Connect
Coming Soon: Message Wall in Labs
Many of you have asked if Message Wall can be optional. My quick and short answer is that we don’t know yet. But, we are taking an important interim step.
Added by Jenburton
During the Labs phase, we’ll be tracking usage and your feedback; we'll also be working on any bugs present. We’ll be asking and answering the following types of questions:
- Are communities that are using Message Wall talking more?
- Are those communities seeing an increase in edits?
- Are communities seeing a growth in new visitors and editors?
- What’s the sentiment like on (new) Message Wall posts as they relate to the product?
The above tracking will occur as we continue to iterate, bug fix, and evaluate the overall launch plan for Message Wall. Overall, our goal with Message Wall is to create a product that works so well and is so compelling that communities will want to use it over Talk Pages.
So, when will this happen? Well, before we put Message Wall in Labs, we want to make sure it’s close to feature complete and has few low-level bugs. It’s not there yet. But, the dev and product teams working on Message Wall are laser focused — we’ll keep you all posted.
In the meantime, register for the Wikia New Product Webinar which will be held on November 1, 2011 at 11AM PDT. We'll be talking about both Message Wall and the Expanded Wiki Navigation (currently in Labs).
Want to receive updates on the latest Staff blog posts? Then click here to follow this blog.
- Showing 20 most recent
- Show all
178 comments
Anonymous User-
If Message Wall will be in Labs, then it's obvious that it can be turned on and off. Therefore there is now no apparent reason for not making it optional.
---****--- Roads
-
They should fix the layout builder first.
-
Fortunately that's in Wiki Features.
---****--- Roads
-
this is different from the persistent chat dialog box we had in monaco sidebar yes? if not, maybe change for the sake of change is coming around full circle (again).
yeah. shout box. that thing. im so confused.
-
Just another person confusing the Message Wall with a Shoutbox. And Wikia just negating the evidence...
-
And you should really reply in a new comment.
-
How can you get the Notification Button and the Message Wall?
-
If you'd like to be a test wiki for Message Wall, you can contact us at Special:Contact and request it (please check with your community members first, though). We expect that it will be in labs at the end of this month, so you can also wait until then.
-
I like message wall so far, but I don't like it that on message wall my real name is used instead of my nickname. If I want people to call me Joost (my real name), then I would've used that as my nick. But I don't want people to call me that. Online I'm Zantam03, not Joost. If I want people to call me Joost, we'll take another step and add each other on MSN or Facebook or whatever and refer to each other by our real name there, if we want.
-
Oh I see, when I delete my name from my profile my name on MW will change to Zantam03... I don't mind about peopling knowing my real name though... I just want to be referred to as Zantam03.
-
I'm glad it's optional for now. Now that I've been testing it out on Community Test and Ben 10 Planet (a volunteer wiki for testing), I can see that it's not that bad. However, I still think it should be optional, since some users downright hate it. Why on earth is something so drastic a change mandatory? Why aren't Article Comment mandatory? Why isn't chat?
---****--- Roads
-
Shhh! Don't give them ideas! ;)
-
Stop making new features and fix Chat!
-
We're working on that, too. :)
-
yes, but stop making stupid things anyways.
-
Ok, I still qestion why we need this but ok.
-
Some of us need it so we can see what's happening with the wikis. That's why I selected it, you don't have to say yes.
-
I have a question about this.
Will you have to archieve your message wall? Or is it supposed to more than 1 page like you do in blog posts. You can go to the older or newer.
Because we need to archieve a lot.
-
Message Wall automatically paginates, and upon load only shows the 20 most recent threads. So yea – like blog posts.
-
Unlike talk pages, if you have alot of posts on your Messaqe Wall, it will be nearly impossible to search. I am not looking forward to it.
-
You could use the "Search" function when you enter the archive, if you remember some key words.
-
Like pressing CTRL+F? Yeah, I do that a lot. And besides, keywords would be how you search anything!
---****--- Roads
-
The Browser's search function? No. Long messages get collapsed and the browser's search function won't find anything inside the collapsed sections. Also, messages are paginated without stating "since (date 1) until (date 2), so it would be extra difficult to search archived discussions by date (that's how I label my talk page archives).
The wiki search is not helpful at all, since it's constantly broken and poor. External web search like google doesn't work at all since archived messages aren't indexed.
-
You're right about the wiki search. That is appalling.
