The Wikiweb application for iOS was released Tuesday by Baltimore-based web and mobile app design firm Friends of the Web.
Instead of digesting Wikipedia articles in text-only forms, Wikiweb allows Wikipedia readers to create webs of interrelated Wikipedia pages, each of which is represented by a hexagon in Wikiweb. Gray lines between hexagons denote the hyperlinks to other Wikipedia entries that one particular Wikipedia page contains. Alternatively, tapping on those hexagons will pull up separate Wikipedia pages, making for more visually-based navigation among entries.
See a video of the application below.
Andy Mangold, one of four co-founders of Friends of the Web, said he and his compatriots were moved to create the app because of the way they read Wikipedia: by clicking on the hyperlinks in the stories until they’re “12 articles deep,” two hours later.
“Wikipedia, despite all the amazing content, is sort of boring and academic,” Mangold says. “We really wanted to create something that would get more people excited.”
Friends of the Web has been working on the app for roughly nine months. Wikiweb, which works on both the iPhone and iPad, costs $4.99, and a portion of the proceeds will be donated to the Wikimedia Foundation.
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