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Rapid AfD after questionable edits by single editor

@KsOstm: I was logging in to take the time to make the argument that a series of recent edits on Rhonda Patrick came pretty close to vandalism and was hoping to appeal to the editor directly regarding their appropriateness. I no longer can since the AfD removes any trace of revision history and it's already gone.

He or she removed mention of an important scientific contribution on the basis that it couldn't be proven to be her work. This is a very specious argument since it's materially represented by her post-doctoral advisor in this interview that it is, in fact, her work (he says repeatedly "Dr. Patrick's paper"). After this removal the editor then removed all media references to this specific work and it appears the article was rapidly approved for an AfD on the basis of lack of WP:NOTABILITY. I think the presence of these otherwise inappropriate edits which damaged the articles claim to WP:NOTABILITY undermined the voting that transpired between July 9th and the approval of the AfD. Disappointing! Snazzywiki (talk) 03:29, 18 July 2017 (UTC)

Re-proposal at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Disaster management

Hello again. I saw you originally proposed a revival of the WikiProject. I have restarted it via RFC process at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Disaster management#Project reboot & project rename to WikiProject Emergency management. Feel free to comment there. Thanks. --George Ho (talk) 15:34, 1 July 2017 (UTC)

I rescinded the RFC tag but notified relevant WikiProjects about this. --George Ho (talk) 20:08, 1 July 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2017

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

Administrator changes

added Happyme22 • Dragons flight
removed Zad68

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Miscellaneous

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

User talk:Rasheoda

The user undid SummerPhDv2.0 revision. Make sure setting to "cannot edit own talk page". 123.136.111.120 (talk) 16:55, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Summer had no business slapping a template on the user's Talk page, and Rasheoda was clearly entitled to revert it.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:01, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
@Bbb23: Saw your post here after I'd done my thing. Somehow I'd gotten my wires crossed and reacted as if the tag had been applied to the user page, not the user talk. You're right, though, and I've reverted by talk page access revocation, though you beat me to reverting my edit. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 17:06, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
The userpage for this particular master should not be tagged per WP:DENY. I don't really care if one of her socks doesn't have Talk page access, although not for what she did in this instance.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:45, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Question (WP:AIV)

Hi,

Is it appropriate for me to place this below this WP:AIV report even though I'm not an admin? I've seen other non-admin users do this before, and I also placed the {{nao}} template just before the comment. So I just wanted to make sure Thanks. 2601:1C0:10E:A22E:5C50:CA04:F35F:9FA (talk) 17:01, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Update (as I was typing this): I see that you put this underneath my comment, too. 2601:1C0:10E:A22E:5C50:CA04:F35F:9FA (talk) 17:01, 11 July 2017 (UTC)
Personally I have no problem with you adding such things with the {{nao}} and I say go ahead, though I can't guarantee everyone will be ok with it. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 17:08, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Question: (Abuse/filter log)

Did you oversight the abuse log entries for this user? Because I swear that I saw something there when I reported this user.2601:1C0:10E:A22E:5C50:CA04:F35F:9FA (talk) 17:04, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Yes; I suppressed them since they contained non-public contact information and since we can't guarantee that the person behind the account is the person who's contact information was published. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 17:11, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Pending changes reviewer?

Hi!

I notice that you recently changed group membership for Shhhhwwww!! from extended confirmed user to extended confirmed user and pending changes reviewer. Would you extend the same courtesy to me, please? BushelCandle (talk) 12:51, 13 July 2017 (UTC)

 Done Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 00:36, 16 July 2017 (UTC)

Talkback

Saw this, and thought that I'd let you know about it.

Hello, Ks0stm. You have new messages at RIP Previous Account, You Will Be Missed's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

65.96.233.85 (talk) 05:01, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 15 July 2017

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Full protect for Natalia Veselnitskaya‎ and Rinat Akhmetshin?

We had a single ip user disrupting the articles , full protection is unnecessarily restrictive; Logged in users were making good progress on the articles. Would you consider downgrading to semiprotect? Darmokand (talk) 14:19, 16 July 2017 (UTC)

 Done by Oshwah. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 17:22, 22 July 2017 (UTC)

RfA

Thanks for supporting my run for administrator. I am honored and grateful. ) Cullen328 Let's discuss it 20:55, 23 July 2017 (UTC)

180.255.0.0/16

We're going to see some collateral damage from this. Though there are a lot of blocks on that range, there are also a number of long term legit users who will be affected, such as User talk:Double sharp; I see another editing well since 2013, another from 2012, another 2015... --jpgordon𝄢𝄆 𝄐𝄇 00:25, 27 July 2017 (UTC)

@Jpgordon: I've reduced the block to anon-only for now, but it's possible that this won't stop the abuse. We'll see how it goes. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 20:32, 28 July 2017 (UTC)
In any case, thank you so much for your help! ^_^ Double sharp (talk) 23:25, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

Show-Score

Hi! You closed Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Show-Score as essentially a PROD. Given that the nom is at ANI and it had no other participation, would you mind if I userfied it to work on it? Thanks either way StarM 02:10, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

@Star Mississippi: Sorry about the slow reply, but I've restored the article. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 23:57, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
No worries on the delay, wasn't hurting for things to edit in the interim. Working on it now, thanks. StarM 01:36, 29 August 2017 (UTC)

ACC request

I normally wouldn't question a CU checking a request, what brings me here is the length of your reservation of the request [[ACC:202794]]. Just a poke in case this has slipped you mind :) cheers, - FlightTime (open channel) 21:53, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

Update: I have dropped this request as stale. - FlightTime (open channel) 16:02, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – August 2017

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

Administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

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

ACC

It may be brought to your kind attention that Request #202794 has been accepted by you and has been pending for over two months.Winged Blades Godric 05:12, 4 August 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 5 August 2017

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Kevin Newsom

I believe that last month you redacted some edits from Kevin Newsom, specifically his date of birth, due to an OTRS request. Recently, his date of birth has been re-added to the article, first without a source (I reverted those edits), and now with a reference of sorts that simply says "From the Justice For America report on him" (no link or further information is provided). I've already reverted the DOB several times and attempted to convey in edit summaries that per WP:BLP and the history with the OTRS request, we need to be extra diligent about sourcing in this instance. I'm wondering if you can provide some guidance on what should be done in this situation--is the given source enough? Or due to the OTRS request, should we never include a DOB in this article? Not sure what the protocol is, thanks. Marquardtika (talk) 16:12, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

IP blocking

Hi Ks0stm, I logged out during a moment and when I wanted to edit some pages, I got this message

You are currently unable to edit Wikipedia.
You are still able to view pages, but you are not currently able to edit, move, or create them.
Editing from 2001:41D0:0:0:0:0:0:0/32 has been blocked (disabled) by Ks0stm for the following reason(s):
The IP address that you are currently using has been blocked because it is believed to be a web host provider or colocation provider. To prevent abuse, web hosts and colocation providers may be blocked from editing Wikipedia.

This IP address comes indeed from OVH that is my internet provider. my IP address is within this range but for sure I have my own public IP address. Could you adjust more slightly this IP blocking? I can give you further information if needed. Pamputt (talk) 08:03, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

Report me without review?

  • Ks0stm, this is my account, I am a font designer and I am not vandalize the page. This IP address has bias to block me without review, Ks0stm that is wrong report to me, I revert the edit of the sockpuppet My Royal Young due to vandalism, zzuuzz has choose My Royal Young due to vandalism, and I cannot recognize, my account has report without review. 175.158.216.150 has biased to a sockpuppetery, I am not a sockpuppet of my account, please ask this IP. --cyɾʋs ɴɵtɵɜat bʉɭagɑ!!! (Talk | Contributions) 11:06, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

Arbitrary Ip blocking without warning nor will to ask for explanation

Hi Ks0stm, you blocked from editing eventhough I have been contributing for more than 8 years without any issues nor conflict. When I try to edit in the articles, I get this message::The IP address that you are currently using has been blocked because it is believed to be a web host provider or colocation provider. To prevent abuse, web hosts and colocation providers may be blocked from editing Wikipedia. My Ip provider if OVH which is one of the major internet provider in Europe. As I can read in the previous messages left by others angry users p, I am not the only one in this situation. This is very confusing especially that you blocked me without any warning nor looking for any explanation. With this type of action, I even can't fill up a request for deblocking my account since I am forbid to use myown account. I am obliged to use my private VPN in order to be able to access this page. This king of behaviour is not not fair not correct. So please, rectify the situation in order to let ny contribute as I did for many years now without any issue. This IP address comes indeed from OVH that is my internet provider. my IP address is within this range but for sure I have my own public IP address. Could you adjust more slightly this IP blocking? I can give you further information if needed. 

--Gabriel HM (talk) 00:14, 26 August 2017 (UTC)

WikiCup 2017 September newsletter

Round 4 of the WikiCup has ended and we move forward into the final round. In round 4, a total of 12 FAs, 3 FLs, 44 GAs, 3 FLs, 79 DYKs, 1 ITN and 42 GARs was achieved, with no FPs or FTs this time. Congratulations to Peacemaker67 on the Royal Yugoslav Navy Good Topic of 36 items, and the 12 featured articles achieved by Cas Liber (5), Vanamonde93 (3), Peacemaker67 (2), Adityavagarwal (1) and 12george1 (1). With a FA scoring 200 points, and bonus points available on top of this, FAs are likely to feature heavily in the final round. Meanwhile Yellow Evan, a typhoon specialist, was contributing 12 DYKs and 10 GAs, while Adityavagarwal and Freikorp topped the GAR list with 8 reviews each. As we enter the final round, we are down to eight contestants, and we would like to thank those of you who have been eliminated for the useful contributions you have made to the Cup and Wikipedia. The lowest score needed to reach round 5 was 305, and I think we can expect a highly competitive final round.

Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 4 but before the start of round 5 can be claimed in round 5. Remember too that you must claim your points within 10 days of "earning" them. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed. It would be helpful if this list could be cleared of any items no longer relevant. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to reduce the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck, and let the best man (or woman) win! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66 and Cwmhiraeth 06:25, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2017

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

Administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

Request on 13:43:49, 4 September 2017 for assistance on AfC submission by Consortiumlegem


This message is in relation to my submission: African Union Law and was declined by reviewer @Ks0stm:

I was wondering if the reviewer could kindly point out the sections that need redrafting. I note the comment on the language to avoid and will work on this also.

Thanks

Consortiumlegem (talk) 13:43, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 6 September 2017

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Talk:Hurricane_Irma/Archive_1#M H S D

Dear Ks0stm,
You archived the thread — that's fair, as the original discussion was finished. But you archived it with the blaming and, as I pointed out, incorrect flag WP:NOTAFORUM. That's abusive.
Ciciban (talk) 06:46, 9 September 2017 (UTC)

Well done on moderating Hurricane Irma's section since it was vandalized! You're a real help. RecentEdits (talk) 11:35, 15 September 2017 (GMT-4)

Troll accounts

Is there an older master to the group of accounts you just blocked? I recognized "Chinese Can't Be Deleted" as an account on Commons that was trolling related to File:CHINESE.jpg, which had been uploaded apparently only for vandalism and blacklisted by Black Kite. Home Lander (talk) 00:31, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

@Home Lander: Confirmed, oldest to newest:
Unfortunately I can't find anything with CheckUser that connects them further back than the Create Account Dude account, though I'm certain that that's not the actual master. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 00:41, 12 September 2017 (UTC)
OK, thanks for rounding all these up. At least one of them is unblocked at Commons, should they be notified? Home Lander (talk) 00:48, 12 September 2017 (UTC)
@Home Lander: I already let the stewards know via IRC, and they're looking into the cross-wiki aspect of it. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 00:50, 12 September 2017 (UTC)
Sounds good. Home Lander (talk) 00:51, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

OK - per this, we now have a known master. Per that behavioral evidence, no surprise that he named an account "Home Destroyer" after interacting with me. Too funny. Home Lander (talk) 17:01, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

Ahh, yeah, SGK makes sense, I suppose. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 17:10, 12 September 2017 (UTC)
I suppose all the above user talk pages can be deleted per WP:DENY as requested on the LTA page; they're not serving much purpose anyway. Home Lander (talk) 17:14, 12 September 2017 (UTC)
@Home Lander: I used a mass delete script to delete all the talk pages, and I used a mass block script to change all the blocks to a deny-worthy {{checkuserblock-account}}. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 17:26, 12 September 2017 (UTC)
Think we're done for now then, thanks. Home Lander (talk) 17:27, 12 September 2017 (UTC)
In other news, see your CU mail for the matter we were discussing earlier. Drmies (talk) 16:51, 18 September 2017 (UTC)

Invitation to Admin confidence survey

Hello,

Beginning in September 2017, the Wikimedia Foundation Anti-harassment tool team will be conducting a survey to gauge how well tools, training, and information exists to assist English Wikipedia administrators in recognizing and mitigating things like sockpuppetry, vandalism, and harassment.

The survey should only take 5 minutes, and your individual response will not be made public. This survey will be integral for our team to determine how to better support administrators.

To take the survey sign up here and we will send you a link to the form.

We really appreciate your input!

Please let us know if you wish to opt-out of all massmessage mailings from the Anti-harassment tools team.

For the Anti-harassment tools team, SPoore (WMF), Community Advocate, Community health initiative (talk) 20:56, 14 September 2017 (UTC)

Chicago Blackhawks protection

Hi,

I saw that you protected the Chicago Blackhawks page on June 7, 2017. However, why my edits are pending in the Blackhawks' page when I have been around Wikipedia for almost 4 years? Is there some kind of change in policy regarding the autoconfirmed users or what? I clearly remember that most of the protected pages show me as autoconfirmed, but not this one. Do you have any idea about this strange status change? – Sabbatino (talk) 09:10, 20 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks!

Hi Ks0stm, thank you for your comments at my RfA. Your support is much appreciated! Cheers, ansh666 19:23, 22 September 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 25 September 2017

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Could you de-salt the page

Could you kindly de-salt the page below because create-protection is not required anymore. User_talk:(TIB1236MTIB1237KTIB1239ETIB1240ATIB1241YTIB1243STIB1244PTIB1245LTIB1246GTIB1247G) Thanks, 128.90.63.10 (talk) 09:23, 29 September 2017 (UTC)

No. Bye. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 10:35, 29 September 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – October 2017

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

Administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

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

Invitation to discuss the soon to built, Interaction Timeline

Hi Checkusers and Checkuser clerks,

The Anti-Harassment Tools team is seeking input about building the Interaction Timeline feature.

We’re inviting you to join the discussion because you use similar tools such as the Editor Interaction Analyser and User compare report during sockpuppet investigations.

You can leave comments on the on wiki discussion page or send an email to the Anti-Harassment Tools team.

For the Anti-Harassment Tools team SPoore (WMF), Community Advocate, Community health initiative (talk) 19:39, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

Please let us know if you wish to opt-out of all massmessage mailings from the Anti-harassment tools team.

Request

Hello Ks0stm, sorry for dropping by. I would like to follow up on your comment in the current pending case. I find your rationale reasonable and there is certainly no need to recuse. However, as 7 out 9 diffs in the request links to past discussions that are between 2012 and 2014, I find it plausible that moving forward, many of the discussion about Joefromrandb would reference these years. Out of these 7 past diffs, you have participated in one ([1]) and initiated another ([2]). In addition, you did comment in the most recent discussion ([3]) about the editor, and I think that comment can very much be interpreted as being relevant to this case, as you have arguably expressed an opinion on a stance. This reminds me of a recent discussion about the idea of "should" and "must", and it is my opinion that your participation in this case would probably not shed the best light on this committee, and it also does not strengthen community confidence over this committee. So if possible, I would like to request your recusal. If you find this request unreasonable, please feel free to decline, as I wouldn't mind at all. Best regards, Alex ShihTalk 02:04, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Considering that incident was mentioned on several ACE2012 guides, I think it might be best to stay out of this one, personally... the appearance of being neutral is important too. --Rschen7754 02:30, 22 October 2017 (UTC)
@Alex Shih: Just a note that I've seen this and will reply at some point soon. I'm in busy stretch at work and in my social life at the moment, but hopefully I'll have time to fully read and contemplate this within a couple of days. If I've not replied by Tuesday give me a poke. I've not voted either way on the case request nor chimed in on the ArbCom mailing list, and I'll keep it that way until I've gotten around to this. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 07:31, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 23 October 2017

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Recusal request

I am formally requesting that you recuse yourself from the case filed by TomStar81. I'm sure that you are already aware of my position on this issue, and I'm only posting this message here because the rules seem to require it. Joefromrandb (talk) 03:10, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2017

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

Administrator changes

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

Technical news

Arbitration

Obituaries

  • The Wikipedia community has recently learned that Allen3 (William Allen Peckham) passed away on December 30, 2016, the same day as JohnCD. Allen began editing in 2005 and became an administrator that same year.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:50, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

WikiCup 2017 November newsletter: Final results

The final round of the 2017 WikiCup is over. Congratulations to the 2017 WikiCup top three finalists:

In addition to recognizing the achievements of the top finishers and everyone who worked hard to make it to the final round, we also want to recognize those participants who were most productive in each of the WikiCup scoring categories:

  • Featured Article – Cas Liber (actually a two-way tie with themselves for an astonishing five FAs in R2 and R4).
  • Good Article – Adityavagarwal had 14 GAs promoted in R5.
  • Featured List – Canada Bloom6132 (submissions) and Japan 1989 (submissions) both produced 2 FLs in R2
  • Featured Pictures – Cascadia SounderBruce (submissions) improved an image to FP status in R5, the only FP this year.
  • Featured Topic – Denmark MPJ-DK (submissions) has the only FT of the Cup in R3.
  • Good Topic – Four different editors created a GT in R2, R3 and R4.
  • Did You Know – Adityavagarwal had 22 DYKs on the main page in R5.
  • In The News – India MBlaze Lightning (submissions) had 14 ITN on the main page in R2.
  • Good Article Review – India Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (submissions) completed 31 GARs in R1.

Over the course of the 2017 WikiCup the following content was added or improved on Wikipedia: 51 Featured Articles, 292 Good Articles, 18 Featured Lists, 1 Featured Picture, 1 Featured Topics, 4 Good Topics, around 400 Did You Knows, 75 In The News, and 442 Good Article Reviews. Thank you to all the competitors for your hard work and what you have done to improve Wikipedia.

Regarding the prize vouchers - @Adityavagarwal, Vanamonde93, Casliber, Bloom6132, 1989, and SounderBruce: please send Godot13 (talk · contribs · email) an email from the email address to which you would like your Amazon voucher sent. Please include your preference of global Amazon marketplace as well. We hope to have the electronic gift cards processed and sent within a week.

We will open up a discussion for comments on process and scoring in a few days. The 2018 WikiCup is just around the corner! Many thanks from all the judges. If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Cwmhiraeth (talk · contribs · email), and Godot13 (talk · contribs · email) MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:42, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Been away for school, tornadoes of 2017 editing privileges?