-
And don't be happy that it's optional, it can be made mandatory. <_<
-
Yup. Wait until an actually decision is made.
-
It won't be optional.
You think that wikia will tell their investors that they spent all this time and money on a useless pos feature that nobody needs?
No, it's going to be a "great success".
-
Wikia is a privately held company. They have no investors.
-
Actually, there have been entities and/or individuals who have invested in Wikia in the past. Whether that is still the case isn't something I know.
-
Oops, by investors I meant stockholders. My bad.
-
Kangaroopower: Wikia has investors, as far as I am aware. You don't need to be a public company to have investors.
-
I know at, what I was trying to state was that wikia does not have stocks on wall street persay
-
I applaud Wikia for taking this step of introducing Message Wall to Wikia Labs. I hope this is the first stage in finally allowing the community to choose what they want, and not what the staff wish to thrust upon them, in the interests of "consistency" and a mis-guided approach to communication on the MediaWiki platform.
-
I appreciate the fact that you might make this optional. Like I've said before, no-one on my wiki likes it. In fact, they all hate it. I am really hoping that this will not be mandatory, since if that happens, then that means that Wikia is running over individual wikis "for the greater good", which is never the right thing to do.
-
same
-
The Message Wall doesn't appear in wiki labs on my wiki
-
As the blog title suggests, it's "Coming Soon". :3=
03:44, October 27, 2011 (UTC)
-
then why was I asked if I was using it???? :P
-
Because some wikis are already using it because they requested it from Wikia when they were asking for wikis to message them to ask to try the feature.
-
oh ok
-
Just to prevent the rewriting of history: Wikia said Message Wall was going to be mandatory when it was initially announced.
I'm glad that Message Wall might be optional, but I suspect the reason to make it mandatory was not for the good of users, but for reasons of expected technical limitations (which probably still exist). A little honesty would go a long way to rebuilding trust with the community rather than flimsy marketing double-speak. Not all of us "just fell off the turnip truck", to use an old phrase.
-
I'm more under the impression it was to make it easier to run for longer periods of time, time on site ads like the video ones. The Message wall doesn't require as many times to load as a talk pages, as a talk page you end up going to the editor and then back to the page after edit. Now with this, there is no more of that which means more time to show vid ads.
-
Not a bad alternative explanation.
-
I really think that if the staff would just decide to make the feature optional, and we didn't have to worry about that anymore, then we'd be able to move on, and be able to actually improve this feature. In my experience, users usually like a mandatory feature less, and a change of this magnitude from the original MediaWiki needs to be optional permanently, rather than simply in labs for a short time.
If the staff just made the Message Wall optional, then we could leave that debate behind and actually work on leaving feedback on how to improve the feature itself. Because making Message Wall mandatory is bad for so many reasons, one of which is that it creates a short of self-fulfilling prophecy ("The feature is bad, and it's mandatory, let's argue against this, we need to keep talk pages") rather than saying. "This feature looks bad, but it's optional. However, I think it can be improved, though. I'll leave feedback in Labs").
Message Wall, unless it's dramatically changed, will not be better than talk pages. But at least make it 100% optional, staff, so we can actually focus on the real purpose of this- How we can make this feature better. But, of course, until the staff understands that some wikis will never, EVER accept this, we really can't focus on improving this feature.
-
very good
-
The only increase in community participation with this feature I can see is the social part of the wikia, not the editing part. So, we wouldn't benefit in the edit part with this feature, at all.
-
Hi Rose - We believe that by offering a more simple experience with Message Wall, new contributors will make greater connections with other members of the community and thereby be more likely to contribute new content as they grow more comfortable.
-
What happens if new contributors don't make greater connections with other members of the community? Will you go back to talk pages?
-
I'm glad you chose the word "offering". It makes it sound better than simply saying "it's mandatory", and more like you're actually considering making it an option, rather then barely acknowledging what we're trying to say here.
I truly hope that the staff has reconsidered this and decided it should, indeed, be completely optional for all wikis. If we want this more "simple" experience on our wikis, we'll add it on our own. And if you think Message Wall is so great, why even make it mandatory? Logically, if it's optional and such a great improvement over talk pages, then all of us would switch over, right?
No. The fact is, this feature is bad. Very. While I can freely admit there are interesting possibilities for more communication listed here, the simple fact is that this article comments like layout is simply not appropriate for some wikis, who, believe it or not prefer professional-looking talk pages, rather than comments with avatars and nicknames.
