Create a Free Wiki with Wikia

Wikia is a community destination supporting the creation and development of wiki communities (or wiki farm) on any topic people are passionate about. Creating your very own wiki is a fun and free, yet challenging process.

Steps

Registering Your Wiki

  1. Create an account. Registering on Wikia is simple. By clicking on "Create an account" link beside the Wikia logo on the Main Page you will be asked create a username tied with a password.
    • You will need to register an email, but you aren't required to use your real name. Creating account will translate to creating a profile. An editing profile gains more credit on a wiki rather than as an anonymous writer. Registered users are also entitled to more editing privileges and input into relevant discussion over policies and editing features. This means only people with a Wikia profile can request rights to start a new wiki.
  2. Choose a topic. Wikia currently hosts over 4300 communities, and before requesting a wiki it is necessary to check whether it meets the policy of having a wide enough appeal to attract a large potential audience. If your proposal is too narrow you will be asked to broaden it. You're also recommended to find out if your idea is already covered by an existing Wikia or become part of a Wikimedia project.
  3. Plan the project. Decide what the aims of your wiki will be. Draft a mission statement. You will need to decide a title and name for the wiki. For a peer review, a wise step to take is to have your idea evaluated by others. This means discussing the plans for your Choose a Wiki Package on the proposed wikis forum, or writing several pages on the Scratchpad Wiki to give a general overview. From there, you could start by creating a "Mini-Wiki" at the Scratchpad Wiki. Later, this can be transferred to a full Wikia.
  4. Request your wiki. You can enter the Requests Wikia from the navigation toolbar on Central Wikia "Request a Wikia". Wikia cannot set up a wiki without assurance that the requester is motivated, organized and willing to take on the role as the founder of a wiki. Filling out a requests form is necessary to present your plan to Wikia at a formal approach. There are four terms you must accept before the request form.
    • Is your wiki unique?
    • Will your wiki attract lots of contributors?
    • Are you happy for everyone to edit this wiki, and for it to be under a free content license?
    • Do you agree to Wiki's terms of use?
  5. Complete a request form.
    • Name for the wiki; what the wiki will be named as a URL, e.g. <insert wikia name here>.wikia.com.
    • Title for the wiki; the general name of the wiki on the browser toolbar, e.g. books.wikia.com might be labeled "Books Wiki".
    • Default language for the wiki; and language will be set as a default for the wiki.
    • Description of the wiki; about the wiki and what sort of articles to be included.
    • Moderate an Online Community; who will edit this wiki, how will you promote this wiki so that others will join in?

Setting Up Your New Wiki

  1. Edit your user page. Include some content on who you are, so other people will learn more about you (this step is optional).
  2. Go to the MediaWiki page called "User-identity-box-group-founder" and change the name from "Founder" to "Owner" or any similar term that best fits for presenting yourself as the local wikia possessor.
  3. Create a Main Page for a Wiki. The main page of the wiki should describe what it is about, what its mission statement is, etc.
  4. Find some content to add. Look for freely licensed photos and articles to add to your wiki so that your editors have content to edit. Wikimedia Commons, Morgue File, Flickr and Everystockphoto are good sources for freely licensed images.
  5. Customize the Theme on a Wikia Wiki if you'd like. Make your new theme creative by adding color, customizing the wordmark, etc.
  6. Build a community. Effectively attract and maintain an editing population. Giving that the topic is relevant to a high number of potential editors and ample promotion has been staged, expect several helping hands.
    • Try Spread News About Your New Website by emailing friends and colleagues about it, advertising it on social networking sites, etc.



Tips

  • Instead of starting your own wiki, you could adopt a wiki. Many new wikis end up like failed businesses. Once opened, they reach their peak in the starting moments of their life. Soon enough the original founder has lost all interest in helping the project lift off due to a lack of helpers, or has come under burdens of other commitments. If a wiki has been listed for more than two months it may be listed for adoption. Potential editors can use the links to implement the revival of the dead wiki. Adopting a wiki can be an alternative to creating one from scratch. Usually, there will be a few articles and guides to start you off. Many wikis which have run to a stop are based around aspects of science. They diminish due to the impossibility to compete with Wikipedia for contributors.
  • If needed, you can contact staff and change your URL or have a redirect made if it is not already in use.
  • While you're the owner, you can do anything without community approval such as making and changing policies you intend.
  • The best thing about creating a wiki is that you can add anything you want while setting up your wikia.

Warnings

  • When your wiki starts for the very first time, there will be a link on Google. However, after a day or two, the Internet link will be gone and you will have to search Wikia to get a link or your profile. Don't think it is deleted because it is not.
  • Although you own a wikia, you have a limited amount of special authorities. This includes to changing wiki policies without community approval. Wikis on wikia are open and public; think twice before banning the person from your wikia. Blocking everyone so only you can edit can either result in losing ownership of the wikia or the wikia to be closed.

Sources and Citations

You may like

Retrieved from "https://kipkis.com/index.php?title=Create_a_Free_Wiki_with_Wikia&oldid=352948"