Hey, been busy with school and haven't caught up here in a while. I see the main page edits require review now? Was wondering since I've added a lot of content, cleaned up a lot of pre-existing tornado articles, and created many tornado articles over the years, that I'd be trustworthy enough to edit without review? Thanks! Sharkguy05 (talk) 07:04, 8 November 2017 (UTC)Sharkguy05

WikiCup 2018

So the 2017 WikiCup has come to an end. Congratulations to the winner, to the other finalists and to all those who took part. 177 contestants signed up, more than usual, but not all of them submitted entries in the first round. Were editors attracted by the cash prizes offered for the first time this year, or were these irrelevant? Do the rules and scoring need changing for the 2018 WikiCup? If you have a view on these or other matters, why not join in the WikiCup discussion about next year's contest? Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Godot13 (talk · contribs · email) and Cwmhiraeth (talk · contribs · email). MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:59, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

198.27.128.0/17 incorrectly identified as colocationwebhost

Hi,

I work for the ISP in question and can confirm that 198.27.128.0/17 is one of the DHCP ranges we serve to residential customers and is numerically remote from the ranges we use in our colocation facility. Can we please discuss how to get this block lifted? Thanks! Opsftw (talk) 00:11, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

Hello Opsftw, Ks0stm isn't around very much, so he may not reply to your message. Read this to see how you can appeal the block of your IP range. PhilrocMy contribs 18:15, 19 November 2017 (UTC)
Hi Philroc, thanks for the suggestion. I've followed your advice (filed with OTRS) that but it has circled right back here - see the post from Ronhjones. Are there other options available to get this block handled in a timely fashion? Opsftw (talk) 18:02, 27 November 2017 (UTC)
@Opsftw: Try an unblock request at Wikipedia:WikiProject on open proxies Ronhjones  (Talk) 18:29, 27 November 2017 (UTC)
@Ronhjones: Thanks. Somebody there was willing to remove the colocationwebhost tag but left the anonblock in place. Doing that to a /17 worth of residential internet customers due to "some vandalism" from that range seems excessive, which point I have made in that thread.Opsftw (talk) 19:34, 27 November 2017 (UTC)
@Opsftw: As I explained to Opsftw before, I've adjusted the block reason to remove mention of webhosts and colos. I've had a further look at the vandalism from the range, with an eye to recommending the block be lifted, but after review and continued vandalism from the range in the last few hours, I'm going to leave the block in place. The only way the block will be lifted is if the network operator contacts OTRS to get a list of IP assignments with a commitment to banning the user from their network. But even then I can't guarantee that will happen. -- zzuuzz (talk) 07:07, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
@Zzuuzz: (keeping indent here for now to preserve readibility) I appreciate and am grateful for the fact that you are working to protect the wiki. That said, with respect I'd like to point out what I believe to be a flaw in your reasoning here. You say that you wish to maintain the anonblock due to ongoing vandalism from that range. Since the anonblock is already in place, then the vandalism which has occurred while the block is effective has to be coming from logged-in users, which moots the point of the anonblock entirely. @Philroc: or @Ronhjones: would you be willing to weigh in here? We're all working from good faith but I think given the fact that this block hits 32,000 residences (at a rate of 2.3 per residence in SF proper that's about 75,000 human beings) I am requesting that we get a few more sets of eyes on the question. We will be happy to work with WP to address the vandal, but will need some evidence to support the effort. I already have a ticket in OTRS from November 20 on this issue but have not seen a reply. Opsftw (talk) 18:10, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
@Opsftw: @Zzuuzz: @Ronhjones: Wow, this discussion has absolutely exploded. I agree with what Opsftw said about a range block being excessive. I think that we should try to track down the specific IP(s) causing the vandalism and block it/them instead of blocking the entire range. PhilrocMy contribs 18:16, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
I've really said my piece, and welcome anyone to review the block originally placed by Ks0stm (though you will really need a checkuser to do so). The vandalism is not coming from a static IP which can be blocked, and apparently there are no sub-ranges to split the /17 into. Also it's fairly standard experience around here that if vandalism is still coming through when there's an anonblock, it's going to be ten times more prolific without any block at all. -- zzuuzz (talk) 18:38, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

The open ticket is OTRS 2017112010012969, if someone wants to send an IP vandal list. Ronhjones  (Talk) 18:41, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

That will need to be dealt with, if at all, by someone familiar and comfortable with revealing the data obtained by checkuser. Personally, I'm going to default to the safe interpretation of the privacy and local checkuser policies and not reveal anything but leave it to OTRS. -- zzuuzz (talk) 19:08, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
@Zzuuzz: Do you see the Catch-22 situation we find ourselves in here? You are unwilling to remove the anonblock on a truly massive chunk of IP space due to vandalism (more on that in a moment) but are unwilling to go further than say "I say it is so" when the question of detailing the issue is raised. WRT the problematic behavior I have two questions. First, how serious is the behavior here? Are we having edit-warring, page vandalism, harassment, copyright issues, or illegal behavior? If the last, please do report to authorities. Second, how many individuals are we talking about? If you're having trouble with one user who is already evading the anonblock then removing the block isn't likely to do much (the troll has the same hours in a day to behave badly either way). Are you seeing this coming from tens of IP addresses? Hundreds? Thousands? Again, details matter.
My personal suspicion is that you could grab any random /17 of residential IP addresses in the United States and see some amount of inappropriate conduct. Does this mean we should be anonblocking all of them? Again I'd like to see more folks who can make changes weigh in. Opsftw (talk) 22:20, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
In response, and I'm assuming a bit here, we are talking about one individual who would probably edit most days, which is about what you can see from the range contribs. If you want to talk numbers that'll be about 50% or more of your SF edits. They are an annoyance, blocked every time they create an account (of which there are probably hundreds), probably breaking no laws but certainly violating our ToS - purposefully harassing users might be the best description. I would hope you understand your IP leases and allocation better than I do, but as I said it has come from throughout the range, and I would welcome any assurance you can give about users not being able to jump around the whole /17 at will. I consider my position here as someone who has been asked to review a webhost block. My view is that there was a labelling issue as it's not a webhost, but it's also a block with a purpose and not a block I greatly disagree with. You're welcome to seek other views and assistance. That may be forthcoming from Ks0stm or OTRS, and I have also sent an email to other checkusers. I would also advise WP:CUBL and perhaps WP:UTRS - this is not strictly a checkuser block, but it was made by a checkuser (presumably) based on checkuser data, and it would be a rare thing to get this block lifted without further input from either the blocking admin or other checkusers. It is an unfortunate fact that sometimes blocks are made based on data considered private and the only people capable of reviewing them are other users with similar access. However there are review processes available and you're welcome to pursue any of them. -- zzuuzz (talk) 23:22, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
Thank you for the response. In terms of assignment, one residential user isn't going to appear all over the /17. They might pop up across a /22 but more likely a /24, and their address assignment is going to be relatively "sticky" so it's unlikely it would change very often (if ever) unless they are powering down their equipment for fifteen or twenty minutes and as I say the address they would get in that case would be within a much smaller block than /17. Can you please at least look again at where this user is connecting from with an eye toward a more reasonable (and plausible from the perspective of our network assignments) range to block? I would also welcome an update to the OTRS ticket from the person who has it assigned.
Thanks again for clearing the mislabeling issue. All this other conversation has effectively masked my gratitude for correcting that part of the problem.

Edit: I just got a fairly nonsensical message on Meta from someone who I can't help but think might be the miscreant in question. Oy... Opsftw (talk) 00:56, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
@Opsftw: I've just had a look and it looks like the person in question is editing across the /17 range. Recently, the person in question has used 198.27.181.7, 198.27.221.91 and 198.27.245.158. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 11:01, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
@Callanecc: Thanks for looking into this. From the standpoint of our network layout, this makes absolutely no sense. We're traversing topology in a way that users simply could not do unless they are connecting from multiple physical locations, and I see no way to connect the dots with those addresses. How certain are we that the person doing inappropriate things is not spoofing? Since I'm unaware of WP's backend capabilities I would like to be sure that's ruled out given what you've told me. In any case, this is a puzzle for sure. Opsftw (talk) 21:16, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
I think the fact that they haven't edited while ever the range has been blocked suggests that they are using the range. Spoofing is a possibility but very unlikely. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 05:45, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

@Callanecc: Based on the comments on our talk page on Meta as well as their talk page, this person is pledging to cease using our IP address space to conduct their activities. When you have time, can you please set a watch on this to see if they're holding to their commitment and if so remove this block? Thanks. Opsftw (talk) 17:40, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

I don't know about "ceasing" but he is definitely pursuing the matter. Is it him that we discuss? if it is, please come to my talkpage so that we have a joined discussion. Yours, --Biografer (talk) 02:56, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Good Article Barnstar
For somehow putting enough information into an article about a 4-mile long road in the middle of Kansas to get it to GA status. PhilrocMy contribs 17:56, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

Tornadoes of 2017 updates not going through

Hey just wondering what the deal is. Thought I was granted pending changes reviewer status, but I just tried to update the June 2017 section, and my edits are under review. Any idea why this is? Thanks Sharkguy05 (talk) 07:21, 20 November 2017 (UTC)Sharkguy05

Diana335

Sorry, this case Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Diana335/Archive should be merge to Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/John574/Archive right? Since the account Diana335 is belonged to John574. SA 13 Bro (talk) 13:15, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 24 November 2017

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Please See...

OTRS 2017112010012969 - refers to one of your range blocks. Ronhjones  (Talk) 22:03, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

ANI Experiences survey

The Wikimedia Foundation Community health initiative (led by the Safety and Support and Anti-Harassment Tools team) is conducting a survey for en.wikipedia contributors on their experience and satisfaction level with the Administrator’s Noticeboard/Incidents. This survey will be integral to gathering information about how this noticeboard works - which problems it deals with well, and which problems it struggles with.

