User talk:Risker/Archive 19

A kitten for you!
Thanks for stepping in!

Dbarthelme (talk) 09:16, 2 January 2019 (UTC) 
 * That sort of coatrack article is very problematic. People confuse "I can source this statement" with "This statement should be in this article". Or perhaps it's not really confusion. Always happy to eradicate such nonsense.  Risker (talk) 22:38, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

Jeremy Kyle
Hi,

Thanks for protecting it. I did wonder about doing that myself but it doesn't usually get that sort of vandalism so I had left it for the time being. Hopefully there won't be any more like that, if there is then I'll extend it to extended confirmed protection. The trouble is, he's the sort of person that's always going to attract vandalism.

Thanks again!-- 5 albert square (talk) 22:22, 5 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Perhaps the advantage of not really knowing much about this guy allows me to take the 30,000-foot view. That kind of nonsense isn't okay, regardless of how much of a jerk an article subject may be - and refer back to sentence 1, I really don't know. Risker (talk) 22:40, 5 January 2019 (UTC)
 * It's not even that he's a jerk, it's because he's a talk show host with a past that includes things like a gambling problem. So now because he has a go at people on his talk show who have problems like gambling etc, people think he's a bit of a hypocrite and the guy really isn't that well liked, well not in the UK anyway.-- 5 albert square (talk) 23:04, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

Heh
Heh, I assume you got what I meant by now, but just to be sure: I do have the system email enabled. I just have emails for pings and talk page messages disabled on en.wiki. TonyBallioni (talk) 21:37, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Yeah, the penny dropped after a few minutes - ironically when I opened my email and found a bunch of pings. Sorry about that!  Risker (talk) 03:01, 26 January 2019 (UTC)
 * You good :) As I told another former arb a few weeks ago, I value our good working relationship, so I have no problem with ever being called out by you if I’m being dumb. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:42, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Template Deletion
Hello there. Can you please recreate Template:Japanese episode list/sublist? There are still numerous articles that rely on using that subtemplate, and this is one of those articles that have pretty much been destroyed by the template deletion. At the very least, if the Japanese episode template shouldn't be recreated, then all of its functions and parameters should be fully merged into Template:Episode list/sublist (and probably redirected as well), and then every article currently employing the Japanese episode list/sublist template needs to be adjusted so that they use the "newer" template. Can you please restore the template or merge the two, so that the affected articles can work properly? Thanks.  Light and Dark2000  🌀 (talk) 06:08, 5 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi - this is now restored. Or at least I have pressed the right buttons. However there isn't much there, so I am not sure what additional pages may be affecting things.  I'm almost inclined to revert the whole pile of deletions. Let me know what else you need, although I may not get to it for several hours.  Risker (talk) 06:14, 5 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Can you please also restore the template's documentation page in the meantime? It would probably help effort with merging (and also understanding parameter functions) for that template. Thanks.  Light and Dark2000  🌀 (talk) 06:46, 5 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Done, . And now I really have to go to bed, but I'll check for messages when I arise. Risker (talk) 06:53, 5 February 2019 (UTC)
 * This is my fault. I'm the one who placed the CSD template on these pages. I thought they were all taken care of as part of the convert/merge. Sorry for the issue and thank you for catching it. Risker sorry for causing you a headache and thank you for resolving the issue! -- Zack mann  (Talk to me/What I been doing) 17:43, 5 February 2019 (UTC)
 * No worries, - it was a very complicated discussion, and one involving so many subpages. Just glad that interested editors were watching what was happening an were able to respond quickly when a correction needed to be made.  As I note, I'm happy to restore anything else that will help to resolve the convert/merge issue.  Risker (talk) 17:51, 5 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Risker, when you get a chance, we can now safely delete Template:Japanese episode list/sublist as all article transclusions have been removed. -- Zack mann  (Talk to me/What I been doing) 04:53, 6 February 2019 (UTC)

Giant steps
Steps taken at time? Hope little Risker referring to steps taken by Bishzilla! bishzilla   ROA R R! !  pocket  19:35, 6 February 2019 (UTC).
 * ! Hello! I am sure your steps would indeed be giant ones - we little editors would never be able to fill your shoes.  Very nice to have you come by and visit my page; I consider it a great honour.  I may find myself in your neighbourhood later on this year, and perhaps we can find an opportunity for a bit of socializing. I trust you not to breathe fire in my general direction. :-)  Risker (talk) 19:39, 6 February 2019 (UTC)
 * That would be nice. I had a lot of trouble restraining Bishzilla from posting and boasting directly at WT:ACN. Mind you, I don't blame the old girl for being proud of the block she placed ten years ago. Something of a high point in her wiki-career! Bishonen &#124; talk 19:52, 6 February 2019 (UTC).

Thanks for your review of Identity verification
I am available to talk as you like. I appreciate any response you have.  Blue Rasberry  (talk)  20:09, 9 February 2019 (UTC)
 * We'll keep it onwiki, I've responded on the talk page. Risker (talk) 20:29, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

Checkuser at RFA
I wanted to follow up a bit on the comment I made at WP:ARBN, where I stated Checkuser is routinely used during RFAs and you responded Checkuser is *not* routinely used during RFAs; in fact, such checks are very rare, and normally are well-substantiated in advance, often at WP:SPI or potentially as a private discussion at the checkuser mailing list or between two or more checkusers. I'm concerned that you have the impression it is commonplace and routine. followed up by You're the one alleging that checks are routinely being performed, so it is up to you to substantiate your statement. I've gone and pulled together some points to back up my statement.

I checked a few recent RFAs. In the Enterprisey RFA here is removing two votes from socks, who they later blocked. In the JJMC89 RFA here is Bbb23 again removing three sock votes, all of whom were later blocked (I think with KAGFan2018 however a checkuser was probably not run). In the Galobtter RFA Bbb23 removed two votes from socks, who turned out to be the same one if I understand the SPI report correctly.

