Future of this wiki[]
Now that this wiki has been moved be under the Fandom domain, we are now directly competing with the Community Wiki, which is now seen as the overall "main wiki" due to its URL. This is not beneficial to our wiki as Fandom readers will gravitate towards the wiki with the root domain name as the "main wiki" as opposed to this one. This was somewhat the case before, but Gamepedia and Fandom are treated as different things due to their content policies, so now that all wikis are under Fandom.com we lose what specialness we had before.
So, with the wiki now part of Fandom, how should we proceed?
- Stay as we are
- Keep this wiki under the Fandom umbrella with no change at all.
- Merge with the Community Wiki
- Stay with Fandom but archive this wiki to merge with the Community Wiki with some arrangement as to how the differing content will be dealt with.
- Leave Fandom
- Leave Fandom and host the wiki privately. This will enable this wiki to remain independent and keep it different from the Fandom wiki to avoid perceptions of a "main wiki".
Personally I'm inclined towards 3 but 2 may be the best option. Nixinova T C 04:58, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
I'll wait to see what others say first. I think some specification should be added as to how #3 would occur though.
Paradox Overlord (talk) 05:32, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
I personally would like to see #2 option. As instead of having the community 'split' (I use Split lightly here) logging similar information in two different mediums, having them work under one area could mean that more time is spent refining the information and expanding upon it. Granted this may not be the idealistic or selected choice, as I am unsure about the methods of which the information may be 'merged' (like would the information be copied over, or through some other method?).
But regardless I see Option 2 as something that could bring communities together and to strive towards providing people with information (may sound a bit dreamy but its a possibility).
As for the option three, it is a completely viable solution, however the question you have to ask is 'what will you provide that others won't?'. As with Gamepedia and Fandom (Or now just Fandom) it's become a precedent that ones that exist on the site are usually the offical/unofficial Wiki to their respective game, movie, TV show, ect. I've seen several other independent websites contain information in a Wiki-esque format (one which comes to mind is Hytale Guide). So if it is the path this community is wishing to go, it will mostly come down to how you manage to get people to both view and interact with your own Wiki. Nic2121 (talk) 06:20, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
- Greetings! In case you didn't know, I'm the Wiki Representative assigned to this wiki to provide technical assistance if needed. Full disclosure: I am a part-time contractor for Fandom.
- Option 1 is obviously the least amount of work for all concerned. I can set up interwiki links so that both wikis can easily link to each other with a shortened link like
[[hw:pagename]]if you wish (I see there are already notices at the top of some pages that point to the other wiki and vice versa, but these do not show up on mobile devices.) and both wikis can continue on with life as usual.
- Option 2 is the best from many standpoints, but requires some work and an agreement between communities that you will have to hash out. What typically happens in these cases is that the admins from the source wiki are granted admin on the destination wiki, but that is not for me to decide. On the technical side, pages can be transferred between wikis using the Export/Import tool. This preserves the history of the page so contributors can still get credit for their work or see their past efforts. Pages with the exact same name will need to be merged unless one completely supersedes the other, so some editing is usually required. Option 2 gives the benefit of having one big community instead of two smaller ones: more wiki activity, better info presentation, better SEO (Search Engine Optimization, meaning Google will rank your pages higher in the search results), and less maintenance.
- Option 3 is probably the greatest amount of work with little benefit over Option 1. May I ask, why do you want to 'avoid perceptions of a "main wiki".'? Don't you want people to use your wiki as an authoritative source for info about the game? Assuming the answer is yes, I don't quite understand this statement. We (Fandom/Gamepedia) would be sad to see you go, but won't stand in your way if that is what the community decides. Like Paradox Overlord above, I'm not sure what would be done, but I would not be able to help you if you go with Option 3, whereas the other options still include me as a free resource, just sayin' ;)
- As you may have heard, Fandom is rolling out a new skin soon with new design tools. This seems like the perfect time to go with Option 2 (or Option 1 even), since pages are going to get a new look anyway, and the design of pages on this wiki should be a more comfortable fit on the new skin than on the Oasis skin in use today.
- I hope you find this constructive and that it prompts some discussion. Feel free to ask me questions on my Message Wall or reply here to keep it all in one place. —Moviesign (talk) 17:06, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
Fork discussion[]
As a continuation of the discussion above, the issues with Fandom remain extreme and irreconcilable. As the administrator and only active editor of this website, being on Fandom completely kills all motivation and enjoyment I get out of editing. This wiki will always be second best to communtity wiki solely due to the URL of the pages which will lead to this wiki never having an air of authority while it remains on Fandom. I have high standards of accuracy and reliability and writing style which is completely at odds with what people see Fandom wikis as. And I've hated the URL we are currently sitting on: why bother trying to maintain this wiki, when it will forever sit in the shadow of hytale.fandom.com?
So I ask here: Should this wiki move away from Fandom? and to where?
Discussion[]
- The primary alternative host I see at this point is wiki.gg. See the Minecraft Wiki discussion of wiki.gg. Any other ideas would be welcome. Nixinova T C 07:30, 12 May 2024 (UTC)