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Archive 5Archive 6Archive 7Archive 8Archive 9Archive 10→Archive 15

Thanks to all

As usual thanks to all for helping get the issue out, with special thanks to @Chris troutman, Bri, and HaeB:. It looks to me like a good issue, it's certainly big enough with 16 pretty large articles. We'll see what the readers think. Smallbones(smalltalk) 02:47, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Big issue - I'm ready, but

@Chris troutman and HaeB: I'm finally ready, except for Recent research. I'm ready to wait on Tillman, but I have to say family matters could turn me into a pumpkin in about 90 minutes (3:30 NYTime) which would last an hour or maybe 2. After that I can still wait, but I wonder if Chris will be available. Please let me know what is best for each of you. I'm somewhat flexible. Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:59, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

@Smallbones: I'll definitely have RR publishable by the publication deadline, per our earlier conversation. (One envisaged contribution is still missing, but we can move it to next month's issue.) Probably also 1 hours before that. I will ping both you and Chris troutman then.
Regards, HaeB (talk) 19:31, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks HaeB, I've been a bit frazzled this issue. Hopefully I gave Chris the same info. Smallbones(smalltalk) 19:39, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
@Smallbones: if Chris isn't, would like like to wait for him, or have someone else publish the issue? I have the rights needed. Are you on IRC? DannyS712 (talk) 22:51, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
@DannyS712: thanks for the offer, but I think everything is starting to come together. HaeB has started his usual uploading of RR (I don't know how long it takes though). Bri is even copyediting above and beyond the call of duty. If we need you, I'll let you know. A couple of general questions though: have you done it before? I personally don't know how to do it, but ultimately, I think we need a backup - everybody needs a break or gets sick, etc. I was mostly out for the last issue. Bri is pretending he's unavailable for this one (joke). So having a backup is a good idea.
But the last thing I want to do is offend, in any way, Chris troutman now. I messed up a couple of ways on the schedule today, so .... Smallbones(smalltalk) 23:05, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
@Smallbones: Haven't done it (though I have run it in dry mode a few times). Also didn't mean to offend anyone, just wanted to put it out there. If you need me, I'll be on IRC for the next few hours. If you want to designate me as a backup, Evad37 can add me to the list of approved users to use the script on a general basis. For today, that isn't needed DannyS712 (talk) 23:08, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
@DannyS712: I'm not on IRC, I think I tried it once and got swamped with stuff. No, I wasn't suggesting that you were offending anybody. We'll see what happens. Smallbones(smalltalk) 23:23, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
@Smallbones: I'm not offended and I hope no one else is, either. It looks like RR needs an evaluation and perhaps we're ready. I'm standing by. Chris Troutman (talk) 23:38, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

@Chris troutman: All ready to go! Smallbones(smalltalk) 23:58, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

@Smallbones: Issue released, tweet out, email sent. Chris Troutman (talk) 02:40, 27 January 2020 (UTC)
Regarding publication backups, one of the most important things might be to make sure we have up-to-date instructions. Is Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Newsroom/Resources#Publication still current?
Regards, HaeB (talk) 03:49, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Archived thread

Does anyone have any advice for what I had posted here [1]? Clovermoss (talk) 02:50, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Sorry it's taken me so long to get back to you. The question is about

Category:Wikipedia Signpost coverage of women and whether CM should update it with articles since they stopped being added in 2015.

  • 1st question - would you or others use the category? The archive search is actually very good, but if you would use it why not?
  • Would somebody consider it sexist - like the controversy 4-5 years ago about Category:American women authors?

I really do like our archives, either by year or the search function.

BTW, @Clovermoss: that was your first Signpost byline, wasn't it? That deserves a barnstar! I'll see if I can find the proper one! Smallbones(smalltalk) 04:08, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

@Smallbones: Yes, this is my first byline. As for the category, I came across it originally while browsing somewhere on WP:WPWIR iirc. I'll try to find the exact place, but I thought that would make updating the category relevant since it hasn't been updated since 2015 and the Signpost has provided coverage since then. Clovermoss (talk) 04:23, 27 January 2020 (UTC)
Fine by me Smallbones(smalltalk) 04:28, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Reader feedback

You can monitor reader comments with the link above. - Bri.public (talk) 20:47, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Traffic report formatting

Answering reader feedback, I tweaked the Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2020-01-27/Traffic report for full width columns. It looks like the Traffic report has always used the narrow display used for most of our articles, but the original Top25, which we copy the body from, uses full width. Any reason we should not go for full-width in The Signpost? I think it makes better use of screen real estate, especially due to the table format used in the Top25. ☆ Bri (talk) 20:10, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Good idea. Maybe we can think of other formatting changes as well, for Traffic report or other articles. Smallbones(smalltalk) 05:54, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Suggestion for the essay for the February issue

Wikipedia:Village stocks. ↠Pine (✉) 06:07, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Interesting Smallbones(smalltalk) 06:21, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Kobe Bryant

See also: Talk:Kobe_Bryant § New_record_for_Wikipedia?

I noticed the Kobe Bryant article was viewed more than 9.5 million times yesterday. Per Wikipedia:Article traffic jumps and Wikipedia:Wikipedia records#Single-day views, this might be a new record? ---Another Believer (Talk) 23:38, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

It looks good to me. This might be a dumb question, but I remember something about Michael Jackson's record and seem to recall that it placed great strains on the servers. Was that just hype, or was there great strain for Kobe, or did the servers just get a whole lot better? Smallbones(smalltalk) 06:35, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
Oh yes, it definitely placed a major strain on the server. I was trying to get on to Wikipedia to read up on the impeachment trial and the page wouldn't load (didn't get an error message, it was just stuck on the loading screen). Then I checked Google.com and it loaded fine so I figured it was another DDoS attack (happens). Then I got a text message that Kobe Bryant died and I immediately thought about when Michael Jackson died and how that broke the internet. After that I tried to load the Main Page again but to be more patient this time and time how long it took to load (it was 1 minute). Checking my text logs against when the TMZ article went up, I found out about 50 minutes after the news first broke, so it was probably even worse before I knew what had happened. TL;DR the servers were not having fun after Kobe died. —pythoncoder (talk | contribs) 21:37, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
As far as I'm aware, Kobe and the server issues were unconnected; the servers were having issues before that news came out. Regarding Michael Jackson and Prince, see my old blog post "The impact of Prince’s death on Wikipedia." :-) Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 22:44, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
18,000,000 page views in two days. Wow. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 23:38, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Multiple day page views

Update for pageviews: It appears that these automatically update if you use February 28 as the ending date. There will be an error message, but the ending date actually used will be the last day that data are available.

Note @David Gerard:'s In focus, crypto article. ~7,000 pageviews. In the Signpost context it looks Kobe-esque to me. Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:48, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Probably because of the off-wiki press(ish) links to the report. Bri.public (talk) 20:34, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
Also linked on reddit. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:55, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
"press(ish)" is precious! In focus is down to 1,200 for day 2
BTW, I'm quite interested in pageviews for the Signpost. It gives us a *very noisy* indication of what our readers are interested in and possibly what we should cover better or more often. But we don't want it to turn us into a series of click-bait articles. I'm much more interested in total pageviews. Nobody should be afraid that their favorite articles are going to get cancelled because they have lower pageviews. There are several reasons to keep "low pageview articles" around.
  • Service to a segment of the community, e.g. recent research (though not really low pageviews), keeping these folks around is important, they are likely very loyal readers, and add to the overall base readership.
  • Service to the overall community, e.g. the basic beat columns - sometimes there's not much happening on a particular beat, and people won't read a column, but sometimes that particular beat will be the most important story in the issue, based on news that came out, perhaps, 4 days before deadline. Regular coverage means we have regular readers specifically interested in that area, a good record of the history of that area, and an up-to-speed reporter when the big news hits.
  • Developing columns - just take time to develop an audience.
  • Variety for variety's sake - readers like variety, so do most reporters
  • Developing reporters - if somebody likes reporting on one area they'll be developing their skills, and may be available when we need them in other areas.

So we're not going for the clickbait, our main focus is service to the community and giving readers what they want to read, and developing the newspaper and our reporters so that we can accomplish the primary goals. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:38, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Multiple day page views

These automatically update by using the end of the month as the ending date. There will be an error message, but the ending date actually used will be the last day that data are available.

The totals are:

  • 33,904 ending Feb. 11, 2020.
  • 41,707 endding Feb, 20, 2020.
  • 48,840 ending Feb. 28, 2020

Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:36, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

Any of this sound funny?

I like the idea of writing something humorous for the paper. Here's a talk page reminisce I wrote recently. Any of it have a kernel of humor in it to you?

Anyways, just had an observation I thought I'd share. I roam around the wiki lately, and I keep seeing names I recognize... It's all the deletionist admins from back in day! Half of them seem to be on arbcom! Kinda making me amused right now. Maybe I'll despair at a later date.
Then I thought about my inclusionist friends who I can't remember without seeing their names. It was just you and DGG (who's some bigwig now) and that's it. Then I saw Dream Focus on this talk page. That's awesome!
Also, your talk page is terrible. Probably all notifications from TTN!
There was a time before I knew you when I would spend all day adding fair use images to lists of episodes. I added hundreds. Then me and User:Matthew would fight Maxim, Black Kite and others with mega reverts and RfCs and tons of other fun stuff. But they finally won. For years and years I got emails saying an image was about to be deleted. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:56, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

How about a communal article where ask people for a humorous response to "if you could block someone and something, what would it be and why? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:26, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Peregrine Fisher, it was made clear by the community not so long ago that to add anything funny to The Signpost is a dangerous occupation. I don't see much very funny about the new Arbcom and its work either, they've had some hard cases to solve right at the beginning of their tenure, but it will be a bonanza for the next issue of the magazine. DGG is probably one of the few really nice 'bigwigs' left on Wikipedia. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 04:29, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
That made me laugh. I don't know what the joke is, but the punchline is "DGG is probably one of the few really nice 'bigwigs' left on Wikipedia." Crack me up! Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

I agree that being a humor columnist for The Signpost can be a dangerous occupation, in particular if you are aiming barbs at specific people or groups, or even if people think you are aiming at them. If we cover something like that, it should be very serious and covered in the news columns with many specific details to back it up. Or perhaps it could be covered in an Op-ed column in depth, but as a general issue, not aimed at a particular person. (Think of our Croatian Op-ed from August(?)). Very pointed humor, as I take yours to be, could possibly get us both thrown off Wikipedia. Thanks for your inquiry. Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:17, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Scope of research reporting

Is research reporting supposed to focus only on articles that directly study Wikipedia, or is there scope for discussing recent research that is not about Wikipedia, but may have implications for us? I was thinking of this recent paper, which may change opinions on verifying non-English sources. buidhe 19:23, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

  • Jackson, Jeffrey L; Kuriyama, Akira; Anton, Andreea; Choi, April; Fournier, Jean-Pascal; Geier, Anne-Kathrin; Jacquerioz, Frederique; Kogan, Dmitry; Scholcoff, Cecilia; Sun, Rao (30 July 2019). "The Accuracy of Google Translate for Abstracting Data From Non–English-Language Trials for Systematic Reviews". Annals of Internal Medicine. 171 (9): 677. doi:10.7326/M19-0891. ISSN 0003-4819.

@Buidhe, HaeB, and Doc James: Ultimately this is a question for HaeB to answer, but I can outline something of an answer. I've pinged Doc James because of the paper's abstract intrinsic interest.

First, it is a very interesting abstract and does have some relation to Wikipedia, though I doubt the word "Wikipedia" is mentioned in the paper. If it did, I suspect that HaeB would consider it. As I understand it there are two classes of research that now go into the Research report: articles directly about Wikipedia and, to a lesser extent, articles that are not really about Wikipedia but use data from Wikipedia to address non-Wiki questions. I'd guess there are some other types of papers that might rarely be considered, e.g. if there was a paper about Twitter or Facebook that examined community health or harassment with a methodology that obviously applies to Wikipedia. That's HaeB's call though.

I'm particularly interested in the question of scope in other of our columns. I consider this question at least every other month for In the media. One example is the Dot.Org takeover by a hedge fund. The first reports did not mention Wikipedia, though it obviously concerned us. The reports were pretty basic at first, not from regular news sources and there wasn't a whole lot to put in the column. At the last minute a news source mentioned Wikipedia in passing, so I think I got a one line "In brief" into ITM. Then this month K. Maher was mentioned as an important person in the "anti-hedge fund" counter proposal, so we got to put in a pretty hefty chunk of ITM about it. Part of me says that I should have charged ahead as soon as it came out, part says wait until something solid comes out with "Wikipedia" specifically mentioned as a main topic in a news item.

The 1st choice could be a slippery slope - pretty soon I'd want to put in stories about the Trump impeachment trial and how that might effect Wikipedia. The second makes us a month late on some stories. I'm sure HaeB has similar borderline issues. Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:05, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

In my opinion generally best to keep this to content that explicitly mentions Wikipedia. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:35, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

@Smallbones: In 2015, I created this Gallery piece for an issue of The Signpost that was published near to Valentine's Day. Are okay with running this gallery again in February 2020 with a few changes? Below are the planned additions.

Thanks, ↠Pine (✉) 04:48, 10 F

Can I add one or two?

Smallbones(smalltalk) 12:45, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Go ahead. Smallbones(smalltalk) 11:42, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
I think we should strongly consider whether images of individual political/social movement/religious figures is appropriate for this column. There's also a preponderance of men in uniforms (even without including sports team uniforms), which could raise eyebrows. Just want to avoid making this a new source of controversy. ☆ Bri (talk) 19:25, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
I tried to go for diversity and not for uniformity, and inevitably not everyone will agree with or like everything and everyone that is included in the gallery. However, I have been thinking about ways that I would change the gallery, and I have made a few subtractions and additions. At this point I don't think that I will do further subtractions, but I am open to further suggestions for additions. ↠Pine (✉) 20:39, 20 February 2020 (UTC)
I'm also in favor of diversity over uniformity, but I looked through this with a "anti-controversy eye" just to be sure. My major worry is that all the pics may take too long to load. Do you remember the one complaint we got (in May?) about the cost of uploading pages?
  • 2. the African soldiers holding hands probably should not be considered gay, and some folks might be offended if they are being presented that way. Different cultures hold hands meaning different things. I'd guess removal would be more controversial than keeping it.
  • 3. Lovelorn Ophelia contemplating suicide might not be appropriate.
  • 4. The Latvian fountain pic of lovers (above) that I suggested might be too sexually graphic (in a wet t-shirt sort of way), but I think you have to be there to really get that impression (no, nothing is sticking out). Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:11, 21 February 2020 (UTC)
Hi @Smallbones:
  1. I am aware that holding hands is not necessarily a romantic gesture in all cultures. To make it clearer that the gallery is not exclusively about romance by the time that the viewer sees that photo of soldiers holding hands, I moved that photo to further down the page.
  2. Where do you see Ophelia?
  3. I'm not seeing what is problematic about the fountain photo.
  4. I made some additional changes to the gallery. Please look through it again.
↠Pine (✉) 21:22, 23 February 2020 (UTC)
  1. Great.
  2. Sorry, it's File:John William Waterhouse The Lady of Shalott.jpg - the lady in the boat (right after the wedding rings). There is something similar in the stories however according to The Lady of Shalott, though are article is not very specific.
  3. The statue is definitely about sexuality, but the photo doesn't show it that well.
  4. Everything looks fine. @Pine: Smallbones(smalltalk) 22:41, 23 February 2020 (UTC)
Hi Smallbones thanks for the information. I removed the Lady of Shalott painting due to the association with suicide, but I don't object to including images that are associated with heartbreak. I was less sure about the statue, which from this angle looks fine, but I've removed it out of an abundance of caution, although I'm fine with including sexuality's relation to romantic love. I support not intentionally surprising readers, but I generally don't agree with censoring educational content even when that content is controversial or emotionally upsetting when the content is important for teaching a topic. Censorship can take us down a dark path. ↠Pine (✉) 23:05, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Who's doing News and notes?

