User blog comment:Ninjamask/Ninjamask going to Community Connect 2016/@comment-1330314-20160711055852/@comment-5275700-20160727000556

Hello,

Ninjamask forwarded this question to us and I can reply. Apologies for the delay!

Wikia is currently looking at ways to improve how we "get the news out" about upcoming changes. When larger changes are coming up we do make an effort to get word out ahead of time, especially when there might be effects on customizations and layouts.

One big question though is, how to get the word out? Those of you who want news and updates from Wikia -- how do you want to get it? Do you subscribe to the Staff Blog or stop by Community Central? Do you click on the bubble-messages that show up in the lower right of the screen? (Not many people do.) Are you opted into getting news from Wikia, in your email preferences? Just some examples of how the vehicle for the news can vary, and it's something we are trying to work on, seeing what works best. Some of you may have received emails recently, that is something we're trying again right now. I would be interested to hear what options sound most appealing to those reading this (don't limit yourself to the options I listed, feel free to make suggestions).

To address a few specific points/questions:


 * often give wiki communities no say in these changes even as they're being applied to their site
 * are there plans to implement a policy that would allow for more two-way input?

In some cases there's a tremendous amount of input. For example, the initial development of the markup for portable infoboxes was done with quite a bit of collaboration with users, which took place on Community Central. Other times, preliminary input is limited to smaller groups like Community Council, since it's not practical to have the whole community giving feedback in the early stages of development. And we are always open to post-release feedback as well. The feedback on the new Community Page feature has definitely influenced the changes that are starting to be released right now. And sometimes the nature of changes are at the deeper platform level, and we don't have many options, so it's not practical or possible to work collaboratively. The specifics of the project usually determine what path we take.


 * there's no direct interaction between Wikia and its own wikis, and contacting Wikia for a local wiki problem isn't really on the table unless it's something really catastrophic on a busy site

Every user (even anons) can use Special:Contact to message Community Support, and you will get a reply. This can be about individual matters or community matters. It's true that often our reply suggests contacting a local admin first, usually for social issues. For technical problems and bug reports, we always investigate and follow-up. It doesn't need to be a catastrophe to get our attention. If there was a time (in the recent past) where you felt a reported problem got no attention, I would like to hear more about that.

As far as Wikia initiating the interaction -- as I said above, we're working on better methods of mass-outreach and welcome ideas. For outreach to individual wikis, this is usually much easier (just post in the forum, etc.) but less frequent and usually happens when we have specific questions or requests. There are too many communities to make "stopping by just to ay hi and check in" practical, much as we would like to be able to do that. But please feel free to message staff when need and provide feedback. We are here and we do listen!