User talk:Nanobear~enwiki

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Barnstar

 * Thanks, I really appreciate this. Offliner (talk) 21:18, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

DYK for Alexei Kudrin
-- Cirt (talk) 18:03, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

WP:AE
Hello Offliner. You opened this enforcement request some time ago, and till now no admin has chimed in. Lately Vecrumba has been saying some rather diplomatic things (see the bottom of the AE). Your main issue appears to be personal attacks. Since we are used to harsh language from most of these participants, it's not clear if any of the statements are rising above the general din. For the EEML editors and Petri Krohn to exchange sharp criticism is not a surprise. Do you want to make a further comment at the AE to help the admins focus their attention, or do you think that enough has been said that the AE might be closed with no action. Thanks, EdJohnston (talk) 19:55, 18 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Never mind. I'm going through all your complaints individually to see what the conclusion should be. EdJohnston (talk) 19:56, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Your question at ACE
Sorry, for some reason I missed it. I have responded now. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:59, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

CE is not a group "seeking to set up a religious state in northern Chechnya"
But in all of Chechnya, but especially (mostly) beyond Chechnya, so Mr. Gollia's allegation must refer to some local group in northern Chechnya (maybe actually existing, but probably not). --Asperchu (talk) 08:43, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I know, but I couldn't figure out in exactly what article to put it. I think Caucasus Emirate is the closest; isn't it a kind of general name for all the various Islamists trying to establish an Islamist republic in the Caucasus? Offliner (talk) 08:47, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

No article, because it is either some actually existing mysterious very-local-and-yet-international group in northern Chechnya, or Mr. Gollia is simply confused like hell, which also tell a lot about this allegation of his. (The whole things reminds me of the so-called "Chechen Network" plot to blow up stuff in France few years ago, in which all of them were North Africans and it was named "Chechen" because one of the Algerians once allegedly travelled to Georgia which is near Chechnya, but hey, "Chechen" sure sounds scary.)

Btw, the Chechen "province of Caucasian Emirate" is right now totally mutined and mostly under the effective contol of Hussein Gakayev (yes, my article), but this makes no "northern Chechnya" either, as even his personal stomping ground is in Vedensky (ie: in the south-east). And this is not even mentioned in the CE article, but oh well. --Asperchu (talk) 09:13, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Also, an emirate and not a republic. Like, it's in the name, you know? --Asperchu (talk) 09:14, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Your new filing about Piotrus at WP:AE
Hello Offliner. You've included a diff of Piotrus at Peace of Riga in your complaint, but you have not given the required explanation of how this edit violates the editor's current restriction. ("Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it"). I also take note that you haven't participated on the article's talk page. Piotrus made only one edit, and since he made it, an IP editor has reverted it. The IP has opened a discussion on talk that appears sensible, at first sight. There are no further reverts. You'll need to give a stronger argument for why we should consider this as bad behavior on the part of Piotrus. Thank you, EdJohnston (talk) 16:58, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
 * There is no need for me to demonstrate any "bad behaviour" by Piotrus (other than the topic ban violation) or to be personally involved in the dispute and its discussions. I'm simply presenting a diff which I think is a clear topic ban violation for investigation. Piotrus is prohibited from editing anywhere near the topics of national and ethnic disputes in Eastern Europe. Arbitrator Coren specifically warned Piotrus not to even try to toe the line. The ArbCom's wish is clear: no violations are to be tolerated. The diff is clearly about national and ethnic disputes in Eastern Europe ("he Belarusian language was banned, in speaking and in literature, and local leadership was sent to a concentration camp at Bereza Kartuska"). Offliner (talk) 17:15, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

DYK for ZALA Aero
Materialscientist (talk) 12:03, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Restriction
As the outcome of this request for arbitration enforcement, you are prohibited from commencing or participating in dispute resolution or enforcement processes (including arbitration enforcement) relating to user conduct within the area of conflict (as defined by WP:DIGWUREN) for a period of two months, save for processes concerning your own conduct. To avoid doubt, "commencing or participating in" includes doing so by proxy. Regards --Mkativerata (talk) 22:43, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

I have made a comment in relation to the above at Dojarco's appeal (WP:AE). Ncmvocalist (talk) 10:26, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

Thank you
Thank you very much for your support in your voter guide, as well as for your other thoughtful observations. I'll also take your more critical comments into account as I continue my service during the next two years. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:50, 10 December 2010 (UTC)

DYK for Medvedev modernisation programme
Materialscientist (talk) 00:03, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Welcome to the 2011 WikiCup!
Hello, happy new year and welcome to the 2011 WikiCup! Your submissions' page can be found here and instructions of how to update the page can be found here and on the submissions' page itself. From the submissions' page, a bot will update the main scoresheet. Our rules have been very slightly updated from last year; the full rules can be found here. Please remember that you can only receive points for content on which you have done significant work in 2011; nominations of work from last year and "drive-by" nominations will not be awarded points. Signups are going to remain open through January, so if you know of anyone who would like to take part, please direct them to WikiCup/2011 signups. The judges can be contacted on the WikiCup talk page, on their respective talk pages, or by email. Other than that, we will be in contact at the end of every month with the newsletter. If you want to stop or start receiving newsletters, please remove your name from or add your name to this list. Good luck! J Milburn and The ed17 12:59, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Monotown
The DYK project (nominate) 00:02, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Kola Peninsula
Hi there! I am trying to work on the Kola Peninsula article to bring it to the GA status, and was wondering if you would be able/willing to help me with the section about the economy. If the GA passes, it may help your WikiCup standing :) If not, that's fine too, but please let me know either way so I could plan accordingly. And of course, should you wish to work on any other section of that article, you are most welcome to! Cheers,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); January 19, 2011; 21:31 (UTC)
 * Yes, I'd love to help (and get potential points). What kind of material do you think the economy section should include? It seems to overlap a lot with that of Murmansk Oblast. I don't have much time this week, but the next week should be better. Nanobear (talk) 21:52, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm not really looking at this week; I myself still have plenty of work to do on that article. Regarding the kind of material to include, anything specific to the peninsula (and not to the whole oblast) would be great. But separating the peninsula from the oblast, I guess, is the hard part :)—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); January 19, 2011; 21:55 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassador Program is looking for new Online Ambassadors
Hi! I noticed your activity as a Good Article reviewer, and wanted to let you know about the Wikipedia Ambassador Program, and specifically the role of Online Ambassador. We're looking for friendly Wikipedians who are good at reviewing articles and giving feedback to serve as mentors for students who are assigned to write for Wikipedia in their classes.

If you're interested, I encourage you to take a look at the Online Ambassador guidelines; the "mentorship process" describes roughly what will be expected of mentors in the coming term. If that's something you want to do, please apply!

You can find instructions for applying at WP:ONLINE. The main things we're looking for in Online Ambassadors are friendliness, regular activity (since mentorship is a commitment that spans several months), and the ability to give detailed, substantive feedback on articles (both short new articles, and longer, more mature ones).

I hope to hear from you soon.--Sage Ross - Online Facilitator, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 20:48, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Re Use of leaked diplomatic cables
Good point. Discuss on further my talk page?

Orphaned non-free image File:PhobosGruntDesign.jpg
 Thanks for uploading File:PhobosGruntDesign.jpg. The image description page currently specifies that the image is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, the image is currently orphaned, meaning that it is not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the image was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that images for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).

If you have uploaded other unlicensed media, please check whether they're used in any articles or not. You can find a list of "file" pages you have edited by clicking on the "my contributions" link (it is located at the very top of any Wikipedia page when you are logged in), and then selecting "File" from the dropdown box. Note that any non-free images not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. Skier Dude2 (talk) 04:41, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Elektro–L
— HJ Mitchell &#124;  Penny for your thoughts?   12:03, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

I need some help with updating articles
Hello! I've nominated the 2011 World Economic Forum on ITN, as well as the joint development of the Black Sea shelf by Rosneft and ExxonMobil, and that of the Arctic shelf by Rosneft and BP, which was announced during the Forum. Could you help me with updating the four related articles: World Economic Forum (the section Deals is needed), Rosneft, ExxonMobil and British Petroleum? Grey Hood  Talk  01:20, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Updating Wikipedia on a night shift? Does this mean I will get a barnstar which is 30% bigger than usual? ;) But seriously, this is interesting news, so I'll see what I can do. Nanobear (talk) 01:53, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, I've had a hope that night comes to your place later than to mine ;) Anyway, the Forum concludes later on January 30, so there is enough time for update in the next two days. There is a consensus on posting the Forum conclusion, while the oil companies part is still questionable. The updates could be copied between the articles, though, and all four could be updated as easily as one of them. I'll also return to this task tomorrow, just thought it would be interesting to you since it involves some of your favourite topics. Grey Hood   Talk  02:05, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I have updated Rosneft. But are you sure the arctic shelf deal was signed during the World Economic Forum? I could not immediately find any sources saying it was signed at Davos. Due to this, I only copied the ExxonMobil deal to the forum article and not the BP one. Nanobear (talk) 03:54, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Btw, I think this is interesting and probably worth a mention in some article. Nanobear (talk) 04:13, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
 * As this Russian source says, on the Forum BP and Rosneft signed a deal on "strategic cooperation" and "in development of the strategic alliance of the two oil companies on the joint development of the Arctic, achieved two weeks ago in London". Also, as far as I understand, they announced more details of their cooperation in the Arctic and other places. Grey Hood   Talk  11:56, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
 * And yes, thanks for the updates! I'll see what credits to give you... Grey Hood   Talk  12:00, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

And here is your rewards

 * Thanks a lot! Nanobear (talk) 22:55, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 January newsletter
We are half way through round one of the WikiCup. Signups are now closed, and we have 129 listed competitors, 64 of whom will make it to round two. Congratulations to, who, at the time of writing, has a comfortable lead with 228 points, followed by , with 144 points. Four others have over 100 points. Congratulations also go to, who scored the first points in the competition, claiming for Talk:Hurricane King/GA1, , who scored the first non-review points in the competition, claiming for Dognapping, and who was the first in the competition to use our new "multiplier" mechanic (explanation), claiming for Grigory Potemkin, a subject covered on numerous Wikipedias. Thanks must also go to Jarry1250 for dealing with all bot work- without you, the competition wouldn't be happening!

A running total of claims can be seen here. However, numerous competitors are yet to score at all- please remember to submit content soon after it is promoted, so that the judges are able to review entries. The number of points that will be needed to reach round two is not clear- everyone needs to get their entries in now to guarantee their places! If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 22:39, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Thank's for signing up
It was my intention to ask you to sign up later, when I've done with the transfer of my old to-do lists to the page. But since now you are signed in, I expect you may start some work for the project right now. Also, me and Ezhiki have planned to set up WikiProject Russia/Economy of Russia task force as the next aim, and pour most of contents of my giant to-do list there. If you like, you may start the project yourself, copying the existing page infrastructure from WikiProject Russia/Science and technology in Russia task force and starting to fill the to-do list in a way you find appropriate. Since it was you who actually drawn me into editing Russian economy articles on Wikipedia, I'd like you to start that page, while I could join the editing when I finish my work with S&T. Grey Hood  Talk  16:16, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Also, we may start WikiProject Russia/Politics of Russia task force, and few more projects, namely History, Geography and Culture, and then the whole range of topics will be well-covered. I'm not a great expert in politics, and I was planning to ask either you or User:Russavia to start the politics task force. What do you think about this idea? Grey Hood   Talk  16:16, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll think about creating the politics and economy task forces. I think the main advantage of the task forces is synchronizing and merging everyone's to-do lists. But I will probably have little time the next two weeks. Nanobear (talk) 15:08, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Glonass-K1
You are right that Glonass-K1 is a separate type of satellite, however the instance which you changed in 2011 in spaceflight was referring to a K1 satellite. The designation Glonass-K is no longer used; K1 refers to the prototypes, and K2 the operational satellites. -- G W … 11:02, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
 * What's the source for this? All the sources I've seen call the first satellite a GLONASS-K satellite, and it's not a prototype. Nanobear (talk) 11:06, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
 * The manufacturer calls it GLONASS-K No. 11. Nanobear (talk) 11:09, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I found a source in which a Roscosmos officials says there is a division to K1 and K2. Although the K1 seems to be a fully operational satellite. As long as all the official sources (Reshetnev, Roscosmos, RIA Novosti, etc.) use GLONASS-K instead of GLONASS-K1, that's what I'm going to use too. Nanobear (talk) 11:23, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I would say that Glonass-K is the collective/programme name, and K1 and K2 are the individual types of spacecraft. -- G W … 16:06, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
 * It's realistic that Glonass-K will eventually have an improved version. But currently there seems to be only a single source (the Roscosmos official) who thinks the K1-K2 scheme will be used. All other sources which talk about the scheme base their information on this official. The manufacturer calls the first satellite GLONASS-K No. 11 and Roscosmos calls it just GLONASS-K, so even if the scheme will eventually be used, it has clearly not yet been adopted. Nanobear (talk) 16:29, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Automotive industry in Russia
Materialscientist (talk) 18:03, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

ITN for GLONASS-K
--BorgQueen (talk) 20:16, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 February newsletter
So begins round two of the WikiCup! We now have eight pools, each with eight random contestants. This round will continue until the end of April, when the top two of each pool, as well as the next 16 highest scorers of those remaining, will make it to round three. Congratulations to (first, with 487 points) and  (second, with 459), who stormed the first round. finished third with 223. Twelve others finished with over 100 points- well done to all of you! The final standings in round one can be seen here. A mere 8 points were required to reach round two; competition will no doubt be much more fierce this round, so be ready for a challenge! A special thanks goes, again, to for dealing with all bot work. This year's bot, as well as running smoothly, is doing some very helpful things that last year's did not. Also, thanks to for some helpful behind-the-scenes updating and number crunching.

