Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Africa/Archive 11

Notice board is getting long - subpage time?
The noticeboard is getting pretty long. Would anyone object if I split Africa-related regional notice board off into a /Participants subpage? Picaroon 19:26, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I would prefer the stub section to be split off. I find the subsections in the TOC maddening. - BanyanTree 19:31, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I added those in my recent updating so as to give the section edit links - is there anyway to make them not show up in the TOC but keep the section edit links? But anyways, I typed the above before I expanded the stub section (but saved it later), so I guess its as good a candidate for splitting off as the participants section is. /Stubs instead, then? Picaroon 19:47, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I believe that one can inhibit with NOTOC and then build a customized TOC using the built-in identifiers of the section headers, but that's way beyond my technical abilities. As for my TOC obsession, I believe a TOC structure should reflect relative importance, and the current TOC tells me that half of the good of the board is in stub compilation. - BanyanTree 20:20, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Alright, I've split off the stubs section and replaced it with transclusion. Noinclude/Includeonly hocus-pocus ensures that section headers don't appear. Picaroon 22:47, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
 * That's a nice sleight of hand with the headers. I've created Category:Africa notice board as our subpage cup runneth over.  However, wasn't the original intention to reduce the length of the page?  - BanyanTree 01:42, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I was going to wait for more people to give their input on whether they'd like it linked or transcluded - this talkpage is so quiet. I just started the process to make editing easier to handle by reducing edit window size. If no one objects in another day or so, I'll switch it to a link. Picaroon 01:54, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject Africa created
I've created a WikiProject Africa that has most everything it needs except members. If you're interested, please join. — Emiellaiendiay 23:34, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Since it is done, we should probably be thinking of which pages, such as the peer review and template list, should be transferred, as well as what end state we want for the board. Since the proposed continent and region projects at the Council subpage have not had their relationships thought out, as far as I can tell, maybe people can add their input. - BanyanTree 01:41, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I've just added the related country wikiprojects. I am not sure as well how we'd deal with the project. On one hand we have country projects and the general Africa project. It would seem redundant but i believe we can redifine the scope of the African project in a way or another. I'd suggest though that we limit the project to general articles which are not country specific (i.e. Military history of Africa Vs. Military history of South Africa). --  FayssalF  - Wiki me up ®  11:35, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Personally, I'm against transferring sections from the board to the project. It must be observed that the board has a far longer history, and much more members, so I'd prefer to keep the new peer review section here, as also the new articles.--Aldux 22:16, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Yeah, but didn't you just give a reason for transferring the peer review? It's less than three months old, and I'd hazard a guess that 90% of the people in that list down there don't know it exists. I think we should move the peer review it and the stub messages subpages over the the project, and scale this page back to, well, a noticeboard. Picaroon 00:35, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I've probably been as forceful as anyone in arguing against the creation of a WikiProject Africa, and I still do not see how a COTW/M can be supported. That said, the project appears to have attracted the taggers and evaluators, which is no small resource.  I had envisioned the board having the functions that don't require large amounts of knowledge in common, while avoiding the pitfalls of forcing a group of people who don't have well-meshing knowledge bases to form highly organized task groups.  I haven't changed my opinion but it would be silly to maintain WikiProject-esque pages here. This is simply counter-intuitive for editors not familiar with the CSB to board history.  I don't know what that leaves the board, and I'm not sure it leaves it with anything but knitting circle duties, but I feel uncomfortable giving the project anything less than the best chance possible for success in improving Africa articles.  I !vote for moving all subpages as well as, depending on how people feel, the award. - BanyanTree 06:32, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I must admit I've had perplexities pretty strong regarding the creation of WP:AFRICA; but its started, and as BT noted, we should give the new project the best possibilities. So I too agree, lets move the subpages.--Aldux 18:57, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Photos for Chad and Niger presidents
The number of images available for Chad and Niger-related articles. In particular, we should at least attempt to provide a photo for the Chadian and Nigerien presidents, that is François Tombalbaye (1960-75), Felix Malloum (1975-79), Goukouni Oueddei (1979-82) for Chad and Hamani Diori (1960-74), Ali Saibou (1987-93) and Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara (1996-99). Of these, Tombalbaye, Goukouni and Diori would be especially appreciated. Please help!--Aldux 23:34, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Massive copyvio problems with new Sierra Leone articles?
I don't have much experience in dealing with copyvio, but I've observed that, probably in good faith, has committed an elevated number of copyvios, completely copying several article from the biogs in http://www.trial-ch.org/en/trial-watch.html, which have a clear copyright mark at the end of the page. Similar copyright problems (and possibly also WP:RS) come from the use of the book Sierra Leonean Heroes - Fifty Great Men and Women Who Helped to Build Our Nation. The same book is used heavily by, maybe, but I'm not sure, to the point of copyvio. Somebody who has a major expewrience in dealing with copyright problems, please look in the topic.--Aldux 12:24, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I've left a note on the first user's talk page. The standard response is to speedy delete them using db-copyvio - they are unambiguous. I'll go through and do that. The affected articles (that I spotted - there may be some I missed) are these, if anyone wants to rewrite them - we probably should have articles on most of the subjects.


