The new Wikia design which will become online in a matter of days / months, we hate it, and we do not want it to ruin our perfectly working design.
[September 5, 2010] - The great war against Wikia
Our Wiki provider / host: Wikia has decided to change their amazing design, Monaco, which we here on Empire of the Sun Wiki use, to another design called Oasis, forcing all of us change our design to the new Oasis design.
We here on Empire of the Sun Wiki hate this design, and almost everyone agrees with us.
Because of this, the work on this Wiki has been slowed down because we both demonstrate to let us use our design, aswell as we concider to change Wiki provider / host , but we haven't decided that yet.
We want our own design, and do not want to change, but our current Wiki provider / host: Wikia force us to change, even though more than 1200 comments posted on their blog articles announcing the change... are negative.
Statements[]
The official statement which came after 700 negative comments got posted, we've got this broadcast answer from Wikia:
As we look at all of the comments, it is clear there are a few recurring themes. While we don’t yet know the answer to some of your questions, we’ve updated the FAQ and provided more details where we can.
We do want to address the most frequent question: “Why is the new look mandatory?” We completely understand why you would like this change to be optional -- it’s always nice to be able to choose. But the new look is not simply a new skin option, it’s the upgraded version of Wikia. We’ve designed it for a number of reasons, and we are dedicating both technical and community resources to its development and support to create the best possible user experience. This means, however, that users on older, unsupported skins will have style and content conflicts on individual wikis and across Wikia. While we know that customization and individuality are at the heart of every great wiki, we strongly believe that it’s important for wikis on Wikia to share a common foundation, and that all users -- new or old, reader or editor -- should have a consistent experience.
You will have plenty of time to adapt your wiki to the new look. We are rolling out the new version in phases, and will provide help and migration resources along the way. We’ll also be providing weekly snapshots and details on its new features -- many of which will give you a deeper understanding of the new design and answer some of the specific questions that have come up in your comments!
The worst thing is that it's just "another skin option" but they won't admitt it, and will keep on pushing this until the launch date, forcing people to like the new design.
They also "answered" a question on their FAQ page:
Why are you allowing us to use Monobook (another design option on Wikia) and not Monaco? - As noted above, we are keeping Monobook for the time being as an admin option for Uncyclopedia and its sister projects (bigger Wikia projects). We are also allowing it as a personal user choice, for those that prefer to view Wikia sites in that format. However, we as a company cannot afford to continue to support older versions of our design. If we allowed all outdated skins, there would be at least 5 very different looks in which our technical and community teams would have to invest time and energy. Monaco is also by nature a complex, sophisticated skin that requires more resources to run correctly.
This is unfair for us "the little Wiki's", why shall we be punished and forced to change our designs when the "bigger Wikia projects" will get the design they always have used without being forced to change? this is both unfair, and negative.
Trying to make Wikia a community instead of an encyclopedia[]
Everyone who uses different types of Wiki's know, that a Wiki should be more as a encyclopedia.
Unfortunately it is not the case for Wikia.
Wikia thinks that a Wiki should be more as a community than a encyclopedia, it's why they will change their design and functionality so much that it will start to look like Facebook aswell as Wordpress in one single mixture, making Wikia everything else but an encyclopedia, making us, Empire of the Sun Wiki very dissapointed.
Ofcourse Empire of the Sun Wiki loves communities, and we try to make a community out of our Wiki, but in our own special way where people can leave messages on their talk pages and edit articles and share their thoughts in comments aswell as articles and so on, but Wikia will force us to become a community where creating friend is more important than to make a good encyclopedia.
Empire of the Sun Wiki is concidering to move[]
Empire of the Sun Wiki are concidering to move their Wiki to another Wiki provider / host which is totally different than Wikia because of the drastical change they want to do to Wikia, both visually aswell as functionally.
This would affect the whole Wiki on a negative way at first, but would be a positive effect in the future, to keep a similar design as the Wiki has now, so it looks like an encyclopedia.
Our thoughts[]
This is something terrible, and will affect everyone including us - in a negative way.
EOTS Wiki is doing its best to send out a clear message to the Wikia staff that we do not want the new design, and we do that by demonstrating in the comment section on Wikia's official blog, aswell as one user on this Wiki has been a part of the BETA test which was available for 1 to 2 weeks somewhere in August - September, and the user has been honest with his thoughts towards the Wikia staff, and did explain why he (and everyone else) hate this design.
Hopefully, our demonstration, aswell as the voices of the BETA testers who hated it, as well as all the other users of Wikia will make that Wikia will change their minds, and let us keep our beautiful Monaco theme.
How can I help?[]
Believe it or not, you can help out pretty much!
The only thing you need to do is to demonstrate on Wikia's official blog on these articles:
http://community.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:Sannse/Your_First_Look_at_the_New_Wikia
http://community.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:Sannse/Sneak_Peek_at_the_New_Look_-_Your_Personal_Toolbar
http://community.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:Sarah_Manley/Sneak_Peek_at_the_New_Look_-_Community_Activity
http://community.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:Sarah_Manley/Beyond_the_Encyclopedia_-_A_Wiki_for_Everyone
and explain why you hate this design, or just write negative about it, with our without an explanation why you hate it.
Remember that it would be twice as good if you include that you want "Monaco" instead of "Oasis", because Monaco is the good hero in this game.
If we all can send a clear message to the staff that we do not want / nor like this design, there's a very little chance that it will get cancelled or that they will let us use our skin (Monaco) as an option, without forcing us to use that ugly design called Oasis.
CitizenQuote in this article:[]
I cannot work on my Wiki (Empire of the Sun Wiki) without feeling a very sad, and having a very negative feeling that I will be forced, in a matter of days or months, to change my design on my Wiki to something I will truely hate... I just hope Wikia will be kind enough to let us keep our Monaco designs, otherwise, Empire of the Sun Wiki are concidering to change webhost provider, making this Wiki a non Wikia project, but what we will not give up on is this Wiki project, this is what we are proud of - this is our empire. /Daniel The creator of EOTS Wiki)
External Links:[]
http://community.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:Sannse/Your_First_Look_at_the_New_Wikia
http://community.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:Sannse/Sneak_Peek_at_the_New_Look_-_Your_Personal_Toolbar
http://community.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:Sarah_Manley/Sneak_Peek_at_the_New_Look_-_Community_Activity
http://community.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:Sarah_Manley/Beyond_the_Encyclopedia_-_A_Wiki_for_Everyone