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Revision as of 22:56, 12 August 2009

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Strategic Planning

The Wikimedia Foundation has begun a year long phase of strategic planning. During this time of planning, members of the community have the opportunity to propose ideas, ask questions, and help to chart the future of the Foundation. In order to create as centralized an area as possible for these discussions, the Strategy Wiki has been launched. This wiki will provide an overview of the strategic planning process and ways to get involved, including just a few questions that everyone can answer. All ideas are welcome, and everyone is invited to participate.

Please take a few moments to check out the strategy wiki. It is being translated into as many languages as possible now; feel free to leave your messages in your native language and we will have them translated (but, in case of any doubt, let us know what language it is, if not english!).

All proposals for the Wikimedia Foundation may be left in any language as well.

Please, take the time to join in this exciting process. The importance of your participation can not be overstated.

--Philippe

(please cross-post widely and forgive those who do)

Academic Research Study Survey: Final Call

Thank you to the Misplaced Pages community for your participation so far in this ongoing research study, and for your response to our previous post on the Administrators' Noticeboard. We plan on keeping this survey open for one more week and would like to encourage anyone who has not yet had the opportunity to participate to take the survey described below.

As part of an ongoing research project by students and faculty at the Carnegie Mellon University School of Computer Science and headed by Professor Robert Kraut, we are conducting a survey of anyone who has participated in the Request for Adminship (RfA) process, either voting or as a candidate.

The survey will only take a few minutes of your time, and will aid furthering our understanding of online communities, and may assist in the development of tools to assist voters in making RfA evaluations. We are NOT attempting to spam anyone with this survey and are doing our best to be considerate and not instrusive in the Misplaced Pages community. The results of this survey are for academic research and are not used for any profit nor sold to any companies. We will also post our results back to the Misplaced Pages community.

Take the survey

Thank you!

If you have any questions or concerns, feel free comment on my talk page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by CMUResearcher (talk • contribs)

Using Sitenotice for Survey

I'm Su-young, a researcher in KISDI (Korea information society development institute). We're doing a comparative study to identify factors affecting Misplaced Pages users' usage and participation between Korean and English version by surveying the participants' motivations as well as knowledge and cultural characteristics.

I'd like to ask you if it's possible to expose our survey link in the sitenotice of English Wikepedia. In the case of Korean Misplaced Pages, members have agreed on putting a survey link in the sitenotice after discussing our survey proposal. As the focus of our research is in comparing the two different Wikipedias, it's very important to do a survey to English Wikipedians.

The survey will only take a few minutes of your time, and your responses are absolutely confidential. Also, We will post the total results of our survey including its analysis, which will be helpful for understanding the causes of differences on among various Wikipedias. It'll extend our understanding of diverse collective intelligence as well. I'll really appreciate for your opinions and advices. Thank you very much.--Iloveyoufirst21 (talk) 02:29, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Hi. I'm sorry but sitenotices are reserved for messages of importance to all Misplaced Pages readers and contributors. We do not add surveys to it. Regards, Rjd0060 (talk) 03:24, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Really? I feel like we've done it before.--Tznkai (talk) 17:14, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Maybe a watchlist notice, rather than a sitenotice. Protonk (talk) 19:52, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

It was done before, but by the Foundation. - Rjd0060 (talk) 03:35, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Would you let me know where I can find a watchlist notice? I'd like to find all the possible ways to expose our research.--Iloveyoufirst21 (talk) 01:28, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I would suggest bringing it to the village pump for proposals, as this is a matter for the entire community to decide, not just administrators. Powers 18:00, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree w/ LtPowers here, though my suggestion would be that you simply bring your survey to the village pump to advertise it. Protonk (talk) 19:52, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for all your advice. I really appreciate it.--Iloveyoufirst21 (talk) 01:28, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Copyright work?