 * Eustace Taylor-Cummings
 * Brima Bazzy Kamara
 * Santigie Borbor Kanu
 * Morris Kallon
 * Augustine Gbao
 * Alex Tamba Brima


 * I've also had a flick through some of the second user's contributions. Some articles (such as Bai Bureh) are heavily based on the Heroes book but are probably just about safe from copyvios. --Cherry blossom tree 13:24, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Very problematic bot actions
Africa-related regional notice board/New articles is being filled w/ many unrelated Africa-related topics. I strongly oppose the bot automatic additions and would like to stop it and do the work manually as we'd done before. I've already contacted the bot operator (User:Alex Bakharev) but i received no reply from him yet. Could someone please have a word w/ him? Thanks. --  FayssalF  - Wiki me up ®  17:12, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm a fan of the bot list. The manual lists missed most newly-created Africa-related articles.  The bot's list should be a useful list of articles which are likely to be related to Africa, and may be of interest to contributors to this noticeboard.  If it's throwing up unrelated articles, it sounds like its parameters need editing.  If you have some examples, that shouldn't be difficult to do.  Even if it were decided not to transclude the bot list (and it seems to have lots of support on the talk page), there is absolutely no need to stop the bot operating. Warofdreams talk 01:29, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikimania 2007
Hello all Wikipedians in Africa;

Wikimania 2007, which is being held in Taipei, Taiwan on August 3-5, is offering opportunities for travel scholarships to Wikimania for active users of Wikimedia projects from the continent of Africa. Although the original scholarship deadline has passed, please, if you are interested, you may still apply at http://wm07schols.wikimedia.org/apply.php. Sincerely yours, Cary Bass 17:14, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Help with some classifications of Nilotic people
I'm trying to expand the article Nilotic. I seems to me that the classifications Plain Nilotes, Nilo-Hamites, Maa-speaking people, Maasai cluster, Karamojong cluster and Ateker are more or less synonyms. Does anyone have references that can help figure out the differences/similarities between them? If so, drop a note. Thanks --Ezeu 01:22, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Contemporary African Database
I'm sure I'm not the only one who has used the Contemporary Africa Database - while it doesn't have much biographical content per person, it is pretty reliable, and is often the best source for birth dates, death dates, and job titles. Recently it has switched to some sort of subcription-only set-up and a user,, decided to remove sixty one links to the site. I used the Wayback Machine and, sure enough, a version of the page was right there. So what do you guys think about this? Should all these edits be outright reverted or replaced with an IA link? Picaroon (Talk) 16:50, 12 May 2007 (UTC)


 * IA links are good (sometimes better than live links because they don't change), paysite references are okay, no references means the unreferenced information may be deleted by anyone. Check out Template:cite web's archiveurl= and archivedate= parameters. -- Jeandré, 2007-05-13t09:12z

Its back online. --Ezeu 02:48, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

> ... a version of the page was right there ... Or perhaps *not* there!

