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Are we really going to publish this weekend?

@JPxG, Bri, HaeB, Adam Cuerden, and Jayen466: I'm still very uncomfortable with our new regularly scheduled, irregularly published, fortnightly publishing schedule. Before our next issue we might want to address among ourselves the big multi-car crash that happened last issue. But that might take a month. Better IMHO, just ignore it for the time being, but promise ourselves that it is not going to happen again - at least until we've had plenty of time to calmly discuss it.

Though I've been promising everybody that I'm going to take a month off for several months now, I could have a disinformation story for this weekend; but it might be better for the following weekend. Unfortunately I can't be here the following weekend, but I could get the story in a few days early. It's not like the Adani article where the hard part was not overloading the readers with evidence that all showed the same thing happening. Here it's just a very nasty story that's thoroughly documented in the mainstream press, with just 3 small bits of primo evidence suggesting that the big story was reflected on Wikipedia. Considering the very nasty story I'd like to just keep on looking for more evidence, but since the VNS is so well documented that part of it really shouldn't be a concern. "Primo" is just 3 blocked socks from the same very well-known big sockfarm (not Status Labs) all editing at a very crucial time in the story. Email me if you have any advice on my story. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:40, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

After reading the Arbcom member's "unofficial" comment at ANI, I'm not sure I should even feel bad about anything that happened. Yeah, a hornet's nest was poked with a stick, but is that really a bad thing?
That aside, can you suggest a succinct question that we should ask ourselves about publication at this point? Is this more about schedules, more about quality control, more about controlling discussion in the Newsroom, about understanding the consensus that results from that discussion, or ...? ☆ Bri (talk) 16:55, 15 March 2023 (UTC)
Hang in there. Things will get back to normal. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:11, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
Thanks, Smallbones. I'd say let's take it easy and publish 25 or 26 March. The current issue's ITM covered press stories up to and including 8 March, so not too long a gap IMO. (It shouldn't be later than 26 March though – otherwise the reminder of the 28 March Wikimania deadline in News and Notes will be too late to be of use to anyone.) Andreas JN466 17:20, 15 March 2023 (UTC)
I suppose I'm more comfortable publishing on the 25th or 26th.
As far as a succinct question:
"Can we get on a regular sustainable schedule, so that our readers will know when we'll be published, and our contributors will know when their contributions are needed so that a reasonable level of quality control can be maintained? (You really expected a succinct question?) IMHO deadlines - and keeping them at least 90% of the time - are hugely important to a newspaper. Almost everything else can be adjusted to fitting the deadline, since everybody knows what to expect. Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:44, 15 March 2023 (UTC)
Publish anything ready on the 18th, and everything else is the next issue. I think if we actually publish when we say we are, biweekly works great. But if we publish half a week late every time, it causes chaos. We have less time for the next issue, and instead of having a starter pack for next issue of the stuff we held back, we instead punish the people (primarily me this time) who actually worked to schedule by giving them less time for the next bit they're working on, or creating doubt, or changing the schedule so now a double-length featured content is needed to catch up.
Featured content all but needs two issues a month. Otherwise it can easily get insurmountable, and we were trying for an April Fools publication issue after next, which I have articles planned for, which all basically get thrown out if we change things now. My stuff gets done early, then I step in where everyone else failed to finish. I basically shouldered the Signpost by myself last issue, except for the controversial section. But I'm not willing to run on some random, constantly-changing schedule, where I work incredibly hard to be ready by publication day, step in to help everyone else, then nothing happens for a week, and then all the articles I'm planning fail because we're skipping the holiday issue I was working on them for. If yopu want to change the schedule, talk to me April 3rd, after my plans are finished. If we're not going to publish on the 18th, I'm not going to be available on the 25th, so you're getting Featured content from me, and none of the other hard work I do to get things to actually be ready on schedule, like writing big chunks of the issue and copyediting the rest, because, at that point, it's going to be your problem, because I'm not going to be here, so the chances of actually publishing on time are pretty minimal. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 20:52, 15 March 2023 (UTC)
Fine, Adam, and sorry for failing to look at it from your point of view. We can also get a small issue out this weekend. Andreas JN466 21:44, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

News and notes, 16 March

Regarding CNET's status as a reliable source: given that the consensus finding was related to CNET's articles since November 2022 (with a consensus for reliability up to October 2020), I think it's a bit misleading to provide a count of all the articles using CNET as a source, regardless of the date of the cited material. Although the cutoff date can be somewhat inferred from the current wording, I suggest that it be made more clear. isaacl (talk) 17:21, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

I thought about adding something to clarify that but struggled to come up with succinct wording. Will try again. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:51, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
Piece updated, more feedback is welcome. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:17, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
Thanks for the update; I made a copy edit. isaacl (talk) 21:16, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

In the media, 16 March

If an item has significant editorial content (e.g. the piece on marriage infoboxes) maybe it should be in its own section with the editor's signature. Not to deprecate the item or question its inclusion, just to make sure it's clear whose opinion is being expressed. Just a thought – anyone agree or disagree? ☆ Bri (talk) 18:27, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Fine with me, but what else are we going to do with a piece like that? Buy into the premise? Because I think we have to either poke at it and analyse it or leave it out. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 20:22, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
I think there is something to be said for just reflecting neutrally what an article said. I mean, I just wrote in N&N: "The Russian authorities complain that the Wikimedia Foundation has failed to remove misleading information about the Russian Army's operations in Ukraine from Wikipedia." Anyone is welcome to nod or guffaw at that. We don't have to tell people what to think.
This said, I agree that if one of us does give an opinion, then it's best to sign the item. Andreas JN466 21:03, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
I think that putting literal hate speech in journalist voice is a bit much. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 21:08, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
I understand the reasoning for the bantering tone in the traffic report, but I think "In the media" should be straight reporting. If it's felt an item can't be covered without editorial comment, I think it should be put into a separate editorial. isaacl (talk) 21:27, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
I think if we're going to put any obscure thing into the In the Media - the Christian Institute is not a respectable news organisation - then we have to treat it this way. We can't both include every random mention of Wikipedia, and treat all of them as valid. We can't treat everything as a respectable news organisation if we're going to include blog posts from hate groups. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 22:00, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
If it's not worth covering, then the Signpost shouldn't cover it at all. isaacl (talk) 22:20, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
In the media is pretty indiscriminate. And to some extent that's fine, but not if we're going to treat literally anything as an unbiased source. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 23:07, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
If the organization in question is an advocacy one and not a news organization, personally I don't think it should be covered in the "In the media" column. It's not clear to me that any coverage is warranted in any other section. Why should the view of this organization be given prominence? isaacl (talk) 23:16, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
I think that's a fair point. The only real point in covering it is to provide a counterbalance, but if it's obscure enough, we're putting its views out further.... Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 03:46, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

Traffic report minor issue

@Igordebraga: The entry for the film Pathaan has a math problem that I can't resolve: "The Indian film is on the list yet again, becoming the 7th highest grossing film of 2023 (although that's not saying much since we're in February) and the 5th highest grossing Indian film of all time."

Obviously, if there are 6 higher grossing films in 2023, there should be at least 6 (not 4) higher grossing films of all time. I tried checking this out via the links, but the links say what you wrote in the entry - so at least one of them is wrong. If nobody else can resolve the mistake, then I suggest deleting the "becoming the 7th highest grossing film of 2023 (although that's not saying much since we're in February) and" which strikes me as the more questionable claim. But the other one might be your choice, so I'll leave it to you. Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:41, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

@Smallbones: There's a difference between film and the subset Indian film. As long as the other films from 2023 that grossed higher aren't Indian, there's no problem. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 15:49, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
@Adam Cuerden: Whoops! I'll change it to "The Indian film is on the list yet again, becoming the 7th highest grossing film worldwide of 2023 (although that's not saying much since we're in February) and the 5th highest grossing Indian film of all time." (without the bolding) to make sure others don't misread it like I did. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:25, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
Works for me. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 17:03, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

BTW - @JPxG: I won't be able to contribute anything this issue. Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:41, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

State of the issue:

Copyedited
News and notes, In the media, Eyewitness Wikimedians Ukraine, Traffic report, Interview, Featured content
Ready for copyedit
In prep

Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 21:33, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Copyedited two four of 'em. Over to you guys. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 22:26, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
ITM is copyedited and illustrated. --Andreas JN466 00:59, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
FC is done as well. --Andreas JN466 02:07, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

I will be ready to run it tomorrow. jp×g 12:18, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

Monday in the United States then? ☆ Bri (talk) 21:43, 19 March 2023 (UTC)
Sorry, I meant tomorrow-today (the 19th). jp×g 23:52, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

Technical stuff -- issue 6

Moved to Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/Technical. jp×g 19:37, 20 March 2023 (UTC)

Sound logo winner

Verge

Wikimedia News

Smallbones(smalltalk) 12:20, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Ok, I should have put this in News and notes (I just did), but I won't have time to write it up. I should have a disinfo report this week though. Smallbones(smalltalk) 13:07, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Also IP masking will be coming soon. See m:IP Editing: Privacy Enhancement and Abuse Mitigation This is quite serious IMHO. When it was first brought up by WMF, there were assurances that the en community and other wikis could ban IP editing and the Portuguese WP did, there was a study made on that ban, and I believe it was overwhelmingly positive. There were also several (5ish?) requests from other Wikipedias to do the same. My feeling was that the WMF were slow-walking these requests, wanting to study them individually before doing ... something. Certainly in terms of paid editing and other disruptive editing, it looks like this could be a disaster. Somebody should propose that we start a test IP editing ban at the same time that the IP masking takes affect. Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:10, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

We mentioned the upcoming IP masking in News and notes about 4 issues back, IIRC. I'll try to find a link. I agree it's a big deal and doesn't seem to be well understood. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:58, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
Apparently it was longer ago than I recalled. Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2020-11-01/News and notes#Mandatory IP masking was a pretty thorough description, with a brief followup 2022-03-27 and a brief mention 2022-08-01. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:04, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
Aha, my memory is not completely shot. It came up again at the In the media talkpage in January. ☆ Bri (talk) 23:41, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Recent research (issue 6)

As usual, we are preparing this regular survey on recent academic research about Wikipedia, doubling as the Wikimedia Research Newsletter (now in its twelfth year). Help is welcome to review or summarize the many interesting items listed here (also for future issues), as are suggestions of other new research papers that haven't been covered yet. Regards, HaeB (talk) 06:48, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

@JPxG and Bri: This should be publishable now, although more copyediting couldn't hurt. Regards, HaeB (talk) 23:26, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

State of the (non) issue

It's about 25 hours until publication is scheduled and the only article that seems to be close to being ready is Bri's Arb report. It's short but publishable. Otherwise, News and notes, and In the media seem to be less than half-ready. I've got a Disinfo report that I should be able to get into publishable shape in about 5 hours, but I'm thinking it could be a much better article if I just took a new look at it and changed it around in several time-consuming ways. @JPxG, Bri, HaeB, Adam Cuerden, and Jayen466:

I'll check back here in an hour or two, but it doesn't look reasonable to expect an issue in the next few days. Let's re-schedule the submission deadline until next Friday/Saturday.

Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:00, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm going to work hard to get From the Archives and FC done within a day or two. Given it's a bit of a time issue, I think we need to publish as near April Fools as possible. Otherwise, why did we bother? Celebrating April Fools' weeks later feels... pointless. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 18:05, 1 April 2023 (UTC)
Why do we bother setting a deadline if nobody follows it? If JPxG sets a deadline that I can meet, I'll try to meet it, but I don't see the point in publishing a 4-5 story issue. Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:28, 1 April 2023 (UTC)
@Smallbones: I think we do, we just... really play it close to the date. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 22:50, 2 April 2023 (UTC)
I'm in favor of sticking to a consistent schedule and against drawing out publication; a Signpost issue with 5 good stories is entirely fine. I agree that publication delays due to EiC availability might have become a bit of an issue in recent months, and it also would have been great if JPxG had not been absent from the two most recent conversations about scheduling above (#Publishing_schedule_for_next_few_issues, #Are_we_really_going_to_publish_this_weekend?). But on an optimistic note, he has been active on-wiki in other areas just yesterday, and also, we do have working backup solutions in place as the publication of the March 9 issue demonstrated.
I think that N&N and ITM have enough content to be published already after a bit of polishing (and removing placeholders if necessary); I also augmented the former a bit myself. And as always I'm committed to having RR in a publishable shape by the publication deadline as well. Regards, HaeB (talk) 15:44, 2 April 2023 (UTC)
@Adam Cuerden: are you referring to UTC? (sounds good to me personally in any case, but obviously it will be up to JPxG or Bri or whoever is going to publish)
Regards, HaeB (talk) 18:53, 2 April 2023 (UTC)
@HaeB: Honestly, it's done now. I'll start copyediting the rest of the issue. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 20:25, 2 April 2023 (UTC)
Cool, I just marked ITM ready for copyedit. ☆ Bri (talk) 21:13, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

I've overcome my grouchiness (apologies to Adam and all) and almost have a disinfo article ready to post. I'll post what's done so far and anybody should feel free to copyedit that part. The conclusion+ should be ready in about an hour. Smallbones(smalltalk) 21:30, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

@Smallbones: is systemic banks in the title intentional? Or should it be systemically important banks? ☆ Bri (talk) 22:39, 2 April 2023 (UTC)
p.s. I added an image, hope it's not too frivolous. If so, we can try again. ☆ Bri (talk) 23:32, 2 April 2023 (UTC)
@Bri: It's done as far as I can tell. "Systemic" is a systemic mistake among some people. I was thinking there could be a good headline in here somewhere but have failed. Go ahead and change it. But if you can make it funny, that would be better! Pic is ok, but is a bit silly. Your choice. Smallbones(smalltalk) 00:01, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Current status

Approved
From the editor
Copyedited
Arbitration report, Featured content, News and notes, In the media, From the archives, Recent research, Disinformation report
Ready for copyedit
Other
JPxG is planning a From the Editor. @HaeB:: Is this the week for Recent Research, or will that be later this month?

Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 21:35, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the nudge regarding RR - yes, as mentioned above and on the Newsroom page, I'm getting it ready for this issue right now (running a bit later than I had expected earlier), hopefully around the same time as Smallbones finishing the Disinformation report.
JPxG is planning a From the Editor - interesting (and thanks Adam for letting us know), but, JPxG, this should really be recorded like any other planned section at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom. (Admittedly, as detailed above, this is all currently a bit of a mess following the recent newsroom formatting reorganization.) Regards, HaeB (talk) 22:13, 2 April 2023 (UTC)
Aye. I think we should probably spend a little time reorganising our reset template - it's missing some occasional features like "Cobwebs", and I wouldn't mind having "Next featured content" and "Next from the archives" as standard parts. Also, didn't we alphabetise things at some point and then... unalphabetise or something? Anyway, @HaeB:, sorry about missing the section about RR. I was kind of rushing my contributions a bit this time due to, well, a week without internet but with... well, a lot of upsetting things. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 22:46, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

Last minute check

@JPxG: was all of this intended? I am fine if you didn’t like the image but you also removed some other copyedits and your own webkit-transform goodness. ☆ Bri (talk) 04:23, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Indeed not, good catch. jp×g 07:33, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Single-page edition cleanup?

The single page edition seems to have a problem with the rotation joke. Maybe applying cumulative rotation. Can somebody see if we can reset that for the Disinfo report which is at the end of the issue? ☆ Bri (talk) 18:02, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

It's probably a missing >/div> at the bottom of one of the pages, or one has it in the noincludes. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 18:05, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
Since it seems many articles are rotated, not sure what you would like to have fixed? isaacl (talk) 18:49, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
OK, I've spent enough time trying to reverse engineer which articles are supposed to be rotated and which ones are not... I'll leave it up to the pranksters to sort it out. isaacl (talk) 18:58, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
I've got it, I think. There was an unclosed Div. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 19:03, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

I've reset the Newsroom

Template:Signpost_assignments is the template for that. I've alphabetised it, but I think the code for the talk pages wasn't duplicated there. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 19:57, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Series tagging

I have forgotten, or maybe I never knew, how to tag articles to include in the paid editing series. Maybe that should be added to /Technical? ☆ Bri (talk) 20:21, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Needs the paidadvocacy tag adding via the "Manage tags" tab. I've just done it and also done it for the February Disinformation piece so it now shows up in the series. --Andreas JN466 21:14, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
There's a user script to facilitate adding tags. See Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Index for details. isaacl (talk) 21:19, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Feeder Readback

Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/Single/2023-04-03 - I didn't make it, but don't think it was linked here yet. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 05:34, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

Also, temporarily put the next issue date for the 16th. Don't think that making it the 23rd would be that bad, though. Otherwise we'll (theoreticaly) have three this month. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 05:36, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

I've accidentally caused trouble at nl-wiki!

Might be a Signpost story here, might not. On 4 April, there was a train crash in the Netherlands. It seemed pretty serious, so I started the 2023 Voorschoten train crash article. A while later, after searching nl-wiki and finding nothing, I asked at the nl-Wiki Help Desk whether or not there was an article to interlink to. There wasn't, but one was quickly created (nl:Treinongeval Voorschoten 2023). It was quickly nominated for deletion as WP:NOTNEWS. A large amount of discussion has followed on nl-Wiki. At this moment in time, my humble opinion is that the article will be kept. Whether or not nl-Wiki re-evaluates its approach to having articles about current events remains to be seen. As for the article on the train crash, there are now also versions on the French, German and Russian language Wikipedias.

P.S. Is there a Dutch version of The Signpost? Could be a story for both if there is! Mjroots (talk) 07:10, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

Answering my own question, there is. Mjroots (talk) 07:16, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
@Mjroots: Can you give us a link? I'm not aware of a nl.wiki newsletter. ☆ Bri (talk) 15:45, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
@Bri: Here it is. Mjroots (talk) 15:49, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
That said, maybe not. Mjroots (talk) 15:52, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
How about Nieuwsbrief Wikimedia Nederland (archive)? ☆ Bri (talk) 15:53, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
That could be it. Mjroots (talk) 17:15, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

News and notes, 16 April

Spicy RfA

Spicy's RfA was self-nominated on April Fools' Day. Not sure if this is worth mentioning. Both facts drew at least some commentary but it is an unopposed RfA at this time, so maybe not worth reporting on. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:22, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

Nomination for Issue 8 humour column

Wikipedia:Law of hats by User:Widefox. It doesn't look controversial at all, putting it here for consideration by the editorial team. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:03, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

It's quite niche, but hopefully not ambiguous. I only expect dab editors to really feel the vibe of it, making it very niche. Widefox; talk 21:20, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

Headlines

I was just thinking of posting Smallbones' Disinformation piece to Hacker News, but neither the original draft headline nor the final published headline would work there. :/ (Hacker News demands that the published headline is used.)

If we have articles that would be of interest to a wider public, could we please use headline wordings that are sufficiently informative to attract outside readers? The articles could get a lot more readers that way. --Andreas JN466 10:39, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm the one who gave it the title "Sus socks support suits, seems systemic". It was in response to a specific request by the author to generate something funnier than "Do systemic banks sock?", at least that's how I understood the request. We should consider what title guidance is best for internal or external audiences. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:07, 5 April 2023 (UTC)
The alliterations are funny and work well for the captive Wikipedia audience. But if we want to have external readers, then just something very factual would probably be best: "How many major banks break Wikipedia's rules on paid editing?" Headlines like that should work for both audiences. Andreas JN466 20:11, 5 April 2023 (UTC)
@Jayen466: Would it help if you just gave the Hacker News the full headline: "Disinformation Report: Sus socks support suits, seems systemic"? It always felt to me like the article type was meant to be part of the headline. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 00:25, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
I tried it; it got a single upvote. Of course, there is no guarantee it would have gotten more with a different headline – apart from anything else, there is always a big element of luck involved. --Andreas JN466 14:26, 7 April 2023 (UTC)
Agreed that informative headlines are generally better, also for a Wikipedian audience. Keep in mind that many of our readers are subscribed via the talk page notices and click through to specific stories from there. Regards, HaeB (talk) 20:47, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

