Wookieepedia

"Wookieepedia is a lavish and stunning homage to the Star Wars pop cultural phenomenon. Thanks to its professional appearance, the scope of its content, the quality of its writers and diligence of its administrators, Wookieepedia has become a valuable resource to fans both casual and obsessive, as well as to Star Wars authors. It's becoming the new nexus for everyone who wants to know as much as Yoda about that galaxy far, far away."

- Abel G. Peña



Wookieepedia, the Star Wars wiki is a wiki that was started on March 4, 2005 by Chad "WhiteBoy" Barbry and Steven "Riffsyphon1024" Greenwood. It strives to be the premier source of information on all aspects of the Star Wars universe. This includes information from the Star Wars films and Expanded Universe, as well as information of value to fans. The Star Wars wiki is inspired by Wikipedia, but can expand on Star Wars information in greater detail and with more freedom than Wikipedia. Wookieepedia was founded when Wikipedia users began to complain of the overabundance of minutiae related to Star Wars, which began appearing on Wikipedia. Since then, it has expanded to become one of the largest wikis on the internet.

As a fan-created encyclopedia, Wookieepedia is not intended to be a primary source, nor is it a replacement for the Databank or any other official source. Rather, it serves as a fan effort to summarize all aspects of the Star Wars universe in the best way possible, while pointing the reader to the respective official sources.

Evolution of a wiki
Chad Barbry, under the screenname of "Cbarbry," was a regular contributor to Wikipedia, participating in a number of different subjects within the online encyclopedia, including Biblical history and technology since October 17, 2004.

In January of 2005, Steven Greenwood joined Wikipedia under the screenname of "Riffsyphon1024," adding articles in the subject of geography and popular culture. Immediately after working on these articles of interest, he took the job of sorting the various Star Wars articles on the site. As Wikipedia was concerned, only notable items would have full articles, with the rest of the minor subjects with descriptions on a giant list. Planets, characters, weapons, and vehicles were all done in this manner. Over a short period of time, Steven found that he disliked this format and sought another way to gather and place information on the saga and its Expanded Universe. On January 21, Steven posted on a section on a talk page regarding the creation of a new Star Wars Portal, but suggested that instead of a portal it should be a wiki.

Two days later, Chad entered the discussion and began working out ideas with Steven. Both agreed that this new project would run alongside Wikipedia as a separate, but equal entity&mdash;something more than simply a Wikiproject. It was here in the discussion that Chad proposed the new nickname of "Wookieepedia," which caught on with Steven and others immediately, and the idea was trailblazed (Steven's request of "Wicketpedia" was an alternate name which did not work nearly as well). However, since Steven was not sure exactly how a new wiki would be created, Chad contacted Angela of then Wikicities (now Wikia) and requested the creation of the new wiki.

Great LucasCruft Purge
For more information, see the Wikipedia article. At the same time, perhaps unaware of the formation of the new wiki, a Wikipedian by the name of GRider, considered by some a deletionist who wished to prove a point, began to place several Star Wars articles in their Votes for Deletion system (now Articles for Deletion). The purge was initiated in March 2005 in an attempt to get these articles deleted from Wikipedia, and was later dubbed the "Great LucasCruft Purge" by Steven himself. It was Steven's goal to save as many articles from this individual before the damage was made permanent, and would then impede Star Wars Wiki's ability to grow as it did within the first month. The purge garnered the Star Wars Wiki a great deal of public attention, which gave many the erroneous impression that Wookieepedia was created because of the purge.

The term "Great LucasCruft Purge" stemmed from the VfD for Great Jedi Purge and was co-coined by Steven and Kappa.

Wiki creation
Other Wikipedia contributors seemed to be getting more hostile toward new Star Wars articles, so in February 2005, Chad decided to make a request of the Wikipedia Board of Trustees to make a "Star Wars Wiki." His intent was more than just another WikiProject, but an official sister project similar to Wikiquotes. He thought the best solution was a separate, but linked project—a project that was separate enough for the "anti-cruft" Wikipedians, but still one that was officially Wikipedia, so there would be no need for redundant articles between the projects.

In early March 2005, after meeting, the board came back with their answer. They did not want to move Wikipedia the direction proposed by Chad, but recommended the suggestion of creating a Star Wars Wikia. Angela of Wikia, was on the Board of Trustees and contacted Chad to let him know of the board's decision and to setup the new Star Wars Wiki. Part of the process that Angela setup was setting up interwiki links so Wikipedia could link to SWW articles and vice versa.

Chad, under the screen name of "WhiteBoy," was the first to edit on the newfound wiki on March 4, starting with the logo and the moving of articles from Wikipedia to SWW. A few days after on the 10th, Steven joined the site, using the same screenname.

