Global Response EffortDifferent Continents Different Countries Different Languages

One Wiki

What is a Wiki?

• A wiki allows users to edit any page or to create new pages within the wiki Web site

• A collaborative space

• Seeks to involve the visitor in an ongoing process of creation and collaboration that constantly changes the Web site landscape

Leuf and Cunningham, The Wiki Way

Wiki Categorizations

Free and Open Source Software

• FOSS wiki platforms differ from each other by functionality, look and feel and target user groups.

• FOSS wiki platforms are created to support various group sizes– Large MediaWiki– Medium TikiWiki– Small DocuWiki

Wiki Strengths

• Collaboration from anywhere there is Internet access and browser

• Real Time Updating

• Anybody (or any approved member) can access and insert/delete/modify data

• Search Engine

• Free and Open Source Software Available

Wiki Limitations

• Learning Curve

• Layout

• Organization of Data

• Needs Facilitator

• Ill Structured

Community of Practice defined

“Communities of Practice are groups of people who share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic, and who deepen their knowledge and expertise in this area by interacting on an ongoing basis”

Wenger

Community of Practice

• Best Group to Leverage a Wiki• Organized • Common Goal• Needs to Use Prior to Response

– Build Inventory • People• Capability• Supplies

– Familiarity With System

High Reliability Organizations

• As a CoP, are strategies best used prior to response on an ongoing basis

• Errors or problems are never normalized, trivialized and passed of as non-consequential

• An assertive approach tat seeks out various scenarios and how to best handle them

Present Emergency Wikis

• Static – used more as a website

• Not nearly utilizing the capability

• Proactive not reactive

• Non-responsive to a situation

• Have not reached potential

• Need to be Knowledge Exchange Centers

emergenciWiki.org Project

“The purpose of this wiki is for a collaborative building effort through any knowledgeable individual or group affiliate who is concerned with natural or man made disasters, be they in the academic and/or industry.”

Future of emergenciWiki

• What does the future hold for such a system?

• Should restraints be used?

• Is this the correct wiki software?

• Does a wiki define it’s own purpose or is it simply evolving?