Wikis are a great way to collaborate on text documents, but different wikis sometimes use incompatible wiki markup languages, and few wikis provide simple WYSIWYG editors to shorten the learning curve. Even for those fluent in wiki markup, using a word processor to create wiki content is often more convenient -- especially for publishing existing documents and for creating complex tables.

"...Both free software and wikis precisely reflect the kind of collaborative networking ethic that I explore in my book, and it should come as no surprise that so many radical or autonomous activists see their own struggles reflected in the struggle for free software or that so many contemporary activist collectives and projects use wikis- and the decentralized, collaborative editing process these

It is after all the largest, accessible, non-commercial information repository of all subjects on earth. If the status is granted it would not only mean more fame and recognition but also special protection and possibly funding. Wikipedia runs on free software (Mediawiki) and its contents are freely licensed.

Wiki software is a kind of collaborative software that runs a wiki system. This usually allows web pages to be created and edited using a common web browser. It is generally implemented as a software engine that runs on one or more web servers, with the content stored in a file system, and content changes kept in a relational database management system.

"...the Wikimedia Foundation Board has agreed with a proposal made by the Free Software Foundation that will permit Wikipedia (and other such wikis) to relicense under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license. [...] My endless thanks to everyone who has helped make this possible, from Richard Stallman and the FSF board..."
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Many types of open or general public licenses govern online collaborative spaces like wikis. The popular choices seem to fall under three categories: CopyLeft, Creative Commons, and Public Domain. All open licenses allow some use of content that would normally be covered by full copyright protection.

A Wiki engine is a type of collaborative software that runs a wiki system. This facilitates web pages being created and edited using a web browser. This type of software is usually implemented as an application server that runs on one or more web servers.

Created as a simple solution for managing documentation, DokuWiki has evolved into a powerful and flexible wiki suitable for most tasks involving collaborative editing. DokuWiki doesn't use a database back end (all pages are stored as plain text files), which makes it easy to install and maintain.

A great wiki engine behind Wikidot.com is now free software as Wikidot Inc owners: Pieter Hintjens and Piotr Frąckowiak, released the code on AGPLv3 license just today. This is great news for the Internet community as Wikidot is one of the most advanced wiki engines out there, leaving MediaWiki and TWiki far behind.