Just a quick question, who's doing News and notes this issue? And a followup after someone steps forward. I have an item to suggest but I was involved in the discussion so I just don't want to plop it in there. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:05, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

  1. Near-record 'crat chat and subsequent questions about reforming procedures Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_adminship/Money_emoji/Bureaucrat_chat#Points for future discussion
  2. Should ITNs relationship to main page be changed User talk:Jimbo Wales#WPITN, original research on popularity, the core of Wikipedia, and bias. followed by RfC: Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Request for comment on the future of Wikipedia:In the news

Two discussions listed above. ☆ Bri (talk) 19:40, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

@Bri: I put both of the above into the Discussion report. Somebody should consider whether Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 165#WMF Legal should enforce the Terms of Use against Status Labs to the fullest extent of the law should also be included. Smallbones(smalltalk) 20:02, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
Thanks. We both voted on the Status Labs RfC, so it would probably be best if another editor made the determination to include that in the News and notes column. ☆ Bri (talk) 20:19, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Just about everybody involved in The Signpost voted in the RfC. The only 3 that I could see who did not are @HaeB, Megalibrarygirl, and Gog the Mild:. I do think that this RfC is quite important, but I'm biased. I will mention it in "From the editor" so it's not absolutely crucial that it's in "Discussion report". I'll write it here and suggest it goes as the first story in Discussion report. But the placement or non-placement and the text are up to whoever wants to make the decision.

"An RfC that followed from last month's From the editor column asked the Wikimedia Foundation to enforce the Terms of Use against new violations by Status Labs. The company, then known as Wiki-PR was banned in 2013, along with 250 sockpuppet accounts, in what was then the the largest paid editing scandal in Wikipedia history. The RfC was closed after 4 days with 100 editors supporting to 2 editors opposing. "

Smallbones(smalltalk) 23:49, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

As someone completely uninvolved until reading this, it absolutely should be in Discussion Report. I have had a look at posting it, but it is way past my bedtime and I just can't figure it out. I would rather leave it than risk making a mess so close to deadline. If someone will leave me simple instructions, I will post it in the morning. Or feel free to post it yourself on my say so as a previously uninvolved Signpost contributor. Gog the Mild (talk) 00:18, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
@Gog the Mild: You can just undo this edit for simplicity. ☆ Bri (talk) 02:12, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
Done. Apologies for my slow-wittedness and thanks for making the process Gog-proof. Gog the Mild (talk) 10:55, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Delayed publishing

I've been in touch with Smallbones offline and he intends to hold publishing a bit for content to come in. Expect publication on March 1 at the soonest. ☆ Bri (talk) 03:58, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Arbitration report

Regarding DeltaQuad's resumption of bureaucrat duties: to streamline the text, I suggest replacing the current two sentences with one such as the following:

As a followup to our October arbitration report, DeltaQuad was reinstated as a bureaucrat on February 8, upon request.

isaacl (talk) 07:15, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't know if the report will be further revised to actually go into more details about the blue wall of silence? The lead paragraph teases it ("in one of two de-sysoppings") but then the rest of the article doesn't provide more info. But perhaps more to the point, I didn't see a denial of having seen any wrongdoing by the arbitrator in question; just a difference in opinion on what to do to address the problematic behaviour. So I'm not sure that the blue wall is the right metaphor to use. isaacl (talk) 19:07, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Two things.
1. The inference that there is a blue shield at Arbcom (or anywhere else for that matter) is an aspersion, as is claiming in your own voice—without evidence—that Xeno deliberately invoked it. So: two aspersions.
2. DeltaQuad has not edited the entire project since 09:06, 27 February 2020, which means, whether you like it or not, you assume she has not even seen your two-day-later messages. This makes the claim that she has not answered The Signpost's inquiry disingenuous at best and falsification at worse.
So, three misleading statements in only one article.
D-, must do better. ——SN54129 19:25, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

First let's start with what's in there now:

DeltaQuad was reinstated as bureaucrat and administrator on February 8, following the former Arbitration Committee member's sudden resignation in October 2019. She has not answered The Signpost's inquiry on whether she intends to return to her former position of ArbCom clerk.

I don't see any potential problem with the 1st sentence. It's straight facts. What makes this newsworthy is that she is a bureaucrat and administrator and that the unusual actions haven't been explained. Thus the second sentence - we're just asking what is going on. There's no accusation that there is any wrongdoing. We basically have to ask her what's happening.

As far as "the blue wall of silence". It takes me a while to catch on to things sometimes. It's in the blurb only. It could be taken as "The police don't fink on their own." Overly flowery IMHO, but it shouldn't be an issue to report that nobody is being transparent on this. I'll see if I can come up with another blurb. BTW, I think you are just completely misreading the 2 de-sysopping in the intro. Smallbones(smalltalk) 19:37, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

I did not, of course, mention the first sentence, so thanks for the trivia. Wrt the other points, Signpost staff are relying on insinuation and misrepresentation: report what is happening, not what you would like to be able to say. I.e., "DQ has not edited since"—allowing the reader to make up their own mind—rather than "She did not reply to us", etc., which, while the letter of the truth, misleads the reader who does not look into it any further—and worse, from an editor's point of view, those that do look in any further will feel themselves to have been misled and respond accordingly. ——SN54129 19:47, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
I don't know what you think I am misreading; can you clarify? And if there is an issue with an administrator not being transparent about the behaviour of other administrators (which would be the blue wall), then surely the article should go into more detail about it, rather than just teasing that it happened in some case this month? isaacl (talk) 19:54, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Smallbones: The word "invoked" is ambiguous here. I am concerned that administrators may be recalcitrant to moderate the behaviour of their own, as this is an important function of community self-governance. (It might be better to say Xeno "raised concern", or "referred", to it, but I won’t tell you how to make sausage.) –xenotalk 20:03, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
    (EC - I don't understand what Xeno just said and will take my break) Everybody should please understand that the draft article is a draft under construction and that we are on deadline, so that we may not be able to address your specific problems. There also has been posts crossing in the sense that I reply to an old question and then there's a new version of an article (since I took the time to answer in detail) and then a new version of a question. This cross posting doesn't help. So I'm going to take a break right now. Jumping on a draft story before publication is sometimes considered a form of harassment around here. Please one question at a time. Then back off for awhile. We're on deadline. Sorry.
    @Bri: can you clarify Xeno's quote Smallbones(smalltalk) 20:04, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
    To clarify, I understand it's up to you to do what you like with feedback. Since the talk page for the draft has a notice inviting feedback to be posted on this talk page, I did so, with the desire of making the article a stronger one. I know from past discussions there is sensitivity around deadlines, so if you'd rather not get feedback within a given time window or at all, then I won't provide it, and I suggest changing the talk page notice for draft articles accordingly. isaacl (talk) 20:21, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
    @Smallbones: Clarified, and footnoted. ☆ Bri (talk) 20:26, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
    That's helpful, as I had missed seeing that you mentioned the blue wall in your comments on remedy 5. If it is deemed to be worth mentioning, then I agree with your proposed rewording. Either way, I think the article should follow up on the thread introduced in the lead, and not leave it hanging. isaacl (talk) 20:12, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Ok, now I believe that I'm caught up with the issue. That what happens when you get in the middle of our "on deadline" period. I still don't see what the fuss was about, but in any case I rearranged and clarified. @Bri: please check to see if the changes reflect what you're trying to report. I also think the Kudpung case is closed now so that might take some rewritting. @Xeno: please check that you are not being misquoted or taken out of context. @Isaacl: thanks for bringing this up so that we can clarify it. Of course you can comment here on deadline. You were short and to the point and polite. I'm sure you understand that not everybody always is. Smallbones(smalltalk) 21:35, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Yes, looks better. Thank you for your efforts. –xenotalk 00:55, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
The main case page hasn't been updated since February 13 [2]. I believe that means it is officially still open, although we can see the decision votes have actually consolidated, and the sixth vote to close happened. ☆ Bri (talk) 21:58, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
Okay, it closed 30 minutes ago. I'll go fix up the wording to reflect the fact. ☆ Bri (talk) 23:14, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Just reiterating for clarity, this column is all done now as far as I know. ☆ Bri (talk) 02:07, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

New column name "By the numbers"

Please see Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/By the numbers. We were running out of useful column names. I hope this doesn't cause any problems publishing.

A careful copyediting would be appreciated for the inaguaral column. Plus, statistics are difficult to write about in an interesting way - the numbers mostly should speak for themselves. But at least the writing should be short and to the point. Any help appreciated. Smallbones(smalltalk) 19:19, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Copyedited. I expected more of a punchy conclusion after all the discussion of paid editing, especially from you and MER-C! ☆ Bri (talk) 23:12, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Sensitive style question for Community view

Should it be "black women" or "Black women"? ☆ Bri (talk) 23:11, 29 February 2020 (UTC) Should it be "black women" or "Black women"? ☆ Bri (talk) 23:11, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Good question https://www.nabj.org/page/styleguideB The National Association of Black Journalists consistently uses a small b, except in proper names or "Black Church" an unoficial organization. https://familyinequality.wordpress.com/2012/04/05/black-is-not-a-color/ from U of Maryland sociologist seems to prefer small b, but notes inconsistencies, Person of color uses a small b., so I'd guess if anybody had a MoS issue it would have been brought up there. I did a quick check of our article and didn't see any problems. Smallbones(smalltalk) 00:08, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Discussion report

RfC tally

I voted at this RfC but the tally needs an update. Another editor is invited to check this re-count and posting the numbers. ☆ Bri (talk) 23:56, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

I went back to the Feb 29 version, (23 to 10) and added "unofficially". I suppose it's alway good to add "unofficially" to these counts - otherwise somebody might think we're doing an official count, but that's for the closer to do. If anybody wants to do their own count, that's ok with me. @Bri:
Smallbones(smalltalk) 00:23, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for catching the date error, too. Leap years are weird! ☆ Bri (talk) 00:46, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

From the editor posted finally

Sorry for the delay. I'll be trying to cut it down a bit, but feel free to do regular copyediting in the meantime. Smallbones(smalltalk) 14:04, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Pageviews

Ten pages thru March 1, 2020 1,506 7 articles thru March 1, 2020 628

  • total thru March 3, 7,668
  • total thru March 7, 13,254
  • total thru March 14, 19,892
  • total thru March 21, 32,508

Smallbones(smalltalk) 23:28, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

All ready to go

@Chris troutman: give me 40 minutes and it should be ready. I'll post again here, just in case. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:43, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

@Smallbones: Issue is out, email sent to listserv, and tweet is being composed now. Chris Troutman (talk) 18:34, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Fantastic! Thanks Chris. It looks like a good issue to me. We'll see what the readers say! Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:36, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Reader feedback

You can monitor reader comments with the link above. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:51, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

"On the bright side" for March 2020

Week of 1 March 2020

Hi Clovermoss, please let me know what you think of my contributions at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/On the bright side. ↠Pine (✉) 07:23, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

@Pine: I think your contributions are amazing, as always. I appreciated the link to the wikitionary definition of hermitage. I've learned a new word. Also, Star Trek! I've been starting to become more of a fan since we started working on On The Bright Side and I've had some interesting discussions with my Mom since then (who's much more of a Trekkie than I am). Clovermoss (talk) 07:33, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

Week of 7 March 2020

Hi Pine. I added content for this week, what do you think? I'm not sure what language translation would work best here, any suggestions? Clovermoss (talk) 05:23, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi Clovermoss, thanks for the update. It's good to see you writing here again.
For a language, I suggest Swedish, because of the involvement of the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs and Wikimedia Sverige in the Wikigap Challenge. What do you think?
Are you okay with my copyedits to your text for this week? Perhaps most important is that Wikimedia-l has an "l" at the end, as in "list".
Would you be willing to add at least one image to the text content for this week?
↠Pine (✉) 04:14, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: Swedish works. I'm fine with your copyedits. I actually didn't know that is was wikimedia-l, and now I do. As for an image, I can probably think of one that works. I do have to go to bed though, it's Sunday night and already pretty late for me. Clovermoss (talk) 04:43, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
  • @Pine: I can probably finish this week's content by this evening. I just couldn't finsh it last night because I needed to sleep and be awake for school this morning. Do you want me to ping you again once I've followed your suggestions or just send out the email? I should probably practice with the plain text format before sending it out to wikimedia-l. Clovermoss (talk) 20:17, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: I took a few hour nap and ate dinner. I'm pinging you now because I'm probrably going to send the email within the next hour or so. Clovermoss (talk) 01:03, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
Hi @Clovermoss: I have not seen an email from you. ↠Pine (✉) 19:32, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
@Clovermoss:, the time is getting to be late in the week. I try to send WMYHTW emails no later than Thursdays. If I don't see an email from you by tomorrow then I'll adapt what you wrote into an email for Wikimedia-l and send it. I hope that you are OK with this. ↠Pine (✉) 02:04, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: Just sent you an email. I'm sorry about the poor communication in the past 48 hours. Clovermoss (talk) 02:08, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Week of 15 March 2020

Hi @Clovermoss: I've started drafting for this week. I'll probably have the draft ready for you to review within the next two hours. ↠Pine (✉) 18:40, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi @Clovermoss: the draft is ready for you to review. ↠Pine (✉) 20:08, 15 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: Looks great! I'm probably going to start reading the articles that you linked, as they seem interesting. Also, the Dutch Wikipedia milestone is pretty spectacular! Clovermoss (talk) 22:15, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

Week of 22 March 2020

Hi @Clovermoss: have you started to think about what to write for the week of the 22nd? ↠Pine (✉) 21:37, 21 March 2020 (UTC)