Some news for those who are interested- March will see a GAN backlog elimination drive, which you are still free to join. Organised by WikiProject Good articles, the drive aims to minimise the GAN backlog and offers prizes to those who help out. Of course, you may well be able to claim WikiCup points for the articles you review as part of the drive. Also ongoing is the Great Backlog Drive, looking to work on clearing all of the backlogs on Wikipedia; again, incentives are offered, and the spirit of friendly competition is alive, while helping the encyclopedia is the ultimate aim. Though unrelated to the WikiCup, these may well be of interest to some of you.

Just a reminder of the rules; if you have done significant work on content this year and it is promoted in this round, you may claim for it. Also, anything that was promoted after the end of round one but before the beginning of round two may be claimed for in round two. Details of the rules can be found on this page. For those interested in statistics, a running total of claims can be seen here, and a very interesting table of that information (along with the highest scorers in each category) can be seen here. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 23:47, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Mir GA nomination
Hello! The article Mir was nominated for GA status. Do you think you could make the requested GA review here? Grey Hood  Talk  15:40, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Perhaps, if I have the time soon. It's a pretty long article to review. Thanks for notifying me. Nanobear (talk) 15:43, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I've noticed this nomination among "Article bot alerts" on WP:RUSSIA page. Recently, the main project page has been updated by me, and I hope it will become more useful facility to work on Russia-related articles. And I think the project could do better with few more good articles. Grey Hood   Talk  15:50, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Sedmoi Kontinent
— HJ Mitchell &#124;  Penny for your thoughts?   01:55, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Islamic Djamaat of Dagestan
— HJ Mitchell &#124;  Penny for your thoughts?   00:05, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 March newsletter
We are half way through round two of the WikiCup, which will end on 28 April. Of the 64 current contestants, 32 will make it through to the next round; the two highest in each pool, and the 16 next highest scorers. At the time of writing, our current overall leader is with 231 points, who leads Pool H.  (Pool G) also has over 200 points, while 9 others (three of whom are in Pool D) have over 100 points. Remember that certain content (specifically, articles/portals included in at least 20 Wikipedias as of 31 December 2010 or articles which are considered "vital") is worth double points if promoted to good or featured status, or if it appears on the main page in the Did You Know column. There were some articles last round which were eligible for double points, but which were not claimed for. For more details, see WikiCup/Scoring.

A running total of claims can be seen here. However, numerous competitors are yet to score at all- please remember to submit content soon after it is promoted, so that the judges are able to review entries. The number of points that will be needed to reach round three is not clear- everyone needs to get their entries in now to guarantee their places! If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 01:03, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

DYK nomination of Russian police reform
Hello! Your submission of Russian police reform at the Did You Know nominations page has been reviewed, and there still are some issues that may need to be clarified. Please review the comment(s) underneath your nomination's entry and respond there as soon as possible. Thank you for contributing to Did You Know! Yoninah (talk) 09:57, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Russian police reform
The DYK project (nominate) 00:02, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Databases
I am hoping to eventually add at least some statistics to my database, but don't have any immediate plans for that yet. There's still much work to be done on the database core, but on the bright side, the database design is certainly conducive to adding whatever statistics on top of the core data. I'll certainly take a look at what you are doing, but the caveat is that my database is in MS Access, not in MySQL. I know that my choice of Access tends to raise a lot of eyebrows :), but, unfortunately, it is the only database product to which I have access both at home and at work. Additionally, my database experience is mostly with the commercial products such as MS SQL and Oracle, and my knowledge of the open-source products is very, very limited (not that I'm unwilling to learn them, mind you; it's just that I don't have any practical use for them). Perl, that I don't know at all (but again, I'm more than interested in learning it). If all this doesn't scare you away, please feel free to email me about any collaboration plans you can think of. It would most certainly be convenient to have a database which can be updated quickly and off of which scripts could be run to update the data in the articles&mdash;it certainly beats updating the articles manually every time new data are released! Cheers,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); April 25, 2011; 16:33 (UTC)

Our recent exchange
P ЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 15:39, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
 * I have refactored my comment since some people did not like it. Nanobear (talk) 16:00, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Still needlessly refers to my (implied) lack of integrity but at least an improvement. Спасибо. P ЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 19:03, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Uruguay
Thanks for reviewing Uruguay against the GA critieria. I'm going to have a stab at making your recommended changes over the next few days. --Matthew Proctor (talk) 08:26, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 April newsletter
Round 2 of the 2011 WikiCup is over, and the new round will begin on 1 May. Note that any points scored in the interim (that is, for content promoted or reviews completed on 29-30 April) can be claimed in the next round, but please do not start updating your submissions' pages until the next round has begun. Fewer than a quarter of our original contestants remain; 32 enter round 3, and, in two months' time, only 16 will progress to our penultimate round. , who led Pool F, was our round champion, with 411 points, while 7 contestants scored between 200 and 300 points. At the other end of the scale, a score of 41 was high enough to reach round 3; more than five times the score required to reach round 2, and competition will no doubt become tighter now we're approaching the later rounds. Those progressing to round 3 were spread fairly evenly across the pools; 4 progressed from each of pools A, B, E and H, while 3 progressed from both pools C and F. Pools D and G were the most successful; each had 5 contestants advancing.

This round saw our first good topic points this year; congratulations to and  who also led pool H and pool B respectively. However, there remain content types for which no points have yet been scored; featured sounds, featured portals and featured topics. In addition to prizes for leaderboard positions, the WikiCup awards other prizes; for instance, last year, a prize was awarded to (who has been eliminated) for his work on In The News. For this reason, working on more unusual content could be even more rewarding than usual!

Sorry this newsletter is going out a little earlier than expected- there is a busy weekend coming up! A running total of claims can be seen here. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 19:25, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Official Russia and RIA Novosti
You are obviously aware that there is a clique of editors who fight against including Russian sources on particular articles, especially when that source is RIA Novosti. It is derided as being state-owned and the mouthpiece of so-called "Official" Russia. What would one make of this article? "Official Russia"? Or proof that RIA Novosti does indeed publish varied points of view? What are your thoughts on this? --Russavia I'm chanting as we speak 16:31, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Non-free files in your user space
Hey there Nanobear, thank you for your contributions. I am a bot, alerting you that non-free files are not allowed in user or talk space. I removed some files I found on User:Nanobear/JR. In the future, please refrain from adding fair-use files to your user-space drafts or your talk page.


 * See a log of files removed today here.


 * Shut off the bot here.


 * Report errors here.

Thank you, -- DASHBot (talk) 05:13, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Hodja and HanzoHattori
Noticed your diff to the - link an the Amendments requests page. Looks like Hodja didn't forget about Hanzo and still supports him, even several years after Hanzo's ban. Back in 2008, Biophys talked with some of the HanzoHattori sockpuppets: RamboKadyrov, Putinjugend,. But all this is quite old stuff and irrelevant to the current amendment request. --DonaldDuck (talk) 10:53, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 May newsletter
We're half way through round 3 of the 2011 WikiCup. There are currently 32 remaining in the competition, but only 16 will progress to our penultimate round. , of pool D, is our overall leader with nearly 200 points, while pools A, B and C are led by, and  respectively. The score required to reach the next round is 35, though this will no doubt go up significantly as the round progresses. We have a good number of high scorers, but also a considerable number who are yet to score. Please remember to submit content soon after it is promoted, so that the judges are able to review entries. Also, an important note concerning nominations at featured article candidates: if you are nominating content for which you intend to claim WikiCup points, please make this clear in the nomination statement so that the FAC director and his delegates are aware of the fact.

A running total of claims can be seen here. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 23:33, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

SPI
-> Would you mind removing or modifying your comments at Amendment page, please? It was not me. Thanks, Biophys (talk) 18:12, 13 June 2011 (UTC)
 * -> Thank you. Biophys (talk) 19:42, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 June newsletter
We are half way through 2011, and entering the penultimate round of this year's WikiCup; the semi-finals are upon us! Points scored in the interim (29/30 June) may be counted towards next round, but please do not update your submissions' pages until the next round has begun. 16 contestants remain, and all have shown dedication to the project to reach this far. Our round leader was who, among other things, successfully passed three articles through featured article candidates and claimed an impressive 29 articles at Did You Know, scoring 555 points. Casliber led pool D. Pool A was led by, claiming points for a featured article, a featured list and seven good article reviews, while pool C was led by , who claimed for two good articles, ten articles at Did You Know and four good article reviews. They scored 154 and 118 respectively. Pool B was by far our most competitive pool; six of the eight competitors made it through to round 4, with all of them scoring over 100 points. The pool was led by, who claimed for, among other things, three featured articles and five good articles. In addition to the four pool leaders, 12 others (the four second places, and the 8 next highest overall) make up our final 16. The lowest scorer who reached round 4 scored 76 points; a significant increase on the 41 needed to reach round 3. Eight of our semi-finalists scored at least twice as much as this.

No points were awarded this round for featured pictures, good topics or In the News, and no points have been awarded in the whole competition for featured topics, featured portals or featured sounds. Instead, the highest percentage of points has come from good articles. Featured articles, despite their high point cost, are low in number, and so, overall, share a comparable number of points with Did You Know, which are high in number but low in cost. A comparatively small but still considerable number of points come from featured lists and good article reviews, rounding out this round's overall scores.

We would again like to thank and  for invaluable background work, as well as all of those helping to provide reviews for the articles listed on WikiCup/Reviews. Please do keep using it, and please do help by providing reviews for the articles listed there. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews generally at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup.

Two final notes: Firstly, please remember to state your participation in the WikiCup when nominating articles at FAC. Finally, some WikiCup-related statistics can be seen here and here, for those interested, though it appears that neither are completely accurate at this time. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 23:37, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Sockpuppets
I have come across a lot of obvious sockpuppets and it is sometimes difficult to determine who they are and to gather the evidence. I do not see any at the moment, but will let you know. Funny too that every time I make a report, User:Collect and sometimes Martintg show up and defend them, although they never provide evidence. TFD (talk) 20:31, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 July newsletter
We are half way through the penultimate round of this year's WikiCup; there is less than a month to go before we have our final 8. Our pool leaders are (Pool A, 189 points) and  (Pool B, 165 points). The number of points required to reach the next round is not clear at this time; there are some users who still do not have any recorded points. Please remember to update your submissions' pages promptly. In addition, congratulations to PresN, who scored the first featured topic points in the competition for his work on Thatgamecompany related articles. Most points this round generally have, so far, come from good articles, with only one featured article (White-bellied Sea Eagle, from ) and two featured lists (Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story, from PresN and Grammy Award for Best Native American Music Album, from ). Points for Did You Know and good article reviews round out the scoring. No points have been awarded for In the News, good topics or featured pictures this round, and no points for featured sounds or portals have been awarded in the entire competition. On an unrelated note, preparation will be beginning soon for next year's WikiCup- watch this space!

