Wikis, Free and Easy

(and maybe some other stuff too, if there's time...)

Steven D. Krause | Department of English Language and Literature | Eastern Michigan University | February 2008

These are notes/links/materials for Krause's presentation at the Wiki Symposium, February 8, 2008.

Always remember and never forget:

Wikipedia is a wiki, but not all wikis are Wikipedia.

 A few other quick (and fun) examples:

• Lostpedia (about the TV show Lost)
• Wikitravel
• Wikibooks
• SpongeBob SquarePants
• CompPile FAQ Wiki

LOTS of different software choices for Wikis-- Here's a link to a Wikipedia list that compares many of these packages

Basically, Wiki software is available in three categories:

• Free and Open Source (MediaWiki, which supports Wikipedia, PmWiki, etc, etc.)
  • Advantages: free, powerful, cool
  • Disadvantages: complicated, requires server space and more
• Free and quasi-commerical (what I'll demonstrate/talk about below)
  • Advantages: free (sort of), easy
  • Disadvantages: limited, some with ads and other catches, not cool
• For a fee (such as the not free version of PBWiki)
  • Advantages (I assume): lots of features, easy, supported
  • Disadvantges (I assume): not cool, expensive

Today's examples:

• ScribbleWiki
  • Link to ScribbleWiki What my students said about ScribbleWiki My goofy example
• Wikia
  • Link to Wikia What my students said about Wikia My goofy example (not)
• Wikispaces
  • Link to Wikispaces What my students said about Wikispaces My goofy example
• PBWiki
  • Link to PBWiki What my students said about PBWiki My goofy example (besides this page)

And if there's time...

How would you use this stuff, anyway?  I can talk through two different examples:

• The English 516 PBWiki
• The WWWW Wiki