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Patelarun.np (talk) 16:53, 19 June 2019 (UTC)Positioning(Marketing)

https://www.thebrandingjournal.com/2016/11/brand-positioning-definition/ 

<ref name="The Branding Journal" />

https://blog.hubspot.com/sales/brand-positioning-strategy

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Patelarun.np (talk • contribs) 16:53, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

(Special:Diff/902554647)
Hi Patelarun.np, these do not appear to be reliable sources, and mentioning the website in the "Definition" section would probably give it undue weight compared with the other, more neutral, content of the article. It is thus relatively unlikely that the edit will be implemented, but if you disagree, feel free to request the change at the article's talk page, Talk:Positioning (marketing). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:02, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Hey

Im new to Wikipedia, but i made a mistake didnt see your last msg that an assistant principal is different, sorry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.2.44.19 (talk) 00:25, 20 June 2019 (UTC)

Hey 100.2.44.19, no worries. The message you're referring to, however, seems to have been sent by John from Idegon, not me. 🙂
Regarding the inclusion of the assistant, I am completely indifferent to that. I just requested a reliable source for the addition. If you agree with John from Idegon, it may be reasonable to undo your own edit to resolve the content dispute. Else, a discussion at Talk:Yeshiva_Tiferes_Yisroel would likely be needed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:34, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
The edit has been undone in Special:Diff/902608064. Please also note that a LinkedIn profile is unlikely to be a reliable source in this case; the official website of the institution is often a better one (conditions apply). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:44, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
As part of the guidelines for school articles, the only non notable person we name is the principal. Not assistants, no teachers, no students. Although guidelines can of course be overridden by local consensus, I really cannot conceive of how enough reliable secondary sources could be found to gain such a consensus. Really the only way it could would probably violate WP:BLP restrictions on giving negative information on non famous people. John from Idegon (talk) 00:49, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
Thank you, good sir! InvictusImperator (talk) 21:14, 22 June 2019 (UTC)
Hey InvictusImperator, thank you for the cookie, you're welcome! 🙂 Please let me know if further questions arise. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:17, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-26

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • The new version of MediaWiki for last week was not fully released due to issues. It was removed from most wikis on Tuesday and from test wikis on Thursday. [1]
  • Most wikis were slow and then briefly read-only last week due to one of the database servers having a problem. It is now replaced. [2]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 25 June. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 26 June. It will be on all wikis from 27 June (calendar).

Meetings

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17:29, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

Donna D'errico

I have 2 link as sources: 1. Still filming all these years later? Nope! https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2425704/?ref_=nm_flmg_prd_3 2. Her Kickstarter fund raising page which she used to allegedly raise funds to complete this project. It's not been updated in years. Frankly, I think she conned the people who donated. At least one person obtained a refund from her. That would be me! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/831132184/the-secret-of-agr-dag

She's a con artist in my view. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 47.145.195.55 (talk) 00:51, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi 47.145.195.55, this seems to be about Special:Diff/903164449. You may remove incorrect information, but adding a new sentence comes with a burden of verifiability. IMDb is not a reliable source, and personally interpreting statements from a Kickstarter page is original research. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:56, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

Message by 2601:C6:C680:7A0:CC62:BB2C:8434:1366

I used the correct language. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:C6:C680:7A0:CC62:BB2C:8434:1366 (talk) 21:44, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi 2601:C6:C680:7A0:CC62:BB2C:8434:1366, Special:Diff/903932550 and Special:Diff/903932764 appear to be introducing factual errors to the article Matchbox Twenty. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:48, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

The June 2019 Signpost is out!

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 15:53, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Towns/Cities

It says here these are towns, not cities — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:306:BC49:3049:7C33:2CD8:6156:3302 (talk) 19:54, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi 2602:306:BC49:3049:7C33:2CD8:6156:3302, thank you very much for the quick response. 🙂 Where is "here", if I may ask? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:55, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

On the website niche.com — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:306:BC49:3049:7C33:2CD8:6156:3302 (talk) 19:58, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

2602:306:BC49:3049:7C33:2CD8:6156:3302, thank you very much again. I see that this website does provide a distinction between "towns" and "cities", as can be seen when entering "San Francisco" in the search form. It is unclear, however, where this data comes from. The website niche.com itself does not seem to be reliable enough to make the changes you're currently introducing. You may need to stop these mass-edits, but I personally am too unsure to take any action here. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:04, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-27

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • The development of Wikidata Bridge has started. The goal is to allow Wikidata edits from Wikipedia. [3]

Problems

  • Sometimes pages load slowly for users routed to the Amsterdam data center. Investigation is in progress. [4]
  • Wikidata query service was overloaded between 11:50 UTC until 13:15 UTC on June 24. It has been fixed. [5]

Changes later this week

  • You will be able to read but not to edit all wikis for a short amount of time, on 3 July at 06:00 (UTC). This is to move a database. [6]
  • There is no deployment of a new version of MediaWiki on the wikis this week (calendar).

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 3 July at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

21:23, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Criminal Party page

I used the same translation for MTV and wikipedia both. I sent them the current translation before. But I created the biography, not them. What do I have to do ? Thanks for helping me. --Fab1966 (talk) 10:29, 3 May 2019 (UTC) Fabio 3/5/19

Hi Fab1966, have you given any "exclusive" rights to the website? Please carefully check your contract. Afterwards, if you did not give "exclusive" rights to anyone, wrote the text entirely yourself in your own words and would like to publish it on Wikipedia, please see Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials. Thanks ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:41, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi, I wrote again the buography. What do you think about it ? Thanks --Fab1966 (talk) 16:56, 6 May 2019 (UTC) Fabio 6/5/19

Hi Fab1966, thank you for the notification. Is there any update about the copyright? Have you sent an e-mail, for example? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:16, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

I could do it, but I didn't because I wrote it again. please, could you check it ? Thanks --Fab1966 (talk) 15:34, 7 May 2019 (UTC) Fabio 7/5/19

Hmm. Fab1966, I am unsure about this. The changes can be found at Special:Diff/895808513. If you wrote the original text, we can ignore all "close paraphrasing" issues if you take a moment to send the e-mail.
If you really would like to submit the article for review without releasing any rights to the original text, you may use the blue "Submit your draft for review!" button. This way, another reviewer can have a look too. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:44, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

Ok, I'll send the e mail. But in the declaration they need to mention a link. Which one need I to include, the MTV one ? Thanks --Fab1966 (talk) 15:46, 7 May 2019 (UTC) 7/5/19 Fabio

Thank you, that solves the whole problem. Fab1966, for the text at Wikipedia:Declaration of consent for all enquiries, the "URL of the content" is the website that you have submitted your text to. If you wrote your text for MTV, it is the MTV page, for example https://mtvrock.com/2016/12/30/criminal-party/ . The "Exact URL of the page or file on Wikipedia" is https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Fab1966/sandbox&oldid=893329948 . ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:33, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi, I just the sent the declaration of the owner of the biography. What need I to publish it ? Thanks --Fab1966 (talk) 17:37, 8 May 2019 (UTC)Fabio 8/5/19

Fab1966: Sorry, I am not sure if I understand your message correctly. Have you sent the e-mail to permissions-en@wikimedia.org? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:23, 8 May 2019 (UTC)

Yes --Fab1966 (talk) 19:25, 8 May 2019 (UTC) Fabio 8/7/19

Perfect, Fab1966, thank you very much for taking the time to do this. We need to wait for an answer now. This can take about 50 days. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:04, 8 May 2019 (UTC)
Bumping thread for 60 days. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:04, 8 May 2019 (UTC)
@Fab1966: If you would like me to submit the draft for review as soon as the e-mail has been read, please tell me "I would like to submit the draft for review as soon as possible" below. I will then wait and later do this for you. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:06, 8 May 2019 (UTC)

Of course yes, I would like to submit the draft for review as soon as possible Thanks --Fab1966 (talk) 14:45, 9 May 2019 (UTC) Fabio 9/5/19

Bumping thread for 1000 days. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:11, 12 May 2019 (UTC)
Note to self: Do this when the OTRS ticket is resolved: Special:Diff/896292830 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:14, 12 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi, I sent the permission as you suggested. They asked for common license, that of course I sent, but the they answered in the following way: Dear Fabio Rapisarda, CC BY-SA 4.0 is not compatible with Wikipedia's license (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Compatible_license). Additionally, I am still not able to verify that you are the copyright holder. (See directions in my previous message.)

Yours sincerely, [...] Of couse, now i don't know how to solve the problem. Please could you help me ? Thanks

fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 23:39, 22 May 2019 (UTC)

OTRS member's signature removed ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:58, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
Hi Fab1966, that's unfortunate.
Per our legal disclaimer, I can't say "this is okay". I can only point out possible issues, like close paraphrasing, but I can not say "this is fine".
Special:Diff/895808513 seems to indicate that the new text is still based on the MTVROCK article, with the wording changed but the structure unchanged. This is not necessarily a problem, but also probably not ideal. If you hadn't written the MTVROCK article, I would probably suggest deleting the whole text, and writing it from scratch in your own words. As these are your own words, I am unsure how to continue. Is there really no way for you to ask the MTVROCK website owner to verify your authorship? Maybe the MTVROCK website owner can send a similar e-mail to Wikipedia? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:25, 23 May 2019 (UTC)

I wrote the biography with own words. I changed something. If you read the MTV biography and the wikipedia one, they are not the same. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 22:32, 23 May 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, I do believe you. However, the OTRS volunteer has expressed doubt. Can you ask the administrator of MTVROCK to add a sentence to the MTVROCK page? "This article has been written by Wikipedia user Fab1966 and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 3.0 license", or something similar? If I understand correctly, you have also received an e-mail with more detailled instructions. There does not seem to be anything I personally can do here at the moment. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:50, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
Pinging JJMC89 per Special:Diff/897865501, maybe he can confirm my interpretation. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:53, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
ticket:2019050810007489 does not contain an adequate statement of permission. The specified license is not compatible, and there is no evidence that the person who signed the statement is the copyright holder. Given that, I did not compare the source text vs Wikipedia. — JJMC89 (T·C) 01:16, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi, if you read the new version of the biography, it's not same of the one published by MTV rock. I don't understand because I need a license. https://mtvrock.com/criminal-party/ Thanks

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 14:03, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, my original concern was close paraphrasing. When I expressed this concern, I did not know that you have written the MTVROCK article yourself.
If I understand correctly, Wikipedia has still not received verification for your authorship. For this reason, the original Wikipedia article text may be deleted as a suspected copyright violation.
In Special:Diff/895808513, you have modified the closely paraphrased text. It is now less closely paraphrased.
I do not know if this is sufficient. I would prefer clarity about this copyright issue.
I can not give legal advice. I can only point out potential problems. This may be a problem. I do not know. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:46, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

I sent them the Creatice Common license 4.0 (as they suggested), but they wrote me it wasn't fine. Now I don't really know what to do. I don't understand what they need. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 19:14, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, there are multiple different "Creative Commons" licenses. Please compare these four licenses:
You have likely been asked to use one of the green licenses (), not the red one ().
If you have questions about an e-mail sent to you, please respond to the e-mail to ask your questions. Please respond via e-mail that you do not understand what to do next. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:15, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, I attached the Creative common 4.0 link in the Criminal Party's page. Please, could you check if it's correct and maybe send it for the approval ? Thanks Fabio

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 08:57, 25 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi Fab1966, that's sadly not what I meant. You do not need to add this text to the Wikipedia article. Wikipedia articles are automatically published under a free license.
I meant: Could you add the text "This article has been written by Wikipedia user Fab1966 and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 3.0 license"
to the following page? https://mtvrock.com/criminal-party/
Thank you very much in advance. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:46, 26 May 2019 (UTC)

I could try. It doesn't depends on me. Can you suggest an alternative ? Thanks Fabio

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 09:47, 27 May 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, I sadly can't think of a good alternative. Please do try. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:09, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

I contacted them, but the biography I wrote on wikipedia EN it's not completely the same. I mean, I don't understand because I need a copyright now I made changes to the one published on MTV !!! Thanks

Fabio

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 09:12, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, merely "making changes" to a potential copyright violation does not necessarily solve the problem. For example, the old version is still accessible in the revision history of the page. Normally, copyright violations are deleted from the history, but this is not a clear case. For the same reason, I am unsure how to continue here.
Thank you for contacting the website administrator. If they add the requested text to the website, we probably do not need to worry about copyright anymore. This is why I have asked you to solve the problem this way.
Let's wait for the website administrator's response. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:20, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi, I've inserted a new biography version. Please, could you check it ?

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 16:03, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi Fab1966, thank you very much for rewriting the article. I have submitted it for review. This may take about 2 months, since there are 3776 other submissions also waiting for review. However, your submission will be reviewed. You will receive a message on your talk page as soon as a reviewer had a look at it.
It may take multiple reviews until the article meets the English Wikipedia's standards. Please don't let this discourage you. Thank you very much for taking the time to write this article, and to deal with the complicated copyright concerns. If you'd like to continue contributing to Wikipedia, you may like to have a look at The Wikipedia Adventure and our community portal. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:52, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

As I wrote you in the other page too, I really don't undestand what I need do now. Are they asking me to resubmit the biography ? Why ?

Thanks

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 01:13, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, this is unrelated to copyright.
The reviewer seems to have the following concern: WP:42
A good next step could be adding links to independent, reliable newspapers or books that detailledly describe the band. Please ask Bkissin if something is unclear about his concerns. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:23, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi, please could you explain me why they aren't publishing on wikipedia EN the Criminal Party's page ? Thanks

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 15:54, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, the English Wikipedia may have stricter guidelines and policies than other Wikipedias. The English Wikipedia also has a larger, more active community that notices potential issues more likely than on other Wikipedias. I am not involved in the review; please ask Bkissin if you have questions about it. Your message on Bkissin's talk page (Special:Diff/899638853) does not look like a question. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:04, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

I wrote in Blissin page that Criminal Party have at least first criteria. Infact i add some links. The band appears in magazine (ex. maximum r'n'r) and books too, but they are not on line. I asked for what I need to add more. Thanks

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 20:00, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, now let's wait for an answer on User talk:Bkissin#Criminal_Party_page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:18, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

Ok, thanks. We'll wait for the answer.

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 09:35, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi, I resubmit again the page. I added some more links, one of a book too. Please, check if now it's allright. Thanks

Fabio

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 18:50, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi Fab1966, thank you very much for your work. Your draft will be reviewed, but it may take about two months. Over 4000 other drafts are waiting, too. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:03, 5 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi, I added the links with the references as requested. Please, could you check the page ? Thanks

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 09:51, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi Fab1966, to solve your help requests in Special:Diff/901202062 and Special:Diff/901530370, I have resubmitted the article for review. A third, uninvolved reviewer will have a look. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:38, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, very much. I hope now it's allright !

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 09:18, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi, Zahne reviewed the new biography and it wrote the following: Article is a mess. Sourcing consists of dozens of unreadable bare urls with no recognizable reliable sources with in depth coverage.Zanhe (talk) 09:03, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

I don't understand what it means, the urls are of dozens of citations and reviewes of the band — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 09:16, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

I added the wikipedia italian link to the english wikipedia page. But I unsderstand, maybe zahne doesn't like how the page is written Please, could you check the page again ? Thanks

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 14:40, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi Fab1966.
Quantity alone does not matter. It is not important if there are 30 or 3 references, as long as the sources are:
  • detailled,
  • reliable and
  • independent.
This does not seem to be the case. If you disagree or have further questions about the review, you may like to:
~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:18, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Ok, thanks. I'll try it. Last time Bliss never answered !! Please, could you tell me why the sources are not: detailled,reliable and independent ? Of course, I didn't wrote the article but indipendent journalist in different magazines !!! Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 09:18, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, which are the three best sources? Press releases do not count (WP:42 / WP:GNG). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:29, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

I added some interviews' links. The other are reviews, not press release. The reviews are after the space of the interviews' links. Thanks

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 23:14, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, which are the three best sources? :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 06:06, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi, I added realible sources with interviews, I don't understand what's happening on publishing the Criminal party's page. Thanks

--Fab1966 (talk) 17:08, 1 July 2019 (UTC)Fabio

Fab1966, which are the three best sources according to WP:42? The three best sources you can find? Please list them here, and I will provide feedback for these three sources. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:41, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

I've already added them and signed as you suggested. Thanks

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 16:17, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, I'm not the reviewer, but if you'd like me to provide feedback, please give me three links to the best sources you can find, here on my talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:37, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

As I wrote and signed in the biography, I listed the followings: Garagerocktopia: http://garagerocktopia.blogspot.it/2017/04/youre-invited-to-criminal-party.html ONDA ALTERNATIVA INTERVIEW: http://www.ondalternativa.it/intervista-criminal-party/ ROCKEVOLUTION INTERVIEW: https://www.rockrevolution.it/video/intervista-ai-criminal-party-su-rock-revolution-radio-one/ ARTISTI MUSICA INTERVIEW: http://www.artistimusica.com/i-criminal-party-presenteranno-il-nuovo-disco-entro-la-fine-di-febbraio-2017/

Thanks

--Fab1966 (talk) 20:48, 2 July 2019 (UTC)Fabio 2/7/19

Fab1966, thank you very much for these four links.
  • The three interviews are not independent from the article subject.

    "Independent of the subject" excludes works produced by the article's subject or someone affiliated with it.
    — WP:GNG, point 4

    We need sources that are independent from the subject of the article. Not: articles written by the topic (including interviews), paid for by the topic, their website, or their organization.
    — WP:42, (over)simplified explanation of WP:GNG. Emphasis mine.

    Interview text has not been written by an independent source.
  • The "blogspot.com" blog is a low-quality self-published source and likely relied heavily on input by the band to be able to create an article about them. It is not an independent source because the blog is very likely to have published the band's statements without doing independent research, fact-checking and verification.
Fab1966, if these are the four best sources available on the internet, the band can not have an article on the English Wikipedia. An essay that explains this problem can be found at WP:No amount of editing can overcome a lack of notability. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:49, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for reply. I really don't understand what it means "indipendent" for wikipedia. We didn't pay nobody for the Criminal Party's reviews, articles and interviews. We have reviews in notable magazines as Maximum rock'n'roll, Rockerilla, Rumore and so on and a video interview by radio revolution. Please, could you send me some links as explanation ? Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 09:06, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, who is "we"? Have you been a band member? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:11, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Yes. We had several articles in the past too, but of course there was not internet and they are only in newspaper. I add others links. The first is a book about the history of rock in Palermo and of course Criminal Party is cited.The third magazines cited the last Criminal Party's album one of the best of 2017:

Palermo al tempo del vinile: https://www.darioflaccovio.it/cultura-siciliana/138-palermo-al-tempo-del-vinile.html ROCKEVOLUTION INTERVIEW: https://www.rockrevolution.it/video/intervista-ai-criminal-party-su-rock-revolution-radio-one/ MUSIC MAP BEST 2017: http://www.musicmap.it/news/new.asp?id=13731&fbclid=IwAR3mY3P_0PCcPBtJeqHDefurmZJRhP8QPoRIdu1wJf9-3q78zn6Kx5Fj8ag

Thanks

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 08:39, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

Fab1966, I should have noticed this earlier. The English Wikipedia has a conflict of interest guideline about this issue.
If you would like to continue submitting the article for review, please do the following things first:
Afterwards, feel free to cite the newspapers in your article (Help:Referencing for beginners). Live help can be found at Wikipedia:IRC help disclaimer.
Thank you very much in advance. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:18, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Fab1966, thank you very much for taking this step even after all the long work, and after such disappointment. I'm sorry that we have taken much of your time and caused you to invest a lot of work before we noticed this issue. If you would ever like to participate in other parts of the project, feel free to check out the Wikipedia Adventure, or our community portal. Similarly, the Italian Wikipedia offers a Portale Comunità.

I'll move our discussion to my talk page archive, but feel free to ask if there are any further questions. Especially feel free to ask for help regarding participation in other areas of the English Wikipedia.

Best wishes, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:48, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

This discussion ended at User talk:Fab1966, with:

The draft has been blanked by its author at Special:Diff/905310519, but I'm not requesting deletion per WP:G7 because it would be neither necessary nor tactful for me to end it that way. The draft will automatically be deleted six months after the last edit, and can be restored on simple request by anyone, at any time in the future. The work is not lost; perhaps an independent editor even manages to prove notability in the future.

Best wishes, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:56, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

I'm sorry to have delected the paper, but it's wright somebody else will try to submit again it. I hope it wasn't a total lost of time !! Thanks

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fab1966 (talk • contribs) 12:24, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

Rezo

Hallo! Gibt es eine Möglichkeit des Halbschutzes des Artikels oder ähnliches? Der Name wird immer wieder eingefügt, so auch diese Nacht. Ich kenne mich in der englischsprachigen Wikipedia zu wenig aus. Danke und Gruss KurtR (talk) 17:16, 16 June 2019 (UTC)

Hey KurtR, danke für die Nachfrage! Ja – normalerweise wird Seitenschutz auf WP:RFPP beantragt, aber in diesem Fall ging es um private Informationen, die (nach einiger Diskussion hinter den Kulissen) inzwischen tatsächlich mit Oversight aus den Logbüchern entfernt werden. Daher habe ich diese im IRC-Channel #wikipedia-en-revdel auf Freenode gemeldet und dabei Deine Nachfrage nach Seitenschutz erwähnt. Die wurde dann auch umgesetzt, war also sinnvoll und berechtigt. 🙂
In hoffentlich nicht allzu ferner Zeit wird WP:RFPP vereinfacht; momentan benötigt man noch Twinkle, um dort einigermaßen komfortabel Seitenschutz beantragen zu können.
PS: Falls Du zur WikiCon 2019 kommen möchtest, gäbe es dort wenigstens eine Person, mit der ich in der Wikipedia zu tun hatte. Du bist herzlich eingeladen.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:51, 16 June 2019 (UTC)
Danke für Deine Antwort und die Einleitung der Massnahmen, super. Ich möchte mich gar nicht zu sehr in die Wiki-Regeln der engl. Wikipedia einlesen, da ich nur wenig hier aktiv bin. Warum bist Du vorallem hier tätig und vernachlässigt die deutschsprachige? :-)
Wird leider nichts mit der WikiCon, sorry. Viele Grüsse KurtR (talk) 22:00, 16 June 2019 (UTC)
Gerne :) In der deutschsprachigen Wikipedia gibt es zu wenig Arbeit für Vandalenjäger wie mich. 😊 Es gibt dort zwar fast halb so viele Artikel wie hier, aber weniger als ein Viertel der Bearbeitungen. Rund um die Uhr wird hier über eine Bearbeitung pro Sekunde getätigt – auch dann, wenn in der deutschsprachigen Wikipedia gerade ein Großteil der Benutzer schläft.
Außerdem gefällt mir die offene, internationale Arbeitsatmosphäre hier besser. Alle Nicht-Muttersprachler, und davon gibt es hier deutlich mehr als auf dewiki, haben eine Fremdsprache erlernt und benutzen diese freiwillig. Das siebt, auch wenn das ein trauriges Qualitätskriterium ist, einige Menschen aus, mit denen ich auf dewiki nichts zu tun haben möchte.
Ich habe den Eindruck, dass enwiki mit Trollen, Halbwahrheiten und Theoriefindung besser klarkommt als dewiki. Richtlinien sind in "Policies" (streng) und "Guidelines" (weniger streng) unterteilt; erstere werden sehr gut durchgesetzt. Dagegen stolpere ich in dewiki gefühlsmäßig zu oft über persönliche Interpretationen von Primärquellen, die es auch dort eigentlich nicht geben dürfte. Vielleicht liegt auch das an der unterschiedlichen Zahl der Augen, die täglich über einen Artikel blicken, und an der kulturellen Diversität der Bearbeiter. Den Hinweis "Dieser Artikel stellt die Situation in Deutschland dar" lese ich in dewiki sehr häufig. Auf enwiki entstehen solche Probleme eher selten, da die Bearbeiter aus der ganzen Welt kommen.
Die sprachliche Unterscheidung zwischen "Du" und "Sie" scheint ebenfalls nicht ganz unproblematisch zu sein. Während "You" beides bedeuten kann, wird in der deutschsprachigen Wikipedia standardmäßig eine Anrede verwendet, die gerade bei der Begrüßung zuvor unbekannter Benutzer eigentlich unangemessen ist. Ich habe den Eindruck, dass das im ganzen Projekt die Hemmschwelle für ad-hominem-Argumente und persönliche Angriffe senkt. Andererseits wirkt die einzige Alternative, "Sie", viel zu distanzierend. Das gezielte Siezen bestimmter Benutzer wird auf dewiki als öffentliche Bekundung von Missgunst eingesetzt. Einen schönen Mittelweg scheint die deutsche Sprache nicht zu bieten. Durch Großschreibung des Wortes "Du", die ich mir momentan mit Schwierigkeiten angewöhne und in Deiner Nachricht bemerke, ist zumindest ein Schritt in die richtige Richtung möglich. Diese Schreibweise scheint aber auf Diskussionsseiten eher eine Seltenheit zu sein und von der Software überhaupt nicht genutzt zu werden.
Schade, dass es mit der WikiCon nichts wird. Mal gucken, ob ich zufällig doch noch jemanden treffe, den ich kenne. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:34, 17 June 2019 (UTC)
Danke für Deine Ausführungen! Evtl. kommentier ich sie ein andermal, viele Grüsse KurtR (talk) 00:48, 21 June 2019 (UTC)
Gerne, und gerne jederzeit, auch falls die Diskussion bereits im Archiv liegt, einfach ansprechen. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:51, 21 June 2019 (UTC)

Question

Greetings, I work for Arlington Christian School as the Director of Communications. I created an account earlier today because I did a google search on the school and saw that some of the information was incorrect. I was able to go in and correct one part, but the second portion that corrected the name of the principal and year of opening was not changed. I received an email that mentioned there may be a conflict of interest because I work at the school, and for that reason, the change may not have gotten in. That makes no sense to me. As Director of Communications, I should be able to edit info on our school. Please advise as to how I can make the changes. The current principal is not Dr. Grace Love. She's the immediate past principal, but the new principal is Dr. Kelvin Griffin. You can verify this by emailing me at [email protected]. You can copy Dr. Griffin at [email protected]. Thanks, --AJDestiny (talk) 22:38, 2 July 2019 (UTC)Alonia Jones

Hi AJDestiny, thank you very much for your correction and your message.
We require verifiability for the addition of new information. The first thing that needs to be updated is the official school website, then Wikipedia, based on the information available from the official website. Wikipedia articles must not contain any information that is not already present in other, reliable sources.
It is not important who makes the correction; there is no need for personal e-mail verification, and nobody owns articles.
As a Director of Communications, you can likely be considered to receive compensation for updating Wikipedia. Please follow the instructions at Wikipedia:Paid-contribution disclosure before making any further edit.
When editing Wikipedia articles, please use the "Cite" button of the editor to allow others to verify the validity of the information.
For further advice, please also see Wikipedia:FAQ/Organizations, which may contain answers to open questions. Feel free to ask if anything is unclear after having read the FAQ.
Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:51, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Voodoo Doughnut

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Voodoo Doughnut. Legobot (talk) 04:32, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Andrzej Gawroński (actor)

The IP is a longtime abuser of removing templates on various pages (interesting mostly Polish actors/actresses) that have been under different IP's, so this is something to look out for. Wgolf (talk) 05:38, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Wgolf, interesting. Thank you for the heads-up, I'll keep it in mind. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:58, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Heads up

FYI I added Harry Dodge back to the list of contemporary artists. When I added them back, I thought they were just in one museum collection, but a bit of sleuthing turned up three museum collections. Thanks.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 20:28, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

Hey ThatMontrealIP, thank you very much 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:29, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you for your kind help and clean up ISBN. I wish I could offer you a nice cup of green tea. (: --Omotecho (talk) 21:09, 7 July 2019 (UTC)
Hey Omotecho, you're welcome, and thank you for the cookie! 😊 I'd definitely enjoy the offered tea. While the idea reminds me of the unfortunate geographical distance, it also reminds me how fascinating the possibility of even having this conversation is. I'd love to visit Japan one day. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:30, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-28

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • For event organizers, if you request a temporary lift of the IP cap for mass account creation, this will now also raise the edit rate limit for those new accounts at the event, which will prevent another bottleneck. [7]
  • Administrators at all Wiktionary, Wikivoyage, and Wikisource wikis are now able to use the new partial blocks feature. [8]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 9 July. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 10 July. It will be on all wikis from 11 July (calendar).
  • The design of MediaWiki's software windows will change for desktop users. Layout will be simpler, buttons will be bolder and clearer, and close buttons will be just icons. This is like the mobile design. This will affect ContentTranslation, VisualEditor, TemplateWizard, and other tools. [9]

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 10 July at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

  • Wikidata will be in read-only mode on 30 July from 05:00 to 05:30 UTC because of a server switch. [10]
  • Advanced item There will be a change in the name format of new Wikidata RDF dumps starting on 15 July. [11]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

20:12, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

----

(message removed)

Atheistbisexual, welcome to Wikipedia. Your addition may be factually correct, but you'll need to prove that this is not original research, please. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:09, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

/* Help me! */ seeking rearranging the lines or removal based on furnished data below

Help me!

Heading level increased from h2 to h3 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:48, 12 July 2019 (UTC)


If the 2nd line (According to the The Economic Times he earned close to ₹150 Crores (1,500,000,000) in 2017-18) cannot be removed in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._P._Gurnani , can you help in lowering the line and keep it along with Career paragraph, above Awards and Honors? Suggested removal as the current compensation structure is revised and so this should not be a highlight which is putting Mr Gurnani in bad light. Links that support the current compensation structure are - Link 1: https://tech.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/corporate/techms-ceo-gurnani-took-home-22-3-cr-in-fy2019/70079383 Link 2: https://www.peoplematters.in/news/corporate/tech-mahindras-ceo-cp-gurnani-received-rs-223-cr-in-fy2019-22247

Arun K, Tech Mahindra

CiaPan, would you mind answering this question? The question seems to be directed at you, I personally have no idea. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:42, 11 July 2019 (UTC)
This help request has been answered at User_talk:119.151.72.80#Help_me! by Tigraan (Special:Diff/905911861). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:46, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-29

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • The mobile web will get more advanced editing tools. Seven more Wikipedias can use them now. This works for Arabic, Indonesian, Italian, Persian, Japanese, Spanish and Thai Wikipedia. You can try the tools on the mobile web and give feedback. [12]

Changes later this week

  • Advanced item The abuse filter system user will soon do maintenance edits on broken abuse filters. This user is called Edit filter and has administrator rights. This is meant to fix technical problems. It will not do any other changes. You can read more.
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 16 July. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 17 July. It will be on all wikis from 18 July (calendar).

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 17 July at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

  • The Wikipedia app for Android will invite users to add image captions to images on Commons. It will only invite users who have added a number of edits in the app without being reverted. This is to avoid spam and bad edits. You can read more and leave feedback. [13]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

15:29, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Notability (people)

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Notability (people). Legobot (talk) 04:35, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Precious anniversary

A year ago ...
fighting vandalism
... you were recipient
no. 1975 of Precious,
a prize of QAI!

--Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:21, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

Hey Gerda Arendt, thank you very much! 😊 Anniversary notifications are a wonderful idea. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:31, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

Photo on the "Lindsey Graham" page

The existing photo was one of Joseph McCarthy, not Lindsey Graham. I removed the old one and was trying to upload a new genuine photo of Graham.

Please could you and your team sort this inaccuracy out and ensure a genuine photo of this US Senator is used?

Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.108.60.106 (talk) 18:16, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi 88.108.60.106, already done. Thank you very much for removing the incorrect image. 🙂
If you notice a similar error again, feel free to remove the incorrect image without trying to replace it. This ensures that your edit can stay in the article in unmodified form, and the issue will likely be fixed shortly afterwards by experienced users who watch the article.
If you'd like to learn more about how I fixed the problem, feel free to have a look at Help:Reverting. But you are never required to do that; simply removing incorrect information is the easiest way of fixing such problems. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:22, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

Samoa

Here is the source [14]. Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.184.112.59 (talk) 16:32, 16 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi 92.184.112.59, this seems to be a primary source; we need to exercise extreme caution when dealing with them. I won't revert your edit, but someone else may do, and if that happens, you'll need to find a secondary source, such as a newspaper article, that clearly confirms the name. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:39, 16 July 2019 (UTC)
the Primary Sources, such as Oceania Athletics Federation (OAA), are much more accurate and formal than most of the newspapers in the Pacific, because it includes the details that common newspapers (never) check out, especially there. If you do not think so, you may undo again. Or someone else. I will not care. When I add info, it is never from nowhere. Yours.-92.184.112.59 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 16:48, 16 July 2019 (UTC)
in any case here it is. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.184.112.59 (talk) 16:51, 16 July 2019 (UTC)
Thanks, 92.184.112.59; using the "Cite" button of the editor, you can add citations. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:59, 16 July 2019 (UTC)

Hello! Help with the Bonetti Kozerski page?

Hello There! I am trying to get the Bonetti Kozerski Architecture ready to post on Wikipedia. I am not being paid by them and I do not work for them. Are there any specific changes you recommend to make it ready to post? I would love to chat with you! Please let me know how you would like to proceed. Thank you! -MD Sillaro Valley (talk) 16:38, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Sillaro Valley, thank you very much for the clarification. If you do not receive, and do not expect to receive, compensation for your contributions to Wikipedia, you are not required to take any further steps regarding my question, and can ignore it safely.
You may have some kind of connection to the company, however. If this is the case, please explain the situation at User:Sillaro Valley, your user page. You are not required to do so, but Wikipedia's conflict of interest guideline points out that you're "expected" to do so, if you have a conflict of interest.
If you have no conflict of interest, you can completely ignore my messages. Alternatively, you may like to explicitly write on your user page that you have no connection to the company at all.
Thank you very much in advance. 🙂
The message one section above was in reply to a different user; I have removed your reply to avoid confusion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:07, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

User page/Change

Heading converted to subheading ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:50, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Hello!

Is it possible to delete a submission and then put in a new one? Thank you for your advice! Sillaro Valley (talk) 14:44, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Sillaro Valley, this depends on what you are trying to do:
  • If you would like to completely re-write a draft about the same subject, you can completely remove all text from the draft (not the review templates), and try again from scratch.
  • If you would like to create a new draft about a different subject, please click here: Wikipedia:Article_wizard/Referencing
I hope this helps – feel free to ask again if I didn't correctly understand the question. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:50, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Soapboxing??

Hello!

Hope you are well.

I don't understand what falls under "soapboxing". I see this as informational rather than promotional. I hope you understand where I am coming from and can allow me to continue to add factual information and edits.

Thank you for taking the time to reach out! I really appreciate it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jchoi102 (talk • contribs) 14:35, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Jchoi102, thanks for asking. You seem to have registered solely to make these edits. What is your connection to the subject? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:37, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

I'm doing a project and one of the people I'm researching is Bassem Awadallah. Upon looking at his involvements, I noticed that he was involved in Bloomberg's New Economy Forum. I've never used Wiki to personally put information in, and that's the one piece of factual information I know that I can contribute to! It made me excited to FINALLY be able to put info into someone's page (because everything is usually on there anyways), so I looked up more people involved in this forum. From there, I've just been adding that one piece to all the member's pages because it's a true fact that I can actually add myself. It's so rewarding being able to add info, so that's why you've been seeing this consistent addition of what you might have thought was "promotional". I'm sorry if you thought it was soapboxing, but I'm just really excited that I'm able to finally contribute to this website!! :) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jchoi102 (talk • contribs) 14:55, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

(duplicate message removed ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:12, 17 July 2019 (UTC))

Jchoi102, thank you very much for the explanation. 🙂 I'm happy to hear that you enjoy editing Wikipedia, and it is definitely not my intention to tarnish this experience.
However, multiple users, including me, have undone these additions. I notice multiple problems that need to be fixed:
  • Without a reliable reference, we can't include this information. Original research is inappropriate on Wikipedia, which is a tertiary, not a primary source. Other Wikipedia articles are not reliable references either (see WP:REFLOOP).
  • The text is not written in a neutral tone. "Group of experts", "Philantrophy", "expertise and leadership" are subjective terms that should not appear in this way in an encyclopedic article.
The proposed addition is promotional in its current form. This may not have been your intention, but this is the result.
I recommend, depending on which learning style you prefer, trying either the WP:Tutorial or the WP:The Wikipedia Adventure to gain more experience about referencing and neutrality before continuing to edit about the original topic. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:10, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Would I be able to change the wording of the text I'm adding? Then would I be able to continue my additions? Something along the lines of: " __ is a member of the Bloomberg New Economy Forum Advisory board, a group of executives and leaders across business, government, education, and public and private sectors contributing to the shifting global economy." I can also change the reference website that shows reliable information on the advisory board members!! I would love to hear more examples that would be fine to use! Thank you so much in advance :) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jchoi102 (talk • contribs) 15:20, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Jchoi102, while I appreciate the attempt, I stand by my recommendation to gain more experience about neutrality and referencing before asking again. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:03, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

New President at Telus Spark

Hello. I added the link to our new presidents update for Spark. The link is correct as it leads to our website/description of her. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ptodd1410 (talk • contribs) 19:27, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Ptodd1410, thank you very much for the explanation. I have converted the external link to a citation now.
Please have a look at our FAQ for organizations and avoid editing the article directly in the future. Thanks! 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:31, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

FOR SOME REASON THE WRONG PRESIDENT IS LINKED FRMO WKI TO OUR GOOGLE PAGE. THAT IS WHAT WE ARE TRYING TO FIX. THE OLD ONE WAS IN FACT ALSO LINKED TO HER PAGE IN OUR WEB SITE. SO ALL WE DID WAS UPDATE THE NAME AND LINK. WE HAVE NO IDEA WHY IT IS LINKED INCORRECTLY TO OUR GOOGLE PAGE. THERE IS NO CONFILICT OF INTEREST AS IT IS A LINK TO THE BUSINESS WEB SITE. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ptodd1410 (talk • contribs) 19:39, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Sorry for caps! :D . — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ptodd1410 (talk • contribs) 19:45, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Ptodd1410, no worries.
You may like to contact Google if you are concerned about incorrect search results. Sometimes, these are caused by incorrect statements at Wikidata, but the relevant item d:Q7697929 does not appear to contain any statement about the president. Neither does the Wikipedia article contain an incorrect name, as far as I can see, and apparently neither do even the two articles in the French and Portugese Wikipedia (fr, pt).
Please disclose your connection to the company on your user page before making any further edit to the article. If you receive, or expect to receive, compensation for your contributions to Wikipedia, you need to do so before making edits anywhere else. Thank you very much in advance. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:54, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Ok, I give up. All we are trying to do is ensure that the correct CEO/Presidents is listed and linked to her info on her business page for Telus Spark in Calgary. I did not write the content, not am I trying to collect money in some way. I am the Marketing and Business Development Director at Spark and I am only in my 3rd week. The president started in March. I will make no further changes. Thanks for all the comments. We will just leave it as is. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ptodd1410 (talk • contribs) 20:01, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Ptodd1410, I'd love to help if the incorrect/old president name is still being displayed on any Wikimedia project. Feel free to tell me if this is the case. At the moment, if I see correctly, Wikipedia has up-to-date information due to a correction made at Special:Diff/906717525. I do now notice that this may have been you too; thank you for your correction, if this is the case. As this is a recent change, you may need to wait a while until websites that rely on Wikipedia have been automatically updated as well.
Directly editing Wikipedia articles is a common mistake by people working in marketing or public relations. As it can lead to very embarrassing situations, such as described at Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia, correction suggestions are instead welcome at Talk:Telus Spark, where I have added the link "request corrections on or suggest content" in an orange information box to allow you to quickly and easily request further corrections.
From my computer, using Google to search for "Telus Spark" does not show any president name, by the way. Perhaps that has been solved in the meantime.
You're welcome; please let me know (or use the link in the orange box) if there is still something incorrect. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:21, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Message by 28bachmancharlott

Heading added ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:57, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

I didn't mean to do it. My 6 year old sister wrote this. Please don't ban me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 28bachmancharlott (talk • contribs) 23:43, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Heh, 28bachmancharlott. If that's true, she can later say that she has edited Wikipedia since 2019. The permanent link to the contribution can be found at Special:Diff/906748808.
That said, please do not share accounts. If multiple people use the same account, or multiple people know the password to an account, the account needs to be blocked from editing.
If multiple people know the password to this account, you must immediately change it to a password that only you know.
Please take a minute to read our Guidance for younger editors. This is important.
Thank you for your constructive contribution at Special:Diff/906749564.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:57, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

JB SCOTT'S

Who are you to edit my comments. I know more about JB SCOTT'S because I was the B in the name and Doug Jacobs was my partner.

Put back what you just deleted before I report you! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:8801:2C80:EFB:9573:96C8:2DAE:8B61 (talk) 23:47, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi 2600:8801:2C80:EFB:9573:96C8:2DAE:8B61, this seems to be a clear case of original research, which is not allowed on Wikipedia.
Please also have a look at our conflict of interest guideline. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:00, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Dude Stop this is being very rude — Preceding unsigned comment added by 28bachmancharlott (talk • contribs) 23:54, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Hey 28bachmancharlott, thank you very much for caring about civility. However, the message by 2600:8801:2C80:EFB:9573:96C8:2DAE:8B61 is relatively harmless compared to other messages I sometimes receive when dealing with vandalism.
May I recommend trying the Wikipedia Adventure? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:00, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

Codex Digital

I got your message about conflict of interest. I did work for Codex Digital but left at the end of 2016. So I'm not sure why you perceive a conflict on interest.

SPriestnall (talk) 01:24, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi SPriestnall, thank you very much for the explanation. This is possibly a connection that should be disclosed at User:SPriestnall.
At least it seems to (have) strongly affect(ed) your neutrality towards the company.

Editors with a COI are sometimes unaware of whether or how much it has influenced their editing.
— Wikipedia:Conflict of interest

The removed text looks like an advertisement rather than an encyclopedic article, and would need to be fundamentally rewritten to qualify for inclusion. "Emmy Award winning", "high-performance", "in support of the leading", "unique", "leading"... Are you sure that your connection to this topic has not severely affected your neutrality?
While writing this, I noticed that the non-neutral text has apparently been copied from https://adobe-video-partner-finder.com/partners/codex/ . That's not better, but at least there is hope regarding your ability to write neutral text about the company, if you actually do so in your own words. It doesn't surprise me that text copied from a marketing website is not suitable for the encyclopedia; it somehow relieves me that this is apparently not your own work.
Please request any further changes at Talk:Codex Digital and/or use a "userspace draft" as described on your user talk page, User talk:SPriestnall, in my COI advice.
Thank you very much in advance. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:56, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
Just so I'm clear, you'd rather have old, inaccurate information than something written by someone who knows the company. Everythin is entirely factual and with citations. Emmy Award winning is a fact.
SPriestnall (talk) 02:51, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
SPriestnall, we'd rather have no information than unverified promotion. Feel free to remove incorrect statements at any time, citing WP:BURDEN in your edit summary. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:52, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
But how to update it then? I felt like I backed everything up with citations.
SPriestnall (talk) 02:55, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
Indentation fixed for above comments ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:00, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
SPriestnall, even facts can be presented in a promotional way, and this has clearly been done. For example, giving undue weight towards positive statements is inappropriate. To allow you to easily and quickly request changes to the article, I have added a "request corrections on or suggest content" link to Talk:Codex Digital. You may do that instead, so that an experienced reviewer (not me, if that relieves you) can discuss the changes with you before implementing them. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:00, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Do I need to include quotations

Hello! I am going to enter a new submission. Must it include codes and footnotes? Thank you! Sillaro Valley (talk) 14:11, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Sillaro Valley, I'll need to ask this first: About which topic? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:49, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Resubmitting a potential entry

Heading converted to subheading ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:49, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Hello! I am going to resubmit an entry for Bonetti Kozerski Architecture to make it sound more neutral and better for your editorial mission. Sillaro Valley (talk) 20:17, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

Ah. Sillaro Valley, that draft is already submitted for review. You can change it at any time without having to click the "Resubmit" button again. Just change the text in any way you like to. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:49, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

New entry

Himid like to do an entry for https://nahr.it/ can you help? It’s an arts charity thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.38.28.231 (talk) 22:04, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi 151.38.28.231, as I have answered at User talk:Taleggio19, Wikipedia is not here to tell the world about your noble cause. We require significant coverage in multiple independent, reliable secondary sources to write a Wikipedia article.
If you can prove that such sources exist, you can add a request to the following page:
Wikipedia:Requested_articles/Business_and_economics/Organizations
If you do not provide multiple, detailled, independent sources, your request will be removed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:48, 19 July 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-30

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

Problems

  • The release of the last version of MediaWiki (1.34.0-wmf.14) has been blocked for groups 1 and 2. [16]

Changes later this week

  • Phabricator database will be moved to a different server. Writes will be blocked on Thursday 25 July, between 05:30 and 06:00 AM UTC. Reads will remain unaffected. [17]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 23 July. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 24 July. It will be on all wikis from 25 July (calendar).

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 24 July at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

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13:07, 22 July 2019 (UTC)

About Football Player Robin Gurung.

I am very Sorry That I Made Mistakes. I want help from u.i want to know how can i edit mean how can i put a photo in nepali football player in Wikipedia.and how can i put notable people option in Wikipedia.from my place there is 3 , 4 top actor actress and musician so i want to put there name.plz help me .and sorry again i apologise. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nimesh Bajagain (talk • contribs) 09:41, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Nimesh Bajagain, no worries. 🙂 Your question seems to have been answered at Special:Diff/907794715. Please let me know, or ask again at the Teahouse, if something is still unclear. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:31, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

Regarding my pubished content on Wikipedia

Hi,

Thanks for suggesting me changes on my published content on wikipedia. While i am trying to create a wikipedia page for Pradip Burman found my submission is declined by you on 23rd-July. while i am chaking my content i found this is a relevent information for all the users,as he was chairman of Dabur group.

And whaterever the content published by me on wikipedia is truly based on the information or with proper references .

I reupdate some content on my published page and resubmit my content again on Wikipedia page.Kinldy reconside my request. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ksumit81 (talk • contribs) 12:11, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Ksumit81, the article has been resubmitted for review. Someone else than me will review the article and provide independent feedback. Please have a look at WP:42, which explains my concern in easy words. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:33, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

Your submission at Articles for creation: Peter Rex (July 26)

Your recent article submission to Articles for Creation has been reviewed! Unfortunately, it has not been accepted at this time. The reason left by MJL was:
This submission's references do not show that the subject qualifies for a Wikipedia article—that is, they do not show significant coverage (not just passing mentions) about the subject in published, reliable, secondary sources that are independent of the subject (see the guidelines on the notability of people). Before any resubmission, additional references meeting these criteria should be added (see technical help and learn about mistakes to avoid when addressing this issue). If no additional references exist, the subject is not suitable for Wikipedia.
Please check the submission for any additional comments left by the reviewer. You are encouraged to edit the submission to address the issues raised and resubmit when they have been resolved.
–MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 18:07, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
Teahouse logo
Hello, ToBeFree! Having an article declined at Articles for Creation can be disappointing. If you are wondering why your article submission was declined, please post a question at the Articles for creation help desk. If you have any other questions about your editing experience, we'd love to help you at the Teahouse, a friendly space on Wikipedia where experienced editors lend a hand to help new editors like yourself! See you there! –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 18:07, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
@MJL: I think you should post this to User talk:73.42.172.80. TBF never created the article, he just submitted it. Masum Reza📞 18:11, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
@Masumrezarock100: Already did. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 18:13, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
Heh, thanks to you two. I didn't even submit it. All I did was providing a button for easy submission, as I often do in response to IRC help requests. Instead of using the button, the user noticed how the template parameters could be modified to "submit" an article and did so without changing the username. I have not seen that before. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:18, 26 July 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-31

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • Wikidata will be in read-only mode on 30 July from 05:00 to 05:30 UTC because of a server switch. [22]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 30 July. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 31 July. It will be on all wikis from 1 August (calendar).

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 31 July at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

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21:42, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – May 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2020).

Administrator changes

removed Gnangarra • Kaisershatner • Malcolmxl5

CheckUser changes

readded Callanecc

Oversight changes

readded HJ Mitchell

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:19, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 July 2019

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:18, 31 July 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation. Legobot (talk) 04:32, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-32

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 6 August. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 7 August. It will be on all wikis from 8 August (calendar).

Problems

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 7 August at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

  • Today everyone can see IP addresses if someone edits without an account. In the future this could be more hidden. This is to protect unregistered editors so fewer can see their IP address. This would only happen after we make sure the tools for vandal fighting can still be effective. You can read more and comment.

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13:24, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Regarding HFT

Hi tobefree, I added the information, which is from the popular book of Harris, on microstructure of market, but the information in the book does not completely reflect the information I added. However, if you google the name you will see plenty of items on fraud and Berny maddoff, I don't know why you need reference for it. however, i do think the information could be edited for improvement. — Preceding unsigned comment added by WillFran (talk • contribs) 02:42, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi WillFran, feel free to add a "new section" to Talk:High-frequency trading with the links you have found via Google, so that we can evaluate their reliability. The Wikipedia community cares a lot about verifiability; a Google results page itself is not a reliable source. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:55, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Lancelot

Heading added ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:40, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

My contribution on Lancelot is my own theory based on my own knowledge of European, including Arthurian, history and literature, language patterns, knowing Latin, French and Spanish and having a passing acquaintance with Italian. If you look at Latin words ending with "-us" and then look up their translation into Spanish or Italian, almost all of them remain the same except that the "-us" becomes "-o". In French phonetics, "-ot" on the end of a word is pronounced "-ō". "-ell-" or "-cell-" is a diminutive in Latin. Lancelot is not part of the earliest Arthurian literature but appears first in French retellings of the Arthurian legend, as your article tells. The real Arthur reigned in the late 5th century, going into the early 6th century. Both in Britain and in Gaul/France, Latin names were still in fairly common use, especially among aristocracy. While in modern French, the name of the Frankish chieftain who conquered most of Gaul, creating France is "Clovis", that is a later adaptation of his actual name, Chlodwig (also the source of the German name "Ludwig"). [1]So the "d"of "Claudas" would not conflict with the name "Clovis." Again, "au" and "o" are pronounced the same in French. "Claudas" is almost certainly Clovis. In the late forms of the Arthurian literature, including Le Morte d'Arthur, Lancelot is said to be the son of King Ban and nephew of King Bors of Gaul, both of whom were dispossessed by King Claudas--as historically many Roman and Gallic leaders were conquered by Clovis--so he and his cousins (or nephews) Bors, Ector de Maris and Lionel (again notice the "young lion" root) fled Gaul to Britain, and wound up in Arthur's court..[2] Lancelot and his relatives were not there for the final battle at Camlann between King Arthur and Mordred. Unfortunately I had to break up my library when I moved to my present location, and most of my books on Arthur and the history of the late 5th century are no longer in my possession. I am a theologian by occupation and so books on theology, especially Lutheran theology, and church history had to take precedence. Kenneth Howes, J.D., M.Div. 2600:6C44:217F:FD07:38EA:FF45:E0B:E63B (talk) 19:27, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Edward Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
  2. ^ Sir Thomas Malory, Le Morte d'Arthur, Vol. I, ed. Janet Cowen (London: Penguin Classics, 1986), 118

Reference syntax fixed, {{Reflist-talk}} added ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:26, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

2600:6C44:217F:FD07:38EA:FF45:E0B:E63B, Wikipedia does not publish original research nor personal knowledge. Wikipedia is a tertiary source, an encyclopedia that summarizes what secondary, published, reliable, independent sources say about a topic. Research based on primary sources is not acceptable for this encyclopedia. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:40, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

RE Waiheke Island - external links

Hi @ToBeFree - I have put most of the links as references and only left the most obvious ones (pdf timetable). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Justbecause09 (talk • contribs) 00:03, 9 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi Justbecause09, thank you very much for taking the time to do this. The result looks good. 😊 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:08, 9 August 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-33

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Editors using the mobile website on Wikipedia can opt-in to new advanced features via your settings page. This will give access to more interface links, special pages, and tools. Feedback on the discussion page is appreciated. [25]
  • Due to the absence of volunteer maintenance of Cologne Blue skin, the link to activate it will be hidden. The skin will still work, but editors using it are encouraged to switch to another skin. [26]

Changes later this week

  • Due to Wikimania, there is no deployment this week. [27]

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 13 August at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

  • The "Wikidata item" link will be moved from "Tools" to "In other projects" section on all Wikimedia projects, starting on August 21. Full announcement, Phabricator task.

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18:19, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for helping me edit.

Thank you for helping me edit the abella danger wikipedia profile. If you would like to, feel free to update the number of performances. I try to update when I'm able to, periodically. If you would like to add a few more news related articles also, I don't mind you doing so. I helped create the profile but she is so active in everything, that it is hard to update the profile. I try to update as long as she is active of course. Thank you.

Scenicview1 (talk) 00:37, 13 August 2019 (UTC)scenicview1

Hi Scenicview1, you're welcome. I think I was only patrolling the recent changes, and decided to remove challenged and unnecessary information from the article. I have no specific involvement in that topic, though. Feel free to make further improvements; feel free to add news articles and thank you very much for updating the page periodically. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:40, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

Hello! Help with the Bonetti Kozerski page? Thank you so much!