There is little else to be said beyond the usual. Please list anything you need reviewing on WikiCup/Reviews, so others following the WikiCup can help, and please do help if you can by providing reviews for the articles listed there. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews generally at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup- points are, of course, offered for reviews at GAC. Two final notes: Firstly, please remember to state your participation in the WikiCup when nominating articles at FAC. Finally, some WikiCup-related statistics can be seen here and here. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 11:38, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 July newsletter
The finals are upon us; we're down to the last few. One of the eight remaining contestants will be this year's WikiCup champion! 150 was the score needed to progress to the final; just under double the 76 required to reach round 4, and more than triple the 41 required to reach round 3. Our eight finalists are:


 * , Pool A's winner. Casliber has the highest total score in the competition, with 1528, the bulk of which is made up of 8 featured articles. He has the highest number of total featured articles (8, 1 of which was eligible for double points) and total did you knows (72) of any finalist. Casliber writes mostly on biology, including ornithology, botany and mycology.
 * , Pool B's winner and the highest scorer this round. PresN is the only finalist who has scored featured topic points, and he has gathered an impressive 330, but most of his points come from his 4 featured articles, one of which scored double. PresN writes mostly on video games and the Hugo Awards.
 * , Pool A's runner-up. Hurricanehink's points are mostly from his 30 good articles, more than any other finalist, and he is also the only finalist to score good topic points. Hurricanehink, as his name suggests, writes mostly on meteorology.
 * , Pool B's runner-up. Wizardman has completed 86 good article reviews, more than any other finalist, but most of his points come from his 2 featured articles. Wizardman writes mostly on American sport, especially baseball.
 * , the "fastest loser" (Pool A). Miyagawa has written 3 featured lists, one of which was awarded double points, more than any other finalist, but he was awarded points mostly for his 68 did you knows. Miyagawa writes on a variety of topics, including dogs, military history and sport.
 * , the second "fastest loser" (Pool B). Most of Resolute's points come from his 9 good articles. He writes mostly on Canadian topics, including ice hockey.
 * , who was joint third "fastest loser" (Pool A). Most of Evan's points come from his 10 good articles, and he writes mostly on meteorology.
 * , who was joint third "fastest loser" (Pool B). Most of Phil's points come from his 9 good articles, 4 of which (more than any other finalist) were eligible for double points. He writes mostly on aeronautics.

We say goodbye to our seven other semi-finalists,, , , , , and. Everyone still in the competition at this stage has done fantastically well, and contributed greatly to Wikipedia. We're on the home straight now, and we will know our winner in two months.

In other news, preparations for next year's competition have begun with a brainstorming thread. Please, feel free to drop by and share any thoughts you have about how the competition should work next year. Sign ups are not yet open, but will be opened in due course. Watch this space. Further, there has been a discussion about the rule whereby those in the WikiCup must delcare their participation when nominating articles at featured article candidates. This has resulted in a bot being created by new featured article delegate. The bot will leave a message on FAC pages if the nominator is a participant in the WikiCup.

A reminder of the rules: any points scored after August 29 may be claimed for the final round, and please remember to update submission pages promptly. If you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 00:09, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Notification per procedure
I regret your continued inflammatory and acrimonious relitigation of the past. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Nanobear Note corrected link. P ЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 20:07, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

ITN credit
Grey Hood  Talk  22:05, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

POV-pushing
"You were one of the best editors in Wikipedia. But you were a fool, because you did not understand that everyone who tries to fix NPOV violations by certain editors gets attacked, sanctioned and eventually psychologically destroyed."

No. People who allow themselves to make heated, angry statements get "sanctioned and eventually psychologically destroyed" If there are POV pushing editors, one has to deliberately plan his or her moves and make sure he/she doesn't fall afoul of behavioral rules. One may be "attacked" - but if one is angry, he/she needs to resolve that in private, then when he or she is ready, post. If the other guy violates behavioral rules, one can report him.

Unlike real life interactions, the internet is not instantaneous. If you get a bad remark, you can plan your response so it does exactly what is desired.

WhisperToMe (talk) 00:14, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 September newsletter
We are on this year's home straight, with less than a month to go until the winner of the 2011 WikiCup will be decided. The fight for first place is currently being contested by, and , all of whom have over 200 points. This round has already seen multiple featured articles (1991 Atlantic hurricane season from Hurricanehink and Northrop YF-23 from Sp33dyphil) and a double-scoring featured list (Miyagawa's 1948 Summer Olympics medal table). The scores will likely increase far further before the end of the round on October 31 as everyone ups their pace. There is not much more to say- thoughts about next year's competition are welcome on the WikiCup talk page or the scoring talk page, and signups will open once a few things have been sorted out.

If you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 12:46, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Journal of Cosmology DRN thread
Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Dispute resolution noticeboard regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The thread is "Journal of Cosmology". Thank you. —  Mr. Stradivarius ♫ 13:23, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 October newsletter
The 2011 WikiCup is now over, and our new champion is, who joins the exclusive club of the previous winners: (2007),  (2008),  (2009) and  (2010). The final standings were as follows:



Prizes for first, second, third and fourth will be awarded, as will prizes for all those who reached the final eight. Every participant who scored in the competition will receive a ribbon of participation. In addition to the prizes based on placement, the following special prizes will be awarded based on high performance in particular areas of content creation. So that the finalists do not have an undue advantage, the prize is awarded to the competitor who scored the highest in any particular field in a single round.


 * The Featured Article Award:, for his performance in round 2. matched the score, but Casliber won the tiebreaker.
 * The Good Article Award:, for his performance in round 4.
 * The Featured List Award:, for his performance in round 4. matched the score, but Miyagawa won the tiebreaker.
 * The Recognised Topic Award (for good and featured topics):, for his performance in round 3.
 * The Did You Know Award:, for his performance in round 1.
 * The In the News Award:, for his performance in round 1.
 * The Reviewer Award (for good article reviews):, for his performance in round 3.

No prize was awarded for featured pictures, sounds or portals, as none were claimed throughout the competition. The awards will be handed out over the next few days. Congratulations to all our participants, and especially our winners; we've all had fun, and Wikipedia has benefitted massively from our content work.

Preparation for next year's WikiCup is ongoing. Interested parties are invited to sign up and participate in our straw polls. It's been a pleasure to work with you all this year, and, whoever's taking part in and running the competition in 2012, we hope to see you all in January! J Milburn and The ed17 00:45, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

2011 WikiCup participation


It was good to have you on board this time around- we hope you enjoyed the competition! In case you are interested, signups for next year are open. Thanks, J Milburn and The ed17 20:55, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Orphaned non-free image File:PhobosGruntDesign.jpg
 Thanks for uploading File:PhobosGruntDesign.jpg. The image description page currently specifies that the image is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, the image is currently orphaned, meaning that it is not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the image was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that images for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).

PLEASE NOTE:


 * I am a bot, and will therefore not be able to answer your questions. If you have a question, place a template, along with your question, beneath this message.
 * I will remove the request for deletion if the file is used in an article once again.
 * If you receive this notice after the image is deleted, and you want to restore the image, click here to file an un-delete request.
 * To opt out of these bot messages, add  to your talk page.
 * If you believe the bot has made an error, please turn it off here and leave a message on my owner's talk page.

Thank you. DASHBot (talk) 18:03, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Fobos-Grunt
Nanobear, thank you for the valuable contributions you make. Well, I was wrong removing (anonymously that time) the text of your contribution on soil sampling — I will not remove it again. The source provided by you is very respectable, but I'm sure some of the information became obsolete since that time (2008). Current plans call for multiple (three) sampling devices, described here, and collecting some 200 grams of soil samples (the same source, as well as multitude of relatively fresh sources). I feel it will be adequate to adjust On Phobos section for that. Svmich (talk) 09:53, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Thank you. You have also made excellent contributions to the article. I agree with your concerns, and I will try to improve this part (it should state that the main claw is just one of the possible extraction mechanisms, and that the mass of the sample can be up to 200g (not just up to 160g)). However, I'm a bit time-pressed right now. Nanobear (talk) 19:49, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

RIA Novosti/Nuclear industry
You might be interested in the images in this recent release from RIA Novosti to Commons. Just in case you haven't seen this so far. Grey Hood  Talk  13:54, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Hey, you seems to be really gloomy in your last edit to the user page. Is this connected to the likely failure of Fobos-Grunt? Cheer up! This seems to be the destiny of the entire Soviet/Russian Mars program, almost exclusively consisting from failures for some reason, much unlike the Venus program. But there are always some ways to amend the situation and complete the task eventually, like they've done with GLONASS. Also, there are many more topics here less prone to ill fate. And your contributions to Wikipedia are really great, it is unjust to say "nothing worked, as usual". Grey Hood   Talk  19:05, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the cheer-up. I'm just really disappointed with loss of Phobos-Grunt. I could write several A4s about why this is a huge catastrophe (although not an entirely unpredicted one). My work on WP feels pointless sometimes, and I'm disappointed with the results. Real-life business is also pretty stressful at the moment. But enough of this crying in my beer. I think writing Nuclear industry in Russia could be fun, now that we have great images available in addition to good sources. Nanobear (talk) 02:56, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * In future I'm going to work with the images from RIA Novosti and insert all of them into relevant articles wherever possible. You could help with the nuclear part of RIAN materials. If you start the Nuclear industry of Russia, please let me know, this is the most interesting area of Russian industry for me. Grey Hood   Talk  12:50, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I will be working on it in my userspace: User:Nanobear/RusNuc. I will probably start this week or the next. No idea when it will be ready though. Right now I'm looking for sources and doing research. Nanobear (talk) 14:47, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Since the nuclear industry is highly centralized, I believe we can use Rosatom site as important source: . The articles Rosatom and Nuclear energy in Russia also might be improved, either simultaneously or later by taking some materials from the nuclear industry article. Grey Hood   Talk  15:25, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

WP Russia in the Signpost
The WikiProject Report would like to focus on WikiProject Russia for a Signpost article. This is an excellent opportunity to draw attention to your efforts and attract new members to the project. Would you be willing to participate in an interview? If so, here are the questions for the interview. Just add your response below each question and feel free to skip any questions that you don't feel comfortable answering. Multiple editors will have an opportunity to respond to the interview questions. If you know anyone else who would like to participate in the interview, please share this with them. Have a great day. -Mabeenot (talk) 23:26, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Our previous discussion
This editor may be relevant to our previous discussion. Please reply to me here. TFD (talk) 06:54, 23 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I just found out that this is a new name for Martintg. TFD (talk) 07:19, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

ITN for the Russian legislative election, 2011
Grey Hood  Talk  22:01, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

2012 WikiCup
Hi! As you've previously expressed interest in the competition, I'm just letting you know that the 2012 WikiCup is due to start in less than 24 hours. Signups are open, and will remain so for a few weeks after the beginning of the competition. The competition itself will follow basically the same format as last year, with a few small tweaks to point costs to reflect the opinions of the community. If you're interested in taking part, you're more than welcome, and if you know anyone who might be, please let them know too- the more the merrier! To join, simply add your name to WikiCup/2012 signups, and we will be in touch. Please feel free to direct any questions to me, or leave a note on the WikiCup talk page. Thanks! You are receiving this note as you are listed on WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Please feel free to add or remove yourself. EdwardsBot (talk) 01:24, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Avoid government (Ria Novosti) sources
Please, be careful of using sources such as Russia Profile. It is published by the RIA Novosti. Unfortunately, independent journalism is (sadly) very rare nowadays. Peltimikko (talk) 17:27, 31 December 2011 (UTC)
 * There is no need to be careful using Russia Profile Nanobear. It may be published by RIA Novosti, but this does not take away from the fact it is a reliable source for our purposes. Also, in case you didn't know Nanobear, Russia Profile has an advisory board, composed of:


 * Leon Aron - Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
 * Yuri Fokine - Rector of the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Foreign Ministry
 * Charles Grant - Director of the Centre for European Reform
 * Konstantin Kosachev - Chairman of the International Affairs Committee, State Duma of the Russian Federation
 * Svetlana Mironyuk* - General Director, Russian News and Information Agency (RIA Novosti)
 * Angela Stent- Director, Center for Eurasian, Russian and East European Studies, Georgetown University
 * Elena Nemirovskaya - Founder and Director, Moscow School of Political Studies
 * Vladimir Pozner - President, Russian Television Academy
 * Alexander Rahr - Director of the Berthold Beitz Center for Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Central Asia
 * Mikhail Zadornov - President, Vneshtorgbank 24
 * Nikolai Zlobin* - Director of Russian and Eurasian Programs, World Security Institute*

Information such as this is often missed, or ignored completely, by some editors, especially those who try to discount use of Russian sources. Continue to use Russia Profile exactly how you would any other reliable source. S novym godom by the way. Y u no be Russavia ლ(ಠ益ಠლ) 23:13, 31 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I would even go so far as to suggest that editors who believe that an editor being fired for:


 * "The magazine had the previous day published a picture of a ballot paper from last week's parliamentary vote with the words "Putin, go fuck yourself" scrawled in red ink. The caption reads: "A correctly filled out ballot recognised as invalid.""


