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Wiki
Abstract | Background | Description
| Analysis | Conclusions | References
(pron. wee-kee or 'as an acceptable alternative' wick-ey, Ward accepts both)
Wikis are created to share and expand public/private knowledge on certain topics. Wikis are a collection of
evolving interconnecting web pages laden with hyperlinks, they are easily editable and can update immediately, wikis
are made to serve the whole community and should never serve individuals or small groups, and pages are searchable
to easily obtain information.
The first wiki (the WikiWikiWeb) was created by Ward Cunningham in 1994 and published onto the web in 1995 as a
forum to allow discussions on the topic of computer science.
Wiki technology excels at the easy creation of html pages that are easily editable through simple markup languages. Many wikis
update edits right away. Both content and organization of content are editable.
Since a lot of wikis are so easily accessed and editable there is always the threat of vandalism (negatively motivated deletions/additions/rearrangements),
but this is countered by an active community and being able to revert a page to a former state. 'Studies from IBM claim that most vandalism to Wikipedia
is removed in 5 minutes or less.' Wikipedia
A wiki refers either to the compilation of web pages or the software used to run a wiki. Wikis can be utilized for
public or private use and are used in either case as a searchable, easily editable database of information. Anyone within
the community of a wiki can create new web pages, edit content, restructure content for the purpose to achieve the best organized,
most accurate database as well as to stimulate thought on a topic. The people who contribute to wikis, WikiZens,
have created their own nomenclature [a couple examples follow].
WikiGnome People who 'clean' up the wiki; they are not appointed and are anyone who does the following: fix broken links,
misspellings, broken whitespace, move content to appropriate places, make sense out of words without spaces (KindOfLikeThis),
as well as any other editing to fit the wiki format [TextFormattingRules].
WalledGarden A set of wiki pages that only link to each other and are disconnected from the rest of the wiki or a set of pages
intended for an individual or a specific group of people and that may be off topic from the wiki. This is considered poor etiquette
in a wiki as the whole wiki should be available to the entire community and no part of it should be used for personal use. Wikis are
akin to socialism not capitalism.
Wikis are to serve the community of WikiZens and people who vandalize, add WikiSpam, create WalledGardens, or attempt WikiSquatting
are not tolerated and can even be banned from wikis.
Wikis are a powerful medium to gain a better understanding of a topic. Wikipedia is very well known,
but other wikis and what a wiki is is not necessarily common knowledge. This is an unfortunate situation
as wikis are yet another source to search for information and if they were more commonplace wiki communities
would grow larger, there would be more wikis on different topics, and wikis would be even more helpful.
There are drawbacks to a completely open source medium though. An example of this was the shutdown of the Wikitorial,
a wiki set up by the Los Angeles Times in the editorial section of its website. The shutdown was due to vandals
defacing the website, in this case there must not have been a strong community of WikiGnomes to efface the damage.
Another drawback is that it can be hard to determine whether information is accurate or not. One more crucial failing
is apparent on TheAdjunct, a wiki, when people give their opinions and do not strive for the truth of a topic, but rather
use the wiki as a board to post their thoughts and opinions [example: Starbucks]. Opinions are great, but not when
they get in the way during the search for truth/information.
Wikis can be very useful, but akin to other online hypertexted sites it can become a time waster or a device of
procrastination because there are so many links that take you to interesting topics/subjects that you did not
necessarily go to the wiki to look up, but you end up reading them out of interest. These sessions of impulse
wiki-ing can take up hours before one realizes how immersed one got.
Competing technologies to wikis are blogs, forums, chat rooms, online dictionaries, news sites, instant messaging
systems, cell phones, any technology that conveys information because people use these other methods to acquire
knowledge rather than using wikis.
As for the future you ask... well, the future holds something. I guarantee that. I will venture a fairly
safe [maybe] assumption that wikis will gain popularity due to the popularity of wikipedia. Wikis like that of the
failed Wikitorial will start popping up. As for the actual technology future of wikis, perhaps they will start
incorporating music and videos, they can already handle images.
Cunningham, Ward. 1995. http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WelcomeVisitors (accessed multiple times in late May 2006).
2001. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page (accessed multiple times in late May 2006).
http://grault.net/adjunct/ (accessed June 4, 2006).
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