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Thank you on behalf of the Support & Safety and Anti-Harassment Tools Teams, Patrick Earley (WMF) talk 18:24, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – December 2017

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

Administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

  • Over the last few months, several users have reported backlogs that require administrator attention at WP:ANI, with the most common backlogs showing up on WP:SPI, WP:AIV and WP:RFPP. It is requested that all administrators take some time during this month to help clear backlogs wherever possible. It should be noted that AIV reports are not always valid; however, they still need to be cleared, which may include needing to remind users on what qualifies as vandalism.
  • The Wikimedia Foundation Community health initiative is conducting a survey for English Wikipedia contributors on their experience and satisfaction level with Administrator’s Noticeboard/Incidents. This survey will be integral to gathering information about how this noticeboard works (i.e. which problems it deals with well and which problems it struggles with). If you would like to take this survey, please sign up on this page, and a link for the survey will be emailed to you via Special:EmailUser.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:58, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

ArbCom 2017 election voter message

Hello, Ks0stm. 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)

Your draft article, Draft:Cooped Up (film)

Hello, Ks0stm. It has been over six months since you last edited the Articles for Creation submission or Draft page you started, "Cooped Up".

In accordance with our policy that Wikipedia is not for the indefinite hosting of material deemed unsuitable for the encyclopedia mainspace, the draft has been nominated for deletion. If you plan on working on it further, or editing it to address the issues raised if it was declined, simply edit the submission and remove the {{db-afc}}, {{db-draft}}, or {{db-g13}} code.

If your submission has already been deleted by the time you get there, and you wish to retrieve it, you can request its undeletion by following the instructions at this link. An administrator will, in most cases, restore the submission so you can continue to work on it.

Thanks for your submission to Wikipedia, and happy editing. TKK! bark with me! 15:45, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 18 December 2017

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Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas and a Prosperous 2018!

Hello Ks0stm, may you be surrounded by peace, success and happiness on this seasonal occasion Sending you a heartfelt and warm greetings for Christmas and New Year 2018. May you and your family have a Happy, Safe and Prosperous New Year!
Happy editing,
--Cameron11598 (Talk) 05:15, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

Nomination of National Weather Service Wichita, Kansas for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article National Weather Service Wichita, Kansas is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/National Weather Service North Little Rock, Arkansas until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article.--Rusf10 (talk) 18:03, 29 December 2017 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2018

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

Administrator changes

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

Bureaucrat changes

readded Worm That Turned

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

Arbitration

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

Congrats ...

Happy to see you in Wiki. Congrats for your contributions to Wiki — Preceding unsigned comment added by Baba Easy English (talk • contribs) 12:48, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 16 January 2018

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Help with Rodrigo Duterte

Hi there, hope you can help with this. I saw that you protected Rodrigo Duterte in 2016. There are two recent edits removing significant content, which looks to me like something that should stay in, but I'm not at all knowledgeable on the subject so can't be sure. Are you able to take a look? Thanks. Tacyarg (talk) 23:10, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – February 2018

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

Administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:52, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 5 February 2018

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Course Report

@Ks0stm:

Hello, Ks0stm. You have new messages at Laurensstew's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Could you explain in more detail why the Course Report page was removed? It is accurate, reputable information about a resource for people looking to change careers into the tech sector. Also, I'd like to see that copy again, to be able to recreate this page. What other information is needed for it to stay up?

Laurensstew (talk) 22:20, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 20 February 2018

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Administrators' newsletter – March 2018

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

Administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Miscellaneous

Obituaries

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

WikiCup 2018 March newsletter

And so ends the first round of the competition, with 4 points required to qualify for round 2. With 53 contestants qualifying, the groups for round 2 are slightly smaller than usual, with the two leaders from each group due to qualify for round 3 as well as the top sixteen remaining users.

Our top scorers in round 1 were:

  • United States Aoba47 led the field with a featured article, 8 good articles and 42 GARs, giving a total of 666 points.
  • Germany FrB.TG , a WikiCup newcomer, came next with 600 points, gained from a featured article and masses of bonus points.
  • India Ssven2, another WikiCup newcomer, was in third place with 403 points, garnered from a featured article, a featured list, a good article and twelve GARs.
  • United States Ceranthor, India Numerounovedant, Minnesota Carbrera, Netherlands Farang Rak Tham and Romania Cartoon network freak all had over 200 points, but like all the other contestants, now have to start again from scratch. A good achievement was the 193 GARs performed by WikiCup contestants, comparing very favourably with the 54 GAs they achieved.

Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 1 but before the start of round 2 can be claimed in round 2. Invitations for collaborative writing efforts or any other discussion of potentially interesting work is always welcome on the WikiCup talk page. Remember, if two or more WikiCup competitors have done significant work on an article, all can claim points. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews.

If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13 (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Cwmhiraeth (talk) and Vanamonde (talk) 15:27, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

User talk:Twitbookspacetube

Hey, this user had been in UTRS for a while, and as you are somewhat less active currently, I went ahead and restored their talk page access so that they can make an unban appeal on-wiki. If you have any problems with this, please feel free to undo my action. TonyBallioni (talk) 16:11, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

Proposed merger of Mesoscale convective vortex into Mesovortices

Please go to Talk:Mesovortices if you have an opinion on the subject. Pierre cb (talk) 12:45, 22 March 2018 (UTC)

Arbitrator gone AWOL?

Hello, are you still active? GoodDay (talk) 16:03, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Signpost issue 4 – 29 March 2018

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Administrators' newsletter – April 2018

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

Administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

Arbitration

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

Miscellaneous

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

The Signpost: 26 April 2018

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WikiCup 2018 May newsletter

The second round of the 2018 WikiCup has now finished. Most contestants who advanced to the next round scored upwards of 100 points, but two with just 10 points managed to scrape through into round 3. Our top scorers in the last round were:

  • Scotland Cas Liber, our winner in 2016, with three featured articles
  • Republic of Texas Iazyges, with nine good articles and lots of bonus points
  • India Yashthepunisher, a first time contestant, with two featured lists
  • Cascadia (independence movement) SounderBruce, a finalist last year, with seventeen good topic articles
  • United States Usernameunique, a first time contestant, with fourteen DYKs
  • San Francisco Muboshgu, a seasoned competitor, with three ITNs and
  • South Carolina Courcelles, another first time contestant, with twenty-seven GARs

So far contestants have achieved twelve featured articles between them and a splendid 124 good articles. Commendably, 326 GARs have been completed during the course of the 2018 WikiCup, so the backlog of articles awaiting GA review has been reduced as a result of contestants' activities. As we enter the third round, remember that any content promoted after the end of round 2 but before the start of round 3 can be claimed in round 3. Remember too that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them. When doing GARs, please make sure that you check that all the GA criteria are fully met; most of the GARs are fine, but a few have been a bit skimpy.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article nominations, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove your name from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13 (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Vanamonde (talk) and Cwmhiraeth (talk) 06:10, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – May 2018

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

Administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Arbitration

Obituaries

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

The Signpost: 24 May 2018

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Administrators' newsletter – June 2018

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

Administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:00, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

Happy Wiki with kitty cats 👍🏻👍🏻

ARMcgrath (talk) 12:18, 3 June 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 29 June 2018

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WikiCup 2018 July newsletter

The third round of the 2018 WikiCup has now come to an end. The 16 users who made it to the fourth round had at least 227 points. Our top scorers in round 3 were:

  • South Carolina Courcelles, a first time contestant, with 1756 points, a tally built largely on 27 GAs related to the Olympics
  • Scotland Cas Liber, our winner in 2016, with two featured articles and three GAs on natural history and astronomy topics
  • Cascadia (independence movement) SounderBruce, a finalist last year, with a variety of submissions related to transport in the state of Washington

Contestants managed 7 featured articles, 4 featured lists, 120 good articles, 1 good topic, 124 DYK entries, 15 ITN entries, and 132 good article reviews. Over the course of the competition, contestants have completed 458 GA reviews, in comparison to 244 good articles submitted for review and promoted. As we enter the fourth round, remember that any content promoted after the end of round 3 but before the start of round 4 can be claimed in round 4. Please also remember that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them. When doing GARs, please make sure that you check that all the GA criteria are fully met. Please also remember that all submissions must meet core Wikipedia policies, regardless of the review process; several submissions, particularly in abstruse or technical areas, have needed additional work to make them completely verifiable.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article nominations, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove your name from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13 (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Cwmhiraeth (talk), Vanamonde (talk) 04:55, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2018

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

Administrator changes

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

Bureaucrat changes

removed Andrevan • EVula

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Miscellaneous

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

The Signpost: 31 July 2018

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Administrators' newsletter – August 2018

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

Administrator changes

added Sro23
readded KaisaL • Ymblanter

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

The Signpost: 30 August 2018

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WikiCup 2018 September newsletter

The fourth round of the 2018 WikiCup has now come to an end. The eight users who made it to the final round had to score a minimum of 422 points to qualify, with the top score in the round being 4869 points. The leaders in round 4 were:

  • South Carolina Courcelles scored a magnificent 4869 points, with 92 good articles on Olympics-related themes. Courcelles' bonus points alone exceeded the total score of any of the other contestants!
  • Hel, Poland Kees08 was second with 1155 points, including a high-scoring featured article for Neil Armstrong, two good topics and some Olympics-related good articles.
  • Scotland Cas Liber, with 1066 points, was in third place this round, with two featured articles and a good article, all on natural history topics.
  • Other contestants who qualified for the final round were Marshall Islands Nova Crystallis, Republic of Texas Iazyges, Cascadia (independence movement) SounderBruce, Wales Kosack and United States Ceranthor.

