Forum:Godammit Wikia!

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Forums: Index > Hocotate Chatter > Godammit Wikia!


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Sir Pikmin
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
If you have been on the Community Central Wikia lately you will notice that they are changing how Wikia looks. And it's not just some optional thing, it's mandatory for everyone. There will not be an option to change back to Monaco, it's permanent. Now after all of almost every wikis' hard work in making a unique and cool custom skin, it's going down the drain and getting removed from existence. And the worst part is that they are acknowledging that nearly everyone who has commented on it hated it, and they do nothing about it!

Now I know that a regular non-admin user might not realize why I'm mad, because they have not done anything with MediaWiki and the skins. I personally have put over 10 hours in customizing the various Monaco skin features, and now they are going to be wasted! </rant>

Ok then, what do you all feel about the new skin change?


This sucks, especially since Greenpickle and Blueninjakoopa were testing out a sweet new skin for he Kirby Wikia. – FREAK ~ GameGameFreak.pngfreak ~ OUT!


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Sir Pikmin
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
Yeah, I know. I was going to maybe get a list of users on this wiki that didn't like the new Wikia style and then add them to the ever-growing list on the comments of the blog announcing it. Can I add you to my list?


Yes! – FREAK ~ GameGameFreak.pngfreak ~ OUT!


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Volatile Dweevil
TALK – Time: {{{2}}}
Count me in!!!

P.S. -Maybe we could bribe or torture convince one of the wikia staff members to keep ours, Pikipedia's and the Kirby Wiki's skin in the original Monaco style.


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Volatile Dweevil
TALK – Time: {{{2}}}
I sent the following message to wikia today. I will continue to message them every day and will post my messages on this forum once I have written them.

This is the first and most polite message, sent on August 25th:

I know that the members of Pikipedia (pikmin.wikia.com), the Pikmin Fanon Wiki (pikminfanon.wikia.com), the Kirby Wiki (kirby.wikia.com), and several other wikis would like to keep our Monaco skins. We are fully aware that certain members of the wikia staff are fully capable of allowing us this and we would really appreciate if you strongly considered our request. If you are not convinced we will send you a petition signed by a large number of users from these wikis and the ones listed below.

Other Wikis that would like to keep the Monaco skin:

  • pikminideas.wikia.com
  • swb.wikia.com

Several other wikis will probably want to do this as well, but remember, we took the trouble to email you and we will be persistent on this problem until it is solved.

Thank you for your compliance,

Volatile Dweevil


I hate it! The worst thing about it Almost all of the wikias will look the same. Pikness34 Pikness34 sprite.gif The Researcher of Fate

Do almost all of the wikia wikis look the same now? --Yoshord 16:01, August 26, 2010 (UTC)
This SUUUUUUCKS *sniffle* D;< john says, "wooferwoof1 is good for your health!" 16:19, August 26, 2010 (UTC)

I give up... Wikia staff members ignore us... In my eyes, we have only two options now.

  1. Live with the new style (we could do this, albeit with much frustration)
  2. Relocate (this might not be such a bad idea, though, if wikia continues to make bad updates)

My user page. My talk page.

I do not think NIWa accepts fan-made wikis. – FREAK ~ GameGameFreak.pngfreak ~ OUT!

My wiki is screwed Pikness34 Pikness34 sprite.gif The Researcher of Fate


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Sir Pikmin
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
Ok guys, all is not lost. What we have to do is get a large number of people to make the Wikia staff believe that we can go elsewhere easily. While technically this is true for this wiki (My site says hello) since I can easily add a Wiki app to the site, other Wikis aren't so lucky. We all just have to send differing emails to Wikia via Special:Contact and hope it does something. Wikia isn't just going to let most of its user-base walk away, they will eventually at least give us a non-BS reason for the skin change. I believe we can win here, but it requires coordination between us.

And to all of the regular users I am going to send out an important email soon maybe answering some questions you may have about a particular badge set.... Or not. It appears only Peanut and I have our emails available here on Wikia, meaning I can't send it out to everyone. I do know that at least a couple of you do have emails, an example is right on this page. If you do have one, and enable it for just one day to be public that would be great. On another note you can still contact Wikia if your email is private, in case you want to file any complaints.


