User talk:AlexEng/Archive 1

Archive 1

Please comment on Talk:Oakland Coliseum station

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Oakland Coliseum station. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 15 February 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Battle of Clyst Heath (1455)

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Battle of Clyst Heath (1455). Legobot (talk) 04:24, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

 Done

Your question at the Help Desk

You have a response.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 19:23, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

 Read

Please comment on Talk:Mumtaz (actress)

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Mumtaz (actress). Legobot (talk) 04:24, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

 Not done

Please comment on Talk:Clinton Foundation

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Clinton Foundation. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 11 November 2016 (UTC)

 Not done

Please comment on Talk:Ronald Reagan

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Ronald Reagan. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 22 November 2016 (UTC)

 Done

Please comment on Talk:Political positions of Donald Trump

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Political positions of Donald Trump. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

 Done

Merging articles on subjects you evidently don't have a clue about

Plip!

As you have little experience editing, I feel that a 'plip' will suffice. Please do not make unilateral decisions just because a merge tag was added by a dubious user in 2013. It's only been left in place under sufferance because the pejorative term Khokhol needs to be better referenced... but references there are, particularly since the events in Ukraine since 2014. It does not mean that it's the right thing to do: it means that numerous editors have been busy on other articles and haven't gotten around to further referencing or working out how best to merge the articles (if, indeed, they ought to be merged).

Note, also, that you are editing in a highly sensitive area of Wikipedia which falls under WP:ARBEE discretionary sanctions. Thanks for taking this on board, and in handling it with a sense of humour. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 05:31, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

@Iryna Harpy: Thank you for your response to my edits. I appreciate that the topic is a sensitive one, and I am aware of all of the relevant policies. However, I am honestly surprised at your objection. There are three major points (and one side-note) to my view:

• The merge was proposed in November of 2015 and the relevant merge discussion had been open for more than a year. The only editor who bothered to comment on the proposal was the creator of the article. Adding his support to the implicit support of the nominator and myself, that's a three-to-nothing consensus for a very old merge proposal. I see you've made 1, 2, 3 edits to the article on which the banner was posted since its addition. Yet in all that time, you didn't raise your objection to the merger? Why not? WP:SILENCE is consensus, and in the absence of any disagreement, I am forced to presume that there is no reason not to go ahead with the merger. That's why WP:MERGECLOSE specifies that if enough time (normally one week or more) has elapsed and there has been no discussion or is unanimous consent to merge, any user may close the discussion and move forward with the merger.
• References (or lack thereof) have nothing to do with this particular merger. As mentioned in my discussion closure, the reason for this merger was #2 under WP:MERGEREASON, i.e. overlap. The two articles discuss the same topic; in fact, Chupryna even has a subsection for the pejorative connotations of Khokhol. That's because the page is a WP:REDUNDANTFORK of Khokhol. However, because that page has a gallery and broader coverage of the topic, I chose to merge Khokhol into it. I believe this was the best choice in this situation.
• I'm not quite clear on whether your objection is to any merger between the two articles or in the manner in which the pages were merged. If it's the former, then I would urge you to voice your concerns on the merge section of the talk page. If it's the latter, then I don't see why you had to revert all of my edits rather than WP:FIXIT on the newly merged page. At least, if it's the text of the page that is in dispute, then we can discuss how it should look after the merger. I am completely open to listening to and incorporating your views on content.
• Lastly, I know you mean well, but I would please ask you not to rely on arguments to the tune of WP:MOREX in your discussions with me. I have spent a long time on the project, and I historically read far more than I wrote. My edit count may be small, but I work hard to make sound, policy-based decisions.

Thanks again for bringing this to my attention. Please respond here or on the article talk page so we can determine how to move forward in a way that works for everyone involved. AlexEng^(TALK) 08:07, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

A) The fact that it was supported by the creator of the article is irrelevant per WP:OWN; B) Not all merger proposals, RfCs, or RMs are closed by anyone. In fact, the majority are not closed and simply get archived due to lack of interest. I appreciate that Discospinster is a very active Wikipedian, but reintroducing a merge discussion tag to both articles without starting any form of discussion is drive-by tagging, and is not constructive. No editors wander in a year later when no one else has responded to the discussion, 'close', then merge in one fell swoop without testing the waters. In fact, 'khokhol' should probably be treated as a distinct WP:TITLE due to its historical and ongoing usage as a pejorative. There are blogs, political newspaper caricatures, etc. in frequent use currently as anti-Ukrainian propaganda, ergo it is 'chupryna' that is merely a simple historical cossack hairstyle. I'm more than happy to discuss it further on the relevant article talk page. That is my preference as, drawing on my experience, transparency of process is integral to the machinations of developing articles. One of the biggest problems with the majority of articles is that, while they are being developed continuously, there are tumbleweeds blowing through the talk pages.

I have other commitments until Sunday, but I will start a discussion on the article's talk page ASAP. Nice to meet you. It's unfortunate that our first encounter has been less than cheery one, but I look forward to working with you. Cheers! --Iryna Harpy (talk) 09:27, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Gibraltar

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Gibraltar. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

 Closed

December 2016

Resolved: Edit Warring Notification
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Your recent editing history at Sunnyvale, California shows that you are currently engaged in an edit war. To resolve the content dispute, please do not revert or change the edits of others when you are reverted. Instead of reverting, please use the talk page to work toward making a version that represents consensus among editors. The best practice at this stage is to discuss, not edit-war. See BRD for how this is done. If discussions reach an impasse, you can then post a request for help at a relevant noticeboard or seek dispute resolution. In some cases, you may wish to request temporary page protection. Being involved in an edit war can result in your being blocked from editing—especially if you violate the three-revert rule, which states that an editor must not perform more than three reverts on a single page within a 24-hour period. Undoing another editor's work—whether in whole or in part, whether involving the same or different material each time—counts as a revert. Also keep in mind that while violating the three-revert rule often leads to a block, you can still be blocked for edit warring—even if you don't violate the three-revert rule—should your behavior indicate that you intend to continue reverting repeatedly. Toddst1 (talk) 20:11, 20 December 2016 (UTC) Thanks for your message; I appreciate your concern. However, I am not engaged in an edit war, nor did I violate 3RR. I simply cleared up your misunderstanding of Northrup Grumman Marine Systems vis-a-vis Northrop Grumman proper. However, if you would like to discuss this as if it were a content dispute, then I'll be happy to take it to the article talk page. Thanks again for bringing this to my attention. AlexEng(TALK) 20:23, 20 December 2016 (UTC) For posterity, I was wrong on this and self-reverted. AlexEng(TALK) 20:47, 20 December 2016 (UTC)

Counseling others

Hi Alex. To the eyes of long-term experienced editors and admins, disruption of serious parts of Wikipedia management are issues that clearly need to be addressed. We don't have anything against younger editors, and we are generally a very supportive community with a high degree of tolerance (much more so than teachers in primary and secondary schools), but you would need to have been around actively on Wikipedia to understand that. Please bear that in mind when offering your 'counsel', and taking others words out of context and casting veiled assertions. Mr rnddude and I while having identified such problem areas may not always agree entirely on the proposed approach and remedies, but he (Mr rnddude) is an editor with a level of experience and analysis which I highly value. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 02:53, 22 December 2016 (UTC)

@Kudpung: thank you for your message. I understand from reading your (and others') interactions with the editor in question that you consider his behavior disruptive. From my point of view, the user is simply offering a non-verbose opinion on RfAs. I've seen, particularly in the most recent RfAs, that he doesn't flinch away from offering more detailed explanations when pressed. From what I understand, this doesn't signal disruptive behavior, but an eagerness to respond constructively to the community's open requests for feedback on RfA candidates. You're right about my edit count, but I should say that I place great value on reading and listening more than I historically placed on editing.

I may not be a prolific editor, but I do have a great deal of experience in conflict resolution and mediation. My message on Martin's talk page is a good faith attempt to de-escalate the conflict before it turns ugly. In order to do that, all parties need to recognize their parts in the conflict and try to understand the situation from the point of view of "the other side." I merely told you that Martin may have taken parts of your initial post as an attack on his competence as an editor. It's ok if that's not how you meant it (I'm assuming good faith on your part too), but that's clearly how it was received. What precipitates from that is Martin lashing out at the perceived attack, and then an escalation into what could potentially become an uncivil discussion. That's what I seek to prevent by counseling patience. Even if one person lashes out, the other can often ameliorate the conflict by remaining patient and calm. You didn't need to refer to his behavior as that of an "arrogant teenager," which clearly caused him offense; please accept this modest criticism, as it is not an attack on your character. I believe in you and Mr rnddude, and I have faith in your abilities to work with Martin to avoid escalation and retain a valuable editor. Warm regards, AlexEng^(TALK) 08:54, 22 December 2016 (UTC)

Please comment on Template talk:Cold War

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Template talk:Cold War. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 23 December 2016 (UTC)

 Done

You're now a pending changes reviewer

Hi AlexEng. I looked into your contributions, and thought that you could use the "pending changes reviewer" user right, so I just went ahead and gave it to you. It lets you review other users' edits on pages protected by pending changes. The list of articles awaiting review is located at Special:PendingChanges, while the list of articles that have pending changes protection turned on is located at Special:StablePages. If you do not want this user right, you may ask any administrator (or just ask me) to remove it for you at any time.

