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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Angela (talk | contribs) at 07:50, 14 March 2024 (fixing archives to have 100 on a page). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

<<User talk:Angela/Archive23
>>User talk:Angela/Archive25

File source problem with File:Andrelenotre.jpg

Thank you for uploading File:Andrelenotre.jpg. I noticed that the file's description page currently doesn't specify who created the content, so the copyright status is unclear. If you did not create this file yourself, you will need to specify the owner of the copyright. If you obtained it from a website, please add a link to the website from which it was taken, together with a brief restatement of that website's terms of use of its content. However, if the copyright holder is a party unaffiliated from the website's publisher, that copyright should also be acknowledged.

If you have uploaded other files, consider verifying that you have specified sources for those files as well. You can find a list of files you have created in your upload log. Unsourced and untagged images may be deleted one week after they have been tagged per Wikipedia's criteria for speedy deletion, F4. If the image is copyrighted and non-free, the image will be deleted 48 hours after 06:51, 26 May 2010 (UTC) per speedy deletion criterion F7. If you have any questions or are in need of assistance please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. FASTILYsock(TALK) 06:51, 26 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As it was painted by someone who died in 1713, I'm sure you can tell that it's public domain, so I don't see what the problem is. However, as a better version has been uploaded since, it may as well be deleted. Angela. 08:25, 26 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

WTF?

Our main datacenter is down, you are accessing our backup datacenter. We are working to fix the problem</div>

What does it mean the </div> character on the end of this message? Are you all right??? O-o

<div> is an HTML tag which shouldn't usually be visible. If you have problems with Wikia, please use Wikia's contact page to report those. Angela. 05:25, 18 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Alexander Pechersky Article

Hi I wrote the Alexander Pechersky (Sobibor Death Camp) article and it was given a C rating. I submitted it for a boost to at least a B, but the person in charge of making that decision is making strange requests prior to his/her approval that I feel will ruin the article. I dont know any admins or bosses on Wikipedia, I just create original content. As a neutral party would you please look at the article if you got a moment, and give a bit of input? Thank you. Cheers! Meishern (talk) 11:48, 6 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Rename

Angela please rename me to Matheus! to unify with my account on wikipedia lusophonic. Thanks --NetworkTV (talk) 17:53, 23 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The name Matheus is already taken. Please see WP:CHU. Angela. 02:08, 24 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]


please help

hello! I am member of the Georgian Wikipedia. I have a Global Account in the name of David1010 but I can not combine it with other accounts. I do not remember my password or e-mail. Maybe you can help me to join the english account with other accounts. User:David1010--94.137.169.234 (talk) 11:33, 25 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I can't help you to recover your password. You might be able to get help if you write to OTRS (See WP:Contact). Angela. 23:06, 25 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
You can remove the User:David1010's account, so I could re-unite with my global account--94.137.169.234 (talk) 13:48, 26 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
If you would like to usurp the account, please see the instructions on WP:USURP. Angela. 14:32, 26 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]


Thank you

Hi Angela, I just noticed this edit and wanted to thank you for the work you put in as bureaucrat on this project over the years. WJBscribe (talk) 15:28, 7 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

_____________________________________________________ Thank you for deleting my page... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.143.234.0 (talk) 15:32, 15 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sydney Meetup :-)

See the meetup page for further information - short version is that we're hoping to meet in a fortnight in the city for a beer and a chat. Minors and Miners are welcome, with a responsible adult and a minimum of coal dust ;-) - do try and get out if you can, it's been a little while since wiki folk met in Sydney :-) cheers, Privatemusings (talk) 05:28, 12 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Tim Starling's recent leave from Wikimedia Foundation.

I just read about Tim's leave in the Signpost and wish to convey my congratulations to you and Tim. --Ancheta Wis (talk) 00:50, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. :) Angela. 03:17, 22 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Eaton Rapids Campmeeting

The website for the page you deleted is here. http://www.eatonrapidscampmeeting.org

You identified this page as a club. It is an organization. It has over two hundred members or so. I know this because I am one myself. However I did not have time to work on the page, only to start it.

Sorry.

I don't have time, but would like the "Please help with this page" tag included.

Could you manage to do that for me? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Austinburk (talk • contribs) 06:48, 25 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It looks like it might be better for you to draft this in your userspace at User:Austinburk/Eaton Rapids Campmeeting to start with. Make sure that some references are added. Have you seen the help page at wikipedia:your first article? Angela. 04:21, 28 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I lovee youuu Legend :P —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.29.60.28 (talk) 19:30, 9 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

An Ask

Hello,please make my userpage (User:فرامرز دانا) to a semi-protected Article. Thanks (Faramarz) —Preceding undated comment added 13:12, 10 December 2010 (UTC).[reply]

Please see Wikipedia:Requests for page protection. Angela. 23:50, 10 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

WikiProject Dacia

Hi, I saw that you collaborated on articles related to Dacia and thought this could be of interest: WikiProject Dacia is looking for supporters, editors and collaborators for creating and better organizing information in articles related to Dacia and the history of Daco-Getae. If interested, PLEASE provide your support on the proposal page. Thanks!!--Codrinb (talk) 04:07, 11 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Nomination of Abdul Majid Zabuli for deletion

The article Abdul Majid Zabuli is being discussed concerning whether it is suitable for inclusion as an article according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Abdul Majid Zabuli until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on good quality evidence, and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion template from the top of the article. David in DC (talk) 20:23, 6 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the info, but I don't think you need to inform everyone that has edited an article that it has been listed for deletion. My only involvement was adding a missing bracket 7 years ago! Angela. 08:58, 8 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nomination of SmallBASIC for deletion

The article SmallBASIC is being discussed concerning whether it is suitable for inclusion as an article according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/SmallBASIC until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on good quality evidence, and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion template from the top of the article. Banaticus (talk) 01:04, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

See above... I don't see a need to inform me about something I formatted 7 years ago! :) Angela. 10:52, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed deletion of Dancing Rabbit

The article Dancing Rabbit has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

non-notable organisation

While all contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing {{proposed deletion/dated}} will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. The speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 23:05, 14 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Why am I suddenly getting spammed about articles I edited 7 years ago? I didn't write any of these and I don't care if they're deleted. Angela. 04:14, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
WP:Twinkle does it automatically regardless of the age of the article. In this case you did a page move. Feel free to support or oppose the PROD. Cheers. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 05:34, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

undo deletions by media relations head at Clearstream

. . .

I have proposed to undo deletions made by the media relations head from Clearstream, see

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Clearstream#undo_deletions_by_media_relations_head_at_clearstream

I am alerting you to this proposed Undo as you have either made edits on the Clearstream pages themselves, or interacted with other editors who have.

Avaiki (talk) 01:53, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I really don't care. (See above) Angela. 12:39, 26 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Question

Is the Jellochuu (now Sade) on this wiki the same as the one on Wikia? 70.90.186.145 (talk) 23:22, 28 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know. I recommend that you ask them. Angela. 13:00, 29 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My IP changed now so I asked him and I have seen not even a reply :/ why? 24.206.37.173 (talk) 21:45, 31 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I guess they're not replying because they're no longer active on the wiki so haven't seen your message. Angela. 03:53, 1 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Help

Seeing that I am banned on wikia infintitely, and Brandon Rhea left me a message about Piratehunter. Can you tell Brandon Rhea that I am banned cross-wikia forever and another favor. Can you please unblock me. I have been helping wikia a lot and one last thing. Can I be a VSTF there? Slipknot Darkrai (talk) 12:57, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You should be able to contact Brandon via special:contact which is also a better place to discuss Wikia issues than here. Angela. 13:11, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I have no e-mail :( also why can't you unblock me? You are the boss of the wiki and I asked you three times if I can be a VSTF on wikia and zero replies yes zero. Thanks Slipknot Darkrai (talk) 12:39, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not going to discuss Wikia issues here. You don't need an email to use special:contact if you wanted to leave Brandon a message, though he obviously wouldn't be able to reply to you by email. Angela. 12:45, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've contacted staff. Can you help me out now? Thanks... Slipknot Darkrai (talk) 12:47, 27 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Why would you want to be unblocked from Wikia? Being blocked was the best thing that happened to me, Solar Dragon! I am now on a better host and if I was you, I would move any wikis you edit(ed) on away from Wikia. 92.7.184.10 (talk) 17:30, 27 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]


Awarded Barnstar

The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
For all your contributions and hard work on the encyclopedia, I am pleased to present Angela Beesley with this Tireless Contributor Barnstar. — Mikhailov Kusserow (talk) 07:17, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]


Thank you! :) I haven't had a barnstar for ages. Angela. 10:30, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

File:Sagittaria.jpg

Much appreciated if a more detailed description for this can be provided so the image can be moved to Commons. :) Sfan00 IMG (talk) 13:42, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't upload this. I just renamed it. I don't have any more info than is on the page. Angela. 23:57, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

File:Madrid-metro-map-300px.png listed for deletion

A file that you uploaded or altered, File:Madrid-metro-map-300px.png, has been listed at Wikipedia:Files for deletion. Please see the discussion to see why this is (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry), if you are interested in it not being deleted. Thank you. Damiens.rf 22:21, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It's not needed now there is automatic thumbnailing. Angela. 05:17, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

File:Wikia logo.png listed for deletion

A file that you uploaded or altered, File:Wikia logo.png, has been listed at Wikipedia:Files for deletion. Please see the discussion to see why this is (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry), if you are interested in it not being deleted. Thank you. damiens.rf 16:43, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I've commented there. Angela. 04:28, 4 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Notzrim

I am asking unofficially on behalf of anon users in desperate need of help at Talk:Notzrim on how to deal with disruptions to team efforts by a very belligerent/aggressive sock-puppet/troll. Once upon a time anon-users were an integral part of the building of the encyclopedia, but now we are increasingly sidelined due to bad behavior of a troublesome but comparatively small minority. On principle I do not want to get a wiki account. I hope this choice can be respected. But I find that my requests for help are being ignored. I am looking for a guardian angel from someone very experienced in wiki policy to watch over our process and a friendly voice to tell us where we are going wrong. Can you recommend anyone or at least point me in the right direction? :( 81.103.121.144 (talk) 11:38, 25 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Deletion of INFINITY (INDIAN BAND)

WHy did you delete the article on INFINITY (INDIAN BAND)? When you do not know the band or anything about the local scene, you should first do a research on them and then delete them. I want the page back.

It looks like the text had been copied from another site. Content on Wikipedia needs to be available under a free license. You might find this page helpful: Wikipedia:Your first article. Angela. 21:06, 12 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Deletion of INFINITY (INDIAN BAND)

The article was not copied... I have copied my own writing because I did not want to type it again and again.

Please see this page for help with this. Angela. 06:24, 21 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

A barnstar for you!

The Barnstar of Diplomacy
This is for your infinite work here at Wikipedia. This is in recon of the effort you made to solve problems without causing conflict

--VoxLive, 8 August 2011 VoxLive Architecture® 01:06, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

MfD nomination of Wikipedia:Village pump sections

Wikipedia:Village pump sections, a page you substantially contributed to, has been nominated for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Village pump sections and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~). You are free to edit the content of Wikipedia:Village pump sections during the discussion but should not remove the miscellany for deletion template from the top of the page; such a removal will not end the deletion discussion. Thank you. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 20:50, 14 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

A barnstar for you!

The Barnstar of Diligence
This is for your amazing work on Wikipedia. NehaMich. (talk) 00:44, 19 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Survey

Hi Angela. Perhaps you're interested in this survey as well? (please revert it if you don't want this message on your user talk) Regards, Trijnstel (talk) 14:04, 1 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nomination for deletion of Template:Article-cv2

Template:Article-cv2 has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Gh87 (talk) 02:40, 17 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

On wikipedia in interlingue

Why you don't work any more in interlingue? we need coworkers,I hope see you there soon, bye.

Unfortunately, I can't write in Interlingua. I just used to add interwiki links, but that's a task done by bots now. Angela. 23:48, 23 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Survey women on Wikipedia

A while ago (on 1 October to be exact) I gave you a link to a survey about women on Wikipedia. Here are the results of it. Regards, Trijnstel (talk) 18:33, 25 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Possibly unfree File:Sagittaria.jpg

A file that you uploaded or altered, File:Sagittaria.jpg, has been listed at Wikipedia:Possibly unfree files because its copyright status is unclear or disputed. If the file's copyright status cannot be verified, it may be deleted. You may find more information on the file description page. You are welcome to add comments to its entry at the discussion if you are interested in it not being deleted. Thank you. Kelly hi! 23:54, 1 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Most up-to-date listing of past and present bots?

Greetings. I am reading through the archived talk:Bots pages for my dissertation work, and I am trying to learn as much as I can about Wikipedia bots. I've noticed that some bots discussed (and sometimes approved) on these talk pages are not listed on the Wikipedia:Bots/Status page, and I'd like to add the missing information as I find it (as well as flag approval dates and purpose of the bot for those that are missing that information). Before I do so, though, I wanted to make sure this is the appropriate page to keep updated. I see there is some discussion about merging Wikipedia:Bots/Status with Wikipedia:Registered_bots, but the former seems to be the more comprehensive and up-to-date list. As I came across your name numerous times in those old archived pages, approving bot flags back in 2004 and 2005, I thought you might know if this is the best page for me to be working on.

Also, as a fairly newbie, I am sometimes overwhelmed with the number of different pages that info on bots was spread out across back then (and still today), so if you have any suggestions on how to sort of organize myself as I search for and read pages on bots (and learn about bots in general), I'd greatly appreciate the direction. Thank you in advance, and if you think this inquiry is best directed to someone else, please let me know who. UOJComm (talk) 21:34, 7 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think I can help since I don't have any idea about the current system for this. Hopefully someone can help you on Wikipedia talk:Bots/Status. Angela. 11:22, 9 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Angela, thank you for the response. Do you know if there are any users who might be able to talk to me about bots historically (i.e. the development of policies, cases for approval, etc. from 04-07ish) as well as current policy and pages? UOJComm (talk) 22:50, 12 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure if you are interested only in English Wikipedia bots, but User:Emijrp/Anti-vandalism bot census includes several anti-vandalism bots from en: and other languages. emijrp (talk) 13:45, 9 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for this reference...your census definitely seems important and will be a useful resource for me. Are you aware of any other projects or pages like this that try to chronicle a sub-type of bot? UOJComm (talk) 22:50, 12 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sydney meetup

You are listed here as interested in Sydney meetups, so I thought I'd let you know about one on this Saturday at 5pm at the Alexandria Hotel. Details here: Wikipedia:Meetup/Sydney/November_2011. It would be great to see you. --99of9 (talk) 00:58, 14 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Marvelous Work,

Thanks for giving us Wikia..!! --Faizanalivarya (talk) 12:04, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Wikia Promotion in Pakistan

Dear Angela,

I would like to thank your for giving us such a marvelous platform called Wikia, this is really a master piece honestly, I am from Pakistan therefore I want to promote Wikia in Pakistan, you may find my details on my Wikipedia page and my contact details are given below as well, Again I honestly appreciated your work.

