Talk:Wikiafication

Regarding this reversion, I find it highly inappropriate. If someone wants to keep this page as the views of a single author, then it should be kept in userspace. If it is to be in mainspace, then the advice of the {{essay}} template must be followed: "Feel free to update this page as needed". LtPowers (talk) 19:47, 5 September 2012 (UTC)

I found your edit inappropriate. I'm not sure if you are familiar with a lot of user essays, I suggest you familiarize yourself if not. Essays of course usually incorporate and grow the original purpose over time with collaboration, but what you did wasn't adding to it but just removing the original intent because you disagreed with it. This also happens to be Meta, not en.wp, which might lead to some misunderstanding about userspace and essays. It was an opinion essay, as the template mentions "It expresses the opinions and ideas of some wikimedians or Meta-Wiki users, but may not have wide support." It mentions to update as needed, since a lot of essays here are pretty old, it does not say, rewrite to remove author's original viewpoint. It is intended to encourage contribution and growth to the underlying sentiment, not censor it. I can update the template if that alone is misleading you about the purpose of user essays. It is absolutely fine if you don't agree with the sentiment, you are free to object to it, mention it on the talk page or write your own essay, but rewriting it to "incorporate more viewpoints", namely your own, opens it up for further interpretation. Your edit conflicted the purpose of the essay, and changed the entire tone. You disagreed with the original author, I disagreed with you, I have as much of a right to revert you as you did to make the edit. Theo10011 (talk) 08:52, 7 September 2012 (UTC)

I incorporated the original viewpoint as well as additional ones. The wording of the essay as you reverted it presents opinion as fact: for example, that the WMF is currently in the process of "Wikiafication" and that the listed features are both "costly" and "unsuccessful". While tagging with a template that says "this is just opinion" is nice as far as it goes, it does not suffice to delineate which parts of the essay are merely opinion, and which are being presented as facts. ("I think this feature is unsuccessful" is an opinion; "This feature is unsuccessful" is a fact, whether true or not.) My changes made it clear to the reader which statements were intended to be the opinions of some people. The essay in its current state is highly misleading. LtPowers (talk) 14:01, 7 September 2012 (UTC)

LtPowers' interprets Wikification under a positive, "feature-introduction" interpretation. He also notes the concerns of its critics. The Theo10011 version only presents the negative "bloat" interpretation. Both are biased. LtPowers version is less biased. As such, the change was a step backwards for the "essay". By rewriting the lead LtPowers purposely changed the tone of the essay instead of adding a "pro-feature" counter interpretation at the end of the original text. At the heart of the issue is whether "wikiafication" is used more often in a endearing or pejorative way. I've usually read it used in a pejorative context, especially recently. If that's true, presenting it as such with a counterpoint of view is more appropriate. Maybe better still is to write the essay as fully neutral as possible by giving both interpretations equal weight. A rational exploration of both sides to an issue is often more illuminating than a biased opinion piece. That latter approach seems better especially with the chance of a lengthy argument regarding namespaces. Jason Quinn (talk) 04:41, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

• With regard to the above discussion, you can gauge the value of Wikia's method of doing things (Wikiafication) by looking at how much of a net plus it has brought. Do they have any top ten websites? Top 50? As a whole, do people consider them academic? Professional? etc. Not to say they don't have a place on the internet, but Wikimedia is distinct from Wikia in some of these regards. Which is why documenting how Wikipedia may or may not be becoming like Wikia is a good thing. Killiondude (talk) 19:02, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Having skimmed the above discussion and re-reading the current version of the page, I think it's too negative currently. Not all of these features are awful, though there are some real doozies in the mix. Some of these features have yet to even be implemented (GlobalProfile!), so it's probably a bit early to judge with the same scrutiny that we might with, say, article feedback. I think a more balanced approach might be a good idea. Perhaps in point–counterpoint style. --MZMcBride (talk) 05:41, 1 June 2013 (UTC)

Bloated?

I'm not sure how having a nicely designed registration form makes things more "bloated". —Tom Morris (talk) 14:11, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

Strictly speaking, it does take up more space than the old form, which is "bloating". However, the login page has mostly unused space anyway. I'm not as contrary to the new login form as the other things on this page, personally. Killiondude (talk) 16:45, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

I think "costly bloat" can refer to interface clutter or the amount of code (and time and staff and other resources...) required to implement certain features. It took a lot of CSS to make those giant, colorful, and anachronistic interface buttons on the login form. This code bloat makes the site slower to download, slower to render, and arguably provides very little benefit to the user or user experience.

That said, the lead (and the rest of the page) could use a serious rewrite. --MZMcBride (talk) 20:46, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

Maybe it should mention that people who support this essay aren't necessarily opposed to all changes (like VisualEditor and Flow) - as long as they are designed and implemented well, and don't "bloat" the wiki. PiRSquared17 (talk) 02:30, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

Synonymous

I think that wikification could be a synonym.--Potenza2021 (talk) 09:07, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

"Wikification" means "adding wikimarkup to something" more or less, while this page talks about something different, that is making a Wikimedia wiki similar to a Wikia one (now Fandom). --Elitre (WMF) (talk) 09:51, 10 October 2022 (UTC)