Wikia announces new layout

[Seritinajii]

Just a random piece of news -

Here on a staff blog, Wikia announced a new layout. Imo it's really kind of unattractive, and apparently it's being done to "bring in a new audience".

Look at the comments.
- The shoutbox is being removed. Supposedly it doesn't get used enough, what about the people who DO use it?
- The right column squeezes the article into a smaller column. Looks like text blocks to me.
- Logos are squeezed into a horizontal rectangle thing. Squares are nice!
- A floating toolbar with notifications and stuff. Is this a social site now?
- Shows "image added by" lines. What's the point of that?
- It's completely mandatory - there's no way to switch back.
- Here at a FAQ, it's basically worded cleverly to say that it's all for more business.

Wikia basically ignored most negative posts. Someone posted a large negative review-thing and then added an extra note about name changes, and an admin responded.. about name changes. To me it looks really bad - lots of unnecessary stuff. Aren't wikis for info and content, not social networking? The majority of commenters dislikes this. And so a lot of people are threatening to leave...

So what do you guys think?

[Member#36]

Wow, I thought "blog" when I first looked at it.  I read a lot of the comments, and it just shows how truly ignorant Wiki is to the opinions of everyone except Wikia staff. 

I find it hilarious that this is doing nothing but further screwing them over... and moreso than some of their past mistakes. 

[Axiomist]

I wonder if they'll take my slogan suggestion:
Wikia: like it or get bent!

[Moydow]

FAIL
And just to drive home the fact they don't really care for the fans, the staff don't respond at all to people complaining about the loss of the Monaco skin, because they've customised it so much on their Wikia. Instead they stick a ridiculous "it's not a new skin, it's a new version" answer in an FAQ, that manages to upgrade it all from "fail" to "epic fail".

[Axiomist]

When someone advertises NIWA in that blog, be sure to link to it! I read page 1 and there's threats to walk off of Wikia.

[Tina]

All I can say is: Oh dear god.

I mean even if it wasn't Wikia, I would hate that skin to death. I really hate this 'social' trend that's been going around websites lately, and from a reader's viewpoint rather than an editors... ugh I don't care how many articles and images there are and what's new, quit bugging me with those huge boxes and let me read my article in piece. 8T

I already don't really like the Wikia skin- it's kind of hard to navigate... like, the navigation's more suited for a personal site rather than a wiki. I'm not sure how to describe it, but for a wiki it's really cluttered. Bleh.

Plus what's with the "Image added by ___" thing? Viewers are not going to really care what user added things. And for editors... you'd probably be using an upload log instead or something. And what's with that toolbar at the bottom? Oh god if that thing follows you as you scroll down... ugh. What's the point of Facebook liking an article anyway? Along with a share button for social sites? I can see that being useful for humorous things being like "dude guys check this out it's hilarious" but I don't really see formal and informative articles spreading via social sites.

The funny thing is this design approach really reminds me of like, three forums I've been on. They were all run by like, 13-15 year olds and would constantly clutter up for forum with useless social gadgets no one ever used. And this is... Wikia, something where profits are made, and likely there are people who are specifically in charge of design, maybe get money off of it, and are likely older than 13 years old. Ouch.

I don't know much about Wikia itself (just that they're a bunch of s***bags) but if they have some sort of friend feature or are planning to add it, I think I might go shoot something. Because... the amount of times I've uttered "Bulbapedia is a wiki, not a social site" at people paying attention to only their userpage... no Wikia do NOT make people make that connection. ;_____;

[dany36]

I wonder if they'll take my slogan suggestion:
Wikia: like it or get bent!

Haha!

As for the layout...eep! Looks like a template off of blogger and NOTHING like a wiki! Too much going on in the layout that it just distracts from the content (other than those ads). Wikia really blew it this time!

[Justin]

Guys, I have to say that I'm very happy about this change.

Don't look at me like I'm insane.
You know how fugly it looks. You know how many editors will hate it. It may even drive people from Wikia. I'm seeing this whole thing as a potential boost to NIWA traffic.

Thanks, Wikia! =D

[Moydow]

Guys, I have to say that I'm very happy about this change.