Regards,

Faizan ALI Varya
President
Youth Welfare Organization

I've sent you an email. Angela. 04:17, 12 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

SOPA

Wikipedia_talk:SOPA_initiative#Reddit_blackout_Jan._18 – An editor is interested in what actions Wikia is taking against SOPA. Can you please provide some insight? --Michaeldsuarez (talk) 00:41, 12 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have any info on this beyond what's in Craig's blog post which is mentioned in that discussion. I'll let people know it's being asked about there though. Angela. 22:55, 14 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Archives

Angela, I've read your talk page archives (at least number 24) after reading your analysis of vandalism. It seems to me that your name reflects your personality (that is, you seem an Angel to me). Anyway, this message is just to congratulate you for your work. I think that God should forgive you five years of Purgatory for every year you have spent as editor (I'm just joking). You have remarkable patience. Thanks for everything, specially Wikia. I hope you have a nice day: after reading your talk page, my day seems a better one.--Ciroa (talk) 03:16, 28 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! :) Angela. 09:28, 28 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Template:Commonspar listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Template:Commonspar. Since you had some involvement with the Template:Commonspar redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion (if you have not already done so). MGA73 (talk) 20:56, 10 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]


Ellen Gallagher

Hi Angela, I'm interested in making an article on Ellen Gallagher, similar in content to one for which you were the deleting administrator back in 2006. Is it alright if I make a new one? I'm still new to editing and would like to avoid the pitfalls that befell the old article, so if you happen to recall what led to the other articles deletion (or know where I can go to find out), please let me know. Thanks! --GogoW24 (talk) 16:34, 13 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The original article didn't say anything about why this person was notable. The only content was where she lived and attended college. Please look at the notability criteria and be sure this article can meet those. You will certainly need to provide third-party reliable sources. Angela (talk) 02:07, 14 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Will do. Thanks! --GogoW24 (talk) 04:03, 14 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Collaborations redux

Hey Angela, if you're not too busy, can I ask you to recall whether the Collaboration (which became WP:ACID) ever linked directly to the main page? I can't find any. Am also proposing something for the mainpage to see if it brings in new editors. Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:11, 14 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I think it was probably only ever on the Community portal, not the main page. Angela (talk) 02:26, 14 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

MSU Interview

Dear Angela, (my apologies for the second posting, dealing with some neatness issues)

My name is Jonathan Obar user:Jaobar, I'm a professor in the College of Communication Arts and Sciences at Michigan State University and a Teaching Fellow with the Wikimedia Foundation's Education Program. This semester I've been running a little experiment at MSU, a class where we teach students about becoming Wikipedia administrators. Not a lot is known about your community, and our students (who are fascinated by wiki-culture by the way!) want to learn how you do what you do, and why you do it. A while back I proposed this idea (the class) to the community HERE, where it was met mainly with positive feedback. Anyhow, I'd like my students to speak with a few administrators to get a sense of admin experiences, training, motivations, likes, dislikes, etc. We were wondering if you'd be interested in speaking with one of our students.


So a few things about the interviews:

  • Interviews will last between 15 and 30 minutes.
  • Interviews can be conducted over skype (preferred), IRC or email. (You choose the form of communication based upon your comfort level, time, etc.)
  • All interviews will be completely anonymous, meaning that you (real name and/or pseudonym) will never be identified in any of our materials, unless you give the interviewer permission to do so.
  • All interviews will be completely voluntary. You are under no obligation to say yes to an interview, and can say no and stop or leave the interview at any time.
  • The entire interview process is being overseen by MSU's institutional review board (ethics review). This means that all questions have been approved by the university and all students have been trained how to conduct interviews ethically and properly.


Bottom line is that we really need your help, and would really appreciate the opportunity to speak with you. If interested, please send me an email at obar@msu.edu (to maintain anonymity) and I will add your name to my offline contact list. If you feel comfortable doing so, you can post your name HERE instead.

If you have questions or concerns at any time, feel free to email me at obar@msu.edu. I will be more than happy to speak with you.

Thanks in advance for your help. We have a lot to learn from you.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Obar --Jaobar (talk) 04:18, 14 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

WikiWomen's Luncheon at Wikimania 2012

WikiWomen's Luncheon at Wikimania - You are invited!
Are you a woman attending Wikimania 2012? If so, join us on Saturday, July 14, for the annual WikiWomen's Luncheon (fka WikiChix Lunch) This event is for any women attending Wikimania. Pick up your lunch, compliments of Wikimania, and join us at 1:30pm in the Grand Ballroom for a lively facilitated discussion hosted by Sue Gardner. We look forward to seeing you there. Please sign up here.
Sarah (talk) 10:42, 4 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

July WMAU Melbourne Meetup

Hi, At last month's June meetup we discussed the idea of setting up a Training Course at a University of the Third Age (U3A) to be held in 2013 and named Becoming a Wikipedia editor. In order to get this course up and running we are calling for volunteers to help develop the idea, and either tutor part of the course, or provide one on one help to students in the class. All local Wikipedians are welcome to discuss this at our 11am meetup to be held this Sunday on 22 July. Please add your name to the attending list at Wikipedia:Meetup/Melbourne 23. Food and beverages are provided. Cuddy Wifter (talk) 02:23, 13 July 2012 (UTC) Victorbyron (talk) 12:22, 14 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Vandalism Studies Update - August 2012

Hello, members of the Vandalism Studies Project! As some of us are quite new with the Vandalism Studies project, it would make sense for us to re-read some of the past studies, as well as studies outside the project. Please do so if you have a chance, just so we can get into the groove of things. We're planning on attempting to salvage the Obama study (or possibly simply convert it to a new Romney study), as well as hopefully begin our third study this November. If you have any ideas for Study 3, please suggest them! If you have any questions please post them on the project talk page. Thanks, and happy editing - we can't wait to begin working on the project! --Dan653 (talk) and Theopolisme :)
11:30, 24 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
If you would like to stop receiving Vandalism Studies newsletters, please remove your name from the member list.

The Olive Branch: A Dispute Resolution Newsletter (Issue #1)

Welcome to the first edition of The Olive Branch. This will be a place to semi-regularly update editors active in dispute resolution (DR) about some of the most important issues, advances, and challenges in the area. You were delivered this update because you are active in DR, but if you would prefer not to receive any future mailing, just add your name to this page.

Steven Zhang's Fellowship Slideshow

In this issue:

  • Background: A brief overview of the DR ecosystem.
  • Research: The most recent DR data
  • Survey results: Highlights from Steven Zhang's April 2012 survey
  • Activity analysis: Where DR happened, broken down by the top DR forums
  • DR Noticeboard comparison: How the newest DR forum has progressed between May and August
  • Discussion update: Checking up on the Wikiquette Assistance close debate
  • Proposal: It's time to close the Geopolitical, ethnic, and religious conflicts noticeboard. Agree or disagree?

--The Olive Branch 18:48, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Sydney workshop

Hi Angela, as you are listed on Wikipedia:Meetup/Sydney/Invite I am letting you know that there is a meetup/workshop on 10 November. I hope you can make it. --John Vandenberg (chat) 16:04, 29 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

A beer for you!

This is for your tireless work. -- RAT -.- Poke it 03:15, 19 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Notice of change

Hello. You are receiving this message because of a recent change to the bureaucrat policy that alters what you were told at the time of your decratting. The effect of the change is that if you are inactive for a continuous three year period, you will be unable to request return of the bureaucrat user right. This includes inactive time prior to your decratting if you were decratted for inactivity and inactive time prior to the change in policy. Inactivity is defined as the absence of edits or logged actions. Until such time as you have been inactive for three years, you may request return of the tools at the bureaucrats' noticeboard. After you have been inactive for three years, you may seek return of the tools only through WP:RFB. Thank you. MBisanz talk 00:20, 4 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sydney meetup on Thursday

Just a quick note to invite you to the next Sydney meetup this Thursday evening. Details here. Hope to see you then! (You received this invitation because you are listed here.) --99of9 (talk) 00:31, 8 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]


acknowledgment

The Arabic Wikipedia community Thank you for your contributions in the establishment at the beginning (see here) شكراً جزيلاً --Trabelsiismail (talk) 12:15, 5 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. :) Angela (talk) 23:41, 5 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]


Invitation to join the Ten Year Society

Dear Angela/Archive24,

I'd like to extend a cordial invitation to you to join the Ten Year Society, an informal group for editors who've been participating in the Wikipedia project for ten years or more.

Best regards, — Hex (❝?!❞) 14:34, 2 March 2013 (UTC).[reply]

Thank you! There are some very memorable names in that category. Angela (talk) 11:23, 3 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Editor @ ar.wiki

Hello. I would like to inform you that I have granted you editor flag at the Arabic Wikipedia, all your edits there will be automatically marked as patrolled. Best regards.--Avocato (talk) 19:01, 19 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Articles deletion

Dear Angela, I apologize for the inconvenience, but have no other way than appealing for administrators’ help recover a deleted article.

I published a film article entitled Drits (Derivas), a film by Portuguese director Ricardo Costa. It is the second film from an autobiographic trilogy, Faraways. The article was kept untouched by several months. To my surprise, it was recently eliminated and redirected to the director’s page with no discussion. I undid the redirection, but saw the article was proposed to deletion. Reason: independent, verifiable, secondary resources. I argued that the article couldn’t have but primary sources (the producer’s ones) as it is an upcoming film, like many others listed at upcoming films. A film that has not yet been premiered or distributed may not be commented. Besides, none of the films so listed has ever been deleted or even contested.

At last, in discussion, user User:reddogsix proposed that the article should be renamed to Drifts (film) or similar, and at the same time put at the disambiguation page of Dritf this reference «Drifs, unreleased film by Ricardo Costa (filmmaker). I created a new page for the same article entitled Drifts (Portuguese film). As the semantic root “drift” seemed to be the problem, I replaced the article name to Derivas (Drifts) and published it once more with some improvements. As a result, the article was fast deleted and I blocked for three days.

In the meantime, a new article about the trilogy was published: Faraways, which was proposed to fast deletion as well by the same user, User:reddogsix.

Although unreleased, although having no reliable secondary sources, Drifts is unquestionably an outstanding film for its uniqueness and characteristics: autobiography, comedy, docufiction, metafiction in one. I guess that “outstanding” may be a synonym for “notable” in such cases and that articles like this shouldn’t be deleted without previous cared analyses: important information may be lost.

This sequence of interventions is clearly a personal attack by User:reddogsix, supported by two or three user friend. It has no other explanation. It contributes in nothing to improve articles quality. Mists article, which I created on 10 September 2010, is the latest example. The article structure was unreasonably modified, loosing clarity and useful content.

NOTE: sent to 30 administrators.

Thanks for your attention, User:Tertulius 20:53, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Invitation to Sydney editathon - Saturday 23rd November

There is a backstage pass coming up to be followed by an editathon in the State Library of New South Wales on Saturday 23 November. This is the first time that an Australian cultural institution has opened its doors to us in this way and will be a special opportunity because the Library is providing: one of its best rooms; its expert curators (along with their expertise and their white gloves); a newly launched website (containing new resources); and of course, items from its collection (including rare and usually unavailable material) which we can look at, learn from, and use, to improve WP articles. For example, on the chosen topic (Australia and WWI), the Library holds many diaries and manuscripts from the period.

As you can see from the Library's project page, they have connected this editathon with their own work. They have already set out a wide range of resources to make things easier for us. Please sign up on the editathon project page if you can participate either online or in person with other Wikipedians. Hope to see you there! (Sorry if you've received this message before - I did a quick check but didn't see it.) 99of9 (talk) 10:41, 19 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Sydney Meetup on Monday evening

There's a Meetup in Sydney on Monday (tomorrow) evening from 5:30pm at the Paragon Hotel Circular Quay. We even have an international guest. See the meetup page for more details and to sign up. Sorry for the late notice - I hope you can make it. --99of9 (talk) 05:53, 2 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Angela. This is Mervat from the Arabic Wikipedia. I have been reading some old posts and discussions related to the first beginnings of Arabic wikipedia and came across your profile as you were one of the pioneers in Wikipedia. How interesting knowing non-arabs were very helpful in putting the foundations and basis on which our work is building up. All the best wishes to you and accept a big thank you from me to you. --Mervat Salman (talk) 19:44, 10 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

10 year club on Swedish Wikipedia

Dear Angela, I have invited you to join the ten year anniversery club on the Swedish Wikipedia, theres a link to that page and the template on your swedish user page, hope you will join! best wishes, Dan Koehl (talk) 13:53, 14 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

เรียนผู้บริหารวิกิพีเดียที่เคารพ ( Dear Wikipedia administrators respected. )

ข้าพเจ้าสมาชิกวิกิพีเดียสารานุกรม มีความประสงค์ที่จะแจ้งความร้องทุกข์กับท่านผู้บริหารจำนวน 3 ข้อดังนี้ 1.ข้าพเจ้าอยากให้ท่านช่วยปลดผู้ใช้Horusออกจากผู้ดูแลระบบเนื่องจากผู้ใช้คนนี้ไดทำการนำอำนาจที่ท่านมอบหมายมาทำการโดยมิชอบ บิดเบือนข้อมูลของWikipedia Thailand หลายอย่าง ทั้งการบล๊อคผู้ใช้โดยมิชอบ การล๊อคหน้าโดยมิชอบ การล๊อคหน้าโดยมิชอบ การแก้ไขข้อมูลโดยมิชอบ อนึ่งข้าพเจ้าขอเพียงแต่ให้ท่านปลดผู้ใช้ใช้Horusออกจากตำแหน่งผู้ดูแลระบบเป็นการถาวรเท่านั้นมิได้ร้องขอถึงการบล๊อคผู้ใช้ดังกล่าว จึงเรียนมาให้ทราบขอบคุณครับ 2.จากการกระทำที่ผู้ใช้ที่ใช้นามว่าHorusได้ล็อคหน้าเพจของ โรงเรียนสามเสนวิทยาลัย โดยมิชอบทั้งมีการแก้ไขข้อมูลที่บิดเบือนบนหน้าเพจสามเสนวิทยาลัย อนึ่งข้าพเจ้าขอให้ท่านช่วยปลดล็อคหน้าเพจ โรงเรียนสามเสนวิทยาลัย จะเป็นการขอบพระคุณยิ่ง

ทั้งนี้ข้าพเจ้าคิดว่าทางWikipedia The Free Encyclopedia จะให้ความช่วยเหลือข้าพเจ้าตามที่ข้าพเจ้าร้องขอ ขอกราบขอบพระคุณท่านไว้ล่วงหน้า ขอบพระคุณครับ

Happy adminship anniversary!!!

