[Wikia-l] MediaWiki:Description

[Brian Grove]

This is awesome -- I wonder how we "productize" it.

Here's a couple thoughts.

Maybe once we learn SEO tips we suggest an optimized set of keywords to 
include. We also link to this MediaWiki:Description in the WebTools report.

We take an active/inactive role in getting this changed:

1) Inactive Wikis with many pages: we go ahead and change the 
description based upon SEO best practices.
2) Active wikis with many pages: suggest changes to this file with SEO 
best practices.
3) New Wikis: make this a first suggestion

All wikis -- add the ability to change this file. Have link within the 
WebTools SEO report. http://hotrod.wikia.com/wiki/Special:Webtools

I'm assuming this is highly SEO valuable. I'm also assuming adding more 
keywords+readable does more good than harm in helping the rank plus 
search users to choose your wiki vs. other results in search.

BG

Danny Horn wrote:
> I should explain the MediaWiki:Description feature -- it's a cool new 
> thing, but it's a lot better if people customize it.
>
> When main pages show up in Google results, they sometimes have odd 
> text showing as the description. Keywords for the topic of the wiki 
> sometimes appear in boxes and templates on the main page, rather than 
> plain text, so what Google shows can be somewhat random.
>
> MediaWiki:Description is a way for wikis to customize what Google uses 
> as the description for the main page. Right now, it's set to a bland 
> default: "{{SITENAME}} is a database that anyone can edit."
>
> Admins can edit that page to expand the description, up to 150 
> characters. It would be great if the description included search terms 
> that you'd expect people to use when they're looking for your site.
>
> Here's a few examples:
>
> * Doctor Who Wiki is a database that anyone can edit, covering Doctor 
> Who episodes, characters and monsters, including the Daleks and Cybermen.
>
> * Muppet Wiki is a database about Jim Henson's work that anyone can 
> edit, including episode and character guides to The Muppet Show and 
> Sesame Street.
>
> * Dofus Wiki is a database that anyone can edit, with articles on 
> quests, guilds, and everything Dofus!
>
> So folks can go ahead and edit that on your wikis, and make it 
> interesting or useful or whatever you'd like.
>
> Unfortunately, I can't help with the question about non-ASCII 
> characters... Maybe someone else can?
>
>
> -- Danny
>
>
> On Sat, May 17, 2008 at 6:28 AM, Jesús Martínez 
> <martineznovo at gmail.com <mailto:martineznovo at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>     I found a new feature: The contents of [[MediaWiki:Description]] will
>     be placed inside the content of the <meta name="description" ... > tag
>     of the main page of a Wiki. That description should be shown on search
>     engines, but only when the main page appears in the results.
>
>     But, it doesn't support non-ASCII characters so non-english wikis
>     would probably have strange characters on it.
>
>     As an example, "é" turns into é�¾, and "ñ" into á�¾
>
>     Encoding such characters as entities -- like &eacute; or &ntilde; --
>     does not work because they are double-encoded: &eacute; turns into
>     &amp;eacute;
>
>     A fix for that would be greatly appreciated!
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