6.2 Blogs, Wikis, Social networking and collective intelligence
6.2.1: Blogs
A blog is a contraction of the words web log. Blogs usually provide commentary or information on a particular issue, event or topic. In some cases, blogs can be about a particular person; an online, public, personal diary. A blog is usually maintained by a single person or a small group of contributors. Visitors to the blog can comment on the entries made or respond to comments made
by other visitors. Blogs are primarily text but can also be the form of photos or other images, sounds, or films.
Examples: Techcruch, Mashable, Medium, Gadgetbyte Nepal, Mysansar,etc.
6.2.2 Wikis
A wiki is a collaborative website that anyone within the community of users can contribute to or edit. A wiki can be open to a global audience or can be restricted to a select network or community. Wikis can cover a specific topic or subject area. Wikis also make it easy to search or browse for information. Although primarily text, wikis can also include images, sound recordings & films. Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org the free internet encyclopedia is the most well known wiki.
6.2.3 Social Networking
Social networking allows an individual to create a profile for themselves on the service and share that profile with other users with similar interests to create a social network. Users can choose to have public profiles which can be viewed by anyone or private profiles which can only be viewed by people that the users allow. Users can usually post photographs, music and videos on their site. Popular social network services include Facebook www.facebook.com, Twitter www.twitter.com and MySpace www.myspace.com.
6.2.3 Collective Intelligence
Collective intelligence is best defined as a shared or group intelligence that emerges from the collaboration and competition of many individuals. This concept is nothing new. For example, political parties have always worked with this concept, by taking the views of people to form policies, select their candidates and run election campaigns.
Collective intelligence plays a huge role within web 2.0. One of the best examples of collective intelligence is Wikipedia. Anyone can add information to an existing page or create a new page. Pages also hyperlink to other areas of the website that people have edited. Search engines like Google and social networking sites such as Facebook are also great examples of sites that depend on a collective aspect to give users the intended experience.
It explains that Amazon is an example of a company that uses collective intelligence. The website is made up of people who buy and sell from each other. It also recommends items that may interest you, based on what you have already looked at. Customer reviews can also be heavily influential when choosing a product. You are essentially basing your opinion off of the opinions of other members of the public.