I could go on, because like I said, this is routinely done at RFA. I hope this helps you understand my position a bit more, and why I would make such a comment. I didn't say that such activity was bad or negative, just that it was common. I'm thankful to Bbb23 for his hard work cleaning out socks. Mr Ernie (talk) 09:12, 13 February 2019 (UTC) — Berean Hunter   (talk)  12:57, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * "I didn't say that such activity was bad or negative" Yes, you did. "I found another example of Bbb23 running an improper check, but I will not share that publicly due to privacy concerns." 1
 * In that one specific case, in my opinion, the check wasn't warranted. Mr Ernie (talk) 14:13, 13 February 2019 (UTC)


 * Hello Mr Ernie. I am traveling now and will respond on my return next week. If other CUs drop by to address your concerns, they're more than welcome to do so here. In the meantime, perhaps you'd like to give some thought as to what is attracting sockpuppeters to participate at RFA; three out of the last three having had confirmed socks is pretty concerning from my point of view.  Risker (talk) 14:50, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

Talk pages consultation 2019
The Wikimedia Foundation has invited the various Wikimedia communities, including the English Wikipedia, to participate in a consultation on improving communication methods within the Wikimedia projects. As such, a request for comment has been created at Talk pages consultation 2019. You are invited to express your views in the discussion. ~ Winged Blades Godric 05:21, 24 February 2019 (UTC)

Probably semantics...
Regarding "identifying to WMF" while they don't take passport copies anymore, there are still real-name declaration processes active for certain things with WMF (using the Trusted Access & Confidentiality Agreement), this is an 'identification' process but not an 'authentication' process as you could just lie on the forms. It is certainly well beyond the realm of a SPI though! — xaosflux  Talk 18:54, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * c.f. wikitech. — xaosflux  Talk 18:55, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Well, I would classify that as a fiduciary relationship, and I'm pretty sure that's not the kind of identification that was meant in the discussion, but I note your point. Risker (talk) 20:18, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

ArbCom 2019 special circular
   

This message was sent to all administrators following a recent motion. Thank you for your attention. For the Arbitration Committee, Cameron11598 02:52, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

When it comes to 2FA, people need to understand what Mediawiki is offering. Right now, it's not anywhere near state-of-the-art; it was written by a former WMF employee and is now maintained by a mix of staff and volunteers, none of whom are responsible for the long-range development of the extension. The WMF is already taking steps to make it *required* usage without taking any responsibility for it. That's well below the standard any of us should expect for security software. In order for it to be a proper fit for the worldwide, diverse movement it is intended to support, the following steps can and should be taken:


 * 1) A WMF department needs to take ownership of the extension, and take responsibility for its ongoing development, improvement, maintenance and user support.
 * 2) It needs to be modified so that it stands alone, without any upload of software or use of specific hardware. That is, it shouldn't be dependent on using the right computer or having two pieces of electronics such as a computer and a smartphone.
 * 3) The WMF needs to commit resources to ensuring that there is 24/7, easily reached user support. Right now, there is no clear pathway to obtaining support. This becomes increasingly important as more and more users with limited technical proficiency and/or who don't have a personal point of contact high up in the WMF technical support system are pushed to use 2FA.  It should be assigned to people who can see a user through the entire process, all the way from communicating with users to resetting passwords/2FA.
 * 4) Generation of scratch codes needs to be easy and able to be done without disabling 2FA, as is necessary with the current software. After all, if 2FA is mandatory, the user can't disable it in order to generate new scratch codes.
 * 5) It needs to work in a simple and streamlined way for users who do most of their work from phones.
 * 6) It needs to be a no-cost solution. Any user should be able to use it anywhere in the world without worrying about hardware costs, software costs, or data/texting/SMS costs. They need to be able to use it on any computer at any time, anywhere, provided they have an internet connection. It needs to not be dependent in any way on mobile phone networks.

These things are all possible. They are, however, entirely dependent on the WMF taking the bull by the horns and redesigning the 2FA system so that it is streamlined, cost-free, easy to use and well-supported. When the WMF has over 100 software developers on staff, and their own Security department is urging the use of 2FA, there's really no excuse not to do this.

And frankly...I don't really see much point in requiring admins to have 2FA when we don't even require them to have a durable email address attached to their account.

If Arbcom is serious about this, then they need to use their influence to get the WMF to do the right thing. This message makes it sound as though Arbcom is requiring that all admins take potentially quite costly steps in order to hold onto their bits. Risker (talk) 00:35, 4 May 2019 (UTC)


 * Luckily, Wikipedia has an article about this. &#8209; Iridescent 06:28, 4 May 2019 (U.TC)


 * AFAICS, from WP:ARB, it  is not  within the Committee's remit  to  stipulate anything like this, except  perhaps in  cases where an admin  has been explicitly  lax in  their use of their passwords, computers, or mobile devices. A global  ruling  for 2FA would at  least  require a major community-wide consensus, and consideration  should be given to  admins whose country  of residence does not  have sufficiently stable Internet  connections or GMS services to use 2FA. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 07:10, 4 May 2019 (UTC)


 * As I've pointed out at the noticeboard discussion, it's especially not within the Committee's remit to stipulate something like this when even 2FA—let alone mandating it—was rejected two weeks ago in a well-attended RFC. &#8209; Iridescent 07:29, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

Administrator account security (Correction to Arbcom 2019 special circular)
ArbCom would like to apologise and correct our previous mass message in light of the response from the community.

Since November 2018, six administrator accounts have been compromised and temporarily desysopped. In an effort to help improve account security, our intention was to remind administrators of existing policies on account security — that they are required to "have strong passwords and follow appropriate personal security practices." We have updated our procedures to ensure that we enforce these policies more strictly in the future. The policies themselves have not changed. In particular, two-factor authentication remains an optional means of adding extra security to your account. The choice not to enable 2FA will not be considered when deciding to restore sysop privileges to administrator accounts that were compromised.

We are sorry for the wording of our previous message, which did not accurately convey this, and deeply regret the tone in which it was delivered.

For the Arbitration Committee, -Cameron11598 21:04, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

ArbCom and their scope
Is ArbCom growing horns and thinking that they have some prescriptive rulership? What in the hell are they even doing having this conversation, or thinking that they set policy? I couldn't believe that have had a discussion, let alone sent an email, then a re-email. What a bloody clusterf**k eyesore! (Hi by the way, hope that you are well.) — billinghurst  sDrewth  03:24, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

A beer for you!
Thanks, - I shall enjoy it in good health. I do actually understand entirely why someone might find the entire MediaWiki structure to be incredibly frustrating; I once gave a talk where I referred to the tendency to focus on the "new shiny" instead of fixing the technical debt. I think my simile was "building new overpasses instead of fixing the potholes". I guess, after all these years here, I've just come to the conclusion that it's not a good investment to focus too much developer (or user) time on something small like the inconsistency you identified, and focus my energy and effort on trying to motivate improvement on things that I think could have a big impact. (Right now, I'm focusing my "MediaWiki energy" on getting significant improvements to the two-factor authentication extension so it will be easy, safe, straightforward, and well-supported.) But of course, we all have our own specialities. Thanks again for the beer! Risker (talk) 03:29, 13 May 2019 (UTC)


