Wiki?

[attrezzo]

http://www.hammockforums.net/forum/s...d=1#post211748

The second post in this thread had me thinking...

It might be worthwhile to start a hammocking wiki. There's plenty of information we all would want to share with the twist being all of the pages dedicated to the wiki would be specifically camping/hammock related.

I'm often bewildered by the older members of these forums as well as they've been reading them so long it seems like every time I start a post or topic something's already been said and I missed the post.

Or a search on something like "whoopie sling" turns up so many results it's hard to get down to the nitty gritty without spending a few good hours weeding through the commentary.

Anyway, ideally, a wiki would simmer all of the various instructional guides and gear definitions together.

I'd be willing to get things started in providing some structure and writing a few of the initial pages. If only to give those with more comprehensive information a good place to start.

[Cannibal]

There is one here.
Could always use some updating if you're feeling frisky.

[angrysparrow]

A lot of info could be added to the Wikipedia page, but what attrezzo is talking about would quickly outgrow it, needing a full dedicated wiki.

The mods have talked about a wiki before, but never took action. For one, it's an enormous undertaking. But also, it's kind of an end-around the forum itself. So much fantastic information and cross-feedback comes from the discourse in various threads. It would be a shame for newcomers to go directly to the wiki, and perhaps miss out on so many wonderful 'follow the rabbit-trail' style diversions into new ideas.

I think it's wonderful that there are so many ideas and so much info here that it takes time and effort to study and sort it all out.

Still, it's a project worth considering.

[attrezzo]

There is one here.
Could always use some updating if you're feeling frisky.

heh, an abbreviated version of what I was thinking.

That's a wiki article. Because it's on wikipedia, the entry is biased toward general human interest. It's written so that if John Doe, who doesn't know what a hammock is, runs across the article he can understand what a hammock is and why it is and when it was and so on.

To help you see what the difference is:

Here's the wikipedia article on the game "guild wars":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guild_wars

And here's an entire wiki about guild wars: (I was suggesting something similar but about hammocking specifically)
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Main_Page

The former is an article written to document the game itself from a general and unbiased perspective. The latter is a encyclopedia of game specific knowledge targeted at people who play guild wars and want more detailed information.

I was imagining something like the latter, only biased towards the hanger/backpacking/floating/climbing crowd.

There might be individual articles about amsteel's use in whoopie slings, different knots used in hammocking, different hammocks and manufacturers, how to articles, hell maybe some celebrity articles. Like a Shug article! It would be considerably smaller than most wikis I imagine but I was thinking it could serve as a good link-to point. A source that noobs (like me) can use to get a whole lot of detailed information very quickly without having to dig in these forums. Though I'd dig in them anyway.

Anyway, that was the idea. ;-)

[attrezzo]

A lot of info could be added to the Wikipedia page, but what attrezzo is talking about would quickly outgrow it, needing a full dedicated wiki.

The mods have talked about a wiki before, but never took action. For one, it's an enormous undertaking. But also, it's kind of an end-around the forum itself. So much fantastic information and cross-feedback comes from the discourse in various threads. It would be a shame for newcomers to go directly to the wiki, and perhaps miss out on so many wonderful 'follow the rabbit-trail' style diversions into new ideas.

Still, it's a project worth considering.

I had thought of that too. A bit like putting a highway bypass around a really wonderful little town. A well developed wiki would certainly lose a lot of the charm a good forum has. Much of the interaction is gone.

Still, it might be possible if you limit the articles to only those that are really important. Things like how-tos, the basic types of hammocks, maybe include a structure for promoting group hangs. (Something that is tough for a forum to accomplish). And set up some heavy cross-linking back to forum entries to get people clicking into the forums.

As far as work is concerned, after the structure is settled a community like this would likely run itself. I can certainly see lots of people who I think would be willing to post and article or two.

I'll see if I can find a good example of a community that made a wiki and survived, even thrived. I know I've seen a few before but they're largely related to computer stuff. Anyhow I'll give it a shot.

