# Website Ideas: Fishy Wiki and Biotope Wiki



## hughitt1 (Jun 19, 2006)

Hey,

Anyone happen to have access to free web-hosting, or some extra space they could afford to share? There are a couple of website ideas that I've been thinking about for a while now, but unfortunately I have no where really to host them. The websites I was thinking of a both community-driven wikis:

*1. Fishy Wiki*

This would just be like Wikipedia, but for aquaria-related articles. It could include fish, plant, equipment, disease, etc articles. Anyone could contribute their knowledge or pictures. The site could even include a section for "guides" or "tutorials." Some level of moderation could always be added if vandalism or inaccurate information becomes a problem. 

*2. Biotope Wiki*
The goal behind this website would be to create articles describing some specific biotope. It could be an exotic place such as the Amazon Basin, or it could simply be the stream in your backyard. People could include information about the water parameters, flora and fauna, temperature variation through the year, pictures, video,etc.

I would be happy to help create either of these sites: I just don't have anywhere to host them, and no money to pay for a dedicated host.

Feel free too to leave any suggestions. I think these projects could be really successful, but both would depend on people to contribute some of their knowledge, experience, and perhaps photography skills.


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## BiscuitSlayer (Apr 1, 2005)

You might want to check with your ISP. Sometimes they offer hosting along with your Internet connection service. 

If you are willing to pay a small monthly fee, there are some sites selling hosting for $5 + a month. One site on this link has 1.2 GB of space and 1.2GB of transfer for $5 a month.

http://www.webhostingbluebook.com/

If you are going to host 2 sites, you could use hostheaders or a scripting redirect to change the URL and send you to another folder on the server.


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## mistergreen (Dec 9, 2006)

I'm making a wiki right now actually...
It's really easy to set up and not at the same time, depending what you want to do...
You might also want to ask you web host if they can support a wiki too.. Sometimes the services aren't available for the WIKI...


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## leviathan0 (Oct 6, 2007)

There's a number of fish wikis out there, none I've came across are any good, and some simply contribute to spreading hearsay and misinformation rather than actually doing any good.

If you're giving it a go though, I don't see why you need to go with dedicated hosting. You could get a shared hosting plan for about $25/yr (or even less) that'll fit your space/bw needs.


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## mistergreen (Dec 9, 2006)

leviathan0 said:


> There's a number of fish wikis out there, none I've came across are any good, and some simply contribute to spreading hearsay and misinformation rather than actually doing any good.


that's the downside to any wiki... You'd have to need an administrator that checks on the entry for validity like wikipedia.


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## leviathan0 (Oct 6, 2007)

The problem with that is the admin himself could easily fall to hearsay/misinformation to validate entries.


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## hughitt1 (Jun 19, 2006)

The issue isn't so much finding affordable hosting. I've already considered using shared-hosting to host the wikis, but I was hoping to find someone who already has a server or hosting and could help to host the sites for free.

As for the issue of inaccurate information, this is of course an issue with an wiki. The easiest, and probably the most suitable route would simply be to have multiple admins, request citations when possible, and use a discussion or "talk" page to debate any controversial issues. Another potential option would be to incorporate ratings of either contributers, articles, etc. This way anyone could rate a contributer or fact as being poor or good.

In the worst case if there is no definitive conclusion on some issue, the wiki could at least include all arguments, and the evidence / counter-evidence for each.

What do you all think of the idea in general though? Would it be something you think would be worth-while, or that you would likely contribute to? There is no way it would work unless people actually liked the projects, and were willing to add to them.


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## leviathan0 (Oct 6, 2007)

If you were to use multiple admins, you'll need them to specialize in different areas. So rather than getting ten fish experts, you'll be better off getting a rainbowfish expert, a loach expert, a goby expert, etc, since each of them would obviously know more about their area of expertise than just a "regular fish guy". This is much like how different sections of a forum is run by different moderators.

I think the idea has great potential since the hobby could really use an authoritative database, but it's going to be a lot of work. Probably the biggest obstacles would be finding the right admins (legit experts who are unbiased and are decent writers) and climbing the ranks on Google.


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## retoid (Jan 2, 2007)

May I suggest surpasshosting.com as a host. Cheap and very effecient.


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## mistergreen (Dec 9, 2006)

oh yeah, here's a good aquarium wiki
http://www.theaquariumwiki.com/Main_Page


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## hughitt1 (Jun 19, 2006)

mistergreen said:


> oh yeah, here's a good aquarium wiki
> http://www.theaquariumwiki.com/Main_Page


Great. I didn't know there was already one out there, but now that I know there is, we just need to make people aware of it, and get knowledgeable people to help contribute. Thanks for the link


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## leviathan0 (Oct 6, 2007)

Like I mentioned earlier, there are quite a few out there. And this one isn't any good.


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## PsiPro (Jan 7, 2008)

Hello,

I'm actually the admin of The Aquarium Wiki, I can provide you with free hosting for your projects. You will just need to buy the the domain names you want, but I can provide them through my hosting company (http://www.psihost.com) if you like. E-mail me at [email protected] or PM me here.

-Brian


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