MediaWiki talk:Spam-whitelist/Archives/2020/10

The Sword


I am requesting that this specific page on thesword.com – an interview with Billy Miller, editor of the influential gay literary zine S.T.H. – be unblocked so that I can use it for its Wikipedia page. Morgan695 (talk) 21:33, 31 August 2020 (UTC)
 * . I'm unsure about the reliability of TheSword.com. Could you please start a discussion on the reliable sources noticeboard about whether this interview is reliable for this topic? Please use nowiki tags to refer to the link in the discussion, i.e. nowiki>https://www.thesword.com/billy-miller-interview.html/nowiki>, and perhaps also include a reminder that the page contains pornography. —  Newslinger  talk   01:35, 17 September 2020 (UTC)
 * I've started a discussion at Reliable_sources/Noticeboard. Morgan695 (talk) 01:46, 17 September 2020 (UTC)
 * to MediaWiki:Spam-whitelist. The noticeboard discussion, now archived at, raised no objections, so this page is now on the whitelist. Thanks for submitting this. —  Newslinger  talk   05:31, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

Request to unblock article at mangauk
for the articles on Blade of the Immortal. I don’t need the whole site whitelisted, just that article. It's quite useful as the writer of the series explains about how he created his work to the point an article for the series character could be used for his creation.Tintor2 (talk) 22:42, 5 September 2020 (UTC)
 * . I'm unsure about the reliability of Manga Entertainment's website. Could you please start a discussion on the reliable sources noticeboard about whether this interview is reliable for this topic? Please use nowiki tags to refer to the link in the discussion, i.e. nowiki>https://www.mangauk.com/blade-of-the-immortal-interview-with-hiroaki-samura//nowiki>. —  Newslinger  talk   02:14, 17 September 2020 (UTC)
 * from the spam blacklist in Special:Diff/980743516. The noticeboard discussion, now archived at, shows consensus that mangauk.com should not be on the spam blacklist at all. You are now able to cite this link. Thanks for reporting this. —  Newslinger  talk   05:43, 28 September 2020 (UTC)
 * , WOW .. WAIT. This was heavily, heavily spammed back in 2011/2012 (see e.g. Special:Contributions/Landagan, Special:Contributions/89.29.172.183 and a plethora of other IPs).  This is a commercial site, official distributor of Manga, not the type of site we would normally use as a source.  Now we have a couple of whitelist requests (rather minimal, 7, some duplicate, some withdrawn because there are better sources, some for use on 'own page'; 2 granted for referencing) and practically zero attempts to use it (OK, also zero attempts to abuse it) and we remove it that easily? Dirk Beetstra T  C 06:20, 28 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Would it be better to only whitelist this link, instead? 8–9 years seems like a very long time ago, and Manga Entertainment's director of marketing from back then had departed in 2014. But I can understand the caution, especially considering that the request only asked for this one link. —  Newslinger  talk   06:45, 28 September 2020 (UTC)
 * , I am always weary with material that has been heavily spammed. Spammers spam because it pays their bills.  They do not tend to stop just because we blacklist their links.  Popular websites are often also popular because of SEO activities.  Often then 8-9 years is not a long time.  You can have a look at User:Beetstra/Long-term spamming (we should move that somewhere more accessible and update some of them) with some cases who are active for more than 10 years.  Often it simply does not stop on any reasonable timescale, again, it pays their bills, some will try to go around or persist.
 * This case seems quiet, no obvious spamming for years indeed, so maybe we can do the experiment of delisting. But generally, I would first liberally whitelist anything that comes.  If that becomes several requests per month, then it may be worth de-listing. Dirk Beetstra T  C 07:26, 28 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Okay, I can volunteer to monitor this domain. Currently, is used in the following seven articles: Manga Entertainment, Summer Wars, Time loop, Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful Dreamer, I Want to Eat Your Pancreas, Erika Harlacher, and My Hero Academia (season 3). I will prefer whitelisting individual links for requests on this page from now on, unless the request refers to the entire domain. —  Newslinger   talk   08:18, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Request to unblock article at swarajyamag.com
for the article on Kathir News. I don’t need the whole site whitelisted, just that article. - Susheelgiri (talk) 05:57, 15 September 2020 (UTC)
 * . Swarajya is not considered a reliable source on Wikipedia, according to a . —  Newslinger   talk   02:09, 17 September 2020 (UTC)