For a brief time, there was some confusion as to how to move articles over. Chad devised a template for use on Wikipedia to place on talk pages of articles of interest, alerting users that the article would be redirected or moved entirely. The idea was to move as many existing articles from Wikipedia to the new wiki, under the GFDL, making sure to save those under threat of deletion first, and then "wookify" them to the new wiki's standards. The hope was that, though separate, Wikipedians would begin to put the more obscure articles (essentially anything but the most encyclopedic of articles) in the Star Wars Wiki. Main articles, such as Luke Skywalker, would remain at Wikipedia.

Wikipedians in general ultimately saw the Star Wars Wiki as an external site, one not affiliated with Wikipedia enough to actually "transwiki" articles over, like one would with Wikibooks or Wikirecipe. Creating redirects to the Star Wars Wiki was not what the Wikipedians had in mind and requested that Chad and Steve immediately cease what they believed was legal transwikification, ; however, articles could still be copied and pasted under the GFDL copyleft license and then "wookified" to fit the scheme of the Star Wars-themed wiki, making sure to place an in-universe article in past tense, or remove redundant sentences. In this aspect, it was decided to have all articles, not just those that were more trivial, lesser known, or more detailed, at the wiki. Later articles were copied in this fashion and the originals were left alone on Wikipedia for its users to edit under its rules. Eventually Wookieepedia would develop so many articles that Wikipedia would no longer have any to copy.

2005
Just days after the founding, new administrator powers were given to Steven (now Riffsyphon1024) by Chad (now WhiteBoy). This set up the two-admin system until the adminships of the users QuentinGeorge, Aidje, and SparqMan later in the year. Eventually the wiki, now going under the moniker of "Wookieepedia," developed a steady rate of contributions by new members from all over, and did not fully rely on the parent wiki anymore. Eventually Wookieepedia became the primarily referred name to the wiki and an official renaming took place with the creation of a new logo by Tracy Duncan.

Wookieepedian of the Month was first started in June 2005, with Imperialles as the first user to be recognized by the community for his contributions. As of February 2008, 37 users have been recognized as WOTM.

July brought the first Quotes of the Day on Wookieepedia. Though now considered minuscule in comparison to the current number of quotes now passed through four subcategories, it was a sufficient means to create a new feature on the wiki. Today, QotD/In-Universe is the most edited page of Wookieepedia. Pages such as these show the significant growth of each area over the course of only two years.

In September 2005, Did You Know? was experimentally created and added to the Main Page.

Consensus Track, a voting and discussion system designed to improve site-wide policies and practices, was formed onto a single page in October 2005. In the same month, Eric Przybylski of Nav-Computer.com allowed Wookieepedia to use his fan-made sector maps on certain articles. Eric responded to JustinGann in TheForce.net's forums, saying "If you're still interested in my maps, I'd be happy to allow there use for Wookieepedia. It's a cool project and I'd be honored to be a part of it."

2006
The first bot, known here as a "droid," was released onto Wookieepedia on February 8. R2-D2 was designed to clean up instances of repeating words, categories, as well as clean the sandbox page. Since then, another bot named Whistler has made over 150,000 total edits on Wookieepedia.

A new Forum area dubbed the Senate Hall was constructed in March 2006 as part of Wikia's MediaWiki updates, and as a result, the Community Portal talk page no longer was the primary form of wikiwide discussion. Senate Hall was chosen as a name that would not be considered too cliché or overly used for a Star Wars name. Consensus Track was subsequently moved into the forums, and becoming its own section, used specifically for policy creation and alteration on the wiki.

April Fool's Day brought the creation of a new Featured Article titled Earth.

2007
On February 20, the first Wookiee-Cast was posted. The podcast was parody and commentary by .... on subjects relating to Wookieepedia and Star Wars in general. It did not, however, represent the views of the wiki, but only the one user. Many however listened to the podcasts as they were released throughout 2007. The Wookiee-Cast is since on hiatus for 2008.

Also in February, the Inquisitorius was formed to handle the structure of the featured article system.

Wookieepedia's Reference desk became the new Knowledge Bank within the forums, where general questions on Star Wars not relating specifically to articles or Wookieepedia could be asked.

Over the course of the spring leading up the 30th anniversary of Star Wars, Wookieepedia held votes for the Coolest thing ever! and Lamest thing ever! with Darth Vader and SuperShadow winning respectively.

For April Fool's Day, Wookieepedia temporarily became "Katarnipedia," with articles moved to alternate titles and fake spoilers posted.