Wishing Angela/Archive24 a very happy adminship anniversary on behalf of the Wikipedia Birthday Committee! Anastasia (talk) 16:25, 17 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Notification of pending suspension of administrative permissions due to inactivity

Information icon Following a community discussion in June 2011, consensus was reached to provisionally suspend the administrative permissions of users who have been inactive for one year (i.e. administrators who have not made any edits or logged actions in over one year). As a result of this discussion, your administrative permissions will be removed pending your return if you do not return to activity within the next month. If you wish to have these permissions reinstated should this occur, please post to the Wikipedia:Bureaucrats' noticeboard and the userright will be restored per the re-sysopping process (i.e. as long as the attending bureaucrats are reasonably satisfied that your account has not been compromised, that your inactivity did not have the effect of evading scrutiny of any actions which might have led to sanctions, and that you have not been inactive for a three year period of time). If you remain inactive for a three year period of time, including the present year you have been inactive, you will need to request reinstatement at WP:RFA. This removal of access is procedural only, and not intended to reflect negatively upon you in any way. We wish you the best in future endeavors, and thank you for your past administrative efforts. MadmanBot (talk) 23:38, 1 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Oops. I'd better log in then. :) Funny that this was right after the "Happy adminship anniversary" message. :) Angela (talk) 00:28, 2 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Never let it be said that our bots can't have a sense of irony...! WJBscribe (talk) 09:30, 4 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A Small Edit I Tried to Make to an Old Comment of Yours

Hi.

It's quite possible you may consider this matter to be utterly unworthy of your time. I read an old comment of yours (from 2003) entitled "Moved to Education in England" on the "Education in England" talk page. I hope you won't find this too obnoxious: I edited one sentence—'For example, Wales no longer have compulsory testing at KS1 and do not publish League Tables.'—changing 'have' to 'has' and 'do' to 'does'.

Some other user (not an administrator) then felt it was necessary to undo the edit, saying, 'don't edit other people's comments.' Of course, it's really none of that person's business, but I do realize some folks find it annoying when someone edits what they've written. That's why I'm writing now to find out whether changing those words bothers you.

I hope all's well, and thank you for reading this!

Thevictor99 (talk) 22:54, 15 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

It doesn't bother me but I know that it bothers others so I wouldn't suggest doing it. There's a policy page about this at Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing comments. Angela (talk) 11:20, 16 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

WikiVIP

Hello! As there is a Wikipedia article about you, you are cordially invited to contribute a short audio recoding of your spoken voice, so that our readers may know what you sound like and how you pronounce your name. Details of how to do so, and examples, are at Wikipedia:Voice intro project. Please feel free to ask for help or clarification on the project talk page, or my talk page. --1Veertje (talk) 20:23, 13 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A kitten for you!

Kitten of the Best Wikipedian

Wosky87 (talk) 16:38, 4 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Sajora Nayasa (WikiPeace)

Sajora Nayasa (WikiPeace)
I like you because of peace on WikiPedia (or you can call WikiPeace "Sajora Nayasa".) Wosky87 (talk) 16:43, 4 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]


Missing

Hi. You've been listed as missing. Should you ever return or choose to not be listed, feel free to remove your name from the list. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:22, 9 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Still here, always will be. :) Angela (talk) 08:51, 9 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Nice to know you are not!! :) Antonio el Retrasado Martin (dilo aqui) 09:55, 9 January, 2015 (UTC)
Thanks. Good to see you're still here too, Antonio. Angela (talk) 11:42, 9 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Your article has been nominated for deletion (again)

See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Angela Beesley Starling (2nd nomination). Everymorning talk 17:42, 25 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

It would be useful if you could verify if your preference for deletion still stands, so we know whether WP:BLPREQUESTDELETE is relevant. CorporateM (Talk) 10:52, 26 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

ALUG

Dear Angela, since it is hard to contact you why you do not DELETE ALL the pages previous created ? Including you. That would be an advantage. My page created was for history since it was the first Linux User Group abroad Finland, the first big Debugging group for hardware and Software. The First Linux UserGroup in Antwerp who helped Linus Torvalds in the first years before firms came into the picture. Thanks for Deleting this wonderfull historic info!!! I have still a lot of historic info but since you like to delete I must save my info to the local Archive not consultative via internet ! Congratulations....

Patrick.Op de Beeck at gmail, Linux Pioneer, Chairman of ALUG till 2005

Hello Patrick. I think you are referring to the ALUG article, which I deleted in 2011. Articles on the English Wikipedia need to be written in English and need to meet certain notability requirements and reliable sources would be required if you wanted to recreate an article on this topic. You may want to read the help page about writing your first article. Angela (talk) 11:32, 12 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Award — Platinum Star

Hi Angela. I recently returned to Wikipedia after an 8-year hibernation ... only to find that you don't seem to be much around these days. But for all the work you did for so many years, I want to award you the Platinum Star. I was going to put it on your user page, but I'll respect your privacy there:-)

This editor is a
Master Editor II
and is entitled to display this Platinum
Editor Star.

David Cannon (talk) 14:43, 8 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, David! I'll add it here. Angela (talk) 09:59, 9 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Implementation of Wikipedia:Bureaucrats#Bureaucrat activity requirements

You are receiving this message because you are listed at Wikipedia:Bureaucrats#Former bureaucrats. Writ Keeper pointed out that these users were not directly notified of the community discussion ending August 2015, where consensus was reached to remove the bureaucrat permissions of users who have not participated in bureaucrat activity for three years.

As of 1 October 2015, any former bureaucrat who has not participated in bureaucrat activity for three years that wishes their bureaucrat permissions restored will need to request reinstatement at RFB.

If you intend to return to bureaucrat activity, please request restoration of permissions before 1 October 2015 or three years passes since your last bureaucrat activity, whichever is later.


To assist with the implementation of this requirement, please see Wikipedia:Bureaucrat activity. Modeled after Wikipedia:Inactive administrators and similar to that process, the log page will be created on 1 September 2015. Bureaucrats who have not met the activity requirements as of that date will be notified by email (where possible) and on their talk page to advise of the pending removal.

If the notified user does not return to bureaucrat activity and the permissions are removed, they will need to request reinstatement at WP:RFB. Removal of access is procedural only, and not intended to reflect negatively upon the affected user in any way.

Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns. –xenotalk 20:53, 18 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

ArbCom elections are now open!

Hi,
You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 08:52, 23 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy deletion nomination of Template:Test intro

A tag has been placed on Template:Test intro requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done for the following reason:

This one got missed in Wikipedia:Templates_for_discussion/Log/2015_April_26#Old_Test_Edit_Warnings

Under the criteria for speedy deletion, pages that meet certain criteria may be deleted at any time.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be removed without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. If the page is deleted, and you wish to retrieve the deleted material for future reference or improvement, then please contact the deleting administrator, or if you have already done so, you can place a request here. EoRdE6(Come Talk to Me!) 04:50, 2 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

San Angelo listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect San Angelo. Since you had some involvement with the San Angelo redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion if you have not already done so. Steel1943 (talk) 16:44, 20 June 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Sydney Meetup next Thursday evening

You are invited to the Sydney Meetup!

  • Thursday 15 September at 6PM at Petersham Bowling Club.
    (a) accessible by train - Petersham station
    (b) has some nice draught beers
    (c) has some nice food
    (d) has some quiet areas outside and inside...so people can chat without getting a hoarse voice by shouting over 100 decibels of muzak etc.
    (e) accessible by car with straightforward parking nearby
This message was delivered to the invitation list - to opt out of future invitations please remove your name from the list. 04:04, 11 September 2016 (UTC)

Extended confirmed protection

Hello, Angela. This message is intended to notify administrators of important changes to the protection policy.

Extended confirmed protection (also known as "30/500 protection") is a new level of page protection that only allows edits from accounts at least 30 days old and with 500 edits. The automatically assigned "extended confirmed" user right was created for this purpose. The protection level was created following this community discussion with the primary intention of enforcing various arbitration remedies that prohibited editors under the "30 days/500 edits" threshold to edit certain topic areas.

In July and August 2016, a request for comment established consensus for community use of the new protection level. Administrators are authorized to apply extended confirmed protection to combat any form of disruption (e.g. vandalism, sock puppetry, edit warring, etc.) on any topic, subject to the following conditions:

  • Extended confirmed protection may only be used in cases where semi-protection has proven ineffective. It should not be used as a first resort.
  • A bot will post a notification at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard of each use. MusikBot currently does this by updating a report, which is transcluded onto the noticeboard.

Please review the protection policy carefully before using this new level of protection on pages. Thank you.
This message was sent to the administrators' mass message list. To opt-out of future messages, please remove yourself from the list. 17:47, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Two-Factor Authentication now available for admins

Hello,

Please note that TOTP based two-factor authentication is now available for all administrators. In light of the recent compromised accounts, you are encouraged to add this additional layer of security to your account. It may be enabled on your preferences page in the "User profile" tab under the "Basic information" section. For basic instructions on how to enable two-factor authentication, please see the developing help page for additional information. Important: Be sure to record the two-factor authentication key and the single use keys. If you lose your two factor authentication and do not have the keys, it's possible that your account will not be recoverable. Furthermore, you are encouraged to utilize a unique password and two-factor authentication for the email account associated with your Wikimedia account. This measure will assist in safeguarding your account from malicious password resets. Comments, questions, and concerns may be directed to the thread on the administrators' noticeboard. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:33, 12 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

A new user right for New Page Patrollers

Hi Angela.

A new user group, New Page Reviewer, has been created in a move to greatly improve the standard of new page patrolling. The user right can be granted by any admin at PERM. It is highly recommended that admins look beyond the simple numerical threshold and satisfy themselves that the candidates have the required skills of communication and an advanced knowledge of notability and deletion. Admins are automatically included in this user right.

It is anticipated that this user right will significantly reduce the work load of admins who patrol the performance of the patrollers. However,due to the complexity of the rollout, some rights may have been accorded that may later need to be withdrawn, so some help will still be needed to some extent when discovering wrongly applied deletion tags or inappropriate pages that escape the attention of less experienced reviewers, and above all, hasty and bitey tagging for maintenance. User warnings are available here but very often a friendly custom message works best.

If you have any questions about this user right, don't hesitate to join us at WT:NPR. (Sent to all admins).MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:46, 15 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

ArbCom Elections 2016: Voting now open!

Hello, Angela. Voting in the 2016 Arbitration Committee elections is open from Monday, 00:00, 21 November through Sunday, 23:59, 4 December to all unblocked users who have registered an account before Wednesday, 00:00, 28 October 2016 and have made at least 150 mainspace edits before Sunday, 00:00, 1 November 2016.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2016 election, please review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page.

ArbCom Elections 2016: Voting now open!

Hello, Angela. Voting in the 2016 Arbitration Committee elections is open from Monday, 00:00, 21 November through Sunday, 23:59, 4 December to all unblocked users who have registered an account before Wednesday, 00:00, 28 October 2016 and have made at least 150 mainspace edits before Sunday, 00:00, 1 November 2016.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2016 election, please review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. Mdann52 (talk) 22:08, 21 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter - February 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2017). This first issue is being sent out to all administrators, if you wish to keep receiving it please subscribe. Your feedback is welcomed.

Administrator changes

NinjaRobotPirate • Schwede66 • K6ka • Ealdgyth • Ferret • Cyberpower678 • Mz7 • Primefac • Dodger67
Briangotts • JeremyA • BU Rob13

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • When performing some administrative actions the reason field briefly gave suggestions as text was typed. This change has since been reverted so that issues with the implementation can be addressed. (T34950)
  • Following the latest RfC concluding that Pending Changes 2 should not be used on the English Wikipedia, an RfC closed with consensus to remove the options for using it from the page protection interface, a change which has now been made. (T156448)
  • The Foundation has announced a new community health initiative to combat harassment. This should bring numerous improvements to tools for admins and CheckUsers in 2017.

Arbitration

Obituaries

  • JohnCD (John Cameron Deas) passed away on 30 December 2016. John began editing Wikipedia seriously during 2007 and became an administrator in November 2009.
Discuss this newsletter • Subscribe • Archive

13:36, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

WikiProject Genealogy - newsletter No.1

Newsletter Nr 1 for WikiProject Genealogy (and Wikimedia genealogy project on Meta)

Participation:

This is the very first newsletter sent by mass mail to members in Wikipedia:WikiProject Genealogy, to everyone who voted a support for establishing a potential Wikimedia genealogy project on meta, and anyone who during the years showed an interest in genealogy on talk pages and likewise.

(To discontinue receiving Project Genealogy newsletters, see below)

Progress report:

Since the Projects very first edit 9 december 2002 by User:Dan Koehl, which eventually became the WikiProject Genealogy, different templates were developed, and the portal Portal:Genealogy was founded by User:Michael A. White in 2008. Over the years a number of articles has been written, with more or less association to genealogy. And, very exciting, there is a proposal made on Meta by User:Another Believer to found a new Wikimedia Genealogy Project, read more at Meta; Wikimedia genealogy project where you also can support the creation with your vote, in case you havnt done so already.

Future:

The future of the Genealogy project on the English Wikipedia, and a potential creation of a new Wikimedia Genealogy Project, is something where you can make a an input.

