To blog or to wiki?

[Maggie Berndt]

It's been a few months since the Illinois Humanities Council's New
Media Roundtable discussion - thank you all so much for coming and
sharing your technological expertise with us! We've done some
research and discussed recommendations and plan to make some final
choices on two to three priorities to take on.

We're currently in the planning stages of our next year-long,
statewide series, "Running on Empty: Conversations on Oil and Water."
The series is going to be focused on how history, civilizations, and
individuals have been shaped by access to and control of oil and
water. The series will be launching in fall 2008. I've uploaded a
complete description of the series into the "Files" if you want to
read more.

As part of the series, we're hoping to have a technological element to
post resources (links to relevant articles, perhaps speaker bios) and
encourage discussion about the topic and the programs. Right now,
we're thinking about doing another blog (like we did with our Genetics
series), but we're also exploring creating a wiki. To take a look at
our previous Genetics page and blog, you can visit www.prairie.org/Genetics
and http://ihckeeptalking.wordpress.com/.

We thought we'd appeal to your superior knowledge and see what you
guys thought - what are the advantages and disadvantages of a blog and
a wiki? What experiences have any of you had with either form? Or
should we try to do some combination of both? Our ideas so far have
been uploaded into the "Files" section as well, so feel free to read
that and give us some feedback or just let us know what you think
might work best for us.

We'd really appreciate your guidance on this - any and all opinions,
corrections, and suggestions are much appreciated!


Maggie

[Aaron]

My 2 cents: I think, as with so many things, the tool you choose
should depend on the goals at hand. Adding a technological element to
a project because it's cool (and I've been guilty of this myself) is
just not a good enough reason to do so. What do you hope will come out
of the project? I understand using a blog to encourage discussion
after the fact (one suggestion if you go this route again: try to get
your speakers to contribute so that attendees can "talk" directly with
them); I'm less clear as to what the desired goal of adding a wiki
would be. Can you write a little more about that?

best,
Aaron Rester
Manager of Electronic Communications
University of Chicaog Law School

[Dimitra Tasiouras]

Hi Aaron:

Good questions. And we actually don't want to add something just because
it's new and cool. Our main goals are to:

Provide a way to engage people on the oil and water issues outside of
the public programs
Provide a way to connect people to resources and information on the
issues, whether they attend a program or not - articles, books,
organizations, etc.

So we've been trying to figure out ways that we can do both, if
possible.

Sincerely,
Dimitra Tasiouras
************************************
Director of Programs and Partnerships
Illinois Humanities Council
17 N. State St. Suite 1400
Chicago, IL 60602.3296
312.422.5585 ext. 225
312.422.5588 Fax
http://www.prairie.org
d...@prairie.org

Watch the "Future Perfect: Conversations on the Meaning of the Genetics
Revolution" programs online at IllinoisChannel.org/Genetics.htm or
download and listen at ChicagoPublicRadio/Amplified.
Coming in Fall 2008, our next year-long, statewide series, Running On

Empty: Conversations on Oil and Water

[Stelios Valavanis]

the blog is ideal for discussion regardless if it's a response to material
being presented or simply open talk on a topic. this is a clear fit with your
goals and with formats you use.

a wiki is very different. since you can edit material, it's not so much a
forum for discussion but rather a collaborative tool allowing multiple
parties to work on a common document or set of documents. while i'm glad
everyone is sensitive to misusing technology for technology's sake it is that
sort of thinking that sometimes leads to a breakthrough. so let's get far
fetched and think of ways to use more technology in this context. if all we
come up with is superficial then we drop it.

perhaps a wiki can be used as an engaging exercise where those who have viewed
or attended the "running on empty" series can work with others to develop
a "position" paper on how we can change or even a statement to our government
or some such documents. perhaps they can start with developing an plan for
producing materials or maybe other action. the blog can be the vehicle to
communicate with and the wiki to actually produce something. another document
i can think of is a list of scientific and policy questions that the
participants can suggest need to be answered. perhaps the experts
participating in the series can work on a closed set of wiki documents
(viewable by the public) to develop a position paper, etc. i'm just thinking
out loud here.

--
_______________________________________
stel valavanis http://www.onshore.com/

[Aaron Rester]

On Nov 18, 2007, at 12:42 AM, Stelios Valavanis wrote:

perhaps a wiki can be used as an engaging exercise where those who have viewed 

or attended the "running on empty" series can work with others to develop 

a "position" paper on how we can change or even a statement to our government 

or some such documents. perhaps they can start with developing an plan for 

producing materials or maybe other action. the blog can be the vehicle to 

communicate with and the wiki to actually produce something. another document 

i can think of is a list of scientific and policy questions that the 

participants can suggest need to be answered. perhaps the experts 

participating in the series can work on a closed set of wiki documents 

(viewable by the public) to develop a position paper, etc. i'm just thinking 

out loud here.

Yes, I agree that this is the sort of thing IHC could use a wiki for. Some questions to consider, though -- I might as well keep playing devil's advocate :-) -- is what will the policy for moderation be? Would anyone be able to to contribute to the wiki, or just the participants in the lectures (perhaps they could be issued a password or something)? If it's wide open (a la Wikipedia), what will be the policy for dealing with abusive/nonsense/completely crazy contributions?

--

Aaron Rester

Manager of Electronic Communications

University of Chicago Law School

1111 E. 60th St., Chicago, IL 60637

phone: 773.702.4782

email: are...@uchicago.edu

[Stelios Valavanis]

i would say make it completely open. somebody needs to keep an eye to correct
offensive things and to catch spam (what's the term when someone takes over a
wiki or web site to put in ads - it happens in forums too typically to
advertise porn). still that's less work than moderating and you will
definitely exclude some users by making any kind of membership or account.
keep it all in some kind of version control system like svn so that you can
roll back to a specific date if need be.

--

[Maggie Berndt]

Thanks so much for your input! Both Stel and Aaron have hit upon the
biggest reservation I have about a wiki: contributions and moderation.
Who would get to contribute? How often would we need to monitor
content ?And would people who are not used to seeing a wiki (probably
a lot of the IHC audience isn't all that computer savvy) be able to
understand that it's constantly changing and evolving, but that those
changes aren't reflected in its outer structure they would be on a
blog. And would they understand that they too can make changes?

Lack of familiarity is always an issue with any new technology, but
since we want to encourage people to repeatedly visit and contribute,
I think that's something we have to consider.

> > email: ares...@uchicago.edu
>
> --
> _______________________________________
> stel valavanis http://www.onshore.com/- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[Stelios Valavanis]

sounds like you should do a forum and not a wiki.

[Andy Hermann]

I agree -- a forum seems the best option for what the IHC is looking for.

A blog should be easy enough to set up too (a forum AND a blog -- why not?), and it would work best if it were based on your site (say prairie.org/blog) and prominently featured.  Use links whenever possible, and build up your blogroll.

Andy Hermann
www.outsidetheloopradio.com
www.wluw.org