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WIKINOMICS: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything Don Tapscott and Anthony Williams, Portfolio (Penguin), New York, 2006. ISBN 978-1-59184-138-8.
First, let's start with the word. "Wiki" is the Hawaiian word for "quick." It is also the name given to a type of software that has the capability of allowing users to easily create and edit web pages using any type of browser. This feature makes web-based collaboration between users extremely simple. For example, it is the means through which the famous "Wikipedia" on-line encyclopedia has been created and maintained. (Now you know why it's called that).
In fact, Wikipedia is the largest encyclopedia in the world (over 1.6 million articles in English), entirely on-line, in several languages, and maintained for free by over 100,000 volunteers worldwide who create and edit each other's content. (If you haven't seen Wikipedia, you owe it to yourself to check it out at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_ Page>.) But, Wikipedia is just one example of what is possible: a host of other Internet applications use wiki or wiki-like software in collaborative ventures with users.
This software has enabled a new type of interaction with the Internet, miles beyond using it merely as a reference source, or a means to send email. Wikis and their ilk have made possible a new form of collaboration where individuals from across the globe can converge and participate in the creation of a product or service. A key characteristic of these collaborations is that they are self-organizing: the users themselves determine the structure and content of what the service is all about. No top-down, hierarchical management style need apply.
The authors of this book, Don Tapscott and Anthony Williams, have coined a new word for this phenomenon: wikinomics, meaning the "economics of mass collaboration." According to the authors, wikinomics will fundamentally change the way we interact with providers of products and services (and this of course includes government at all levels).
Tapscott and Williams have identified four characteristics of this new form of mass collaboration. They are:
Being open - enabling participation by inviting involvement from anyone who has something to contribute;
Sharing - providing users with free software, source code, ideas and intellectual property...