In May, at least ten Wookieepedians from across the globe attended Celebration IV to help monitor Wookieepedia's table alongside Completely Unofficial Star Wars Encyclopedia founder Bob Vitas, advertise the wiki, and host a trivia contest named "Stump the Wookiee." In the months before the convention, admins and users came across a notice by Mary Franklin that a group could obtain a table at CIV for free. Immediately the wiki reacted and set up a page for those interested as well as other details of the event. By February, it was known that Wookieepedia won the table and final preparations were made. Some users and administrators that attended and helped man the table alongside Vitas included Riffsyphon1024, Xwing328, jSarek, LtNOWIS, Ozzel, Graestan, Taybo20, Azizlight, Adamwankenobi and Lord Hydronium. As a result of Wookieepedia's appearance and contest at Celebration IV, it was mentioned by the official site for the first time, marking another level of awareness in the Star Wars community. In addition, the event allowed the wiki to express itself to the fans directly.

Also in May, the Votes for Deletion page was renamed to the more in-universe sounding Trash compactor.

In 2007, the wiki's Main Page underwent a major change, which allowed for exploration of the Star Wars universe within films, Expanded Universe, and in-universe categories to be hidden on a subpage with the use of Javascript. See here for a version of the old Main Page. In addition, the single search icon in the Wookieepedia's sidebar was upgraded in April to include rotating search icons.

2008
Wookieepedia began its fourth year on March 4, 2008.

Multi-year phenomena
Over the course of the wiki's history, several attempts were made to curb fanon or delete it altogether. Most votes resulted in no consensus and the issue was pushed back until a few months later when it became known again. A major influence became the creation of the Star Wars Fanon Wiki which was accepting all forms of fanon written by its users. Most users to that wiki happened to be Wookieepedians as well, however not in the form of long-staying administrators, but rather those who had been told not to add fanon to Wookieepedia. This shift of population was seen as general amounts of fanon reduced, but there were still users that went ahead with filling in their user pages and then not editing any or even a few articles.

Each year since 2005, a contest for Miss Star Wars and Mister Star Wars has been held.

Growth
Wookieepedia has grown quickly from its start in March 2005 to present to reach articles. One relatively large spike in contributions occurred in August 2005, after the release of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith.

Article milestones

 * First article: Brianna, March 9, 2005
 * Longest article: Palpatine
 * Most edited article: Star Wars: Battlefront II
 * 50,000th article: Solitaire

Wookieeterms
The term "Wookieepedia" was coined on January 23, 2005 by WhiteBoy as a joke during the preliminary discussions about creating the Star Wars Wiki. (Link)

It is coincidental that the word "Wookiee" would be the closest to resemble the word "Wiki" in Wikipedia, and so the creation of the term "Wookieepedia," a portmanteau, made perfect sense.

The term stuck with Wookieepedians&mdash;a term used to describe those who work on the Star Wars Wiki and of those not directly affiliated with the wiki&mdash;and eventually SWW's namespace was changed from "Star Wars" to "Wookieepedia."

The term "wookify," a variation of the word "wikify" used on Wikipedia, was used from SWW's inception as a term for adding wiki links and bringing articles up to the standard of Wookieepedia's Manual of Style, particularly changing the article to an in-universe perspective.

