"Wikis occupy a really unique place within the social web," says Wikia's CEO, Craig Palmer. "They're very different to the short attention span, individual-focused sites where you put something up and have someone react to it. Here, people band together and produce long-lasting content. You can't collaborate on an original body of work on Facebook, Tumblr, Flickr or Twitter; that's what makes Wikia unique."
It certainly involves a different level of engagement to merely thumbing up something on a Facebook page, and in some cases you could even call it a labour of love. The John Peel wiki at peel.wikia.com, a huge resource of information about the late DJ's shows on Radio 1 and elsewhere, began just four years ago.
"A friend of mine wanted a place where all the information about Peel on the net could be centralised," says contributor Steve Lodge. "And that wiki is what I've spent most of my spare time doing over the past four years."
If you're wondering why a man would devote so much effort to such a thing, Wikia have pondered the same question. "We've done some deep research to understand what motivates people to chronicle this stuff, what compels them to put forward their knowledge in a way that furthers other people's knowledge," says Wikia's senior vice-president of marketing, Jennifer Betka. In Lodge's case, John Peel's death meant that the project had more purpose.
"As there's a definitive beginning and an end it feels calculable," he says. "Maybe realisable. You never know."
The explosion of interest in wikis isn't all about facts, however. AltHistory is a fascinating project where contributors outline alternative historical outcomes based upon crucial events going a different way for example, Joan of Arc's triumphant defeat of the English, or catastrophic nuclear war engulfing Britain in 1983. Or, if you prefer your wiki-ing a little less intense, galaxiki.org lets you create and name your own imaginary solar systems forever more.
But what all these wikis have in common is the proactive diligence of the contributors, and surprisingly high visitor numbers helped in many cases by the high Google rankings Wikia has managed to achieve. "Shows of Peel's are coming up all the time from people who've stumbled across the wiki," says Lodge, "shows that we thought we'd never hear."
Visitors engage wiki resources in many different ways, according to Craig Palmer. "Users of the Glee wiki clearly chat while they watch the show using Wikia tools," he says, "and then add a lot of content when it's finished."
Gamers, meanwhile, will use wikis such as wowwiki.com (World of Warcraft) or callofduty.wikia.com as "second-screen resources" having the wiki open while they play to assist them with making progress through the game.
But from the end users all the way up to the wiki admins, it's a more complex social structure than on most social media sites and one that the entertainment industry is keen to tap into.
Companies such as Warner have already been developing links to Wikia communities as part of their PR drives.
"When communities look for everything there is to know about a subject," says Betka, "it creates a beautiful structure for people to collaborate around. Because it's about being positive, comprehensive and accurate. The underlying principle is the pursuit of knowledge." And, crucially, wikis know no snobbery; from Adele to Zoroastrianism, and pretty much all points in between.
- Independent
