When I started this over 10 years abo, I was excited about the promise of wikis, and I felt there was still a lot of value in a human edited directory. At the time, we enjoyed moderate success, and for a very brief period (while Google's algorithms favored us) it looked like it could really be a thing. I had email conversatins with Jimmy Wales and Jason Calacanis about philosophy and direction - it was a lot of fun.
Very early on, Jimmy Wales did not like the domain name - said it would attract porno sites. We actually did pretty okay with that, as we had a few volunteer editors, and it was important enough to me to spend some time checking every day or two. The bigger problem was automated postings, or maybe they weren't automated, but simply posted by low-paid SEO flunkies. But for years, I still hoped to do something with it.
We even had "competition" - Aboutus.org had basically the same idea, but grew bigger faster by scraping websites, and did a much better job of marketing itself. If memory serves, Jason Calacanis had Mahalo.com for awhile - I never really saw any novelty there.
Wikia briefly adopted my sponsorship model of advertising, and even hired me to write their first implementation. I still think that direct, automated, advertising sales is a viable alternative to Adwords, etc.
After all that though, I haven't been able to build anything out of it. The Wiki Directory of the Web is still receiving new listings, though much less than it used to. And yes, some of them are adult in nature. That brings me to this decision: With the passage of FOSTA, I've decided the directory is more of a liability than it's worth. I have no delusions - I don't think anyone will really miss it, but I enjoyed having it sit here, collecting the occasional new listing, so I'll be sad. But FOSTA is the final nail in Wikidweb's coffin.
To everyone who contributed, thanks. If you were a sponsor, thank you. If you shared this vision with me and editted articles, thank you even more.
Best Regards,
Aerik
May 2, 2018