Hello!

We re-submitted our entry for Bonetti Kozerski Architecture. Does it work editorially for Wiki? Do we need to enter the text into quotation marks?

Cheers, Margo

Hi Margo, who is "we"? 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:36, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

In repsonse!

Headings converted to subheadings; duplicate text removed

"We" is Me. Margo, nice to meet you! :)

Sillaro Valley (talk) 16:21, 30 July 2019 (UTC)

Me questions is format

Hello again!

I have been working on formatting and I wanted to know if I need to include all quotations for my sources? Thank you! Margo Sillaro Valley (talk) 16:41, 30 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Margo, do you really have no connection to the company? None at all?
Please edit the text of the draft directly, instead of creating new text at the bottom of the article.
The article has been submitted for review, but as you will notice when looking at Draft:Bonetti Kozerski Architecture, the old text is still at the top, and new text has unnecessarily been added to the bottom.
When you have corrected this, feel free to let me know. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:11, 30 July 2019 (UTC)

Hello! Help with the Bonetti Kozerski page?

Heading converted to subheading ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:41, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi. I am an architecture geek! This is all new me so I just wanted to be sure. Do I need to include references and external links.? Do I need need to delete everything and then start over? Or do I just need to make the two edits you suggested? Thank you!!! Margo Sillaro Valley (talk) 14:05, 31 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi Sillaro Valley, please have a closer look at Draft:Bonetti_Kozerski_Architecture.
At the top, there is the article you need to edit and improve.
At the bottom, there is an incorrectly placed raw-text submission.
Please incorporate all your desired changes into the top article and delete the bottom duplicate afterwards. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:35, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Hello! Help with the Bonetti Kozerski page?

Heading converted to subheading ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:24, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi! This is the feedback I have: At the top, there is the article you need to edit and improve. At the bottom, there is an incorrectly placed raw-text submission.

Here is the top: Bonetti/Kozerski Architecture is an international design firm located in New York City.

Founded in 2000 by Italian-born Enrico Bonetti, AIA and British-born Dominic Kozerski, RIBA, the firm’s portfolio spans residential, retail, hospitality, cultural and commercial design. Highlights include projects in collaboration with tastemakers such as Ian Schrager, Andre Balazs, Donna Karan, Rick Rubin, Diego Della Valle, and Arne and Marc Glimcher.

What sort of edit does it need?

For the bottom: How is this incorrectly placed? Forays into the educational and cultural spheres have resulted in two of Bonetti/Kozerski Architecture’s most ambitious projects. The firm designed the interiors for the flagship campus of Avenues: The World School (pre-K to 12th grade), which opened in Manhattan in 2013. It also designed the new headquarters and multi-gallery exhibition space for PACE Gallery, an eight-story 70,000 square foot ground-up building slated to open in the fall of 2019 in New York’s Chelsea neighborhood.

Thank you!

Sillaro Valley (talk) 15:55, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

Sillaro Valley, use your browser's text search function to search for the text "RESIDENTIAL PROJECTS". You will notice that it appears twice on the page. This is because the page contains a duplicate article. Please fix this. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:08, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

Hello! Help with the Bonetti Kozerski page?

Heading converted to subheading ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:37, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi:

I changed the sentence. Did that help?

Margo Sillaro Valley (talk) 18:47, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) No. What you did there made the page worse because, for example, you removed all the references. Search the page for the phrase "working with creative and successful individuals" and you'll find it twice: Content is duplicated. That's obviously not how it should be. There should be only one copy of the draft on the page, the one you want reviewers to look at. (By the way, that phrase is one example of the inappropriately promotional tone; Wikipedia shouldn't contain such language at all.) Huon (talk) 20:01, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

Hello! Help with the Bonetti Kozerski page?

Heading converted to subheading ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:32, 8 August 2019 (UTC)

Hello!

I have several secondary sources for my article to include with our article. Do I need to add them within the article and so you think that will help with giving a neutral tone by adding it? My question is do you think that will be helpful or do we need to work on the article itself more?

The firm gained initial recognition for an apartment in Manhattan's Upper West Side that they designed for fashion designer Donna Karan. [1] [2] [3], marking the beginning of a collaboration that encompassed a house in East Hampton[4] and a vacation compound in Turks and Caicos[5]. From that ensued projects for hotelier Andre Balazs [6] and Italian industrialist Diego Della Valle, cementing a reputation for being able to work with very creative and strong-minded clients[7]. Further residential work includes a barn renovation in the Hamptons [8] and upstate New York [9], as well as multiple retreat beach homes in the Hamptons [10] [11]. Recent projects shifted the focus from private residential to other architectural categories more publicly accessible. In the educational field the firm designed the interiors for the first Avenues World School [12] [13] (pre-k to 12) in Manhattan. In the hospitality field the firm created the interiors for the public areas of the Public Hotel[14] in Manhattan in collaboration with architects Ian Schrager and Herzog & de Meuron, and the interiors for The Asbury Hotel[15] in Asbury Park, NJ. Besides residential and hospitality work, Bonetti Kozerski [16] [17] [18] [19] designs many commercial and corporate spaces such as Ralph Rucci’s headquarters [20], Ford’s modeling agency [21], Laird + Partner’s ad agency [22], and the newly opened Sant Ambroeus cafe in the Upper East Side [23]. Currently under construction are the New York headquarters and exhibition spaces for Pace Gallery[24], slated for completion in 2019.

Sillaro Valley (talk) 16:04, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

@Sillaro Valley: If you have further questions about the review, please ask the reviewers, not me, for clarification. That said, yes, please add the secondary sources within the article, using the "Cite" button of the editor. Adding references has nothing to do with neutrality, though. Text like "reputation for being able to work with very creative and strong-minded clients" is not neutral. If this is not clear, please refrain from submitting the article until you understand why that passage is promotional. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:53, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Hello! Help with the Bonetti Kozerski page?

Heading converted to subheading ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:33, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

Hello!

I added secondary resources and not mere mentions to the piece for Bonetti/Kozerski. Do they fit for Wikipedia now?

Thank you for your help!

Sillaro Valley (talk) 20:40, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi Sillaro Valley, you can use the "Resubmit" button to ask for a new review, if you believe that you have fixed the problems pointed out by four independent reviewers. Please note that I have been none of them. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:04, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

Hello! Follow Up with the Bonetti/Kozerski page? Thank you so much!

Heading converted to subheading ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:00, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Hello!

I made changes and resubmitted the Bonetti/Kozerski page for Wiki on August 9, 2019. Have you had a chance to review it? Do you need me to resubmit it? It hopefully fulfills your editorial preferences. Thank you very much! Happy Friday!

SV August 16, 2019

Sillaro Valley (talk) 15:14, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi Sillaro Valley, the draft has been, uh, "correctly" submitted for review. I have no idea how to explain that you should submit one draft, and that you should not have two drafts on the same page. Huon has tried to explain this, I have tried to explain this. The text "RESIDENTIAL PROJECTS", for example, currently appears twice on the same page: Draft:Bonetti_Kozerski_Architecture. Why twice? Why not just one text? Edit the page by clicking here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Draft:Bonetti_Kozerski_Architecture&action=edit
  • Remove duplicate text
That's it. Then wait for the review to happen. This can take about 8 weeks. Note that I personally will not review your draft, no matter how often you ask. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:48, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Thank you!

Heading converted to subheading

Thank you for your help with this process.

SV

August 16, 2019 Sillaro Valley (talk) 18:24, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Hey Sillaro Valley, thank you very much for doing this. I was very happy about the general format when I had a look at the draft this time. Regarding neutrality/promotion, and regarding references, a reviewer will decide if the article can now be accepted. If not, the reviewer will provide an explanation on your user talk page.
For reviewer convenience, I have re-added the "declined" comments above the article. These do not affect the review result, but they allow reviewers to quickly get an overview of the situation.
The article will be reviewed within about 8 weeks. It can take longer, it can be quicker, it's random. Eight weeks is only an estimation, but it is usually a good estimation. I wish you all the best, a nice weekend and good luck with the draft. Best regards! 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:31, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Re: NPOV Westminster

Believe me, Westminster is the classy part of Balga. What, do I have to buy you a plane ticket for you to see for yourself? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 101.118.7.115 (talk) 21:51, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi 101.118.7.115, Westminster surely can be beautiful, but neither of us two can write this in an encyclopedia as if it were an objective fact. As you have correctly indicated in the heading, Special:Diff/911154798 sadly lacks the neutrality that we need to adhere to when building this encyclopedia. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:55, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Guidance Barnstar
For extraordinary efforts to guide people on IRC with respect to conflict of interest editing. Huon (talk) 22:53, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
This is a thing? 😃 It is so beautiful with its compass design. Huon, thank you very much, you made my day. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:05, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi ToBeFree

I have a little doubt about the article "Italians"

The article mentions that the Italians are an Ethnic group native to Italy. So, if someone of foreign origin, non-Italian ancestors and birth obtains Italian citizenship is not considered Italian this person? Jacob34T (talk) 10:32, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

Hey Jacob34T, I personally don't care about ethnicities and genetics. To me, someone is Italian if they are a citizen of Italy. Regarding the article, I support the removal of potentially biased information, and I thank you for caring about neutrality. I personally prefer to avoid getting involved too deeply in that discussion. Feel free to do what you think is the right thing to do. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:06, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

Don't worry, it was just a question of general culture that has come to me.

Thank you for the support. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jacob34T (talk • contribs) 15:36, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

😊 You're welcome. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:58, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:List of common misconceptions

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:List of common misconceptions. Legobot (talk) 04:34, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-34

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Tech News

  • There will be no Tech News issue next week. The next issue of Tech News will be sent out on 2 September 2019.

Problems

  • Advanced item Some abuse filters stopped working because of a code change. Only variables for the current action will work. Variables defined inside a branch may not work outside of that branch. You can read more to see how to fix the filters.
  • Only six accounts can be created from one IP address per day. Between 12 August and August 15 this was two accounts per day. This was because of a security issue. It is now six accounts per day again. [28]

Changes later this week

  • Only a limited number of accounts can be created from one IP address. An IP address can be whitelisted so that it can create as many accounts as needed. This is useful at events where many new persons learn to edit. IP addresses that are whitelisted for this reason will also not show CAPTCHAs when you create accounts. This will happen on Wednesday. [29]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 20 August. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 21 August. It will be on all wikis from 22 August (calendar).

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 21 August at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

  • There is an RFC about creating a new global user group with the right to edit abuse filters. This will be used to fix broken filters and make sure all filters will still work when software changes happen. You can read more and comment.
  • Special:Contributions/newbies will no longer be working. This is because of performance reasons. It showed edits by new accounts. You can see this in the recent changes feed instead. [30]

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15:21, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 30 August 2019

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 23:42, 30 August 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:The Real Housewives of New York City

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:The Real Housewives of New York City. Legobot (talk) 04:33, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-36

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • You can use the new termbox interface if you edit Wikidata on a mobile device. This is to edit labels, descriptions and aliases easier on the mobile pages. [31]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki has been deployed during the last week.
  • The previously announced change of positions of the "Wikidata item" link on all wikis has been rollbacked due to unexpected cache issues. [32]
  • The limit for rollbacks has been increased from 10 to 100 rollbacks per minute. [33]
  • The advanced version of the edit review pages (Recent Changes, Watchlist, and Related Changes) now include two new filters. These filters are for "All contents" and "All discussions". They will filter the view to just those namespaces. However the "All discussions" filter does not include pseudo talk pages, like discussions that are in the Project: or Wikipedia: namespaces. But it will include changes happening on Project talk: or the Wikipedia talk:. [34]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 3 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 4 September. It will be on all wikis from 5 September (calendar).
  • When you log in, the software checks your password to see if it follows the Password policy. From this week, it will also complain if your password is one of the most common passwords in the world. If your password is not strong enough, please consider to change your password for a stronger password. [35]

Meetings

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09:07, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Hello

I am not connected to Kieran Simcox please google him and you’ll see he’s a professional cyclist thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cyclopedia1997 (talk • contribs) 20:17, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Kieran Simcox

Heading converted to subheading~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:12, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Just google the person, I’d seen a video of him racing the the Elite Circuit series — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cyclopedia1997 (talk • contribs) 20:52, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Hi, my answer can be found at User talk:Cyclopedia1997. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:12, 21 August 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Template talk:Infobox film

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Template talk:Infobox film. Legobot (talk) 04:30, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

David & Mary Thomson Collegiate Institute

Hello ToBeFree, 

             To be honest with you, this is my first time editing a page. I don't understand what you meant by conflict of interest. I literally took 1-2 hrs to add credible information in the page. However, I think you deleted all of that editions. Why? I was trying my best to help others with the credible information. Why did you delete this information? WHYYYYY? I was trying to help parents gather information, so they can see what the school offers. This was a helpful act I have done. But you, who lives far away, don't understand what I have written. The information comes from the school's website and the school's book. How credible is that?

I won't edit anymore. VERY DISSAPOINTED WITH HOW WIKIPEDIA WORKS.

BYE. Kevgeorge275 (talk) 14:12, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Hello Kevgeorge275, it was never my intention to disappoint you, and I'm sorry to hear that this first editing experience has been a negative one.
There are two main problems with the text, one of which I noticed too late:
  • "strong visual links"
  • "safe"
  • "strong and welcoming"
  • "fun activities"
  • "positive habits"
  • "proud to offer this unique […] program"
  • "smooth transition"
  • "opportunity to actively enhance […] leadership skills"
  • "fellow students"
  • "unique classroom experiences"
  • "opportunities"
  • "empower by developing leadership skills"
  • "recognized by international universities as one of the best/flexible programs"
  • "richer, deeper, and more demanding"
  • "university- critical thinking"
This alone was reason enough for me to completely undo your additions for being "not encyclopedic".
  • The additions have, at least in part, been directly copied from (an)other website(s), such as taylorsmyth.com. This is a copyright violation; you must use your own words instead.
Regarding your potential conflict of interest (COI), if you are connected to the school in any way, please avoid writing about it.

Editors with a COI are sometimes unaware of whether or how much it has influenced their editing.
— Wikipedia:Conflict of interest

Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:06, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Possibly Hostile Editor

Greetings, I thought to inform you that user User talk:UCaetano has began an edit war in Anti-Iranian sentiment. User AntiRacistZwei brought back information that was removed from the article, even providing proper definitions, etc. I cleaned up the citations, grammar, and double checked the sources. User talk:UCaetano as you may have seen on his talk page has not only engaged in Edit-Warring but has notably started them. I've already escalated this to [[Wikipedia] 's Press-Contacts, however, I am not sure how to escalate to moderators as this individual may lie and attempt to place blame on either myself or the other editors, I have exercised good faith to the best of my abilities, however, after looking at their contributions and their past posts, I feel the need to ask for help. Thanks. Rodianreader (talk) 02:07, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi Rodianreader, I appreciate your kind information message. I personally, however, would like to avoid any involvement in this matter. The aforementioned "escalation" does not sound like a good nor effective idea. You may like to have a look at WP:Dispute resolution instead.
That said, if you have any external relation to any of these editors, you need to properly disclose it on your user page or risk being blocked per Wikipedia's policy on sockpuppetry. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:16, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Understood. I am attempting to get an Administrator's attention. The other user seems to be passive aggressive and non-helpful. They have threatened to escalate with other users and I do not feel comfortable dealing with them any further. I will comply and escalate through proper channels. Thank you. Rodianreader (talk) 02:22, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Quick question about adding more citations

Hello and good afternoon!

We have a page currently in line to be reviewed. We recently received some new press and wondered if we should add them now? Or wait until we hear back from Wiki? We did not want to lose our place in line. Thank you very much in advance for your help and advice!

Sillaro Valley (talk) 16:17, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Hey Sillaro Valley, nice to meet you again. :)
Feel free to click "edit" and add anything you like. This will not change the position in the queue. You can always freely do this. Adding links to detailled news articles is indeed a very good thing to do, at any time.
I am a bit confused about your usage of "we" and phrases like "we received new press", as it sounds to me as if you are connected to the article subject. This would be fine, but you should then openly clarify this connection on your user page (the red link in your signature).
You're welcome; have a nice day and good luck with the article.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:48, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Code usage on userspace page

Hey ToBeFree, recently I've taken the content on your dashboard page, moved it over to this page in my userspace, then changed up all the links to meet my purposes. I used your page as the template, then changed the content due to the formatting and design done on it and how it was already set up to be a link holder page. If you have any problems with me using this, just tell me and I'll CSD it for you. Redactyll Social pub of talking 17:51, 28 August 2019 (UTC) at 17:51, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Hey Redactyll, nice to meet you again! 🙂
It made me very happy to see the page creation appearing in an IRC channel, pinging me because it had my username in the edit summary. I greatly value Wikipedia's licensing policy, and not only do I consciously release all of my contributions under a free license because I have to: I'd always do so because it makes me happy whenever someone actually reuses my contributions.
Enjoy your dashboard! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:37, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Dashboard

Hey,ToBeFree I like your dashboard. Could you please make one such dashboard for me?Andrew Base (talk) 03:39, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi Andrew Base, thank you very much, I'm glad you like it! 😊
At User:Andrew Base/Dashboard, feel free to customize it in any way you like. For example, the de.wikipedia link may be irrelevant, but you may have a personal idea for a replacement. Some of the red links can automatically be filled by Twinkle (CSD log, PROD log) if the tool is configured to do so (Wikipedia:Twinkle/Preferences).
Happy editing! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:33, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

ToBeFree Thank you very much.Andrew Base (talk) 04:37, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

No COI for my recent edits

Hi ToBeFree. Thank you for your concern but I have no COI when correcting the URLs on the page New Zealand Diplomatic Missions, other than that I used to be employed by NZ MFAT but have been retired for more than two years. The previous URLs by each NZ Embassy, High Commission or Consulate/Consulate-General linked to Wiki info on the city where the mission is located, rather than the implied mission's official website, which is much more useful and interesting for a reader seeking detailed information on the mission in question. If I have misunderstood the reason for the links, then my apologies. Kev.bonnici (talk) 12:46, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Hey Kev.bonnici, nice to meet you, thank you for the explanation and your edits.
I have to admit that I figured as much: The (previous) employment is exactly what I assumed when I saw the edits. This does not inherently make these edits problematic, but it makes the COI information page a (tiny) bit more relevant for you than for completely uninvolved editors. This does not mean that you do have a conflict of interest, and it does not mean that you are restricted in any way from editing related articles. The amount of conflict here seems to be pretty low, but it has interestingly lead to a situation where I had to undo your good-faith improvement efforts on List of diplomatic missions of New Zealand. For me personally, that's not a problem and involved only a few clicks. There had also never been any noticeable damage to the article, the edits just did not conform to Wikipedia's external link guideline, which advises against the addition of external links to an article's text body.
Generally, if a Wikipedia article exists about a topic, Wikipedia should link to that article. If none exists, Wikipedia can link to the non-existing article, and the link will be red instead of blue. Anyone can then create the missing article; this is how the encyclopedia grew in the first place. If no article exists and the topic is not notable, then no link at all should be added.
The only correct usage of external links in an article body is using them as references for information. Simply adding links, even in form of "references" without adding actual information cited from them, may seem to be useful and interesting, but is actually adverse to the free encyclopedia's interests.
No worries, Kev.bonnici; I hope you do enjoy editing Wikipedia despite this first experience. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:08, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Can you edit the mistakes on the page where you've undone all my edits

Heading converted to subheading ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:08, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi again,

I think I'll pass on editing Wikipedia as it's all a bit restrictive - saying one has a potential COI just because one had extensive knowledge of the subject due to previous hands-on experience is a little off-putting. Surely Wiki should welcome subject-matter-experts.

However, it would be good if you could correct the following errors on the List of New Zealand Diplomatic Missions:

- in the NZ context, there are NO honorary consulates: the term 'honorary' qualifies the person performing the role. All NZ consular missions are 'consulates or consulates-general [note correct plural] headed by either a career diplomat or an honorary consul / honorary consul-general'.

- why do photos of certain NZ diplomatic missions figure indiscriminately under the paragraph 'Africa'? I had created a separate paragraph 'Photos of NZ diplomatic missions', but this got wound back to the original layout.

- you should remove the brackets containing (Embassy), (High Commission), (Consulate) etc. after each country where NZ has a diplomatic mission because, as I mentioned in my previous message, a normal English reader would expect the link to take one to more information on the diplomatic mission concerned, not to general Wiki information on a geographical city. In fact, I don't know what purpose this list of country flags and links to cities serves, as a simple paragraph under each region stating 'NZ currently has diplomatic and consular missions in the following countries: ...' would suffice. It would be preferable to somehow link to NZ's official government department, MFAT, to ensure this list is up-to-date. I think I noticed in the history paragraph of this topic that NZ closed its mission in Vienna - you'll find on MFAT's website that there is currently a mission in Vienna!

Thanks and good luck with encouraging people to do this onerous editing in their free time 😉 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kev.bonnici (talk • contribs) 13:53, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi Kev.bonnici, thank you for requesting these edits.
  • After the message "External links in article text" on User talk:Kev.bonnici, but before my reply above, Special:Diff/913663685 happened. I'll undo it, assuming that you had not seen the former message and only received a notification after saving your changes.
  • Thank you very much for the requested correction; I was not aware of this distinction. I have removed the text "excluding honorary consulates" together with its inaccessible (dead link) reference. The addition of new text requires a new reference (WP:V).
  • Regarding the photos, the "separate photograph" was an empty one with no text, and the section below the new heading is not mainly about photos. Please have a look at Special:PermanentLink/913660100 for the incorrectly formatted result. I could have converted the headings "Africa" etc. to subheadings, but there was no reason to do so: The "Africa" section is no a photo section, it is a list of diplomatic missions. The photos just happen to appear next to it; to actually fix this problem, the photo selection could be modified to match the actual article content: The "Africa" section could contain photos from Africa, for example. I do not believe that there is a need for a separate gallery if the photo selection is improved.
  • The article is a list of diplomatic missions and should ideally contain (internal, not external) links to other Wikipedia articles about these missions. In its current form, I completely agree that the list is a suboptimal list of countries, not missions. However, the way to fix this is not the removal of the only information that is actually relevant to the list. We would probably rather remove all country links instead of removing the text in the brackets. That said, if something in the list is factually incorrect, please remove the factually incorrect content, but do not add any new text in the process. Afterwards, if you do want to add new text, please do so in a separate edit and provide a reliable reference that supports your addition, using the "Cite" button of the editor.
  • The "History" paragraph of List of diplomatic missions of New Zealand does not mention "Vienna". Is there something factually incorrect in the History paragraph? Feel free to remove it.
Any further content-related requests about articles should ideally be made at the talk page of the article. To do so, click "Talk" above any article you'd like to discuss, and "New section" to add a discussion topic. If you are explicitly requesting a specific change, you may like to use {{request edit}} to notify experienced volunteer reviewers about the request. The edit will then usually be implemented or discussed with you within a day or two. You are not required to do this, but it can't hurt either. If you choose to do so, please also click the red link in your signature, which points to your user page, and take a moment to explain there that you likely have no conflict of interest but have worked for New Zealand's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade in the past. This avoids confusion, as it clarifies that the connection is a relatively distant one, contrary to those who edit Wikipedia on behalf of their employer.
If there are any questions left about Wikipedia and/or editing in general, feel free to ask here; if there are questions left about article content, feel free to ask on the article's talk page. Do feel free to inform me about new discussions; I will happily have a look. Thank you very much in advance. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:08, 2 September 2019 (UTC)

Adam Jones (American football)

Not sure what is going on but the same edit was made several times yesterday by another IP [40]. ?? S0091 (talk) 18:40, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Oh, with two "s". I see. Well then, a good reason for the removal is "unsourced" per WP:PROVEIT. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:43, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Quirks and Quarks Edit

Thanks for your message - I was unaware that a citation was required. However, I am the son of the creator of the series and my mother doesn't know how to edit Wiki entries so I offered to do it for her. The reference was 100% correct but if a citation is required I'll go figure out how to add one and redo the edit.

- R.F. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.79.137.185 (talk) 05:44, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi 70.79.137.185, you're welcome. Please note that, according to your message, you may have a conflict of interest. Please take a moment to have a look at the WP:Conflict of interest guideline, and please mention your conflict of interest in the edit summary of each edit you're making about this topic. Thank you very much in advance. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:01, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

This is his organization, I don't understand why you removed the link. — Preceding unsigned comment added by WriterlyKi (talk • contribs) 15:48, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

This is HIS group and as he currently has no website, why is this link not allowed? It is absolutely verifiable. WriterlyKi (talk) 15:55, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

The second removal wasn't even done by me, WriterlyKi. 🙂
The reason is simple: Wikipedia does not have external links in the article body. We prefer links to other articles if they exist, links to non-existent articles if they should exist, or no link if neither is the case. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:57, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

So you are saying someone needs to create a separate page for this organization on Wikipedia, and link to it instead?

The user who deleted the last edit just deleted themselves, after deleting the edit. Great community you all have.

This is his organization, and they are trying to grow. Do you have suggestions then, should they write their own Wikipedia page? — Preceding unsigned comment added by WriterlyKi (talk • contribs) 16:04, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi WriterlyKi,
Deleted themselves? If you're referring to the red user page link, you can safely ignore that. Serols is an active, experienced editor. You can contact them on their user talk page, User talk:Serols. Nobody "deleted themselves".
No, they should not write "their own" Wikipedia page, as they have a conflict of interest regarding the topic, and as the topic may not be notable yet (see WP:42 for an oversimplified explanation). If the organization is notable, an uninvolved editor will write about it sooner or later. If you have any connection to the organization, you should not do so yourself. See also: Wikipedia:FAQ/Organizations.
Wikipedia is not a platform for advertising; if an organization is trying to grow, they must not use Wikipedia to do so. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:25, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

Request for protection page

Hy can you protect this page Religion in Pakistan an IP user changing information without sources & reference — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.104.130.19 (talk) 05:35, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm moving your request to Wikipedia:Requests for page protection. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:37, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
This is for your valuable efforts for countering Vandalism and protecting Wikipedia from it's threats. I appreciate your effort. You are a defender of Wikipedia. Thank you. PATH SLOPU 16:39, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
Hey Path slopu, thank you very much! 😃
Sent via Huggle, very interesting. I think I have only yet sent a custom message once, but I could use the feature more often as well. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:45, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

Message by Bigmancambo

why i must ask have you edited the tomos watkins page Bigmancambo (talk) 00:14, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi Bigmancambo, thanks for asking. This seems to be about Special:Diff/916095238.
I believe that the article does not need a list of beers, especially not without citations.
The article could be improved by adding encyclopedic text, not pure lists. It is not meant to be an advertisement catalogue nor a substitute for the company's website. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:20, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Bioaccumulation

You have talked to me [41]? It would be polite to remove the warning from my discussion page.--Marghilos (talk) 16:38, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi Marghilos, sorry and welcome to Wikipedia. I have already removed the incorrect warning and restored your edit.
I seem to have clicked the revert button 1-2 seconds after you, which is normally prevented by a whitelist. It may be the account age (4 days) or the edit count (<500) or both that made the usual safety mechanisms fail to prevent my error. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:44, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks!

I can't believe I forgot to sign my vote on "RFC on Sorting of Names with Particles" on MOS, thanks for correcting that for me. Do I leave the signature as is now, or do I go and correctly sign? AnAudLife (talk) 19:36, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi AnAudLife, no worries. If it bothers you, feel free to replace the automatic signature by yours, probably easiest by copying your signature from here and modifying time and date. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:45, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, I went ahead and fixed it, I wouldn't want anyone to think I was avoiding signing, thanks for your help. AnAudLife (talk) 20:01, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Looks good, AnAudLife, you're welcome. I think I would have done the same. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:02, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Message from Antiracistzwei

Greetings! Thank you for welcoming me. I am actually rather new to this and am not very computer savvy, though I have a decent amount of writing experience (having graduated with a writing BA). Please share any tips that you may have. Lastly, the other user AhbiMukh seemed to be exercising poor-faith/bad-faith, as I had citations as well as sources for my edits. They made an Ultimatum demanding I "stop vandalizing" or that I'd be reprimanded. That was uncalled for. What would you recommend in the future? -ARZ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Antiracistzwei (talk • contribs) 03:31, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi Antiracistzwei, nice to meet you. The matter has – in an overreaction, I'd say – been escalated to WP:AIV. If the report is still present there when you read this text, do not respond to the report in any way; I have already noted that it is probably unnecessary. The report will be removed automatically. I'll have a closer look at this later today, perhaps in about 12 hours or so. Until then, I recommend having a look at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution and starting a discussion at the talk page of the article. To do so, click "Talk" above any article you'd like to discuss, and "New section" there. Describe concisely in neutral, calm words, without talking about user conduct, and only addressing the article content, why you would like to implement which changes, and which sources support the addition. That alone should already nicely resolve the conflict. Feel free to invite the other user to the discussion by adding a short, neutral message on their user talk page, inviting them to join the discussion. Provide a link to the article's talk page for them to have a look. Thanks. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:44, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
The AIV report has been declined in Special:Diff/916289956, mostly for procedural reasons (wrong noticeboard), but also noting that the underlying report reason was probably invalid.
That said, it can't hurt if I wait before responding to this further. I may not even have to add anything later. All necessary instructions for de-escalation are present in my previous answer. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:01, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
Hello @Antiracistzwei:, I have no problem with your edits. When I reverted your edit, it was like this, it was not properly cited and seemed like vandalism. The only thing that bothers me is your comment "Your actions will be documented. Just a headsup". It would be better if maintain civility. If you have any problems(even with my actions), you can ask me on my talk page, I will be glad to resolve it out. Thank you and happy editing. AbhiMukh97(Speak)(Contribs) 04:07, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
Issue has been de-escalated. Thank you ~ ToBeFree, [[User talk:AbhiMukh97|] has cleared things up with me. I did, however, fix the edit after noticing it myself (making sure my citations are air-tight). We are currently in a hot political climate and there may be individuals trying to erase Anti-Iranian sentiment in order to erase history. Please check Anti-Iranian_sentiment as well. I have been keeping track of that page as a non-user since I was in highschool (I am now a college graduate) and the Joker (from Batman) reference was removed, for example. In Mass media, my ethnic group has been targeted for very evil reasons, often times, as a means of pushing for our linguistic and other-wise extermination. I appreciate any help in preserving history as well as casting light on those who seek to erase us. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Antiracistzwei (talk • contribs) 01:26, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

My change to the portuguese language page

I just copied it from the Spanish phonology page, which I assumed was sourced. Now I check I realise it wasn't sorry. Ewokpedia (talk) 17:31, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi Ewokpedia, no worries. If something is sourced on the Spanish Wikipedia, please copy the citation as well. Thanks 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:34, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Kk I will remember to use citations next time 🙂 Ewokpedia (talk) 18:12, 19 September 2019 (UTC) I just realised how stupid i am Ewokpedia (talk) 19:39, 19 September 2019 (UTC) Now I'm just confused if I changed the portuguese one or spanish one XD Ewokpedia (talk) 19:42, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

@Ewokpedia: Nah, don't worry, take your time. 😊 I'm unsure if I can help at the moment, but if there is a specific question, feel free to ask. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:45, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Add the otpc controversial topics

Moved to Talk:ONGC Tripura Power Company § Add the otpc controversial topics
 – ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:35, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

I don't work for Boomtown

Hiu,

I'm a normal I don't work for Boomtown Fair.....I love the festival and am editing it to make it more complete.

I'm editing from my work PC so a shared IP.

Thanks

Chris B — Preceding unsigned comment added by 31.221.4.2 (talk) 15:57, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi Chris B, thank you very much for the response. Please also consider whether you may have a conflict of interest, depending on your connection to the festival. If you don't, you may ignore this message, and I wish you happy editing. Please note that very long lists are unlikely to be encyclopedically useful, and that inline citations should be used to prove statements. I have removed the huge "Artists" lists, but apart from this, I do not see other issues. The rewriting of the "Incidents" section seems to be an improvement towards a neutral point of view. Thank you for doing this. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:02, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Messages by 167.206.244.10

You've weakened the article. You've made it less intelligent and informative. Original research was NOT done. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.206.244.10 (talk) 21:33, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

You weakened the article. You made it less intelligent and informative. Now people don't know where business cycles come from. This point is neither original nor research. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.206.244.10 (talk) 21:36, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi 167.206.244.10, this seems to be about Special:Diff/916831202 and Special:Diff/916831677.

All content must be verifiable. The burden to demonstrate verifiability lies with the editor who adds or restores material, and it is satisfied by providing an inline citation to a reliable source that directly supports[2] the contribution.[3]
— WP:BURDEN

~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:30, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Oops, undid your good edit

Sorry about that--an edit conflict meant I managed to undo your edit instead of the original test edit. I should have previewed before committing. --{{u|Mark viking}} {Talk} 19:57, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Hey Mark viking, no worries! As you can see at #Bioaccumulation, it happens to me too. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:59, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Sutton Grammar School.

Hi, ToBeFree, I have added a reliable source. I am a student at the school. Thank you for pointing out, im new to Wikipedia and I was not fully aware of citations. — Preceding unsigned comment added by KeeranKiru (talk • contribs) 19:37, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi KeeranKiru, thank you very much! 🙂
You may like to have a look at Special:Diff/917683064: Using the visual editor, this is currently impossible to do, as far as I know. I have used the "source code" editor to move the citation to the right place. You can access the source code editor by clicking the pencil icon at the top right of the visual editor.
Usually, the visual editor is a powerful tool to quickly make changes while seeing what happens in front of the scenes. Rarely, in cases such as this one, when adding a citation to an infobox parameter, the source editor can be very useful to control what happens behind the scenes. Feel free to experiment with it at WP:Sandbox; try all the interesting features it offers. Try creating some deliberately incorrect code. Try creating headings with only the left or right half of the "=" that are normally needed. Try starting bold text somewhere, but not closing it anywhere. Try adding images and bulleted lists. And try what happens when you add "~~~~" to a page. Experiment and have fun. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:47, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

You won't win so don't try

I'll change anything you edit right back again so don't even bother.... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 31.221.4.2 (talk) 13:35, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi 31.221.4.2, you seem to have announced interest in an edit war in Special:Diff/917784061, likely regarding Boomtown Fair; that means that you are considering to repeatedly change content back to how you think it should be, when you have seen or know that other editors disagree. Users are expected to collaborate with others, to avoid editing disruptively, and to try to reach a consensus, rather than repeatedly undoing other users' edits once it is known that there is a disagreement.
Points to note:
  1. Edit warring is, and will always be, disruptive regardless of how many reverts you have made;
  2. Do not edit war even if you believe you are right.
If you find yourself in an editing dispute, use the article's talk page to discuss controversial changes and work towards a version that represents consensus among editors. You can post a request for help at an appropriate noticeboard or seek dispute resolution. In some cases, it may be appropriate to request temporary page protection. If you engage in an edit war, you may be blocked from editing. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:32, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Boomtown Fair#45,000 bytes of band names

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Boomtown Fair#45,000 bytes of band names. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:56, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

An award for you!!!!

CVU Anti-Vandalism Award
This is for your excellent performance in saving Wikipedia from the harmful threats of vandalism. I appreciate your efforts and hardwork. You are a bold defender of Wikipedia. Thank you. PATH SLOPU 10:58, 28 September 2019 (UTC)
Hey Path slopu, thank you very much for the award! 😃 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:21, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 30 September 2019

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:07, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-40

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

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  • Last week's Tech News had delivery problems. Some did not get the newsletter. Some got it more than one time. The problem where some pages got it three times should now be fixed. [42]

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  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 1 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 2 October. It will be on all wikis from 3 October (calendar).

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16:51, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
Thank you for your service. May you help me reword that statement to be more neutral? FlamboyantPotato (talk) 20:32, 30 September 2019 (UTC)
Hey FlamboyantPotato, thank you very much for asking, and for the barnstar. 🙂
I assume this is about Special:Diff/918902740. The article describes the term "ugly Christmas sweater" as colloquial; Wikipedia as an encyclopedia does not use such colloquial language in its own voice.
If reliable sources are provided and doing so does not add undue weight towards the colloquialism, it may be appropriate to describe the sweater the way it already is. The addition, on the contrary, is not encyclopedic in its original form.
Your question is how to "reword" the statement, but the question seems to contain an incorrect implication. Rewording the statement alone can likely not fix the larger issue.
To avoid laying undue weight on the matter in the lead section of the article, I recommend adding such information elsewhere, if at all. It already seems to be present in the article:

Ugly Christmas Sweater Contests are held annually in the United States.[9]
— Christmas jumper, revision 918902740

The "ugly sweater" colloquialism is also mentioned in the lead already, as much as necessary. I think the article is fine as it is.
If this answer is unsatisfactory and you would like to discuss the topic, feel free to create a "New section" on the talk page of the article, Talk:Christmas jumper. Afterwards, feel free to invite me to the discussion.
If you agree, there's nothing left to do; you may like to try The Wikipedia Adventure or have a look at our community portal. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:59, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks!

Thanks for your clarification regarding my Steven Crowder edit. I'm not terribly experienced with editing Wikipedia; this is actually my first "Talk Page" message. Per your suggestion, I have removed the word "frequently" from the aforementioned edit. Hunkybuck (talk) 08:48, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi Hunkybuck, no problem; thanks for joining the discussion at Talk:Steven Crowder. Take your time; feel free to ask here or at the Teahouse if technical issues arise. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:47, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Thank you!

For this!!! KillerChihuahua 12:17, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T234082
Open
The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
For fixing Huggle so editors cannot add IPs who have not been recently warned to the AIV list, thus saving admins watching and working on that list the time and effort required to decline and explain, and leaving them free to spend their time and effort blocking correctly warned and persistent vandals, which is a much better use of their time! Your modification also educates helpful (but a bit too eager) editors about how to best help! Thank you so much. KillerChihuahua 12:28, 1 October 2019 (UTC)
Oh hi, you're welcome, KillerChihuahua. Thank you very much for the kind words and the barnstar. 😃
I guess ideally, for most IP addresses, the "3 days" should even be lowered – but let's see how 3 days work out. It is the status quo, very broadly interpreted. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:03, 1 October 2019 (UTC)
I agree, it might be helpful to reduce the time, but this is a huge step. I was having to decline reports with a "last warning" that was literally several months old. People weren't bothering to check the time/date stamp in their eagerness to Vanquish Vandalstm. So thank you so much. Modifying Huggle is outside my area of expertise. KillerChihuahua 17:11, 1 October 2019 (UTC)
Erm...does this prevent Huggle users from reporting IP's, or simply change when Huggle does it automatically? The former could be problematic. Vermont (talk) 16:00, 3 October 2019 (UTC)
Hey Vermont, this does not have any effect on manual reports; it solely makes Huggle ignore templates that are older than 3 days (rather than the "30 days" we had for a while) when deciding which warning level a user currently has. The original value on enwiki was 3 days, but this has accidentally changed during an update (from WP:Huggle/Config to WP:Huggle/Config.yaml). The result have been some very weird automatic reports that took a while to debug. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:45, 3 October 2019 (UTC)
Thanks for the response. I’m surprised it was 30, thanks for changing it. Vermont (talk) 18:18, 3 October 2019 (UTC)

History of Ecology

I added some material about EG Hutchinson that I want to use for a later new section I have worked out. You deleted it almost as fast as I put it up. I did not add a citation because I thought it would be redundant with the new section, to be called Transition to Modern Ecology from Ecology as a Point of View and following Conservation and Ecology. Please be a dear and undo your cut. Also can you tell me how to link names in articles to the articles that you have for such people. MacArthur, for example. I find your help pages confusing. Thank you.WDrit2 (talk) 22:15, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi WDrit2, thank you very much for writing the new text. To restore your edit, only a few steps are needed. Please read the whole list before clicking the first link.
  • Click here to open the editor, with your content restored and ready to be saved again. If asked, "Switch to the visual editor". You can also do so by clicking the pencil icon at the top right of the editor.
  • To add a link: Mark the name you'd like to link, for example with your mouse or Shift+Arrowkey on a keyboard, then click the chain icon at the top of the editor (between "A" and "Cite").
  • To add a citation: Move the cursor to the end of your addition, then click "Cite".
Please do include a citation; if something is redundant, it can be removed later. Verifiability is important; let's rather include too many than too few good references.
If one of these steps does not work, feel free to ask again; I'll need to know what exactly you have already tried to be able to provide more specific technical advice.
Thank you very much in advance! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:28, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks

My biggest problem right now, I thing, is not with editing, but with using this particular form of communication.WDrit2 (talk) 16:11, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Hey WDrit2, that's normal; it takes some time to get accustomed to. You're doing pretty well, though. Thank you very much for adding a citation! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:25, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Answer here.

Hello. I saw your asking “have you been editing Wikipedia under another username before?” and my answer is no. I simply put my opinion on nomination of deletion and suddenly administrators accused me of sockpuppetry and article got deleted. Which can not understand they did this because I made my account only few days ago. Thanks for asking me. I’m new at here so wonder what I did wrong. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Joanaones (talk • contribs) 15:41, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi Joanaones, if you're actually new to Wikipedia, you did nothing wrong and can probably ignore accusations of sockpuppetry. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:38, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Thank you. I feel sorry for my action brought article negative effect. I wroted there with comments simply because guideline instructed if you are new your vote can be ignored but you are always welcome to comment to prove with right articles as many as you can. I looked over every article to prove because when I looked over the situation it didnt seems like saying the right thing(like this is more important than that) wont be counted because there are not many users on wikipedia understand this sport unlike films or actors. All of a sudden one of user accused me after my comments about I only wrote about nomination(which is quite not true) and almost right after another administrator closed the article on the name of sockpuppetry. Is this right actions? I’m sorry I’m so new here all I could do was look over the guideline. Joanaones (talk) 20:26, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Joanaones, if you never have edited Wikipedia before, just ignore the sockpuppetry accusations and move on. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:31, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

OK

thanks trying to learn http or what its called where you build websites and the sandbox will be helpful — Preceding unsigned comment added by 169.139.8.171 (talk) 15:55, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

you are a good person helping wikipedia — Preceding unsigned comment added by 169.139.8.171 (talk) 15:56, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi 169.139.8.171, you're welcome, thank you. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:35, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Confused...

Thanks for letting me know about disclosing about Boxstat. Wikipedia confuses me if I'm completely honest. Am I allowed to replace dead links with Boxstat ones at all? I only ever replace them with relevant links to match up with the text. I do try and replace all dead links when I can with all sources. If this isn't allowed at all or considered spam I will obviously stop, I was just under the impression that by replacing dead links with a relevant link then its an improvement regardless if it was to my site or not. Also I don't ever add links to pages randomly, only ever dead link replacement. Thanks and again apologies if this is spam and I've misunderstood. Also I've just seen the Sock Puppetry thing. Boxstat ones is mine because I had forgot that I had a personal account the others can be deleted. I have explained myself to someone before and asked for advice but never seems easy to actually speak to people. (User talk:Stump1990) —Preceding undated comment added 23:01, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi Stump1990, the "Boxstat" account is blocked; you'll probably need to appeal that block. The confession above, combined with a genuine misunderstanding, may help you in this situation. Please take a moment to clearly state, at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Stump1990, in the "Comments by other users" section, the situation from your point of view. If you describe concisely which accounts you have used and where the misunderstanding is, this may perhaps end amicably and perhaps even without a re-block. You need to make clear that you understand why you had been blocked, and that a block is no longer necessary. I'm not the person to make the final decision, but I think that a requirement will be permanently refraining from adding links to any websites you are affiliated with. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:12, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Thank You. Yes it's all been a bit confusing. I don't use and had no intention of using any of the Boxstat accounts after I realised I had a personal account. I'm not going to bother contesting any more its more hassle than its worth, I genuinely thought I was adding value and was always careful when editing dead links. Obviously I was wrong. Thanks for replying to me and explaining. I won't bother contributing any more to save any more hassle for anyone and myself. Thanks again and sorry again for the confusion. (User talk:Stump1990) —Preceding undated comment added 23:29, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Stump1990, you're welcome, but I'm not entirely sure:
  • If all you ever want to do on Wikipedia is adding links to your website, the decision to stop doing so will not be a voluntary one;
  • if you would like to contribute constructively, you'll need to appeal the block.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:32, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

No Connection

Hello,

I am not being compensanted or related to this project in anyway. I write finance and data articles, and thought this was an interesting area that should be given a wikipedia page. So, I figured I might attempt my wikipedia page writing about this emerging area. I am in no way connected to any companies or anything of the like and I am looking for tips to ensure this is more than just a neologism. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Brettq888 (talk • contribs) 07:59, 3 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi Brettq888, thank you very much for the clarification. I have added a link to this section below my "conflict of interest" message on your talk page, which you may freely remove completely, just like all messages you'd like to remove.
Please also see Wikipedia:Teahouse#Fraud_Orchestration--_Help_Improving for further information regarding the draft. Please note that, if a topic is not notable according to Wikipedia's notability standards, even a perfectly-written article could not overcome the notability problem and no article about it would ever be accepted. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:11, 3 October 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Template editor

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Template editor. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 6 October 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-41

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

Problems

  • There is a problem in the visual editor when you copy or delete text with footnotes. It will be fixed soon. [45]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 8 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 9 October. It will be on all wikis from 10 October (calendar).

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 9 October at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

  • The Community Wishlist Survey has a new format. It will focus on wikis that typically get less support. It will probably go back to the normal format next year. It is not decided exactly how it will work this year. You can leave feedback.
  • The URL of the Wikimedia wiki main pages could be changed. This is because the current URLs cause several problems. For example https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Main_Page would be https://www.wikidata.org/ instead. You can tell the developers if this would cause problems for your wiki.
  • There is a new technical community newsletter. You can read more about the work of Wikimedia's technical community. Subscribe to get the information in the future.
  • Advanced item Outreachy is an internship program for groups who are underrepresented in free and open-source software. There are seven Wikimedia projects about coding, documentation and quality assurance in the next round. Persons who fit the criteria can apply. The last day to apply is 5 November.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

15:36, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for Fortification of Frankfurt its really great!

I just did some copyediting there and couldn't help but notice how great of an article you wrote! here's a barnstar.

The Rosetta Barnstar
message Kaiser Kitkat (talk) 21:55, 9 October 2019 (UTC)
The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
message Kaiser Kitkat (talk) 21:55, 9 October 2019 (UTC)
Hey Kaiser Kitkat, thank you very much for the extensive copyediting and the barnstars! 😃
It's probably clear, but I should point out that I didn't write the original German article. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:42, 9 October 2019 (UTC)

You're welcome! -kaiserkitkat — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kaiser Kitkat (talk • contribs) 23:46, 9 October 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-42

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 15 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 16 October. It will be on all wikis from 17 October (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

  • Internet Explorer 6 and 7 are no longer supported. This means the browsers might start looking a bit weird. They will not get security support. You can't read Wikimedia wikis in Internet Explorer on Windows XP or Windows versions that are older than Windows XP. This is because almost no one uses the browsers anymore. Supporting them made the wikis less secure for everyone else. [47]
  • In the future section headings might have a share link. This is to make it easier to link to the section. You can read more and discuss.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

23:55, 14 October 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia:Requests for comment/2019 community sentiment on binding desysop procedure

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia:Requests for comment/2019 community sentiment on binding desysop procedure. Legobot (talk) 04:31, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-43

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. The API sandbox and help pages now show more clearly when API modules are marked as internal. API modules marked as internal were probably internal before. It was easier to miss. You should look for non-internal alternatives. [48]

Problems

  • There is a translation tool we use on wikis with more than one language. For a few days it did not create pages for new languages when someone translated a page. The languages did not show in the language bar. This has been fixed. [49]
  • The history and diffs can show wrong content. This is because of a cache problem. It will soon be fixed. [50]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 22 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 23 October. It will be on all wikis from 24 October (calendar).
  • Reference Previews will be a beta feature on all Wikipedias and some Wikivoyages. It shows you a preview of the footnote when you hover over or click on the number. It has been a beta feature on German and Arabic Wikipedia since April.

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 23 October. See how to join.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

14:42, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-44

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • You can post proposals for the Community Wishlist Survey. The survey decides what the Community Tech team will work on. You can post proposals until 11 November. You can vote on proposals from 20 November to 2 December. This year the wishlist will focus on Wikibooks, Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikisource, Wikiversity, Wikispecies, Wikivoyage and Wikinews. You can read more about the format for this year.
  • Mobile users now have a specific design for their Watchlist. [51][52]
  • You can share feedback and ideas on the Desktop Improvements project. The goal is to make the interface easier to use for readers and editors without removing any functionality. The Foundation's Readers Web team will work on this over the next two years.
  • Advanced item OOUI now allows using px (pixels) instead of em (em) for some specific cases. [53][54]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 29 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 30 October. It will be on all wikis from 31 October (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

  • There will be no software changes from 19 December to 2 January. The first MediaWiki version next year will come the week of 6 January. [55]
  • Advanced item Gadgets and user scripts can access variables about the current page in JavaScript. In 2015, this information was moved from global variables named wg* to mw.config. The old global variables will be removed later this year. You can know more about it and tell the developers if you want to try this out on your wiki first.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:25, 28 October 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 October 2019

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:12, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-45

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • At Special:Contributions you could see up to 5000 edits at the same time if you edited the URL. This has been lowered to 500. This is to stop requests which break the sites. [56]

Changes later this week

  • MediaWiki:ipb-default-expiry can set the default length to block a user for your wiki. You will be able to use MediaWiki:ipb-default-expiry-ip to set a different default block length for IP editors. [57]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 5 November. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 6 November. It will be on all wikis from 7 November (calendar).

Meetings

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:48, 4 November 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Category talk:Transportation in the United States by county

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Category talk:Transportation in the United States by county. Legobot (talk) 04:32, 6 November 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-46

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • MediaWiki2LaTeX can put different pages from a Wikimedia wiki into a PDF. It can now make a PDF with around 5000 pages. Previously this was 800 pages.

Changes later this week

  • There is no new MediaWiki version this week.

Meetings

Future changes

  • Wikimedia will take part in Google Code-in. This is for young students who want to help with open source software. You can read more. Experienced technical Wikimedians can mentor students.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

22:04, 11 November 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)

Contributing more Female Founders to Wikipedia

Hi ToBeFree, I'm fairly new to Wikipedia so my apologies as I am still learning how to use the talk section. I read an article about gaps wikipedia has in relation to women and I decided to try and contribute more information about female-founded companies and female startup founders.[1] I do know some of the women I am trying to add, what is the proper way to cite that? Also, to push this forward and get more notable women should I be simply requesting for others to create the pages with their work or request for someone else to be profiling them instead of contributing that information myself? Pumpkin candle (talk) 01:36, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ https://whoseknowledge.org/initiatives/visiblewikiwomen/. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
Hi Pumpkin candle, thanks for asking. If you have a personal connection to a person, please do not edit Wikipedia about them. Please also disclose your connection, if any, to "CareMessage", on your user page. You can do so by clicking here and explaining your connection to the topic of Draft:CareMessage.
I may have more advice to offer, but only if such connections have been properly disclosed. Feel free to inform me when this has happened. General advice can be found at Wikipedia:FAQ/Organizations and Wikipedia:FAQ/Article subjects, for organizations and people, respectively. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:43, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Message by Greenkingwashere

In regards to my article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draft:Home_(American_Electronic_Band), you said that is doesnt not have enough sources. I have some articles and other sources written about the artist, do you think including a style section or something similar with links to those sources is what you need to wrap it up? I was planning on adding articles about some of the albums as well, but I can include some of the content on the artist page as well. Greenkingwashere (talk) 22:39, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi Greenkingwashere, my main concern is only whether such sources exist at all. They do not have to be used in the article, but the article should at very least contain a link to them. Perhaps a "Further Reading" section can already prove notability.
If you like to, I'll have a look at the three best sources you can find, according to the general notability criteria that are described in (over)simplified form at WP:42. If you are interested in such an analysis, feel free to add up to three links to the bottom of this talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:49, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

I found an article about them I just added to the draft, and I dug up an interview that should provide more info. I'll add them to the draft then submit again. Greenkingwashere (talk) 23:08, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Greenkingwashere, interviews are often not independent coverage. That said, of course, do feel free to re-submit the article and someone else will provide a second opinion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:10, 20 October 2019 (UTC)

im sorry

hello mr free, i apologize for my previous remarks and am especially sorry for any damage i have caused. sincerely, me — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:18A:104:BD40:CD5D:A128:6FA6:7E05 (talk) 20:51, 20 October 2019 (UTC)

Hey 2601:18A:104:BD40:CD5D:A128:6FA6:7E05, do I correctly understand that this is about Special:Contributions/2601:18a:104:bd40:58c5:a474:57a3:8123? If it relieves you, I didn't even see these messages. They have been removed from the page's history. That said, the headings and multiple users' reactions to the content do allow me to guess what might have been written there. I'm not offended; I only find it weird that anyone would write such messages. I am positively surprised by your apology and accept it. Your block seems to have expired as well. If you are interested in contributing to Wikipedia productively, you may like to have a look at our community portal, or – after registering an account – the Wikipedia Adventure. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:22, 20 October 2019 (UTC)

Draft:Flexibound

Thanks ToBeFree. I've marked it for deletion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 83Gulf (talk • contribs) 21:52, 20 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi 83Gulf, you're welcome – I'm always a bit sad to see that happen, but I think it's a reasonable decision.
On a lighter note, thank you for contributing to Wikipedia: I see that you have already edited many other articles, and that your first edit anniversary will be on Thursday this week. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:11, 20 October 2019 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
Your work is appreciated! S0091 (talk) 19:36, 26 October 2019 (UTC)
Hey S0091, thank you very much! 😃
We seem to meet each other often. I appreciate your work as well! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:09, 26 October 2019 (UTC)

Tupperware

I have declined your revdel request on Tupperware because https://www.academia.edu/34798666/BLACK_BOOK_final_mom (listed in the linked earwig report) is a backwards copy, no cited refs appear to be copyright problems. If there is a problem here, please be much clearer on exactly what is copied and from where. DES (talk)DESiegel Contribs 23:52, 26 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi DESiegel, thank you very much for the notification. I am referring to the first reference added in Special:Diff/922992423, which appears to be a violation of the WP:LINKVIO section of Wikipedia's copyright policy. Sorry for having been too unspecific about this; it is a bit tricky to describe a link violation without linking to the infringement oneself. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:22, 27 October 2019 (UTC)
Thank you!  Done I am not sure that linkvio in the history alone needs revdel, but the revision in this case had nothing of significant value anyway, and the YouTube vid was clearly a copyvio. DES (talk)DESiegel Contribs 01:27, 27 October 2019 (UTC)
Thank you, DESiegel. 🙂 I completely agree with this assessment. Perhaps there should be a RfC about the applicability of link violations for RD1; the sentence "However, if you know or reasonably suspect that an external Web site is carrying a work in violation of the creator's copyright, do not link to that copy of the work."[1] seems to contain a condition that, uh, could possibly be argued not to apply to clueless violations by new editors. This would be a weird condition if it really had to be taken into account when deciding whether to revision-delete links to clear copyright violations. And do administrators perhaps knowingly contribute to the "linking" if they actively deny such a request? I'm not a lawyer; perhaps I'm talking nonsense. 😊 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:42, 27 October 2019 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you for the warm welcome and the cookies too! :)

The notable person I mentioned has given me permission to do his page.

