WikiDot is an online wiki farm that has become the primary platform for hosting containment fiction and liminal fiction communities since 2008. Notable communities hosted on WikiDot include the SCP Foundation, Wayward Society, Backrooms Wiki, RPC Authority, Liminal Archives, and their associated sandbox sites.

The platform has played a crucial role in developing collaborative fiction projects through its user-friendly interface, collaborative editing capabilities, and versatile customization options. WikiDot supports various content types including text, images, and multimedia, making it ideal for fiction communities. The platform also features built-in forums and commenting systems that foster community interaction and engagement. WikiDot offers free hosting for basic sites, making it accessible to projects with varying resource levels.

History

WikiDot was founded in 2006 with venture capital startup funding from Pieter Hintjens. It was designed as a platform that would empower users to create and customize websites without requiring extensive technical expertise. Beyond containment fiction, WikiDot has successfully supported other communities.^[1]https://wiki.archiveteam.org/index.php/Wikidot

WikiDot functions as a pure-wiki building tool that enables the creation of custom, personalized websites. This capability has allowed containment fiction to flourish, with new communities branching off to become independent entities as the genre continues to expand.

The evolution of containment fiction’s style has been influenced by both WikiDot’s limitations and freedoms. Early SCP writing was characterized by creative use of basic markdown text editing, while the introduction of custom CSS was later utilized and systematized by more experienced writers and operators.

Stability Issues

While WikiDot is generally stable, it experienced a major blackout in May 2022, reportedly caused by Russian hackers. This incident led to Russian IP addresses being banned from the platform, forcing Russian containment fiction communities to seek alternatives. This policy, while unpopular, has remained in place since the downtime ended.

Even before this incident, WikiDot faced stability issues. When the SCP Foundation gained widespread popularity following the release of SCP: Containment Breach, WikiDot reportedly struggled to handle the increased traffic.^[2]https://www.conficmagazine.com/post/project-foundation-forever However, the most severe downtime issues were concentrated in the period immediately after the game’s release, which prompted WikiDot to begin using AWS hosting.

Ownership

WikiDot is owned by Michal Frackowiak, one of the original members of the WikiDot team from 2006. He has been attempting to sell WikiDot since at least February 27, 2020, though there has been no public information about any change in ownership since May 29 of that same year.^[3]https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5228862.0

For more information generally on Wikidot, visit its Simple Wikipedia page.

Project Foundation

Project Foundation is an initiative formally launched by the SCP Wiki community in April 2018 to establish platform independence from the Wikidot hosting service.^[4]http://scpmigration.wikidot.com/ The project gained renewed urgency following the 2022 Wikidot blackout and subsequent regional access bans, which demonstrated the vulnerabilities of relying on a single external platform.

Background

As the SCP Wiki community expanded to include thousands of articles and branches in over fifteen languages, reliance on Wikidot presented increasing challenges:

• Lack of ongoing development and maintenance by Wikidot
• Technical limitations restricting new features
• Platform instability concerns
• Vulnerability to service disruptions

Efforts to migrate to a self-sustaining platform were in discussion as early as 2011.^[5]https://05command.wikidot.com/forum/t-415735 These concerns led the SCP Wiki administration to initiate Project Foundation as a strategic effort to secure the community’s future.^[6]https://05command.wikidot.com/forum/t-849687/the-future-development-of-the-site

Development Approach

After considering existing open-source wiki software like MediaWiki, the technical team opted to fork the Wikidot codebase, resulting in the development of Wikijump. This approach was chosen to:

• Maintain familiar functionalities and syntax
• Implement necessary improvements and bug fixes
• Create a platform specifically tailored to the SCP Wiki’s unique needs

Wikijump’s technical foundation includes:

• PHP
• Rust
• JavaScript
• TypeScript
• Smarty
• Svelte
• PostgreSQL

The project has remained under active development since 2011, with current efforts focused on resolving existing issues, integrating forum capabilities, and creating content migration tools.^[7]https://github.com/scpwiki/wikijump^[8]https://www.reddit.com/r/SCP/comments/1foa8kn/regarding_project_foundation_or_project_wikijump/?rdt=45398 Discussions regarding Project Foundation and its development is ongoing at the time of writing.^[9]https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/forum/t-16960613/2024-preliminary-town-hall-responses A blog post update in October 2024 recognized the inefficiencies of the past development, and described an incremental delivery plan for future development and deployment.^[10]https://www.wikijump.org/2024/10/06/project-foundation-stages/