See also:

• Wikipedia:Reviewing pending changes, the guideline on reviewing
• Wikipedia:Pending changes, the summary of the use of pending changes
• Wikipedia:Protection policy#Pending changes protection, the policy determining which pages can be given pending changes protection by administrators.

Cheers. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 06:26, 23 December 2016 (UTC)

Thanks very much! I'm actually very interested in doing this type of work. I'll put it to good use. AlexEng^(TALK) 06:29, 23 December 2016 (UTC)

Happy Holidays

	The 12 Days of Wikipedia On the 12th day of Christmas Jimbo sent to me 12 BLPs 11 RFAs 10 New Users 9 Barn Stars 8 Admins Blocking 7 Socks Socking 6 Clerks Clerking 5. Check Users Checking 4 Over Sighters Hiding 3 GAs 2. Did You Knows and an ARB in a pear tree. -May your holiday season be filled with joy, laughter and good health. --Cameron11598

Thank you very much! And a happy holiday season to you as well! AlexEng^(TALK) 06:51, 26 December 2016 (UTC)

Seasons Greetings!

Hello AlexEng: Enjoy the holiday season, and thanks for your work to maintain, improve and expand Wikipedia. Cheers, -- Dane ^talk 08:19, 25 December 2016 (UTC)

Spread the WikiLove; use {{subst:Season's Greetings1}} to send this message

Thank you, Dane! Wishing you and yours a happy holiday season too! AlexEng^(TALK) 06:51, 26 December 2016 (UTC)

Merry Christmas

	Merry Christmas AlexEng!!
	Hi AlexEng, I wish you and your family a very Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year, Thanks for all your help on the 'pedia!    –Davey2010 Merry Xmas / Happy New Year 13:29, 25 December 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for thinking of me, Davey. Wishing a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and your family as well! AlexEng^(TALK) 06:52, 26 December 2016 (UTC)

Merry, merry!

From the icy Canajian north; to you and yours! FWiW Bzuk (talk) 18:59, 25 December 2016 (UTC)

Thanks very much, Bzuk! Merry Christmas from the only slightly uncomfortable reaches of California. And a Happy New Year! AlexEng^(TALK) 06:53, 26 December 2016 (UTC)

Happy New Year AlexEng!

Happy New Year!

Hello AlexEng:
Thanks for all of your contributions to improve the encyclopedia for Wikipedia's readers, and have a happy and enjoyable New Year! Cheers, JustBerry (talk) 00:32, 1 January 2017 (UTC)

Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:AlexEng}} to user talk pages with a friendly message.

Happy New Year, AlexEng!

Happy New Year!

AlexEng,
Have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable New Year, and thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia. -- Dane ^talk 02:21, 1 January 2017 (UTC)

Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year fireworks}} to user talk pages.

Happy New Year, AlexEng!

Happy New Year!

AlexEng,
Have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable New Year, and thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia.
–Davey2010 ^{Merry Xmas / Happy New Year} 12:44, 1 January 2017 (UTC)

   Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year fireworks}} to user talk pages.

Happy New Year, AlexEng!

Happy New Year!

AlexEng,
Have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable New Year, and thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia.
SorryNotSorry ✽ ✉ 15:43, 1 January 2017 (UTC)

   Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year fireworks}} to user talk pages.

Please comment on Talk:Sati (practice)

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Sati (practice). Legobot (talk) 04:26, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

 Not done

Ealdgyth - RfA

I've undone your patronising comment at the RfC - please don't re-add it. If you have anything further to say, or if you'd like to make another pathetic attempt to try and patronise me by telling me to "settle down", please feel free, either here or on my talk page, if you must. But the RfA is no place to do it. Cassianto^Talk 05:31, 10 January 2017 (UTC)

@Cassianto: thank you for your response! I'm genuinely sorry that my comment was interpreted as patronizing. My intention was to communicate the fact that it's all in good fun; I typically announce that intention by using the {{smiley}} template (!). People will often do these joke "opposes" in the support section of an extremely successful RfA, a point cemented by the fact that the author of the comment thanked me for my response. That being said, your comments and edit summary are very close to breaching WP:CIVILITY, and I urge you not to cross that line. Not I nor any of the other involved editors come bearing any ill will; I'm assuming you feel the same. Additionally, you should know that striking (let alone reverting!) others' comments is contrary to the talk page guidelines which also apply to discussion pages such as RfAs. In this case, I will not re-add the removed comment because doing so would invalidate its purpose—to call attention to the humor of the situation. However, it is often considered bad form to remove others' comments in a discussion absent any extenuating circumstances discussed in WP:TPO, and I hope you don't do this to others. I'm sorry that we seem to have gotten off on the wrong foot, and I hope we have more cordial interactions in the future. Warm regards, AlexEng^(TALK) 07:52, 10 January 2017 (UTC)

Flag icons for Template:Welcome non-latin

Hey AlexEng,

I am a regular user of the Template:Welcome non-latin and noticed some changes had been made. I saw in your edit summary that you are interested in adding flag icons like and to the links to the translations of the welcome at the bottom of the page. Is that what you meant? If so, I would be glad to do that for you! Let me know!

Best,

TJH2018talk 21:42, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

@TJH2018: hi! Thanks for the message and for recognizing the work. Getting all the symbols right and paired with the right languages in the translation page took way longer than I'm willing to admit . I would be grateful if you could add the flag icons (like the ones you posted) of the major countries associated with each language next to each link in the template. That would make identification of a user's native script much easier. I used the ISO 639-1 language codes to identify which language link goes to which section in the translation page. You can use this page to pair the language codes with the full names of their respective languages. Thank you for the offer to help! AlexEng^(TALK) 22:34, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Saudi Arabia

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Saudi Arabia. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 14 January 2017 (UTC)

 Done

Please revisit

Please revisit Talk:Haredi_Judaism#Ultra-Orthodoxy_considered_.22pejorative.22 in view of my latest comment there. Debresser (talk) 16:54, 14 January 2017 (UTC)

 Not done

Please comment on Talk:Indus Valley Civilisation

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Indus Valley Civilisation. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

 Not done

Please comment on Talk:Persian people

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Persian people. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Katherine Johnson

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Katherine Johnson. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:George Wylde

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:George Wylde. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 25 February 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Willie and Joe

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Willie and Joe. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Cold War II

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Cold War II. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Attack on Pearl Harbor

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Attack on Pearl Harbor. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 30 March 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:1873 in Germany

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:1873 in Germany. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:List of violent incidents in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, 2017

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:List of violent incidents in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, 2017. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Jewish diaspora

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Jewish diaspora. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 30 April 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Khan Shaykhun chemical attack

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Khan Shaykhun chemical attack. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 11 May 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Lord North (disambiguation)

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Lord North (disambiguation). Legobot (talk) 04:25, 22 May 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Judaism and sexuality

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Judaism and sexuality. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 3 June 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Winnipeg

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Winnipeg. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:McMahon–Hussein Correspondence

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:McMahon–Hussein Correspondence. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 25 June 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Longquan celadon

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Longquan celadon. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Template talk:Infobox country

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Template talk:Infobox country. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 17 July 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Joseph Stalin

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Joseph Stalin. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 28 July 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Ted Kaczynski

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Ted Kaczynski. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Badme

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Badme. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 28 August 2017 (UTC)

IPBE Request

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
This blocked user is asking that his block be reviewed on the Unblock Ticket Request System: AlexEng (block log • active blocks • global blocks • autoblocks • contribs • deleted contribs • abuse filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log)) UTRS appeal #19133 was submitted on Sep 01, 2017 18:27:09. This review is now closed. --UTRSBot (talk) 18:27, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Algerian War

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Algerian War. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

Orphaned non-free image File:CyberPowerPC Logo.jpg

⚠

Thanks for uploading File:CyberPowerPC Logo.jpg. The image description page currently specifies that the image is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, the image is currently not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the image was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that images for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).

Note that any non-free images not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described in section F5 of the criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. --B-bot (talk) 17:40, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

 Done (better image was inserted into the article) AlexEng^(TALK) 23:29, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:State atheism

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:State atheism. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 18 September 2017 (UTC)

 Done

Kate Millett

Please provide a policy or guideline against including survivors in Wikipedia articles. Many other articles have them, and the source cited is The New York Times. Skyerise (talk) 19:52, 20 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the message, Skyerise. Please read the Manual of Style entry about this exact issue: WP:SURVIVEDBY, which I twice mentioned in my edit summaries. I have no problems with The New York Times' reliability as a source, but using the language "survived by" is imprecise and unnecessary. The article already indicates that Millett had a wife and two sisters. Why is it noteworthy to specify that they were all alive at the time of her death? AlexEng^(TALK) 00:13, 21 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks!

Hi Alex, thank you for your comments at my RfA. I hope that I'll be able to answer your concerns with my actions rather than my words. Cheers, ansh666 23:53, 22 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for reaching out, Ansh666. Despite my oppose, I'm happy you got the bit, as you clearly have the backing of the community. Best of luck; I've no doubt you'll do well. AlexEng^(TALK) 00:46, 23 September 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Historicity of Jesus

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Historicity of Jesus. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – October 2017

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

Administrator changes

Boing! said Zebedee • Ansh666 • Ad Orientem

Tonywalton • AmiDaniel • Silence • BanyanTree • Magioladitis • Vanamonde93 • Mr.Z-man • Jdavidb • Jakec • Ram-Man • Yelyos • Kurt Shaped Box

Guideline and policy news

• Following a successful proposal to create it, a new user right called "edit filter helper" is now assignable and revocable by administrators. The right allows non-administrators to view the details of private edit filters, but not to edit them.
• Following a discussion about mass-application of ECP and how the need for logging and other details of an evolving consensus may have been missed by some administrators, a rough guide to extended confirmed protection has been written. This information page describes how the extended-confirmed aspects of the protection policy are currently being applied by administrators.

