Blog:We're leaving Fandom

Good day everyone. If you're reading this, we have officially moved from Fandom to Miraheze.

How?
I recently hosted an RfC in the wiki discord, and it didn't have any oppositions that changed the game. With near unanimous support, we were outta Fandom.

Where to?
We're moving to https://darkwitch.miraheze.org, and if you're on Miraheze, you're in the right spot.

Some of you may be asking "Why?" Well, we have several reasons why.

Pros
And the issues go on, and on, and on. But I don't feel like going on, so here are some minor losses.
 * No ads: Miraheze has no ads because it's a non-profit company. Obviously, Fandom is a business, and it's going to have ads, but that's still better for readers.
 * Less pop-ups: Unlike Miraheze, Fandom has a lot of annoying pop-ups, making it feel like a malware site rather than a wiki farm. You're basically required to install ad-block just to view the website, which is absolutely unacceptable. Ads should be mostly out of the viewer's way, but in Fandom, they're obnoxiously distracting. Miraheze only pops up when it's necessary for stuff like fundraisers, downtime, etc.
 * Terrible updates: Fandom has a large history of terrible updates. One of their most recent updates recommends you check out another wiki, which is really inconvenient on mobile. Compared to something like Miraheze, the updates rarely break or change anything major, and instead add more content and better moderation tools.
 * Mobile website: Their mobile website is genuinely one of the worst things I've ever seen on the internet. I will admit that I'll cut them some slack here as editing on mobile is a pain, even on Miraheze, but the reading experience is just awful. Combined with the ad and pop up problem, I rarely go to Fandom on mobile because it's such an inconvenience.
 * Better overall control of wikis: Compared to Fandom, Miraheze allows control over several things, like the UI, the background, user rights, and more. There's a lot more you can do on Miraheze over Fandom. For example, look at the Wordle Hub, which is on Miraheze.
 * MediaWiki updates: For a long time, Fandom ran on an outdated version of MediaWiki until 2022, where they finally upgraded to MediaWiki 1.37.2. While this is not bad on it's own (after all, Halopedia runs on an outdated version), this took them over 2 years just to upgrade to a new version, which is absurd.
 * Extensions: Miraheze has a lot more extensions compared to Fandom. On Miraheze, all you have to do is click a box, Save, and you're done. Most extensions on Fandom require you to contact Fandom Support, which is annoying.

Cons

 * We cannot download all the images from Fandom, which is odd, considering Special:DataDump exists on here. I've also contacted Fandom Support, and they said they do not have a tool for this.
 * We cannot close the original wiki on Fandom, which is also odd, considering it's pretty easy to do so. I asked Fandom Support to close one of my wikis, and they did it right away.
 * We lose achievements in the process, but considering barely anyone used them, I don't see how this would be a problem.
 * We lose comments, but 1. /CommentBox exists, and 2. we can simply back them up with Special:Export.

Transition
For the most part, this will be a simple transition. All the pages will go over, and all your userpages will be transferred over. The only issue is the files, which don't go over. We'll try and download all of them, but you can help by uploading some.

Conclusion
I don't want to move from Fandom, but they basically forced us to. Remember when they were all about just hosting wikis? What happened to those good old days? If a Fandom Staff member is reading this - please don't take this as a hate post. We want you to improve. But until things change, were staying on Miraheze. And unfortunately, that's how things are gonna stay. Signing off, ZeusDeeGoose (talk) 01:33, 19 July 2022 (UTC)