The founder of Huiji wiki, a Chinese online game encyclopedia community, has told Superpixel that their websites were not closed, nor do they plan to close them either. Despite that, their servers were found to be inaccessible.
It turns out that the network trouble was due to a delay of payment for the servers instead of a shortage of financial resources. The founder was, in fact, busy coloring some small models for his side gig when he was notified on Wechat the servers were down.
Rows of game models on a desk.
Previously, a group of wiki editors noticed some errors on Huiji’s sub-site, its Final Fantasy XIV wiki, and they found that the public database was also not functioning normally; in the back-end of the site, there was even a statement regarding the delay of payment.
Some gamers immediately donated money to the founder after the rumor of the website closure.
On WikiApiary, a list for wiki farms, HuijiWiki is ranked 4th with about 3.8 million pages, but it receives few donations. Over the past seven years since its founding, they’ve received only about 40,000 yuan (~ 6305 USD). The painting of the small game models was an attempt by the founder to raise some money for the site.