Muammar al-Gaddafi coma(?)
Muammar al-Gaddafi might have had a coma, but it seems not. If you want, you might put him on your watchlist for a couple days to help keep the page clean, while this report cycles. Best, Smmurphy(Talk) 17:59, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
 * For the record, this turned out not to be a false report. Picaroon (Talk) 20:17, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Dispute on Imo State
I have been engaged in a month long dispute with / over the state (no pun intended) of. I neutralized multiple blatantly biased sections, removed a lot of unsourced information, and removed non-notable individuals and spammy external links from the "Notable residents" section (which he repeatedly renames to "Some Distinguished Natives"). He has positively refused to even acknowledge me, not even using edit summaries while reverting. Could I please get some other opinions? Picaroon (Talk) 20:17, 18 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Resolving disputes. -- Jeandré, 2007-05-19t18:24z


 * I looked over that entire page and nothing seemed applicable. A third opinion request wouldn't work because Academicigbo would be unresponsive, as always. A request for mediation would fail for the same reason. And requests for comments are reserved for bigger disputes involving multiple editors. Which is why I thought the best thing would be asking some other Africa-editors' opinions. Picaroon (Talk) 19:18, 19 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Jeez, that page has more activity than my entire (admittedly truncated) watchlist. In my opinion, this is well beyond the point of disruption.  It is not a content dispute.  Treat it as vandalism - warn, block and protect as needed to keep the page in line with site policies. - BanyanTree 00:19, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep an eye on the redirect Imo state (& others?), too. Bolivian Unicyclist 19:18, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Krio language a "former" creole language?
The other day there was an edit to Krio language by an anon, which changed the lead to say that it is a "former" creole language. I don't think that page is widely watched, so I'm asking this here. What is a "former" creole language, and does it make sense to describe Krio in that way? The other part of that particular edit is ok, assuming that the population of Krio in the diaspora is notable (probably), so... Let me know if you know what that means. Thanks, Smmurphy(Talk) 19:09, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Rwandan Civil War referencing
I'm in the process of expanding and referencing Rwandan Civil War and have a problem. An anon had previously written a detailed account, and by "detailed" I mean with more detail than anything I've ever read. The content looks good and is in line with the less detailed sources I have, and I would love to just reference the anon's work, as opposed to removing it. Does anyone have, or have they ever read, a work that offers such details? Help with citations would be great, but just knowing where to look would help. Thanks, BanyanTree 12:31, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Deletion sorting
Please see my comment at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Deletion sorting/List control, where I've proposed deleting the inactive country-specific subpages (almost all of them) in favor of listing their occasional afds on the main WikiProject Deletion sorting/Africa page. Picaroon (t) 20:17, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Mo Ibrahim Foundation Index of African Governance
What, if anything, should we mine from the Mo Ibrahim Foundation's Index of African Governance? It ranks African countries in a number of different categories, from "Safety and Security" to "Sustainable Economic Development" and "Human Development" and then assigns an overall rank. Are these rankings something we should consider reporting in articles on African countries? The index is still quite new, if I'm not mistaken, so I'm not sure what it's reputation is. Does anyone have any idea how to use it, if at all? (I tried to add a weblink to the index, but it breaks the page for some reason. Google it. :) — Amcaja ( talk ) 05:47, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
 * An article in The Economist about the index spurred me to expand the Mo Ibrahim article, and I redirected his eponymous foundation there for now. The foundation should have its own page eventually, as this and the leadership award both have wide coverage.