Newsroom formatting reorganization

I have updated the templates at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom to automatically use labeled section transclusion. Thus, if we want to discuss this issue's "From the editor" or "Serendipity" (or whatever), we can just create a section on this talk page and it will show up there as well as here. I think this will resolve the previously mentioned issue of the newsroom needing to constantly be reset and updated (as well as make it easier to participate in discussions on articles prior to running them). jp×g 02:24, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for tackling this longstanding problem. How do you suggest to deal with recurring sections, where we may often end up having two threads with the same name on this talk page until automatic archiving kicks in? (One could manually mark them for archiving right after publication, but that's kind of the same as having to reset the newsroom page.) Regards, HaeB (talk) 06:38, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
@JPxG: OK, I see your idea appears to be to rename all the corresponding section headings on this talk page after publication [1]. This works, but it is still something that needs to be done manually every time. In fact has already been omitted for the current issue (meaning that the Newsroom page shows outdated content, with all the potential for serious misunderstandings of the kind we encountered a couple of months ago). What's the longterm plan here? Are you going to automate this step as part of the publishing script, or at least add it to the documentation (in the newsroom page and here)? Regards, HaeB (talk) 05:41, 24 February 2023 (UTC)
Just a note that we still don't have a solution here that is sustainable (in the sense that it doesn't involve a manual step that's frequently forgotten, for either 1) resetting the newsroom page per the earlier instructions, or 2) renaming all the sections headings for just published stories on this talk page, in JPxG's labeled section tranclusion approach).
If anyone else has ideas, that would be great. Regards, HaeB (talk) 04:36, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
For the record, to keep the archives happy: Adam has since reset the newsroom page using the previously used template, i.e. we're back to the system used before. I think that's a reasonable outcome given that nobody has been able to fix the aforementioned issues with the labeled section transclusion idea. However, let's keep in mind that we've had issues with the template system too - in particular, one should not assume that draft sections which end up not making it into the current issue will automatically carry forward to the next issue. Regards, HaeB (talk) 16:16, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

Paper on gender and race bias

HaeB, pretty sure you will have spotted this already, but just in case:

--Andreas JN466 19:48, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, but thanks for the heads-up, as always. Generally it's safe to assume that it's on the radar if we already featured it on the @WikiResearch Twitter feed (as in this case). Regards, HaeB (talk) 20:44, 7 April 2023 (UTC)
@HaeB, in case you haven't seen these on-wiki discussions: User_talk:Jimbo_Wales/Archive_250#Getting_NPOV_right and Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Women_in_Red#“Too_Soon”_to_count?_How_gender_and_race_cloud_notability_considerations_on_Wikipedia. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 16:39, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

Authors' submissions pending review

There are two items at WP:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom/Submissions waiting for approval. I think we should go with them, and have provided tentative column names for both. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:19, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

Maybe I need to ask – what's the process for approving submissions from non-regular Signpost staff (like these)? Can I just do it myself? Do we need a vote, or at least a couple of people looking it over? Does every submission need the E-in-C's personal approval? ☆ Bri (talk) 16:28, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

I'd say just add them; that's been the traditional way. If there's a problem, someone will say. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 20:36, 9 April 2023 (UTC)
Okay, moved in the special report to WP:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/Special report. The original author asked me to add myself to the byline due to the proportion of text that is attributed to my editing. I think the other one needs more work before being an Op-ed. ☆ Bri (talk) 04:31, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

"Something went wrong": SPS.js giving up the ghost?

I don't know what the deal is. I am trying to publish, and the script is crapping out with a cryptic message saying only that "Something went wrong". My guess is that there might be something wrong with the formatting of some articles in this issue: the script has worked fine for about a year and a half, and I've never gotten this error before. This is going to be a huge pain to debug.

Anyway, I am giving up for tonight, and will be back online tomorrow morning. In the meantime, if anyone wants to figure it out themselves, everything is ready for publication, except for pressing the button. If you do so, please be sure to use my version of SPS.js (at User:JPxG/SPS.js); I have a bugfix in it (removing a duplicate div tag that some people on Meta were saying broke their talk pages on the MMS distribution list). This might be in Evad37's version as well. Who knows. Anyway, I am tired so I am going to go to bed.

On a related note, I think we may be nearing the time when SPS.js succumbs to the accumulated weight of changes and fixes, and needs to be refactored or rewritten. That'll be fun! jp×g 11:34, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

This is what the error looks like. I didn't see anything in the console that would indicate a more detailed message. There may be a verbose-logging option I can enable in the script to figure out what is going on. Otherwise, it might take a while to drill down. jp×g 11:36, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
We could go manual if necessary. I used to do it that way every time before using the script, and a copy of the procedure is saved in my user space. ☆ Bri (talk) 14:07, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
I have a limited time window to do this on 3 April so we don't have to update a bunch of in-article links. I'm going to go ahead and do the manual steps, unless someone shouts "stop" in the next hour, say by 1630 UTC. ☆ Bri (talk) 15:49, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
This probably goes without saying: please don't run the publishing script once I start, or we will have a trainwreck. Starting in 1 minute. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:29, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
(ec) I would say go ahead - good luck!
Regarding documentation, we actually still have the one at Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Newsroom/Resources#Manual_process - perhaps you could compare that with your notes and update if necessary, once you have a moment after publication.
Regards, HaeB (talk) 16:32, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

It is done except for the mail list, social media announcements, and global delivery (on meta).

There was one oddity, an extra blank line at the top of From the archives draft. Just in case that had something to do with the script error, I'm mentioning it here. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:46, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Oops, fixing up main page now. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:49, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
Really done now, I think. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:00, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
Thanks, Bri. Andreas JN466 17:40, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
Poggers. I will try to pick apart why the script didn't work... jp×g 19:46, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
Maybe it's the tilt code? Some pages have it over the header, so... If that's it, it doesn't matter too much, as we're not going to be repeating it. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 19:50, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Global delivery not done

The pre-generated code that was offered for global mass message delivery on the manual publishing process page looked weird to me, so I skipped that step. It was referencing {{Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost}} which only exists on enwp, I think. Maybe I overreacted? Something still needs to be sent out for the people on m:Global message delivery/Targets/Signpost. ☆ Bri (talk) 20:25, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

@Bri: Good call - it was broken in this recent Linter cleanup edit which I have just reverted. Looks OK to me now. Regards, HaeB (talk) 20:50, 3 April 2023 (UTC)
HaeB, thanks for undoing my edit. One in every few thousand Linter errors that I fix goes a bit sideways, and this one was the lucky one. I have added more <noinclude /> tags to try to preserve the output of the page while fixing the Linter errors. Can you and Bri please check to see if the output looks right to you? Thanks. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:31, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Forgot to follow up on this. I finally did global delivery on 7 April. ☆ Bri (talk) 15:54, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

India fundraising

Just pointing out that the thread Upcoming WMF fundraising campaign in India was started by WMF staff at Village Pump. Do we want to add something to News and notes about this? ☆ Bri (talk) 15:50, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes. But please keep it neutral. Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:48, 15 April 2023 (UTC)
Done ☆ Bri (talk) 17:38, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

Trouble finding Mastodon feed for The Signpost

Trying to find the appropriate Mastodon feed for The Signpost, I remember seeing something about it in the publishing instructions. No luck so far. Not a good sign if a motivated insider can't do it. p.s. I use DuckDuckGo. ☆ Bri (talk) 04:21, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

@Bri: https://wikis.world/@WikiSignpost Legoktm (talk) 04:29, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
Yeah I know now, I sneaked a peek at the manual publishing instructions. I guess it wasn't clear, I was saying it's not easy for a "normal" person. It isn't even listed in the Wikipedia article Wikipedia Signpost. DuckDuckGo's information card gives the Twitter and Facebook links only (barf). ☆ Bri (talk) 04:32, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
Hmmm. It definitely knows about some other accounts though. Will see if there's anything on our end we can do... Legoktm (talk) 05:46, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
Good grief, I didn't even know meta:wikis.world was a thing (until now). Should everybody know about this? ☆ Bri (talk) 04:36, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
It is already listed at Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Subscribe#Social_media, alongside the Twitter and Facebook feeds. But yes, it might be possible to highlight all three of them more prominently, for example on the "About" page. Regards, HaeB (talk) 11:13, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

Rumor - WMF layoff of 10% of staff?

Rumor, no evidence, not sure how to check. DO NOT TAKE THIS AS FACT, I am just talking through an observation. I wish we had a clear line of communication with the WMF to verify such things but here we are, a volunteer news organization with no stable communication channels with the WMF. My option is to post here for thoughts from others.

I think the WMF is in the process of laying off staff. There is a global log of user accounts on meta. In this flood of data users can search for WMF accounts however they manage data themselves. Sorry, I know of no way to link to what I did to examine the data. I see about 40 accounts locked since the start of 2023. When accounts are locked then that means people left WMF. This could be for any reason. I suspect that my count of locked accounts is low and that more people left recently, just because I only examined part of the data.

Wikidata Wikimedia Foundation (Q180) reports employees (P1128) to number 450 as of October 2021. If I undercounted, then perhaps about 10% of staff left recently.

Possible follow ups:

  • Ask someone at WMF for comment as to whether layoffs are happening
  • Contact anyone laid off for comment
  • Ask WMF if there is a new priority for the money

If this is a signal of a significant restructuring or new organizational direction then I think it is in Wikimedia community interest to be aware. Senior people that I see gone are

