User blog comment:Sannse/Your First Look at the New Wikia/@comment-118736-20100817175924

It is immediately obvious that there is less room on the page for content in this new layout.

I'm pretty sure Wikia's hands are tied: they aren't making enough money with the ad system they have right now, and have contractually agreed with their clients to periodically increase advertisement space. Or something like that. But you can't talk business to a community of wiki editors, you have to sell it like it's an important improvement for the content. It's just that, in this picture here, it's not an improvement.