 * As to reporting the ranking in articles, I think this would be a good idea. It is compiled by Ibrahim and two Harvard academics, and the two news reports I've seen so far have not been critical (although they haven't gone in-depth on the selection process, either.) I guess the question is, if we decide to use the info somehow, does it belong in infoboxes, the text of the article, or both? (The top and bottom ten nations can be seen here.) Picaroon (t) 23:17, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree about including the index in articles where appropriate. The "where appropriate" part is the difficult one, as you note, however. For example, the overall index score might be worth noting in the infobox, but the individual rankings would seem to fit better elsewhere. For example, the "sustainable economic development" ranking would belong in a country article's "Economy" section, and the "safety and security" part might fit under "Politics and government". The potential problem with this would be mentioning the foundation over and over in the article. I don't think the foundation has individual country reports available, either; such reports would be more useful as sources than just raw rankings. — Amcaja ( talk ) 02:12, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Africana Studies
There is some confusion about how to organize these terms:
 * African American Studies
 * Africana Studies
 * African Studies
 * African Diaspora Studies
 * etc.

Specifically, should the page on Africana Studies act as a disambiguation page, or should it describe the field of Africana Studies? I think I know what I'm talking about but I could use a little help here. Please see the conversation at the talk page. futurebird (talk) 17:41, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Africa-related regional notice board/New articles/Archive 2006
Would anyone object to deletion of Africa-related regional notice board/New articles/Archive 2006 under speedy deletion criterion G6 (housekeeping)? The page is an orphaned archive that contains a hopelessly-incomplete listing of Africa-related articles created during 2006. Since the main "New articles" page is now automatically updated by a bot, I can see no administrative or other need to retain the archive page. – Black Falcon (Talk) 07:56, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Deleted. If the page has usefulness, or if there is need for discussion, please let me know and I will restore the page. – Black Falcon (Talk) 16:27, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Proposed Wikiproject for Netball
I've started the ball rolling (should that be made the centre pass?) on creating a Wikiproject for Netball (in which a number of African countries participate at an International level). If you would particiapte in this, please indicate your support at WikiProject_Council/Proposals dramatic (talk) 00:44, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

An Invitation from the Philippine Wikipedia Community
Hello folks,

The Philippine Wikipedia Community will be holding its 1st Meet-up in Cebu City (the fourth one in the Philippines) on June 23-24, 2008. This coincides with the first Philippine Open Source Summit also to be held in Cebu, and which the Philippine Wikipedia Community is a Implementing Partner in. We invite you to join us in this event. If you are in the IT or IT-enabled services industry, this would be a great opportunity to network with leaders from the 4th best outsourcing city in the world. This is also a good excuse to visit our beautiful beaches :)

If you're interested in joining the Wikipedia meet-up, please join our discussion. To register for the Open Source Summit, please contact CEDF-IT. If you would like some assistance with local accomodations, you may email User:Bentong Isles.

The Philippine Wikipedia Community WP:PINOY

Problem with WP:FRINGE
There is a wikiproject that is very self important, called WP:FRINGE. It ought to be renamed WP:HERESY, because its role seems to be to determine WHOSE books and published ideas are acceptable ("ours") and whose books and ideas are NOT acceptable ("yours") for purposes of determining the official "truth" on any matter, and to persecute those ideas that are determined by that august Council as heretical or not acceptable ideas people aren't supposed to be thinking, by declaring them unmentionable things that nobody must ever read about on wikipedia (even though, anyone buying these books or reading them online can easily get a different story).

We now have a problem because somebody actually tried to make an article listing all the African Empires on one page. Oh no! DBachmann, who seems to be the main driving force behind deciding what is "FRINGE", very often based on blatantly ethnic considerations, considers this "fringe" material. See Fringe_theories/Noticeboard. Note he grudgingly admits that there were indeed several Empires in African history. But once you start talking about them all on the same page, you're entering DBachmann's fringe radar, because you're not SUPPOSED to talk about them all on the same page, and therefore any of the sources that do, have been a priori disqualified as FRINGE, and are therefore ruled inadmissible for "our" purposes, don't you see. Blockinblox (talk) 14:07, 30 July 2008 (UTC)