Don't you see? There's no way anyone will like this if you make it mandatory. If it is so great, than all of us will be using it. But I'm afraid that, unless you've planned to completely overhaul this, some wikis won't accept this, because of it's core nature. If wikis want this, then they can have it. I know most wikis I regularly edit on will not stand for it.
There would be no problem here if you staff members just decided now, that it would stay in Labs, where it belongs. Rather than pushing for a full release date, leave it in Wikia Labs so you can get the most out of all of the communities' across wikia over a span of not a few months, but forever. This will benefit you, and I see no logical reason not to make it optional.
We've tried it, we'll keep trying it, but not all wikis will accept it. Unless you realize that now, you will lose members and wikis, over something that should have simply been stated as optional in the first place. It's quite obvious by now that you're trying to make Wikia into the equivalent of a social network, and you're simply damaging the credibility of Wikia by forcing this on us.
So, instead, simply announce it will be completely, 100% optional for all wikis permanently (or at least in the foreseeable future). Because it makes no sense to make this (Which is clearly based on Article Comments, no matter what you say) mandatory on all wikis.
You gave us the personal option to opt out of using the new skin, by using Monobook. You gave us the personal option to opt out of Chat, article comments, and image attribution either by Wikia labs or via personal css and js. So why not Message Wall? Are you finally admitting what we all suspected when the new skin came along, that Wikia wants to become a social network?
Don't shove this at us, Wikia. It simply encourages more animosity against the Message Wall from users. I think if you stepped back for a moment and thought exactly why you want this to be mandatory, you'll find what I'm saying is correct: it needs to be optional. And here's another important point:
If a wiki wants this feature, they will implement it on their own! If a wiki is arguing against this, chances are they won't use it, mandatory or no. They'll find a way to circumvent it somehow, or, failing that, just move. There's always a choice, and rather than try to eliminate that, simply acknowledge it, like you've done in the past. There's no reason to force it on all communities, many of which don't support your social networking move in any way, shape, or form.
Please, understand that you're simply damaging your credibility needlessly over this, (Given the quality of the other features that you've released over the summer, this will be little better than article comments or Chat, and from the test my hopes are not high), get over the fact that there are wikis out there you do not support your move for social networking, and make it optional. Because I feel like I'm not being given reasonable, logical answers about Message Wall in the process, the kind of answers you had back during the days of the Monaco/Oasis transition. (At least then you acknowledged that not everyone would like the change, and gave us a personal option to opt out of it).
So, please give me a logical answer about why, if Message Wall is so great, you need to make it mandatory. (And none of "we think it will be so much more helpful to new users" if new users are so bad at editing they can't even figure out how to use a talk page, then how are they going to actually contribute to a wiki in a constructive way). Sorry, but it's the truth. I think that you, as wiki editors as well as staff members, know that wikis are diverse, and trying to make them all into the same social-y site will not work. Which, consciously or not (I really don't know at this point) you're doing.
Sincerely,
Varkanax39
-
Jen, is there any researched basis for this belief or is it mostly "put the feature in and see what happens"?
-
@Varkanax
It's a shame the staff will read one line of what you said and continue trying to force this down our throats, fully aware that their membership is likely to drop from a few million to a couple dozen or hundred.
-
@Varkanax: How did the new skin, in any way, make Wikia more like a social networking site?
-
@LurkerLordB: I think Oasis just fits better with all of the social networking features Wikia's been pushing this summer, but that's just my opinion. The only reason I brought up the new skin was to remind Wikia staff that even for that change, users had a personal option to opt out (by using Monobook) if they didn't want to use the new skin. Message Wall, on the other hand, is planned to be completely mandatory.
-
Yay for giving us this temporary optional options! :D
-
12 people like this (on a forum) and over 300 hate it, why is this even being released? It better be optional, because it will be disabled right away on most wikis.
-
The auto 20 topic archive might be a drag.. can u give admins the option to increase that limit? I haven't followed this discussion at all, a user just informed me about it, but what'll happen to welcome messages?
-
And btw "talking more" is not always a good thing. We have blogs and the chat feature for that. Talk pages are supposed to be informative ways for user to communicate and have discussion about the Wiki.. not random topics.
-
And...just my opinion, but i just saw the Test wiki, and the talk page looks like a blog now.. Would really appreciate if this was optional
