User talk:Wolfbln

Jobs to be done in December:

- completion of Latin America: Brazil (better order), Mexico, Peru  (update),

- updates of some African countries: South Africa, Namibia, new: The Seychelles

- check for updates and check updates

- in Winter: Australia is outdated, lots of Asia countries too, bad structure, few logos, no frequencies... will have to wait for winter, as the bulk of info is still ok. new countries to be added : Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos....

Hope and thanks for your cooperation

Wolfbln (talk) 16:48, November 26, 2014 (UTC)

TR
It is really hard to understand the insistence about advertisement with same standard words on Turkey's page. I appreciate your efforts to warn him but as an employee, it is probably the most that he can do on editing his words. Glad to have this wiki about the world but sad to see that we always abuse something for a countable amount of money without respecting community's sensibility who managed to put this valuable information all together.94.122.109.18 21:08, November 24, 2014 (UTC)E

Thanks. But I believe to treat everybody equally. So I finally checked their website and their advertisment edit and took out the facts and put in in words like alldaywifi. It's a very similar product after all. Hope everybody is now satisfied. Wolfbln (talk) 16:48, November 26, 2014 (UTC)

PrimeTel is the cheapest and most convenient internet provider, it should be the first of the list, not the last.

Kenilchattiero (talk) 15:21, December 25, 2014 (UTC)

@ Kenilchattiero: I give you the reasons, why I put it in 3rd position on your Talk Page. In short: First (physical) operators, then MVNOs. This is no price ranking and you can argue if PrimeTel is really the cheapest.

Wolfbln (talk) 16:46, December 25, 2014 (UTC)

yah, you are right, actually PrimeTel is not so cheap, I mixed up the price for the abonement option with the prepaid...

But in general I think would be better to keep at the top the most convenient operator, (for price, coverage, speed and amount of data) instead of using other criteria, otherwise we just support the monopoly and cartel of mobile data.

62.228.51.157 18:27, December 25, 2014 (UTC)

Yeah. I agree. But what is "convenient"? Why is PrimeTel more convenient then Cyta? That is still unclear. Normally we put the biggest network of the country on top, the "market leader". That is because people want to have the best coverage, speed, availability a.s.o. first. This "market leader" has the most customers but often not the best price. Its competitors are mostly cheaper. MVNOs are sometimes much cheaper.

But there is no single country where the MVNO is mentioned before the network provider on which it is operating. This gives the possibility to characterise the network first and show later its MVNOs.

I think in (South) Cyprus, its undisputed that Cyta/Vodafone is market leader. PrimeTel a MVNO on its network. In some countries like Switzerland with many MVNOs we sort the operators according to network, but always the physical operator first. But in Cyprus PrimeTel is the only (mentioned) MVNO.

Last but not least: Tell me: Why is it "more convenient" than Cyta? As a MVNO it has the same coverage and speeds, let's say at similar rates. Does it have more sales points for the start-up SIM, does it have more recharge points than Cyta? I doubt that. So: What makes PrimeTel more "convenient" than Cyta?

I think for many travellers, the tourist SIM of Cyta may the more "convenient" solution. But again, this list IS NO RANKING and people are confused when there is an introduction in a complicated (as divided) country like Cyprus. There the 2 (physical) operators are named for the Greek part and then we start with an MVNO, it still does not make sense to me.

I have to say, I looked at PrimeTel more closely now and found this article: http://www.mvnodynamics.com/2014/02/10/mvno-mno-primetel-wins-3rd-mobile-licence-cyprus/

So PrimeTel will be a (physical) operator in Cyprus soon as they acquired a license. But only on 4G as far as I understand the article. On 2G and 3G it will keep on using Cyta. According to some other statistics MTN has more customers than Cyta, so it should be mentioned first in the country....

Do you agree that we charactise PrimeTel as MVNO as long it has no own network operating? As soon as it starts, it will be a physical (3rd) operator on 4G roaming on Cyta for 2G/3G. So when it starts on 4G, PrimeTel may be a "monopolist" in Cyprus for 4G....

