Star Wars Fanon

"Imagination is more important than knowledge."

- Albert Einstein

The Star Wars Fanon Wiki (SWF or SWFanon) is a fanon, or fan-fiction, Wiki of Star Wars.

The purpose of the Star Wars Fanon Wiki is to provide a wiki that creative Star Wars fans can publish their own fanon articles without being deleted like they would be at Wookieepedia. Users can read the material of other users, suggest changes, or even edit the article to improve it (though you should get permission before you do more than very minor, simple revisions and fixes). The Wiki was made as a fan fiction version of Wookieepedia, a Wikia made to document canon Star Wars information. Recently, a few non-canon facts have popped up here and there.

History
Star Wars Fanon was founded on August 30, 2005 by Neomessiah as a fan fiction version of Wookieepedia. Despite the date of creation, the Wiki did not become an active one until May 2006, a whole nine months after it was actually created. When it became active, numerous problems began to arise. There were various attempts to elect an active System Operator, also known as SysOps and Administrators, but all of the elections fell through and no one was elected. In June 2006, there was a major occurrence of vandalism throughout the entire Wiki which caused a Wiki-wide rollback effort, forcing many users to restart to the work they had been working on.

Despite the major string of vandalism, the community as a whole was able to come together in July 2006 to participate in the First Star Wars Fanon Wiki Awards. Hosted by Darth Vacatour, a total of twenty awards were handed out to various users. During the same month, the Senate Hall, the Fanon Cantina and the Star Wars Fanon IRC channel were established by the members.

In August 2006, StarNeptune was appointed by Wikia Staff to be the first Star Wars Fanon Administrator in order to help around the Wiki. Check user rights were also appointed, but only due to the heavy amount of vandalism. In October 2006, Jedi Master 76, C3PO the Dragon Slayer and Bub were also appointed to be Administrators.

As the Wiki continued to grow in size and membership, the Alliance of Fanon was established. In February 2007, much to the joy of the entire community, Star Wars Fanon was the featured Wikia Wiki. In April 2007, the community came together once again and held the Second Star Wars Fanon Wiki Awards. Hosted by Jasca Ducato, a total of twenty-seven awards were handed out to various users. Later that month, Jack Phoenix and Victor Dorantes were elected as Administrators.

Throughout the months of 2007, numerous new policies were established. The Voting Policy, Video policy and the Userbox Policy were all created, as was the Clan Policy. There was some backlash from members regarding the banning of clans, but the policy remained intact. The Manual of Style, the Layout Guide and the Categorization Policy were also extensively rewritten in order to conform to and create a much higher standard of quality. Thousands of uncategorized articles were also deleted by the Administration. Two additional user groups were created to oversee the promotion of articles. The Decreton Lords, whose name was based off of a rank in the Sith Order of Decreto, were created to oversee and handle the promotion of articles to Featured article status. Later, the High Priests, based off of a rank in the Bendu Order, were created to oversee and handle the promotion of articles to Good article status.

Four additional Administrators were elected by the community as a whole in two Administrative elections during the summer months. In June 2007, Wayne Lipman III and Jasca Ducato were elected by the community as Administrators. In September 2007, Brandon Rhea and Christian Ashley were also elected by the community as Administrators. There have been no further Administrative elections since the last election ended on September 1, 2007. Once again, the community as a whole came together in January and February of 2008 for the Third Star Wars Fanon Wiki Awards. Hosted by Brandon Rhea and Victor Dorantes, a total of twenty-three awards were handed out to various users.

Star Wars Fanon currently has articles and  uploaded files, as well as a consistent number of active users who contribute daily to make Star Wars Fanon a premier Wiki for fans of the Star Wars Saga to delve into the universe and use and express their vast imaginations.

Community names
What members of this site are called is a disputed topic. "Fanonians," "Fanonites," and other names have been suggested, though none have caught on in the current community. "Users" and "Contributors," which are Wikia-wide titles, are the general formal term for a writer of fanon on this site. "Fanonify" has been a term used, mimicking "Wikify" and "Wookify" from the Wikipedia and Wookieepedia.

The administrators of the site once held the title of "The Cabal", but they have recently decided to change their title back to simply "Administrators."