 * is an example of how Russian media is not independent, and actually have a problem with the editor being fired, should have their own edits scrutinised on a more substantial basis, for numerous things are plainly obvious to me. I don't think I need to state the bleeding obvious either. Y u no be Russavia ლ(ಠ益ಠლ) 23:27, 31 December 2011 (UTC)


 * I wonder if User Peltimikko would ask us to avoid using YLE, the state owned radio and television network of his home country Finland, as a source? Or BBC for that matter? There exists a strong argument that radio and television stations have to be state owned (and and financed by license fees) because only then can the impartiality of news be guaranteed. For critical news it is vital that journalist are secure in their jobs without the fear of being arbitrarily fired because of their reporting. In the case of the Kommersant editor that was fired for screwing Putin, it was exactly the private corporate owner of the newspaper who fired him. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 05:30, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

2011 Tucson shooting
 SilkTork   ✔Tea time  16:23, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 January newsletter
WikiCup 2012 is off to a flying start. At the time of writing, we have 112 contestants; comparable to last year, but slightly fewer than 2010. Signups will remain open for another week, after which time they will be closed for this year. Our currrent far-away leader is, due mostly to his work on a slew of good articles about The X-Files; there remain many such articles waiting to be reviewed at good article candidates. Second place is currently held by, whose points come mostly from good articles about television episodes, although good article reviews, did you knows and an article about a baroness round out the score. In third place is, who has scored 200 points for his work on a single featured article, as well as points for work on others, mostly in the area of pop music. In all, nine users have 100 or more points. However, at the other end of the scale, there are still dozens of participants who are yet to score. Please remember to update your submission pages promptly!

The 64 highest scoring participants will advance to round 2 in a month's time. There, they will be split into eight random groups of eight. The score needed to reach the next round is not at all clear; last year, 8 points guaranteed a place. The year before, 20.

A few participants and their work warrant a mention for achieving "firsts" in this competition.
 * was the first to score, with his good article review of Illinois v. McArthur.
 * was also the first to score points for an article, thanks to his work on Hurricane Debby (1982)- now a good article. Tropical storms have featured heavily in the Cup, and good articles currently have a relatively fast turnaround time for reviews.
 * was the first to score points for a did you know, with Russian submarine K-114 Tula. Military history is another subject which has seen a lot of Cup activity.
 * is also the first person to successfully claim bonus points. Terminator 2: Judgment Day is now a good article, and was eligible for bonus points because the subject was covered on more than 20 other Wikipedias at the start of the competition. It is fantastic to see bonus points being claimed so early!
 * was the first to score points for an In the News entry, with Paedophryne amauensis. The lead image from the article was also used on the main page for a time, and it's certainly eye-catching!
 * was the first to score points for a featured article, and is, at the moment, the only competitor to claim for one. The article, "Halo" (Beyoncé Knowles song), was also worth double points because of its wide coverage. While this is an article that Jivesh and others have worked on for some time, it is undeniable that he has put considerable work into it this year, pushing it over the edge.

We are yet to see any featured lists, featured topics or good topics, but this is unsurprising; firstly, the nomination processes with each of these can take some time, and, secondly, it can take a considerable amount of time to work content to this level. In a similar vein, we have seen only one featured article. The requirement that content must have been worked on this year to be eligible means that we did not expect to see these at the start of the competition. No points have been claimed for featured portals or pictures, but these are not content types which are often claimed; the former has never made a big impact on the WikiCup, while the latter has not done so since 2009's competition.

A quick rules clarification before the regular notices: If you are concerned that another user is claiming points inappropriately, please contact a judge to take a look at the article. Competitors policing one another can create a bad atmosphere, and may lead to inconsistencies and mistakes. Rest assured that we, the judges, are making an effort to check submissions, but it is possible that we will miss something. On a loosely related note: If you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 00:13, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

A kitten for you!
A lovely kitten for you for all your work on Russian related articles. :D

LauraHale (talk) 00:41, 8 February 2012 (UTC) 

Thought you'd want to know
I thought you'd want to know that I edited your user page to link to an identical edit counter to the one you had linked, as it (the soxred93 one) has expired (Tparis has taken over the tools). Hope you don't mind. :-) -- Gilderien Talk|Contribs 19:09, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 February newsletter
Round 1 is already over! The 64 highest scorers have progressed to round 2. Our highest scorer was, again thanks mostly to a swathe of good articles on The X-Files. In second place was, thanks an impressive list of did you knows about racehorses. Both scored over 400 points. Following behind with over 300 points were, , and. February also saw the competition's first featured list: List of colleges and universities in North Dakota, from. At the other end of the scale, 11 points was enough to secure a place in this round, and some contestants with 10 points made it into the round on a tiebreaker. This is higher than the 8 points that were needed last year, but lower than the 20 points required the year before. The number of points required to progress to round 3 will be significantly higher.

The remaining contestants have been split into 8 pools of 8, named A through H. Round two will finish in two months time on 28 April, when the two highest scorers in each pool, as well as the next 16 highest scorers, will progress to round 3. The pools were entirely random, so while some pools may end up being more competitive than others, this is by chance rather than design.

The judges would like to point out two quick rules reminders. First, any content promoted during the interim period (that is, on or after 27 February) is eligible for points in round 2. Second, any content worked on significantly this year is eligible for points if promoted in this round. On a related note, if you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which would otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk &bull; email) and The ed17 (talk &bull; email) 00:03, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Norwegian C-130 Hercules accident


The article Norwegian C-130 Hercules accident has been proposed for deletion&#32; because of the following concern:
 * Non-notable event

While all contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. In particular, the speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. Speciate (talk) 06:07, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Nomination of Norwegian C-130 Hercules accident for deletion
A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Norwegian C-130 Hercules accident is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Articles for deletion/Norwegian C-130 Hercules accident until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on good quality evidence, and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion template from the top of the article. ...William 21:56, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 March newsletter
We are over half way through the second round of this year's WikiCup and things are going well! , of Pool B, is our highest overall scorer thanks to his prolific writings on television and film. In second place is Pool H's, thanks primarily to work on biological articles, especially in marine biology and herpetology. Third place goes to Pool E's, who also writes primarily on biology (including ornithology and botany) and has already submitted two featured articles this round. Of the 63 contestants remaining, 15 (just under a quarter) have over 100 points this round. However, 25 are yet to score. Please remember to update your submission pages promptly. 32 contestants, the top two from each pool and the 16 next-highest scorers, will advance to round 3.

Congratulations to, whose impressive File:Wacht am Rhein map (Opaque).svg became the competition's first featured picture. Also, congratulations to, who claimed good topic points, our first contestant this year to do so, for his work on Featured topics/1982 Atlantic hurricane season. This leaves featured topics and featured portals as the only sources of points not yet utilised. However, as recent statistics from show, no source has yet been utilised this competition to the same extent it has been previously!

It has been observed that the backlogs at good article candidates are building up again. While the points for good article reviews will be remaining constant, any help that can be offered keeping the backlog down would be appreciated. On a related note, if you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk &bull; email) and The ed17 (talk &bull; email) 23:23, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

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Scratching at the scab
I was a bit disappointed regarding your feeler for comments on this. I suppose old habits are what they are. Rather than stirring the proverbial pot, have you given any thought to my cooperative editing proposal regarding Ludmila Terenteva? VєсrumЬа ►TALK 15:45, 24 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm currently very busy in real life, so I do not have much time to edit. In the end, I'm not all that interested in pre-1991 history or biographies of non-living persons... I like to edit economy, because it is neutral, and there one rarely gets into conflict with other editors. Do you know any interesting Latvian companies? Something like that could be more relaxed and fun to edit than hot political topics like Vladimir Putin or Human rights in Latvia, don't you agree? Nanobear (talk) 17:46, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, if those in some circles merely fessed up to facts of history (this is as opposed to person "A"'s "truth" versus person "B"'s truth), there would be much less need for retrospection. However, I commend you on your initiative.
 * To your inquiry, unfortunately many of the "interesting" Latvian companies, even iconic brands, are now subsidiaries of foreign holding companies. I believe "Cēsis Beer" Cēsu Alus is still Latvian-held and has been brewing since the 16th century—and the current article is pretty much a stub. There's nothing like a good beer to facilitate collegial debate.
 * A company of wider interest would be Melodiya, whose Rīga studio is still in production today. Their article looks to be quite wanting for attention as well. VєсrumЬа ►TALK 18:06, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 April newsletter
Round 2 of this year's WikiCup is over, and so we are down to our final 32, in what could be called our quarter-finals. The two highest scorers from each pool, as well as the next 16 highest scorers overall, have entered round 3, while 30 participants have been eliminated. Pool B's remains our top scorer with over 700 points; he continues to gain high numbers of points for his good articles on The X-Files, but also Millennium and other subjects. He has also gained points for a good topic, a featured list, multiple good article reviews and several did you knows. Pool E's was second, thanks primarily to his biology articles, with Pool H's  coming in third, with an impressive 46 did you knows, mostly on the subject of baseball. Casliber and Cwmhiraeth both scored over 600 points. Pools E and H proved our most successful, with each seeing 5 members qualify for round 3, while Pools C and D were the least, with each seeing only 3 reach round 3. However, it was Pool G which saw the lowest scoring, with a little under 400 points combined; Pool H, the highest scoring group, saw over triple that score.

65 points was the lowest qualifying score for round 3; significantly higher than the 11 required to enter round 2, and also higher than the 41 required to reach round 3 last year. However, in 2010, 100 points were needed to secure a place in round 3. 16 will progress to round 4. In round 3, 150 points was the 16th highest score, though, statistically, people tend to up their game a little in later rounds. Last year, 76 points secured a place, while in 2010, a massive 250 points were needed. Guessing how many points will be required is not easy. We still have not seen any featured portals or topics this year, but, on the subject of less common content types, a small correction needs to be made to the previous newsletter: File:Wacht am Rhein map (Opaque).svg, our first featured picture, was the work of both and, the latter of whom has also gone on to score with File:Map of the Battle of Guam, 1944.svg. Bonus points also continue to roll in; this round, earned triple points for her good articles on William the Conqueror and the Middle Ages, Casliber and Cwmhiraeth both earned triple points for their work on Western Jackdaw, now a good article,  earned triple points for her work on lettuce and work by  to ready antimony for good article status earned him triple points. managed to expand Vitus Bering far enough for a did you know, which was also worth triple points. All of these highly important topics featured on 50 or more Wikipedias at the start of the year.