 * Emoji_u1f60a.svg Thanks for your work on 2FA, I'm happily looking forward to this. To me as a potential user, the risk of me locking myself out permanently currently feels to be higher than the risk of an account compromise. On the other hand, I can't really point to any specific issue that currently prevents me from requesting the 2FA permission. The topic interests me though; feel free to provide a list of phabricator tasks for me to subscribe to. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:06, 13 May 2019 (UTC)

Userpage deletion information request
Hello Risker, I noticed my user page User:Os was deleted with: 00:10, 31 January 2019 Risker (talk | contribs) deleted page User:Os (G6: Housekeeping and routine (non-controversial) cleanup) (thank). I know it was a trivial user page about me (or about the pseudonym I use online, really), created a long long time ago, but I didn't think user pages usually got cleaned up like that. Was that the sole reason for its removal, or was there something else? I wanted to create a new userpage for myself which would be more like the userpages people have nowadays and less eccentric/discordian, but as the page was speedily deleted, proper procedure dictates that I reach out to the deleter before creating a new page under that title. Thanks :) os (talk) 04:32, 13 May 2019 (UTC)

Old drafts
Hi Risker. It has been ages since I dropped by your talk page - I am stopping by briefly to ask about a vague memory I have of you saying something (either on-wiki or by email) about a draft in my userspace that you hoped to see me finish. I have been making a bit of an effort to catch up with some of those drafts, and I recently put Eddington experiment out there. It is one of those drafts that had been bugging me that I hadn't had time to finish properly (still haven't really), and I was wondering if I am remembering your comment correctly, if you were thinking of that draft, or if you were referring to something else? No worried if you can't remember, as it was many years ago! :-) Carcharoth (talk) 14:54, 27 May 2019 (UTC)
 * Hello there, ! Nice to see you continuing to contribute to the article space. Yes, I'm pretty sure it was Eddington experiment that I referred to all those moons ago, and it looks like a pretty informative article now.  (Okay, it could use more refs, but just about anything can use more refs.)  Pop in any time!  Risker (talk) 16:50, 27 May 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, it does need more refs. Glad it was that article. Will try not to leave it so long to pop in again! Carcharoth (talk) 08:38, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Notice of arbitration
You recently offered a statement in a request for arbitration. The Arbitration Committee has accepted that request for arbitration and an arbitration case has been opened at Arbitration/Requests/Case/Antisemitism in Poland. Evidence that you wish the arbitrators to consider should be added to the evidence subpage, at Arbitration/Requests/Case/Antisemitism in Poland/Evidence. Please add your evidence by June 23, 2019, which is when the evidence phase closes. You can also contribute to the case workshop subpage, Arbitration/Requests/Case/Antisemitism in Poland/Workshop. For a guide to the arbitration process, see Arbitration/Guide to arbitration. For the Arbitration Committee, – bradv 🍁  15:08, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

Thank you
Thanks for your comments here. As you probably know, I have been expressing my displeasure regarding this subject on Wikimedia-l. -- Pine  (✉)  23:05, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, I've been reading over the Wikimedia-L thread. Some very good points have been made there, and ultimately it was a post by that motivated me to write up that summary of concerns and issues with the process. I don't know how this will all work out, and no matter what happens, this has been a loss for just about everyone, which was why I avoided participating (with exceptions on the "getting adminship returned" process question) until this point; kind of trying to avoid the ETTD syndrome. Ah well.  Risker (talk) 23:14, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Thank you very much for your comments, I mentioned them on de:Wikipedia Diskussion:Kurier, see here. Maybe you are interested in m:Talk:Trust and Safety. In my view, you addressed my issue about procedure, but did it with much more knowledge and insight than me. I don't know if you agree with me on that talk page, but I feel that you share my opinion that this subject requires open global discussion (not the concrete case but the change in strategy and scope). Do you see any possibility how this could be done? I'd like very much to do something about this.--Mautpreller (talk) 09:01, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

+1. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 11:26, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

 * P.S. I've kept this generic. You know the problems that come with this office – saying too much causes problems down the line.   AGK  &#9632;  08:08, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

Something I should mention
We do not give any useful input or action on any and all WMF bans: we are usually (if not always) notified of the facts after the facts (including this case), and play no role there — it is basically an FYI. I think Ajr did explained the other stuff well, so gonna leave it as is. &mdash; regards, Revi 08:17, 14 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I intentionally avoided the WP:FRAM because that page is too toxic to me and overly long. &mdash; regards, Revi 08:20, 14 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi, and thanks for that information. I understand entirely why you have no interest in posting on that page, and I also understand why many people are ignoring it or avoiding it or anything else; there are big chunks I'm not reading either, because every time I do, I find myself embarrassed the really substandard behaviour of some people on that page.  Frankly, if the WMF ever needed evidence that enwiki can't appropriately deal with harassment and personal attacks, that page could easily serve as Exhibit #1. It is a shame that people don't get that they're proving the point of why the WMF feels the need to step in. And perhaps that is part of the plan, to illustrate how poorly behaved and inflammatory the community is in this way, to implement and enforce other WMF "community health" initiatives. I keep reading words to the effect of "we've always valued competence over civility"...but that isn't actually true. We used to value collegiality as the equal to competence. Back in my early days on Arbcom, I did some research on "civility" blocks; I don't have the results anymore after a couple of computer changes and deleting most of my Arbcom stuff, but it basically showed that cool-down blocks were more effective than longterm blocks, but they had to be applied contemporaneous to the behaviour.  Any block applied more than an hour after the last problem edit was pretty much ineffective, and those applied many hours to days later were pretty closely associated with a boomerang effect - some of the editors most notoriously associated with incivility were first blocked hours or days after having made their "blockable" comment.  Now, I'd hope that the WMF would have some research that justifies a single-project, one-year civility block as being effective in changing the behaviour of the blocked user, but I think we need to be realistic and consider that whether or not it changes that user's behaviour may very well be irrelevant. There's some anecdotal evidence that this "partial ban" process was developed because people up the chain of command were unwilling to globally and permanently ban productive community members, even if they were jerks.  There's also some anecdotal evidence that its intention is to pressure other users and in particular administrators to (a) reflect and self-modify their behaviour and/or (b) start taking steps internally to establish clearer project-specific behavioural expectations and penalties for failure to uphold them, and/or (c) report people they feel are abusive, harassing or chronically uncivil to the WMF so they'll have a broader range of "candidates" for the next ban. (I think (a) and (b) are likely, because I'm sure they're now already flooded with (c) examples now that people think they will do something.) The T&S people aren't idiots, despite what some people have said, and whether or not it's truly applicable, they do have a lot more knowledge about online community management and other behavioural modification processes than most of us.  Risker (talk) 20:53, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