@Pine: I do! I'm going to start writing right now. Clovermoss (talk) 21:40, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
@Clovermoss: great. Please ping me when you're ready for me to look at it. ↠Pine (✉) 21:47, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: I have everything except the language. I was thinking Austrian German, but I don't think you 7have that in the list of translations. Any ideas on what I should do instead? Also, my content is slightly different from what I typically do, is that okay? Clovermoss (talk) 22:46, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
Hi @Clovermoss:
  • I like generally your content, including the reference to The Sound of Music. That's very nice and uplifting. I'm glad that you had a good week.
  • I have one significant suggestion, which is to add an expression of sympathy for people who are significantly harmed by COVID-19 directly or indirectly, including health care workers, people who are losing their jobs, and people who get the disease. For many people, this is a difficult time and they have not had a good week. I'm not suggesting that you not talk about your good week, but I think that an expression of sympathy for people who are less fortunate would be appropriate.
  • Along with my suggestion above, I suggest deleting the opening sentence so that the message starts with "Especially during a time like now, I find it important to focus on the bright side.", to set a slightly more serious tone for the message.
  • A reference to Austrian German makes sense to me. Depending on what you say in an expression of sympathy, I think that some other options are Italian, Chinese, or Korean. If you decide to go with an Austrian German translation then you can request one. However, given that recently we have been featuring European languages, I think that Chinese or Korean would be a nice change.
What do you think? ↠Pine (✉) 03:43, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: Alright. Thanks for your suggestions. I think it's important to be sincere and realize that yeah, it's not a great time for a lot of people right now. I want to extend my sympathy to others who are dealing with so much more than I am right now. I'll make some changes in a few minutes and ping you again once I've made them. As for languages, now that you've mentioned it, I think Italian would probrably be a good choice. Clovermoss (talk) 03:50, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: I've made some changes and added to the introductory paragraph. What do you think? I think the transition between the first and second paragraph could be better, but I'm a bit stuck on what I should do to actually fix that. I've also added Italian as the language for this week. Clovermoss (talk) 04:28, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
@Clovermoss: it is very nice of you to revise your comments like that. The only suggestion that I have is to italicize The Sound of Music. Please create this week's WMYHTW email version of the content. If you feel confident about sending it without having me review a draft then feel free to do that. ↠Pine (✉) 04:53, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: I think that I will send you a draft of the email first, since I'm still new to sending out emails in plaintext. I can probrably accomplish that within the next 15-20 minutes or so. Will you still be online then? Clovermoss (talk) 05:02, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
@Clovermoss: I can check my email in about 30 minutes. By the way, there is no rush to get this done immediately, so feel free to take a break for sleep or anything else that you need. ↠Pine (✉) 05:05, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: Thanks for the kindness and understanding, as always. I happen to stay up later and wake up later when I don't have to go to school, so I should be able to at least start the draft. I am starting to get fairly tired though, so heading off to sleep might be a good idea. I tend to think best once I've had rest. I'm thinking that I'll start the draft, maybe get to the point of emailing it to you if it's completely finished, but it might not be realistic to have it finished and sent out tonight. Clovermoss (talk) 05:14, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: Been busy today but have time to work on the email now. Just thought I'd let you know since communication is important. Clovermoss (talk) 23:50, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: Sent a draft of the email out to you. Does it look fine as it is or should changes be made before sending it out to wikimedia-l? Clovermoss (talk) 01:16, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
@Clovermoss: for the sake of others on wiki I'm noting here that the email discussion has finished. I have some ideas for next week. By the way, I sent an email to a few mailing lists with a request for translations of the sentence "What's making you happy this week?" into indigenous languages of the Americas. ↠Pine (✉) 02:47, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Week of 29 March 2020

@Pine: Do you want me to add anything for next week's content? I could if you want me to. I'm asking because typically next week would be your turn for our alternating schedules. Clovermoss (talk) 02:50, 23 March 2020 (UTC) @Pine: pinging so you can see that the comment was moved Clovermoss (talk) 03:03, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

  • @Clovermoss: Thanks. If you would like to suggest content, please feel free to add it to the Signpost page where we're drafting content for each week. You can add a "From User:Clovermoss" subsection for your content. I probably won't start to make a public draft of my content until at least 12 hours from now, and many things may change between now and the end of the week, so let's try to be flexible regarding what we include in the draft. By the way, that is a clever use of small text, ClevermossClovermoss. Please remember to close HTML tags such as </small> with the "/" character. Thanks very much for offering to add content during a week when you are normally not doing that for WMYHTW. ↠Pine (✉) 03:20, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
  • @Pine: Glad I can help. I'm planning on adding the content in the subsection tomorrow. I'll comment here after I have added it. As for the small text, I realized I messed up once I saw the rest of the page that wasn't shown in preview (I was editing by subsection). Thanks for caring and for the compliment. :) Clovermoss (talk) 03:26, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
  • @Pine: I started the seperate subsection. My content is currently echoing a lot of what I wrote yesterday and I'm still thinking about what exactly I might add/change. I'm thinking that I might write about other Wikimedia projects as well and maybe focus specifically on article translation efforts. Clovermoss (talk) 04:22, 24 March 2020 (UTC)
  • Hi @Clovermoss: I started a gallery. It would be interesting to have information regarding article translation and non-English Wikipedia coverage of the COVID-19 situation. Content from non-English Wikipedias may be translated from English Wikipedia or another language edition of Wikipedia, or may be content that is original to that language edition of Wikipedia. You might want to start by looking at French Wikipedia because you know some French. For this week's translation, I am likely to use a South Asian language. ↠Pine (✉) 06:46, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
  • Hi @Clovermoss: OK. As a reminder, you're already doing extra work for this week's OTBS and WMYHTW, and there is no need to have this be a big research project. I'm serious about trying to keep the time for this publication under an hour each week, although so far I think that at best I have spent 90 minutes one week. If you have other things to do this week please feel free to stop or to postpone the research project. If you postpone it by a week then you can consider using it for next week's OTBS and WMYHW when you are currently scheduled to be the author anyway. ↠Pine (✉) 19:31, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
  • @Pine: Thanks for the reminder. I'll try not to spend too much time on it. If I'm not satisfied with what I have by the end of the day, I think I'll follow your advice and save it for next week. I haven't really done much research yet, today's kind of been the sort of day where I just kind of feel blah. My mom's been sick, so I might be getting what she has. Clovermoss (talk) 19:40, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
  • @Pine: I think that I will write about article translation specifically as part of my content for next week. I did update the number of articles as part of WikiProject COVID-19, and added information about the collective pageviews across 110 languages for the article about the 2019-2020 coronavirus outbreak. Clovermoss (talk) 02:24, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
  • @Clovermoss: That sounds good. I will let you know when I'm ready for you to review a draft of this week's content before I send the email version to Wikimedia-l. I will try to finish the on-wiki version by Saturday evening. ↠Pine (✉) 05:16, 27 March 2020 (UTC)
  • @Clovermoss: I'm running low on time and I'm not going to add more content for this week. If the content looks good to you then please ping me and set the status of OTBS to "Ready for copyediting". Thanks, ↠Pine (✉) 04:15, 28 March 2020 (UTC)
  • @Pine: I'm fine with what you have this week. I saw it earlier, and the gallery itself is a really nice touch. Thank you for everything you do. I'll set the status of OTBS to "ready for copyediting" right now. Clovermoss (talk) 04:20, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

HotArticlesBot report for WikiProject Medicine 4 March 2020

User:HotArticlesBot report for WikiProject Medicine on 4 March 2020

On WikiProject Medicine's front page at Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine we present a report from user:HotArticlesBot.

Kaldari (talk · contribs) You operate this bot. Is it correct that there is no easy way for a user to see past reports with this bot?

I do not have old data, but I watch WikiProject Medicine, and I think these things are correct:

  1. Rarely does the most edited article in medicine get more than 400 edits in aweek
  2. This bar has never been all red before, so current editing is beyond the intended scale
  3. there has never been a time when the top 10 articles in medicine were all one topic

I showed this off at WikiProject Medicine's talk page. Users may comment there.

Check the Massviews report for reader traffic. I still have challenges interpreting traffic reports but at least it is easy to say that a lot of people are reading this content.

I am not sure what the story will be but I expect the next issue will have a feature.

The Wikimedia Summit is canceled over this. Perhaps other wiki conferences will be canceled. Blue Rasberry (talk) 21:22, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

@Blue Rasberry: You can see past reports by looking at past revisions of Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Hot articles. Is that what you meant? Kaldari (talk) 19:34, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
@Kaldari: Yes it is, thank you, very interesting, I will reflect on this. Blue Rasberry (talk) 10:42, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Blue Rasberry (talk) 00:34, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

@Bluerasberry: I think it's safe to say that the reader interest in medical articles spilled over into connected topics, e.g. pageviews for Kirkland, Washington averages 250 per day normally, but spiked to 5,000+ on March 2. ☆ Bri (talk) 13:27, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:33, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
Thanks @Bluerasberry: There's a lot here. Just the office closing is important enough for it's own article. A personal interest angle would be possible - but we might be able to do better than that. By personal interest angle, I mean emailing or phoning your favorite WMF workers, asking them how it's going working from home? what are the streets like in SF? (probably empty) How's the family taking it? (if they want to answer personal questions). At least we'd give our readers a feeling of personal contact with the situation, be in contact if something big happens, get to know some good people at the WMF and how they react to challenges. A straight news story *might* be better, if we have enough straight news to report. Should we make this a team effort? @Puddleglum2.0: - you need a challenging assignment, don't you? Everybody invited to pitch in! Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:18, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
@Smallbones: I can probably do something! I am a bit busy in RL currently and not sure when stuff will clear up, but I can still find some time to help! Thanks, Puddleglum2.0(How's my driving?) 18:14, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
@Puddleglum2.0: - Thanks, you've got the assignment, let's see if we can get 2 more reporters on it to help. We can wait a week so that WMF workers have something to report. I'll ping @Kaldari:, just because he was mentioned above and I want to check to make sure that no WMF'er would consider this to be too intrusive. In most cases I'd say, it never hurts to ask people questions, but just make sure they know there's no pressure to respond, that a simple no is all they need to say if they don't want to. Does that work? BTW, I've got 2 big stories I'm working on, so I doubt that I'll be able to participate in this beyond general advice. Thanks. Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:35, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
@Smallbones: Ok, I'll be ready! Thanks, Puddleglum2.0(How's my driving?) 18:38, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
@Puddleglum2.0: Consider the community angle from this too. I listed some conferences. There are also several hundred Art+Feminism Wikipedia events scheduled right now. The community puts very high resources into planning events, and when these events get cancelled, the scarce community resources can be lost. WMF staffers who stay home still get paid, but when volunteers lose their events, the pain is greater as they were not paid and they do not get refunds for the resources they put into this. I do not know who is assuming all the cost of the cancelled Wikimedia Summit, but that could be 200 plane tickets and I do not know how they were cancelled. For other conferences I have no idea. If the WMF has funded these things there can be some pressure on the community groups to host the events anyway, or otherwise lose the investment and face some judgement for not producing the event. This would not be intentional but this disruption is definitely making a lot of community groups miss their long-scheduled programs. Blue Rasberry (talk) 19:38, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
There's definitely an opportunity to show what 'pedians are doing in response to various crises going on right now. Is the time ripe even for a special issue? The 2020 coronavirus outbreak in Washington (state) ed's might make a good subject for interview. ☆ Bri (talk) 14:16, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
Bluerasberry and I are going forward with two columns due to the amount of content. Mine's up at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/Special report and he's preparing a draft for the second half, column title TBD. ☆ Bri (talk) 21:08, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
Proposed that the second part runs under the Community view column. ☆ Bri (talk) 21:14, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
It's up to you folks. Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:50, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

There's another Slate article from Stephen Harrison

https://slate.com/technology/2020/03/coronavirus-wikipedia-policies.html @Bri and Bluerasberry:. Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:50, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

It's good to see Doc James' spelling quirks self-authenticating his quote I kid!! ☆ Bri (talk) 18:16, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Delhi riots, harassment, and privacy

I think this topic could be a good one as part of a larger article in about 3 months. For now it does have the potential for a Streisand effect. If anyone wants to write something about this, especially if the situation changes, please let me know via email. Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:41, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

I am not sure that I want to write about this but if anyone else does I am oriented to India's politics and can assist. Blue Rasberry (talk) 11:45, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

This could be a dynamite article once the heat is off individual Wikipedia editors who are being harassed about working on this article (which might be 3 months from now). Right now, the only way I can see this being covered without bringing specific editors into the conversation is to look at certain Indian media organizations who have been pressuring WMF to release data about editors who edit "controversial" articles that reflect the political situation in India. Make it a general article about how some biased tabloids pressure the WMF for user data and not about a specific article and the people who edit it. I have some details from social media I can share which do not reveal private information on editors and I'm guessing that Newslinger might as well. I'm guessing you could get someone from WMF to go on record on how they handle these requests for user data which I hope would be reassuring to editors who work in areas of potential conflict. Liz Read! Talk! 01:16, 14 March 2020 (UTC)
  • Hey, there are some other issues here. It seems like the Indian Central Government is going to compel or force the Wikimedia Foundation to open an office in India in the context of various Wikipedia shutdown reports. India has some heavy-handed general policy coming through to counter fake news and misinformation. There is general mistrust about lots of Western media, especially after the major public outcry over Facebook's Internet.org. I am sort of speculating but also I strongly wonder if anyone at the WMF is lobbying the Indian government for an exemption, and if the WMF would reveal this if they were. I would be keen to join anyone else in writing and researching anything wiki + India. It is a big lift for one person. Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:51, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

General discussion

This next issue will be my 13th as editor-in-chief of The Signpost and I'd love to hear some feedback about how I and we are doing. I'd also like to resolve some potential problems that I see (including the EiC, general direction, organization, and Wikipedia rules and how they apply here).

  • Let's start with organization, since I see a chance that we might want to vote on some things here. My feeling is that the people who write here should control the major long-term (over a month, not weeks) decisions. Letting the people we cover, e.g. the WMF, ArbCom and admins, decide is not a path to good journalism. So let's just assume for now that everybody who has a byline (or any part of one) over the last 12 issues is a member of the team and has a vote. Short term decisions, especially in the last 2 weeks before publication should be made by the EiC with help from the team, but there should be some authority above the EiC - the Editorial Board, which we really don't have. Can we make that 3 people - the publisher, Chris, and two other people selected by the membership? Their function should be to tell the EiC he's going in the wrong direction and replace him or her when needed with a new temp EiC, to be voted on later by the membership.
  • Following Wikipedia rules - as I see it and have said before without contradiction - the rules that apply to us are the same as for any WikiProject. We're allowed some of our own organization and essentially the rules for talk pages apply to what we publish in The Signpost, e.g. OR is allowed, BLP violations aren't.
    • Interpretation of outing and harassment rules as suggested by outsiders have seemed extreme, but in general the real rules do apply. In particular, I'd say if we can use a source in a Wikipedia article we can use it here, e.g. if a WaPo story quotes another reliable source saying that so-and-so named themselves as a particular Wikipedia editor, we're not outing anybody by linking to WaPo's story or reporting what WaPo, the 2nd reliable source, and the editor said. Especially if we don't name the editor. It just seems silly to censor ourselves on reporting publicly known information from reliable sources. We do have to be careful however.
    • Use of unnamed sources - as I understand what an ArbCom member said to me, if what the sources say can be shown to be false, then we're responsible for what they said, even in the case that we have no way of knowing that a statement is false, or even of checking the falsity now. This is a bit stronger than the standard off-Wiki which would usually take into consideration the good-faith of the source and the reporter, and whether the source is shown as reporting on their own state-of-mind. But so be it, we have to be very careful using unnamed sources, be able to document everything (at least in private) and set up standards for their use. We don't have formal standards on this now but should. For now, published statements based on unnamed sources should be cleared with the EiC, and when I use unnamed sources, I'll clear it with a long-time staff member.
  • There have been other situations reported to me where folks with advanced permissions have done some things that appear to be attempts at pre-publication censorship. Please do report these incidents to me and realize that this will always be a tense situation that I'll try to defuse. But nothing prepublication in our draft articles should be open for admins, etc. to delete (beyond obvious BLP, outing, etc. violations). They should just ask the EiC. Once I've approved publication, the reporter is off the hook IMHO, and the other side can have at me. So I'm going to be careful, but we don't accept censorship except in emergency-type situations (and then I still get a review of it).
  • to get around this type of prepublication censorship, it has been suggested that we move off-enWiki. There could be some net benefit for this. I'm willing to hear proposals. I've even tried to work through the pluses and minuses of moving prepublication to meta as part of a Signpost User group. It could work, but right now I'm not that enthusiastic about it. If you want more discussion, just let us know.

