wiki

A wiki is a collaboratively written website. Visitors of a wiki can read articles and also edit or add content to them.

"Wiki-wiki" means "quick" in the Hawaiian language; pronounced "wee kee wee kee".

Hi!,

Writing in a wiki is like zuihitsu. It is zen-like.. it is relaxing and feels good. There is very little thought-time between thinking of something to write and actually comitting it into the wiki world. One's most idle and fleeting notions can be taken advantage of. In a sense, a wiki may be thought of as collaborative zuihitsu.

Moreover, one is committing one's thoughts into a community of similar authors. Collaboration among those authors can make even humble ideas flourish.

Using a wiki

People have individual desires and uses, but there are some common trends. Where some view a website and therefore a wiki as a construct of information tools, others see an opportunity to intellectually vent, to author and create within the wiki, to help.

Some wikis set up a homepage and a mission statement and attempt to create a theme between all hosted pages. Other wikis are meant to be a collection of the outlet of creativity, and are only themed in that their regular authors have certain interests.

The wiki concept itself has become an excellent tool for collaboration and for the creation of online encyclopediae.

Some view a wiki as anarchic, others are structured. Some "walk the wiki", like one would "surf the net", where others delve deeply into specific topics. There have been efforts such as the meatball wiki Tour Bus which act somewhat like both, allowing a tour of featured wiki pages.

Ultimately, a wiki remains as both a live structure which may be used as a potent reference tool, and a pool of authors.. all desirous to create.