 * As for the repeated removal of the above (perhaps uncivil) notice, please see CIVIL. Note the lines "Only in the most serious of circumstances should an editor replace or edit a comment made by another editor. Only in the event of something that can cause actual damage in the real world should this be the first step (i.e., disclosing the name, address or phone number of an opponent). In the event of rudeness or incivility on the part of an editor, it is appropriate to discuss the offending words with that editor, and to request that editor to change that specific wording."  Thank you.  T L Miles (talk) 03:31, 3 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Wikiquette alerts -- Jeandré, 2008-08-03t12:57z


 * I was directed here do to the Wikiquette Alert. I have to echo what T L Miles has said:  Removal of talk page comments is supposed to be reserved for really egregious stuff, and the above rant, while shrill and mostly unproductive, does not really fall into the category of what we typically remove.  Please do not remove it again.
 * I would simultaneously encourage Blockinblox do take a deep breath and try to discuss this more calmly. I do see one statement in particular that concerns me, and that is the assertion that DBachmann's decisions are "very often based on blatantly ethnic considerations."  I would encourage Blockinblox to strike this comment (by putting it between " " and " " ), as it is almost always a bad idea to accuse a good faith editor of racism, whether implicitly or explicitly.  However, I would also discourage other editors from unilaterally striking or redacting Blockinblox's comment -- let his statements stand on their own, and if he wishes to retract, it will mean more if he does it himself.
 * Since I see now edit warring in several days, I am marking the Wikiquette Alert as "Resolved". --Jaysweet (talk) 13:13, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Date format poll confirmation
There is ongoing discussion on the talk page for the Manual of Style (including a series of polls) aimed at achieving consensus on presenting dates in American (February 11, 1990) or International (11 February 1990) format on an article by article basis. The poll gives full instructions, but briefly the choices are: If you wish to participate or review the progress of discussion, you may follow this link. --Pete (talk) 08:49, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
 * C = Option C, the winner of the initial poll and run-off. (US articles have US format dates, international format otherwise)
 * R = Retain existing wording. (National format for English-speaking countries, no guidance otherwise).

African cinema task force
An African cinema task force has been proposed at WikiProject Films. Interested editors are encouraged to sign up - if there is enough interest, then the task force will be created! Many thanks, Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 03:12, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Ubuntu
The discussion over at Talk:Ubuntu could use some input from someone involved in this project. Yworo (talk) 14:57, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Added new cat: Category:Sufism in Africa
Just in case anyone wanted to add any articles. It's mainly subcatting Category:African Sufis, but there are also articles on Sufi orders peculiar to Africa. MatthewVanitas (talk) 21:39, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Somali clan lineage
(Originally posted at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Somalia) On many of the Somali clan and sub-clan articles (see Category:Somali clans), the lineage section consists of an unwieldy list. Anything where I've had to scroll down for more than one or two screens, I've been adding in that section. I can't imagine, in their current state, how these lists could be useful to anyone - they seem to be lists of names. I propose that there should be some sort of guideline to keeping these concise, or that there is some sort of threshold for inclusion. One rule of thumb could be that a list item links to an actual article (I've been using that criteria for lists of notable people). -- Gyrofrog (talk) 19:41, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Barnstar for crime available fort the, ahem, taking
We now have a Uganda barnstar. We do not however yet have a Crime in Uganda article, and that page is currently a redirect to the category of Crime in Uganda. The barnstar will be given to a person who can get a Crime in Uganda article up to at least Start class level. John Carter (talk) 16:11, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

