User talk:Ewitch51

Your messages to users
You state that you're an intern at the Wikimedia Foundation - do you have a WMF account? You should be using that account to officially represent yourself as an intern or employee with the organization if you're asking people to participate in your study...  ~Oshwah~  (talk) (contribs)   17:56, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Also, Wikipedia is not a place to mass message people like this... please stop and don't make any more. If you're doing this under the direction or approval of the WMF, you should be using a WMF account to do this or someone with a WMF should be the one to leave these messages...  ~Oshwah~  (talk) (contribs)   18:01, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
 * This has confused several stewards and admins, and some were considering blocking you for impersonation until someone found the meta research page. Pinging User:Halfak (WMF) just so he's aware. TonyBallioni (talk) 18:03, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
 * & - I have a slight feeling this editor is not in any way, shape or form related to the WMF ... If you were part of the WMF you'd either use that account or link to it ? ... FWIW I was about to head to ANI to query it but anyway I'd support indeffing. – Davey 2010 Talk 18:20, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't think it's common for interns to necessarily get formal "staff" accounts (most wouldn't be contacting users like this, so probably less necessary for them to do so), but they should be certainly better identified than they are currently etc. As they're seemingly working with/for Halfak, I've emailed him directly and asked him to come here to respond. It looks like he's possibly offline due to internet connection issues.
 * Based on meta:Research:Civil Behavior Interviews, and the fact Halfak has edited the page too, it does seem this is related to the WMF as a research project. I'll leave it at that, and let Halfak respond. Reedy (talk) 18:24, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Reedy, yes, that makes sense. I was just commenting because it had confused several people. TonyBallioni (talk) 18:27, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Ah okay, I was under the impression everyone related to the WMF had WMF accounts, If they don't then ignore everything I've just said. – Davey 2010 Talk 18:28, 4 June 2018 (UTC)


 * So long as this user doesn't create any more of those messages until this is sorted out, I'm not inclined to take any action. But this needs to be sorted out and someone with a trustworthy account and contact information (WMF account and a WMF email address used - where we can easily verify their claims to be legitimate) needs to be doing the reaching out and requesting participation like this...  ~Oshwah~  (talk) (contribs)   18:30, 4 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I can vouch for Ewitch51's legitimacy, and the concerns raised here make sense. We only need a small number of additional study participants, so this isn't going to balloon into a huge spam wave or anything.
 * We'll go through the script tomorrow and: * Create Ewitch51's user page, explaining the research context. * Sign messages in the normal ~ way. * Ensure that the context is easily verifiable.  Meanwhile, thank you for the explanations and for the timely, generous response to potential phishing.  Adamw (talk) 19:32, 4 June 2018 (UTC)


 * We've had WMF consultants and interns previously editing from non-staff accounts, and I see no issue with that or need for harassing the user here. But it would be nice if non-(WMF) accounts could get some sort of staff confirmation that their activities are legitimate and link to it from their userpage. -- Ajraddatz (talk) 21:04, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Tsk, tsk, tsk .... while I appreciate our admins standing guard over the pedia ... AGF would have been a nice touch. I agreed to an interview with Ewitch, met with her last week, and she was most pleasant, easy to talk to, and highly professional.  She's a real person doing a real job, and I'll bet next time, she'll remember to setup her user page announcement first. 🤗  Atsme 📞📧 02:39, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Hey folks! Sorry this happened while I was out wrecking myself in the Flint Hills so I've only just seen the messages now. Ewitch51 is working with my team as an intern. I'm sorry for all of this confusion. I have a few points to add to this discussion.

First and most importantly, if you feel that this is disruptive, it is. That means we should stop contacting folks until any details have been sorted out. Given that Adamw and I have vouched for Ewitch51, are there any more concerns?

Second, it's very common for researchers to ask for help to study the dynamics of Wikipedia through interview and survey invitations. I've been supporting these activities on a volunteer bases (via my volunteer account, EpochFail) for years. One does not need to be staff or have a relationship with the WMF to run a research project. I think it is to us as Wikipedians to decide which projects are valuable for our community and our concerns. I think the studies of civil behavior (and incivil behavior) are very important to us and we'd like to see these studies happen. (Alternatively, I think we're very tired of people surveying the most active editors to find out why they edit. For crying out loud!)

Finally, I wish there were an official process by which researchers who wish to ethically perform their research on Wikipedia can receive guidance and approval so we can fully avoid these problems. I've made proposals in the past and had pushback from both sides ("no policy needed" vs. "policy isn't strict enough") and I got tired of fighting the fight. Generally, I recommend that researchers who I work with clearly document their projects on Meta and make some posts in forums where their target participants frequent. If no serious concerns are raised about the project, I advise that the research proceeds with small batches of recruiting messages on talk pages (as opposed to emailing users directly) because it is easiest to track via recent changes and it is easy to interrupt if something is disruptive (like in this case) before too much disruption occurs.