So put PrimeTel wherever you like in the country, but please not into the Turkish part :-)

Wolfbln (talk) 20:40, December 25, 2014 (UTC)

Design redo
Heya Wolfbin :)

I'm from Wikia's Community Development team, and I specialise in making wikias look a little bit better than when I found them :) I stumbled across your site today, and I thought it was great! See, i like wikias that push the envelope of what wikias can be. Don't get me wrong, as an admin at w:c:tardis, I like "traditional" fan sites. But I also really like wikias about subjects that matter to everyday life.

Back in September, I contacted the site's founder, User:Joskarsson, but he or she appear to be well and truly done with this place.

So, since you're the wikia's most active user, and, I suppose, effective admin, let me put the question to you now.

I was wondering if you would mind me giving your front page and general colour scheme a makeover? If you're okay with this, please let me know! Also, if you haveany ideas about the colour scheme you'd like to use, I'd love to hear them! Finally, I was wondering if we could maybe do something about the name of this wiki. It's very long and unwieldy. What do you think about just simcards.wikia.com or maybe prepaidsimcards.wikia.com. I think a simpler name would do wonders for your SEO by making it easier to find you. — CzechOut 05:45, January 8, 2015 (UTC)
 * Hey again, Wolfbin :) So I've got some of the design elements in place, and I wanted to get your opinion on them. Please go to w:c:czechit and tell me what you think of the wordmark (logo in the upper left corner), colors and background. Everything's really based off the color of a SIM card itself, so hopefully you'll find that appropriate.


 * To make things simple, I created a logo that will allow us to name the wikia whatever we want later, but still work as a logo. At the end of the day, there are only two things of relevance to the identity of the wikia: a SIM chip itself and the acronym SIM. Everything else is just fat, in my opinion. What do you think?


 * The front page itself needs to have its content refactored. I've got some ideas which I've been playing around with. I'll try to get those in place tomorrow or over the weekend. Please let me know if you have any thoughts about that! — CzechOut 09:07, January 8, 2015 (UTC)


 * Hi CzechOut.
 * Good work. Please read my comments on your Talk Page. Can you give me an address where i can get in touch with your directly?
 * Wolfbln (talk) 11:37, January 8, 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your response! There's a lot of detail to read through there and I think I've got an idea of what points you want to stress on the main page. I'll be taking a crack at that today, and will hopefully have something to show you soon. What I'm not seeing in your front page proposals, however, is any sort of inclusion for the dominant material that's currently on the main page. Namely, you've made no reference at all to having easy access to per-country information on the front page. Is this not something you feel would be valuable for your wikia?


 * Additionally, I just wanna be clear about what you mean by "Good work". Are you basically happy with the wordmark, background and general color scheme that I've got over at w:c:czechit? If so, I can move that over to this wiki now and we can then focus our energies on refactoring the actual content of the main page.


 * Finally, I'd prefer that communications happened in normal talk spaces or forums, just so that we can refer back to them here in future. Because I communicate with a number of wikias at any one time, it helps me stay less confused if the conversations occur where they are relevant. — CzechOut 21:06, January 8, 2015 (UTC)

Name
On the name thing, it's possible you don't know that you can have multiple names. So there's no reason you couldn't have a whole list of alternatives, so that people can find you whatever they locally call it. This helps tremendously in cases like yours where the colloquial varies in British and American English.

Still, you can have only one name which displays as the URL, and I wanna make sure that we fully explore the issue to find the best possible name. This site got 35k page views over the last week, which is pretty good — but I really feel that the number could be greatly increased if the name were even slightly more discoverable. There is no reason in the world that this wiki couldn't become a 100k+ wiki in 2015.

What worries me about the term prepaidwithdata is that the acronym sim isn't even present. There's no noun at all in the main URL. This makes it ambiguous. To my ears, prepaidwithdata begs the question, "Prepaid what?"

While it's true that changing the name would temporarily affect your SEO, the long term benefits of a name that actually included the main name of the topic — SIMs — would improve things. Plus, Wikia's excellent SEO optimisation means the downside won't last very long.

One of the key goals of SEO optimisation on the front page of our wikias is to go simple. The whole prepaid/pay as you go debate is simply not worth having in the site name and on the front page. What I think the site's founder was trying to do with the difference between the URL and sitename was to go American on the URL and British on the sitename, in the hopes that he'd catch both audiences.

