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The following is an automatically-generated compilation of all talk pages for the Signpost issue dated 2024-01-10. For general Signpost discussion, see Wikipedia talk:Signpost.

Comix: Conflict resolution (949 bytes · 💬)

  • I recall this unironically being the solution to several infobox discussions I've participated in. ThadeusOfNazereth(he/him)Talk to Me! 14:14, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
    Wouldn't that just shift disagreements over to what goes into that half? CurryCity (talk) 12:03, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
    I haven't ever seen an infobox discussion, but having only half an infobox would most likely shift the disagreements over to a fight over what parts are put into the "half" of the infobox. - The Master of Hedgehogs (always up for a conversation!) 19:01, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Crossword: everybody gangsta till the style sheets start cascading (2,740 bytes · 💬)

As a person who has wrestled with CSS for a long while, I enjoyed this! →StaniStani 02:54, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I have an idea: Maybe add text-transform: uppercase and text-align: center to the input boxes.

Crosswords are case-insensitive and are usually filled with uppercase letters. Also, there should be one character per input, so it should be centered. (I know that putting a maximum length on an input field is a technical impossibility in MediaWiki, but the users are still expected to type one character) QuickQuokka [⁠talk • contribs] 14:03, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

@QuickQuokka: Yeah, I banged my head against the task of limiting the fields to one character for a while. My conclusion was that this is simply impossible to do with the abilities we're granted by MediaWiki. The text-transform thing, though, I will be stealing, because that's smart. jp×g🗯️ 01:08, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
@JPxG: It's not stealing if it's CC BY-SA. I agreed to share my work with others when I signed up to use this platform
Also, is it possible to use JavaScript to limit the number of characters? I know you can't just load JS into articles, so it would have to be sitewide JS edited by an interface admin. QuickQuokka [⁠talk • contribs] 13:32, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

Not to spoil the fun of discovering ingenious wikitext hacks, but if/when WP:On-demand gadgets are implemented, crosswords could be done more like every other website. – SD0001 (talk) 18:14, 4 February 2024 (UTC)

From the editor: NINETEEN MORE YEARS! NINETEEN MORE YEARS! (4,076 bytes · 💬)

Congratulations!

Congratulations on Signpost birthday and best wishes! =)) --former Vikivestnik author --ssr (talk) 13:57, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

What a great history Signpost has! Props to User:Michael Snow, and all the Signposters over the years. All the best: Rich Farmbrough 14:12, 12 January 2024 (UTC).
Happy Birthday WikiSignPost!Vulcan❯❯❯Sphere! 14:30, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Great to see how far we've come, here's to NINETEEN MORE YEARS, CHEERS!!! -B D A *clink!* — Preceding undated comment added 22:42, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

As Wikipedia has grown, it's become clear just how good an idea this was. It's impossible on one's own to keep up with everything going on everywhere, so something highlighting the "hot spots" really has been valuable. I'd be very happy to buy the Signpost (or those who help make it happen) a beer. Seraphimblade Talk to me 14:46, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

NINETEEN MORE YEARS! NINETEEN MORE YEARS! Kazamzam (talk) 15:38, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Don't usually join in chants, but I'll yell this one! Been reading this worthy news almost since it began, and it is my sincerest hope that The Signpost will still be around long after I'm not. P.I. Ellsworth , ed. put'er there 17:16, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

So, the Signpost has turned 19 years old! But will Wikipedia and the Signpost still be around in 2043? GeoffreyT2000 (talk) 17:21, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Of course that post would be featured! Better-reputed platforms than Reddit much? Aaron Liu (talk) 17:31, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Congratulations! I just checked, and I am two months short of having 19 years as a Wikipedia editor. --rogerd (talk) 18:54, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

  • Congrats to The Signpost, and thank you for your work as editor-in-chief! —Ganesha811 (talk) 22:09, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Even though I'm terribly late to the party at this point, I couldn't agree more with JPxG and Michael Snow: so, happy birthday to the Signpost, and thank you for allowing me to write some pieces of its history... : ) Oltrepier (talk) 20:26, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Love the beautiful illustration! Alsoyeahcongratson19yearstoo UnexpectedSmoreInquisition aka USI (talk) 04:03, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

