wikis

JotSpot is now Google Sites... and the lines blur

by Rob Cottingham – February 28, 2008 - 12:03pm

Wondering what happened to Google's acquisition of hosted-wiki-on-steroids-provider JotSpot? You're looking at it.

Screen capture of a Google Sites page

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Bedtime with Rob and Alex ep. 11: the wikified episode

by Alexandra Samuel and Rob Cottingham – February 28, 2008 - 10:58am

This episode, we take on wikis: when you should use them, and when you should try something else.

And we try on a new feature: the tip-off, where we alternate coming up with handy tips on a topic until one of us runs out. The result is our first 20-minute episode... which tells us we might want to review the rules. Maybe require each tip to be phrased as a limerick...

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Wikipedinsomnia

by Rob Cottingham – July 12, 2007 - 11:19am

Does your organization have a Wikipedia entry? Start monitoring it now.

by Rob Cottingham – March 13, 2007 - 12:01am

If your organization is listed in Wikipedia, the community-edited online encyclopedia, congratulations. Quite apart from the virtues of collaborative editing, Wikipedia entries often rank at or near the top of Google search results.

Now break open your RSS aggregator. You're going to want to add a new subscription immediately... because nearly anybody could be editing your entry.

Here's what you do: navigate to your Wikipedia page. (Here's a shot from the entry about Wikipedia itself.)

Wikipedia screenshot

Click on the "history" tab, and you'll be taken to a page detailing every change that anyone has made to this entry, with the most recent at the top.

In other words, it's in the same order as a blog... and like a blog, this page has a news feed. If you're using a modern browser, you'll see an indicator in your address bar (and you can use your browser to subscribe to the feed). If not, just scroll down to the Toolbox on the left-hand side of the page.

Wikipedia toolbox block

The third item in that list offers you your choice of an RSS feed and an Atom feed. Copy the link from whichever one you prefer, and paste it into the aggregator of your choice.

(My setup: I use Firefox 2.0, and I've configured it so that when I click on the XML feed icon in the browser's address bar, it prompts me to subscribe to the feed using Bloglines. I already have a Bloglines folder dedicated to media and blog monitoring, and in it goes.)

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