An article on the WikiCup in the Wikimedia Blog, "Improving Wikipedia with friendly competition", was posted at the end of April. This may be of interest to those who are signed up to this newsletter, as well as serving as another way to draw attention to our project. Also, we would again like to thank and, for continued help behind the scenes. As ever, if you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk &bull; email) and The ed17 (talk &bull; email) 23:17, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 May newsletter
We're halfway through round 3 (or the quarter finals, if you prefer) and things are running smoothly. We're seeing very high scoring; as of the time of writing, the top 16 all have over 90 points. This has already proved to be more competative than this time last year- in 2011, 76 points secured a place, while in 2010, a massive 250 was the lowest qualifying score. People have also upped their game slightly from last round, which is to be expected as we approach the end of the competition. Leading Pool A is, whose points have mostly come from a large number of did you knows on marine biology. Pool B's leader,, is for the first time not our highest scorer at the time of newsletter publication, but his good articles on The X-Files and Millenium keep him in second place overall. leads Pool C, our quietest pool, with content in a variety of areas on a variety of topics. Pool D is led by, our current overall leader. Nearly half of Casliber's points come from his triple-scored Western Jackdaw, which is now a featured article.

This round has seen an unusually high number of featured lists, with nearly one in five remaining participants claiming one, and one user,, claiming two. Miyagawa's featured list, 1936 Summer Olympics medal table, was even awarded double points. By comparison, good article reviews seem to be playing a smaller part, and featured topics portals remain two content-types still unutilised in this competition. Other than that, there isn't much to say! Things are coming along smoothly. As ever, if you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 23:39, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 June newsletter
Apologies for the lateness of this letter; our usual bot wasn't working. We are now entering round 4, our semi-finals, and have our final 16. A score of 243 was required to reach this round; significantly more than 2011's 76 points, and only a little behind 2010's 250 points. By comparison, last year, 150 points in round 4 secured a place in the final; in 2010, 430 were needed. Commiserations to Pool A's, who scored 242 points, missing out on a place in the round by a whisker. However, congratulations to Pool B's, whose television articles have brought him another round victory. Pool A's came second overall, with an impressive list of biological did you knows, good articles and featured articles. Third overall was Pool D's, with a long list of contibutions, mostly relating to baseball. Of course, with the points resetting every round, the playing field has been levelled. The most successful Pool was Pool D, which saw seven into the final round. Pool B saw four, C saw three and Pool A saw only the two round leaders.

A quick note about other competitions taking place on Wikipedia which may be of interest. There are 13 days remaining in the June-July GAN backlog elimination drive, but it is not too late to take part. August will also see the return of The Core Contest- a one month long competition first run in 2007. While the WikiCup awards points for audited content on any subject, The Core Contest about is raw article improvement, focussing heavily on the most important articles on Wikipedia. As ever, if you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 11:03, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 July newsletter
We're approaching the beginning of 2012's final round. Pool A sees as the leader, with 300 points being awarded for the featured article Bivalvia, and Pool B sees  in the lead, with 10 good articles, and over 35 articles eligible for good topic points. Pool A sees in second place with a number of articles relating to baseball, while Pool B's  follows Grapple X, with a variety of contributions including the high-scoring, high-importance featured article on the 2010 film Pride & Prejudice. Ruby2010, like Grapple X, also claimed a number of good topic points; despite this, not a single point has been claimed for featured topics in the contest so far. The same is true for featured portals.

Currently, the eighth-place competitor (and so the lowest scorer who would reach the final round right now) has scored 332, more than double the 150 needed to reach the final round last year. In 2010, however, 430 was the lowest qualifying score. In this competition, we have generally seen scores closer to those in 2010 than those in 2011. Let's see what kind of benchmark we can set for future competitions! As ever, if you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 22:29, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

Notice of Dispute resolution discussion
Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Dispute resolution noticeboard regarding a content dispute in which you may have been involved. Content disputes can hold up article development, therefore we request your participation in the discussion to help find a resolution. The thread is "Dispute resolution noticeboard and related articles|Vladimir Putin and related articles]]". Thank you! EarwigBot   operator  /  talk 17:40, 31 August 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 August newsletter
The final is upon us! We are down to our final 8. A massive 573 was our lowest qualifying score; this is higher than the 150 points needed last year and the 430 needed in 2010. Even in 2009, when points were acquired for mainspace edit count in addition to audited content, 417 points secured a place. That leaves this year's WikiCup, by one measure at least, our most competitive ever. Our finalists, ordered by round 4 score, are:
 * 1) once again finishes the round in first place, leading Pool B. Grapple X writes articles about television, and especially The X-Files and Millenium, with good articles making up the bulk of the score.
 * 2) led Pool A this round. Fourth-place finalist last year, Miyagawa writes on a variety of topics, and has reached the final primarily off the back of his massive number of did you knows.
 * 3) was second in Pool B. Ruby2010 writes primarily on television and film, and scores primarily from good articles.
 * 4) finished third in Pool B. Casliber is something of a WikiCup veteran, having finished sixth in 2011 and fourth in 2010. Casliber writes on the natural sciences, including ornithology, botany and astronomy. Over half of Casliber's points this round were bonus points from the high-importance articles he has worked on.
 * 5) came second in Pool A. Also writing on biology, especially marine biology, Cwmhiraeth received 390 points for one featured article (Bivalvia) and one good article (pelican), topping up with a large number of did you knows.
 * 6) was third in Pool A. Muboshgu writes primarily on baseball, and this round saw Muboshgu's first featured article, Derek Jeter, promoted on its fourth attempt at FAC.
 * 7) was fourth in Pool A. She writes on a variety of topics, including horses, but this round also saw the high-importance lettuce reach featured article status.
 * 8) is another WikiCup veteran, having been a finalist in 2009 and 2010. He writes mostly on mycology.

However, we must also say goodbye to the eight who did not make the final, having fallen at the last hurdle:, , , , , , and. We hope to see you all next year.

On the subject of next year, a discussion has been opened here. Come and have your say about the competition, and how you'd like it to run in the future. This brainstorming will go on for some time before more focused discussions/polls are opened. As ever, if you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 00:19, 1 September 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 September newsletter


We're over half way through the final, and so it is less than a month until we know for certain our 2012 WikiCup champion. currently leads, followed by, and. However, we have no one resembling a breakaway leader, and so the competition is a long way from over. Next month's newsletter will feature a list of our winners (who are not necessarily only the finalists) and keep your eyes open for an article on the WikiCup in a future edition of The Signpost. The leaders are already on a par with last year's winners, but a long way from the huge scores seen in 2010. That said, a repeat of the competition from 2010 seems unlikely.

It is good to see that three-quarters of our finalists have already scored bonus points this round. This shows that, contrary to criticism that the WikiCup has received in the past, the competition does not merely incentivise the writing of trivial articles; instead, our top competitors are still spending their time contributing to high-importance articles, and bringing them to a high standard. This does a great service to the encyclopedia and its readers. Thank you, and good work!

The planning for next year's WikiCup is ongoing. Some straw polls have been opened concerning the scoring, and you can now sign up for next year's competition. As ever, if you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) J Milburn (talk) 19:59, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 October newsletter
The 2012 WikiCup has come to a close; congratulations to, our 2012 champion! Cwmhiraeth joins our exclusive club of previous winners: (2007),  (2008),  (2009),  (2010) and  (2011). Our final standings were as follows:



Prizes for first, second, third and fourth will be awarded, as will prizes for all those who reached the final eight. Every participant who scored in the competition will receive a ribbon of participation. In addition to the prizes based on placement, the following special prizes will be awarded based on high performance in particular areas of content creation. So that the finalists do not have an undue advantage, the prize is awarded to the competitor who scored the highest in any particular field in a single round.


 * The featured article award goes to, for four featured articles in the final round.
 * The good article award also goes to, for 19 good articles in the second round.
 * The list award goes to, for three featured lists in the final round.
 * The topic award goes to, for three good topics (with around 40 articles) in round 4.
 * The did you know award goes to, for well over 100 DYKs in the final round.
 * The news award goes to, for 10 in the news items in round 3.
 * The picture award goes to, for two featured pictures in round 2.
 * The reviewer award goes to both (14 reviews in round 1) and  (14 reviews in round 3).
 * Finally, for achieving an incredible bonus point total in the final round, and for bringing the top-importance article frog to featured status, a biostar has been awarded to.

Awards will be handed out in the coming days; please bear with us! This year's competition also saw fantastic contributions in all rounds, from newer Wikipedians contributing their first good or featured articles, right up to highly experienced Wikipedians chasing high scores and contributing to topics outside of their usual comfort zones. It would be impossible to name all of the participants who have achieved things to be proud of, but well done to all of you, and thanks! Wikipedia has certainly benefited from the work of this year's WikiCup participants.

Next year's WikiCup will begin in January. Currently, discussions and polls are open, and all contributions are welcome. You can also sign up for next year's competition. There will be no further newsletters this year, although brief notes may be sent out in December to remind everyone about the upcoming competition. It's been a pleasure to work with you all, and we hope to see you all in January! J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 00:36, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

File permission problem with File:Zemo nikosi tanks.jpg
Thanks for uploading File:Zemo nikosi tanks.jpg. I noticed that while you provided a valid copyright licensing tag, there is no proof that the creator of the file agreed to license it under the given license.

If you created this media entirely yourself but have previously published it elsewhere (especially online), please either
 * make a note permitting reuse under the CC-BY-SA or another acceptable free license (see this list) at the site of the original publication; or
 * Send an email from an address associated with the original publication to permissions-en@wikimedia.org, stating your ownership of the material and your intention to publish it under a free license. You can find a sample permission letter here. If you take this step, add OTRS pending to the file description page to prevent premature deletion.

If you did not create it entirely yourself, please ask the person who created the file to take one of the two steps listed above, or if the owner of the file has already given their permission to you via email, please forward that email to permissions-en@wikimedia.org.

If you believe the media meets the criteria at Non-free content, use a tag such as or one of the other tags listed at File copyright tags, and add a rationale justifying the file's use on the article or articles where it is included. See File copyright tags for the full list of copyright tags that you can use.

If you have uploaded other files, consider checking that you have provided evidence that their copyright owners have agreed to license their works under the tags you supplied, too. You can find a list of files you have created in [ your upload log]. Files lacking evidence of permission may be deleted one week after they have been tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. You may wish to read the Wikipedia's image use policy. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. Magog the Ogre (t • c) 02:20, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2013 starting soon
Hi there; you're receiving this message because you have previously shown interest in the WikiCup. This is just to remind you that the 2013 WikiCup will be starting on 1 January, and that signups will remain open throughout January. Old and new Wikipedians and WikiCup participants are warmly invited to take part in this year's competition. (Though, as a note to the more experienced participants, there have been a few small rules changes in the last few months.) If you have already signed up, let this be a reminder; you will receive a message with your submissions' page soon. Please direct any questions to the WikiCup talk page. Thanks! J Milburn 19:12, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2013 January newsletter
Signups are now closed; we have our final 127 contestants for this year's competition. 64 contestants will make it to the next round at the end of February, but we're already seeing strong scoring compared to previous years. currently leads, with 358 points. At this stage in 2012, the leader had 342 points, while in 2011, the leader had 228 points. We also have a large number of scorers when compared with this stage in previous years. was the first competitor to score this year, as he was last year, with a detailed good article review. Some other firsts:
 * was also the first to score for an article, with the good article Hurricane Gordon (2000). Again, this is a repeat of last year!
 * was the first to score for a did you know, with Marquis Flowers.
 * was the first to score for an in the news, with 2013 Houphouët-Boigny stampede.
 * was the first to score for a featured list, with list of Billboard Social 50 number-one artists.
 * was the first to score for a featured picture, with File:Thure de Thulstrup - L. Prang and Co. - Battle of Gettysburg - Restoration by Adam Cuerden.jpg.

Featured articles, portals and topics, as well as good topics, are yet to feature in the competition.

This year, the bonus points system has been reworked, with bonus points on offer for old articles prepared for did you know, and "multiplier" points reworked to become more linear. For details, please see WikiCup/Scoring. There have been some teething problems as the bot has worked its way around the new system, but issues should mostly be ironed out- please report any problems to the WikiCup talk page. Here are some participants worthy of note with regards to the bonus points:


 * was the first to score bonus points, with Portland-class cruiser, a good article.
 * has the highest overall bonus points, as well as the highest scoring article, thanks to his work on Enrico Fermi, now a good article. The biography of such a significant figure to the history of science warrants nearly five times the normal score.
 * claimed bonus points for René Vautier and Nicolas de Fer, articles that did not exist on the English Wikipedia at the start of the year; a first for the WikiCup. The articles were eligible for bonus points because of fact they were both covered on a number of other Wikipedias.