As a former Western New Yorker, I will raise a toast as heartily as any Southeast Michigander on this issue.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 08:07, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

In focus: The long road of a featured article candidate (7,718 bytes · 💬)

I an sorry you received an email saying your review "was unwelcome and [you] should stay away": that is completely unacceptable. The whole FAC process depends on the kindness of others to give up their limited time to review articles, and hearing that someone was trying to force you away is problematic. I hope it never happens to you again, but if it does (or if it happens to anyone who reads this), please post the details with the name of the editor concerned at Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. If people object to someone's review, the best place(s) to discuss it are either on the review page or FAC Talk, where a wider audience—including the @FAC coordinators: —are able to judge the merits and to stop people forcing reviewers away. Cheers - SchroCat (talk) 13:19, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

  • I would agree with SchroCat above. FAC is only as good as the reviewers who show up, and hostility towards people taking time out of their day to improve articles hurts the entire process. Article quality already suffers in my opinion from people being afraid of opposing on quality concerns. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 13:35, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
    I agree with SchroCat and David Fuchs - it bears repeating that an oppose !vote is a commentary on the article, not an attack against the nominator. I would rather have a well-reasoned oppose than a cursory support, since one could at least use the opposer's feedback to fix the article and potentially flip them into the support column. If someone were to support without actually believing that the article should be promoted to FAC, it would be bad both for the nominator and for the article. Driving opposing reviewers away just turns the FAC process into "a politicized good ol' boys' club", as one editor recently described it, and it reflects poorly on the process. – Epicgenius (talk) 18:11, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
    "a politicized good ol' boys' club" smacks of bad faith and a sentiment I would roundly reject. We have a healthy proportion of new nominators every month and many of those come back with their second or third FACs after that. - SchroCat (talk) 18:21, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
    I wholeheartedly agree. That was just something I saw in an unrelated discussion about topicons; if people think FAC is a cliquish process, that will certainly make them distrust the entire concept of featured articles. – Epicgenius (talk) 18:35, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for the inside advice about FAC work! I am currently working on improving Ida Saxton McKinley to GA status in hopes of making it an FA. To be honest, doing all the research and making sure that you have enough details but not too much is really difficult, but I think that having high-quality articles about U.S. First Ladies is a goal worth striving for. I am very much looking forward to the next installment. ❤HistoryTheorist❤ 17:03, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

  • FAC can be nitpicky for sure, but each time I've been through it I know the article has ended up in a much better place than it started. I agree with the author that promptness avails the nominator well, and that purely cosmetic/subjective battles aren't worth fighting. I'd also note one piece of etiquette that I had no idea of for my first nomination - it's ok to explicitly ask someone else to come review your FAC! My third nomination languished for weeks - so I went and asked some folks on their talk pages, and a bunch of them came and reviewed the article! Not everyone will say yes, of course. Phrasing your request neutrally (and without any hint of quid pro quo) is also important. But I think many nominators are unaware that the best option, if no one is showing up to review, is to go ask some people! Prior reviewers of any GAs or DYKs you've written are a good place to start. —Ganesha811 (talk) 22:15, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
    @Ganesha811 that's a good point, I'll mention that in Part 2. And, @HistoryTheorist, when your article is ready, please ping me and I'll be happy to give it a look. I recently reviewed Jane Irwin Harrison; maybe I'll make a hobby out of doing first lady reviews :-) RoySmith (talk) 23:12, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
    Asking other active FAC reviewers in a neutral manner is also a great way to get people to your review too. Looking down the nominations page shows a lot of regular reviewers who it's good to ask. Not all will be able to help, obviously, but enough to help your review get some traction. - SchroCat (talk) 17:22, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
    it's ok to explicitly ask someone else to come review your FAC! this is also true if you are putting the article up for a pre-FAC peer review. If your article is within the remit of an active wikiproject, you can also leave a notification on the project's talkpage as well as notifying individual editors Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 15:58, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
  • @HistoryTheorist, best of luck on improving Ida Saxton McKinley to GA/FA status. If you're going for a GAN or FAC, you may want to request feedback from other editors who contribute in the topic area. For example, @Thebiguglyalien has written numerous GAs/FAs on U.S. first ladies, so it may be a good idea to ask if he has any advice (he may not, but it's not a bad idea to try). – Epicgenius (talk) 17:33, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
  • In my experience, everyone (barring the odd exception) at FAC is there because they want to see the best-quality articles promoted. The source of conflict is that nominators, who have worked hard on their article and believe them to be near-flawless (otherwise they wouldn't be nominating it), are interested in their article being promoted whereas reviewers are interesting upholding the process and the criteria. It can be frustrating for both sometimes, especially with less-experienced nominators, because the reviewer will be seeing flaws that they've seen many times in many articles ("haven't people learnt by now!") but are brand new to the nominator. I hope you enjoyed the FAC process, Roy, and that you'll bring more articles through it. I'll try to offer a review when I get chance! HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:24, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
  • This is incredibly helpful in demystifying the process. Thank you for such a clearly and lively report! Innisfree987 (talk) 09:20, 6 February 2024 (UTC)