Bluerasberry (talk) 20:21, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

I believe the account belonging to the Director of Global Data & Insights is also locked. ☆ Bri (talk) 01:00, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
I blogged about this a little earlier before seeing this post. But in short, it's a 5% layoff. Definitely disappointed the WMF didn't proactively announce this. Legoktm (talk) 02:49, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
Add the Director of Product Management. I confirmed via their LinkedIn page. And there's a job posting. ☆ Bri (talk) 05:09, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
They definitely are laying people off. Across most departments. (edit: Like Lego, I also heard 5% personnel) First started hearing about it a week or so ago. Earlier departures are likely more related to cutbacks on contract work and the likes + the standard departures. Like Lego, I've been amazed and disappointed that they haven't shared anything about this. I mean we were all gonna find out anyway eventually.... —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:14, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
Hi All, a few points here that I wanted to share.
  • As noted already in this thread, people leave the Foundation regularly for a range of reasons (including the names you have identified above). The Foundation provides flexibility for departing staff to communicate their news however they see appropriate, so we won’t be able to provide specific details about individuals now or in the future.
  • That being said, Foundation leadership has been consistently communicating since the English Wikipedia RfC on fundraising banners that our growth will not be able to continue at the same rate into the future as it has in the past (Meta Wiki link and coverage in signpost).
The RfC raised a much wider range of issues than just fundraising banners. While anticipated revenue shortfalls made this a difficult period for the Foundation, I believe we tried to hear these broader concerns, many of which are shared across communities beyond English Wikipedia.
One concern was about the very rapid budget growth of the Foundation, which has stabilized in the last year. Given the revenue gap from this year's English campaign, we are reviewing and lowering our expenditure for the current year. And I anticipate we will have a reduced budget and certainly slower growth next year. We will have more information by April on future financial projections.
I communicated previously that I have started frank conversations with the Board of Trustees and Foundation staff about what roles the Foundation should grow (like support for technology) and what activities we should hand over to others or stop altogether. Looking ahead, the size of our budget should be driven by what the Foundation should be doing and can actually do well. The 2030 movement strategy provided guidance (and motivated much of our historic growth), but was short on specifics. I await the Movement Charter to provide further clarity, but believe the Foundation may need to make some decisions sooner.
  • As has been shared with staff over the past few months, the Foundation has made expense reductions for next year’s budget that prioritize non-staffing costs but have also included looking at vacant/unfilled roles and about a 5% reduction in occupied roles. More details about these changes will be forthcoming on-wiki in the Foundation’s draft Annual Plan.
  • We plan to release the Wikimedia Foundation's annual plan for feedback from the movement in the next couple of weeks (as mentioned in this update on VPM back in January.
  • You can see some of the early work here on Meta Wiki.
  • I have started a Signpost piece proposal here. This piece will summarise the priorities for the next year including the staffing, budget and other changes and importantly will link through to the many ways people can share their inputs, thoughts, priorities and feedback. MPaul (WMF) (talk) 14:46, 6 April 2023 (UTC)
Okay, so I think we have a story here. I started a section in news and notes. Anyone can contribute. Before going too much further I think that someone from Signpost should write to the WMF for comment. Perhaps to the communication director User:AAlikhan (WMF) , who can refer as needed?
I volunteer to write but @JPxG: can you approve me contacting the WMF? Here is the email I would send. Anyone edit this, or if you like, volunteer in my place to be contact.

Hello,

I am writing as a journalist for The Signpost. We have heard that the Wikimedia Foundation is laying off staff and I am writing for comment. We publish in about a week. Here are specific questions:

  1. Are layoffs happening? If so, how many staff?
  2. Was there prior notice to which we can refer in our article?
  3. Why are the layoffs happening?
  4. Can you point to any particular documentation which describes the strategic direction of the WMF, of which these layoffs are a part?
  5. What steps does the WMF take to ensure that laid-off WMF staff close out any collaborations they had with the Wikimedia community, to minimize impact to volunteers?

Feel free to be brief. From a Wikimedia community perspective, answering with links to documentation is ideal, but answer as you like.

Edit conflict, already have staff comment here. Bluerasberry (talk) 14:59, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

The most recently reported number of WMF staff I'm aware of was "around 700". [2] So 5% would be about 35 people. To put this into perspective, the WMF reported in spring 2022 that it had hired 240 people in the first three quarters of the 2021–2022 financial year. [3] Andreas JN466 09:38, 7 April 2023 (UTC)
According to those 2021-2022 slides, hiring 240 people only resulted in a netto 114 (maybe 120, the numbers were not final yet) person headcount increase over that time period. This is because not all hires are permanent and there is turnover. Even if its only 5%.... With a 10% annual attrition rate (quote from the slides), most likely a hiring freeze for at least part of the year and less contracted out work, I suspect the de-facto effect will be more significant than saying "firing 35 people is only 1/8th of what they hired a year ago"........ You cannot take a percentage from one point in time and illustrate it with completely different numbers and dimensions. That's not how percentages work. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:17, 7 April 2023 (UTC)
@TheDJ: Sure. There is always churn, and some of the new hires will always be to replace people who have left. There appear to have been 142 people who left in the first three quarters of 2021–22, judging by this slide (240 people were hired, but "known headcount" only increased by 98, from 472 to 570).
But by November 2022 Lisa Seitz-Gruwell was saying that "around 700 people work at the Wikimedia Foundation". That is an increase of another 130 or so over the end of March 2022 figure.
Altogether then you have an increase of around 230 staff and contractors over the past 21 months, followed now by a decrease of around 35. As far as I can see, that still leaves a net increase of about 200 since July 2021.
Incidentally, the 2021-2022 3Q tuning sessions that these slides are from were the last ones that were made available. The WMF has stopped publishing them. Andreas JN466 13:45, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

Due diligence / fact check for News and notes

Please fact check me on the News and notes headline piece. I removed the word "layoffs" since who knows, there could have been a bunch of voluntary separations slash golden parachutes going on. It's important to justify the 5% figure, which as noted above will be true if ~35 people were separated. This Quarry query that I created gives that datum, with the methodology explained in News and notes, and finds 52 locked accounts which is actually over 7% of 700. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:01, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

Since I mentioned it in the article, for fact checking, here are the locked Director accounts:
I'll be checking in to see if there are any comments here before publication deadline. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:28, 15 April 2023 (UTC)
Hi @Bri, just noting my comment here about people leaving for all sorts of reasons and this submission (thank you for your help there already!) that notes how the foundation is approaching expense reductions. The second part of the proposed series will include links to more granular information about the work and plans of the Foundation next year including more detailed budgets. MPaul (WMF) (talk) 10:24, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
I'm not sure whether I'm a reliable source for the Signpost, but in any case, since January 1 staff departures are mix of people leaving on their own and for cause in addition to the 5% layoffs. And, the 5% layoff figure is basically confirmed now, so I think it's worth calling out explicitly. I would not necessarily call any of the departures "voluntary" without knowing specifics, I wouldn't be surprised if some people saw the writing on the wall and simply left ahead of time.
Most (all?) full-time staff are given official WMF accounts on Meta-Wiki, but many contractors may not get them (and definitely contractors were let go during the period in question). Those accounts are locked as part of offboarding, but there can be some delay in that happening and some times it's instantaneous. The distinction between "staff" and "contractors" is very fuzzy, many people we all consider to be staff may technically (for legal reasons) be contractors.
I think looking at headcount over the past 2 years is a slightly biased picture, because it doesn't account for the WMF hiring freeze that was in place for most of 2020, and then you'll see a spike in 2021 once the freeze was lifted. Legoktm (talk) 04:58, 16 April 2023 (UTC)
@Legoktm You mention the fuzzy distinction between staff and contractors. One thing I've long been interested in ascertaining is how many contractors and overseas staff – if any – are included in the Form 990 salary costs (e.g. the $67,857,675 figure in Line 15 on page 1 of the 2020 Form 990), in addition to the "Total number of people employed in the calendar year" (the 320 people indicated in Line 5 on the same page). The WMF has steadfastly refused to answer that one ... If you have an idea or ever manage to find out, do please let me know. Andreas JN466 11:02, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Obituary for user:DGG, David Goodman

User:DGG was a prolific Wikipedia editor and as active as a person can be for in-person Wikimedia outreach. I am coordinating the development of an obituary for him with Wikimedia New York City. I am sharing this text here for anyone to develop while I also adapt this as a submission to The Signpost. Thanks to anyone who has content to add, or who can make editorial improvements. Bluerasberry (talk) 16:57, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, Bluerasberry. Sad news. I was really fond of David and had a lot of respect for what he did here. Andreas JN466 18:18, 10 April 2023 (UTC)
Any objections to publishing this in The Signpost? I think the community as a whole would want to know and mourn. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 19:22, 10 April 2023 (UTC)
Adam Cuerden Sorry for unclear communication. Yes, I posted this at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom/Submissions. For due process and to help the editor, if you can support the inclusion of this obituary, please indicate this on the submissions page. I would like to migrate all of this into the next issue of The Signpost. Bluerasberry (talk) 19:47, 10 April 2023 (UTC)
I believe the procedure for supporting by a regular Signpost editor nowadays is just... moving it into the queue for publishing. Do you want the Signpost to publish a copy of it, or to have the Signpost's copy be the main copy? E.g. should it still exist at the original link? Either way is fine, just better to check before pagemoves begin. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 20:29, 10 April 2023 (UTC)
Move the original link, please. I know that I am an editor here but David is also a personal friend, and I am a member of Wikimedia New York City. I felt like I should use the formal submission process because this is not only my own journalism; this is also personal from me. But yes - my intent is that if this is accepted, then the original should be a publication in The Signpost which I do not intend to mirror elsewhere. Bluerasberry (talk) 21:09, 10 April 2023 (UTC)
Aye. Just the formal process is... honestly, just a matter of someone reviewing it, pretty much. I've brought it over and set up the templates, I think alright. . Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 01:13, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
@Bluerasberry I am unfamiliar with Signpost process, but found my way here from David's Talk. He is a damn legend. Please count this as a support of the submission, he absolutely deserves the honor and recognition, although we both know he'd demur. I wish we'd found time to get together one last time. Star Mississippi 01:20, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
@Star Mississippi: To be explicit, it's now moved into the publication queue. I suspect next publication will be the 23rd, to avoid three April Signposts, but I could be wrong. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 03:04, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
Absolutely heartbreaking news. Fucking terrible. I really looked up to David. I like the obituary and hope the family is doing ok. If there's any way I can send them my respects while not disturbing their grieving process I'd like to know. — Ixtal ( T / C ) ⁂ Non nobis solum. 05:32, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
There's a section of the Obituary dedicated to personal reminiscenses. That may not be the worst way. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 18:09, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
Thanks, Adam Cuerden. — Ixtal ( T / C ) ⁂ Non nobis solum. 10:33, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
Damn, I did not want this news to happen, ever. DGG was a titan amongst us. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 05:09, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Pencils down soon...

