User:Minihaa/Incorporation of doctoral theses

Incorporation of text and pictures from doctoral theses under a creative commons licence (thus material that is readily available) is in some cases an efficient way to grow Wikipedia. The literature overview section of PhD theses are in some cases very usable and typically well referenced (even though some drawbacks exist). Only the literature overview of a PhD thesis is suited as it is backed up by peer-reviewed literature.

Where to find

Numerous depositories exist with PhD theses under a free licence, for example:

• Use Google Advanced Search and set "usage rights" to "free to use, share or modify, even commercially". You can than search for PhD thesis specific topic, for example PhD thesis polymers.
• In Wikimedia Commons, see c:Category:Doctoral_theses
• Oxford CC 2.5
• st-andrews

The text should be under the right licence, please refer to Wikipedia:Copying_text_from_other_sources#Can_I_copy_from_open_license_or_public_domain_sources?

How to do

Once you have copied text from a PhD thesis into a Wikipedia article please mark it via the Template:CC-notice as for example in Carboxylate–based_metal–organic_frameworks#References.

Disadvantages

Using text from PhD theses may have potential drawbacks:

• The text might be very technical, a introduction might have to be written or the text might not be suited at all. You should be adept in the field to evaluate if the text is general enough to suit Wikipedia's requirements.