The Dallas Mavericks have a wiki. Check it out here.
If you’ve never heard of a “wiki” then it’s time you got up to speed. This simple, collaboration tool is quietly changing the way people get and share their information. It will certainly impact your life, whether you work in sports or not.
A wiki is essentially a document (web page) that can be easily created and edited by anyone who feels like it. Wikipedia, the Web based encyclopedia, is the most famous example. It has already torpedoed the storied Encyclopedia Britannica, and contiues to grow now it’s setting its sites on Google.
Wikis seem to be popping up everywhere. There’s even a new book out called “Wikinomics, How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything” in which authors, Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams, call for nothing less than a sea change. The following excerpt comes from the book’s introduction, and summarizes the authors’ theory.
“Billions of connected individuals can now actively participate in innovation, wealth creation, and social development in ways we once only dreamed of. And when these masses of people collaborate they collectively can advance the arts, culture, science, education, government, and the economy in surprising but ultimately profitable ways. Companies that engage with these exploding Web-enabled communities are already discovering the tru dividends of collective capability and genius.
To succeed, it will not be sufficient to simply intensify existing management strategies. Leaders mus think differently about how to compete and be profitable, and embrace a new art and science of collaboration we call wikinomics. This is more than open source, social networking, so-called crowdsourcing, smart mobs, crowd wisdom, or other ideas that touch upon the subject. Rather, we are talking about deep changes in the structure and modus operandi of the corporation and our economy, based on new competitive princicples such as opennes, peering, sharing, and acting globally (p 3).”
So how will wikis impact sports marketing?
Even before Mark Cuban made news by launching his team wiki, readers could find detailed history of sports teams on wikipedia. Here’s the history of the Colts, for example. If you follow that link you may be amazed at how much detail you find. Keep in mind the Colts had nothing to do with creating this entry. It’s all done by volunteers, mostly amaeteur sports buff, which leads many people (including our head of P.R.) skeptical. How could a bunch of amateurs know our history as well as we do? I don’t want to waste time in the “accuracy of wikepedia” debate. I think it’s clear that wikipedia is getting bigger and more accurate every day. So what are we going to do about it?
Sports teams, especially teams as popular as the Colts or the Mavericks, find themselves in an interesting position. For decades we have relied on media coverage to fan the flames of fan passion. We still do need media to broadcast and cover our games, but because of our websites, forums and now wikis and social networks, we are in the media business too…and much of our “content” is being created by the fans themselves.
We are realizing at once that there is economic value in the news we create, and thanks to the Web, we can knock out the middle man (media) and deliver this news directly to the fan. As the producer and distributor of the news, we have the opportunity to make money by selling subscriptions and sponsorships around that news. And now, thanks to the Web, fans are actually doing more and more of the “production” work FOR us, that is, if we choose to let them.
Allowing fans to write and post their thoughts and opinions can be dangerous, messy and inconvenient. Publishing fan opinions runs counter to most teams’ status quo. But I would submit this is exactly what we should do. We should not wait, as newspapers have done, until the cow is out of the barn and readers have defected. We should proactively create the platforms for user generated content, as the Mavs have done, and as we are doing with our upcoming social network.
Special thanks to David Schoenberg of Career Sports Entertainment for alerting me to the news about the Mavs Wiki.
This is not only a great way to outsource your administration of these details to devout fans willing to volunteer the time, but it is the best way to understand how those same fans want to organize the information. The function of wikis is a much about organizational choices as it is collaborative writing (in which “official” Colts folk can certainly participate to verify facts). Wikis, though, are primarily about community. They work when the community is empowered and invested in the work; they die when obstacles are put in the way or the topic doesn’t get enough interest to become fruitful.
I think it is well worth the day or so it would take to have the Colts launch an official wiki space and start seeding it slowly, as part of your normal operations. The important thing to keep saying as a mantra, though, is “We cannot control the content” Once an admin views the wiki as free legwork and wrests editorial control from its members, it is no longer a wiki.
Here’s another sports-centered wiki kind of tool: armchairgm.com. FYI.
Don’t rely on Wikipedia to do this kind of community building. First, it is a very different community than what you want. Second, the mission of the wiki is well beyond caring about the Indianapolis Colts. Leverage (and edit) the pages on Wikipedia by linking it to your own wiki, but do start your own.
Sorry … one more thing.
While MediaWiki is a common and reasonable choice for a wiki engine, because of the success and familiarity with Wikipedia, there are many others from which to choose. A great site for looking at the differences in feature and code can be found at Wiki Matrix .
I agree with Kevin on his point of control. A main stalwart of Wiki’s success has been the absence of an authority. It will be interesting to see how much control members of the Mavericks organization will try to have over MavsWiki.
To his explanation of what makes Wiki so successful, I agree that “community” plays a huge role. However, “passion” is just as important. A Wiki project will only work if there is a passionate community (i.e. Mavs fan base) to support it.
P.s. I like that one sentence in the description of the Wikinomics book: “The more you share, the more you win.”
I wonder whether they teach that in business schools…
Fittingly, I got an E mail today from my boss wondering why we hadn’t updated the history component of our Web site since 2002. Well, it’s simply because our PR Dept and our Web Dept. haven’t gotten around to it…yet I’ll bet we’re up to date on Wikipedia though :-).
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