My question was: What is the procedure? I already have the content and the photo for uploading on the page. However, I'm still lost on how to upload the information on his page.

Please assist me.

--Skanake (talk) 13:34, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi Skanake, you're welcome. :)
About the article: As you have a connection to the person, and thus a conflict of interest, I personally recommend not creating an article about them. The advice in WP:Autobiography mostly applies to your situation, even if you do not directly write about yourself. Photos often come with copyright problems; you can generally only upload what you have personally photographed with your own hands. As there are so many pitfalls to consider here, I strongly recommend gaining more experience with editing, for example using the community portal or the Wikipedia Adventure, before even thinking about article creation.
Please forward the following advice page to the person you hopefully do not yet create an article about: WP:FAQ/Article subjects.
Thank you very much in advance and sorry for the probably disappointing answer. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:47, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

I get it, thanks. I'll work on a different subject.

Thanks for the advice. I'll work on a few more edits and see how it goes.

Regards, --Skanake (talk) 13:58, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

Skanake, thank you very much for the consideration. I wish you good luck, enjoy editing, and do feel free to ask here or at the Teahouse whenever questions arise. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:04, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

edits on Harry Dodge page

Hi ToBeFree,

I noticed the edits I made on Harry Dodge were deleted and I am a bit confused. You left me a message saying there may be a conflict of interest? I made a draft of the page... Maybe you can review it as you suggested? Let me know what I can do and thank you for the tips! Here is the link to the draft: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draft:Harry_Dodge

talk soon Kekatcan (talk) 19:19, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi Kekatcan, nice to meet you. Do you have any connection to Harry Dodge? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:42, 30 October 2019 (UTC)
No I don't have any connection to Harry Dodge.. I'm interested in his work and saw that his wiki page is not updated Kekatcan (talk) 20:05, 30 October 2019 (UTC)
Kekatcan, please explain the existence of the following document:
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:21, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

Thorntons

Hello. The source is me. Thank you for not interfering unless you really know something about the topic. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.12.152.220 (talk) 20:05, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi 24.12.152.220, thank you very much for the clarification.

Wikipedia does not publish original research. Its content is determined by previously published information rather than the beliefs or experiences of editors. Even if you're sure something is true, it must be verifiable before you can add it.
— Wikipedia:Verifiability

Or, as Jimmy Wales once wrote,

If it is true, it should be easy to supply a reference.
— https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2006-July/050773.html

You may like to use the "Cite" button of the visual editor to easily provide an inline citation. Thank you very much in advance. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:16, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

Al Nahda National Schools

Hello! As a student of this school, I was wondering (after seeing your contributions to its wikipedia page) what relationship you bear to it? I've not met any German students here- nor are there any teachers from there either. How did you come across my school's page, and why the interest in it?

This might come off as rude, but trust me that this is not the case AT ALL- I am simply curious.

- Emma — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:8F8:1125:8EF2:A104:8304:120C:75FF (talk) 20:05, 1 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Emma, no worries. Nice to meet you.
It may be surprising, but many Wikipedia editors do not have a close connection to the topics they write about. We try to avoid editing articles if we have a conflict of interest; experienced editors usually do not edit articles about their employer, their friends or their family. The volunteer community is especially critical of paid editing, which is tolerated only within strict limits.
Some Wikipedia editors regularly have a look at Special:RecentChanges, a chronological list of recent edits to all Wikipedia articles. The English Wikipedia has about 120 edits per minute; this is more than a human can reasonably monitor. I personally use tools that filter out potentially problematic edits, using artificial neural networks and a huge database of edits known to be "good" or "bad". New edits are compared against the database entries, and a list of "probably bad" edits appears 🡆here🡄.
This is how I found the text that I have removed in Special:Diff/884043392, for example. I have no connection to the school; I just stumbled upon the page in the list of recent changes.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:40, 1 November 2019 (UTC)

Ah, that makes a lot of sense. Thank you for your contributions! I wasn't aware of these things. — Preceding unsigned comment added by InbetweenCupsOfTea (talk • contribs) 15:16, 2 November 2019 (UTC)

Thank you so much!

I'm incredibly grateful for the links you have provided me (and the cookies..). As you may have noticed, I have a very rudimentary understanding of editing on Wikipedia- removing vandalism and fixing grammatical mistakes is all I can manage at the moment. I've been wanting to delve further into this for a while now- looks like now's the time!

Thanks again,

InbetweenCupsOfTea (talk) 16:01, 2 November 2019 (UTC)

You're welcome, InbetweenCupsOfTea. I'm happy to hear that. 🙂
You may like using the following three links as stepping stones:
Have fun editing and feel free to ask if any questions arise.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:09, 2 November 2019 (UTC)

(Slightly early) congratulations!

Hi - I'm about to log off to make dinner, so will probably miss your RfA's formal closure - but as the outgoing 'newest admin', I wanted to be the first to congratulate the incoming one - welcome to the corps! Cheers GirthSummit (blether) 18:14, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

😄 Thank you very much, Girth Summit. This is a nice idea, I'll pass it on to the next successful candidate. Bon appétit! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:30, 10 November 2019 (UTC)
ToBeFree, (editing on phone while stirring some slowly-frying onions) cool - will this be the start of a time-honored traditional? GirthSummit (blether) 19:05, 10 November 2019 (UTC)
Haha, that would be awesome. I thought you had inherited it. If it's your idea, congratulations: This will become a thing. That is, unless someone breaks the chain. We may have to intrudoce a requirement for the previous candidate to remind them if needed. 😉 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:24, 10 November 2019 (UTC)
The bigger issue is sneaking past all of these unobliging souls wanting to wish successful candidates congratulations, which personally I just view as inconsiderate! ;) Nosebagbear (talk) 21:19, 10 November 2019 (UTC)
ToBeFree, no I didn't inherit it, so I guess it's our thing! I'm now imagining a template with an imageof some sort of 'torch of newbia', with a link to The Chain! GirthSummit (blether) 21:23, 10 November 2019 (UTC)
+1! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:32, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

A beer for you!

Congratulations! — Javert2113 (Siarad.|¤) 18:31, 10 November 2019 (UTC)
It's nice to meet you again, Javert2113. Thank you very much for your support, the congratulations and the beer. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:38, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Your RFA

As implied by those above, your RFA was successful. Congratulations! Primefac (talk) 18:34, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Thank you very much, Primefac! Suddenly, before I saw the closure, many new buttons and links appeared on my screen. 😄 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:43, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Congrats TBF. I'll let someone else dig out the t-shirt, but I did want to say it's good to have you on board. Feel free to abuse me with any questions or anything you may have. — Ched (talk) 18:35, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Will do. 😊 Thank you very much for the offer and the support. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:47, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Congratulations and welcome to the ranks of WP:SWAT! Still working on the uniforms so for now, feel free to use this t-shirt Regards SoWhy 18:38, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Hey SoWhy. I can't thank you enough for your wonderful nomination. 🌈 Thank you for making this possible. While it should perhaps ideally have no effect, I think a self-nomination would at very least have been more exhausting. Your volunteer time made my volunteering possible; I'll make sure to offset that over time. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:57, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Congratulations TBF. I look forward to seeing you around. AmericanAir88(talk) 18:48, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the congratulations and the support, AmericanAir88. The same to you. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:03, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Congrats! You might find Wikipedia:Administrators' guide helpful, but either way, time to get to work! ~ Amory (u • t • c) 19:16, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

You have got mail 😃 Thank you very much, Amory, also for the wonderful co-nomination. I will do my best to meet the high expectations that may come with the stunning RfA result.
It was a pleasure to plan and run this candidature with you two. Thank you for your time and work, and for a wonderful week. 🌈 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:31, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

On behalf of good Wikipedians everywhere, I present you with your level 1 mop. May it serve you long and well. Your gilded and diamond encrusted level 60 mop is on back order :) Captain Eek Edits Ho Cap'n!⚓ 19:21, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Take the sacred mop and with it rinse the Wiki of its scum and villany!
😂 Didn't know that image yet. It's a pretty mop, you can keep the one with diamonds. 😃 Thank you very much. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:34, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Congrats! A cabal representative will be along shortly to provide you with the secret handshake and a progress report on the world domination plan Look forward to seeing you around, have fun with the mop and reading! :) Nosebagbear (talk) 21:20, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

There's a typo on page 3 and the paper has no edit button. Who wrote this? Thank you very much, Nosebagbear. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:31, 10 November 2019 (UTC)
Are you sure you weren't playing around like Fuhghettaboutit? Nosebagbear (talk)

Felicitations and welcome to the team. -Ad Orientem (talk) 02:56, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Ad Orientem, thank you very much, for the support too. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:59, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Congratulations and good luck; glad to have had a chance to support your RFA. Donner60 (talk) 04:30, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Glad to have your support, Donner60. Thank you very much! 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:23, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Okay So Developments

Okay because I was doing this for school, I contacted the company to see if they could point me to information that would help with making sure this article was beyond a "neologism". Obviously, now I guess you could say I may have a conflict of interest to disclose because in getting them to show me some of their data they are now vested in me getting this published. So How should I go about this.

https://en.everybodywiki.com/Fraud_Orchestration

https://www.fico.com/blogs/orchestration-tailor-made-business-rules

https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/opinions/fighting-fraud-with-data/

https://www.kount.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Ebook-Fraud-in-a-Digital-World.pdf

https://www.bankinfosecurity.asia/how-automation-orchestration-help-cisos-a-12575

These are articles they sent me and they have a medium article so I do not know if that counts toward what you are looking for? Again this was more an experience to me wanting to learn to make a wikipedia page from a topic I learned about in law school, specializing in an emerging legal area as well. Sorry that was a lot, I just want to make sure I am properly handling this! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Brettq888 (talk • contribs) 23:08, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Brettq888,
this is probably less problematic than most conflicts of interest, but I would recommend explaining the connection on your user page anyway. This allows others to quickly get an overview of the situation. You may like to copy the nice explanation from your first paragraph above.
Regarding the links: Interviews with company representatives and press releases by the company are not independent coverage. The blog at fico.com seems to be intended for commercial promotion, not independent journalism.
I personally would recommend not investing volunteer or school time into the promotion of a neologism on Wikipedia. Your work likely makes the company representatives or teachers happy, and they may encourage you to do so, but the efforts appear to be misdirected.
Please have a look at our wonderful task center and perhaps the Wikipedia Adventure for more productive ideas.
If you disagree with this assessment, feel free to improve your draft at Draft:Fraud Orchestration at any time, and feel free to "Resubmit" it for review. An independent other reviewer will then have a look and provide a second opinion. However, please note that no amount of editing can overcome a lack of notability. If something is not notable, no article about it can exist on Wikipedia, no matter how well-written it is.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:45, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Hello! Help with the Bonetti Kozerski page?

Hello! We have added new citations with a neutral tone in October to our page for submission. Just wanted to be sure you had them? Thankyou in advance! Sillaro Valley (talk) 17:29, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Sillaro Valley, "we" is only you, I hope. :)
The draft has been correctly submitted for review. It may take about 8 weeks, and you will be notified at User talk:Sillaro Valley.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:52, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

A cup of coffee for you!

Congratulations on becoming an Administrator! Best wishes, Harshil want to talk? 03:32, 12 November 2019 (UTC)
This is very kind, thank you, Harshil169. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:05, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

+1 Daniel Case (talk) 16:13, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

And thank you too, Daniel Case, also for your kind support. 😊 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:05, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

Congratulations!

Rubbish computer (Talk: Contribs) 11:43, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

Cute 🤗 Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:09, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

Contributions by Psimonson

Moved to WP:AN § Psimonson's contributions
 – ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:33, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

Rudy Rotter

I probably selected the wrong mouse option, the one for an existing draft when I was trying to get the one for an existing article. Oops.

Is there any reason why the draft shouldn't just be redirected to the article? The paid editor still should be told not to edit the article directly. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:30, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Robert McClenon, no worries – I think I did tell the editor about this now, but feel free to provide additional advice. The previous advice by two users seems to have been suggesting editing the article directly, even "boldly" so, so I collapsed it. If I understand the situation correctly, the conflict of interest is unrelated to payment.
About redirecting: Doing so using an actual redirect would prevent the editor from easily requesting the changes to be incorporated into the article. If I see the situation correctly, no further change is currently needed, but do feel free to implement any changes that you consider to be additional improvements. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:39, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
Normally when there is a draft and an article, it is simplest to redirect the draft to the article. In this case, I will leave it alone. I don't want to give you an opportunity to test the new Delete button. Unless you want me to create something and then U1 it so that you can test the new Delete button. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:48, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
😃
Thanks for the kind offer. Leaving the U1 joke aside, I wonder, though... Which deletion criterion would I use? I'm not sure if I understand the suggestion correctly and/or how serious it is. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:54, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
Only half joking. I meant that I could create a test file in user space and then tag it for U1 so that you could see if you can delete it. Actually, in that case, it could be both U1 and G2, because it would be a user request to delete test data. Robert McClenon (talk) 02:09, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
Woopps. G2 doesn't apply in user space. Okay. Robert McClenon (talk) 02:11, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
Ah, I see, thanks for the clarification. I misinterpreted the message as consisting of two parts, an actual deletion suggestion related to the draft and the U1 joke. I've had the unfortunate opportunity of testing both revision deletion and deletion for less amusing cases already, but I wouldn't say no to a humorful U1/G7. To be extra nitpicky, G2 seems to be excluded. 😉 Edit conflict: yup. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:15, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
Would you like to test your ability to look for G4 nominations? Robert McClenon (talk) 22:44, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
😬 A delicate subject, Robert McClenon, considering that one of the few oppose reasons for the RfA was a clear lack of AfD experience. I think that's one of the few speedy deletion criteria I should not yet touch with a ten-foot pole. 😄 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:48, 13 November 2019 (UTC)
Then someone will look at it. Fair enough. Robert McClenon (talk) 23:07, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

Conflict of interest comment

Hello. On my draft article, you said there could be a conflict of interest: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draft:Ryan-Mark_Parsons

Why is this? I don't know the subject, not related, work with him, no mutual friends etc. I simply watch him on BBC One's The Apprentice. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JPA24 (talk • contribs) 17:26, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi JPA24, which source does the birth date come from? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:56, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

I have realised, upon gaining feedback from an editor, to refrain from original research. The BBC announced he is aged 19 and have seen on his social media celebrating his birthday. I have no relationship to the subject or know of his friends/family. I'm merely a viewer of The Apprentice UK. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JPA24‎ (talk • contribs) 20:36, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the explanation, JPA24. If I understand your original question correctly, you wondered why I considered a conflict of interest to be possible here. I still do, and I hope that my questions explain my suspicion.
For example, I wonder about the timing of commons:Special:Diff/375143555 and Special:Diff/925915496, about the similarity of the usernames, about the abbreviation "RMP", and about the edit summary "Permission granted to use photograph." By whom?
Can you see why the claim of "I don't know the subject" looks strange to me? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:37, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

I really think you're looking into this too much. I was using both accounts to edit the article and upload the media. This being my first ever article that I'm attempting to write on Wikipedia, I thought I could tribute one of my usernames to my first subject. That was literally my thought process whilst creating that username - which I'm sure you can agree is understandable. Regarding the permission being granted, the image is in the public domain and there is no copyright. The wording I used was a misapprehension and I can retract that from the media to reflect the process in which was carried out. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JPA24 (talk • contribs) 01:34, 14 November 2019 (UTC)

All right, JPA24, you do not have a conflict of interest then, and I was incorrect. You can then disregard my message and the COI tag CaptainEek has added to the draft. I will clarify this on your talk page.
There is one question left that worries me: Why is the image in the public domain, where have you found it, and why did you license it as your "own work"? This must be fixed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:30, 14 November 2019 (UTC)

I found the image on Google, it was taken in a public building, seemingly the Guildhall in City of London. I will amend where it states it's my 'own work'. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JPA24 (talk • contribs) 16:16, 14 November 2019 (UTC)

JPA24, thank you. When you do so, please use the account that you have used to upload the image, and specify which page exactly you have copied the image from. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:18, 14 November 2019 (UTC)
JPA24, thanks again, I have had a look at the source now. I am afraid that "public domain" may be an incorrect assumption. Details about copyright and licensing can be found at commons:Commons:Licensing. For me personally, the situation is resolved, as there is no conflict of interest and the potential copyright problem has been marked as such. The copyright owner probably needs to send proof of permission to the volunteer license review team, see commons:COM:OTRS. I have added details about the process to commons:User talk:RMP00. In the worst case, the images may be deleted, but I can assure you that images have no effect on the English Wikipedia draft review. We usually recommend uploading images only after the draft has been successfully accepted, to avoid similar issues. It is a common misconception that images from the internet are "public domain" or otherwise freely usable. They usually are not. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:39, 14 November 2019 (UTC)

See also meta:User talk:ToBeFree#Images require permission. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:15, 14 November 2019 (UTC)

Thank you ToBeFree. I will take all of this feedback on-board and work on the draft in other areas and solve the image situation hopefully after approval. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JPA24 (talk • contribs) 21:57, 15 November 2019 (UTC)

You're welcome, JPA24. Good luck with the draft, and afterwards with the images. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:16, 15 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi

Just FYI for what 100kb is referring to, see WP:RPS; your current article was about 82kb. Anyway, best of luck. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:22, 4 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Alanscottwalker, thank you very much for the kind notification. I have now added a "correction" note to the answer. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:40, 4 November 2019 (UTC)

A bowl of strawberries for you!

:) QwertyXV15 (talk) 01:41, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
Oh hey QwertyXV15, this is very kind, thank you! 😃
Enjoy editing, take your time, and feel free to ask if any questions arise. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:43, 16 November 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-47

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

Changes later this week

  • You can soon vote on proposals for the Community Wishlist Survey. The survey decides what the Community Tech team will work on. You can vote on proposals from 20 November to 2 December. This year the wishlist will focus on Wikibooks, Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikisource, Wikiversity, Wikispecies, Wikivoyage and Wikinews. You can read more about the format for this year.
  • There is no new MediaWiki version this week.

Meetings

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

20:17, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

ArbCom 2019 election voter message

Hello! Voting in the 2019 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 on Monday, 2 December 2019. All eligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2019 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. If you no longer wish to receive these messages, you may add {{NoACEMM}} to your user talk page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:15, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

Sir, I need your one help!

Sir, there is one user who is removing images of Muhammad from the pages. Like, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Super_Best_Friends&diff=prev&oldid=926890364 and again https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Contributions/Edward_Zigma&dir=prev&target=Edward+Zigma. Their latest and oldest contributions are like this. I am new here, I was editing anonymously before. So, I request you to check their talk page. This user is removing too details. Please take note. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Krishna's flute (talk • contribs) 07:06, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Krishna's flute, thank you for the notification. I do not want to get involved in that dispute. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:02, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Textus Receptus

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Textus Receptus. Legobot (talk) 04:31, 22 November 2019 (UTC)

Google Code-In 2019 is coming - please mentor some documentation tasks!

Hello,

Google Code-In, Google-organized contest in which the Wikimedia Foundation participates, starts in a few weeks. This contest is about taking high school students into the world of opensource. I'm sending you this message because you recently edited a documentation page at the English Wikipedia.

I would like to ask you to take part in Google Code-In as a mentor. That would mean to prepare at least one task (it can be documentation related, or something else - the other categories are Code, Design, Quality Assurance and Outreach) for the participants, and help the student to complete it. Please sign up at the contest page and send us your Google account address to [email protected], so we can invite you in!

From my own experience, Google Code-In can be fun, you can make several new friends, attract new people to your wiki and make them part of your community.

If you have any questions, please let us know at [email protected].

Thank you!

--User:Martin Urbanec (talk) 21:58, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

The above mess message is probably a bit too enthusiastic regarding my documentation mentoring capability. The list of recipients is large, the kind of requested mentoring seems to be relatively time-intensive and my competence as a mentor in this regard is below what I personally would see as a requirement for offering detailed advice. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:49, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

Vladivostok Air Flight 352

Hello ToBeFree, I've looked at the sources included in the Vladviostok Air Flight 352 article, and I've realized my source is already included. It is https://www.tailstrike.com/040701.htm. It is a full CVR transcript. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.132.211.109 (talk) 13:55, 17 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi 68.132.211.109, thank you very much for taking the time to verify this. However,
  • The link appears in the "External links" section and may not be usable as a source. Its reliability seems doubtful to me; it seems to lack editorial oversight. The "Contact" page makes a poor impression; the transcript may be a copyright violation and/or self-published research by the website owner. See WP:SPS or WP:USERG for details about possible issues with this website.
  • The proposed addition, even with a reliable source, does not seem to be an improvement. The article should be written in an encyclopedic, neutral tone, and should not give undue weight to irrelevant details. Wikipedia does not need to describe whether the pilots cursed before dying or not. I guess most pilots do; there is no need to highlight this in an encyclopedia.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:30, 17 November 2019 (UTC)

Questions by Raymond648

Hello..

Can you help me with something? I need to know why poverty is much lower in a socialist country compared to a capitalist country. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Raymond648 (talk • contribs) 00:33, 17 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Raymond648, the question seems to be based on incorrect generalization, unless it was originally referring to specific countries and has been incompletely relayed here.
Wikipedia is not a forum, but we do have a reference desk that may be able to provide information. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:40, 17 November 2019 (UTC)

Hello...

One more question. Is Wikipedia a reliable source to use? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Raymond648 (talk • contribs) 00:43, 17 November 2019 (UTC)

Raymond648, Wikipedia is not a reliable source – neither for other Wikipedia articles (see WP:REFLOOP), nor for other projects (see WP:General disclaimer). It can be a useful starting point for research when used with care, and when keeping in mind that it is a user-generated tertiary source without any guarantee of validity. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:47, 17 November 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-48

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • The mobile beta mode will be disabled to have less maintenance. The developers will focus on the desktop improvements project. You can turn on advanced mobile contributions mode if you want to see the categories. You could also jump back to the top. This can instead be done with a gadget or user script. [59]
  • Parsoid is software we use for the visual editor, content translation, Flow and the Android app. This has been rewritten. It will come to the wikis gradually over the next two weeks. It has been tested, but there could be some diffs or previews that don't look right. If you see any you can report them. [60]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 26 November. It will be on the other wikis next week (calendar). This is because of holidays.

Meetings

Future changes

  • You will switch between the article and the talk page in a new way in the mobile view in the future. It will use tabs. This is more like in the desktop view. [61]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:52, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

A cupcake for you!

For responding to Interstellarity's question so quickly and answering it in a straightforward, concise way. I learned something new as well! : ) Doug Mehus T·C 18:42, 21 November 2019 (UTC)
Hey Dmehus, you're welcome, and thank you very much for the cupcake and the kind feedback. 🙂 The actual solution can be found on the Huggle feedback page, Special:PermanentLink/7927332666#Warning_user. Technical details about the newly learned information can be found at
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:20, 21 November 2019 (UTC)

Karaburun Peninsula

I read your post but just seconds before posting my response, Cyberbot archived the thread! Thanks again. Cheers :) Ktrimi991 (talk) 02:25, 22 November 2019 (UTC)

Oh hi Ktrimi991, thank you for writing the reply (even if lost), the original report, and for your kind message here as well. 😊 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:27, 22 November 2019 (UTC)

Edits to page on Cremation

Hi there - thanks for the feedback on the edits I had made to the page on cremation. I do apologise that I had not appreciated the rules.

However, I am a little puzzled as to why the links that I was trying to amend, have been allowed to stay when they are links to a third party commercial operation (selling a product)?

Will you be dealing with removing those links also?

Many thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wendywoowoo (talk • contribs) 14:35, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Wendywoowoo, no worries. It is clear that this has been a genuine misunderstanding.
Please take a moment to disclose your connection to the not-for-profit organisation, ideally on your user page. As you seem to be messaging me as a part of your job, please see WP:PAID for the requirements, specifically the "Wikimedia Foundation Terms of Use" section. I will happily help with this if technical questions arise, but I can't answer any other messages until the disclosure has been properly provided. You are not required to use a template or special code for this; just write the required information in plain text.
After you have done so, feel free to reply with a list of articles that still seem to contain links to third party commercial websites selling products. Please also specify which link exactly you are referring to in these articles.
Thank you very much in advance!
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:58, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

Your message on my talk page

Just saying, I literally just got on the computer and got this message. I'm not the one who vandalized the page. 64.251.57.106 (talk) 17:49, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi 64.251.57.106, no worries. Feel free to ignore any messages directed at other users of your IP address. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:38, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

Completely lost in publishing

Hi,

I tried to add new keyword - Cloudification, but it has been declined from several reasons.

What does it mean here it HAVE TO NOT CONTAIN OPINIONS? WHAT IS in this article NOT NEUTRAL? why I have CONFLICT OF INTEREST according to your response?

This is just short description, which hopefully will create some community updates and extension. Because it is a new topic, I have not any sources to refer. This is therefore completely new text, not copied from the internet.

I am completely lost and need your kind help to be able to publish this article.

Thank you

Beda

This submission reads more like an essay than an encyclopedia article. Submissions should summarise information in secondary, reliable sources and not contain opinions or original research. Please write about the topic from a neutral point of view in an encyclopedic manner.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Vavrena (talk • contribs) 09:28, 26 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Beda, welcome to Wikipedia.
It may not be possible to publish an article about Cloudification on Wikipedia yet. Not all topics qualify for inclusion; an (over)simplified summary of the inclusion criteria can be found at WP:42.
If it is a new topic without any sources to refer to, it is per definition unsuitable for Wikipedia, a tertiary source that does not publish original research.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:07, 26 November 2019 (UTC)

Karla (name)

Can you protect this page? I have a request in at RPP; nothing but vandalism since it became unprotected. Home Lander (talk) 00:04, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Home Lander, thank you very much for the two reports and the protection request – I had seen the AIV reports on the IRC monitoring channel and decided to re-start the desktop computer to handle them as the last action for today, so I'll conveniently leave that decision to the next RPP patrolling admin. 😉 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:14, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

Hello

This is logan in georgia...I have a special rainbow dragon in my dream now..and I have the ability to control my dreams...but in reality now also....I need a helping hand from the guardian and observer...I need angelic sos......reach me at (Redacted)....love and light — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1700:B7D0:68F0:E400:7D:7B9A:B9AC (talk) 09:18, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

Ah, okay. Better don't edit Wikipedia while dreaming. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:33, 28 November 2019 (UTC)

Thanks

For your swift action. The user is definitely trying to pretend to be me. Myself and Materialscientist was harrassed by an IP a few months ago and the IP proxy was unblocked recently so could be that person. Again, thank you.BabbaQ (talk) 14:36, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

Hey BabbaQ, you're welcome. I lack the background knowledge about this case; perhaps a block is well-warranted already, and an administrator will implement it. Also, I'll ping Materialscientist to the report, to ensure that Materialscientist sees the report even if it has already been archived. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:39, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
OK, good. I have contacted user Berean Hunter who dealt with the IP.BabbaQ (talk) 14:42, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
This is one of several messages from the IP, remember though that it is a proxy that uses a number of IPs. Just so you see some context. [62]. Hopefully your warning is enough.BabbaQ (talk) 15:00, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
Thank you very much for the context; this seems to have quite a history. I'll watch to see what happens next. If the user continues to follow other users around, I'll block them. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:15, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
BabbaQ, thanks again for the report. Berean Hunter has checkuser-blocked the account and linked it to Golf-ben10 (Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Golf-ben10). If the same behavior continues from a different account, an alternative way of getting help (currently pretty quickly) is filing a sockpuppet investigation for Golf-ben10. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:32, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

Trying to request IPvandal block

Hi ToBeFree,

I’m trying to use the correct way of requesting the block of a IPVandal account. From your messages I can see I’m not very good at this. Can you please advise? Many thanks and apologies for any inconvenience Melroross (talk) 19:22, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi Melroross, no worries – now I understand what has happened. 🙂
You have probably clicked the "IPvandal" link in the instructions at WP:AIV. Instead of clicking the link, please:
  • Open WP:AIV.
  • Click "edit" or "edit source" next to the "User-reported" heading.
  • Copy the example line from "Anonymous Users (IP addresses):"
  • Paste the example line at the bottom.
  • Replace "IP address" by the IP address, for example 127.0.0.1.
  • Replace "brief reason for listing (keep it short)" by a good reason for blocking the IP address from editing.
Please note that the noticeboard is only for obvious vandals who have recently edited and must quickly be blocked. Vandalism means intentionally damaging the encyclopedia.
In all other cases, please see Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents. Please carefully read the explanation at the top of that page ("This page is for discussion of urgent incidents and chronic, intractable behavioral problems."). The box contains help for dealing with various other problems.
Feel free to ask here or at the Teahouse if further questions arise, at any time. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:44, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 29 November 2019

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:24, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

Killeshin GAA vandalism

Hello ToBeFree, Hon the town might be a WP:DUCK of Hon the yard (who you just blocked), judging by the name and disruptive editing on the same article. You may also wish to take a look at this account, and block it if necessary. ComplexRational (talk) 22:38, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

Hi ComplexRational, thank you very much for the notice. A sockpuppet investigation exists now at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Hon_the_yard. Feel free to create such investigations in similar cases; Twinkle makes this easy ("ARV" button). Ideally, I'd then look at an investigation you're sending me a link to.
In this clear case, I took action on request, but I'd prefer actions to be requested on central noticeboards, if possible. Perhaps I'm a bit pedantic in this regard. 🙂
Thanks again and best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:52, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
I just thought that the resemblance was evident enough in this case that an SPI would be unnecessarily bureaucratic, but I would agree SPI a better general practice (more so in non-DUCK cases?). I'll certainly keep this in mind. Thank you again for looking into this. Cheers, ComplexRational (talk) 23:20, 29 November 2019 (UTC)
It was definitely evident enough; I tend to be overly bureaucratic. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:23, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – December 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2019).

Administrator changes

added EvergreenFir • ToBeFree
removed Akhilleus • Athaenara • John Vandenberg • Melchoir • MichaelQSchmidt • NeilN • Youngamerican • 😂

CheckUser changes

readded Beeblebrox
removed Deskana

Interface administrator changes

readded Evad37

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:48, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-49

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Mix'n'match is a tool to connect Wikidata items to information in other databases. It can be used to find subjects that are missing in a Wikipedia. It now has more than 3000 datasets. Before it was closer to 2000.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 3 December. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 4 December. It will be on all wikis from 5 December (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

  • Advanced item There will be a new schema for XML dumps. Scripts and apps that use them will need to be updated. If they are not updated they will no longer work. [63]
  • Advanced item The {{REVISIONID}} magic word will no longer work in the content namespaces. This is for performance reasons. When you preview a page it returns "" (empty string). When you read a page it returns "-" (dash). In the future this will also affect other namespaces. The next ones are file and category namespaces. [64]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:59, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Did you know

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Did you know. Legobot (talk) 04:31, 8 December 2019 (UTC)

Re: Josh Supan

Good day,

I'm writing to you to express concern about the article for Josh Supan. I work with Forbes Asia. We need a Wikipedia page for one of the new additions to our Forbes Asia 30 under 30 list. I would like to ask for your help in getting Josh Supan's page published. Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by GianSantillan (talk • contribs) 15:24, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi GianSantillan, welcome to Wikipedia, and thank you very much for asking.
Wikipedia is not a free webspace provider, and not a platform for promotion. Wikipedia has notability criteria that Josh Supan does not meet. An article about Josh Supan can not be published on Wikipedia, no matter how well-written it is.
Additionally:
If you are interested in contributing to this encyclopedia as a volunteer in your free time, about topics unrelated to you, you are welcome to have a look at our Task Center and the community portal. The Wikipedia Adventure may be an interesting tutorial in this case.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:08, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-50

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Wikimedia projects use Translatewiki to translate the wiki interface. You can now use WatchTranslations to watch projects there. You would get an email if there are missing translations to your language. [65]
  • Advanced item There is a new dataset you can use. It shows the number of editors per country per month for a number of countries. You can read the documentation and download the dataset.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 10 December. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 11 December. It will be on all wikis from 12 December (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:38, 9 December 2019 (UTC)

December talk by Priyanka8971

Hi, Thanks for letting me know that I will be blocked if I proceed with those editings, I have read what HUg syrup has written and I will move according to that. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Priyanka8971 (talk • contribs) 17:37, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi Priyanka8971, thank you very much for the response. However, you have not yet clarified:
  • Do you receive, or expect to receive, compensation for your edits to Wikipedia?
Please take a moment to answer this question. You can choose to do so here or on your talk page. Thank you very much in advance. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:36, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

6 December ,Priyanka8971

Hi Tobefree, I have not yet received any payment from anyone for wiki article, will receive in future if the page/article is published and live in Wikipedia, so what next I can do? As per your marked lines, I have disclosed the paid statement on my priyanka8971 page.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Priyanka8971

What else can I do, and how to create the page for Nandog.

Please help, as this is my first project and I am a freelancer, Need to earn for my kid. Please help by any means for me, if you can on the wiki.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Priyanka8971 (talk • contribs) 07:49, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

Welcome back, Priyanka8971,
Thank you very much for the disclosure and explanation, on your user page and here. While the disclosure on your user page is nothing unusual, the explanation here sets a new record of tragedy in the history of this talk page.
Please read these words carefully. If you disagree with these words, please read them again. If you then still disagree with them, please at least accept them, even if you do not agree to them.
  • There is no chance for these articles to be published, as their subjects are not notable. See WP:42 for an (over)simplified explanation of the problem.
  • Your reputation as a person has already been damaged for money. Please do not make it worse.
  • Your time and hope seems to be misused by companies who do not care about you nor your child.
  • You will not make any money here, no matter how much you try. Your contract contains conditions that you can not fulfill.
It deeply saddens me to see a mother making promotional edits on Wikipedia to earn money for raising her child. Please do not do this. It is a bad idea and can not succeed.
I wish you and your child all the best.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:20, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

Building an encyclopedia

A gentle suggestion. Instead of tearing up the tracks of User:Internnh and his/her adding of MacDowell Medial Winner, you could simply have added "MacDowell Medal winners — 1960–2011". The Telegraph. 13 April 2011. Retrieved 6 December 2019. as a source. I understand that you want to enforce policy, but there were alternative approaches. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 20:31, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Hey 7&6=thirteen,
Thank you very much for looking up a universal citation, and for the message. As always, you are correct. 🙂
I have incorrectly assumed that such a convenient secondary source doesn't exist, and saw both your and Schazjmd's messages too late. As the award is obviously notable, I have restored Internnh's edits with minor adjustments such as adding a wikilink or moving the additions a bit further up the timeline, and citing your proposed reference.
Only the edit to Stephen Sondheim, referring to an award that happened after publication of the above-mentioned citation, remains undone. Be it a compromise solution, a teaching attempt or pedantism – I'll let someone else find a citation, and hope that Internnh will be this person.
Lastly, one could argue that the edits did not even violate the verifiability policy and did not even need to be reverted from a verification point of view. Yes... Possibly. I normally do not undo such additions when I see them on patrol, for precisely this reason. In this specific case, there was the extremely rare conditition of having public, clear proof for a lack of a required COI disclosure. That alone doesn't justify reverting an edit, but when dealing with self-promotional paid edits to biographies, we may have a lower level of tolerance than usual. I rarely do such mass-reverts; there is often a more productive approach at the cost of doing someone else's paid job for them. More often than not, that's what I sighingly decide to do.
Thank you again and have a nice day. Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:00, 6 December 2019 (UTC)
I hate to see new constructive editors being crushed as they come out of the box. I meant no criticism of you. I only suggested what I believed to be a more constructive solution to the problems — a Saddle point in the dispute. Best regards. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 22:08, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Civility Barnstar
Well done. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 21:22, 6 December 2019 (UTC)
😄 Apparently I get barnstars for bad edits. I'll keep that in mind. ;) Just kidding.
Thank you very much, 7&6=thirteen, for the kind gift. Ever since the food party with you and Abelmoschus Esculentus, your username is connected to the custom Dobos torte in my mind. Now the color of the signature is, too. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:19, 6 December 2019 (UTC)
You get barnstars for undoing bad edits. And not getting an attitude when somebody calls on you.
It is too easy to be defensive; a tiger trap for all of us, I think
Collegiality and cooperation are what we are (ideally at least) supposed to do.
We are all volunteers.
We should be in common cause. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 23:07, 6 December 2019 (UTC)
💚😊 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:22, 6 December 2019 (UTC)
IMO, the biggest threat to our project is editor recruitment and retention. We use pokes too often, and strokes too little. Positive reinforcement is the best way to alter many behavioral patterns. B.F. Skinner had the answer. It worked for rats; it works for people as well. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 23:58, 6 December 2019 (UTC)
Heh. I have a feeling that's a slightly controversial metaphor. :) But yes, definitely. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:03, 7 December 2019 (UTC)
And we all make mistakes. Computers have made me faster; but they have not made me more accurate. It is not a question of "if"; it is a question of "when".
There is a reason why they put a DELETE BUTTON on a computer. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 21:44, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

Please help me

Hello ToBeFree, first of all thanks a lot for advices. I'm a newbie on Wikipedia and I often do edits on commission; my purpose is not to work againts Wikipedia rules but only to update pages with the right informations. Clients who ask for this know very well that I can't write false or texts that promote them but only give the correct information. Now I am going to update my profile with all the referencies you have written and then I'm going to read the right procedure in order not to work against Wikipedia rules. Please tell me If I'm doing all great, thanks a lot! Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fabio Roffinott (talk • contribs) 09:22, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi Fabio Roffinott, welcome to Wikipedia.
Thank you very much for the disclosure and your message. We do welcome factual, non-promotional corrections, and a conflict of interest is not necessarily a problem by itself. In this specific case, there are a few points of advice left.
  • On your user page, perhaps simply below the current disclosure, please provide links to all active accounts on external websites where you offer paid editing services. See meta:Linking_to_external_advertising_accounts for the relevant policy.
  • On these external websites, please provide a link back to your user page on Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Fabio_Roffinott). When dealing with clients, please make sure that they are aware of the facts described in WP:COI, section "Solicitations by paid editors".
  • While you are not required to read every word of it, I recommend having a thorough look at Wikipedia's conflict of interest guideline. Please note that the guideline contains stronger wording regarding paid editing than other types of COI.
  • Specifically, unless you are removing (not "replacing" or "correcting") factually incorrect information, please request edits by clicking "Talk" above an article, then "New section". On the talk page, you can use the code {{request edit}} at the top of the new section to notify independent reviewers of your request. Such requests are usually answered within a week, often within 24 hours. In your first sentence, please mention that you are being paid to request the edits on behalf of CompanyName. Below this clarification, please request the desired changes in a "please replace X by Y" format, if possible. Provide at least one reliable source, ideally an independent secondary source, that directly supports your addition (see WP:BURDEN). At the very bottom of the text, use the code "~~~~" to sign your request. If you would like to propose multiple changes, I recommend using bullet points just like I do in this message.
  • If you would ever like to create a new article about a topic, please use the WP:Wizard to do so. Click "Next" on the first step, not "Edit your sandbox", and not "Wikipedia Sandbox". All other steps are self-explanatory. See WP:42 and think twice before accepting such a job; if a company needs to hire a paid editor to write an article, they are extremely unlikely to be notable. See the section above for a clear warning about this kind of requests.
At any time, feel free to ask questions that are left or arise during the process. You seem to be doing this with the right attitude and competence, and despite all warnings, your careful, kind approach may well be one of the reasons why the community does not forbid paid editing completely. Thank you very much for taking the time to do this correctly.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:40, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Hello ToBeFree, thanks again for the advices. Let me be helpful in order not to compromise Wikipedia rules: I don't have active accounts on external websites where I offer paid editing services. I will for sure use the tool "Talk" for next little edit con Cassa Centrale Banca page. Thanks again.

Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fabio Roffinott (talk • contribs) 16:51, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Fabio Roffinott, ah, I thought you'd be working for multiple clients and looking for new ones. All right then; you're welcome. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:55, 10 December 2019 (UTC)

Really?

This. After a single edit - which could even have been a misunderstanding of grammar. Wow. Ghmyrtle (talk) 20:00, 13 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi Ghmyrtle, please compare Special:Diff/930474746 and Special:Diff/930619077. While not explicitly marked as such, it is a sockpuppetry block as well. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:03, 13 December 2019 (UTC)

Sorry, my mistake - I was confusing their edit with this one. All good. Ghmyrtle (talk) 20:09, 13 December 2019 (UTC)

That would indeed have been a bad block 😄 – no worries and thank you very much for asking. It can't hurt to review blocks; feel free to ask again if any other of my actions seem strange in the future. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:13, 13 December 2019 (UTC)

Jeff Van Drew - page protection request

Hi ToBeFree, this person is reported to be changing political parties but no official announcement yet. Currently, several IPs are changing his party (good faith given the news) and/or adding defamatory content (such as traitor, clown, etc.). I have submitted a request at RFPP but given the activity, will please protect for a couple days until things are more settled? S0091 (talk) 22:57, 14 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi S0091, thank you very much for your request, and for the trust implied by it. Requesting page protection is probably a reasonable step, and having done so at RFPP is perfect. Unless extremely urgent, I prefer to avoid implementing requests for administrative action made directly on my talk page. This ensures a neutral review, and it guarantees a timely answer even when I am offline. Coincidentally, I will actually be offline now.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:19, 14 December 2019 (UTC)
Understood and respected TBF. Thanks for your reply. S0091 (talk) 23:58, 14 December 2019 (UTC)
You're welcome :)
Note: The resulting action went beyond page protection: Talk:Jeff_Van_Drew#Discretionary_sanctions ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:36, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

== Just copy the source code and paste it on the talk page of the user you wish to invite.

This user has been invited WikiProject Prussia please consider checking us out.

==

Nice piano playing by the way. (: Kaiser Kitkat (talk) 20:22, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

Hey, thank you very much for the kind invitation. It is the first wikiproject invitation I have ever received, I think. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:52, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

You deserve more. (: Kaiser Kitkat (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 18:21, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

Also, do you plan to join? Kaiser Kitkat (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 18:23, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

😊 I'm just a butterfly, free and without project association. 🦋 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:27, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

Okay, best wishes. Kaiser Kitkat (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 22:26, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

Message by Takeem3250

music is subjective — Preceding unsigned comment added by Takeem3250 (talk • contribs) 17:42, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi Takeem3250, when making such edits, please provide at least one reliable source that directly supports your addition. See WP:INTREF for help. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:45, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

define reliable source — Preceding unsigned comment added by Takeem3250 (talk • contribs) 17:48, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

Takeem3250, see WP:Reliable sources. Exceptional claims such as "universally ... among experts" need exceptionally reliable sources. See WP:REDFLAG for details. Do not continue to add such text without a reliable citation, or you may be blocked from editing without further warning. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:51, 16 December 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-51

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • The Linter extension helps you find technical errors in articles. It did not show new changes last week. This was because of an API problem. It is now working again. [67]
  • Special:Watchlist can show the wrong information again. It does not always show which edits are read and which are unread. This is because of a database problem. The developers are working on solving the problem. [68]

Changes later this week

  • You can get email notifications. You can get them immediately, a summary every day or a summary once every week. If you choose a summary you can soon choose not to get notifications you have already marked as read on the wiki. [69]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 17 December. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 18 December. It will be on all wikis from 19 December (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

  • The partial blocks feature is now stable. It will come to most wikis on 6 January. Your wiki can ask to wait. Contact NKohli (WMF) if you don't want it now. [70]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

00:18, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

LisaThorne007

Thank you for being another administrator who is working to deal with undisclosed paid editing.

Maybe I should clarify that I didn't "just" mean that all that was being done was gaming the system, because I use the term "gaming the system" to encompass a number of forms of what would be called cheating in academic circles.

Do you know why that sockpuppet report has been open for nine days?

I didn't know about the request for a disclosure of COI. If I had, I would of course have mentioned it.

I frequently work Articles for Creation requests in user space, and I normally try to move them into draft space. Usually they move all right. Sometimes there is already a draft at the same title. There are at least two possible reasons for there already being a draft. First, the editor is just creating two copies of the draft, which is innocent. Second, another editor created the draft. If the two drafts are different in content, then two editors are interested in the same subject, usually a person, and I ask them to combine the two drafts into one that contains more complete information about the subject. However, sometimes there are two identical drafts by different accounts. In that case, either the second account is ripping off the first version without attribution, possible but less likely, or the two accounts are sockpuppets. Most of the sockpuppets that I report are ones that I find because they are trying to cheat on the AFC process.

Thank you in general. We need more admins who see undisclosed paid editing as one of the threats to the integrity of the encyclopedia.

Why is the SPI open so long?

Robert McClenon (talk) 17:15, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Hey Robert McClenon, thank you very much for your kind message and for dealing with these issues. 🙂
I think my comment might cause the SPI to get finally processed; perhaps others saw the report and didn't find the behavior disruptive enough to warrant a block. "Undisclosed paid editing" might be the key term for attention there. Let's see what happens in the next days. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:20, 17 December 2019 (UTC)
User:ToBeFree - Maybe there is a lesson, which is that in filing future SPIs, most of which are about questionable BLPs, I should look briefly for evidence of undisclosed paid editing and mention it in the SPI. Also, I have a standard {{COIinquiry}} that I sometimes put in drafts. Maybe I should use it more often, because if it is asked and not answered, it creates more of a case of possible UPE. Okay. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:43, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Edit warring

It is user Kthxbay that is engaging in edit warring, removing random bits of text from articles for no reason. I'm simply trying to keep Wikipedia useful and informative, which is somewhat lacking in Indian music articles. Please talk to him/her and get them to stop edit warring with the threat of a block (or protect the original version of the pages). SwarSadhak (talk) 19:19, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

SwarSadhak, I have warned both participants of the edit war at Indian classical music. It was you who continued to revert instead of discussing the matter at Talk:Indian classical music after the warning. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:48, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Ninjabot360

This was headed to a block regardless so no issue there, but the reason might not have been the right one. It's not a profane or threatening username. I don't think it impersonates, though I obviously don't know everyone. As far as username blocks go, this one might have fit under Bot usernames though. Anyway, just meant to be a friendly nudge/advice. -- ferret (talk) 00:26, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi ferret, thank you very much for the friendly advice. I had considered {{Uw-botublock}}, but that's a soft-block template without a hard-block equivalent. {{Uw-uhblock}} seems to be the generic alternative in such cases, although its default text focuses too much on what most such blocks seem to be about. The text "or suggests that you do not intend to contribute positively to the encyclopedia" seemed to be fitting enough, but was definitely not ideal. I have personalized the template in Special:Diff/931455826 now, and replaced the block reason by a more fitting one in Special:Redirect/logid/104347547. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:40, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
Not too big a deal, the template texts don't always match what one might expect. I pretty much expected to CIR block that one with the next edit either way, so you're right on that part fitting. -- ferret (talk) 00:41, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

ANI (smh, once again...)

Information icon There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. -- Begoon 12:05, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi Begoon, thank you for the notification. We seem to have noticeably differing opinions about WP:AGF. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:07, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
I think it's more likely that we have noticeably different opinions about how an admin should perform the role they've been entrusted with. But I'll get to that later, if necessary - I hope it won't be necessary. For now I'm much more concerned that the editor in question be prevented from deleting swathes of useful referencing content, contrary to WP:DEADLINK and, well, just simple common sense. -- Begoon 12:34, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Your work at AIV

Having just run into the above mentioned discussion on ANI, I just thought I'd mention my appreciation for the work you've been doing at AIV recently. I keep noticing it, because the work of declining inappropriate reports is underappreciated there. Lots of admins (certainly me included) skip in there to check for obvious vandals that need a fast block, but the effort of declining questionable reports, or otherwise dealing with the grey-area stuff that probably shouldn't have been there in the first place is genuinely important; and many of the questionable reports would really have got a much faster response if they'd just quickly described the issue on WP:ANI. I do hope you continue with this! ~ mazca talk 23:04, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

This is very kind, Mazca, thank you very much. Now I can sleep well. 🙂💚 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:21, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Happy holidays

Interstellarity (talk) is wishing you Happy Holidays! This greeting (and season) promotes WikiLove and hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user Happy Holidays, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Happy New Year!

Spread the cheer by adding {{subst:Happy holidays}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

Hey Interstellarity, thank you very much! Happy Holidays to you too! 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:33, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Merry Merry!

Merry Christmas and a Prosperous 2020!

Hello ToBeFree, may you be surrounded by peace, success and happiness on this seasonal occasion. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Sending you heartfelt and warm greetings for Christmas and New Year 2020.
Happy editing,
★Trekker (talk) 14:49, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Spread the love by adding {{subst:Seasonal Greetings}} to other user talk pages.

Hey ★Trekker, thank you very much! 🙂 To you too; enjoy the holidays. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:10, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas and a Prosperous 2020!

Hello ToBeFree, may you be surrounded by peace, success and happiness on this seasonal occasion. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Sending you heartfelt and warm greetings for Christmas and New Year 2020.
Happy editing,
Katniss May the odds be ever in your favor ♥ 23:38, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Spread the love by adding {{subst:Seasonal Greetings}} to other user talk pages.

Hey KatnissEverdeen, nice to meet you again.
I just had a look at your talk page and smiled about the button at the top. Slowly, slowly, the template is gaining usage. I had hoped for a kind of "epidemic" distribution, but that was a bit too optimistic.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you too! 😊
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:31, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

TheNerdyKid848- The Mandalorian Edits

Hi, I just wanted to know what the standards are for "neutral" writing. I tried to keep the edits from the Mandalorian page solely based on episode reviews, show ratings, and statistical information, not for it to sound opinionated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheNerdyKid848 (talk • contribs) 01:46, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi TheNerdyKid848, you had added the word "very" to the following sentence: Special:Diff/931899263 (your addition: Special:Diff/931898128).
Instead of adding "very" to it, I have removed the sentence for not being a neutral, encyclopedic description.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:07, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Oh, okay. That's understandable. So, would adding the sentence in a more neutral way by saying "The Mandalorian has received acclaim for it's writing, characters, etc." be acceptable without any adverbs like "very" to strength any opinion speculation? — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheNerdyKid848 (talk • contribs) 02:11, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi TheNerdyKid848, no worries. Regarding the proposed sentence, nah; I'd not add any such sentence to the lead section of an article. The lead section is prominently visible, and the sentence has no encyclopedic meaning. The article is better without it, sorry. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:13, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Oh, okay. Thank you for the response. Happy holidays. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheNerdyKid848 (talk • contribs) 02:15, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

(I would like to add something to my previous message: The same words could be said about anything; that's my main reasoning. If it can be said about anything, it is probably meaningless.)
You're welcome, thank you for your edits, and happy holidays to you too. Welcome to Wikipedia, TheNerdyKid848, and feel free to ask at any time if new questions arise. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:18, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Will do, thank you! :D — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheNerdyKid848 (talk • contribs) 02:20, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Frohe Weihnachten!

Merry Christmas and a Prosperous 2020!

Hello ToBeFree, may you be surrounded by peace, success and happiness on this seasonal occasion. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Sending you heartfelt and warm greetings for Christmas and New Year 2020.
Happy editing,
JACKINTHEBOX • TALK 08:25, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Spread the love by adding {{subst:Seasonal Greetings}} to other user talk pages.

