Under the direction of Marshall Iliff,
eBird project leader, the technical infrastructure, database, and linkages to external digital resources will be coordinated at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, one of the foremost interfaces between ornithological science and the broader ornithological community in the world. The database will be built in collaboration with Denis Lepage, creator of
Avibase, and firmly rooted in the adoption of taxonomic concepts. Taxonomic concepts, an organizational structure for taxonomies that already has been applied by Avibase across all major checklists, will not only allow us to better understand differences among existing lists, but also will be used to track future taxon changes over time and ensure that external data resources are accurately linked. Avibase already acts as a repository for much of the information WGAC hopes to maintain and will continue to play a key role in the maintenance of the new global list.
The final checklist will produce more than just a hierarchical list of species and recommended names. It will provide, through its detailed fields and connections to external references, the basic information for all ornithology – professional ornithologists, citizen scientists, conservationists and students – to draw on the full record of diversity of earth’s birdlife.