During round four, 6 featured articles and 164 good articles were promoted by WikiCup contestants, 13 articles were included in good topics and 143 good article reviews were performed. There were also 10 "in the news" contributions on the main page and 53 "did you knows". Congratulations to all who participated! It was a generally high-scoring and productive round and I think we can expect a highly competitive finish to the competition.

Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 4 but before the start of round 5 can be claimed in round 5. Remember too that you must claim your points within 10 days of "earning" them. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. It would be helpful if this list could be cleared of any items no longer relevant. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck, and let the best editor win! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66, Vanamonde and Cwmhiraeth. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:31, 1 September 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2018

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

Administrator changes

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

Interface administrator changes

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

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

You've got mail

Hello, Ks0stm. Please check your email; you've got mail!
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.Ilaila999 (talk) 23:25, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 1 October 2018

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Administrators' newsletter – October 2018

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

Administrator changes

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

Interface administrator changes

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

Oversight changes

removed Guerillero • NativeForeigner • Snowolf • Xeno

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

The Signpost: 28 October 2018

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WikiCup 2018 November newsletter

The WikiCup is over for another year! Our Champion this year is South Carolina Courcelles (submissions), who over the course of the competition has amassed 147 GAs, 111 GARs, 9 DYKs, 4 FLs and 1 ITN. Our finalists were as follows:

  1. South Carolina Courcelles (submissions)
  2. Wales Kosack (submissions)
  3. Hel, Poland Kees08 (submissions)
  4. SounderBruce (submissions)
  5. Scotland Cas Liber (submissions)
  6. Marshall Islands Nova Crystallis (submissions)
  7. Republic of Texas Iazyges (submissions)
  8. United States Ceranthor (submissions)


All those who reached the final win awards, and awards will also be going to the following participants:

Awards will be handed out in the coming weeks. Please be patient!

Congratulations to everyone who participated in this year's WikiCup, whether you made it to the final rounds or not, and particular congratulations to the newcomers to the WikiCup who have achieved much this year. Thanks to all who have taken part and helped out with the competition.

Next year's competition begins on 1 January. You are invited to sign up to participate; it is open to all Wikipedians, new and old. The WikiCup judges will be back in touch over the coming months, and we hope to see you all in the 2019 competition. Until then, it only remains to once again congratulate our worthy winners, and thank all participants for their involvement! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Godot13 (talk · contribs · email), Cwmhiraeth (talk · contribs · email) and Vanamonde93 (talk · contribs · email).

Administrators' newsletter – November 2018

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

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

ArbCom 2018 election voter message

Hello, Ks0stm. 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)

Arbcom

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#2017 ArbCom and the GdB unban. Fram (talk) 11:11, 29 November 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 1 December 2018

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 04:47, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – December 2018

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

Administrator changes

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

Interface administrator changes

removedDeryck Chan

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

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

Obituaries

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

Happy Holidays!

Happy Holidays!
May your winter holidays be filled with joy, laughter and good health. Wishing you all the best in 2019 and beyond.

--Cameron11598 (Talk) 04:40, 24 December 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 24 December 2018

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:35, 24 December 2018 (UTC)

Yo Ho Ho

Liz Read! Talk! is wishing you Seasons Greetings! Whether you celebrate your hemisphere's Solstice or Christmas, Diwali, Hogmanay, Hanukkah, Lenaia, Festivus or even the Saturnalia, this is a special time of year for almost everyone!

Spread the holiday cheer by adding {{subst:User:WereSpielChequers/Dec15b}} to your friends' talk pages.

Welcome to the 2019 WikiCup!

Hello and Happy New Year!

Welcome to the 2019 WikiCup, the competition begins today. If you have already joined, your submission page can be found here. If you have not yet signed up, you can add your name here and we will set up your submissions page. One important rule to remember is that only content on which you have completed significant work during 2019, and which you have nominated this year, is eligible for points in the competition, the judges will be checking! Any questions should be directed to one of the judges, or left on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup. Signups will close at the end of January, and the first round will end on 26 February; the 64 highest scorers at that time will make it to round 2. Good luck! The judges for the WikiCup are Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Godot13 (talk · contribs · email), Vanamonde93 (talk · contribs · email) and Cwmhiraeth (talk · contribs · email). MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:14, 1 January 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2019

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

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

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

The Signpost: 31 January 2019

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Administrators' newsletter – February 2019

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

Administrator changes

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

Interface administrator changes

removedEnterprisey

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Miscellaneous

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

The Signpost: 28 February 2019

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WikiCup 2019 March newsletter

And so ends the first round of the competition. Everyone with a positive score moves on to Round 2. With 56 contestants qualifying, each group in Round 2 contains seven contestants, with the two leaders from each group due to qualify for Round 3 as well as the top sixteen remaining contestants.

Our top scorers in Round 1 were:

  • United States L293D, a WikiCup newcomer, led the field with ten good articles on submarines for a total of 357 points.
  • Adam Cuerden, a WikiCup veteran, came next with 274 points, mostly from eight featured pictures, restorations of artwork.
  • Denmark MPJ-DK, a wrestling enthusiast, was in third place with 263 points, garnered from a featured list, five good articles, two DYKs and four GARs.
  • United States Usernameunique came next at 243, with a featured article and a good article, both on ancient helmets.
  • Squeamish Ossifrage was in joint fifth place with 224 points, mostly garnered from bringing the 1937 Fox vault fire to featured article status.
  • Ohio Ed! was also on 224, with an amazing number of good article reviews (56 actually).

These contestants, like all the others, now have to start scoring points again from scratch. Between them, contestants completed reviews on 143 good articles, one hundred more than the number of good articles they claimed for, thus making a substantial dent in the review backlog. Well done all!

Remember that any content promoted after the end of Round 1 but before the start of Round 2 can be claimed in Round 2. Invitations for collaborative writing efforts or any other discussion of potentially interesting work is always welcome on the WikiCup talk page. Remember, if two or more WikiCup competitors have done significant work on an article, all can claim points. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews.

If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13 (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Vanamonde (talk) and Cwmhiraeth (talk).

Administrators' newsletter – March 2019

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

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:13, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 March 2019

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Administrators' newsletter – April 2019

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

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

  • Two more administrator accounts were compromised. Evidence has shown that these attacks, like previous incidents, were due to reusing a password that was used on another website that suffered a data breach. If you have ever used your current password on any other website, you should change it immediately. All admins are strongly encouraged to enable two-factor authentication, please consider doing so. Please always practice appropriate account security by ensuring your password is secure and unique to Wikimedia.
  • As a reminder, according to WP:NOQUORUM, administrators looking to close or relist an AfD should evaluate a nomination that has received few or no comments as if it were a proposed deletion (PROD) prior to determining whether it should be relisted.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:57, 7 April 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 30 April 2019

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WikiCup 2019 May newsletter

The second round of the 2019 WikiCup has now finished. Contestants needed to scored 32 points to advance into round 3. Our top four scorers in round 2 all scored over 400 points and were:

  • Scotland Cas Liber (1210), our winner in 2016, with two featured articles and three DYKs. He also made good use of the bonus points available, more than doubling his score by choosing appropriate articles to work on.
  • Wales Kosack (750), last year's runner up, with an FA, a GA, two FLs, and five DYKs.
  • Adam Cuerden (480), a WikiCup veteran, with 16 featured pictures, mostly restorations.
  • Kingdom of Prussia Zwerg Nase (461), a seasoned competitor, with a FA, a GA and an ITN item.

Other notable performances were put in by Chicago Barkeep49 with six GAs, United States Ceranthor, England Lee Vilenski, and Saskatchewan Canada Hky, each with seven GARs, and Denmark MPJ-DK with a seven item GT.

So far contestants have achieved nine featured articles between them and a splendid 80 good articles. Commendably, 227 GARs have been completed during the course of the 2019 WikiCup, so the backlog of articles awaiting GA review has been reduced as a result of contestants' activities. The judges are pleased with the thorough GARs that are being performed, and have hardly had to reject any. As we enter the third round, remember that any content promoted after the end of round 2 but before the start of round 3 can be claimed in round 3. Remember too that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article nominations, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove your name from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13 (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Vanamonde (talk) and Cwmhiraeth (talk) MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:46, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

ArbCom 2019 special circular

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

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

View additional information

This message was sent to all administrators following a recent motion. Thank you for your attention. For the Arbitration Committee, Cameron11598 02:44, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

Administrator account security (Correction to Arbcom 2019 special circular)

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

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

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

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

Administrators' newsletter – May 2019

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

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

Miscellaneous

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

The Signpost: 31 May 2019

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Administrators' newsletter – June 2019

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

Administrator changes

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

CheckUser changes

removed Ivanvector

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

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

Miscellaneous

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

Global renamer permissions

Hello,

I see you aren't very active these days, but just a note that your global renamer rights will soon be removed for inactivity. To prevent this, please rename an account within the next four days.

Thanks, -- Ajraddatz (talk) 21:57, 21 June 2019 (UTC)

The June 2019 Signpost is out!

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 15:52, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2019

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

Administrator changes

removed 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.

