At the same time it has attracted a total of nearly 3 million visits from bird and nature enthusiasts from all over the world.

Such a massive and popular website attracts numerous spammers hoping to benefit from our traffic. At the same time the site has been experiencing link rot and image disappearance. The site urgently needs housekeeping to bring the many posts up to date. Though tedious and time consuming, housekeeping needs to be done to maintain the quality and integrity of the website. After all, the website had become a valuable database on bird behaviour, not only to Singapore and the region, but also to the world at large.

Currently, N Sivasothi and Dr Zeehan Jaafar (above right), both from the Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Singapore, are making full use of the website in their cross-faculty courses. The website is the resource where the students search for aspects of ecology and animal behaviour. Being non-biology students, they have a better chance of understanding the generally non-technical style of writings than if they are to refer to scientific papers in journals.

The question of continuity is another crucial matter. The website should continue even when the current group of activists fade into the background. Under the control of RMBR, there is a good possibility of the website continuing to operate should such a scenario becomes a reality.

At the same time the primary site is being maintained courtesy of Jacqueline Lau who has been hosting it all this time.

BESG aims to continue to make information on bird ecology collated by citizen scientists available to anyone from any part of the world with access to a computer. This will be BESG’s contribution to ornithology.

If you like this post please tap on the Like button at the left bottom of page. Any views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the authors/contributors, and are not endorsed by the Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum (LKCNHM, NUS) or its affiliated institutions. Readers are encouraged to use their discretion before making any decisions or judgements based on the information presented.

YC Wee

Dr Wee played a significant role as a green advocate in Singapore through his extensive involvement in various organizations and committees: as Secretary and Chairman for the Malayan Nature Society (Singapore Branch), and with the Nature Society (Singapore) as founding President (1978-1995). He has also served in the Nature Reserve Board (1987-1989), Nature Reserves Committee (1990-1996), National Council on the Environment/Singapore Environment Council (1992-1996), Work-Group on Nature Conservation (1992) and Inter-Varsity Council on the Environment (1995-1997). He is Patron of the Singapore Gardening Society and was appointed Honorary Museum Associate of the Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum (LKCNHM) in 2012. In 2005, Dr Wee started the Bird Ecology Study Group. With more than 6,000 entries, the website has become a valuable resource consulted by students, birdwatchers and researchers locally and internationally. The views and opinions expressed in this article are his own, and do not represent those of LKCNHM, the National University of Singapore or its affiliated institutions.

Other posts by YC Wee

8 Responses

  1. Great progress, congratulations, I am sure being with a scientific body like RMBR further proves the quality of the contributions. Once again, congratulations.

    1. Thanks Howard and Jing Yi. Yes, joining up with RMBR definitely boost BESG’s status in terms of scientific contents, etc.

  2. Yes collaboration with RMBR definately a good foresight move.
    A win win situation for BESG activists and RMBR.

    Congratulations! on another milestone forward.

    Daisy O’Neill

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