Feedback
Been impressed by some of your recent discussions and I noticed that you said "[Another complete aside, it seems that the software that estimates number/percentage of female editors uses this preference, and counts "gender neutral" as male.] - I'm not sure this is always true. The WiR project normally quotes the figure for "non-blokes" on Twitter. This avoids taking a binary view that any one who is not a bloke must be a woman. We do (lazily?) refer to "articles about women" but we actively support any article that is not about a bloke. HTH Victuallers (talk) 22:58, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi and thanks for the kind words.  I think you may be talking about articles rather than editors; I haven't located the "page" where I found the data I was talking about, but I remember even at the time thinking that there was no way it was an accurate reflection because the vast majority of accounts have been dormant for years and would have had the default "gender neutral" setting in their preferences, or the denominator should have been "number of accounts that have set a specific preference" or something like that. On a side note, someone did some statistical reports that determined that approximately 15% of biographical articles on English Wikipedia are about a footballer (I'm pretty sure it included female footballers, but they'd only be a tiny proportion).  That little "factoid" by itself gives some insight into why it would be so hard to move the needle on percentage of biographical articles about women.  Risker (talk) 01:38, 16 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh you re right. My mistake. Intrigued by the 15% footballer figure - we can make political capital from that factoid. Do you remember the source? Victuallers (talk) 08:41, 17 June 2019 (UTC)
 * @ I'm not sure where exactly this first came to my attention so I don't know for certain what databases were used for that initial report. However, we can look at some of the data utilized for gender gap research.  There are some variables here (i.e., there's a variation depending on whether to rely on categories from wikidata or project-specific wikipedia).  Even at its most restrictive level (i.e., enwiki biographies and enwiki-categorized male association football players), that category is 10.1% of all biographies on this project; if using all wikidata categorized association football players, it's 15% of all biographies.  I mean...nobody's shocked that most Roman Catholic priests or most American gridiron football players with biographies are male; but when one sees that many biographies of people in one extremely narrow field (male OR female), one starts to wonder if maybe there are some issues with notability.  Risker (talk) 23:11, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Chat?
Hi Risker!

Reaching out from BuzzFeed News, where I'm a senior reporter. Another Wikipedian recommended that I talk to you about the Fram situation — not the specifics, but broadly about Wikipedia culture and context. You were described as "an incredible resource," and I want to make sure the piece I'm working on takes into full account Wikipedia history. If you have some time, I'm at joe.bernstein@buzzfeed.com or 646-599-8655 (desk) or 301-704-2549 (cell.) I'd love to hear from you.

All best,

Joe — Preceding unsigned comment added by JosephABernstein (talk • contribs) 14:50, 18 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Hello . You should consider connecting your email account to your Wikipedia account (you can do this by clicking on "preferences" at the very top of any page).  That way, if someone responds to you on-wiki, you can get an email notification and read the response. There's almost nothing I can think of pertaining to English Wikipedia history and background that would be inappropriate for me to post publicly. If you have specific questions you'd like me to consider, I think it might be easiest if you post them here, so both of us (and any other readers) are very clear about exactly what I said and the context in which it was said. I'm very flattered that a colleague has referred to me as a good resource; I do have a bit of a tendency to wax poetic about ancient times, and do try to put current events into context, both from an Enwiki historical perspective and from a more global perspective, and I trust that's what was meant.  Risker (talk) 20:00, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi !

Thanks for the helpful suggestion; I added my email to my account.

I read your long and extremely helpful comment on the problems inherent in the Fram ban. I also understand and admire your (and this project's) commitment to openness and understand why you want me to post my questions for you here — especially because this entire situation revolves around what seem to be opaque dealings.

One of the reasons its useful for a reporter to have such conversations in private is so a competitor doesn't swoop in and steal them! I understand and appreciate how foreign that must seem in such a collaborative context. What if I send you queries in private on the condition, which I'm agreeing to here, that I post the full exchange right here after the story runs?

All best,

Joe JosephABernstein


 * Just noting in follow-up (because I got asked) that no, I didn't communicate with JosephABernstein either publicly or privately prior to the publication of his article. Risker (talk) 03:00, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Mention in upcoming issue of The Signpost
Just wanted you to know your name is included in a report about FRAMBAN in the upcoming issue of The Signpost. If you have any comments you can leave them on my talkpage or other Signpost official channels. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:55, 23 June 2019 (UTC)
 * , thank you for the heads up. There's absolutely no information in the reams of discussion relating to Fram or T&S that indicates that there was any "harassment" of non-majority editors involved in this situation, and I strongly urge you to remove that adjective. It's actually pretty unclear what you mean by it, anyway:  do you mean minors (i.e., those who have not yet reached the *age* of majority), people who are members of some sort of minority group, or members of some sort of under-represented community?  Just for the record, I am a member of at least one of those groups.  I'd also encourage you to consider quoting more people than just me; there have been several other participants in the various discussions who have raised important and useful points.  Might want to also highlight the fall-out in terms of administrators who have resigned (and note that they include admins who both disagree and agree with the WMF position).  Might be worth looking at how active those particular admins are and what percentage of the total "admin-only" activity they carried out over the last three months or something like that.  Finally...perhaps some statistical data on whether the number of newly created pages/new patrolled pages/stuff like that has changed over the course of the last couple of weeks; I have no idea where to get current stats on this information since they killed Wikistats.  Risker (talk) 19:49, 23 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks -- This wasn't meant to make a direct connection between Fram and anything. I have followed up further at User talk:Iridescent. ☆ Bri (talk) 19:51, 23 June 2019 (UTC)
 * , This report is admittedly crude, but it does attempt to provide some quantification. S Philbrick  (Talk)  21:18, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

About the Hearse Song
A surprising number of people have privately asked me about the version of The Hearse Song that I posted on my userpage. For some reason, several of them interpreted that posting to mean that I thought the project was dead, so I think I'd better clarify. My grandmother taught me that song to help me to understand some pretty advanced concepts for a pre-schooler, which I've mentioned in the "attribution" line. None of them relate to death itself; they're about not taking pleasure in the downfall of others and of understanding that the bad thing that happened to someone else could just as easily happen to me. I could have added a John Donne quote as well, but I got lazy.

I was right there as the process for using OFFICE to globally ban users was codified, and I was an advocate of it then and continue to be an advocate of the process and principles that were designed at that time. It was not intended to be some sort of back-door user behaviour management system. It was meant to remove users from any kind of participation in any Wikimedia-related activities if they had demonstrated certain behaviours that were extremely problematic for both the community and the WMF: people who triggered big red flags that were outside of the ability of local communities to address, or that needed to be addressed on a system-wide basis. I'm pretty sure that most of the people involved in the original development (most if not all of them no longer work at WMF) did not foresee that within a few years, others would use the same process and same tools to address user behaviour issues that local communities regularly address through their internal processes. I am personally devastated that the work I did to remove paedophile advocates and actual stalkers (i.e., people who showed up at the homes or workplaces of editors/staff) from this project has now been used in this way.