There are 2.5 hours left until writing deadline for the issue. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:30, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

The From the Archives is going to be late, but should slip in before publication. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 19:30, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

I was able to deal with losing my wallet, my credit cards and my ID, cleaning my laptop's motherboard and drying out the screen. Apparently my power supply has now given up the ghost as well. I am learning a lot about this new city -- tomorrow I will find out how much it costs around here to get a few amps of nineteen DC volts put through a standard polarity barrel connector on a Sunday. Woe unto me for not bringing a bench power supply and a soldering iron! But perhaps I can borrow these as well. Who knows. I will -- in the morning. jp×g 08:45, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

^^^ This is the last thing posted by JPxG on-wiki and I haven't heard back from an email ping. ☆ Bri (talk) 05:23, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Do we have a Plan B, e.g. who can publish tonight? I'll step out on a limb and say that @JPxG: would want us to publish. Smallbones(smalltalk) 12:59, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Actually, I've got a good reason now to revise my opinion acticle. In fact I'd prefer it to be withdrawn than publish it now. @JPxG and Bri: How's 9pm EDT sound? Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:02, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
@Bri and Smallbones: In case you haven't seen it, Bradv posted a response to Jimbo's allegation here. Andreas JN466 15:11, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
9 Eastern/6 Pacific Time/2300 UTC is OK by me, and I can push the buttons. Still nothing on email so I think it's safe to conclude JPxG is out of the picture until they get some new computing equipment. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:21, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
I actually did manage to get hold of a 19.5V nominal PSU, an appropriately sized barrel plug, and a soldering iron, meaning that I am good to roam as soon as I get back today in a couple hours, although of course I am fine with someone else running the final checks and getting it out should this prove unwieldly. jp×g 17:19, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Awesome, I will stand down. Don't inhale too many of those solder fumes. Pb is not your friend. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:07, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

@JPxG: As above in this section - there's movement in my opinion and there should be in the Opinion piece as well. Please do not print it as is. 5 hours until completion of the draft (maybe even less!) Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:33, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

New WMF draft annual planning documentation: Product & Tech department OKRs

FYI, Signpost readers might benefit from a short notification in the next edition of some newly published WMF annual planning documentation. I'm putting a note here for the editors' consideration.

[context: Back in February was the the first steps in this year's WMFs Annual Planning process - documenting its Product & Technology departments' draft work portfolios, nominally called "buckets". (associated diff blogpost) ]

Part 2 of that documentation is now available, covering the departments' proposed Objectives and Key Results (OKRs). This draft documentation is published in the spirit of trying to get something public, and published, even though it is not finished yet so that there is time to seek and incorporate feedback. The full WMF annual plan draft is coming soon and there will be several (real-time and on-wiki) ways to comment there too. Comments at the associated subheading on the talkpage are welcome. LWyatt (WMF) (talk) 15:24, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Noting @LWyatt (WMF) & I are collaborating to include this update within the planned piece for the Signpost in the News from WMF section. MPaul (WMF) (talk) 10:35, 13 April 2023 (UTC)
The draft is in Signpost space now, and I've marked it ready for copyediting. ☆ Bri (talk) 15:46, 14 April 2023 (UTC)
A quick note to say I just made two minor edits to the article to link to the annual plan draft, since it's now available (there's no more need for a sign-up list to be notified when it's out). I'm not totally sure what the common practice is for updating Signpost drafts when their publication date slips, so I wanted to drop a note here to let you know. Guillaume (WMF) (talk) 19:52, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

State of the issue

Copyedited
Arbitration report, Featured content, From the archives, Humour, In the media, News and notes Obituary, Op-Ed, Opinion, Traffic report
Need copyediting
News from the WMF, Special report,

Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 22:35, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm done with Opinion (might put in a link or two). I'd emailed Bradv for comment on Friday(?) and twice today and just now he's writing stuff about the article on his talk page. @JPxG: be just a bit careful. Smallbones(smalltalk) 01:11, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Thinking about Op-ed for next issue

I'm thinking about an Op-ed reacting to the RfC that was just closed. I haven't decided on a tone yet. If anybody wants to collaborate, please send me an email. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:39, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Bri, which RFC? — Ixtal ( T / C ) ⁂ Non nobis solum. 16:42, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
The one posted on WT:Wikipedia Signpost. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:43, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
I forgot about that. Email sent. — Ixtal ( T / C ) ⁂ Non nobis solum. 09:27, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Opinion

I suggest moving the coverage of the events to the News and Notes column, and focusing on the content in the current "What next?" section. I feel this will tighten up the throughline and get to the takeaway from the opinion piece. It will also better separate factual reporting from commentary. isaacl (talk) 01:15, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I disagree, of course. I've always said that a good opinion piece needs to have more facts than an average news story. Nobody can reasonably challenge the facts I've presented (perhaps I should add more links), anybody can disagree with my opinion, my interpretation of the facts. But they'd benefit if they had some facts that agree with their interpretation. The title is "What Jimbo did and what it means" before the "and" facts, after it , opinion. Smallbones(smalltalk) 02:01, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Done for the night. @JPxG and Bri: It's always better when the EiC publishes, of course, but per above, I'd be willing to approve all the articles tomorrow night if nobody else wants to, and even finish most of the copyediting during the day. Smallbones(smalltalk) 03:21, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Naturally, it's up to you, and I'm not saying to remove all facts. Personally, I think the narrative meanders a bit, thus making it harder for readers to get a sense of where it's going, and being prepared for commentary when it comes. isaacl (talk) 03:57, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
@Beeblebrox: Sorry, what is your complaint? Are you saying that the opinion piece is Whitewashing (censorship)? What is the problem, and to whose benefit? I am not following. Bluerasberry (talk) 21:37, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Some rich person tries to buy a Wikipedia article, thinks they are buying corrupt admins, yells at Jimmy Wales when it doesn't go the way he thought his money would make it go, Mr. Wales makes an extremely inflammatory accusation based on that, and the Signpost is here to tell us "this is your fault, community". C'mon. We can disagree, but I think enough of you to be sure you understand my point. Beeblebrox (talk) 01:57, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
I don't quite see the problem with Smallbones' piece. It's clearly marked "Opinion". In addition, there is "just the facts" coverage in the News and notes draft already, and in the arbitration report draft as well.
Personally I am in favour of publishing the issue. Pieces written for a particular date are always a bit like fish; they don't improve with hanging around. Andreas JN466 22:59, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
From a journalistic perspective I agree, always strike while the iron is hot. An opinion piece can contain terrible opinions that make little to no sense to anyone familiar with the facts, that is how opinions work. Beeblebrox (talk) 02:02, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Column status

Opinion

I've just started writing an *opinion piece* with the working title of "Jimbo takes a hit". I'm pretty sure that I can finish it in 2 hours. If you decide you don't want it before then, please let me know. Smallbones(smalltalk) 14:17, 16 April 2023 (UTC)
A good draft for Opinion will be up in about 10 minutes. All be changing, checking, and polishing though. Ping me in 30-40 minutes if you are ready to copy edit it. Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:59, 16 April 2023 (UTC)
@Smallbones: Ready now. ☆ Bri (talk) 19:02, 16 April 2023 (UTC)
I had a tough week at work but ITM and N&N are now in reasonable shape and ready for a copyedit. --Andreas JN466 19:17, 16 April 2023 (UTC)
@Bri: and all - Opinion could use a good copy edit, but is otherwise ready. Back in 5 minutes. Smallbones(smalltalk) 20:11, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

Arbitration report

Arbitration report is ready. ☆ Bri (talk) 20:12, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

Traffic report

Unless you want to take a second look, Traffic Report is ready. (already missed last edition, better leave the pending one for this week to the next) igordebraga ≠ 23:41, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

From the archives

@Adam Cuerden: is From the archives ready for copyedit? ☆ Bri (talk) 23:48, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

Not really. I can probably finish it tomorrow, but it's my partner's birthday. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 02:09, 17 April 2023 (UTC)
@Bri: I'll do the rest in a part 3. I did a significant chunk for this issue. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 20:51, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Irish judges' use of Wikipedia

@HaeB: Irish judge Richard Humphreys claims to have debunked the study, authors disagree. [4][5][6] Will go and add a very brief write-up to ITM. --Andreas JN466 19:09, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

  • 'Mr Justice Cian Ferriter added: “The findings of the detailed study led by Judge Humphreys confirm empirically what any High Court judge, or barrister or solicitor practising in the High Court, would readily have explained if asked: that case law cited in Irish court judgments comes from parties’ written or oral submissions and not from Wikipedia.”' I think Adam and I specifically mentioned that in our ITM after the original paper came out. Of course it does not mean that the "parties' written or oral submissions are not from Wikipedia." Smallbones(smalltalk) 01:18, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Thanks for the heads-up. By the way, has anyone been able to find a citation to the actual rebuttal paper/summary article that is at the center of these news reports? ("Humphreys has published a summary article in the Irish Law Times", but the article index at https://irlii.org/irish-law-times/ stops in 2020.) Regards, HaeB (talk) 22:46, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
I followed the links in Itm and found it (and will post link here). I have to say, I like the argument about any links to Wikipedia wording coming thru the lawyers written or oral presentation to the court, but the write-up is absolutely the worst! Combine the worst of legal writing with the worst of scientific writing, and it's even worser!. Back in a few. Smallbones(smalltalk) 23:42, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
The link is here https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4327890 via the ILT article. Perhaps it might be just the summary, but it drones on forever, and the main argument is almost always similar to "I work there. I know how this works. You got it wrong." Smallbones(smalltalk) 23:56, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
That's a link to the original paper that they criticize. I was asking about the rebuttal paper/summary article. Regards, HaeB (talk) 20:25, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
It's actually a link to a follow-up paper the authors of the original study published earlier this year.
I haven't found the rebuttal either. Andreas JN466 00:09, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Badness

I think that publication should be delayed by a bit, as some problems have arisen with this issue, and currently I need to file a police report and then attempt to board a plane with no photo ID. I will deal with what's going on here as soon as it is possible for me to do so. jp×g 07:28, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