In the media: What is plagiarism? Oklahoma Disneyland? Reaching a human being at Wikipedia? (9,228 bytes · 💬)

  • Excellent article! Smallchief (talk) 13:11, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
    • Thanks for the kind words @Smallchief:! I should emphasize that I'm somewhat embarrassed that, while we were trying to publish, I found @GorrillaWarfare:'s X video about the same topic as the top Ackman story. She did a wonderful job (in under 10 minutes). My 560 word text suffers in comparison. - Smallbones no relation

A while back I spotted an article on a Facebook history interest page that was a direct unattributed copy of a Wikipedia article that I had contributed to. I contacted the page admin (who was not the author of the piece) and it was removed. I suspect that (unattributed copying) happens a lot. Donald Albury 16:29, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

It happens. I remember one time I asked another editor to translate a quote from Turkish so I could put it in an article. They did and I did. Later, I found the exact same words in Dawn. If I remember correctly, @Jenhawk777 found some of her WP-work in some sort of academic journal.
I liked Molly's little video-note on "Oxman is not currenlty on Plagiarism from Wikipedia - Correction, she wasn't when I recorded this, but..." Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 16:49, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
It's true! The copyvio tester found almost the entire article on Biblical criticism, that I had written, copied word for word with my references, in an academic journal published in Africa! No credit was given - as if they had done the months of research themselves! (It was easy to prove it wasn't me doing the copying because of the dates.) I guess they didn't realize Wiki is global! I contacted the publisher and ratted them out. Jenhawk777 (talk) 21:49, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
A few years ago I was reading a planning application about the proposed demolition of a disused chapel building which I hadn't yet photographed. I was bemused to find that, as an attempt to justify the point that it was no longer required, the applicant (a housebuilding firm which wanted to buy the site) had copied and pasted the whole of one of my "List of places of worship in..." lists, with all the Wiki markup, images, references and everything else (in excess of 120KB!), into the Planning Statement. It was clearly an attempt to demonstrate that other places of worship existed locally; but in the largely rural area in question, the fact that it is irrelevant that churches of an entirely different denomination happen to exist anything up to 20 villages and 40 miles away was apparently lost on them. Needless to say, no acknowledgement of the copying was given. I never did get to photograph the chapel, incidentally ... it was demolished before I could visit the village in question! Hassocks5489 (Floreat Hova!) 21:23, 26 January 2024 (UTC)
  • Molly's video is published on YouTube not on X/Twitter. Barkeep49 (talk) 22:07, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
  • Yes, plagiarism of Wikipedia has been an ongoing issue for as long as I can remember. Back in the day, I once found a magazine article on a topic I'd written about that was about 50% cribbed from the Wikipedia article. It will continue to happen, particularly in non-mainstream sources; the kinds of media that we normally consider reliable sources now use better anti-plagiarism software prior to publishing than they did in the "old days". Risker (talk) 22:11, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
    That' good to know. Thank you. Jenhawk777 (talk) 23:16, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I first came to Wikipedia because some of my work had been copied onto Wikipedia, and I was asked to make some corrections to the Wikipedia version. I resolved this by re-licensing my work under Creative Commons, so there was no copyright violation any more. Some people might be curious about plagiarism can be avoided in most, but not all, situations simply by complying with copyright law. The classic exception is self-plagiarism, where the same article is submitted a second time. There is no copyright violation, but it is still plagiarism because it is not an original work. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 18:26, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I have gotten in serious trouble a couple of times for copying myself - which I thought was allowed - and it is, but not without noting it in the edit summary. Big fire on head! Jenhawk777 (talk) 21:10, 13 January 2024 (UTC)


