The Uninivited- Crashing the Sandbox Party- Test #17

So..... I dutifully attempted to do the exercise for Playing Around with PBWiki only to find out that I needed an invitation to the JPL Learning 2.0 Sandbox. It would not let me in. I did not have an invitation and did not know the secret word. So, I sent out some SOSes. And NO ONE ANSWERED ME! sniff! No one told me that it was exclusive invitation! HA! We'll just see about that!

So- I guessed it. And I got in there and played around in the sandbox. Don't worry. I raked the sand so it's not that obvious that I was there.

Wiki Tiki Tavi- # 16 So what's in a wiki?

Assignment: What did you find interesting? What types of applications within libraries might work well with a wiki?
I work with and have been published in a Resource Sharing Wiki: shareill. It's a great tool for ILL staff to use and saves a lot of searching through the Internet for information we need. It was also very easy to add information and correct information. The shareill wiki does make it clear, though: "if you aren't open to what you write being changed around, don't post here."

I like the way wikis have been used by other libraries in this exercise. It would be easier if JPL's recommended websites could be in a wiki that's accessible by JPL librarians as in the SJCPL Subject Guides. It would speed up correcting defunct websites. I also like the way other libraries used the wiki as a way to get customer input and build community oriented sites. I was puzzled by the Bull Run Public Library site. It's more of a Twitter-type site with the short bits of information they give. I was concerned about the ads showing up in some of the wikis.

So- I can see how libraries could use wikis in two different ways- for building community and support through customer participation and for making it easier for staff to update information for recommended websites while exercising some professional and local control over the content. But as the shareill founders said- you can't count on what you place in the wiki being unchanged. Librarians pride themselves as trying to provide accurate verifiable information and that's not always a given in a wiki set-up.