Fandom (website)

Fandom
	File:Fandom logo.svg Logo since 2021
Company type	Private
Industry	Wiki hosting service, Entertainment media
Founded	October 18, 2004; 22 years ago
Founder	Jimmy Wales, Angela Beesley
Headquarters	United States
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Jon Miller (co-chairman), Jimmy Wales (co-chairman), Perkins Miller (CEO)
Products	Wiki hosting, Entertainment news, Advertising platform
Owner	TPG Inc., Jon Miller (Integrated Media Co.)
Website	fandom.com

Fandom (known as FANDOM between 2017 and 2021, and previously called Wikicities and Wikia) is a wiki hosting service dedicated to entertainment-related subjects including video games, television shows, films, and celebrities. Established in October 2004 by Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales alongside Angela Beesley, this privately owned enterprise is incorporated under Delaware jurisdiction. In 2018, ownership transferred to TPG Inc. and Jon Miller through Integrated Media Co.

Built on the open-source MediaWiki platform, Fandom monetizes its services via advertising and content sales while most contributions from users are published under copyleft licenses. Additionally, the company operates an editorial division that produces news focused on pop culture and gaming. Its website, fandom.com, ranks within the top 50 most visited sites worldwide as of October 2023, with notable user bases in the United States (25.79%) and Russia (7.76%).

The Fandom brand encompasses multiple entertainment news and information outlets such as TV Guide, GameFAQs, GameSpot, and Metacritic, thereby strengthening its presence in the digital pop culture and gaming media sectors.

2004–2009: Formation and expansion

On October 18, 2004, Wikicities was introduced by Jimmy Wales—co-founder of Wikipedia—and Angela Beesley Starling, both prominent figures within the Wikimedia Foundation. Wales originally intended the platform to serve as a community hub for individuals sharing geographic proximity.

The company underwent rebranding to Wikia on March 27, 2006. Before this transition, Wikia raised $4 million in venture capital from investors including Bessemer Venture Partners and First Round Capital. Later that year, Amazon contributed $10 million through Series B financing. By September 2006, Wikia had grown to support approximately 1,500 wikis across 48 languages.

Wikia broadened its portfolio by acquiring several independent fan wikis such as LyricWiki, Nukapedia, Uncyclopedia, and WoWWiki. Early characterizations described Wikia as a resource complementing Wikipedia by focusing on informal entertainment content enriched with multimedia elements like maps and embedded YouTube videos.

This initial period of growth laid the groundwork for Wikia’s business approach centered on community-generated content spanning various interests, establishing a foundation for its worldwide reach and industry impact.

2010–2015: Leadership changes

By 2010, the platform hosted wikis in 188 different languages. In October 2011, Craig Palmer—formerly CEO of Gracenote—was appointed CEO, succeeding Penchina. Co-founder Beesley Starling departed in February 2012 to launch ChalkDrop.com. In November of that year, Wikia secured $10.8 million in Series C funding from Institutional Venture Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners, and Amazon.com. An additional $15 million was raised during Series D funding in August 2014 from Digital Garage, Amazon, Bessemer, and Institutional Venture Partners, bringing total investments to $39.8 million.

On March 4, 2015, Walker Jacobs—previously executive VP at Turner Broadcasting System—joined Wikia as chief operating officer. Later that year in December, the company launched the Fan Contributor Program aimed at boosting user participation and content development.

2016–2018: Transition to the Fandom Identity

On January 25, 2016, Wikia introduced an entertainment news platform under the name Fandom. Later that year, on October 4, the company rebranded itself as "Fandom powered by Wikia" to better align with the Fandom site. Despite this change, the parent company remained Wikia, Inc. until 2019, during which time the homepage URL shifted from wikia.com/fandom to fandom.com. In December, Dorth Raphaely, previously general manager at Bleacher Report, was appointed as chief content officer.

On May 18, 2017, Fandom updated its visual identity by adopting a logo in all capital letters paired with a flat design style.

2018–Present: Expansion and Corporate Developments

In February 2018, Jon Miller, former CEO of AOL and supported by private equity firm TPG Capital, acquired Fandom. Miller took on the role of co-chairman alongside founder Jimmy Wales, while Andrew Doyle of TPG served as interim CEO. That July, Fandom expanded its portfolio by acquiring Screen Junkies from Defy Media. Later in December, it further grew by purchasing Curse Media, which included Gamepedia and platforms such as D&D Beyond and StrawPoll.me.

Perkins Miller, who formerly led StubHub as CEO, assumed leadership of Fandom in February 2019. That same year marked the complete switch of Wikia’s domain to fandom.com. Additionally, Fandom began modernizing its core infrastructure by upgrading to a newer version of MediaWiki and introduced the Unified Community Platform (UCP) in March 2020 for launching new wikis.

