Joho the Blog
An Entry from the Archives

Mary Chimato who works in a medical library at SUNY Stonybrook gave a terrific presentation on how she introduced a wiki into her millieu. She reassured people that they could make no mistakes that couldn't easily be undone. Sounds totally human. E.g., the staff training sessions — which everyone dreads — were Hawaiian themed parties. As people started using the "sandbox," experimenting with the wiki, others read what they were writing. People discovered interests. People who hadn't ever spoken found each other. Sounds just perfect. (They use twiki.)

Maureen Clements of NPR set up an internal wiki for the organization's 750 employees. It started out for news folks, but as people heard about it, it's gone corporate-wide. It does lots: Helps reporters find experts. Lists (and plays) pronunciations. Tracks previous guests. Briefing books. It's designed also to help hosts who may have questions such as "How many Republican governors were elected in the last election." [I hope she went to the Semantic Web presentation yesterday, where the question they used as an example was "How many female mayors of major cities are there?" In a closed system such as NPR's, a Semantic Web approach makes tons of sense.]