HELSINKI (Reuters) - After the wikipedia, the wikicar. "eCars - Now!" is a Finnish Internet community seeking to apply the collective approach taken by online collaborators like the authors of Wikipedia to start converting used petrol-fuelled cars to electric ones, with the first roll-out due this year.

The Finnish-language forum claims to be first of its kind in the world, and wants to provide an alternative to what its members perceive as foot-dragging in the oil and auto industries.

The group is working in the tradition of 'open source' projects laid down by information technology -- like the Linux computer operating system which was started by a Finn and challenged Microsoft's dominance.

"If we succeed very well it will create similar projects across the world with whom we can share what we know," said project participant Jukka Jarvinen, adding that a similar scheme was launching in Denmark.

"We're hoping to create a global movement."