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For the first time in a while I checked my Pathfinder Wikia page and saw an automated message there on my 'talk page' about the wikia having moved to wiki.
Since the address at the top of the screen said I was still at wikia, I'm not sure what's going on?
Are there now two copies of the Golarion wikipedia around, if so which is more up to date, and will steps be taken to delete the old one (which I assume may become more and more out of date and thus dangerously misleading with the passage of time) and link visiters to the old wikipedia site to the new one?
Will there be an email message sent to all known contributors/editors of the old wikia, informing them of the situation so that they can update bookmarks, create new identities, register with new w2hatever the technical terms are, etc?
Hi Charles, there is going to be a bigger announcement about this soon, but this is as good a point as any.
Not too long ago Wikia Changed the layout all wikis under them had to display. This was discussed at length on the wiki forum, because among other things, it was creating eye strain on some of the more active users and contributors, and shrunk the size of the text/picture area so there was more scrolling needed to read the entire article.
It was decided among the contributors that we would prefer to have the old layout back, which meant leaving wikia. This also means that the ads are gone, but we loose some of the wikia features that were not standard to the skin (such as blogs and certain extensions to templates).
This Week we transferred all data (as of Nov 3rd) to a self-hosting which is still accessible using www.pathfinderwiki.com we are still working on cleaning up some of the things that were unique to wikia's skin, but all of the data and edits are there.
As for messaging the old users, I'm not an admin, so I'm not sure what they are able to do, but wikia has policies against advertising that your wiki has left wikia, so we can not put anything on the main page advertising this split.
As soon as everything is finished getting cleaned up on the new page, we were going to make the announcement loud and clear, it just hadn't fully gotten to that point yet.
Please bear with us during the transition, and feel free to contribute to the wiki forum discussion HERE if you see any other issues. Thanks!
(Yoda, feel free to edit as needed)
What Cpt Kirstov said.
PathfinderWiki will continue as normal, except we'll be hosting the site privately instead of on the wikia community. Their handling of the switch to the new skin and some of their focus on Wikia as a whole over individual projects has led the PathfinderWiki admins to feel that a move to something we control is in the best interest of the site. As such, please make any additional edits or contributions to the site at pathfinderwiki.com, not the one at pathfinder.wikia.com.
Because we can't actively delete content from the wikia hosted site, we have to hope the move doesn't completely split the community, but that's a risk we take. As it stands, there are only a handful of really active members, and all of them will be moving to the new site. Over time, the hope is that the wikia site becomes outdated due to lack of active editors. Only time will tell, however.
Unfortunately, as others have mentioned there's not really anything that can be done within the Wikia project, other than what we already have, to point users from the Wikia fork to our new home. Wikia sees any text or descriptions that might funnel users to a different project as vandalism, and they have made it very clear that they will not only revert such edits, but ban those responsible. Nor will Wikia remove the content; they will retain it so that they can continue to sell advertising on the project. That it is unlikely to be actively contributed to or moderated does not seem to matter to them, so long as they can still profit monetarily from its presence on their network.
Normally I approve of Chaos. Blessed, sweet divine Chaos. But in this instance I approve of the move to a different site.
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Wow that seems a bit dodgy - they don't let you delete the content you posted, cause they want to make money off it..
Doesn't this go against the OGL or something? You can use it so long as it isn't used for profit. Sounds to me as if this Wikia website is using it for profit..
Although i'm not a law student, so i don't know exactly!
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If you want to help make the transition move along faster, the best thing to do is to help push Google along in updating links to the Wiki content.
In order to do that, the most important thing to remember is that Google randomly samples what links are clicked on in search results, so stop clicking on Wikia links when they show up.
There are a few other things you can do as well:
- Change any links you have, even on personal pages.
- When you search on Google for Pathfinder info, use "site:pathfinderwiki.com" at the end of your search.
- If you're really bored, find a random page on the new Pathfinder Wiki. Search for text from that page on Google in double quotes and click on the pathfinderwiki.com link (and NOT the wikia link). Don't do this more than twice. Google's pretty good at noticing deliberate link-pumping, but when it's dozens of people doing unrelated searches, that can work out well.
- On profile pages on other sites, link to your Pathfinder Wiki user page.
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Oh, one other thing... and I direct this at the people who are mad at Wikia. Please, don't be.
Wikia sees their role as being like Wikipedia, but for lots of special-purpose sub-cultures and communities, with advertising revenue to support it. When you create a wiki there, it's much like creating an article on Wikipedia. They don't see you as the "owner" of that wiki, and if you choose to create another wiki somewhere else, that's fine. They welcome your doing so, and wish you the best of luck, but that doesn't invalidate the wiki that exists on Wikia. You can even take content from Wikia, given the licensing and put it on your own wiki, elsewhere. They support that.
Many wikis have moved off Wikia successfully and many others exist in multiple places. As long as we, the community, understand where the Pathfinder Wiki is authoritative, there's no reason to be unhappy with the Wikia people keeping their version around. Just the same, there's no reason to be unhappy with anyone who decides to keep their own community site for Pathfinder. Some will become authoritative in their own ways.
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Oh, one other thing... and I direct this at the people who are mad at Wikia. Please, don't be.Still, it would be nice if they would at least allow you to put up an "obsolete Wiki" sign on all the pages or something.
That's a bit like saying that you want Wikipedia to put up a sign on the entry for "President of the United States" saying, "obsolete article" pointing to the information hosted on president.gov. From the Wikia standpoint, their (and I stress their) wiki is not obsolete just because some or all of the current contributors have gone off to work on another wiki.
Wikipedia and Wikia are all about community forks, and they're not bothered by those forks. They just don't want you using their site to advertise your fork.
People who assume that a Wikia site is their wiki or their community's wiki then get unhappy about this, but Wikia has always been up-front about what they're trying to establish and the service they provide.
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If I google 'Pathfinder Wiki' I get this site
Is this the correct site? Or would you please post a link to the correct site so that I can change my bookmark?
If I google 'Pathfinder Wiki' I get this site
Is this the correct site? Or would you please post a link to the correct site so that I can change my bookmark?
Third post - relinked for you.
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Third post - relinked for you.If I google 'Pathfinder Wiki' I get this site
Is this the correct site? Or would you please post a link to the correct site so that I can change my bookmark?
Oops
cheers