The Emergence of "Google Jail" for Independent Wikis

It has been a monumental week! We have successfully migrated the Fortnite and Overwatch wikis away from Fandom.

Helping community editors reclaim their projects—stripping away the clutter of a dozen auto-playing video ads—remains my absolute favorite pursuit. However, there is a quirk to this specific migration. Unlike our other hosted projects (such as runescape.wiki, minecraft.wiki, or gta.wiki), these two are launching as subdomains of weirdgloop.org rather than on their own dedicated root domains (e.g., overwatch.wiki).

The "Google Jail" Phenomenon

There is a very specific, and rather frustrating, reason for this decision. Since early 2024, Google has implemented a change in how it treats brand-new domains. This has created a "failure mode" on Google Search that is catastrophic for a new class of websites, specifically independent wikis.

The Core Problem

For the past two years, almost every wiki launched on a fresh domain has suffered from a specific symptom: only the main page is indexed and appears in search results.

Since roughly $85\%$ of video game wiki traffic is driven by Google, the inability to get internal pages indexed is a fatal blow to visibility.

Evidence and Scope

We believe this is affecting approximately $90\%$ of new-domain wikis. Examples include:

gta.wiki
hytalewiki.org
hollowknight.wiki
hollowknight.wiki (which entered "jail" in March 2024 and escaped after 9 months)
The official Path of Exile 2 wiki

[!IMPORTANT] This issue persists regardless of whether the content is original or migrated from an existing source like Fandom. It is not a "duplicate content" penalty.

Characteristics of the "Jail"

Feature	Behavior
Ranking	The main page may actually outrank Fandom, but internal pages remain invisible.
Duration	Unclear; can last up to a year.
Escape Route	Often "defeated" by massive spikes in traffic or content caused by major game updates.
Stability	Intermittent; sites can slip in and out of the jail.
Indexing	Internal pages are often still crawled and indexed (visible via `site:` search), but they won't appear in organic search.

The Theory: Why is this happening?

The author's best guess is that Google is struggling to combat "SEO slop"—low-quality, AI-generated content designed to manipulate search rankings. To solve this, they have likely decided to massively nerf brand-new domains to prevent them from appearing in search results until they are established.

A Shift in Strategy

Previously, the only significant hurdle in leaving Fandom was a long-term "Google war" against the legacy Fandom pages. Now, however, the new-domain issue makes the project's success dependent on something entirely different.

The New Domain Dilemma

When wiki communities approach us for hosting, we now face three suboptimal choices:

Root Domain (e.g., overwatch.wiki): The natural choice, but likely to be "wrecked" by Google.
Studio Subdomain (e.g., wiki.overwatch.com): The ideal choice, but only achievable about $50\%$ of the time.
weirdgloop.org Subdomain: Placing the wiki on a subdomain of an established domain with existing authority.

The Trade-off

From an aesthetic and branding perspective, the author dislikes using weirdgloop.org as a user-facing domain. While "Weird Gloop" is a great inside joke for wiki enthusiasts, it is a poor name for a general audience. It also seems contradictory to criticize global branding for wiki platforms while adopting a similar approach.

Summary Checklist for New Wikis

Migrate content from Fandom.
Identify domain strategy.
Avoid "Google Jail" by using an established subdomain.
Navigate the stability of theuncertain indexing period.
Fight the "zombified corpse" of the Fandom legacy pages.

~~This is the only hard part of the move.~~ $\rightarrow$ Now, the "Google Jail" is the new primary obstacle.

Note: The original article discusses the challenges of independent wikis facing Google's search algorithm changes in the March 2024 core update.

site:overwatch.weirdgloop.org (Example of search operator)