The WMF, simply put, doesn't have the staffing, the knowledge, the experience, or the credibility to modify the behaviour of individual users in a way that is likely to lead to a good outcome for the projects involved or the users involved. The process Trust & Safety describes, where a person can file a complaint with them and gets told of the progress of the case but the subject of the complaint (I'll call that person User X) is given almost no information about what behaviours triggered the complaint or support on how to modify behaviour, is designed in such a way that it is almost guaranteed to result in User X no longer participating (i.e. User X is likely to quit entirely or be banned). There is no system of regular joint review of actions/edits to identify problems, of positive feedback, of involving the community to help in providing reinforcement or progressive discipline. There's nothing that prevents the complainant from telling all their friends to file complaints with T&S about User X. And I can speak from my years of experience on Arbcom that tracking and reviewing the edits/actions of a busy User X and putting them into context can take almost as much time as it took User X to make them in the first place; even if that was all that T&S staff did, they'd have a hard time doing it effectively.

There is an argument for Trust & Safety or another Community Engagement program's involvement when there is evidence that a particular community is blatantly biased in handling certain types of issues (for example, if a community systematically took steps to support a certain political party, or if there was a systematic effort to prevent gay contributors or women from editing at all or becoming administrators or checkusers), but that wouldn't involve secret private emails to individual users saying that they were misbehaving in ways that wouldn't be discussed for privacy reasons. It would involve publicly and visibly discussing these problems with the broad community, a process that is much more likely to achieve the desired outcome.

Editors who applaud the year-long, single-project ban of a proliferate editor for pretty non-specific reasons through this means should be cautious about their celebrations. This type of secretive investigation with non-specific descriptions of wrongdoing that the accused can't effectively address is well-known. In this case, it's been used to control someone perceived to be "popular" or "part of the in-set". But these same tools could just as easily be turned on anyone; in fact, outside of this project this type of process has frequently been used to subjugate underrepresented and disenfranchised people far more often than it has been used against people who are considered mainstream. I'm not celebrating this, and I hope anyone who is thinks twice about it. Risker (talk) 03:00, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
 * This is an excellent comment and deserves to be more visible than merely a remark on your talkpage. I showed up personally after being otherwise inactive specifically to comment that I was (minorly) involved in discussions/incidents that brought about WP:OFFICE and this 'behavioral' usage is very much not what they were created for, nor do I believe it is a viable direction for the project for the reasons you stated as well as others. --Gmaxwell (talk) 15:14, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Namecheck
You are the former arbitrator mentioned here. More Signpost troubles. I'd completely missed that earlier discussion. Thanks, btw, for what you posted above, it is really insightful (I posted this to WTT's talk page, pointing out among other things that there is a risk that all the good work done will be undone if things don't stabilise in the right way). Carcharoth (talk) 16:08, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh for pity's sake. I thought that matter was resolved right there in the discussion, and I've never thought about it since then. It's kind of worrisome that a grudge has been held for all those months, and I'm really sad to see that. I'm not intending to participate at RFAR for any reason, because I think arbcom has more than enough on their plate right now and they don't need me kibbitzing there; nor, for that matter, do I need it.  To be honest, since it appears the article has been deleted, I'm not sure this is the case they want to spend their time on, but they may well have some different notions and I'll leave them to it. Thanks for the note, . Risker (talk) 16:57, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Regarding that closed AN discussion...
After you closed the discussion regarding the anon's heads-up, I started noting odd copyedits to certain articles, like Deep State in the United States. I think that article bears some watching; there is clearly some alterations that appear to be giving some fringe theories more weight that perhaps they deserve. While there is no cabal, there are working groups, and they might not be using Wikipedia as purely as the Four Pillars and our altruism might suggest. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 04:39, 3 July 2019 (UTC)
 * There are literally tens of thousands of groups and individuals who try to do that in this topic area (and many others). The solution is to remove the fringe stuff ("poorly sourced" or "not a reliable source"), although in fairness the article by its nature is going to include some discussions of fringe theories. It looks like a fairly knowledgeable editor has recently worked on it, and it has almost 200 watchers (with about a third of them having visited recent changes), so the worst of the issues are likely to be sorted in days rather than weeks. It's not a topic that I wish to edit (I choose not to involve myself in politics-related stuff generally speaking, I get more than my fill from wiki-politics), but if it is an area in which you have an interest, I suggest you put it on your watchlist, read over the talk page and archives, and jump in. Risker (talk) 04:51, 3 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I think I do not have the sufficient tolerance of bullshit to participate in the article beyond what I already have. And you have my kudos regarding editing politics; I have even less tolerance for a conservative point of view. I have grown to accept that the best way to deal with right wing people is to trout slap them with an embiggening series of hammers or simply march them into the sea. So, I am probably not the most neutral person to address a political debate. - Jack Sebastian (talk) 14:30, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

WMF Emails - Dab Hand
Hi there,

Having never emailed the WMF before, I was just hoping to get a more experienced viewpoint before I dropped myself in it by leaping first.

I sent them an email asking for a clarification about a couple of their "general warnings". I just received a reply. It doesn't include any personal information (once scrubbed of the replier's name, who purely acted in a team function), and I wasn't told otherwise. Would it be reasonable to say I can post this openly. Obviously I can message them again asking for permission, but they're clearly somewhat snowed under (good to hear) by emails atm, so would rather not wait for the delay.

Your clarity and prior experience made me think you were a good person to ask.