Guideline and policy news

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

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

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:20, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

WikiCup 2019 July newsletter

The third round of the 2019 WikiCup has now come to an end. The 16 users who made it to the fourth round needed to score at least 68 points, which is substantially lower than last year's 227 points. Our top scorers in round 3 were:

  • Norfolk Island Cas Liber, our winner in 2016, with 500 points derived mainly from a featured article and two GAs on natural history topics
  • South Carolina Adam Cuerden, with 480 points, a tally built on 16 featured pictures, the result of meticulous restoration work
  • Cascadia (independence movement) SounderBruce, a finalist in the last two years, with 306 points from a variety of submissions, mostly related to sport or the State of Washington
  • United States Usernameunique, with 305 points derived from a featured article and two GAs on archaeology and related topics

Contestants managed 4 (5) featured articles, 4 featured lists, 18 featured pictures, 29 good articles, 50 DYK entries, 9 ITN entries, and 39 good article reviews. As we enter the fourth round, remember that any content promoted after the end of round 3 but before the start of round 4 can be claimed in round 4. Please also remember that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them, and it is imperative to claim them in the correct round; one FA claim had to be rejected because it was incorrectly submitted (claimed in Round 3 when it qualified for Round 2), so be warned! When doing GARs, please make sure that you check that all the GA criteria are fully met.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article nominations, a featured process, or anything else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove your name from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13 (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Vanamonde (talk) and Cwmhiraeth (talk). MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:12, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 July 2019

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Administrators' newsletter – August 2019

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

Guideline and policy news

Arbitration

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

The Signpost: 30 August 2019

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WikiCup 2019 September newsletter

The fourth round of the competition has finished in a flurry of last minute activity, with 454 points being required to qualify for the final round. It was a hotly competitive round with two contestants with over 400 points being eliminated, and all but two of the finalists having achieved an FA during the round. Casliber, our 2016 winner, was the highest point-scorer, followed by Enwebb and Lee Vilenski, who are both new to the competition. In fourth place was SounderBruce, a finalist last year. But all those points are swept away as we start afresh for the final round.

Round 4 saw the achievement of 11 featured articles. In addition, Adam Cuerden scored with 18 FPs, Lee Vilenski led the GA score with 8 GAs while Kosack performed 15 GA reviews. There were around 40 DYKs, 40 GARs and 31 GAs overall during round 4. Even though contestants performed more GARs than they achieved GAs, there was still some frustration at the length of time taken to get articles reviewed.

As we start round 5, we say goodbye to the eight competitors who didn't quite make it; thank you for the useful contributions you have made to the Cup and Wikipedia, and we hope you will join us again next year. Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 4 but before the start of round 5 can be claimed in round 5. Remember too that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them (some people have fallen foul of this rule and the points have been removed).

If you are concerned that your nomination, whether it be for a good article, a featured process, or anything else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66, Vanamonde and Cwmhiraeth MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:44, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2019

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

Administrator changes

added Bradv • Chetsford • Izno
readded Floquenbeam • Lectonar
removed DESiegel • Jake Wartenberg • Rjanag • Topbanana

CheckUser changes

removed Callanecc • LFaraone • There'sNoTime

Oversight changes

removed 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

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:37, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Woohooo!

Happy Adminship from the Birthday Committee

Wishing Ks0stm a very happy adminship anniversary on behalf of the Wikipedia Birthday Committee!

-- Mjs1991 (talk) 09:45, 13 September 2019 (UTC)


The Signpost: 30 September 2019

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:07, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – October 2019

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

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

Miscellaneous

  • The Community Tech team has been working on a system for temporarily watching pages, and welcomes feedback.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:55, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Please adjust page protection

Please adjust the page protection settings on the following pages. As discussed at there is clear community consensus that ECP should not apply for "high risk templates" and nothing under WP:ECP supports such protection to this/these template(s) (example: "by request" is insufficient).

Thank you. Buffs (talk) 16:11, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 October 2019

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:12, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

WikiCup 2019 November newsletter

The WikiCup is over for another year! Our Champion this year is Better far to live and die / Under the brave black flag I fly Adam Cuerden (submissions), who over the course of the competition has amassed 91 featured pictures, including 32 in the final round. Our finalists this year were:

  1. Better far to live and die / Under the brave black flag I fly Adam Cuerden (submissions) with 964 points
  2. England Lee Vilenski (submissions) with 899 points
  3. Norfolk Island Casliber (submissions) with 817 points
  4. Wales Kosack (submissions) with 691 points
  5. Washington (state) SounderBruce (submissions) with 388 points
  6. Antarctica Enwebb (submissions) with 146 points
  7. United States Usernameunique (submissions) with 145 points
  8. Indonesia HaEr48 (submissions) with 74 points

All those who reached the final will win awards. The following special awards will be made based on high performance in particular areas of content creation. So that the finalists do not have an undue advantage, these prizes are awarded to the competitor who scored the highest in any particular field in a single round, or in the event of a tie, to the overall leader in this field. Awards will be handed out in the coming weeks. Please be patient!

Congratulations to everyone who participated in this year's WikiCup, whether you made it to the final rounds or not, and particular congratulations to the newcomers to the WikiCup who have achieved much this year. Thanks to all who have taken part and helped out with the competition, not forgetting User:Jarry1250, who runs the scoring bot.

We have opened a scoring discussion on whether the rules and scoring need adjustment. Please have your say. Next year's competition will begin on 1 January. You are invited to sign up to participate; the WikiCup is open to all Wikipedians, both novices and experienced editors, and we hope to see you all in the 2020 competition. Until then, it only remains to once again congratulate our worthy winners, and thank all participants for their involvement! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66, Vanamonde and Cwmhiraeth 14:18, 2 November 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2019

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

Guideline and policy news

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

Arbitration

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

Precious anniversary

Precious
Five years!

--Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:09, 22 November 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 29 November 2019

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:24, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – December 2019

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

Administrator changes

added EvergreenFir • ToBeFree
removed Akhilleus • Athaenara • John Vandenberg • Melchoir • MichaelQSchmidt • NeilN • Youngamerican • 😂

CheckUser changes

readded Beeblebrox
removed Deskana

Interface administrator changes

readded Evad37

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:48, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 December 2019

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 12:37, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Welcome to the 2020 WikiCup!

Happy New Year, Happy New Decade and Happy New WikiCup! The competition begins today and all article creators, expanders and improvers are welcome to take part. If you have already signed up, your submissions page can be found here. If you have not yet signed up, you can add your name here and the judges will set up your submissions page. We are relaxing the rule that only content on which you have completed significant work during 2020 will count; now to be eligible for points in the competition, you must have completed significant work on the content at some time! Any questions on the rules or on anything else connected to the Cup should be directed to one of the judges, or posted to the WikiCup talk page. Signups will close at the end of January, and the first round will end on 26 February; the 64 highest scorers at that time will move on to round 2. Good luck! The judges for the WikiCup are Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Godot13 (talk · contribs · email), Vanamonde93 (talk · contribs · email) and Cwmhiraeth (talk) 11:43, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2020

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

Guideline and policy news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

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

The Signpost: 27 January 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:09, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – February 2020

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

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. [4]

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


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

Creation protection for Awesome sauce

@Ks0stm:

I see you're on a university wikibreak; I'm on an education-related semi-wikibreak as well. Since you were the protecting admin for awesome sauce following its deletion ~9 years ago, I was wondering if you would entertain one of two things, which I'll outline in turn:

  1. Reduce salt protection to either of semi-protected or extended-confirmed protected, to prevent vandalism from IP editors or inexperienced new editors from trying to create a non-qualifying article; so that,
    1. A Wiktionary {{Wiktionary redirect}} soft redirect can be created to wikt:awesome sauce. In this way, Wiktionary soft redirects essentially help us to enforce WP:NOTDICTIONARY; or,
  2. Retain salt protection at fully-protected; and,
    1. Create a Wiktionary {{Wiktionary redirect}} soft redirect to wikt:awesome sauce on my behalf.

Cheers,
--Doug Mehus T·C 22:00, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

WikiCup 2020 March newsletter

And so ends the first round of the competition. Everyone with a positive score moves on to Round 2, with 57 contestants qualifying. We have abolished the groups this year, so to qualify for Round 3 you will need to finish Round 2 among the top thirty-two contestants.

Our top scorers in Round 1 were:

  • New York (state) Epicgenius, a WikiCup newcomer, led the field with a featured article, five good articles and an assortment of other submissions, specialising on buildings and locations in New York, for a total of 895 points.
  • England Gog the Mild came next with 464 points, from a featured article, two good articles and a number of reviews, the main theme being naval warfare.
  • United States Raymie was in third place with 419 points, garnered from one good article and an impressive 34 DYKs on radio and TV stations in the United States.
  • Somerset Harrias came next at 414, with a featured article and three good articles, an English civil war battle specialist.
  • Pirate flag CaptainEek was in fifth place with 405 points, mostly garnered from bringing Cactus wren to featured article status.
  • The top ten contestants at the end of Round 1 all scored over 200 points; they also included United States L293D, Venezuela Kingsif, Antarctica Enwebb, England Lee Vilenski and Nepal CAPTAIN MEDUSA. Seven of the top ten contestants in Round 1 are new to the WikiCup.

These contestants, like all the others, now have to start scoring points again from scratch. In Round 1 there were four featured articles, one featured list and two featured pictures, as well as around two hundred DYKs and twenty-seven ITNs. Between them, contestants completed 127 good article reviews, nearly a hundred more than the 43 good articles they claimed for, thus making a substantial dent in the review backlog. Contestants also claimed for 40 featured article / featured list reviews, and most even remembered to mention their WikiCup participation in their reviews (a requirement).

Remember that any content promoted after the end of Round 1 but before the start of Round 2 can be claimed in Round 2. Some contestants made claims before the new submissions pages were set up, and they will need to resubmit them. Invitations for collaborative writing efforts or any other discussion of potentially interesting work is always welcome on the WikiCup talk page. Remember, if two or more WikiCup competitors have done significant work on an article, all can claim points. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews.