In 2020, ownership of Curse Network properties was transferred to Magic Find. Starting in November of that year, Gamepedia wikis were migrated onto fandom.com as part of a strategic SEO initiative.

February 2021 saw Fandom acquire Focus Multimedia, the proprietor of Fanatical—a digital marketplace specializing in video games and related products. Later that year, Fandom revised its community guidelines to ban deadnaming of transgender individuals and implemented LGBTQ+ supportive policies across its network.

June 2021 marked the introduction of FandomDesktop, a redesigned desktop interface replacing older skins. By August, a refreshed logo and new slogan—"For the love of fans"—were unveiled. By the end of 2021, all remaining wikis previously hosted on wikia.org had transitioned to fandom.com.

In April 2022, Hasbro completed the acquisition of D&D Beyond from Fandom. StrawPoll.me was discontinued in August. On October 3, 2022, Fandom broadened its holdings by acquiring several entertainment and gaming brands from Red Ventures including GameSpot, Metacritic, TV Guide, GameFAQs, Giant Bomb, Cord Cutters News, and Comic Vine.

Early 2023 saw workforce reductions impacting teams behind GameSpot, Metacritic, and Giant Bomb; additional cuts occurred in January 2024 focusing on GameSpot’s editorial staff. In October 2024, roughly 11% of Fandom’s employees were laid off due to unmet revenue goals—affecting sales personnel, management teams, and content creators such as those at GameSpot UK and Honest Trailers.

By February 2025, Fandom launched “FanDNA Helix,” an AI-powered advertising platform that utilizes site content combined with user social media data for precision-targeted advertisements. In May 2025, Giant Bomb was sold back to its original staff members. By July 2025, plans were announced to employ Generative AI technology to translate entire wikis to enhance global accessibility.

Wikis

Fandom communities specialize in producing comprehensive articles that cover specific subjects more thoroughly than Wikipedia. These contributions typically include detailed information about video games such as gameplay guides and story summaries alongside other specialized topics not usually found on Wikipedia. Unlike Wikipedia’s strict neutral point-of-view policy, Fandom wikis may present multiple viewpoints tailored to engage their particular audiences.

The platform’s image usage guidelines are more permissive compared to Wikimedia projects, allowing for more extensive visual content. All textual contributions by users are released under free licenses—primarily the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license—although some communities opt for noncommercial or GNU Free Documentation licenses. To maintain a safe environment worldwide, Fandom enforces prohibitions against hate speech, libelous content, pornography, and copyright violations.

Control over individual wikis does not rest with their founders; instead decisions are made collectively through community consensus and collaboration. Nevertheless, Fandom retains overarching authority to implement platform-wide policies regardless of community agreement—reflecting its centralized corporate governance and strategic oversight across its broad network of subsidiaries.

Technology

By May 2023, Fandom was running on a significantly customized iteration of MediaWiki 1.39, integrating proprietary extensions to bolster social functionalities such as blogs, chat systems, badges, forums, and multimedia content. Nevertheless, certain advanced user settings and skin options were eliminated to adhere to regulations like GDPR; for instance, the Monobook skin option was removed in May 2018.

In August 2016, Fandom adopted a service-oriented architecture, simplifying its platform by eliminating numerous bespoke extensions and wiki-specific features while introducing alternative tools designed to facilitate community management. This technological evolution supports the company’s strategic goals of enhancing scalability and optimizing user experience across its worldwide operations.

Entertainment news

Wikia introduced Fandom in 2016 as an entertainment media platform that combines contributions from volunteer "Fandom Contributors" with an editorial staff. The platform focuses on pop culture and fandom subjects such as video games, films, and television series, providing fan perspectives, interviews, reviews, tutorials, videos, and sponsored news content to promote entertainment properties.

That same year marked the rebranding of Wikia’s entire platform under the Fandom identity. In early 2019, all wikis transitioned from the wikia.com domain to fandom.com as part of a strategic initiative to broaden Fandom’s reach on iOS and Android mobile applications.

Wiki partnerships

Fandom has formed official collaborations to develop verified wikis regarded as authoritative sources for specific franchises. In 2012, it partnered with Sony Online Entertainment to launch the inaugural "Wikia Official Community" for PlanetSide 2, offering exclusive content and dedicated support. In 2014, Fandom joined forces with Roddenberry Enterprises for the Trek Initiative, a wiki community commemorating Star Trek’s 50th anniversary through video interviews and promotional activities.

Other partnerships include alliances with 2K Games for Civilization: Beyond Earth and Warner Bros. Interactive for Shadow of Mordor. Additionally, Fandom cooperates with Lionsgate Media to promote Starz and related film franchises via wiki content, articles, and advertising campaigns.