😄 Dir auch frohe Weihnachten, JackintheBox, und alles Gute für 2020. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:17, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Season's Greetings

FWiW Bzuk (talk) 12:47, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Heh! Thank you very much, Bzuk. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you too! 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:18, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Tech News: 2019-52

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Tech News

  • Because of the holidays the next issue of Tech News will be sent out on 6 January 2020.

Recent changes

  • All mobile site users now have new features. Features include: tabs for page/discussion; an expanded user-menu; direct access to history pages. These features were initially part of the "advanced mode".

Changes later this week

  • There is no new MediaWiki version this week or next week.

Future changes

  • You can use setlang in the URL to change the user interface language. This will no longer happen automatically. When you open the link you will be asked to confirm the language change. This will not happen if Javascript is not working in your browser. [71]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

20:08, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

A Joyous Yuletide to you!

Christmas card by Louis Prang, showing a group of anthropomorphized frogs parading with banner and band.
Carole of the Bells by Pentatonix


Hello TBF, may you be surrounded by peace, success and happiness on this seasonal occasion. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Sending you heartfelt and warm greetings for Christmas and New Year 2020.
Happy editing, 7&6=thirteen (☎) 20:45, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Hey 7&6=thirteen, thank you very much! Pentatonix, wonderful. Merry Christmas to you too, and thanks for inadvertently teaching me a new word, Yuletide. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:14, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

Good luck

豊かな十年へようこそ/WELCOME TO THE D20s

Miraclepine wishes you a Merry Christmas, a Happy New Year, and a prosperous decade of change and fortune.
このミラPはToBeFreeたちのメリークリスマスも新年も変革と幸運の豊かな十年をおめでとうございます！
フレフレ、みんなの未来！/GOOD LUCK WITH YOUR FUTURE!
ミラP 02:17, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

Hey Miraclepine, thank you very much, best wishes to you too! The transparently floating image is an interesting effect. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:37, 25 December 2019 (UTC)
And so is the impression that she's practically stepping out of the image, as if she is going from one place to the next (think the 2010s to the 2020s). ミラP 02:38, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

Season's Greetings

Merry Christmas and a Prosperous 2020!

Hello ToBeFree, may you be surrounded by peace, success and happiness on this seasonal occasion. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Sending you heartfelt and warm greetings for Christmas and New Year 2020.
Happy editing,
Donner60 (talk) 07:01, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

Spread the love by adding {{subst:Seasonal Greetings}} to other user talk pages.

Hey Donner60, thank you very much. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you too. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:16, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

Edit warring by User:Aryan790

Hi, heads up -- following your final warning for edit warring you posted on their talk page, Aryan790 has again removed the line in question. They have not made any effort to discuss on any talk page, either. Thanks! –Erakura(talk) 05:28, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi Erakura, thanks for the quick notification. Except for the typography fix, I won't be touching the article directly; that's something for others to do, perhaps after discussion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:34, 26 December 2019 (UTC)
Agreed - as I've stated in my edits to the article, I'm no linguistics expert, so my input is probably of minimal usefulness to the conversation. (In hindsight, for this reason, I likely should have stayed uninvolved in the first place.) Therefore I will also not be touching it any further. Thank you for the quick response! –Erakura(talk) 05:37, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

a friend

I hate to not AGF, but I seem to see the word "friend" come up in cases of possible UPE. Plausible, endearing, heart melting. Who would willingingly stand in the way of friendship?-- Deepfriedokra 22:15, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

Heh, Deepfriedokra, thanks – I take it that you don't believe the "friend" explanation? I'm not sure yet, as I currently lack an answer to my latest question. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:25, 26 December 2019 (UTC)
Born sceptic, that's me.-- Deepfriedokra 22:35, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 December 2019

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 12:38, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Dangerous Woman

You may consider pp-sock this article. --Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 03:31, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi Thegooduser, this may well be a valid suggestion, and I had the article's history open hovering over the protection button... Hmm hmm. Would you mind asking at WP:RFPP for it? 🙂
Thank you so much for your reverts and the other request already. It took me a while to notice how widespread this sockpuppetry is, over time and places. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:33, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
Thanks for blocking and protecting the article! I would have still been smashing the rollback button right now if it were not for you thanks. --Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 03:35, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
😄👍 no worries ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:36, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
I am pretty sure they would say not enough disruption at rfpp, but it's worth a try! --Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 03:36, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
Yup to both 😉 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:37, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
Do you know how to troubleshoot technical issues? Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 03:38, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
Oh, that's a very broad question, Thegooduser. With scripts? If so, I'd remove all of them and then re-enable one by one to see if one causes problems. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:41, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
Yea scripts, I asked at vpt, gonna see what the folks there say. Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 03:42, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
Do you use Windows 10 or Ubuntu/other Linux? Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 03:43, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
Both; currently mostly (K)ubuntu. I hope I was able to solve the VPT question :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:45, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
Sorry, the script still does not work. Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 03:50, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
Going to bed now, will check back at vpt in a few days :) Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 03:50, 28 December 2019 (UTC)
Ah, I noticed and re-replied already. The advice is now the same as before: Try removing the others first. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:53, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

Happy Holidays!

Hello ToBeFree: Enjoy the holiday season and winter solstice if it's occurring in your area of the world, and thanks for your work to maintain, improve and expand Wikipedia. Cheers, Fylindfotberserk (talk) 17:44, 29 December 2019 (UTC)

Spread the WikiLove; use {{subst:Season's Greetings}} to send this message
Oh hey Fylindfotberserk. 😊 I highly appreciate your maintenance of biographies. Happy New Year to you too! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:48, 29 December 2019 (UTC)
Thanks man. Thank you very much. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 17:50, 29 December 2019 (UTC)

Happy New Year ToBeFree!

Happy New Year!
Hello ToBeFree:
Thanks for all of your contributions to improve the encyclopedia for Wikipedia's readers, and have a happy and enjoyable New Year! Cheers, ★Trekker (talk) 19:56, 30 December 2019 (UTC)



Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year fireworks (static)}} to user talk pages with a friendly message.
Thanks again, ★Trekker. 🙂 To you too! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:46, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Happy New Year

Heading added ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:35, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Happy New Year!
Hello ToBeFree:


Did you know ... that back in 1885, Wikipedia editors wrote Good Articles with axes, hammers and chisels?

Thank you for your contributions to this encyclopedia using 21st century technology. I hope you don't get any unnecessary blisters.

CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 06:59, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Spread the WikiLove; use {{subst:Happy New Year elves}} to send this message
Thank you very much, CAPTAIN RAJU; a Happy New Year to you too! 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:12, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!
ToBeFree,
Have a great 2020 and thanks for your continued contributions to Wikipedia.

   – 2020 is a leap year – news article.
   – Background color is Classic Blue (#0F4C81), Pantone's 2020 Color of the year

Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year 2020}} to user talk pages.

– Utopes (talk) 04:32, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Hey Utopes, I hope you have a great new year too! 🙂 Thank you very much. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:12, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

VaughnDickerson1

Heading added ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:35, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Hey, I wanted to drop by and say that User:VaughnDickerson1, who you warned about non-neutral editing earlier this month (and who had a history of non-neutral editing in favor of Christian biblical literalism), appears to be going to various Jewish pages and breaking MOS:BC by changing BCE/BC to BC/AD without first adding an "Era" section to the talk page (presumably, based on edit history, in the effort to add Christ to Jewish topic pages.) I did about a half-hour of research, and wasn't sure whether to report this as vandalism, and whether I should revert these changes, particularly as an inexperienced user without much history, so I thought I'd just let you know that he appears to be violating this warning?

Jess from online (talk) 04:02, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Hey Jess from online, thank you very much for the report. This does indeed seem to be a problem. If I see correctly, Salvidrim! has noticed it (or seen the report) as well and dealt with the situation nicely for now. If the issue persists, please give the user one more warning. The warning should make clear that repeatedly making such changes after objection has been voiced can cause the person to be blocked from editing.
If, after that final warning, the user still continues to make similar problematic changes, please create a new section at WP:ANI about them. When you have done so, please immediately notify the following editors about the discussion:
  • VaughnDickerson1
  • Salvidrim!
  • ToBeFree
I will keep an eye on the situation myself too, but please don't rely on me in this regard – when the issue persists, the instructions above are probably the best way to deal with the problem directly, without waiting for me.
Thank you very much again, Jess from online, and enjoy the new year. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:35, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
Thanks ToBeFree, as you've noticed yes I'm already aware! Jess is an off-wiki friend new to Wikipedia and had asked me for advice last night. As you noted I reverted and left a notice for the latest edits but did suggest as an avenue for further help that Jess could leave a note to the admin who left the first warning (ANI seemed a heavy-handed first recourse for the current minimal level of disruption and AIV isn't ideal for this kinda stuff that isn't unambiguously vandalism). But I agree that if problems should persist or aggravate with this user's editing, ANI is indeed the next step. ^_^ Ben · Salvidrim! ✉ 13:41, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (December 2019).

Guideline and policy news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:07, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-02

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • When trying to move a page, if the target title already exists then a warning message is shown. The warning message will now include a link to the target title. [72]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 7 January. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 8 January. It will be on all wikis from 9 January (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

21:23, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Original Barnstar
You're doing a great job, thank you for everything! By the way I can't help but notice your name everywhere and hear "I want to break free!" by Queen when I read your name haha! :) TheEpTic (talk) 02:37, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
😄💚 Thank you very much, TheEpTic, for the barnstar and the kind feedback. Your name is positively familiar to me too, and I see we share a preference for CamelCase UserNames. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:53, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Iconman1

Hello, I'm writing to you about an user who was indefinitely blocked by you some time ago, User talk:Iconman1. Before being blocked, the user copy-pasted my user page in his talk page; I'm not sure if the purpose is simply to mock me for having reverted his vandalism many times, or an attempt to impersonate a "clean" user. At each attempt to remove my infos, the user – who still maintains right to edit his talk page – restores it, even if he has already violated the block with at least one other account. In all honesty I believe this goes beyond the rights a user can have on his/her talk page. Khruner (talk) 19:19, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi Khruner, this is more tricky than it may seem to be. First of all, thank you very much for the notification; I find this strange as well.
  • As all contributions to Wikipedia, including your contributions to your user page, are freely licensed, it is -- from a copyright/license point of view -- unproblematic to copy text within Wikipedia, if attribution is properly given (WP:CWW). This is not the case, however.
  • The user has modified the recipient name of the barnstar message by Iry-Hor to change its meaning in a misleading or trolling way. This is prohibited by WP:TPO.
  • Broadly construed, this may be a form of harassment, although the harassment policy does not appear to directly address this rather unique case (WP:HARASS).
  • The blocking policy, section WP:OPTIONS, says that "editing of the user's talk page should be disabled only in the case of continued abuse of their user talk page".
  • Revoking talk page access disables the user's main way of appealing the block. This is effectively declining any talk page requests in advance. Since the purpose of an unblock request is to obtain review from a third party, the blocking administrators should not decline unblock requests from users they have blocked (WP:BLOCK#Unblock_requests). I do, rarely, revoke talk page access, but the situation may not be clear enough for me to do so.
I'd recommend ignoring the user and disabling notifications and e-mails from them in your preferences. They are currently unable to damage the encyclopedia. If this does not seem to be a good solution, feel free to request for talk page access revocation at WP:ANI. I guess there will be at least one uninvolved administrator watching the noticeboard who sees Iconman1's behavior as disruptive enough to grant the request. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:47, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
I see, thanks for the exhaustive explanations. Best, Khruner (talk) 20:55, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-03

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • You can no longer read Wikimedia wikis if your browser use very old TLS. This is because it is a security problem for everyone. It can lead to downgrade attacks. Since 9 December you just see a warning. Soon the browser will not connect to the wikis at all. Most are users on Android systems older than 4.4. You can read the browser recommendations. [73]
  • Special:LinkSearch has been moved from the "Redirecting special pages" section on Special:SpecialPages to the "Lists of pages" section. [74]

Changes later this week

  • Advanced item Wikis can protect pages so that only some users can edit them. The standard protection levels are Require autoconfirmed or confirmed access and Require administrator access. If your wiki use more protection levels the technical name might be renamed for standardisation. This doesn't affect what users see. [75]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 14 January. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 15 January. It will be on all wikis from 16 January (calendar).

Future changes

  • Deepcat and Catgraph will stop working. This will happen at the end of January. This is because you can now use the normal search function instead. [76]
  • You can use <ref follow="…"> to merge footnotes that follow each other. It is meant to be used for digitised books on Wikisource. If the order of the footnotes is wrong no error was shown but the bad <ref> was shown outside the <references /> list. This will change and you will see an error message instead. [77]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:40, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Message by GODSNTDEAD

ok thanks how can i help? — Preceding unsigned comment added by GODSNTDEAD (talk • contribs) 22:08, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi GODSNTDEAD, sorry, I had either misread or misunderstood your message first, and had removed it incorrectly.
My personal favorite inspirations for helping are:
I hope you enjoy these as much as I do. Please let me know if any questions arise.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:03, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

sorry i havent answerd because i been making articles on wikiHow GODSNTDEAD (talk) 23:54, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

Hey GODSNTDEAD, that's cool. Both Wikipedia and wikiHow are good places to share knowledge with the world. Just keep in mind that original research is only allowed on wikiHow. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:47, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

what do you want me to help with?GODSNTDEAD (talk) 23:53, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi GODSNTDEAD,
Thanks for asking. Did you already see the three recommendations above, and are none of them interesting?
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:58, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

168.9.26.236

user:168.9.26.236 is abusing her talkpage. CLCStudent (talk) 18:54, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi CLCStudent, that was interesting:
Special:Contributions/ToBeFree?offset=20200110191000&limit=17
Thank you very much for the notification. If you need such assistance while I'm offline, or perhaps better in general, WP:ANI is the ideal noticeboard for such requests.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:17, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Original Barnstar
Thank you for all you do on wikipedia! GODSNTDEAD (talk) 14:48, 8 January 2020 (UTC)
Thank you very much, GODSNTDEAD. Please do keep in mind that Wikipedia is not a social network; it would be great if you could perhaps contribute outside of "User:" and "User talk:" pages as well.
You are not required to donate any time to Wikipedia, as Wikipedia is an entirely voluntary project. However, if you do, please do actually improve or maintain the encyclopedia in some way. There are uncountable ways to help, but using the user page as a personal website and talk pages as forums is not one of them, sorry. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:05, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

Edit warring about a redirect: Use WP:AFD instead

Hi GliderMaven,

if you disagree about the existence of a page, please nominate it for deletion. Repeatedly replacing it by a redirect is disruptive and will lead to a block when done again at Levelized cost of energy.

Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:46, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

No, the idiot just through his toys out of the pram and arbitrarily duped the whole page into existence. He didn't write anything. The original material is still there in the original article. It's an incorrect split. All the material associated with that topic, that he didn't move, is still there in the original article.GliderMaven (talk) 23:33, 13 January 2020 (UTC)
AFD is completely inappropriate for that. We already have that exact article elsewhere. If I was to propose AFD it would be closed because that's the wrong process. GliderMaven (talk) 23:42, 13 January 2020 (UTC)
GliderMaven, both the deletion policy (section WP:ATD-R) and the content forking guideline (section WP:POVFORK) seem to explicitly mention a deletion nomination as viable next step. Alternatives mentioned in the deletion policy are the "article's talk page" and "Wikipedia:Requests for Comment". None of the three options has been taken yet; neither a discussion on the target page of the disputed redirect nor edit warring are suitable. Personal attacks are not, either. It may surprise you, but at the very moment, your behavior is the only one that could lead to a block, while the attacked editor is in a strange position of almost policy-compliant editing. This can't be your intention; please reconsider the situation and do start a deletion discussion if it still matters to you. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:04, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

unclear about where to respond - response to COI guidance

Hello and thanks for the guidance. Long time wikipedia user and donor, first time digging into the editing. So thanks for the patience with this newbie, too.

Would appreciate review of the minor edits I made - added our marriage date per BLP convention, added citation links on educational history, moved committees from bio box to political history section, and added where we currently live to the personal history section. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sbeinla (talk • contribs) 17:03, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi Sbeinla, welcome to Wikipedia. I have fixed the deletion nomination. Do I correctly assume that you have also edited under a different username recently? If so, please decide which of both accounts you would like to use. When you have made your decision, please log into the other account, and add a message here saying "I would like to permanently abandon this account, and continue editing as Sbeinla", or "I would like to permanently abandon this account, and continue editing as …".
Afterwards, please log out, then log in to your preferred account. Add another message, "I confirm this message" with your preferred account.
Only when this has been done, we can continue talking about the article itself if you like to.
Thank you very much in advance and best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:10, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
Hi ToBeFree I did not make a deletion request and this is my only account. I believe you're also in communication with David Englin and he made the request (DLEnglin96). I have asked him to be in touch with you directly here or on his own talk page and assume he'll do so shortly. Sbeinla (talk) 17:23, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
I noted on our converastion on my own talk page: I'm David's wife. Clarifying here, too, for transparency. Thanks again. ToBeFree — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sbeinla (talk • contribs) 17:34, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
Ah, sorry, I didn't see that clarification on your talk page. All right. There is no need to abandon any account then.
However, please be careful when editing about the same topic together. This is almost bound to lead to problems; see Wikipedia:Sock_puppetry#Meatpuppetry for details.
Sbeinla and Dlenglin96, you have a strong conflict of interest regarding the Wikipedia article David L. Englin. Unless you are removing factually incorrect information, please do not edit the article directly again. Instead, whenever you would like to propose a change, please click "Talk" above the article, then "request corrections on or suggest content" in the orange warning box. Such requests are usually handled within about 24 hours. See WP:FAQ/Article subjects for details.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:55, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
Hi ToBeFree Thanks and apologies - I was following these guidelines: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Help#Editing_the_article_yourself — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sbeinla (talk • contribs) 18:21, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
No worries, Sbeinla. These guidelines are correct, thank you very much for having searched, found and followed them. I am a bit worried about the "location of residence", "marriage date" and "full wife name" pieces of information currently in the article without a reliable inline citation. Would you mind proposing the addition of such citations or the removal of unverifiable information as your first ever edit request? Thank you very much in advance! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:34, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
Hi ToBeFree So... what is a good citation for where we live, my name, and when we got married? David's current job - which is listed and cited with a link to his work bio - is in LA and lists LA as his residence. We were married in 1996, so... that's not online. A pic of our wedding license...? And how do you want me to cite my full name? It's... my name. My birth certificate? These seem like basic facts that are referenced in most other bio pages and don't generally have online citations.
Welcome back and thanks for asking, Sbeinla. Sadly, this is exactly why we discourage editing with a conflict of interest. Wikipedia is not a publisher of original research; it summarizes what published sources, preferably independent secondary ones, say about a topic. Especially when writing about living people, we're strict in this regard. The proposed documents are unsuitable per "WP:BLPPRIMARY", a section of the biographies of living persons policy.
I will now remove the unverifiable information from the article; thank you for having clarified the situation and sorry for the inconvenience. The existence of policy-violating material in other articles does not justify similar policy violations. If you know of other articles with similar issues, please do point them out.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:14, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
Hi ToBeFreeThis is starting to feel really abusive. I'll ask for additional help and elevate in all the other ways I can. In the meantime, can you please remove our son's name from the bio box, since there's no citation for that? Many thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sbeinla (talk • contribs) 22:36, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
Sbeinla, per your request, I have removed the name. If the above statement is referring to my answers, I'm sorry for the unfavorable response, but these policies exist to protect your husband from situations such as the Wikipedia Seigenthaler biography incident. Wikipedia is not, and was never, a service for publicizing previously unpublished statements about the article topics. Discussions such as the one we're currently having are the reason why WP:COI and WP:AUTO have been created.
You may always ask for independent advice at the Teahouse or the Help desk. There are also places to "elevate" conduct issues, such as the Incidents Noticeboard, but I strongly recommend seeking independent advice before publicity, especially when dealing with biographies.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:51, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

You are most welcome sir.

Fylindfotberserk (talk) 07:48, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Cute! 🤗💚 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:46, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks. -

Tech News: 2020-04

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

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19:42, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Submitted articles

Dear ToBeFree, The submitted articles are not fringe as evidenced by references. They represent the mainstream view of theories of Earth’s glacial and interglacial conditions. Current Wikipedia articles on glacial and interglacial Earth lack comprehensive and coherent coverage of Earth’s glacial and interglacial conditions. The submitted articles remove that deficiency and provide a compact, comprehensive and encyclopedic view of Earth’s glacial and interglacial conditions based on the latest available information. This topic is most notable from the perspective of climate change. As pointed out in theories of glacial and interglacial conditions, in severity, the climate change associated with glacial conditions is beyond anything imagined in global warming debates. By the way, how do I reply to those like jmcgnh that have provided guidance? Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RafizadehTO100P (talk • contribs) 20:00, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi RafizadehTO100P,
Thanks for asking. However, the onus is on you to prove that "Amplified Milankovitch theory", "Canopied earth theory" and "Earth’s two versions" are more than neologisms and the result of your original research. At the moment, this looks like a pseudoscientific topic of science fiction books and dubious publications. Show us reliable secondary sources that actually use the terms "Amplified Milankovitch theory", "Canopied earth theory" and "Earth’s two versions". I bet none exist, but feel free to prove me wrong.
To reply to messages on your talk page, you can click "edit" next to the section heading, then add your message at the bottom of the section. Click "edit" here to see how I replied, with indentation, for example.
Please let me know if any further questions arise, or feel free to ask for independent advice at the Teahouse.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:08, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Submitted articles

Dear ToBeFree, Thanks for the quick response. I have been a professor for twenty years and have researched glacial and interglacial conditions for even longer than that. It is true that I am highlighting the article’s title as “Earth’s two versions” (therefore neologism) than calling it “Earth’s glacial and interglacial conditions” (not neologism) but that is an attempt at pointing at the topic’s significance. There is a total lack of awareness that Earth has two versions. Does that make it an Encyclopedic item or not? Let me know what you think. The glacial (the second version) is around the corner and at present there is almost zero awareness of its existence. It is possible that an encyclopedia is not a channel for creating awareness on critical items. In my years as professor I am quite aware of and respect the editor’s “does not fit” decision in rejecting an otherwise scholarly article. Best. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RafizadehTO100P (talk • contribs) 20:32, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

RafizadehTO100P, Wikipedia is a tertiary source, not a secondary nor primary one. Wikipedia does not publish original research, and the community generally does not consider such articles to be encyclopedic. Wikipedia is not a webhost for pseudoscientific essays. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:37, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Submitted articles

Dear ToBeFree, Thanks for clarification. My understanding is that in order to completely delete an article from Wikipedia I need an editor’s help. Would you please delete the three draft articles that are in my account? Thanks and best — Preceding unsigned comment added by RafizadehTO100P (talk • contribs) 20:43, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

RafizadehTO100P, no worries and all the best. Do feel free to smile at my incorrect skepticism if this happens to become a widely used term in 20 years. Who knows. 🙂
Please note that technically, deletion on Wikipedia is not completely irreversible; the article can probably be restored if requested at WP:REFUND. Also, due to Wikipedia's free content license, the text may continue to appear outside of Wikipedia, on websites we have no technical nor legal control over.
To allow you to create backup copies of your work, and to allow you to easily reverse this decision if it happens to have been made too quickly, I will delete the following three drafts in approximately 24 hours unless you cancel this request during this time. Alternatively, you can ask an independent administrator to do an immediate deletion by removing all content from the drafts and replacing it by "{{db-author}}".
I hope that, despite the negative first experience, you may like to contribute to Wikipedia in other ways. If you are interested in doing so, and even if this interest arises after years of inactivity, you may enjoy the following pages:
Wikipedia can be a pretty strange community, especially to newcomers. We encourage users to be bold, especially in updating existing articles. While I personally would recommend avoiding topics with a conflict of interest, this encyclopedia is so huge that doing so is hardly a noticeable restriction. I have seen engineers write wonderful articles about botany.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:07, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Message by Utoby

Heading replaced ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:12, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Hello, Gilbert freeman has been blocked but his revision is still there so I would like to know if it's possible to go back to yours. Best regards. --Utoby (talk) 21:09, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi Utoby,
I am positively surprised: the edit war has ended. I'm out; let's both stay away from that contentious area. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:12, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Re: A heated start

Isn't WP:BITE a behavioral guideline? Why is it acceptable for editors to tag-team me, and for one of them to call me an antisemite, but you warn me I should keep things less personal? How about the tag team who have reverted all my edits like robots, especially the asshole who called me an antisemitic troll because I disagree with the racist way he's portraying the adherents of an African American religion? I must have missed the invisible warning you left that editor. They call me the Big Pill (talk) 00:33, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi They call me the Big Pill,
It may not seem so, but all I really did was having a short look at your contributions, noticing "oh, hmm, that's an unnecessarily heated start" and taking a moment to write this on your talk page. It is not intended to be a strict warning, but I can understand this impression and would like to retract it.
My message did not take into account anyone else's behavior or further details, especially as at least one of your edit summaries contained an accusation about "stalking". Hence I explained how I noticed the contributions, and that I only had a short surprised look.
To clarify this: I personally won't take any administrative action against you. In this non-administrative context, I would like to point to "WP:NOTTHEM", a section in a guide for blocked editors. While you are not blocked, and do not have to expect blocking from my side, I think the main point of that section clearly applies to your message on my talk page.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:42, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 January 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:10, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-05

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • Some mobile diffs have problems. A couple of buttons are not shown. Structured data diffs on Commons are confusing. The developers are working on fixing it. [80][81]
  • Administrators on wikis that use Structured Discussions can't move discussion pages. This is a bug. The developers are working on fixing it. [82]

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18:53, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Hy...

List is to find in german article de:Deutschland sucht den Superstar. --Catgermancate (talk) 19:18, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi Catgermancate,
Please do not use Wikipedia articles as a source for statements in other Wikipedia articles. See WP:REFLOOP and WP:General disclaimer for information.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:20, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Be sure, the list is correct on German wiki. --Catgermancate (talk) 19:22, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Catgermancate, the burden is on you to provide citations for such edits; you may not rely on Wikipedia articles for this purpose. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:23, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

The list is correct and many German Wikipedian look for that list on German wiki. Best greetings, from Germany --Catgermancate (talk) 19:24, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Catgermancate, if you continue to rely solely on Wikipedia articles for adding information about living people, you may be blocked from editing without further warning. Please have a look at the biographies of living persons policy and WP:BURDEN, part of the verifiability policy, for details. Best regards from Wuppertal. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:27, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Response to your assistance.

Thanks for your help.

In response to your question regarding relationship to TEK-Energy Systems Inc. (the subject of the article). I am assisting the Founder of TEK-Energy Systems Inc. with social media help (Linked-in, Facebook, and the like). I worked for the Founder a number of years ago for a company that is now defunct. I am retired myself and my assistance to the Founder (David Eisenhaure) is unpaid. These tasks keeps my mind from shrinking too much.  :)

Let me know if the article is acceptable. I got other responses to my help request which imply otherwise. — Preceding unsigned comment added by HelpfulHopper (talk • contribs) 00:41, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi HelpfulHopper,
You're welcome; thank you very much for the answer.
The motivation is understandable, and it is less problematic than most conflicts of interest, but it is still a conflict of interest that should be avoided.
I highly recommend contributing in other ways that are unrelated to such connections, instead. Wikipedia is huge, and editing about the very few topics one has a connection to is a common mistake that should ideally be avoided.
The following two pages might be more suitable for the described purpose:
You might enjoy the Signpost newspaper displayed at the community portal; today's "From the Editors" is interestingly about COI editing: Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2019-12-27/From_the_editors
Please let me know if any questions arise, and feel free to ask for independent assistance at the Teahouse at any time.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:30, 27 January 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for your assistance and advice. I am disappointed that I am not permitted to post the article but I understand. It was an interesting exercise none-the-less. Best regards to you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by HelpfulHopper (talk • contribs) 09:07, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

89.165.69.40 vandalism

This is IP not user. I wrote him/ her but she/he refuses to answer me and continuously reverting my changes. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mirhasanov (talk • contribs) 21:56, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi Mirhasanov, I saw your message too late. Let's keep the discussion at User talk:Mirhasanov, where I have coincidentally already answered this message. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:01, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks my friend. Let's talk in my page. Mirhasanov (talk) 22:12, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

AeoNew

You got to that account before I could block it. Fun fact: I was going to block per NOTHERE--the edits are obviously socky, but the CU data don't support that. Drmies (talk) 01:34, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Oh, interesting, thanks for the notification – feel free to change the block reason and to replace my block message. While the alleged sockpuppeteer may be innocent, "obvious sockpuppet" might still be an appropriate description for the blocked account, though, I guess. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:36, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
Absolutely. Thanks, Drmies (talk) 03:08, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Kai Cheng Thom

Hi!

I am a student at Concordia university, I am not in any relationship with Kai Cheng Thom. I am doing it as part of my assignment for my class. She is not my relative in any way and I don't have any relationship with her.

I hope it helps, Thank you — Preceding unsigned comment added by Orangina3133 (talk • contribs) 15:53, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi Orangina3133,
Thanks for the explanation; this is probably fine then. However, please carefully read the orange warning message at the bottom of your talk page.
Because the additions lacked the required neutrality and verifiability, they have been completely removed for now. Please be more careful when proceeding, or choose a different topic to write about: Biographies of living people are not a good topic for experiments and learning about Wikipedia's policies by trial and error. There are tons of other topics you can edit more boldly.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:58, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

sources

I am doing bio of Kai Cheng thom, everything was deleted due to poor sourcing. As sources I included interviews that were conducted with Kai Cheng Thom. Isn't it a good source enough to write about her early life and education? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Orangina3133 (talk • contribs) 16:05, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi Orangina3133,
Yes – you have correctly identified one of the issues. Please use independent sources that directly support your additions. Interviews with the article subject are not independent: The person talks about herself. Wikipedia is a tertiary source, not a secondary source; this encyclopedia summarizes what independent secondary sources have published about a topic. Combining primary sources to build an article is something that journalists can do, but not Wikipedians. Wikipedians summarize what journalists have already summarized. See WP:PSTS, part of the "no original research" policy, for details. The following (informal, not authoritative) explanation page may be helpful: WP:42
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:10, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Message by 206.248.44.207

i did not edit any thing — Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.248.44.207 (talk) 15:57, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi 206.248.44.207,
Sorry for the irrelevant warning message, and thanks for the clarification. You are probably using a dynamic IP address, and the same IP address had previously been assigned to someone else completely unrelated to you. This was in September 2019.
You can freely ignore messages that have clearly not been directed at you, such as warnings complaining about edits you have never made. To prevent future confusion, I have removed the message now.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:36, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

TopIMR

Is IMR the agency for Brooke Butler? I didn't see a connection, but it does look like paid editing. There have been two accounts submitting drafts on Brooke Butler, both of which have been blocked. The shame of it is that she does appear to pass acting notability. If her publicist had been honest, a neutral editor would probably have reviewed and cleaned up the draft, and she would get coverage. As it is, it isn't likely that a neutral editor will deal with her as a subject in the near future, and she will have to wait. There is a lesson here.

I see that User:Justlettersandnumbers blocked the other one. I think that the two accounts are probably the same person, but with them both blocked for promotional editing, there is no point in requesting Checkuser, and there is very little difference between a blocked spammer and a blocked sockpupeteer. Robert McClenon (talk) 21:44, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi Robert McClenon,
Thank you very much for noticing and pointing out the duplication of these drafts. This allowed me to do some research.
Combining the usernames and contributions of both users leads to a pretty clear image. However, the conclusion is one-way; we can't say for sure if this isn't someone intentionally damaging the reputation of the agency or the promoted person. All we know is that either the impression of paid editing is true, or malice/impersonation is involved. For Wikipedia, this distinction is irrelevant – both scenarios justify a block.
Regarding sockpuppetry / checkuser: Yeah, I agree. It probably does not matter whether they are confirmed or technically seemingly unrelated to each other.
No comment/idea regarding notability. :)
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:10, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
Well, when a sandbox is tagged for AFC review, the first thing that I do is to try to move it to draft space with the title from the lede sentence. Sometimes this results in it telling me that there is already a draft with that name. This may be an editor who creates two copies by good-faith error, or it may be an editor who is trying to flood the system with multiple copies of a draft. It may also be that another editor, a few months ago, submitted a draft. In that case, the two drafts should be compared and consolidated. It may also be that the first account has been blocked for promotional editing. In that case, the second account is a sockpuppet. In any case, submitting multiple drafts usually is easy to notice. I think that paid editing is more common then malicious impersonation, and is the less bad faith explanation. That is, paid editing isn't good faith, but is by no means as unethical as malicious impersonation. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:22, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

A Response!

Thank you so much for welcoming me into the Wikipedia community.

I accidentally deleted it all! thank you for reverting it! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wiki-heIper (talk • contribs) 23:58, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Hey Wiki-heIper,
You're welcome! 🙂 And no worries about the page; be bold – any mistakes can easily be fixed afterwards.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:15, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – February 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2020).

Guideline and policy news

  • Following a request for comment, partial blocks are now enabled on the English Wikipedia. This functionality allows administrators to block users from editing specific pages or namespaces rather than the entire site. A draft policy is being workshopped at Wikipedia:Partial blocks.
  • The request for comment seeking the community's sentiment for a binding desysop procedure closed with wide-spread support for an alternative desysoping procedure based on community input. No proposed process received consensus.

Technical news

  • Twinkle now supports partial blocking. There is a small checkbox that toggles the "partial" status for both blocks and templating. There is currently one template: {{uw-pblock}}.
  • When trying to move a page, if the target title already exists then a warning message is shown. The warning message will now include a link to the target title. [83]

Arbitration

  • Following a recent arbitration case, the Arbitration Committee reminded administrators that checkuser and oversight blocks must not be reversed or modified without prior consultation with the checkuser or oversighter who placed the block, the respective functionary team, or the Arbitration Committee.

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 15:06, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Your advice is needed.

My friend ToBeFree,

Is it ok if I write someone a message and he is deleting it then asking me not to revert as he will be complaining it as harassment? Do I violate anything here?

Looking for your advice.

Regards,

Mirhasanov (talk) 20:05, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi Mirhasanov,
Inviting others to discussion is fine, but when it is clear that they have seen the message, please don't repeat the notification. 🙂
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:10, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

ToBeFree,

Thank you very much. I just thought that he/she just want delete what I wrote, as when he/she deleted my message didn't give any justification. Seems like I act a bit out of policy :). Hope didn't make him/her angry :)

Thanks for advice.

Mirhasanov (talk) 20:15, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Mirhasanov,
Yeah, having such messages deleted feels strange. However, it's usually fine, and we just have to accept it.
No worries.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:18, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

ToBeFree,

I send him apologize message just to ask him for getting back to constructive discussion. Thanks for advice my friend.

Regards,

Mirhasanov (talk) 20:21, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Mirhasanov,
Apologies are fine and normally a good thing. "Apologizing" to repeat the same point might not have been a good idea, though. 😉
The message has been read and removed; I think that's okay for now. I recommend not messaging HistoryofIran for the next months. Any discussion should happen at the article talk page anyway; user talk pages are not necessary for article discussions.
Don't worry too much about it; consider disengaging.
Good luck and best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:27, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

ToBeFree,

Yes it was him/her. Unfortunately, he don't want to get involved into healthy discussion with me, but keeping reverting my edits. But anyway hope he accepts my apologize and one day we will have very good discussion with him/her.

Thanks for your advices my friend. It is really good having you and your direction.

Best regards,

Mirhasanov (talk) 20:31, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

ToBeFree,

Btw I just saw that you are an Electrical Engineer. I am also, but more electronic and control engineering :) I am Msc from Imperial College. Where are you from my friend ?

Regards, Mirhasanov (talk) 21:02, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

😊
Public German university in NRW. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:44, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

ToBeFree,

WOW German engineer ! :) Hats off to all German engineers as I am driving Mercedes :)

Tech News: 2020-06

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 4 February. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 5 February. It will be on all wikis from 6 February (calendar).

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20:05, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

A user you blocked...

Lu tawa has possibly made a comeback as Se pinya (same single-minded attention to writing about Besunff in a way which appears to be autobiographical). Do you want to deal with it or should I file at SPI? Please ping me if you reply. --kingboyk (talk) 11:12, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Hey kingboyk, thanks for asking. Even the header at the top of their talk pages is identical. The name, the edits, the timing... Please create a SPI, but I might be the administrator closing it with a block indeed. Thank you very much for noticing this and for the offer to create a formal report. I know that SPI can be annoying to create in obvious cases, but having the evidence in a central place is useful, I think. I am currently not on my desktop anyway, so couldn't make a quick "duck" block. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:36, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
Yeah, SPI filing is a bit of a pain but I discovered that it can be done with Twinkle which makes it just a touch easier :) Report filed at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Lu tawa. --kingboyk (talk) 14:45, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
kingboyk, Thank you very much! Yeah, I didn't know about Twinkle's SPI function for a long time, and until then it was a horribly tedious process. Now it's finally bearable. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:25, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) Either ToBeFree or Kingboyk, can you tell me how to access Twinkle's SPI function? I don't see any link to do it, nor can I find any setting for it in my Twinkle preferences. JBW (talk) 22:14, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Heh, JBW, it's really a hidden gem. The "ARV" link in the TW menu contains a "sockpuppet" and "sockpuppeteer" report interface. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:16, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

User:ToBeFree/topicons

Hi, I was just looking how I could get a fancy top-icon on my userpage with the anti vandalism barnstar and I accidentally modified User:ToBeFree/topicons instead of my userpage, rookie mistake I guess. I reverted the edit. Thanks again. TruthToBeSpoken (talk) 21:06, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Heh, that happens quickly. Happy to see that it worked afterwards. No worries. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:08, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Alanna Ubach

The username hints at the editor being someone very specific. I'd recommend waiting to see if they respond (or understand how to respond) before posting there again. There's been COI editing on this page before, though--you can see the redlinked Ubach and 'chica' accounts that have tried to add promotional material and puffery in the page history. They come, edit war in stuff a few times, and then never use that particular account again. Grandpallama (talk) 22:15, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi Grandpallama, oh! I did notice the username, but I wasn't aware of the long history of similar edits and accounts. Thanks for dealing with this. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:21, 6 February 2020 (UTC)
It's a small COI rabbit hole. One of the chica accounts also edited Lauralee Bell, which also required clean-up, and that led me to similar edits that were made on Team Unicorn and its constituent members. All the COI editing on those pages follows the same pattern of new accounts that edit 2-3 days and then go quiet. It's never been persistent or frequent enough to merit filing at SPI (and I also believe these are different people--their usernames are pretty indicative of their real-life identities), so I just keep the pages watchlisted and deal with it whenever it pops up. Grandpallama (talk) 14:41, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Taking me literally...

In answer to this edit, I wasn't assuming good faith, I was being ironic. Of course I knew what the edit was intended to mean. Oh well... JBW (talk) 20:32, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Incidentally, I didn't get your ping from that edit. I have no idea why. (I saw the edit because I checked back to see if tehre had been any follow up from the editor.) JBW (talk) 20:36, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi JBW, I noticed this after sending and decided not to make myself look more silly by removing the message afterwards. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:40, 7 February 2020 (UTC)
The whole thing was really just a little bit of fun, and of no importance whatever. More likely than not, the editor will never come back and see my message anyway. (And this time I did get your ping.) JBW (talk) 21:00, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Not paid

I do not work for the university nor am I getting paid. I just like to add value to Wikipedia. Richinstead (talk) 01:04, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks :) Answered on your talk page ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:09, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Imagine (song)

Hello, You have blocked me for no reason. I need your futher explanations. Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Greenhornfromwildwest (talk • contribs) 18:34, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi Greenhornfromwildwest, you have repeatedly made the same edit again and again at Imagine (John Lennon song), and have been blocked to prevent further edit warring. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:37, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick action

Thanks for the quick action. I've also opened an SPI here. It seems the other user and some IPs are working in tandem to destabilize the article. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 18:36, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Hey Fylindfotberserk, no worries. Thank you for writing the RFPP report and the SPI. I have marked it as "CU requested" and will wait for a checkuser to do the next step: If there is technical evidence for sockpuppetry, we can conveniently lean back now. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:40, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
Thank you very much. I suspect Sairg is involved in this mess. They are known for their sock/meat puppetry. Thanks again - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 18:43, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi

You might want to take a look at the history for the Parkland School District. It looks like the vandal you just blocked may have some socks there. Sakura CarteletTalk 03:55, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much, Sakura Cartelet. I think I got them now; one of the new users appears to be a good-faith editor with a conflict of interest as well. I'll be offline now; feel free to report any further occurrences to WP:AIV or WP:RFPP. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:07, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-07

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

Problems

  • There was a problem with the new MediaWiki version last week. It deleted some messages by accident. The new version was late because it was stopped to fix things. [85]

Changes later this week

  • Advanced item The MediaWiki action API is used by various tools like bots and gadgets. Some error codes will change. Some parameter values that do not follow the standard will no longer work. [86]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 11 February. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 12 February. It will be on all wikis from 13 February (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

19:12, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Issues with editor Bobsterboy05

I don't know if you can help me and other us somehow - an editor named Bobsterboy05 is continuously updating dates in articles (e.g https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Premier_League_players) without updating the respective reference date, and despite numerous attempts to inform him of this and even leaving a message in the code to remind him he continuously ignores this. He sometimes updates article dates on an almost daily basis even when there is no new information and doesn't update the reference date as mentioned.

Can you suggest a better way of handling this so that he edits correctly or somehow informing him (he doesn't respond to his talk page) so he's aware of what he's doing and can confirm he will do it correctly or just stop completely? Thanks TheRealGutripper (talk) 22:38, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi TheRealGutripper,
Thank you very much for asking and describing the problem; your explanation allows me to clearly see what you mean. Looking at Special:Diff/939987022 is almost comical, as the HTML comment next to the date even directly addresses the user by their name, yet is ignored.
Normally, when an editor makes disruptive edits and continues to do so despite communication attempts by other users, administrators will be pretty quick and unhesitant to block the disruptive user to enforce communication. However, this very specific case – assuming that the information is correct, of course – is probably not disruptive editing. It is not even edit warring; nobody contests the change made by the user. The only problem is that they are not doing enough, and that we would prefer them to do more than they currently do. Per WP:NOTCOMPULSORY, we are probably not allowed to do so. If the user's edits are fine, and the only objection in this specific case is that they are not doing more, we can't block the user.
Such a very clear lack of communication quickly gets disruptive, as nobody is perfect and the user will make errors sooner or later. If the user makes actually disruptive edits (again), then please attempt to communicate (again). Only if the user makes disruptive edits without listening to warnings, there is a reason to block them. Updating outdated information without updating the "accessdate" parameter of a reference is probably one of the very few cases where we can't do anything. They are improving the encyclopedia, after all.
Sorry for the unfavorable message. If you disagree about my analysis, feel free to copy this section to WP:ANI for community input. And if the user makes disruptive edits in the future, don't hesitate to create a report at WP:ANI. Please invite me to the discussion if that happens, and mention that you had messaged me about this before. This allows other administrators to quickly get an overview.
Thank you very much in advance and best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:52, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

Blocked IP

Hey there. I saw you recently blocked this IP for a mass of disruptive edits and lack of communication, and saw this IP making the same edits with the same misleading edit summaries. Alex (talk) 23:15, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Hey Alex! Thank you very much for the notification. There have been even more edits, it seems, from 208.71.226.97 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log). I have now blocked both and manually reverted their edits. Please let me know if the problem persists; I will then create a sockpuppet investigation as a next step. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:39, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Blocked IP

Hey there. An IP you previously blocked appears to be back again with another IP, same misleading summaries and edits (see here). You mentioned opening a sockpuppet investigation when I brought this to you before, I don't fully understand the process for that so I thought bringing it to you again was the best option. Thanks, Alex (talk) 21:02, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Heh, just when I had archived the previous thread. :)
Thank you very much, Alex. Widr has now rangeblocked the IP address. I hope this finally solves the problem. Feel free to report here if it occurs again, I will then consider creating a sockpuppetry investigation or restoring an expired rangeblock. In the long term, the community has larger patience and more resources than the blocked editor, and the blocked user will give up sooner or later. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:39, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

(For the record, the current block range is 120.29.0.0/17) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:11, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

information Note: Now blocked as 208.71.226.161 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:11, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
Blocked as Special:Contributions/208.71.226.0/24 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:19, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-08

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 18 February. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 19 February. It will be on all wikis from 20 February (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:17, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

WPAIV

Will you review my most recent report in WP:AIV and block the IP range? Thank you. Flix11 (talk) 00:40, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi Flix11,  done - thank you very much for the report. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:02, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Record seal

Hi. Can you please seal the history of insult by a Glaswegian IP (yes, the same person with shorter IP) along with the SineBot tag occurred last afternoon GMT on my talk page? Thanks. Flix11 (talk) 01:20, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi Flix11, thanks for the request; I have forwarded it to oversighters. The edits have been suppressed. Please use WP:RFOS for similar requests in the future, as my talk page is public and watched by many editors. Thanks and best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:58, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

US Army Armor School

To all,

The US Army Armor School Wikipedia page is updated (as of 19 February 2020) with information from the HQ staff and all subordinate organization in the school. Those of you out there that are changing this information are posting incorrect and outdated info. PLEASE STOP. Armor School senior leadership review and approve the posts to Armor School's Wikipedia page. If you are not associated with the US Army Armor School STOP changing the page and posting incorrect information. Doing so is doing and injustice to the Soldiers who bravely serve in the Tank and Cavalry Force.

V/r,

Armor School Warriors and Leaders — Preceding unsigned comment added by 150.226.142.22 (talk) 15:44, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

You have been reported at WP:COIN#United States Army Armor School. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:24, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Conflict Resolution

Hello ToBeFree. I apologize for the repeated offensive against Wikipedia that our organization is causing in an effort to correct our USAARMS Page. Please understand this is not "sock-puppetry" or "vandalizing". This is under good intentions, but I understand after reviewing Wiki policies that we do have a "COI" that I would like to try to resolve.

I work for the United States Army Armor School and have been assigned to update our Wikipedia page to reflect the "Chief of Armor approved" edits. In the last couple of weeks we have attempted to accomplish this with little to no understanding of Wiki policies using two IP addresses that you have blocked. Your diligence in editing and blocking is admirable.

It looks like you are the only editor of this page for the next couple of weeks. Out of respect for the men and women that will look to this resource for information and guidance, I would like to help. I need to know how I can update the out-dated information that continues to be added by other great Wiki editors. I know that their information is well cited and falls in line with Wiki policies, but this doesn't mean that it is 100% accurate. The information I have to add is approved by the primary source for distribution, ie. Armor Historian, Unit Commanders, Armor Commandants and Command Sergeants Major. I understand that Wiki prefer's Secondary sources, but it is in the best interest of the audience that we are able to give them the most up to date information straight from the command authority themselves. 

- Please advise -
File:United States Army Armor School - Wikipedia approved edit 13Feb.pdf
Hello Hinch32,
Thank you very much for your message. I have copied the disclosure template to the talk page of the article, Talk:United States Army Armor School. For hopefully completely adhering to the strict requirements of WP:PAID, I additionally recommend doing the following:
I assume that you are not the same person who has edited Wikipedia as "Luckythreetwo" before. If you are Luckythreetwo, the next step is a mandatory block appeal, before we can continue. If this is the case, please say so; I can then provide the necessary instructions.
If you are not the person who has edited as "Luckythreetwo", or if you have successfully appealed your block, you can request changes at the talk page of the article. The orange warning box contains a link labeled "request corrections on or suggest content". Clicking this link will open a form for requesting changes. On the blocked user's talk page, User_talk:Luckythreetwo, I have provided a bulleted list of examples for such requests. Feel free to copy them to the request form, and modify as needed.
Thank you very much in advance and best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:22, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

~ToBeFree, Thanks for the help and initial guidance. For the time being it looks like I'll have to "request edit" each of our updates. I will start working on the first few today, with the intent to prioritize the "Course Information" for readers. Understand all edits are in an attempt to update the information while submitting to Wiki policies. Thank you.

Hinch32 (talk) 15:03, 20 February 2020 (UTC)Hinch32

Hi Hinch32,
You're welcome, and thank you very much for the disclosure, the patience and the upcoming requests.
Please note that this likely won't only be "for the time being" – it is the recommended procedure for proposing changes when having a conflict of interest, independently of the page protection which temporarily enforces this process. Given the history of unsuccessful direct editing attempts, I'd almost say this is permanently required for all COI-influenced changes to the article, at any future time.
Edit requests are usually handled within 24 hours, and the volunteers provide helpful feedback when answering them.
One thing I should note: As the protecting administrator, unless there are clear policy violations, I won't get involved editorially. I can provide technical advice, but I won't be the person answering the edit request. I am thus neither in favor nor against your proposed changes; my task is only to provide and maintain the foundation for a good editing atmosphere. I have no opinion on whether your preferred version of the article is "better" or "worse" than other editor's proposals. As long as the information is verifiable and not obviously biased/promotional, and as long as any conflicts of interest are properly disclosed, it's fine with me.
Please let me know if any technical issues or policy questions arise. Good luck and best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:31, 20 February 2020 (UTC)
Additional note: If the page already contains the "connected contributor (paid)" template, you are not required to duplicate it. I personally would probably use a short introductory sentence like "I work for the United States Army Armor School" when starting a new discussion on the same page, and completely omit the disclosure in subsequent replies. However, the diligence shown by the unnecessary duplication is commendable. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:39, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks...

...for your welcome at WP:AIV. I'm still finding my feet and trying to work out how declined or commented-upon reports get removed (hence this question and this). I hadn't actually considered manually clearing the page, assuming I agree with the reports. Makes sense though. My impression was that all responses resulting in blocks were speedily removed by HBC AIV helperbot5 unless they contained admin-added text. And presumably that would be intended to be seen by the reporting editors, and maybe other admins, so it makes sense for it to linger for a while. So much to learn; so little brain power to do it with...! Cheers, Nick Moyes (talk) 02:04, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

You're welcome, Nick Moyes. Regarding removal, that isn't done by the helperbot, and – possibly due to a bug, SQL? – only on the human reports page at the moment. See User:SQL/AIVStale for details about the algorithm used. The admin templates interestingly (possibly due to a bug, JamesR?) neither seem to have an effect on the helperbot's "backlogged noticeboard" templating, nor on automatic report removal time. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:12, 23 February 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, What specific diff is possibly a bug? I don't believe the admin templates factor into either bot's decision making. SQLQuery me! 02:45, 23 February 2020 (UTC)
Heh, SQL, there's no diff – the bug would be the bot not doing anything at WP:AIV/TB2. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:48, 23 February 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, Ah, it ignores that (only ever loads AIV itself). Sorry, wasn't sure what the concern was. SQLQuery me! 02:55, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for the reply!

Hello ToBeFree! Thank you for the warm and welcoming invite :). About what you said, I wasn't trying to be disruptive. I have reverted some vandalism and posted some warnings. The war that you talked about was because me and a user had a fight about wether to remove plagiarized content or not to. I told him that he shouldn't remove it and should just add it to the list of references but he wouldn't listen. Sorry if my intentions were distorted. I promise to be better. Faboof (talk) 02:25, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Hello Faboof, no worries, and thank you for your message. Your intentions have clearly been positive, and the encyclopedia does need volunteers to continue existing. I also think that none of your edits have initially been a problem – any mistakes can easily be reverted. The only issue was not accepting such reverts. It might also perhaps be a bit early for anti-vandalism; I recommend waiting until you meet the criteria for enrolling at the counter-vandalism academy, and making any further anti-vandalism edits only under mentorship until graduation. This is not required, but it could have prevented some of the issues.
I recommend having a look at the task center or the community portal as an entry point to Wikipedia. Fixing errors and improving citations could be a good start.
Good luck and best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:40, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Block evader

I suspect that Special:Contributions/88.151.157.185 is User:62.64.224.120 block evading, as promised, return to the same articles and making the same edits. -Jason A. Quest (talk) 14:57, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much, JasonAQuest – I had expected them to return with insults on your talk page, so I'm a bit relieved for now. Blocked; thanks for the reverts. Let's see if they need their talk page access revoked in a few hours too. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:20, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-09

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 25 February. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 26 February. It will be on all wikis from 27 February (calendar).

Future changes

  • There will be a reply button after each post on a talk page if you want one. This will soon be a beta feature on the Arabic, French, Dutch and Hungarian Wikipedias. You will have to turn it on if you want to use it. It will come to more wikis later. You can test the reply button. It was briefly shown earlier than planned by mistake on the four first wikis last week.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

21:00, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

IP Evading Block

Hi,

I reported the IP 67.87.197.43 and it got blocked, but other IPs, *2601:381:4203:C70:6D24:9237:BBBC:B981
*2600:387:5:807:0:0:0:3A
*2601:381:4203:C70:65C2:B293:733F:22EC have all been making extremely similar edits and in small chunks just like 67.87.197.43, and on the same pages. In addition, in October 2019 got the same “editing not constructive” warning that 67.87.197.43 got over and over again. I’m not sure how a Sockpuppet Investigation is supposed to work, could you help me out? I’m trying to revert his/her edits.