Most of the above might seem fairly distance from our basic month-to-month workflow. Let me concentrate there now.

  • A magazine format (long-form journalism, more emphasis on in-depth reporting and opinion) has been suggested years ago and continues. I'm all for that and think we've been moving in that direction. The monthly schedule almost forces us in that direction. We've always been a newspaper though (please don't anybody say "newsletter"). A magazine format still means that we're journalists. I would want to continue and even strengthen the news columns or beat reports - on Arbcom, Discussions, News & Notes. Tech report and Featured articles seem to have floated away without anybody complaining so we can leave those only until somebody says they want them, and somebody else says they'll write it. I do think that the news beats could be done much like ITM is done. Different staffers can be encouraged to drop off bits and pieces, with links, throughout the month. More than one person can do the writing up, but one person should be recognized as having the last word on each of the beats.
  • This is now much too long, but there is the old question of how do we get people to contribute. I see 2 ways:
    • to continue to write the best we can and put out the best publication we can. People like to contribute to that type of publication, but they might be a bit shy in approaching us. We do have a lot of people who like to write on Wikipedia and have something to say.
    • to get people to actually contribute we're going to have to invite many of them. A general cattle-call looks desperate in my opinion, and should be avoided unless it's the only opinion.
    • this just needs to be organized, sometimes planned 6-8 weeks before publication. I'm pretty bad at doing that.
    • the biggest place that I want help is not with additional writers. They'll come IMHO. It's with organization. We need a managing editor - this doesn't have to be solved this week, but I hope that within 3 months we'll have somebody in here organizing things. Who's doing which story this month? What stories will be coming up in 2-3 months and how are we going to handle them? We should never be caught unawares on Wikimania, or many of the other meetings, or Black History Month, or similar. But I have to admit that I miss something like that every month. Following up after an issue with after publication - reader's comments, checking in and thanking the authors and seeing what else they'd like to write. In general I'd like to see the start of the month with a list of 70% of the stories we're going to do with a very good idea of who is going to be doing them. Compare that with my usual monthly routine. About this time of the month, most of the reader comments are in and I've had a bit of a break. I go to the newsroom and putter a bit with ITM and then realize - there are 15 blank stories to work on. Ahhh!
    • To get somebody to serve as managing editor we all need to look around for those folks who have the organizing skills to do this and just ask them if they'd like to be considered for the job. Sure they should be able to copyedit a bit and we'd let them write something every once in a while. but the main skills needed are organization and planning and people skills. You know some people like that. Let's each just ask 1 or 2 of them if they'd like to be considered. Anybody who would do that work on a consistent basis would be golden.

Miscellaneous- we need the staff/writers to be more diverse - get in more non-US editors, more conservatives! maybe a teenager! people who disagree with the stereotypical US/UK male techno-nerd liberal. @Chris troutman, Bri, Blue Rasberry, MegaLibraryGirl, Newslinger, HaeB, Igordebraga, Pine, and Clovermoss: @Gog the Mild and Doc James: Smallbones(smalltalk) 01:30, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

@Smallbones: I just read this and am still trying to think about it all, but I do have some ideas that spring to mind. First, some of this applies to me much less than for the writers of other columns. I'm not super concerned about censorship on my end, but I've been a reader of the Signpost in the past and think it's important that we don't deal with a chilling effect and a blue wall of silence. As for moving the Signpost off-wiki, the idea doesn't really appeal to me. I think I could get used to it, but it's just that I know that the Signpost has been on-wiki for so many years and I like the idea of having everything in one place. On the other hand, sometimes change is good and nessecary. Since the Signpost isn't just about the English Wikipedia community, maybe a move to meta would be meaningful in a different way? As for diverse staff... I'm not really sure about everyone else, but I'm a teenage girl. I'm not American, either. I'm Canadian. I've been pretty open about those parts of my identity, so I don't mind writing about it here. Clovermoss (talk) 20:06, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Just a suggestion: I wouldn't sell the managing editor role by saying "we'd let them write something every once in a while". The job basically sounds thankless enough as it is; being able to schedule their own writing workload might be the only perk. isaacl (talk) 16:34, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  • Support all This is more of a set of discussion topics than a decision to make, but I agree with everything written.
    • Yes contributors to The Signpost control its editorial direction.
    • Yes The Signpost can operate in a manner comparable to a WikiProject. WikiProject organization is different from Wikipedia article writing. The English Wikipedia platform is many things including a publisher for an encyclopedia and a community forum for certain types of discussion. Not all guidelines of Wikipedia article writing apply to every place in Wikipedia. A good model for The Signpost is the WikiProject model.
    • Personally, I like the Wikimedia user group registration model and think that it would be a useful fit for The Signpost someday. Registering as a user group has an administrative cost and right now, that cost could be in excess of the benefits. If there are 3 people who could commit to the administration, which is mostly the publishing of an annual report, then I am in favor. I could help others but would not want to be among the 3 responsible administrators.
    • Yes, I agree that The Signpost has special needs and should develop policy, like for use of unnamed sources. I do not see urgency in writing and setting that policy. Ambiguity of policy is a norm in journalism and no shortcoming, and it is not the burden of The Signpost to quickly resolve age-old challenges in the administration of journalism.
    • Yes, I suppose the use of the editor in chief as the hub who receives reports of censorship. The Signpost and its writers routinely get requests to self-censor. Organizations including the Wikimedia Foundation, the Arbitration Committee, and informal collectives of Wikipedia editors routinely request that The Signpost not publish stories. The typical intent of censorship is to avoid sparking panic when a one-time extraordinary and unusual small-scale problem happens. I can understand avoiding journalism about extraordinary cases which, if reported, would confuse many readers. What I regret is that too often, writers for The Signpost get asked to delay reporting a story because the involved parties feel that they are one unusual case, when in fact, a certain problem is systemic and happening at scale as a consequence of the Wikimedia infrastructure providing a global digital shared experience. No one should feel ashamed for facing a challenge which is an at-scale consequence of the design of a universal platform like Wikipedia. Example common requests for censorship are stories of discrimination, a WMF staffer who does not want anyone to know that they or their role exists until and unless their current project is complete and has a report of success, in-wiki organizations hastily promising massive results which are impossible then feeling embarrassed, external off-wiki would-be funder or partner organizations professing expertise about Wikipedia yet having no experience or understanding of Wikipedia, and the failure of Wikipedia to have unprecedented success in resolving major challenges in global media. When someone asks for censorship, usually my own internal feeling is that they think their situation is special when in fact it is some common occurrence worth reporting as a general case.
    • Yes, I am in favor of having a small outpost on Meta-wiki. I wish that The Signpost could eventually grow to include news about all Wikimedia projects and culture. Right now it necessarily focuses on English Wikipedia, which is worthwhile, but many readers care about wiki in general and we need general journalism somehow.
    • Yes, magazine format is a better fit than news.
    • Yes, I also see the challenge of administration to be The Signpost's greatest difficulty. If only we could relieve the burden of administration, then it would be much easier to recruit excellent writers. Writers need a bit of administrative support which is difficult to provide. I think paid staff would be the easiest and most efficient way to address this difficulty. Funding is hard to access. I still think of ways to come up with paid non-editorial and administrative labor for The Signpost. I wish that I could find success in this.
    • Yes, we more diversity among writers would be useful. I think this would come if we had administration to lower the barrier for writer participation.
Thanks. Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:50, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

Non random break

Hi @Smallbones: I didn't see this ping from you. I think that there is a limit to the number of people that can be pinged at once. Anyway, unfortunately I am too busy to address many of the points that you made above, but I will mention that one potential problem with moving The Signpost off wiki is that the authors might lose some legal protection that is afforded by being here. I don't know how all of that would work, but WMF in the past has been willing to pay for outside counsel to defend Wikipedia authors who are sued for their good faith contributions. I think that this would be a good topic to discuss with WMF. I worry that someday one of The Signpost authors will be sued for good faith contributions that are published in it, possibly by another Wikipedian or possibly by an outsider such as an organization that a Signpost contributor accuses of misconduct. ↠Pine (✉) 04:21, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, Pine. I'll try the ping again @Chris troutman, Bri, Blue Rasberry, MegaLibraryGirl, and Newslinger: Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:41, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
@HaeB, Igordebraga, Clovermoss, Gog the Mild, and Doc James:
Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:39, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
I am busy with COVID19 preparations. Not able to take on anything else for an unclear period of time. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:43, 9 March 2020 (UTC)
I like the gist of this, and especially the concern of viewpoint diversity. At the same time time, some of the implementation details are of concern, for instance, it would be offputting to have anyone go through anything approaching an RfA type run at any named position for the publication – we have enough trouble with recruiting and retention as it is. Bri.public (talk) 16:15, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
@Bri: Perhaps a more structured/ordered approach to leadership would draw more people in? @Smallbones: As for the rest of the plan, I know I wasn't pinged, but I've had (three) bylines in the past twelve issues... Anyways, I think your plan outline is great, I think overall it would be a great improvement. I have interesting thoughts about what to do with the WPR, so if wanted I could outline those, but I know I am a newcomer to the Signpost so I will not stick my oar into discussions that aren't my business. :D Thanks, Puddleglum2.0(How's my driving?) 22:56, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
I have no faith that our readership would follow us off-wiki. Staying within WMF's servers, even with the imaginary protection of WMF lawyers, keeps us within the range of the same folks that think we ought/must be censored. Since the readership does not, to my mind, support uncensored news because they're of the same ilk, we can either choose to publish watered-down stuff to the same clods or seek independence in a place no one will venture. There already exists a site for criticism of Wikipedia but posting there is preaching to the choir and the homeless. Everything described as "managing editor" sounds like what the EiC should be doing. But with volunteer effort, I don't see how we find someone to drive the content direction of the paper. I still support the idea that WMF ought to pay someone who can break away from their day job and yet remain independent. Chris Troutman (talk) 19:21, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
  • Quick driveby comment here; I think moving The Signpost off-wiki would negatively impact the number of people who read it and make it harder to find for newer users. -Indy beetle (talk) 06:32, 28 March 2020 (UTC)
  • Hi all! I know I haven't really been active here for far too long, and I felt perhaps I wasn't really qualified... But anyways, I've thought long and hard about this, and I think I'm ready to jump back in next issue. I can write FC again; I think it's nice to have a record of featured content, and enjoy looking at the articles. If that wouldn't be useful, or there's something more useful I can do, I'll happily do that. Eddie891 Talk Work 14:40, 29 March 2020 (UTC)
    An idea I had about featured content is that we could start it with some featured content discussion, maybe a 'tip of the month' or news in the featured content world (milestones of that month, etc.) Eddie891 Talk Work 14:44, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks @Eddie891:. I'll email you in a couple of days. Smallbones(smalltalk) 14:59, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

RfA interrupted by health issue

We probably should discuss how to handle reporting this. -- Bri.public (talk) 23:03, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

No reply, so proposing text here, will one of the de-facto editorial board okay this? Guy Macon's request for administrator was marked "unsuccessful" on March 5. The community was notified on March 8 by a family member that the candidate had experienced a health event on March 3. Guy returned on March 12 to say "As a general response to the oppose !votes, I will be studying them and seeing what I can learn ... don't expect any 2nd RfA any time soon." ☆ Bri (talk) 20:42, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
I suggest "heath problem" or "health issue". isaacl (talk) 23:36, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
A slight variation on Isaacl's suggestion is now at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/News and notes. I'm not 100% sure this is newsworthy, so I won't take it personally if it isn't retained. ☆ Bri (talk) 23:46, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
Of course it isn't newsworthy, especially for an editor that uses their real name. Drop it, for goodness sake. Black Kite (talk) 00:28, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
I don't see it as a clear cut question, could you explain why you seem to? The candidate himself has said he doesn't mind discussing the health issue. A heart attack in the middle of an RfA is potentially interesting to our readers. Though not necessarily diagnostic of any issue with the RfA process, The Signpost definitely has an interest in the RfA process and is entitled to bring it up. IMO. In short, what's the counterpoint to: RfA process is newsworthy and the candidate doesn't mind discussing? ☆ Bri (talk) 14:33, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
Even by Signpost standards, this discussion is morally bankrupt. Unless you have specific written consent from the subject, I (and I imagine every other admin) will treat any attempt to write this as we would any other editor creating an attack page. You're Wikipedia editors, not independent journalists, and it's been affirmed by Arbcom that any edits made at the Signpost are subject to the same rules as edits made anywhere else on the project. Whether or not a portion of your readers would find it interesting is completely irrelevant—"public interest" is not synonymous with "interesting to the public". ‑ Iridescent 14:48, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
(edit conflict)/ Borderline tittle-tattle. Leaky caldron (talk) 14:52, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
I disagree that it's a personal attack. Nonetheless, it feels more like gossip than news. isaacl (talk) 15:04, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

@Iridescent: Thanks for your opinion on our draft News & notes article. If you ever have any evidence that The Signpost is breaking any of the rules that apply to it on Wikipedia, I'd appreciate you letting me know. If you can convince me that there is a violation of the rules *anywhere* on Signpost pages, I will remove it asap.

That said, I'd like you to look at the top of the page at the N&n draft where it says

"This is a draft of a potential Signpost article, and should not be interpreted as a finished piece. Its content is subject to review by the editorial team and ultimately by Smallbones, the editor-in-chief."

That means that I will be reviewing this before publication, and if it meets The Signpost's standards it will likely be published. If you think that anything we publish breaks the rules, feel free to take it to ArbCom after publication. Your complaint will be against me, not the writer of the piece, since I have the obligation to check everything before publication. We do not accept censorship prior to publication, I don't think any Wikipedia editor would.

I can't see how anybody could consider the following to be an attack piece. Is this really what you were calling an attack page?