Instead, a better strategy would probably be to avoid that fight altogether, and go for sim-cards-with-data.wikia.com and SIM Cards with Data Wiki for your sitename. Why a hyphenated name? Google sees each word when you insert hyphens and thus the wikia will be more discoverable. Indeed, that's why I'm recommending "SIM Cards" and not just "SIM", so that we avoid confusion with "sim" as in simulation.

Yes, I realise that it's vital to your operation of the wikia that you emphasise "prepaid-ness", but I think it's worth considering whether it's a higher priority to get people here first. We can then stress in the body of the text that we're talking about prepaid cards. In fact, if we link to articles called prepaid and pay as you go, in which we briefly define those terms, that'll actually help your SEO when people search for "prepaid sim cards/pay as you go sim cards".

Besides, people looking for SIM Cards pretty much always mean prepaid, don't they? You don't call going into AT&T and signing up for a plan "getting a SIM Card" — even though you in fact do get a SIM card. You call that "subscribing", or "going under contract", don't you?

Please lemme know what you think about all this. I actually think it's the most important step we can take in our redesign, and I wanna get it right. If we're going to take the time to rebuild, let's make sure people have a good chance of finding us. — CzechOut 21:50, January 8, 2015 (UTC)


 * Well I only can tell from my experience of editing. You have to limit the amount of infomation: to


 * prepaid (or pay-as-you-go) SIM cards


 * mostly data rates


 * In fact there are other limitations too: like to GSM-based systems or cards which are publicly available, but this is secondary.


 * The reason to limit 1.) to prepaid: data on contracts is mostly cheaper. But then we address a totally different audience. Contracts are not for travellers or visitors. Contracts need to be linked to bank accounts or credit cards a.s.o. There is always a pressure to include contracts (check in France for instance the "rolling contracts") but this is a totally different cup of tea. If somebody wants to inform himself about options in his own country for contracts, he can find other sources.


 * The reason to limit 2.) to data: This is where the biggest rip-off internationally is taken place. Roaming data rates are still horrendous. Local SIM cards don't differ so much for domestic voice or text. But data gets more and more important. SMS is replaced by Whatsapp. MMS by Facebook. So it's mostly about data today.


 * Still I think prepaid or pay-as-you-go should be part of the name as well as data. SIM card, is a keyword or catchword, I agree. But the catch on Google is not the "card" part, but the SIM. SIM stands for subscriber idendity module. It does not necessarely require "card" to follow: What do think about Prepaid SIM with data ???Wolfbln (talk) 22:17, January 8, 2015 (UTC)


 * Well, my issue with just going with SIM without the word "card" is just simple deference to the colloquial. I get that it's not even right, really, to say "SIM card", since it's actually a module and the word module is inherent in the acronym. But that's what everyone calls it. The average person is going to enter "sim card" into Google. They just are. Because the average person has no idea what "sim" means.


 * The other problem I see in not including the word "card" is that "sim", by itself, has multiple meanings. A simple experiment:
 * Google results for "sim"
 * Google results for "sim card"


 * By adding the "card", you get only results that are pertinent to this wikia's topic.


 * This additionally concerns me:
 * Google results for "prepaid sim card" doesn't have this wiki on the first page of results, meaning we're not visible using the most standard American way of phrasing the wiki's topic
 * Google results for "prepaid sim" does have this wiki on the first page of results
 * Google for "pay as you go sim" gives this wiki a (slightly) lower ranking than "pay as you go sim card"


 * I think the impact of using the word "card" is demonstrable, even though it's technically an unnecessary word. Our goal, I think, should be that we get the highest possible rank out of the terms "pay as you go sim card" and "prepaid sim card" — neither of which we're doing at the moment.


 * As for "prepaid" in the URL, well, I'm still not getting it, but maybe this is just my lack of knowledge about SIMs. Is there some middle road between prepaid and not prepaid? My experience with phones is that I decided to go with a plan instead of prepaid cards. And when I shopped between Verizon and AT&T, I didn't consider shopping the SIM itself, but rather the plan to which the SIM gave me access.


