Why are Wikis Important?

• Wikis are instantaneous; no need to wait around for a publisher to create a new edition to fix a mistake or update information.
• Wikis are collaborative and promote cooperation; people from all over the world can work on the same project.
• Wikis are a place where knowledge, skills, experiences and other beneficial information can be shared.
• Wiki content is not off-limits which means that the written can be rewritten.
• Wikis are affordable and most often free.

Insights

WikiWiki means quick or fast in Hawaiian.  For a more complete definition go to Wikipedia.

Around Ohio

• Using Blogs and Wikis to Promote Information Literacy Skills and Library Resources (Ohio University).

Around the Nation

• Seven Things You Should Know About Wikis by Educause.
• The Wikipedia War, an article from Technology Review about the pitfalls and changing rules of Wikis (Massachusetts Institute of Technology).
• Teaching, Learning, and Other Uses for Wikis in Academia (University of South Carolina).
• Teaching tips for Wikis (Middle Tennessee State University).
• From beginner to pro, a great site for wiki users (Texas A&M University).
• Blogs and Wikis: Environments for On-line Collaboration (Virginia Commonwealth University).

Around the World

• Intro to Wikis, what good is a wiki, and examples, and wiki software (University of Calgary).
• Educational Wikis: features and selection criteria (Athabasca University, Canada).
• Proceedings for the 2005 International Symposium on Wikis.

Examples

• Wikipedia - Free encyclopedia.
• Wikibooks - Free textbooks and manuals.
• Wikiquote - Collection of quotations.
• Wikisource - Free source documents.
• Wiktionary - Dictionary and thesaurus.
• Wikinews - Free content news source.
• Wikimedia Commons - Shared media repository.
• Wikispecies - Directory of species.

• Go to the Wiki Sandbox: a site built for wiki demo so you may see how it works.

Free and Low Cost Tools

• PC / Windows software
  Connect to Microsoft's Wiki Workspace. You just need a username and password.