You can

Cheers from your WikiProject Genealogy founder and coordinator Dan Koehl

To discontinue receiving Project Genealogy newsletters, please remove your name from our mailing list.
Newsletter delivered by MediaWiki message delivery Dan Koehl (talk) 22:28, 6 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Happy First Edit Day

Happy First Edit Day, Angela, from the Wikipedia Birthday Committee! Have a great day! Chris Troutman (talk) 02:39, 21 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – March 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2017).

Administrator changes

Amortias • Deckiller • BU Rob13
Ronnotel • Islander • Chamal N • Isomorphic • Keeper76 • Lord Voldemort • Shereth • Bdesham • Pjacobi

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • A recent query shows that only 16% of administrators on the English Wikipedia have enabled two-factor authentication. If you haven't already enabled it please consider doing so.
  • Cookie blocks should be deployed to the English Wikipedia soon. This will extend the current autoblock system by setting a cookie for each block, which will then autoblock the user after they switch accounts under a new IP.
  • A bot will now automatically place a protection template on protected pages when admins forget to do so.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 05:14, 1 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – April 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2017).

Administrator changes

added TheDJ
removed Xnuala • CJ • Oldelpaso • Berean Hunter • Jimbo Wales • Andrew c • Karanacs • Modemac • Scott

Guideline and policy news

  • Following a discussion on the backlog of unpatrolled files, consensus was found to create a new user right for autopatrolling file uploads. Implementation progress can be tracked on Phabricator.
  • The BLPPROD grandfather clause, which stated that unreferenced biographies of living persons were only eligible for proposed deletion if they were created after March 18, 2010, has been removed following an RfC.
  • An RfC has closed with consensus to allow proposed deletion of files. The implementation process is ongoing.
  • After an unsuccessful proposal to automatically grant IP block exemption, consensus was found to relax the criteria for granting the user right from needing it to wanting it.

Technical news

  • After a recent RfC, moved pages will soon be featured in a queue similar to Special:NewPagesFeed and require patrolling. Moves by administrators, page movers, and autopatrolled editors will be automatically marked as patrolled.
  • Cookie blocks have been deployed. This extends the current autoblock system by setting a cookie for each block, which will then autoblock the user if they switch accounts, even under a new IP.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:54, 1 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – May 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2017).

Administrator changes

added Karanacs • Berean Hunter • GoldenRing • Dlohcierekim
removed Gdr • Tyrenius • JYolkowski • Longhair • Master Thief Garrett • Aaron Brenneman • Laser brain • JzG • Dragons flight

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Miscellaneous

  • Following an RfC, the editing restrictions page is now split into a list of active restrictions and an archive of those that are old or on inactive accounts. Make sure to check both pages if searching for a restriction.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:19, 2 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Capital of Holland listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Capital of Holland. Since you had some involvement with the Capital of Holland redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion if you have not already done so. Thryduulf (talk) 23:26, 20 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – June 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2017).

Administrator changes

added Doug Bell • Dennis Brown • Clpo13 • ONUnicorn
removed ThaddeusB • Yandman • Bjarki S • OldakQuill • Shyam • Jondel • Worm That Turned

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:40, 1 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – July 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2017).

Administrator changes

added Happyme22 • Dragons flight
removed Zad68

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Miscellaneous

  • A newly revamped database report can help identify users who may be eligible to be autopatrolled.
  • A potentially compromised account from 2001–2002 attempted to request resysop. Please practice appropriate account security by using a unique password for Wikipedia, and consider enabling two-factor authentication. Currently around 17% of admins have enabled 2FA, up from 16% in February 2017.
  • Did you know: On 29 June 2017, there were 1,261 administrators on the English Wikipedia – the exact number of administrators as there were ten years ago on 29 June 2007. Since that time, the English Wikipedia has grown from 1.85 million articles to over 5.43 million.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:59, 6 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 2 – 13 July 2017

Facto Post – Issue 2 – 13 July 2017

Editorial: Core models and topics

Wikimedians interest themselves in everything under the sun — and then some. Discussion on "core topics" may, oddly, be a fringe activity, and was popular here a decade ago.

The situation on Wikidata today does resemble the halcyon days of 2006 of the English Wikipedia. The growth is there, and the reliability and stylistic issues are not yet pressing in on the project. Its Berlin conference at the end of October will have five years of achievement to celebrate. Think Wikimania Frankfurt 2005.

Progress must be made, however, on referencing "core facts". This has two parts: replacing "imported from Wikipedia" in referencing by external authorities; and picking out statements, such as dates and family relationships, that must not only be reliable but be seen to be reliable.

In addition, there are many properties on Wikidata lacking a clear data model. An emerging consensus may push to the front key sourcing and biomedical properties as requiring urgent attention. Wikidata's "manual of style" is currently distributed over thousands of discussions. To make it coalesce, work on such a core is needed.


Editor Charles Matthews. Please leave feedback for him.
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Administrators' newsletter – August 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2017).

Administrator changes

added Anarchyte • GeneralizationsAreBad • Cullen328 (first RfA to reach WP:300)
removed Cprompt • Rockpocket • Rambo's Revenge • Animum • TexasAndroid • Chuck SMITH • MikeLynch • Crazytales • Ad Orientem

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:11, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 3 – 11 August 2017

Facto Post – Issue 3 – 11 August 2017

Wikimania report

Interviewed by Facto Post at the hackathon, Lydia Pintscher of Wikidata said that the most significant recent development is that Wikidata now accounts for one third of Wikimedia edits. And the essential growth of human editing.

Internet-In-A-Box

Impressive development work on Internet-in-a-Box featured in the WikiMedFoundation annual conference on Thursday. Hardware is Raspberry Pi, running Linux and the Kiwix browser. It can operate as a wifi hotspot and support a local intranet in parts of the world lacking phone signal. The medical use case is for those delivering care, who have smartphones but have to function in clinics in just such areas with few reference resources. Wikipedia medical content can be served to their phones, and power supplied by standard lithium battery packages.

Yesterday Katherine Maher unveiled the draft Wikimedia 2030 strategy, featuring a picturesque metaphor, "roads, bridges and villages". Here "bridges" could do with illustration. Perhaps it stands for engineering round or over the obstacles to progress down the obvious highways. Internet-in-a-Box would then do fine as an example.

"Bridging the gap" explains a take on that same metaphor, with its human component. If you are at Wikimania, come talk to WikiFactMine at its stall in the Community Village, just by the 3D-printed display for Bassel Khartabil; come hear T Arrow talk at 3 pm today in Drummond West, Level 3.

  • Plaudit for the Medical Wikipedia app, content that is loaded into Internet-In-A-Box with other material, such as per-country documentation.
Editor Charles Matthews. Please leave feedback for him.
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:55, 12 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – September 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2017).

Administrator changes

added Nakon • Scott
removed Sverdrup • Thespian • Elockid • James086 • Ffirehorse • Celestianpower • Boing! said Zebedee

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • You will now get a notification when someone tries to log in to your account and fails. If they try from a device that has logged into your account before, you will be notified after five failed attempts. You can also set in your preferences to get an email when someone logs in to your account from a new device or IP address, which may be encouraged for admins and accounts with sensitive permissions.
  • Syntax highlighting is now available as a beta feature (more info). This may assist administrators and template editors when dealing with intricate syntax of high-risk templates and system messages.
  • In your notification preferences, you can now block specific users from pinging you. This functionality will soon be available for Special:EmailUser as well.

Arbitration

  • Applications for CheckUser and Oversight are being accepted by the Arbitration Committee until September 12. Community discussion of the candidates will begin on September 18.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:35, 1 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 4 – 18 September 2017

Facto Post – Issue 4 – 18 September 2017

Editorial: Conservation data

The IUCN Red List update of 14 September led with a threat to North American ash trees. The International Union for Conservation of Nature produces authoritative species listings that are peer-reviewed. Examples used as metonyms for loss of species and biodiversity, and discussion of extinction rates, are the usual topics covered in the media to inform us about this area. But actual data matters.

Dorstenia elata, a critically endangered South American herb, contained in Moraceae, the family of figs and mulberries

Clearly, conservation work depends on decisions about what should be done, and where. While animals, particularly mammals, are photogenic, species numbers run into millions. Plant species lie at the base of typical land-based food chains, and vegetation is key to the habitats of most animals.

ContentMine dictionaries, for example as tabulated at d:Wikidata:WikiFactMine/Dictionary list, enable detailed control of queries about endangered species, in their taxonomic context. To target conservation measures properly, species listings running into the thousands are not what is needed: range maps showing current distribution are. Between the will to act, and effective steps taken, the services of data handling are required. There is now no reason at all why Wikidata should not take up the burden.

Editor Charles Matthews. Please leave feedback for him.
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 14:46, 18 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – October 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2017).

Administrator changes

added Boing! said Zebedee • Ansh666 • Ad Orientem
removed Tonywalton • AmiDaniel • Silence • BanyanTree • Magioladitis • Vanamonde93 • Mr.Z-man • Jdavidb • Jakec • Ram-Man • Yelyos • Kurt Shaped Box

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

  • Community consultation on the 2017 candidates for CheckUser and Oversight has concluded. The Arbitration Committee will appoint successful candidates by October 11.
  • A request for comment is open regarding the structure, rules, and procedures of the December 2017 Arbitration Committee election, and how to resolve any issues not covered by existing rules.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:23, 2 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Chortle

Hi Angela, I'd like to recreate Chortle as a page about the comedy website. I wanted to check with you first though as you previously deleted the original in 2006. My thinking is that the publishing environment has changed in the years since. Chortle is now nearly 20 years old and is the recognised comedy website of record for the UK. It runs the Chortle Awards (which might be a candidate to merge into the recreated page) and is a vital part of the British arts media infrastructure. It is particularly active during the Edinburgh Festival Fringe (which is where my interest comes in - I'm working on expanding that topic). The current page redirects to Laughter but most of the pages that link to it are actually attempting to reference the website. Would you have any objections to me recreating the page? Peaky76 (talk) 17:05, 13 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Peaky76. I don't think I was involved in that deletion. You'd need to see whether it meets WP:WEB. Angela (talk) 06:36, 14 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, Angela, my mistake. It looks like you deleted an earlier version of the page which had little content. That discussion is from later the same year. It definitely now meets WP:WEB in my view. I will go ahead and recreate with suitable commentary on the talk page. Thanks. Peaky76 (talk) 09:06, 14 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'm being harassed by editor EddieHugh, please help me.....

Hello Wikipedia Administrator,

I've been trying for days now to reason with an editor. He's obsessed with removing my actual fact history as one of the premier saxophonist in Jazz. Two previous editors approved my article Robert Stewart (saxophonist) almost a year ago now. EddieHugh has come and attempted to delete most of my actual fact history with over 100 citations in the article as evidence. My talk page is filled with my attempts to reason with him and resolve without issue. But, I need the help of an authority as soon as possible. I sincerely thank you for your time. Professor Reason (talk) 00:31, 15 October 2017 (UTC) Professor Reason (talk) 00:31, 15 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Angela, you can read all about it at Talk:Robert Stewart (saxophonist), plus bits at User talk:Professorreason and User talk:EddieHugh. There's also an ongoing case at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring. EddieHugh (talk) 10:20, 15 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]
FYI the same note was placed on several other user talk pages. I took it seriously and penned a long, kind reply. You need not bother. The user has been indeffed, for good reason. --MelanieN (talk) 02:33, 16 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 5 – 17 October 2017

Facto Post – Issue 5 – 17 October 2017

Editorial: Annotations

Annotation is nothing new. The glossators of medieval Europe annotated between the lines, or in the margins of legal manuscripts of texts going back to Roman times, and created a new discipline. In the form of web annotation, the idea is back, with texts being marked up inline, or with a stand-off system. Where could it lead?

1495 print version of the Digesta of Justinian, with the annotations of the glossator Accursius from the 13th century

ContentMine operates in the field of text and data mining (TDM), where annotation, simply put, can add value to mined text. It now sees annotation as a possible advance in semi-automation, the use of human judgement assisted by bot editing, which now plays a large part in Wikidata tools. While a human judgement call of yes/no, on the addition of a statement to Wikidata, is usually taken as decisive, it need not be. The human assent may be passed into an annotation system, and stored: this idea is standard on Wikisource, for example, where text is considered "validated" only when two different accounts have stated that the proof-reading is correct. A typical application would be to require more than one person to agree that what is said in the reference translates correctly into the formal Wikidata statement. Rejections are also potentially useful to record, for machine learning.

As a contribution to data integrity on Wikidata, annotation has much to offer. Some "hard cases" on importing data are much more difficult than average. There are for example biographical puzzles: whether person A in one context is really identical with person B, of the same name, in another context. In science, clinical medicine require special attention to sourcing (WP:MEDRS), and is challenging in terms of connecting findings with the methodology employed. Currently decisions in areas such as these, on Wikipedia and Wikidata, are often made ad hoc. In particular there may be no audit trail for those who want to check what is decided.

Annotations are subject to a World Wide Web Consortium standard, and behind the terminology constitute a simple JSON data structure. What WikiFactMine proposes to do with them is to implement the MEDRS guideline, as a formal algorithm, on bibliographical and methodological data. The structure will integrate with those inputs the human decisions on the interpretation of scientific papers that underlie claims on Wikidata. What is added to Wikidata will therefore be supported by a transparent and rigorous system that documents decisions.

An example of the possible future scope of annotation, for medical content, is in the first link below. That sort of detailed abstract of a publication can be a target for TDM, adds great value, and could be presented in machine-readable form. You are invited to discuss the detailed proposal on Wikidata, via its talk page.

Editor Charles Matthews. Please leave feedback for him.
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 08:45, 17 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – November 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2017).

Administrator changes

added Longhair • Megalibrarygirl • TonyBallioni • Vanamonde93
removed Allen3 • Eluchil404 • Arthur Rubin • Bencherlite

Technical news

Arbitration

Obituaries

  • The Wikipedia community has recently learned that Allen3 (William Allen Peckham) passed away on December 30, 2016, the same day as JohnCD. Allen began editing in 2005 and became an administrator that same year.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:49, 2 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 6 – 15 November 2017

Facto Post – Issue 6 – 15 November 2017

WikidataCon Berlin 28–9 October 2017

WikidataCon 2017 group photo

Under the heading rerum causas cognescere, the first ever Wikidata conference got under way in the Tagesspiegel building with two keynotes, One was on YAGO, about how a knowledge base conceived ten years ago if you assume automatic compilation from Wikipedia. The other was from manager Lydia Pintscher, on the "state of the data". Interesting rumours flourished: the mix'n'match tool and its 600+ datasets, mostly in digital humanities, to be taken off the hands of its author Magnus Manske by the WMF; a Wikibase incubator site is on its way. Announcements came in talks: structured data on Wikimedia Commons is scheduled to make substantive progress by 2019. The lexeme development on Wikidata is now not expected to make the Wiktionary sites redundant, but may facilitate automated compilation of dictionaries.