We really need more editors and particularly admins (since the delete tool comes in handy for this job) helping out with copyright investigations. Misplaced Pages:Suspected copyright violations, where CSBot's tags are listed, is backlogged. CSBot occasionally tags something that isn't an issue, but generally it's spot on, and it's really an important first line of defense against copyvio. We need more people who can evaluate the listings there and, equally importantly, figure out if copyvios it detects reflect a systematic problem contributor that needs to be addressed. There are also a number of long-term multiple-article infringement cleanups open and unresolved at Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Copyright Cleanup/Contributor surveys. Thanks to User:CactusWriter, who has joined me at WP:CP, we've got that board under control. If there are any admins (or other readers here) who have an interest in keeping our content legal, we could seriously use a hand. I dream of a day when we have more contributors than work to be done. :)

I wish I could think of a way to more proactively treat the problem. The current method we use is pretty inefficient. There must be some way to keep stuff like this from happening. :/ --Moonriddengirl 11:33, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Many dealt with, many more to go! I'll try to stop by from time to time. This is important work. decltype (talk) 12:55, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

We could make a new edit filter that googles every edit before it is committed...might slow the site down a bit though... Thatcher 20:06, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Just a tad. ;) Protonk (talk) 20:08, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Now you're thinking, Thatcher, but I think a better way to handle all this craziness would be to stop all self-directed instant editing. Think about it - all the problems we have, from vandalism and copyvios to POV-pushers and illiterates are all rooted in this crazy "anybody can edit right now" mentality. If people want to make changes, they can submit an application in triplicate including a rationale for their suggested changes and their full resume, to a triple level editorial board for consideration, factual review and verification and finally, implementation. Trust me, this is the way of the future and it will fix all our problems. hawhaw Sarah 00:48, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Great idea! Too bad someone else already had it... :-) Vicenarian 00:52, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Is there an abuse filter to report removals of copyvio notices? Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 04:55, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Not that I know of. --Moonriddengirl 17:17, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

See Misplaced Pages talk:Edit filter#Removing copyright tags. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 21:08, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Editor Review backlog

I'm here to humbly request some assistance in reviewing editors over at editor reveiw, and yes I am one of the editors awaiting a review. I'm going to try and give a couple reviews within the next day or two. It's kind of unfortunate that the only way to get really good feedback from fellow contributors is through RFA/B's, especially for those of us who don't feel ready to apply or are unsure if they want to be a sysop/crat. I would appreciate any help anyone can offer. Thanks.    23:25, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Just wondering

Umm ... what purpose does allowing you to block for a fortnight serve? :-) King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 04:46, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

That funny. :) Seriously though, you can do that?Abce2|Aww nuts!Wribbit!(Sign here) 04:53, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Just today I felt like giving an IP a fortnight block. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 05:09, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

You can give all kinds of bizarre expiry times. Whatever time parser they use is very robust. Icewedge (talk) 05:17, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Supposedly the software will recognize any time interval that GNU tar can understand, though I don't recall where I've seen this documented. In theory, that means you could set a block in microfortnights. — Gavia immer (talk) 05:39, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Here's where it's documented, for the record. — Gavia immer (talk) 05:48, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Apparently won't honor a block for four score and twain years. How disappointing. decltype (talk) 06:12, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I think relative dates are the most amusing, such as "one year ago" (). Icewedge (talk) 06:26, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Hahaha, nice bug :D -- Luk 12:37, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Lol... Can a block be set for a millisecond? What about a nanosecond? Until It Sleeps 14:25, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I believe so. Of course, the block will expire before the request finishes processing. Hersfold 02:45, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

User:Tom harrison selectively deleting revisions on many pages

was User:Tom harrison Mass Delete Of Pages

The admin User:Tom harrison just mass deleted every page a banned user touched, then protected his user talk page so noone could comment on it while he was fixing his mistake. This kind of error is HUGE, to just mass delete every page a user ever edited if they're banned?! Thought this should be looked at a little further why such a major error like that took place. — raeky  14:38, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm guessing the protection was a mistake since Tom reverted it. I suggest you bring the matter with him first, now that you can contact him on his talk page. -- Luk 14:42, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Seems this was about deleting the selected edits from the history of pages in question. As long as everything is fixed now, I don't see any problem here. --Tone 14:43, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I tried it on his talk page at first, then someone reverted it (i added it back) then the page was promptly protected from further edits so I posted here. So the discussion would take place here now. — raeky  14:45, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Whoa, I don't understand what he's doing. He must be an idiot. I'll go and interrupt his work and berate him on his talk page. Now he's trying to cover up his mistake! Not only stupid, but evil too! Quick, to the barricades! Seriously, besides good faith, you might at least begin with the assumption that other people know what they're doing, investigate, think, then ask politely if it still looks like a mistake. Tom Harrison 14:46, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

