In the first quarter of 2000 the original wiki was moved to c2.com 
and a new wiki started at c2.com . All that existed was a simple Welcome Visitors page. Everything else grew from that.
Lots of Wiki Zens were upset initially after the big fire. After a day or two to cool off most folks realized this was a second chance. Thread Mode was quickly shuffled off to *Discussion pages, pages were summarized and shortened, and nobody missed the folks that left. The few pages that were copied verbatim from the old wiki were soon refactored beyond recognition.
Ward was able to install a new code base and a new look in the transition. The superior karma of the new code permeated the atmosphere after the fire.
The big Wiki Fire was soon seen as the beginning of the Second Wiki Renaissance.
-- Encyclopaedia Galactica, 432FE
"Always be prepared to scrap your first version."
An extreme form of Kill The Hostage.
Unfortunately, the new Wiki Wiki, methodogically correct though it was, didn't have quite the quality of the old wiki database (I can't remember the name of the quality, because its page on the new wiki was refactored into seventeen sub-pages). A hacker crept into to c2.com and removed the write-lock on the oldwiki, and many of the wiki lurkers quietly changed their urls and kept on with the old, organic, emergent wiki, rather than the brand new gleaming modularized, componentized, refactorized version.
Whereupon the Extreme Programming devotees decried the changes as a huge exercise in Big Design Up Front Water Fall thinking, abandoned the new wiki en mass, and Ward changed the Wiki URLs back to normal on 1 April 2000.
'changed the Wiki URLs back to normal' means that the old wiki database was used again? What happened to the new? Was the work done on the new pages merged into the old pages? Or the other way around?
Since arriving on Wiki (late in 2000) I've come across this page a couple of times, and I've always assumed that it's a fictional story, and that the page was created to make a point in some argument that was taking place, presumably sometime before (or at least early in) 2000, but I've never been entirely sure. (Of course, the dates 432FE and 1 April 2000 do both seem to support my current interpretation). As time goes by, of course, the story becomes more and more shrouded in mystery. Is there, by any chance, some Wiki Elder out there who would be willing to enlighten me?
Some people used to think that we'd all be better off if a large amount of what appears on the Wiki were deleted. The idea didn't catch on. Although, ironically, there was much written about it.the idea was to start over, with a clean slate and without the history that was, at that point, highly emotional for a lot of people. The old pages would remain available, but all new discussion would start from, as it were, page one. -- Anonymous Donor
It's now being deleted. If you don't like the weather, just wait a few years.
The story is true (I've been here since 1998), as is the original Wiki Mind Wipe (which was in summer 1999). One day in early 2000 I came here, and everything was gone for some reason. Then a couple months later I came back, and things were restored. I never understood what happened, but this page seems to explains that experience. -- Anonymous Donor
In fact the Big Wiki Fire Of Double Ought is entirely fictional. So is Anonymous Donor's contribution. And so is this one. And the next one.
I disagree. This contribution is fictitious.
The idea emerged during the discussion of the Wiki Mind Wipe, when the metaphor of a forest fire was proposed. It has now become part of the collective Wiki Memory, I suppose. The page was originally set a few months in the future. I hate to dispel the mystery, so feel free to Delete Me.
Heh. Joking aside, what actually happened was that the old wiki, which included most of the valuable Document Mode and High Signal pages, was taken offline over a copyright dispute between Ward And Kent. If you have the first edition of Ward's book you'll still be able to read it on the accompanying CD-ROM. Ward was permitted to leave all the pages where live threads were going on, and everything that was on Recent Changes at the time. Surprisingly few Wiki Zens ever noticed. Most assumed that the lost pages were just gone in the Wiki Mind Wipe. But if you remember the old stuff - Ward On Xp, Ron Jeffries' Coaching Patterns, Peter Merel's True Secrets Of Zen, Cfour Project Cancellation, Wiki Base War, all the gorilla pages, not to mention Kent Beck's poignant announcement that he'd never set foot on wiki again - well, you know how much we've lost forever.
Can you name 5 C2 persons, besides Ward, who come here often and also have been around this site in the last century? Are you the only one left?
"Nothing beside remains. Round the decay of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, the lone and level sands stretch far away."
Some of us feel at times Ward encourages people to come here and create signal, and then move on elsewhere. If it is a true intention of Ward, then I am unsure about the ethics side of things.
Gorilla pages?
The wiki plugin to mozilla. But it's better not to talk about it - there are still folk with frayed nerves about the whole thing.
Sounds a bit like the Wikalong Extension. (Sorry, but nobody ever said this wiki thing was going to be smooth sailing all the way.)
Everything else grew from that?
What does that mean? Quite a few pages have last update date of 1998, etc. Were these all live threads? What constituted a live thread?
More interestingly, anyone still got that CDROM? Did the license then (pre 2000) prohibits CDROM copying? I am interested in tying Wiki Server software to Portal Software. -- dl
Suspect you were caught in an April Fools Day prank. Nothing like this ever occurred. There was no dispute between Ward And Kent. There was no mozilla gorilla. Though that sounds like a pretty good name for something google oriented. And none of the pages the prankster quoted ever existed. There is no secret wiki on CDROMs and there was no Wiki Mind Wipe. It's all just a childish practical joke.
Now wait a moment there. There certainly was a Wiki Mind Wipe. And there was a Coaching Patterns page with lots of content by Ron. And I did read something on the XP mailing list about Kent not doing his thing here any more. Most of Peter Merel's Off Topic Eastern Wuss stuff was moved off to Why Clublet around that time ... now I don't know about any gorilla, but the rest seems like it's fairly likely. Maybe the gorilla wiki was called something else. Monki? Anyone know whether some version of The Wiki Way had a CDROM?
The Wiki Way wasn't published till 2001. And my first edition has no CDROM. If there was ever a CDROM it could only have gone out with galley proofs in 2000. Who here got review copies? Was there a CDROM with them?
See original on c2.com