 * So at this juncture, my thought is that if someone is on this site, they're naturally looking for a prepaid SIM, so the word prepaid isn't necessary. Is there a kind of SIM that you could buy that wouldn't be a prepaid SIM, but that would require some kind of comparison shopping? I'm not opposed to it, but I don't really get it. Your greater knowledge here would be helpful to me on this point. :) In theory, prepaid-sim-cards-with-data would be okay with me, but I just want to understand — more for my own personal edification than anything — why prepaid is important to the URL. — CzechOut 23:31, January 8, 2015 (UTC)


 * Well you may be not so familiar the cell phone industry. Generally, at least in Europe but on other continents too, the providers like to talk you into a "contract", which you call "plan". I try to avoid the word as "plan" can be prepaid or postpaid. When they see a chance to lock you for a while to a contract, they will do, as they get more provision for postpaid customers. They subsidize your smartphone and so on. This can only happen in the most countries if you have a good credit rating or have a bank account in the country or a credit card. But: this is not an accessible way for a tourist or visitor - so it's not an option.


 * Now the point is: data on contracts is mostly cheaper than on prepaid. So many people hear about tariffs giving out bargain data. Then somebody from this country add this offer .... and I have to delete it, because you can't get it without a local ID or local bank account or local credit card.


 * To give you an example: Vodafone gives out 1 GB per month on a 2-year contract almost free in Europe. On prepaid they charge you according to country 8-20 EUR for that. I live in Germany, no problem of getting a contract here with my local ID, address, credit card and bank account. But in the UK, France or the US I can't. There I'm only confined to prepaid "plans".


 * Lot of local people are not aware of that. Check: Israel - Golan Mobile. There we describe to fake a local ID to get a (non-binding) contract. Check France - SFR or Joe Mobile: There a long chapter about "rolling contracts" is added because data on these (non-binding) contracts is so much cheaper than on real prepaid. And of course, there countries where there are hybrid pre-/postpaid "plans".


 * I only like to point out that we must draw a line here. Anything which can be considered prepaid (or pay as you go) is included as long it has a good data rate. So much better rates, which are only accessible by contract are off-limits, as normally only residents can get it.


 * Right now on top left it now says Pay as you go SIM with data. 
 * If you are so keen on the word "card" what about Prepaid SIM card with data (its shorter, but not much).
 * As "data SIM" is a acknowledged term too: Prepaid data SIM card (if it is with voice or without, is secondary and described in the offers).

Wolfbln (talk) 00:36, January 9, 2015 (UTC)
 * Cool. :) Thanks for that explanation. I think the last suggestion is probably the best solution because it gets rid of the SEO-useless preposition. So are you okay with the primary URL being prepaid-data-SIM-card.wikia.com? Again, the dashes help SEO. (Sorry to respond a day late, but I don't get alerts about activity on your user talk page, only mine.) — CzechOut 22:19, January 10, 2015 (UTC)

Colors
As you rightly point out, color contrast is important, so I always try to take that into consideration when I design. Anything over a 7:1 ratio is the standard for body text, according to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0, recommended by the World Wide Web Consortium.

The proposed background is HEX #31250E. The text is white, which leads to an excellent 14:98 : 1 ratio. (For reference, black on white has the highest contrast of all, at 21:1.)

The link color is #DFC592, which works out to a contrast ratio of 8.94:1, well above the W3 recs.

Now, of course, if you simply don't like the colors, that's one thing and we can certainly address that. I'm not married to these colors or anything. But they are in fact highly legible and well within current contrast ratio standards.

Finally, these colors apply to the entire site and not just the main page. So we are indeed making a sitewide decision here. — CzechOut 22:26, January 8, 2015 (UTC)

So let the users decide
You have probably seen that I put it on the front page for others to read. Please wait until we get some more feedback. Wolfbln (talk) 22:50, January 8, 2015 (UTC)

I understand that it will apply to all pages of the WIKI. But I just checked the mobile version on a smartphone or tablet of your proposal. There your proposal is still black letters on white background, only the top banner has become brown. So it only applies to the non-mobile version??? Then obviously it's not a big deal, as most people access this site from mobile devices. It's after all about mobile devices.... The changes in the mobile version are really minimal to the previous site.

