- Dec 16: Consumer Tools Team
- Dec 17: Traffic Team
- Dec 18: N&Rs Team
- Dec 19: UGC Team
- Dec 20: UXFCP Team
Hello everyone!
As we approach the final days of 2024, it's the perfect time to reflect on an incredible year filled with some new features, interesting experiments and important learnings that have impacted the Fandom experience. Stay tuned because starting today until this Friday, the Product Support team is going to release a blog series highlighting all the work done by the Product Teams, including: Consumer Tools, User Generated Content, News & Ratings, Traffic, and User Experience.
As you may know from my previous blogs, I collaborate with the Consumer Tools Team (formerly known as Engagement). This team focuses on improving features like Interactive Maps, Discussions, and Message Walls.
Earlier this year, we shared our progress in a series of blogs published in August, outlining key developments and setting expectations for the rest of the year. Whether or not you had the chance to read those updates, we encourage you to revisit them to get a full picture of the details and progress we discussed.
Before diving into the specifics, let's take a moment to appreciate the team's efforts in engaging new visitors and readers. Their primary goal this year has been to encourage them to be users and join our platform, fostering engagement and inspiring them to become active members of the Fandom community. Ideally, these efforts lead users on a journey—from casual visitors to editors, admins, and eventually top contributors who inspire others, much like our Fandom Stars.
The highlight of their work this year has been a complete overhaul of the Interactive Maps, giving them a fresh new look and functionality. Alongside this, the team has also delivered updates and improvements to other areas, including Discussions, Talk Pages, Message Walls, Comments, User Profiles, and Permissions.
The Overhaul of Interactive Maps[]
You can use the progress tracking feature, for instance, to mark the bosses you defeat when you're playing a video game.
This year, our top priority has been enhancing Interactive Maps, transforming them into a premium feature for our platform. One of the most exciting additions was the progress tracking tool, designed especially for video game players. This tool allows users to log their real-world progress in a game by marking it on a wiki map using markers—a feature that bridges gaming and community engagement in a unique way.
To ensure we delivered the most useful version of this tool, we dedicated five months to rigorous testing, running three distinct experiments to refine its functionality. In August, we successfully launched the tool across all wikis. Thanks to the invaluable feedback from our community during this period, we introduced additional improvements based on your suggestions, making the tool even better.
With the new embedding options, you can optimize the full width of the content area, for instance placing a map next to a list.
Alongside improving the Maps feature, we also focused on enhancing its usability and integration within the platform. Initially, maps were created in their own namespace and could be transcluded on article pages at full width. However, the community expressed the need for more versatile options to blend maps seamlessly with other content elements, such as text, images, videos, or additional maps.
To address this, we developed new embedding options for maps on article pages. During a testing phase—where several beloved communities volunteered to help—we refined the feature based on your feedback. By August, we were ready for full implementation. We continued to enhance the feature post-launch, adding functionalities such as tooltips to enrich the user experience.
You can take a look to this map and how you can interact with it, for instance using the zoom, without performance issues even with loading thousands of markers.
Other key updates included the introduction of a fullscreen button, a direct link to the map page from the embedded view, syntax highlighting, and the ability to display multiple categories when embedding maps.
But that's not all! Over the past few months, we've also focused on improving the performance of maps, especially those with a large number of markers—a long-standing request from several communities. By transitioning the marker engine to Canvas, we resolved significant performance issues, making interactions with large maps smoother and more efficient. After thorough testing, this new engine was successfully rolled out a few weeks ago, enabling all wikis to enjoy better-performing maps than ever before!
Our Work in Other Areas[]
As mentioned earlier, the Consumer Tools Team is also responsible for several user-related areas, and this year they introduced a range of impactful updates.
This is the new UI we're using for the Register page for desktop devices.
One of the most significant changes was the introduction of restrictions on wikis aimed at children. To provide additional protection for these sensitive communities, users are now required to auto-confirm their email before editing or publishing content—whether it's on articles, comments, walls, talk pages, or Discussions. This step helps ensure a safer environment for all.
We also made notable improvements to Message Walls, including the ability to display custom JavaScript events. Additionally, we addressed various issues not just on Walls, but also across other areas like Notifications, Discussions, user profiles and permissions, enhancing functionality and user experience.
As a final touch, we worked on refreshing the registration form pages. A few months ago, we tested several new designs to determine which UI would be the most engaging and user-friendly for account creation. After thoroughly analyzing the results, we're excited to roll out these updates in the coming days, providing an improved experience for our new users.
Looking Ahead to 2025[]
This year has been pivotal for the team formerly known as Engagement, marking a journey of exploration to better understand our users and how we can support them both now and in the future. Based on your requests and feedback, we chose to focus on Interactive Maps, and a year later, it's clear how valuable they are to all of you! Beyond mapping fictional zones and their elements, you've found creative uses for Maps, such as illustrating timelines, biographies, and even family trees.
When we first experimented with the progress tracking feature, we were thrilled by the overwhelming response from users and visitors. While we believed it would be helpful, the results exceeded our expectations—users who interacted with the feature registered at a rate 600% higher than those who didn't!
We're deeply grateful to our community for your collaboration, especially during feature testing and sharing feedback. Although we strive to develop updates with users' best interests in mind, your input has been invaluable in shaping our decisions and roadmap. This ongoing cycle of feedback and refinement has proven to be incredibly effective.
These insights have motivated us to dedicate even more resources to Maps in 2025. Our plans include adding highly requested features like a search function and advanced category systems for map markers. Looking beyond this year's progress, and in line with our updated team name, we aim to expand our focus to include utility tools for the broader community. This starts with exploring a progress tracking feature for tables and other data elements, as well as developing new options to enhance guide content.
The plans for next year are exciting, and we can't wait to bring them to life! For now, I want to extend my heartfelt thanks to everyone on the Consumer Tools Team for their hard work and dedication this year. A big thank-you also goes out to all of you—our beloved community of users—for being such an integral part of this journey. Your support and feedback are invaluable.
How do you feel about the progress we've made this year? We'd love to hear your feedback! Use the Comments section to share which features or improvements you've enjoyed the most, and let the Consumer Tools Team know your thoughts on their performance. Don't forget to stay tuned this week for more posts highlighting the other Product Teams working to enhance the platform!
Take these final days of the year to recharge and enjoy the holiday season. Happy holidays!
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