It was obviously a mistake, but I posted here after you made it not possible for me to follow-up on your talk page about the mistake. Was a pretty big mistake though, admittedly. — raeky  14:48, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Raeky, that’s simply not true. You screamed at him at 14:31, then again at 14:33. He answered you quite politely at 14:34. You posted this admin’s notice thread at 14:38. Please don’t mischaracterize the timeline. — Satori Son 14:58, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I posted at 14:31, reverted the deletion of my post on 14:33, the page was protected on 14:33, I noticed the protection, looked up this page to post and made that post on 14:38, he unprotected his page on 14:39. Get the complete timeline before you criticize mine. Thanks. — raeky  15:14, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Also, Raeky, beware of using ALL CAPITALS IN YOUR POSTS, because that's generally viewed as "shouting," thus uncivil, thus could be removed. Vicenarian 14:47, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

It was INTENDED as shouting, that evolution faq represented A LOT of work. — raeky  14:48, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

If you had bothered to read the two sections above your post on Tom harrison's talk page, you would have figured out what was going on. Nishkid64 _{(Make articles, not wikidrama)} 14:49, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Okay, we have the drama and sarcasm quota met so that's out of the way. Regarding the actual issue, I am a bit puzzled by this approach to enforcing WP:BAN. Deleting pages and then selectively restoring only the non-banned users' interleaved edits? At best, that seems yucky to me. It now looks like non-banned users made the banned user's edits. At worst, that's a WP:GFDL violation, isn't it? Wknight94 14:55, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

As far as I can see, the user was reverted and then both the user's edit and the revert were deleted, so there's no problem with wrongly attributed edits, at least. --Conti|✉ 15:04, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

That's very difficult to say when you look at this edit. In reality, this user only changed one line (see my reconstruction) but it looks like he completely re-did the whole page! And that's only in the first deleted page that I checked. I'm all for undoing banned user's contributions but that's not what happened here. The contributions weren't undone, they were reattributed. Bad mojo. Wknight94 15:17, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Yikes, I didn't notice that. If the edits of a banned user are so bad that they need to be deleted immediately, misattributing those edits to another user in good standing seems even worse to me. --Conti|✉ 15:48, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I will revert or try to carefully undo the content contributed by a banned user, but in cases like these where the edits are interspersed all throughout, I just leave them alone and say c'est la vie. See Jmfangio (talk · contribs) - I undid what I could easily undo but I'm not going to try to extract his edits from Dan Marino made two months before he was identified as a banned sock. In this case, I recommend restoring all of the edits and more carefully undoing them. Wknight94 17:01, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Requesting oversight (assuming the edits of the banned user meet the requirements at WP:OVER can also be a helpful tool in some situations like this. — Kralizec! (talk) 17:06, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

They can now do oversight in a way that the user name is just hidden, can't they? If that works the way I think it does, that might also be a good approach. But like you say, I'm not sure enforcing WP:BAN qualifies for oversight. Wknight94 17:14, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

You guys work it out and let me know. I'm going on break. Tom Harrison 15:00, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Tom might have done well to use a more informative deletion summary (rather than just "banned user" you could use "deleting edits from banned user, restoring page shortly" or some such). Either way, hysterically DEMANDING AND SHOUTING probably isn't going to help this situation, or even get an adequate response. What ever happened to a simple, "Hey, why did you do this?" This is a wiki, after all: almost any action can be reversed, including admin actions. – Luna Santin (talk) 20:53, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Apart from the drama here (seriously, yelling and screaming is what children do when they don't get what they want), this provides a neat example of why CSD-BAN is not a terribly good idea. Protonk (talk) 00:32, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Nah, it's a good concept - it just wasn't done properly here. Wknight94 00:51, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages, where no good deed goes unpunished. ➲ REDVERS 07:36, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I enforce Morrow's ban by undoing all his work that I can, and deleting all his revisions that I can, while minimizing disruption and inconvenience, subject to technical limitations. Obviously there's judgment involved choosing trade-offs. Informed, intelligent feedback from the community is helpful and welcome, and Wknight94 makes a legitimate point that I'll keep in mind. It would also be helpful if more people who felt able to would enforce this ban. It's great that Wknight94's taken an interest. Tom Harrison 13:58, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