Wolfbln (talk) 22:59, January 8, 2015 (UTC)
 * Yep, as far as the colour scheme is concerned, this is purely a proposal for desktop redesign. (However, you should still be seeing the "desktop" version on tablets and devices > 700px wide.)


 * Thing is, you only have two editors who've been active since Christmas. It's probably more efficient to simply to change over the design and then leave a note on their user talk page. Do you have an objection to me making the change and then soliciting comment directly from people? — CzechOut 23:46, January 8, 2015 (UTC)


 * OK. Make the change. But link user comments to your Talk page please. I don't want to get bashed :-)


 * And change the text in the present brown box on top to something appropriate. BTW have you checked the contrast of letters and background in the first box ("Here's what this WIKI is about") too?


 * I will think about the redesign of the first page. New colors may make it more appealing, but 1st page is still text only and therefore boring. It's like an exhibiton where your always have to read. I will try to implement a page with small graphics to click to open a subpage in the near future.  But I think it's easier to adapt, when there is a basic set of colors given.


 * For title i give you following choices: Pay-as-you-go SIM with Data (as it is right now), Prepaid SIM Card with Data, Prepaid SIM with data or Prepaid Data SIM Card (not 100% right, but the most condensed way IMHO with all the important words - that they may have voice or text too, is secondary) but leave the browser address as it is.
 * Wolfbln (talk) 00:33, January 9, 2015 (UTC)


 * And sure: your are right: People are looking for a "plan" (= tariff) for data. But this is too abstract as a search. With GSM-devices (in the US AT&T or T-Mobile) people look for SIMs or SIM cards instead. Because these SIMs incorporate the plan. You are right that this is only a concrete objectification of something abstract like a plan (whether post- or prepaid). In most of the world plan => SIM. It's a bit different on Verizon and Sprint, because they don't have SIM cards as a CDMA network (check US section). But "Prepaid Plan with data" sounds just not so good, I'm afraid. So in most of the world people look for SIM cards, but they mean plans. It's like looking for money but meaning happiness. Good night.
 * Wolfbln (talk) 01:03, January 9, 2015 (UTC)

Clarifying wiki renaming objections

 * Sorry, didn't see you had more about the name in the section above. From those comments, it appears I may not have adequately explained things. There are a lot of aspects to this redesign, so i apologise if I haven't communicated effectively.


 * The object here is to harmonise the visible URL with the wiki title by choosing an SEO-effective name from a series of options. At the end of the day both the title and the URL will be changed, if for no other reason than that it's more SEO-effective to separate the constituent words in the URL, and to rid it of SEO-meaningless words like "with".


 * The title of the wiki, or what you're calling "the words in the upper left corner" — will be replaced by the new wordmark — as can now be seen at w:c:czechit — at least as far as human eyes are concerned. We won't see the title of the wikia with great regularity, but Google will. That's because Google's going to drill down into the code, where the wikia title appears with frequency.


 * ==About the name==

Hi CzechOut.

I totally disagree to change the name of this WIKI what the name in the address (URL) line of the browser is concerned.

Reasons: the address line prepaidwithdata is a well known address quite often mentioned in specialized forums. To just add "SIm Card" and skip "with", I don't think we should risk it. We will start from scratch.

All links in other documents from Wikitravel to a lot of sites like Tripadvisor become useless with the new address because the links will become dead, I guess. These links are often years old, but still work because the address has not changed, even when the articles have been updated.

You said: "On the name thing, it's possible you don't know that you can have multiple names. So there's no reason you couldn't have a whole list of alternatives, so that people can find you whatever they locally call it."

So it's all right with me, if you change the name on top left of the WIKI site a bit to Prepaid SIM Card with data or similar, but NOT the name of the URL line.

I dont think that URL and name on top left need to coincide 100%. All - so I think - is negotiable, is the written name on top left, not the URL!

If there is a way to link all http://prepaidwithdata.wikia.com sub-sites automatically to http.//prepaid-data-sim-card,wikia.com sub-sites, I might think about it. But if all links to prepaidwithdata on the net will die, no way!

BTW. all your proposals are about formalities: a different color setting or a different name. Without adding any contents or trying to make the present content more visually appealing, we wont get any further.

