What are the ethics & etiquette of forking someone else's github project to release it as a gem?

Question

I\'m doing some spare time coding around CultureGrid. They have a SOLR API to access 1.2m cultural artefacts. I\'ve released a gem to consume their service, but I\'ve got a nice

Answer 1

With regards to checking a project's status, there's a new site called http://stillmaintained.com/ where some people register whether their project is either maintained, looking for a maintainer, or abandoned.