Don't look at me like I'm insane.
You know how fugly it looks. You know how many editors will hate it. It may even drive people from Wikia. I'm seeing this whole thing as a potential boost to NIWA traffic.

Thanks, Wikia! =D

I concur.

[dany36]

That could happen, OR it could just be like how people are always complaining about Facebook's layout changes: they threaten to leave, they make petitions to change it back to the old layout, but in the end they get used to it and forget all about how much they hated the layout.

[mtn_otter]

Every once in a while, I start thinking people's hate for Wikia is out of proportion. "Not everything there is horrible," I'll say, "I know a few wikis there that are actually decent. Arguably even better than those run independently."

Then the ******* ******** **** themselves like a ****** ******* with half a gallon of horseradish.

If you cannot detect the attempt at humor in the second part of that, I declare you brain dead.

[Archaic]

Just to clarify the hate for Wikia though....what you said is correct.
"I know a few wikis there that are actually decent. Arguably even better than those run independently."

The thing is...that's not why we hate Wikia. While some of us do dislike some certain specific Wikia wiki's (those which have engaged in plagiarism, or deceptive practises), overall we don't dislike the individual wikis. What we do dislike is Wikia as a organisation, and how it operates in its relations with the fan communities it hosts, and the wider fan communities they are a part of.

I mean, hell, theoretically, a wiki farm could start up with people running it who actually care about fandoms and work together with wiki communities to make something that the wiki communities are happy with, without imposing on the wiki communities in any way. If that started up, we wouldn't have a problem with it whatsoever. Hell, we'd be all for it. I know of some (non-Nintendo) wikis out there in the wilderness which have corporate owners (who otherwise have no involvement in the fandom, so not a situation like the Guild Wars Wiki has), but where these owners don't interfere in the day-to-day running of the wiki, and where they work side by side with the wiki community to make something that everyone's happy with. That kind of situation is damn rare, but it can and has happened.

[Steve]

I mean even if it wasn't Wikia, I would hate that skin to death. I really hate this 'social' trend that's been going around websites lately, and from a reader's viewpoint rather than an editors...

I disagree there, the reader's view should ALWAYS be more important than the editor's, for that is the purpose of a wiki's existence. The problem here, is that this skin doesn't seem to cater to the reader at all, rather the editor, with those recent image gadgets and whatnot. I, as a reader, do not want to see any of that, nor the ads.

[Tina]

I mean even if it wasn't Wikia, I would hate that skin to death. I really hate this 'social' trend that's been going around websites lately, and from a reader's viewpoint rather than an editors...

I disagree there, the reader's view should ALWAYS be more important than the editor's, for that is the purpose of a wiki's existence. The problem here, is that this skin doesn't seem to cater to the reader at all, rather the editor, with those recent image gadgets and whatnot. I, as a reader, do not want to see any of that, nor the ads.

Yeah, that was my point, haha. I think you explained it better in that post than I did, though. XD;

[Xizor]

http://community.wikia.com/wiki/Forum:Anti-Wikia_Alliance

I am going to contact their apparent Leader and inform them of NIWA as an option for any Nintendo-based Wikis that are considering being a part of or are a part of their movement. This will probably be good for us.

Edit: Nevermind, I just added on to their page.

http://community.wikia.com/wiki/Forum:Anti-Wikia_Alliance#NIWA

[Seritinajii]

The NIWA section appears to have been deleted, unfortunately. And I can't find any part of the history that has a record of the NIWA section..

And on a related note, amazing news - SmashWiki plans on breaking from Wikia. I'd post that in all-capitals, but it wouldn't look so great... so pretend I said it with a lot of emphasis! Anyway, what do you guys think? The possibly most well-known SSB wiki is hopefully going independent!

It looks like they just started, but they have quite a few pages. Unfortunately, there aren't many images. Here's an example: http://www.ssbwiki.com/Ike

[Xizor]

The NIWA Section is still there...somebody else had trouble seeing it earlier, too. I don't know why, but I assure you, it's there.

[Archaic]

If I do a search for NIWA there (just with ctl+F), I don't see it. Do you need to be logged in or something?

EDIT: Yup, as soon as I logged in, I saw it. Interesting...

[Moydow]

Odd, I can see it fine logged out.

[Xizor]

Odd indeed. Don't ask me lol.