4 ms·

Fandom is one of my least favorite things now. The site ends up having more ads than the average porn or piracy website, it manages to slow down my relatively b

Fandom is one of my least favorite things now. The site ends up having more ads than the average porn or piracy website, it manages to slow down my relatively beefy laptops without even trying. I love the idea of fan wikis, but Fandom is basically the worst possible implementation of that idea.

cbm-vic-20 2y ago
The "fan" in "Fandom" means the fan in your computer.
- setopt 2y ago
  And the “dom” refers to how it completely dominates that fan.
  - aylons 2y ago
    The dom comes from some of the tame ads...
  - preciousoo 2y ago
    Or how they use every square pixel of the dom
- razodactyl 2y ago
  ...I like you. I'm gonna keep you around... hahaha
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
GJim 2y ago
What are these 'ads' of which you speak?
- ta1243 2y ago
  Assuming you're not on an adblocker, what's really odd is every page has a video about the subject. Not an advert, just a video that you aren't interested in. I don't get it. If I'm looking up a specific year in the star trek universe, say 2381, to see what happened, why would I want 14 minute video on "a history of star trek". Then why would I want it again when I check the next year
  - homebrewer 2y ago
    For some reason you're assuming the owners of the website have your interests at heart, and not the interest of their bank account.
    - ta1243 2y ago
      Sure, but how does serving me a 15 minute video help their bank account? If it were a youtube style video advert I could understand it.
      - mschuster91 2y ago
        You watch it, and Google Ads records a veeery long "user is present on website" time, which is a boost in SEO - Google ranks how long people spend on a website, hence the "trend" of endless waffling around in stuff as basic as cooking recipes, or inline videos that entice the user to spend time on the website. Even if all of it (nowadays including videos) is AI-generated slop. But if the user immediately finds the information and goes back or closes the tab, then the site will get punished for being actually efficient and useful. SEO has ruined the Internet.
      - philipov 2y ago
        Putting autoplaying videos on every page farms their view count and gets the algorithm to show it to more people, which drives ad revenue. It's quite similar to how Fextralife embeds twitch streams to farm viewer counts.
dvngnt_ 2y ago
laughs in ublock origin
- tombert 2y ago
  I use ublock now too, but it's this really annoying feedback loop; people use ad blockers, making the websites less money, so they add more advertisements for the people who don't have ad blockers, and making the website worse and more likely for them to install an ad blocker etc... I know that running a website isn't free, so I understand the need for ads. Fandom is just a terrible version of it.
  - teddyh 2y ago
    > people use ad blockers, making the websites less money, so they add more advertisements for the people who don't have ad blockers I have serious doubts about this step in the spiral. IIUC, people who use ad blockers are still vanishingly few, and therefore the loss of ad impressions should not be that large.
    - card_zero 2y ago
      Some sites have a message like "hey, we can't serve you ads, you must be using an ad blocker, stop that and absorb the advertising as is your duty because we need the money". But maybe that's just desperation and they aren't losing much to ad blockers anyway.
      - teddyh 2y ago
        Many people believe that the loss is great, especially web site owners, which would certainly explain such messages. But lived experience shows at least me that most people don’t even know what an ad blocker is.
    - ARandumGuy 2y ago
      It's clearly enough of an impact for Google to spend effort killing uBlock on Chrome, and (attempting) to block it on Youtube. Obviously Google is huge, and even a small percentage of users is still a lot of money on the table.
duxup 2y ago
It's not even accurate at times. I think a lot of the dedicated fans have given up on it. I've seen several that have chunks of straight wrong information. Usually it's stuff where the fan seems to have picked up on something implied in a story, but missed where it is clearly stated that isn't the case ... but then they go and write on fandom and make lots of assumptions from there and fill in other gaps with guesses.
- matheusmoreira 2y ago
  > I think a lot of the dedicated fans have given up on it. As someone who once edited those wikis, I certainly hope they did. Who wants to work for free to enrich some private equity firm?
- Starlevel004 2y ago
  > I think a lot of the dedicated fans have given up on it. I've seen several that have chunks of straight wrong information. It's a not-so-open secret that a lot of wikia wikis are not only vandalised but encouraged to be vandalised as to make people move off them.
  - duxup 2y ago
    I can understand the urge and frustration level. Just wish there was a more centralized / good alternative to promote rather than just wrecking fandom.
  - mschae23 2y ago
    Vandalism on Fandom wikis is counter-productive. It just makes it look more active, to both users and search engines, and so will in turn make it harder for people to find the independent wiki. The best thing to do is just to ignore abandoned Fandom wikis entirely.
- shbooms 2y ago
  Same here. Prior to my discovery that fandom was bad and a lot of wikis were moving away, I was following so many instances of out dated info in games I was playing due to not realizing that the wiki was no longer maintained since the active contributors had moved elsewhere and updates/patches to the game had rendered the info moot.
jagermo 2y ago
agreed. the good thing is, it teaches a new generation why adblockers are great.
formerly_proven 2y ago
In a nutshell https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page vs https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_Wiki https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_Wiki (Though UESP has had banner ads for a while now)
- sickofparadox 2y ago
  Love the UESP, probably my favorite wiki.
  - red-iron-pine 2y ago
    UESP is amazing, and is a great example of what the non-fandom wikis are trying to be
- eviks 2y ago
  A big blocking modal with "Privacy Notice We & our 726 technology partners ask you to consent"?
fenomas 2y ago
Just a week or two ago my chrome plugins got temporarily disabled for some reason, and I didn't notice for a day or two... until I happened to check a fandom wiki. Then for about five seconds I thought I'd somehow installed All The Viruses. And ironically, I already hated fandom before I'd seen it without an ad blocker! Just for the large sidebars and ugly flyouts and whatnot. It really feels like a contender for worst site on the internet.
- m463 2y ago
  > I'd somehow installed All The Viruses maybe at that moment, you did.
ykonstant 2y ago
I have blocked the domain on my browser; this helps with mindless clicking on fandom sites appearing on top of Google searches while the communities have moved on to other wikis.
Dwedit 2y ago
Fandom is perfectly usable with adblockers and the "Cleaner Fandom" userscript. But only with those extensions!
- GoblinSlayer 2y ago
  I just disable javascript and googletagmanager and don't see any ads. The good moment is that Fandom shows static content as opposed to an average web 2.0 SPA.
- yamazakiwi 2y ago
  I don't use it out of principle.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

