Fandom (website)

Fandom, Inc.
Logo used since 2021
Type of businessPrivate
Type of site
Wiki hosting service
Available inMultilingual
FoundedOctober 18, 2004; 20 years ago (2004-10-18)
Headquarters
San Francisco, California
,
U.S.
OwnerTPG Inc. (2018–present)[1]
Founder(s)
Key people
  • Perkins Miller (CEO)
  • Jimmy Wales (president)
  • Brandon Rhea (VP of Community)
Products
  • Wiki hosting
    • Wiki topic discussion forums
  • Data research[2]
  • Private focus group and early marketing[3]
  • API[4]
  • Digital pop culture news magazine[5]
Employees300+ (2016)
Subsidiaries
URL
AdvertisingDirect and advertising networks
RegistrationOptional
Users350 million[6] (as of December 11, 2022)
Launched
  • October 18, 2004; 20 years ago (2004-10-18) (wiki hosting service; as Wikicities)
  • January 25, 2016; 8 years ago (2016-01-25) (Fandom News and Stories)
Current statusActive
Content license
Written inPHP, JavaScript (Node.js)
Hallidie Building in San Francisco, current Fandom headquarters

Fandom[a] (formerly known as Wikicities and Wikia[b]) is a wiki hosting service that hosts wikis mainly on entertainment topics (i.e., video games, TV series, movies, entertainers, etc.).[9] The privately held, for-profit Delaware company was founded in October 2004 by Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales and Angela Beesley.[1][10] Fandom was acquired in 2018 by TPG Inc. and Jon Miller through Integrated Media Co.[11]

Fandom uses MediaWiki, the same open-source wiki software used by Wikipedia. Unlike the Wikimedia Foundation, the nonprofit organization that hosts Wikipedia, Fandom, Inc. operates as a for-profit company and derives its income from advertising and sold content, publishing most user-provided text under copyleft licenses.[12] The company also runs the associated Fandom editorial project, offering pop-culture and gaming news.[13] Fandom wikis are hosted under the domain fandom.com, which has become one of the top 50 most visited websites in the world, rapidly rising in popularity beginning in the early 2020s. It ranks as the 50th as of October 2023, with 25.79% of its traffic coming from the United States, followed by Russia with 7.76%, according to Similarweb.[14]

  1. ^ a b Kafka, Peter (March 12, 2018). "Digital media veteran Jon Miller, backed with money from TPG, is going shopping for websites". Vox. Vox Media, Inc. Archived from the original on April 26, 2022. Retrieved March 5, 2021.
  2. ^ "Media kit". Wikia. Archived from the original on April 27, 2019. Retrieved April 27, 2019.
  3. ^ "Wikia Fan Studio FAQ". Archived from the original on October 20, 2016. Retrieved September 21, 2016.
  4. ^ "Wikia API Wiki". api.wikia.com. Archived from the original on May 14, 2016. Retrieved November 26, 2018.
  5. ^ "Fandom powered by Wikia". Archived from the original on February 8, 2014. Retrieved November 26, 2018.
  6. ^ "What Is Fandom". Fandom. Archived from the original on December 11, 2023. Retrieved December 11, 2023.
  7. ^ "Licensing". Fandom. Wikia, Inc. Archived from the original on April 27, 2019. Retrieved April 27, 2019.
  8. ^ Palmer, Craig L. (September 26, 2016). "Wikia is now Fandom powered by Wikia". Community Central. Wikia, Inc. Archived from the original on April 27, 2019. Retrieved April 27, 2019.
  9. ^ Chmielewski, Dawn (January 25, 2016). "Wikia Launches Fandom, a New Place to Get Your Nerd On". Vox. Archived from the original on March 12, 2022. Retrieved March 12, 2022.
  10. ^ Pink, Daniel H. (March 13, 2005). "The Book Stops Here". Wired. Vol. 13, no. 3. Archived from the original on March 4, 2005. Retrieved August 1, 2007.
  11. ^ "About Fandom". Fandom powered by Wikia. Wikia, Inc. Archived from the original on April 27, 2019. Retrieved April 27, 2019.
  12. ^ John K Waters & Lester, John (2010). The Everything Guide to Social Media: All you need to know about participating in today's most popular online communities. Adams Media. p. 171. ISBN 9781440509469. Retrieved September 17, 2014. Wikia is free.
  13. ^ "Fandom". Fandom powered by Wikia. Wikia, Inc. Archived from the original on April 27, 2019. Retrieved April 27, 2019.
  14. ^ "fandom.com Market Share, Revenue and Traffic Analytics". Similarweb. Archived from the original on May 11, 2019. Retrieved May 10, 2023.


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