Off-topic, but wanted to share Pantera - Wikipedia Fact or Fiction (Best of Compilation). -At the age of 15 you started a fire in your home to scare your sister, but you accidentally burned the house down. -I was 14 and I only burnt a great portion of the house down. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 19:19, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

OMG! Jenhawk777 (talk) 21:09, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
@Gråbergs Gråa Sång: - I just love the format on that show and think I've put links in about 20 Wikiarticles to the videos. Ice-T is my favorite, it shows him and his schtick much better than any words could, and essentially confirms the facts as stated in Wikipedia. Sure there are almost always minor grumbles and fine tuning interpretations, but for the series as a whole, the 14 vs. 15 and "only a great portion of the house" are about as extreme as the "mistakes of fact" get. I only quit putting these videos into articles because I don't really like heavy metal music. The genre goes back - as far as I can tell - to about 2005 on WBEZ radio. It appeared to me like some middle talent rocker showed up unexpectedly at the studio, and they wanted to do an interview but had done no prep. So just read the Wikipedia article and ask if it's true. Somehow I'd love to do a whole on-Wiki series like this, but I have no video production experience. Anybody want to volunteer? Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:37, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
Not 20, but I did do Dee Snider. There was another thing called WikiWhat? And something called Actually me [1] that looked at WP at least sometimes. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 18:59, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
  • The bit about Mendriq is really cool to hear, I think more cross-site integration like that for wikiprojects could go a long way in Wikimedia's future. Orchastrattor (talk) 17:16, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
    Yeah, there's plenty of groups doing small, well-organized scholarly websites with parallels to bits of our Wikimedia sites. I've been corresponding with one of the regional editors of Historic Markers Database about setting up links from Wikidata to their pages and back, and Commons, and ENWP especially our lists of landmarks and historic places. At Wikipedia Day NYC I saw an OpenStreetMaps guy explaining something to a Wikipedian and it was too bad the HMDB guy wasn't there to get in on that. Anyway I was busy explaining the birth and childhood of an article to a pair of WP newbies at the moment. Opportunities for collaboration are many, but of course we tend to become too busy playing around with our own insiders. Jim.henderson (talk) 15:54, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
  • Three tangents: a) I wish there were a way to teach Wikipedia readers about the existence of Special:CiteThisPage, b) unattributed copies of Wikipedia are a pain because they can result in circular reporting, and c) old news but multiple counts of unattributed copying from Wikipedia were discussed (or found in some cases) by Hbomberguy for his "Plagiarism and You(tube)" video. Rotideypoc41352 (talk · contribs) 21:51, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

News and notes: In other news ... see ya in court! (1,405 bytes · 💬)

  • "If the Times lawsuit is successful, then the use of Wikipedia content could – conceivably – likewise be found to be infringing the copyright of its volunteer authors." -- However, due to the terms of our Creative Commons license, as long as there is an acknowledgement somewhere they are using text from Wikipedia, the copyright of volunteer editors are not harmed. The license permits -- if not encourages -- text on Wikipedia can be reused for any purpose, in any way, a user permits. However, only as long as that freedom is given in turn which may be their infringement. -- llywrch (talk) 21:31, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Obituary: Anthony Bradbury (1,156 bytes · 💬)