"*The community was notified on March 8 by a family member of request for adminship (RfA) candidate Guy Macon that the candidate had experienced a health incident on March 3, while the RfA was in progress. The RfA was marked "unsuccessful" on March 5. Guy returned from an editing hiatus on March 12 to say that he was recovering and "As a general response to the oppose !votes, I will be studying them and seeing what I can learn ... don't expect any 2nd RfA any time soon." "

I'm likely to ask Guy Macon what he thinks about this. Somehow, I'd expect him to say something like "give some guys a two-bit title like "oversighter" and it's likely to go to their head. Soon they'll think they were appointed king." Would you consider that to be a personal attack? Just in case, why don't you say what you really object to in N&n and we may publish that as well. Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:57, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Guy Macon doesn't say things like that any more. (Smile.) As a direct result of the RfA, for the foreseeable future you can expect everything I write to be as boring and anodyne as possible.
I appreciate and support the general principle of keeping health information private but in my case I strongly prefer this to be completely open and give anyone and everyone explicit permission to discuss my health issues. I think it would indeed be an interesting story for the signpost.
I would like to correct something. I have been studying this a bit and have discovered that the phrase I have been using ("heart attack") isn't accurate. What happened to me was actually "cardiac arrest / ventricular fibrillation" (or in layman's terms, "my heart stopped beating"), so let's be sure to get the terminology correct from now on despite my earlier misunderstanding. My arteries are wide open and there is no blood flow to the heart issue. What happened was electrical. My heart stopped beating and started quivering while I was editing Wikipedia, and I fell over unconscious with no pain but also with zero ability to breathe. The paramedics got here in minutes, I came to in the ambulance just long enough to experience the defibrillation shock, then I passed out again and woke up almost three days later with a machine doing my breathing for me, and I was too week to even lift an arm. I came extremely close to death that day.
They slowly got me moving again; first I got well enough to breathe. Then days later well enough to sit up in bed for a few minutes (with a lot of help getting into that position). Days later came my first baby steps with a walker. It has been nearly two weeks and I am now at home, able to walk unaided 30 feet or so, and things are improving for me every day.
I now wear an external defibrillator vest 24/7. If my heart stops again it will shock me. I am still a bit weak, but am remarkably improved.
Again, the signpost has full permission to write about this. Perhaps I should be interviewed? --Guy Macon (talk) 00:36, 18 March 2020 (UTC)
  • Well, there you go Smallbones, the man has given you permission (which you should have asked for first). You'll completely understand why a significant number of editors and admins are keeping an eye on your BLP policies after the Fram escapade, of course. Incidentally, "We do not accept censorship prior to publication" - you may want to rethink that statement. Black Kite (talk) 00:43, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

I've already thanked Guy, but in case he hasn't seen it yet - Thanks Guy. I'll say that it seemed obvious from his talk page and this, which we quoted that he didn't mind some discussion on talk pages. And just a hint if somebody wants to ever attempt journalism - in many cases if you are trying to clear something with the subject of an article, it can be best to actually show them the whole draft article to get a proper reaction.

Since I seem to have lost my temper on this matter, I'd prefer somebody else write up the story. @Bri:? I will suggest adding some of the info Guy sent to us, as in "Guy Macon told The Signpost ..." with quotes for a lot of it. News & notes seems to be the right place for it.

As for "Incidentally, "We do not accept censorship prior to publication" - you may want to rethink that statement." Let me restate and expand on the statement: We do not accept censorship prior to publication. Is that simple enough? OK then see WP:NOTCENSORED or you may provide a simple reference to any policy or guideline that you believe justifies prior censorship. Now this is a working space. We use it to put out a newspaper. If folks want to rehash old battles that they lost - please stay off this page. Smallbones(smalltalk) 01:49, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

  • Yes, there's an obvious policy that justifies censorship and that's WP:BLP. I absolutely hope it never happens again, but if there's a BLP issue with the working version then of course it will be redacted before it's published. Whether you wish to call that "censorship" is only semantics, but regardless it's still policy. Black Kite (talk) 10:27, 18 March 2020 (UTC)
Could it be that we are taking about two different kinds of "censorship"? To draw an imperfect analogy, if a writer for the NYT (presumably just hired from Infoworld) wrote an article saying that Bernie Sanders is actually a reptile from mars, the normal editorial process -- the NYT equivalent of BLP -- would "censor" that article and it would never be published. On the other hand, if some government entity tried to get the NYT to let them preapprove (and possibly reject!) stories about political candidates, the NYT would likely tell them to pound sand. IMO this is the difference between "we do not accept censorship prior to publication" and "we do apply editorial judgement, including at times self-censoring to comply with BLP policy".
In my particular case, I thought I had made my permission to freely discuss my recent cardiac arrest clear on my talk page, but also welcomed the opportunity to make it explicit. If I had wanted to keep my health status private (which I do not), I was free to not mention it at all or to simply make a vague reference to "personal issues". --Guy Macon (talk) 14:05, 18 March 2020 (UTC)
In 2008, The New York Times published a piece that contains the words "the earth has been secretly colonized by a race of reptilian extraterrestrials... [and] has infiltrated the highest levels of the U.S. and U.K. governments, as well as the British royal family". Of course it is an arts review and is wrapped in 'David Icke claims'. But my point is all sorts of stuff can be news. ☆ Bri (talk) 14:56, 18 March 2020 (UTC)
The censorship being pushed by out-of-step admins like Black Kite isn't the prevention of publishing falsehood. Rather, it's the censorship of stuff they wouldn't allow in encyclopedic articles or don't like because it offends their sensibilities. Of course, with the banhammer in hand, all problems look like policy violations. I would wish the editors who imagine themselves our collective betters would consider the value of honest reportage compared to the tyranny to maintain their happy little safe space on the internet. Chris Troutman (talk) 15:21, 18 March 2020 (UTC)
By popular demand[3] I no longer express opinions that anyone might disagree with, and thus I am withdrawing from this discussion. For the foreseeable future you can expect everything I write to be as boring and anodyne as possible. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:31, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

@Bri and Chris troutman: (I won't ping Guy Macon since he has withdrawn from the conversation). Thanks. Also, how did you know the subject of the article I'm writing now? None of that stuff is actually true. Smallbones(smalltalk) 19:59, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

None of my comments address whatever you're writing. My comments address the pushes for censorship that I've seen here. Chris Troutman (talk) 20:42, 18 March 2020 (UTC)
Sorry @Chris troutman:. Just a bad joke. (More follow) Reptilian extraterrestrials on Wikipedia would be a great story though. Does BLP apply? I'd guess it does but we'd have to rename it BLP&RE. How would WikiProject medicine deal with it? They might have to download all the Martian medical journals. BTW, no April Fool's jokes or even coverage of other's jokes. I've got enough troubles as it is. Smallbones(smalltalk) 20:54, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

In the press...

---Another Believer (Talk) 16:27, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

@Another Believer: we covered this in the prior issue ☆ Bri (talk) 01:27, 14 March 2020 (UTC)
Ok, thanks! ---Another Believer (Talk) 14:03, 14 March 2020 (UTC)
It's just great that WikiProject Medicine is getting some well-deserved recognition. They are an invaluable resource here. Liz Read! Talk! 21:35, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

I actually got recently published on Wikipedia in a mainstream Polish newspaper: [4]. The gist is a polemic with another recent piece about Wikipedia [5] where a professional historian inspired by the story we covered few months ago that he (and I...) where cited in (Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2019-10-31/In the media) argued that English Wikipedia articles (yes, the focus is on English, not Polish wiki) on Polish history, particularly Polish-Jewish history which is his expertise, have many errors, which he concludes must be intentional and represent a biased POV of some greater conspiracy (he attributes it to the current Polish nationalist government, suggesting it or its supporters succeeded in taking over the discourse on English Wikipedia). In my rebuttal I point out that while he is right that many articles in this topic area (and others) have errors, there is no evidence of any conspiracy, most errors he points out are old dating to the first formative years of Wikipedia where poor sources, or often no sources at all, where used (so those errors predate the current Polish government which has not been in power that long), and I argue that the problem is a result of experts, like professional historians, not understanding Wikipedia (he complains, for example, that reviewed articles are not up to academic standards, but he reviews among others article in a start-class, clearly noi not realizing many articles are just early drafts) and not being willing to become volunteers, since they are too busy with having careers and such. As an expert myself (I am a prof of sociology and I actually specialize in new media see my userpage, I am not anonymous - he is a prof of history) I argue that it is unethical for experts to criticize well meaning volunteers for not fixing everything, and instead they should try to contribute to the public good that is Wikipedia. In summary, it's another "breaking story: errors found in Wikipedia" to which I reply "yes, WP:SOFIXIT" :D --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 03:14, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

Grabowski states that the English Wikipedia is hosting falsified history about Polish-Jewish relations during the Holocaust. He attributes this to Polish nationalists. He writes that the same issues are handled more neutrally on the Polish Wikipedia, where editors can spot the problems. On the English Wikipedia, with its larger reach but fewer editors familiar with the sources and able to read Polish, we are not able to crowdsource corrections.
This affects a large number of articles, and realistically it isn't clear what we can do about it, given how labour-intensive the clean-up would be. There was an Arbcom case last year, Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Antisemitism in Poland, but it dealt with only one aspect of this, then it was interrupted by the Fram situation, so several outstanding issues were never resolved. SarahSV (talk) 22:21, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
Right, that's the piece I replied to. Unfortunately while Grabowski is an expert historian he doesn't understand how Wikipedia works. Fortunately, we have already begun addressing the issues he raises on discussion pages and some articles are already partially fixed, further proof there is no conspiracy of Polish nationalists in control of the discourse, just a bunch of old errors in need of someone to care and fix. Hopefully his piece will make someone interested (and I think it is happening, so all good). --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 04:27, 18 March 2020 (UTC)
The Signpost is definitely interested in more non-US/UK stories. We've actually had quite a few over the last 6 months or so. 4 on China, 1 on Croatia, a couple of paragraphs on Azerbaijan, and as noted above a very large section in In the media on Poland. There was another country that would have fit in there very well, but if we'd have covered it .... There does seem to be a pattern in these stories, a) they are pretty hard to do correctly, but we've been pretty lucky so far, b) they get a big reaction, and c) the story seems to be (nationalist/government vs. liberal/"freedom-loving". The Polish story might fit in with that theme or it might be "Pole vs. Jew" - it's very hard for me to tell and I wouldn't want to start off assuming anything. A few people on both sides behaved pretty poorly in Round 1 (nobody on this page). @Piotrus: could you get me an English version of your article (machine translation would be fine). There probably won't be an article in this month's issue. But if we can think of something a bit more creative than taking axes to each other, I'd be happy to try next month. Maybe a pro&con article with opposing authors, perhaps Piotrus vs. Grabowski. Let me know what track to take, and we'll try. Smallbones(smalltalk) 05:01, 18 March 2020 (UTC)
I asked in the same forum SV asked to see if we can get a copy of my article to you that way, if not I'll try another. Also, a few days ago I had a nice and long VoiP chat with Grabowski, and I think we are closer to one another in views than the newspaper polemic might indicate. If you'd want, I can ask him if he would like to write something together with me for The Signpost? Who knows, maybe he will agree (through I know it is rare for non-Wikipedians to write for TS). --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 05:15, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

@Piotrus: please do see if you can arrange something with Grabowski. I have no problem with non-Wikipedians writing for The Signpost. It's unusual since many of them don't know a whole lot about Wikipedia, they don't get paid, and I think our free-licensing might scare some people away too.

If you want to write a pro&con 2 author "debate" that would be great. These are harder than you'd think to arrange - it really does have to come down to a good faith difference of opinion between responsible people. So decide between you how many words each will write before hand. I suppose we can go a bit more than 1,000 each, but not much more. And then who goes first? Grabowski might seem logical here, but it's up to you two. Of course, no personal attacks, BLP violations. Smallbones(smalltalk) 20:43, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Piotrus, you wrote above: "we have already begun addressing the issues he raises on discussion pages and some articles are already partially fixed." Can you point to those discussions and articles? I'd like to take a look. SarahSV (talk) 02:28, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

I think he mentions six articles in his piece, out of which IIRC KL Warschau is already fixed and has been for many months, and the only error mentioned in his bio has been removed long ago as well (in 2018, and incidentally, by you, thank you btw). The other four articles still need more fixing. Please stop by at Talk:Jedwabne pogrom again when you have some time, I think it's the most high visibility on out of those, and so we should prioritize fixing it. I started a source review thread, and I think many more sources there need review. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 02:35, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Wikimania 2020 postponed until 2021

@Bri: This might be something that could go into news and notes. Katherine Maher sent out an email on wikimedia-L about this yesterday. Wikimania has been postponed as a response to COVID-19. There will not be a virtual event to replace it. Information about scholarships will be made available within the next few weeks. That's my summary of the email thread, but you might want to check it out yourself for important details I may have missed. Clovermoss (talk) 14:13, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

I touched upon this in my recent update to WP:CANCER. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:09, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Special report

Hello, Signpost,

I was looking through your Special report for the next issue and I was wondering, could you include a mention of WikiProject COVID-19? It's pretty new but also very active. Thanks. Liz Read! Talk! 21:43, 21 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi Liz, thanks for previewing. We moved the how of content creation to Community view; there was too much for one column. ☆ Bri (talk) 21:48, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
@Puddleglum2.0: I know that you do wikiproject reports. Is there any chance you might be interested in doing one for this WikiProject? Clovermoss (talk) 04:34, 22 March 2020 (UTC) If it does happen, maybe it could be interviews with active members of the WikiProject. That way, it would be different from the community view. Just some of my thoughts which may or may not be all that helpful. Clovermoss (talk) 04:40, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
@Clovermoss: That would actually be great! I was looking for a project to interview, and looks like this will probably work. I've put a request on the talk page. Thank you, Puddleglum2.0(How's my driving?) 05:14, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Related: I've been asked about WikiProject COVID-19 by WikiProject Tree of Life. See my replies at User_talk:Another_Believer#WikiProject_Tree_of_Life_Newsletter, and feel free to reference the interview/newsletter or use my replies in The Signpost if helpful. ---Another Believer (Talk) 18:25, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Publication date for March 2020

Hi @Smallbones, Bri, and Chris troutman: I think that Clovermoss and I can get content for "On the bright side" for the week of the 29th done by that day. If The Signpost's publication moves forward much at all from its current planned date of 29 March then please {{ping}} us. Otherwise the content for the week of the 29th will go into the next issue of The Signpost. ↠Pine (✉) 21:52, 21 March 2020 (UTC)

@Pine and Clovermoss: before noon NY time please! Smallbones(smalltalk) 22:11, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
@Smallbones: Alright, will do! NY stands for New York, right? So that would be noon in Eastern Time? Clovermoss (talk) 22:52, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
Hi @Clovermoss: would you please move your question to the WMYHTW section on this page and start a new subsection for the new week? We can discuss this there. ↠Pine (✉) 02:56, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
@Smallbones: The content for OTBS is finished and ready for a copyedit. ↠Pine (✉) 01:03, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

@Pine: Thanks, I'll get right on it. Smallbones(smalltalk) 01:16, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Arbitration report

I'm kind of running out of mental steam and the Arbitration report is very brief. If anyone else wants to contribute, they are welcome. Both cases I wrote about aren't really doing anything I can think of comments for. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:31, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

@Bri: Maybe something about Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Anti-harassment RfC (Draft) could be added? Clovermoss (talk) 18:01, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
Excellent idea, Clovermoss. I've added it. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:57, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
One other thing. Our E-in-C has commented in one of the Arbcom cases that we're covering. Should we say anything about that as a disclaimer or disclosure? As the regular reporter for Arbitration report, I generally don't comment at Arbcom cases to aovid this problem, and didn't comment on this one. ☆ Bri (talk) 19:01, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
I understand Bri's reluctance to comment on an area that he reports on. It's good practice, but I think of The Signpost as something like a small-town newspaper, say for a town of 10,000 people where everybody might not know each other, but they know somebody who knows most of the people they don't. The education reporter may have attended the local schools k-12 and had an uncle on the School Board a decade ago, and a relative has just started as a new teacher. It's hard to be completely disinterested on everything that might be reported in that small town or on Wikipedia. Let's not have a rule like "If a regular Signpost contributor has posted an opinion on a subject, we need to note it in any story on that subject." Personal comments made at an RfC or similar can reasonably be ignored at times. Perhaps my personal comments are a bit more sensitive, since generally I'd be the one to bring up COI problems to reporters. In short, I'd like Bri to handle this however he thinks best, but I don't see my comment here as requiring anything special but would understand if he disagrees. Smallbones(smalltalk) 20:01, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
Well, the first comment to last month's AR was related to an involved (former) E-in-C, so I didn't want that to be the main topic of discussion again. We should probably have a policy anyway, and the one you just annunciated seems good to me. ☆ Bri (talk) 20:23, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
Ok, I see what's up now. Yes, we could have, and probably should have, mentioned that Kudpung is a former editor-in-chief of The Signpost. I'd thought about this briefly, but I missed the call. We should identify current or former EICs if they are the main topic of a section of our coverage. The same rule should apply for regular contributors with a byline (say contributors to about 10 issues). But I can't imagine my comment at the Jytdog arbcom case would attract even a sentence in The Signpost. Smallbones(smalltalk) 14:59, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Does anyone mind...