Technical news

• You can now search for IP ranges at Special:Contributions. Some log pages and Special:DeletedContributions are not yet supported. Wildcards (e.g. 192.168.0.*) are also not supported, but the popular contribsrange gadget will continue to work.

Arbitration

• Community consultation on the 2017 candidates for CheckUser and Oversight has concluded. The Arbitration Committee will appoint successful candidates by October 11.
• A request for comment is open regarding the structure, rules, and procedures of the December 2017 Arbitration Committee election, and how to resolve any issues not covered by existing rules.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:23, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Iyoki Station

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Iyoki Station. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:2017 Las Vegas Strip shooting

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:2017 Las Vegas Strip shooting. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 20 October 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Rivers

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Rivers. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 30 October 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2017

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

Administrator changes

Longhair • Megalibrarygirl • TonyBallioni • Vanamonde93

Allen3 • Eluchil404 • Arthur Rubin • Bencherlite

Technical news

• The Wikimedia Foundation's Anti-Harassment Tools team is creating an "Interaction Timeline" tool that intends to assist administrators in resolving user conduct disputes. Feedback on the concept may be posted on the talk page.
• A new function is now available to edit filter managers that will make it easier to look for multiple strings containing spoofed text.

Arbitration

• Eligible editors will be invited to submit candidate statements for the 2017 Arbitration Committee Elections starting on November 12 until November 21. Voting will begin on November 27 and last until December 10.
• Following a request for comment, Ritchie333, Yunshui and Ymblanter will serve as the Electoral Commission for the 2017 ArbCom Elections.

Obituaries

• The Wikipedia community has recently learned that Allen3 (William Allen Peckham) passed away on December 30, 2016, the same day as JohnCD. Allen began editing in 2005 and became an administrator that same year.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:49, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Category talk:Years by country

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Category talk:Years by country. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 9 November 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Elections and Referendums

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Elections and Referendums. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Flag of Turkey

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Flag of Turkey. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – December 2017

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

Administrator changes

Joe Roe

JzG

Ericorbit • Perceval • Thingg • Tristanb • Violetriga

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

• Wikimedians are now invited to vote on the proposals in the 2017 Community Wishlist Survey on Meta Wiki until 10 December 2017. In particular, there is a section of the survey regarding new tools for administrators and for anti-harassment.
• A new function is available to edit filter managers which can be used to store matches from regular expressions.

Arbitration

• Voting in the 2017 Arbitration Committee elections is open until Sunday 23:59, 10 December 2017 (UTC). There are 12 candidates running for 8 vacant seats.

Miscellaneous

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

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:57, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

ArbCom 2017 election voter message

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

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

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

Please comment on Talk:Flag of Turkey

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Flag of Turkey. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Kashmir conflict

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Kashmir conflict. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas AlexEng!!


Hi AlexEng, I wish you and your family a very Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year,
Thanks for all your help and contributions on the 'pedia! ,
   –Davey2010 ^{Merry Xmas / Happy New Year} 13:20, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

Seasons' Greetings

...to you and yours, from the Great White North! FWiW Bzuk (talk) 17:32, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2018

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

Administrator changes

Muboshgu

Anetode • Laser brain • Worm That Turned

None

Bureaucrat changes

Worm That Turned

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

• The 2017 Community Wishlist Survey results have been posted. The Community Tech team will investigate and address the top ten results.
• The Anti-Harassment Tools team is inviting comments on new blocking tools and improvements to existing blocking tools for development in early 2018. Feedback can be left on the discussion page or by email.

Arbitration

• Following the results of the 2017 election, the following editors have been (re)appointed to the Arbitration Committee: Alex Shih, BU Rob13, Callanecc, KrakatoaKatie, Opabinia regalis, Premeditated Chaos, RickinBaltimore, Worm That Turned.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

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

Please comment on Talk:Israel

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Israel. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Gråen

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Gråen. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Armenian Genocide

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Armenian Genocide. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – February 2018

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

Administrator changes

None

Blurpeace • Dana boomer • Deltabeignet • Denelson83 • Grandiose • Salvidrim! • Ymblanter

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Arbitration

• The Arbitration Committee has enacted a change to the discretionary sanctions procedure which requires administrators to add a standardized editnotice when placing page restrictions. Editors cannot be sanctioned for violations of page restrictions if this editnotice was not in place at the time of the violation.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

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

Please comment on Talk:1948 Palestine war

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:1948 Palestine war. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Joseph Stalin

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Joseph Stalin. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 25 February 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – March 2018

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

Administrator changes

Lourdes†

AngelOfSadness • Bhadani • Chris 73 • Coren • Friday • Midom • Mike V

† Lourdes has requested that her admin rights be temporarily removed, pending her return from travel.

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Miscellaneous

• Following the 2018 Steward elections, the following users are our new stewards: -revi, Green Giant, Rxy, There'sNoTime, علاء.

Obituaries

• Bhadani (Gangadhar Bhadani) passed away on 8 February 2018. Bhadani joined Wikipedia in March 2005 and became an administrator in September 2005. While he was active, Bhadani was regarded as one of the most prolific Wikipedians from India.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:00, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Winter War

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Winter War. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 8 March 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Racism in the United States

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Racism in the United States. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 19 March 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Polish collaboration with Nazi Germany

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Polish collaboration with Nazi Germany. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – April 2018

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

Administrator changes

331dot • Cordless Larry • ClueBot NG

Gogo Dodo • Pb30 • Sebastiankessel • Seicer • SoLando

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

• There will soon be a calendar widget at Special:Block, making it easier to set expiries for a specific date and time.

Arbitration

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

Miscellaneous

• A discussion has closed which concluded that administrators are not required to enable email, though many editors suggested doing so as a matter of best practice.
• The Foundations' Anti-Harassment Tools team has released the Interaction Timeline. This shows a chronologic history for two users on pages where they have both made edits, which may be helpful in identifying sockpuppetry and investigating editing disputes.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:23, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:National Rifle Association

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:National Rifle Association. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:List of English monarchs

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:List of English monarchs. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 20 April 2018 (UTC)

Randa Jarrar

I have reverted several of your whitewashed edits for Randa Jarrar's page. If you disagree, you may message me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RRBBLL (talk • contribs) 23:53, 20 April 2018 (UTC)

@RRBBLL: hi! Thank you for contacting me directly about this. I do disagree with many of your edits:

1. I think the article lead should contain a balanced view of the author/professor.
2. Ethnicity should not be included in the article lead unless it is contextually relevant. See MOS.
3. Alumni and donor feedback is not relevant to the article section, especially if you're only going to include quotations from a single alumnus. Wikipedia is WP:NOTNEWS, and we don't necessarily include everything that a newspaper such as the NY Post would in the article. Reactions from various people fall under the category of WP:EXCESSDETAIL.
4. The same applies to similar incidents at Fresno State. The article subject, Randa Jarrar is not an article about Fresno State as a whole. Information about similar incidents, while interesting, has no place in an article about one specific person: Randa Jarrar. This detail need not be included in the article.

I hope we can come to an agreement about these points, but if not, fear not. There are many forms of Dispute Resolution that we can pursue. AlexEng^(TALK) 00:43, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

What he said ^. Look, @RRBBLL: you really need to understand where we’re coming from. Wikipedia has a large body of guidance relating to every aspect of editing, from spelling, to what abbreviations to use, to writing neutrally. And that guidance is what we’re trying to get the article to comply with. I get the sense from your edits, judging by the totality of them, that you wish to editorialize and basically insert loaded language. That’s not how it’s done here. We need to rely on facts and sources, not introduce a narrative we want to be true.

Think about it. Open yourself up to constructive criticism, but for the love of God, please start using the talk page. Let’s get a resolution to these issues. GnarlyLikeWhoa (talk) 00:52, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

Follow Up

Noted. I will attempt to find an alternate photograph of Randa Jarrar. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RRBBLL (talk • contribs) 00:01, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

AE

I've moved your statement to the non-admin section. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 00:41, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

@NeilN: thank you. My mistake. AlexEng^(TALK) 00:42, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Syria

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Syria. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – May 2018

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

Administrator changes

None

Chochopk • Coffee • Gryffindor • Jimp • Knowledge Seeker • Lankiveil • Peridon • Rjd0060

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Arbitration

• The Arbitration Committee is seeking additional clerks to help with the arbitration process.

Obituaries

• Lankiveil (Craig Franklin) passed away in mid-April. Lankiveil joined Wikipedia on 12 August 2004 and became an administrator on 31 August 2008. During his time with the Wikimedia community, Lankiveil served as an oversighter for the English Wikipedia and as president of Wikimedia Australia.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:05, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Re: wording of text in the Drew Barrymore article.

Alex, Regarding your edit to Drew Barrymore article, the wording makes little sense (to me, at least). Of course the Barrymore family is a "thing." However, as it is now worded, with the statement that Barrymore is part of the Barrymore acting dynasty, followed by a colon and a list of that dynasty, it makes little sense that the Costellos (apart from Dolores, who married a Barrymore) should follow in the list of that dynasty. They were not part of the Barrymore acting dynasty. I won't revert, but it seems somewhat clumsy, or not well worded to me. It presupposes the Costellos were part of this family.