You see, I started to rebuild the main page a bit. It's only half done so far. But this I think is a way to get more attention: not any new color or new name. As a graphics man you could help me how to visualize the sometimes very abstract features of this site.

In short, don't touch the URL if all existing links to this WIKI on other sites become dead after that. Wolfbln (talk) 23:22, January 10, 2015 (UTC)


 * So, all that in mind, do you have an objection to re-chrisening the site entirely under the name Prepaid Data SIM Card Wiki, which will then translate in the main visible URL to prepaid-data-sim-card.wikia.com? — CzechOut 22:37, January 10, 2015 (UTC)


 * A clear NO when all links from outside will become dead after this.


 * Is there a way  to automatically transfer or reroute a link like  e.g. prepaidwithdata.wikia.com/wiki/Bulgaria  to prepaid-data-sim-card.wikia.com/wiki/Bulgaria  in all present links on other sites? Or will everybody have an error after clicking an old prepaidwithdata - link on another site?
 * Wolfbln (talk) 23:22, January 10, 2015 (UTC)
 * The only name change I'd agree (for the URL line) can be a gradual migration from prepaidwithdata to something like prepaid-data-SIM-card. Is it be possible to mirror the prepaidwithdata page on prepaid-data-SIM-card, keep both WIKIs on and check if we really get more hits on the new URL??? We will have 2 WIKIs for a limited time.
 * Wolfbln (talk) 23:32, January 10, 2015 (UTC)
 * Wolfbln (talk) 23:32, January 10, 2015 (UTC)


 * ==Reconsideration of CzechOut's proposals==

Hi CzechOut.

Today, I thought about your two proposals. The one of renaming the URL name and your new color layout. I've come to the conclusion that I reject both.

The reasons are: Most people come here for information. We are the only site on the net covering prepaid data plans for people travelling to other countries. I think it's really not so important what the colors are or the exact name of the WIKI.

I do really  think that this WIKI can improve a lot graphically, but not in simply changing white to brown background or black to white letters. Instead by trying to visually "translate" the often very abstract topics.

As you have seen, I'm in the process of visually enhance our main page. Even if I think, that most users come through links directly to national chapters. But the main page can be our billboard for Newbies to get attracted to the subject.

1.) new color layout: 

Generally, it's a matter of taste and I don't like brown so much. I don't know what the color has to do with SIM cards or the subject but this can be said to white too. I tried it out in a national chapter: http://czechit.wikia.com/wiki/Bulgaria and there is a fact I especially don't like. The logos of the listed providers become very dominant as they are mostly against a white background. They are only used as guidance for the reader to find the shops on the street, but now they dominate the whole article. It's better when they are not against a white background like the Orange logo, but I don't think that you want to mask the background of 200 jpg. pics from white into brown.

2.) new URL address

As I said before, prepaidsimwithdata is an established address within the community. I would not give this up. People don't only come through Google or Bing but linked by a lot of travel sites and bloggers as well. You don't give up this in the hope of a few clicks more when the URL contains "SIM" too. But you can mirror this WIKI with the new name prepaid-data-sim-card or whatever and start a new main page with this name and link it to the old prepaidsimwithdata. Count the clicks on both and we know more.

So, I'm sorry to say, that I reject both of your proposals. I'm not against change, but I don't see any advantages in renaming or recoloring. But what about my proposal to enhance the contents graphically, not only by giving it a new color or name but by visualizing the text?.What are your ideas for a good main page?

Wolfbln (talk) 01:41, January 12, 2015 (UTC)


 * Why do you want to change the whole WIKI totally without having added one single contribution yet? We can co-work on how to improve the main page or get some points more visually attractive. But all you are interested in is background color or name changes to get more hits.
 * Wolfbln (talk) 23:37, January 10, 2015 (UTC)


 * Let me try to answer your questions one by one, though perhaps not in the order you've asked them. :)


 * Why do I want to change the design of the wiki without having contributed to the content of the wiki? Easy: it's my job. This wiki was noticed by our very highest management and a request came forth for me to help redesign it. Most Wikia communities are thrilled to get professional help with their redesign. In fact, we've got so many requests that we've had to create a process by which to handle them. In essence, because this wikia was noticed by our highest management, you're being given the opportunity to skip the normal process and receive some special attention. Please don't feel threatened by me or my efforts. If we at Wikia didn't value your opinion, we would have just made changes without consulting you.


