Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)

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The miscellaneous section of the village pump is used to post messages that do not fit into any other category. Please post on the policy, technical, or proposals sections when appropriate, or at the help desk for assistance. For general knowledge questions, please use the reference desk.

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Upcoming WMF fundraising campaign in India

Dear all,

I would like to inform our community members in India about the upcoming annual Wikimedia Foundation fundraising campaign in India.

The fundraising campaign will have two components.

1. We will send emails to people who have previously donated from India. The emails are scheduled to be sent between the 2nd of May and the 1st of June.  
2. We will run banners for non-logged in users in India on English Wikipedia itself. The banners will run from the 30th of May until the 27th of June.

Prior to this, we are planning to run some tests in April and May, so you might see banners a couple of times before the campaign starts. This activity will ensure that our technical infrastructure works.

We have now launched a community engagement page where you can find more detail around the campaign. We are also sharing some banner examples there and are inviting you to give feedback on the examples as well as provide your own messaging on the talk page.  

I will also be hosting a community call on the 23rd of April at 19:30pm IST to which you can bring your questions and suggestions.

Generally, before and during the campaign, you can contact us:

• On the talk page of the fundraising team
• If you need to report a bug or technical issue, please create a phabricator ticket
• If you see a donor on a talk page, VRT or social media having difficulties in donating, please refer them to donatewikimedia.org

Thanks you and regards, JBrungs (WMF) (talk) 07:00, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

@JBrungs (WMF): I am not convinced we should be running any campaigns in the global south, but while we are can you please post all banners that you use so that we can ensure they meet the requirements of the 2022 Banners RfC? BilledMammal (talk) 03:30, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

Sure, you can find example banners on the community engagement page we created. As always, we provide our control banners as example banners. JBrungs (WMF) (talk) 07:17, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

@JBrungs (WMF): Thank you, but what I was asking for was as you deploy different banners you post the banners here so that they can be reviewed by the community. BilledMammal (talk) 02:33, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

We will use the community engagement page, and the community call on the 23rd of April at 19:30pm IST, to talk to Indian volunteers about messaging improvement ideas they have as well as inviting new messaging ideas from them. This is very similar to the process we had around the English campaign. JBrungs (WMF) (talk) 05:46, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

Please no more "community calls". Hard to see this as a good faith practice. small jars tc 14:56, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

How is a community call with Indian Wikimedians about a fundraising campaign in India not a "good faith practice"? dwadieff ✉ 15:01, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

@David Wadie Fisher-Freberg: It is not a good faith practice because the Wikimedia Foundation is not soliciting active consent, they only solicit for opposition. There is no Wikimedia community in India which has the infrastructure to organize a response to this call. Part of the reason for that is that the Wikimedia Foundation does not fund community organization in India. Because there is no community which is able to oppose or even appear at these calls, the Wikimedia Foundation by default interprets lack of participation as consent for the foundation to proceed. Also, the Wikimedia Foundation sets the agenda for the conversation, not the community. The community in India would like support for accessing grants, not to volunteer in assisting the transfer of money from India to the Wikimedia Foundation. If the volunteers had their way, first they would get WMF sponsorship to organize themselves to participate in conversations, then after that there could be conversations about India giving money back to the foundation.

The ethical alternative that I would propose for this and all other community conversations is a global Wikimedia default presumption that there is no Wikimedia community consent, until and unless there is on-wiki evidence of active consent. Only "yes" means yes; the absence of "no" is not consent. A great demonstration of consent would be for Wikimedia user groups and individuals in India to sign their support for this kind of fundraising to happen. That demonstration of support does not exist - the Wikimedia Foundation's evidence of support is that few or no people show up to the calls. If we ever had a third party researcher at a university evaluate this consent process, it would not pass as valid.

The fundraising is not the problem, exactly. The problem is colonization in which the Wikimedia Foundation speaks for the community of India, while also not supporting the development of community infrastructure which would empower local people to speak for themselves. If the people could speak for themselves, then I expect they would ask for collected funds to support programs in India, and actively negotiate how that would look. I am aware of no evidence that such community conversation is happening. Bluerasberry (talk) 16:22, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

@BilledMammal: For reference, here are the sample banners and sample email texts Julia kindly posted on m:Fundraising:

• Fundraising emails in India - 2nd to 19th of May. Here are some example emails please note, we are still working on those and they might change, we also test emails and you might see different variations of these emails: Email 1, Email 2, Email 3, Email 4
• Fundraising banners in India - 30th of May to 27th of June. Here are some example banners - please note that we constantly test banners and you might see different variations of these banners: Desktop large, Desktop small, Mobile large, Mobile small

--Andreas JN466 19:41, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

We ⚠️⚠️choose⚠️⚠️ not to charge a subscription fee – emphasis my own. small jars tc 23:17, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree. That passage is unacceptable. Andreas JN466 07:15, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

A few issues

Hello,

Just wondering if there may be a fix, without having to get a new computer. I have an old version of Windows and Firefox that can't be updated anymore. I know this.