• "She was born into the Barrymore acting dynasty: All of her paternal great-grandparents – Maurice and Georgie Drew Barrymore, Maurice and Mae Costello (née Altschuk) – as well as her paternal grandparents, John Barrymore and Dolores Costello, were actors, with John being arguably the most acclaimed actor of his generation. Barrymore is a niece of Diana Barrymore, a grandniece of Lionel Barrymore, Ethel Barrymore, and Helene Costello...."

Cheers. ExRat (talk) 22:23, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

@ExRat: hello! Thanks for contacting me about this. You make a good point. The wording is confusing as I left it. Moreover, I've been racking my brain, and I can't actually find a better way to word it without making it even more confusing. I've self-reverted. Thanks again for your thoughts! AlexEng^(TALK) 03:53, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Invitation to the Portals WikiProject...

You are invited to join the effort to revitalize and improve the Portal system.

The Portals WikiProject was rebooted on April 17th, and is going strong. Sixty-six editors have joined so far, with more joining daily. We're having a blast, and excitement is high...

Our goal is to update, upgrade, and maintain portals.

In addition to working directly on portals, we are developing tools to make portals more dynamic (self-updating), and to make building and maintaining portals easier. We've finished two tools so far, with more to come. They are Template:Transclude lead excerpt and Template:Transclude random excerpt.

Discussions are underway about how to further upgrade portals, and what the portals of the future will be.

There are plenty of tasks (including WikiGnome tasks too).

With more to come.

We may even surprise ourselves and exceed all expectations. Who knows what we will be able to accomplish in what may become the biggest Wikicollaboration in years.

See ya at the WikiProject!

Sincerely,    — The Transhumanist   06:52, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Abortion and the Catholic Church

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Abortion and the Catholic Church. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

Referenced DOY?

Dear AlexEng, I would like to invite you into a discussion about referenced DOY. I see you were involved in a discussion about DOY somewhere in October 2017 and figure out perhaps I should invite you. I would appreciate your comment and many thanks :) --Rochelimit (talk) 16:38, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Foreign involvement in the Syrian Civil War

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Foreign involvement in the Syrian Civil War. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 23 May 2018 (UTC)

Right to Exist

Re [[1]] - sorry for bad formatting, just back after 5 year ban! While you may be right that right to exist a moral defense of israel's wars is the most famous book with 'right to exist' in the title, it is not the only book with those words in the title, is not actually about the right to exist per se, and its article only gets an average of 5 views a day. To describe it as "the book" on "right to exist" is wrong. I would be most grateful if you would revert your edit. Thanks a lot!♥ L'Origine du monde ♥ ^{(♥ Talk♥ )} 23:10, 23 May 2018 (UTC)

Hello, and thank you for your thoughtful message, L'Origine du monde! While I agree that there are surely other books out there with the term "Right to exist" in their titles, there are no notable ones (at least judging by Wikipedia articles and by a cursory Google search). Hatnotes are there to help our readers find what they're looking for, particularly when they've typed a word or phrase that can refer to multiple things. In this case, I think it's reasonable for a user who may have been searching for the book Right to Exist: a Moral Defense of Israel's Wars to have typed only "Right to Exist" in their search bar. That's why the hatnote should be there. As for the wording, you'll find that prefixing disambiguations with "the" is both more precise and more common on the project. You can check out the numerous examples on WP:Hatnote for reference. Referring to it in this way does not confer any special status to this text as an important book, it simply aims to say "This article is about the idea of a right to exist; you may have been looking for the book instead. Here's the link to it.". As a thought experiment, try saying out loud, "For the book, see Right to Exist: a Moral Defense of Israel's Wars." and then try saying, "For a book, see Right to Exist: a Moral Defense of Israel's Wars." Which one sounds more awkward?

By the way, welcome back to Wikipedia, and thank you for contributing!!! AlexEng^(TALK) 00:05, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

Thank you for your kind words Alex, and your thoughtful message! Very glad to be back! I think that if you say "for the book" it confers undue authority on a book very few people are interested in, and is less precise, but I can see your point of view :) I hope you have no objection to me putting "For the personal right to exist, see Right to life." before the book, as I think it more likely people would be looking for that, as it is a lot more popular! ♥ L'Origine du monde ♥ ^{(♥ Talk♥ )} 00:42, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

@L'Origine du monde: no objections. AlexEng^(TALK) 00:44, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

Thank you Alex. I hope you don't mind me copying your smiley lets chat! ♥ L'Origine du monde ♥ ^{(♥ Talk♥ )} 00:49, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

@L'Origine du monde: No problem! I copied it myself from the ever-helpful Oshwah. AlexEng^(TALK) 01:03, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

I really like it :) Is it possible to describe Chomsky in some way? He is twice a professor, has over 40 degrees, linguist etc? You are right that it is wrong on wikipedia to say Professor Chomsky, but how could one give an idea of who he is?♥ L'Origine du monde ♥ ^{(♥ Talk♥ )} 03:33, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for tidying up the mess I madeThis bit in the Israel section puzzles me - could you improve it too, if it doesn't just need deleting, which I am tempted to do! "Journalist and author Alan Hart, an anti-Zionist who has speculated that Israeli agents were behind the 9/11 attacks, has argued that there is no legitimacy to Israel’s claim to have a right to exist until Palestinians recognize it, and reasons that this is why Israel insists the Palestinians recognise its right to exist: "Israel has no right to exist unless it was recognized and legitimized by those who were dispossessed of their land and their rights during the creation of the Zionist state." "♥ L'Origine du monde ♥ ^{(♥ Talk♥ )} 03:37, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

Thank you very much

The RfC discussion to eliminate portals was closed May 12, with the statement "There exists a strong consensus against deleting or even deprecating portals at this time." This was made possible because you and others came to the rescue. Thank you for speaking up.

By the way, the current issue of the Signpost features an article with interviews about the RfC and the Portals WikiProject.

I'd also like to let you know that the Portals WikiProject is working hard to make sure your support of portals was not in vain. Toward that end, we have been working diligently to innovate portals, while building, updating, upgrading, and maintaining them. The project has grown to 80 members so far, and has become a beehive of activity.

Our two main goals at this time are to automate portals (in terms of refreshing, rotating, and selecting content), and to develop a one-page model in order to make obsolete and eliminate most of the 150,000 subpages from the portal namespace by migrating their functions to the portal base pages, using technologies such as selective transclusion. Please feel free to join in on any of the many threads of development at the WikiProject's talk page, or just stop by to see how we are doing. If you have any questions about portals or portal development, that is the best place to ask them.

If you would like to keep abreast of developments on portals, keep in mind that the project's members receive updates on their talk pages. The updates are also posted here, for your convenience.

Again, we can't thank you enough for your support of portals, and we hope to make you proud of your decision. Sincerely,    — The Transhumanist   23:30, 26 May 2018 (UTC)

P.S.: if you reply to this message, please {{ping}} me. Thank you. -TT

Administrators' newsletter – June 2018

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

Administrator changes

None

Al Ameer son • AliveFreeHappy • Cenarium • Lupo • MichaelBillington

Guideline and policy news

• Following a successful request for comment, administrators are now able to add and remove editors to the "event coordinator" group. Users in the event coordinator group have the ability to temporarily add the "confirmed" flag to new user accounts and to create many new user accounts without being hindered by a rate limit. Users will no longer need to be in the "account creator" group if they are in the event coordinator group.
• Following an AN discussion, all pages with content related to blockchain and cryptocurrencies, broadly construed, are now under indefinite general sanctions.

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

Miscellaneous

• In early May, an unusually high level of failed login attempts was observed. The WMF has stated that this was an "external effort to gain unauthorized access to random accounts". Under Wikipedia policy, administrators are required to have strong passwords. To further reinforce security, administrators should also consider enabling two-factor authentication. A committed identity can be used to verify that you are the true account owner in the event that your account is compromised and/or you are unable to log in.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

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

Please comment on Talk:Jabel Mukaber

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Jabel Mukaber. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Mass killings under Communist regimes

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Mass killings under Communist regimes. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 13 June 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Donald Trump

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Donald Trump. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 24 June 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2018

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

Administrator changes

Pbsouthwood • TheSandDoctor

Gogo Dodo

Andrevan • Doug • EVula • KaisaL • Tony Fox • WilyD

Bureaucrat changes

Andrevan • EVula

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Miscellaneous

• Currently around 20% of admins have enabled two-factor authentication, up from 17% a year ago. If you haven't already enabled it, please consider doing so. Regardless if you use 2FA, please practice appropriate account security by ensuring your password is secure and unique to Wikimedia.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:22, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Ideological bias on Wikipedia

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Ideological bias on Wikipedia. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:No original research

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:No original research. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Khalistan movement

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Khalistan movement. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 24 July 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Donald Trump

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Donald Trump. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – August 2018

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

Administrator changes

Sro23

KaisaL • Ymblanter

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

• The WMF Anti-Harassment Tools team is seeking input on the second set of wireframes for the Special:Block redesign that will introduce partial blocks. The new functionality will allow you to block a user from editing a specific set of pages, pages in a category, a namespace, and for specific actions such as moving pages and uploading files.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

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

Please comment on Talk:George Galloway

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:George Galloway. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 14 August 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Module talk:Infobox military conflict

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Module talk:Infobox military conflict. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2018

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

Administrator changes

None

Asterion • Crisco 1492 • KF • Kudpung • Liz • Randykitty • Spartaz

Optimist on the run → Voice of Clam

Interface administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 23:22, 2 September 2018 (UTC)

We need your input! Request for Comment - Including China's stance on Hamas

Your name was found on Feedback request service Politics, government, and law. Please join the discussion here and give your needed opinion on whether to include China's position concerning Hamas. Thanks! Veritycheck✔️ (talk) 16:25, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:United States Senate elections, 2018

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:United States Senate elections, 2018. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Saudi Arabia

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Saudi Arabia. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 19 September 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:United Daughters of the Confederacy

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:United Daughters of the Confederacy. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 3 October 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – October 2018

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

Administrator changes

Justlettersandnumbers • L235

Bgwhite • HorsePunchKid • J Greb • KillerChihuahua • Rami R • Winhunter

Interface administrator changes

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

Oversight changes

Guerillero • NativeForeigner • Snowolf • Xeno

Guideline and policy news

• Following a request for comment, the process for appointing interface administrators has been established. Currently only existing admins can request these rights, while a new RfC has begun on whether it should be available to non-admins.
• There is an open request for comment on Meta regarding the creation a new user group for global edit filter management.