Famous Birthdays (original creator)
But I'm looking for the original creator of Famous Birthdays website via Internet Archive, which was dated on February 23, 1999. --122.2.10.69 (talk) 04:56, 17 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Absolutely do not whitelist. This was a very problematic, unreliable source until we got it blacklisted. --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 17:15, 18 September 2020 (UTC)
 * , it appears that this request is for using it as a primary source for the creator of the website, not for any general use.
 * @IP: I am unsure what you want to do, and what you want to link here. You want to link to the internet archive to show the name of the creator of the website?  Is there really nothing independent that states who the creator of the website is?  This link is a 404, so this does not help me for anything to evaluate what you want to whitelist.  Dirk Beetstra T  C 17:35, 18 September 2020 (UTC)
 * I'm connecting the dots now. We've got the name of the creator, Edward Morykwas, across the different websites. An independent source would really help. --Hipal/Ronz (talk) 19:04, 18 September 2020 (UTC)
 * But I'm very sure about this dead link, maybe you should choose the archived link via Wayback Machine. --122.2.10.69 (talk) 02:10, 20 September 2020 (UTC)
 * The most recent archive of this page is dated 13 December 2011: https://web.archive.org/web/20111213102724/famousbirthdays.com/bio.html. Since I can't find any information on Edward Morykwas in secondary sources, and not even on the current version of Famous Birthdays, I don't think this information is due in the article. The archived site was located at the same famousbirthdays.com domain, but was an entirely different website. —  Newslinger  talk   02:20, 20 September 2020 (UTC)
 * . Famous Birthdays as we know it today was founded in 2012, while the most recent archive of famousbirthdays.com/bio.html was captured in 2011. Since the information on the page in question refers to a different website (albeit on the same domain), it is outside the scope of the article. —  Newslinger  talk   02:29, 20 September 2020 (UTC)

avoiceformen.com/women/to-the-women-that-arent-like-that/#comment-1275480260


I'm writing User:GRuban/Honey Badger (men's rights) which is an article on "Honey Badgers", which is what female men's rights activists are called. Any comments about "a rara avis", or that "there ain't no such animal", have been foreseen, and will be dealt with appropriately! I can write without the rest of "A Voice for Men", since Honey Badgers have gotten a good bit of coverage in unrelated reliable sources but this one very specific page on A Voice for Men is specifically the place where Paul Elam asked for a term for female men's rights activists, and Tara Palmatier suggested "Honey Badgers" in the comment section, which was adopted. There is, by definition, no substitute. --GRuban (talk) 14:40, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Geeze, I just saw that the instructions at the top of this page directing people to add links to this section are different from the ones at the top of this section. Can someone who understands this page please make them consistent? --GRuban (talk) 14:42, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
 * . This request is likely to be controversial. Could you please start a discussion on the reliable sources noticeboard about whether this page is usable for this topic? Please use nowiki tags to refer to the link in the discussion, i.e. nowiki>avoiceformen.com/women/to-the-women-that-arent-like-that/#comment-1275480260/nowiki>. If there are secondary reliable sources that refer to the comment section of the page, please mention them in the discussion. Also, I agree that the instructions on this page could be reorganized. What do you think about changing Template:Spam-whitelist header to be more similar to Template:Spam-blacklist header, with links to sections that would contain all of the relevant instructions for that section? —  Newslinger   talk   08:41, 28 September 2020 (UTC)
 * , it would indeed be better to have them similar, with the instructions at the different sections. Of course, the information that needs to be provided is different between WL and BL. Dirk Beetstra T  C 08:47, 28 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Made section on RSN per request. --GRuban (talk) 12:28, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Statements from Facebook to Breitbart


You can find the original analysis on Talk:Kenosha unrest. To summarize, editor posts an article on the talk page, I read it. I later include a claim based on that article. The article's too general so I follow the source chain, and it turns out the claim is based on a statement given by Facebook to Breitbart. I consider the claim by itself to be reliable, it's made by a named journalist who published a book on the subject, it includes precise citations from the facebook spokesman but doesn't reveal their name. Furthermore, the statement is itself cited by at least 3 outlets, at least one of which is reliable (Buzzfeed) Please add this article as an exception to the breitbart.com blacklist, alternatively, please let me know of a scenario where a Breitbart correspondent falsified a statement by an informant. Thanks --TZubiri (talk) 01:17, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

Oppose – At Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources you will find links to numerous discussions which concluded that Breitbart "has published a number of falsehoods, conspiracy theories, and intentionally misleading stories". Smyth (talk) 15:26, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

Oppose - The article text in question is "Facebook labelled the incident as a "mass murder" and banned all expressions of support for Rittenhouse." I see no reason to cite the Breitbart article, "Facebook Declares Kyle Rittenhouse’s Actions ‘Mass Murder,’ Won’t Allow Posts in Support", since the fact has been very widely reported by reliable sources including ABC News and The Guradian which are currently cited. –dlthewave ☎ 17:08, 27 September 2020 (UTC)
 * . Breitbart News is not considered a reliable source on Wikipedia, according to . —  Newslinger   talk   08:20, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Online version of book on econlib


As used at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joy%27s_law_(management)#cite_ref-7

