Board Thread:News and Announcements/@comment-40175719-20191127005406

Hello folks!

Now that the JoJo Wiki fork has been announced, we in Fandom’s Anime team wanted to spend a little time addressing some of the concerns you’re all likely feeling.

As you may know, a fork is not synonymous with a move. Forking is a division which separates one wiki into two. While jarring, it is my goal to help make this division as seamless and amicable as possible while building the future of this wiki for those want to stay. When our team sees a fork on a wiki, we know that the community feels we have failed them in some way. We understand that and accept that responsibility. It is the goal of our Anime team to listen to all of your concerns, and discuss ways to enact real change both now and in the long-term in order to correct what has gotten us to this point.

What Fandom does behind the scenes is not super visible to you, and because of that, it might seem like we’re not supporting your community. I am here to assure you that our main focus right now is improving the wiki platform. We are focused around the fact that we need to improve the platform and deliver a modern wiki engine to our users -- given that our staff are first and foremost wiki fans, this is not just an improvement we know you want, it’s one we want as well. We have been collecting feedback from users all over Fandom, and we are anticipating the unified platform to solve many of the concerns which the JoJo community has voiced.

So first, let us dive into the UCP (Unified Community Platform). I will be referencing this blog post throughout this message.

https://community.fandom.com/wiki/User_blog:MisterWoodhouse/The_first_specifics_on_the_Unified_Community_Platform

We are looking to not only update our MediaWiki instance to the latest version, we are also working towards increasing security and modernizing the platform as a whole. Part of this is the sad departure from Forums, which understandably can be quite stressful to hear if you have not seen what is replacing it. The reality is that Forums in its current state does not work with the latest version of MediaWiki. It’s essentially “bolted” onto our forked instance of MediaWiki 1.19 (fourteen versions out of date) and, along with a few other features we announced for retirement, is not compatible and keeping it would mean not being able to upgrade to modern software. We are reworking the Discussions feature to deliver a stronger experience, related to Forums. While it might seem like we’re ridding ourselves of Forums without any alternate, we are more so just losing the old platform and updating it to a more usable, secure, and user-friendly solution. We’re looking forward to your feedback on that once we’re able to share more.

A large concern that I have seen on many wikis, not just JoJo, is the ability to change Javascript as well as increase the amount (and type) of links in the top navigation bar. This limitation exists for many reasons, including security and overall site design; that being said, as part of the UCP project, this is definitely something we’re already taking a close look at. As for the Featured Videos, we understand your concerns, and are also actively looking at better options moving forward -- for the immediate future, we have disabled Featured Video for JoJo Wiki.

We are well aware that security is a major concern for the JoJo wiki user base. We’re actively working on improving security, and in fact have recently launched a bug bounty here to deliver on that effort: https://community.fandom.com/wiki/User_blog:MisterWoodhouse/Introducing_the_Fandom_Bug_Bounty_Program.

Earlier this year, as part of the domain migration process, we also became HTTPS compliant.

In regards to vandalism, we have a lot that we can do internally to help manage this; we are more than willing to help you, and if you desire a definitive user block, please report here: https://vstf.fandom.com/wiki/VSTF_Wiki or talk to your Wiki Manager. There’s solutions ranging from active monitoring of wikis to the implementation of abuse filters to combat regular vandalism and spam. To other wikis reading this, you are always welcome to ask for a Wiki Manager to be assigned!

As for the future of the JoJo wiki, all content which existed on the site prior to the announcement will still be here, and new administrators and bureaucrats will be appointed with assistance and feedback from the community -- to reiterate, we’re not going to force anything on you. This is your community. If you’ve chosen to stay here instead of the fork then you have the right to have a say in how it is run. JoJo does currently have an assigned Wiki Manager and Content Team Member from our staff team to help keep this wiki up to date and moderated in the interim. You may see them poking about -- feel free to say hello! Your Wiki Manager is SayuriDarling, and your Content Team Member is Lder1995.

Regarding the new main administrative team, we have a few options we’d like to suggest.
 * In looking at the current wiki user base, we found a few JoJo regulars which we believe would make an excellent administration team. With your permission, we would put up a poll next week to elect admins. Community vote wins! (If you have a nomination you would like to submit, please enter it in the comments.)
 * Another easy method would be to bring in some of our more experienced Wiki Managers to help in the interim while we go through a formal recruitment process. They have direct experience handling larger wikis as founders, bureaucrats, and admins. We will not assign a WM to admin unless the community desires it, as it is absolutely not our place to take over. This is everyone’s wiki, not just ours, and we certainly do not want to give off the impression that we are trying to enforce any particular action on you.

I would like to let you know that we are dedicated to supporting this community through the transition. There is not a single person within this community who is not welcome, and those who decide to leave are always welcome back at any time. This is a home you all helped build, and as such, it will always be here for you to enjoy. As part of efforts, this last year, we authored the Contract for the New Fandom Platform -- ttps://community.fandom.com/wiki/User_blog:MisterWoodhouse/Community_Contract_for_the_New_Fandom_Platform. We absolutely swore to uphold it, and we want to reaffirm to you today that everyone at Fandom is bound by this contract for the UCP changes.

Please continue to ask questions and hold us accountable. We would not be able to do this without you.

Just a heads up: Most of our team will be out for the Thanksgiving holiday in the US. I will try to answer as many questions as I can throughout the break, but you might not hear back until Monday, the 2nd. -Zoe  Fandom Anime Community Manager  