New article Xagar lower jubba somalia
Needs work - moving to better title and disam from Xagar (which is in Tibet), improving the English etc. Or prodding if the info is already in somewhere else. Peridon (talk) 12:40, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Discussion
At Talk:2010–2011 Ivorian crisis, there's a discussion going on about merging that article into the Second Ivorian Civil War article. B-Machine (talk) 19:32, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Call for Volunteer Wikipedians!
The Africa Centre (www.africacentre.net) is a Pan-African cultural and arts social innovator that is based in Cape Town. One of its projects, Wiki Africa is seeking volunteers to assist with vital aspects of the project. The aim of WikiAfrica is to redress the critical imbalance of factual information about historic and contemporary Africa on the Internet’s most utilised information resource, Wikipedia. Its goal is to add African content to Wikipedia by generating and expanding 30,000 articles by the end of 2012. As an organisation, Africa Centre is passionate about knowledge creation, transparency, participation, collaboration, and open access to information. We value and seek to encourage the contribution of citizen archivists, citizen historians, and citizen journalists across Africa. This ground-breaking project benefits from partnerships with core cultural and artistic repositories/ archives, and individuals from across Africa. We are inviting applications from students and academics interested in contributing their time and passion to the project.

The ideal candidate should possess the following qualities: • Have good writing skills in English, • Have an eye for detail, • Be passionate about the web and internet technologies, • Have experience in uploading articles on Wikipedia, • Be familiar with Wikipedia and how it works, and • Be passionate about Africa’s voice in the world. The volunteer will participate in activities that involve: • Adding content to the Wikimedia Commons and Wikisource sites from digital archives at the Africa Centre and those of content partner organisations, • Guiding and training new Wikipedians through the project, • Training content partners in Wikipedia and the WikiAfrica project, • Liaising with stakeholders to promote Wikipedia and Wiki Africa at their university or college, and • Being part of workshops and giving input to various projects that are part of WikiAfrica. ABOUT THE POSITION: • Transport allowance; • Work Schedule: 2.5 days a week (20 hours per week); • Duration: flexible (between 3 months – 6 months); • Location: Cape Town, South Africa; • This position is ideally suited for a university masters or doctoral student. TO APPLY: If you are interested, please apply on or before 24th June 2012. Include in your application: 1. A cover letter; [Note: Include why you would like to volunteer for WikiAfrica; your Wikipedia username; and an overview of your Wikipedia experience.] 2. Your CV (2 pages max.); 3. Your availability; and 4. An example of an article that you have researched and written. Submit your application to: Isla Haddow-Flood,<br. Project Manager WikiAfrica, Africa Centre Email: wikiafrica@africacentre.net Questions? Francis at +21 422 0468 (francisa@africacentre.net) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiAfrica • www.africacentre.net/wikiafrica --Awinda 10:29, 12 June 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Awinda (talk • contribs)

Alerts not working?
There doesn't appear to be an alerts macro on the homepage of this project. Doesn't have to be, but many projects have one. It means that e.g. when Talk:Côte d'Ivoire is proposed to be moved to Ivory Coast it will show up as an alert on the WP:AFRICA homepage. Btw - I have a question about French-speaking Africa. If anyone can help. Thanks. In ictu oculi (talk) 05:25, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't speak French myself, but shoot. And thanks for the reminder about article alerts. John Carter (talk) 18:34, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * What's the question? bobrayner (talk) 18:50, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Request for help
Hi, the WikiAfrica and Share Your Knowledge teams are glad to announce that many "African" pictures are being published on Commons, either donated by international institutions or by single photographers. You can help: please see the list of categories here, then you can either add relevant categories to the pictures or place them in relevant articles in your favourite Wikipedia. Contents are mainly about, but not limited to, Senegal, Ethiopia, Mali, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, South Africa. Thanks a lot! --Elitre (talk) 13:43, 19 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I've made one iteration through the list (though additional categories have already been added to that list), and added relevant Ethiopia-related categories to the files (commons:Category:Omo River Valley, in particular). It's entirely possible that I've overlooked some, miscategorized, and/or that other categories are applicable. Elitre indicated (over at Commons) that they could use more help (in general) with this effort. -- Gyrofrog  (talk) 21:39, 19 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you so much. I also left a message about your remark there. --Elitre (talk) 10:10, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Hi, I updated the list, there are many new images waiting for Wikipedia articles to host them. Who's willing to help? --Elitre (talk) 13:51, 23 October 2012 (UTC)