Is it ok if I do some major overhauling to WP:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom/WikiProject desk? It's not been used for years, but I had a couple ideas for it to make my job a bit easier. I can outline my plan on detail if needed, but it will not affect the Signpost as a whole, it will only make getting WikiProjects to interview a lot easier. Thanks, --Puddleglum2.0(How's my driving?) 21:21, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Go for it! Smallbones(smalltalk) 14:29, 27 March 2020 (UTC)
Thanks! --Puddleglum2.0(How's my driving?) 14:35, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Issue 3 status update

Content looks good for many sections. Both News and notes and In the media are a bit rough but could be cleaned up in time. Opinion is fully written but could be wikified some, especially by adding internal links. @Smallbones: perhaps it would be useful to mark the unstarted sections cancelled/postponed/on hiatus as appropriate? @Pythoncoder: Thanks for starting Discussion report, do you think you will finish for this issue?

Thanks all! ☆ Bri (talk) 16:51, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks Bri. You all may have noticed that I've been a bit out of touch this month. Just 2 days to go, but I think there's a good chance everything gets done in time. There are a couple of submissions that I'd been expecting that won't come in. That's ok, absolutely to be expected in the circumstances. I'll finish moving my drafts into the Newsroom, and then get started on "From the editors" (plural). Please wait until I've got the basic outline but then I'll ask everybody to add a paragraph. The theme will be "The good and the bad" (I haven't figured out where "the ugly fits in" - bad joke). The authors should be listed as "This months contributors". Copyeditors report for duty! Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:14, 27 March 2020 (UTC)
Yes, I'll finish DR right now. —pythoncoder (talk | contribs) 18:16, 27 March 2020 (UTC)
You've probably seen this by now but the Discussion Report is ready for a copyedit. It's good to be back. —pythoncoder (talk | contribs) 20:24, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

I will finish Community view quickly ☆ Bri (talk) 15:31, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

It's finished (roughly, but publishable). @Smallbones: editorial decision whether or not to link to my criteria for listing individuals. As of now, it is not linked. ☆ Bri (talk) 15:52, 29 March 2020 (UTC)
@Bluerasberry: If you didn't see this already -- I un-postponed the Community view column, quickly finished what we had for issue 3. IMO a lot of the content will be too stale to carry over for issue 4. We can continue the same topic then, extending or expanding on what we have now. Hope this is OK by you. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:05, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Mailing list

Could Bri or someone please remove me as an admin from the Signpost editors' mail? Requests for moderation of the list are filling up my email daily and I have no interest in it. Thanks. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 12:58, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

I forgot that even existed. Not sure if I have control of it, though. Do I? ☆ Bri (talk) 16:37, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Copyediting help needed

@Bri, Megalibrarygirl, and Pythoncoder: and any other experienced copyeditors. For the next 2 hours or so.

Thanks,

Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:02, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

The two largest columns (I think?) are the Special report and Community view ... both still need copyedit. I contributed too much myself to be an effective copyeditor. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:24, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Pageviews last issue

Ten pages thru March 1, 2020 1,506 7 articles thru March 1, 2020 628

  • total thru March 3, 7,668
  • total thru March 7, 13,254
  • total thru March 14, 19,892
  • total thru March 21, 32,508
  • total thru March 28, 44,988

Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:54, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

New issue [6] 10 articles 4,839 [7] 5 articles 1,364,

  • total thru March 31 6,203
  • total thru April 4 26,276
  • total thru April 11 42,591
  • total thru April 18 50,059
  • total through April 25 57,878

Reader feedback on current issue

You can monitor reader feedback with the link above. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:17, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Tatar 3rd re-ban from Derslek

At Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2020-03-29/News and notes 2 bans are mentioned, and 3rd ban took place right now. See also here. --ssr (talk) 17:29, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Ready for publication

@Chris troutman and Bri: ready to go. This looks like a good one to me. We'll see what the readers say!

Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:31, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Starting publication now. Chris Troutman (talk) 17:35, 29 March 2020 (UTC)
 Done Chris Troutman (talk) 17:53, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Column formatting

I wasn't able to get columns displaying correctly in Community view, probably a consequence of the complex Signpost script wrappers. It shows up correctly in the preview, then goes away when you save the page. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:07, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks to all - it looks like a good one!

I've only seen 4 comments so far, plus one off-wiki(!), but this looks like a good issue. Thanks to everybody involved. @Bri, Bluerasberry, Pythoncoder, Megalibrarygirl, and Chris troutman: (I think I'm limited to 5 pings!). Smallbones(smalltalk) 19:04, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Cardiac arrest in the middle of an RfA

For those who are unfamiliar with my case, I was running for RfA and editing Wikipedia when the authorities dragged me away from my computer and put me in a tiny room that I could not leave. Or, to say the exact same thing using different language, my heart stopped beating, I fell over unconscious, the paramedics restarted my heart in the ambulance, and I woke up after four days in intensive care with a machine breathing for me.

There was a minor dust-up about BLP concerns until I made it clear that I don't want to keep this private, and because of this my story did not make the last issue. I am still willing to be interviewed and have something published about the experience if anyone thinks that it would make for an interesting Signpost piece. --Guy Macon (talk) 20:33, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi Guy,
1st - please see News and notes in case you already haven't. I'll plead a rough month getting the paper together. Sorry. Now if you want to do an interview, I'll recommend @Puddleglum2.0: tale care of it who did a great mass interview with WikiProject COVID-19 participants this month. I'll suggest some ground rules. 10 questions, just keep your answers within space bounds. Humor allowed, e,g, which was more painful the cardiac arrest, or the RfA? I'll let the 2 of you decide on the specifics. Smallbones(smalltalk) 21:52, 29 March 2020 (UTC)
Sounds good to me. I am finding a lot of people I know to be interested in what it felt like to have my heart stop -- something most of you will only experience once -- and how cardiac arrest is different from a heart attack (even I confused the two until I read the Wikipedia articles on them). Also potentially interesting; my hard work at physical rehab so I could get well enough to go home before coronavirus hit the hospital I was at. Don't care how many questions; sometimes more and shorter are better than fewer and longer. --Guy Macon (talk) 04:06, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
@Smallbones: @Guy Macon: I would be happy to take this on, but bear in mind I'm better at interviewing groups rather than one individual. =) Thanks, --Puddleglum2.0(How's my driving?) 14:24, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

@Guy Macon: are you still interested in this? If so, I've got a couple questions, we can get set up. Thanks, --Puddleglum2.0(How's my driving?) 14:30, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

Ready when you are. I just sent you an email with an email address in case you want to respond directly, or you can use the usual Wikipedia email link at [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:EmailUser/Guy_Macon ], or we can do everything in the open on my talk page or yours (my first choice). --Guy Macon (talk) 15:51, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
OK, sounds great! I don't have email enabled on my account, so I'll just set it up on a user subpage and ping you there when it's ready. Thanks! --Puddleglum2.0(How's my driving?) 14:28, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
For those interested, the page where Puddleglum2.0 is putting this together is at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/Interview. Anyone reading this is invited to go to my talk page and let me know if any of my answers are unclear or ill-advised. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:40, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Suggestions page cleanup

I'm going to archive most everything at WP:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom/Suggestions, unless I hear an objection... ☆ Bri (talk) 21:48, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Celebrity pays consultant to withdraw CC license

Story pitch summary - Pop star pays a consultant Web Sheriff to withdraw a CC license through a DMCA request to the WMF. Some wiki community members perceive the claim as illegitimate or untruthful, the conversation process breaks down perhaps due to the inflexible nature of DMCA requests and the challenges of communicating with WMF staff, perhaps other things happen, and the resolution is that a long-time well known Commons contributor gets a block.

I have less opinion on the actions of individual unpaid volunteers but do see a story here about a corporation using the power of paid legal workers to make a dubious DMCA filing based on what seems to be the inappropriate revocation of a valid CC license. One angle for this story could that the corporate behavior contests the legitimacy of the Creative Commons license and the validity of Wikimedia Common's content hosting process.

  1. popular performer - The Weeknd
  2. lots of concert photos in flickr account
  3. File:The_Weeknd_August_2017.jpg previously reviewed, along with other photos, to have CC license
  4. Web Sheriff sends DMCA - wmf:Legal:DMCA_The_Weeknd
    1. from the Web Sheriff - "As a gesture of goodwill and subject, simply, to due and timely compliance with this copyright notification, the Rights Owners are happy to offer the following, more up-to-date, official photographs of THE WEEKND™ and for on-line reproduction under a limited, non-commercial and revocable, so-called ‘creative commons’ license"[8]
    2. discussion at https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commons:Office_actions/DMCA_notices&diff=prev&oldid=405678602
  5. Commons:User:Alexis Jazz upset
  6. not to attribute this to anyone, but perhaps the general complaint is a claim that a large company is claiming someone else's already CC licensed photography as its own years after the CC license was applied, then compelling Wikimedia Foundation to direct volunteer community labor to assist it in changing history logs to retroactively establish their new narrative
  7. Google takedown notice - https://www.lumendatabase.org/notices/20130121#
  8. communication - miscommunication
    1. random uninvolved commentators may have said anything
    2. result - a block for Alexis Jazz
  9. WMF lawyers in the mix

Blue Rasberry (talk) 12:32, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Sounds interesting to me. Do you happen to know if Creative Commons got involved at all? Obviously they stand to lose a lot if their licenses can be defeated this easily. They say that in the past they have filed amicus briefs [9]. This would add a dimension to the story: it's not just about one image, but about basically everything we do here. ☆ Bri (talk) 15:29, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
Bluerasberry, can you check me on something. This is even more chilling if it is correct. The flickr account does not belong to a client of the Web Sheriff. Web Sheriff appears to have been hired by the performer or the agent. The images were uploaded probably by an event attendee. The performer is reaching out through a mishmash of personality rights and consumer protection law (claiming it represents celebrity endorsement of Wikipedia, among other things – disregarding its educational nature) to get "their" image removed. If this stands, then basically all of our BLPs are potentially without images.
If this is all true, I think this is an explosive story.
Just as a p.s., at least one of the URLs noted in the takedown demand is still in a well-known nonprofit site that caches web pages (you probably know what I mean). One of us could reach out to them and see if they got the same takedown.
p.p.s. I wonder if WMF, being a California business entity (C3162275), is at a disadvantage here, due to pecularities in California law wrt media company/individual performer IP rights. The drafter of the takedown certainly seems to be aware that California has extraordinary consumer protection law, as well, and is willing to leverage it. ☆ Bri (talk) 15:56, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
@Bri: I do not know, but yes, the relationships seem to be as you describe. Probably the correct course of action is to ask wiki people at the Commons page for the story. Blue Rasberry (talk) 13:53, 2 April 2020 (UTC)
Ahem This (section "Update from the Foundation") seems to suggest that the performer does indeed own the rights to the image. Black Kite (talk) 15:59, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
@Black Kite: According to the WMF statement, the copyright transfer happened after the upload to Flickr, which would mean after the application of the CC license. The change in copyright ownership would require a change in copyright attribution, but a change in ownership would not change the CC license. Do you see something different here? Blue Rasberry (talk) 13:53, 2 April 2020 (UTC)
@Blue Rasberry: (Sorry, missed the ping) Yes, the copyright holder is saying (and this appears to be the case) that the images were uploaded to the ComeUpShow's Flickr account without his permission, which would of course make any CC licenses invalid. Black Kite (talk) 18:56, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
The claim "under a limited, non-commercial and revocable, so-called ‘creative commons’ license" (emphasis added) is particularly likely to ignite a firestorm.
Wikipedia:Revocation of our licensing is not permitted
"What if I change my mind about using a CC license?"
"CC licenses are not revocable. Once something has been published under a CC license, licensees may continue using it according to the license terms for the duration of applicable copyright and similar rights. As a licensor, you may stop distributing under the CC license at any time, but anyone who has access to a copy of the material may continue to redistribute it under the CC license terms. While you cannot revoke the license, CC licenses do provide a mechanism for licensors to ask that others using their material remove the attribution information. You should think carefully before choosing a Creative Commons license."[10]
--Guy Macon (talk) 16:03, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
Indeed, the performer's company are wrong about that, but that only refers to their "offer" of giving Commons other images of the performer, not to the issue of the original image. I doubt Commons would accept any images unless they were "proper" CC licenses. Black Kite (talk) 16:09, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Tags placed on column

I think we should encourage readers to give feedback explicitly in the reader feedback, not in the column itself like this. Since I am a co-author I'm going to let someone else decide if this should be undone or whatever. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:54, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

I just reverted with a short note in the edit summary. Smallbones(smalltalk) 19:05, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Three COVID-relevant traffic reports

Cross-posted from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject COVID-19, originally in a longer form, by Jtmorgan in his or her volunteer role (also WMF employee). There is a link for feedback at the original post.

