Forum:SH:The newest Wikia fail

Forums > Senate Hall > SH:The newest Wikia fail

Copy-pasta'd from the Mighty Wook:

I just discovered this. In a nutshell:

• All user talk pages will be replaced by a facebook-ish message wall.
• All user talk pages will be archived and removed.
• This will affect Monobook.

All hail our Wikian overlords! The random disruptive changes will continue until morale improves!

No seriously, this sounds like a terrible idea to me, but might as well open it up for discussion. While I can't speak collectively for Wookieepedia, I'll say that there's an active and prolific effort to oppose this move as vigorously as possible in the works over there. Atarumaster88 ^{(Talk page)} 03:56, September 27, 2011 (UTC)

• I say we start the petition for SWFanon as soon as possible. In the meantime, I'm designing a pair of thumbscrews for Wikia staff members. Trak Nar ^{Ramble on} 04:04, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
  • Despite my consistent inactivity at this site, I, for one, am always ready to crawl out of the woodwork to oppose change. Where do I sign? Karohalva ^(Talk) 04:12, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
    • As Trak and myself made quite clear on the blog post announcing this latest epic adventure into failure and misery, this is a terrible idea and should be shitcanned ASAP.

GoodwoodDebating Society11,988 Edits 04:24, September 27, 2011 (UTC)

It will debut, like Oasis/Wikia, Editor v.2.0, blogs, chat etc. There isn't really anything you can do against it. Swallow & customize. I'm pretty sure Wikia does want to achieve something other than annoying you with its changes. TK999 15:03, September 27, 2011 (UTC)

• Much ado about nothing. If it gets the job done and allows communication it isn't a big deal. A case of being afraid of change? Haven't used Facebook much ever, but a wall doesn't seem that bad since talk must still conform to regulations.-I'm the Chosen One 16:37, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
  • The primary issue is that it disables pre, source and syntaxhighlight tags as well as other formatting. TK999 16:41, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
    • The purpose of the talk page is to communicate, so I do not see a problem with despite these setbacks. Plus the article and other talk pages will not be affected so one could still use those. (Kind of makes them useful for something other than accolade notifications.)-I'm the Chosen One 16:49, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
      • Agreed. Problem is, we can't share code afterwards, can't really use templates and the feature will probably be extended to all talk pages sometime in the future. TK999 16:52, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
        • True. Maybe, it looks more and more like they will be phased out since Wikia Labs developed the comments thing for articles. However, the fact that it still largely does the same thing as a talk page and it eases the newer user problems that plague the talk pages on this wiki, I think this is being blown out of proportion. That and the blanket "anti-Facebook" bias.-I'm the Chosen One 16:56, September 27, 2011 (UTC)

Let me just state this up front: in leaving this comment, I’m wearing my SWFanon admin hat, not my Wikia staff hat—I even changed my signature for this comment! If you would like to debate the change, leave feedback, criticize it, etc. with a Wikia staff member, you are more than welcome to do so at the blog on Community Central or via Special:Contact. Even if your blog comment isn’t replied to, ALL blog comments are read by staff.

That said, I don’t think this is a bad thing for SWFanon. We’re a fan fic wiki, not an encyclopedia, so our subject matter makes us, in theory, inherently more social than an encyclopedic wiki like, say, Wookieepedia. Because of that, as an admin on SWFanon, I have no problem with this at all. If it streamlines discussions, then that’s a good thing on a fan fic website where our goal SHOULD be discussion amongst users about their fanon and fan fiction. I would even argue that article comments would be a good thing for this wiki for the same reasons, but I’m probably outnumbered on that one so I’ve never approached it.

So yeah, that’s my SWFanon admin comment. =) - Brandon Rhea ^(talk) 17:08, September 27, 2011 (UTC)

• I exactly agree with the social advantages of the concept, but what will happen to the article status notification templates? TK999 17:10, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
  • If you're referring to article comments, talk pages don't go away. The only thing that changes is that there's no more link to talk pages in the Wikia skin on articles. But if your page is titled Luke Skywalker, you can type in Talk:Luke Skywalker to the URL bar or the search bar and it will still exist/can still be created. - Brandon Rhea ^(talk) 17:12, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
    • No, I mean the notifiers you get when one of your articles is promoted. TK999 17:15, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
      • I'm sure there would be a way to make it work. Even if we couldn't make it work for whatever reason, I'm not sure if that's too big of a deal. They're nice to have, but they can be replaced with a simple textual notification too. - Brandon Rhea ^(talk) 17:19, September 27, 2011 (UTC)

This may sound harsh, Brandon, but it is how I honestly feel, and it needs to be aired: I do not believe for one moment that you are actually able to divorce yourself from being a staff person even to just post this comment; your temporary sig change only proves that you're a half-decent showman. Wikia has repeatedly demonstrated a near-total disregard for what its userbase thinks, and this...change...is yet more proof that they have ceased to care. Wikia is a repository of knowledge, not a social network. This was what Wikia was founded on, this is the only thing that will sustain them. Not to mention the steady stream of buggy software, broken promises, and outright lies from their front office—an office in which you now have a "virtual cubicle," apparently. If I had to take a stab at why you support this, my reply would be simple: in my experience you've always been about improving the social side of the farm. Sure you add content, but you're also the first to jump on any Wikia bandwagons—that's probably one reason why they hired you.

Brandon, I am now in the unenviable position of having to question your commitment to Star Wars Fanon. You still edit, which is good, but you have been avoiding the rest of the admin team (either by accident or design, it doesn't matter). Even when you are available for discussions regarding site policies, you have demonstrated an unwillingness to help in developing new ideas, showing a Wikia-esque knack for dismissing them by saying "oh, they're working on a feature for that." Well, if this is that feature you were cryptically telling me about, then the Force help us all. GoodwoodDebating Society11,988 Edits 17:59, September 27, 2011 (UTC)

• This discussion isn't about me, nor should it be, so I'll go onto IRC later today so we can have a direct conversation. - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 18:14, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
  • Just so there's no misconceptions or confusion, Goodwood and I had a very nice conversation earlier. I'm saying that because I didn't want anyone thinking this was a big issue. =) - Brandon Rhea^(talk) 23:36, September 27, 2011 (UTC)
    • If we were to make a petition, would wikia accept it? you're staff, tell us.--VideoGamePower ^(Talk) 03:41, September 28, 2011 (UTC)
• I don't think this is all bad. I think the lack of being able to mark up or post code to share with other users, etc. like we can right now might be a bit of a hassle to get around. We'd have to get into discussion pages or article/template talk pages, where we won't get notices of our talk page sort. But how often does that happen? My only other concern is that if this is truly anything like Facebook posts/walls, then the updates will be nearly instantaneous. However, if it's more like the whole blog comment system Wikia already has, it's going to be weak. Slow to update, and if you don't manually clear your cache or reset your browser, the damn thing won't update with the latest comments or conversations (regardless of the fact that they appear in the RC). I think it's not bad, but it's also not very good or well thought out. After all, being editing wikis, we need to be able to transcribe coding and what not to one another (and show examples in real time) without making the experience more difficult. This is just another epic meh. Squishy Vic ^talk 04:03, September 28, 2011 (UTC)