Do Wikis Have Finite Lifetime

Quite a few have. e.g. AndStuffWiki, BridgesWiki, TheReformSociety...

Wiki (or wiki-like) sites seem to be growing in popularity very rapidly and seem to rely quite heavily on the participants' restraint and integrity. These two factors (popularity and reader's consideration) rarely interfere with a small, selected audience, but will the whole system collapse when larger numbers of participants are involved?

I liken the wiki to the newsgroup - a free-form medium for sharing ideas and discussing on and around a topic. I'm concerned that, like the newsgroup, it will become near unusable with a more general audience. Newsgroups have, in recent years, degenerated into forums for advertising, flaming and other non-constructive, off-topic material. Is it likely that the same will happen to the more famous wikis as less considerate readers are involved and how long before we see the first wiki robots adding spam content to the sites?

More importantly, will the efforts of the intended wiki readership be enough to instill the WikiCulture into newcomers and police unsavory behavior? What steps can we take to prevent this from happening or should be just address it if and when it happens?

-- PaulRuane

Well, let's look at history. WardsWiki has been going strong for a number of years, and has a large audience. It has not collapsed.

Newsgroups aren't quite like wiki, as the "collapse" of Usenet occurred at a time when Usenet was one of few discussion options open to a large number of complete newbies. It was a big target. Wikis are one of many discussion/collaboration options available today. Moreover, the wiki architecture is open to change; if a wiki is persistently vandalized, it can be (fairly) easily re-coded to provide more security. Usenet is/was much less flexible in this way.

-- BrentNewhall

Furthermore, much of the UseNet collapse is because of the long, ranting threads that need to be sifted for signal. Wiki appears not to suffer from that because the WikiGnomes are constantly deleting noise, removing repetitions, and keeping things tidy. -- WikiGnome

On the other hand, WikiIsUsenet.

See CommunityLifeCycle, WikiLifeCycle (on MeatballWiki), WikiEcology.

The only real answer is We'll be better prepared to answer WithinTwentyYears. Everything else is just discussion to make sure we'll be around in twenty years to answer.

Everything has a finite lifetime. It is safe to assume that no wiki will survive the heat death of the universe. But is it safe to assume the universe will undergo thermodynamically-mandated extinction?

Pessimist

Realist.

I prefer to plan and shape for a better tomorrow. -- Activist

OK, perhaps my question would better be: do you think we should start considering measures we could apply now for preventing abuse and assigning value to content or take a more agile approach and deal with abuse only if and when it happens, as we are then better placed to know what to do?

I've been thinking a bit recently about how one could apply voting on the significance and usefulness of pages and their contents and how one could make a wiki 'forgetful' in a manner similar to a human memory. One could code a wiki to discard pages based upon amount of access, size, amendment activity or other metrics, so that the wiki is still approachable. I feel that if a wiki were to grow too big for its user-base, its community 'feel' could be degraded.

-- PaulRuane

I've given this some thought as well. It seems like a shame to lose any information that might be useful in the future, though. Memory loss is one of the reasons we build machines to remember stuff for us, even if it has its advantages. My first thought is weighted links of some sort, where low weight values are less apparent (perhaps a scale of hues from normal text (low weight) to link (high weight)). My second thought was that RecentChanges serves solves most of these problems already. RecentChanges mimics a combination of short term memory and consciousness in human brains. Much of the "community" lives on a moving edge of RecentChanges that is constantly sweeping through the pages, bringing some into focus, allowing others to be ignored. -- EricHodges

Interesting thought, RecentChanges sweeps through like a broom, comb or rake. Some sweepers are more like leafBlowers, others like vacuumCleaners and even some flameThrowers. I think some even sweep with copyMachines. --Observationalist

This theory was born of thoughts about the DeclineOfCivility

When wikis grow too big for their inhabitants to maintain in the face of the forces of incivility, they die.

Wiki is a complex system with all kinds of feedback loops, comparable to a rich ecosystem. Such systems are often inherently stable in some respects, and inherently unstable or semi-stable in others.

