Thanks for the info. The ability to export data into an open format + open source base does solve my problem.

If the 20-80% revenue sharing is indeed true, then IMO it is a very smart long-term plan.

There are 2 things mentioned here that I would like to address:

open source & wiki migrations

One of the main points of the open-source release is that wikis could be easily migrated between Wikidot installations. This would mean that if at some point you would like to move from Wikidot.com to another server (e.g. your own), you should be able to do this seamlessly. This would also allow full backups of wikis. The thing that we need for it is the full wiki backup&restore feature. Then you simply back-up your wiki at wikidot.com and move it somewhere else. This would benefit all of us, because our users get the freedom of hosting and the guarantee of 100% wiki availability (if they are doing backups).

Of course we would like migrations to happen the other way too. But so far we had no time to analyze the PBWiki dump format nor develop an automated migration tool. As far as the wiki-syntax conversion is concerned, we have a required framework in Wikidot v 2, where all wiki pages are stored in XML format (WikiML). Moreover, we have already great transformation framework that converts our current syntax into XML and preliminary support for MediaWiki markup. There is absolutely no problem in creating rules for PBWiki. The tool can be used to convert the WikiML into text-based Wiki Syntax, so potentially could be even used with the current Wikidot 1.
I will try to set up an on-line demo later this week. It would already had a web api for transformations too.

Anyway, if someone would like to help creating migration tools for Wikidot from other wikis, it would be just more than great! Migrating wikis "by hand" is a pain." We could at least work together on syntax conversions.

our backbone (aka business model & long-term stability of wikidot.com)

This week we are writing a short newsletter to the Wikidot users that will also mention this stuff. You could find some info in the recent press release. We have created a company, Wikidot Inc, to back-up the growth of the Wikidot project. There are a few private investors and Pieter Hintjens as our CEO. This way we have secured the project so that now we can easily concentrate on the growth ;-)

We have some great plans for the next year or two, most of them are related to the open-source release. Needless to say, we want to be better than other wiki hosting providers ;-) And we still want to be free!

Slightly OT:

I would like to know what is the business model (just a high level overview) so that I can trust the longevity of my content. Sorry if I sound overly skeptical but I have been burned before with free wikis.

I had developed two comprehensive wikis on schtuff.com which was ad-revenue based. But they got bought over by pbwiki and schtuff wikis had to be migrated to a new domain with a completely different wiki software. To their credit, they automated the migration to a large extent, but the usage model was completely different and hence the two wikis are now useless.

I would need some assurance before I invest too much time into creating a new wiki all over again.

m.

What this basically means is that you can grab the software, install this and have your very own Wikidot! Would it not be great to have such a wiki farm at your work, school or university? We hope so and we encourage every wiki- enthusiast to consider this.

Join us at the (redesigned) Wikidot.org site and find more information about the software, downloads and resources.

See also the press release.

Good luck!
The Wikidot Team