Comments on: The Wealth of Networks http://www.plannedobsolescence.net/the-wealth-of-networks/ falling indelibly into the past Sat, 11 Oct 2008 12:52:34 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.2 By: Sean http://www.plannedobsolescence.net/the-wealth-of-networks/#comment-426 Sean Wed, 19 Apr 2006 01:50:44 +0000 http://www.new.plannedobsolescence.net/?p=213#comment-426 <p>If you have time, it might be worth looking at the “TiddlyWiki” phenomenon, starting with the original version at <a href="http://www.tiddlywiki.com" rel="nofollow">http://www.tiddlywiki.com</a>. TiddlyWiki hasn’t caught on the same way that MediaWiki (the technology behind Wikipedia) has, but I believe it demonstrates some serious potential. It’s still very young, and I expect to see more from it in the future. </p> <p> The TiddlyWiki concept revolves around “MicroContent” in the same way that traditional wikis revolve around pages. The difference is that a TiddlyWiki page is extremely malleable, and can be made up of any combination of MicroContent blocks. This means that a user navigating the wiki has much more control over how they view the available information, opening and closing MicroContent blocks at will, sequentially or inline. </p> <p> I’m imagining a website that presents the authoritative text as some manner of static document, but filled with MicroContent, which is editable by the community. A casual viewer navigates by reading the text as it was originally written, and opening microcontent along the way to get additional viewpoints, updated information, and relevent links or references. Community members can add MicroContent to the original document, or edit MicroContent that has already been created. </p> <p> An engine that allows for this sort of navigation doesn’t exist at the moment. But it’s essentially a TiddlyWiki page (or collection thereof) with specialized control over how content can be edited. TiddlyWiki is an open-source technology, so I imagine it could be customized in this way. </p> <p> Just a thought. </p> If you have time, it might be worth looking at the “TiddlyWiki” phenomenon, starting with the original version at http://www.tiddlywiki.com. TiddlyWiki hasn’t caught on the same way that MediaWiki (the technology behind Wikipedia) has, but I believe it demonstrates some serious potential. It’s still very young, and I expect to see more from it in the future.

The TiddlyWiki concept revolves around “MicroContent” in the same way that traditional wikis revolve around pages. The difference is that a TiddlyWiki page is extremely malleable, and can be made up of any combination of MicroContent blocks. This means that a user navigating the wiki has much more control over how they view the available information, opening and closing MicroContent blocks at will, sequentially or inline.

I’m imagining a website that presents the authoritative text as some manner of static document, but filled with MicroContent, which is editable by the community. A casual viewer navigates by reading the text as it was originally written, and opening microcontent along the way to get additional viewpoints, updated information, and relevent links or references. Community members can add MicroContent to the original document, or edit MicroContent that has already been created.

An engine that allows for this sort of navigation doesn’t exist at the moment. But it’s essentially a TiddlyWiki page (or collection thereof) with specialized control over how content can be edited. TiddlyWiki is an open-source technology, so I imagine it could be customized in this way.

Just a thought.

]]> By: KF http://www.plannedobsolescence.net/the-wealth-of-networks/#comment-425 KF Tue, 18 Apr 2006 15:47:25 +0000 http://www.new.plannedobsolescence.net/?p=213#comment-425 <p>This is exactly the kind of thing I’m thinking of—I’d like very much to find a way to have simultaneously a relatively stable core text and a dynamic text that exists in fluid relationship to its readers.  Of the currently existing technologies that I’m familiar with, the versioning allowed by wikis seems closest—one is at least able to preserve the history of that text as it develops.  But I could imagine, for instance, the single-author text that somehow shows, via highlights or rollovers or whathaveyou, the places where other authors have revised, deleted, added, etc.  Something much more palimpsest-like. </p> <p> Or, if we want to defend the monograph rather than sliding quite so far into the multigraph, I could imagine the same text revealing the markup (via comments or discussion, perhaps of the sort in the Benkler wiki) of readers, and versioning allowing the author to review, revise, reconceive, based on such discussions. </p> <p> Some of these problems are technical, of course, but some of them are just a matter of dreaming big enough, of thinking outside the print box and imagining something different… </p> This is exactly the kind of thing I’m thinking of—I’d like very much to find a way to have simultaneously a relatively stable core text and a dynamic text that exists in fluid relationship to its readers.  Of the currently existing technologies that I’m familiar with, the versioning allowed by wikis seems closest—one is at least able to preserve the history of that text as it develops.  But I could imagine, for instance, the single-author text that somehow shows, via highlights or rollovers or whathaveyou, the places where other authors have revised, deleted, added, etc.  Something much more palimpsest-like.

Or, if we want to defend the monograph rather than sliding quite so far into the multigraph, I could imagine the same text revealing the markup (via comments or discussion, perhaps of the sort in the Benkler wiki) of readers, and versioning allowing the author to review, revise, reconceive, based on such discussions.

Some of these problems are technical, of course, but some of them are just a matter of dreaming big enough, of thinking outside the print box and imagining something different…

]]> By: meg http://www.plannedobsolescence.net/the-wealth-of-networks/#comment-424 meg Tue, 18 Apr 2006 14:37:05 +0000 http://www.new.plannedobsolescence.net/?p=213#comment-424 <p>I can imagine two different versions of a book (yours, mine, his)—the static, single-authored version and the wikified, hypertext version, in which the text is broken up into wiki entries, with linkage galore. </p> <p> Then what began as a monograph would gradually turn into a multigraph as people added to each wiki entry.  They would quickly become two different books, not simply by virtue of the “additions” of the other authors but also—and more fundamentally—by virtue of the lack of linearity.  And that could have a positive effect on the delicate sensibilities of publishers etc etc. </p> <p> Of course, that may not be the direction in which you were thinking.  But when I think about my own book (and the various directions it heads in simultaneously), wikifying it like that sounds like a win. </p> I can imagine two different versions of a book (yours, mine, his)—the static, single-authored version and the wikified, hypertext version, in which the text is broken up into wiki entries, with linkage galore.

Then what began as a monograph would gradually turn into a multigraph as people added to each wiki entry.  They would quickly become two different books, not simply by virtue of the “additions” of the other authors but also—and more fundamentally—by virtue of the lack of linearity.  And that could have a positive effect on the delicate sensibilities of publishers etc etc.

Of course, that may not be the direction in which you were thinking.  But when I think about my own book (and the various directions it heads in simultaneously), wikifying it like that sounds like a win.

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