When we started out with RubberSquid’s distant ancestor (in 1997!), the term “wiki” usually drew blank looks. Even now, in the era of the Wikipedia (an uber-wiki amongst wikis), the generic wiki concept is at once both so simple and so novel that, for many, it’s difficult to grasp. In some respects, it’s similar to riding a bicycle: simple and natural for one who knows how, and a useful mode of transport – yet seemingly absurd to somebody who has never experienced it.
Wikipedia and its descendants aside, most of the wikis deployed today are on corporate intranets providing an invaluable way for teams to collaborate through pages of information delivered to conventional browsers.
But, left on their own, wikis can be chaotic beasts. In the enterprise environment, it is only the stakeholders’ vested interest in the information contained that tames the wiki’s natural instinct towards chaos. Given an infinite number of monkeys on typewriters, one of them will eventually type a “Midsummer Night’s Dream”, but give a finite number of anarchic employees a wiki and, pretty soon, information chaos prevails. It’s not so much that participants maliciously set out to damage the wiki, although there is always some risk of that, it’s more to do with the different approaches that people take to organising and presenting what is after all “their” information.
RubberSquid is a “wiki for the masses”. It is a wiki that anyone should be able to use in their everyday lives. It is also a wiki that needs to work on any device with a browser – not just the big friendly PC screen with its full keyboard and mouse. At heart, it’s a wiki that needs to tame and restrain itself from its natural tendancy towards chaos.
And how does it do this? Simply by keeping it simple.
Look at almost any other wiki and you’ll see an approach designed for enterprise PC users, one that does not migrate well to the mobile environment, and one that is not going to be embraced by the avarage consumer.
RubberSquid is different.
- It uses an easily understood information hierarchy: account >> channels >> memos >> attachments; a hierarchy that’s already familiar to any PC user, and one that migrates cleanly and clearly to mobile;
- It has a user interface that adapts itself according to which device you’re using: a simplified display with a slightly deeper hierarchy for mobile phones compared with a richer, shallower view on the desktop.
- It encapsulates all the operations (such as Edit, Rename, Delete, etc.) that users may want to perform on an entry into easily accessed menus instead of seemingly random pick-points in a page; menus that retain continuity across device types;
- It provides numerous ways for mobile users to get RubberSquid on their phones, ranging from QR Codes, through to email and SMS invitations;
- It allows users full control over who gets to see their information. A RubberSquid channel can be private or it can be shared with up to 120 other people. Also, channel owners can define privileges for each sharer of a channel, choosing whether a particular sharer is allowed to add memos for example.
A hardcore wiki purist might argue that RubberSquid is not really a true wiki precisely because it curbs the wiki’s instinct towards information chaos. We don’t think it’s really worth debating. RubberSquid provides wiki functions to all kinds of consumers and prosumers ranging from individual contractors, to small companies, to families – all of whom need to share information without it being public, and all of whom need the ability to access their information when they’re away from their PC.
RubberSquid does what it says on the tin, and that’s why RubberSquid really is the people’s wiki.
May 20, 2008 at 1:44 pm
[...] wikis can be complex, and not everyone is compatible with challenging technology. And that’s where RubberSquid [...]