1- Watchlist no longer offers live updates. When a watchlist edit was viewed already, it still shows like you never read it. 2- When editing a page -- it no longer has the advanced/symbol etc. drop tab on top. When you click 'show preview', no preview is shown, it keeps me on the same edit page. 3- Replying to a message on a talk page, there's no reply button. This message I'm sending may not be signed either. I have to edit in order to send a message.

If anyone knows anything about any of these problems, please reply.

Thank you in advance. Bringingthewood

P.S. I was here for exactly one year this April 6th (no problems at all).... this all happened overnight starting April 7th with no warning. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bringingthewood (talk • contribs) 23:54, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

See phab:T178356 - Wikimedia recently dropped support for running JavaScript on old browsers. As far as I can tell there's nothing you can do other than upgrade to a browser that meets the requirements for "Grade A" at mw:Compatibility (what you are currently experiencing is "Grade C"). * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 01:29, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

Thank you, Pppery. Sorry for not having an official reply to send you. Options are really limited.

I'll try searching for a browser upgrade. Looks like this old thing will have to go. Never thought it would all crumble on 4/7.

Oh well. I thank you again for the info.

Regards, John (BTW) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bringingthewood (talk • contribs) 02:24, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

@Bringingthewood: This was covered by Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Tech News: 2023-14, the bit beginning "Some older Web browsers ..." and several of the posts afterwards. BTW, please always sign your posts. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 07:58, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

Thank you, Redrose64.

I'd love to sign my posts, but like I mentioned in my list of problems ... that's one of them. I have to edit the page in order to send a message/reply.

You must have seen that I apologized to Pppery and now I apologize to you.

One day I'll get a new computer and this will be done.

Thank you all.  :)

Regards,

John (Bringingthewood) -- This is the best I can do. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bringingthewood (talk • contribs) 03:17, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

@Bringingthewood: Have you seen Wikipedia:Signatures#How to sign your posts? You can type ~~~~ (that's four tilde characters) to sign your post, as I am doing with my own post right now telling you this to sign it. Anomie⚔ 12:08, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Wow, it really seems like it bothers everyone that I'm not signing my posts.

I CAN'T!!! I have no reply button, no show preview and no tildes. Just edit and publish changes. I can't even edit with an 'en dash'. I explained all this above. Trust me I sent messages to talk pages before this all happened on April 7th.

I'm friends with Bagumba, thank God when he said to come to this page he did not say ... OH and by the way.... sign your post.

I actually apologized prior to all this regarding just that.

Thank you all once again, but guess what? I have to type my name in. Sorry.

JOHN (BRINGINGTHEWOOD) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bringingthewood (talk • contribs) 22:42, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

If you can type your name, you can type four tildes (~~~~). - Donald Albury 22:57, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

HEY LOOK AT THAT. Instead of treating me like a criminal not having a valid excuse, I looked and found the tilde button on my Window Vista relic.

Now I can sign my requests for help ... which the answer is probably me getting a new computer.

Donald, please tell me you're happy that I found that button. And forgive me if you thought I was here for my health and to annoy everyone else.

Please, at least give me that much. Bringingthewood (talk) 23:10, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Easter Eggs

As roughly a third of the world marks the Easter holiday, some children around the world will go (or have already gone) hunting for eggs. Although the WP version isn't colored or filled with candy, I'd like to invite the community to help hunt down some of our own WP:EASTEREGGs during this season as well.

If you're unfamiliar, an WP:EASTEREGG link is a wikilink that requires the reader to open the link before understanding where it leads.

To help find links like this, a good while back I put together a very rough "EggHunt" script. The script can tag links in article prose that might be in need of review. If you use it, look for emojii like 🥚 and 🐣 to be added next to some links.

Script is available here: User:N8wilson/EggHunt.js, and a brief overview here. Happy Hunting! --N8_wilson 🔔 12:17, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

Cool script, nice connection to the date, love the emojis! EpicPupper (talk) 02:53, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Help finding an essay on not watchlisting your created articles

I've lost a link to something that I intended to re-read. It was about not watchlisting articles you create. A phrase in it struck me, that the original revision that you created is always there so you should not feel that anything is "lost" by subsequent editing. The problem is I'm not sure where I read it. It's probably an essay in WP: space but maybe a user essay. And possibly off-wiki entirely. Sorry for the broad ask, but I thought maybe it is well known to another editor. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:34, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Hi Bri. Maybe Wikipedia:Don't watch articles that you care about? Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 16:42, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

I was just in progress of linking to the same page... (I found it from its link on Wikipedia:Don't overload your watchlist!, which came up in a Wikipedia search for "watchlist created articles".) isaacl (talk) 16:45, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Misunderstood on first try. Try again. Every edit you ever make is preserved in the page's history, unless it has been revdeled or oversighted. All you have to do is look in the edit history of a page for edits you made. If you are on the [(article name):Revision history] page, there is link at the top to a tool that will let you search the history for all edits made by a designated editor. Donald Albury 16:46, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I'm looking for the essay that references that fact. It's in the spirit of "Don't watch articles that you care about", but more specifically about the page history preserving something you might otherwise feel compelled to prevent changes to. ☆ Bri (talk) 20:44, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand what you are looking for. Once an edit has been committed, it is preserved for ever (or, at least, as long as the current WikiMedia software is in use), and cannot be changed. Old edits can be hidden by revdel or oversight, but they are still there, are still visible to admins (revdels only) and oversighters, and can be made visible again to regular editors if it is decided policy will allow that. When you edit a page, you are creating a new version of the page that is the default seen by readers, but the pervious version is unchanged, and can be seen by anyone who cares to dig into the edit history. Donald Albury 21:10, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks Donald, I'm aware of the edit history feature but I'm looking for the essay that references it. Sorry I'm not being clearer but my memory of exactl what the essay said is fuzzy. ☆ Bri (talk) 15:47, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