I am convinced that the Wikia's advertising department is certain that their new format will be so inviting to new members that they could double their users overnight even if all the old members left. I doubt that their mind could be changed by mere "I'm leaving and everyone else will too!" --Yoshord 02:36, August 28, 2010 (UTC)

Contrarily, are you actually beta-testing right now? Have you seen this skin? Is it really so bad that you feel the need to mass-organize a revolt so that you won't need to spend another five hours modifying the new skin to have a grassy background? Is it in the slightest worth it? --Yoshord 03:34, August 28, 2010 (UTC)


Zekk.png
Zoadra – There is a one in a 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 chance that I will make you a bureaucrat right now.
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
We should relocate or something. I won't take this crap, and I hope no one else here will.
@Sir Pikmin: The wikis on webs aren't really suitable to transform and move all of our articles at once, even at a time!
@Everyone:I made the skin, and now Wikia is changing eveything.... Just crap. :


Zekk.png
Zoadra – There is a one in a 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 chance that I will make you a bureaucrat right now.
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
 : I just sent the NIWA a message:

Hello there, NIWA.

I am sure you know of Wikia, because they are the base of thousands of controlled wikis. Now they are changing the entire layout of Wikia and all of the Wikis. This is terrible because I designed the css based on the monaco, and they are going to change it. We of http://www.pikminfanon.wikia.com Pikmin Fanon ask of membership into the NIWA. It is clear to us that no Fanon wikis exist on your group of wikis, but we can make it a Pikmin Wiki with a seprate Fanon namespace. So please respond to this sincere message, and have a great day!
Peanut64,
Co-Leader of Pikminfanon
I hope they respond, because I don't like Wikia anymore at ALL.


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Sir Pikmin
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
Ok then, one at a time:

@Yoshord:I am not actually even going to attempt beta testing it. However there were a few images released which showed some really bad design choices IMO. First off, and the only part of this that I don't hate, is that the sidebar will be moved to the top and changed into a drop-down menu. That gets it up and out of the way, meaning we could have wider article space and include more content in said space. However, that is messed up by the right recent activity bar. To me, that is very bad because it makes it so there's no buffer between the article text and the left side of the screen. My monitor for some strange reason has about half an inch of the left side of every program cut off, meaning that I might not be able to read articles correctly anymore. However, that is an issue only for me, so it doesn't really count.

Honestly, I'm not as mad at this as before when I made the topic. I understand Wikia's reason to screw with the wikis, even though it is a really crappy reason. I may try the beta once I can get some more info about it, like can I revert back to normal or am I stuck with the beta skin once I apply for it?

It does appear that every wiki will have the same background and that we can only change the colors, at least that's what I saw on on of their blog posts about this. And I believe it is worth it, Wikia didn't let us contribute to their new format before it became known. So we are stuck with what they give us. We might be able to mess with it, but from the look of the screenshots I don't think so.

@Peanut:

You really should of asked before you sent that message. I personally would prefer Dweevil's first idea, with making your own Wiki with MediaWiki. It would be almost the same as now, so everyone doesn't need to learn a whole new system. And the best part is, we would have full control of how it works and what happens on it. If we were to do that, or course I would set it up, with the whole Head Admin thing and all. I would send Peanut a copy when it's done, so we could have a backup of the info. I think that could work out fine, but let us wait until Wikia gives more information about the new changes before we do anything else people. We're not going to move anytime soon.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be making a backup of all the css and js we have, just in case.


Zekk.png
Zoadra – There is a one in a 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 chance that I will make you a bureaucrat right now.
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
I am sorry about always jumping ahead before asking, and If the NIWA responds, I'll tell them that we decline. Anyways, chao!


First, you can obtain a backup of everything here. Second, no, every wiki can change their background, and everything else. --Yoshord 17:44, August 28, 2010 (UTC)


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Sir Pikmin
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
Thanks, I didn't know about the first one, and I'm not sure how I missed the second. In that case, then we'll definitely not move at least until we see how it will look customized.