WD-FIST explained

And so it went, with five strands of talks and workshops, through to 11 pm on Saturday. Wikidata applies to GLAM work via metadata. It may be used in education, raises issues such as author disambiguation, and lends itself to different types of graphical display and reuse. Many millions of SPARQL queries are run on the site every day. Over the summer a large open science bibliography has come into existence there.

Wikidata's fifth birthday party on the Sunday brought matters to a close. See a dozen and more reports by other hands.

Editor Charles Matthews. Please leave feedback for him.
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:02, 15 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – December 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2017).

Administrator changes

added Joe Roe
readded JzG
removed Ericorbit • Perceval • Thingg • Tristanb • Violetriga

Guideline and policy news

  • Following a request for comment, a new section has been added to the username policy which disallows usernames containing emoji, emoticons or otherwise "decorative" usernames, and usernames that use any non-language symbols. Administrators should discuss issues related to these types of usernames before blocking.

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

  • Over the last few months, several users have reported backlogs that require administrator attention at WP:ANI, with the most common backlogs showing up on WP:SPI, WP:AIV and WP:RFPP. It is requested that all administrators take some time during this month to help clear backlogs wherever possible. It should be noted that AIV reports are not always valid; however, they still need to be cleared, which may include needing to remind users on what qualifies as vandalism.
  • The Wikimedia Foundation Community health initiative is conducting a survey for English Wikipedia contributors on their experience and satisfaction level with Administrator’s Noticeboard/Incidents. This survey will be integral to gathering information about how this noticeboard works (i.e. which problems it deals with well and which problems it struggles with). If you would like to take this survey, please sign up on this page, and a link for the survey will be emailed to you via Special:EmailUser.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:57, 2 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

ArbCom 2017 election voter message

Hello, Angela. Voting in the 2017 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 10 December. All users who registered an account before Saturday, 28 October 2017, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Wednesday, 1 November 2017 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2017 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:42, 3 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 7 – 15 December 2017

Facto Post – Issue 7 – 15 December 2017

A new bibliographical landscape

At the beginning of December, Wikidata items on individual scientific articles passed the 10 million mark. This figure contrasts with the state of play in early summer, when there were around half a million. In the big picture, Wikidata is now documenting the scientific literature at a rate that is about eight times as fast as papers are published. As 2017 ends, progress is quite evident.

Behind this achievement are a technical advance (fatameh), and bots that do the lifting. Much more than dry migration of metadata is potentially involved, however. If paper A cites paper B, both papers having an item, a link can be created on Wikidata, and the information presented to both human readers, and machines. This cross-linking is one of the most significant aspects of the scientific literature, and now a long-sought open version is rapidly being built up.

The effort for the lifting of copyright restrictions on citation data of this kind has had real momentum behind it during 2017. WikiCite and the I4OC have been pushing hard, with the result that on CrossRef over 50% of the citation data is open. Now the holdout publishers are being lobbied to release rights on citations.

But all that is just the beginning. Topics of papers are identified, authors disambiguated, with significant progress on the use of the four million ORCID IDs for researchers, and proposals formulated to identify methodology in a machine-readable way. P4510 on Wikidata has been introduced so that methodology can sit comfortably on items about papers.

More is on the way. OABot applies the unpaywall principle to Wikipedia referencing. It has been proposed that Wikidata could assist WorldCat in compiling the global history of book translation. Watch this space.

And make promoting #1lib1ref one of your New Year's resolutions. Happy holidays, all!

November 2017 map of geolocated Wikidata items, made by Addshore
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see below.
Editor Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him. Back numbers are here.
Reminder: WikiFactMine pages on Wikidata are at WD:WFM.
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 14:54, 15 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – January 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (December 2017).

Administrator changes

added Muboshgu
readded Anetode • Laser brain • Worm That Turned
removed None

Bureaucrat changes

readded Worm That Turned

Guideline and policy news

  • A request for comment is in progress to determine whether the administrator policy should be amended to require disclosure of paid editing activity at WP:RFA and to prohibit the use of administrative tools as part of paid editing activity, with certain exceptions.

Technical news

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:37, 3 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Sydney meetup

Short notice but there will be a meetup in Sydney on the 13 January 2018 at 6:30pm, still looking for a venue and open to suggestions. I hope you're able to make it but understand that this is very short notice. Bidgee (talk) 20:41, 10 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 8 – 15 January 2018

Facto Post – Issue 8 – 15 January 2018

Metadata on the March

From the days of hard-copy liner notes on music albums, metadata have stood outside a piece or file, while adding to understanding of where it comes from, and some of what needs to be appreciated about its content. In the GLAM sector, the accumulation of accurate metadata for objects is key to the mission of an institution, and its presentation in cataloguing.

Today Wikipedia turns 17, with worlds still to conquer. Zooming out from the individual GLAM object to the ontology in which it is set, one such world becomes apparent: GLAMs use custom ontologies, and those introduce massive incompatibilities. From a recent article by sadads, we quote the observation that "vocabularies needed for many collections, topics and intellectual spaces defy the expectations of the larger professional communities." A job for the encyclopedist, certainly. But the data-minded Wikimedian has the advantages of Wikidata, starting with its multilingual data, and facility with aliases. The controlled vocabulary — sometimes referred to as a "thesaurus" as term of art — simplifies search: if a "spade" must be called that, rather than "shovel", it is easier to find all spade references. That control comes at a cost.

SVG pedestrian crosses road
Zebra crossing/crosswalk, Singapore

Case studies in that article show what can lie ahead. The schema crosswalk, in jargon, is a potential answer to the GLAM Babel of proliferating and expanding vocabularies. Even if you have no interest in Wikidata as such, simply vocabularies V and W, if both V and W are matched to Wikidata, then a "crosswalk" arises from term v in V to w in W, whenever v and w both match to the same item d in Wikidata.

For metadata mobility, match to Wikidata. It's apparently that simple: infrastructure requirements have turned out, so far, to be challenges that can be met.

To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see below.
Editor Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him. Back numbers are here.
Reminder: WikiFactMine pages on Wikidata are at WD:WFM.
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 12:38, 15 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Robert William Thomson (journalist) listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Robert William Thomson (journalist). Since you had some involvement with the Robert William Thomson (journalist) redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion if you have not already done so. --Animalparty! (talk) 02:41, 23 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – February 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2018).

Administrator changes

added None
removed Blurpeace • Dana boomer • Deltabeignet • Denelson83 • Grandiose • Salvidrim! • Ymblanter

Guideline and policy news

  • An RfC has closed with a consensus that candidates at WP:RFA must disclose whether they have ever edited for pay and that administrators may never use administrative tools as part of any paid editing activity, except when they are acting as a Wikipedian-in-Residence or when the payment is made by the Wikimedia Foundation or an affiliate of the WMF.
  • Editors responding to threats of harm can now contact the Wikimedia Foundation's emergency address by using Special:EmailUser/Emergency. If you don't have email enabled on Wikipedia, directly contacting the emergency address using your own email client remains an option.

Technical news

  • A tag will now be automatically applied to edits that blank a page, turn a page into a redirect, remove/replace almost all content in a page, undo an edit, or rollback an edit. These edits were previously denoted solely by automatic edit summaries.

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:51, 4 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]


Facto Post – Issue 9 – 5 February 2018

Facto Post – Issue 9 – 5 February 2018
m:Grants:Project/ScienceSource is the new ContentMine proposal: please take a look.

Wikidata as Hub

One way of looking at Wikidata relates it to the semantic web concept, around for about as long as Wikipedia, and realised in dozens of distributed Web institutions. It sees Wikidata as supplying central, encyclopedic coverage of linked structured data, and looks ahead to greater support for "federated queries" that draw together information from all parts of the emerging network of websites.

Another perspective might be likened to a photographic negative of that one: Wikidata as an already-functioning Web hub. Over half of its properties are identifiers on other websites. These are Wikidata's "external links", to use Wikipedia terminology: one type for the DOI of a publication, another for the VIAF page of an author, with thousands more such. Wikidata links out to sites that are not nominally part of the semantic web, effectively drawing them into a larger system. The crosswalk possibilities of the systematic construction of these links was covered in Issue 8.

Wikipedia:External links speaks of them as kept "minimal, meritable, and directly relevant to the article." Here Wikidata finds more of a function. On viaf.org one can type a VIAF author identifier into the search box, and find the author page. The Wikidata Resolver tool, these days including Open Street Map, Scholia etc., allows this kind of lookup. The hub tool by maxlath takes a major step further, allowing both lookup and crosswalk to be encoded in a single URL.

To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see below.
Editor Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him. Back numbers are here.
Reminder: WikiFactMine pages on Wikidata are at WD:WFM.
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:50, 5 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – March 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2018).

Administrator changes

added Lourdes†
removed AngelOfSadness • Bhadani • Chris 73 • Coren • Friday • Midom • Mike V
† Lourdes has requested that her admin rights be temporarily removed, pending her return from travel.

Guideline and policy news

  • The autoconfirmed article creation trial (ACTRIAL) is scheduled to end on 14 March 2018. The results of the research collected can be read on Meta Wiki.
  • Community ban discussions must now stay open for at least 24 hours prior to being closed.
  • A change to the administrator inactivity policy has been proposed. Under the proposal, if an administrator has not used their admin tools for a period of five years and is subsequently desysopped for inactivity, the administrator would have to file a new RfA in order to regain the tools.
  • A change to the banning policy has been proposed which would specify conditions under which a repeat sockmaster may be considered de facto banned, reducing the need to start a community ban discussion for these users.

Technical news

  • CheckUsers are now able to view private data such as IP addresses from the edit filter log, e.g. when the filter prevents a user from creating an account. Previously, this information was unavailable to CheckUsers because access to it could not be logged.
  • The edit filter has a new feature contains_all that edit filter managers may use to check if one or more strings are all contained in another given string.

Miscellaneous

Obituaries

  • Bhadani (Gangadhar Bhadani) passed away on 8 February 2018. Bhadani joined Wikipedia in March 2005 and became an administrator in September 2005. While he was active, Bhadani was regarded as one of the most prolific Wikipedians from India.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:00, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 10 – 12 March 2018

Facto Post – Issue 10 – 12 March 2018

Milestone for mix'n'match

Around the time in February when Wikidata clicked past item Q50000000, another milestone was reached: the mix'n'match tool uploaded its 1000th dataset. Concisely defined by its author, Magnus Manske, it works "to match entries in external catalogs to Wikidata". The total number of entries is now well into eight figures, and more are constantly being added: a couple of new catalogs each day is normal.

Since the end of 2013, mix'n'match has gradually come to play a significant part in adding statements to Wikidata. Particularly in areas with the flavour of digital humanities, but datasets can of course be about practically anything. There is a catalog on skyscrapers, and two on spiders.

These days mix'n'match can be used in numerous modes, from the relaxed gamified click through a catalog looking for matches, with prompts, to the fantastically useful and often demanding search across all catalogs. I'll type that again: you can search 1000+ datasets from the simple box at the top right. The drop-down menu top left offers "creation candidates", Magnus's personal favourite. m:Mix'n'match/Manual for more.

For the Wikidatan, a key point is that these matches, however carried out, add statements to Wikidata if, and naturally only if, there is a Wikidata property associated with the catalog. For everyone, however, the hands-on experience of deciding of what is a good match is an education, in a scholarly area, biographical catalogs being particularly fraught. Underpinning recent rapid progress is an open infrastructure for scraping and uploading.

Congratulations to Magnus, our data Stakhanovite!

3D printing
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see below.
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Reminder: WikiFactMine pages on Wikidata are at WD:WFM.
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 12:26, 12 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – April 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2018).

Administrator changes

added 331dot • Cordless Larry • ClueBot NG
removed Gogo Dodo • Pb30 • Sebastiankessel • Seicer • SoLando

Guideline and policy news

  • Administrators who have been desysopped due to inactivity are now required to have performed at least one (logged) administrative action in the past 5 years in order to qualify for a resysop without going through a new RfA.
  • Editors who have been found to have engaged in sockpuppetry on at least two occasions after an initial indefinite block, for whatever reason, are now automatically considered banned by the community without the need to start a ban discussion.
  • The notability guideline for organizations and companies has been substantially rewritten following the closure of this request for comment. Among the changes, the guideline more clearly defines the sourcing requirements needed for organizations and companies to be considered notable.
  • The six-month autoconfirmed article creation trial (ACTRIAL) ended on 14 March 2018. The post-trial research report has been published. A request for comment is now underway to determine whether the restrictions from ACTRIAL should be implemented permanently.

Technical news

Arbitration

  • The Arbitration Committee is considering a change to the discretionary sanctions procedures which would require an editor to appeal a sanction to the community at WP:AE or WP:AN prior to appealing directly to the Arbitration Committee at WP:ARCA.

Miscellaneous

  • A discussion has closed which concluded that administrators are not required to enable email, though many editors suggested doing so as a matter of best practice.
  • The Foundations' Anti-Harassment Tools team has released the Interaction Timeline. This shows a chronologic history for two users on pages where they have both made edits, which may be helpful in identifying sockpuppetry and investigating editing disputes.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:23, 2 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 11 – 9 April 2018

Facto Post – Issue 11 – 9 April 2018

The 100 Skins of the Onion

Open Citations Month, with its eminently guessable hashtag, is upon us. We should be utterly grateful that in the past 12 months, so much data on which papers cite which other papers has been made open, and that Wikidata is playing its part in hosting it as "cites" statements. At the time of writing, there are 15.3M Wikidata items that can do that.

Pulling back to look at open access papers in the large, though, there is is less reason for celebration. Access in theory does not yet equate to practical access. A recent LSE IMPACT blogpost puts that issue down to "heterogeneity". A useful euphemism to save us from thinking that the whole concept doesn't fall into the realm of the oxymoron.

Some home truths: aggregation is not content management, if it falls short on reusability. The PDF file format is wedded to how humans read documents, not how machines ingest them. The salami-slicer is our friend in the current downloading of open access papers, but for a better metaphor, think about skinning an onion, laboriously, 100 times with diminishing returns. There are of the order of 100 major publisher sites hosting open access papers, and the predominant offer there is still a PDF.

