{"id":22760,"key":"Public_health_wiki","title":"Public health wiki","latest":{"id":1247791,"timestamp":"2026-05-15T10:25:26Z"},"content_model":"wikitext","license":{"url":"https://www.appropedia.org/Appropedia:Copyrights","title":"CC-BY-SA-4.0"},"source":"The value of a '''wiki for [[public health]]''' appears obvious for improving community knowledge and practices, and projects such as [[Wikipedia]] have demonstrated the value of a wiki for general knowledge. However, efforts in the public health field are in their infancy.\n\nThe only active wikis which cover public health in depth appear to be:\n\n* Wikipedia - extensive coverage, but limited in detail allowed, due to Wikipedia's strict criteria.\n* [[Appropedia]] - strongest in areas related to technologies (e.g. [[water treatment]]), but also covering social aspects (e.g. [[community-led total sanitation]]).\n\n== Appropedia ==\n\n[[Appropedia]] covers public health, but with an international focus, and content on [[water]], [[sanitation]] and human development more generally, so it can be considered a '''\"global health wiki\"''' or '''\"international public health wiki\"'''.\n\nTo see the range of information covered, explore the public health category - click the '+' if you have javascript available, and click a subject to browse that category:\n\n<categorytree depth=0>Public health</categorytree>\n\n=== Reasons for a broad scope ===\n\nThere are very few successful wikis with a narrow scope on serious subjects.<ref>Active wikis about some specific topics in popular culture do exist, supported by the enthusiasm and affinity that the participants bring to their hobby or interest. In particular, certain video games have active wikis, aided by the fact that gamers are more comfortable with taking on a mildly technical task like editing a wiki.</ref> Rare examples do exist where they are actively supported by a committed organization, typically with one committed employee who edits the wiki and promotes it within the organization.<ref>E.g. http://solarcooking.wikia.com/</ref>\n\nThe most successful wikis tend to be extremely broad, e.g. [[Wikipedia]] and wikiHow. Appropedia is by far the most active in the areas of sustainability and development. The largest body of wiki content on public health is probably Wikipedia<ref>See [[Wikipedia:Public health]] and [[Wikipedia:Category:Public health]]</ref>\n\nLarger wikis are more visible, and have benefits in search rankings.\n\nA combined maintenance team - those workers and volunteers who guard against [[spam]] and poor quality content.\n\nShares the load in technical management - smaller wikis with smaller communities and support teams can more easily disappear.\n\nShares the load in policy making - e.g. it is common to see narrowly defined wikis without a copyright policy, or with content.\n\n== Dedicated public health wikis ==\n\nThere appear to be no active wikis specifically about public health.\n\nThe largest wikis specifically about public health are almost completely inactive: [http://wikiph.org/ WikiPH] (or \"Wiki Public Health\") and University of Manitoba's [http://ltc.umanitoba.ca/wikis/publichealth Public Health Wiki].<ref>On 27 Nov 2010, checking the RecentChanges of each showed no edits in 30 days for WikiPH, and 2 edits on UoM's wiki.</ref> Neither of these fall into the category of [[open knowledge]], as they have not used an [[open license]] of any form. (No copyright information could be found on WikiPH, and the U Manitoba wiki's [http://ltc.umanitoba.ca/wikis/publichealth/index.php/PublicHealth:About About] page states that copyright is held by a university body.)\n\n== Support required for success ==\n\nA successful wiki project requires resources. Wikipedia, a pioneer, began with $10 million in seed funding; however more modest funding would be effective for newer projects, as some of the key work (such as development of the [[MediaWiki]] software platform), has been largely done.\n\n== Notes ==\n\n<references />\n\n== See also ==\n\n* [[Humanitarian wiki]]\n* [[Green wikis and development wikis]]\n\n{{Page data\n| license = CC-BY-SA-3.0\n}}\n\n[[Category:Wikis for human development]]\n[[Category:Public health]]"}