Thinking of creating your own Wikia wiki? Here are some things you really ought to know

Wikia is the world's largest free wiki hosting service. In times past, potential wikis had to be submitted for approval before getting the go ahead, and involved members of the Wikia community assessing the merits your idea before deciding whether to start up your proposed project. If it was very similar to a wiki already in existence on the Wikia servers, you were directed there instead.

Such restrictions have since been lifted, however, and now anybody can create their own Wikia wiki about (almost) anything they wish free of the initial moderation process.

So you've weighed up the opposition and have decided Wikia is the best option for hosting your brand, spanking new wiki. But just hold on there a minute! Said wiki hosting service may seem the almost perfect choice -- free customer service, vandal exterminating tools, mailing list and all the trappings of a Wikipedia-backed project -- but as you know, hardly anything in this life comes for free.

I'll assume you already know that Wikia is advertisement funded, and thus will place advertisements on your wiki to generate revenue to keep it online - the only catch? Well, yes and no. Read on and you will find out how and why.

Don't use Wikia as a stepping stone to bigger things. If you plan to one day move away from Wikia, you will experience much hassle and grief in establishing your new home elsewhere. Wikia will (understandably) do everything they can to keep you on their servers and will not, under any circumstances, close the wiki. This makes it extremely difficult for you to go independent, as they will run your old wiki in direct competition to any new project you set up, forked or not.

Due to its higher Google PageRank status, the Wikia wiki will almost always rank above your new project on search engine queries, making it more difficult for people to find your new wiki. Of course, if you plan to stay with Wikia forevermore, then this is not really a massive problem, but should be factored in when deciding on an appropriate wiki host.

• Illustration of this: Illogicopedia.

Wikia is partially controlled by advertisers. Wikia's Terms of Service are drawn up in relation to advertisers' needs rather than your freedom of speech. This means that any controversial or outspoken content -- regardless of its legal status -- in contradiction to the advertisers' wishes will be removed without your consent.

"The wikis are owned by the communities. No one user owns any wiki on Wikia. Founders are those who requested a wiki be created, but ownership of that wiki resides with the community as a whole, not only with the founder." -- Wikia Terms of Service

• Oh really? The guys at The Spanking Art wiki would beg to differ.

Wikia can basically do what they like - they are the ones hosting your wiki and have the rights to modify the Terms of Service should they deem it commercially viable. This includes major design changes -- regardless of whether the community at large agrees with them or not -- content license changes and, worst of all, advert placement (see next point).

• Example: Creatures wiki

Their design is not to everyone's taste. Wikia's default 'New Monaco' design scheme, or 'skin', has been widely criticised as advertisement-heavy, and though they have taken steps to rectify this, many feel the large blocks of inconveniently placed advert areas block access to information - namely the articles on your wiki. It is strongly recommended that you check out other Wikia wikis using the New Monaco skin with Ad Block turned off before you jump into the Wikia jacuzzi. Oh, and you can change your own personal skin, but this has no effect on what other visitors to your site will see when they hit the main page or content pages - they'll still get the intrusive ads.

• Case in point: The Transformers wiki.

Please do not view this as a piece of anti-Wikia propaganda, rather an article highlighting some important information for of any person wishing to create a wiki at Wikia. You have a right to know this stuff, which is by and large swept under the carpet by Wikia; understandably so, it is in their best interests and makes good business sense to play down past discrepancies. However, I believe people really should know what they're letting themselves in for when they sign up for a new Wikia wiki. Believe me, I have learned the hard way.

Further reading

• Complaint wiki, for more detailed documentation on this subject.