Are Wikis on the Way Out?
TL Infobits
“Have wikis lost their mojo? Were they before their (Internet) time? Or have they been co-opted by the newer, shinier social networks?”
In “Whither Wikis? The State of Collaborative Web Publishing” (LINUX INSIDER, April 29, 2009) Renay San Miguel asks if the usefulness of wikis has run its course. He speculates that the tool is too “nerdy,” takes too much work, and requires too much oversight.
In response to San Miguel’s argument, THE CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION asked the question “Have Wikis Run Out of Steam?” (April 30, 2009). The resulting reader comments indicate that many college and university Instructors still continue to find wikis beneficial for their courses and students.
Sample comments:
“I use them as course reference repositories and extend them on to new sessions for students to use and continue to build. I think they are a great way to build communal knowledge.”
“At Penn State Press we have been using a wiki to distribute information about books proposed for acceptance to our faculty editorial board for a year now, and this has been a huge success, appreciated by the faculty for its ease of use 24/7 and by the staff because, among other things, it saves a ton of photocopying paper and hence is a boon to the environment.”
TL Infobits is an electronic service of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill ITS Teaching and Learning division. Each month the ITS-TL’s Academic Outreach Consultant monitors and selects from a number of information and instructional technology sources that come to her attention and provides brief notes for electronic dissemination to educators.
Link: https://its.unc.edu/TeachingAndLearning/publications/tlinfobits/CCM3_007214#2