Thanks! Smith0124 (talk) 00:07, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi Smith0124, thank you very much for the report!
This was a bit tricky, but the edits at Mosholu Parkway really gave it away: [89] [90] [91] [92] [93] – in addition, the reported IP address has a very strong and obvious editing overlap with the blocked IP address, editing the same articles (!) and making the same changes. I have blocked the IP range to prevent further block evasion, and I have reverted the changes made in violation of the block.
Regarding sockpuppet investigations, Twinkle offers a nice sockpuppet reporting tool. When you're on the contributions page of the blocked user, click TW->ARV->Select report type: Sockpuppeteer. Provide evidence like we both have collected here, ideally with diff links that make the situation very clear. Afterwards, do feel free to notify the blocking administrator about the created investigation. This way, both the blocking administrator and other experienced sockpuppet investigators can have a look. Note: Do not click "Request CheckUser evidence". If CheckUser evidence is really necessary, an experienced user or checkuser will mark the report as such; in almost all cases, you do not need to do so manually.
Now that the user has already been blocked, don't worry: You do not need to create a sockpuppet investigation now. Just keep the handy tool in mind for the future. 🙂
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:01, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Thank you so much!! You’re the best. I appreciate everything. I assume this type of thing is annoying to deal with. I will keep the knowledge for the future. Smith0124 (talk) 01:03, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

You're welcome, Smith0124, and thank you very much for the kind feedback. I actually happen to enjoy this sometimes. Such as now. 😄 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:05, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

I think our friend needs more help, and it ain't coming from me

Faboof (talk · contribs) has constructed a user page that indicates they don't understand WP:NOTWEBHOST, especially in the inclusion of personal contact information. ToBeFree, the edit history, aside from the disruption they caused me, does suggest WP:CIR issues. Wherever this goes, thanks for helping. 2601:188:180:B8E0:65F5:930C:B0B2:CD63 (talk) 04:20, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi 2601:188:180:B8E0:65F5:930C:B0B2:CD63, I'll keep an eye on the situation. 😊 Don't expect quick indefinite action, but do have a look in a few weeks or months. I hope that's okay; feel free to report to WP:ANI if it becomes too hard to watch. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:09, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Bumping thread for 30 days. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:09, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
I don't expect a quick indefinite. I do think they'll walk into a block of their own making soon enough. Cheers, 2601:188:180:B8E0:65F5:930C:B0B2:CD63 (talk) 05:15, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Hello! I saw this post in my notifications. Does this have anything to do with me? If so, what can I do to help? ~~ Faboof (talk)(contribs) 14:17, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Hi Faboof, thanks for asking. I don't yet see it as a real problem, as I consider your experiments with the wiki syntax to be an acceptable first step for newcomers to do at Wikipedia. However, ideally, you should probably set up an own website with MediaWiki for detailed experiments, and use Wikipedia for contributions to actual articles instead. I think the main concern here is that of 170 edits, only the following very short list actually had an effect on Wikipedia articles: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?target=Faboof&namespace=0&tagfilter=&start=&end=&limit=50&title=Special%3AContributions
As Wikipedia is a volunteer project, you are of course never required to make any contributions. However, if you do, please increase the focus on actual edits rather than userspace experiments. See the WP:Task Center for ideas. Good luck and best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:20, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Yeah, sorry. Most of my edits are because I keepy forgetting to click the "Preview" button so I have to go back and make an edit each time. Sorry, I'll try contributing to wikipedia more :) ~~ Faboof (talk)(contribs) 22:10, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

IP Evading Block (again)

Hi ToBeFree,

I'm so sorry to bother you again, but it seems the same anonymous user is sockpuppeting again. IP 166.109.255.177 is making similar edits on the same pages (such as Interstate 87 (New York)), has gotten the same unconstructive edit warnings in the past, you get the idea. I think the original account needs to get a stricter punishment to encourage them to stop. I leave it to you, you have good judgement.

Thanks! Smith0124 (talk) 01:35, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi Smith0124,
That's a tricky case, but [94] and [95], combined with the timing and the article overlap, are sufficient evidence.
A three-month block is already at the upper end of reasonable actions against an IP-hopping editor who behaves in this way. If they continue to make the same edits after three months, I'll set a new three-month block. Also, with each catched block evasion, the timer is effectively reset by the new block. The only way to get out of the situation without making an unblock appeal is to stay away from Wikipedia for three months and to start discussing controversial changes on talk pages.
Please continue to report and undo such block evasion; I'm still confident they'll eventually lose their interest in making changes that do not persist.
I'm now creating a sockpuppet investigation before blocking the IP address.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:28, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
 Done: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/67.87.197.43 – please report all further cases of sockpuppetry by this person using Twinkle, as described in Special:PermanentLink/942833916. After creating a report, feel free to notify me about it. Thank you very much in advance! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:53, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

Thank you so much! Sorry I’m not very experienced with this. I will certainly continue to report any future evasion. Smith0124 (talk) 04:34, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

No problem; don't worry – thank you for doing this. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:43, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

Hello please help me

Hi ToBeFree, I followed your instructions on my user page, I sincerily don't understand what I have to do now. Could you please help me again? Thanks a lot in advance. Fabio — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fabio Roffinott (talk • contribs) 10:23, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi Fabio Roffinott, Thanks for asking.
Unless you are removing (not "replacing" or "correcting") factually incorrect information, please request edits by clicking "Talk" above an article, then "New section". On the talk page, you can use the code {{request edit}} at the top of the new section to notify independent reviewers of your request. Such requests are usually answered within a week, often within 24 hours. In your first sentence, please mention that you are being paid to request the edits on behalf of CompanyName. Below this clarification, please request the desired changes in a "please replace X by Y" format, if possible. Provide at least one reliable source, ideally an independent secondary source, that directly supports your addition (see WP:BURDEN). At the very bottom of the text, use the code "~~~~" to sign your request. If you would like to propose multiple changes, I recommend using bullet points.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:29, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 1 March 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:46, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – March 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2020).

Guideline and policy news

  • Following an RfC, the blocking policy was changed to state that sysops must not undo or alter CheckUser or Oversight blocks, rather than should not.
  • A request for comment confirmed that sandboxes of established but inactive editors may not be blanked due solely to inactivity.

Technical news

  • Following a discussion, Twinkle's default CSD behavior will soon change, most likely this week. After the change, Twinkle will default to "tagging mode" if there is no CSD tag present, and default to "deletion mode" if there is a CSD tag present. You will be able to always default to "deletion mode" (the current behavior) using your Twinkle preferences.

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:21, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi there,

I have no idea how to edit things but I noticed a Google search of Richard Archer still shows his birth year as 1966 but I see you edited it out in February. Why does it still show on Google but not the article itself? Is it a question of time delay? I know it's a basic question. He's got a new music outfit called Off World and I was looking to see if it has been added, see if there was any info about it on here.

Thanks if you have insight on the d.o.b. question. I am pretty sure he wasn't born in 1966!

Cheers!

IvyWeaver (talk) 17:14, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi IvyWeaver, it's likely a caching issue on Google's side; the Wikidata item at wikidata:Q7323763 appears to say "1977", not "1966". I'll remove it just to make sure incorrect information isn't spread via Wikidata either. Click "View History" at the Wikidata item to see this change. I hope that helps – Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:39, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
Hey again, thanks very much for the info and further adjustments. Thanks also for my cookies and welcome.
IvyWeaver (talk) 20:13, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
😊 You're welcome, IvyWeaver. Enjoy your stay. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:42, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-10

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • Readers who were not logged in briefly saw the interface in a language decided by their browser. It should normally be in the language of the wiki. This happened for a short period of time last week. This was because of a bug. [96]

Changes later this week

  • If you forget your password you can ask for a new one to be sent to your email address. You need to know your email address or your username. You will now be able to choose that you need to enter both your email address and your username. This will be a preference. This is to get fewer password reset emails someone else asked for. [97]
  • When you asked for a new password you could see if the username didn't exist on Special:PasswordReset. Now the page will show the username you entered and tell you an email has been sent if the username exists. This is for better security. [98]
  • On Special:WhatLinksHere you can see what other pages link to a page. You can see if the link is from a redirect. You can now see which section the redirect links to. [99]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 3 March. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 4 March. It will be on all wikis from 5 March (calendar).

Future changes

  • The developers are working on a new interface to solve edit conflicts on talk pages. You can give feedback. [100]
  • There is a vote on the creation of a new user group called abuse filter manager. The vote runs from March 1 to March 31 on Meta.
  • Advanced item wgMFSpecialCaseMainPage was used for the mobile site. It was deprecated in 2017. It will stop working in April. Wikis should see if they use it. If they do they should fix it. You can read more and ask for help. This affects 183 wikis. There is a list. [101]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

00:36, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

Tyronm.fultz

Thanks for blocking as a suspected compromise - I saw the talk page message and was just looking up what to do when I saw you deleted the page and blocked the user. I'm guessing that they weren't really compromised and were just pulling a "my little brother did it," but hey, that's not for us to decide. creffett (talk) 02:16, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi creffett, no problem, and thanks for the deletion tagging and notification – I agree. It's essentially "compromised or vandal", both justifying a block, and "compromised" being the good-faith interpretation I chose to put in the block log just in case. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:18, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-11

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • There is a new search word called articletopic. You can use it to search for articles on a specific topic. It is available on the Arabic, Czech, English and Vietnamese Wikipedias. It will come to more Wikipedias soon. [102][103][104]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 10 March. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 11 March. It will be on all wikis from 12 March (calendar).

Future changes

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:15, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Message by Jenaaliyah

Hi ToBeFree,

Just to clarify - so any one related to the company is not able contribute to Wikipedia?

Sorry, I am confused - because I saw in the previous post that it is alright to declare?

Thanks

Jen — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jenaaliyah (talk • contribs) 01:00, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi Jenaaliyah,
thanks for asking. The message you are referring to contains the following advice:
  • avoid editing or creating articles about yourself, your family, friends, colleagues, company, organization or competitors
Please take this advice. Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:06, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Reply

Hi. I'm looking to make a lot of small edits to fill out spaces during my day. So, two questions in response - #1. How can anyone know at a glance whether someone will be a vandal or not when they haven't edited anything yet or they've only made a few edits? #2. If welcoming new users is not appropriate, what would you recommend in terms of small, rapid edits? Royal Autumn Crest (talk) 19:29, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Looking forward to your response and I appreciate you reaching out. I'm going to welcome a few more people before I head out, because I want to believe maybe some vandals will stop being vandals if they are treated with respect. Not all of them, but maybe just one. I wonder at times if I can make the world a better place and I'd like to think if I could convince that one person, it would be a small thing toward that goal. Royal Autumn Crest (talk) 19:43, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
One more thing - if there is an easy way to know that a new user had made vandalism edits just looking at a glance on recent changes, I'm happy to provide modified welcomes asking them not to vandalize. If that exists, let me know. Royal Autumn Crest (talk) 19:47, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
Hi Royal Autumn Crest, thank you very much for asking.
I had to smile when reading "what would you recommend in terms of small, rapid edits". This is refreshingly honest, and the answer is "don't". 😉
If the main point of an edit is increasing the edit counter, I recommend reconsidering whether that's really a good idea. However, there are ways to quickly make many contributions while actually benefiting the encyclopedia. Mass welcomes less so – mass typography fixes more so! I recommend having a look at the Task Center for ideas. If it helps Wikipedia, I won't complain about it being motivated by the edit counter.
Please be careful, though: Sacrificing quality for quantity is a bad idea and can lead to severe problems. Relevant links about this warning:
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:06, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
PS: To answer the other questions: Assuming good faith is definitely a good principle. I am positively impressed by this attitude, and I don't want to tarnish it. As long as you don't thank users for obvious malicious damage to the encyclopedia, all is fine. When unsure, it's perfectly reasonable to assume that something is not vandalism. A common problem is that way too much good-faith disruptive editing is incorrectly labelled as "vandalism". Many experienced users suffer from this problem, and your approach is positively different. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:06, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for the reply. I'll take a look at the Task Center and be cautious as I can in terms of welcoming. If I slip up now and then, I'll do my best to make amends. To reiterate, my main purpose isn't edit counts, but relieving stress from IRL. Royal Autumn Crest (talk) 14:25, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Historical Vedic religion

Hi TBF, you recently blocked 223.181.123.4 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) but now they are back as 223.181.122.100 (talk · contribs · WHOIS). I have submitted an AIV report but given the continued disruption, will you block this IP as well? S0091 (talk) 22:04, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Well, now they are at it with another IP address so I have submitted RFPP. S0091 (talk) 22:06, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
Hi S0091, thanks for the report and sorry for the late reply. I have blocked the IP address used for block evasion, and have protected the page to prevent further disruption. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:26, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
No worries and appreciate it! S0091 (talk) 23:30, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

User:: Saucer Tennis

What specifically was promotional as opposed to being informative regarding the history of the disc sport Saucer Tennis? The facts provided are verifiable (example the link to the copyright notice within the LOC.gov database). There was no call to action requesting the user do anything for the benefit of the growth of Saucer Tennis. It is also not a website hosted at Wikipedia as we have a youtube channel, as well as host 3D models of the Saucer Tennis Speed and Tournament courts on Sketchfab site. As the inventor of the disc sport Saucer Tennis I have given proper evidence, (A COPYRIGHT) of the material assigned to me in 1980. Saucer Tennis (talk) 13:20, 12 March 2020 (UTC) Saucer Tennis

Hi Saucer Tennis,
Thanks for asking. Please note that editors with a COI are sometimes unaware of whether or how much it has influenced their editing. The usage of marketing language ("call to action") in your request rather confirms than disproves this observation. The page was not deleted for being promotional per se, but rather for misusing Wikipedia as a webhost.
Wikipedia does not publish original research, and articles generally require secondary, independent sources ("notability") to exist. Wikipedia is not a webhost; to publish a website about your own invention, please use an own website instead of the free encyclopedia.
The usage of "we", a plural pronoun, furthermore strengthens a concern your account had originally been reported for – being a promotion-only role account. I had originally declined the request for a block, and chose to provide a custom warning instead.
Please see your talk page for further instructions, as these seem to have become necessary while I was formulating an answer.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:33, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Re: 120.29.67.231

Hi. Can you please remove this IP's user talk page editing privileges? After the 2 week ban has been applied, they are continuing the vandalism in their talk page. Please see 1, 2, 3. Thanks. -WayKurat (talk) 06:52, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi WayKurat, sorry – I was offline and Widr did it. Central noticeboards like WP:ANI are often a quicker way to get the problem solved. Thanks for the notification, though. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:52, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

AIV

I saw your message before it was archived. I have the time shown already but didn't pay much attention. I think I got a few vandals blocked because of that, which makes me think the blocking admins haven't notice the time of the filters either. Jerm (talk) 19:32, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks and no worries. The blocks might have been justified by the history of (attempted) disruption coming from the same address again and again. I was surprised. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:43, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

AIV apology

Hey ToBeFree, just a heads up this was an accident. Sorry! -- LuK3 (Talk) 17:08, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

😄 Made me laugh! Wonderful. No worries and thank you very much for dealing with the actual problem that led to the report. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:26, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you

I really appreciate your efforts. Have a great weekend, 2601:188:180:B8E0:65F5:930C:B0B2:CD63 (talk) 16:13, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the report, for the kind feedback and for the weekend wish :) You too! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:25, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-12

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 17 March. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 18 March. It will be on all wikis from 19 March (calendar).

Future changes

  • If you edit a page at the same time as someone else you can get an edit conflict. There is a new two-column interface to make it easier to solve this. It will soon be active by default on the German, Arabic, and Farsi Wikipedias. It will be on by default on more wikis within the next months. You will be able to opt out of the new interface. [107][108]
  • You can see a proposed design for replying to comments in an easier way.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

21:14, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

March 2020

Warning icon Please stop your disruptive editing. If you continue to vandalize Wikipedia, as you did at Coronavirus disease 2019, you may be blocked from editing. Carl Fredrik talk 19:08, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Please, CFCF, tell me this was a humorous message. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:09, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
No, it is fully serious. You are abusing your admin privileges, and disrupting what is a intense but non-adversarial editing environment. What you are doing is extremely serious, and will undoubtedly lead to a review of your admin privileges. Carl Fredrik talk 19:11, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
Fine, CFCF, I'll add the custom edit warring notification to your talk page too – I had not added it to yours, trying to avoid friction by informing you about something I was completely sure you are aware of.
Protection has been requested at WP:RFPP and was the less invasive alternative to a partial block from editing. If you disagree about the decision, feel free to ask for it to be reviewed at WP:AN.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:17, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
Do feel free to place warnings wherever you wish, that neither makes them applicable nor free you from the extreme overstepping of administrator privileges you undertook by fully protecting the page. The page has seen over 500 edits per day, and a two-day block is a ridiculously thoughtless approach in face of what was a single editor posting on WP:RFPP — a discussion to which you didn't even link. Carl Fredrik talk 19:21, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
The protection policy, section "Full protection: Content disputes", lists full protection as "an alternative approach" (to blocking) "to end an ongoing edit war". It is described as "better suited to multi-party disputes and contentious content as talk page consensus becomes a requirement for implementation of requested edits". I'll reduce the protection duration to 12 hours to limit the impact of your content dispute on other editors, and will use blocks if it continues instead. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:29, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
If you don't understand that the extraordinary volume of edits currently experienced makes this into an exceptional and frankly WP:UNPRECEDENTED situation, where ordinary application of policy is not only unwise but foolish and severely lacking in judgement — you are truly not fit to be an administrator. Carl Fredrik talk 19:34, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
CFCF, I can understand these concerns, and I do thank you for the feedback. You can be pretty sure that it won't happen again, and if it's only because I am uninterested in the drama some editors are making of such decisions. I'd argue that especially regarding this topic, careful editing and proper discussion is important. This is why the community has authorized general sanctions in the area, after all. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:37, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
I'm sorry to be quick to jump towards de-adminship, but it was an extreme act to protect the page. The volume of edits makes many things difficult, but on the whole it has to be seen as something good for Wikipedia, and clanking down on it could have real harm for Wikipedia as a whole. This might end up in the newspapers. Carl Fredrik talk 19:43, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for starting your own discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard#Page_protection_of_Coronavirus_disease_2019. The current situation is trying for all of us, and I apologize for being aggressive, and am the first to admit that I may also not be acting my best fully-rational self. Carl Fredrik talk 19:52, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm sorry for my initial dismissal of your valid concerns, CFCF. If you don't mind, I'll throw this section into the archive of my talk page and try not to think about the disaster too much. Thanks for the quick application of a needed cluebat. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:08, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
FWIW, I'm the one who requested protection over at RFPP. In hindsight it probably wasn't the best idea to request full-protection on a high-edited page, especially with other constructive edits. I'm sorry I put TBF in that situation. -- LuK3 (Talk) 21:26, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
Understandable and very kind, LuK3, but all requests for administrative action need to be reviewed and properly answered, and also it wasn't you who asked for 48 hours, a duration that is the default in Twinkle but completely unapplicable for such an article. Of all those involved in the conflict and discussion, you – as the person who has merely pointed out an actual problem – need to worry about it the least. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:47, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Block request

Hey! Could you block 223.187.189.47 (talk) or its range for me? My report at AIV gets removed because the IP is covered under a partial rangeblock right now, but it has continued its spam on different pages. --MrClog (talk) 00:48, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi MrClog, thanks for asking! A steward has already globally blocked this specific IP address in the meantime, but I have now also converted the partial rangeblock to a sitewide one. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:46, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you

...for the block [109]. Since I sometimes complain about slow response to reports, I'm happy to acknowledge the opposite. Cheers, 2601:188:180:B8E0:65F5:930C:B0B2:CD63 (talk) 00:14, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

😄 You're welcome. Thank you very much for the kind feedback! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:17, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for the blocking of the sock. If you don't mind, can you link the sock investigation? Also, this user posted the same exact edit awhile back as this sock, see the <br style="clear: both;"/> in the edit. — Mr Xaero ☎️ 00:52, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

 Comment: Umm.... blocked[110]? LOL — Mr Xaero ☎️ 00:57, 20 March 2020 (UTC)
😐 Mr Xaero, I'm relieved to see you find it funny, since I find it horribly embarrassing. I am deeply sorry for my moment of absent-mindedness when trying to block the user displayed on the right side of the diff, where the Twinkle menu also is. At least that's how I attempt to explain my mistake to myself. Meh.
To answer your original question, none existed, but your diff made this interesting enough for one to be created: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Nicky jam el cangri
Let's see how it is answered. "Sock puppet" was a clear enough reason for me to block the sockpuppet, but the master attribution is just a suspicion.
Not sure how to end this message. Damn. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:09, 20 March 2020 (UTC)
I played the first one off but when that second one popped up and was the same I felt like dealing with it but I got wrapped up with this COVID-19 junk so I deleted. As for the block part, I am not worried and I find it as humorous. Don't beat yourself up over it as we are all human and we are not perfect. — Mr Xaero ☎️ 01:18, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Awesome

← This is awesome. 👍 - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 05:52, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

😄 Thank you very much, Fylindfotberserk! I wish more songs were freely licensed. Especially Korobeiniki being public domain was a very pleasant surprise for me, allowing me to share what I believed to be copyrighted by Nintendo. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:08, 20 March 2020 (UTC)
Have you played Risen, Spellforce? These games and their sequels, IMO, have the best soundtracks. Rise of Legends is another game, awesome soundtrack. Darksiders 2 also. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 07:35, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
Oh, I didn't know these before. Dramatic, ambient music – probably best played by a group of strings and drums. Freely licensed similar music is available in The Battle for Wesnoth, but I have never managed to isolate piano melodies from such soundtracks yet. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:27, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
The Battle for Wesnoth has some nice music. Thanks for sharing that. -Fylindfotberserk (talk) 08:20, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you

Hi - I just wanted to thank you properly for that recent edit summary. As a new admin, I sometimes have doubts about whether I'm doing things in the right way - is there something I haven't thought about, would an old hand do things differently? It's really nice to have someone say 'good job' every now and again - if only to top up my confidence reserves! Let me know if you're ever feeling like you're in the same boat, I'd be happy to offer another pair of eyes. Stay safe in the current chaos, GirthSummit (blether) 20:36, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Hey Girth Summit, I know that feeling! 😄 Happy to hear that I'm not the only one. I was a bit afraid it might be a bit out-of-my-position to provide feedback in this way, as I'm just as new. But then again, four eyes are more than two, and we both do have a considerable amount of Wikipedia editing experience. You're welcome and thank you very much – stay safe too! I guess the virus is beneficial for online communities like Wikipedia. It's a horrible thing, but the encyclopedia is a bastion of calm. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:30, 20 March 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, it'll be interesting to see whether it turns out to be beneficial. The optimist in me says yay; however, we've just closed all schools in the UK - we're going to have a lot of bored, English-speaking teenagers on our hands. This bored, English-speaking teacher is going to be on-hand to counter any resultant vandalism, but I hope we don't get overwhelmed. And yes, for sure, your feedback is definitely appreciated - positive or otherwise, I always want to know whether folk agree with my actions. Cheers GirthSummit (blether) 21:36, 20 March 2020 (UTC)
Interesting theory! Hmm. I have a feeling teenagers at a school computer are more likely to vandalize pages – e.g. to impress classmates who are required to look at the same page at the same time, and whose reaction happens in the same room – than those sitting at home. It might depend on the level of homework they are now required to do. No homework, no Wikipedia research, no school vandalism. Almost only long-term abusers open Wikipedia to damage it in the first place, I think. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:44, 20 March 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, that's a heartening perspective - you might well be right. Let's see how this social experiment pans out! GirthSummit (blether) 21:54, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Conflict of interest

Hello--I got a message from you about conflicts of interest. Can you clarify what that is about? Have I done something wrong that you are aware of? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.223.179.60 (talk) 05:34, 21 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi 66.223.179.60, thanks for asking! I wondered if you might have a connection to the University of Alaska Fairbanks, for example. The general advice is meant to allow you to determine if you have a conflict of interest, and if you have one, how to deal with it. If you have no conflict of interest and are not being compensated for your edits to Wikipedia, you have done nothing wrong and can freely ignore the message. In any case, feel free to remove it from your talk page at any time, since you have seen it and it was just meant for your information. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:26, 21 March 2020 (UTC)

Fair enough! I am a two-time alum, but am not an employee or current student of UA. Thanks for the information. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.223.179.60 (talk) 08:25, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification, 66.223.179.60 – if you regularly edit in this area, I recommend creating an account and mentioning this on your user page. However, you are not required to do so, and the situation is very likely fine. I'll remove the message from your user talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:53, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Parkdean Resorts

Hi there, sorry for a newbie question, I see that you actioned the Parkdean Resorts page request to secure the page and it results in "User Blocked", I just wanted to enquire, is that the members of the marketing team manipulating the page or me? Apologies, new to editing Wikipedia, but this was an issue that I cared about so wanted to keep things up to date. Sorry to bother you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.187.190.111 (talk) 01:03, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi 81.187.190.111, thank you very much for the report. The action can be seen at the bottom of User_talk:Adam_blogs, User_talk:Eoin_Kenneally and User_talk:62.254.135.82. You have not been blocked; you are also the first person who has actually taken the time to discuss the issue on the article's talk page. If you keep the edit-warring policy in mind, you are likely doing fine. When you see others disagree, you may like to invite them to the discussion with a short, neutral message on their user talk page. See {{Please see}} for an example of such a message. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:11, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
Thank you, this is a really helpful and detailed reply. Thanks for making my first experience editing a Wikipedia article easy to understand. I will try to go about things in the correct way. Appreciate you signposting resources and policies. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.187.190.111 (talk) 01:13, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
🙂 You're welcome; thanks for the kind feedback. I see now that MelanieN has proposed a compromise solution. I recommend accepting the recent changes as a good compromise. If you disagree, feel free to invite MelanieN to the talk page discussion. The section has now reached a state where discussion is probably more civil and calm than direct editing. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:17, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
No I think that MelanieN has done a brilliant job. I left a note on her page thanking her, she'd managed to make things punchy and concise and she got the point across better than I was managing. I think her edits are fair, balanced and read really well. Thank you both for your help. 81.187.190.111 (talk) 01:21, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
Ah, perfect. That's a nice result – thank you very much for staying calm and reasonable during a dispute. And of course you're welcome. Feel free to ask if new questions arise. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:23, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Asuka

All of that information was sourced. Thats what the IP was stripping from the article. I was avoiding an edit war by turning to page protection. Also the content had been discussed prior and it was agreed that it was content that can be reliably sourced and thus included on the page. Rusted AutoParts 02:02, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi Rusted AutoParts, all I saw is a discussion about the article subject being a mother or not – I've yet to see a source for the number "1". Perhaps there is one in the article, but when there is such a dispute, an inline citation could really make a difference. Removing unsourced or poorly sourced information about living people is explicitly listed as an exception at WP:3RRNO, which is why protection or blocking didn't seem appropriate to me yet. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:04, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
It wasn’t poorly sourced though, in the personal life section there is a reliable source identifying her as a mother. Perhaps it’s incorrect to include the 1, it isn’t mentioned the number of children she has, but stripping reliably sourced content, specifically identifying her as a mother, is wrong and the IP gave no valid reason to strip that content. Rusted AutoParts 02:07, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

(discussion continued at Talk:Asuka_(wrestler)#Wife_and_mother) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:47, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Barnstar of Diplomacy
Just wanted to note that I think your handling of the Terminader situation is excellent. MrClog (talk) 20:03, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
A moment of "please no" followed by "thank God it's a barnstar". 😄
MrClog, this means a lot to me. The kind feedback of course. (And the shiny barnstar, there's no denying it. 🙂) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:17, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Ping back

Thank you for pinging me in your edit summary. I didn't even know one could do that. But why did you ping me, instead of the person you were replying to? ◄ Sebastian 09:22, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Hey SebastianHelm, I thought we had been talking about the size of the special page output before. I just wanted to let you know that the monster has been slain. :) See the history of the discussion page for technical details about my gigabyte journey through the API. Best regards ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:58, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
🙌 ◀ Sebastian 14:35, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-13

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • Some development will be slower than planned. This is because of the current pandemic. You can see the new deployment guidelines. This is to avoid risks when some persons could be unavailable.
  • There was a problem when adding interwiki links. The tool you use to add interwiki links could suggest the wrong project to link to. This has now been fixed. [111][112]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 24 March. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 25 March. It will be on all wikis from 26 March (calendar).

Future changes

  • There is a project to make editing easier for newcomers. The developers are trying to understand what initiatives different Wikipedias have to welcome newcomers. They also want to know which templates are often used for maintenance activities. You can help this project by checking if your wiki's pages are listed on Wikidata.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:08, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Page Deletion Request

I accidentally created a template called Template:TestTemplate, can you delete it? Thanks! ~~ Faboof (talk)(contribs) - (March 24 2020 14:59) 14:59, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi Faboof, Sure, will do – alternatively feel free to add {{db-self}} to it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:04, 24 March 2020 (UTC)
Thank you :D ~~ Faboof (talk)(contribs) - (March 24 2020 15:05) 15:05, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Can you check something for me?

Hello ToBeFree,
I have just responded to an editor on my talk page: User_talk:Interstellarity#Edit_Revert. Can you please make sure that I responded OK and provide your input if needed? Thank you, Interstellarity (talk) 18:37, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

@Interstellarity: looking... ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:38, 24 March 2020 (UTC)
Good that you asked 🙂 See the bottom of the latest archive of this talk page for how badly I mess up sometimes. Don't worry about it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:00, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

College Railman

I appreciate you're trying to be as minimally restrictive as possible, and I appreciate the article space ban, but I cannot see them discussing competently on talk. Please see their recent edit at their prime interest article's talk page. That fairly clearly illustrates a native incompetence. And frankly telling him to petition other editors to proxy for him will lead to abuse in that namespace too. But perhaps that's what you intended. John from Idegon (talk) 02:35, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi John from Idegon, of course that was not my intention. I had seen the talk edits, but did not appropriately weigh them in my decision. Please have a look again. Thanks. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:46, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
Thanks. John from Idegon (talk) 03:47, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

Difference between AIV and ANEW

Hi, thanks for your comments at ANEW. Do you know why it's as though AIV and ANEW are almost like two different cultures? I've been reporting users to AIV for years. "You say this person's vandalizing and they've received ample warning? OK, let me look at their talk page and hover over the Diff links for their contributions. Wow, yes, that certainly calls for a block." With ANEW, it seems to be, "You want me to deal with an editor you think is disruptive? OK, but you have to hold my head and point my eyes, one at a time, at each and every one of the sentences you've written warning this person, and each and every one of their contributions you consider disruptive, because otherwise, I just can't be bothered." At least, that's the impression that I get. I don't understand why the level of effort requested of people reporting users at ANEW is so much more demanding than the level at AIV. Largoplazo (talk) 12:02, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Heh, Largoplazo, thanks for your reports on both noticeboards. Strictly speaking, I guess WP:ANI would have been a better place than WP:AIV for making the first report, since the user isn't vandalizing (nor spamming, nor sockpuppeteering) – they're just disruptively clueless. Reports at WP:ANI are free-form and easy to create; add a {{userlinks}} to the top of your report, describe the problem, provide a few diffs to make the problem really obvious – the user will almost certainly be blocked. Reports at WP:ANEW are different due to the nature of the "edit warring" decision process. ANEW administrators are frequently dealing with experienced long-time contributors, some of which have over 50,000 edits and suddenly break the three-revert rule. Extreme project-wide drama often occurs if such users are blocked. That's why the three-revert rule exists, and that's why ANEW administrators insist on undeniable proof, I think. This goes to the point of refusing to answer malformed requests, something we would not do at WP:AIV and something that can't really happen at WP:ANI. There is no "malformed" ANI report, since there is no form requirement in the first place... except notifying the reported user. AIV doesn't even have this requirement, but should only be used for clear vandalism, spamming or sockpuppetry. Even non-obvious vandalism, done in worst faith and intentionally damaging the encyclopedia, is better reported at WP:ANI if the situation isn't obvious on first look.
I'm still not in form to properly deal with the reports at the moment; someone else looking at the noticeboards will hopefully help you to resolve what does appear to require administrative intervention. Thanks for your frustration tolerance and patience, and thanks for asking.
Best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:53, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
Thank you, I appreciate your thorough explanation! I hope you're up to snuff soon. Largoplazo (talk) 21:39, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 29 March 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:43, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-14

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 31 March. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 1 April. It will be on all wikis from 2 April (calendar).

Future changes

  • The video player will change to be simpler and more modern. The current beta feature will become the video player for everyone. The old player will be removed. [114]
  • There is a project to make templates easier to use. The next few weeks the developers will present ideas on the project page. You can watch that page if you are interested in giving feedback. [115]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:26, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for the welcome!

Thank you for the warm welcome to the Wiki community! I’m looking forward to contributing as much as I can to help spread the knowledge around the world :) Czarek11 (talk) 00:45, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Hey Czarek11, you're welcome! 🙂 Good luck and have fun! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:47, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

hydroxychloroquine page

hello there. sorry i did not you were removing my sources. i kept adding them on thinking it was an electronic error. All my sources are legitimate links adding to the COID-19 portion of hydroxychloroquine. after checking these links, if you feel they are inappropriate or breaking laws then please do remove them and let me know. however, likely all link i put up for this section will not be inappropriate. let me know if there is anything i need to know as this is my first time editing on Wikipedia. thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Drganand.13 (talk • contribs) 19:13, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi Drganand.13, if I understand correctly, you have added original research or personal interpretation of material to the article. If I understand correctly, your edits have been problematic because they combined multiple sources into something that neither source actually said, and because at least some of the sources are completely unreliable (Google Docs, YouTube blogger). Wikipedia does not publish information based on self-published sources.
Please have a look at the history of the article, by clicking "History" at the top of the "Hydroxychloroquine" page. If you disagree with Zefr, who has removed your text, please click "Talk" above the article, "New Section", and explain why you disagree with these findings.
If you have a personal connection to the sources, please have a look at our conflict of interest guideline. Under no circumstance, re-insert the material without discussion. The topic is delicate, and users are quickly blocked from editing when causing disruption in this area.
Thank you very much for your understanding. Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:23, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

hydroxychloroquine page

In major medical emergencies, it is urgent that the available facts be debated. An urgent debate needs to take place on the following questions: Is it more dangerous to wait for clinical trials (which could take weeks/months before offering prevention to nurses, doctors, firemen and paramedics and who are already in great danger), and if a patient is at extreme risk by reason of their medical condition (such as immunosuppression) and if they don't have any of the contraindications (forbidden situation) listed by the manufacturer then is it better to wait for research on prevention? As you know, COVID-19 is ripping through nursing homes and killing people in numbers. The true spirit of Wikipedia is to foster debate. I understand that under normal circumstances you want to see a published clinical trial, but this could be dangerous to the public. I recommend that you allow me to list the 5, or so, best scientific papers. I agree to refrain from youtube videos. I suggest that if a proper disclaimer is added, then it is reasonable under these special circumstances to include certain information. I assume you have no objections to posting information about regulatory announcements, information from highly credible resources, and a list of trials in-progress so that interested parties can track new scientific information as it becomes available. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Drganand.13 (talk • contribs) 20:04, 31 March 2020 (UTC) Drganand.13 (talk) 20:05, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi Drganand.13, thanks for your message. To quickly note this before any bad ideas happen: I strongly object to any further edits to the article by you, if they are made in this promotional spirit. I highly recommend avoiding any further edits to the article before you have reached a consensus on the article's talk page. Discussions on individual user talk pages are not a sufficient alternative to a proper article discussion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:10, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
Drganand.13, Wikipedia articles are not meant to "foster debate"; they are meant to be based on reliable, independent, published sources – ideally secondary ones. See WP:PSTS, part of the original research policy, for details. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:15, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Okay thanks for your time. I'll visit the discussion and post my ideas for consensus if they allow me to (seems like they closed the discussion...?). I may message you just to ask brief and general questions if that's okay with you as I am inexperienced in editing on Wikipedia.Drganand.13 (talk) 20:19, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much, Drganand.13, and no worries. I replied hastily above to prevent an edit war. If I see correctly, none of the discussions at Talk:Hydroxychloroquine are closed; you can reply to any that seems relevant. Do always feel free to ask here if any questions arise, especially of technical nature. I'll happily help with technical issues. There is also the Teahouse with many independent volunteers for assistance. Good luck and best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:25, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

The worst userpage I have seen

Honestly. Did you know I was going to look at your page

Nice use of CSS though. I'd give you an award for it. But that shadow Thepenguin9 (talk) 22:13, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

😄 Thepenguin9, I've never thought about this problem. While probably not to your satisfaction, could you confirm that the issue has been, uh, "resolved" now? :P ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:07, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
I am shocked that my four tildes weren't added to that first message (blaming the late nightfor that one)
I also was not expecting you to edit your page because of me! The fancy drawing was fine, the background is also fine, it's just the drop shadow on the text that is messing up here
Additionally here is the addon I use Thepenguin9 (talk) 22:14, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
🙂 Ah, it still looks bad, somehow. Not as bad as before, but in an unexpectedly ugly way – yes. I am unsure how to fix this without affecting the "normal" output; perhaps I'll have an idea later. You're probably not the only person with a dark browser theme, and user-side CSS is a good thing. Relying on a white background is old-fashioned and sometimes incorrect. Now I'm enforcing the white background, but that only breaks your black theme further. I'm not yet sure what a better solution could look like. Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:19, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
(edit conflict) And thanks for sharing the addon, that's a very popular one recommended to all Firefox users as far as I know. I'll try to keep its existence in mind on other websites as well. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:19, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – April 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2020).

Guideline and policy news

  • There is an ongoing request for comment to streamline the source deprecation and blacklisting process.

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

  • The WMF has begun a pilot report of the pages most visited through various social media platforms to help with anti-vandalism and anti-disinformation efforts. The report is updated daily and will be available through the end of May.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:00, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

2606:A000:1017:896D:41AC:B437:C183:E4D8

user:2606:A000:1017:896D:41AC:B437:C183:E4D8 has been triggering the filter, and AIV keeps removing it since she is already blocked from editing certain pages. CLCStudent (talk) 23:54, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much for all the reports, CLCStudent!  Done ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:57, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

2606:a000:1320:85ef:9c25:60de:d2e6:a293

user:2606:a000:1320:85ef:9c25:60de:d2e6:a293 just vandalized after her final warning, but AIV won't accept the report, as she is already blocked from editing certain pages. CLCStudent (talk) 18:16, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi CLCStudent, done – perhaps you should add your support at the top of WT:AIV. I hope this is fixed one day. Thanks for the report! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:18, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Voyager of the Seas

pls semi-protect indefinitely as the previous protection has already been expired per WP:GS/COVID19. most of the new users now appears to edit with their unsourced and placing incorrect stats. 95.58.3.0 (talk) 06:09, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi 95.58.3.0, please use WP:RFPP for such requests, to ensure a neutral, independent, quick response. I'll copy your request there. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:50, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

Modifying comments

Regarding your edit comment here, if I'm modifying something I wrote previously (other than something trivial like correcting a typo), I'll strike out the original with <s>...</s> and add the new text. That makes it obvious to everybody that I've made a change. -- RoySmith (talk) 16:24, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi RoySmith, Thanks – I agree, and there is even "<ins>...</ins>" for insertions. I usually do this, unless I'm the last editor and quickly fix a typo before someone replies. As far as I know, that causes "edit conflict" warnings for those who happen to reply to the old message, so everyone is informed. That is, unless they use reply-link. 🙂
I'll re-think this practice especially on highly frequented noticeboards. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:29, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks

Got your message on WP:AIV: thanks, I thought I'd looked in the block log but I've realised I looked in the wrong place. YorkshireLad  ✿  (talk) 19:07, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

Hey YorkshireLad, no worries :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:08, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

IP evading block again

Hi ToBeFree,

I just want to let the IP 67.87.197.43 is evading his/her block again. There are once again multiple acccounts, again making similar edits on the same road articles in New York, Connecticut, and Arkansas. I think the master should get a more severe punishment, this is the third time and he/she clearly has no interest in stopping or using the talk page. Here are the sockpuppet IPs:

  • 69.118.161.167
  • 2601:192:103:3000:25a0:2401:8fbd:f794
  • 2600:1017:b800:7aac:b5c9:76a2:cb56:fee5
  • 2600:1017:b809:e51f:f98f:3ce8:a486:b64e
  • 2601:192:103:3000:a9a6:bd10:bd2d:3374
  • 2601:192:103:3000:f12f:da8c:feff:1308
  • 2601:192:103:3000:25A0:2401:8FBD:F794
  • 2600:1017:B8A3:A090:F580:AD67:E48F:1B5

Thank you, and stay healthy! I will add more sockpuppets if I find them. Smith0124 (talk) 22:43, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

Received, looking ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:44, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:26, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

Smith0124, there's not much I can do at the moment; the IP addresses are stale and won't be used anymore. A block is not punishment; it is meant to prevent further disruption. A block on these IP addresses can prevent nothing anymore.
If you are absolutely sure, you can revert the changes per WP:Block evasion. If you have done so multiple times on a page, you can request page protection. For example, Hutchinson River Parkway has been protected for one month now. Administrators can only help in this way if you have reverted the user multiple times on the same page. Slowly, we'll get the issue resolved this way.
I'm sorry for the frustration caused by this user. Perhaps it's Peterjack1 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:21, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for the help. I don’t really think it’s my place to investigate who the person really is, if they can continuously evade the block than there’s not much we can do. Smith0124 (talk) 02:59, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
You're welcome, no worries. This is indeed pretty frustrating. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:01, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
Yeah, it is, but it’s just not worth an investigation. Frustrating yes, a big problem no. Smith0124 (talk) 03:04, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Can I use this source?

Hello, ToBeFree. Thank you again for unblocking me, but I have a question. I know there is an optional part of a settlement infobox that is for demonyms, and I would like to add one to Paradise, Nevada's infobox. The demonym is "Paradiseian" (pronounced Pair-ă-dee-see-an). Here is my source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=naDCCW5TSpU

It is the video from CGP Grey talking about the unincorporated town, and at the 1:34 mark, he says the aforementioned demonym. Is it okay if I use YouTube videos as a source? TylerNguyen1 (talk) 06:57, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi TylerNguyen1, thanks for asking. This is an ideal Teahouse question; feel free to ask such questions there at any time. The answer to this one is "No, YouTube videos are self-published and lack editorial oversight." Please also see the "YouTube" entry at WP:RSP. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:28, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Okay, thanks. TylerNguyen1 (talk) 20:44, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

No problem, you're welcome. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:45, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Graywalls is still hounding me

I appreciate all your help and time you have put into this matter. I thought you should know that graywalls is continuing to fight against my contributions to the point of making someone with the Commons help desk angry when the matter has been attempted to be resolved:

Original Help Desk conversation in Commons

Help desk's escalation to Commons Admin

And now I just got an alert that he has initiated an image review of an article I had recently contributed to (it may need it but he did this after you telling him "I believe that you should not be the person to start that discussion."):

Graffiti: Difference between revisions

I don't mind the image review at all, the problem is, it appears that he is still actively hounding me, especially in the Commons. Matthew T Rader (talk) 00:18, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Matthew T Rader, you're welcome, and thank you very much for the update. I'm pretty sure this will be dealt with properly on Wikimedia Commons now. I have added a comment on the Commons Administrator's Noticeboard and recommend ignoring Graywalls on Wikimedia Commons from now on.
Regarding the English Wikipedia, if I see correctly, that's one edit, and it can probably be justified well enough. Graywalls is facing opposition for their behavior on Commons; I'd like to see how this works out. I recommend waiting at least one week before checking if this has become persistent hounding. Do not engage with Graywalls if anyhow possible – to the extent of ignoring them even if they message you on your talk page. Don't remove their messages, don't answer them, don't edit articles they have recently edited. This allows us to see easily if they still follow you, and it prevents the excuse "they started the interaction".
Let's have a look again in a week. This will be dealt with, using blocks or interaction bans if necessary, if it turns out to still be a habit. Harassment is not tolerated on Wikimedia projects, and users who persistently engage in such behavior will be expelled from the editing community. We just need patience to see if this is the case here.
Thank you very much and best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:07, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
Thank you too, I haven't engaged with him since our discussion on the Admin page yesterday. I'll do as you suggest and not respond to him and do my part to calm this situation down and not escalate it with him. Matthew T Rader (talk) 01:13, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
Thank you very much, Matthew T Rader. I'd like to emphasize that I do not blame you for Graywalls's behavior. My request not to interact with them is only meant to prevent excuses, and to keep the situation absolutely clear and investigatable. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:15, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
I understood that, thanks for clarifying. I've definitely learned a lot in this process about how to be a better contributor, so I think that's cool. Matthew T Rader (talk) 01:20, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
I would like to state, for the record, that help desk discussion over at Commons was happening BEFORE Matthew T Rader started a complaint on English Wikipedia. I don't feel it was inappropriate to wrap up something that was already in progress. There is nothing personal against that editor, however what I did find objectionable on here was what appeared to be serial promotional activity, and that was what I was addressing, in batch. Not the user. Going forward, when I encounter this kind of things, I'll take it to COI/N before going back-and-forth excessively. On the copyright concerns, it's my understanding that it's most appropriately taken to Commons, which is why I started that discussion over there. I feel it's important that everything copyright guidelines are precised adhered to so situations like this would not occur down the road. Also, LeoFrank had suggested him to utilize Dispute Resolution. That discussion can be seen over at User_talk:LeoFrank#Help. He did not take that suggestion. He did not revert just me, but two other editors to reinstate his edits. My interaction with what I believed to be promotional occurred over a span of roughly 36 hours, so to say "it's been going on for days" in my opinion is a bit of a stretch. When you look at his edits over many articles, they're very closely together, so I am guessing he's using script assisted method, however I am doing it manually, therefore a time spread between edits is naturally longer and that should be considered a "series of edits" rather than "persistently undoing his work over day". Graywalls (talk) 05:44, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-15

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • There was a problem with user pages not being shown properly on desktop. This was because of a bug. It will soon be fixed. [116]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 7 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 8 April. It will be on all wikis from 9 April (calendar).

Future changes

  • MediaWiki will use a newer version of Unicode. Some characters that did not have an upper case equivalent before do now. Titles beginning with one of these characters will be moved. A list of these titles can be seen on Phabricator. The titles will be renamed by the user Maintenance script. This will start on 13 April 2020. You can rename them before this if you wish and the new title can be different from the one the script would rename it to. [117]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

19:03, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Talk page protection

Hey ToBeFree, thank you for your help with that recent block. Would it be possible to semi-protect my talk page for a few days? -- LuK3 (Talk) 18:36, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi LuK3, no worries – but for semi-protection of talk pages, I think WP:RFPP is a better option. I'm not entirely comfortable with that. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:43, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
No worries! I appreciate your help. -- LuK3 (Talk) 18:45, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Anna Catharina Bischoff

Hey there,

I'm contacting you because of an odd pattern with an anon user.

They've made some strange edits to the Anna Catharina Bischoff page, and I may have stepped a bit far by reverting all their edits at once (just meant to undo their latest with a 700px change), but after that, the user seems to have gone back and forth on re-adding their edit and reverting it back to gone again.... and the user also briefly edited their talk page to replace my warning label with a "poopy poopy" message (and then they reverted it back).

I'm not sure quite what to do here. Any thoughts, since you were the last person to briefly deal with the user in question? NomadicNom (talk) 20:57, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi NomadicNom, I've just had a look at the block log of 2606:A000:E5CF:7C00::/64 and decided to add a 6-month block. Thanks for noticing and asking! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:03, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
Cheers, thanks mate. NomadicNom (talk) 21:06, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Barnstar

The Admin's Barnstar
For gracefully doing the mostly thankless tasks of an administrator. 73.186.215.222 (talk) 15:53, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

😃 Hey 73.186.215.222, this made my day. You are one of the reasons the encyclopedia should always remain openly editable by anyone, and any requests to the contrary look funny whenever you're spending your free time to deal with disruptive accounts. I sadly often filter the recent changes list for AI-detected potentially problematic edits, but it is important to always remember that the majority of all users, whether registered or not, is helping the project. The need for automated pre-filtering to detect vandalism confirms just this: There is an overwhelming amount of positive changes, and a few negative changes, per hour.

Whether or not you're the same person: User_talk:2601:188:180:B8E0:65F5:930C:B0B2:CD63#A_well-deserved_tea_and_thanks is very applicable. Thank you very much for all your work, for the kind feedback, and for the barnstar!

Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:33, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

  • I'm very much the same editor as 2601--probably the editing style will clarify that. Your observations are correct, I concentrate on disruptive edits because it's mostly mindless work, and has a generally constructive function. Also, I remember the value accorded to high quality encyclopedias in my youth, long ago, and am genuinely appalled at the self-serving and destructive impulse that drives even 5% of the traffic here. And, as I've noted before, I save my real writing for published content for which I'm paid. Some misinformed but well-meaning editors consider me knowledgeable in my field. Bless them.

Be well. It's good to have you here. 73.186.215.222 (talk) 16:46, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Heh :) A large website, visited and trusted by many, editable by anyone, seemingly inviting the spam – of 8 billion humans, the spammers are perhaps the least strange, most understandable disruptive editors. And school children, sure. An "edit" button on a page viewed by the whole class, and a lack of awareness about the worldwide impact... What I don't get, however, is adults dedicating their free time to intentional destruction.
Thanks for the kind words, and all the best to you too! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:09, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Reply

Hi ToBeFree. Apologies. I was simply trying to edit the page for my company as we've had a rebrand and i wanted the information to be the most current. Please let me know next steps - so I can update correctly. Thanks for your time. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pedia 2021 (talk • contribs) 00:18, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Pedia 2021, thank you very much for providing the disclosure. However, if I understand correctly, you have edited as Businessowner1987 before, and neither the connection between the two accounts, nor the paid editor status of the other account has been dislosed yet.
Please – urgently – take the following steps to prevent a block for sock- / meatpuppetry:
  1. Log into the Businessowner1987 account, open the page User:Businessowner1987 while logged in. Create the page with the following code: {{subst:User:Pedia_2021}}{{clear}}{{Abandoned account|[[User:Pedia 2021]]|{{subst:Currentdate}}}} – do not add anything else. It already contains your disclosure.
  2. Log out of the Businessowner1987 account and never use it again afterwards.
  3. Log in as Pedia 2021, open the page User talk:Businessowner1987 (!). Click "New Section". Add the following code: "As advised at [[User talk:ToBeFree]], I hereby confirm that this is my old account, and that I will not use it anymore. ~~~~" Subject: "Abandoned". Edit summary: "Abandoned".
  4. While logged in as Pedia 2021, open the page User:Pedia 2021. Click "Edit". Add the following code to the bottom of the page: "I have previously edited as [[User:Businessowner1987]], and will not use any other account than "Pedia 2021" in the future. ~~~~"
When you have carefully followed all these steps in the correct order, the main problem is solved.
Afterwards, you should not edit the article directly anymore. Whenever you would like to change something in the article, please click the "Talk" tab above the article. I have added an orange warning box to the article's talk page. It allows you to easily click the link "request corrections on or suggest content", which you should do if you would like to make any further change on the page.
It is extremely likely that your extensive rewrite of the article will be undone by volunteers sooner or later. This has nothing to do with your disclosure. The disclosure only prevents a block for undisclosed paid editing and sockpuppetry, both of which was not your intention. You need to take the steps above to prevent this misinterpretation from happening, and I recommend that you do so while you're still able to. Hence I wrote "urgently": There is possibly not much time to correct the earlier mistakes in this way.
Good luck and best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:21, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Block of IP 66.65.97.10

@ToBeFree:Technically, edit warring. But who was edit warring with whom? List of Dora the Explorer home video releases - if you look at the detail, a lot of that, was the IP trying to remove direct links to Amazon.com as the sourcing, which I don't think we are supposed to have in articles. The other editor in that edit war was @SMargan: who has been adding, and re-adding, the Amazon. com links. — Maile (talk) 20:35, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Maile66, there seems to be a content dispute, with SMargan repeatedly attempting to reach out to the other editor via their talk page, and the article's talk page, and via edit summaries. 66.65.97.10 is being completely unresponsive. I have warned SMargan in kind words about the edit warring policy, and blocked the warning-resistant 66.65.97.10. Per WP:RSP, "Amazon is a reliable source for basic information about a work (such as release date, ISBN, etc.), although it is unnecessary to cite Amazon when the work itself may serve as a source for that information (e.g., authors' names and ISBNs)." However, I'm open to alternative ideas how to deal with the slightly unusual problem. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:08, 1 April 2020 (UTC)
I have no problem with this, if you don't. That's interesting info about using Amazon as a reliable source. — Maile (talk) 21:16, 1 April 2020 (UTC)
I think it's often misused for promotion, especially via their referral program. I normally prefer to avoid using it, but I really had no opinion about it in the content dispute – which I hope is a good thing. Thanks for pointing it out, though; let's see what happens after the block. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:19, 1 April 2020 (UTC)
Hello Maile66 and ToBeFree, I have responded, and both acknowledged and appreciated, the polite and firm "email warring" warning issued by ToBeFree in my personal talk section (talk).[1] I am still new to this editing process, so bare with me.
I am responding to the 'substantive change' issues here, i.e. my content changes to the table of "Dora Explorer" DVD releases ("List of Dora the Explorer home video releases"), which were made in good faith and honestly designed to improve the page. The changes, and the intention behind them, were all extensively described when those changes were each initially made,[2] but those raft of changes can be broadly summarised as:-
  • Formatting the table,
  • Adding Region 4 release dates.
  • Adding episode list corrections and Region 4 title additions.
It is hard to say what 66.65.97.10's unspoken rationalisation was, so I will not attempt to speak for him. In defence of my changes:-
  • CONTENT, NOT REFERENCES - I would argue that the dispute was mainly on the substantive information I was providing, i.e. the addition of Region 4 data which were absent from the table, which were being continually removed by 66.65.97.10. I was looking forward to the explanation from 66.65.97.10, as to why he was so adamant that the corrections and 'missing information' additions I added should not be allowed, however, I never got a response. The contention arose on my side, as the version of the page that 66.65.97.10 continual wanted to revert to had information deficiencies and other problems that I believed needed being addressed to improve the page, and make it worthy of inclusion.
  • SOURCING - My evidencing of the contested information was from Amazon links, which I admitted needed verification. However, the changes and continual reversions that 66.65.97.10 did were unevidenced by any source.
  • VERIFICATION - The Region 1 information largely was untouched by me and existed on the page originally. I only reconfirmed each of these piece of information each with a single Amazon reference source. [See the instance were I left information on the Wikipedia page that I thought was in error, which had a contradiction between the Amazon reference source and the original Wikipedia content [3]]. The Region 4 information was mainly the content I added, which I double-referenced with both Amazon and JB Hifi. I was going to triple reference this information with Sanity as a reference source (and still can if need be), but decided that this might look cluttered.
  • REFERENCE VERACITY - Acknowledged articles from reputable sources are always preferred. However, the information added was concerning commercial release dates of DVD products. The best source I saw being available was from the on-line distributor of that commercial product. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) was the only distributors of the product in Region 4. Both Amazon and JB HiFi are the ABC's official retail partners in Australia,[4] since the ABC's funding was cut (which closed down the official ABC merchandise shops and merchandising sites). In that respect, Amazon and JB HiFi do have some semi-official status to the ABC. I was more than happy, and I am still more than happy, to use other more reputable reference sources, but none were suggested by 66.65.97.10. Can anyone suggest any links?
  • CONTENT FROM RESOURCE - The 1) episode lists and 2) existence of Region 4 titles are information I was extensively taking from visual pictures on the the Amazon and JB Hifi pages. Whilst Amazon text information might sometimes be in error, these is no reason to believe that these errors would be in the pictures themselves on those sites. It is hard to mistake our own eyes, when visualising an actual picture of the resource being sold on this internet resource, especially a picture of the official DVD jacket information, which contains the episode list (which was a back-up to any text information provided). Indeed, it is made all the more frustrating as I am actually in possession of the DVD titles (Being made to watch then by my sister's kids over and over again), so I know that the Region 4 DVD titles in question actually exist and that the reference source was genuine.
I hope that explains why I edited the page in the manner that I did. Once again, apologies for the "editor war" that I unwittingly got myself into. Thanks to both of you for this chance to put my editing rationalisation forward on the substantive changes to the "List of Dora the Explorer home video releases" page.
SMargan (talk) 02:22, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:SMargan
  2. ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_Dora_the_Explorer_home_video_releases&action=history
  3. ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:List_of_Dora_the_Explorer_home_video_releases
  4. ^ http://www.abccommercial.com/shop

Edit warring?