Red onion cross section

From the discoverability angle, Wikidata's bibliographic resources combined with the SPARQL query are superior in principle, by far, to existing keyword searches run over papers. Open access content should be managed into consistent HTML, something that is currently strenuous. The good news, such as it is, would be that much of it is already in XML. The organisational problem of removing further skins from the onion, with sensible prioritisation, is certainly not insuperable. The CORE group (the bloggers in the LSE posting) has some answers, but actually not all that is needed for the text and data mining purposes they highlight. The long tail, or in other words the onion heart when it has become fiddly beyond patience to skin, does call for a pis aller. But the real knack is to do more between the XML and the heart.

To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see below.
Editor Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him. Back numbers are here.
Reminder: WikiFactMine pages on Wikidata are at WD:WFM.
If you wish to receive no further issues of Facto Post, please remove your name from our mailing list. Alternatively, to opt out of all massmessage mailings, you may add Category:Wikipedians who opt out of message delivery to your user talk page.
Newsletter delivered by MediaWiki message delivery

MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:25, 9 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – May 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2018).

Administrator changes

added None
removed Chochopk • Coffee • Gryffindor • Jimp • Knowledge Seeker • Lankiveil • Peridon • Rjd0060

Guideline and policy news

  • The ability to create articles directly in mainspace is now indefinitely restricted to autoconfirmed users.
  • A proposal is being discussed which would create a new "event coordinator" right that would allow users to temporarily add the "confirmed" flag to new user accounts and to create many new user accounts without being hindered by a rate limit.

Technical news

  • AbuseFilter has received numerous improvements, including an OOUI overhaul, syntax highlighting, ability to search existing filters, and a few new functions. In particular, the search feature can be used to ensure there aren't existing filters for what you need, and the new equals_to_any function can be used when checking multiple namespaces. One major upcoming change is the ability to see which filters are the slowest. This information is currently only available to those with access to Logstash.
  • When blocking anonymous users, a cookie will be applied that reloads the block if the user changes their IP. This means in most cases, you may no longer need to do /64 range blocks on residential IPv6 addresses in order to effectively block the end user. It will also help combat abuse from IP hoppers in general. This currently only occurs when hard-blocking accounts.
  • The block notice shown on mobile will soon be more informative and point users to a help page on how to request an unblock, just as it currently does on desktop.
  • There will soon be a calendar widget at Special:Block, making it easier to set expiries for a specific date and time.

Arbitration

Obituaries

  • Lankiveil (Craig Franklin) passed away in mid-April. Lankiveil joined Wikipedia on 12 August 2004 and became an administrator on 31 August 2008. During his time with the Wikimedia community, Lankiveil served as an oversighter for the English Wikipedia and as president of Wikimedia Australia.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:05, 2 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

File permission problem with File:Kirkjubaejarklaustur 1.jpg

Thanks for uploading File:Kirkjubaejarklaustur 1.jpg. I noticed that while you provided a valid copyright licensing tag, there is no proof that the creator of the file has agreed to release it under the given license.

If you are the copyright holder for this media entirely yourself but have previously published it elsewhere (especially online), please either

  • make a note permitting reuse under the CC-BY-SA or another acceptable free license (see this list) at the site of the original publication; or
  • Send an email from an address associated with the original publication to permissions-en@wikimedia.org, stating your ownership of the material and your intention to publish it under a free license. You can find a sample permission letter here. If you take this step, add {{OTRS pending}} to the file description page to prevent premature deletion.

If you did not create it entirely yourself, please ask the person who created the file to take one of the two steps listed above, or if the owner of the file has already given their permission to you via email, please forward that email to permissions-en@wikimedia.org.

If you believe the media meets the criteria at Wikipedia:Non-free content, use a tag such as {{non-free fair use}} or one of the other tags listed at Wikipedia:File copyright tags#Fair use, and add a rationale justifying the file's use on the article or articles where it is included. See Wikipedia:File copyright tags for the full list of copyright tags that you can use.

If you have uploaded other files, consider checking that you have provided evidence that their copyright owners have agreed to license their works under the tags you supplied, too. You can find a list of files you have created in your upload log. Files lacking evidence of permission may be deleted one week after they have been tagged, as described in section F11 of the criteria for speedy deletion. You may wish to read Wikipedia's image use policy. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. Kelly hi! 23:27, 8 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The image was originally copied over from the German Wikipedia before Wikimedia Commons existed. It's now on Commons as File:KirkjubaejarklausturFloor.jpg so I've deleted the local copy. Angela (talk) 00:10, 9 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Melbourne Wikimeetup (June/July)

Melbourne Meetup
See also: Australian events listed at Wikimedia.org.au (or on Facebook)

Hi, I've just made a doodle poll to vote on the best date for the next Wikimeetup in Melbourne (Beer Deluxe, Fed Square). Would be great to see you there. T.Shafee(Evo&Evo)talk 12:36, 23 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Date of next Melbourne meetup decided:

T.Shafee(Evo&Evo)talk 01:30, 10 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 12 – 28 May 2018

Facto Post – Issue 12 – 28 May 2018

ScienceSource funded

The Wikimedia Foundation announced full funding of the ScienceSource grant proposal from ContentMine on May 18. See the ScienceSource Twitter announcement and 60 second video.

A medical canon?

The proposal includes downloading 30,000 open access papers, aiming (roughly speaking) to create a baseline for medical referencing on Wikipedia. It leaves open the question of how these are to be chosen.

The basic criteria of WP:MEDRS include a concentration on secondary literature. Attention has to be given to the long tail of diseases that receive less current research. The MEDRS guideline supposes that edge cases will have to be handled, and the premature exclusion of publications that would be in those marginal positions would reduce the value of the collection. Prophylaxis misses the point that gate-keeping will be done by an algorithm.

Two well-known but rather different areas where such considerations apply are tropical diseases and alternative medicine. There are also a number of potential downloading troubles, and these were mentioned in Issue 11. There is likely to be a gap, even with the guideline, between conditions taken to be necessary but not sufficient, and conditions sufficient but not necessary, for candidate papers to be included. With around 10,000 recognised medical conditions in standard lists, being comprehensive is demanding. With all of these aspects of the task, ScienceSource will seek community help.

OpenRefine logo, courtesy of Google
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see below.
Editor Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him. Back numbers are here.
Reminder: WikiFactMine pages on Wikidata are at WD:WFM. ScienceSource pages will be announced there, and in this mass message.
If you wish to receive no further issues of Facto Post, please remove your name from our mailing list. Alternatively, to opt out of all massmessage mailings, you may add Category:Wikipedians who opt out of message delivery to your user talk page.
Newsletter delivered by MediaWiki message delivery

MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:16, 28 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – June 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2018).

Administrator changes

added None
removed Al Ameer son • AliveFreeHappy • Cenarium • Lupo • MichaelBillington

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • IP-based cookie blocks should be deployed to English Wikipedia in June. This will cause the block of a logged-out user to be reloaded if they change IPs. This means in most cases, you may no longer need to do /64 range blocks on residential IPv6 addresses in order to effectively block the end user. It will also help combat abuse from IP hoppers in general. For the time being, it only affects users of the desktop interface.
  • The Wikimedia Foundation's Anti-Harassment Tools team will build granular types of blocks in 2018 (e.g. a block from uploading or editing specific pages, categories, or namespaces, as opposed to a full-site block). Feedback on the concept may be left at the talk page.
  • There is now a checkbox on Special:ListUsers to let you see only users in temporary user groups.
  • It is now easier for blocked mobile users to see why they were blocked.

Arbitration

  • A recent technical issue with the Arbitration Committee's spam filter inadvertently caused all messages sent to the committee through Wikipedia (i.e. Special:EmailUser/Arbitration Committee) to be discarded. If you attempted to send an email to the Arbitration Committee via Wikipedia between May 16 and May 31, your message was not received and you are encouraged to resend it. Messages sent outside of these dates or directly to the Arbitration Committee email address were not affected by this issue.

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:59, 1 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 13 – 29 May 2018

Facto Post – Issue 13 – 29 May 2018
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
Respecting MEDRS

Facto Post enters its second year, with a Cambridge Blue (OK, Aquamarine) background, a new logo, but no Cambridge blues. On-topic for the ScienceSource project is a project page here. It contains some case studies on how the WP:MEDRS guideline, for the referencing of articles at all related to human health, is applied in typical discussions.

Close to home also, a template, called {{medrs}} for short, is used to express dissatisfaction with particular references. Technology can help with patrolling, and this Petscan query finds over 450 articles where there is at least one use of the template. Of course the template is merely suggesting there is a possible issue with the reliability of a reference. Deciding the truth of the allegation is another matter.

This maintenance issue is one example of where ScienceSource aims to help. Where the reference is to a scientific paper, its type of algorithm could give a pass/fail opinion on such references. It could assist patrollers of medical articles, therefore, with the templated references and more generally. There may be more to proper referencing than that, indeed: context, quite what the statement supported by the reference expresses, prominence and weight. For that kind of consideration, case studies can help. But an algorithm might help to clear the backlog.

Evidence pyramid leading up to clinical guidelines, from WP:MEDRS
Links
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:19, 29 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – July 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2018).

Administrator changes

added Pbsouthwood • TheSandDoctor
readded Gogo Dodo
removed Andrevan • Doug • EVula • KaisaL • Tony Fox • WilyD

Bureaucrat changes

removed Andrevan • EVula

Guideline and policy news

  • An RfC about the deletion of drafts closed with a consensus to change the wording of WP:NMFD. Specifically, a draft that has been repeatedly resubmitted and declined at AfC without any substantial improvement may be deleted at MfD if consensus determines that it is unlikely to ever meet the requirements for mainspace and it otherwise meets one of the reasons for deletion outlined in the deletion policy.
  • A request for comment closed with a consensus that the {{promising draft}} template cannot be used to indefinitely prevent a WP:G13 speedy deletion nomination.

Technical news

  • Starting on July 9, the WMF Security team, Trust & Safety, and the broader technical community will be seeking input on an upcoming change that will restrict editing of site-wide JavaScript and CSS to a new technical administrators user group. Bureaucrats and stewards will be able to grant this right per a community-defined process. The intention is to reduce the number of accounts who can edit frontend code to those who actually need to, which in turn lessens the risk of malicious code being added that compromises the security and privacy of everyone who accesses Wikipedia. For more information, please review the FAQ.
  • Syntax highlighting has been graduated from a Beta feature on the English Wikipedia. To enable this feature, click the highlighter icon () in your editing toolbar (or under the hamburger menu in the 2017 wikitext editor). This feature can help prevent you from making mistakes when editing complex templates.
  • IP-based cookie blocks should be deployed to English Wikipedia in July (previously scheduled for June). This will cause the block of a logged-out user to be reloaded if they change IPs. This means in most cases, you may no longer need to do /64 range blocks on residential IPv6 addresses in order to effectively block the end user. It will also help combat abuse from IP hoppers in general. For the time being, it only affects users of the desktop interface.

Miscellaneous

  • Currently around 20% of admins have enabled two-factor authentication, up from 17% a year ago. If you haven't already enabled it, please consider doing so. Regardless if you use 2FA, please practice appropriate account security by ensuring your password is secure and unique to Wikimedia.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:22, 3 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

FANDOM

Hello, I’ve noticed you contribute on FANDOM. Do you still edit there? —Heating172 (talk) 19:43, 3 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Rarely. Angela (talk) 00:40, 4 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Why rarely? —H172, 19:47, 3 August 2018
I also noticed you were FANDOM staff. Are you still staff? —H172 Feel free to leave a message!, 19:59,3 August 2018

Facto Post – Issue 14 – 21 July 2018

Facto Post – Issue 14 – 21 July 2018
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
Plugging the gaps – Wikimania report

Officially it is "bridging the gaps in knowledge", with Wikimania 2018 in Cape Town paying tribute to the southern African concept of ubuntu to implement it. Besides face-to-face interactions, Wikimedians do need their power sources.

Hackathon mentoring table wiring

Facto Post interviewed Jdforrester, who has attended every Wikimania, and now works as Senior Product Manager for the Wikimedia Foundation. His take on tackling the gaps in the Wikimedia movement is that "if we were an army, we could march in a column and close up all the gaps". In his view though, that is a faulty metaphor, and it leads to a completely false misunderstanding of the movement, its diversity and different aspirations, and the nature of the work as "fighting" to be done in the open sector. There are many fronts, and as an eventualist he feels the gaps experienced both by editors and by users of Wikimedia content are inevitable. He would like to see a greater emphasis on reuse of content, not simply its volume.

If that may not sound like radicalism, the Decolonizing the Internet conference here organized jointly with Whose Knowledge? can redress the picture. It comes with the claim to be "the first ever conference about centering marginalized knowledge online".

Plugbar buildup at the Hackathon
Links
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 06:10, 21 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – August 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2018).

Administrator changes

added Sro23
readded KaisaL • Ymblanter

Guideline and policy news

  • After a discussion at Meta, a new user group called "interface administrators" (formerly "technical administrator") has been created. Come the end of August, interface admins will be the only users able to edit site-wide JavaScript and CSS pages like MediaWiki:Common.js and MediaWiki:Common.css, or edit other user's personal JavaScript and CSS. The intention is to improve security and privacy by reducing the number of accounts which could be used to compromise the site or another user's account through malicious code. The new user group can be assigned and revoked by bureaucrats. Discussion is ongoing to establish details for implementing the group on the English Wikipedia.
  • Following a request for comment, the WP:SISTER style guideline now states that in the mainspace, interwiki links to Wikinews should only be made as per the external links guideline. This generally means that within the body of an article, you should not link to Wikinews about a particular event that is only a part of the larger topic. Wikinews links in "external links" sections can be used where helpful, but not automatically if an equivalent article from a reliable news outlet could be linked in the same manner.

Technical news

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:31, 5 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 15 – 21 August 2018

Facto Post – Issue 15 – 21 August 2018
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
Neglected diseases
Anti-parasitic drugs being distributed in Côte d'Ivoire
What's a Neglected Disease?, ScienceSource video

To grasp the nettle, there are rare diseases, there are tropical diseases and then there are "neglected diseases". Evidently a rare enough disease is likely to be neglected, but neglected disease these days means a disease not rare, but tropical, and most often infectious or parasitic. Rare diseases as a group are dominated, in contrast, by genetic diseases.