Popular acclaim


"Now this is what life day is all about... Wookieepedia be damned! I'm going to tag the entry as inaccurate... but first, let's sing!"
 * Wookieepedia was mentioned in TIME magazine on May 29, 2005 as one of Wikia's largest wikis; only Star Trek's Memory Alpha was larger, though as of November 12, 2005, Wookieepedia has exceeded Memory Alpha in legitimate number of articles.
 * On September 26, 2005, Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia, mentioned Wookieepedia in an interview on C-SPAN.
 * Abel G. Peña mentioned Wookieepedia in his October 11, 2005 blog, calling it a "staggering enterprise."
 * Nathan Butler mentioned and gave his support to the wiki in a recent episode of his ChronoRadio internet radio show.
 * SciFi.com selected Wookieepedia as its Sci Fi Site of the Week on November 28, 2005.
 * TheForce.Net acknowledges Wookieepedia for the first time on December 2, 2005, comparing it with the Completely Unofficial Star Wars Encyclopedia.
 * On March 27, 2006, Wookieepedia was mentioned in the official Wikia press release covering the relaunch of Wikicities under the new name Wikia.
 * Dan Wallace puts Wookieepedia links in his blog. He also admitted being a "giant fan of Wookieepedia."
 * John Jackson Miller mentioned Wookieepedia in behind the scenes comments for Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic 6: Commencement, Part 6 as the source of the conjectural name "Padawan Massacre of Taris," which was later canonized in issue 11 of that same series. Also, he dedicated a blog post called "On Wikis and Wookiees" to it.
 * On September 4, 2006, Wookieepedia was mentioned in the New York Times.
 * In Matt and Ben Loewen's audio commentary for A New Hope, done as an episode of their fan audio show Star Wars FM, they cite Wookieepedia as where they looked for information on the retconned appearance of the 501st in the film. In reference to the site's name, Matt quips "I love that name!"
 * Pablo Hidalgo mentioned Wookieepedia in one of his blog entries. He stated "...there's a variety of reasons I can't go into that playground as someone on the official side of things. I try to avoid it, though from what I've seen it's pretty darn impressive."
 * In an interview with comedian C.C. Banana regarding the 30th anniversary of Star Wars, Peter Mayhew was asked if he contributed to the site, and replied that while he hadn't, "I do click onto it every now and again."
 * In an NBC blog, Aaron Bleyaert wrote about Wookieepedia's quick response to changing Motti's name to the disputed but, as of now, G-canon name Conan Antonio Motti. In the blog, released a day after George Lucas's statement, he praised Wookieepedia for their quickness in incorporating it into the Star Wars mythology.
 * On May 4, 2007, Variety.com wrote an article on Wookieepedia. The article was later included on Star Wars Hyperspace and the starwars.com Homing Beacon #187&mdash;making this the first time the official site has recognized the existence of Wookieepedia.
 * On May 18, 2007, StarWars.com again mentioned Wookieepedia in the Behind-the-Scenes Stage Programming" section of its article "Insider's Guide to Celebration IV: Part III." Wookieepedia was later mentioned in the printed form of the guide available at the event.
 * Wookieepedia was alloted time on the "Behind the Scenes" stage during Celebration IV for a trivia game set up by members of the Wookieepedia community.
 * In the June 2007 issue of Reason Magazine, an article about Jimmy Wales discussed the Star Wars wikia community as one of the largest wikis.
 * On the June 19, 2007 episode of his radio show, Howard Stern&mdash;an influential radio shock jock&mdash;mentioned Wookieepedia, and proceeded to read from the Wookieepedia entry on Darth Nihilus.
 * In Issue #121 of ToyFare magazine, the "Twisted Toyfare Theater" section is devoted exclusively to The Star Wars Holiday Special, with Lumpy questioning Chewbacca about Life Day, and Chewbacca responding that he should look it up on Wookieepedia.

- Mallatobuck in Twisted Toyfare Theatre Sept 2007


 * TimesOnline mentioned Wookieepedia as being one of the best Wikipedia spinoffs and referred to its "regularly amusing Quotes of the Day."
 * RiffTrax's Kevin Murphy worked a Wookieepedia reference into their commentary for The Star Wars Holiday Special.
 * Wookieepedia was mentioned in StarWars.com's February 12, 2008 Photo Caption.

Criticism
Like all wikis, Wookieepedia has been criticized for common wiki flaws such as pushing a certain point of view and for its easily editable nature, leading to frequent vandalism. A question about the validity of the wiki was asked on the TFN Boards in 2008 whether it continued to be reliable, to which jSarek had replied "To a degree. We generally keep the nonsense out, but we're not perfect, and sometimes something slips through." The wiki intends for good articles to remain on the site, however vandalism can easily distort canonical information if not checked.

Criticisms more specific to Wookieepedia concern the bureaucracy, which many dislike.

Influences on canon

 * Jedi Exile
 * Padawan Massacre of Taris - The event was first called "Padawan Massacre of Taris" on Wookieepedia for lack of an official term. Later this term was adopted into canon sources.
 * Sian Jeisel

In other languages
In addition to Wookieepedia, several other Star Wars wikis exist in multiple languages. Though these different language encyclopedias were started by, and are currently run by different people, many are located at the wikia.com subdomain, meaning that membership at any one version is extended to the others as well.


 * Star Wars Wiki en Español (Spanish)
 * Star Wars Wiki fr (French)
 * Star Wars Wiki em Português (Portuguese)
 * Вукипедия (Russian; Star Wars Wiki Ru)
 * Biblioteka Ossus (Polish)
 * Üdvözlünk a Csillagok Háborúja Wikiben (Hungarian; Star Wars Wiki Hu)
 * Yodapedia (Dutch; Star Wars Wiki Dutch)
 * Holopedia (Bulgarian; Star Wars Wiki Bulgarian)
 * Jedipedia (German; Das Star Wars Wiki)
 * Star Wars Wiki Da (Danish)
 * SWikoopedia (Slovenian)
 * Jedipedia (Finnish)
 * Star Wars Wiki sv (Swedish)
 * Jawapedia (Italian)

Other Star Wars-related wikis

 * Biblioteka Ossus, Polish Fandom wiki about Star Wars

Wookieepedia