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:12, 5 October 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:List of years in Bulgaria

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:List of years in Bulgaria. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography/How to write about counties

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography/How to write about counties. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2018

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

Administrator changes

Sir Sputnik

Kudpung • Liz • Lourdes

Everyking • Jackmcbarn

Interface administrator changes

Dinoguy1000

CheckUser changes

AGK • Ivanvector • Stwalkerster • TonyBallioni

Oversight changes

Amorymeltzer • Oshwah • TonyBallioni • Vanamonde93

Keilana

Guideline and policy news

• A request for comment determined that non-administrators will not be able to request interface admin access.
• A request for comment is in progress to determine whether the Mediation Committee should be closed and marked as historical.
• A village pump discussion has been ongoing about whether the proposed deletion policy (PROD) should be clarified or amended.
• A request for comment is in progress to determine whether pending changes protection should be applied automatically to today's featured article (TFA) in order to mitigate a recent trend of severe image vandalism.

Technical news

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

Arbitration

• Eligible editors will be invited to nominate themselves as candidates in the 2018 Arbitration Committee Elections starting on November 4 until November 13. Voting will begin on November 19 and last until December 2.
• The Arbitration Committee's email address has changed to arbcom-enwikimedia.org. Other email lists, such as functionaries-en and clerks-l, remain unchanged.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:18, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

ArbCom 2018 election voter message

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

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

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

ArbCom 2018 election voter message

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

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

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

Administrators' newsletter – December 2018

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

Administrator changes

Al Ameer son • Randykitty • Spartaz

Boson • Daniel J. Leivick • Efe • Esanchez7587 • Fred Bauder • Garzo • Martijn Hoekstra • Orangemike

Interface administrator changes

Deryck Chan

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

• Administrators and bureaucrats can no longer unblock themselves unless they placed the block initially. This change has been implemented globally. See also this ongoing village pump discussion (permalink).
• To complement the aforementioned change, blocked administrators will soon have the ability to block the administrator that placed their block to mitigate the possibility of a compromised administrator account blocking all other active administrators.
• Since deployment of Partial blocks on Test Wikipedia, several bugs were identified. Most of them are now fixed. Administrators are encouraged to test the new deployment and report new bugs on Phabricator or leave feedback on the Project's talk page. You can request administrator access on the Test Wiki here.

Arbitration

• Voting in the 2018 Arbitration Committee Elections is open to eligible editors until Monday 23:59, 3 December 2018. Please review the candidates and, if you wish to do so, submit your choices on the voting page.

Miscellaneous

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

Obituaries

• Shock Brigade Harvester Boris (Raymond Arritt) passed away on 14 November 2018. Boris joined Wikipedia as Raymond arritt on 8 May 2006 and was an administrator from 30 July 2007 to 2 June 2008.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

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

Administrators' newsletter – January 2019

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

Administrator changes

Galobtter

Orangemike

BorgQueen • Davidruben • Ocee • Revolving Bugbear • Theda • There'sNoTime • Timc • Tijuana Brass • Tristessa de St Ange

Bureaucrat changes

Addshore

CheckUser changes

Joe Roe • SilkTork

Euryalus • Newyorkbrad • There'sNoTime

Oversight changes

AGK • Joe Roe • SilkTork

Euryalus • Newyorkbrad • There'sNoTime

Guideline and policy news

• There are a number of new or changed speedy deletion criteria, each previously part of WP:CSD#G6:

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

• The Wikimedia Foundation now requires all interface administrators to enable two-factor authentication.
• Members of the Bot Approvals Group (BAG) are now subject to an activity requirement. After two years without any bot-related activity (e.g. operating a bot, posting on a bot-related talk page), BAG members will be retired from BAG following a one-week notice.

Technical news

• Starting on December 13, the Wikimedia Foundation security team implemented new password policy and requirements. Privileged accounts (administrators, bureaucrats, checkusers, oversighters, interface administrators, bots, edit filter managers/helpers, template editors, et al.) must have a password at least 10 characters in length. All accounts must have a password:

1. At least 8 characters in length
2. Not in the 100,000 most popular passwords (defined by the Password Blacklist library)
3. Different from their username

User accounts not meeting these requirements will be prompted to update their password accordingly. More information is available on MediaWiki.org.

• Blocked administrators may now block the administrator that blocked them. This was done to mitigate the possibility that a compromised administrator account would block all other active administrators, complementing the removal of the ability to unblock oneself outside of self-imposed blocks. A request for comment is currently in progress to determine whether the blocking policy should be updated regarding this change.
• {{Copyvio-revdel}} now has a link to open the history with the RevDel checkboxes already filled in.

Arbitration

• Following the 2018 Arbitration Committee elections, the following editors have been appointed to the Arbitration Committee: AGK, Courcelles, GorillaWarfare, Joe Roe, Mkdw, SilkTork.

Miscellaneous

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

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:38, 1 January 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – February 2019

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

Administrator changes

Enterprisey • JJMC89

BorgQueen

Harro5 • Jenks24 • Graft • R. Baley

Interface administrator changes

Enterprisey

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Miscellaneous

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

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:15, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – March 2019

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

Administrator changes

Evad37

There'sNoTime

Alex Shih • Brian • Mushroom • Nakon • Oscarthecat • PeruvianLlama • Ragib • Reaper Eternal • Rossami • Tom

Interface administrator changes

Evad37 • Galobtter

Ritchie333

CheckUser changes

There'sNoTime

Keegan • Ks0stm

Oversight changes

There'sNoTime

Ks0stm • Sphilbrick

Guideline and policy news

• The RfC on administrator activity requirements failed to reach consensus for any proposal.
• Following discussions at the Bureaucrats' noticeboard and Wikipedia talk:Administrators, an earlier change to the restoration of adminship policy was reverted. If requested, bureaucrats will not restore administrator permissions removed due to inactivity if there have been five years without a logged administrator action; this "five year rule" does not apply to permissions removed voluntarily.

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

Miscellaneous

• Following the 2019 Steward Elections, the following editors have been appointed as stewards: Base, Einsbor, Jon Kolbert, Schniggendiller, and Wim b.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

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

Please comment on Talk:North Korea

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:North Korea. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 14 March 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Germanic peoples

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Germanic peoples. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 24 March 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:List of surviving Messerschmitt Bf 109s

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:List of surviving Messerschmitt Bf 109s. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – April 2019

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

Administrator changes

Reaper Eternal • ThaddeusB

Bogdangiusca • Christopher Parham • Necrothesp • Schneelocke • Siroxo • Sarah

Mentifisto → Lofty abyss

Interface administrator changes

Mr. Stradivarius

Bureaucrat changes

DeltaQuad

Kingturtle

Technical news

• In Special:Preferences under "Appearance" → "Advanced options", there is now an option to show a confirmation prompt when clicking on a rollback link.
• The Wikimedia Foundation's Community health initiative plans to design and build a new user reporting system to make it easier for people experiencing harassment and other forms of abuse to provide accurate information to the appropriate channel for action to be taken. Please see meta:Community health initiative/User reporting system consultation 2019 to provide your input on this idea.

Arbitration

• The Arbitration Committee clarified that the General 1RR prohibition for Palestine-Israel articles may only be enforced on pages with the {{ARBPIA 1RR editnotice}} edit notice.

Miscellaneous

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

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:56, 7 April 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Romania

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Romania. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 15 April 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Pacific War

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Pacific War. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – May 2019

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

Administrator changes

HickoryOughtShirt?4 • RexxS

Necrothesp

Bratsche • Kyle Barbour • Kzollman • Madman

Interface administrator changes

Pharos

Bureaucrat changes

Primefac

CheckUser changes

Reaper Eternal

Guideline and policy news

• A request for comment concluded that creating pages in the portal namespace should be restricted to autoconfirmed users.
• Following a request for comment, the subject-specific notability guideline for pornographic actors and models (WP:PORNBIO) was removed; in its place, editors should consult WP:ENT and WP:GNG.

