The Wikipedia has been wildly successful. Millions of articles, fed and edited by an army of enthusiasts. True that some of these participants are more enthusiastic than truthful or competent. Still, you cannot deny that the WP has become a marvelous source of instantly available information, warts and all. Yet despite this model, it does not seem to be working for enterprise knowledge management. I have now been involved in four experiments using wikis to deliver knowledge in groups. From the size of a few dozen people to that of an entire enterprise. All sort of problems emerge: Relatively few enthusiasts, worry about who can contribute, copyright compliance, lack and changing of underlying organization, desire for absolute answers, lack of interest in maintaining existing knowledge and removing out of date information. I can point to none of the experiments that were truly successful. I remain a proponent of their value, their simplicity, linked with enterprise search, is a big positive.
It was good to see this set of mini case studies that show enterprises in which they have been successful.
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