How about we aim for next sunday, the 23rd? Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.2% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 07:43, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Have you considered just abandoning the Shitepost and not bothering at all ? Nick (talk) 21:11, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
@Adam Cuerden: No objections to delay.
@Nick: You seem to be insulting The Signpost, or otherwise, I am not sure what you are communicating. Can you restate what you came here to say? Bluerasberry (talk) 21:38, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Bluerasberry, are you really that naïve? This is incredibly lame. El_C 01:45, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
I can only conclude that Mr. Blue is doing this on purpose, although I am not sure why. For some reason I assumed he would feel exactly the opposite way regarding someone in power picking on someone who was not prepared to defend themselves from baseless, ludicrous, accusations. Beeblebrox (talk) 02:06, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
@Bluerasberry, if you really don't know what's going on, see my talk page. – bradv 02:11, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
You want the signpost to close, you should ask at wider forum than this page which is dedicated to the production of it. Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost at least. Or is the idea here to just gang up on the people who edit it until they're forced out? ––FormalDude (talk) 02:37, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Brad is the victim here. You working towards victimizing him a second time with this sort of gaslighting is discreditable. El_C 02:55, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Meh, I can handle it. I just want the article about this to state, above the fold, that the allegations were completely false. That seems to be a tough ask, as this is apparently just Smallbones' "opinion". I also expressed that I do not believe Jimbo's actions were due to malice, but incompetence/ignorance, which was shortened to "not malice". If this is what passes for journalism in this newsletter then I can see why it's getting this sort of reaction. It will be interesting to see what happens when it publishes. – bradv 03:05, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Working towards victimizing him a second time? Wow. I don't like the article either, but maybe stop taking it out on others for no reason? ––FormalDude (talk) 03:35, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
I know you can take it, Brad, but it's still fuckin' infuriating. What happened to reporting the facts, even and especially when it merits speaking truth to power? Opinion? More like an agenda. FormalDude, when you respond to Brad like you did above, yes, your apologia is discreditable. I stand by that. El_C 03:40, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
My comment was not directed at Brad, he was the only one who assumed good faith of Bluerasberry's comment. It was directed at Nick, you, and Beeblebrox. ––FormalDude (talk) 07:12, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Maybe learn to indent correctly, then. El_C 07:51, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
@Bluerasberry: You're astute, I'll give you that much. Bradv is the latest in a fairly long line of Jimmy Wales's victims on this project and across the wider Wikimedia sphere of his influence. I've considered the man to have been a major liability for the project for the bulk of the time I've been editing, he should have had his residual powers removed many years ago during one of those unpleasant episodes where he reverted other administrative decisions on the basis that he knew best (narrator - he didn't know best). This needs to be clearly elucidated to the community, so they're made very clearly aware that Brad is a victim and Jimmy, through what I and many others have clearly considered to be incompetence and ignorance, was the abuser in this situation. If the Signpost cannot manage that in a fair, impartial and balanced manner, then there will clearly need to be a reappraisal made at community level as to what we do and where we go with the Signpost. I would suggest the way to demonstrate to the wider community that such a reappraisal may not be necessary is if there's a clear apology made to Brad by the Signpost editorial team, and equally as importantly, by preparing a suitably balanced article that makes it abundantly clear that Brad is the victim here. I would also suggest, given the importance of the topic (joe jobbing and paid editorials services) that providing further content on this within the Signpost would be wise, so we can try as best we can to make sure no other editors suffer in the way Brad has. Nick (talk) 07:14, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
First, has anyone proposed specific changes to what Smallbones wrote? Is it allowed to just edit it before publication? It doesn't seem like it would take a total overhaul to get over the primary objections, right? An alternative for those who feel like he got it wrote is to just write another opinion column. Maybe if done quickly, the same issue can have competing perspectives. Ideally it's not, you know, full of insults and bile, but hey I'm no journalist. If Bradv has time, he'd make a good candidate for this. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 11:26, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Thanks, Rhododendrites.
@Smallbones and Bradv: I wonder if this would help?
Obviously, I have every sympathy for the argument that we shouldn't leave the reader hanging for 358 words before telling them that the accusation Wales made against Brad was roundly dismissed as nonsense, including by ArbCom. Andreas JN466 16:29, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Not just nonsense, the supposed evidence is laughably fake. To someone with absolutely no knowledge of what Wikipedia is and how it works, I suppose it could look convincing, but to anyone with even a little experience editing here, it was obviously not real. I don't know what the author of this piece saw in their investigation, but what Mr. Wales shared with the committee was just a bunch of garbage, the main thing it proved was that the alleged victim was totally cool with paying off corrupt admins to get what he wanted. The headline here is absolutely not "guy got scammed because the community sucks, Jimmy Wales unfairly targeted for trying to do something about it." Beeblebrox (talk) 17:37, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Andreas's suggestion doesn't look bad, but I'd want to see the whole of any suggested changes before writing a final piece. Think "complaint creep" - not that I've seen that yet. I do think that it is unfair to blame the guy who was scammed. Scammers do prey on folks who think they can bend the rules, but it seems like few if any people know our rules. And we do change our interpretation of the rules quite a lot. Nobody deserves to be scammed. The scammers are to blame of course, but I do think that the WMF and some folks on the WP side, share some of the blame for letting the scam go on for so long. As far as the community at large. Well if we know how big the scams are, and see evidence that it is really going on (as is shown by this case), then of course we'll share a small bit too if we don't speak out. If you see something - say something is a pretty good rule. Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:54, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
@Rhododendrites: Am mildly startled by the suggestion that Bradv write a "competing perspectives" column about being accused by Jimbo. Bradv is not an advocate for UPE, is not credibly accused of UPE, and has done nothing to justify being accused of it. It's not a subject over which anyone seems to have any doubt. Unless the Signpost draft is unintentionally mischaracterising him as guilty, what competing perspective could he possibly present? He can hardly be expected to have to go about Wikipedia loudly re-protesting his innocence, or explaining why scammers used his name and why Jimbo fell for it. This would be an unfair burden on someone who did nothing to attract the allegation in the first place. I don't mean this comment as an attack or personal criticism, and it's good of you to propose alternative ways forward. Just raising this because in my opinion rebuttal pieces only work where there are two sides to an argument, which there really aren't here.
Worth noting in passing that this is a separate issue to Smallbones' wider point of who deserves criticism for Wikipedia's deluge of scammers, joe jobs and UPE (the scammers? the payee? the community?). Can't say I agree with Smallbones' opinion on this, but that's a valid topic for a rebuttal piece. :) -- Euryalus (talk) 00:05, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
what competing perspective could he possibly present - Obviously I didn't mean Bradv is a paid editor vs. Bradv is not a paid editor (??). An alternative doesn't have to mean exactly opposite in some weird way. The point is that if you don't like someone's take on an event, one option is to write your own take. Clearly there are several people that don't agree with Smallbones' framing, so clearly there is another way to present it, right? Sometimes people can agree on the most basic facts but disagree over what should be made prominent, how it should be ordered, how to characterize different elements, etc. That doesn't seem particularly controversial. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 00:18, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
Do remember that Smallbones' main focus on here is paid editing. I'm not surprised he focuses on that. This removed sentence from a different article is more of a problem as we missed the antecedant and directly implied BradV was involved. That's a bad thing. Smallbones, at worse, uses the situation as a jumping-off point to talk about other things.
I think there's room for a lot of other takes. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 00:23, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
Yes that's completely fair re other takes on who is to blame for UPE proliferation. It is not true on whether Bradv is involved. Perhaps this could perhaps be made clearer in the draft by separating the issues more and flagging the complete lack of evidence re Bradv much earlier than it presently is. But I'm now merely repeating other viewpoints on this page, so will leave it there. Thanks also for the sentence removal you highlighted above. -- Euryalus (talk) 01:22, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
Even without that sentence, it still implies I was somehow involved. I wasn't even editing at the time (an obvious fact that Jimbo's investigation failed to uncover). – bradv 01:31, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
I think the big problem is that we don't make an effort anywhere to actually cover the issues involved. As you may know, I'm no Jimbo apologist. I think we need to cover this in detail, and, while Smallbones' take is, I think, fine, it is pretty much immediately using the situation as a jumping off point. Probably not great "first coverage", as it were, but valid alongside more detailed coverage.
The problem is we lack that detailed coverage. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 02:48, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
I have now expanded the piece in News and notes and put it top of the page. For those who are not regular visitors to this page, part of the problem here was that Wales' loss of permissions came just as we were ready to publish. I (and others here) did not have time to write more in the short time window that remained and I think we were all happy for Smallbones to do the heavy lifting (and Smallbones' points about Wales' declining interest and influence are well taken and provide useful context).
So, hopefully this longer piece in N&N, which focuses on ArbCom's assessment, will help to fill the gap some of you have felt there to be. Andreas JN466 14:23, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
Yes agree with that. Only thing I'd add is apparently it is controversial for the article to state up-front that there was zero evidence to support the allegation against Bradv. Otherwise it could have been changed by now and this entire conversation would be moot. I doubt the omission is deliberate or conspiratorial. It's likely, as Adam_Cuerden suggests, a result of wanting to jump quickly to the article's main argument on the origins of UPE. And the opinion topic as a whole is worthwhile - Jimbo's accusation is newsworthy, UPE is worth writing about and it's just an opinion piece and not some kind of holy writ. But an up-front acknowledgement that the accusation was false seems to be a reasonable courtesy to the accused, especially as they've specifically asked for it on this page. Either way, enough said from me and all the best with it. -- Euryalus (talk) 04:20, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
I've tweaked a few things: Smallbones' opinion piece title to set the expectation, made Bradv's innocence clear when mentioned. As he's not mentioned in the opinion piece intro, and it's made clear he's innocent elsewhere, I think it's fairly clear throughout. Any thoughts? Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 00:30, 22 April 2023 (UTC)
Thanks for this, it's certainly an improvement. As a bystander I'd also prefer something like: As we'll see, the report Wales based his inquiry on turned out to be a lot less credible than he stated. no credibility at all, as Bradv had zero connection to the scam.. But up to you all, including obviously Smallbones and Bradv. -- Euryalus (talk) 07:58, 22 April 2023 (UTC)
I think that's just idiom at this point. That sort of understatement feels like it works out to a stronger statement, at least to my British ears. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 08:16, 22 April 2023 (UTC)
I think there's a missing "and" in the second sentence of the italicized intro (question, [and] that). XOR'easter (talk) 00:03, 25 April 2023 (UTC)
@XOR'easter: That's the 3rd sentence, but i hadn't intended the parts to be separate. Same thought, slightly different expression. Is that a grammatically correct thing to do? Dunno, but the "and" doesn't really hurt it any. I'll leave it to the copyeditor. Smallbones(smalltalk) 01:42, 25 April 2023 (UTC)
  • @Nick, Beeblebrox, and El C: I am currently on my second day of being stuck in the airport after my wallet was stolen and my laptpp screen broken, and have not had time to copyedit the article in question (I am currrently writing from my phone). My second flight was cancelled, and I am waiting in line to see if there is another one available today. It will likely not be possible for me to address the issues and publish today. If anyone would like to purchase me a ticket on another airline so that I can get home and fix this sooner, please let me know and we can arrange something. jp×g 17:52, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
    There was a new flight available an hour later, but it was delayed, so I might miss my connection. jp×g 18:44, 20 April 2023 (UTC).
    It was delayed a second time, causing everybody to miss the connection, and the next flight puts me home at approximately this time tomorrow. I am sympathetic to the concerns raised here, and have no intention of having the issue published without the opportunity of reviewing it and taking responsibility for what goes out, but this will constitute three and a half consecutive days inside an airport, so the first thing I'm going to do when I get home is sleep on a mattress and not the floor. Feel free to make "Shitepost" claims if the issue sucks after that, but in the meantime, I think they may be premature. jp×g 04:01, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
    Ugh :( hope this flight finally works out for you 🤞. I am interested in writing a (possibly contrasting) opinion piece from the perspective of founder syndrome, but I don't think I would have enough time to write it well until the next issue. Legoktm (talk) 14:41, 21 April 2023 (UTC)
    Go for it. Plenty of space for takes. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 10:52, 25 April 2023 (UTC)
  • The updated version of Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/Opinion is ready for copyediting (by any regular Signpost contributor0 Smallbones(smalltalk) 00:54, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Publishing issue 8