  • My condolences to his family friends, and fellow Wikipedians. Bearian (talk) 15:47, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
  • So sorry to read this, it seems like we have lost a number of old-timers over the past year. I appreciate you publishing these obituatries though and the opportunity to know a little bit more about editors who we work alongside daily. Liz Read! Talk! 17:40, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
  • Rest in peace <3 sawyer * he/they * talk 22:06, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
  • Peace be upon him and his family. Yanguas (talk) 00:11, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Special report: Public Domain Day 2024 (6,784 bytes · 💬)

I intend to subsist solely on kale and quinoa so I can categorize Picasso on commons on my 198th birthday. No Swan So Fine (talk) 12:57, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

The copyright terms are ridiculously too long.Vulcan❯❯❯Sphere! 14:40, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

  • The editorial I believe is correct when it says to avoid involving politicians But I believe that courts have taken a broader view of fair use because of the 1998 extension. Many academics and libraries have formulated guidelines for fair use and encourage people to use it. Even the fact that SCOTUS declined to rule again Google's in Authors Guild, Inc. v. Google, Inc. shows a willingness to take the public domain more seriously. Indeed, WP editors should do all they can to exercise their right to the material that just entered the public domain. As the aphorism goes, "Use it, or lose it."- kosboot (talk) 17:07, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
@Kosboot: As a foreign, I can't speak for the US, but another good example comes from the recent statements of the Italian Court of Audit, which I covered in a previous issue. Yes, it's kind of a shameless plug, but I hope it's justified... : D Oltrepier (talk) 21:02, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
Agreed. In my opinion, works should be released into the public domain at most 50 years after publication in my opinion, and even that's too long.
Also, copyright laws did not consider for the fact that in their future, anybody could share and remix almost anything and everything easily. QuickQuokka [⁠talk • contribs] 13:53, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
No, it should be from creation, not publication. Determining when something was first published is difficult, and many photographs and manuscripts were never published. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 23:44, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Missing in the article

What I miss in the article is the celebration of Public Domain Day 2024 on Commons. All files that have been restored 1 - 10 January because of Public Domain Day + newly uploaded files, are now available at the project page c:Commons:Public Domain Day/2024. Romaine (talk) 22:23, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Here's a question

About 10 years ago, I took a photograph of a statue in a public park. The statue had recently been commissioned and the artist paid for it by the city government. Thus, I contributed a few pennies from my taxes for the creation of that statue in that public park that anyone could see and photograph. I posted my photograph of the statue on a Wikipedia page -- and it was removed by someone who said I was violating the copyright of the artist. Was I? Why? Smallchief (talk) 11:59, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

@Smallchief: Well... I've genuinely no idea, but maybe SnowFire can help us! Oltrepier (talk) 21:24, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
I am not an expert here on sculptures; I'd mostly be quoting from Freedom_of_panorama#Notable_lawsuits_concerning_sculptures and c:Commons:Public art and copyrights in the US. My understanding is that if the sculpture was truly generic where the "sculptor" was just a employee hammering out a paint-by-numbers generic thingy that's a glorified lamppost, then there might be no right to it (as there's either no creative element). Alternatively, if a federal government employee made it as part of performance of their duties, it might be public domain (uncharted territory here - does this even ever happen? Sounds like it was the municipal government anyway.) If the artist built a sculpture then sold it, even if it was directed by the government, then the artist probably does have some rights, and then there's all the usual questions about if the artist has freely licensed the work. However, per the Commons link above, if the statue is from before 1989, it's probably public domain due to the annoyance of registering a copyright on a sculpture. (This is not legal advice.) SnowFire (talk) 23:12, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
Thanks for the expert comment. Smallchief (talk) 02:06, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
Please see: Commons:Public_art_and_copyrights_in_the_US- kosboot (talk) 00:59, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
Sorry - this is the correct link: c:COM:PACUSA kosboot (talk) 13:08, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
That answers my question. I likely violated copyright law by publishing a photo of the statue on Wikipedia. But...I think the copyright law is ridiculous -- offering far too much protection to authors, sculptors, etc. Moreover, if I were the artist who created the statue I mentioned above, I would be delighted to have it displayed on Wikipedia: free publicity and recognition rather than wallowing in obscurity. Smallchief (talk) 13:22, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
It is, yes.
If you really want to go down the rabbit hole: you can try and look up who the sculptor was, and then ask them for permission - either via the sculptor posting on their website that they've licensed works X, Y, and Z under cc-by-sa, or via convincing the sculptor to follow the process at c:Commons:Volunteer_Response_Team#Declaration_of_consent_for_all_enquiries. Given that the odds of someone abusing the license to create a line of knock-off statues is... remote... it should be safe-ish for the sculptor. (Technically it gives up the legal right to mess with, like, a band of Illinois Nazis using the image too, except that with Google Image search, that's nearly impossible to stop anyway.) SnowFire (talk) 18:45, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Technology report: Wikipedia: A Multigenerational Pursuit (8,242 bytes · 💬)

