Compare and contrast blogs and wikis. Comment on the importance of convergence in today's networked world. How can blogs be used for collaboration? Can you think of a new use for a wiki that has not been done yet?
Technology is always opening doors
to new ways of communicating and collaborating. It’s constantly changing the
way people create and share information. Two examples are wikis and blogs. Two
different forms of communication enabled through the new media that has become
the pinnacle of network convergence.
For startles, a blog, is defined by
an unknown author of the website https://www.wooster.edu/offices/web/how/scotblogs/wiki-blog/ is “an
abbreviated version of Weblog, which is a term used to describe Web sites that
maintain an ongoing chronicle of information. A blog is a frequently updated,
personal Web site featuring diary-type commentary and links to articles or
other Web sites.” Basically the author argues that a blog is a digital diary
that’s not so secretive, in where the author has the freedom to write their
personal opinions and maintain complete ownership and control of the content on
their blog. While a wiki is “a website that provides collaborative modification
of its content and structure directly from the web browser” as defined in Wikipedia.
In other words, a digital form of collaborating using a website as a medium, where
multiple people have access to editing its content. Wikis are often used by
business and schools. The reason why is because this type of collaborating
makes it easy to exchange information and ideals within groups. Gardiner Morse agrees
to this point on his article “Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales on making the most
of company wikis”, when he said that “wikis are great tools for helping people
to come to consensus quickly, whether about what to put on a meeting agenda or
how best to meet customer’s needs.
All of that being said, the key difference
between a blog and a wiki, is the extent of collaboration. A wiki’s content is
done by more than one person, while a blog’s is usually done by one individual.
However, that doesn’t mean that one can’t use a blog for to collaborate with
others. In his article “Brooklyn Blog
Helps Lead to Drug Raid” by Michael Wilson, he writes on how almost every
neighborhood in Brooklyn has a blog, and how bloggers communicate among each
other. He gets into detail on his article on how Brooklyn bloggers write about
bad activities that goes around their neighborhood, especially when they
believe to have a “crack house” around the area. He then states this type of
collaboration among bloggers creates a safer environment, because it gives the
police insights. Which ultimately helps the police enforce the law, and create
a safer environment.
Furthermore, with
the notion that the world must become smaller in order for humanity to evolve
and advance, network convergence has only become crucial as time progress. Work
places and academies have increase the demand for collaborative work to get better
solutions to problems. But the issue is time, collaborative work usually is
time consuming, and finding time to work on projects can really be a major
issue: Wikis, have really hit the nail on the head to this problem. Wikis invites
a frictionless way of working with people without the need of their physical presence.
On the other hand, blogs makes the spreading of information easier and gives
the people the power to become publishers. This in fact makes a smaller world.
People from all over the world can get different narratives of cultures and
places with the comfort of being at home. Not only that, but through blogs
people can comment and view others opinions, which promote the idea that every individuals
voice is hear. Ultimately, through network convergence people can work together
since the obstacles of communication has been eliminated; and all being
possible through unison that network convergence has welcomed.
On a side note, a
pretty neat idea for a wiki, would be to create a wiki page on Baruch College
student. I feel that a Wikipedia page on the student’s at Baruch, their likes,
and dislikes, etc. This would give Baruch’s staff an invaluable insight on how
the students feels, and if there are any issues, then it could be targeted
easier.
References:
3. “Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales on
making the most of company wikis” by Gardiner Morse
4. “Brooklyn Blog Helps Lead to Drug
Raid” by Michael Wilson
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