 * If you don't like the brown color scheme, we can easily try something else. The brown comes because it's complementary to the gold of the sim card in the logo. But it's not necessary. If you'd like it to be something else, we can certainly try other color combinations.


 * Why have I gone for the color scheme first? Because it's the essential building block of design. Refactoring the front page is not the hardest thing. What's difficult is making sure that we know what colors we're going to use. That knowledge then allows us to know how to build the front page and every other page. Starting with the content and then designing your color palette is literally like trying to run before walking.


 * So let's decide that first. Are you saying you'd prefer a white background?


 * As far as your company logos are concerned, it would generally be considered a better practice to make sure that they are transparent. If some have orange backgrounds, some white, and some yellow, that's going to naturally hinder attractive page design. Almost every company's logo can be found in transparent versions through Google image searches. And those that can't can be easily stripped of their backgrounds through a single step in Photoshop. I'd strongly suggest that we not design the wiki according to the backgrounds of logos currently uploaded here, but rather plan on switching out those logos, or at least putting them in thumbnails so that their backgrounds are de-emphasised by the border naturally created by adding  to a file call (i.e.  )


 * Finally, on the subject of renaming, I think you've gotten the wrong idea — and I apologise again if I've not been clear. We wouldn't at all be starting from ground zero. All of the places on the internet that now link to this wiki would still be linked here. http://prepaidwithdata.wikia.com would still be a valid address. In fact, you'd get even more valid addresses, so it would be super simple for people to find this place, regardless of the variety of English they spoke. The point of moving the visible URL to your own suggestion of prepaid-data-SIM-card would only be to improve your position. See, we find through analytics that the vast, vast majority of visitors to Wikia actually do come through Google or other search engines. So whatever we can do to improve the search ranking directly translates to more visitors to the site.


 * But, again, please do not be fearful of the change. It would not in any way, shape or form put you back to "ground zero" or invalidate any existing links on other websites.


 * Finally, I'm quite interested in refactoring the actual content of the front page. That's in fact my main goal. I look forward to working with you on that, once we can agree on the building blocks of a color palette and background.

Reply to your statement of Jan/12
Hi CzechOut.

First, of all, I'm sorry for my inexperience: I have never moved a WIKI to a new address or anything else. That's why this leads to a lot of misunderstandings for which I am really sorry. I absolutely have NO objection if you move the visible URL line of this WIKI from prepaidwithdata to something different as long as all hits or requests on the net directed at prepaidwithdata will be automatically linked to the new address. So if anybody puts in "http://prepaidwithdata.wikia.com/wiki/Finland" he ends up at http:// .wikia.com/wiki/Finland
 * 1) URL change

So if we link the old URL line to the new visible URL, it is all right with me. Then, it is kind of a mirror of the prepaidwithdata site on the new URL. You can even think of more names to get more hits or more keywords in.

Prepaid should be in (alternatively pay as you go, but this is even longer), data and as you think SIM as a keyword. You also told me that SIM card leads to more results than SIM alone. The shortest possible way to put these 4 words in a row which makes sense is '''Prepaid data SIM card. '''We both agree that "with" is dispensable as keyword.

Just one question: you made prepaid-data-SIM-card out of it. Words seperated by dashes. The old URL has skipped all dashes. It's not prepaid-with-data. You think the single words are better for search engines? We might as well go with prepaiddataSIMcard analog to prepaidwithdata.


 * 2. Color layout

First, I agree our WIKI lacks color. Color is always a matter of taste. I don't hesitate to say, that I think this dark brown looks awful. But is white so much better? I don't get any connection between dark brown and a SIM card. The "chip" undoubtly looks golden, which is not easy to display. Golden is often displayed as yellow or in yellowish colors (e.g. in the German flag). Anyway, I can think of many colors looking more like a SIM card than dark brown.

If we agree to leave the letters (outside of links) in either black or white, we need a bright or dark color for background to reach a certain contrast ratio. Right?