  • This year, I re-created a MediaWiki team It's sad that this is at least the second time someone has had to do that. Lila killed the first one in the Reorg of Doom. Other managers unrecognizably transformed the second trying to further their rise, driving off some good people in the process. Anomie⚔ 13:53, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
    • It was quite an eye-opener for me to realize that the bot I volunteered to take over eleven years ago was developed and run by volunteers, and later to realize that even virtually the entire MediaWiki software platform that Wikipedia runs on was also developed and supported by volunteers. At this point I assume that virtually everything but the server hardware and fundraising is run by volunteers. It's nice to know that there is a MediaWiki team, albeit one listed at the very bottom of the organization. It was nice to meet Selena and Birgit in Toronto at the November conference there. – wbm1058 (talk) 04:38, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
  • I think the Foundation is really thinking through these issues correctly under Maryana, and I like what Selena had to say here. They are taking the issue of editor retention seriously. No doubt there will always be some tension between the WMF and Wikipedians, but this is a very positive indication. —Ganesha811 (talk) 22:39, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
  • In April 2024 you said, "My experience so far has been that we (the Wikimedia Foundation) have a very contentious relationship with English Wikipedia." As a Wikimedia community member, I agree with this. Here you ask, "How can we, as the Foundation, best support volunteers so that you can do the work of producing more knowledge?" I would like 1) the Foundation to openly encourage the Wikimedia community to list points of contention and 2) empower the community to seriously discuss these issues in public. Right now, the Wikimedia Foundation has extreme aversion to acknowledging when the Wikimedia community consensus takes different social and ethical positions than the Wikimedia Foundation. Without the Wikimedia Foundation and the Wikimedia community being able to openly discuss differences as peer institutions, I see little hope of reconciling differences. Bluerasberry (talk) 18:01, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
  • Years ago, WMF managed to arrest the decline in the number of editors, but we still have the problem of more of the work being done by fewer editors. The problem is generational; when you talk to the kids, not just the internet but the Wikipedia has always been there. Most don't even stop to think that someone wrote it. And no one looks at the source code of web pages any more, as it is a mass of incomprehensible CSS. I hope that WMF can come up with another solution. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 04:13, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
  • Some thoughts:
    1. The Foundation needs to think beyond technology to solve editor retention problems. For example, Wikimedia markup is not that difficult: it's just another form of punctuation. The problem, IMHO, is with templates which are either poorly documented or unfindable. In the past when I've complained about this, the response has been "You're right, but the developers want to make these changes before they're documented." Users don't care about what's under the hood: knowing that they exist & how to use them is the important part.
    2. Money always helps. (Note: this is a point I believe I've mentioned to Selena face-to-face.) A lot of work -- currently unpaid -- goes into creating & maintaining all of the projects, & "labor of love" only motivates volunteers so far. At the same time, we have repeated demonstrations that there is a lot of money available. (For example, $1 million was wasted on an unneeded & poorly-received effort to renaming the Foundation. Other examples can easily be found.) Now I'm not even asking that every volunteer be given a share of money from the donations -- or interest on the endowment -- but that rules or a procedure be made available to volunteers for requesting funding for uses of this money beyond evangelism. Say, if a volunteer has written several Featured Articles they are qualified to ask for money to buy (or be reimbursed) research materials. After all, writing a useful article -- by which I mean an article of B or even C quality -- can take as much effort as writing an undergraduate term paper; having done both, I know what I'm saying here. Currently, there is little indication this is possible. (And then there are the needs of volunteers who perform less visible but equally valuable work such as monitoring AfD or resolving disputes.)
    3. And then there's having an open dialogue with the volunteer community. Sometimes we volunteers are wrong, & sometimes we're inexcusably rude. But both of those arise because far too often the Foundation treats us as the staff of your average social media website, such as Twitter/X or Stack Exchange, treats its users: as a bunch of anonymous eyeballs who must be tolerated because it's part of the job. While there are individual Foundation employees who are praiseworthy exceptions to this comment, I can't help but reminded of Cory Doctorov's suggestion that a business on the information superhighway has some cool people in it -- "Can you let them come out & play?" -- only to reflect that all of them who are have. -- llywrch (talk) 21:22, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
    On your example for point 2.. I think this is possible. Local wikimedia orgs have purchased books, cameras and refunded event attendance in the past. We have the whole Wikipedia Library. There are lots of examples where recognised editors, organisers and developers are helped with all kinds of things. However due to tax fraud and corruption risks, managing such programs comes with challenges.. So as an editor, you cannot just say "gimme money for a book". You have to bring the use case, document it, administrate it and verify it. And for many editors that is simply too much work. I think this is an important point to make as I often see people asking for things, which I know my local wikimedia org can help with or facilitate, yet some people are unaware, or don't want to spend effort. But effort is needed because without it, abuse will follow. And if you want people not to have to spend effort than you have to think it through to the level of a Wikipedia Library initiative. So if this is something that interests you I would encourage you to, like the wikipedia library, spend some time thinking about how to make a program for this work. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 10:57, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Another issue? VisualEditor is praised because time was put in to fix it. It was improved immensely until it actually worked, and wasn't a buggy mess.

