User:Manutius/blog/

=The Blog=

Intro - 21 August 2007
I have chosen to place a blog here as it is my intention to use this as a place to journal my thoughts not only on the wikis I have founded and contributed to but also on wikis themselves and perhaps a few other things as the mood takes me. I have no desire to maintain a blog for each of my main wikis. Keeping it here simplifies things.

Since the development of wikis by Ward Cunningham, they have come to play an increasing role in Tim Berners-Lee vision of the Web. According to an interview I read with the conceptualiser of the internet, the idea of Web 2.0 - the social, collaborative web - exemplified by wikis and social bookmarking is still Web 1.0 which consists of elements contained in the original vision. Web 2.0 implies an extension of the concept, but it seems that this is misguided.

Wikia for me significantly shifts wiki concepts into the place of a Community of Practice. At least in public. The idea of a wiki in a Community of Practice has existed before now, but this is the most public display of it. Wikipedia is not about communities of practice but about a huge knowledge base. Within it communities of interest have sprung up, but it is not the same as Wikia which has added additional support elements for communities, such as mailing lists and forums.