What is this?
Hello, a user (Commons · Wikipedia) who does not seem to respond to messages has overwritten an existing file (and its description) with completely different content: original version → 2012-09-12 version (still current as of 2012-10-10, but the change may already have been reverted by the time you read this)

Perhaps somebody would like to identify the new content and move it to a new file so that both the old content of Carving.jpg and the September 2012 content can stay at Commons. Good luck --Wikipeditor (talk) 02:55, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

It is the same user that has posted Call for Volunteer Wikipedians! above. --Wikipeditor (talk) 02:59, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

allafrica.com access
Is there some way to get free access to allafrica.com articles? Hack (talk) 15:49, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
 * In the past I've often found that allafrica.com content is copied from other sources. Is there a particular part of allafrica.com (or a particular set of pages) which isn't freely available and which isn't copied from another freely-available site? bobrayner (talk) 02:49, 9 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Pretty much all of it is from other sources. It's just that the original sources tend to be a little harder to find. Hack (talk) 11:44, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Paul Kagame FAC
Just in case anyone missed it and it interested, the article about Rwandan President Paul Kagame is currently up for Featured Article candidature. I've had two full reviews so far (one of which is still in progress), and it's generally looking positive, but it would be useful to get more pairs of eyes on it and further feedback. The FAC page is at WP:Featured article candidates/Paul_Kagame/archive1. Many thanks! &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 10:59, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

irrelevant and specious
It should be obvious by now that Africans and African Americans for the most part ignore Wikipedia and are tired of fighting the games of the super editors and the general public with the incessant misinformation and abuse campaign in innumerable articles. So that's why even this weak attempt has gone nowhere. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.142.141.144 (talk) 04:30, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
 * There are some "super" editors on the African topic who do really outstanding work with often no recognition. If you have a specific fight that you think the people who look at this board might be able to help with, please provide the link to the page. Thanks. AbstractIllusions (talk) 05:00, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Diaspora maghrébine: Article in French with no English equivalent
fr:Diaspora maghrébine does not yet have an English equivalent. Is anyone interested in writing one? WhisperToMe (talk) 12:10, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Problem at Ghana
Any help here would be greatly appreciated.John Carter (talk) 18:18, 23 June 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia Primary School: first Calls for Articles!
Hi everybody, I'm quite excited to announce the first two articles selected to kick-start the content phase of the Wikipedia Primary School project! This research project focuses on the South Africa primary school curriculum: the involved teams have selected a list of 100+ relevant articles which will undergo review (or creation) by Wikipedians, scholars/experts, or journals. We thought that involving the Wikipedia community was the obvious first step in the process, which is going to last for the next couple of years. So the articles we'd like to suggest for creation are: Please see the project pages for more information and instructions, and thanks in advance for your invaluable help. Best, --Elitre (WPS) (talk) 13:07, 18 November 2014 (UTC)
 * 1) Makhonjwa Mountains;
 * 2) Stone-walled town of Kaditshwene.

Pategi or Patagi? (Nigeria question)
Please see Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Nigeria, a dispute about a place name in Nigeria. WhisperToMe (talk) 01:49, 5 April 2015 (UTC)

Academic paper about the Indian Ocean Rim
I found this academic paper in English. Someone may find it useful?
 * Takahashi, Motoki (高橋 基樹; Kobe University Graduate School of Cooperation Studies). "Rise in Economic Interactions in the Indian Ocean Rim : Implication for Maritime Policies in African Countries" (Archive). Journal of Maritime Researches. 2(1), 25-46, 2012-03. Kobe University. See profile at CiNii. See profile at Kernel Kobe University Repository. WhisperToMe (talk) 06:38, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

List of Presidents of Zimbabwe Suggestion
This page has been vandalised over the last few days. I reverted to a point but changes have been made subsequently. Can someone more knowledgeable please take a look? Gbawden (talk) 17:15, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

