Thing 16: Wikis

When I stated this "thing" I knew about wikis, but I didn't really know of many ways for libraries to use them. However, wikis can be very useful to libraries. One idea I saw was to allow patrons to use wikis to annotate the catalog. This way people can learn more about a book than what the standard catalog provides and can get a better idea if this is the right book for them. Another idea was using wikis for subject guides. I thought this was particularly useful because I've been to plenty of sites with links that are no longer good and it would be great if people could delete old link and add new links on their own. One last way to use wikis that I thought was really cool was to create a community wiki, allowing people to add information about everything from the best mechanic to use to schedules for events and games. You can also subscribe to many wikis so that you can be notified when updates or changes are made. I think this is a really cool way to get patrons personally involved in the services libraries provide rather than merely acting as consumers.