I have returned. Issue will be out tomorrow. jp×g 07:32, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

@JPxG:
Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:08, 25 April 2023 (UTC)
User:Bri, could you publish this issue please when you're next able to? Andreas JN466 07:40, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
Perhaps you should try a "once-per-3-weeks" schedule? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:19, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
I support this, based on the arrangements we've previously made with @JPxG:. We've been in this situation before and dealt with it. I'll approve each article in an hour or two, unless anybody objects, including my opinion piece. I'd like to hear from all current staff including @HaeB, Adam Cuerden, and Bluerasberry: Smallbones(smalltalk) 11:21, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
That was and edit conflict. To be clear, I support, Bri publishing. Smallbones(smalltalk) 11:24, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
I have been copyediting for the last hour or so. I am about halfway through. jp×g 11:26, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
Once per three weeks means my job goes back to being almost as bad as it used to be. Biweekly takes advantage of the secret 13th month (52 weeks/4= 13) to make it easy to keep up to date with featured content, even giving optional weeks off. And two weeks is about the absolute limit for a featured content anyone would want to read anyway. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 12:24, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
Acknowledging the ping, I just saw it – and that publication has already occurred. ☆ Bri (talk) 13:39, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Issue out

Feedback at Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/Single/2023-04-26. jp×g 18:00, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Most funded countries - US, then Nigeria

tldr - WMF's funding of Nigeria probably is a major new influence on the English-speaking Wikimedia community, and Signpost should be open to Nigerian contributors

This is not urgent but I wanted to flag something not generally known - the country with the most funded Wikimedia Foundation projects is the United States. The next most funded country is Nigeria. This could be of interest to The Signpost as English is the only official language in that country, with Languages of Nigeria saying that there are 60 million English speakers and another 100 million speaking Nigerian Pidgin. Right now The Signpost does not have contributors from Nigeria, but as a sizeable amount of all Wikimedia Movement funds are going to this English speaking community, The Signpost as an English Wikipedia and English-language publication probably should have some coverage of that region.

I think these September 2022 reports are the first documentation that the WMF has made of this.

The reports include all grants to the Wikimedia community, not just for Nigeria. The amount of money to Nigeria is a surprise to me as someone who follows the in person conferences because at the last one, Wikimania 2019 in Sweden, Nigeria was not a strong presence, whereas now I expect there will be a showing of outcomes at Wikimania 2023 in Singapore. It probably also will be the case that the WMF sustains or grows this level of funding to Nigeria, so this region may be a big part of the future of English Wikipedia. In general the Wikimedia Foundation has not attracted community discussion of its grant reports as evidenced by talk page activity and incoming links. I do not have an explanation for the low discussion as other initiatives which direct smaller amounts of money, like the meta:Community Wishlist Survey 2023, get participation from about 1000 editors.

I came to know about these reports when someone asked me to review Nigerian grant proposals, when otherwise I have not had much contact with Wikimedia community organizers from that region.

I feel that The Signpost is already a friendly enough space but I wanted to raise the funding trend here as a prelude to asking Nigerian grant recipients to feel welcome to report outcomes and submit journalism here. I plan to be at Wikimania 2023 in Singapore in August and I will try to recruit Signpost contributors there. Bluerasberry (talk) 15:46, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

@Bluerasberry I wanted to belatedly acknowledge this post. I meant to reply at the time and forgot. I agree that having more info in the Signpost about what's happening in Nigeria or Africa generally would be a good thing. Having one or two Signpost contributors from that part of the world would certainly help and make us a bit more cosmopolitan. Andreas JN466 08:08, 4 April 2023 (UTC)
Thanks, I am looking for support. Bluerasberry (talk) 14:02, 4 April 2023 (UTC)
This is a great idea. Up till now I don't think anyone has mentioned recruiting for The Signpost at any WMF sponsored event. I support growing a team of qualified contributors by all means possible. Having people from Nigeria has a plus – we would expand our points of view in ways we probably don't appreciate yet. And talk about underrpresenation? Nigeria has more English speakers than the UK (by a factor of two!). ☆ Bri (talk) 14:49, 4 April 2023 (UTC)
@Bluerasberry: I'm for it. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 07:57, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

WikiConference India

WikiConference India 2023 logo (RGB)

We completely missed announcing WikiConference India 2023 in the Signpost. :(

The event concludes today. Abhinav619 has been attending and has offered to contribute a write-up of the event to the Signpost (along with an obit for an Indian Wikimedian).

I'd suggest the WikiConference India piece would be best as a Special report. (Abhinav, the link to start an obit is [7] here.) Andreas JN466 15:11, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

In general a Special report should be pretty special. I've got nothing against the topic or the author, but think it's unlikely that this is so very special. Should we have a paragraph in News and notes? Obviously, at a minimum. A full page on it's own - very likely. Or perhaps best of all - just identify here why this story is so special. Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:58, 2 May 2023 (UTC)
I think we've used "Special report" generally for full-page reports on things like conferences (last year's virtual Wikimania?) ... I couldn't see any other regular title that fits. Andreas JN466 21:57, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

Followup on paid editing scam(s)

Since we had so much coverage of the paid-editing fiasco last month (Opinion, Arb Report, News and notes, at least...) I think it would be interesting to do a followup review of the discussions happening at WT:COI#Do we need a disclaimer/warning? and Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab)#Why don't we have warning banners about scams? I'm recusing myself since I added a comment there. ☆ Bri (talk) 22:28, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

Potential topic

This is worth covering IMO. QuicoleJR (talk) 20:06, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Unless there is consensus in favor of a change, which seems very unlikely, I'd disagree. Editors propose changes to big policies and guidelines all the time and we don't cover all of them. — Ixtal ( T / C ) ⁂ Non nobis solum. 06:47, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

State of the issue, May 7 2023

@JPxG, Bri, HaeB, Adam Cuerden, and Jayen466: and everybody.

It looks like there will be 6 or 7 articles. Most are in good shape. Should we aim for 6 or 7 hours from now for publication? JPxG let us know please. I'm outa here for 90 minutes. Smallbones(smalltalk) 14:10, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Sounds good. I normally do charts, but let's keep it simple since we can: Everything's ready to go except Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/Featured content needs copyedit, and Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/Recent research isn't written. Recent research has a habit of appearing right at the last minute; if it doesn't, I suppose it'll jump to next issue. I might make a grand effort to finish the April Fools retrospective, but, honestly, late is fine. We're volunteers. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 16:17, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
Featured content is copyedited. Note that the "seasons refreshing" in the Special report headline is from a piece of music. (Uncultured as I am, I was nonplussed at first and took it out. Now restored.) Andreas JN466 16:51, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
Sounds good. --Andreas JN466 16:28, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Unless we hear from JPxG first, it looks like publication is dependent on Bri's schedule so it will be about 8-9pm Eastern time, or in about 5 hours. I'm not going to get stressed about this - it looks like everything is ready to go. Smallbones(smalltalk) 19:32, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

"Recent research" should be publishable now if need be. (That is, if 1) we decide to postpone the "too soon" review per the above discussion and 2) Bri publishes a bit later today per Smallbones' note, I would add some more content still so that it doesn't just consist of the list items.)
Regards, HaeB (talk) 20:06, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
Good morning. I will boot the laptop once I am off the toilet, and then we can roll. jp×g 20:47, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
Thanks @JPxG:. I'll ping User:Bri as well to let him know. I'd essentially recused myself from the Recent research, but trust what @HaeB: is doing. Smallbones(smalltalk) 20:57, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
Laptop booted (I have not been on the toilet this whole time). jp×g 23:09, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
Just checking in – I'm on the road so contact will be irregular tonight. ☆ Bri (talk) 01:52, 8 May 2023 (UTC)
  • The research section is long and good writing. It is not marked as "ready for copyedit" but XOR wrote a complete review and Tilman presented some abstracts. There is enough content here to print without waiting for the next issue, and if there were more content, then it could be too much content. It is done. I copyedited it. Print it if possible. Bluerasberry (talk) 23:13, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

@JPxG: - Will you be publishing tonight? Smallbones(smalltalk) 00:51, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

OK, let's do what we can.

@JPxG, Bri, HaeB, Adam Cuerden, and Jayen466: and everybody.