Thanks for the warning, but why not be fair and warn Jeff6045 as well? Res Iudicata (talk) 09:03, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Res Iudicata, they had already been warned in March, and have now also been warned again. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:28, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Your block of User:Gumaraid

Please see Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2020 April 10#Olan_Montgomery for some background here. I can see that he's been making inappropriate edits, but blocking him seems a bit excessive, especially since he's in the middle of a DRV case. May I suggest that you unblock him and just protect Olan Montgomery instead, which would prevent the damage to the encyclopedia in different way. -- RoySmith (talk) 14:50, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi RoySmith, I think the deletion review has already been answered pretty finally. When disruption comes from one single editor, blocking seems preferable to protection. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:58, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
I agree that it's implausible that the DRV will go anywhere, but quickly blocking somebody who is dealing with the death of an immediate family member, even if they are misinformed about wikipedia, seems rather heartless. Surely we can find a way to protect the encyclopedia without losing our humanity? -- RoySmith (talk) 15:14, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
😐 Blocking is a pretty cold, heartless decision process. If that's the only reason for a complaint, I accept the impression of heartlessness – and I'm definitely not a heartless person, just able to make such decisions when needed. The response to the block seems to insist on removing the images again, so the block currently does seem to prevent disruption. I'll have a look again in a few hours, as I'm afraid removing the block right now would be a mistake. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:49, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, I've never issued a partial block, but I'm wondering if that would be the right tool here. It would prevent the ongoing disruption to the article, yet still allow the user to have their say at DRV. Well, enough said. Thank you for agreeing to take another look. I leave it to your best judgement on how to proceed. -- RoySmith (talk) 15:57, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
Thanks RoySmith. The reason for the block just disappeared, and I have removed it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:37, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

AIV

I agree with your block of the IP that seems to be static. I've been trying to gently push back on a few well-meaning but overzealous contributors to AIV who tend to report accounts that (1) have only been warned once, or (2) are given a final warning, and then immediately reported. I don't expect each account to get four warnings, but jeesh. OhNoitsJamie Talk 20:16, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Also; wouldn't it be nice it we had a sub-board of AIV just for cartoon and wrestling related reports? Most of the time I have no idea how the edits are supposed to be vandalism because I'm unfamiliar with the subjects. OhNoitsJamie Talk 20:22, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
Heh, yes – I definitely agree, and am very thankful for your replies to these reports. This is also why I restored your comment with an answer from me, just to make sure that there is no impression of silent, overriding disagreement. More often than not, I remove such declined reports because I concur with the decline reason, to clean the noticeboard from unnecessary reports. In the "user reported" section, I personally am very careful not to remove unanswered reports, and mark them as "stale" instead if needed. In the "bot reported" section, I sometimes clean up silently, because the archival bot doesn't touch it and there is no human whose concerns I'd dismiss this way.
You're not the only person to notice and complain about over-eager reports based on filter log entries. Materialscientist has complained to the same user before; rarely even I do. The large amount of correct reports makes me very cautious not to discourage them from their work, but yes, the error rate is noticeably above zero. I'm not even mentioning their username in this message here because I personally think it wouldn't help anyone... But yes, it is noticed again and again. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:27, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
Regarding the sub-board, heh! Add Indian movie disputes to the list and count me in. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:27, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Editing Bands and avoiding Edit Wars

Hey ~ ToBeFree (talk), I have managed to wait at least a week after I last edited and explained my viewpoints on the Darkest Hour Page, I was wondering if I could go forward and make an edit white avoiding an edit war, using reliable sources, thanks. Miked1992 (talk) 01:15, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Miked1992, thanks for asking, and for starting these discussions. Sadly, the answers to your other, similar requests, have been negative. The concerns voiced by other users at Talk:Lamb_of_God_(band) and Talk:As_I_Lay_Dying_(band) show clearly, with many references, that your proposed type of editing is being objected to. While there has been no response to Talk:Darkest_Hour_(band)#Guitar_Roles, I believe that the reactions on the other talk pages should be reason enough to stop making similar proposals in the future. Please find different topics to contribute about, instead of making these changes about bands. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:32, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

FYI

Hi there! Please see this, don't know if you want to unblock on that basis? For what it's worth, I think the user has had a fairly rough ride for someone just trying to get unsourced BLP mistakes removed from a page – really, we should all be in sackcloth and ashes. Regards, Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 20:49, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Justlettersandnumbers, ouch – yes, of course. Thank you very much for verifying the account. I think Meters and you shouldn't worry; I'm more concerned about earlier reverts. The now-verified users' conflict of interest will probably create a need for additional maintenance sooner or later, but I think we owe that to them, after all the trouble. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:08, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
@Justlettersandnumbers:I don't see this as a rough ride. The contested information was removed pending confirmation of the user's identity. The user was politely informed, multiple times, of how to confirm her identity. We explained why she needed to confirm her identity, and why her account was being blocked in the meantime. What would you have us do instead? Allow yet another editor claiming to be the subject to make unsourced changes to a BLP, just because she jumps up and down and says "but it is me!" Meters (talk) 21:24, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
Meters, I think your response was fine. The longer history of the article, including reverts of the removal of incorrect information does seem to have been a rough ride. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:26, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
Fair enough. I wasn't thinking of that. Meters (talk) 21:31, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Ouch indeed! I've now looked at the history and there's another very similarly-named COI account there. I'm really tempted to just remove all the unsourced content outright. We have policies and processes to make sure that BLP articles are properly sourced and reasonably accurate, and it seems to me that we have collectively dropped the ball here – for thirteen years! Anyway, on to the next! Regards, Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 21:44, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
Meters, I'm really not pointing any fingers here, as far as I can see the page has been a train-smash since it was started. But – only because you ask – what I'd like us all to do is to remove unsourced personal BLP information on sight, quite regardless of who is making the request, or indeed even if there hasn't been a request. Really, we shouldn't wait to be asked. You did just that, so kudos and thanks to you! Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 21:44, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

vandal

Hi Othayoth shankaran and Outlander07, this seems to be a case of forum shopping. This talk page is not a replacement for WP:ANI, and creating a request is as easy as clicking "Click here to start a new discussion" at WP:ANI. If you do so, you must provide diff links to the behavior you are complaining about. There is not much else than "please read Help:Diff" I can offer as a guide here. Special thanks to Ian.thomson, who has perfectly summarized the situation. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:46, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

@Othayoth shankaran: See WP:NOTVAND. Just because you disagree with Outlander07's edits doesn't make them vandalism. Even if they are bad edits, that doesn't mean they're vandalism. Disruptive editing alone is not vandalism.
You and Outlander07 need to discuss your disagreements instead of calling each other vandals.
Also, read WP:DIFF for instructions on how to provide evidence instead of just telling us to look for it. If you make a claim, it's your job to provide evidence. Ian.thomson (talk) 06:46, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

But i don't know how to make a request . can please guide me? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Othayoth shankaran (talk • contribs) 06:50, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

I am ready to settle the disagreements.I am not interested in causing problems unnecessarily. Outlander07 (talk) 07:25, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

concerning changes i made the

this is the documentation to the changes made

https://murderpedia.org/male.L/l1/lundgren-jeffrey-don.htm

"Lundgren and about two dozen followers had broken away from the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints"

Teh reference to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints was removed, a edit war ensued — Preceding unsigned comment added by Elkrivermr (talk • contribs) 18:33, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

User-generated content is not a reliable source, and edit warring is disruptive. The page has been protected for a week; please discuss changes at the article's talk page (Talk:Jeffrey Lundgren). I am completely uninvolved in this matter. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:43, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Talk page access

Royalty clothing posted spam on their user talk page after removing your block notice. You might need to revoke their talk page access. --Drm310 🍁 (talk) 20:21, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Heh, that doesn't happen often. Interesting case. Thanks for the notification! 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:25, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks!

I've been seeing you around a lot lately at CAT:RFU. Thank you very much for helping! SQLQuery me! 20:40, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Hey SQL, thank you very much for the kind feedback! 😊 I've just had a look at your contributions – there's a script for this? Given all the syntax fixes I have to make when reviewing unblock requests, I guess it must have been a nightmare to program it in a robust way.
I think there should be a template status for "awaiting response by the appellant". The category is constantly above 15 members, but only a third of them appears to actually require input from an administrator. Ignoring rows where last_admin_edit = last_user_edit seems to be the best available approach at the moment. However, this incorrectly ignores any page where the syntax had to be fixed by someone who didn't review the request.
Thank you for all your work and making me aware of Enterprisey's script! I'm not sure about using it yet; just like reply-link, it saves time that would otherwise have been spent thinking about the text again. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:54, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, I use: User:Enterprisey/unblock-review.js. At this time, I don't think there is an 'awaiting response' template, but I think that could be very helpful! I normally close out requests where the appellant hasn't responded in 7-14 days, encouraging them to re-request an unblock when they are available to engage. SQLQuery me! 21:58, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
Thanks :) Yeah, I sometimes do the same. Implementing "awaiting response" in a user-friendly way may by tough. I could imagine something like an additional "|idletimestamp=" parameter. If the parameter exists, the template does not embed CAT:RFU until the page is edited at any later time (current_revision_timestamp > idletimestamp). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:41, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

My edits have documentation, ElSnakeoBwb is not allowing proper edits and is involved/started the edit war. I have followed all guidelines and provided documentation to the changes that have been made

you are allowing a user to restrict factual changes over bias and syntax? duly noted

documentation link to changes is still as follows:

https://murderpedia.org/male.L/l1/lundgren-jeffrey-don.htm

"Lundgren and about two dozen followers had broken away from the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints"

Link to church is incorrect and should be removed — Preceding unsigned comment added by Elkrivermr (talk • contribs) 21:22, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Elkrivermr, you have never edited Talk:Jeffrey Lundgren, the article's talk page, yet. Before you have made a discussion attempt, please do not ask me or other administrators for assistance again. Only if you have attempted to discuss the matter on the article's talk page, others can help. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:48, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-16

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

Problems

  • There was a problem with the Wikidata database last week. Some wikis went down for twenty minutes. Wikidata and other projects showed error messages. Interwiki links were not shown, some tools did not work and other problems. Some of this was fixed quickly. The developers are working on fixing the rest. [122][123][124]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from April 14. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from April 15. It will be on all wikis from April 16 (calendar).

Future changes

  • Some graphs have not worked on mobile. This will soon be fixed. [125]
  • The article tab on talk pages of redirects links to the target of the redirect. It could link to the redirect page itself instead. You can leave feedback on this.
  • For pages using syntax highlighting, the use of the deprecated <source> tag, as well as the use of the deprecated enclose parameter, will add tracking categories.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

15:31, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Puzzled

When reading Wikipedia I got a message about a ‘range block’ by you? I next to never edit anything so I’m not overly concerned but I am more confused. What’s the deal? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.77.211.214 (talk) 01:24, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi 74.77.211.214, your current IP address is not blocked. You can use it to create an account.
Editing by unregistered users from your IP address range has been blocked. An IP address range may in some cases be used by many people; if you do not believe that you are the person this block is intended for, please follow the instructions below:
If you do not have an account: Registered users are still able to edit. Please create an account. If you cannot create an account from this or any another network in the foreseeable future, you may request that volunteers create your username for you. Please follow the instructions at Wikipedia:Request an account to request an account under your preferred username. It may take some time to process your request.
If you have an account: Please log in to edit. If you still cannot edit, please place {{unblock}} on your talk page and make reference to this message.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:32, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Puzzled 2

So I got one message from you. As I followed the instructions that apparently disappeared and I got just a cut and paste. I guess I wanted to find out if you are up to something nefarious? Who are you? Why are you blocking people? Again. I’ve edited Wikipedia like 3 times ever and not in ages. I don’t want an account. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.77.211.214 (talk) 01:47, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

(talk page stalker)Again, you are not blocked, or you would not have been able to post your questions to this page. Your IP is a mobile IP, so you were likely on a different IP when you saw the message. As for why ToBeFree would be blocking users or IPs, he or she is an administrator on English Wikipedia. That's one of the actions admins do. Meters (talk) 01:54, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
Hi 74.77.211.214, after sending the instructions, I figured that they probably won't help you much, since you use a mobile device and can't see what I was pointing to. Instead, I have copied what you'd see on a desktop computer here. You can now see the standardized instructions for such a case. Other users from your network have been vandalizing Wikipedia, and anonymous editing had to be disabled to prevent further disruption.
If you would like to appeal this measure, please do so from the blocked connection, by opening Special:MyTalk while blocked and writing "{{unblock}}" there. We can then have a second look to see if the block is really still necessary.
Alternatively, just create an account if you would like to edit from the blocked connection. If you don't want to edit from there, the block won't affect you anyway. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:56, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Puzzled again

Okay. One last time what is going on. Why can’t I just respond to your message? Your refusal to give anything approaching a straight answer seems like you are up to some shady shit. I please don’t make me waste my time getting into this. Just tell me what is happening. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.77.211.214 (talk) 02:02, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

74.77.211.214, I'm equally puzzled. 🙂 I have no idea which of my blocks, specifically, we are talking about. Your current IP address is not affected by any block, and I can't telepathically determine the required technical information to produce a more specific response. If you follow the instructions above – standardized but helpful –, we can have a closer look. Thank you very much in advance. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:08, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Draft:Harald_Schmied

Hi, is that statement Draft_talk:Harald_Schmied all right and if so, could you do the "move" and fix the ":categories"? --mARTin 17:17, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi mARTin, thanks for asking! You have correctly submitted the article for review, and you have correctly described your (probably unproblematic) connection to the subject on the talk page. That looks good to me, but I'll let one of the experienced reviewers have a look; I rarely review drafts. This may take about 3 months, but the draft will be reviewed, and you are not required to do anything else. Feel free to lean back; this will be dealt with. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:30, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
PS: mARTin, would you mind disabling the checkmark below your signature in your preferences? ("Treat the above as wiki markup"/"Individuell gestaltete Signatur"). If you disable the option, you can still choose any text (such as "mARTin"), but the signature will contain a link to your talk page and user page. Thank you very much in advance! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:33, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
thanks for the feedback and the p.s., just unchecked the checkmark, hope that works fine [it works fine] --mARTin (talk) 18:26, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
Thanks and you're welcome 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:26, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Filter 954

(Was trying to reply at WP:AIV/TB2) I've set 954 (hist · log) to log-only, but left it on DatBot's list. See the filter notes. You might still see some FP reports, but at least users won't be hassled anymore. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 21:23, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Oh hey Suffusion of Yellow, thank you very much! 🙂 I think logging is fine; when the actual LTA appears at AIV, they'll probably be blocked quickly enough. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:27, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Talk page access?

Hi TBF - please see the history of this userpage. You blocked the /64 - do we remove talk page access on range blocks? They certainly aren't using the talk page for making an unblock request, but range blocks aren't my thing. GirthSummit (blether) 12:18, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Girth Summit, thanks for the notification and for asking – it depends. /64 "range" blocks on IPv6 addresses are pretty similar to single-IP IPv4 blocks (User:TonyBallioni/Just block the /64), and the block log of that particular IPv6 range made the decision easy. The request for blocking it from editing is just a week old; it can be found at User talk:ToBeFree/Archive 2#Anna Catharina Bischoff. If unsure, always feel free to create a single-IP block with talk page access revoked, or semi-protecting the talk page for "disruptive editing". If you notice that you have to make multiple such blocks/protections over time, you're probably dealing with a problem that requires talk page access revocation on the whole range.
To make the decision even easier, the {{rangeblock}} template is much more helpful than other templates in helping innocent users to deal with the situation. Blocking templates just sadly do not seem to be shown on mobile devices. A blocked mobile user just sees the text "{{rangeblock}}"; I hope this will be changed in the future. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:15, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
(Correction: Only use semi-protection in such a case if multiple IP addresses are involved. I've seen this happening multiple times, an IP-hopping editor returning to their old talk pages disruptively, but usually a block will do. WP:SEMI notes that "Protection should be used sparingly on the talk pages of blocked users, including IP addresses. Instead the user should be re-blocked with talk page editing disallowed. When required, or when re-blocking without talk page editing allowed is unsuccessful, protection should be implemented for only a brief period, and not exceeding the duration of the block.") ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:19, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Cheers!

Just spotted the amount of work you've been doing on the unblock request backlog, and the number of more detailed discussions (rather than jumping to a refusal with details) you've got going simultaneously. Cheers! Nosebagbear (talk) 13:08, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Hey Nosebagbear, thanks for the kind feedback! It makes me happy to see it being positively noticed 😃 Thanks for your work, too, especially for dealing with spam and copyright violations, and for providing insight at WP:AN! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:29, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Experienced Practice

Hello, ToBeFree,

You blocked Experienced Practice because of their username. The username has been changed but they are still blocked. Would it be alright with you if I unblocked them? I'm pinging JBW since they denied their last unblock request. Here is Experienced Practice's response to the denial of that request. Liz Read! Talk! 16:03, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Liz, I had stopped responding to them because of the following statements (emphasis mine):
If I understand the situation correctly, the user intends to edit about such topics in the future. I agree that the original reason for the block, promotion of a specific website, has disappeared. I do believe that the user will never spam their website again, and we probably agree in this regard. Unexpectedly, however, the block reason might still describe a valid concern that is not longer related to a specific website.
The new username, while no longer promoting a specific website, seems to indicate a focus on promoting a pseudoscientific theory – allegedly proven by their personal practical experience. The document linked in the latest response seems to confirm that the user considers religious documents and their "experienced practice" to be reliable sources for an encyclopedia, even when dealing with topics like COVID-19. At best, we could expect original research about religion; at worst, sentences like "Coronavirus is an illusion" could suddenly appear in encyclopedic articles affected by general sanctions. The user is autoconfirmed with 24 edits; their next one could already cause noticeable damage. A topic ban from COVID-19 could be a reasonable requirement, but I'm afraid it would not be sufficient to prevent a dangerous kind of disruption.
However, since I have set the block and may have unreasonably strong feelings against the user's behavior, I trust your judgement, Liz. If after reading these concerns, you would like to unblock the user – under any condition(s) selected by you –, I will accept the decision, and I will avoid interacting with the unblocked user. If they are actually disruptive enough to justify a re-block, it wouldn't come from me. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:57, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
"Nevermind" might be an understatement. Sorry to bother you about this. Thank you for laying out your reasons in such detail. Liz Read! Talk! 18:43, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
😄 No worries. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:21, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
It is probably redundant for me to comment now, Liz, since ToBeFree has given such a detailed and thorough answer, and you have said "Nevermind", but since you have pinged me, my (much less thorough) answer is that the editor was clearly here to promote her or his personal views on religion and philosophy, and clearly has neither an understanding of what the problem was nor any intention of desisting from similar editing in future. Also, it is not entirely true to say that ToBeFree blocked the editor "because of their username": it was because of their username and promotional editing. My own view is that the username issue is a minor issue, but the nature of the editing is a very major one. JBW (talk) 19:37, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for page protection/Edit

ToBeFree, could you please clarify what is the purpose of subpage /Edit at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection? The subpage itself was only ever used for some prolonged discussion of the page Gamergate controversy. Its transclusion is empty in the section Current requests for edits to a protected page. And the instructions in section do not mention the subpage, instead suggesting to create a level 3 subsection instead. —⁠andrybak (talk) 07:57, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

I just found a pertinent discussion on the talk page.  Reading... —⁠andrybak (talk) 08:27, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
So, if I understand correctly, the progress on the technical roadmap is stuck, because it requires a rewrite of the bot, which clerks WP:RFPP. Perhaps the transclusion of /Edit should be removed for the time being? —⁠andrybak (talk) 08:35, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
Hi Andrybak, I had completely forgotten about this transclusion. 🙂 Feel free to remove it for now – perhaps we finally get a bot update in 2021. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:25, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Administration and Academic Calendar

The given link in Wikipedia is a 404 page. So I replaced the link with the appropriate link. Kindly check the link once — Preceding unsigned comment added by Prasnt3eee (talk • contribs) 13:33, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Prasnt3eee, no other editor has ever added a link to freshersvoice.com on Wikipedia. Which connection do you have to freshersvoice.com? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:58, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

How do I become unblocked from the OUPC page

Hi there, thank you for your swift reply, and after reading the COI page I understand my mistake - may I please ask how I get unblocked from the Oxford University Polo Club page as I will need to make serious changes to my club's page in future. Warm regards, Dhruv Sengupta, OUPC Treasurer — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.14.100.80 (talk) 16:59, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi 86.14.100.80 / Dhruv Sengupta,
Thank you very much for your message. However, it does not seem to indicate the professed understanding: You do not "need" to make changes to the article, and the article is not owned by the club.
Please do not edit the article directly. Instead, click the "Talk" tab above the article, then click the link "request corrections on or suggest content" in the orange warning box.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:01, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

User:NatroneDay

I thought I;d just let you know that the editor has now called you a "Nazi Wannabe" on his talk page. Time for TPA revoke? Tknifton (talk) 20:11, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Tknifton, interesting. Give me a moment, I'll just throw it to AIV. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:13, 19 April 2020 (UTC)
I don't even need to; I guess your notification appeared on a watchlist. Thanks ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:14, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-17

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Tech News

  • The next issue of Tech News will be sent out on 4 May 2020.

Recent changes

  • Advanced item The small wiki toolkits is to help smaller wikis that need technical skills. They can learn and share technical skills. [126]
  • Advanced item Over-qualified CSS selectors in Wikimedia skins have been removed. div#content is now .mw-body. div.portal is now .portal. div#footer is now #footer. This is so the skins can use HTML5 elements. If your gadgets or user styles used them you will have to update them. [127]

Changes later this week

  • There is no new MediaWiki version this week.

Future changes

  • Some things on the wikis might look weird or not work in Internet Explorer 8 in the future. Internet Explorer 8 was replaced in 2011. [128]
  • The font in the diffs will change. [129]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 28 April next week. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 29 April next week. It will be on all wikis from 30 April next week (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

18:45, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

MediaWiki:Spam-whitelist

What is this nonsense? I direct your attention to the big green box at the top of the page. See where it says "Important" in bold? "You must provide a full link to the specific web page you want to be whitelisted". That's not a LINKVIO, that's following posted directions. Revert and correct your edit summary. - Neutralhomer • Talk • 16:52 on April 21, 2020 (UTC) • #StayAtHome

answered at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard#User:Beetstra/Spam-whitelist, but I do agree that the situation is unclear, and the instructions didn't help. I'm not sure if the instructions should be changed, as in almost all cases, others do want to see the exact link that is under discussion, and most of the reports will probably be about reliable reference links on spammed websites, not copyright violations on websites blacklisted for copyright violations. Hmm. This is tricky. I have no solution yet. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:16, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Pghsathletics

FWIW I wouldn't necessarily classify their editing as WP:PAID; WP:COI editing, yes, but not PAID. It is generally rare for public school administrators to require their employees to edit Wikipedia on their behalf. I think what's more likely is they came across information they thought was incorrect and decided to "correct the record" and their motivations are more akin to a politician attempting to scrub their own page. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 14:07, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi King of Hearts, I generally agree, but if that is the situation, the person shouldn't attempt to act as an official representative of the institution towards us. This seems to be a common pattern: Someone over-displays their officialness, then notices it's not a good thing, then downplays their affiliation. I won't insist in a paid editing disclosure by someone who merely has a financial COI, but the difference isn't large. If the director asked them to do this, no matter how informally, the're suddenly "paid" for editing. All I'm really looking for is an honest explanation of how official and close the connection really is. If we offered article ownership to official paid editors, I bet they'd claim such a connection. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:15, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
Agreed, I think it's just that the attitude we approach with matters. If we essentially accuse them of taking a bribe then they are going to act defensive. If we calmly explain that they have a conflict of interest and outline what they are permitted and not permitted to do, they'll either listen and accept the conditions or leave quietly. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 19:20, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
Ah, yes – I'll add a friendly overview and a link to our discussion here to their talk page soon. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:26, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
King of Hearts, thanks – I have now created a detailed overview of the situation on their talk page. To avoid confusion by the abbreviations, I didn't yet link to our discussion; I'll do this for transparency when the situation is a bit clearer and less chaotic. My overview could probably be written more inviting and friendly, but I had to include a lot of clarifications, and adding nice words around each bullet point would have converted the informative list into a wall of text. Just like for every unblocked user, I'll properly welcome them back when unblocking, or when someone else unblocks them. I usually use {{welcome-belated}} to do so, and offer the editor to remove the whole unblock discussion from the page. Sometimes I just unbureaucratically do so myself. This will become much more inviting soon, when the bureaucratic unblock process is finally done. Thanks again ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:31, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
King of Hearts, I have re-read the whole page on my desktop computer and have finally noticed the issue that had probably caused you to message me in the first place. I hope to have addressed this now, by rewriting my initial "Decline reason" and apologizing for its unnecessarily accusative tone. I didn't think about this when replying to your initial message on my mobile phone, sorry. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:51, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Range block fun

Apparently, I applied the same block to that IPv6 range just as you did, and mine overwrote yours... Aside from being impressed that you were able to calculate that range as quick as I was, I also should apologize for the accidental "bumping into". :-) Cheers - ~Oshwah~(talk) (contribs) 21:45, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Haha, Oshwah, I was looking for a "Thanks" button in the block log. I smiled when I saw you taking exactly the same decision, which – especially for non-/64 rangeblocks and regarding the duration – is a rare event. It makes me happy to see my decision being supported by an experienced administrator in this amusing way. 😊 Do you remember our very first interaction on Wikipedia? It's cool how this has evolved; time flies! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:00, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree - Indeed, I'm sure it does feel good! It must've been a very long time ago, because I can't recall our first interaction at all. It's great to see how far you've come in the time you've been here; I'm proud of you, man! :-D Keep up the great work, and please know that I'm always available and more than happy to help if you need any input or guidance - all you have to do is reach out. :-) ~Oshwah~(talk) (contribs) 22:21, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
Heh, this time you beat me to an answer on your talk page. I should have expected the edit conflict. ;) Thank you very much for the kind words and the offer; I'll definitely do! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:28, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Congrats!

Hi! Just happened to notice with your recent "thanks!" that you're an admin now! I don't think we've crossed paths for a while, so you could have been an admin for a while now...but nonetheless I wanted to say congrats on becoming an admin! The previous admins definitely picked someone super deserving of the role :) Hope you and your family are doing well and staying healthy during this crazy time! <3 Cheers, Katniss May the odds be ever in your favor ♥ 02:48, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

KatnissEverdeen! Hey! 😄 Long time no see. You still have the "new message" button, I'm always happy when I see it on other talk pages. Thank you very much for the kind words, and best wishes to your family as well! I guess Wikipedia is one of the few things that benefit from home office days and empty town centres. Let's make the best of the situation. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:56, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Sock edits

Hi ToBeFree. 2 days ago you assisted me with a disruptive editor that was adding inappropriate links to article pages as well as their subsequent sock (thanks for that). I see the same person is back making the same edits from a different IP address. Would you be so kind as cast an eye on this if possible please. Robvanvee 07:44, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Many thanks!. Robvanvee 08:38, 23 April 2020 (UTC)
Hey Robvanvee, you're welcome. 🙂 Thank you very much for the notification; feel free to notify me when it happens again. "When", not "if", I guess. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:41, 23 April 2020 (UTC)
Touche my friend. Much appreciated! Robvanvee 08:43, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Special Barnstar
Thanks a ton for helping me out when I got autoblocked! Thatoneweirdwikier | Say hi 08:06, 23 April 2020 (UTC)
Welcome back, Thatoneweirdwikier. Sorry for not having directly unblocked you – but I hope the explanation (~"it's just 24 hours anyway, does not appear in the block log and silently disappears") did help. 🙂
PS: Thatoneweirdwikier, may I add that to the barnstar list on the user page, or is it meant humorously, or both? 😉 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:42, 23 April 2020 (UTC)
You may add it to the barnstar list. Your explanation was the reason I gave it to you in the first place! Thatoneweirdwikier | Say hi 10:23, 23 April 2020 (UTC)
Thank you very much, happy to have helped! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:24, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

A(nother) barnstar for you!

The Less Special Barnstar
Like the Special Barnstar, but slightly less impressive considering the fact that I already gave you one. Still, many thanks! Thatoneweirdwikier | Say hi 14:07, 23 April 2020 (UTC)
😄 Thank you very much, Thatoneweirdwikier! You're welcome of course. And welcome back! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:56, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the unblock

Hi ToBeFree, thank you for unblocking my account. I will do my best to follow the suggestions put forth by you and MER-C.

As you suggested, I tried archiving my talk page, but I also created this one other archive by mistake. I have moved it to a draft, can you please delete it or whatever else needs to be done with it? Archiving is a tad bit tricky. There are auto-bots to do it, I see, but I wasn't sure if I want to go into using them. Tried the manual method explained here. I hope I've done it right.

Thank you! NawJee (talk) 19:04, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi NawJee, you're welcome, and thank you very much for the unbureaucratic agreement. Also, thank you very much for creating an archive! Since the "Draft:" and "Talk:" pages have been unambiguously created in error, I have deleted them via WP:G6. The remaining archive page at User talk:NawJee/Archive 1 looks fine, and the archive box on your talk page also looks good. If you ever want to try automatic archival, feel free to copy the code from the top of my talk page. Manual archival, however, is a very viable option especially on less frequently used talk pages. It gives you full control about what happens, how large the archive grows, how the archive is structured, et cetera. At the moment, manual archival seems to be a good choice. Well done and welcome back! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:04, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
Thank you for doing the needful. I'll look into archiving again if and when the need arises. If you say it is good for now, I'll let it be as it is.
Also, I've started working on tasks in the Task Center and Community Portal. Adding images from Wikimedia Commons mostly, for now. NawJee (talk) 00:10, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
Yeah, looks good, no need to make changes to the archive at the moment. Thank you very much for helping with the most important community tasks and reducing the huge backlog of pages that need attention. Keep in mind that Wikipedia is not compulsory, and dedicating your free time to Wikipedia is never a requirement. Thank you very much for doing so, though! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:15, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
Glad to be of help. Sure, I know, but it is a good way to spend time during the lock down. It is something I've thought about doing plenty of times in the past, the current situation just gave me the opportunity to finally get down it. Hopefully, I'll be able to find the time to do it once active work resumes. NawJee (talk) 03:14, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

your email

got hashed by my email's security. Could you please resend? Strange. No mail notice on Wikipedia. --Deep fried okra User talk:Deepfriedokra 01:41, 24 April 2020 (UTC) Oh, never mind. It was something else. Thanks, --Deep fried okra User talk:Deepfriedokra 01:45, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Deepfriedokra, if I remember correctly, I didn't send an email to you in the last months :) No worries ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:48, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Kobe Bryant

Actually, I didn't assume. Based on the really hard time we gave to Tsarina Alexandra Hesse (aka Alexandra Feodorovna (Alix of Hesse)) who did her level best (photo included!) to convince us she was 100-years-not-quite-dead nobility, I and Bonadea and SimmeD and David notMD and some others performed your "thought experiment" and came to a drastically different conclusion than you did. So you will have to excuse me for assuming that administrators would present a united front in this regard. Cheers. Elizium23 (talk) 17:40, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Elizium23, thanks for the explanation. I assume this is about Kobe248Bryant, who clearly and openly created their account in good-faith memory of a deceased person. This does not appear to be the case regarding the two accounts linked as counter-examples, whose behavior was disruptive enough to justify a block by itself, and whose name isn't a part of their given block reason. We usually use {{Uw-ublock-wellknown}} for WP:REALNAME cases; the template describes the main concern that leads to such blocks. Applying the same procedure to Kobe248Bryant's account does not seem to be applicable, so we're at very least dealing with an unusual, non-standard case. There is also no harm in asking them to change their name and waiting for a response. Their interest in COVID-19 related topics seems to be a bit strange and potentially problematic to me, but we could just point that out to them instead of using their username as a block justification. They appear to be editing in good faith, and to build an encyclopedia; advice #5 in the header at WP:UAA might apply. The username policy has a WP:BADNAME section; the sub-sections "Consider leaving well enough alone" and "Talk to the user" might describe reasonable alternatives to a block in this case. Since none of the mentioned users are administrators – not that it should matter anyway –, I am also uncertain where the "united front" concern comes from, or what it has to do with these users.
To make sure that someone else has a look before blocking or removing the list entry, I have now converted the "decline" to a "note". I'll link to this discussion for transparency.
Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:57, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
I have asked them to change their username now; let's just wait for their reaction. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:02, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
Elizium23, on second thought and after further discussion at WP:UAA, I have now replaced the warning by a block with a friendly blue background and custom wording. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:31, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
Okay then. I am sorry I was so obstinate about this, but I am glad for your collegial discussion and willingness to be persuaded. Elizium23 (talk) 18:40, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
😄 Elizium23, I'm thankful for this, and sorry for the initial dismissal of your valid concerns. I was a bit surprised about the importance it had to you first, but we both share a relatively strong opinion about WP:BLP, and it took me a while – and your correct explanation – to notice that WP:BDP still applies here. It is also a tricky situation to be both required to justify and overturn a decision at the same time, and the initial reflex is to justify only. I should have noticed that earlier, when writing the justification, already. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:47, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
Here's to a peaceful resolution of our dispute. Elizium23 (talk) 18:40, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
I love cookies! This is very kind, thank you very much. Elizium23, I'll add one to your talk page too. Thanks again ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:48, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Partial blocks

Hey! Just wanted to let you know that when blocking users because of edit warring, it can be useful to apply a partial block - blocking them from the specific page - instead of a general block. Best, MrClog (talk) 23:07, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi MrClog, I'm waiting for a checkuser to indefinitely block a sockmaster in that dispute. But yes, perhaps. Maybe. I don't yet think so. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:08, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
(This was about an edit war at Kingdom of England) No checkuser confirmation happened. MrClog, thank you very much. I'll let these 24-hour blocks run and wait to see what happens, but I'll consider a week-long partial block if necessary next. An argument against a partial block could be "If they are so disruptive that they need to be blocked, they would disruptively edit other pages as well. If they are not disruptive enough to be blocked from every page, we don't need a block at all". I do not entirely agree with this, but partial blocks are not always the best response to an edit war. This one was really weird and disruptive. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:30, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

"GeorgeTopouria" rename

Looks like a way to continue his UPE deterred? Thoughts? --Deep fried okra User talk:Deepfriedokra 23:18, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Deepfriedokra, good question. Your interpretation sounds reasonable. However, my current interpretation is that they gave up in frustration and don't want their name to permanently be visible on Wikipedia in connection with this block. I'll mark the unblock request as "idle" (Category:Requests for unblock awaiting response from the blocked user) if they don't respond in the next days. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:22, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

From VeryGoodBoy

Moved to User talk:VeryGoodBoy
 – ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:23, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

User DrWilliamConroy

I'm finding it hard to see precisely what DrWilliamConroy did that was so wrong it led to him being blocked with hours of him registering? My words there are chosen carefully. I am not criticising. I am wondering. So, genuine question, is he some sort of serial offender or is there some other problem? HiLo48 (talk) 01:03, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi HiLo48, the user registred for the sole purpose of vandalizing the encyclopedia by deliberately introducing incorrect information (hoaxes) that isn't easily detected as such. Duodecimal is not "also known as unicial", and "the operator expand" is not "denoted by a forward slash" in APL. The encyclopedia probably benefits from every second that this troll is prevented from causing more damage. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:11, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
Cool. I guess my mathematics wasn't good enough to pick up on the hoax. But I also got nothing from the Edit summaries of the first few reversions of that User's edits. It looked pretty aggressive and nasty to this "outsider". HiLo48 (talk) 01:15, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
I agree, HiLo48 – when I saw the blanket reverts without an explanatory edit summary, I was about to ask Dorsetonian for the reason. The new user made the impression of an emeritus professor who had technical difficulties with using the encyclopedia, and I was about to help them and mediate between the conflict parties. It took me three or four close looks at the edits to see that they can't be explained by good-faith mistakes. This is also why their discussion attempt at Wikipedia:Reference desk/Mathematics was removed by Deacon Vorbis: The user already got the attention they wanted – and now again –, so the trolling was successful. And now they even got a compliment from me, but I don't care that much. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:21, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

Sock edits: The return

Hey ToBeFree. Hope all is well. As per your prediction above, the disruptive IP and their inappropriate links are back. Would you be able to assist once again please. Robvanvee 15:38, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

Robvanvee, done :) Thanks for the quick notification. That happened earlier than expected. Please keep me updated ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:12, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
Will do and many thanks to you! Robvanvee 16:58, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
No problem. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:59, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 26 April 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:18, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

On appeals

If you're going to copy an appeal, it's usually best to consult a CU before copying it :) In this case, Callanecc had just found some socks at the SPI, and most CUs aren't going to be okay with a repeat sockmaster appealing within that timeframe. You don't have to ever copy an appeal to AN even if they want you to, and in cases like this where most CUs would require 6 months before consenting to an unblock, it's usually best to tell them to try again in 6 months. TonyBallioni (talk) 21:26, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

Hey TonyBallioni, thank you very much, both for the closure at AN and the advice. I had declined their previous appeal, so I was really unsure how to deal with that immediate re-appeal – I didn't want to reject a request for community input about my action. Perhaps I should just have let another admin decline it outright. Perhaps adding {{checkuser needed}} to their talk page would have worked equally well. I'll keep it in mind. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:33, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
TonyBallioni, additional note: I must have been blind! I did even look at the SPI. Still I didn't see the new two sections until just now. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:45, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
TonyBallioni, now I got it: The block reason points to the wrong SPI. I'd ask the blocking administrator, but... you know... Would you mind fixing this? :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:48, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
Hi ToBeFree, no worries at all re the original post.

I've retargeted the link in the block log to the right SPI. Whenever a user is appealing a CU block (or if they have a confirmed sock tag on their talk page) it's worth using {{Checkuser needed}} on their talk page except if there's an obvious reason to just decline. Regarding community input and not wanting to ignore it, another option could be to post an AN asking someone to have a look. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 10:28, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Hey Callanecc, thank you very much! I was sure I had at least clicked the "Thanks" link, but looking at my logs, I completely forgot to reply. The AN post is a nice idea, I'll just do that next time. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:59, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

Re: Brittany Ferries

Hi, my apologies, I am confused with how to write or reply to messages. This seems to be the only thing on Wikipedia are am unable to do. Re: Brittany Ferries, apart from running a Fan Page on Facebook & Twitter, I am in no way associated with the ferry company, paid or otherwise. The reason why the section of 'Future Fleet' was removed was to prevent a editing war with another user who is constantly incorrectly editing the section of 'Honfleur'. I fully understand that this is not my jurisdiction and will happily put it back on. I would appreciate it though if you could contact the person who is incorrectly editing this section. Every edit I have made on Brittany Ferries is 100% fact. It also appears that a huge chunk has been removed from the History section after 2012, I want to add that the info that has been deleted was correct and should not have been taken down. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TonyMWeaver (talk • contribs) 20:33, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi TonyMWeaver,
No worries, and thank you very much for the explanation.
This focus on one specific company is very unusual, though. May I ask where it comes from, and are you sure that there is no conflict of interest involved? Like, for example, having been an employee in the past or something similar.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:54, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi, I can assure you that there is no conflict of interest. All info I have added to the Brittany Ferries page I have got from the Brittany Ferries Press Room [1] and where possible, I include sources every time. I was disappointed to learn that Ian.Thomson who i assume is an admin on here deleted a large chunk of info I have added in the past along with 3 vessels belonging to the 'Future Fleet' section: Galicia, Salamanca and Santoña all 3 are confirmed. If I added these again with a link to a source, would it be deleted again? I worked hard adding all this so I was not happy when it was deleted. What I don't understand is this info has been on the page for over 5 years but there only seems to be an issue with it now.

Hi TonyMWeaver, thank you very much for the clarification. Please note that Wikipedia prefers independent secondary sources (see WP:PSTS) to primary press releases by the company itself. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:00, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ "Brittany Ferries Newsroom".

Blocked for unknown reason.

Hello, Apparently you have something to do with blocking my account on 17 April 2020. I don't understand why my account would be blocked. Please provide an explanation. Thank you. Dr. Lorenzo Fritz-Francisco — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dr. Lorenzo Fritz-Francisco (talk • contribs) 06:15, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Dr. Lorenzo Fritz-Francisco, Thanks for your message and welcome to Wikipedia. Your account has never been blocked directly, but you may have been affected by a block on the IP address of someone else. If you see an error when trying to edit, please copy the entire error message to a Word document on your computer, for future reference. Without any technical details, I am currently unable to find the block you are referring to, sorry. The block was likely not intended to affect you at all. Please let me know if it happens again. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:03, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

Gracias

Thank you for your attention. I am confused and unfamiliar with most of the Wikipedia edit/submission procedures. I shall try to become more familiar with them by following the links you gave. Muchas gracias. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dr. Lorenzo Fritz-Francisco (talk • contribs) 18:30, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

You're welcome, Dr. Lorenzo Fritz-Francisco, and thanks for asking. Feel free to have a look at the Teahouse, a place full of friendly volunteers who enjoy answering questions that commonly arise when starting to edit. 🙂 Good luck and best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:36, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

103.60.175.78

I see that you've blocked 103.60.175.78. Thanks for doing that. Would you be able to use the appropriate tools to revert the offending edits, please? --David Biddulph (talk) 12:01, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi David Biddulph, you're welcome; done 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:27, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

Collaborative efforts

Hi, a quick question. There are a number of editors at the Teahouse who ask for help with their drafts. If those drafts are about a terminology, concept, a place, a historical event, something that can't be promotional, is it okay to directly collaborate on the draft with them? NawJee (talk) 08:59, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi NawJee, let's see if there is really no promotion involved. ;) You'd be surprised how often this is the case, if someone is strangely focused on one very specific topic and nothing else on Wikipedia. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:37, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
Makes sense. Well, this is the draft I am talking about: Draft:Planetisation. Here's the corresponding Teahouse discussion. This is the editor's first article, so there's that. But, I'll wait for what you have to say before I work on it. Thanks. NawJee (talk) 14:43, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
Thanks – let's wait for their response on their talk page. :) And have a look at their edits on de.wikipedia.org, specifically the timestamps of them. 2006. Pretty much nothing but "Planetisation" since 2006. My guess is "ideological insistent promotion". It doesn't have to be commercial to be a problem. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:02, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
Thank you. He has responded with a number of references on the draft talk page, following my comment there. Here's the link: Draft talk: Planetisation. It is true that the editor has been mostly interested in only this topic since 2006 on de.wikipedia.org, but I do see that he has made contributions to some other topics in recent years. What do you suggest? NawJee (talk) 15:45, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
Ah, just noticed you were talking about a possible COI on the editor's talk page, not the draft's talk page. Oh, well. Let's see what becomes of it. Thanks for looking into it. NawJee (talk) 15:49, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
Hmm. NawJee, I think I can now answer the original question:
Most drafts are about topics that are not notable at all, and their creators severely over-estimate their chances of getting an article accepted. Many drafts are created for promotional purposes, and I'm afraid that "Planetisation" is not a positive exception. Especially to new editors, the enthusiasm and insistence of editors with a conflict of interest can create a false impression of a need for collaboration. If all the work does never result in an article being published, and if the author is not interested in editing about anything else in the future, then the time and work is ultimately lost without benefit to the encyclopedia. Some people are paid to waste their time; some do it for their god. If you have neither of these motivations, you'll probably be frustrated when joining them in their pointless work. However, the "Draft" namespace was probably originally meant to be collaborative, and has become a sad place with thousands of lone warriors fighting for their own cause, without the larger encyclopedia in mind. Your idea, on the contrary, is in the spirit of the free, collaborative encyclopedia, and I can't really advise you against it. I just personally find this specific type of contribution relatively unlikely to actually end in success and a good feeling. If you have the frustration tolerance to deal with this draft, well, why not? Just please keep in mind not to over-use the review process; use your experience to avoid premature submission.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:13, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
Thank you @ToBeFree: for the elaborate response. It makes a great deal of sense and I think it will be very helpful to remember for any future collaborative opportunities, and in dealing with such requests wherever they may be found on Wikipedia. But, in the spirit of good faith, I also believe that some people just are narrow-focused in life, we come across them everyday in our lives, not just here. I have a friend who can only talk about fringe ideas at length and with excitement, but is easily bored if the conversation is about anything else - the guy is an excellent musician and runs a non-profit community for budding artists, and still doesn't find the subject of 'art' exciting to talk about.
I think this editor is the same. I could be wrong about it, but I don't know how we could be sure. I have read about de Chardin's idea of planetisation before, as well. There is sufficient information about it out there, with many secondary and reliable sources, to create a well-structured and expansive draft on the subject. I will try to do my best by it and submit the draft only once more for review, when I believe it will be accepted by the reviewers. I'll try to keep the original editor in check. Thank you for your time and consideration. NawJee (talk) 23:31, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
🙂 NawJee, I think you have the right attitude for the task, and for this encyclopedia in general. Thanks for asking, for the kind feedback and for helping! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:33, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree Thank you, it means a lot. Thank you for the vote of confidence. NawJee (talk) 00:13, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

An Additional Favor

Could you also semi-protect List of The Emperor's New Groove characters, too? The same vandal behind the gay Gaston dating scene nonsense also haunts this page, too.--Mr Fink (talk) 02:11, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Apokryltaros, thank you very much for the initial report and this update. I first thought it's a sockpuppeteer using proxies or a VPN, but I guess this is actually a trending meme. Semi-protected for one week, pending changes enabled for a month. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:21, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
I see, thank you very much for your help.--Mr Fink (talk) 02:31, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

103.86.192.74

Lifetime open proxies

Hey! Thanks for blocking 103.86.192.74 (talk · contribs · WHOIS). I see you blocked it for a year. I would suggest blocking it for 3 months instead. Most open proxies die quite early and don't become one year old. On the right, you can see the liftime of open proxies as observed by a nl.wiki admin that has a database with all open proxies that edited Wikipedia. (Also, I originally requested a month long block, but missed the fact that it has been blocked before, so 3 months would be a good option). --MrClog (talk) 08:18, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi MrClog, you're welcome, and thanks for the tip. I'm not entirely sure. Tks4Fish has globally blocked it for three years; I see you have sent the same message to them already. I think I'll wait for their response. The possible damage of a too-early block expiration may in some cases justify a long block; the IP address seems to be static. Any collateral damage is probably limited to those who ran the proxy in the first place. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:45, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
While the IP seems to be static, static IPs still switch owner. For example, if whoever runs the open proxy shuts off their machine and when they turn it back on, their lease has expired, they'll be assigned a new IP. Note that most open proxies are not run by professionals (privacy advocates, misconfiguration, zombies), thus they tend to not stick around after a while. --MrClog (talk) 11:30, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
Hm, well. Tks4Fish, should we both reduce our blocks to half a year? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:11, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
Even though the data appears to be outdated, I'm not against reducing it to half a year, which I've done globally, @ToBeFree and @MrClog:. Best, —Thanks for the fish! talk•contribs 21:18, 2 May 2020 (UTC)
@MrClog and Tks4Fish: Thanks,  Done ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:23, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

Creating page for my own book?

I am an author and would like to write an article about my own book? Would this violate WP:Conflict of Interest? --James Miko (talk) 22:36, 3 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Jamesmiko, thanks for asking! Also thanks for asking at Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard#Creating_page_for_my_own_book?, which is the perfect noticeboard for the question. In addition to the others' advice: If the book is truly notable, someone will write about it sooner or later. If the author has to do so himself, as a rule of thumb, this is a pretty clear sign for a lack of notability. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:49, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

A request

I think we should stop Vipinahir for removing AfC templates from Drafts. I just got a notification that my edit was reverted. — GargAvinash talk 21:15, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

Could use your steady hand...

Here at User talk:Jcashman1997. The purported subject of the article is rather unhappy and making legal threats. Could use your help. — Javert2113 (Siarad.|¤) 22:05, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

Javert2113, on it ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:06, 5 May 2020 (UTC)
Hi Javert2113, nice to meet you again. Thank you very much for the quick notification. 🙂
  • The user has been blocked for now.
  • The user has now received a link to Wikipedia:Contact us/Article subjects, which could be useful if there are factual errors that need to be removed during the block.
  • The article's talk page now contains a {{COI editnotice}}.
  • The article's talk page now contains a {{BLP}} notice.
  • The article has been categorized into Category:Living people to automatically display an editnotice when someone clicks "Edit".
  • A discussion at the BLP noticeboard has been started; feel free to add a comment at WP:BLPN#Josephine_Cashman.
I hope this helps! Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:44, 5 May 2020 (UTC)
I saw, my friend. Thank you for all your help. — Javert2113 (Siarad.|¤) 22:48, 5 May 2020 (UTC)
Anytime. 😊 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:49, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
Thanks for your Awesome help to keep Wikipedia vandal free! The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 16:45, 6 May 2020 (UTC)
Hey The4lines, thank you very much! I'm impressed by your antivandalism work and reports; you should have this barnstar too. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:53, 6 May 2020 (UTC)
Thanks so much! 🙂 I can’t tell you how happy and encouraged by you post and subsequent Barnstar. Thanks again and remember to always defend the wiki. The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 16:57, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

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Spam account

Hi, can you please look into User:Gsy65reegfjsh4? They dropped an unsigned comment on my talk page asking how to create a page and their talk page says this: "hey guys this is my second discord YEET u can spam if you want or ask question or make memes." The rest of their contributions look spammy, too. Thanks. NawJee (talk) 17:03, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi NawJee, interesting case, thanks for the notification. I think they had another account before, but I can't remember which it was. Now they're gone. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:07, 6 May 2020 (UTC)
Seemed like it. Well, glad to be of service. Happy editing. NawJee (talk) 17:13, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

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Tobefreee and Tobefreeee

Hi, ToBeFree. Clearly, Tobefreee and ToBeFreeee are here for no good, and I've hardblocked them now that I've checked the page history, but do you reckon they're anybody's socks in particular? Not that it's a big deal. (I'll check back tomorrow — this timezone has turned its back on the sun, so good night.) Bishonen | tålk 21:14, 6 May 2020 (UTC).

