Wiki Vs. Forum for collaboration?

While I am very familiar with message boards and forums I have to admit that I a complete wikinoob. I just never saw the need to get into wikis when forums seemed to do the same thing. It seems though the wiki idea has become dominant so I'm ready to consider it.

A colleague and I are setting up a project that will require students across campus to have a central location to share information AND discuss it. It is basically a series of brainteaser-esque puzzles and so the discussion part ("Hey, I think we should try...") is key to making it work.

Given that, would a Wiki be the way to go or is the good ol' forum still the best way to do information discussion while wikis serve more to present/share the info itself?

Tags: forum, wiki

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Permalink Reply by Ian Grove-Stephensen on October 9, 2008 at 9:09am

At first glance, this hinges around how the information is to be shared. Wikis work when users actively edit each others' entries to the point where you really cannot tell who said what. The final output can only be said to be the work of the group acting as a whole. I suspect that they only work when the primary goal is to create shared content. If the primary goal is to debate, then a debating tool is more appropriate.

If the aim of the exercise is more like "I will show you my content, then we will collectively discuss it", then I would consider a third tool - blogs.