  1. COVID-19 article report: (updates daily at 14:00 UTC) This report contains the previous-days pageview totals for all articles with the COVID-19 topic template. It also provides predicted quality scores for each article (at its latest revision when the report was run). And most recently I added the total count of articles that transclude the template, and the cumulative daily pageviews for those articles.
  2. Top 1000 report: (updates daily at 15:00 UTC) This report is intended as a replacement for the (currently stalled) Top 5000 report. It provides running traffic counts for the most popular Wikipedia articles within the past 7 days. As you can imagine, many of these articles are related to COVID-19 (whether or not they have the template, c.f. Andrew Cuomo, which is #14 as of yesterday).
  3. Social media traffic report: (updates daily, at around 15-17:00 UTC) Like the Top 1000 report, many of these articles are related to COVID-19. Given the rise troubling rise in COVID-related conspiracy theories propagated through social media, this report may be especially helpful for monitoring attempts to disrupt Wikipedia or undermine it by inserting disinformation.

Cheers ☆ Bri (talk) 02:46, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

Potential op-ed - billionaire paid editing

moved to Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom/Submissions
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

@Smallbones: I have created a draft for a potential Signpost op-ed on paid editing at Greg Lindberg in my sandbox here: User:Indy beetle/sandbox#Signpost draft : The Lindberg Affair. I wrote it in a similar vein to the Jeffrey Epstein one that ran this addition though, considering my own involvement in the affair—and yours—and my opinions on it (which are reflected) I think it would be incorrect to try and submit it as a regular news piece. It's not finished but I'm nearly there. Would the Signpost like to run it next edition? -Indy beetle (talk) 07:53, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

Smallbones I think this is pretty much done Eddie891 Talk Work 02:49, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

@Eddie891: I think we should still keep this on hold, pending external events. Smallbones(smalltalk) 03:13, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
@Eddie891 and Smallbones: This article is not necessarily time sensitive, although it is recent news right now.
I went over it with Indy beetle and I am comfortable to present it. I should have brought it back here sooner, but is there a reason to delay this to next month? Blue Rasberry (talk) 22:32, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

The article is getting better with age, though I still think the material on the Wikiedia article is too detailed. I'm sure I don't have time for this over the next few day, i.e. until after the next issue. I would like to revisit this next month. I do have a problem however in that I am involved with editing the Wikipedia article. So please let's take this slow. Smallbones(smalltalk) 23:45, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

GA Backlog

I'm not exactly sure where this would fit best in terms of Signpost coverage, but I think it's noteworthy that WP:GAN has a backlog of 700+ nominations, which is the highest it has ever been, and has exceeded the maximum size of a template-based page with transcluded templates. The page became broken on March 26, with new GA nominations failing to transclude. There's an interesting discussion about this over at WT:GAN#GAN has exceed its physical limits. A backlog drive has started for April and May. Clovermoss (talk) 21:24, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

I could see an article along the lines of "is the backlog insurmountable?: can WIkipedia today handle good article nominations" discussing reviewing in the past and strategies for moving forward... Eddie891 Talk Work 00:58, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
@Eddie891: I'm thinking of mentioning the backlog drive as part of this week's content for On The Bright Side, but I think there's enough there for its own separate feature - if someone wanted to write it. The talk page discussion offers lots to think about. Can something be done about the limitations of the bot? How can the backlog be kept down? What are the pros/cons of a Quid Pro Quo system and/or potentially limiting the number of nominations someone has going at once? There could be information about past backlog drives and how the backlog keeps coming back. @Smallbones: What do you think? If no one else is interested in writing about this, I could try to give it a shot. I want to focus on On The Bright Side and the article I'm currently working on, but I've had more free time on my hands lately. Clovermoss (talk) 01:34, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
@Clovermoss and Eddie891: Is there any chance you could do this together? I know Eddie is a reviewer over there, but I don't think that would be a COI, especially if it's a Community view article. Why don't one of you start the article and then we'll see what happens? If it turns into a collaboration so much the better. Smallbones(smalltalk) 02:46, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
@Smallbones: I wouldn't mind collaborating if Eddie891 wanted to do so, or another editor did. Clovermoss (talk) 02:53, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Clovermoss, Smallbones I'm in! Eddie891 Talk Work 13:43, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
Where should I start the article?
(also does anyone know if the fcimporter script is still usable? Eddie891 Talk Work 20:36, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
@Eddie891 and Smallbones: Is the community view idea still alright? Thanks for offering to work with me, by the way. Clovermoss (talk) 03:09, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

@Eddie891 and Clovermoss: I think the Community view would work well. As far as where to write the article, I'll suggest on a user sandbox page to start. Whoever starts first just ping (and sign) the other. Might as well ping me too. Eddie, I don't know if the fcimporter works. Smallbones(smalltalk) 03:24, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Can I ask the author/s to use the “create a draft” workflow at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom/Submissions? It will make moving to a SP column much easier. ☆ Bri (talk) 04:08, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
Clovermoss, started at User:Eddie891/Signpost draft Eddie891 Talk Work 13:31, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
Thanks Eddie891. My tablet broke so I might not be able to help for a few days. When I have more reliable access to a device with Internet I'll let you know. I really am looking forward to writing with you, so my current situation really sucks. Clovermoss (talk) 23:21, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
Clovermoss, I've made a bit of a start...
@all: If you look at the draft, i've made a graph of ga nominations (quarterly). Is there a way to gray out part of the background (like this file) when a backlog drive is in progress, or will I have to take the graph to some off-wiki material? Eddie891 Talk Work 02:07, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
@Eddie891: I wanted to say that I am incredibly sorry that I was not able to get back to you sooner. Access to a device was harder than I thought it would previously be and real life has been taking priotory right now for other reasons. It's midnight and I need to sleep but I needed to get this off my chest now that I can do so. I will spend more time going through what I missed tomorrow. If you no longer want to colloborate with me since it's been an entire week, I totally understand. But if you still want to work with me, I will try to do my best. Clovermoss (talk) 04:08, 18 April 2020 (UTC)
Clovermoss, That's quite fine, and I'm still ready to whip up an article- you'll note that I've been largely waiting for you so you haven't missed much. I completely understand that real life is more important than WP, it always should. I'm going to try and flesh the article out tomorrow. Eddie891 Talk Work 12:34, 18 April 2020 (UTC)
@Eddie891: I started looking at the long-term solutions section and previous backlog drive pages. I added the outstanding nominations for Dec 2011 to the y axis, but I can't figure out what the x axis represents. I also wanted to check in with you that what I did was okay and did not break anything, as I must admit that I do not have much experience with tables. Is there anything specific that you would like me to work on moving forward? Clovermoss (talk) 03:01, 19 April 2020 (UTC)
Clovermoss, I can handle the table, it's basically just every seventh day for the drives through the 56, because that will allow it to show long term effect, and the trend we of course expect to see, is that the chart always goes back up. If you could write a section about the actual drive, that would be great, especially given the great success it's had. Maybe ask some of the more prolific reviewers about their thoughts on it. We should try to get this article together in the next couple of days to give copy editors enough time to read it over-- Eddie891 Talk Work 22:50, 19 April 2020 (UTC)
Clovermoss I think that it makes sense to hold the piece until next month, given that the ga drive ends then, so A) we could sum up the drive and B) that would be a better time to promote more long-term reform. How does that sound? Eddie891 Talk Work 13:16, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

@Clovermoss and Eddie891: - I just checked out the user draft. It does look a bit thin. but nothing a couple of days work couldn't fix. If you do finish it up soon, please move it to Community view. Otherwise, please put a 2 line "In brief" in News & notes, and hold the full article for next month. Smallbones(smalltalk) 00:53, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Smallbones,I'll try and flesh it out over the next couple of days. I guess the biggest reason to probably support push it off is so we can get some more input from others on broader ga reform, but I'll ping again once the draft is pretty much done and we can revisit Eddie891 Talk Work 13:30, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
It will be mostly done by today, but I'm still waiting on one or two more responses from editors... Are we going to push this issue a couple of days back? Eddie891 Talk Work 23:02, 23 April 2020 (UTC)
Smallbones, I meant to point towards this article... Mobile typing has a long way to go Eddie891 Talk Work 12:52, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
@Eddie891: yes I should have noticed that this was about GA. Even without the last quote it is publishable, but ... Please leave out all the qualifiers about your opinions and recommendations. (My example) "I think this might be considered" in a piece like this is better put as "Let's do it!" Smallbones(smalltalk) 13:24, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

On The Bright Side for April 2020

Reference: Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/On the bright side

Week of March 29

Hi @Pine:. I hope you and @Clovermoss: don't mind me being WP:BOLD with my first contribution to the Signpost covering the success of April Fools Day at DYK. I have written a basic paragraph about it. I can write more but I would like to ask if mentioning 17 Million Fuck Offs would be suitable for inclusion as the composer expressed support for it being on DYK? Normally I would presume WP:NOTCENSORED but since this is my first time, I thought I would ask before including. The C of E God Save the Queen! (talk) 15:08, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

  • Hello @The C of E: thanks for the initiative. However, the week of March 29 was covered in the previous issue of "On the bright side". Also, that style of humor doesn't fit with my vision for the type of content that should be in WMYHTW. However, I'm happy to take suggestions for additional content, and I won't censor your contribution if you put it into the comment section of the April issue after it's published. I will ping User:Clovermoss here to ask for her opinions also and to make sure that she agrees with this. Thanks, ↠Pine (✉) 06:02, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
    • @Pine: But how can last issue which was published on the 29th cover something that happened on 1 April, let alone the viewing figures? That's why I put it under there as I thought it was most appropriate. Would just saying 1 April as the header be better or would it be better as its own separate article in the signpost? The C of E God Save the Queen! (talk) 06:13, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Week of April 5

Hi Pine. I think I have finished writing this week's content. Any suggestions? I decided against quoting the one source and just summarized it instead. I think that a relevant image or maybe even a gallery could be nice, but I'm not sure what I would put in it. Clovermoss (talk) 03:12, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

  • @Pine: Thanks for the ideas! I'll wait and see about the email suggestion and look for other relevant media in the meantime. Clovermoss (talk) 02:25, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
  • @Pine: I added the 1 million article logo for the Ukrainian Wikipedia in-between the text. That's the best I could find for direct relevance. I couldn't find any related images for the Kazakh language User Group. I took a look at the featured pictures this week, and while I admire the one for Jane Digby, I can't think of a way to tie it in with this week's content. There's no specific logo for the new funding launched with MOSS available on Commons, and I think the Mozilla logo itself may be potentially distracting? When I look at it in preview it just doesn't seem like it fits. Is it okay if I just have the one image? If so, do you want me to start the email draft or to wait? If the email suggestion does happen, that would take time, and I don't want to rush anything. Clovermoss (talk) 04:48, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
  • @Clovermoss: An image to represent a language user group is somewhat more challenging than finding an image to represent a national user group. How about the stamp that is shown in the article Kazakh literature? Hopefully no one will be offended by the inclusion of a stamp that features someone who was an author and a political figure. You could say in the caption that this is "A postage stamp from the year 1965 that features Abai Qunanbaiuly, who is a well-known author who wrote in the Kazakh language". ↠Pine (✉) 05:23, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
@Pine: My tablet broke last night and I'm borrowing my Mom's phone to write this. I may not be able to access Google Docs for a few days. Clovermoss (talk) 23:15, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
@Clovermoss: I'm sorry to hear about the break. WMYHTW can wait for you. I have an idea that I'll share with you you through email. ↠Pine (✉) 04:29, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Week of April 12

No content

Week of April 19

Hi @Clovermoss:, my content for this week is ready for you to review. ↠Pine (✉) 05:14, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

  • Hi @Clovermoss: I went ahead with publishing this week's email. Next week is your turn for writing content. Do you think that you can write it by the middle of the day on Saturday so that it is ready for Smallbones to publish that evening? ↠Pine (✉) 01:35, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
  • Hi @Smallbones: Clovermoss has been away for a few days. Although it would be nice if she adds more content for OTBS tomorrow, that probably won't happen. If she is away next month then I'll probably write content every other week at most. I've been busy off wiki recently. Thanks for what you do for The Signpost. ↠Pine (✉) 05:29, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

Wikimedia Foundation re-branding

Will someone volunteer to write the story of the Wikimedia Foundation rebranding? Will anyone volunteer to do at least 1 section of such an article? I will ping people who have been involved in the discussion, but there could be a full story here.

As I see, here are major points of this narrative

  1. WMF presents a survey results calculation which the Wikimedia community contests as inaccurate
  2. WMF asserts power to make a rebranding decision; the Wikimedia community also claims a right to have significant power in this decision
  3. WMF staff enters Wikimedia community spaces as outsiders and non-wiki community members; WMF staff declines to follow wiki community norms in discussion, decision making, etc
  4. The conflict has little to do with any re-branding proposal. The wiki community wants a routine and typical wiki discussion about rebranding as with any big issue, but the conflict is more about Wikimedia community participation in the decision making process than it is about any particular subject of discussion, such as re-branding.

Other points seem to be

  1. WMF claims the right to represent and speak the silent Wikimedia userbase, including readers and consumers
    1. Readers are 99.9% of the Wikimedia user base. Readers do not communicate in any obvious way, such as by taking surveys or giving comments
    2. The organized Wikimedia community who participate in surveys, edit the wiki, etc. is less than 0.1% of the billion annual users
    3. The general idea is that WMF's interpretation of what readers want is a more weighty vote than the sum of all Wikimedia community organization
    4. the WMF's claim to speak for the 99% has arisen before - The reader as tool for autocracy
  2. US$1.5-2 million dollars? Where does this go?
    1. meta:Communications/Wikimedia_brands/2030_movement_brand_project/FAQ#How_much_does_this_project_cost?
    2. that FAQ mentions cost to the wiki community, no report of any money going into wiki community control
  3. Two in-person meetups with Snohetta, the design consultants
    1. "Snohetta told us that they designed Times Square in NYC"
    2. meetup in India
      1. Indian volunteers are 4 of 41 attendees? Why host in India without Indian community participation?
      2. Bengaluru brand workshop
    3. protest at the Norway meetup?
      1. no documentation of protest but Oslo brand workshop

The WMF did a survey. Some in the Wikimedia community are claiming that the WMF presented results in error and which favored the WMF desired outcome.

In a normal survey, the method for calculating support and opposition is the same. In this survey, the WMF used different methods to calculate the support and opposition.