Bureaucrats
The Bureaucrats of Star Wars Fanon, who are also referred to as Supreme Chancellors, are elected users that have the power to appoint administrators on the wiki. They can only do this, however, when the community agrees upon a specific person becoming an administrator through voting. While they are largely similar to administrators in general article editing, their opinions are almost always considered in important policy decisions that affect the whole site, as well as determining consensus in difficult cases. Other than that, the role of a bureaucrat is similar to the role of the administrator. While bureaucrats can grant sysop powers to a user, they cannot remove them. That task must be done by a Wikia Staff member.

Another segment of the bureaucrats' role is that their votes must be unanimous in order for a user to be approved as a sysop. Bureaucrats are selected through requests for bureaucratship. Generally, a bureaucrat should have been an admin on Star Wars Fanon for some time, have been a regular contributor for five months or more, be critical, skeptical, but willing, and they must support community spirit.

There have been four Bureaucrats throughout the history of Star Wars Fanon. Neomessiah was a Bureaucrats by default due to his position as founder of the Wiki, and C3PO the Dragon Slayer became one later. In 2007, Squishy Vic was granted Bureaucrats powers, and upon his resignation in June 2008 Brandon Rhea was elected to fill the position. Rhea and C3PO the Dragon Slayer are currently the only active Bureaucrats.

Administrators
The Administrators of Star Wars Fanon, once known as The Cabal and more technically as System Operators or SysOps, are users who have been given extended technical privileges. Administrators have been elected by the community of Star Wars Fanon because they are trusted, seen as worthy, and have proven themselves to be the best choice to be an administrator. There are currently seven active Administrators, those users being Brandon Rhea, C3PO the Dragon Slayer, CurrentBigThing, Darth tom, Drewton, Gnosis is knowledge, Jack Phoenix, Jasca Ducato, Michaeldsuarez and NKSCF.

Administrators are also supposed to be there to help new members and amateur writers. Administrators can show their worth by guiding new users how to format, properly write, and categorize articles. Administrators can also help with technical difficulties, such as creating templates or editing mark up codes. Administrators also have the advantage to delete unwanted and unused articles, templates, categories and images. The most important task of all, however, is to watch over the recent changes for vandalism and punish vandals appropriately.

Another duty that the administrator must handle is arguments amongst the members and writers of Star Wars Fanon. If a user has a dispute with another user, they must settle it in a civil manner. However, if an administrator must intervene, it is usually because a personal attack or perhaps vandalism has occurred, in which the administrator must take action. Administrators are elected to make the wiki a fun, friendly and quality place for everyone. They are elected through requests for adminship.

Criticism
Most critics of Star Wars Fanon have noted the following drawbacks to this wiki:
 * 1) Users are overposessive of pages, and community editing is seemingly extinguished.
 * 2) The articles on Star Wars Fanon commonly contradict canon, and are ridiculous to the extremes at many times.
 * 3) Because of the "copyrights" of created pages, though they are officially under GDFL and GNU, users cannot freely fix a horribly written article that might have been made.
 * 4) Continuity contradictions are very common among different users' contributions.
 * 5) Some critics claim that Star Wars Fanon was more of a chat site than a Wiki, as many users talk informally in forums and discussion pages.
 * 6) The information on Star Wars Fanon is relatively pointless and offers no benefit to research.
 * 7) Users commonly feed the trolls.
 * 8) Before the appointment of StarNeptune as sysop, followed by three new administrators some time later, the site was criticized to be slow to respond to vandal attacks and many unwanted pages were omnipresent.
 * 9) Occasionally, Star Wars Fanon contributors have been called "thirteen year olds with delusions of grandeur."
 * 10) More recently, Star Wars Fanon has been criticized for its site name, due to Wikia's definition of "fanon".

Star Wars Fanon contributors view the Star Wars Fanon Wiki as a site to offer creative, and by no means unconstructive, work to a community on a common subject and offer suggestions and ideas to the such work of others. As there are few limits to the opportunities on this Wiki in the eyes of many users, the place makes up for its lack of research value with its value of teaching writers with experience and feedback. Other users commonly compare the Star Wars Fanon Wiki with the Uncyclopedia, given the wide coverage of non-Star Wars or Cross-over material.

Star Wars Fanon users generally respond in a "So what?" manner, meaning that this wiki is for an audience that they are members of, and alternative audiences should respect their appreciation for a Fanon wiki. Many criticisms are about the topic and the seemingly limitless freedom, and irrelevant to the possibility that a user could enjoy contributing to Star Wars Fanon.