Also, a quick mention of, who may well have already written the oddest article of the WikiCup this year: did you know that the Fucking mayor objected to Fucking Hell on the grounds that there was no Fucking brewery? The gauntlet has been thrown down; can anyone beat it?

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 00:22, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Are Russians culturally muslims?
this user insist that russians are muslims http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Hmains

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russians

Predominantly † Eastern Orthodox Christianity (Russian Orthodox Church) Significant non-religious population. Minorities of Old Believers and Muslims

In my opinion the Muslims should be removed from religions about russians, because there are a lot of other russian people like tatars and bashkirs and so on which applies to them. If you look at other people articles you will see that they havent it like this

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_people

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germans

Do you agree? You seem to know more about russia and wikipedia than i do, imo the russians article should also be locked.--Noelmantra (talk) 08:15, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

WikiCup 2013 February newsletter
Round 1 is now over. The top 64 scorers have progressed to round 2, where they have been randomly split into eight pools of eight. At the end of April, the top two from each pool, as well as the 16 highest scorers from those remaining, will progress to round 3. Commiserations to those eliminated; if you're interested in still being involved in the WikiCup, able and willing reviewers will always be needed, and if you're interested in getting involved with other collaborative projects, take a look at the WikiWomen's Month discussed below.

Round 1 saw 21 competitors with over 100 points, which is fantastic; that suggests that this year's competition is going to be highly competative. Our lower scores indicate this, too: A score of 19 was required to reach round 2, which was significantly higher than the 11 points required in 2012 and 8 points required in 2011. The score needed to reach round 3 will be higher, and may depend on pool groupings. In 2011, 41 points secured a round 3 place, while in 2012, 65 was needed. Our top three scorers in round 1 were:
 * , primarily for an array of warship GAs.
 * , primarily for an array of did you knows and good articles, some of which were awarded bonus points.
 * , due in no small part to Canis Minor, a featured article awarded a total of 340 points. A joint submission with, this is the highest scoring single article yet submitted in this year's competition.

Other contributors of note include:
 * , whose Portal:Massachusetts is the first featured portal this year. The featured portal process is one of the less well-known featured processes, and featured portals have traditionally had little impact on WikiCup scores.
 * , whose Mycena aurantiomarginata was the first featured article this year.
 * and, who both claimed points for articles in the Major League Baseball tie-breakers topic, the first topic points in the competition.
 * , who claimed for the first full good topic with the Casting Crowns studio albums topic.

Featured topics have still played no part in this year's competition, but once again, a curious contribution has been offered by : did you know that there is a Shit Brook in Shropshire? With April Fools' Day during the next round, there will probably be a good chance of more unusual articles...

March sees the WikiWomen's History Month, a series of collaborative efforts to aid the women's history WikiProject to coincide with Women's History Month and International Women's Day. A number of WikiCup participants have already started to take part. The project has a to-do list of articles needing work on the topic of women's history. Those interested in helping out with the project can find articles in need of attention there, or, alternatively, add articles to the list. Those interested in collaborating on articles on women's history are also welcome to use the WikiCup talk page to find others willing to lend a helping hand. Another collaboration currently running is an an effort from WikiCup participants to coordinate a number of Easter-themed did you know articles. Contributions are welcome!

A few final administrative issues. From now on, submission pages will need only a link to the article and a link to the nomination page, or, in the case of good article reviews, a link to the review only. See your submissions' page for details. This will hopefully make updating submission pages a little less tedious. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) J Milburn (talk) 11:26, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

WikiCup 2013 March newsletter
We are halfway through round two. Pool A sees the strongest competition, with five out of eight of its competitors scoring over 100, and Pool H is lagging, with half of its competitors yet to score. WikiCup veterans lead overall; Pool A's (2010's winner) leads overall, with poolmate  (a finalist in 2011 and 2012) not far behind. Pool F's (a finalist in 2010, 2011 and 2012) is in third. The top two scorers in each pool, as well as the next highest 16 scorers overall, will progress to round three at the end of April.

Today has seen a number of Easter-themed did you knows from WikiCup participants, and March has seen collaboration from contestants with WikiWomen's History Month. It's great to see the WikiCup being used as a locus of collaboration; if you know of any collaborative efforts going on, or want to start anything up, please feel free to use the WikiCup talk page to help find interested editors. As well as fostering collaboration, we're also seeing the Cup encouraging the improvement of high-importance articles through the bonus point system. Highlights from the last month include GAs on physicist Niels Bohr, on the European hare , on the constellation Circinus ( and ) and on the Third Epistle of John. All of these subjects were covered on at least 50 Wikipedias at the beginning of the year and, subsequently, each contribution was awarded at least three times as many points as normal.

Wikipedians who enjoy friendly competition may be interested in participating in April's wikification drive. While wikifying an article is typically not considered "significant work" such that it can be claimed for WikiCup points, such gnomish work is often invaluable in keeping articles in shape, and is typically very helpful for new writers who may not be familiar with formatting norms.

A quick reminder: now, submission pages will need only a link to the article and a link to the nomination page, or, in the case of good article reviews, a link to the review only. See your submissions' page for details. This will hopefully make updating submission pages a little less tedious. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) J Milburn (talk) 22:17, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

 * Thank you, I appreciate it a lot! Nanobear (talk) 09:58, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Hidden Nations, Enduring Crimes conference
You voted to delete one of the conferences as not notable. With the Boston Marathon bombings this activity has again hit the limelight. Is the Fund of Caucasus the organizer of the Hidden Nations, Enduring Crimes conference? Wayne Madsen says they are related, but does not provide a source. I see you have been working on the bombings article. If you have time, you might look into this aspect of the story. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 03:00, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

WikiCup 2013 April newsletter
We are a week into Round 3, but it is off to a flying start, with claiming for the high-importance Portal:Sports and Portal:Geography (which are the first portals ever awarded bonus points in the WikiCup) and  claiming for a did you know of sea, the highest scoring individual did you know article ever submitted for the WikiCup. Round 2 saw very impressive scores at close; first place and second place  both scored over 1000 points; a feat not seen in Round 2 since 2010. This, in part, has been made possible by the change in the bonus points rules, but is also testament to the quality of the competition this year. Pool C and Pool G were most competitive, with three quarters of participants making it to Round 3, while Pool D was the least, with only the top two scorers making it through. The lowest qualifying score was 123, significantly higher than last year's 65, 2011's 41 or even 2010's 100.

The next issue of The Signpost is due to include a brief update on the current WikiCup, comparing it to previous years' competitions. This may be of interest to current WikiCup followers, and may help bring some more new faces into the community. We would also like to note that this round includes an extra competitor to the 32 advertised, who has been added to a random pool. This extra inclusion seems to have been the fairest way to deal with a small mistake made before the beginning of this round, but should not affect the competition in a large way. If you have any questions or concerns about this, please feel free to contact one of the judges.

A rules clarification: content promoted between rounds can be claimed in the round after the break, but not the round before. The case in point is content promoted on 29/30 April, which may be claimed in this round. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 15:42, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

WikiCup 2013 June newsletter
We are down to our final 16: the 2013 semi-finals are upon us. A score of 321 was required to survive round 3, further cementing this as the most competitive WikiCup yet; round 3 was survived in 2012 with 243 points, in 2011 with 76 points and in 2010 with 250 points. The change may in part be to do with the fact that more articles are now awarded bonus points, in addition to more competitive play. Reaching the final has, in the past, required 573 points (2012, a 135% increase on the score needed to reach round 4), 150 points (2011, a 97% increase) and 417 points (2010, a 72% increase). This round has seen over a third of participants claiming points for featured articles (with seven users claiming for multiple featured articles) and most users have also gained bonus points. However, the majority of points continue to come from good articles, followed by did you know articles. In this round, every content type was utilised by at least one user, proving that the WikiCup brings together content contributors from all corners of the project.

Round 3 saw a number of contributions of note. claimed the first featured topic points in this year's competition for her excellent work on topics related to Maya Angelou, the noted American author and poet. We have also continued to see high-importance articles improved as part of the competition: was awarded a thoroughly well-earned 560 points for her featured article Middle Ages and 102 points for her good article Battle of Hastings. Good articles James Chadwick and Stanislaw Ulam netted 102 and 72 points respectively, while 72 points were awarded to  for each of Władysław Sikorski and Emilia Plater, both recently promoted to good article status. Collaborative efforts between WikiCup participants have continued, with, for example, and  being awarded 180 points each for their featured article on Boletus luridus.

A rules reminder: content promoted between rounds can be claimed in the round after the break, but not the round before. The case in point is content promoted on the 29/30 June, which may be claimed in this round. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. We are currently seeing concern about the amount of time people have to wait for reviews, especially at GAC- if you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to reduce the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 09:47, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

WikiCup 2013 July newsletter
We're halfway through this year's penultimate round, and the competition is moving along well. Pool A's currently leads overall, while Pool B's  is second. Both leaders are WikiCup veterans, and both have already scored over 600 points this month. If the round were to end today,, with 274 points, would be the lowest-scoring participant to make it through. This indicates that participants will need a score comparable to last year's (573, the highest ever) to qualify for the final. The high scores this year are a testament both to the quality of participants and to the increased focus on significant content (eligible for bonus points) in this year's competition. So far this round, both Sasata and have made up over half of their score through bonus points, with, for example, high importance FA koala earning Sasata a total of 440 points (from a multiplier of 4.4) and high-importance GA sea earning Cwmhiraeth a total of 216 points (from a multiplier of 7.2). Other articles on important topics submitted this round include a featured article on the Norman conquest of England by, and good articles on Nobel laureate in literature Henryk Sienkiewicz, Nobel laureate in physics Hans Bethe, and the noted Japanese aircraft carrier Hiryū. These articles are by, and Sturmvogel_66 respectively.

Other than that, there is not much to report! If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to reduce the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 23:12, 31 July 2013 (UTC)

WikiCup 2013 August newsletter
This year's final is upon us. Our final eight, in order of last round's score, are:
 * , a WikiCup newcomer who has contributed on topics of military history and physics, including a number of high-importance topics. Good articles have made up the bulk of his points, but he has also scored a great deal of bonus points. He has the second highest score overall so far, with more than 3000 points accumulated.
 * , another WikiCup veteran who reached the finals in 2012, 2011 and 2010. He writes on a variety of topics including botany, mycology and astronomy, and has claimed the highest or joint highest number of featured articles every round so far this year. He has the third highest score overall, with just under 3000 points accumulated.
 * , 2012 WikiCup champion, who writes mostly on marine biology. She has also contributed to high-importance topics, seeing huge numbers of bonus points for high-importance featured and good articles. Previous rounds have seen her scoring the most bonus points, with scoring spread across did you knows, good articles and featured articles.
 * , a WikiCup veteran who finished in second place in 2012, and competed as early as 2009. He writes articles on biology, especially mycology, and has scored highly for a number of collaborations at featured article candidates.
 * , the winner of the 2010 competition. His contributions mostly concern Naval history, and he has scored a very large number of points for good articles and good article reviews in every round. He is the highest scorer overall this year, with over 3500 points in total.
 * , who is competing in the WikiCup for the second time, though this will be her first time in the final. A regular at FAC, she is mostly interested in British medieval history, and has scored very highly for some top-importance featured articles on the topic.
 * , a finalist in 2012 and 2011. He writes on a broad variety of topics, with many of this year's points coming from good articles about Star Trek. Good articles make up the bulk of his points, and he had the most good articles back in round 2; he was also the highest scorer for DYK in rounds 1 and 2.
 * 1) has previously been involved with the WikiCup, but hasn't participated for a number of years. He scores mostly from restoration work leading to featured picture credits, but has also done some article writing and reviewing.

We say goodbye to eight great participants who did not qualify for the final:, , , , , , ,. Having made it to this stage is still an excellent achievement, and you can leave with your heads held high. We hope to see you all again next year. Signups are now open for the 2014 WikiCup, which will begin on 1 January. All Wikipedians, whatever their interest or level of experience, are warmly invited to participate in next year's competition.