What I mean with "inherently stable" is that when there's some kind of disturbance, certain ("negative") feedback loops kick in and work against the disturbance, resulting in some kind of equilibrium. Example: If there's too much discussion on a single topic (disturbance), people get bored in it, stop reading it, and start to visit and edit pages on other topics more frequently (feedback), so there's always a mix of topics being discussed (resulting equilibrium).

What I mean with "inherently unstable" is when there's the opposite kind of feedback loop ("positive feedback loop"), the kind that works to increase the effect of disturbances. Example: Flames (disturbance) usually result in more flames (feedback). Another Example: If people with a certain kind of background don't feel they are welcome on Wiki any more (disturbance), some of them leave, increasing the very bias which made them feel unwelcome (feedback).

If you don't keep effects of the latter kind in check, runaway chain reactions can result, turning the whole system into something completely different.

What I want to say with all that: Please don't assume the Wiki we all know and love is eternal and immortal, no matter what we do. Once a community has turned into a place of flames and holy wars, or, conversely, into a peaceful but boring mono-culture, there's no way back. If we don't want that, IMHO, we as a community have to treat each other more carefully than we do today.

-- FalkBruegmann, being melodramatic instead of cynical for a change :-)

One nice thing about Wiki is that you can just delete flames. We need to do more housecleaning if we want to keep this place nice. -- PhilGoodwin

I prefer to view wiki as a grand experiment. Everything that happens (and that includes being reduced to a heap of smoldering ashes) is something to be noted, wondered at, and learned from. Wiki seems magical to most of us, but it is surely mortal. Experimenters here have taken it upon themselves - as part of the experiment - to see just how long wiki can live, and what kind of practices can be used to that end. Phil's comment above about housecleaning is a fine example of that. Wiki could die somehow, but why grieve over the outcome of an experiment?

There is a reason WhyWikiWorks and I doubt that we're even close to understanding that. But I think in time we will... WikiPromisesNothingButOffersEverything?. --TimVoght

That's nice. Thanks, Tim.

Sorry, but WikiIsNotMortal? for the very simple reason that it is not alive. It is an InformationSystem?. Due to its construction and because of the basic ideas behind it, is vulnerable to certain kinds of attacks, accidents, and user's behavior. The Wiki mechanics (MoreAboutMechanics) are not AlienTechnology?, the "only" unpredictable factor are its users. Speculating WhyWikiWorks is actually trying to analyse certain types of human behaviour, and since humans are alive, WikiUsersAreMortal?.

I'd like to add the theory that one reason why we have difficulties to understand WhyWikiWorks is the fact that most Wiki regulars are software people, and not sociologiy scientists (correct me if I am wrong).

-- ThomasWeidenfeller

The way I see it, Wiki is not just a perl script and a database, but also a group of people with certain characteristics and an ongoing social process; it's more than the sum of all these, and displays certain kinds of emergent behaviour. If the group participants changes in the wrong way, or if the social process is permanently disturbed, the whole thing may stop working, whether you call that "breaking" or "dying" or whatever. -- FalkBruegmann

why grieve over the outcome of an experiment?

I think it's vital that we can grieve. Because the experiment succeeded in producing something very valuable, not just in content but in enriched relationship (as described in WikiPolitenessLevel and many other places). The prospect of losing that quality of interaction and relationship should cause us grief, because we're human beings, not machines. Anticipating such future grief may indeed help motivate more helpful and humane responses to some disturbing signs of WikiSenility? today. --RichardDrake

Maybe it is cyclical. If something becomes too popular, then the higher quantity of "information terrorists" can drag it down so that it falls out of popularity. When that happens, the stubburn stay-put fans clean it up and make it a nice place again. Word eventually gets around and the cycle starts again.

Do some contributors have the effect of DeathOfThePage Is there anyone else out there who feels like this? -- MartinNoutch

CategoryWiki