This is not true of a lot of things pushed forwards by the Foundation. MediaViewer thinks that if the date is given as 1900, then the work dates from 1 January 1900, and will tell people that. If the work is by Mathew Brady and Levin Corbin Handy, it'll tell you it was a work by Mathew Brady alone. These bugs have been unfixed for EIGHT YEARS. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.7% of all FPs. 05:25, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Traffic report: The most viewed articles of 2023 (3,390 bytes · 💬)

Good to know, specially considering how the daily numbers never seemed troublesome. Hope 2024 doesn't have such a case again. igordebraga ≠ 14:36, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
  • It seems rather arbitrary to exclude YouTube but include ChatGPT. Andrew🐉(talk) 19:22, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
  • Unfiltered/unmodified TOP 30 pageviews of enwiki articles from pageview exports on the year 2023:
     1	 140245117 Main_Page
     2	 128879655 Special:Search
     3	  85424619 Wikipedia:Featured_pictures
     4	  80543464 -
     5	  64539644 Cleopatra
     6	  63581990 YouTube
     7	  52459446 ChatGPT
     8	  48549304 Deaths_in_2023
     9	  38706364 2023_Cricket_World_Cup
    10	  35039343 XXX:_Return_of_Xander_Cage
    11	  32403012 Indian_Premier_League
    12	  31260165 Oppenheimer_(film)
    13	  31169166 Facebook
    14	  28203418 J._Robert_Oppenheimer
    15	  27855090 Instagram
    16	  27311024 XXX_(film_series)
    17	  25902840 Cricket_World_Cup
    18	  23078233 Jawan_(film)
    19	  22368029 Sex
    20	  22079082 XXXX_(beer)
    21	  22030018 Taylor_Swift
    22	  20997223 The_Last_of_Us_(TV_series)
    23	  20806557 2023_Indian_Premier_League
    24	  20652505 Index_(statistics)
    25	  20610304 Pathaan_(film)
    26	  20104479 XXXTentacion
    27	  19872205 Premier_League
    28	  19761243 Barbie_(film)
    29	  19186453 The_Idol_(TV_series)
    30	  19029679 Cristiano_Ronaldo
Source: https://archive.org/details/2023-top_2k_user_pageviews
--Dušan Kreheľ (talk) 21:54, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

