What's happened?

bubba

Administrator
I've noticed that the once extremely busy wiki is now only rarely updated. It's been like this for some time but I thought it might just be down to people being away/busy/etc.

Seems a shame and I was just wondering why this happened...

Better alternatives elsewhere?
Something we did/broke/said?
Something else?

It doesn't really matter - in it's current state it's still a useful resource and will remain in place but just wanted to know if there's anything we could change that might help.
 

dunc

New member
bubba said:
I've noticed that the once extremely busy wiki is now only rarely updated. It's been like this for some time but I thought it might just be down to people being away/busy/etc.

Seems a shame and I was just wondering why this happened...

Better alternatives elsewhere?
Something we did/broke/said?
Something else?

It doesn't really matter - in it's current state it's still a useful resource and will remain in place but just wanted to know if there's anything we could change that might help.
I think my interest waned when I spent a bit of time updating a few things, including uploading a couple of pictures, only to find it wiped out by some issue that resulted in the forum and/or wiki being reset to a few days previous. Can't recall why exactly, I've drank too much and slept since then! After that I just did small occasional updates, once bitten and all that.. I've not done much recently because I've been too busy with other stuff, not visited as many caves so have less fresh info and couldn't decide if it was worth it or not (does anyone use it?)  I doubt there's anything better, at least not that I'm aware of, certainly not something that covers the whole country anyway.

But yes, still a potentially very useful resource.

Not sure if anything needs improving; maybe it just needs a fresh injection of blood! Perhaps a reminder occasionally that the resource exists and that forum members can add/edit details etc...  :confused:
 

graham

New member
An interesting webbie conundrum.

One of the main points of the whole html thang as devised by the wonderful Tim Berners-Lee, is that it uses links. That's what hypertext is all about.

Now wiki is an interesting thing and works for something like Wikipedia 'cos it is very well known, its reliability as a source is understood (not perfect but generally OK) and thus it becomes a go-to site if you don't know much about something.

Other wikis, such as this one will suffer from both these effects.

Nobody will use the caving wiki if, a) they have a link to a better (primary?) source or b) they've never heard of it and will use a search engine which will lead them either to a (semi) reliable known like Wikipedia or an unknown but potentially authoritative source (in caving terns such as this one. (shameless plug).

it is difficult, therefore, to see where something like the caving wiki fits in, usefully.

This is not, however, to laud Wikipedia. I once spent some time creating and updating Wikipedia pages on caves only to end up banging my head against the wall when dealing with their VERY STUPID editors. I asked the guy who initiated our work why we were bothering & he pointed out that Wikipedia was the go-to resource used by the press in the event of rescues and the like. I see that, I also see that they'll not use this wiki as they'll either never see it or not be assured of its reliability if they ever do. (Which is in contradistinction to them finding and using material in the Forum itself where, being the gutter press, they'll be more interested in a juicy quote than in accuracy.)
 

graham

New member
Sorry if that sounded harsh. It wasn't meant to be, just the way I see it. Soxcial media is an interesting subject.  Listening to some research recently, people now don't use Facebook, for example, for anything except family & close friends stuff, but Twitter seems to get information out and widely spread very fast. Ephemeral, OK, but that doesn't always matter.
 

Bottlebank

New member
I've noticed that the once extremely busy wiki is now only rarely updated

The what?

Nobody will use the caving wiki if, a) they have a link to a better (primary?) source or b) they've never heard of it and will use a search engine which will lead them either to a (semi) reliable known like Wikipedia or an unknown but potentially authoritative source (in caving terns such as this one. (shameless plug).

I think this puts me in category b.

Could anyone explain a little?
 

Bottlebank

New member
Hmm. I've found it, and was surprised to find I'd already made one contribution. Bit puzzled though, what are the rules? Who can contribute? What's to stop anyone posting complete rubbish? Is it moderated in some way?

If I spend a bit of time posting something what's to stop somebody else simply changing it?
 

Hughie

Active member
Bottlebank said:
Hmm. I've found it, and was surprised to find I'd already made one contribution. Bit puzzled though, what are the rules? Who can contribute? What's to stop anyone posting complete rubbish? Is it moderated in some way?

If I spend a bit of time posting something what's to stop somebody else simply changing it?