• Why haven't admins been granted with WP:RevDel yet? Seems like this would be a good way to go about this... Rather than deleting and selectively restoring, which brings up these attribution issues. –xeno 14:01, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
  • It hasn't been fully tested yet. Brion said that last time there was a bug. It was likely fixed, but he has not been able to test RevDel again. Part of the reason he is going to clone himself —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 14:09, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

MassDev

Apparently the Massachusetts Redevelopment Authority has found a way to add their propaganda to our site. They go by the username User:MassDev. I'm going to warn them as they have already screwed up some pages. Am I bringing this to the right place? Kevin Rutherford (talk) 01:29, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't know that they've "screwed up some pages", but that's certainly a promotional account, possibly a prohibited role account, and definitely a username violation. They're also likely to fall afoul of the COI guidelines sooner or later. I'd suggest a calm warning rather than an aggressive one, though. — Gavia immer (talk) 01:36, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I gave them a level 2 warning for promotional criteria. I based the screw up on speculation, as I had only seen two pages. Thanks for the help. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 01:44, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I think that account is a pretty clear username violation; it could probably be soft-blocked. MuZemike 02:02, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I would do that, but I can't. I'm behind you in that idea. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 02:05, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Hmmm, no edits in six weeks. I think they may be done doing what they were doing anyway. Wknight94 14:58, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Help with Village pump archive merge - the bots are after me

Could someone please help me fix a little archive confusion at the VPP? Two bots didn't agree, but I've fixed that. Can someone histmerge Misplaced Pages:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 49 into Misplaced Pages:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 50? I've already merged the content. Then could that same someone move Misplaced Pages:Village pump (proposals)/Archive48 to (the now vacant) Misplaced Pages:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 49? Thanks muchly! Hopefully before another bot edit makes this more confusing. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 02:39, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

If a histmerge doesn't leave a redirect, I can do the second part myself. Obviously. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 02:54, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

All done. For future reference, per the eidt noticce, this would be better off on ANI. Viridae 03:27, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I reverted to the combined archive before either bot appended to the partial version. Flatscan (talk) 03:42, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

ANI? I don't need Cluebot blocked. Thanks for the help! ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 03:49, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

The AN structure is being reworked. For more information, see WP:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive199#Use of this page and various discussions at WT:Administrators' noticeboard. Flatscan (talk) 03:56, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Updating Misplaced Pages:Most wanted articles?

I know this should be on WP:VPT but it was ignored there and then archived without reply.

Since Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Database analysis seems to be dead, Misplaced Pages:Most wanted articles has been outdated for 2 years now. It's featured on many project pages and should allow newcomers to find articles they could create. As such, I think it needs to be updated. Question is, who will do it? Can this be done by a bot or does anyone know how to do it? Regards SoWhy 06:19, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

• Misplaced Pages talk:Database reports seems to be active enough, or at least it was a few months ago. Protonk (talk) 06:28, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
• Also DB dumps just got restarted, so maybe there will be a resurgence in interest in that sort of thing? Protonk (talk) 06:29, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

i have a message

Attention: high holy wikipedian

from this guy: bigtimepeace. he says,

Single-payer

Please start discussing the changes you are making to Single-payer health care on the article talk page. You are drastically rewriting things without any discussion, even after you have been reverted by others. And please read this policy. Your contention in this edit summary that "concensus never defines wikipedia" is categorically incorrect. Consensus-based editing is at the heart of the project, and since at least one editor has disagreed with your changes, you need to start discussing them before editing further. Thanks. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 20:10, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

===my response is,

consensus-building, yes, but not consensus defining. plus, i explained my edits, while the reversions were *not* explained, and consensus is no excuse for irrelevancy. on this basis, i feel harassed, unduly chastised, and my time and efforts disrespected. just because the admin (as proudly self-identified) bigtimepeace has no basis for their reversion, it doesn't mean that i should be required to do extra legwork, or be threatened with sanction. i suggest that the person taking the action reverting, deleting or creating paragraphs should be able to back it up with at minimum a short and relevant explanation.[REDACTED] is supposed to be about the written word! relevancy changes with time, and consensus cannot be a catch-all for deletions of significant parts of politically charged current topics. 24.2.247.208 (talk) 22:56, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

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