Cheers, Nosebagbear (talk) 12:55, 4 July 2019 (UTC)


 * , sorry for not getting back to you sooner; I was away for a bit and am not even close to catching up on the latest in the whole WP:FRAM thing. I don't have a good answer for you; my personal opinion is that it is usually best to avoid posting emails, even comparatively innocuous ones, because it establishes a precedent that will only be expanded over time. Those sorts of things tend to bite us in the posterior over the long run, as we've seen time after time.  Risker (talk) 17:49, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

--UTRSBot (talk) 17:24, 13 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks, responded there . While I'm the official blocking admin, this is an Arbcom block, there is info on the Arbcom wiki about it (or at least I left info about it there, whether or not it's been deleted in the interim is anyone's guess) and Arbcom (including  or any other current member) is very welcome to communicate with me if they have any questions about why I do not recommend unblocking.  Risker (talk) 17:38, 13 July 2019 (UTC)
 * After your helpful response, Sophie has sent another email which is on the UTRS page. Just Chilling (talk) 17:52, 13 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks, . I will send an email to T&S and Arbcom. I don't know about you, but there's always something really weird about someone who's asking to be unblocked on their same account after 9.5 years.  Risker (talk) 18:32, 13 July 2019 (UTC
 * I think that's a good way forward. I know it does sound strange but we do get, from time to time, appeals at UTRS of that sort of vintage. Usually they are from someone who was a kid at the time of the block and want to try again after growing up. Just Chilling (talk) 19:27, 13 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Risker. We've received the email. GorillaWarfare (talk) 00:55, 14 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi guys, I commented this in the UTRS, but what do people think the best way to handle the UTRS is. My comment was that it should be declined since ArbCom would likely handle anything directly rather than just booting to UTRS, but I could be wrong. Also, Just Chilling, apologies for replying in UTRS again! I realized after I posted it makes more sense just to ask GW/Risker for their thoughts 🙃 TonyBallioni (talk) 05:01, 16 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Well, I'd suggest that the UTRS just be closed with a note saying that the matter has been referred to WMF T&S. I'm not familiar enough with UTRS to know if that's an acceptable approach, though; this is the first time I've used it in the current configuration, the last time was at least 4 years ago.  Risker (talk) 05:25, 16 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Going along with consensus I have closed the UTRS ticket and informed Sophie. Just Chilling (talk) 18:26, 16 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks, . Since I wrote last night, I've received confirmation from T&S that they will be addressing this situation directly, so this is definitely the right step.  Risker (talk) 19:21, 16 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Sorry for the late reply, have been away-from-wiki for a bit. I/the ArbCom also directed Sophie to T&S. GorillaWarfare (talk) 01:52, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion
Delete my comments again and I will go to WP:ANI. This is a promise. 7&amp;6=thirteen (☎) 15:29, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I fixed the mistyped link. <b style="color:#060">7&amp;6=thirteen</b> (<b style="color:#000">☎</b>) 15:34, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Seriously, please calm down. Your edit messed up the header; I figured you'd know exactly what needed to be fixed quickly, but darned if I wanted to start monkeying around with a template that I don't know. It was an AGF undo where I had absolutely no issue with your restoring and fixing your edit. It's disappointing that your first reaction was to be insulting and rude rather than to examine the reverted edit for the problem. I would have expected you'd know me better than to think that I'd revert another editor's opinion in a discussion. In fact, I didn't even read what you wrote, I just saw that the template or whatever that you'd added messed up the whole page.  Risker (talk) 15:51, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Sorry for my misunderstanding. Cheers.  <b style="color:#060">7&amp;6=thirteen</b> (<b style="color:#000">☎</b>) 15:53, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * 54129 to the rescue :) I also added an indentation to User:7&6=thirteen's post, but didn't want to touch the user link within your post itself, 13, hope that's OK.  ——  SerialNumber  54129  16:24, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Bureaucrat
Have you thought of running for bureaucrat? I think you'd make a good one. Hawkeye7  (discuss)  02:43, 23 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi . Thank you very much for the compliment; I value your opinion.  Nonetheless, it would probably not be appropriate for me to run for 'crat when the last RfB I voted on was an oppose "particularly as we already have an overabundance of bureaucrats".  I still think that, and I know I wouldn't be the right person to do much work at BAG, either.  Risker (talk) 03:26, 23 July 2019 (UTC)
 * We’re -7 in the last 12 months, would that change your mind? –<b style="font-family:verdana;color:#000">xeno</b><sup style="color:#000">talk 08:43, 23 October 2019 (UTC)

Article Re-Written
Hello Risker. I must admit that I wrote my first article in a hurry. Thank you though for seeing potential in it. I have amended it and written in my own words. Please review it for me. Thanks. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draft:Enkay_Ogboruche (Ogeode (talk) 10:13, 24 July 2019 (UTC))

Deletion of DiMuro (record producer) [unjust]
Hello, good day.

I am a bit upset that my page for the subject DiMuro (record producer) has been completely deleted. This action, i feel, is completely unjust. The page did not need to be deleted.

As others even agreed in the talk page of the original article, as well as the talk page of the individual who placed the "speedy deletion" tag on the article - the page i created was just a start. The subject is notable enough. Granted, there was more information to be added, but deleting all of the work of myself and other contributors is not right. Now we can't continue to improve on a article thats relevant to music / music production. If you researched the sources that were cited, you'd see that the subject was fairly notable in the music industry. Wikipedia is supposed to be a place for knowledge, and people like to know who is involved in todays music. I think this is a fair point. I do not want to come off rude or condescending, i just want my article to be given a chance. I have spent alot of time researching the subject in question and found plenty of sites / wikis that prove notability in the music industry. Please, could you revert your deletion? I really hope you can consider this. I simply do not understand what else is needed, all of the reliable information was right there on the page.

I am providing you with links to help you understand that this subject has enough written on them to prove notability to a degree. And as i stated before, this was just the beginning of the article. There will be new information added as soon as it comes to surface. Please, Risker, reconsider this action. Thank you

Links:


 * 1. FANDOM Music Wiki
 * 2. Discogs biography and info
 * 3. Revolvy Wiki Information
 * 4. GENIUS Song lyrics & knowledge (DiMuro - VERIFIED)
 * 5. Spotify Biography from Artist
 * 6. Short biography directly from subjects website
 * 7. Google knowledge panel
 * 8. MusicBrainz info
 * 9. DiMuro WIKIDATA

Musicmaniac03 (talk) 02:26, 30 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Hello . (Note that I fixed the article title in your post above by adding a closing bracket so that other administrators can go directly to the deleted version.) There was no assertion of notability in the article; that's absolutely required for an article about a musician or record producer. The closest that the article came to asserting notability was indicating that he'd produced one song that was never released as a single on a notable album, and that doesn't count.  I'm happy to return it to draft status for you, but what we'd be looking for when it comes to notability would be articles in independent third party sources that are mainly about this article subject, not the album, the song, the performer or anything else.  Links like Spotify and Discogs and Revolvy don't count, and FANDOM wiki absolutely is not a reliable source. Let me know if you want me to move it back to draft for you, and you can continue to develop it and look for those independent third party sources that are primarily about DiMuro. I'd suggest you also go and read through other articles about record producers to see what is likely to be required.  Risker (talk) 02:54, 30 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Thank you, i would absolutely appreciate you restoring it back to draft, that would be great. I will continue to expand on the subject more over time. I understand about the sources now, basically you want to see news/media/interviews on the subject. Also, just to point out one thing - the song he produced was actually released, it is part of the album that released on June 28, 2019 (Chris Brown - Indigo) which i have linked here (track #19)

Anyways, besides that - thank you again, if you moved it back to draft so i may improve on it, i would very much appreciate that!