Both a Jira and a GitHub exist for Project Foundation.^[11]https://scuttle.atlassian.net/jira/software/c/projects/WJ/issues?jql=project%20%3D%20%22WJ%22%20ORDER%20BY%20created%20DESC^[12]https://github.com/scpwiki/wikijump

The 2022 Wikidot Blackout

On May 19, 2022, Wikidot experienced a significant security breach that brought the entire platform offline for several days. The cyberattack, reportedly originating from Russia, rendered the SCP Wiki and its content completely inaccessible until May 25, 2022.

Aftermath and Russian Ban

Following the cyberattack, Wikidot implemented a geo-block preventing access from Russia and Belarus. This security measure had profound consequences for the Russian branch of the SCP Wiki, effectively forcing users in those regions to either utilize VPNs or find an alternative platform.^[13]https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/news-10-2022

The Russian Branch’s Response

RuFoundation Development

Prior to the 2022 blackout, the Russian SCP Wiki branch had already begun exploring platform independence due to technical difficulties and constraints in receiving community feedback. The Wikidot ban accelerated these efforts, prompting:

• A “massive development push” to create an independent platform
• A community fundraiser to support the technical team
• The creation of a new open-source engine designed to be compatible with Wikidot syntax^[14]https://boosty.to/scpfanpage

Current Status

The Russian branch successfully launched their independent platform, RuFoundation (accessible at scpfoundation.net), powered by an open-source engine developed by their technical team.^[15]https://archive.ph/7MQ8B#selection-2285.0-2291.8 The platform:

• Maintains compatibility with Wikidot’s syntax
• Supports edit and rating modules
• Is built using Rust, Python, TypeScript, JavaScript, CSS, and HTML
• Is hosted on a public GitHub repository (SCPru/RuFoundation)
• Continues to undergo development for forum integration and content migration

Comparative Analysis

Members of -EN’s technical team have been in discussions with the -RU team about the similarities and differences between the two approaches.^[16]https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/news-10-2022

Significance

The divergent paths of Project Foundation and RuFoundation demonstrate different approaches to achieving platform independence for online communities. The Russian branch’s successful migration offers potential lessons for the broader SCP Wiki community and similar collaborative online projects:

1. The effectiveness of community-driven development under urgent circumstances
2. The viability of building new, compatible platforms rather than forking existing ones
3. The importance of open-source approaches to facilitate shared solutions

Both initiatives reflect a commitment to preserving the SCP Wiki’s creative universe and ensuring its accessibility independent of any single platform provider.

Trivia

“Project Foundation” was reportedly coined by user Aelanna/Raven Mackenzie.^[17]https://www.conficmagazine.com/post/project-foundation-forever^[18]https://05command.wikidot.com/forum/t-536036/project-foundation-faq

A demo site for Project Foundation was created, and is still visible via the Wayback Machine.^[19]web.archive.org/web/20130103221004/http://foundation.eorbit.net/

The SCP Wiki’s Technical Team had the job of executing solutions to the technical challenges and preparing the Wiki for Project Foundation. This team was the creation of the first staff team, and would serve as a template for the bureaucratization of staff.^[20]https://www.conficmagazine.com/post/project-foundation-forever

Terms of Service were created for Project Foundation.^[21]https://05command.wikidot.com/forum/t-571599/terms-of-service-for-pf

Aelanna, who was the primary motivator in Project Foundation in its early development, quit the project in 2013 for reasons unrelated to the development.^[22]https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/forum/t-1033470/scp-site-redesign-ii:the-argumentening#post-2122860

SCP Wiki member DrMagnus attempted to revive Project Foundation in 2018.^[23]https://05command.wikidot.com/forum/t-5494797/project-foundation:project-plan^[24]https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/forum/t-5648699

*This article was partially written by AI.