What in the Wiggity World is a Wiki?
- Ebony Brewer
- Feb 9, 2021
- 4 min read
If you're like me, the first thing you think of when you hear the word "wiki" is good ol' Wikipedia. But have you ever thought about why Wikipedia is called Wikipedia? Well, before today neither had I.
It turns out the "wiki" in Wikipedia, is more than just a memorable name for a website. According to Oxford Languages, a wiki is, "a website that allows collaborative editing of its content and structure by its user." When you apply this definition to the rest of the website's name, "pedia", it suddenly makes sense as to why the name Wikipedia was chosen. Wikipedia is a website which houses information about anything and everything (like an encyclopedia) however, it has a unique characteristic of being able to be edited by anyone who chooses to visit the site (like a wiki).
As it turns out there are wikis for thousands, if not millions, of topics spanning the internet. There are wikis about social media platforms, musicians, movies, animals, you name it! If there is information to be shared, there is probably a wiki about it.
Not only was this my first time learning about what a wiki is, but I also had the opportunity to create one. Now I will say, my wiki is quite bland compared with the wonderful wikis of the world, but what can I say? I barely knew what I was doing. But that's the beauty of a wiki. Anyone with interest in a subject, coupled with limited knowledge of said subject, can create a wiki specifically to learn about that subject!
According to Zach Lebar, author of the article, "What are Wikis and Why Should You Use Them?" , a wiki consists of collaborative editing by the people who use it. This means, people with much more knowledge than you can take hold of your wiki and turn into the educational smorgasbord of your dreams! And all you have to do is start the conversation. That's pretty darn cool, and the defining feature which makes wikis so unique.
My wiki was about YouTube. More specifically, YouTube as a writing machine. In my wiki, I begin to explore the subject of how writing on YouTube differs from writing on other social media platforms. Some of the questions I hope my wiki could answer ( if extensive information was added to it) are: What kind of things do people mostly write about in YouTube? Is the writing mostly positive or negative? Who makes up the writing community on YouTube? How does writing on YouTube differ from other popular social media platforms? At this point the questions are virtually endless.
Aside from creating my own wiki, I was tasked with linking my wiki to other wikis, and other wikis to . . . other other wikis. I decided to link my wiki to separate wikis about Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook in order to give more context to the social media platforms I was comparing writing on YouTube with. I also linked a wiki about computers to a wiki about email, a wiki about iPads to a wiki about Computers, and a Wiki about YouTube to another wiki about YouTube.
For me, the process of creating a wiki was quite stressful. I had no idea what a wiki was. As mentioned earlier, I thought Wikipedia was its own unique name having nothing to do with a type of website known to many users of the internet. Needless to say, I had no idea where to start. I kind of winged my wiki's layout as best I could and tried to make it a bit more interesting by messing with sentence format and text color. When I compared my wiki to the wikis my classmates created I must admit, I was a bit embarrassed.
Another thing that stressed me out about my wiki was not having control of the format of the information other people added to my wiki. I'm a bit anal retentive when it comes to stuff like this. For example, I have dreaded the thought of letting my son decorate the Christmas tree when he gets older, because I know he isn't going to make it look the way I want it to look. I know. It's shameful. But what can I say? Knowing you have a problem is the first step to recovery right? Needless to say, when it comes to certain things, I like to have control of the outcome, and with wikis, I don't have the control I so desperately crave!
As for following the links others left on their wiki pages, I felt disorganized in the most organized way possible. I followed a linear path from one piece of information to the next. Everything worked as it was designed to, and the information made sense in relation to the page it was linked to. However, I found myself becoming a bit overwhelmed with the multiple tabs that were opened in my browser. Yes, I know. Hello. Ms. Anal Retentive is back.
I can't stand having too many pages open in my browser. It feels incredibly disorganized and crowded. Maybe this could be remedied by having experienced wiki creators edit the pages so that they flow more fluidly, and efficiently. But regardless of the design, it seems to be extremely easy to fall down a rabbit hole of linked information.
All in all, I think wikis are a cool idea. They're a unique way of compiling information for users all over the world to use and interact with. Will I ever be making a wiki again? Not unless I'm forced to. But the experience did help me to better understand what wikis are and how they work. If you're interested, all of the wikis I linked to (as mentioned above) can be found below.
Linked Wiki Pages
Wiki Facebook Abdullah Bu Khader , Wiki Instagram Sweebe , Wiki Twitter Barone -> Wiki YouTube Brewer
*I read all of the above pages plus:
Comments