We should further agree that the transition from the old background color to the new one must not lead to a lot of extra work to adapt. The logos are a problem, because they are against a white background. Some logos of the major companies may be available without backround. But I can tell you a lot are NOT. In these the background must be adjusted by hand (Photoshop, masking the white). This is a lot of work. After one year, there are still countries (like Japan and Kores) without any logos, because I had no time to edit it up to now. And you tell me, you are going to adapt our logos to the new background? I don't want to spend my time painting logos. Take the logos i used here in Bulgaria: http://czechit.wikia.com/wiki/Bulgaria  Just Vodafone, Telenor, Viva and Orange. Orange is OK. I just took the time to mask the white background to dark brown on Vodafone, Telenor and Viva:

Sorry. But this just looks awful. Most of the logos are designed in front of a white background which can't be simply replaced by dark brown. You hardly recognize the logos. You have to acknowledge this,

My proposal What about black letters and color #FFFFB2 or something similar. I have used this for the country survey on the main page. Yellow or a beige color can also remind someone of a SIM card. By just slightly adjusting to a discreet background color means that there will be no extra work to adjust the pics or logos by masking and replacing backgrounds. So come up with a more restrained color proposal please.

Wolfbln (talk) 17:55, January 12, 2015 (UTC)


 * Please don't give up on this process; I know we're going to be able to create something special — together! — CzechOut 06:11, January 12, 2015 (UTC)

Name
Hey, thanks for reconsidering your rejection. According to the above discussion the visible URL of the wikia is now http://prepaid-data-sim-card.wikia.com.

Here are other aliases that work:

... and all of these work if you add "www" in front of the address, as with http://www.prepaid-data-sim-card.wikia.com. Lemme know if you think we've missed any obvious alternatives! — CzechOut 21:13, January 13, 2015 (UTC)

Hi CzechOut..

Thanks. Good names. You can may be one name with plan in it too. Because - as you have correctly realized - people are actually looking for plans. The SIM (card) is only the object of the plan. As we have payg-sim-with-data-card and without -card, you may change payg-sim-data-plan or something like this. But I really like your proposals. The main known address will be from now on: prepaid-data-sim-card. Shouldn't we adjust the name in the left top position of the WIKI to it as well?

And before you paint everything dark brown, we should really reconsider it. Any ideas for the main page? I have realized that the national link list can't be too much on top because advertisment will partly cover it otherwise. Text is adjusted to the ads, but not the columms of the links.As it is right now, that's how I think it may look like. I will link the rest of the gallery soon and think about a Q&A troubleshooting. I think there should be no more on it, not to overload it. What is your opinion?

Wolfbln (talk) 21:28, January 13, 2015 (UTC)
 * Additions to above aliases, per your request:
 * {|class=wikitable

!style="margin-bottom:1px solid black;width:33%"|Hyphenated form !style="margin-bottom:1px solid black;width:33%"|Unhyphenated form !style="margin-bottom:1px solid black"|Notes
 * -style="margin-bottom:1px solid black"
 * prepaid-data-plan
 * prepaiddataplan
 * pay-as-you-go-data-plan
 * payasyougodataplan
 * to ensure Britons not left out
 * payg-data-plan
 * paygdataplan
 * most common British abbreviation
 * }
 * paygdataplan
 * most common British abbreviation
 * }


 * On other naming matters, the actual sitename of the wikia is . Additionally the name of your project namespace was getting so long, most people would never have found it. It's been shortened to Data SIM:, as in Data SIM:About. — CzechOut 18:56, January 15, 2015 (UTC)

Adoption
Hi. I’ve given you admin and bureaucrat rights on this wikia as you requested. You now have the tools you need to clean up, customize and maintain the wikia.
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Check out your Admin Dashboard, which can by found by clicking "Admin" on the bottom toolbar -- it has links to all your new tools. Please let me know if you have any questions, and good luck with your new (old) wikia! -- Wendy (talk ) 04:43, June 25, 2015 (UTC)

Great edits for Greece. Best wishes Mike GRTMan (talk) 09:48, July 5, 2015 (UTC)

Hi Wolfbln,

I am a frequent traveller and use SIM cards all over the world and start contributing now. I would like to see a designated "Check balance" heading, as it is quite crucial and often somewhere in the text. What do you think? Best, Tillmc