This last month has seen some incredible contributions; for instance, Cwmhiraeth's Starfish and Ealdgyth's Battle of Hastings—two highly important, highly viewed pages—made it to featured article status. It would be all too easy to focus solely on these stunning achievements at the expense of those participants working in lower-scoring areas, when in fact all WikiCup participants are doing excellent work. A mention of everything done is impossible, but here are a few: Last round saw the completion of several good topics (on the 1958, 1959 and 1962 Atlantic hurricane seasons) to which 12george1 had contributed. Calvin999 saw "S&M" (song), on which he has been working for several years, through to featured article status on its tenth try. Figureskatingfan continued towards her goal of a broad featured/good topic on Maya Angelou, with two featured and four good articles. ThaddeusB contributed significantly to over 20 articles which appeared on the main page's "in the news" section. Adam Cuerden continued to restore a large number of historical images, resulting in over a dozen FP credits this round alone. The WikiCup is not just about top-importance featured articles, and the work of all of these users is worthy of commendation.

Finally, the usual notices: If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to reduce the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 05:13, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

WikiCup 2013 September newsletter
In 30 days, we will know the identity of our 2013 WikiCup champion. currently leads; if that lead is held, she will become the first person to have won the WikiCup twice. , —who has never participated in the competition before—and follow. The majority of points in this round have come from a mix of good articles and bonus points. This final round is seeing contributions to a number of highly important topics; recent submissions include Phoenix (constellation) (FA by Casliber), Ernest Lawrence (GA by Hawkeye7), Pinniped, and red fox (both GAs by Sasata).

The did you know (DYK) eligibility criteria have recently changed, meaning that newly passed good articles are accepted as "new" for did you know purposes. However, in the interests of not changing the WikiCup rules mid-competition, please note that only articles eligible for DYK under the old system (that is, newly created articles or 5x expansions) will be eligible for points in this year's WikiCup. We do, however, have time to discuss how this new system will work for next year's competition; a discussion will be opened in due course. On that note, thoughts are welcome on changes you'd like to see for next year. What worked? What didn't work? What would you like to see more of? What would you like to see less of? All Wikipedians, new or old, are also warmly invited to sign up for the 2014 WikiCup.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to reduce the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 22:38, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Books and Bytes: The Wikipedia Library Newsletter
Books and Bytes Volume 1, Issue 1, October 2013 by , Greetings Wikipedia Library members! Welcome to the inaugural edition of Books and Bytes, TWL’s monthly newsletter. We're sending you the first edition of this opt-in newsletter, because you signed up, or applied for a free research account: HighBeam, Credo, Questia, JSTOR, or Cochrane. To receive future updates of Books and Bytes, please add your name to the subscriber's list. There's lots of news this month for the Wikipedia Library, including new accounts, upcoming events, and new ways to get involved... New positions: Sign up to be a Wikipedia Visiting Scholar, or a Volunteer Wikipedia Librarian Wikipedia Loves Libraries: Off to a roaring start this fall in the United States: 29 events are planned or have been hosted. New subscription donations: Cochrane round 2; HighBeam round 8; Questia round 4... Can we partner with NY Times and Lexis-Nexis?? New ideas: OCLC innovations in the works; VisualEditor Reference Dialog Workshop; a photo contest idea emerges News from the library world: Wikipedian joins the National Archives full time; the Getty Museum releases 4,500 images; CERN goes CC-BY Announcing WikiProject Open: WikiProject Open kicked off in October, with several brainstorming and co-working sessions New ways to get involved: Visiting scholar requirements; subject guides; room for library expansion and exploration Read the full newsletter ''Thanks for reading! All future newsletters will be opt-in only. Have an item for the next issue? Leave a note for the editor on the Suggestions page. --The Interior 19:50, 27 October 2013 (UTC)''

WikiCup 2013 October newsletter
The WikiCup is over for another year! Our champion, for the second year running, is. Our final nine were as follows:

All those who reached the final win prizes, and prizes will also be going to the following participants:


 * wins the FA prize, for four featured articles in round 4, worth 400 points.
 * wins the GA prize, for 20 good articles in round 3, worth 600 points.
 * wins the FL prize, for four featured lists in round 2, worth 180 points.
 * wins the FP prize, for 23 featured pictures in round 5, worth 805 point.
 * wins the FPo prize, for 2 featured portals in round 3, worth 70 points.
 * wins the topic prize, for a 23-article featured topic in round 5, worth 230 points.
 * wins the DYK prize, for 79 did you know articles in round 5, worth 570 points.
 * wins the ITN prize, for 23 in the news articles in round 4, worth 270 points.
 * wins the GAR prize, for 24 good article reviews in round 1, worth 96 points.
 * The judges are awarding the Oddball Barnstar to, for some curious contributions in earlier rounds.
 * Finally, the judges are awarding the Geography Barnstar for her work on sea, now a featured article. This top-importance article was the highest-scoring this year; when it was promoted to FA status, Cwmhiraeth could claim 720 points.

Prizes will be handed out in the coming weeks. Please be patient!

Congratulations to everyone who has been successful in this year's WikiCup, whether you made it to the final rounds or not, and a particular congratulations to the newcomers to the WikiCup who have achieved this year. Thanks to all who have taken part and helped out with the competition. While it has been an excellent year, errors have opened up the judges' eyes to the need for a third judge, and it is with pleasure that we announce that experienced WikiCup participant Miyagawa will be acting as a judge from now on. We hope you will all join us in welcoming him to the team.

Next year's competition begins on 1 January. You are invited to sign up to participate; it is open to all Wikipedians, new and old. Brainstorming and discussion remains open for how next year's competition will work, and straw polls will be opened by the judges soon. Those interested in friendly competition may also like to keep an eye on the stub contest, being organised by Casliber. The WikiCup judges will be back in touch over the coming months, and we hope to see you all in the 2014 competition. Until then, it only remains to once again congratulate our worthy winners, and thank all participants for their involvement! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 00:14, 1 November 2013 (UTC)

The Wikipedia Library Survey
As a subscriber to one of The Wikipedia Library's programs, we'd like to hear your thoughts about future donations and project activities in this brief survey. Thanks and cheers, Ocaasit &#124; c 14:45, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

WP Russia in the Signpost (2014)
The WikiProject Report would like to focus on WikiProject Russia for a Signpost article. This is an excellent opportunity to draw attention to your efforts and attract new members to the project. Would you be willing to participate in an interview? If so, here are the questions for the interview. Just add your response below each question and feel free to skip any questions that you don't feel comfortable answering. Multiple editors will have an opportunity to respond to the interview questions, so be sure to sign your answers. If you know anyone else who would like to participate in the interview, please share this with them. Have a great day. –Mabeenot (talk) 17:12, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

WikiCup 2014 January newsletter
The 2014 WikiCup is off to a flying start, with, at time of writing, 138 participants. The is the largest number of participants we have seen since 2010. If you are yet to join the competition, don't worry- the judges have agreed to keep the signups open for a few more days. By a wide margin, our current leader is newcomer, whose set of 14 featured pictures, the first FPs of the competition, was worth 490 points. Here are some more noteworthy scorers:


 * and were the first people to score, for the good article Tropical Storm Bret (1981) and its good article review respectively. 12george1 was also the first person to score in 2012 and 2013.
 * scored the first ITN points for 2014 North American polar vortex.
 * scored points for an early good topic, finishing off Featured topics/She Wolf.
 * scored the first bonus points of the competition, for his work on Typhoon Vera.
 * has scored the highest number of bonus points for a single article, for the high-importance Jurassic Park (film).

Featured articles, featured lists, featured topics and featured portals are yet to play a part in the competition. The judges have removed a number of submissions which were deemed ineligible. Typically, we aim to see work on a project, followed by a nomination, followed by promotion, this year. We apologise for any disappointment caused by our strict enforcement this year; we're aiming to keep the competition as fair as possible.

Wikipedians interested in friendly competition may be interested to take part in The Core Contest; unlike the WikiCup, The Core Contest is not about audited content, but, like the WikiCup, it is about article improvement; specifically, The Core Contest is about contribution to some of Wikipedia's most important article. Of course, any work done for The Core Contest, if it leads to a DYK, GA or FA, can earn WikiCup points.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email), The ed17 (talk • email) and Miyagawa (talk • email) 19:54, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

WikiCup 2014 February newsletter
And so ends the most competitive first round we have ever seen, with 38 points required to qualify for round 2. Last year, 19 points secured a place; before that, 11 (2012) or 8 (2011) were enough. This is both a blessing and a curse. While it shows the vigourous good health of the competition, it also means that we have already lost many worthy competitors. Our top three scorers were:


 * , a WikiCup newcomer whose high-quality scans of rare banknotes represent an unusual, interesting and valuable contribution to Wikipedia. Most of Godot's points this round have come from a large set of pictures used in Treasury Note (1890–91).
 * , a WikiCup veteran and a finalist last year, Adam is also a featured picture specialist, focusing on the restoration of historical images. This month's promotions have included a carefully restored set of artist William Russell Flint's work.
 * , another WikiCup newcomer. WikiRedactor has claimed points for good article reviews and good articles relating to pop music, many of which were awarded bonus points. Articles include Sky Ferreira, Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley Cyrus and "Wrecking Ball" (Miley Cyrus song).

Other competitors of note include:


 * , who helped take Thirty Flights of Loving through good article candidates and featured article candidates, claiming the first first featured article of the competition.
 * , who claimed the first featured list of the competition with Natalia Kills discography.
 * , who takes the title of the contributor awarded the highest bonus point multiplier (resulting in the highest scoring article) of the competition so far. Her high-importance salamander, now a good article, scored 108 points.

After such a competitive first round, expect the second round to also be fiercely fought. Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 1 but before the start of round 2 can be claimed in round 2, but please do not update your submission page until March (UTC). Invitations for collaborative writing efforts or any other discussion of potentially interesting work is always welcome on the WikiCup talk page. Remember, if two or more WikiCup competitors have done significant work on an article, all can claim points equally.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email), The ed17 (talk • email) and Miyagawa (talk • email) 00:01, 1 March 2014 (UTC)

WikiCup 2014 March newsletter
A quick update as we are half way through round two of this year's competition. WikiCup newcomer (Pool E) leads, having produced a massive set of featured pictures for Silver certificate (United States), an article also brought to featured list status. Former finalist (Pool G) is in second, which he owes mostly to his work with historical images, including a number of images from Urania's Mirror, an article also brought to good status. 2010 champion (Pool C) is third overall, thanks to contributions relating to naval history, including the newly featured Japanese battleship Nagato. , who currently leads Pool A and is sixth overall, takes the title for the highest scoring individual article of the competition so far, with the top importance featured article Ian Smith.

With 26 people having already scored over 100 points, it is likely that well over 100 points will be needed to secure a place in round 3. Recent years have required 123 (2013), 65 (2012), 41 (2011) and 100 (2010). Remember that only 64 will progress to round 3 at the end of April. Invitations for collaborative writing efforts or any other discussion of potentially interesting work is always welcome on the WikiCup talk page; if two or more WikiCup competitors have done significant work on an article, all can claim points equally. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email), The ed17 (talk • email) and Miyagawa (talk • email) 22:55, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

WikiCup 2014 April newsletter
Round 3 of the 2014 WikiCup has just begun; 32 competitors remain. Pool G's was Round 2's highest scorer, with a large number of featured picture credits. In March/April, he restored star charts from Urania's Mirror, lithographs of various warships (such as SMS Gefion) and assorted other historical media. Second overall was Pool E's, whose featured list Silver certificate (United States) contains dozens of scans of banknotes recently promoted to featured picture status. Third was Pool G's who has produced a large number of good articles, many, including Falkner Island, on Connecticut-related topics. Other successful participants included, who saw three articles (including the top-importance Ian Smith) through featured article candidacies, and , who saw three lists (including the beautifully-illustrated list of plantations in West Virginia) through featured list candidacies. High-importance good articles promoted this round include narwhal from, tiger from and The Lion King from. We also saw our first featured topic points of the competition, awarded to and  for their work on the Sega Genesis topic. No points have been claimed so far for good topics or featured portals.