[Cannibal]

Oh, I know what you're talking about. We have several non-public Wikis that we have developed for our clients to help them understand how and why our software works. You'd be rather amazed how many 'bankers' don't get some of the fundamentals of risk analysis.

But like angrysparrow said, getting it started and keeping it current would be a massive undertaking. I'll sure read it if you build it.

[angrysparrow]

You need not look hard, attrezzo. One is here, hosted by the forum that generated it.

I will point out that we already have a dedicated Articles section that is underused. Perhaps we could get folks posting more of those...then, grow that into a full wiki once there's enough info...

[attrezzo]

Oh, I know what you're talking about. We have several non-public Wikis that we have developed for our clients to help them understand how and why our software works. You'd be rather amazed how many 'bankers' don't get some of the fundamentals of risk analysis.

But like angrysparrow said, getting it started and keeping it current would be a massive undertaking. I'll sure read it if you build it.

On the bankers, after the rather public mortgage crisis I would handily disagree. I would have been surprised. But now I'm just confused. heh.

No disagreement on getting it started. Makeing the structures and putting in the code is by far the hardest part. I've found once an article is made (especially if it's horrifically bad) it prods the users to correct it. And before long you have a dedicated team of wiki-addicts keeping things very current. That's really the key. In the wikis I've made it's best to create a structure and in all of the popular topics purposely put very silly misinformation in the topic. It will basically force your more anal types to figure out how to wiki so they can fix it, and they get addicted. It's evil, but it works.


I guess what I'm trying to say is that there are things a wiki can do better than a forum, and a forum can do some things better than a wiki.

Forums are for maintaining a community, it forces people to socially interact to get data efficiently. This is great for making friends and such. A question like "What kind of tarp should I buy?" is best answered by a forum. Also a topics like "I was thinking of starting a hang to go to so and so.", "And look at my cool new stove" are best handled in a forum.

Wikis are best as a knowledge compendium. Detailed group reference articles. Things like "What is a whoopie sling and how can I build one?" are best suited for a wiki.

Say Bob used his forum topic to determine there was some interest in going to hang at so and so, so he makes a wiki article detailing when, where, how, and who linking the forum entry to the article, and the article to the forum entry for commentary. Now Bob can edit the basic details and others can share their information, stuff like, "yeah I went to so and so a year ago, here's a good pic of soldiers whelp". Bob can put that pic in the main article. Additionally now that it's an article in a wiki it would be assigned a structure, so and so happens to be in the Oklahoma subcatagory, because it's in oklahoma. It's also and upcomming event so it goes into the greater catagory of upcomming events. Other people interested in Bob's hang can now drill down through upcomming events to get to events in oklahoma and they'll see Bob's so and so hang.

Say Bill's stove turned out to be a huge hit. People are constantly asking about his topic or posting other topics about mods on Bill's stove. It would be a good thing to create a wiki article for Bill's stove with the best known mods for it, boiling down those complex forum topics into one article that summarizes how to build and use a type Bill stove.

John's topic about bringing his cat along on a hang was funny and interesting, but in the long term serves no real informational value. It is best to leave it on the forums.

In short, I think it would work if we limited the new articles/topics to only those that are approved by moderators and encouraging heavy crosslinking. Requiring someone to intelligently make sure people won't start using it to ask the things a community could better answer. Instead only allow articles that are commonly referenced on the forums.

I noticed we already have a basic structure for it in the "Articles" link on the home page and it doesn't seem to detract from the forums one bit. A well placed wiki could do that job better by allowing anyone to update the articles as time goes on, preventing them from becomming outdated because the original poster lost interest.

[Cannibal]

compendium

Gonna be my word of the day.

[angrysparrow]

That's quite a rundown on wikis, for those that might be unfamiliar. I agree that some topics are well suited to being presented that way.

The current Articles section already has the ability for us to let authors (even multiple ones) maintain endlessly, in addition to new topics being by moderated for approval. And, bonus, that they are integrated into the forum itself.

I'm not at all opposed to a wiki. But, starting it by expanding the Articles is probably the best course. That information can easily be moved to a full wiki, when needed.