Wiki collaboration doesn't necessarily end when a project is up and running. Users now have a place to share requests and complaints about how well a new IT system is working and what more they'd like out of it in the future. They do this via software called Bugzilla, a free "bug-tracking" system that allows people to track outstanding bugs they've discovered in a product.

Bugzilla can put vendors and users on the same electronic page. Montgomery County previously used a spreadsheet approach. People identified an issue and wrote a description of it. Next to that went the steps that had to be taken to cure the ill and the name of the person responsible for taking those steps. It was updated each week and discussed at a status meeting.

The grumbling ricocheted around in the ether until someone had a bright idea: Why not put transit-agency staff and public officials, transit riders and business people, and technology experts in a room and let them hash out ideas for making these systems work better together? Transit people usually don't get to sit down with technology experts without paying for their services. This was their opportunity.

The opportunity was called Transit Camp — a two-day conference, held in Palo Alto in February, to pull together ideas about how to fix what was broken in inter-county, inter-city transit. Transit enthusiasts got about 100 people from the public and private sectors to show up to brainstorm. The focus was on finding a user-friendly way for riders to navigate between and among two dozen transit systems.

In the wiki world, camps are the new style of conference. They are ad hoc and user-generated, put on by and for participants. There are no conference planners to put together an agenda of sessions. People interested in a particular issue — alerted by e-mail or word of mouth — just show up at the camp. On the fly, attendees discuss problems and demonstrate possible solutions. On a big board, people write down what they plan to talk about, and others sign up to listen.