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

Miscellaneous

• A request for comment is currently open to amend the community sanctions procedure to exclude non XfD or CSD deletions.
• A proposal to remove pre-2009 indefinite IP blocks is currently open for discussion.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

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

Please comment on Talk:Civil Rights Act of 1968

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Civil Rights Act of 1968. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Cossack Hetmanate

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Cossack Hetmanate. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Council of People's Commissars of the Soviet Union

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Council of People's Commissars of the Soviet Union. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 25 May 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Xinjiang conflict

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Xinjiang conflict. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – June 2019

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

Administrator changes

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

CheckUser changes

Ivanvector

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Miscellaneous

• The previously discussed unblocking of IP addresses indefinitely-blocked before 2009 was approved and has taken place.
• The 2019 talk pages consultation produced a report for Phase 1 and has entered Phase 2.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

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

Please comment on Talk:Schoharie limousine crash

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Schoharie limousine crash. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Presidency of Donald Trump

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Presidency of Donald Trump. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2019

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

Administrator changes

28bytes • Ad Orientem • Ansh666 • Beeblebrox • Boing! said Zebedee • BU Rob13 • Dennis Brown • Deor • DoRD • Floquenbeam¹ • Flyguy649 • Fram² • Gadfium • GB fan • Jonathunder • Kusma • Lectonar • Moink • MSGJ • Nick • Od Mishehu • Rama • Spartaz • Syrthiss • TheDJ • WJBscribe

¹Floquenbeam's access was removed, then restored, then removed again.

²Fram's access was removed, then restored, then removed again.

Bureaucrat changes

28bytes • WJBscribe • Wizardman

Interface administrator changes

MSGJ • TheDJ

CheckUser changes

Beeblebrox • BU Rob13 • DoRD

Oversight changes

Beeblebrox • BU Rob13 • DoRD • GB fan

Guideline and policy news

• A request for comment seeking to alleviate pressures on the request an account (ACC) process proposes either raising the account creation limit for extended confirmed editors or granting the account creator permission on request to new ACC tool users.

• In a related matter, the account throttle has been restored to six creations per day as the mitigation activity completed.

• The scope of CSD criterion G8 has been tightened such that the only redirects that it now applies to are those which target non-existent pages.
• The scope of CSD criterion G14 has been expanded slightly to include orphan "Foo (disambiguation)" redirects that target pages that are not disambiguation pages or pages that perform a disambiguation-like function (such as set index articles or lists).
• A request for comment seeks to determine whether Wikipedia:Office actions should be a policy page or an information page.

Technical news

• The Wikimedia Foundation's Community health initiative plans to design and build a new user reporting system to make it easier for people experiencing harassment and other forms of abuse to provide accurate information to the appropriate channel for action to be taken. Community feedback is invited.

Miscellaneous

• In February 2019, the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) changed its office actions policy to include temporary and project-specific bans. The WMF exercised this new ability for the first time on the English Wikipedia on 10 June 2019 to temporarily ban and desysop Fram. This action has resulted in significant community discussion, a request for arbitration (permalink), and, either directly or indirectly, the resignations of numerous administrators and functionaries. The WMF Board of Trustees is aware of the situation, and discussions continue on a statement and a way forward. The Arbitration Committee has sent an open letter to the WMF Board.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:19, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:United States involvement in regime change

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:United States involvement in regime change. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 5 July 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Allegations of CIA drug trafficking

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Allegations of CIA drug trafficking. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 16 July 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Tel Aviv

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Tel Aviv. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 27 July 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – August 2019

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

Administrator changes

Johnuniq • Kosack • Valereee

Ad Orientem • Ched • Gadfium • Jonathunder • Nick • Yelyos

Bald Zebra • Beetstra • Doug Bell • Journalist • Ruud Koot • Splash • Voice of Clam

Interface administrator changes

Dinoguy1000

CheckUser changes

RickinBaltimore

Oversight changes

Beeblebrox

RickinBaltimore

Guideline and policy news

• Following a request for comment, the page Wikipedia:Office actions has been changed from a policy page to an information page.
• A request for comment (permalink) is in progress regarding the administrator inactivity policy.

Arbitration

• Editors may now use the template {{Ds/aware}} to indicate that they are aware that discretionary sanctions are in force for a topic area, so it is unnecessary to alert them.

Miscellaneous

• Following a research project on masking IP addresses, the Foundation is starting a new project to improve the privacy of IP editors. The result of this project may significantly change administrative and counter-vandalism workflows. The project is in the very early stages of discussions and there is no concrete plan yet. Admins and the broader community are encouraged to leave feedback on the talk page.
• The new page reviewer right is bundled with the admin tool set. Many admins regularly help out at Special:NewPagesFeed, but they may not be aware of improvements, changes, and new tools for the Curation system. Stay up to date by subscribing here to the NPP newsletter that appears every two months, and/or putting the reviewers' talk page on your watchlist.

  Since the introduction of temporary user rights, it is becoming more usual to accord the New Page Reviewer right on a probationary period of 3 to 6 months in the first instance. This avoids rights removal for inactivity at a later stage and enables a review of their work before according the right on a permanent basis.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:23, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Fascism

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Fascism. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 6 August 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Central Europe

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Central Europe. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Russian to English

Request translation: Pamfil Nazarovich Nazarov (ru:Назаров, Памфил Назарович) (for more information: 1, 2, 3, 4), François de Montlezun (ru:Безмо, Франсуа де Монлезен), Karl Joseph Stanislaw von Nolcken (ru:Нолькен, Карл Станиславович), Evgeny Golikov (ru:Голиков, Евгений Николаевич). Thank you if you can help me. --87.15.239.114 12:45, 22 August 2019 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.15.239.114 (talk)

Please comment on Talk:Valrico, Florida

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Valrico, Florida. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Boston City Hall

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Boston City Hall. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2019

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

Administrator changes

Bradv • Chetsford • Izno

Floquenbeam • Lectonar

DESiegel • Jake Wartenberg • Rjanag • Topbanana

CheckUser changes

Callanecc • LFaraone • There'sNoTime

Oversight changes

Callanecc • Fox • HJ Mitchell • LFaraone • There'sNoTime

Technical news

• Editors using the mobile website on Wikipedia can opt-in to new advanced features via your settings page. This will give access to more interface links, special pages, and tools.
• The advanced version of the edit review pages (recent changes, watchlist, and related changes) now includes two new filters. These filters are for "All contents" and "All discussions". They will filter the view to just those namespaces.

Arbitration

• A request for comment is open to provide an opportunity to amend the structure, rules, and procedures of the 2019 English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee election and to resolve any issues not covered by existing rules.

Miscellaneous

• A global request for comment is in progress regarding whether a user group should be created that could modify edit filters across all public Wikimedia wikis.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:36, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks

I wanted to thank you for the time you took to consider my candidacy and thought you put into your oppose. I hope that my actions going forward, including how often and in what way I use the toolkit, will meet the standard you and the community have for administrators. Should you have feedback in the future know that I welcome it. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 22:21, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

@Barkeep49: thank you for the thoughtful response. I wish you the best in your future as an administrator. Congratulations! AlexEng^(TALK) 23:39, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:U.S. state

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:U.S. state. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography/How to write about rivers

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography/How to write about rivers. Legobot (talk) 04:25, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – October 2019

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

Administrator changes

Barkeep49

Beetstra • KillerChihuahua • Kusma

Arcadian • Extraordinary Machine • Xeno

JamesBWatson → JBW

Interface administrator changes

Evad37

CheckUser changes

Courcelles • SilkTork • Timotheus Canens

Oversight changes

Courcelles • SilkTork • Timotheus Canens

Guideline and policy news

• Following a discussion, a new criterion for speedy category renaming was added: C2F: One eponymous article, which applies if the category contains only an eponymous article or media file, provided that the category has not otherwise been emptied shortly before the nomination. The default outcome is an upmerge to the parent categories.

Technical news

• As previously noted, tighter password requirements for Administrators were put in place last year. Wikipedia should now alert you if your password is less than 10 characters long and thus too short.

Arbitration

• The 2019 CheckUser and Oversight appointment process has begun. The community consultation period will take place October 4th to 10th.
• The arbitration case regarding Fram was closed. While there will be a local RfC focus[ing] on how harassment and private complaints should be handled in the future, there is currently a global community consultation on partial and temporary office actions in response to the incident. It will be open until October 30th.

Miscellaneous

• The Community Tech team has been working on a system for temporarily watching pages, and welcomes feedback.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:54, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Right-wing populism

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Right-wing populism. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Catholic Church and homosexuality

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Catholic Church and homosexuality. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:International Brigades

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:International Brigades. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 29 October 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2019

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

Administrator changes

GermanJoe • Girth Summit • Kees08 • Nosebagbear

DESiegel • GB fan • MSGJ • Voice of Clam • WilyD

DeltaQuad • Fang Aili • Pakaran

Bureaucrat changes

DeltaQuad • Pakaran

Interface administrator changes

MSGJ

CheckUser changes

L235 • Mz7 • SQL • ST47

Ivanvector

DeltaQuad

Oversight changes

L235 • Mz7 • ST47 • Stwalkerster • The Blade of the Northern Lights • Xaosflux

DeltaQuad • DGG • Julia W

Guideline and policy news

• An RfC was closed with the consensus that the resysop criteria should be made stricter.

• The follow-up RfC to develop that change is now open at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/2019 Resysop Criteria (2).

• A related RfC is seeking the community's sentiment for a binding desysop procedure.