cbm-vic-20 2y ago

The "fan" in "Fandom" means the fan in your computer.

setopt 2y ago
And the “dom” refers to how it completely dominates that fan.
- aylons 2y ago
  The dom comes from some of the tame ads...
- preciousoo 2y ago
  Or how they use every square pixel of the dom
razodactyl 2y ago
...I like you. I'm gonna keep you around... hahaha
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

GJim 2y ago

What are these 'ads' of which you speak?

ta1243 2y ago
Assuming you're not on an adblocker, what's really odd is every page has a video about the subject. Not an advert, just a video that you aren't interested in. I don't get it. If I'm looking up a specific year in the star trek universe, say 2381, to see what happened, why would I want 14 minute video on "a history of star trek". Then why would I want it again when I check the next year
- homebrewer 2y ago
  For some reason you're assuming the owners of the website have your interests at heart, and not the interest of their bank account.
  - ta1243 2y ago
    Sure, but how does serving me a 15 minute video help their bank account? If it were a youtube style video advert I could understand it.
    - mschuster91 2y ago
      You watch it, and Google Ads records a veeery long "user is present on website" time, which is a boost in SEO - Google ranks how long people spend on a website, hence the "trend" of endless waffling around in stuff as basic as cooking recipes, or inline videos that entice the user to spend time on the website. Even if all of it (nowadays including videos) is AI-generated slop. But if the user immediately finds the information and goes back or closes the tab, then the site will get punished for being actually efficient and useful. SEO has ruined the Internet.
    - philipov 2y ago
      Putting autoplaying videos on every page farms their view count and gets the algorithm to show it to more people, which drives ad revenue. It's quite similar to how Fextralife embeds twitch streams to farm viewer counts.