If we have to move can someone help me move my wiki please? Pikness34 Pikness34 sprite.gif The Researcher of Fate

Just so you know me, I'm Axiomist of NIWA and owner of WiKirby. We got Peanut's email and I was looking around. Seems there's some confusion about NIWA. NIWA isn't anything like Wikia. We don't force anything on anyone, we just help each wiki figure out how to code up what THEY want. If you look around the NIWA wikis you'll notice there's hardly anything identical among each site. We love individuality and believe each wiki develops their own personality, style, and values. From my honest assessment of the situation you guys are in, I'd say to back up and export all of your files, get a working version of mediawiki installed, hosted, as quickly as possible, Wikia will change the skin, things may need extensive retuning to get a smooth look again. While the wiki is broken down, abandon it for the newly created working port of the wiki and enjoy the freedom from them forever!

This is the NIWA manifesto here you may find lines you agree with and even have suggestions for new ones. Axiomist 00:39, August 29, 2010 (UTC)


Zekk.png
Zoadra – There is a one in a 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 chance that I will make you a bureaucrat right now.
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
Well.. It doesn't actually seem that bad.
@Sir Pikmin: We could do both things (set up a mediawiki & put it for membership on NIWA) because from my point of view, It is an oppurtunity for far more users than we could imagine and imagination fills the users we could have which keeps us alive. So we shouldn't turn them down right away, but think about it first. We would still have power over our wiki as it seems, and That's good.


Because I'm on a wii I'm making a new heading so my wii Doesn't get fragged

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Pikness34
TALK – Time: it's whatever I want it to be!!
I'm screwed
  1. Because Spectrobes arent from nintendo
  2. I can't download on a wii


Hi, I'm Porplemontage, founder of the Super Mario Wiki. If hosting is an issue, I've registered pikminwiki.com and could set up and host a wiki for you there. It would be a Pikmin wiki at its core, but with a fanon namespace for the non-canon stuff. A majority of the community here would have to be on board. If hosting is not a problem, that's great, either way NIWA would love to have this community in the network. --Porplemontage 11:06, August 29, 2010 (UTC)


Zekk.png
Zoadra – There is a one in a 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 chance that I will make you a bureaucrat right now.
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
Thank's Porple, but we need to discuss this more. Also, I actually first found out about Wikis with Mariopedia but I thought it was a part of Wikia. So I looked it up later and found out it was seprate and went with Wikia. I would love to kick Wikia in the... Because of all the darn control they have over us.


Good day, Axiomist and Porplemontage, I'm sure you know me. Anyways, we are still under discussion, but when we come to a stable conclusion, we'll let you know. – FREAK ~ GameGameFreak.pngfreak ~ OUT!


Zekk.png
Zoadra – There is a one in a 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 chance that I will make you a bureaucrat right now.
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
@Pikness: Spectrobes is Nintendo, just made by Disney..


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Sir Pikmin
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
Axiomist and Porpalmontage, I thank you for taking notice of this and replying to us, that right there shows that you guys are better than Wikia. I do have some questions though, and I'll split them up so you can see them better.

1. About the namespace thing, do we basically change our name to pikmin wiki and have it set up as we do now, or something new?

2. The skin at all of the NIWA wikis appear to be based off of Wikipedia's skin and the Monobook skin here on wikia. Is it possible to change this, or do we have to keep it like that? I assume that we could because they all use MediaWiki, which is what Wikia uses too. EDIT:I looked at the Kirby NIWA Wiki and saw that you can.

3. Not a question, but something for you guys. We're probably not going to move until after we find out how the beta for the new wikia look goes. I personally want to make sure that we can't avoid it until we start to move.

4. How is the activity over there? Do you guys get a lot of people at your Wiki's, or what?

5. On the same note, what about spammers and vandals? Do they frequent NIWA wikis or do they avoid them?

6. Is it possible to move everything over there, and have it work just fine? I mean, can we move all our templates and pages over and have them work without having to modify them? Even though I'm pretty sure the answer would be yes, since it's MediaWiki and all, I wanna make sure.

7. Do you get a lot of Wikis that apply to be in NIWA? Since you both probably got Peanut's message I assume that you would both also know about that question. And as a follow-up, has this sort of activity increased since Wikia announce their planned 'updates' to their system?