See meta:special:diff/19800238 for this table

WMF reported survey results
Reach and Response
Consultation overview (*)
Affiliate discussion via email on Meta-Wiki
Reach 122 affiliates 14 mailing lists (9,066 registered subscribers) 9,078 page views of review talk page
Response 63 affiliates (52% rate) 38 unique responders 106 contributors
Positions 24 support, 6 oppose 7 support, 12 oppose 13 support, 45 oppose

(*) There were also 9,880 unique pageviews on the blog post announcing the proposal and consultation

Response KPIs
Goal KPI Results
Share widely with community Reach 80% of affiliates ✓ 82% of affiliates
Collect feedback from many perspectives 100+ comments from            

100+ users/groups

✓ 319+ comments

✓ 63 groups, 150+ users

Measure community appetite

for change

20% of affiliates support

Less than 20% of informed community oppose

✓ 38% of reviewing affiliates support

✓ 0.6% of informed oppose (57 users oppose of ~9,000 reached)

  1. WMF presented a survey
    1. Survey results
      1. taken from meta:special:diff/19800238
      2. WMF send survey to over 9000 potential respondents and 144 responded
      3. 0.6% oppose (57), 0.2% support (20), 0.7% undecided (67) and 98.4 (~8900) did not respond
      4. within that survey, 63 of the respondents were Wikimedia affiliates (? not sure what this is)
      5. of the affiliates, 24 support and 6 oppose
    2. WMF survey interpretation
      1. WMF's calculation of opposition - 57 opposed out of potential 9000 respondents, so WMF's report of opposition to the rebranding is 0.6%
      2. WMF's calculation of support - 24 supported out of 63 affiliates, so WMF's report of support for the rebranding is 38%
      3. results page updated changed following community discussion on talk page
    3. Wiki community survey interpretation
      1. The metrics used here are troubling
      2. Can you confirm that numbers mean numbers?
      3. Informed people
        1. "anyone who didn't specifically oppose, but had viewed the page, was perceived as somehow supporting the page?" -Nosebagbear
        2. "9,000 users viewing the page does not mean 9,000 valid survey participants." -NickK
  2. Wiki community runs a conventional in-wiki survey
    1. meta:Requests for comment/Should the Foundation call itself Wikipedia
    2. due to end 16 April
    3. WMF requests to close RfC advertising on 6 April - Removing the banner about the RfC
    4. WMF responds to this community-run survey
    5. A statement from the Board of Trustees
    6. Updates to already existing 2030 movement brand project/FAQ

Blue Rasberry (talk) 19:17, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Previous reporting in English Wikipedia's The Signpost:

Blue Rasberry (talk) 19:24, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

I have very little experience with the English Wikipedia's Signpost, and I don't view this issue from the perspective of an English Wikipedian, but I would be happy to contribute to an article on this subject. I've been following the rebranding and other WMF initiatives (like the UCoC) relatively closely the last few months and have developed informed opinions. As such, I could write a decent amount about basically any aspect of the issue. Vermont (talk) 00:06, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
I'm far too involved at this point to morally write an article about it. That being said, I'd be happy to discuss it as necessary. I do think that a piece that's missed above is the planning project summary, which set forth standards as to what would count as a consultation, but was ignored going forwards. TomDotGov (talk) 02:39, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

FC

I'm still willing and able to write a featured content section. Please let me know if people feel there's sufficient interest. Eddie891 Talk Work 20:46, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Yes, please do write it up. It's been so long, that we all might have forgotten how to put it together - so that will be up to you. I'll say "not too long and not too many photos" but take that with a grain of salt. @Eddie891:
Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:44, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
Smallbones, I think I'll just include stuff promoted in April, which will allow a manageable length. Also... After some experimenting, I got fcimporter to work, making this fc far easier! Eddie891 Talk Work 15:18, 18 April 2020 (UTC)
Sounds good! Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:20, 18 April 2020 (UTC)
Smallbones, Can I create a page at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Featuredcontentimporting for using the script on, because it's very good at the manual work, but not so good at the new formatting, so having a page to consistently run the script on and then copy and pasting it into the next issue page would be really helpful. I would use a userpage, but the script demands that it be in the Signpost namespace Eddie891 Talk Work 15:48, 18 April 2020 (UTC)
@Eddie891: Yes, please! Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:02, 18 April 2020 (UTC)
Smallbones, What's the latest date we can hold off marking FC for a copy edit? I wan't to get as much content in as possible Eddie891 Talk Work 22:57, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

A week to publication (April 25)

It's been a strange month for everybody, lots of schedules disrupted. My difficulties have been along the line of not having time to concentrate and edit. Sorry for my lack of communication so far. That said, I see this being a potentially very good issue. I also see this month as a time when the community needs us - lots of people looking to see what's happening on Wiki, lots of people looking for a bit of direction, or just having brief bits of time to kill. If you look at the pageviews (near the top of this page), the pvs for the last issue are running about 50% higher than the previous months.

A few things everybody can do:

  • upload the articles to the pages on the Newsroom in time and get them in position to be copyedted.
  • when in doubt, keep the articles basic, simple, non-complicated, neutral or positive. The message I'd like to see, and I think the community would like to see, is that everything is ok, solid. Wikipedia is still here, The Signpost is still here. There's at least one place in our lives that is moving ahead. Of course, if there are things to worry about, or be negative about, cover them.
  • Expect unexpected disruptions. I very much want to publish on time. There should be enough articles (14?). If something gets complicated or difficult to publish, I'll tend to putting it off until next month in order to publish the rest on time.

Some specifics:

  • I think Bri's time this week is limited. So who's going to save the issue when I mess things up? @Bluerasberry, Pine, Clovermoss, Megalibrarygirl, and Indy beetle:, well all of you I hope!
  • There's a good article by Diego (WMF) in "By the numbers". It was previously published in Medium [11]. The problem is that the article depends greatly on the 6 graphs which they made real fancy and aren't freely licensed. The data is freely available (I've got it). We need to come up with approximate replications of the graphs(with links to the fancy ones). Does anybody have real good graphing skills? I'll put a notice on Wikipedia:Graphics Lab/Illustration workshop, but if we can handle it in-house, all the better. e-mail me if you want a challenge.
  • Denny, former Board member, has submitted what I expect to be a very good article. I saw an earlier version, but haven't had time for a good look at the shorter version. Could somebody give it a good deep editing once I get it uploaded tonight. Good feedback to Denny could make this a great article.

There will be more, as it comes to me. Smallbones(smalltalk) 20:47, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

What's the Signpost quote template? The one that comes in green? Eddie891 Talk Work 17:42, 23 April 2020 (UTC)
@Eddie891: I think you want {{Signpost inline quote}}. There's a formatting cheat sheet link in a box at the top of this page. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:48, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Special report

During copyedit on Next issue/Special report, I can’t find the source of this quotation so as "not to inflict his terrible English" on the English Wikipedia. Where did this come from? ☆ Bri (talk) 05:29, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

I found an instance on the Catalan Wikipedia, posted by IP user [ 193.167.41.1 ] on the talk page for IP user [ 193.167.41.1 ]
I checked the reference on the special report page, checking every edit to the page and associated talk page in 2019 and sampling other dates, and that phrase does not appear to have ever been posted to that Wikipedia page.
I spot checked the early posting history at [17] and [18] and found no evidence of the phrase.
The Editor interaction Analyzer found no interaction between Cdani and Jimbo Wales.[19]
--Guy Macon (talk) 06:36, 21 April 2020 (UTC)
@Bri, Guy Macon, and Marcmiquel: - good catch. The key date here should be in 2001 (though not all wikirecords go back that far! and some have been recreated). The footnote given several words after the quote is from Jimbo and contains a garbled version of the quote [20]. The page info at [21] has some interesting info, as does the talk page at [22].. Marc Miquel, can you find an exact source for the quote? Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:21, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

OK, now that I've had a chance to look at it, I simply replaced the ref to

Humour report article

I have written the humour article (my first article so please be kind!) as a tribute to DYK's April Fools. I was wondering if someone would think it worthwhile if we include a picture of the table at DYKSTATS that shows clearly all 11 hooks and what their views were for the day? The C of E God Save the Queen! (talk) 09:20, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Is COVID-19 not "current" anymore?

There's an interesting discussion at WikiProject COVID-19 (the subject of last issue's WikiProject report) that is contemplating removal of the current-event template {{Current}} at the top of some articles. Maybe for discussion report? ☆ Bri (talk) 18:21, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Opinion

I have to say I do not understand the meaning of the Opinion column section title "Wikipedia emerged in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks". ☆ Bri (talk) 06:07, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

As a expanded version of the author's published work elsewhere, I'm reluctant to do anything more than punctuation fixes... I agree though that the subheading in question isn't really covered by the corresponding section. While it's possible Wikipedia gained greater renown in the wake of the events of September 11, 2001, the text doesn't get into it. isaacl (talk) 06:24, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
@Bri, Isaacl, and Pete Forsyth: Thanks for copyediting this so quickly. I'll ask Pete F if he wants to change the heading (but not the meaning of the text). There will be lots of CE to do today and I've got lots of writing left to do! Can anybody write a neutral Arbitration report. It should be short - only 2 or 3 events that I know of. If not, I'll write it as an opinion piece - completely labeled as such. It's too important to completely leave out Smallbones(smalltalk) 12:25, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
@Bri: Thank you for bringing this up (and for your excellent edits). I'm now realizing, that section header is a holdover from a very early draft, and was only intended as a placeholder, but I never got back to it. I'll see what I can come up with. -Pete Forsyth (talk) 19:50, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
Always use "This is a placeholder" or some such instead of copying previous material. I also like to copy an existing page and then edit it, but the first thing I do after copying is replace all of the text with ????. --Guy Macon (talk) 20:07, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

I changed it to "The appeal of transparency in a time of uncertainty". This captures the purpose of the section better, I think. -Pete Forsyth (talk) 22:27, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

Traffic report

I presume the flippant tone in the first item is intentional, so I'm a bit reluctant to copy edit it directly. I suggest modifying the last sentence to the following, to remove the awkward phrase "of which causes", and to put the pandemic (the actual traffic item) at the end of the sentence, rather than the beginning. This allows for a more natural progression of cause and effect.

The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), which is responsible for the 2019-20 coronavirus pandemic and its tragic consequences.

Although personally I disagree with the tone, if it is to be kept, I still suggest using my rewording, while preserving the existing ending instead of using "its tragic consequences". isaacl (talk) 06:14, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

@Isaacl and Igordebraga: Let me first say that the Traffic report is very successful at what it does - giving traffic statistics not as a mere (likely unreadable) list, but as an entertaining summary of what people actually read with indications of why they read it. This is true not just on The Signpost, but also on the project's own page. The Signpost is lucky to have this.
That said the tone comes off as rather breezy, irreverent, humourous, likely by design - that's what makes it readable to most of its many fans. That does not mean that The Signpost does not have a responsibility to make sure that we don't offend our readers. Let me get back to you on this. Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:58, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
My 2¢ – humor does not translate well between cultures even within the Anglophone world. This might be one of those things. Or it could be people who don’t grasp the sense of dread in the U.S. Northeast. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:02, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

Given our time constraints (I intend to publish tomorrow midday), the alternative I see are

  • rewrite every coronavirus blurb (likely impossible) with a concentration on the latest (bottom section).
  • put a small, black box (I'll see if I can come up with an example) saying something like "In memory of the victims" or more directly "in memory of the dead".
  • remove the column entirely for this issue. I'm leaning to the second alternative.

My apologies to Igordebraga and the other authors for not catching this earlier. They are just doing what we've always asked them to do. This only applies to this issue.

All comments appreciated. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:24, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

 In memory of the dead 

@Igordebraga: just in case.

I'll see if it works in the column. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:37, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

OK, please see Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/Traffic report and tell me if it works. Two possible objections

  • Some people will think it's morbid
  • Deciding whether to include the box for particular articles, e.g. Spanish flue, John Prine, is not totally straightforward.

Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:49, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

I've no comment on the general tone of In the News; I understand the intent of making it lively to read. I didn't specifically like "tragic things like that" as it comes off as dismissive and I don't think text conveys the intent well. (I can hear in my mind how it's intended to sound, but it kind of assumes familiarity with people talking that way in certain humourous contexts; without this, the connotation isn't great.) Regarding the Reddit song, I think mentioning Republicans and Democrats may be offputting, and it is country-specific, particularly for text covering various multi-national articles. Otherwise, I don't have any general objections to the quote (I suppose technically it could be considered a copyright violation, but it can be easily argued someone contributing to a thread like that is providing an implicit license); it's probably funnier to someone who knows the song being parodied. I don't think "In memory of the dead" with a black background is a good solution; the articles aren't memorials, nor are their placements in the traffic report. Item 2 has a pretty cut-and-dried set of notes, and the notes for item 3 are just free-associating on words. My suggestion is to run the notes as in your edit. isaacl (talk) 17:27, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
@Isaacl: First "In the news" or "Traffic report"? I'll assume "Traffic report" here. The little black box is probably something of an over-reaction. My reaction to re-writing (or at least re-checking) all the 30+ articles on coronavirus in TR is just to simplify the style a bit and stick as closely to the facts as possible. I'm particularly worried about the last (bottom) 10 articles which I've only briefly copyedited. This will take some time to check and to rewrite. Could you list any additional blurbs that you have questions or worries about? Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:09, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
Sorry, I meant "Traffic report". As usual, I forgot to scroll further down past the first week; nothing stuck out with a quick skim but I'll have a closer look. isaacl (talk) 18:13, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
I read through the other items; I made a small copy edit to the notes for one. I don't have any specific concerns. Unsurprisingly, the notes tend to become more matter-of-fact with each successive week. isaacl (talk) 18:39, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
Oh, I forgot about the note talking about tiny things, which I see you removed. I assumed it was an intentional joke (though it felt overly subtle to me) since viruses are even smaller than bacteria. I think the later note that links to a blog post showing a million dots is effective. isaacl (talk) 18:47, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

Running late by about an hour

@Eddie891, Bri, Megalibrarygirl, and Isaacl: and chris Troutman. I could use some help copyediting. Most of the article marked "CE done' could use a second pair of eyes. I also need to write a very brief Arbitration report but have a COI, if anybody want to write it, there are only 2 events as far as I can see. Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:04, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

My apologies as I was busy before now and did not get a chance to read the arbitration report until now. The proposed remedies for the Medicine arbitration case do not favour excluding prices (this would be a content matter). They quite correctly propose methods of managing editor behaviour in the area of dispute. isaacl (talk) 17:57, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
Sorry again for the last minute rush... Regarding your edit: it's kind of "dog bites man" territory. None of the proposals try to make a decision on the content issue, and that's always the case with commenters familiar with how arbitration works, as they know content decisions won't be passed as remedies. isaacl (talk) 18:11, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
I have to disagree. If I was writing the report I'd call out that there are proposals about content, specifically 0RR or 1RR vice price edits. In fact the very first proposed temporary injunction was "Moratorium on addition/removal of drug prices". ☆ Bri (talk) 18:17, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes, there are proposals about managing editor behaviour on prices, which would still allow the editing community as a whole to work out the dispute by themselves. There are no proposals on deciding that prices should be included or excluded under specific circumstances. Proposed remedies like that are dead in the water. The closest the committee comes to this is deciding on overseeing an RfC on the matter, and even there the community is working out the decision. Summarizing the 0RR or 1RR proposals would be fine; I'm just saying the current summary ("many of the proposals appear to favor letting the editors solve the content dispute on their own") is incomplete (all of them do), and to be expected, so not particularly revealing for this case. isaacl (talk) 18:32, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
I copyedited quickly. It looks good overall. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:05, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
Thanks and sorry for putting this off to the last minute. If necessary we can make corrections after publication. More last minute pre-publication corrections may interfere with Chris's publication process (not that I'm sure how this works exactly). Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:20, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes, I agree – editing now could cause edit conflicts and throw the publishing script(s) off the rails and require vexing manual fixups. Probably best to leave it as-is at least until Chris finishes. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:24, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
I'm sorry Smallbones. I dropped the ball on this. Let me know if it needs after publishing cleanup. Megalibrarygirl (talk) 18:32, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
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