Arbitration

• Eligible editors may now nominate themselves as candidates for the 2019 Arbitration Committee Elections. The self-nomination period will close November 12, with voting running from November 19 through December 2.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:15, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:India

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:India. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 9 November 2019 (UTC)

ArbCom 2019 election voter message

Hello! Voting in the 2019 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 on Monday, 2 December 2019. All eligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate in the 2019 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. If you no longer wish to receive these messages, you may add {{NoACEMM}} to your user talk page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:09, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:EOKA

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:EOKA. Legobot (talk) 04:24, 20 November 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:List of nicknames of presidents of the United States

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:List of nicknames of presidents of the United States. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – December 2019

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

Administrator changes

EvergreenFir • ToBeFree

Akhilleus • Athaenara • John Vandenberg • Melchoir • MichaelQSchmidt • NeilN • Youngamerican • 😂

CheckUser changes

Beeblebrox

Deskana

Interface administrator changes

Evad37

Guideline and policy news

• An RfC on the administrator resysop criteria was closed. 18 proposals have been summarised with a variety of supported and opposed statements. The inactivity grace period within which a new request for adminship is not required has been reduced from three years to two. Additionally, Bureaucrats are permitted to use their discretion when returning administrator rights.
• Following a proposal, the edit filter mailing list has been opened up to users with the Edit Filter Helper right.

Technical news

• Wikimedia projects can set a default block length for users via MediaWiki:ipb-default-expiry. A new page, MediaWiki:ipb-default-expiry-ip, allows the setting of a different default block length for IP editors. Neither is currently used. (T219126)

Arbitration

• Voting in the 2019 Arbitration Committee Elections is open to eligible editors until Monday 23:59, 2 December 2018 UTC. Please review the candidates and, if you wish to do so, submit your choices on the voting page.

Miscellaneous

• The global consultation on partial and temporary office actions that ended in October received a closing statement from staff concluding, among other things, that the WMF will no longer use partial or temporary Office Action bans... until and unless community consensus that they are of value or Board directive.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:47, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Alcohol intoxication

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Alcohol intoxication. Legobot (talk) 04:23, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

recent edits

i see how the 'nestle' edit could be controversial, so I will add numerous reliable sources later, but I did revert the penelope cruz edit. Snapplerocks (talk) 23:20, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

@Snapplerocks: I removed the Cruz edit again, as it doesn't belong in that sentence. Please see my explanation on Talk:Penélope Cruz. AlexEng^(TALK) 01:05, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2020

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

Administrator changes

Dreamy Jazz • Newslinger • Rosguill

Deor • Spartaz • Xeno

Angusmclellan • clpo13 • Edgar181 • Matthewedwards • NCurse

CheckUser changes

Bradv • Casliber • David Fuchs • Maxim • Newyorkbrad • SoWhy • Xeno

Oversight changes

Bradv • Casliber • DGG • David Fuchs • Maxim • Newyorkbrad • SoWhy • Xeno

Someguy1221

Guideline and policy news

• A request for comment asks whether partial blocks should be enabled on the English Wikipedia. If enabled, this functionality would allow administrators to block users from editing specific pages or namespaces, rather than the entire site.
• A proposal asks whether admins who don't use their tools for a significant period of time (e.g. five years) should have the toolset procedurally removed.
• Following a successful RfC, a whitelist is now available for users whose redirects will be autopatrolled by a bot, removing them from the new pages patrol queue. Admins can add such users to Wikipedia:New pages patrol/Redirect whitelist after a discussion following the guidelines at Wikipedia talk:New pages patrol/Redirect whitelist.

Arbitration

• The fourth case on Palestine-Israel articles was closed. The case consolidated all previous remedies under one heading, which should make them easier to understand, apply, and enforce. In particular, the distinction between "primary articles" and "related content" has been clarified, with the former being the entire set of articles whose topic relates to the Arab-Israeli conflict, broadly interpreted rather than reasonably construed.
• Following the 2019 Arbitration Committee elections, the following editors have been appointed to the Arbitration Committee: Beeblebrox, Bradv, Casliber, David Fuchs, DGG, KrakatoaKatie, Maxim, Newyorkbrad, SoWhy, Worm That Turned, Xeno.

Miscellaneous

• This issue marks three full years of the Admin newsletter. Thanks for reading!

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:06, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – February 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2020).

Administrator changes

Ergo Sum • Nick Moyes • QEDK • Wugapodes

Dennis Brown

Aude • BrownHairedGirl • CALR • Jengod • John Reaves • J.smith • Kim Dent-Brown • K1Bond007 • MECU • Refdoc • RHaworth

CheckUser changes

Opabinia regalis • Premeditated Chaos

Interface administrator changes

Ragesoss

Guideline and policy news

• Following a request for comment, partial blocks are now enabled on the English Wikipedia. This functionality allows administrators to block users from editing specific pages or namespaces rather than the entire site. A draft policy is being workshopped at Wikipedia:Partial blocks.
• The request for comment seeking the community's sentiment for a binding desysop procedure closed with wide-spread support for an alternative desysoping procedure based on community input. No proposed process received consensus.

Technical news

• Twinkle now supports partial blocking. There is a small checkbox that toggles the "partial" status for both blocks and templating. There is currently one template: {{uw-pblock}}.
• When trying to move a page, if the target title already exists then a warning message is shown. The warning message will now include a link to the target title. [2]

Arbitration

• Following a recent arbitration case, the Arbitration Committee reminded administrators that checkuser and oversight blocks must not be reversed or modified without prior consultation with the checkuser or oversighter who placed the block, the respective functionary team, or the Arbitration Committee.

Miscellaneous

• Voting in the 2020 Steward elections will begin on 08 February 2020, 14:00 (UTC) and end on 28 February 2020, 13:59 (UTC). The confirmation process of current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automatically check your eligibility to vote.
• The English Wikipedia has reached six million articles. Thank you everyone for your contributions!

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 15:05, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – March 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2020).

Administrator changes

Money emoji

Athaenara • DeltaQuad

Fishhead64 • Kudpung • Mikaey

Bureaucrat changes

DeltaQuad

CheckUser changes

DeltaQuad

Oversight changes

DeltaQuad

Guideline and policy news

• Following an RfC, the blocking policy was changed to state that sysops must not undo or alter CheckUser or Oversight blocks, rather than should not.
• A request for comment confirmed that sandboxes of established but inactive editors may not be blanked due solely to inactivity.

Technical news

• Following a discussion, Twinkle's default CSD behavior will soon change, most likely this week. After the change, Twinkle will default to "tagging mode" if there is no CSD tag present, and default to "deletion mode" if there is a CSD tag present. You will be able to always default to "deletion mode" (the current behavior) using your Twinkle preferences.

Miscellaneous

• Following the 2020 Steward Elections, the following editors have been appointed as stewards: BRPever, Krd, Martin Urbanec, MusikAnimal, Sakretsu, Sotiale, and Tks4Fish. There are a total of seven editors that have been appointed as stewards, the most since 2014.
• The 2020 appointees for the Ombudsman commission are Ajraddatz and Uzoma Ozurumba; they will serve for one year.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:20, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – April 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2020).

Administrator changes

Cabayi • Lee Vilenski

Boing! said Zebedee

Jonny-mt • MarkGallagher • PeaceNT

Money emoji → Moneytrees

Bureaucrat changes

SilkTork • WereSpielChequers

CheckUser changes

NativeForeigner

Oversight changes

Someguy1221

Daniel Case

Guideline and policy news

• There is an ongoing request for comment to streamline the source deprecation and blacklisting process.

Technical news

• There is a plan for new requirements for user signatures. You can give feedback.

Arbitration

• Following the banning of an editor by the WMF last year, the Arbitration Committee resolved to hold a Arbcom RfC regarding on-wiki harassment. A draft RfC has been posted at Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Anti-harassment RfC (Draft) and not open to comments from the community yet. Interested editors can comment on the RfC itself on its talk page.

Miscellaneous

• The WMF has begun a pilot report of the pages most visited through various social media platforms to help with anti-vandalism and anti-disinformation efforts. The report is updated daily and will be available through the end of May.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:00, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – May 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2020).

Administrator changes

Gnangarra • Kaisershatner • Malcolmxl5

CheckUser changes

Callanecc

Oversight changes

HJ Mitchell

Guideline and policy news

• Discretionary sanctions have been authorized for all pages and edits related to COVID-19, to be logged at WP:GS/COVID19.
• Following a recent discussion on Meta-Wiki, the edit filter maintainer global group has been created.
• A request for comment has been proposed to create a new main page editor usergroup.
• A request for comment has been proposed to make the bureaucrat activity requirements more strict.

Technical news

• The Editing team has been working on the talk pages project. You can review the proposed design and share your thoughts on the talk page.
• Enterprisey created a script that will show a link to the proper Special:Undelete page when viewing a since-deleted revision, see User:Enterprisey/link-deleted-revs.

Miscellaneous

• A request for comment closed with consensus to create a Village Pump-style page for communication with the Wikimedia Foundation.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:19, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – June 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2020).

Administrator changes

CaptainEek • Creffett • Cwmhiraeth

Anna Frodesiak • Buckshot06 • Ronhjones • SQL

CheckUser changes

SQL

Guideline and policy news

• A request for comment asks whether the Unblock Ticket Request System (UTRS) should allowed any unblock request or just private appeals.
• The Wikimedia Foundation announced that they will develop a universal code of conduct for all WMF projects. There is an open local discussion regarding the same.

Arbitration

• A motion was passed to enact a 500/30 restriction on articles related to the history of Jews and antisemitism in Poland during World War II (1933–45), including the Holocaust in Poland. Article talk pages where disruption occurs may also be managed with the stated restriction.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:27, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Politics, government, and law request for comment

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. Sent at 08:02, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: History and geography request for comment

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. Sent at 08:07, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: History and geography request for comment

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. Sent at 08:24, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Politics, government, and law request for comment

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. Sent at 08:32, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2020).