That's all I could think of for now. I would like to thank you again for taking the time to come and help us with this. If/When we do have to move, I already know I can trust you and hopefully the rest of NIWA.


Zekk.png
Zoadra – There is a one in a 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 chance that I will make you a bureaucrat right now.
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
:SirPikmin: I know your question was for them, but I know some answers because of my research and talks with the people there.

4. I was at the chatroom at Mariowiki and I was talking to like, nine people. The activity is different than that, they get constant edits. Its like they are all seprate Wikipedias.

6. People have done it already.

Any other question is for them to answer.


  1. You would change your name to the Pikmin Wiki and have factual articles listed as articles meanwhile you would have a seperate namespace (fanon) for all the fanon stuff, the articles would be labeled Fanon:<thing> instead of just <thing>.
  2. OK
  3. You should move before but not leave officially, just have something set up in case. Then if you want to go back on your decision, you can just forget about the wiki.
  4. Activity is pretty good, your current community would be active on the new wiki meanwhile the community of the other wikis would also help out. A good example would be the Wars Wiki, when it joined NIWA, a user from the MarioWiki (RAP) and a user from Bulbapedia (KC-Earthshaker) joined it (that's all I saw) and improved it greatly, KC is actually a 'crat there as well.
  5. Spammers and vandals haven't targetted multiple wikis yet, or at least not in that great of a magnitude.
  6. Yes
  7. Well, more wikis join every now and then, there's a topic on the forums where wikis apply, it's kind of slow, kind of fast. Fanguy1 (talk).


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Sir Pikmin
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
Ok then, thanks for answering! But I have one more question:

I know that NIWA as a whole is a not-for-profit, however I assume that all of the individual Wikis there have to to pay to have their their domain name. Can we get a rough estimate of how much that would be, or is it free? The link that Volatile Dweevil gave out near the top of the page makes it seem like it would be at least relatively inexpensive, but I could be wrong on that.

The NIWA wikis are all individual sites, like different wikis. The cost of hosting WiKirby for the first year was around $70 but that included some onetime expenses. Renewal is expected to be around $40 per year, but less if they have like a 3yr deal. I opted for inline text ads (Kontera) but Bulbapedia and Mario Wiki seem to use Google Ads (image ads), which probably pay more. The idea there is to have them pay some of the hosting costs, but when the time comes I can pay for my renewal regardless. New sites like mine are expected to cost more than they make. Now to answer the questions from Sir Pikmin:

  1. Well if you buy your own domain name and cover all of your own costs, then I'd expect you could do whatever you pleased. My guess, (I haven't asked him but I think) Porplemontage bought the domain for a canon Pikmin wiki and is offering you a home on it, in which you could use your awesome wiki design for both (canon and fanon) wikis housed under one roof, in which you'd be a staff member of both, or even a vested owner of it. (best to get the specifics from him since that is his own personal offer)
  2. Although most of them stayed using the monobook, Zelda Wiki.org has an optional Gumaxx skin toggled in the user preferences panel. Best way to see that is to sign up and change your preference, it's unbelievably awesome. And a newer one is in the works. The same designer of it made the skin for WiKirby and Metroid Wiki.org. Wikirby has the Gumaxx set to default since it works best for the idea Steve had on the skin design.
  3. Understood, Fanguy1's idea seems worth consideration as well.
  4. Activity fluctuates. I can't promise any activity level quotas. A better analogy for NIWA and Wikia would be: Buying a house on a large plot of land vs an apartment. The apartment (Wikia) comes with strings attached, the landlord can do whatever he/she wants. Your house (NIWA) might get fewer guests at the parties, but you can decorate however you want-get to be your own boss.
  5. Well we employ more antispammer and vandal tools than most Wikia wikis do. For one, WiKirby requires an account to edit. Fewer spammers and even fewer spambots will go through that step, instead waste their time targeting wikis that allow anon editing. We get an occasional spammer and just block them on the spot.
  6. More have applied than have been accepted yes. Mostly startups, we have to tell them that we can't build their wiki for them, only help them afterwards. We actually have the expertise to build the wiki, but ya know, if we go around building wiki after wiki, we won't have time to work on the wikis we call homewikis. So it makes more sense to help a wiki after they get off the ground, NIWA has a 200 article de facto standard for inclusion.

