Many wiki authors have requested the ability to write in wiki without the material being publicly available on the internet. This is particularly common amongst first time writers in wiki.
The historical response to this request has been to enable writers to write locally using local wiki. Mobile wiki will provide this functionality on the desktop and mobile.
As we move progressively towards rolling out more and more standardised decentralised and privacy protecting technology, the future (and to some extent the present) of wiki gives us the capability of writing together, or as an individual with fine grained control over privacy.
Currently we are able to use Federated Wiki on Dat in the Beaker Browser, which provides strong cryptographic protection of your content, at the cost of making it harder to discover other writers.
# Privacy and openness The relationship between privacy and the openness of wiki is not a straight forward thing. The demand for openness can be oppressive to those that prefer slower, less public and a more contemplative writing experience. A secret ballot was created for exactly this reason, not to hide corruption, but to provide a safe space for the human conscience.
On the other hand every time a writer, trained in our current education system, finds it difficult to publish their work in a way that can be easily shared, the commons loses a little something. the individual loses the ability to gain feedback and learning from others, and the group loses knowledge and learning from the individual.
A great deal of facilitation and training in groups that begin writing in wiki is about giving encouragement to people that it is "ok" to reveal their early stage thinking and writing.
This vulnerability requites a set or norms that differ from conventional group think. Clarity and brevity can be mistaken for arrogance, and arrogance masked by poetic rhetoric. Privacy can be mistaken for dishonesty, and public writing for self-promotion.
In wiki we often write with "we" - which historically was part of the hubris that led to the downfall of Margaret Thatcher who infamously declared:
An idea should be able to evolve in its own niche. It should not be swamped too early by mainstream ideas. It should not be trolled out of existence, nor privy only to the bold. Our ideas must be allowed their introversion.
A man walks into a bar... it's a social situation we are all familiar with. It could be any public space. Most of them offer semi-anonymity. You could easily be identified, but probably not. Hidden in plain site so to speak.
There are levels of obscurity. Wiki is obscure - it likes to be obscure. This imparts a sense of freedom to you writing, perhaps mistaken, perhaps not. You feel less judged as you type. Wiki is not a blog post - you do not try to publish the results - rather you try to explore ideas in the early stage of formation.
With __self-sovereign identity (SSI)__ the individual identity holders can fully create and control their credentials, without being forced to request permission of an intermediary or centralised authority and gives control over how their personal data is shared and used - wikipedia 