A major aspect of neglect is found in tracking drug discovery. Orphan drugs are those developed to treat rare diseases (rare enough not to have market-driven research), but there is some overlap in practice with the WHO's neglected diseases, where snakebite, a "neglected public health issue", is on the list.

From an encyclopedic point of view, lack of research also may mean lack of high-quality references: the core medical literature differs from primary research, since it operates by aggregating trials. This bibliographic deficit clearly hinders Wikipedia's mission. The ScienceSource project is currently addressing this issue, on Wikidata. Its Wikidata focus list at WD:SSFL is trying to ensure that neglect does not turn into bias in its selection of science papers.

Links
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Administrators' newsletter – September 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2018).

Administrator changes

added None
removed Asterion • Crisco 1492 • KF • Kudpung • Liz • Randykitty • Spartaz
renamed Optimist on the run → Voice of Clam

Interface administrator changes

added Amorymeltzer • Mr. Stradivarius • MusikAnimal • MSGJ • TheDJ • Xaosflux

Guideline and policy news

  • Following a "stop-gap" discussion, six users have temporarily been made interface administrators while discussion is ongoing for a more permanent process for assigning the permission. Interface administrators are now the only editors allowed to edit sitewide CSS and JavaScript pages, as well as CSS/JS pages in another user's userspace. Previously, all administrators had this ability. The right can be granted and revoked by bureaucrats.

Technical news

  • Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 12 September and 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour.
  • Some abuse filter variables have changed. They are now easier to understand for non-experts. The old variables will still work but filter editors are encouraged to replace them with the new ones. You can find the list of changed variables on mediawiki.org. They have a note which says Deprecated. Use ... instead. An example is article_text which is now page_title.
  • Abuse filters can now use how old a page is. The variable is page_age.

Arbitration

  • The Arbitration Committee has resolved to perform a round of Checkuser and Oversight appointments. The usernames of all applicants will be shared with the Functionaries team, and they will be requested to assist in the vetting process. The deadline to submit an application is 23:59 UTC, 12 September, and the candidates that move forward will be published on-wiki for community comments on 18 September.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 23:22, 2 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Sydney meetup

There will be a meetup in Sydney on the 12 of September. More info at Wikipedia:Meetup/Sydney/September 2018. Bidgee (talk) 05:05, 5 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 16 – 30 September 2018

Facto Post – Issue 16 – 30 September 2018
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
The science publishing landscape

In an ideal world ... no, bear with your editor for just a minute ... there would be a format for scientific publishing online that was as much a standard as SI units are for the content. Likewise cataloguing publications would not be onerous, because part of the process would be to generate uniform metadata. Without claiming it could be the mythical free lunch, it might be reasonably be argued that sandwiches can be packaged much alike and have barcodes, whatever the fillings.

The best on offer, to stretch the metaphor, is the meal kit option, in the form of XML. Where scientific papers are delivered as XML downloads, you get all the ingredients ready to cook. But have to prepare the actual meal of slow food yourself. See Scholarly HTML for a recent pass at heading off XML with HTML, in other words in the native language of the Web.

The argument from real life is a traditional mixture of frictional forces, vested interests, and the classic irony of the principle of unripe time. On the other hand, discoverability actually diminishes with the prolific progress of science publishing. No, it really doesn't scale. Wikimedia as movement can do something in such cases. We know from open access, we grok the Web, we have our own horse in the HTML race, we have Wikidata and WikiJournal, and we have the chops to act.

Links
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:57, 30 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – October 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2018).

Administrator changes

added Justlettersandnumbers • L235
removed Bgwhite • HorsePunchKid • J Greb • KillerChihuahua • Rami R • Winhunter

Interface administrator changes

added Cyberpower678 • Deryck Chan • Oshwah • Pharos • Ragesoss • Ritchie333

Oversight changes

removed Guerillero • NativeForeigner • Snowolf • Xeno

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • Partial blocks should be available for testing in October on the Test Wikipedia and the Beta-Cluster. This new feature allows admins to block users from editing specific pages and in the near-future, namespaces and uploading files. You can expect more updates and an invitation to help with testing once it is available.
  • The Foundations' Anti-Harassment Tools team is currently looking for input on how to measure the effectiveness of blocks. This is in particular related to how they will measure the success of the aforementioned partial blocks.
  • Because of a data centre test, you will be able to read but not edit the Wikimedia projects for up to an hour on 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time.

Arbitration

  • The Arbitration Committee has, by motion, amended the procedure on functionary inactivity.
  • The community consultation for 2018 CheckUser and Oversight appointments has concluded. Appointments will be made by October 11.
  • Following a request for comment, the size of the Arbitration Committee will be decreased to 13 arbitrators, starting in 2019. Additionally, the minimum support percentage required to be appointed to a two-year term on ArbCom has been increased to 60%. ArbCom candidates who receive between 50% and 60% support will be appointed to one-year terms instead.
  • Nominations for the 2018 Arbitration Committee Electoral Commission are being accepted until 12 October. These are the editors who help run the ArbCom election smoothly. If you are interested in volunteering for this role, please consider nominating yourself.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:12, 5 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 17 – 29 October 2018

Facto Post – Issue 17 – 29 October 2018
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
Wikidata imaged

Around 2.7 million Wikidata items have an illustrative image. These files, you might say, are Wikimedia's stock images, and if the number is large, it is still only 5% or so of items that have one. All such images are taken from Wikimedia Commons, which has 50 million media files. One key issue is how to expand the stock.

Indeed, there is a tool. WD-FIST exploits the fact that each Wikipedia is differently illustrated, mostly with images from Commons but also with fair use images. An item that has sitelinks but no illustrative image can be tested to see if the linked wikis have a suitable one. This works well for a volunteer who wants to add images at a reasonable scale, and a small amount of SPARQL knowledge goes a long way in producing checklists.

Gran Teatro, Cáceres, Spain, at night

It should be noted, though, that there are currently 53 Wikidata properties that link to Commons, of which P18 for the basic image is just one. WD-FIST prompts the user to add signatures, plaques, pictures of graves and so on. There are a couple of hundred monograms, mostly of historical figures, and this query allows you to view all of them. commons:Category:Monograms and its subcategories provide rich scope for adding more.

And so it is generally. The list of properties linking to Commons does contain a few that concern video and audio files, and rather more for maps. But it contains gems such as P3451 for "nighttime view". Over 1000 of those on Wikidata, but as for so much else, there could be yet more.

Go on. Today is Wikidata's birthday. An illustrative image is always an acceptable gift, so why not add one? You can follow these easy steps: (i) log in at https://tools.wmflabs.org/widar/, (ii) paste the Petscan ID 6263583 into https://tools.wmflabs.org/fist/wdfist/ and click run, and (iii) just add cake.

Birthday logo
Links
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 15:01, 29 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – November 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2018).

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • Partial blocks is now available for testing on the Test Wikipedia. The new functionality allows you to block users from editing specific pages. Bugs may exist and can be reported on the local talk page or on Meta. A discussion regarding deployment to English Wikipedia will be started by community liaisons sometime in the near future.
  • A user script is now available to quickly review unblock requests.
  • The 2019 Community Wishlist Survey is now accepting new proposals until November 11, 2018. The results of this survey will determine what software the Wikimedia Foundation's Community Tech team will work on next year. Voting on the proposals will take place from November 16 to November 30, 2018. Specifically, there is a proposal category for admins and stewards that may be of interest.

Arbitration

  • Eligible editors will be invited to nominate themselves as candidates in the 2018 Arbitration Committee Elections starting on November 4 until November 13. Voting will begin on November 19 and last until December 2.
  • The Arbitration Committee's email address has changed to arbcom-en@wikimedia.org. Other email lists, such as functionaries-en and clerks-l, remain unchanged.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:18, 3 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

3Apes listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect 3Apes. Since you had some involvement with the 3Apes redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion if you have not already done so. Steel1943 (talk) 22:13, 13 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Bookmarklets listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Wikipedia:Bookmarklets. Since you had some involvement with the Wikipedia:Bookmarklets redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion if you have not already done so.  — Mr. Guye (talk) (contribs)  01:57, 14 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

ArbCom 2018 election voter message

Hello, Angela. Voting in the 2018 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 2 December. All users who registered an account before Sunday, 28 October 2018, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Thursday, 1 November 2018 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2018 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:42, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

ArbCom 2018 election voter message

Hello, Angela. Voting in the 2018 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 3 December. All users who registered an account before Sunday, 28 October 2018, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Thursday, 1 November 2018 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2018 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:42, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 18 – 30 November 2018

Facto Post – Issue 18 – 30 November 2018
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
WikiCite issue

GLAM ♥ data — what is a gallery, library, archive or museum without a catalogue? It follows that Wikidata must love librarians. Bibliography supports students and researchers in any topic, but open and machine-readable bibliographic data even more so, outside the silo. Cue the WikiCite initiative, which was meeting in conference this week, in the Bay Area of California.

Wikidata training for librarians at WikiCite 2018

In fact there is a broad scope: "Open Knowledge Maps via SPARQL" and the "Sum of All Welsh Literature", identification of research outputs, Library.Link Network and Bibframe 2.0, OSCAR and LUCINDA (who they?), OCLC and Scholia, all these co-exist on the agenda. Certainly more library science is coming Wikidata's way. That poses the question about the other direction: is more Wikimedia technology advancing on libraries? Good point.

Wikimedians generally are not aware of the tech background that can be assumed, unless they are close to current training for librarians. A baseline definition is useful here: "bash, git and OpenRefine". Compare and contrast with pywikibot, GitHub and mix'n'match. Translation: scripting for automation, version control, data set matching and wrangling in the large, are on the agenda also for contemporary library work. Certainly there is some possible common ground here. Time to understand rather more about the motivations that operate in the library sector.

Links
Account creation is now open on the ScienceSource wiki, where you can see SPARQL visualisations of text mining.
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:20, 30 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – December 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2018).

Administrator changes

readded Al Ameer son • Randykitty • Spartaz
removed Boson • Daniel J. Leivick • Efe • Esanchez7587 • Fred Bauder • Garzo • Martijn Hoekstra • Orangemike

Interface administrator changes

removedDeryck Chan

Guideline and policy news

  • Following a request for comment, the Mediation Committee is now closed and will no longer be accepting case requests.
  • A request for comment is in progress to determine whether members of the Bot Approvals Group should satisfy activity requirements in order to remain in that role.
  • A request for comment is in progress regarding whether to change the administrator inactivity policy, such that administrators "who have made no logged administrative actions for at least 12 months may be desysopped". Currently, the policy states that administrators "who have made neither edits nor administrative actions for at least 12 months may be desysopped".
  • A proposal has been made to temporarily restrict editing of the Main Page to interface administrators in order to mitigate the impact of compromised accounts.

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

  • In late November, an attacker compromised multiple accounts, including at least four administrator accounts, and used them to vandalize Wikipedia. If you have ever used your current password on any other website, you should change it immediately. Sharing the same password across multiple websites makes your account vulnerable, especially if your password was used on a website that suffered a data breach. As these incidents have shown, these concerns are not pure fantasies.
  • Wikipedia policy requires administrators to have strong passwords. To further reinforce security, administrators should also consider enabling two-factor authentication. A committed identity can be used to verify that you are the true account owner in the event that your account is compromised and/or you are unable to log in.

Obituaries

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:36, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 19 – 27 December 2018

Facto Post – Issue 19 – 27 December 2018
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
Learning from Zotero

Zotero is free software for reference management by the Center for History and New Media: see Wikipedia:Citing sources with Zotero. It is also an active user community, and has broad-based language support.

Zotero logo

Besides the handiness of Zotero's warehousing of personal citation collections, the Zotero translator underlies the citoid service, at work behind the VisualEditor. Metadata from Wikidata can be imported into Zotero; and in the other direction the zotkat tool from the University of Mannheim allows Zotero bibliographies to be exported to Wikidata, by item creation. With an extra feature to add statements, that route could lead to much development of the focus list (P5008) tagging on Wikidata, by WikiProjects.

Zotero demo video

There is also a large-scale encyclopedic dimension here. The construction of Zotero translators is one facet of Web scraping that has a strong community and open source basis. In that it resembles the less formal mix'n'match import community, and growing networks around other approaches that can integrate datasets into Wikidata, such as the use of OpenRefine.

Looking ahead, the thirtieth birthday of the World Wide Web falls in 2019, and yet the ambition to make webpages routinely readable by machines can still seem an ever-retreating mirage. Wikidata should not only be helping Wikimedia integrate its projects, an ongoing process represented by Structured Data on Commons and lexemes. It should also be acting as a catalyst to bring scraping in from the cold, with institutional strengths as well as resourceful code.

Links
Diversitech, the latest ContentMine grant application to the Wikimedia Foundation, is in its community review stage until January 2.
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:08, 27 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – January 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (December 2018).

Guideline and policy news

  1. G14 (new): Disambiguation pages that disambiguate only zero or one existing pages are now covered under the new G14 criterion (discussion). This is {{db-disambig}}; the text is unchanged and candidates may be found in Category:Candidates for speedy deletion as unnecessary disambiguation pages.
  2. R4 (new): Redirects in the file namespace (and no file links) that have the same name as a file or redirect at Commons are now covered under the new R4 criterion (discussion). This is {{db-redircom}}; the text is unchanged.
  3. G13 (expanded): Userspace drafts containing only the default Article Wizard text are now covered under G13 along with other drafts (discussion). Such blank drafts are now eligible after six months rather than one year, and taggers continue to use {{db-blankdraft}}.

Technical news

  • Starting on December 13, the Wikimedia Foundation security team implemented new password policy and requirements. Privileged accounts (administrators, bureaucrats, checkusers, oversighters, interface administrators, bots, edit filter managers/helpers, template editors, et al.) must have a password at least 10 characters in length. All accounts must have a password:
  1. At least 8 characters in length
  2. Not in the 100,000 most popular passwords (defined by the Password Blacklist library)
  3. Different from their username
User accounts not meeting these requirements will be prompted to update their password accordingly. More information is available on MediaWiki.org.
  • Blocked administrators may now block the administrator that blocked them. This was done to mitigate the possibility that a compromised administrator account would block all other active administrators, complementing the removal of the ability to unblock oneself outside of self-imposed blocks. A request for comment is currently in progress to determine whether the blocking policy should be updated regarding this change.
  • {{Copyvio-revdel}} now has a link to open the history with the RevDel checkboxes already filled in.