WikiProject report: WikiProjects Israel and Palestine (5,727 bytes · 💬)

Them AI flags are cursed. Aaron Liu (talk) 13:55, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@Aaron Liu I think JPxG is trying to land himself a copyright case in the ICC. The SignPost will be there to report on the case of course! ~ 🦝 Shushugah (he/him • talk) 16:06, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm *very* surprised that the Signpost author would spoof the term From the river to the sea given how politically charged (to put it mildly) the phrase is. A phrase in the opposite direction would be something like A land without an article for an article without a land.Naraht (talk) 14:25, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

@Naraht Politically charged is the alternate name of this article. From the river to the sea in contemporary terms is a Pro-Palestinian chant, but historically it was also used by Revisionist Zionism including the Likud party, which makes it a deliciously controversial slogan. I haven't heard of A land without a people for a people without a land before, thank you for that! ~ 🦝 Shushugah (he/him • talk) 16:04, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
Shushugah Welcome to Category:Phrases related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Some are less controversial, but a good number are.Naraht (talk) 16:23, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree that the play on "river to the sea" was not optimal, but I'm surprised the comments are only on that and not on, for instance, the brilliance of my contributions. Coretheapple (talk) 15:57, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

And by the way, if a harmless use of "river to sea" bothers you, the blood would spray from your ears if you waded into some of the talk page discussions in I/P. This article focuses on civility for a reason. Coretheapple (talk) 16:04, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

I couldn't help but read it as "From the River to Alternativ für Deutschland" xD Bart Terpstra (talk) 16:15, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I always felt that in controversial topics like the current Israeli-Palestinian conflict one needed to be more informed than usual because each side tends to er present their, er, own set of alternative facts. At least that's been my experience off-Wiki. And since I don't have the interest to properly educate myself about Israel-related topics, I've tended to stay away from those articles except where being a disinterested party can help. So perhaps I am wrong in this opinion. -- llywrch (talk) 00:35, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

I think it's like controversial subjects in other topic areas. Gamergate, for instance. I picked that at random because I know it's controversial. In putting in the hyperlink I noticed that there's a "harassment campaign." Didn't know. Well, I guess that's why it's controversial. Obviously I know nothing about Gamergate. But I bet that I or any experienced editor could go into the talk pages and, while knowing nothing about Gamergate, could ascertain if there are any policy violations there, any incivility, any WP:OWN behavior. Same with the I/P articles, where incivility, personalizing discussions, tendentious editing and the usual gamut are rife. It might be time-consuming to come up to speed on the talk page posts, that is true. But edit-warring and other behavioral issues do not require subject matter expertise, and in my view tend to be unhelpful. If I boned up on Gamergate and I had to wade into the talk page, it might give me a POV one way or the other. (And thank you for commenting on the substance of the Signpost article and not just "river to sea"!) Coretheapple (talk) 16:12, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Bump! I found the phrase used by Shushugah to be a clever, amusing, and inoffensive play on words that was perfect for a Signpost publication. I am one of those evil Jewish Zionists, by the way. Naraht means well, I believe, and I had never heard that phrase before, but Shushugah's wording was pithier and droll.--FeralOink (talk) 14:18, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

I congratulate you, Coretheapple for your brilliant contributions to the body of the Signpost. I balk at your response to Naraht: "if a harmless use of "river to sea" bothers you, the blood would spray from your ears ..." as that is gruesome and it presumes that the "river to the sea" expression is harmless, which isn't true, neither now or in the past.
I commend both Shushugah AND Bart Terpstra, as Bart morphed it into an also-amusing "From the River to Alternativ für Deutschland"!--FeralOink (talk) 14:18, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
  • The Quarry permalink should be [2], the query appears to have been repurposed at some point. ☆ Bri (talk) 17:48, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
    @Bri fixed, thank you! ~ 🦝 Shushugah (he/him • talk) 18:12, 8 April 2024 (UTC)


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