You know, I've always thought it'd be cool if the createBlog community could have something like Wikipedia, but exclusively for the createBlog community. For example, YTMND's Wiki. I was browsing through their Wiki one day and I thought it was pretty cool, so I was like, "hey, createBlog should have one of these."

The YTMND Wiki and Wikipedia both are run by MediaWiki, and after looking at it a bit, I figured maybe this could actually work out.

I'd love to get this up and running for createBlog, though of course I'm going to need some opinions first and help later.

I've set up the Mediawiki software before, so I can attest that it's easy to get up and running.

Couple big questions arise though:

1. For what does CreateBlog need a wiki? Web design tips, that sort of thing?
2. How do you propose that CB deal with vandalism? Judging by the forums, the wiki would inevitably see a lot of spam, greatly reducing its utilitarian value. Wikipedia has mechanisms in place to deal with this, but Wikipedia also has more manpower than CB. How could CB deal with it?

That'd be great if you could help out, Michael.

As for the purpose of the wiki, I had in mind reference as well as for amusement (much like the YTMND Wiki). Rather notable events in the past of createBlog (such as Hilary's "death," this years April Fools prank, Xangans, and etc.) could be made as articles here for informational and amusement purposes.

As for vandalism, we could deal with it just as we've always dealt with it (or spam if you want to get specific). Limit their access, ban them, etc. And if we need more manpower besides the staff we already have, I suppose a seperate Wiki staff could be established.

Also, I had in mind of doing this rather than whatever cB News is doing, because we all know that never worked out regardless of our attempts of bringing it back again.

That actually sounds like i would be pretty fun to do, but it WOULD be subject to a LOT of spam... it would take major modding.

I like it, though.

*raises hand*

KAYCEE THINKS IT'S AN AWESOME IDEA!

Hopefully the current staff can handle it, but if not, like AC suggested, another staff can be made like was for the By-Laws.

Would we be allowing encyclopedia pages to made for individual people? They have it on wiki, but I doubt that such pages could be very neutral. However, I can't really think of many events that can be done for the CreateWiki so....does that mean that we'd allow it?

I think I'm geting a ahead of myself.

Yes and yes, Kaycee.

For individual people, I was thinking following suit of YTMND Wiki and including Ju-Sun, all moderators, and notable people. I'm hoping we can handle not member bashing on these.

As for events, I'm can't recall too many for myself, but that's because I'm relatively new to createBlog (2006). I'm sure something happened since 2003.

Superlatives, Trish vs. Heather+cousin, cB revolutions v. 1.0 & 2.0, bylaws, the short-lived cB paper, JAK (in no order)? There's definitely more than that.. I'm just out of it.

But I'm for this idea; it sounds interesting.

Anna's got the idea.
I'm also talking all the inside jokes and fads of createBlog, so that outside people know where they originated and such, such as NPS (new page syndrome).

Spin-Offs, like Dynasty and GenF...

Cb's rivalry with Blogring...

Oh, this WOULD be fun

I would be delighted to help out, if the staff and Ju-Sun are interested. I've installed the Mediawiki software a few times at a previous (real-life) job. It literally can be download, unpacked, and installed in less than an hour.


Oh, okay. I thought maybe you were going to allow it to be edited by anyone, but allowing only registered users to create and modify pages will be easier to control.

Sounds good, I guess we just have to wait for the approval of Ju-Sun and other staff members.Yeah, createBlog users only. Everyone can view it, but only cB users can add or remove anything.

There's probably a way to tie existing counts into a Mediawiki system, but that might take a bit of work to get up and running.

Well, I guess we better get approval soon so we can start working on this. I don't want this to be another dragged project.

Ooooh, that sounds like a really good idea.

Maybe to limit the spam that would come with this, maybe require a user to have a certain amount of posts / contributions to make an article?

That's not a bad idea, though, right now I'm not particularly worried about vandals at the moment. We'll probably add limitations and what not as we go.

I don't know if you can program the forum posts and Wiki accounts to go together, or how we would be able to work out something like that. I guess Michael would know more about it than myself.

To be honest, plenty of the people who spam regularly here have pretty high post counts ANYWAY, so I'm not really sure how useful that would be.

Well, it would prevent random people from creating random accounts just to vandalize.

I generally like the idea, it would be fun, besides having a place to have notable events/people for prosperity's sake, but who would really be interested in it other than the dedicated members? And how many people from the "old days" are left that can explain all the legendary incidents (i.e. Trish vs. a lot of people)? Also, on a more pragmatic level, how much space would something like this take up? I can't imagine running/owning a site like cB is inexpensive.

Well, I had this Wiki in mind specifically for the members. As for the really old stuff, well, if we really looked for it, I'm sure we could find it.

As for the more technical stuff like costs, I can't really say too much about. Michael might know more about it than myself; all I know is that the MediaWiki software itself is supposed to be free.

Not out of the box, but I imagine it could be done. Mediawiki is open source/free software (released under the GPL), and is written in PHP, so it could be modified.


It's really just text, so it wouldn't take up that much space... Certainly not as much as the forums themselves and all the rest of the stuff on CB, although resources are a consideration. But Ju-Sun is really the only person that could make that estimate (unless someone else here has extensive knowledge of the server setup of CB; I don't, I'm just conjecturing).


Mediawiki is available free of charge.

That would be really fun. But I agree about the vandalism and all.

Instead of just post count, how about ... how long had we been here?

Nah, I would rather not use "seniority" instead of something like post count. Post count would better represent how contributive someone is to the community.

Really though, I'm not even sure yet whether we should or could do it by post count.

Yeah, I'm iffy on the whole post count AND seniority thing. Why not have people who want editing access apply to have it? Nothing fancy, a PM to a Admin or something would do. That way those who are interested in contributing, not spamming would have access. :)

I'd just hate to see something really fun like this become too regimented.

^ That's the best idea.

Or would it be better to just take away the privaledge if it was abused. rather than the hassle of applying for it?