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

  • Accounts continue to be compromised on a regular basis. Evidence shows this is entirely due to the accounts having the same password that was used on another website that suffered a data breach. If you have ever used your current password on any other website, you should change it immediately.
  • Around 22% of admins have enabled two-factor authentication, up from 20% in June 2018. If you haven't already enabled it, please consider doing so. Regardless of whether you use 2FA, please practice appropriate account security by ensuring your password is secure and unique to Wikimedia.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:38, 1 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 20 – 31 January 2019

Facto Post – Issue 20 – 31 January 2019
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
Everything flows (and certainly data does)

Recently Jimmy Wales has made the point that computer home assistants take much of their data from Wikipedia, one way or another. So as well as getting Spotify to play Frosty the Snowman for you, they may be able to answer the question "is the Pope Catholic?" Possibly by asking for disambiguation (Coptic?).

Amazon Echo device using the Amazon Alexa service in voice search showdown with the Google rival on an Android phone

Headlines about data breaches are now familiar, but the unannounced circulation of information raises other issues. One of those is Gresham's law stated as "bad data drives out good". Wikipedia and now Wikidata have been criticised on related grounds: what if their content, unattributed, is taken to have a higher standing than Wikimedians themselves would grant it? See Wikiquote on a misattribution to Bismarck for the usual quip about "law and sausages", and why one shouldn't watch them in the making.

Wikipedia has now turned 18, so should act like as adult, as well as being treated like one. The Web itself turns 30 some time between March and November this year, per Tim Berners-Lee. If the Knowledge Graph by Google exemplifies Heraclitean Web technology gaining authority, contra GIGO, Wikimedians still have a role in its critique. But not just with the teenage skill of detecting phoniness.

There is more to beating Gresham than exposing the factoid and urban myth, where WP:V does do a great job. Placeholders must be detected, and working with Wikidata is a good way to understand how having one statement as data can blind us to replacing it by a more accurate one. An example that is important to open access is that, firstly, the term itself needs considerable unpacking, because just being able to read material online is a poor relation of "open"; and secondly, trying to get Creative Commons license information into Wikidata shows up issues with classes of license (such as CC-BY) standing for the actual license in major repositories. Detailed investigation shows that "everything flows" exacerbates the issue. But Wikidata can solve it.

Links
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:53, 31 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – February 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2019).

Administrator changes

added Enterprisey • JJMC89
readded BorgQueen
removed Harro5 • Jenks24 • Graft • R. Baley

Interface administrator changes

removedEnterprisey

Guideline and policy news

  • A request for comment is currently open to reevaluate the activity requirements for administrators.
  • Administrators who are blocked have the technical ability to block the administrator who blocked their own account. A recent request for comment has amended the blocking policy to clarify that this ability should only be used in exceptional circumstances, such as account compromises, where there is a clear and immediate need.
  • A request for comment closed with a consensus in favor of deprecating The Sun as a permissible reference, and creating an edit filter to warn users who attempt to cite it.

Technical news

  • A discussion regarding an overhaul of the format and appearance of Wikipedia:Requests for page protection is in progress (permalink). The proposed changes will make it easier to create requests for those who are not using Twinkle. The workflow for administrators at this venue will largely be unchanged. Additionally, there are plans to archive requests similar to how it is done at WP:PERM, where historical records are kept so that prior requests can more easily be searched for.

Miscellaneous

  • Voting in the 2019 Steward elections will begin on 08 February 2019, 14:00 (UTC) and end on 28 February 2019, 13:59 (UTC). The confirmation process of current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automatically check your eligibility to vote.
  • A new IRC bot is available that allows you to subscribe to notifications when specific filters are tripped. This requires that your IRC handle be identified.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:15, 4 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 21 – 28 February 2019

Facto Post – Issue 21 – 28 February 2019
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
What is a systematic review?

Systematic reviews are basic building blocks of evidence-based medicine, surveys of existing literature devoted typically to a definite question that aim to bring out scientific conclusions. They are principled in a way Wikipedians can appreciate, taking a critical view of their sources.

PRISMA flow diagram for a systematic review

Ben Goldacre in 2014 wrote (link below) "[...] : the "information architecture" of evidence based medicine (if you can tolerate such a phrase) is a chaotic, ad hoc, poorly connected ecosystem of legacy projects. In some respects the whole show is still run on paper, like it's the 19th century." Is there a Wikidatan in the house? Wouldn't some machine-readable content that is structured data help?

File:Schittny, Facing East, 2011, Legacy Projects.jpg
2011 photograph by Bernard Schittny of the "Legacy Projects" group

Most likely it would, but the arcana of systematic reviews and how they add value would still need formal handling. The PRISMA standard dates from 2009, with an update started in 2018. The concerns there include the corpus of papers used: how selected and filtered? Now that Wikidata has a 20.9 million item bibliography, one can at least pose questions. Each systematic review is a tagging opportunity for a bibliography. Could that tagging be reproduced by a query, in principle? Can it even be second-guessed by a query (i.e. simulated by a protocol which translates into SPARQL)? Homing in on the arcana, do the inclusion and filtering criteria translate into metadata? At some level they must, but are these metadata explicitly expressed in the articles themselves? The answer to that is surely "no" at this point, but can TDM find them? Again "no", right now. Automatic identification doesn't just happen.

Actually these questions lack originality. It should be noted though that WP:MEDRS, the reliable sources guideline used here for health information, hinges on the assumption that the usefully systematic reviews of biomedical literature can be recognised. Its nutshell summary, normally the part of a guideline with the highest density of common sense, allows literature reviews in general validity, but WP:MEDASSESS qualifies that indication heavily. Process wonkery about systematic reviews definitely has merit.

Links
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:01, 28 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – March 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2019).

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • A new tool is available to help determine if a given IP is an open proxy/VPN/webhost/compromised host.

Arbitration

  • The Arbitration Committee announced two new OTRS queues. Both are meant solely for cases involving private information; other cases will continue to be handled at the appropriate venues (e.g., WP:COIN or WP:SPI).
    • paid-en-wp@wikipedia.org has been set up to receive private evidence related to abusive paid editing.
    • checkuser-en-wp@wikipedia.org has been set up to receive private requests for CheckUser. For instance, requests for IP block exemption for anonymous proxy editing should now be sent to this address instead of the functionaries-en list.

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:12, 4 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 22 – 28 March 2019

Facto Post – Issue 22 – 28 March 2019
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
When in the cloud, do as the APIs do

Half a century ago, it was the era of the mainframe computer, with its air-conditioned room, twitching tape-drives, and appearance in the title of a spy novel Billion-Dollar Brain then made into a Hollywood film. Now we have the cloud, with server farms and the client–server model as quotidian: this text is being typed on a Chromebook.

File:Cloud-API-Logo.svg
Logo of Cloud API on Google Cloud Platform

The term Applications Programming Interface or API is 50 years old, and refers to a type of software library as well as the interface to its use. While a compiler is what you need to get high-level code executed by a mainframe, an API out in the cloud somewhere offers a chance to perform operations on a remote server. For example, the multifarious bots active on Wikipedia have owners who exploit the MediaWiki API.

APIs (called RESTful) that allow for the GET HTTP request are fundamental for what could colloquially be called "moving data around the Web"; from which Wikidata benefits 24/7. So the fact that the Wikidata SPARQL endpoint at query.wikidata.org has a RESTful API means that, in lay terms, Wikidata content can be GOT from it. The programming involved, besides the SPARQL language, could be in Python, younger by a few months than the Web.

Magic words, such as occur in fantasy stories, are wishful (rather than RESTful) solutions to gaining access. You may need to be a linguist to enter Ali Baba's cave or the western door of Moria (French in the case of "Open Sesame", in fact, and Sindarin being the respective languages). Talking to an API requires a bigger toolkit, which first means you have to recognise the tools in terms of what they can do. On the way to the wikt:impactful or polymathic modern handling of facts, one must perhaps take only tactful notice of tech's endemic problem with documentation, and absorb the insightful point that the code in APIs does articulate the customary procedures now in place on the cloud for getting information. As Owl explained to Winnie-the-Pooh, it tells you The Thing to Do.

Links
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:45, 28 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – April 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2019).

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

  • Two more administrator accounts were compromised. Evidence has shown that these attacks, like previous incidents, were due to reusing a password that was used on another website that suffered a data breach. If you have ever used your current password on any other website, you should change it immediately. All admins are strongly encouraged to enable two-factor authentication, please consider doing so. Please always practice appropriate account security by ensuring your password is secure and unique to Wikimedia.
  • As a reminder, according to WP:NOQUORUM, administrators looking to close or relist an AfD should evaluate a nomination that has received few or no comments as if it were a proposed deletion (PROD) prior to determining whether it should be relisted.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:56, 7 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Facto Post – Issue 23 – 30 April 2019

Facto Post – Issue 23 – 30 April 2019
The Editor is Charles Matthews, for ContentMine. Please leave feedback for him, on his User talk page.
To subscribe to Facto Post go to Wikipedia:Facto Post mailing list. For the ways to unsubscribe, see the footer.
Back numbers are here.
Completely clouded?
Cloud computing logo

Talk of cloud computing draws a veil over hardware, but also, less obviously but more importantly, obscures such intellectual distinction as matters most in its use. Wikidata begins to allow tasks to be undertaken that were out of easy reach. The facility should not be taken as the real point.

Coming in from another angle, the "executive decision" is more glamorous; but the "administrative decision" should be admired for its command of facts. Think of the attitudes ad fontes, so prevalent here on Wikipedia as "can you give me a source for that?", and being prepared to deal with complicated analyses into specified subcases. Impatience expressed as a disdain for such pedantry is quite understandable, but neither dirty data nor false dichotomies are at all good to have around.

Issue 13 and Issue 21, respectively on WP:MEDRS and systematic reviews, talk about biomedical literature and computing tasks that would be of higher quality if they could be made more "administrative". For example, it is desirable that the decisions involved be consistent, explicable, and reproducible by non-experts from specified inputs.

What gets clouded out is not impossibly hard to understand. You do need to put together the insights of functional programming, which is a doctrinaire and purist but clearcut approach, with the practicality of office software. Loopless computation can be conceived of as a seamless forward march of spreadsheet columns, each determined by the content of previous ones. Very well: to do a backward audit, when now we are talking about Wikidata, we rely on integrity of data and its scrupulous sourcing: and clearcut case analyses. The MEDRS example forces attention on purge attempts such as Beall's list.

Links
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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:27, 30 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

ArbCom 2019 special circular

Icon of a white exclamation mark within a black triangle
 Administrators must secure their accounts

The Arbitration Committee may require a new RfA if your account is compromised.

View additional information

This message was sent to all administrators following a recent motion. Thank you for your attention. For the Arbitration Committee, Cameron11598 02:30, 4 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Administrator account security (Correction to Arbcom 2019 special circular)

ArbCom would like to apologise and correct our previous mass message in light of the response from the community.

Since November 2018, six administrator accounts have been compromised and temporarily desysopped. In an effort to help improve account security, our intention was to remind administrators of existing policies on account security — that they are required to "have strong passwords and follow appropriate personal security practices." We have updated our procedures to ensure that we enforce these policies more strictly in the future. The policies themselves have not changed. In particular, two-factor authentication remains an optional means of adding extra security to your account. The choice not to enable 2FA will not be considered when deciding to restore sysop privileges to administrator accounts that were compromised.

We are sorry for the wording of our previous message, which did not accurately convey this, and deeply regret the tone in which it was delivered.

For the Arbitration Committee, -Cameron11598 21:03, 4 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – May 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2019).

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • XTools Admin Stats, a tool to list admins by administrative actions, has been revamped to support more types of log entries such as AbuseFilter changes. Two additional tools have been integrated into it as well: Steward Stats and Patroller Stats.

Arbitration

  • In response to the continuing compromise of administrator accounts, the Arbitration Committee passed a motion amending the procedures for return of permissions (diff). In such cases, the committee will review all available information to determine whether the administrator followed "appropriate personal security practices" before restoring permissions; administrators found failing to have adequately done so will not be resysopped automatically. All current administrators have been notified of this change.
  • Following a formal ratification process, the arbitration policy has been amended (diff). Specifically, the two-thirds majority required to remove or suspend an arbitrator now excludes (1) the arbitrator facing suspension or removal, and (2) any inactive arbitrator who does not respond within 30 days to attempts to solicit their feedback on the resolution through all known methods of communication.

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:37, 5 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Invitation to join the Fifteen Year Society

Dear Angela/Archive24,

I'd like to extend a cordial invitation to you to join the Fifteen Year Society, an informal group for editors who've been participating in the Wikipedia project for fifteen years or more. ​

Best regards, Urhixidur (talk) 18:42, 8 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]


¬ listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect ¬. Since you had some involvement with the ¬ redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 22:07, 4 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – June 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2019).

Administrator changes

removed Andonic • Consumed Crustacean • Enigmaman • Euryalus • EWS23 • HereToHelp • Nv8200pa • Peripitus • StringTheory11 • Vejvančický

CheckUser changes

removed Ivanvector

Guideline and policy news

  • An RfC seeks to clarify whether WP:OUTING should include information on just the English Wikipedia or any Wikimedia project.
  • An RfC on WT:RfA concluded that Requests for adminship and bureaucratship are discussions seeking to build consensus.
  • An RfC proposal to make the templates for discussion (TfD) process more like the requested moves (RM) process, i.e. "as a clearinghouse of template discussions", was closed as successful.

Technical news

  • The CSD feature of Twinkle now allows admins to notify page creators of deletion if the page had not been tagged. The default behavior matches that of tagging notifications, and replaces the ability to open the user talk page upon deletion. You can customize which criteria receive notifications in your Twinkle preferences: look for Notify page creator when deleting under these criteria.
  • Twinkle's d-batch (batch delete) feature now supports deleting subpages (and related redirects and talk pages) of each page. The pages will be listed first but use with caution! The und-batch (batch undelete) option can now also restore talk pages.

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 09:48, 8 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Congratulations!!

Happy Adminship from the Birthday Committee

Wishing Angela a very happy adminship anniversary on behalf of the Wikipedia Birthday Committee!

-- Mjs1991 (talk) 02:48, 17 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. :) Angela (talk) 10:08, 17 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Angela/Archive24&oldid=1213643399"