192 was our lowest qualifying score, again showing that this WikiCup is the most competitive ever. In previous years, 123 (2013), 65 (2012), 41 (2011) or 100 (2010) secured a place in Round 3. Pool H was the strongest performer, with all but one of its members advancing, while only the two highest scorers in Pools G and F advanced. At the end of June, 16 users will advance into the semi-finals. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email), The ed17 (talk • email) and Miyagawa (talk • email) 17:57, 4 May 2014 (UTC)

WikiCup 2014 June newsletter
After an extremely close race, Round 3 is over. 244 points secured a place in Round 4, which is comparable to previous years- 321 was required in 2013, while 243 points were needed in 2012. Pool C's was the round's highest scorer, mostly due to a 32 featured pictures, including both scans and photographs. Also from Pool C, finished second overall, claiming three featured articles, including the high-importance Grus (constellation). Third place was Pool B's, whose contributions included featured articles Russian battleship Poltava (1894) and Russian battleship Peresvet. Pool C saw the highest number of participants advance, with six out of eight making it to the next round.

The round saw this year's first featured portal, with taking Portal:Literature to featured status. The round also saw the first good topic points, thanks to and the 2013 Atlantic hurricane season. This means that all content types have been claimed this year. Other contributions of note this round include a featured topic on Maya Angelou's autobiographies from, a good article on the noted Czech footballer Tomáš Rosický from and a now-featured video game screenshot, freely released due to the efforts of.

The judges would like to remind participants to update submission pages promptly. This means that content can be checked, and allows those following the competition (including those participating) to keep track of scores effectively. This round has seen discussion about various aspects of the WikiCup's rules and procedures. Those interested in the competition can be assured that formal discussions about how next year's competition will work will be opened shortly, and all are welcome to voice their views then. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. and 18:48, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

WikiCup 2014 August newsletter
The final of the 2014 WikiCup begins in a few short minutes! Our eight finalists are listed below, along with their placement in Round 4:


 * , a WikiCup newcomer, finished top of Pool A and was the round's highest scorer. Godot is a featured picture specialist, claiming large numbers of points due to high-quality scans of historical documents, especially banknotes.
 * 1) is a WikiCup veteran, having been a finalist every year since 2010. In the semi-final, he was Pool B's highest scorer. Cas's points primarily come from articles on the natural sciences.
 * 2) was Pool A's runner-up. Czar's points come mostly from content related to independent video games, including both articles and topics.
 * 3) was Pool B's runner-up. Another featured picture specialist, many of Adam's points come from the restoration of historical media. He has been a WikiCup finalist twice before.
 * 4) won the WikiCup in 2012 and 2013, and enters this final as the first wildcard. She focuses on biology-related articles, and has worked on several high-importance articles.
 * 5) is the second wildcard. George's points come primarily from meteorology-related articles. This year and last year, George was the first person in the competition to score.
 * , the third wildcard, was the 2010 champion and a finalist last year. His writes mostly on military history, especially naval history.
 * , the fourth and final wildcard, has participated in previous WikiCups, but not reached any finals. Bloom's points are mostly thanks to did you knows, featured lists and good articles related to sport and national symbols.

We say goodbye to this year's semi-finalists. ,, , , , and  have all performed well to reach this stage of the competition, and we hope they will all be joining us again next year.

There are two upcoming competitions unrelated to the WikiCup which may be of interest to those who receive this newsletter. The Stub Contest will run through September, and revolves around expanding stub articles, especially high-importance or old stubs. In addition, a proposal has been made for a new competition, the GA Cup, which the organisers plan to run next year. This competition is based on the WikiCup and aims to reduce the good article review backlog.

There is now a thread for brainstorming on how next year's WikiCup competition should work. Please come along and share your thoughts- What works? What doesn't work? What needs changing? Signups for next year's competition will be open soon; we will be in touch. If, at this stage of the competition, you are keen to help the with the WikiCup, please do what you can to participate in review processes. Our finalists will find things much easier if the backlogs at good article candidates, featured article candidates, featured picture candidates and the rest are kept at a minimum. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. and 22:09, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

WikiCup 2014 September newsletter
In one month's time, we will know our WikiCup 2014 champion. Newcomer has taken a strong lead with a featured list (historical coats of arms of the U.S. states from 1876) and a raft of featured pictures. Reigning champion is in second place with a number of high-importance biology articles, including new FA Isopoda and new GA least weasel. , who is in his fifth WikiCup final, is in third, with featured articles Pictor and Epacris impressa.

Signups for the 2015 WikiCup are open. All Wikipedians, new and experienced, are warmly invited to sign up for the competition. Wikipedians interested in friendly competition may also like to sign up for the GA Cup, a new WikiCup-inspired competition which revolves around completing good article reviews. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. and 22:11, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

WikiCup 2014: The results
The 2014 WikiCup champion is, who flew the flag of the Smithsonian Institution. This was Godot13's first WikiCup competition and, over the 10 months of the competition, he has produced (among other contributions) two featured lists and an incredible 292 featured pictures, including architectural photographs and scans of historical documents. , 2012 and 2013 WikiCup champion, came in second, having written a large number of biology-related articles. , WikiCup finalist every year since 2010, finished in third.

A full list of our prize-winners follows:


 * wins the prize for first place and the FP prize for 181 featured pictures in the final round.
 * wins the prize for second place and the DYK prize for 65 did you knows in the final round.
 * wins the prize for third place and the FA prize for four featured articles in the final round.
 * wins the prize for fourth place
 * wins a final 8 prize.
 * wins a final 8 prize.
 * wins a final 8 prize.
 * wins the GA prize for 27 good articles in round 2 and the review prize for 28 good article reviews in round 1.
 * wins the FL prize for three featured lists in round 2.
 * wins the FPo prize his work on featured portals.
 * wins the topic prize for a nine-article featured topic in round 3.
 * wins the news prize for 28 in the news articles in round 3.

Congratulations to everyone who has been successful in this year's WikiCup, whether you made it to the final rounds or not, and a particular congratulations to the newcomers to the WikiCup who have participated this year. We warmly invite all of you to sign up for next year's competition. Discussions and polls concerning potential rules changes are also open, and all are welcome to participate. The WikiCup judges will be back in touch over the coming months, and we hope to see you all in the 2014 competition. Until then, it only remains to once again congratulate our worthy winners, and thank all participants for their involvement! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. and 22:52, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

WikiCup 2015 is just around the corner...
Hello everyone, and may we wish you all a happy holiday season. As you will probably already know, the 2015 WikiCup begins in the new year; there is still time to sign up. We have a few important announcements concerning the future of the WikiCup.


 * We would like to announce that Josh (J Milburn) and Ed (The ed17), who have been WikiCup judges since 2009 and 2010 respectively, are stepping down. This decision has been made for a number of reasons, but the main one is time. Both Josh and Ed have found that, over the previous year, they have been unable to devote the time necessary to the WikiCup, and it is not likely that they will be able to do this in the near future. Furthermore, new people at the helm can only help to invigorate the WikiCup and keep it dynamic. Josh and Ed will still be around, and will likely be participating in the Cup this following year as competitors, which is where both started out.
 * In a similar vein, we hope you will all join us in welcoming Jason (Sturmvogel 66) and Christine (Figureskatingfan), who are joining Brian (Miyagawa) to form the 2015 WikiCup judging team. Jason is a WikiCup veteran, having won in 2010 and finishing in fifth this year. Christine has participated in two WikiCups, reaching the semi-finals in both, and is responsible for the GA Cup, which she now co-runs.
 * The discussions/polls concerning the next competition's rules will be closed soon, and rules changes will be made clear on WikiCup/Scoring and talk pages. While it may be impossible to please everyone, the judges will make every effort to ensure that the new rules are both fair and in the best interests of the competition, which is, first and foremost, about improving Wikipedia.

If you have any questions or concerns, the judges can be reached on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, on their talk pages, or by email. We hope you will all join us in trying to make the 2015 WikiCup the most productive and enjoyable yet. You are receiving this message because you are listed on WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk), The ed17 (talk), Miyagawa (talk), Sturmvogel 66 (talk) and Figureskatingfan (talk) 18:54, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

WikiCup 2015 launch newsletter
Round one of the 2015 WikiCup has begun! So far we've had around 80 signups, which close on February 5. If you have not already signed up and want to do so, then you can add your name here. There have been changes to to several of the points scores for various categories, and the addition of Peer Reviews for the first time. These will work in the same manner as Good Article Reviews, and all of the changes are summarised here.

Remember that only the top 64 scoring competitors will make it through to the second round, and one of the new changes this year is that all scores must be claimed within two weeks of an article's promotion or appearance, so don't forget to add them to your submissions pages! If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAN, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages. Good luck! , and

If you wish to opt-out of future mailings, please remove yourself from the mailing list or alternatively to opt-out of all massmessage mailings, you may add Category:Opted-out of message delivery to your user talk page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:51, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

WikiCup 2015 March newsletter
That's it, the first round is done, sign-ups are closed and we're into round 2. 64 competitors made it into this round, and are now broken into eight groups of eight. The top two of each group will go through to round 3, and then the top scoring 16 "wildcards" across all groups. Round 1 saw some interesting work on some very important articles, with the round leader owing most of his 622 points scored to a Featured Article on the 2001 film Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within which qualified for a times-two multiplier. This is a higher score than in previous years, as had 500 points in 2014 at the end of round 1, and our very own judge,  led round 1 with 601 points in 2013.

In addition to Freikorp's work, some other important articles and pictures were improved during round one, here's a snapshot of a few of them:
 * took Bumblebee, a level-4 vital article, to Good Article;
 * worked-up the Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 article, also to Good Article status;
 * developed an extremely timely article to Good Article, taking Magna Carta there some 800 years after it was first sealed;
 * And last but not least, worked up a number of Featured Pictures during round 1, including the 1948 one Deutsche Mark (pictured right), receiving the maximum bonus due to the number of Wikis that the related article appears in.

You may also wish to know that The Core Contest is running through the month of March. Head there for further details - they even have actual prizes!

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. , and

Thanks for your assistance! Miyagawa (talk) on behalf of Wikipedia:WikiCup.

(Opt-out Instructions) This message was send by through MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 04:54, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

Your account will be renamed
Hello,

The developer team at Wikimedia is making some changes to how accounts work, as part of our on-going efforts to provide new and better tools for our users like cross-wiki notifications. These changes will mean you have the same account name everywhere. This will let us give you new features that will help you edit and discuss better, and allow more flexible user permissions for tools. One of the side-effects of this is that user accounts will now have to be unique across all 900 Wikimedia wikis. See the announcement for more information.

Unfortunately, your account clashes with another account also called Nanobear. To make sure that both of you can use all Wikimedia projects in future, we have reserved the name Nanobear~enwiki that only you will have. If you like it, you don't have to do anything. If you do not like it, you can pick out a different name. If you think you might own all of the accounts with this name and this message is in error, please visit Special:MergeAccount to check and attach all of your accounts to prevent them from being renamed.

Your account will still work as before, and you will be credited for all your edits made so far, but you will have to use the new account name when you log in.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

Yours, Keegan Peterzell Community Liaison, Wikimedia Foundation 01:43, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Renamed
 This account has been renamed as part of single-user login finalisation. If you own this account you can |log in using your previous username and password for more information. If you do not like this account's new name, you can choose your own using this form after logging in: . -- Keegan (WMF) (talk) 16:48, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

ArbCom elections are now open!
Hi, You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:35, 24 November 2015 (UTC)

Nomination of Razgulay for deletion
A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Razgulay is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Articles for deletion/Razgulay until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. Jip Orlando (talk) 18:02, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

Nomination of Henry Plater-Zyberk for deletion
A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Henry Plater-Zyberk is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Articles for deletion/Henry Plater-Zyberk& until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. SahabAli говорити 18:03, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

Nomination of Telesystems (company) for deletion
A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Telesystems (company) is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Articles for deletion/Telesystems (company) until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article until the discussion has finished. Oliver Virk (talk) 10:32, 2 September 2022 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Telesystems (company)


A tag has been placed on Telesystems (company), requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section G11 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because the page seems to be unambiguous advertising which only promotes a company, group, product, service, person, or point of view and would need to be fundamentally rewritten in order to become encyclopedic. Please read the guidelines on spam and FAQ/Organizations for more information.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. If the page is deleted, and you wish to retrieve the deleted material for future reference or improvement, then please contact the. GoldenRing (talk) 13:11, 2 September 2022 (UTC)