Administrator changes

Malcolmxl5

John • TheCoffee • Tim!

Creffett → GeneralNotability

DeltaQuad → AmandaNP

CheckUser changes

Bbb23

Interface administrator changes

TonyBallioni

Guideline and policy news

• A request for comment is in progress to remove the T2 (template that misrepresents established policy) speedy deletion criterion.

Technical news

• Protection templates on mainspace pages are now automatically added by User:MusikBot II (BRFA).

Arbitration

• Following the banning of an editor by the WMF last year, the Arbitration Committee resolved to hold an RfC regarding on-wiki harassment. The RfC has been posted at Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Anti-harassment RfC and is open to comments from the community.
• The Medicine case was closed, with a remedy authorizing standard discretionary sanctions for all discussions about pharmaceutical drug prices and pricing and for edits adding, changing, or removing pharmaceutical drug prices or pricing from articles.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:25, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Politics, government, and law request for comment

Your feedback is requested at Talk:Genetic Literacy Project on a "Politics, government, and law" request for comment. Thank you for helping out!
You were randomly selected to receive this invitation from the list of Feedback Request Service subscribers. If you'd like not to receive these messages any more, you can opt out at any time by removing your name.

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) | Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. | Sent at 16:30, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – August 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2020).

Administrator changes

Red Phoenix

Euryalus • SQL

Jujutacular • Monty845 • Rettetast • Madchester

Oversight changes

GB fan

Keegan • Opabinia regalis • Premeditated Chaos

Guideline and policy news

• There is an open request for comment to decide whether to increase the minimum duration a sanction discussion has to remain open (currently 24 hours).
• Speedy deletion criterion T2 (template that misrepresents established policy) has been repealed following a request for comment.
• Speedy deletion criterion X2 (pages created by the content translation tool) has been repealed following a discussion.
• There is a proposal to restrict proposed deletion to confirmed users.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 08:20, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Politics, government, and law request for comment

Your feedback is requested at Talk:National Rally on a "Politics, government, and law" request for comment. Thank you for helping out!
You were randomly selected to receive this invitation from the list of Feedback Request Service subscribers. If you'd like not to receive these messages any more, you can opt out at any time by removing your name.

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) | Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. | Sent at 03:31, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Politics, government, and law request for comment

Your feedback is requested at Talk:Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania on a "Politics, government, and law" request for comment. Thank you for helping out!
You were randomly selected to receive this invitation from the list of Feedback Request Service subscribers. If you'd like not to receive these messages any more, you can opt out at any time by removing your name.

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) | Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. | Sent at 22:31, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2020).

Administrator changes

Eddie891

Angela • Jcw69 • Just Chilling • Philg88 • Viajero

CheckUser changes

SQL

Guideline and policy news

• Following a request for comment, the minimum length for site ban discussions was increased to 72 hours, up from 24.
• A request for comment is ongoing to determine whether paid editors must or should use the articles for creation process.
• A request for comment is open to resolve inconsistencies between the draftification and alternative to deletion processes.

Arbitration

• A request for comment is open to provide an opportunity to amend the structure, rules, and procedures of the 2020 English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee election and to resolve any issues not covered by existing rules.
• An open request for comment asks whether active Arbitrators may serve on the Trust and Safety Case Review Committee or Ombudsman commission.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 09:55, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Politics, government, and law request for comment

Your feedback is requested at Talk:Authoritarianism on a "Politics, government, and law" request for comment. Thank you for helping out!
You were randomly selected to receive this invitation from the list of Feedback Request Service subscribers. If you'd like not to receive these messages any more, you can opt out at any time by removing your name.

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) | Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. | Sent at 05:31, 12 September 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2020).

Administrator changes

Ajpolino • LuK3

Jackmcbarn

Ad Orientem • Harej • Lid • Lomn • Mentoz86 • Oliver Pereira • XJaM

There'sNoTime → TheresNoTime

Guideline and policy news

• A request for comment found consensus that incubation as an alternative to deletion should generally only be recommended when draftification is appropriate, namely 1) if the result of a deletion discussion is to draftify; or 2) if the article is newly created.

Technical news

• The filter log now provides links to view diffs of deleted revisions (phab:T261630).

Arbitration

• The 2020 CheckUser and Oversight appointment process has begun. The community consultation period will take place from September 27th to October 7th.
• Following a request for comment, sitting Committee members may not serve on either the Ombuds Commission or the WMF Case Review Committee. The Arbitration Committee passed a motion implementing those results into their procedures.

Miscellaneous

• The Universal Code of Conduct draft is open for community review and comment until October 6th, 2020.
• Office actions may now be appealed to the Interim Trust & Safety Case Review Committee.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:42, 1 October 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Politics, government, and law request for comment

Your feedback is requested at Talk:Union of Soviet Sovereign Republics on a "Politics, government, and law" request for comment. Thank you for helping out!
You were randomly selected to receive this invitation from the list of Feedback Request Service subscribers. If you'd like not to receive these messages any more, you can opt out at any time by removing your name.

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) | Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. | Sent at 08:31, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: History and geography request for comment

Your feedback is requested at Talk:Komala Party of Iranian Kurdistan on a "History and geography" request for comment. Thank you for helping out!
You were randomly selected to receive this invitation from the list of Feedback Request Service subscribers. If you'd like not to receive these messages any more, you can opt out at any time by removing your name.

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) | Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. | Sent at 08:30, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2020).

Administrator changes

John M Wolfson

Bduke • Nilfanion • Philosopher • Rspeer • Yunshui

Interface administrator changes

Ragesoss

TonyBallioni

CheckUser changes

EdJohnston • Oshwah • Yamla

Yunshui

Oversight changes

Anarchyte

Yunshui

Guideline and policy news

• Community sanctions now authorize administrators to place under indefinite semiprotection any article on a beauty pageant, or biography of a person known as a beauty pageant contestant, which has been edited by a sockpuppet account or logged-out sockpuppet, to be logged at WP:GS/PAGEANT.

Technical news

• Sysops will once again be able to view the deleted history of JS/CSS pages; this was restricted to interface administrators when that group was introduced.
• Twinkle's block module now includes the ability to note the specific case when applying a discretionary sanctions block and/or template.
• Sysops will be able to use Special:CreateLocalAccount to create a local account for a global user that is prevented from auto-creation locally (such as by a filter or range block). Administrators that are not sure if such a creation is appropriate should contact a checkuser.

Arbitration

• The 2020 Arbitration Committee Elections process has begun. Eligible editors will be able to nominate themselves as candidates from November 8 through November 17. The voting period will run from November 23 through December 6.
• The Anti-harassment RfC has concluded with a summary of the feedback provided.

Miscellaneous

• A reminder that standard discretionary sanctions are authorized for all edits about, and all pages related to post-1932 politics of the United States and closely related people. (American Politics 2 Arbitration case).

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:51, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Politics, government, and law request for comment

Your feedback is requested at Talk:2020 United States presidential election on a "Politics, government, and law" request for comment. Thank you for helping out!
You were randomly selected to receive this invitation from the list of Feedback Request Service subscribers. If you'd like not to receive these messages any more, you can opt out at any time by removing your name.

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) | Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. | Sent at 03:33, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

ArbCom 2020 Elections voter message

Hello! Voting in the 2020 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on Monday, 7 December 2020. All eligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate in the 2020 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. If you no longer wish to receive these messages, you may add {{NoACEMM}} to your user talk page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:39, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – December 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2020).

Administrator changes

Andrwsc • Anetode • GoldenRing • JzG • LinguistAtLarge • Nehrams2020

Interface administrator changes

Izno

Guideline and policy news

• There is a request for comment in progress to either remove T3 (duplicated and hardcoded instances) as a speedy deletion criterion or eliminate its seven-day waiting period.

Technical news

• Voting for proposals in the 2021 Community Wishlist Survey, which determines what software the Wikimedia Foundation's Community Tech team will work on next year, will take place from 8 December through 21 December. In particular, there are sections regarding administrators and anti-harassment.

Arbitration

• Voting in the 2020 Arbitration Committee Elections is open to eligible editors until Monday 23:59, 7 December 2020 UTC. Please review the candidates and, if you wish to do so, submit your choices on the voting page.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:36, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2021

News and updates for administrators from the past month (December 2020).

Administrator changes

Hammersoft

Andres • Brion VIBBER • Rkitko • Thatcher

CheckUser changes

Barkeep49 • BDD • CaptainEek • Primefac

Oversight changes

Barkeep49 • BDD • CaptainEek

Joe Roe

Guideline and policy news

• Speedy deletion criterion T3 (duplication and hardcoded instances) has been repealed following a request for comment.

Technical news

• You can now put pages on your watchlist for a limited period of time.

Arbitration

• By motion, standard discretionary sanctions have been temporarily authorized for all pages relating to the Horn of Africa (defined as including Ethiopia, Somalia, Eritrea, Djibouti, and adjoining areas if involved in related disputes). The effectiveness of the discretionary sanctions can be evaluated on the request by any editor after March 1, 2021 (or sooner if for a good reason).
• Following the 2020 Arbitration Committee elections, the following editors have been appointed to the Arbitration Committee: Barkeep49, BDD, Bradv, CaptainEek, L235, Maxim, Primefac.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:07, 5 January 2021 (UTC)