Originally published on Medium: Wikis are gardens

Wikis aren't empty, like the term 'cyberspace' sounds, nor filled with clean, glowing lines, nor grungy and neuromantic.

Wikis are a communal garden, where anyone can graze, and anything can grow. Just like a communal garden, one fears vandalism and internal strife, and one battles against an idealism that can spill into self-righteousness. On the plus side, the devilish generativity and the pleasure of just wandering around and gazing at the flowers tended by many hands is a huge pleasure.

But the biggest problem with wikis is that, perhaps also like gardening, they need regular tending otherwise they turn into a jungle, and they need a structuring vision to decide what should be where.