Esports

In 2021, the United States Navy contracted Fandom to organize and promote esports tournaments and Twitch streaming events, thereby expanding Fandom’s footprint within digital entertainment marketing.

Fandom Games (YouTube channel)

After acquiring Curse Media, Fandom rebranded the former Curse Entertainment YouTube channel as Fandom Games. This channel hosts Honest Game Trailers, which were originally featured on the Smosh Games channel until Fandom’s acquisition of Screen Junkies, further diversifying its digital content offerings.

OpenServing

OpenServing was a brief web publishing project launched by Fandom on December 12, 2006, designed to provide free wiki hosting alongside revenue-sharing opportunities for wiki creators through advertising. Although it attracted several thousand sign-ups initially, the initiative was quietly terminated in January 2008 without any live sites being launched. OpenServing operated on a modified version of MediaWiki software but was unable to establish a viable business model or secure a market foothold.

Armchair GM

ArmchairGM was a sports-focused forum and wiki platform created by Aaron Wright, Dan Lewis, Robert Lefkowitz, and programmer David Pean. It debuted in early 2006, initially concentrating on the American sports audience before broadening its scope to cover UK sports as well. Built on MediaWiki technology, the site incorporated a Digg-inspired voting mechanism for articles, user comment sections resembling blogs with interactive feedback, and diverse content formats including news, opinions, and discussion threads.

Fandom acquired ArmchairGM in late 2006 for $2 million. Following this acquisition, the underlying architecture of ArmchairGM was adapted for use across other Fandom properties. Nevertheless, by January 2010, Fandom ceased support for its proprietary software. Between September 2010 and February 2011, ArmchairGM’s materials were merged into Fandom’s main encyclopedia platform, marking the conclusion of the original website.

Beginning in February 2008, the innovative software components of ArmchairGM—referred to as "social tools"—were progressively released as open source, starting with the SocialProfile extension for MediaWiki. By August 2011, the complete ArmchairGM codebase (known internally as wikia-ny) was made publicly available under the GNU General Public License version 2 or later. Since then, these social features have been supported and enhanced by volunteer contributors within the MediaWiki community. The code repository is maintained on Wikimedia Foundation servers and mirrored on GitHub.

Search engines

In 2004, Wikia, Inc. proposed a copyleft search engine named "Wikiasari," a term combining Hawaiian and Japanese words meaning "quick search." This initiative became inactive by 2005. On January 7, 2008, Wikia Search entered public alpha from the USSHC underground data center but was met with largely negative reviews from technology media outlets. The project was officially discontinued in March 2009. Later that year, a new search engine was created to crawl and present search results exclusively from all sites hosted on Fandom.

Questions and answers site

In January 2009, the company introduced a question and answer website called "Wikianswers," which was separate from an earlier service named WikiAnswers. In March 2010, Fandom rebranded this platform as "Answers from Wikia," allowing users to establish specialized knowledge market wikis focused on specific topics via Fandom’s Wikianswers subdomain.

Relationship with Wikipedia

During the 2000s, Fandom (formerly known as Wikia) attracted criticism for capitalizing on a presumed connection to Wikipedia. Media outlets frequently referred to Fandom as "the commercial counterpart to the non-profit Wikipedia," a description contested by both Wikimedia and Fandom representatives.

In 2006, the Wikimedia Foundation shared expenses related to hosting and bandwidth with Wikia and benefited from donated office space provided by the company. By the end of fiscal year 2007, Wikia had an outstanding balance of $6,000 owed to Wikimedia. Additionally, two members of Wikimedia’s board concurrently held positions at Wikia during this timeframe. In January 2009, Wikia leased conference room space to Wikimedia for use by the Wikipedia Usability Initiative. According to Wikimedia deputy director Erik Möller, rental fees were aligned with market rates to maintain impartiality without granting preferential treatment to Wikia.

Advertising controversies

Fandom communities have expressed dissatisfaction with intrusive and resource-intensive advertisements, often compelling users to utilize ad-blocking tools to preserve site functionality. The sheer quantity and format of ads, particularly autoplay videos on mobile devices, detract from overall site performance and degrade the user experience.

Criticism from outlets such as The Guardian and various academic commentators has labeled Fandom’s monetization strategy as exploitative, pointing out that content creators receive no direct compensation despite contributing valuable material. Additionally, the platform's business model has been characterized as monopolistic, restricting competition within fan-driven informational ecosystems.

In August 2024, Adalytics revealed that prominent brand advertisements were displayed alongside offensive and racially insensitive content on smaller Fandom wikis. Although the ad placement system is AI-powered and supported by DoubleVerify and Integral Ad Science, it faced backlash for inadequately preventing ads from appearing next to harmful content, raising significant brand safety issues.