Theatre of Zambia
I tagged Theatre of Zambia for deletion, and it was closed as "keep", but the article is still in totally atrocious shape. Is anyone willing to fix it up, or are we just gonna let it sit and rot forever? It was completely unedited since 2009. So if this is so notable, how about getting your ass in gear and fixing it? Ten Pound Hammer • (What did I screw up now?) 20:37, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

RSN discussion about Somali sources
I just wanted to draw people's attention to a discussion I started on the reliable sources noticeboard about the reliability of some Somali sources. Please chime there in if you have any familiarity with the sources. signed,Rosguill talk 17:44, 16 April 2019 (UTC)

Noticeboard discussion on reliability of the Ethiopian Journal of Biological Sciences
There is a noticeboard discussion on the reliability of the Ethiopian Journal of Biological Sciences. If you are interested, please participate at. —  Newslinger  talk   16:45, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

RfC on reliability of African Independent
There is a request for comment on the reliability of African Independent (africanindy.com). If you are interested, please participate at —  Newslinger   talk   16:46, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

Requesting expansion and update edit support
Hi,

Season's greetings

I am looking for proactive expansion and update support/input help the following (So far neglected but important topic) articles, if possible. Even if you feel your focus area bit different still contribution of few line may help bring in some different perspective and also help Wikipedia goal of neutrality. If you can't spare time but if you know any good references you can note those on talk pages.


 * Islamic advice literature

This has been posted to this forum since, one of article review suggested to have more diverse editor participation to have more inclusive, neutral and balanced worldview

I hope and request some editors from this forum too proactively and constructively participate in updating and expanding of article Islamic advice literature

Thanks, warm regards and greetings

Bookku (talk) 07:43, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

Uploading Support for Covid19 response
It was rather curious how for a GLOBAL pandemic, there was what the UN secretary general called an "infodemic" in european languages but in African languages, free and open access to info on covid in African languages was poor.

I'm a program manager for a program that introduces wikipedia to youth in Africa as an education tool, for an organisation called Moleskine Foundation. The program, called WikiAfrica Education, aims to inspire a new generation of African creative thinkers and doers by increasing production, access and awareness of contextually and linguistically relevant knowledge resources from African continent.

For our covid response, we are gathering a movement of volunteers to translate the 10 most relevant articles to help spark creative solutions to the pandemic in African languages. These were existing Covid-relevant articles on English wikipedia that were not existing in the African languages we checked on. We, along with partner organisations and WikimediaZA, simplified and condensed them to reduce margin of translation error, making them a maximum of 1.5k words, only 6 sections, not too many subordinate clauses, not too china- or europe-centric, and no more than 6 sections. So far over 300 volunteers have signed-up to translate the articles into more than 40 languages, and our published work has been seen over 35k times (WM Dashboard). However, the volunteers are collaborating on Google docs. We are trying to train them on Wiki, but not all have the desire to learn. Meanwhile we have a stockpile of translations, and some paid for professionally, released under Creative Commons and ready to upload. And this is where we are bottle-necked.

For sake of project scope, focus and scarce resources we chose to focus on 11 languages for number of speakers and coverage over regions of Africa: Twi	Kiswahili	Sesotho	isiXhosa	isiZulu	Afrikaans    Shona	Wolof	Yoruba	Fula/Pulaar	Igbo. This gave us clear enough scope to approach local Wiki communities via the WMF. We have a good relationship with WikimediaZA (South Africa), and have established ties with Wikimedia Yoruba (Nigeria) and Wikimedia Ghana. But we need to upload the translations we have as soon as possible and need wikimedian support as everyone is busy at this moment- either with other projects, or just trying to survive under covid-society.

I am looking for experienced wikimedian support to upload about 80 articles translated by volunteers and professionals by end of 1st week of July as a Wikimedian in Residence. Keen to hear what other support is available out there. --Papa Baiden (talk) 11:40, 26 June 2020 (UTC)