I hope we can move forward from this and allow Ewitch to continue the civility research. Please let us know what you need from us before we can continue. --Halfak (WMF) (talk) 13:36, 5 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Hey folks. It's been 24 hours.  Upon re-reading this thread it seems that the main concern raised was (1) the amount of posting and (2) verifying ewitch's identity.  Given that (2) has been clearly addressed, I'm advising Ewitch51 to continue recruiting interview subjects and to make at most 25 interview requests per day so that we can minimize disruption, and again, make it easier to put the brakes on if any other issues arise.  Thanks for your consideration and let us know if you have any other concerns. --Halfak (WMF) (talk) 14:04, 6 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Just found this from . I noticed that the message doesn't state whether the study will be released under a free license (it's obvious for WMF staff, but here a university email was being used). Linking m:Research:Civil Behavior Interviews would suffice (I see it's now in the user page, which is ok for past edits). --Nemo 06:15, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Or maybe even adding a wikilink to the research page so it's not just "email this random user about some random thing"? Primefac (talk) 12:57, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Ewitch51, could you add the link to the research page to all future messages?  We (the WMF, my team) will be picking up the open access costs for any pubs that come out of this work. :)  I expect we'll be uploading the preprint to commons under CC-BY-SA like I've been doing for all of my recent papers. --Halfak (WMF) (talk) 14:59, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Yep, will do! Sorry about that. I would also like to point out that whatever dataset comes out of this work will be publicly available as well. Ewitch51 (talk) 15:15, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

Hi Ewitch51, Sorry but I don't want to be interviewed, I tried to email you at your given address but couldn't: emailer said address invalid or similar. I'm only new to Wikipedia and still learning the basics, so forgive me if you or anyone finds me uncivil, most of the time I don't know what to do ect. I haven't come across any uncivil comments/behaviour. Thank you for contacting me anyway, best wishes with your project! Passionfruitvine Passionfruitvine (talk) 04:25, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

Please
read this page about classifying edits as minor or not.Best, &#x222F; WBG converse 03:24, 25 June 2018 (UTC)

Talkback
Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 11:08, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

Request to be added to project
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research_talk:Civil_Behavior_Interviews — Preceding unsigned comment added by 103.30.143.137 (talk) 16:38, 8 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Hi Ewitch51! I am Jenhawk777. I saw a request you sent to JMilburn to participate in a study on incivility, and I would like to volunteer. Josh has way more experience than I do, I am still a relative new-comer, but I have been here long enough to have some experience with this.  If you could use me for this project, I would like very much to participate. Jenhawk777 (talk) 18:26, 27 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Hello Jenhawk777! That sounds fantastic, I'd love to have you participate. In order to make an interview appointment, please follow this link: https://calendar.google.com/calendar/selfsched?sstoken=UU1RWWM4Nmp2Ym5ffGRlZmF1bHR8ZGFjZjQyZTMyMjc2NTE1YjcxN2U5MmFlMDU3MDlkNzY.

Also, before your interview, it would be very helpful if you could please select one clearly uncivil talk page, and one clearly civil talk page (by your definition) to review with the interviewer. Thanks! Ewitch51 (talk) 18:47, 27 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Cool I have gathered diffs! I have multiples! Is this Central US time--since the University of Michigan is doing it? Or Greenwich time?  I only ask because when Wikipedia stamps the time with my name it is never actually the time where I am. Jenhawk777 (talk) 21:58, 29 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia time is 5 hours later than I am. Jenhawk777 (talk) 21:59, 29 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Great, thank you! It is Eastern time. When you go to sign up for an interview session, the calendar should adjust to your time zone (so, if you schedule an interview at 2 pm your time, it will be at 2 pm your time, even if it's a different time where I am). Please let me know if none of the scheduled times work for you, and I'll add some at other times! Thanks, Ewitch51 (talk) 22:24, 29 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Okay! Jenhawk777 (talk) 22:46, 29 July 2018 (UTC)


 * The link to the interview is here: Ewitch51 (talk) 16:52, 31 July 2018 (UTC)
 * An acceptance email is on its way. Carptrash (talk) 20:37, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the invitation - I'm sorry I can't participate Footnotefanatic (talk) 04:52, 31 August 2018 (UTC)


 * No worries, thanks for the response! Ewitch51 (talk) 19:31, 31 August 2018 (UTC)

Mass sending of user talk page messages
Haven't we been over this before? I thought we wen't supposed to be doing this.... why is it continuing?  ~Oshwah~  (talk) (contribs)   19:32, 31 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Hi, we addressed the questions about Ewitch51 doing this work in an official capacity, and it's now well-documented on this user page. It was helpful to flag at the time, to prevent any further misunderstandings, but I'm unclear about what could be problematic at this point?  This is a small number of invitations, hopefully causing minimal disruption to editors.  We can clear up any remaining issues once we understand what is lacking.  Thanks, Adamw (talk) 00:33, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Hi Adamw! Yeahhhh, I forgot that we established that this was okay. I'm going to undo my reverts and restore the messages this user left. I appreciate your response here and I apologize for any frustration or inconvenience that my stupidity caused.  ~Oshwah~  (talk) (contribs)   00:39, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Adamw - All of Ewitch51's messages left on August 31 have been restored. I apologize again for everything, and I appreciate you for responding here and for pushing back when I thought differently than what was actually discussed :-). If you have any additional questions or concerns, my user talk page is always open to you. Best regards -  ~Oshwah~  (talk) (contribs)   00:47, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
 * There's a lot to keep track of! I thought it was a fair question, anyway.  I didn't realize it had gotten as far as reverts, so thank you again for cleaning that up.  Adamw (talk) 07:18, 1 September 2018 (UTC)

Try some syntax things
Knitting