If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13 (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Vanamonde (talk) and Cwmhiraeth (talk). MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:47, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 1 March 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:44, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

WikiCup newsletter correction

There was an error in the WikiCup 2020 March newsletter; United States L293D should not have been included in the list of top ten scorers in Round 1 (they led the list last year), instead, United States Dunkleosteus77 should have been included, having garnered 334 points from five good articles on animals, living or extinct, and various reviews. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 09:30, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – March 2020

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

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


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

The Signpost: 29 March 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:42, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Pending suspension of administrative permissions due to inactivity

Information icon Established policy provides for removal of the administrative permissions of users who have not made any edits or logged actions in the preceding twelve months. Because you have been inactive, your administrative permissions will be removed if you do not return to activity within the next month.

Inactive administrators are encouraged to rejoin the project in earnest rather than to make token edits to avoid loss of administrative permissions. Resources and support for reengaging with the project are available at Wikipedia:WikiProject Editor Retention/administrators. If you do not intend to rejoin the project in the foreseeable future, please consider voluntarily resigning your administrative permissions by making a request at the bureaucrats' noticeboard.

Thank you for your past contributions to the project. — JJMC89 bot 00:04, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – April 2020

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

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

Arbitration

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

The Signpost: 26 April 2020

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WikiCup 2020 May newsletter

The second round of the 2020 WikiCup has now finished. It was a high-scoring round and contestants needed 75 points to advance to round 3. There were some very impressive efforts in round 2, with the top ten contestants all scoring more than 500 points. A large number of the points came from the 12 featured articles and the 186 good articles achieved in total by contestants, and the 355 good article reviews they performed; the GAN backlog drive and the stay-at-home imperative during the COVID-19 pandemic may have been partially responsible for these impressive figures.

Our top scorers in round 2 were:

  • New York (state) Epicgenius, with 2333 points from one featured article, forty-five good articles, fourteen DYKs and plenty of bonus points
  • England Gog the Mild, with 1784 points from three featured articles, eight good articles, a substantial number of featured article and good article reviews and lots of bonus points
  • Botswana The Rambling Man, with 1262 points from two featured articles, eight good articles and a hundred good article reviews
  • Somerset Harrias, with 1141 points from two featured articles, three featured lists, ten good articles, nine DYKs and a substantial number of featured article and good article reviews
  • England Lee Vilenski with 869 points, Gondor Hog Farm with 801, Venezuela Kingsif with 719, Cascadia (independence movement) SounderBruce with 710, United States Dunkleosteus77 with 608 and Mexico MX with 515.

The rules for featured article reviews have been adjusted; reviews may cover three aspects of the article, content, images and sources, and contestants may receive points for each of these three types of review. Please also remember the requirement to mention the WikiCup when undertaking an FAR for which you intend to claim points. Remember also that DYKs cannot be claimed until they have appeared on the main page. As we enter the third round, any content promoted after the end of round 2 but before the start of round 3 can be claimed now, and anything you forgot to claim in round 2 cannot! Remember too, that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them. When doing GARs, please make sure that you check that all the GA criteria are fully met.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article nominations, a featured process, or anything else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove your name from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13 (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Vanamonde (talk) and Cwmhiraeth. - MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:44, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – May 2020

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

Administrator changes

removed Gnangarra • Kaisershatner • Malcolmxl5

CheckUser changes

readded Callanecc

Oversight changes

readded HJ Mitchell

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Miscellaneous

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

The Who

Two years ago you extended-protected the page for the rock band The Who. You said that "after a reasonable amount of time (~ a few months)" the protection can be reduced down to semi-protection. I would like to ask you to do so. JJPMaster (talk) 14:37, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

FYI, I unprotected the page. Feel free to reprotect if you think it necessary. Hope RL is treating you well!--regentspark (comment) 20:22, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

Thirteen Years on Wikipedia!

Hey, Ks0stm. I'd like to wish you a wonderful First Edit Day on behalf of the Wikipedia Birthday Committee!
Have a great day! Chris Troutman (talk) 19:58, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 May 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:06, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – June 2020

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

Administrator changes

added CaptainEek • Creffett • Cwmhiraeth
removed Anna Frodesiak • Buckshot06 • Ronhjones • SQL

CheckUser changes

removed SQL

Guideline and policy news

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

The Signpost: 28 June 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:53, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2020

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

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

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

WikiCup 2020 July newsletter

The third round of the 2020 WikiCup has now come to an end. The 16 users who made it into the fourth round each had at least 353 points (compared to 68 in 2019). It was a highly competitive round, and a number of contestants were eliminated who would have moved on in earlier years. Our top scorers in round 3 were:

  • New York (state) Epicgenius, with one featured article, 28 good articles and 17 DYKs, amassing 1836 points
  • Botswana The Rambling Man , with 1672 points gained from four featured articles and seventeen good articles, plus reviews of a large number of FACs and GAs
  • England Gog the Mild, a first time contestant, with 1540 points, a tally built largely on 4 featured articles and related bonus points.

Between them, contestants managed 14 featured articles, 9 featured lists, 3 featured pictures, 152 good articles, 136 DYK entries, 55 ITN entries, 65 featured article candidate reviews and 221 good article reviews. Additionally, Denmark MPJ-DK added 3 items to featured topics and 44 to good topics. Over the course of the competition, contestants have completed 710 good article reviews, in comparison to 387 good articles submitted for review and promoted. These large numbers are probably linked to a GAN backlog drive in April and May, and the changed patterns of editing during the COVID-19 pandemic. As we enter the fourth round, remember that any content promoted after the end of round 3 but before the start of round 4 can be claimed in round 4. Please also remember that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them. When doing GARs, please make sure that you check that all the GA criteria are fully met. Please also remember that all submissions must meet core Wikipedia policies, regardless of the review process.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article nominations, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove your name from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13 (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Vanamonde (talk), Cwmhiraeth (talk) MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 12:33, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – August 2020

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

Administrator changes

added Red Phoenix
readded Euryalus • SQL
removed Jujutacular • Monty845 • Rettetast • Madchester

Oversight changes

readded GB fan
removed Keegan • Opabinia regalis • Premeditated Chaos

Guideline and policy news

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

The Signpost: 2 August 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:25, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

Today's Wikipedian 10 years ago

Awesome
Ten years!

--Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:56, 16 August 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 30 August 2020

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WikiCup 2020 September newsletter

The fourth round of the competition has finished, with 865 points being required to qualify for the final round, nearly twice as many points as last year. It was a hotly competitive round with two contestants with 598 and 605 points being eliminated, and all but two of the contestants who reached the final round having achieved an FA during the round. The highest scorers were

  • Free Hong Kong Bloom6132, with 1478 points gained mainly from 5 featured lists, 12 DYKs and 63 in the news items;
  • IndonesiaHaEr48 with 1318 points gained mainly from 2 featured articles, 5 good articles and 8 DYKs;
  • England Lee Vilenski with 1201 points mainly gained from 2 featured articles and 10 good articles.

Between them, contestants achieved 14 featured articles, 14 featured lists, 2 featured pictures, 87 good articles, 90 DYK entries, 75 ITN entries, 95 featured article candidate reviews and 81 good article reviews. Congratulations to all who participated! It was a generally high-scoring and productive round and I think we can expect a highly competitive finish to the competition.

Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 4 but before the start of round 5 can be claimed in round 5. Remember too that you must claim your points within 10 days of "earning" them. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. It would be helpful if this list could be cleared of any items no longer relevant. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13 (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Vanamonde (talk), Cwmhiraeth (talk) MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:52, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2020

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

Administrator changes

added Eddie891
removed Angela • Jcw69 • Just Chilling • Philg88 • Viajero

CheckUser changes

readded SQL

Guideline and policy news

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 09:56, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

Happy Adminship Anniversary!

Happy Adminship Anniversary!

Have a very happy adminship anniversary on your special day!

Best wishes, CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 06:13, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 September 2020

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The Signpost: 27 September 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:53, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2020

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

Administrator changes

added Ajpolino • LuK3
readded Jackmcbarn
removed Ad Orientem • Harej • Lid • Lomn • Mentoz86 • Oliver Pereira • XJaM
renamed There'sNoTime → TheresNoTime

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:43, 1 October 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2020

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

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:52, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 1 November 2020

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WikiCup 2020 November newsletter

The 2020 WikiCup has come to an end, with the final round going down to the wire. Our new Champion is England Lee Vilenski (submissions), the runner-up last year, who was closely followed by England Gog the Mild (submissions). In the final round, Lee achieved 4 FAs and 30 GAs, mostly on cue sport topics, while Gog achieved 3 FAs and 15 GAs, mostly on important battles and wars, which earned him a high number of bonus points. Botswana The Rambling Man (submissions) was in third place with 4 FAs and 8 GAs on football topics, with New York (state) Epicgenius (submissions) close behind with 19 GAs and 16 DYK's, his interest being the buildings of New York.

The other finalists were Gondor Hog Farm (submissions), Indonesia HaEr48 (submissions), Somerset Harrias (submissions) and Free Hong Kong Bloom6132 (submissions). The final round was very productive, and besides 15 FAs, contestants achieved 75 FAC reviews, 88 GAs and 108 GAN reviews. Altogether, Wikipedia has benefited greatly from the activities of WikiCup competitors all through the contest. Well done everyone!

All those who reached the final will receive awards and the following special awards will be made, based on high performance in particular areas of content creation. So that the finalists do not have an undue advantage, these prizes are awarded to the competitor who scored the highest in any particular field in a single round, or in the event of a tie, to the overall leader in this field.