Musicmaniac03 (talk) 03:06, 30 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, I know the song appeared on the album, but the song itself isn't notable, so it doesn't really help establish DiMuro's notability. In any case, I've undeleted and moved the page back to Draft:DiMuro (record producer) and also undeleted and moved back the talk page so that you have that information to work with as well.  Good luck with your work.  Risker (talk) 03:20, 30 July 2019 (UTC)


 * I understand. Thank you ! I will keep working on it until its notable enough. :)

Musicmaniac03 (talk) 03:36, 30 July 2019 (UTC)

db-g3 vs db-hoax
Thanks for catching that I'd used the wrong template for "2020 world currency crisis". I saw in my notes that g3 was the correct category for hoax or vandalism, but didn't notice that I should use db-hoax specifically (I mentioned the hoax/crystal ball issue in the edit summary instead). My apologies for tagging it incorrectly. It was my first g3, I'll know better next time. Schazjmd  (talk)  14:12, 30 July 2019 (UTC)
 * No worries at all, - if I'd thought you were on the wrong track, I would have dropped you a talk page note.  As it is, you were mostly right, and it was just a matter of selected template.  In either case, the page definitely was eligible for CSD, as even the author agreed (on the talk page, also now deleted).  Thanks for your work in reviewing new pages.  Risker (talk) 14:41, 30 July 2019 (UTC)

It's me from the bench outside Aula Magna :-)
Hi there! Just got round to pinging you for the extended user right to use the translation tool on English Wikipedia (if you look around you'll see I have over a couple thousand edits on other WM projects, but not many on EN). It was a pleasure to meet you, hope to see you again at an upcoming event :-) Saintfevrier (talk) 05:55, 24 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Hello ! I hope your travels were pleasant.  Who knows, our paths may well cross again.  I have now granted the extended confirmed user right so that you can use the translation tool.  Good luck in your editing, feel free to stop by if I can be of further assistance.  Risker (talk) 06:13, 24 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Wow, that was quick! Thank you, thank you, thank you! (Travels were pleasant, now back home catching up with stuff that fell behind during my stay in Stockholm. I will start translating ASAP, and I will return here to post the first article I intend to translate. I'm sure we will meet again... till later, wishing you all the best from Kefalonia, Greece :-) Saintfevrier (talk) 07:02, 24 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Here is the article :-) (I was wondering if there is a way to privately reach out to you, as I am having issues with another article and I would value your opinion. If you have a look at my recent contribs you'll get the picture...) Thanks again for everything! Saintfevrier (talk) 06:31, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

You've got mail
Thank you. I've responded by email. Let me know your response ASAP, thanks. Risker (talk) 20:27, 1 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks
Thanks for considering my candidacy at RfA. You are someone whose thoughts matter to me and so it was an honor to have you say nice things about me. Thank you. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 02:15, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

You've got mail
Thanks, - I've responded. :-) Risker (talk) 23:59, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

Editing workflows
Hi!

I have a vague recollection that you had something like a list of important things that designers and developers need to check when they are considering software changes that affect editing workflows.

An I recalling correctly? If I do, where can I read it?

Thanks! --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 07:21, 13 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Hello - I think the page you're looking for is this checklist, and I hope you find it helpful.  Risker (talk) 15:49, 13 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, thanks! --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 19:55, 13 October 2019 (UTC)
 * So, here's a bit of follow-up. I went over your page, and while it's not directly related to what I'm about to ask, it's at least tangentially related.
 * I've been working on a proposal to make a big change in how templates work. The central part of this proposal is to allow global storage of some templates and modules. The short version of the proposal can be found at the page mw:Global templates/Draft spec/TLDR. (There's also a much longer version at mw:Global templates/Draft spec/TLDR.)
 * I cannot find anything on your page that contradicts my proposal, but it's possible that I'm missing something. If you could give that page a few minutes and tell me what do you think about it, it would be very nice.
 * Thanks! --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 09:43, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

Hello there ...
And Welcome Back (not that there's anything wrong with hearses and worms crawling out of people's mouths). Really I just wanted to say hi to someone I haven't spoken with in a very long time. Hi Risker, I hope you're still able to find an enjoyable brownie to indulge in. Cheers.
 * Hey there Ched! Ironically, I brought the page back because someone was asking me about my essays on being an arbitrator, and it was the only place I'd put the links. And no, I'm not going to run again. I've been kept very busy since I was an arb, first with FDC and more recently with the Wikimedia movement strategy process.  Or, as I jokingly said, dispute resolution on a very different scale.  :-)  I've always been able to find something interesting to do around here, whether it's the occasional bit of content work, a bit of functionary work here and there, some general commentary on the great scheme of things, or trying to keep up with what's going on in the big wide wiki-world.  So I'm always around somewhere or other. Any chance you're heading to Cambridge next month?  Risker (talk) 05:54, 19 October 2019 (UTC)


 * I wasn't aware of anything in Cambridge (UK, Ohio, or Boston?) - but I doubt I'll be there. I've sent you some info in email that may explain a bit more.  Cheers. — Ched (talk) 11:59, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Answered by email. :-)  Risker (talk) 03:48, 20 October 2019 (UTC)