Editorial interference

Fandom has modified user-submitted content by inserting obstructive features such as popups for ad personalization, promoting unrelated articles, and embedding quizzes unrelated to the original material to increase engagement—often without consulting the community. The platform has also removed content arbitrarily without informing contributors.

In 2017, Fandom implemented autoplay videos on wikis for gaming franchises like Runescape and Fallout without seeking input from editors. This decision was met with criticism for diminishing the quality standards of the sites.

Beginning in 2021, Fandom initiated censorship of adult-themed content by deleting entire wikis focused on such material without prior notification, provoking disapproval from users and editors alike.

In 2022, Fandom consolidated several wikis centered on sexuality and gender topics, deleting pages without consulting users. This action sparked controversy due to offensive content targeting intersex identities and a shift toward a more “corporate-friendly” editorial stance. Those who challenged these changes were reportedly blocked on both social media and Fandom’s own platforms.

In 2023, Fandom introduced AI-generated “Quick Answers” across various wikis; however, these responses contained grammatical mistakes and factual errors. After public criticism, the feature was discontinued.

In May 2025, Fandom enforced “brand safety” policies at GiantBomb, resulting in tensions with the site’s staff. This conflict led to GiantBomb becoming independently owned by its original creators after Fandom halted new content publication during a so-called "strategic reset and realignment."

Privacy concerns

Fandom has been subject to lawsuits in California over data collection practices deemed to violate the Video Privacy Protection Act. The company reportedly shared user data—including IP addresses and viewing behaviors—with third parties such as Meta without obtaining prior consent.

McDonald's Grimace Shake promotion

In June 2023, McDonald's compensated Fandom to temporarily replace the main page of the McDonald's Wiki and its comprehensive article about Grimace with an advertisement promoting the Grimace Shake and celebrating the character’s 52nd anniversary. Nathan Steinmetz, the primary contributor to the article, criticized this decision for undermining his research efforts and establishing a troubling precedent that allows intellectual property holders to override user-generated content with promotional campaigns.

Wiki migrations

Numerous wikis have chosen to leave Fandom, citing issues such as excessive advertising, a user interface that lacks intuitiveness, limited options for customization, and irrelevant promotional content. One of the earliest examples was the Transformers Wiki, which departed in 2008 due to disagreements over advertising practices. More recently, communities including the Zelda and Minecraft wikis have expressed concerns about Fandom’s corporate consolidation, alleged censorship, declining functionality, and controversies like the Grimace incident.

After Fandom acquired Gamepedia in 2018, the rate of wiki departures increased significantly. Industry observers have pointed out that wikis leaving Fandom often struggle to match Fandom’s advantages in search engine optimization (SEO) and audience reach. In 2023, CEO Perkins Miller acknowledged these losses as a major challenge and highlighted ongoing initiatives aimed at enhancing platform reliability and strengthening community engagement.

Notable migrations include the RuneScape wiki in 2018; the Zelda and Terraria wikis in 2022; followed by the Minecraft, Fallout, and Hollow Knight wikis in 2023; and the South Park, Dead by Daylight, and League of Legends wikis in 2024. In 2025, additional departures included wikis for Warframe, Vampire Survivors, Undertale/Deltarune, Nichijou, and Balatro. Several of these transitions received backing from original content creators, reflecting strategic changes in community management and platform alliances.

Forking

Moving a wiki from Fandom to standard paid hosting services presents challenges primarily because Fandom usually retains control over the original domain names. When a community relocates, Fandom often continues to host the abandoned or "forked" wiki under its initial domain and content, leveraging it for advertising revenue as long as it still attracts traffic and edits. This practice can negatively impact the new wiki’s search visibility and may cause outdated or inaccurate information to appear more prominently. Fandom allows only a brief notice linking to discussions about forking before removing it entirely and rescinding editing privileges from administrators involved with the new wiki.

Fandom, Inc.

Fandom, Inc., based at the Hallidie Building located at 130 Sutter Street in San Francisco, California, was originally incorporated in Florida in December 2004 and later re-incorporated in Delaware as Wikia, Inc. in January 2006. The company employs technical personnel within the United States and maintains an engineering office in Poznań, Poland.

The company’s revenue model is primarily driven by advertising income. Initially dependent on Google AdSense, it transitioned through Federated Media Publishing before developing its proprietary ad management platform. Despite this shift, Fandom still utilizes AdSense, Amazon Ads, and other external advertising services alongside its internal solutions. Additional revenue is generated through partnerships and sponsorships for sweepstakes hosted on affiliated wikis.

Fandom operates multiple offices globally: international operations are headquartered in Germany; Asian sales and operations are managed from Tokyo; while sales teams are situated in Chicago, Latin America, Los Angeles (focusing on marketing programming and content), New York City, and London.

External links