Hi Bishonen, thank you very much 🙂 Compare Special:Diff/954901414/954905122 and Special:Diff/954930794/955176338. I don't know if there's a more global, long-term case behind this, but the term "sockpuppet" does at least clearly fit. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:39, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

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3ANI

Hey ToBeFree, is it okay if I did this [130]? They were blocked for Personal harassment. As you have more experience in that area. Thanks, Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 01:37, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi The4lines, thanks for the reports, and thanks for asking! The actual result of the WP:ANEW report was "warned", but I have added a note about the WP:ANI-based block now too. The heading was broken (Special:Diff/955299177 contains a closing bracket after the equal signs). The headings are automatically filled by the reviewing administrators' JavaScript tools; I recommend not touching them even if one of them seems to have forgotten filling it in. Don't worry, however! 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:20, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
Thanks ToBeFree, I will make sure I won’t touch it. See you around! Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 14:33, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
(Off topic from the title) Good choice blocking User:Josephine121901. I was going to comment but you beat me to blocking. Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:09, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
Heh, well, that was an unexpected turn of events! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:13, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
🙂 Ha seeing you makes me want to be admin to help, but I guess not yet for me, so I’ll just be reverting lol Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:18, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
That's a very kind compliment. I'm sure the time will come, but do take your time. Aim for two years of active editing experience, ideally. Chances are people will ask you about adminship before the two years are over. Long-term continuous activity is probably more important than how active you exactly are during the time. An editor who has four years of experience in many areas of the project is probably supported more easily than someone who made exactly the same amount of high-quality edits in four months. The community values long-term commitment, not full-time burnout 😉 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:34, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
Right, also I have seen the number of edits do not matter, as people with 100,000s edits (Cassiopeia) sometimes don’t make it through the RFA and people with 10,000 edits sometime to make it. (Money trees) Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:41, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
That observation is mostly correct, but a high number of edits does usually imply a kind of "minimum time invested". Antivandalism may be a task with a very high edit rate, but even antivandalism takes time. Time spent editing implies experience. 10,000 seems to be a lower boundary these days, unless your edits are very time-intensive and extraordinatily beneficial to the encyclopedia, e.g. building featured articles. That said, focusing on the edit count because it is taken into account at RfA can easily lead to careless mistakes, so the general advice is "edit count does not matter". It does matter, but not in a way you can noticeably influence by doing anything different than you currently do. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:14, 7 May 2020 (UTC)
Right, Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 03:02, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

I have got though my CUVA FE and I graduated from it! Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 14:26, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Hey The4lines, I have now had a look at the graduation page and am impressed! Congratulations and enjoy antivandalism! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:07, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
Thanks ToBeFree! Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 15:17, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Hey ToBeFree, how are you? I started the NPP school with Rosguill as I want to learn more. Thanks, Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:21, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

Hey The4lines, that's wonderful news :) I'm fine, just a bit busy at the moment. I wish you all the best with NPP! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:21, 13 May 2020 (UTC)
Thanks, I’m a bit busy with school but not as much as I would be before the pandemic. I Wish you luck. Best, Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:23, 13 May 2020 (UTC)
Before cluebot archives it, could you take a look at User:NewArtistsofficial and maybe block. I would like your insights on this user. Thanks, Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:43, 13 May 2020 (UTC)
Hi The4lines, thanks for discussing the issue with the user at Draft talk:Valor Music, but I'm afraid that the chat-like responses do not actually convey the needed information. The decline messages by the reviewers are fine, and there is probably no immediate need for deleting the article. There is no harm in letting the article be declined and eventually rejected (big red stop button) by reviewers. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:51, 13 May 2020 (UTC)
Ok, thanks Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:53, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

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The re-return

Hi ToBeFree. As suspected this sock is back with their usual inappropriate links, though with some additional incivility this time. Could I trouble you to assist again please. Cheers. Robvanvee 10:26, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Robvanvee, thank you very much for the quick response to the block evasion. Sometimes, we're lucky and can deal with the problem immediately. I hope the problem has been solved for at least two weeks now, or even three months, but I have a feeling this isn't the last report about the issue. Thank you for your patience in dealing with harassment and sockpuppetry. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:38, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
Thank you so much ToBeFree! Protection is going to be a great help. To be honest, the harassment is actually a good laugh. Kudos to them on the effective use of repeated middle fingers to instill a deeper sense of insult . While I'm here: I filed a report at ANI on the 4th that, to date has not been addressed. In an attempt to delay archiving I added an extra comment yesterday (not sure if that is acceptable) asking for help again. I'm not asking you to look into the issue that I reported, just to let me know if the report looks ok please. I'm trying to figure out why no one wants to get their hands dirty. Many thanks again for your swift action! Robvanvee 12:19, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
You're welcome, Robvanvee; I hope it doesn't spread to other articles now. Since the "See also: Wikipedia:Contents" behavior is clearly disruptive and easy to detect without false positives, I already have drafted an edit filter that could be used to track the issue and to trigger an automatic notification at WP:AIV, if the problem persists.
Regarding the ANI thread: Answered and done; see ANI for details. If a request remains unanswered for days at WP:ANI while the reported user's behavior continues, pointing this out is perfectly fine. Thanks for the report, and again for your patience. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:13, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

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A cup of tea for you!

For your continued assistance with tedious issues and courteous, helpful approach! Robvanvee 14:02, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
😄 Thank you very much, Robvanvee! I'll physically make a cup of tea now. Happy to have helped, and am very interested in future updates about these cases. Perhaps the "See also: Wikipedia:Contents" editor just gives up now. If not, I'll try a partial block on the IP range, or an edit filter. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:20, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

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Anons

2020-05-09T20:04:28 Yamla blocked 100.2.34.35 talk with an expiration time of 1 month (account creation blocked) (Block evasion: Andrew5) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:25, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I am not trying to be rude(and please warn me if I am)but it seems you have something against anons. I mean, look at your unblock responses. 19:35, 9 May 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.2.34.35 (talk)

Hi 100.2.34.35, thank you very much for the feedback. Do I correctly understand that my response to an unregistered ("anonymous" is not a good term) user, perhaps yourself, has upset you? Please provide a specific example; I'd love to have a look again. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:42, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
It's not just that. If it was I wouldn't care. You also reset the blocks and for the rangeblock of 2600:387:5:800::/60 you did not give a reason for revoking TPA and resetting(note that a huge range here in NY relies on that. I did not vandalize but I do have to use WiFi to edit now). But keep in mind you did get many users like TigerWarz19, unblocked. 100.2.34.35 (talk) 19:49, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
I'm sad to hear that kindness towards good-faith users who returned after a long time is being interpreted as bias against unregistered editors. There are no indefinite IP address blocks; an unregistered editor can just return after a year without edits, without having to request an unblock. A blocked registered user in the same situation needs an unblock to have the same chance. Unblocking accounts is not privileging them; it removes inequality. The reason for resetting the block of 2600:387:5:800::/60 is "less than a month difference between keeping and resetting the duration; a year is fine." The reason for revoking talk page access is "The rangeblock fulfills its intended purpose. Due to persistent disruption, an account is temporarily required to edit from this specific IP address range, to allow a clear password-based distinction between disruptive and non-disruptive users from the same range. The disruptive repetition of requests from multiple IP addresses in the range needs to stop." The {{rangeblock}} template does provide pretty useful advice to anyone who "relies" on the ability to edit from the range. In an ideal world, noone needs an account to edit. The existence of semi-protection could equally be interpreted as "having something against" unregistered users, but I prefer to interpret the lack of semi-protection on most pages, on a website that does not even require an e-mail address for registration, as the closest we can come to this ideal world as possible. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:07, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Tech News: 2020-20

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Everyone can now import photos from Flickr to Commons with the UploadWizard. Before this only autopatrollers on Commons could import photos from Flickr. [131]

Problems

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 12 May. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 13 May. It will be on all wikis from 14 May (calendar).

Future changes

  • Advanced item JavaScript scripts and gadgets can no longer check multiple keys at once via mw.config.exists() or mw.user.tokens.exists(). You can use exists() or get() to check one at a time instead. [135]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

20:41, 11 May 2020 (UTC)

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Innapropriate linking, block evading IP...the re-re-return

Hey ToBeFree. I hope this finds you well. Our old friend, the ridiculously inappropriate linking IP is back and up to their old tricks. Please could I once again trouble you to take a look. Robvanvee 06:43, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Robvanvee, thank you very much for the report; done. I have a feeling the next block of this user won't be done by me, but by another administrator. 😉 Please keep me updated! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:17, 14 May 2020 (UTC)
As always, tis I who thanks you! I will keep you updated but just out of curiosity, why would it not be you who would perform the next block? Robvanvee 11:46, 14 May 2020 (UTC)
You're welcome :) For reasons. :P ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:57, 14 May 2020 (UTC)
Thumbs up icon Robvanvee 12:26, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

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Message by Ursula Golling

Heading added ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:18, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Hello ToBeFree,

first of all let me say, that I was very surprised to read your message. Indeed, I was positively impressed, because this underlines my impression, that Wikipedia is a Encyclopedia which is watched and surveyed keenly by a highly motivated community to avoid any fraud. In my case, I admit, you could get the imagination that I am a paid attorney or similar, but I am not. I am Marketing Manager of Hoffmann Mineral and one of my taskes is, to translate the two existing entries "Hoffmann Mineral GmbH" and "Neuburger Kieselerde" into English language. So I get paid by this company whose entry I want to adapt. Hoffmann Mineral is a family owned company and we are manufacturer of a unique raw material, a mineral named "Neuburger Kieselerde" or in English "Neuburg Siliceous Earth". Unfortunately I am bloody beginner regarding Wikipedia entries and community. Therefore I am not familiar with the rules and how a Wikipedia entry works. First of all I had to learn that I had to apply to the English entries of the two above mentioned topics. After that I did not had time to care for all further steps to layout and edit the entries, although the English translation is ready. I must admit, that for me it is not easy, as it is not like "copy and paste" to change the entry from German to English. If you have some hints for me, how this is easily to do, I would be very grateful. Sorry for the confusion and thank you for helping the Wikipedia community. Ursula Golling (talk) 09:13, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Ursula Golling,
First of all, welcome to Wikipedia! I'm sorry to hear that the first experience was a frustrating one.
Thank you very much for the disclosure. If I understand correctly, you are writing the translation yourself, in your own words. This is perfect. For a moment, it seemed that you might want to copy someone else's work to Wikipedia; if that was what you wanted to do, we'd ask the person to do so themselves. This is because Wikipedia edits are attributed to their contributors, and uploading someone else's text to Wikipedia is almost always problematic for legal and internal policy reasons. Do feel free to forward all my instructions to the translator if you hire/hired one.
I recommend the following procedure:
  1. Create an account (already done by you; should be done individually by anyone before making paid contributions. One account per person, one person per account. See WP:Sockpuppetry for the relevant policy; the section "WP:COWORKER" becomes relevant if multiple people coordinate editing behind the scenes, which can be fine if it is done openly. If everyone follows this instruction list, it will probably be fine.)
  2. Create the account's user page. The easiest way to do so is opening Special:MyPage while logged in. Create the user page with text that fulfills the disclosure requirements of WP:PAID. I personally am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice, but I personally think the following disclosure text could be useful: "I am the Marketing Manager of Hoffmann Mineral GmbH. All edits from this account to Wikipedia are made on behalf of my employer. My past and present tasks are: Translating the German Wikipedia article [[:de:Hoffmann Mineral]] to the English Wikipedia ([[Draft:Hoffmann Mineral]]); translating the German Wikipedia article [[:de:Neuburger Kieselerde]] to the English Wikipedia ([[Draft:Neuburger Kieselerde]])." You can freely copy and modify this text to fit your situation, and you should add any future tasks to the list.
  3. Create the draft. If you have followed the previous step, you'll see red links that can simply be clicked to create your first article, "Draft:Hoffmann Mineral". Never create an article directly; always prefix it with "Draft:". If you would like to translate a German Wikipedia article, the very first sentence of your draft should be like "This is a translation of the German Wikipedia article [[:de:Hoffmann Mineral]], as it appeared on the German Wikipedia at 8 May 2020, 14:00 CEST. A list of contributors and licensing information can be found by opening the original article's history." An experienced contributor will later modify or remove this sentence for procedural reasons; don't be surprised if it disappears one day.
  4. Save the page early, save it often. Perhaps even save it after adding the first sentence. The save button is labelled "Publish changes" or "Publish page" or similar, which may be confusing. It does not submit your article for review; it just publicly saves your work, so you can continue editing at any time. You are allowed to copy German text to the draft, for future translation. Remember that there is no backup copy of your work if you don't save the page.
  5. When the draft is ready for review, simply copy the following code to the top of the article: {{subst:submit}}. If you copy this code instead of typing it yourself, it will work in every situation. Save the page with the added code.
  • You are allowed to work on multiple projects in parallel, and you are allowed to edit your draft at any time, even after submission for review. Just keep in mind to list your projects on your user page. You can open your user page at any time by clicking your username at the very top of any Wikipedia page.
  • You are allowed to collaborate on the draft, but there will be technical problems ("edit conflicts") if two collaborators attempt to edit the draft at the same time. All participants need to follow the disclosure instructions before starting to contribute.
Perhaps you would like to edit Wikipedia in your free time, as a volunteer, one day. This is a valid and good reason for operating two accounts, when done openly. To do so, I recommend creating a new account for volunteer contributions while you are still logged in as "Ursula Golling", by clicking Special:CreateAccount. After creating your volunteer account, log out, log in with the volunteer account, create your user page with the following text (or similar): This account is used for volunteer contributions to the encyclopedia. My work account is [[User:Ursula Golling]].. When you use the work account the next time, edit its user page as well, adding "My account for volunteer contributions is [[User:Example]]." to it, replacing "Example" by the name of your volunteer account. Ideas for volunteer contributions can be found at the community portal and the Task Center. Always check which account you are currently using before making an edit. Your current account name is always displayed at the very top of all Wikipedia pages.
If any questions arise, always feel free to ask at the Teahouse. Technical questions and policy questions are both welcome.
Good luck and best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:18, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
Hello ToBeFree,
lots of information, but good to understand, also for me :-)
You are right, I mentioned that the translation has been made from a professional, but this means, it has been translated by me and revised by a native speaker. Therefore it is "professional".
I will start in due course with the edition of the english pages. Your explanation helps a lot.
Thank you and have a nice weekend,
Ursula Golling (talk) 11:56, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
Hello Ursula Golling, you're welcome! Thank you very much for the kind feedback and for soon providing a high-quality translation to Wikipedia. Ideally, in the future, please create the translation on Wikipedia before letting someone revise it; the copyeditor can then correct the translation on Wikipedia with an own account. Have a nice weekend too, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:08, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

AFC

Do you mind reviewing my Draft, Draft:Dixon Lake (Escondido) thanks, Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:07, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi The4lines, congratulations and thank you very much for creating an article! It is an honor to me to receive this request, but reviews are never done on personal request. You have correctly submitted the article for review, and someone will have a look. Sadly, this may take 6 weeks or more, but I can't change that. You are welcome to edit your draft at any time if you would like to change something before it is reviewed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:14, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
Ah, good to Know :) Thanks, Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:16, 16 May 2020 (UTC) (You are welcome to Archive this now)
No problem, you're welcome 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:36, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

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User:E-Stylus

Regarding this discussion, I see that there is clear consensus not to unblock, but where was the consensus to ban? Banning was never raised in the discussion, and not mentioned by anyone commenting. - Bilby (talk) 19:53, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Bilby, all this means is that any further appeals must be made to the community, not individual administrators. I had already mentioned this, with a quote of the relevant policy sentence, when advising the user about an appeal at AN. Editors who are or remain indefinitely blocked after due consideration by the community are considered "banned by the Wikipedia community". Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:14, 14 May 2020 (UTC)
No problem. I don't particularly like that rule, but so be it. - Bilby (talk) 20:17, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

User Block request for user: Kohaku015

I saw your response regarding my request. I am so sorry since this is the first time I have requested this and may not have understood the process fully before proceeding.

I have revisited this user and saw that he has requested to move his account to a new username which is very similar to mine(only one letter is different). This looks more than just vandalism now. I somehow feel that my stay in wikipedia community is no longer safe with this attempt to mimic my username.

I am new to this process and am not very sure how to proceed with this kind of situation. I would really need your opinion and expertise.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Kohaku015 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kulotchii (talk • contribs) 15:02, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Kulotchii, no worries! When you need administrative help, WP:ANI is probably the best place to ask for it. Many other noticeboards exist, but WP:ANI is the central place for such requests.
Regarding the other user, they have clearly attempted to impersonate you. This is indeed more severe than usual vandalism. Wikipedia does not tolerate harassment, and this is a form of harassment. The user has been blocked now. Because the renaming was inappropriate and should never have been done, I have reported the renaming error at meta:Stewards'_noticeboard#Abusive_rename_request_granted. We'll deal with this; you do not need to take any further action. However, if the harassment continues, or if something similar happens again, please report it, either here or at WP:ANI.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:23, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much! I will take note of this noticeboard for future requests! Have a good day! Kulotchii (talk) 18:14, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

You're welcome, Kulotchii, and have a good day too 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:40, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Generosity

I've just seen the background behind this. You were more generous than I would probably have been: I would probably have gone for indefinite. However, it is quite likely that it makes no difference, as the editor very probably won't come back. JBW (talk) 23:35, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi JBW, I would normally have indefinitely blocked such an editor, as I completely agree with you. In this specific case, the account is almost a year old, has made a few constructive contributions before and received a topic ban warning before I noticed the blockworthy filter log entries. This influenced my decision; perhaps it ideally shouldn't have. Now that it happened, though, I have a feeling that a week of silence followed by new disruption would be a solid basis for an indefinite block and/or topic bans that are pretty much unappealable. If that happens, the result may be even more comfortable to deal with for us. It leaves no room for "this was a one time exception" excuses. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:42, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
Actually, after I posted the message above, I thought about it some more and changed my mind. In fact I came to pretty much the same conclusion as you have described. JBW (talk) 23:14, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
Thank you very much, JBW, for this update – this is valuable feedback for me. Let's see what happens after the week. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:20, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Someone ripping off your userpage

Just FYI User:Make_me_Feel_Alright has ripped your userpage. Sulfurboy (talk) 14:27, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Hey Sulfurboy, thank you very much for the notification. I have created a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Trolling? to get uninvolved input. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:40, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Potential editing war brewing...

We are having an issue with a user that wishes to arbitrarily delete legitametely referenced inclusions (records) to a page, due to personal preference. I have asked him to start a discussion if he wishes to change guideline but is trying to twist it the other way. We don't wish to have a editing war with PeeJay2K3 but I think an admin i needed already. Article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premier_League_records_and_statistics

TheRealGutripper (talk) 14:35, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) TheRealGutripper doesn't seem to be fully aware of Wikipedia guidelines regarding the addition of content to articles. The onus is always on the person adding content to an article to show why that content should be added. The mere existence of a source is insufficient to satisfy the claim that content is worthy of inclusion in an encylopaedia. – PeeJay 14:39, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
@TheRealGutripper and PeeJay2K3: Hi, please have a look at the bottom of Special:MyTalk. Thanks ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:47, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

---Thanks for taking quick action ToBeFree TheRealGutripper (talk) 14:49, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

@TheRealGutripper: What action do you think has been taken? Do you really still think that policy is on your side in this regard? You have already violated WP:3RR today, so the only reason the content remains in the article is because I'm not willing to do the same. Please read WP:ONUS and have a think about your actions. By the way, accusing others of censorship (among other things) is unlikely to win you many supporters for your cause. – PeeJay 14:52, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
As living people are involved, I have now – after all these messages – restored the revision that does not contain the disputed material. Both users have been reminded about the edit warring policy. I have additionally informed TheRealGutripper about the discretionary sanctions applying to content about living persons. Further disruption may require a block from editing, perhaps a partial one, or – in TheRealGutripper's case – a topic ban from making biographical edits. The easiest way to avoid such trouble is to disengage from the conflict, or at least to follow proper dispute resolution measures. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:01, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for your help, ToBeFree. Fine advice all round. – PeeJay 15:20, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for your action in this ToBeFree. I have clearly misunderstood something fundamental reg the requirements for deleting content from a page, and I apologise. I have been, and still am being, civil and polite throughout this, however I would mention that I consider PeeJay's behaviour extremely rude, snarky and bullying in this series of communications, and I hope Wikipedia does not condone this. As you are aware I contacted Admin (yourself) to try and moderate/resolve this issue immediately. I would like to engage admin (@ToBeFree) with some questions arising from this situation for future understanding of the rules. How can I contact you with more questions? — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheRealGutripper (talk • contribs) 16:04, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
No worries, TheRealGutripper. I do also acknowledge that you have been the person who has sought help, and that your tone has been, and is still, commendable. Edit wars, or content disputes in general, tend to become heated petty quickly. This is one of the reasons why edit warring is always disruptive, even if someone is right. There are a few exceptions, for example when writing about living people, that justify immediate removal of challenged information, and I assume that PeeJay2K3 intended to uphold the strict "WP:BLP" policy without explicitly referring to it. For this reason, it is practically impossible to condemn their efforts in this specific matter. I understand that the communication had a negative impression, and I personally might have reacted in a different, more calm way, but then again, I wasn't involved in the heated dispute, and it is easy for me to say so.
I understand that your motivation, at all the time, was to improve the encyclopedia. I also acknowledge that Wikipedia is extremely complex, and that newcomers are sometimes treated unnecessarily harshly for not having known about complicated guidelines. In general, we do encourage everyone to be bold. Being bold was perfectly fine, and the only mistake on your part was insistence, when disengagement was a better option. I personally believe that it still is: The situation has been resolved amicably, if I understand correctly. The path to this resolution was bumpy – I have seen the exchange of talk page messages and tried to reduce the heat. Your message, although understandably mentioning a reasonable complaint, does seem to prove that most of the unnecessary heat has been taken away from the situation. Whether the credit for this belongs to you, PeeJay2K3 or me is not that important; I'm happy to see that this conflict has been reduced to a calm, acceptable disagreement between judicious adults. I sometimes think of children when I see edit wars; let's handle such conflicts more wisely than throwing sand into each other's eyes. For this reason, while you are always welcome to add a message here (or, if I have been acting extremely unreasonably, WP:ANI), I personally recommend letting the matter rest. Administrative measures are preventative, not punitive, so there is probably no need for administrative action at this time. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:16, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-21

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • If you forget your password you can ask for a new one to be sent to your email address. You need to know your email address or your username. You can choose that you need to enter both your email address and your username. This is a preference. This is to get fewer password reset emails someone else asked for. This is now available on all Wikimedia wikis. [136][137]

Problems

Changes later this week

Future changes

  • Graphs will be rendered in the reader's browser. This will use Javascript. Graphs will hopefully work better for everyone who uses Javascript. It will not work for users who don't use Javascript. This will not affect diagrams in image files. [142]
  • Advanced item Some CSS for the skins has been simplified. This affects div#p-personal, div#p-navigation, div#p-interaction, div#p-tb, div#p-lang, div#p-namespaces, div#p-variants and div#footer. They will have to remove div. You will have to update your gadgets, scripts or user styles. This is so we can use HTML5. [143]
  • Advanced item Some CSS for the Vector skin has been changed. This affects #p-variants, #p-namespaces, #p-personal, #p-views and #p-cactions. They can no longer use > ul. You might need to update your gadgets, scripts or user styles. See how.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:19, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi ToBeFree, I have found the following articles Confederate Hellcat, Confederate Hellcat Speedster, Confederate P-51 Combat Fighter, Confederate F-117 Fighter, Confederate FA-13 Combat Bomber and Confederate Wraith violating copyright as they have reported from 95-75% direct copied content from websites that has © 2020 Confederate Motorcycles LLC at the end of the page so have placed CSD G12 notices to all. The author in response to the notice mentions the following at the respective talk page "The content contained herein is my own original work as also contained on the Confederate Motorcycles website. I own Confederate Motorcycles and have submitted appropriate license information giving Wikipedia authority to publish both the text and image.". I tried to find such declaration on the website or user talk page but could not find one. Could you help what's the issue is? Thank you.~Amkgp ✉ 17:48, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Amkgp, thank you very much for noticing and reporting this. I currently can't do a thorough investigation, but I have added a short message asking for clarification, and providing the needed instruction link, on the article creator's talk page. Let's see what happens. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:57, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Amkgp, PS, this seems to be either original research or reference spamming, or both. They should probably stop regardless of copyright issues. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:03, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, Yes I also conclude the same. The author is trying to escape without doing anything in real. ~Amkgp ✉ 18:07, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
But what about the articles, are they needs to be removed to as it clearly a case of WP:G12 ? ~Amkgp ✉ 18:09, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Alright, I see you have already drafted them. Thank you for the quick help and clarifications. ~Amkgp ✉ 18:11, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Amkgp, I have moved all of them to the draft namespace. I have updated the links in your message to avoid confusion. Again, thank you very much for your report. Good call. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:14, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Regarding the articles that are now in the draft namespace, while strictly speaking they violate Wikipedia's copyright policy, I assume that there is no actual copyright violation, and that the user will shortly fix the licensing problem. However, another administrator will sooner or later see the deletion tag, and will perform the deletion if it is still appropriate. I'm personally much more concerned about the spamming.
No problem, you're welcome, and thank you for the correct report. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:15, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Confederate Motorcycles

My name is Ernest Lee. I own Confederate Motorcycles and was invited and asked to post pages on each model of motorcycle models on Wikipedia:WikiProject Motorcycling/New Articles. I was planning to first post the current models that Confederate Motorcycles is building and then to work my way back to models that Confederate Motorcycles has produced over the last 29 years. End of the day, I spent several hours providing information on six models of motorcycle that Confederate is currently producing. I first submitted links to the specifications on our official website. I was advised that the links needed to be to external third party sources as well. I then submitted links to two external sources in addition to the official website. I was advised that the information on the external sources (two notable motorcycle journalists) "regurgitated" the information on the Confederate Motorcycles official website. To the extent that they stated the exact engine size and other specifications they had copied such stats and information from Confederate Motorcycles press releases but the sources are in no way connected to the company. I thereafter peformed google searches for third party material and cited several sources for each sentence in the articles for each of the motorcycles currently manufactured by Confederate Motorcycles. I was then advised that the text in the article needed to be my own summary of the information in the articles and not direct quotes. I would like to submit these models of motorcycle to this project but humbly ask that you verify my sources and submit the information in my stead. Thank you for your time and consideration. Earnestly (talk) 02:46, 19 May 2020 (UTC)Earnestly — Preceding unsigned comment added by Earnestly (talk • contribs)

Please do not continue to use Wikipedia as a platform for your commercial promotion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:29, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Frederika cull page

Good afternoon,

There have been a lot of changes made to frederika culls page over the last couple of months and there are a number of errors that have been incorectly accepted as true.

Frederika was born in jakarta. The information about her mother is mostly incorrect including the spelling of her first name!

The page is being sabotaged by jealous online bullies and changes should be locked after we correct the page back to its original state. You can contact me at (Redacted)

Thanks Psymon peers 36.71.139.22 (talk) 09:24, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi 36.71.139.22,
thanks for asking, but I'm not sure why I personally am being asked – are there instructions somewhere that point to my talk page for help? Did I edit the article in the past, did I take administrative action, am I involved in any way?
Concerns about biographies can be voiced at WP:BLPN, the "biographies of living persons noticeboard". I will copy your message there.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:05, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

User name conflict

Actually this the username which is unique and that's the real name of peoples of bibliography. It's quite easy to the author who creates the bibliography, so please consider this user name. Thank you very much — Preceding unsigned comment added by Professor Syed Safiullah (talk • contribs) 16:40, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Professor Syed Safiullah, are you Syed Safiullah? If not, please request a name that represents yourself, not someone else, at Special:GlobalRenameRequest. Thank you very much in advance. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:43, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

User Name Change Request

Hi dear!!! I understand these situations. Can you please tell me, how can I change the username?- Thanks in advance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Professor Syed Safiullah (talk • contribs) 03:43, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) @Professor Syed Safiullah: Usernames can be changed by going to either Special:GlobalRenameRequest or Wikipedia:Changing username/Simple. However, because your account has a short history, it would be easier to abandon that account and create a new one. Interstellarity (talk) 13:17, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Confusing and disruptive editing

Hi ToBeFree, I have found very confusing edits by a user which seems to me a case of WP:GAMING, pardon or correct me if it turns out wrong. This is with respect to User:Prince Kumara Rama, which is many times moved. Chronology as follows (1) created a page named Harihara Bukkaraya (whose title or header is 'The Vijayanagara Empire ( Also Called Karnataka Empire,and The Kingdom of Bisnegar by the Portuguese ) was based in the Deccan Plateau region in So...'). The page looked problematic so tagged with PROD (2) after that user moved page Harihara Bukkaraya → Prince Kumara Rama (3) and again moved Prince Kumara Rama → User:Prince Kumara Rama. In between these activities the user was warned for WP:Vandalism by an admin/sysop. Verify from page history here. Now I find content totally confusing with page title, consists of words like hakka Bukka in sub-sections etc and it has zero references. Thank you.~Amkgp ✉ 08:58, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

Currently unable to investigate, will have a look later today. Alternatively, copy the message to WP:ANI for quick response 24/7 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:19, 20 May 2020 (UTC)
Hi Amkgp, I think I have solved the problem now. I would block the user from moving pages for two weeks, but that feature is currently not available and will come in a few weeks or months. If further disruptive moving occurs, please tell me or the people at WP:ANI. Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:10, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

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New message from Prahlad balaji

Hello, ToBeFree. You have new messages at Prahlad balaji's talk page.
Message added 01:48, 23 May 2020 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

--Stay safe, ◊PRAHLADbalaji (M•T•A•C) This message was left at 01:48, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

{{User:ClueBot III/ArchiveNow}}

User talk:STAY AT HOME FOR THE NHS - Question

Would it be appropriate to revoke talk page access for this user? The user put a retired banner with an abusive edit summary. Interstellarity (talk) 21:05, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Interstellarity, thanks for the notification. They even left the block message in place, which they don't even need to, and they kept their complaint pretty on-topic, without wiki-unrelated attacks or insults. The probability of a preventative need for a block is lower than the probability of a legitimate block appeal. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:55, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

{{User:ClueBot III/ArchiveNow}}

About Google Chrome...

I'm getting confused. Today you removed the Preview releases template and replaced the Stable releases template from the Google Chrome article. If you remove the Preview release template and replace the Stable release template, do you also have to remove both Omahaproxy and the Chrome Releases blog links as well? I'm so confused. And what about Google Chrome for Android and Chrome OS? Do all these Preview and Stable release templates have to be removed/replaced as well? --Angeldeb82 (talk) 18:08, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Angeldeb82, thanks for asking. I think that, while the current revision should be mentioned in the infobox, further information about different operating systems and development releases is too long for the infobox, and more suitable for the article body or Google_Chrome_version_history. Also thank you for your message at Talk:Google_Chrome#Infobox:_Release_list; I have now replied there. I have seen too late that you have already undone your undo; thank you for doing this as well. The situation is a bit chaotic at the moment; let's keep the discussion at Talk:Google_Chrome#Infobox:_Release_list. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:21, 24 May 2020 (UTC)
PS: Angeldeb82, thank you for having kept the list updated since 2014! For many years, you have invested your volunteer time in maintaining this list, and suddenly it has been removed. I can understand that this hurts, and I did not mean to hurt you. It might feel as if you had wasted your time, but this is not the case: From 2014 to 2020, your up-to-date information has helped readers. Or, at very least, your work has prevented outdated information from confusing readers. I am sorry for my sudden, unexpected disruption of this habit. I hope that my reason for proposing this change is understandable, and I am very happy if you continue to update the revision number at Wikidata. Perhaps the community also agrees that we should at least include "Beta" and "Dev" in the infobox (screenshot 2 in the discussion); if so, you're also very welcome to keep these numbers updated. The list was just too long, but your volunteer help is still welcome and appreciated. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:30, 24 May 2020 (UTC) (correction: I meant "Beta and Dev") ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:40, 24 May 2020 (UTC)
Thank you kindly. I will try to do so in the Wikidata in the future when I get a chance. --Angeldeb82 (talk) 18:53, 24 May 2020 (UTC)
Thank you very much, Angeldeb82, this relieves me. Sorry again, and have a nice day! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:03, 24 May 2020 (UTC)
Today I got the news that the Dev Channel Update for Google Chrome has been updated on this link here. Somebody needs to do something about this preview release template. Can you please add the Wikidata editor for the preview releases for Chrome. Your help is pretty much appreciated. --Angeldeb82 (talk) 19:58, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
Hi Angeldeb82, the template is currently intentionally empty and unused. It is not embedded on any other page than Google Chrome, and does not need to be updated at the moment. There is no outdated data and nothing visible to readers. When the main release gets updated, feel free to update the main release number on Wikidata. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:43, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

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Tech News: 2020-22

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • The visual editor will now work in the Modern skin. The changes that needed to happen for this to work could cause problems for some scripts or gadgets. [144]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from May 26. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from May 27. It will be on all wikis from May 28 (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

14:18, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

{{User:ClueBot III/ArchiveNow}}

Mentor

Hello after Galendaila's WP:AN/I discussion I asked if he wanted to be my adtopee which he agreed, but after some edtior said it would be better if another experienced edtior help me mentor galendaila. Would you be willing to help me? Thanks, Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 21:52, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi The4lines, I've had a short look; it seems pretty chaotic. I'd say this is too early. If you currently assume that you are not yet ready to mentor other users, then please don't offer, nor agree to provide, mentorship. There is no benefit, but a lot of potential damage, confusion and disruption if a new user "mentors" a new user. See The Mote and the Beam for a potentially relevant metaphor. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:04, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
I reason I took it up is becuase it seems like the places that the edtior wants to edit are places that feel like I can control. But you may beg to differ. Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 22:06, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
The interesting part about this apparent disagreement is that I have never detailedly assessed your ability to mentor; I went simply by what you said 😉 So listen to your heart / your gut-feeling. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:08, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
Right, that interesting. Are you up to the task of helping me? That’s what my gut told me 😉. Best, Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 22:17, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
Heh. :) But sorry, I currently don't have the time for mentorship. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:25, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Oh well I will ask someone else. Best :) Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 22:53, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

{{User:ClueBot III/ArchiveNow}}

Hi, ToBeFree, User:Lksantos2003 is going away with copyright violation with articles and files. See Neferti Tadiar (copyright violation with 83.4% ) and File:Neferti Tadiar in 2019.jpg (image is not in public domain as Copyright © 2019 Barnard College is clearly mentioned at the end of the web-page). I have also posted notices about Wikipedia copyright polices, but the person is not correcting. The person has a history of problems regarding copyright violations evident from talk page. On top instead of correcting, the person has 'contested speedy deletion' and says I am currently editing the article. Please do not interfere as I only created the page minutes ago.as per Talk:Neferti Tadiar. Please have a look. Thank you. ~Amkgp ✉ 06:09, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

 Done. Thank you very much for the report, Amkgp. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 06:30, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

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Possible sock

Hello ToBeFree, user Robertsatya was inactive since March and reappeared today just after Darkwolf0010 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) was blocked and removed the prod as well as the paid tag. GSS 💬 07:37, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi GSS, I saw this and found it pretty strange. I'm not sure how to deal with the case, though. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:42, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
I guess it's better to fill the SPI. GSS 💬 07:44, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
Perhaps even a deletion discussion, GSS – I just sadly don't have the time to do a thorough notability search. Thank you very much for handling this. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:46, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
Done Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Mohit.chawla29. Googling his real name revealed he has a conflict of interest so, they are in a violation of WP:PAID too. GSS 💬 08:13, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

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Unblock of Jamesmiko

Hey. I see that you unblocked him. And I have a question. Has Jamesmiko's recent sockpuppet account been taken into consideration when making the decision? – Sabbatino (talk) 11:01, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Sabbatino, thank you very much for asking. It's been a month, and I'm not sure. However, I'm afraid I was unaware of this. Pinging Callanecc and NinjaRobotPirate, the latter of whom probably also was unaware, for deciding what to do now. With the topic ban in place, I hope there is no need for further action for now. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:29, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
I just wanted you to know. After seeing his block appeal I thought that probably nobody was aware of that. – Sabbatino (talk) 11:33, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
No, I didn't know about it. I'd be tempted to just let it go; the only other option that I can think of is to restore the indefinite block. I'm going to save this for the next time someone says "sock puppetry tags on the user page are pointless", though. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 12:03, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
Thanks, I agree. Ping Jamesmiko: Perhaps you have something to say about this. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:25, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
The block for the master account would likely not have been for more than a month and the topic ban probably covers the issue anyway. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 13:00, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

There should be a Wikipedia rule for a user taking it upon themselves to ban others when they're not an admin themselves. This is harassment. Aside from this, I have honored the topic ban. James Miko (talk) 21:56, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Notifying the administrators of your block evasion is not harassment. You should have thought about that when you created that other account while being blocked. – Sabbatino (talk) 10:47, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

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My IP is blocked

My IP is blocked please free it — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dhurvi1995 (talk • contribs) 11:50, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Dhurvi1995, which page(s) did you edit before? Did you have a different username? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:26, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Nonconstructive edit activity by User:Beatrice Ampadu

Hi, ToBeFree An article sometime back I found undersourced and moved from main-space to draft-space to improve the article. See below the details:

  1. George Padmore Research Library on African Affairs moved to Draft:George Padmore Research Library on African Affairs at 10:33, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

The editor instead of improving the draft mischievously moved the George Padmore Research Library on African Affairs → Talk:George Padmore Research Library on African Affairs and commented on edit summary allow to add content. See this for proof. This is done to evade from deleting Admin's notice. The user is clearly WP:NOTHERE. Thank you. ~ Amkgp ✉ 14:30, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

Ah. Hey Amkgp, nice to meet you again. Regarding "nothere", well, I never make "nothere" blocks; I believe that every non-vandal is here to improve the encyclopedia. Many, however, act disruptively with their good intentions. I have reverted the move and implemented the correctly requested deletion. If the user continues to make disruptive moves, please use {{subst:uw-move2}}, {{subst:uw-move3}}, {{subst:uw-move4}}, then WP:ANI. I have a feeling that a block would be, at least slightly, controversial, since the user seems to be a good-faith participant of a larger editing project, according to their edit summaries and user page. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:42, 27 May 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, OK. Thanks ~ Amkgp ✉ 14:43, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

Articles for Creation: List of reviewers by subject notice

Hi ToBeFree/A, you are receiving this notice because you are listed as an active Articles for Creation reviewer.

Recently a list of reviewers by area of expertise was created. This notice is being sent out to alert you to the existence of that list, and to encourage you to add your name to it. If you or other reviewers come across articles in the queue where an acceptance/decline hinges on specialist knowledge, this list should serve to facilitate contact with a fellow reviewer.

To end on a positive note, the backlog has dropped below 1,500, so thanks for all of the hard work some of you have been putting into the AfC process!

Sent to all Articles for Creation reviewers as a one-time notice. To opt-out of all massmessage mailings, you may add Category:Wikipedians who opt out of message delivery to your user talk page. Regards, Sam-2727 (talk)

MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:35, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

York Civic Trust

Thanks for adding the COI Tag to the York Civic Trust page. I'd clocked this and have already messaged the user explaining COI and neutrality. Currently trying to clean it up. Sigh.Zakhx150 (talk) 18:14, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Zakhx150, you are always allowed to revert these changes entirely, then manually implement the few factual corrections that might have been part of the promotion, or remove any statements that have been challenged by the promotional editor (per WP:BURDEN). I'll stay uninvolved, as this may require administrative intervention in the future. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:16, 27 May 2020 (UTC)
Indeed, but I am AFGing (perhaps stretching it beyond reasonable expectations). There are useful additions here, but some ruthless culling won't go amiss. Shouldn't take too long, and thanks for the overishgt - much appreciated.Zakhx150 (talk) 18:27, 27 May 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for your volunteer work and the kind feedback, Zakhx150. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:30, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

What if I learned it by experience?

What if I learn something from experience, not from the web or a book? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.185.119.98 (talk) 02:16, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi 108.185.119.98, Wikipedia does not publish personal experiences. See WP:INTREF and WP:No original research. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:44, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

User violating topic ban

Hi sir, the user:Editor wikip6 is violating his topic ban and constituting to edit on various south Asian social group articles. Please take a look.YaRaabAlHind (talk) 16:34, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi YaRaabAlHind, thank you very much for the notification. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:03, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Speedy del.

Could you Del. this page X word It clealy does not belong here. Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:24, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi The4lines, thanks for asking. However, I do not close deletion discussions (see my RfA) and there is no urgent need to circumvent the running deletion discussion anyway. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:27, 28 May 2020 (UTC)
Hmm. ok thanks Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 17:28, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Sock block please

Howdy - logged out EuanB2000 resuming as IP on the same articles (same edit summaries). Could you block? Thank you! --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 21:21, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Elmidae, thank you very much for the notification. That was an easy decision. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:32, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

G7

Hi, You recently reverted my revision on the deleted version of User:Miles Joy, claiming that G7 does not apply to pages in the userspace. However, User:Lemnisk Marketing/sandbox was recently deleted by Stwalkerster under G7. Could you help me out? Thanks. --Stay safe, ◊PRAHLADbalaji (M•T•A•C) This message was left at 22:05, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Prahlad balaji, the world is not black and white. 🙂 If you believe that a speedy deletion has been inappropriate, you may like to discuss it with the deleting administrator. If there is no such concern, there is probably no need for a long nitpicking discussion, and time is better spent elsewhere. 😉
In a nutshell: It wasn't me, I'm out :P ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:12, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Oh, I thought it was you who deleted it. Sorry! --Stay safe, ◊PRAHLADbalaji (M•T•A•C) This message was left at 22:17, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Prahlad balaji, your original description was correct: I have deleted some revisions of User:Miles Joy, but not User:Lemnisk Marketing/sandbox. However, you seem to question the other administrator's deletion, not mine. Hence I'm out :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:22, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Message by CYSYork

Thanks for your query about my username. It consists of my initials and where I live. It wasn't intended to offend any Wikipedia guidelines. CYSYork (talk) 15:54, 28 May 2020 (UTC)CYSYork

Hi CYSYork, someone had reported the name at the username noticeboard, but I figured as much. Thank you very much for the clarification. Your username is perfectly fine.
Unrelated to your username: Could you perhaps have a conflict of interest regarding York Civic Trust? If so, please consider editing about other topics than your affiliations.
Thanks again and best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:59, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. I do have a connection with the York Civic Trust, but only in an editing role, which is why I was asked to help. I have no vested interest in the Trust at all. (The Trustee who altered my original text does have such an interest.) Hope that answers your concern.CYSYork (talk) 16:05, 28 May 2020 (UTC)CYSYork

Hi CYSYork, thanks for the clarification, but I'm not entirely sure which Trustee you are referring to – did someone revise the text before you uploaded it to Wikipedia, or has another Wikipedia user edited the submitted text? I'm not sure if I actually have an overview of the situation at the moment. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:07, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

This Trustee emailed me this morning to say she'd expanded and added to my text - it included some typos, which is also annoying. In fact my text has been considerably altered and new sections have been introduced which were not in my original and are redundant. I've suggested she deal with it, so I hope she does.CYSYork (talk) 16:28, 28 May 2020 (UTC)CYSYork

Ah. No worries, CYSYork. However, if I understand correctly, you do have relatively close connections to the trust. I'm not sure what the "editing role" means, but if you have been asked by the article subject to edit the Wikipedia article, then you are practically editing "on behalf of", or "representing", the article subject and/or people with a close connection. Please propose further changes on the talk page of the article (by clicking "Talk" above the article, and then "request corrections on or suggest content" in the orange box). Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:07, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

I don't see myself as representing the Trust - I help with proofreading and copy-editing their Annual Report - but I will do as you suggest. Probably not tonight, however, but sometime tomorrow. Thanks for your help.CYSYork (talk) 17:22, 28 May 2020 (UTC)CYSYork

Thank you very much, CYSYork. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:25, 28 May 2020 (UTC)
Hi all, Just dropping into here as I've been part of amending the various edits made to the York Civic Trust and everyone seems to have been in contact with everyone else now. If CYSYork is not COI then fine (though I'd recommend they read up on the Manual of style before undertaking such large edits on a page again, as a lot of good earlier text was deleted in favour of poorly referenced material. C'est la vie, that's sorted now and I'll welcome any recommended additions they add to the talk page. However, do I have the correct reading of this that recent editions by User:Benyon4 to this page are thus the edits by the Trustee .If Benyon4 is a Trustee of YCT then, ToBeFree we are back into COI territory but for a different user, no? I was about to drop a note onto their talk page being mildly miffed at some of these recent edits, but this is probs best being from a higher power. Zakhx150 (talk) 08:34, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Confused occasional editor

Dear ToBe Free

I hope this is how I reply to your comment, which suggests that my edits to the article York Civic Trust are because I am paid. I am not paid. I am a member and active volunteer of the English charity York Civic Trust. I am one of the people who keeps the Trust's records, in my spare unpaid time. I enjoy writing minutes and reports. All voluntary and unpaid.

Benyon4 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Benyon4 (talk • contribs) 08:01, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Benyon4, thank you very much for the clarification. I have replied on your talk page. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:52, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Please have a look

Hi,


Please have a look at the pages Ambalavasi and Polyandry in India an anonymous guy (2402:3A80:12A2:3CD1:557B:CB9F:7074:22DC) blatantly removing sourced contents by saying "not in the source".

[[145]]

The statement he removed was clearly mentioned in the provided source [2] of the article Ambalavasi here [[146]]

[[147]]

This statement also clearly mentioned in the provided source [13] and [11] of the article here Polyandry in India [[148]] and [[149]]


Already reported the same on WP:AIV here [[150]]

Please look into the matter.

Thank You Outlander07@talk 08:51, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Outlander07, thanks for the report, but please consider copying your report to WP:ANI, as this talk page is not a replacement for Wikipedia's central noticeboards. As a rule of thumb, whenever diffs and a longer explanation are needed to prove a problem, WP:ANI is the place to go. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:39, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

O.K Thank you for your reply,will do like the way you suggested.Outlander07@talk 13:34, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Your block of Special:Contributions/MiniKayla1133

Hi there, was this supposed to be an indefinite block? I don't see how blocking a clear throw-away vandalism-only account for 1 month is practical. (also FYI, I made that initial report at AIV, but my IP address rotates annoyingly very often). 76.120.32.35 (talk) 05:50, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi 76.120.32.35, thanks for asking, and sorry for the delayed response. I have incorrectly assumed that the filter log might qualify for suppression, and that there is a remote chance of the user saying the truth. An oversighter has now, however, agreed with me that this is a very unlikely scenario, and has declined removal of the log entries. Our interpretation is that this is likely a trolling-only account. While it hopefully makes no difference anyway, I have now removed the automatic expiration from the block. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:40, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Rangeblock TPA

Hey ToBeFree, hope you are well. I saw you blocked the 2601:1C2:4E00:7:0:0:0:0/64 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · block user · block log) range for vandalism. Since your block, multiple IPs within the range have vandalized their talk page after your block. You might want to revoke their talk page access for their block duration. Just wanted to put it on your radar. Thanks! -- LuK3 (Talk) 00:26, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi LuK3, thank you very much 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:30, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

talk page vandalism

Thanks for the message - I suspected that it may have been something senseless like that, and happy to see that filters are in place to block edits like these. EdwardUK (talk) 13:12, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

No worries, EdwardUK. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:22, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

You've got mail

Hello, ToBeFree/A. Please check your email; you've got mail!
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template. Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 04:15, 31 May 2020 (UTC)
Hi The4lines, thanks for the notification. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:42, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

You've got mail!

Hello, ToBeFree/A. Please check your email; you've got mail!
Message added 07:56, 31 May 2020 (UTC). It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.

Jack Frost (talk) 07:56, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Jack Frost, thanks for the notification. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:43, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 May 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:06, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

IPv6

Thanks for blocking 2601:3C7:4204:FC0:5592:C0F5:1651:1F38 (talk), but blocking a single IPv6 address is kind of pointless. See 2601:3C7:4204:FC0::/64, where you can see the blocked user has already resumed the disruptive editing, which they have a history of. Nardog (talk) 02:13, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Nardog, when it works, it has the nice benefit of affecting only the intended target, even in a multi-user network. This probably wasn't my intention, though; I simply forgot to check the /64 range for similar contributions. Widr has now dealt with the problem, I hope. Sorry for creating an unnecessary need for a second report, and please let me know if there is more block evasion happening in the future. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:16, 31 May 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree (mobile), that's not how IPv6 works. /64 ranges are always assigned to single users, and will not be collateral damage such as happens in IPv4. It's hard for anyone from 1990 to imagine that individual users should be assigned an address space larger than IPv4 ever offered, but that's how v6 is intended to work. Elizium23 (talk) 04:45, 31 May 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree (mobile), further, blocking a /128 never works as intended, because the blocked user is always free to change host identifiers, and host ID will change eventually, given enough time, thus evading the block with no user action required. Elizium23 (talk) 04:46, 31 May 2020 (UTC)
Hi Elizium23, my desktop computer's IP address is 2a02:908:f89:f940:b42b:1794:3cb3:f27e; my notebook's IP address is 2a02:908:f89:f940:79c3:8bb3:bed4:ad09. Blocking the /64 would block all users in my house. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:55, 31 May 2020 (UTC)
Yes, you probably have a single-host account with your ISP, who has issued you a single /64. If you were using IPv4, you would have a lease on a single IP address and be using NAT instead. Works as intended. Elizium23 (talk) 20:51, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Disruptive editing

Hi, ToBeFree User:I amsajin has done editing that's look like WP:DISRUPT in nature. Twenty30 Association for Sustainable Development and Category:Twenty30 Association for Sustainable Development are both same copy-paste and WP:PROMOTIONAL. How can be an article be a category! I am clueless. The user has also engaged in copyright violations and other issues. See the User talk:I amsajin. Thank you. ~ Amkgp ✉ 15:14, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi Amkgp, thanks for the notification. That was a copyright policy violation, although possibly not a violation of copyright laws. In any case, it was a clear violation of the "Wikipedia is not for promotion" policy section and the conflict of interest guideline. The user has a history of using Wikipedia for promotion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:03, 31 May 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, Thanks for the quick help. ~ Amkgp ✉ 17:43, 31 May 2020 (UTC)
No problem, you're welcome, Amkgp. In general, WP:ANI will be a better place to report such issues, though, for a quick independent response. Reports such as this one seem to be perfect for ANI. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:06, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – June 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2020).