Reminder to self
Review Thurs at 0600 UTC

Please...
Currently your actions regarding the Adam Lambert article have no rationale in the log. Please resubmit your ECP of the page with a rationale. Likewise, if you are invoking protection of the article because it's BLP, you need to log such actions here. Please do so. Buffs (talk) 16:53, 22 October 2019 (UTC)
 * It's a step down from indefinite full move protection, and I did write a rationale at the time but it does not seem to have been included in the log. I actually cannot see why full move protection was applied in the first place; it's not clear in the log, and it's not clear in the activity of the article at the time. ECP protection allows it to be moved by pagemovers - not that the page is likely to ever need to be moved.  Weird that it didn't allow me to fix the log directly but I think there is a reasonable rationale there now.  Risker (talk) 17:54, 22 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Sorry for a delayed reply, but is ECP being applied due to BLP rules? Buffs (talk) 15:54, 28 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Okay so back in the day, move protection used to be set to sysop for lots of things that people though would never need to be moved, even if they'd never been subject to movepage vandalism. It looks like Risker is trying to step it down from move=sysop, but "ECP" is a bit of a landmine of a protection setting. I'd say just remove it entirely, or set it inline with the existing protection level, to expire (or even just leave it in place as move=sysop and let any move happen via the WP:RM process?).
 * Risker, I don't see any special relationship between ECP and Page Mover? Am I missing something? –<b style="font-family:verdana;color:#000">xeno</b><sup style="color:#000">talk 16:19, 28 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Likewise; thanks! Buffs (talk) 16:35, 28 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi Everyone! Thanks  for responding more quickly than I could; your interpretation is correct. At the time that I stepped down the level of protection, there was an ongoing discussion on one of the village pumps about how we had so many pages that were fully move protected (in many cases, indefinitely) in relation to whether or not pagemovers should be able to move fully protected pages, and I felt encouraged to take a look at some of them to see *why* they were move protected and step them down if appropriate. This was one of the ones I looked at, but I must have mixed up its move log with one of the other ones I had in my (way too many open) windows at the time; I thought it had been "vandal-moved" by a registered account, but when I review the move log for the page right now without a zillion tabs open, I see that there was no history of a move.  I'm going to downgrade it to semi-move-protection - the article has truly been the target of some pretty vile vandalism by unregistered or newly registered accounts - and we'll see how it goes. Thanks for following up,  Risker (talk) 22:01, 28 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the clarification! Buffs (talk) 23:21, 28 October 2019 (UTC)

Tools
WP:TOOLS......-- Moxy 🍁 15:00, 26 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks, . Appreciate both the help and the tip.  Risker (talk) 20:21, 26 October 2019 (UTC)

Problem with vandalous IP edits
I just want to mention this comment I inserted into a discussion in reaction to a comment of yours in case you missed my insertion. I wish I had a solution to suggest, but I don't. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 09:11, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

A survey to improve the community consultation outreach process
Hello!

The Wikimedia Foundation is seeking to improve the community consultation outreach process for Foundation policies, and we are interested in why you didn't participate in a recent consultation that followed a community discussion you’ve been part of.

Please fill out this short survey to help us improve our community consultation process for the future. It should only take about three minutes.

The privacy policy for this survey is here. This survey is a one-off request from us related to this unique topic.

Thank you for your participation, Kbrown (WMF) 10:45, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

Please see Wikipedia Signpost/Next issue/In focus
Dear Risker,

Thanks for the submission to The Signpost. I just caught it on my "final round" of checking all suggestions, submissions, etc. We still have a lot of things to catch up on, so the actual publication will likely be about noon on Friday NYTime. I really appreciate the hard work it takes to get a large mass of committee-written text down to something that people outside the committee can understand. I tried my hand at a bit more of this in the first round of copy editing. There should be another round of light copyediting before publication, but I'd appreciate it if you go through it once more, if only to make sure that I didn't do any damage in my attempted ce efforts. One of the benefits of The Signpost is that a good round of comments often results. From previous discussions on the strategy process (e.g. at Jimbo talk), I expect there will be lots of comments. It will help if you check for comments a couple of times over the weekend.

Thanks again.

Smallbones( smalltalk ) 19:46, 27 November 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks very much, . I've taken a look at your copy edits, and they seem fine to me.  I've asked the rest of our little "team" to take a look and given them the heads-up about the likely publishing date/time on Friday. I'll be on tap to respond to comments as best I can over the weekend; several of the other working group members who primarily edit on enwiki (and thus could pitch in to respond) are US-based, so may be busy with family matters over the holiday weekend, but I'm sure we'll figure it all out.  Let's hope that we get some useful feedback and commentary; I know the strategy core team will be watching as well.  Risker (talk) 19:59, 27 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Yes, many people will be in the same holiday boat over the weekend. Maybe that will result in calmer discussions than is sometimes the case. Smallbones( smalltalk ) 20:29, 27 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Sorry to bother you again. Would it be possible to give a half-sentence or so about each of you (Risker with FULBERT and Jackiekoerner) and especially about your relation to the strategy process. Short is good here! Smallbones( smalltalk ) 02:08, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi . The following should be helpful.  Risker (talk) 03:19, 28 November 2019 (UTC)
 * has held multiple roles within both English Wikipedia and the broader Wikimedia community over the last 14 years, and is a member of the Roles & Responsibilities strategy working group
 * has been an instructor of multiple WikiEdu programs for New York University students, is a member of multiple user groups, and is a member of the Capacity Building strategy working group
 * holds a doctorate in Higher Education, has participated in a wide range of Wikimedia community activities, and is a member of the Community Health strategy working group.

Barnstar of Awesomeness

 * Awww, thank you so much, . This really means a lot!  Risker (talk) 06:00, 7 December 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure if this barnstar was left for this comment, but it was just what we needed to hear. Thanks Risker. – bradv  🍁  06:02, 7 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your kind words, . Let's hope things settle down soon.  Risker (talk) 04:52, 8 December 2019 (UTC)

Request
On the Edgar181 discussion page you wrote "It's one of the worst abuses, but we did have one event where it was identified that someone wasn't only socking, but actually had two admin accounts. - can you provide a link to the relevant ARBCOM case/motion/discussion/whatever? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:187:4581:7F50:59CE:30EB:8BFA:997B (talk) 21:54, 11 December 2019 (UTC)
 * The accounts were and, both accounts emergency desysopped in July 2008 because of password compromise. There was no arbcom motion. Apparently, there were people who edited contemporaneously who knew (a) that both admin accounts were "owned" by the same person, (b) that they had the same password, and (c) knew what that password was.  One might also count the "Poetlister" group of accounts including enwiki admin account  and "other project" admin/CU . The history there is complex and cross-wiki; however, the end result was a global ban.  Risker (talk) 22:41, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

IP Block Exemption Extension
How do I request an extension to my IP block exemption? By March 2020 when my trial period ends I will not be able to access Wikipedia through means other than censorship evasion software. How can I ensure that I am able to request an extension before that trial period ends? -Splinemath (talk) 02:41, 10 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Please see WP:IPECPROXY which will tell you: Email the checkuser team at . I handle many (but certainly not all) requests there. You can expect that whichever CU is reviewing, they will be looking at whether or not you've edited during the three months. You don't have to do a lot - I doubt anyone is expecting you to do a thousand edits - but it should be enough to persuade someone that you're actively participating in a positive way (e.g., no unaddressed warnings, no blocks for really serious matters like harassment or other inappropriate behaviour, etc.)  It won't hurt for you to *also* be active on other projects, although it's certainly not mandatory. Response is generally pretty quick; it would be okay to send through the request a week or so in advance, as most are handled within a week.  Risker (talk) 03:01, 10 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you. I will email within the week of expiration.-Splinemath (talk) 03:11, 10 January 2020 (UTC)