I’d like to say I’m a heavy user of Wikipedia. I don’t have any stats to prove that. But, I’ll still try. How about the fact that a lot of times I hit Wikipedia before Google to do my research. How about, I even have a Firefox smart keyword for Wikipedia search? How about that I quoted Wikipedia extensively in my PhD thesis! OK, just kidding on the last one.
Wikis are fun. I, for one, am a wiki fan. Not long after I started using Wikipedia, I wanted to have one of my own. Wiki that is. What came next surprised me! It’s quite easy to start your own wiki. Easier than adding your own page to Wikipedia only to see it deleted almost instantaneously by a Beowulf cluster of Wikipedia editors. There are websites that provide you hosting for your very own wiki. They are called wiki farms. I confess I started with a Google search on this, and, ended up signing up at Wikidot.com. A Wikipedia search would have sufficed just fine, leading me up to this.
If you have tried out any of these and have anything specific to say, holler@me using comments below. As far as I am concerned, I have tried Wikidot and Wikia. I like Wikia more because it’s MediaWiki based, which means you don’t have to learn a new markup language. The biggest advantage I saw was that they allow you to download a database backup of your wiki (any wiki for that matter). That’s more than I need for now. Wikidot’s only feature that attracted some attention was its tag feature. You can attach text tags to any page you edit. This is a little step towards helping people find what they are looking for.
Having said that, there’s nothing like your own own wiki. Sometime ago, I installed my own copy of Mediawiki here. I do feel that wikis are a powerful way to make knowledge accessible. Wikipedia has already demonstrated that. It’s time for you to get your knowledge out there; planted as a wiki in a wiki farm.
