Wiki: Pedia

A wiki is a website designed for collaborative editing, letting many people create, update, and organize content directly in a web browser.

They emphasize simplicity and openness — pages can be created or modified without special technical skills, and most maintain an edit history so revisions can be reviewed or reverted.

Common features
- **Collaborative editing:** Multiple people can edit the same pages, occasionally concurrently.
- **Edit history:** Each change is logged with a time and the editor’s name or IP.
- **Interlinking:** Links between pages are simple to create, helping build connected content.
- **Lightweight markup:** Formatting is usually handled by lightweight markup languages (e.g., WikiText or Markdown).
- **Permission settings:** Wikis may allow public editing or restrict changes to registered or authorized users.
- **Discussion pages:** Talk or discussion pages let contributors debate edits and organization.

Common uses
- Crowd-sourced knowledge resources (e.g., Wikipedia)
- Internal documentation and company knowledge bases
- Group writing and collaborative note-taking
- School and instructional projects

Benefits
- **Fast collaboration:** Contributors can rapidly create and improve content.
- **Openness:** Edit histories and talk pages reveal how content decisions were made.
- **Expandable:** They scale organically as users add more pages and topics.

Drawbacks
- **Vandalism and false information:** Public editing can lead to vandalism or incorrect information.
- **Inconsistent quality:** Content quality may vary widely between pages.
- **Organizational issues:** Lack of structure or rules can lead to disorganization and conflicts.

Example
- **Wikipedia** — a well-known wiki operated by the Wikimedia Foundation and written by volunteers around the globe.