Not entirely sure why econlib is blocked in the first place (Can't find the discussion referred to in https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=MediaWiki%3ASpam-blacklist&diff=prev&oldid=769671539), though that particular link seems sane enough. martin sandsmark (talk) 17:34, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

About pages of crowdfunders


Neutral landing pages for crowdfunders, to be linked as the official websites in the GoFundMe, Indiegogo, and Kickstarter articles. —  Newslinger  talk   11:57, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
 * to MediaWiki:Spam-whitelist. —  Newslinger  talk   11:58, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

Single YouTube video for Brown Grand Theatre


No doubt that YouTube has a lot of "junk" on it, but this video in particular would be an excellent addition to the "External Links" section of the article Brown Grand Theatre. It is (I presume) copyrighted material, so it isn't well-suited for a conversion to a Wikipedia file. I believe that including this link would help make Wikipedia better by making the article better. Readers could get a much better understanding of the building and its unique design. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Paulmcdonald (talk • contribs)


 * , the redirect site is blocked due to extensive and massive spamming, that one can avoid to use the redirect in favour of the full link, and that there is specific material on YouTube that is blocked through blacklisting. You can use https://youtube.com/watch/?v=YW1-qBx7bfc (note, this is explicitly explained for youtu.be in the spam-block-message that you received).  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 13:59, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Seems like a good alternative. I'll have to re-check the details, thank you!--Paul McDonald (talk) 14:07, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

How link shortening is disallowed in discussion pages
At ITN/C discussion I wanted to link to google result and used link shortener to make the post reasonable and the resulting wikitext more cleaner, to my surprise short urls were blocked by "spamblacklist"? This does not make sense completely. Please where is the community discussion that disallowed short links in discussion pages? – Ammarpad (talk) 08:26, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
 * , The spam blacklist is black-and-white. Links are blacklisted everywhere without any possibilities inbetween.  Though there are reasons why some blacklisted links can be used on talkpages, there are also blacklisted links that should not be used on talkpages either.  This is not a community decision, this is the WMF developers who programmed this. Dirk Beetstra T  C 08:35, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, I understand why they're disallowed on content pages, that's why I am specifically asking for "discussion pages". I have no desire to use short links in articles, so that will never bother me. Even on discussion pages I don't use them often, that's why I am only surprised now. I however understand the root cause now since you said the blacklisting is sitewide, I will probably find time to take a look at the extension code myself, as I am sure there must be old requests for granular blacklisting on phabricator (at the very least per namespace). Thanks. – Ammarpad (talk) 08:50, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
 * , url shorteners are typically globally blacklisted, because they can be used to link to other blacklisted sites. Link aliasing is a thing, so it's unclear why you would need a shortener. Guy (help! - typo?) 09:06, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
 * , Link aliasing only affects the visual output, in my post I said I want make the "wikitext cleaner". I always edit using source editor and it's really distracting having to write and navigate around lengthy meaningless strings of url. – Ammarpad (talk) 11:46, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
 * , that is the design of the MediaWiki software (or better, the spam-blacklist extension). Anything that is blacklisted is blacklisted literally everywhere with no-one (including admins) being able to circumvent.
 * Please see m:Community_Wishlist_Survey_2019/Admins_and_patrollers/Overhaul_spam-blacklist and m:Community_Wishlist_Survey_2017/Miscellaneous/Overhaul_spam-blacklist.  is one,  is another.  The latter is >12 years old.  (Now I need my anti-frust-medication, I am getting really pissed of with WMF again :-) ).  Dirk Beetstra T  C 10:43, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Note that it anyway is better to use the real link, it shows you were you go when you hover over it, with a shortener you always have to have the faith that it was added in good faith (and no-one checks who added the link). The link-aliasing takes away the ugly in normal view, it is just ugly in edit mode. Dirk Beetstra T  C 10:50, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you for this context. No wonder the problem has been this old. The extension essentially has no maintainer: T224921. – Ammarpad (talk) 11:46, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

Xeno Crisis Kickstarter campaign page / updates


Unfortunately some details of the game Xeno Crisis are contained on kickstarter.com, and I'd like to include these links as references to help round out the remaining parts of this page. The game's developers used the backer updates feature as the "development blog", and a lot of first party information about the game is contained on this blog.

The URLs I'd like unblocked include the main campaign page (contains details of the game's story and the individuals involved in the project), a link to the entire backer updates as it contains additional information of development with the project, and a specific post on the development blog that mentions when the project became fully funded. If it's possible to do a regex for any page under the project's url like  it should cover each of the urls I requested.

As the project has been funded, and the game has been released, linking to these pages will not be seen as an ad for the crowdfunding campaign Cmahns (talk) 04:51, 22 October 2020 (UTC)


 * to MediaWiki:Spam-whitelist (I'll adapt to the top path). --Dirk Beetstra T C 06:29, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you! Cmahns (talk) 14:30, 22 October 2020 (UTC)