dvngnt_ 2y ago

laughs in ublock origin

tombert 2y ago
I use ublock now too, but it's this really annoying feedback loop; people use ad blockers, making the websites less money, so they add more advertisements for the people who don't have ad blockers, and making the website worse and more likely for them to install an ad blocker etc... I know that running a website isn't free, so I understand the need for ads. Fandom is just a terrible version of it.
- teddyh 2y ago
  > people use ad blockers, making the websites less money, so they add more advertisements for the people who don't have ad blockers I have serious doubts about this step in the spiral. IIUC, people who use ad blockers are still vanishingly few, and therefore the loss of ad impressions should not be that large.
  - card_zero 2y ago
    Some sites have a message like "hey, we can't serve you ads, you must be using an ad blocker, stop that and absorb the advertising as is your duty because we need the money". But maybe that's just desperation and they aren't losing much to ad blockers anyway.
    - teddyh 2y ago
      Many people believe that the loss is great, especially web site owners, which would certainly explain such messages. But lived experience shows at least me that most people don’t even know what an ad blocker is.
  - ARandumGuy 2y ago
    It's clearly enough of an impact for Google to spend effort killing uBlock on Chrome, and (attempting) to block it on Youtube. Obviously Google is huge, and even a small percentage of users is still a lot of money on the table.

duxup 2y ago

It's not even accurate at times. I think a lot of the dedicated fans have given up on it. I've seen several that have chunks of straight wrong information. Usually it's stuff where the fan seems to have picked up on something implied in a story, but missed where it is clearly stated that isn't the case ... but then they go and write on fandom and make lots of assumptions from there and fill in other gaps with guesses.

matheusmoreira 2y ago
> I think a lot of the dedicated fans have given up on it. As someone who once edited those wikis, I certainly hope they did. Who wants to work for free to enrich some private equity firm?
Starlevel004 2y ago
> I think a lot of the dedicated fans have given up on it. I've seen several that have chunks of straight wrong information. It's a not-so-open secret that a lot of wikia wikis are not only vandalised but encouraged to be vandalised as to make people move off them.
- duxup 2y ago
  I can understand the urge and frustration level. Just wish there was a more centralized / good alternative to promote rather than just wrecking fandom.
- mschae23 2y ago
  Vandalism on Fandom wikis is counter-productive. It just makes it look more active, to both users and search engines, and so will in turn make it harder for people to find the independent wiki. The best thing to do is just to ignore abandoned Fandom wikis entirely.
shbooms 2y ago
Same here. Prior to my discovery that fandom was bad and a lot of wikis were moving away, I was following so many instances of out dated info in games I was playing due to not realizing that the wiki was no longer maintained since the active contributors had moved elsewhere and updates/patches to the game had rendered the info moot.

jagermo 2y ago

agreed. the good thing is, it teaches a new generation why adblockers are great.

formerly_proven 2y ago

In a nutshell https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page vs https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_Wiki https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_Wiki (Though UESP has had banner ads for a while now)

sickofparadox 2y ago
Love the UESP, probably my favorite wiki.
- red-iron-pine 2y ago
  UESP is amazing, and is a great example of what the non-fandom wikis are trying to be
eviks 2y ago
A big blocking modal with "Privacy Notice We & our 726 technology partners ask you to consent"?

fenomas 2y ago

Just a week or two ago my chrome plugins got temporarily disabled for some reason, and I didn't notice for a day or two... until I happened to check a fandom wiki. Then for about five seconds I thought I'd somehow installed All The Viruses. And ironically, I already hated fandom before I'd seen it without an ad blocker! Just for the large sidebars and ugly flyouts and whatnot. It really feels like a contender for worst site on the internet.

m463 2y ago
> I'd somehow installed All The Viruses maybe at that moment, you did.

ykonstant 2y ago

I have blocked the domain on my browser; this helps with mindless clicking on fandom sites appearing on top of Google searches while the communities have moved on to other wikis.

Dwedit 2y ago

Fandom is perfectly usable with adblockers and the "Cleaner Fandom" userscript. But only with those extensions!

GoblinSlayer 2y ago
I just disable javascript and googletagmanager and don't see any ads. The good moment is that Fandom shows static content as opposed to an average web 2.0 SPA.
yamazakiwi 2y ago
I don't use it out of principle.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]