WikiYou: A Wikipedia About You

Have you ever had a good story about a person or just had something interesting to say about somebody? Did you then decide that the perfect place for that little anecdote of yours was on Wikipedia, only to find that shortly after writing it and putting it up on the website it was deleted for lack of "factual information" and too much "opinion"? Well, now there is a new website out there that is called Wikiyou, where you could do exactly what you couldn't do on Wikipedia.

Wikiyou came out this month and attempts to blend the idea of a website with collaborative editing of its content by users and a social networking site. It's a marriage between Wikipedia and Facebook or Myspace. Hence the name, Wikiyou.

Let me explain how it works. You sign up by providing your name, email address, and zip code. After that you could provide more biographical information. You then have the option to import your friends from your email address book and from Facebook as well. Then, you could get to work.

Click on someone and you can write a story about them. If you can't find that person, just click "Add Someone" at the top of the screen and they'll be added in. Likewise, people can write stories about you. These stories can be edited by anyone, just like in Wikipedia. The only exception being Editor's stories that tend to be more truthful and thus cannot be changed. As it is a user edited website, everybody's profile is public and can be seen by anyone else. Anyone can also write a story about anyone else.

The idea seems pretty unique and interesting, and while I have yet to fully explore the site, it also seems to have several kinks to work out. The first one is the obvious one: How can false or even damaging information be prevented from being added to the site? True, if I have made a profile and somebody writes something on it, I can very easily just edit that information and delete it. Aside from the slight annoyance, no real problem there. However, suppose I don't have a profile and somebody writes something false and injurious. How would I ever know? It's not hard to add someone to the site, which I tested out. All one has to do is click the Add Someone button, type in a name, and then start writing "biographical information" about them. Worse yet, if this site becomes like Myspace or Facebook, where prospective colleges and employers check up on people before accepting them, it may cause problems. Theoretically, I could add someone I dislike, and write that they have some sort of venereal disease, and they would never be the wiser.

This is the bigger concern, not one I have yet to witness, perhaps because the site is still small with few users, but one that worries me. The other problem I see is that given the opportunity to write biographical information, there is too much non-biographical information and more filler. Clicking on almost any user, I find their page filled with comments like "He's so cool" or "He loves Star Wars." Granted, the fact the he loves Star Wars is biographical, but not only is it not that interesting, but having ten separate comments, or "stories," saying the exact same thing is unnecessary, and I have seen stuff like that mentioned multiple times. If the site becomes larger, these comments will become like spam, and I doubt people would truly want to read about other people if they have to sift through pages of "He's really nice."

Nevertheless, I find the prospects of the site interesting and if these little issues could be worked out (perhaps you can only write about people you're friends with) then it has potential. If you're interested, I recommend checking it out at http://www.wikiyou.com/.