Exploiting The Potential Of Wikis
UKOLN Workshop

Exploiting The Potential Of Wikis.

Wikis are one of a range of technologies collectively often referred to as "Web 2.0" which are the focus of much interest within the higher education community. Wikis, which can be defined as collaborative Web based authoring tools, reflect the original vision of the Web which breaks down traditional barriers between readers and authors of Web resources.

Wikis would appear to be of particular relevance within the higher education sector, as they have the potential to make it much easier for students, researchers and support staff to create and annotate resources. However concerns have been raised over potential misuse of Wikis. There are also many issues to be addressed concerning how Wikis can be used; how they relate to other technologies such as Blogs; the sustainability and support of Wikis and the approaches which should be taken to the evaluation and deployment of Wikis, including issues such as whether to provide a single institutional Wiki or multiple Wikis to support multiple purposes and the benefits and dangers of using externally externally-hosted Wiki services.

The issues will be addressed in this workshop.

At the end of the workshop delegates should:

• Have gained an understanding of Wikis including what they are and how they can be used.
• Have learnt about the potential of Wikis to support teaching and learning, research and support activities within the institution.
• Have discussed the potential difficulties in providing, maintaining and supporting Wikis.
• Have had an opportunity to discuss approaches to the deployment of Wikis within the institution.

This workshop will be held at Austin Court, Birmingham on Friday 3^rd November 2006.

Please note that although the scheduled closing date for bookings was Friday 20^th October 2006 due to the high levels of demand, bookings closed on Saturday 7^th October 2006.
The workshop fee, which includes workshop materials, lunch and coffee and access to the WiFi network, is £75.

The workshop was organised by UKOLN, a national centre of expertise in digital information management based at the University of Bath. The workshop co-chairs are Brian Kelly (UKOLN) and Steven Warburton (Kings College London). Natasha Bishop (UKOLN) is resposible for the workshop organisation and administration.

The recommended tag for the workshop is 'ukoln-wiki-workshop-2006'. We suggest this tag is used in social bookmarking services (such as del.icio.us), photographic sharing services (such as Flickr), Blogs, etc.

Follow up information, including links to key resources, and details of the workshop evaluation is now available.