Therein lies the problem, as I see it. When it was started, there was a lot of stuff posted about a lot of places. I happened to look up a site that I'm particularly familiar with, and found somebody - unknown to me, and my fellow diggers - had posted up quite a lot of (incorrect) information.

As such, I consider its value as a resource somewhat limited.

Wikipedia/thickipedia - you decide!
 

Bottlebank

New member
Is it part of Wikipedia? I'm pretty sure I never modified anything from this forum?

There seems to be a community portal page that's blank - perhaps someone who understands it could post some details about how it works?
 

TheBitterEnd

Well-known member
No it?s not part of Wikipedia it is owned and run by the same people as this forum.

Just for background there are lots of Wikis (curiously wikileaks is not actually a wiki). The original term comes from the Hawaiian for quick, which is Wiki-Wiki, so someone thought it would be ?fun? to re-purpose the abbreviation WWW to Wiki Wiki Web as in ?quick web?. What they meant by ?quick? was easy to edit. I.e. you could update the website from the website itself rather than having to know anything about HTML, FTP and the rest.

So the primary intention and the deliberate aim was to make something that anyone could edit. The creators of most Wiki sites are not daft though and there are usually built in edit history and some sort of moderation so ?vandalism? can be rolled-back. However this does not mean there are not wars fought where competing views keep getting edited in to the site.

As far as caving goes we seem to be a sensitive and secretive bunch, see recent threads on whether or not to tell someone about well decorated caves. I seem to recall a debate about whether capping should be in the Wiki in case we got told off (by whom never seemed to be clear). There are concerns about copyright, the fact that some clubs make money off their hard work in producing surveys and descriptions and the sensitivities around digs and access. Views on the extent to which these sensitivities should be considered will of course vary, but I think the effort required to put a half decent wiki page together only to court a load of controversy probably puts people off.
 

Rhys

Moderator
Wormy said:
Is it worth me updating the wiki with stuff from weardale/teesdale?
Yes - I'm sure it's all useful information to be out there.

I was doing quite a bit of editing, proof-reading and contributing to the wiki at one time but rather ran out of steam, I'm afraid. So much to do, so little time.

Rhys
 

Badlad

Administrator
Staff member
Difficult question.  I don't really have any immediate plans although I have wondered where to go with it.  Some people put in an a lot of effort to get it to where it is but that seems to have mostly run out of steam.  We will come up with a plan in time.
 

And

New member
I'd like to see a table function added. I'd like to insert a lamp comparison table at some point.
 

Cookie

New member
The more places survey data is archived the better.

So I'll shamelessly plug BCA's www.cave-registry.org.uk site - the place to keep your data safe.

There is a remarkable amount there already but more is always welcome.
 

Rhys

Moderator
Using the wiki to archive survey data never took off; I think I was the only person to do so! Subsequently the BCA archive was set up, which is good.
 
I've just did an updating of the lighting stuff. I think I may have done a fair bit of the old version, but basically it's now "LEDs are the thing", and downgraded the miners' lamps stuff to historic interest. It does need a proof read, (anyone? please?) as I just whacked in my updates to bring it into the 21st century.

For what it's worth, the caving wiki on here  is vastly better than the scrappy entries in Wikipedia proper
 

nearlywhite

Active member
hyweldavies said:
vastly better than the scrappy entries in Wikipedia proper

Makes me wonder whether 'we' should fix those ones instead. It does worry me how little information is available to the general public, I mean they're their caves too.

I can see that a UK caving wiki is one cavers would use and so the nature of the information and its presentation would be different. However given survey data is being catered for by the BCA, google/multiple threads on this forum cover lighting, cave locations and descriptions come from the books and guides people use - it is hard to see why you'd stick with a wiki unless you could put rigging guides, descriptions, locations, history, speleology and geology in one place. That'd be brilliant  ;)

Badlad said:
We will come up with a plan in time.

I don't envy you  ;)
 

SamT

Moderator
nearlywhite said:
unless you could put rigging guides, descriptions, locations, history, speleology and geology in one place. That'd be brilliant  ;)

Indeed, that would be great, and was my original 'vision' for the wiki when we first started updating it.

Would be great if everyone were willing to donate surveys, descriptions. Current access issues/arrangements could be updated as and when.

Not sure all the folks who've put in-ordinate amounts of time and effort writing guidebooks would agree though.
Not sure I agree at about updating wikipedia itself either.
 
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