Hello -

For the past couple of weeks my friend Kris & I have been putting together the beginnings of a belly dance wiki called BellyWiki. BellyWiki (www.bellywiki.com) is a Wikipedia-style website intended to suppliment the already vast online community of belly dancers and belly dance enthusiasts.

BellyWiki came about because I'd noticed that lots of folks were asking around if there were a big list of moves/drills anywhere online. There didn't seem to be any centralized open-source place for that kind of thing. I thought a wiki would be a great format for this kind of thing because all of the knowledge would be written by the community. This allows for all the 7-bazillion names for each move to be recorded in one place.

I also think it will be a great place to gather all the wonderful linkies to the dancers, musicians, costume makers, etc. so we can all find each other. It can also provide a place where people can learn the history of belly dance and other kinds of information about our beloved art.

I extend participation in this wiki to any and all performers, instructors, students and afficianados of belly dance of all kinds.

I just got the site up on Monday, April 2nd. There's only a few articles so far, all written by volunteers. There's a big list of articles that need to be written and I'd like YOU to start writing them. Please don't be shy! Just follow the Articles Wish List link from the main page of BellyWIki to get started.

If you have any questions about how to work a wiki, or if you run into any technical problems, please message me on Tribe or visit the BellyWiki Tribe tribes.tribe.net/bellywiki You'll be able to give feedback there as well as see what's going on with the wiki.

This is the first wiki I've worked with so if you have any suggestions or comments, please feel free to share. I've made this site out of love and respect for the community and I hope you like it! If you have critiques for me, I'm open to hearing them. Just be gentle!

Thanks! Hope to see you on the wiki!