the wiki and the dead

Well, I think Wikis are fine in certain applications. I personally find it hard to allow the books to be opened for just anyone to write in. I think the reason we have the word "experts" is because we need a word for these people, just as we need the people themselves. We need to be able to trust in expertise. I understand the democracy angle, but I think the people who work so hard in their fields deserve the respect of being listened to, and in some situations, the open ended creation of wikis allows too much leeway for facts to be distorted. That said, however, I also think that for social applications, they are a marvellous forum for groups to promote ideas, activities, build artistic communities, or what have you. Gig guides could be updated by the performers, or venues, without worrying about printing deadlines. Lexicons of slang terms or business jargon could be updated daily, following the trends of human speech as quick as the language itself evolves. Heaven forbid though, that the Oxford dictionary should ever end up as the Oxford Wiki. We can't measure how far we've progressed if we lose sight of the starting point. As far as library applications, I think Wikis are really just like The Fitch, except they include the customer as well. The platform is open to any of us to add to the fitch, not as a successor to OPAC, but as an aide. I think wikis should remain in a similar proportion. Just like web 2.0, I think they are supplements, not replacements.