You might try looking in the Help: or User: namespaces. Help:Wikipedia: The Missing Manual/Editing, creating, and maintaining articles/Who did what: Page histories and reverting says something about everything being preserved forever, but I don't think that's exactly what you're looking for. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:36, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

I vaguely remember reading something about not worrying about changes being lost forever as you can retrieve them from the article history, but I don't remember this being tied to your watchlist. So far, I haven't found what I was thinking of by looking through Wikipedia:Essay directory and Template:Wikipedia essays. isaacl (talk) 22:50, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

But please do continue to watchlist articles you create. I'm increasingly worried that there are articles out there slowly degrading through incompetent, or worse, edits which are not noticed. For a sad saga, see this ANI report where I described the edits of one editor who had left a trail of muddled edits, most of which had not been picked up and corrected (stuff like changing the surname "Yampier" to "Vampire" or "Bibliomemoir" to "Bibliometric" because their spellchecker suggested it). The essay Wikipedia:Don't watch articles that you care about seems to be about avoiding stressful content disputes, but there are other reasons to watchlist articles: just keeping up the quality of the encyclopedia. If you don't look after the artices you create, perhaps no-one else will do so. PamD 08:12, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

@PamD: Agreed, in general, to the limits of this being a volunteer project and all that; a lot of the articles on my watchlist are only there because no-one else seems to be watching them. Bri, was this inspired by the email I sent you, since you linked me to the first essay noted above? (I occasionally check out all the village pumps which is how I found this). I'll briefly summarise the relevant case here. It was about the Sally Whitwell article that you created, which had a blatant lie about a supposed breakup of her long-term relationship that stayed in the article for over two years. Literally my first thought when finding out about this situation was "I wish article creators would keep a better eye on their articles". She was very distressed when she discovered the vandalism; I know this through mutual friends (she's fairly well-known among the Australian blind musicians community, which I used to be involved with, because she helped us out in the past). Adding an article to Wikipedia increases its knowledge base but also increases its maintenance burden, especially regarding biographies of living people like that one. Having said that, the watchlist system does have major problems ... it's all-too-easy for things like that to fall off the wagon, even with assiduous watchlist checking ... and it's always good to find new pages in the Wikipedia namespace. Graham87 11:59, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

Search by user number

Is there any way to search users by their registration number? Beyond My Ken (talk) 20:37, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

@Beyond My Ken: Do you mean User ID? Special:Redirect provides such functionality if so. You can look up User ID of users at https://xtools.wmflabs.org/. If that's not what you're looking for, my pardon. –Vipz (talk) 20:54, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

The API is probably most often used for that. If that's not your thing, try like this. There's probably other places that works, but I forget them. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 20:55, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, that's what I was looking for, I appreciate the answers. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:08, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia on Mastodon

As a follow-up to a previous discussion here, there is now a community-run @Wikipedia account on Mastodon/the Fediverse. Please see m:@Wikipedia for more details if you're interested in contributing. Legoktm (talk) 05:54, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

WP:Bot requests that were made two months ago but got no response

here is the link to the requests. I don't know if there is a better place to be posting this. 137a (talk • edits) 13:46, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

permanent link in case this gets archived 137a (talk • edits) 13:49, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

Seeking input on an RFC related to WP:CATV

Hello! For anyone willing to provide input, there's an RFC related to a couple mass-shooting categories here, and any input would be greatly appreciated. The question is: "Should this article, concerning firearm-related violence with multiple persons injured, be included in mass-shooting categories, even though no sources directly refer to it as a 'mass shooting'?" The key debate concerns whether "mass shooting" is a special term that requires labelling by a reliable source. Thanks in advance!--Jerome Frank Disciple (talk) 17:05, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

Award certificate (or any other official document) as a source

Hi! Does enwiki have any policy regarding the use of these? Is it acceptable to use a photo of an award certificate as a proof of that reward if no other sources are available? P.S. especially if it's been uploaded to Wikipedia or Wikimedia Commons and hadn't been published anywhere else? Piramidion 17:21, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

Hmm! If an image has been uploaded to Commons, but is not available anywhere else, that is a problem. Commons, like Wikipedia itself, is not a reliable source. Anyone can upload any image to Commons as long as they claim it is in the public domain or is released under a license compatible with our requirements. Without a link to a reliable source establishing the provenance of the image, it is not usable as a source. Even then, I would question using such an image as a source. Donald Albury 17:30, 15 April 2023 (UTC)