The purpose behind the IT Kitchen was to provide an overview of weblogging, the nuances and the ins and outs and that sort of thing. Sort of like many of the handbooks about weblogging that have been published online by various people (see Rebecca Blood’s). However, instead of just providing static content, there’s an interactive element to it, a community participation, which allows people to ask questions as the material is published, or even provide their own material in support of a topic.
Shelley has germinated and grown the idea into a really really really good idea -- one in which the nucleus of defining blogging in a living way -- of keeping good blogging alive by putting historic threads or posts somewhere where we can REFERENCE them as we all write into the future, age and die off (sorry, no time for tact) -- and to keep this ongoing discussion in a Wikipedia setting -- well that's just really smart.
I'm so excited that I'm afraid to think straight.
But I have a confession to make:
I have never written on a WIKI. I don't know how.
I know. That's hard to believe.
I have stayed away from them on purpose because I knew that the minute I jumped into the wonderful world of WIKI, I would never come out.
Gonzo Engaged, way back in 2001, would have been born on a WIKI if WIKI had been WIKI back then. We barely had team blogging, so we did our best.
But the idea of a hierarchically flat, fluid, idea-evolving tablet for our good thinking and writing blew my mind when I first heard about WIKIs.
I ran far away fearing I'd disappear inside of them for a year.
But it appears I will be learning because I want to help with IT Kitchen, and because it's time to step through the door to WIKI.
If you don't see me for a week, send a search party.
