Adventure into Faviki

Hmm... Here is my tour through Faviki site. It is another free social bookmarking tool developed by Vuk Milicic from Belgrade, Serbia. Differ from Diigo that it does not need to install toolbar, which make it more simple to use like Delicious. One amazing thing about Faviki is, it introduces semantic tags concept to users. According to Faviki, "free-word tags do not have defined meanings". What Faviki does is, it not only allows user to bookmark web pages, insert tags, automatically categorise tags, it also connects those tags to wikipedia's terms. It gives meaning to tags used in it. It also provides bookmarklet which links to the user's browser toolbar.

I am going to show you all what does it mean by giving a meaning to tag. Here, I have decided to bookmark the Louise Hansen Dyer Music Library.

1. Click the add bookmark "+" on the top right corner in Faviki.

2. Type in the URL address of the website you want to add as bookmark.

3. A tag adding box will appear with different suggested tags.

4. Place your cursor over Louise Hanson Dyer, a drop-down box will appear with a brief explanation about who is Louise Hanson Dyer from Wikipedia. See the below diagram.


5. You can add as many tags you want.

6. Save it.

7. Back to your Faviki main page, a list of bookmarks that you have added will appear, include all the tags you have selected.

8. Place your cursor over each of those tags, you will have a brief explanation box appear under the related tag. As shown in the diagram below.


Another good thing about Faviki is, those tags are available in 14 different languages.

Fun tool to use!! Try it out!!

I hate you, Wikipedia!!!

Yes, this is exactly what I felt last week. Totally disappointed with it. I have tried to edit some articles in the wikis, I even signed up for it, and it didn't let me do any editing. I have tried to add some useful links URL to library location, and it was telling me that: external links are better to add in the footnote or reference part. I was furious!!!! So, no luck on editing Wikis.

Yea yea, I know that wikipedia is a really powerful online free encyclopedia, it is dynamic, attractive, open to public, easy to access from anywhere with internet facilities. In one simple description: the 21st century online collaborative tool... But, I was told it is not an authoritative source from the first lecture I have in this course. I was taught as an information manager, I have to think of the following questions:
1. Do we(information profession) use it?
2. Do we encourage people to use it?
3. Do we train people to use it? If so, how do we train people to use the wiki with evaluative and critical eyes.

I also learned that, apart from wikipedia, there are a lot of other similar collaborative tool in the web. I list some of them here:
1. Encyclopedia of Life - an online collaborative encyclopedia between scientific community and the general public. Goal: to provide knowledge about all the world's organism or living species. This is done in a more controlled environment. It is authoritative and restricted. Information is more reliable.
2. Conservapedia - American, conservative point of view, wiki-based Web encyclopedia.
3. Scholarpedia - this is a peer-reviewed open-access encyclopedia. Articles in there are dynamic. They provide up-to-date and high quality of content.
4. Knol - Google version of collaborative encyclopedia. Knol = a unit of knowledge. Some pages are opinion pages, selling products, how to use product and etc.
5. Citizendium - this includes acticles with reliable, authoratitive and quality. The contributors must use their real name in posting articles.