Like I said last issue - we've been here before. The editor-in-chief is missing-in-action, probably his computer down again. We can do what he suggested before (way back) and just publish it ourselves. If Bri can publish, and nobody objects in the next 15 minutes, I'll approve all the articles and let Bri handle the rest. If JPxG comes back in time or somebody else objects, JPxG can remove my approvals and do it himself. Thanks. Smallbones(smalltalk) 02:21, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. (For reference / context, see also #Publication schedule above)
Regards, HaeB (talk) 02:29, 8 May 2023 (UTC)
Still here, on mobile. I'll do it when back at my keyboard in 30 minutes or less. ☆ Bri (talk) 03:24, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Looks like we missed the last two WP:TOP25 → Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/Traffic report (April 16 to 22 & April 23 to 29). If it's there when I get to publishing, I will include it. Otherwise, not. ☆ Bri (talk) 03:27, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

@Bri: If you are geared up to roll today, go ahead. I am out of town again (i.e. on 1366x768, of which about half is unreadable from aforementiond water damage). If not, fine too, although I will take more time to do it. Alo, the letter between "r" and "t" I find to work very intermittently on aforementioned keyboard, so if you could lend me a few for copyediting, that would be great. Or I can utilize my phone, I reckon. jp×g 03:59, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

It doeS! work, I juS!t have to S!lam it. jp×g 04:00, 8 May 2023 (UTC)
I can start on it. If your number keys work and you are using Windows, you can use the ASCII+Unicode hack. But it takes a pretty good memory to do the whole alphabet that way. Ha ha ha. But really, I'm going to start publishing in a minute. ☆ Bri (talk) 04:07, 8 May 2023 (UTC)
Many things I've been called on here, and many of them true, but I am proud to say that "proprietary OS user" isn't among them! Ha. Anyway, yeah, whoever pushes the button to publish is fine, so long as it is only one person. jp×g 04:15, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Issue 9, 8 May 2023 published

I think the script did everything OK. Spot checked a couple of enwp subscribers, and that appears done. Global, too. Can somebody do the social media posts? ☆ Bri (talk) 04:34, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! Mailing lists are done. Andreas JN466 05:18, 8 May 2023 (UTC)
I think Reader feedback's automatically created on publication. Going to search for it. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 05:48, 8 May 2023 (UTC)
If it isn't, I created a page manually so this works. ☆ Bri (talk) 05:53, 8 May 2023 (UTC)
Theoretically, Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/Single/2023-05-08 should work, but Module:Signpost isn't grabbing this issue yet Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 08:24, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks to everybody! Smallbones(smalltalk) 11:46, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

At the time of writing, Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Archives/2023-04-26 and Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Archives/2023-04-03 lack "Next issue" links. Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Archives/2023-03-20 on the other hand has the "Next issue" link.

I was looking for a way to fix this ... but at present it defeats me. Anyone? Andreas JN466 13:03, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

The new Form 990 is out

Page 49 of the new Form 990 (2021) shows the following total compensation figures for former CEO Katherine Maher and Janeen Uzzell in that year:

$798,632 and $515,553 respectively. Both figures far exceed all prior records.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/1/14/Wikimedia_Foundation_2021_Form_990.pdf#page=49

The Form 990 now shows a total of six executives whose total compensation exceeded $400,000.

For comparison, the Form 990 for the year before (2020) showed a total of eight executives whose total compensation exceeded $300,000:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/e/e4/Wikimedia_Foundation_2020_Form_990.pdf#page=48

Interesting developments ... Andreas JN466 17:04, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

I was wondering if Maher's 150% base-pay severance was out of line. According to this report, 200% is common. So, no; at least not at first blush. ☆ Bri (talk) 23:29, 9 May 2023 (UTC)
In Tretikov's case it was around 75%. Möller and Gardner about 100%, though in Gardner's case I recall that included consulting fees and the whole package was very controversial at the time. So compared to past WMF practice it is absolutely a new record. Andreas JN466 05:36, 10 May 2023 (UTC)
Incidentally, Tretikov's departure really was involuntary (occasioned by the Knowledge Engine controversy and WMF staff revolting/quitting). In Maher's case we know less, though Victoria said last year The Board has done its main job - changed the CEO. (She did not provide further details when asked.) Andreas JN466 06:05, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Featured Content

Is it okay if I try to help with some of the rhymes? I already did one. QuicoleJR (talk) 01:42, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Also, if my rhyming sucks, just tell me. QuicoleJR (talk) 01:44, 10 May 2023 (UTC)
@Adam Cuerden: Pinging the main editor of the section. QuicoleJR (talk) 01:50, 10 May 2023 (UTC)
@QuicoleJR: No worries! Help out at will! Just make sure to add your name to the list of credited people. Now, I should warn you: The first FA in the list has to have a good image for next to it, and the snooker one doesn't, so I'll need to reshuffle the order a bit. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.3% of all FPs. Currently celebrating his 600th FP! 05:51, 10 May 2023 (UTC)
Ok. Thanks! QuicoleJR (talk) 11:58, 10 May 2023 (UTC)
@Adam Cuerden: All the summaries are done, except for a few music articles I left to you. The main thing now is figuring out the pictures. QuicoleJR (talk) 14:14, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Removing myself

Hi! I've removed myself from the contributors list. I don't think I'll be dedicating much time to the Post, especially with the quicker schedule, so I think this is the best move. I'll keep the pages watchlisted and might contribute to some discussions, though. — Ixtal ( T / C ) ⁂ Non nobis solum. 16:36, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Queering Wikipedia

Let's not overlook this submission:

User:Hexatekin/Signpost_draft

Seems important and from a quick scan looks like a pretty good job to me. Andreas JN466 23:46, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree, this could have some copyediting and run in the upcoming issue. ☆ Bri (talk) 00:22, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
Copyedit done. Nice work. Andreas JN466 14:58, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

I have moved it to Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/WikiProject report ☆ Bri (talk) 17:05, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

The intro should clarify the relation of the authors to the event that this report covers. Weren't at least some of them also among its main organizers? When they write things like "Organizers hope to ...", are they talking about themselves in the third person? As a reminder, one of the authors had already failed to disclose such a relation in his previous Signpost contribution, giving rise to serious concerns.
I'm not fundamentally opposed to the Signpost occasionally giving room to Wikimedians promoting their organizing efforts (after all, we also have the recurring "News from the WMF" section), but readers should be enabled to distinguish that from independent reporting. Regards, HaeB (talk) 17:25, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
I thought it was obvious that it was from the organizers. But now that you raise the issue I also strongly agree that it should be made explicit for readers, in particular given the earlier issue. Thank you for mentioning it. Usually we just have a little italic paragraph at the top saying something about the authors. Andreas JN466 17:44, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
@OwenBlacker: Could you please add some author information at the top of the piece? Andreas JN466 17:50, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
I too had thought it was obvious enough not to need disclaiming — apologies. I have added a paragraph immediately after the logo at the start, in italics and starting with the word "Disclaimer". Feel free to edit into house style as appropriate. — OwenBlacker (he/him; Talk; please {{ping}} me in replies) 18:04, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
This is great. Thank you! Andreas JN466 18:23, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
Thank you OwenBlacker, this is appreciated. Please try to be proactive about this in future Signpost contributions. Regards, HaeB (talk) 18:25, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
Thanks @HaeB. As I only provided copy-edits and a minor expansion, it just didn't really occur to me. It should have done, of course; I will try to keep it in mind in future. Thank you for the prompt. — OwenBlacker (he/him; Talk; please {{ping}} me in replies) 18:40, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Arbitration report

I could use some help getting my head around the upcoming Arbitration report. The discussions have been lengthy, as are the proposed remedies. Should I just sum up the remedies, which are mostly i-bans and topic bans plus a new unusual "reliable sourcing restriction"? Personally I find "Wugapodes' rationale" for an editor ban (2400+ words!) the most compelling, well presented, and interesting to read part of the decision. But giving special attention to one arb I'm sure will result in new drama and vitriol against The Signpost, so maybe I'll do it on my own. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:44, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

I would support that. Speaking generally and historically, the Signpost's Arbitration reports have often not been very informative, limiting themselves to a formulaic replication of user names and sanctions that may be helpful for those readers that are already familiar with the conflict that ArbCom ruled on, but don't provide a lot of context for those who are not, or who are interested in what might be wider consequences or historical contexts of a decision. E.g.:
1. Did the ruling contain parts that might become important precedents? On what precedents did it rely on?
2. What (if anything) was unusual or special about the case?
3. What (if any) were aspects that the arbitrators were divided or conflicted about, according to their public statements?
4. What were the main content conflicts that led to the behavioral issues which ArbCom ruled on?
(I almost wrote "robotic replication" above, but as JPxG demonstrated here, a AI-generated and human-corrected case summary can in fact be quite informative, at least compared to the usual generic listing of remedies.)
Specifically regarding this case and Wugapodes' rationale, quoting from it would seem quite useful regarding 2. and 3. For balance though it might be good to also cite or summarize opposing rationales from the vote that it concerned.
Regards, HaeB (talk) 22:33, 20 May 2023 (UTC)
As for 1., Principle 16 seems important and a possible precedent: Therefore, the Arbitration Committee, as an identified high-level decision making body under the UCoC enforcement guidelines, may choose to evaluate compliance with English Wikipedia PAG, while still respecting the UCoC. If I understand this correctly, ArbCom posits it as axiomatic that if PAG are applied, UCOC compliance has also been addressed. In other words, ArbCom reserves the right to refer solely to PAG wordings in deciding cases. Andreas JN466 23:12, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestions, they helped a lot. I've made some additions, wrapped it up marked ready for copyediting, ☆ Bri (talk) 14:18, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

@Bri: The case has now actually concluded, so we need to speak of decision instead of proposed decision etc. Do you have time to go through it and make the changes? Andreas JN466 14:28, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
Yes, I think I can. In a 15 second review I don’t see much change from the proposal. ☆ Bri (talk) 14:31, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
Marked ready for copyediting, again. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:04, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
Done. Still needs a title though. Perhaps easiest if you lose the == Headline == and use that as the page title? Andreas JN466 17:35, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Reliable sourcing restriction precedent

Does anyone know if the sourcing "reliable sourcing restriction" under this decision has a precedent? I thought maybe WP:MEDRS was parallel but just discovered that it is only a guideline. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:31, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

I just added something on this topic (I had not seen your question here ...). Andreas JN466 17:33, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Image proposal

Prime Minister of Poland Mateusz Morawiecki taking part in the celebrations on the occasion of the National Remembrance Day for Poles rescuing Jews during the German occupation in Sadowne in 2019. May the on-wiki reconciliation be as graceful.

I would like to include an image with the piece, maybe this one with suggested caption. Maybe it would be more appropriate if we had another article editor decide to include it. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:30, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

The picture may well prove controversial, given that it touches on one of the key points many of the arguments are about. (Also, "German occupation" is probably a bit tame. Something like "German reign of industrial-scale mass murder, enslavement and terror" would probably be more apt.) Andreas JN466 18:20, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
Caption was virtually cut-paste from Commons. There are other images that may be better at commons:Category:Righteous Among the Nations from Poland. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:36, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
The reason the pic might be deemed provocative is that Grabowski et al. feel Poles use memorial events like this to portray Poland as a "noble victim". They feel it is part of a whitewashing attempt. So that is something to be aware of. The sentiment of reconciliation is of course laudable.
(And ignore my comment about the Germans. Reading up recently about the level of death and suffering, among Poles as well as Jews, I was just struck by how Poles and Jews are accusing each other 80 years on, while nobody reproaches the Germans, whose (ancestors') sole fault all of this was.) Andreas JN466 19:30, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
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