I know nothing about Spectrobes, but if you ask people on the NIWA forums, you might be able to find some help with it. NIWA is in talks with GameHiker.com to see if they would like to be a sort of a "potpourri" wiki which would be the home for games with only a few releases. One possibility is to build up info on those series there and if they decide to break a series off into its own wiki after a series gets too large, they could always do that. Axiomist 03:07, August 30, 2010 (UTC)

Sorry on a Wii

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Pikness34
TALK – Time: it's whatever I want it to be!!
Hope still lingers for my Wiki!!,WAIT!!!!! NIWA dudes, will you accept Spectrobes Fanon Wiki?


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Sir Pikmin
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
Ok, I'm going to break up my reply one bold sentence at a time.

The cost of hosting WiKirby for the first year was around $70 but that included some onetime expenses. Renewal is expected to be around $40 per year, but less if they have like a 3yr deal.- That's a bit more than I expected, but it's not that bad. We can deal with that.

My guess, (I haven't asked him but I think) Porplemontage bought the domain for a canon Pikmin wiki and is offering you a home on it,- That would be awesome, but whatever he (she? Just want to cover all my bases here.) decides is fine. Unlike Wikia, I have faith that you guys know what you're doing and won't screw us over.

Zelda Wiki.org has an optional Gumaxx skin toggled in the user preferences panel. Best way to see that is to sign up and change your preference, it's unbelievably awesome. And a newer one is in the works.- Ok, I'll have to check that out.

Your house (NIWA) might get fewer guests at the parties, but you can decorate however you want-get to be your own boss.- That's good, fewer guests to steal the beer :D. But seriously now, that's good thing. And I like all the different skins that I saw when I visited them, and a lot had things that Wikia won't let you do.

Well we employ more antispammer and vandal tools than most Wikia wikis do.- Tell me more.

For one, WiKirby requires an account to edit.- *Hugs* I love that idea! But like above, please tell me more.

Fewer spammers and even fewer spambots will go through that step, instead waste their time targeting wikis that allow anon editing. We get an occasional spammer and just block them on the spot.- This is good, and while we really haven't had many spammers and vandals, I like to know that we will have almost none.

So it makes more sense to help a wiki after they get off the ground, NIWA has a 200 article de facto standard for inclusion.- To me it seems like that standard should be raised up a bit, but it's your de facto standard and not mine.

And I have another one more question. I also know that was horrible grammar, but it fits its purpose.

About things like seasonal or holiday events, have those happened much on NIWA Wikis? Not a major question, but something that's almost pertinent considering that we have done an event like that last year for Halloween.


What up, man? I'm Neo, the owner of Lylat Wiki, an upcoming NIWA entrant wiki. I'm also a NIWA staff member, so I can provide some info.
  1. Anti-spam tools:We use a variety of tools to stop spam dead in its tracks. We have captchas at Zelda Wiki and Wars Wiki. Also, we have extensions which prevent spam bots from registering (supposedly.)
  2. Account-only editing:This is actually REALLY simple. It's a matter of disallowing IP editing and only allowing user editing. I did it for Lylat Wiki due to a lack of positive contributions from IPs.
  3. Article Standard:Actually, some series struggle even with that 200 article standard. We have to be careful about regulating that because some series can't even churn out 500 articles, meaning that things will progress much slower.
  4. Holidays:Well, each wiki is different, so I don't know, but the NIWA itself has not yet done any holiday themed stuff. It could come about later on, though. I'd love to see like a Pumpkin-themed NIWA hub :P
Hope these have been helpful. Let me know if you've got any more questions!Neo of ZW 05:24, September 6, 2010 (UTC)


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Sir Pikmin
TALK – Saturday, November 11, 2023
I'd like to thank you for coming Neo. You guys really are better than Wikia, especially in Custom Support. I don't have any more questions, but I hope that Pikness's can be answered soon. I'm going to make a new topic because this is getting too long, and also because we're getting a bit off topic here.

So this post will be the </endtopic>