Next year's competition will begin on 1 January. You are invited to sign up to participate; the WikiCup is open to all Wikipedians, both novices and experienced editors, and we hope to see you all in the 2021 competition. Until then, it only remains to once again congratulate our worthy winners, and thank all participants for their involvement! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66, Vanamonde and Cwmhiraeth MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:37, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday!

Have a very happy birthday on your special day!

Best wishes, CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 18:07, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Precious anniversary

Precious
Six years!

--Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:59, 22 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) 01:41, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 29 November 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:46, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – December 2020

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

Administrator changes

removed Andrwsc • Anetode • GoldenRing • JzG • LinguistAtLarge • Nehrams2020

Interface administrator changes

added Izno

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:37, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 28 December 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 04:25, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Welcome to the 2021 WikiCup!

Happy New Year and Happy New WikiCup! The competition begins today and all article creators, expanders, improvers and reviewers are welcome to take part. If you have already signed up, your submissions page can be found here. If you have not yet signed up, you can add your name here and the judges will set up your submissions page. Any questions on the rules or on anything else should be directed to one of the judges, or posted to the WikiCup talk page. Signups will close at the end of January, and the first round will end on 26 February; the 64 highest scorers at that time will move on to round 2. We thank Vanamonde93 and Godot13, who have retired as judges, and we thank them for their past dedication. The judges for the WikiCup this year are Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email) and Cwmhiraeth (talk · contribs · email). Good luck! MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:11, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2021

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

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:08, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 January 2021

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Administrators' newsletter – February 2021

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2021).

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:09, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

Long time no chat!

I miss seeing you, Ks0stm! I just wanted to leave you a message to let you know that I was thinking about you... :-) ~Oshwah~(talk) (contribs) 04:51, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

The Signpost: 28 February 2021

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:29, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – March 2021

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2021).

Administrator changes

added TJMSmith
removed Boing! said Zebedee • Hiberniantears • Lear's Fool • Only • WGFinley

Interface administrator changes

added AmandaNP

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • When blocking an IPv6 address with Twinkle, there is now a checkbox with the option to just block the /64 range. When doing so, you can still leave a block template on the initial, single IP address' talkpage.
  • When protecting a page with Twinkle, you can now add a note if doing so was in response to a request at WP:RfPP, and even link to the specific revision.
  • There have been a number of reported issues with Pending Changes. Most problems setting protection appear to have been resolved (phab:T273317) but other issues with autoaccepting edits persist (phab:T275322).

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:14, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

WikiCup 2021 March newsletter

Round 1 of the competition has finished; it was a high-scoring round with 21 contestants scoring more than 100 points. Everyone with a positive score moves on to Round 2, with 55 contestants qualifying. You will need to finish among the top thirty-two contestants in Round 2 if you are to qualify for Round 3. Our top scorers in Round 1 were:

  • New York (state) Epicgenius led the field with a featured article, nine good articles and an assortment of other submissions, specialising on buildings and locations in New York, for a total of 945 points.
  • Republic of Venice Bloom6132 was close behind with 896 points, largely gained from 71 "In the news" items, mostly recent deaths.
  • Scotland ImaginesTigers, who has been editing Wikipedia for less than a year, was in third place with 711 points, much helped by bringing League of Legends to featured article status, exemplifying how bonus points can boost a contestant's score.
  • Rwanda Amakuru came next with 708 points, Kigali being another featured article that scored maximum bonus points.
  • Ktin, new to the WikiCup, was in fifth place with 523 points, garnered from 15 DYKs and 34 "In the news" items.
  • Botswana The Rambling Man scored 511 points, many from featured article candidate reviews and from football related DYKs.
  • Gog the Mild, last year's runner-up, came next with 498 points, from a featured article and numerous featured article candidate reviews.
  • Hog Farm, at 452, scored for a featured article, four good articles and a number of reviews.
  • United States Le Panini, another newcomer to the WikiCup, scored 438 for a featured article and three good articles.
  • England Lee Vilenski, last year's champion, scored 332 points, from a featured article and various other sport-related topics.

These contestants, like all the others, now have to start again from scratch. In Round 1, contestants achieved eight featured articles, three featured lists and one featured picture, as well as around two hundred DYKs and twenty-seven ITNs. They completed 97 good article reviews, nearly double the 52 good articles they claimed. Contestants also claimed for 135 featured article and featured list candidate reviews. There is no longer a requirement to mention your WikiCup participation when undertaking these reviews.

Remember that any content promoted after the end of Round 1 but before the start of Round 2 can be claimed in Round 2. Invitations for collaborative writing efforts or any other discussion of potentially interesting work is always welcome on the WikiCup talk page. Remember, if two or more WikiCup competitors have done significant work on an article, all can claim points. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is a good article candidate, a featured process, or something else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews.

If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Sturmvogel 66 (talk) and Cwmhiraeth (talk). MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:26, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

The Signpost: 28 March 2021

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Administrators' newsletter – April 2021

News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2021).

Administrator changes

removed Alexandria • Happyme22 • RexxS

Guideline and policy news

  • Following a request for comment, F7 (invalid fair-use claim) subcriterion a has been deprecated; it covered immediate deletion of non-free media with invalid fair-use tags.
  • Following a request for comment, page movers were granted the delete-redirect userright, which allows moving a page over a single-revision redirect, regardless of that redirect's target.

Technical news

  • When you move a page that many editors have on their watchlist the history can be split and it might also not be possible to move it again for a while. This is because of a job queue problem. (T278350)
  • Code to support some very old web browsers is being removed. This could cause issues in those browsers. (T277803)

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:20, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

(Possibly) stale page restrictions

Hi, I was recently doing a review of all the page restrictions I've placed or taken ownership of over the years, and I noticed that a majority of the pages were no longer battlegrounds and didn't require restrictions anymore. I was looking backwards a couple of months on the article history and talk page looking for major diputes, and for the most part things were pretty quiet. I've removed the BRD restrictions from about 70% of the articles that I had put them on, and the 1RR restrictions from probably 90% of pages.

I figured while I was at it I might as well try to track down the other pages with active sanctions and see if the admins who placed them might also be interested in doing a similar review. The following list might not be complete, but it's the best I could come up with by tracking usages of the American Politics AE template. (Perhaps you can compare it to whatever system you have for tracking your active sanctions.)

I'm hoping that removing some of these restrictions can help restore some sense of normalcy to the topic area. In any case I hope this list is helpful. ~Awilley (talk) 00:13, 9 April 2021 (UTC)

The Signpost: 25 April 2021

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The Signpost: 25 April 2021

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 04:30, 26 April 2021 (UTC)

WikiCup 2021 May newsletter

The second round of the 2021 WikiCup has now finished; it was a high-scoring round and contestants needed 61 points to advance to Round 3. There were some impressive efforts in the round, with the top eight contestants all scoring more than 400 points. A large number of the points came from the 12 featured articles and the 110 good articles achieved in total by contestants, as well as the 216 good article reviews they performed; the GAN backlog drive and the stay-at-home imperative during the COVID-19 pandemic may have been partially responsible for these impressive figures.

Our top scorers in Round 2 were:

  • Botswana The Rambling Man, with 2963 points from three featured articles, 20 featured article reviews, 37 good articles, 73 good article reviews, as well as 22 DYKs.
  • New York (state) Epicgenius, with 1718 points from one featured article, 29 good articles, 16 DYKs and plenty of bonus points.
  • Republic of Venice Bloom6132, with 990 points from 13 DYKs and 64 "In the news" items, mostly recent deaths.
  • Hog Farm, with 834 points from two featured articles, five good articles, 14 featured article reviews and 15 good article reviews.
  • England Gog the Mild, with 524 points from two featured articles and four featured article reviews.
  • England Lee Vilenski, with 501 points from one featured article, three good articles, six featured article reviews and 25 good article reviews.
  • Sammi Brie, with 485 points from four good articles, eight good article reviews and 27 DYKs, on US radio and television stations.
  • Ktin, with 436 points from four good articles, seven DYKs and 11 "In the news" items.

Please remember that DYKs cannot be claimed until they have appeared on the main page. As we enter the third round, any content promoted after the end of Round 2 but before the start of Round 3 can be claimed now, and anything you forgot to claim in Round 2 cannot! Remember too, that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them (except for at the end of each round, when you must claim them before the cut-off date/time). When doing GARs, please make sure that you check that all the GA criteria are fully met.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article nominations, a featured process, or anything else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Judges: Sturmvogel 66 (talk) and Cwmhiraeth MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:27, 2 May 2021 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – May 2021

News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2021).

Administrator changes

removed Enchanter • Carlossuarez46

Interface administrator changes

removed Ragesoss

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • The user group oversight will be renamed to suppress. This is for technical reasons. You can comment at T112147 if you have objections.

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 15:51, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

Happy First Edit Day!

Happy First Edit Day!

Have a very happy first edit anniversary!

From the Birthday Committee, CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 21:02, 29 May 2021 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – June 2021

News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2021).

Administrator changes

added Ashleyyoursmile • Less Unless
removed Husond • MattWade • MJCdetroit • Carioca • Vague Rant • Kingboyk • Thunderboltz • Gwen Gale • AniMate • SlimVirgin (deceased)

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • Wikimedia previously used the IRC network Freenode. However, due to changes over who controlled the network with reports of a forceful takeover by several ex-staff members, the Wikimedia IRC Group Contacts decided to move to the new Libera Chat network. It has been reported that Wikimedia related channels on Freenode have been forcibly taken over if they pointed members to Libera. There is a migration guide and Wikimedia discussions about this.

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 14:45, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 June 2021

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