Lesson plan

Spiceworks

Spiceworks is a professional network for the information technology (IT) industry that is headquartered in Austin, Texas. The company was founded in January 2006 by Scott Abel, Jay Hallberg, Greg Kattawar, and Francis Sullivan to build IT management software. Since 2019 it has been owned by Ziff Davis. Spiceworks is an online community where users can collaborate and seek advice from one another, and also engage in a marketplace to purchase IT-related services and products. In 2014 the network was estimated to be used by more than six million IT professionals and 3,000 technology vendors. The company's original free proprietary software was written in Ruby on Rails, and ran exclusively on Microsoft Windows. The software discovered IP-addressable devices and included help desk functionality and an integrated knowledge base. The desktop application was retired in 2021 in favor of a cloud-based help desk.

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Article summary

Spiceworks is a professional network for the information technology (IT) industry that is headquartered in Austin, Texas. The company was founded in January 2006 by Scott Abel, Jay Hallberg, Greg Kattawar, and Francis Sullivan to build IT management software. Since 2019 it has been owned by Ziff Davis. Spiceworks is an online community where users can collaborate and seek advice from one another, and also engage in a marketplace to purchase IT-related services and products. In 2014 the network was estimated to be used by more than six million IT professionals and 3,000 technology vendors. The company's original free proprietary software was written in Ruby on Rails, and ran exclusively on Microsoft Windows. The software discovered IP-addressable devices and included help desk functionality and an integrated knowledge base. The desktop application was retired in 2021 in favor of a cloud-based help desk.

Key claims

  1. date of formation: 2006 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95
  2. date of foundation: 2006 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95
  3. release date: 2006 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95
  4. release date: 2007 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95
  5. release date: 2014 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95

Discussion questions

  1. Summarise the article in your own words. Which single claim would you verify first, and why?
  2. The record states that the date of formation is "2006". What evidence would count against this claim?
  3. The record states that the date of foundation is "2006". What evidence would count against this claim?
  4. The record states that the release date is "2006". What evidence would count against this claim?
  5. The record states that the release date is "2007". What evidence would count against this claim?
  6. The record states that the release date is "2014". What evidence would count against this claim?
  7. Which claim in this article is most likely to be revised as the sources update? How would you check its current status?
  8. If two sources disagreed about one of these facts, what would you need in order to trust one over the other?

Bibliography

  1. Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1375051592

Key claims and bibliography are generated from the same tracked claims and sources as the article page.