Collaborative Knowledge at the Grass-roots Level: the Risks and Rewards of Corporate Wikis

The open source movement is founded on the concept of democratising knowledge to freely collaborate and exchange information at the grass-roots level. As Wikis are philosophically grounded in this movement, the use of corporate Wikis in the collaborative creation and operation of knowledge management systems holds considerable potential. However, the impact of using corporate Wikis in the business environment has uncovered some challenging issues such as licensing, accountability and liability regarding copyright, which may require a change in the way we think about intellectual property and licensing in this connected world.