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Combine OverWiki is Leaving Wikia this Summer

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The Combine OverWiki, even if it may have quite a few rough spots, may be the very best Half-Life wiki out there. It also focuses on Portal and is a part of the Valve Wiki Network. It’s been with Wikia since the OverWiki first came about, on the 12th of February 2006. However, recently, Wikia has been making some disappointing decisions and changes. Some fan wikis have been moving away from Wikia, and towards private hosts. For example, the Official Team Fortress Wiki and the recently announced Unofficial Portal Wiki are both privately owned and operated.

And now the OverWiki is joining them!

Combine OverWiki is Leaving Wikia this Summer

In a post on his user blog, lead admin Klow, together with fellow admin Bramblepath, at last confirmed the OverWiki’s departure from Wikia.

The community is grateful for everything Wikia has provided over the years for free, but its new changes and policies towards wiki communities have made us think for a while about leaving.

We have finally taken action, and are currently working on moving our data to the new host, fixing bugs and setting up convenient skins, the move being scheduled for this summer (2011), although we have no precise date yet. When the wiki has been moved, you’ll be invited to cease editing here, and resume contributing to the new website, where you’ll be able to find your account, with your contributions, watchlist and user page unchanged, and resume editing immediately (see below)

Moving will give us as much as freedom as we want. Total control over our content, over our policies, over the site’s design, and we hope more credibility towards the community. I guess most of the protagonists of the Half-Life and Portal universe would agree about our quest of freedom. We also spend too much time and energy trying to revert Wikia’s new design changes to what they were (what we consider “good”), and often with unsatisfying, broken results, and we’d rather spend this time and energy on improving our actual content.

Wikia is a for-profit business, who makes money by selling advertising on their wikis. We believe that is wrong for them to make money off of the back of volunteer editors, Valve, and the Half-Life community, who give everything to Wikia for free. Whilst we are not and never will be at war with Wikia, who are perfectly within their rights to make money, they go against our view of the true wiki spirit, which is to create an open source, free and public encylopedia of everything, that anyone can improve, and we feel that it is best to simply cease our relationship with them peacefully.

You can of course continue editing here, since Wikia will not close the wiki. However since we’re taking Combine OverWiki’s spirit with us, we’re taking the name as well, so the Wikia wiki will just return to its original name, “Half-Life Wiki”. The new community is then free to come up with the name they want and make whatever they want of the wiki, though we sincerely hope that most editors will agree with our reasons to move and move along with us.

And that’s their official announcement. They have more substantial information on how the move will take place, on the blog post in question, so you should check that out as well. In any case, we stand by, and agree with the editors of the OverWiki and gladly await to see them at their new home, on CombineOverWiki.net.

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7 Comments

  1. I’m just in the middle of writing a post for my website about this. I can’t believe anyone would put in those thousands of hours that some of those wikis take to line the pockets of Jimmy Wales, for he sure as heck isn’t sharing any of the money he’s making with Wikia.

    On the internet there’s no reason EVER to give free labor to anyone, and that’s why having your own site is the way to go. I avoid Wikia and Wikipedia like the plague. Don’t plan on making one red cent for Jimmy Wales 🙂

  2. That simple ability is present in EVERY wiki.

  3. I hope they dont take away the ability to see the most recently uploaded images.
    I love that feature and I think it doesnt exist in the TF wiki.

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