Administrator changes

added CaptainEek • Creffett • Cwmhiraeth
removed Anna Frodesiak • Buckshot06 • Ronhjones • SQL

CheckUser changes

removed SQL

Guideline and policy news

Arbitration

  • A motion was passed to enact a 500/30 restriction on articles related to the history of Jews and antisemitism in Poland during World War II (1933–45), including the Holocaust in Poland. Article talk pages where disruption occurs may also be managed with the stated restriction.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:28, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

CSD

Could you del. this Draft Draft:Cronkers. Thanks, Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 19:51, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi The4lines, thanks for asking, but my talk page is not a substitution for WP:ANI, nor a fast lane for reporting pages that are already correctly tagged for speedy deletion. To prevent encouraging queue-jumping, I won't delete the page. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:56, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
Some other admins would say yes but it is your choice. Thanks anyways. Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 19:58, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
The4lines, yes, and that's one reason why "WP:ADMINSHOP" is part of the consensus policy. No worries, though. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:00, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
Ah, thanks, Best Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 20:01, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-23

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • There is a new beta version of the Wikimedia Commons app for Android. It has a new zoom function when you look at images. It can also suggest places when you upload geotagged photos. [151]

Problems

  • There was a problem with the Commons database on 27 May. Commons could not be edited for eight minutes. Because of this problem the database was moved. This caused another short read-only time on 29 May. [152][153][154]
  • The Vector skin had a problem where you couldn't add links to the article in other languages. You couldn't see the section if there were no links to other languages already. It also removed content translation links and links to language settings. This has now been fixed. [155]

Changes later this week

  • You can get a notification when someone links to a page you created. You can turn these notifications off for individual pages. You can soon turn them off also in the notifications you get. [156]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 2 June. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 3 June. It will be on all wikis from 4 June (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

22:32, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

98.0.38.216

Pretty well as soon as the block you imposed on Monday has expired this IP is being a nuisance. See List of tautological place names, I don't know about Geary_Boulevard. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 21:44, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi Martin of Sheffield, thanks for the notification. I had wanted to block them for a month, but Materialscientist had beat me to it with a 12-hour block, which I then decided to leave as is. Now it's the month-long block I had intended to do in the first place. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:12, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

MRadice unblocked

Hi ToBeFree! Martin Urbanec confirmed MRadice via OTRS (see MRadice userpage), so I have undone your block. This is just a courtesy heads up. --TheSandDoctor Talk 13:52, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi TheSandDoctor, thank you very much, both for the unblock and for the notification. I have now collapsed the block notice and replaced it by advice that is more relevant to the situation. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:03, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

Danke

Hallo Toby, Vielen dank fur ihren hilfe. You saw a problem on my Wikipedia page and you fixed it. Und mit grund, mit reason. I am an adjunct professor and I am doing the whole online distance learning thing and at the same time I have become a believer in the Wikipedia mission. I saw your user page and I want to be like you when I grow up (ne' witz alter). I will do as you say and watch more tutorials. Fruher habe ich in Berlin gewohnt. Es war echt toll. LGEBirzin (talk) 12:17, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Hey EBirzin,
You're welcome of course. Thank you very much for the kind feedback and clarification! 😃
I am very happy to see that, in all the trouble caused by the global pandemic, there is a silver lining between the clouds. Wikipedia is one of the few large communities that benefit from lockdowns and working at home.
Berlin is a very interesting, huge city; I've been there once on a class trip. After entering the city and driving in a straight line for an hour, the bus driver reminded us that we were still driving through the same city!
Between all the tutorials and policies, we have a newspaper: WP:SIGNPOST – for someone both enthusiastic about and new to the project, this might be fun reading.
Enjoy your stay and all the best,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:19, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

Block of User:Playlet2.0

It is my understanding that when a user has been giver a user talk warning about a user name, that we do not promptly block that user. On that basis I declined to block Playlet2.0 at WP:UAA, and left the usual comment indicating this. Is your understanding different from mine? DES (talk)DESiegel Contribs 01:20, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi DESiegel, thanks for asking and voicing this concern; I believe that it is usually justified per Wikipedia:Username_policy#Report_blatant_violations.
I was cleaning up reports at WP:UAA, and I had a second look at each declined one before removing them. I then noticed that the username similarity is very unlikely to be an accident, and more likely to be trolling or sockpuppetry, so I decided to block the account instead of removing the report. As it was Playlet himself who has placed both the custom message, and then – after some editing – the WP:UAA report, I believe that Playlet's main intention wasn't discussion, but rather enforcing a username change, if necessarily administratively. Interpreting an "accidental", if you like, discussion attempt as a reason to decline a later request for help by the same user might be counter-intuitive. Perhaps Playlet would like to provide their opinion here as well. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:35, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
I must say, I still do not think that is justified. When the intention is to force a change of name, one files a UAA report without doing a talk page warning first. Wikipedia:Usernames for administrator attention/Instructions says: Do not warn someone about their name and then immediately report them to UAA. The entire point of a warning is to give someone a chance to stop doing something wrong and to discuss concerns. (emphasis in the original. That the same person placed the warning and the UAA report is, IMO, all the more reason not to block until a reasonable time for discussion has elapsed, as that user had the chance to. report without placing a warning. If the user continues to edit without responding, then and only then is a block justified, I think. I do not kn ow, and I do not think any credible evidence shows, what the intent of Playlet2.0 might have been. If that editor were to make an unblock request stating an intention to change to a quite different name, I would seriously consider unblocking. DES (talk)DESiegel Contribs 03:10, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
DESiegel, I'm unsure. The appearance of a second single-purpose account next to Irving1110 in the article, with a username similar to their main opponent in content disputes, does not look well to me. That said, if this concern were based on solid evidence for sockpuppetry, the block would not need to be justified by the username, and it would not be a soft block. The soft block is pretty pointless if the concerns are correct, and causes unnecessary annoyance if the user is a good-faith non-sockpuppet. I have now unblocked the account because, as I have been correctly reminded by you, a block solely based on the username concern is not appropriate in this situation. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:07, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
Thank you. Of couse later developments may change the outcome. DES (talk)DESiegel Contribs 04:13, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for considering my report. I left the message on the users page after the first instance, it was only after the user ignored the request and continued to edit under that name a second time that I reported them. I am also disinclined to see this as accidental , as the only edits they is on one specific page where I have been active.Playlet (talk) 05:45, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
I have to admit I didn't look at the timestamps closely enough. I assume DESiegel might have overlooked this as well. Do we assume that the user has sent a rename request that is currently in the queue? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:10, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
The user has made exactly 2 edits, both to the same page, and no name change request, nor any edits to any other Wikimedia projects under this name/account. My inclination would be to gave a very strong custom warning, and if the user edits again without requesting a name change, except perhaps to ask about that process, to then block. But if you want to block sooner, To Be Free, you certianly have a basis. I admit I didn't examine the timestamps of the user's edits, and i should have. DES (talk)DESiegel Contribs 16:17, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
Thanks again, DESiegel; the strong final warning sounds like a fine choice. It might perchance also allow us to see an actual reaction instead of a silent abandonment of the account. Warning added. Playlet, please message me or DESiegel if the user continues to ignore the concern. If, independently of the username concern, you suspect sock puppetry and have evidence for it, then please have a look at WP:SPI for further advice. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:30, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

No.achne is back.

ToBeFree, would you block two new ips that are clear socks of the editor you blocked a few hours ago? [[157]] Springee (talk) 22:58, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi Springee, thank you very much for the notification! I had already blocked 120.20.223.15; now 14.2.3.205 has been blocked as well. Please let me know if the problem persists; consider reporting persistent sockpuppet edit warring at WP:RFPP to deter IP address changes. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:42, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Thank you

I would like to thank you for your action in addressing the conduct of 86.129.117.3. They consistently violated Wikipedia policies and attacked me and other users over the past few weeks. I even notified another administrator at one point, and they carried on. I appreciate you for making sure these violations don’t go unnoticed, and putting a stop to this behavior. I hope that when the user’s block expires, they can learn to become a meaningful contributor to Wikipedia. Have a great day! MrSwagger21 (talk) 03:23, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Note: This is a message of thanks and is not meant to target, degrade, or shame the blocked user (86.129.117.3), or use the block to do so.

Hey MrSwagger21,
Thank you very much for the wonderful feedback. Especially in a case where a user was blocked to prevent further harassment, it is incredibly valuable to see that the users protected by the action agree with it too.
It can be tricky to deal with such cases, especially when the user does not have an account and might not see messages sent to their previous IP addresses. In this specific case, the IP address is fortunately very static, almost like an account. However, the address might still change one day, and if this happens and you notice it, please notify me about it. Even if the block has expired, if the same behavior continues from any address a few months later, I'd like to re-block immediately. A "whois" query often reveals if we're dealing with the same person.
I personally am afraid that the currently-blocked person might continue to be disruptive even after the block. A stricter enforcement of WP:NOTFORUM on talk pages may be helpful in general, and could have prevented the situation from becoming as excessive as it did. It is usually reasonable to respond friendly and in kind to occasional off-topic chatter (see "Berlin" above), but this only works when both sides of the discussion understand that it is off topic and needs to be kept to a minimum. If the editor in the Berlin section above started to provide a list of their favorite travel locations, I'd raise an eyebrow and carefully attempt to end the derailment. Maintaining a balance between a welcoming atmosphere for those who do build the encyclopedia, and proper rejection towards people who are only here to chat about drug usage ([158]), personal life experiences ([159]) and brushing their teeth ([160]) can be tricky sometimes.
Feedback is often loud in cases of errors, and silent in cases of success. Thanks for making a difference.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:48, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
Additional note: MrSwagger21, if something similar happens again, the community at WP:ANI is usually pretty helpful in dealing with the problem, 24/7. It is especially helpful if, after continued disruption, one can point to a previous discussion at that noticeboard, saying "Look, the community has condemned this behavior before, but the discussion and the warnings didn't help. Please consider blocking the user." If the behavior is disruptive and justifies a block, a report at WP:ANI will almost certainly cause the block to happen. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:59, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
I agree with what you have said in regard to the nature of the IP address, block evasion, WP:NOTFORUM and feedback with success. I also warned the user that Wikipedia is not a social networking site since they stated they wanted to be “playful” and have “fun”, and also explained that I had to stop discussing their conduct on an article’s talk page, since they are not for discussions about such.
Thank you for your advice about ANI, I will be sure to keep it in mind. In addition, I will notify you if I see the user resuming their past conduct once the block has expired, or using sockpuppetry/switching IPs as a method of block evasion.
I am glad I was able to help recognize your work in making Wikipedia a more welcoming place for all.
Best,
MrSwagger21 (talk) 05:40, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Attic as a reliable source

I just noticed the various removals of my edits, charging that The Attic is not a reliable source. I recognize that blogs can be written by anyone and hence unreliable. But what if the blog is written by someone with a long publishing record, as is the case with The Attic? I am its sole author and I have published more than 40 articles with Smithsonian, American Heritage, the Washington Post, LA Times, etc. I have published five books with mainstream publishers -- Viking and Bloomsbury. My record for reliability stands on these publications. Given that, and that The Attic is as carefully researched as anything I've ever written, why should it not be a reliable source?

Is there someone at Wikipedia to whom I can appeal this?

Bewat (talk) 14:12, 5 June 2020 (UTC) Bruce Watson

Hi Bewat, thanks for asking.
I'm happy to see that someone else has the same concerns. Also, it makes me a bit sad to see that the removal of your additions by another editor was the only event that caused you to reply to my concerns voiced back in 2018. Thanks for finally engaging in an overdue discussion about your conflict of interest.
There was no formal consensus whether The Attic is a reliable source or not; I believe that Epinoia's description of the situation on your talk page is a bit exaggerated. There is no project-wide decision specific to your website that could be "appealed".
Please have a look at the conflict of interest guideline and the "Citation spam" section of the spam guideline. Your primary motivation when editing Wikipedia seems to be inserting original research into Wikipedia articles, and using your own website as citation when doing so.
The closest to an "appeal" is starting a discussion on the talk page of the affected articles (WP:Dispute resolution), or – probably better – another central discussion at WP:RSN, about the reliability of your own website. If you decide to do this, please openly disclose your connection to the website, on your user page and in any discussions about the reliability or inclusion of your website.
But perhaps I should ask a different question! And perhaps I get an answer this time: Bewat, why don't you just cite your actual sources? You surely got your information from somewhere, so you could cite your information sources. Just do so?
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:52, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for responding so quickly. I'm sorry that I waited so long. I don't look at my Wikipedia messages often. I don't know whether I will engage in a discussion about the pages or not. Depends on whether I have time. However, you ask why I don't cite my original sources in my edits. You are correct in noting that I am careful not to add anything to an article that is already there, hence I am adding to the content of Wikipedia. The reason I don't cite original sources is probably the same reason that Wikipedia citations do not cite the original source of information that comes from the New York Times. Times reporters get their information for books, some of it, but when the Times is quoted, they don't quote the original book. To tell the truth, I really did not see this use of links to The Attic as a problem. I make no money from The Attic -- in fact I lose money, spending far more in advertising than I take in meager donations. It's a public service that I really believe in and to have it lumped in with "self-promotion" of a blog is a bit demeaning. Ever last footballer, ever last rock wannabe, every last author with the slightest publication list has a dedicated Wikipedia page, so the idea that Wikipedia, which I love and have donated to whenever asked, shouldn't be used for self-promotion seems an ideal, one far from attainaable and not really even necessary.
Thanks again. I'll consider my response. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bewat (talk • contribs) 17:36, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
No worries, Bewat. As Wikipedia is not compulsory, you are not required to use Wikipedia at any time. However, when you do, please always have a look at your talk page messages before continuing to edit after a break.
The New York Times has the needed editorial oversight and known reliability to be used as a secondary source by itself. It is added as such by users who are unaffiliated with the New York Times. Your personal website, on the other hand, has the same status as your Wikipedia edits: By themselves, they do not fulfill the requirements of the verifiability policy. You can technically write anything on Wikipedia, including misinformation, and you can publish anything on your website, so Wikipedia requires reliable citations for your edits. You should not game the system by publishing your original research somewhere else and then linking to it to circumvent the original research policy. Please simply cite the books you take your information from, like everyone else here does. There is no special exemption for people who believe themselves to be reliable enough to write on Wikipedia without citing their sources.
Promotion does not necessarily imply commerce; many people attempt to promote their "noble causes" on Wikipedia. So many that an essay about the problem was written at WP:NOBLE. Wikipedia is not for promotion, without regard to commercial intent. Your edits so far have been self-promoting. If this sober fact sounds demeaning to you, then please stop doing things that sound demeaning when pointed out to you. The volunteer community building this encyclopedia also does not care about who has made donations to the Wikimedia Foundation.
The English Wikipedia has a relatively strict notability guideline; see WP:42 for a short summary and WP:GNG for the most important part of the actual guideline. The current existence of other promotion and/or articles about non-notable subjects can not be used as an argument for including more policy-violating content or more articles about non-notable subjects. That said, the community does delete an impressive amount of such content every day, sometimes noticing a problem after years and solving it in an overdue deletion discussion. For example, search for "result was delete" and "result was redirect" on the page Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Log/2020_May_28 to see a list of 48 pages that have been deleted on one single day, per community consensus. This is a tiny number compared to the amount of pages that are speedily deleted every day at Special:Log/delete. In a nutshell: Promotion is not welcome, and the impression that "every last author with the slightest publication list" seems to meet the notability criteria is incorrect. You may have seen examples for bad content, and if you look at them again in ten years, that content might have been removed or improved for good reason, but later than ideal. There is no deadline on Wikipedia and the community sometimes needs a few years to notice and fix a problem. If this happens, it has been a problem all the time nevertheless.
Whether Wikipedia's policies or guidelines are "necessary" or not is neither for me nor you to decide. If you strongly disagree about an existing policy, you might like to try voicing your concern at the policy village pump. Unless it is changed by community consensus, you are expected to follow it like everyone else.
Oh, and now that I notice it: Please stop directly editing biographic article(s) about yourself, unless you are purely removing factually incorrect statements (see WP:AUTOBIO). I wasn't aware of this, but now I really believe that I am talking to someone whose Wikipedia account exists for the primary purpose of promoting a person, company, product, service, or organization. You really need to start listening to other users' concerns.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:50, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
Okay, thanks. I get it. I edited my own bio page which someone else, without my asking, put up. I see that was wrong, though I had no idea. Yeah I see that I missed a few policies that I should’ve read. Since I never really liked writing for editors even one or two, you can probably imagine how I feel about writing for a village off editors. My intentions were simply to promote —yes promote — a nonprofit website with what seemed to me the admirable goal of sharing American stories. Sharing stories is what you’re all about, too, isn’t it?
But since the village does not agree I guess I’ll leave the village thank you.
So in the long run, I reckon I won't use Wikipedia this way anymore, and probably will use it much less in general. See ya. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bewat (talk • contribs) 19:17, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Block IP request

Hi,

Could you please block the IP address that is disruptively editing on Esteban (musician) despite a final warning? I reported them a while ago but they are still vandalizing that page. Thanks, Hummerrocket (talk) 17:45, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

 Done ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:47, 8 June 2020 (UTC)
Thanks, appreciate it. Hummerrocket (talk) 17:49, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-24

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Some articles have tables that can be sorted in different ways. For example a list of countries can be sorted alphabetically but you can click on the size column to sort them by size. If you clicked on the column a second time it would sort the countries from the bottom to the top instead. A third click will now take you back to the original sorting. [161]
  • Self-closed tags now work as in the HTML5 specifications. This means you should stop using some of them. <b/> is an example of a self-closed tag that won't work. area, base, br, col, embed, hr, img, input, keygen, link, meta, param, source, track, wbr can be self-closed. Pages with tags that should not be self-closed have been listed in a tracking category since 2016. They will be listed in Special:LintErrors/self-closed-tag. This doesn't affect <references /> or <ref />. [162]
  • There is a banner called WikidataPageBanner. It is for example used by the Wikivoyages, Wikimedia Russia and the Catalan, Basque, Galician and Turkish Wikipedias. It will now been seen by mobile visitors too. Before this it was only seen on desktop. The wikis should update instructions on MediaWiki:Sitenotice so that editors know to test and style for mobile too. [163][164]

Changes later this week

  • Advanced item You can now edit MassMessage descriptions through the API. This is useful for tools and gadgets. [165]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 9 June. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 10 June. It will be on all wikis from 11 June (calendar).

Future changes

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

21:12, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for guiding me

Thank you ToBeFree for guiding me to change my username — Preceding unsigned comment added by Indian web service (talk • contribs) 23:06, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi Indian web service,
You're welcome, of course. :) I'm curious, however: Where did the name come from? Have you edited under a different name before perhaps?
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:09, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Just came into my mind, Can you help me create a biowiki for a celebrity — Preceding unsigned comment added by Indian web service (talk • contribs) 23:22, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Ah, all right then. But Indian web service, biographies are very hard to create correctly. Especially if the person has no article yet, the celebrity might not be notable according to Wikipedia's standards anyway:
  • Notability is tricky, but WP:42 is a good summary. If you're interested in the details, see WP:GNG and WP:NBIO for the actual guidelines.
  • Biographies of living people must be edited with care, and should be edited with experience.
  • If you have a conflict of interest, such as a connection to the celebrity, then please do not edit about the topic.
Please have a look at the community portal or the Task Center for less dangerous alternatives.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:27, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much for guiding me ~ ToBeFree (talk) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Indian web service (talk • contribs) 23:43, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Requesting help with submitting request for page write up.

Hi, You helped answer some questions for me in a chat group a few weeks ago. I was finally getting around to officially submitting a description and resources.

For the resources do I include them in the description or completely after the description section?

For citing sources to get the shortened link does it matter where the brackets[] go is it around the Cite error: There are <ref> tags on this page without content in them (see the help page). or within them? For example, would these be correct? [[1]] [[2]]

Thanks again for your expertise in advance, JanelleP7 (talk) 14:15, 10 June 2020 (UTC)Janelle

Hi JanelleP7, please have a look at the "BETSOL" entry in the list at Wikipedia:Requested_articles/Business_and_economics/Companies/A-E#B. I personally recommend that type of formatting. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:53, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ https://www.boxlatch.com/
  2. ^ https://www.materialhandling247.com/guide/box_latch

Disruptive editing by User:Alan di Carpov

Hi, ToBeFree, I have found User:Alan di Carpov engaged in a kind of disruptive editing by creating series of non-English articles in mainspace where almost all are marked for deletion. Please have a look. Thank you. ~ Amkgp 💬 16:57, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi Amkgp, I have now prevented further disruption and cleaned up the talk page a bit, but others will deal with the deletions. Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:00, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, Thank you ~ Amkgp 💬 17:01, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
Saw the block, and jumped over to say thank you as well. I tagged and warned, but wasn't sure if to report. The articles are all on famous Russian swearwords (with one possible exception which is also an vandalism/test page and involves profanity as well), and are (probably almost all) copy-pasted (but from a CC-by-SA site - http://mat.pifia.ru/wiki/%D0%9D%D0%B0%D1%81%D1%80%D0%B0%D1%82%D1%8C).--Eostrix (talk) 17:04, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
Heh, thanks for the kind feedback and explanation. Yeah, I did notice the profanity, but I'll let someone else review the deletion requests just to make sure four eyes have seen this. You're welcome, Amkgp and Eostrix. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:07, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Block evasion

Hi TBF. You previously blocked this user but it seems they are back as per the signature edit summary ("the"). Could I ask you to take a look please? Robvanvee 15:14, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi Robvanvee :) Yeah, that's an obvious case.  Done ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:59, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
As always, much appreciated! Robvanvee 16:10, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
Now that I've said "you're welcome" in the section below, I can't omit it here. 😄 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:08, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Block extended

Hi, just letting you know I've extended your block on Editor wikip6 (talk · contribs) to indef for creating another sockpuppet. Cheers! Reaper Eternal (talk) 16:41, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Oh my. Thank you very much, both for checking and blocking, Reaper Eternal. Having a checkuser result in this case is enormously helpful and clarifies the situation. Any doubt about the justifiability of my first GS-authorized topic ban is finally gone. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:49, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Possible Vandalism?

Hi! So I was checking the "Recent changes" page and have been noticing alerts from this user: 78.190.232.245. I think he might be reverting the changes of random users on random articles. If you check his contributions, you can see what I mean. Can you maybe keep a watch for him or something? Thanks! ~~ Faboof (talk)(contribs) - (June 13 2020 17:03) 17:03, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi Faboof, thanks for asking. To me, it doesn't seem to be random, rather directly targeted, starting an edit war by reverting a revert. If it continues, please report it at WP:3RR or WP:ANI. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:01, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
Oh, ok. You welcome :P ~~ Faboof (talk)(contribs) - (June 14 2020 00:13) 00:13, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Deprecated source clearing

Good work! It was most heartening to discover a couple hundred DM links disappear overnight :-) - David Gerard (talk) 15:28, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Hey David Gerard! I wondered whether you'd find out who did it. 😄 I'll continue tomorrow. 8000 is a lot; I have currently filtered the list for redundant references that can be removed by simply removing the superfluous citations. There are about 700 entries left on my list. The other 7300 will be more tricky, requiring a decision between {{cn}} or removal.
Thank you very much for your part and coordination of this effort, and for the kind feedback. Seeing that others are happy about these removals means a lot to me, and it's fun teamwork. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:05, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
The others that may be susceptible to semi-automation are dailymail.co.uk/wires/ - those are just newswire reprints, and often you can find a good copy elsewhere - Reuters almost always, AP usually, AFP I tend to use the copy on Yahoo, PA may be in other papers, AAP sometimes is ... - David Gerard (talk) 00:43, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
Ah, interesting aspect. Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:05, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Kushwaha

Hi, I see you have had some recent activity at Kushwaha following a spate of disruptive editing. I have been trying to clean the mess but it is hopeless. As you can see from my edit summaries, many of the statements added of late are not in fact supported by the sources.

I have had enough & intend to find a "last best version" after I have slept. Almost certainly, that will be the last time I edited the article before this month. It could be a long way back in time but it will be "right". Please let me know if this is a problem. - Sitush (talk) 21:12, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Hey Sitush, thank you very much for dealing with the mess. In my personal opinion, editors should never be afraid of completely reverting an article to a years-old version after years of unsourced additions. Be bold and merciless :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:24, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
Ha! I usually do, and without asking :) It's just better to give a heads-up when (a) someone in good standing etc but probably not knowledgeable about caste stuff has been in the middle of things recently; & (b) on the face of it, statements do appear to be sourced even though examination shows masses of faking. I'll sort it out tomorrow. Keep well & thanks for a rapid response. - Sitush (talk) 21:34, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
Heh, that's a perfect assessment. :) Thank you very much for the kind notification and your knowledgeable work. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:55, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Daily Mail

Hello, just to let you know I've restored this content on Relocation of sports teams in the United Kingdom. Hull Daily Mail is a small local paper and there's lots of similar named Daily Mails or even different Daily Mails in other parts of the world which are nothing to do with the Daily Mail. Abcmaxx (talk) 22:10, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Ouch, sorry! 🙂 Abcmaxx, I made that mistake as a part of Special:Diff/962333900, when trying to remove all occurrences of Daily Mail citations in the article. It turns out that "<ref>[^<]+dailymail[^<]+</ref>" was not the correct way to locate them, and I misread the search results. Thank you very much for restoring the citation. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:49, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
No worries, I figured you'd used some kind of search function / detection tool or maybe even a bot-type editor to do this which is why I thought best to let you know just in case of a snowballing Scunthorpe problem. Abcmaxx (talk) 23:52, 14 June 2020 (UTC)
My only tools are "100 open tabs in Firefox" and WikEd's regular expression search field. 😄 And then keyboard shortcuts. Ctrl+Tab, Ctrl+V, repeat 100 times, Ctrl+Tab, click, repeat 100 times, et cetera. At least that's for the edit summaries and selecting the regex. Removing a redundant citation can be done by clicking the "replace" button, but whenever the Daily Mail – or, in this case, a source that I have misread to be the Daily Mail – is the only citation, I try to deal with the actual problem. Usually by adding {{cn}} or removing the text, depending on the situation (biographical statement? exceptional claim? likely to have been mentioned by other sources too?).
That said, I have trusted my regular expression way too naively, and this was indeed a scunthorpe problem. I'll try "<ref>[^<]+[./]dailymail.co.uk\.?\/[^<]+</ref>" next. It still matches multi-citations, but I have noticed and fixed these pretty easily so far. Thanks again for the helpful notification. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:40, 15 June 2020 (UTC)
yeah, the URL situation is messy - see the note on WP:RSPDM and the list of DM domains. There's also dailymail.com, which is now the UK paper, but used to be the Charleston Daily Mail which was a normal WP:NEWSORG, and has usages on Wikipedia - David Gerard (talk) 05:20, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-25

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Advanced item Toolforge hosts several tools created by the Wikimedia community like edit counters or enhanced editors. It is changing the domain from tools.wmflabs.org to toolforge.org. The routing scheme is moving from tools.wmflabs.org/toolname to toolname.toolforge.org. You can read the details. Tools that use OAuth will have to be updated to keep working. You can ask for help.

Problems

  • There is a Wikidata item link in the sidebar on many pages. This disappeared for a couple of days for users who have the Monobook skin. This was because of a bug. It has now been fixed. [167]
  • Editing, logging in and logging out didn't work properly for a short period of time last week. It was soon fixed. [168]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 16 June. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 17 June. It will be on all wikis from 18 June (calendar).

Future changes

  • Advanced item Pywikibot is a Python library to automate work on wikis. It will not support Python 2 after the new version in July. Support for Python 3.4 and MediaWiki below 1.19 will also be dropped. You should migrate to Python 3. You can ask for help. [169]
  • The selectors .menu and .vectorMenu will no longer work in the Vector skin. This can affect gadgets and user scripts. .menu should be replaced by ul. .vectorMenu should be replaced by .vector-menu. [170]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

21:38, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

"harassment"

That's one of those that need acronyms: My Royal Young, Nipponese Dog Whatever. I don't know how much you've seen the last few days, but they've been active and I'm glad you blocked them. Thanks, Drmies (talk) 00:57, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi Drmies, I always choose "Harassment" as the block reason for LTAs, as that's what they do. No problem ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:59, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
I agree. Thanks. Drmies (talk) 00:59, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

EuanB2000 again

He's baaack [171] (hasn't gotten any smarter about it either...) Cheers --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 20:06, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi Elmidae, thanks,  Done. If it continues, I guess a report at WP:RFPP can help. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:31, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
Eh, which strange statement did I protect there. I looked at the user's behavior, not closely enough at the content. Sorry and thanks, Liz. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:16, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Blocked

Could you please explain why you blocked me from editing for over a month? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.97.212.235 (talk) 06:57, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi 77.97.212.235,
there has been a series of Wimbledon-related edits from your IP address, between 2019-07-04T22:13:14 and 2020-05-16T18:03:08. There have also been edits to the article Jackie Walker (activist), on 2020-05-13T18:49:23 and 2020-05-17T14:11:33. As these time periods overlap, I assumed that the same person made all these edits, and that the IP address is very static, i.e., does not change over time. However, your IP address might be shared with other people. You say that "I had not made any edits on any pages". If this is true, the block was not intended for you, and I'm sorry for the collateral damage caused by it. It might have been someone sharing your IP address, for example someone in the same house.
Sadly, the syntax of the unblock request is broken. If I had seen this earlier, I would have fixed this immediately, to ensure that your request for an independent review does not remain unheard. Now that you have made me aware of the problem, I have fixed the syntax. An independent administrator will review the unblock request. If the block was completely inappropriate, this will be noticed.
To answer the actual question, though: There was an edit with a summary that grossly violated our biographies of living persons policy, at Special:Diff/957185191. I have removed the summary and blocked unregistered editing from the IP address to prevent further disruption.
Assuming that someone else in your house did that, and that this person is still present and using the same IP address: Please create an account and use it for editing, to ensure that you are not affected by such blocks in the future. You do not have to specify an email address; all you need is a name and a password. This allows us to distinguish between you and the disruptive editor.
Sorry again for the inconvenience, and best regards
~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:12, 18 June 2020 (UTC)
Block review result: Procedural decline, as the block has already expired. This IP address was essentially blocked for racism and the block was entirely justified. It may not have been you making the edits, but it was someone from this IP address. Yamla (talk) 10:15, 18 June 2020 (UTC) (Special:Diff/963181074) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:18, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-26

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • There are some new tools to make it easier for newcomers to start editing. They are available on some wikis. These wikis had a problem with the visual editor for a short period of time last week. This was because of a bug in the new tools. It was soon fixed. [172]
  • Advanced item Some user scripts and gadgets stopped working because of a change to CSS selectors. .vectorTabs should be replaced with .vector-menu-tabs to fix this. [173]

Changes later this week

  • The developers are working on a new interface to solve edit conflicts on talk pages. This will be released on 24 June. You can give feedback. [174]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 23 June. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 24 June. It will be on all wikis from 25 June (calendar).

Future changes

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

18:49, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Need a help regarding harrasment by Sock puppets

Moved to WP:ANI#Need a help regarding harrasment by Sock puppets
 – ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:28, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

block evasion

Hi, you blocked CJEDJCRobertiPARMMSCTBrown2000s-2010s-2020s for 1 month; editor has returned as CJEDJCRobertiPARMMSTCBrown21stCentury and is making the same edits again (adding articles to category "songs about Santa Claus" when they're not). Schazjmd (talk) 15:44, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for opening the SPI, I didn't make the mental connection between evading a block and sock-puppet until I saw your post and duh. I'll remember to take that approach if I run into a similar situation. Schazjmd (talk) 16:40, 23 June 2020 (UTC)
Hey Schazjmd, thank you very much for the report. I would have attempted to fix the problem myself, but the people at SPI found more accounts than I would have, and I only had access to my mobile account at the time. In general, yeah, SPI is probably a good place for centrally reporting such block evasion / sock puppetry. I personally prefer central noticeboards to specific admins' talk pages anyway. If a central report exists, one can still invite specific administrators to the noticeboard. No worries, though, and thanks again! 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:44, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

I understand my fault.

I understood my faults. I should not do this. Please unblock me so that I can make or contribute on Wikipedia. Please unblock me once for the last time. Thanks Abid Noyon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by PS Abid Noyon (talk • contribs) 18:02, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi PS Abid Noyon, the block has already expired 🙂 Don't worry. If you would like to contribute to Wikipedia, you may like to have a look at the community portal and/or the Task Center for ideas. You are also allowed to remove all the messages from your talk page, for a clean start (WP:BLANKING). Actually, I would like to encourage you to do this. The talk page is not meant to be a pillory. Feel free to remove the old stuff. Welcome back and enjoy editing! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:13, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 28 June 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:54, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-27

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • Everyone was logged out. This was because a few users saw the wikis as if they were logged in to someone else's account. The problem should be fixed now. [176]
  • Some readers didn't see new edits to pages. If the page had been recently changed they saw an older version of the page instead. This only affected readers who were logged out. It lasted for ten days. It has been fixed. [177]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 30 June. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 1 July. It will be on all wikis from 1 July (calendar).

Future changes

  • The Modern and Monobook skins use the ID searchGoButton for the go button. This is searchButton for Vector. To have the same ID for all skins it will change to searchButton in Monobook and Modern too. This will affect gadgets and user scripts. It will happen on 23 July. They should be updated to use searchButton. You can read more and see a list of affected scripts.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:31, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

WikiLoop Battlefield new name vote

Dear ToBeFree,

Thank you for your interest and contributions to WikiLoop Battlefield. We are holding a voting for proposed new name. We would like to invite you to this voting. The voting is held at m:WikiProject_WikiLoop/New_name_vote and ends on July 13th 00:00 UTC.

xinbenlv Talk, Remember to "ping" me 05:08, 30 June 2020 (UTC)

Misunderstanding

I have 3 ID's{Purposes are different and are not sock-puppets as I already have been blocked once for that and then unblocked when my innocence was proved; Therefore 1 is inactive(Tylertoney Dude Perfect) other is the Main Id(XxPixel WarriorxX) and one when my main ID is unavailable(Pixel Lupus)}. I forgot my password a long time ago but my phone used to manage the password and auto-type it when the username was typed but now that fails to work. So I thought to go for (Forgot the password) but then I saw that my IP address has been blocked by you. I believe that the block was not for me but for somebody else (because I do not make any edit using My IP but use My ID for that) but while blocking I also got blocked which makes it impossible for me to log in into my account. So I am sending you this message from my abandoned ID with a hope that you may read it and think of Helping me out of this situation. Message Sending ID (Tylertoney Dude Perfect) and the ID blocked which needs to be unblocked is (XxPixel WarriorxX). Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 12:32, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi Tylertoney Dude perfect, please try to edit WP:Sandbox while logged out, and copy the entire error message here if that doesn't work. If it works, there is no block. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:53, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Yeah My IP is actually blocked. You have been blocked from editing Wikipedia Reason for the block

Editing from this range has been disabled (blocked) in response to abuse. A range may be shared by many users and innocent users may be affected; if you believe that you are not the person this block is intended for, please follow the instructions below:

If you have an account: Please log in to edit. In rare cases, in response to serious abuse, logged-in editing may also be disabled. If you still cannot edit, place {{unblock}} on your talk page and make reference to this message. You may wish to ping the blocking administrator or email them via the "email this user" function.

If you do not have an account: Registered users are still able to edit. If you cannot create an account from this or another network, you may request that volunteers create your username for you. Please follow the instructions at Wikipedia:Request an account to request an account under your preferred username. It may take some time to process your request.

Administrators: Please consult the blocking administrator before altering or lifting this block, and consider consulting with a CheckUser before granting an IP block exemption to an editor using this range. Note that large or hard (logged-in editing blocked) rangeblocks are usually only made in response to serious abuse, and the blocking admin may have information about this block which is essential to reviewing any unblock request.

: LTA: contact #, reservation # scam. Partial block is ineffective: See filter log of 2409:4064:2288:5d9d::20c2:88a4

Blocked by ToBeFree Block will expire in a year / 21 May 2021 3:17 PM Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 15:39, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

I have a account but this block just stops me from choosing the option (Forgot the Password) as I forgot my password Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 15:40, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Ah. Tylertoney Dude perfect, please try the following page: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:PasswordReset
Please let me know if this works. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:19, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

It actually does not work (I am not saying that it is not working, it could be that I am not using it properly). But still now I need another either you give me a step-by-step answer of what shall I do with meta or unblock my IP or any other way possible. Sorry I am disturbing you here. Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 07:44, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi Tylertoney Dude perfect, I just had a closer look, and there is no verified e-mail address set for the account "XxPixel WarriorxX". There is nothing I can do to recover the account, and the block is not the problem. You are not blocked from creating a new account, but I recommend not to do so, to avoid new sockpuppetry accusations. Instead, please use your current account. If you would like to change its name, please use the form at meta:Special:GlobalRenameRequest. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:29, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Can we verify it! Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 15:05, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Verify the E-mail I mean!! Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 15:06, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Tylertoney Dude perfect, if you have entered an email address when registering the account, you have probably received an e-mail with a verification link. If you can find this e-mail and click the link, you're lucky. Else, there is really nothing we can do. In this case, please use your current account. You can rename it at any time, and you can add a link to your old account's edit history on your user page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:05, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Let's test my luck and see what happens now!! Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 17:20, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

My luck failed here!! Anyway can I get the number of edits that I have done on that account i.e, 420 edits cause I want to become a Extended Confirmed User. So is there anyway that I can get those numbers to be added to this account then I will become a extended Confirmed or else I will lose all my edits and I would like to change my name. Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 08:40, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

Wait can't you unblock my IP then everything will become Normal then I can use the Forgot the Password option. If that works? Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 08:43, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

Or I can place a UTRS for my IP then it will be unblocked. Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 08:43, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

Tylertoney Dude perfect, this has nothing to do with the block. Your account does not have an email address set in the preferences. You can't change this without logging in. If you can't login, the account is lost. You are not blocked from requesting a new password. You have used the password reset form and noticed yourself that it does not work. There is nothing anyone can now do to recover the account. Use your current one, rename it if you like. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:50, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

Gone.Gone.Gone Can I at Least get my number of edits from that account to this. Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 13:11, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

Tylertoney Dude perfect, for extended confirmation? Do you actually intend to edit extended-confirmed-protected pages, or do you just view it as a trophy? Please provide some examples for actual intended usage of the right. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:45, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

Sorry Sir if you feel offended!! It's like both, Yeah it is like a achievment we can get but more than that there is a user named YTPKS896 I do not trust that guy. He is a Extended-Confirmed User and can edit a page called Gilgit-Baltistan, it is a extended-confirmed page and I would like to see and edit it. And about YTPKS896 he indirectly caused the Blockage of ABHIMAN 19,a editor, ABHI just changeed the map with an updated one and he reverted it when I looked into it, the map was correct, he was pretty much reverting things of his like that. Yeah I agree many times ABHI's editing was going in a wrong Direction but still he was a new editor so pretty much I was telling him that understand it does not work here. In between his revertings drove ABHI crazy and he edit-warred with another guy and got blocked. That's it! Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 03:11, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

Tylertoney Dude perfect, no worries, I'm not offended. I understand that the edit count can feel like a nice achievement after many hours invested into this encyclopedia. Your long edit history is not really lost, but it doesn't show up in your "Tylertoney Dude perfect" account. Sadly, there is currently no way to change this. It is technically not possible for administrators to merge accounts.
The "extended confirmation" permission can be granted manually by administrators, to users who clearly already possess the required experience and calmness to edit extended-confirmed-protected pages. I would do this right now, if I had the impression that it would benefit the encyclopedia. However, while I understand your request and am not offended by it, I do not believe that manually extended-confirming your account would be a good idea yet. I believe that pages like Gilgit-Baltistan are very sensitive and must be edited with care and a lot of experience.
All I can offer are two options:
  • Please consider having a look at the community portal or the Task Center for ideas, to gain experience for a few more months. If you enjoy editing and regularly do so, your account will be extended-confirmed sooner or later. There is no need to rush this process. Take your time.
  • If you would like to change extended-confirmed pages earlier, you can always click "View source" in these articles, and then click the button "Submit an edit request".
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:59, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

No I am not in a rush If it just hit my head bro I will take only 24 Hours to reach 500 edits, that though meaningful edits, but currently I have some work load on me just for that!! Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 09:46, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

It hit my head Then Now I am Ready! Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 01:00, 30 June 2020 (UTC)

It's all OK right!! According to you It is all right!! Thanks for the help? Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 07:09, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

I'm sorry for the probably incorrect sockpuppetry accusation, Tylertoney Dude perfect. It seemed so clear to me, but was incorrect. Everything is fine, feel free to edit Wikipedia and enjoy doing so. 🙂 No worries. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:27, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Thanks!! This time no offense! But I will need some help! Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 09:19, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Feel free to ask at the Teahouse if questions arise, at any time. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:36, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2020).

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:26, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Help

Please help me by mistake I uploaded a wrong image in the Wikimedia Commons that I did not intend to Upload.( File:The Path Connecting Asia and Africa.jpg ) Please remove it from Wikimedia Commons Tylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 14:53, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi Tylertoney Dude perfect,
 Done by Jcornelius (see the upload log and file description page).
Tylertoney Dude perfect, please use the Wikimedia Commons Help Desk for questions about Wikimedia Commons in the future. Please use the Wikipedia Teahouse for questions about the English Wikipedia.
To request deletion, I have added {{db-self}} to the description page on your behalf. The relevant criterion is "COM:CSD#G7".
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:57, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

ThanksTylertoney Dude perfect (talk) 15:48, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-28

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • The Score extension has been disabled for now. This is because of a security issue. It will work again as soon as the security issue has been fixed. [178]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 7 July. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 8 July. It will be on all wikis from 9 July (calendar).

Future changes

  • Abstract Wikipedia is a new Wikimedia project. It will collect language-independent information that can be easily read in different languages. It builds on Wikidata. The name is preliminary. You can read more. [179]
  • The iOS Wikipedia app developers are thinking about new experimental tools. If you use an iPhone you can help them by answering the survey.
  • Some rules for user signatures will soon be enforced. Lint errors and invalid HTML will no longer be allowed in user signatures. Nested substitution will not be allowed. A link to your user page, user talk page or user contributions will be required. You can check if your signature works with the new rules. This is because the signatures can cause problems for tools or other text on the page.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

20:18, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

Questions

Hi ToBeFree. I see that on the Jeremy Griffith page you have deleted a source reference to an article published on The Daily Mail. I’m aware that The Daily Mail is a deprecated source, but as I understand it, its use in this specific context should be permissible as evidence of the statement on the page: that the particular bushfire article being discussed generated interest. The actual content of the article is not being relied on, and nor should it be, given The Daily Mail is deprecated. As I say, the reference is only being used as evidence that interest was generated in the UK. This would seem to me to be an acceptable use of this specific The Daily Mail article as explained in the deprecated sources page [[180]].

If this makes sense would you be happy to undo your deletion/edit? Cheers, Schnitzelking — Preceding unsigned comment added by Schnitzelking (talk • contribs) 18:04, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi Schnitzelking, thank you very much for the kind request and the detailed analysis. I'm not entirely sure. Would replacing it by the following reference be an acceptable idea, perhaps? https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-science-of-bushfires-is-settled-part-2- At least, while it is described at WP:RSP as "primarily consist[ing] of opinion pieces", it might be exactly the kind of reference you're looking for. That said, I'll ping David Gerard for a (not necessarily neutral, I'll admit) third opinion here; he might have further concerns regarding the usage of the deprecated source. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:46, 8 July 2020 (UTC)
So, this is how I apply my own editorial judgement on this issue - WP:DAILYMAIL says "the Daily Mail should not be used for determining notability". So if something was only noted in the DM, that's not evidence it was noteworthy. If DM coverage itself is noteworthy, there should be evidence in an RS that it was - and there frequently is. If there's no evidence anyone noticed the DM coverage, then there's no evidence.
I must note, this is not me dictating rules of Wikipedia - but it is how I've been handling things like this. If all coverage of something is tabloid, in unreliable and deprecated sources, then it's probably not evidence of noteworthiness for our purposes - unless someone else has noted it. Sometimes I go to sources like Press Gazette to check if they noted DM coverage, for instance ...
tl;dr if it's just in the DM or Sun, I'd avoid noting it - David Gerard (talk) 22:45, 8 July 2020 (UTC)
Thank you both ToBeFree and David Gerard. I'll follow your learned advice and not use DM as a source. Very much appreciated. Schnitzelking
Thanks again, and you're welcome of course. No worries. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:42, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

Editing news 2020 #3

Read this in another language • Subscription list for this multilingual newsletter

A gold star with a blue ribbon, and the text 50m
More than 50 million edits have been made using the visual editor on desktop.

Seven years ago this month, the Editing team offered the visual editor to most Wikipedia editors. Since then, editors have achieved many milestones:

  • More than 50 million edits have been made using the visual editor on desktop.
  • More than 2 million new articles have been created in the visual editor. More than 600,000 of these new articles were created during 2019.
  • The visual editor is increasingly popular. The proportion of all edits made using the visual editor has increased every year since its introduction.
  • In 2019, 35% of the edits by newcomers (logged-in editors with ≤99 edits) used the visual editor. This percentage has increased every year.
  • Almost 5 million edits on the mobile site have been made with the visual editor. Most of these edits have been made since the Editing team started improving the mobile visual editor in 2018.
  • On 17 November 2019, the first edit from outer space was made in the mobile visual editor. 🚀 👩‍🚀
  • Editors have made more than 7 million edits in the 2017 wikitext editor, including starting 600,000 new articles in it. The 2017 wikitext editor is VisualEditor's built-in wikitext mode. You can enable it in your preferences.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk)

12:48, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Wikipedia policies and guidelines request for comment

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Tech News: 2020-29

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Users can thank others for their edits. Checkusers can now see user data related to that action. This can help identify sock puppets who harass others using thanks. [181]

Problems

  • Everyone was logged out a couple of weeks ago to fix a security problem. The problem was not entirely fixed. Because of this everyone was logged out once again last week. [182][183]

Changes later this week

  • Wikis that are not for one specific language can translate pages. Sometimes parts of translations are outdated or missing. Outdated translations are marked with a pink background. Missing translations will also be marked in the future. This markup can sometimes break things. It can soon be disabled by using <translate nowrap></translate> on the source page. [184]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 14 July. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 15 July. It will be on all wikis from 16 July (calendar).

Future changes

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:30, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Rangeblock on 137.97.0.0/16

I had to overwrite your partial block on that range to upgrade it to sitewide for 48 hours, but I kept it as a hard block due to your comment about socking. I will restore your partial block just before the 48 hours is up. (Honestly, I would kind of rather leave it blocked, but 6 months is a little long for a sitewide hard block on a /16...) –Darkwind (talk) 09:05, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi Darkwind, thank you very much for the kind notification, the block upgrade and the restoration offer. I'll ping ST47 for information. I personally am not generally opposed to a week(s)-long sitewide soft rangeblock, perhaps even for 6 months, if an IP range continues to be disruptive during a partial block. A longer hardblock on such a large range, though, would probably be pretty excessive indeed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:32, 13 July 2020 (UTC)
Additional note: Darkwind, perhaps two blocks on the /17 ranges that make up the /16 could be used to implement a second block with different settings. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:42, 13 July 2020 (UTC)
@ToBeFree: Yeah, I wish I had thought of that; I'm getting several inquiries from editors with accounts who were caught in the hard block. –Darkwind (talk) 08:55, 14 July 2020 (UTC)
Heh. No worries ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:18, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

Precious anniversary

Precious
Two years!

--Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:06, 15 July 2020 (UTC)

Hey Gerda Arendt, this is very kind, thank you! 😃
I still remember the day of the original award, with a rainbow and the wonderful feeling of being part of a community that values the time and work invested into Wikipedia. The feeling is still present, and I love this community. I've been busy in the last days, and will be busy again, but – what a cool coincidence – I'll be able to invest two weeks of full-time administration into the project now. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:43, 15 July 2020 (UTC)

Marking unreliable sources

Per WP:MEATBOT it appears you are using semi-automated processing to mark unreliable sources as Template:Citation needed and removing e.g. Better source needed. When you mark a source an Template:Citation needed you have a duty to make a reasonable attempt to find an alternative source and when you actually remove the unreliable source you actually make it more difficult for someone to find an alternative source by e.g. attempting to check for a similar source on the same day. Can you confirm you are using due dillgence and if you are using semi-automation what is the authority you are using. Thankyou.Djm-leighpark (talk) 01:21, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi Djm-leighpark,
Thanks for asking – thinking about them again, I agree that my latest replacements have been pretty pointless.
I've been using the WikEd editor's regular expression search and hundreds of open tabs in Firefox as a way to deal with the huge number of deprecated Daily Mail citations. This resulted in short, large bursts of edits, whenever I finished the work with "Publish changes", Alt+Tab, "Publish changes", Alt+Tab et cetera. In my latest edits, I have also used the search form to replace the matches by {{cn}} one by one, and this is where it became problematic. Neither does this solve any problem, nor does it come with the required amount of thinking and manual work.
If a Daily Mail citation has been tagged as "deprecated source" or "better source needed" for almost a year, removing information sourced only by it seemed to be a reasonable approach. This was triggered by a recent discussion at the reliable sources noticeboard, specifically by the invitation at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_299#Daily_Mail:_The_halving. In my first edits, I have removed about 600 redundant unreliable citations. This was easy and pretty uncontroversial: A better citation already existed, and removing the Daily Mail citation was not a big deal.
Now my list of redundant citations is empty, and all that remains is a list of over 5000 pure Daily Mail citations.
I did not search for an alternative source when dealing with them; the alleged "duty" would probably conflict with the verifiability policy by reversing the burden of proof. The real problem, I'd say, is that I didn't actually deal with the unreliably sourced content. Instead of resolving the problem, I made it less convenient to solve.
In my most recent series of edits, I have focused too strongly on reducing the backlog, and not on actually fixing the problem. Keeping the information inside the article while removing its citation is probably indeed a bad idea. My intention was to increase the pressure, to increase the likelihood of the challenged statement being deleted soon, without taking the drastic measure of removing the content myself. However, all this achieved was practically hiding the still-existing problem. In the future, instead of replacing already-tagged Daily Mail citations by {{cn}}, I'll take the time to remove the challenged information from the article, especially when it is about a living person.
This change will probably also resolve the meatbot concern, resulting in slower, more careful and sustainable edits.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:48, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

777 charlie moved to draftspace

Thanks for notifying the details. I am an independent Wikipedia contributor. whenever I see new Movie getting released or any update on the movie in News, I search on those in the wiki and if it's not there I create based on that

I am not compositing for this contribution or have any connection to the subject, If Get something like that defiantly I adhere to WP:PAID and WP:MEAT.

I feel at this moment my article is in citations from reliable, independent sources; and i feel it meets Wikipedia's general notability guideline

I will be waiting for Ivanvector response and take action accordingly

If you have any suggestions. I would be thankful for that

Playlikeastar (talk) 03:51, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi Playlikeastar, thank you very much for the clarification. That does sound fine. I'm copying your message to Draft talk:777 charlie; you might like to submit the draft for review. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:29, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Touch (Lebanon)

I would like to ask you to reconsider closing this as keep. I think relisting would be better, as it is rather clear we have no consensus. There are three keep votes, two delete (including mine by default), and comment by User:Buidhe who while does not say delete, makes a strong criticism of the keep votes, which has not been addressed. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 04:06, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi Piotrus, thank you very much for taking the time to challenge a bad closure with a friendly message. I do not close deletion discussions, though. See the history of the deletion discussion for details. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:18, 19 July 2020 (UTC)
I see, sorry for the mistake, it seems you are subject to some trolling - sorry about that! --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 01:09, 20 July 2020 (UTC)
Heh, no worries. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:11, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-30

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • A temporary fix helped wikis make their main pages more mobile friendly. This was in 2012. It has not been recommended since 2017. The mobile main page special casing stopped working 14 July. 60 wikis now have main pages that don't work well on mobile. You can see which ones, how to fix it and how to get help in Phabricator. This is the same problem that was reported in Tech News 2020/24 and 2020/26.

Problems

  • There is a problem with the interlanguage links. The interlanguage links are the links that help you find a specific page in a different language. The sorting is broken. The developers are working on a solution. [189]
  • Some users keep getting the notifications for the same event. Some of these are old events. [190]
  • Some users have trouble logging in. This is probably a browser cookie problem. The developers are working on understanding the problem. If you have trouble logging in you can see the details on Phabricator. [191]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 21 July. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 22 July. It will be on all wikis from 23 July (calendar).

Future changes

  • There is a Printable version link. This will disappear. That is because web browsers today can create a printable version or show how it will look in print anyway. [192]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

19:05, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

List of North Queensland Cowboys players

Hi! I saw that you recently protected List of North Queensland Cowboys players. I suspect that same puppet is the person doing the same at List of Parramatta Eels players. Any protection you can add would be greatly appreciated. Doctorhawkes (talk) 08:50, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi Doctorhawkes, thank you very much for the notification. We both probably have the same idea who it could be. Let's see what happens during the next six months. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:53, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

Request for Template:5_(current_and_upcoming_original_programming) to be semi-protected due to vandalism

Hello ToBeFree,

I would like to request the template to be semi-protected due to the vandalism (caused by listing of hoax shows that are not even aired on 5). Thank you. David Isaac C. M. (talk) 02:28, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

(copied to WP:RFPP, done by Woody; Special:Diff/968830053) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:33, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

Bruce's Beach

If you'd read the history of Bruce's Beach you'd know that my edit was NOT inaccurate. It "seemed" biased to you but you did not check. So on what you do base your "seeming"

There is bias indeed. But not in the way that you think. What happened at "Bruce's Beach" is a textbook act of racial terrorism. What then would fall under that category for you? Please advise. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.64.10.47 (talk) 12:26, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi 74.64.10.47, thanks for asking!
This seems to be about Special:Diff/968366187, in the lead section of the article. It seems to be a summary of a paragraph with a broken citation; I hope I have found an accessible copy now (Special:Diff/969796450).
I didn't thoroughly check if the source described it as "terrorism" or "friction"; on second look, neither seems to be the case. When in doubt, "friction" is more likely to be a neutral, encyclopedic description. "Terrorism" is a description that I personally would probably agree with, yet would personally avoid using in Wikipedia if there is no citation to back up that wording. Wikipedia summarizes what other sources say (see WP:PSTS and WP:BURDEN). If there is a reliable source for any wording, let's use it, with a proper citation.
As the wording seems to be very important to you, and as I personally have no such strong opinion about the wording, I'll restore your revision. If someone else voices disagreement, please start a discussion on the talk page of the article, Talk:Bruce's_Beach.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:44, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
 Done: The self-undo can be found at Special:Diff/969798604. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:48, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-31

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • The Starter kit is now available for wiki communities. This page lists technical resources, tools, and recommendations. These are essential to operate a wiki project. This is mostly useful for smaller wikis where the community has limited experience with this. [193]
  • The first features of the Desktop Improvements project are available for logged-in users on all wikis. In order to use them, uncheck Use Legacy Vector in your local or global preferences in section Skin preferences. More improvements are planned. Feedback is welcome.
  • Advanced item On multiple wikis, a UTCLiveClock gadget is available. For wikis that import the gadget directly from mediawiki.org, end users can now choose a different timezone to show instead of UTC.

Problems

  • Advanced item The deployment train for MediaWiki has been blocked this week. [194][195]
  • Translation Notification Bot was sending the same message multiple times to every translator. This has been fixed. [196]
  • Some users were receiving the same notification multiple times. This has been fixed. [197]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from July 28. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from July 29. It will be on all wikis from JUly 30 (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

13:53, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

Question about rollback

Thank you for the 1 month! I will certainly check back then and hopefully make it permanent? If I may ask: do I actually need to use the rollback button on-wiki with reasonable oftenness to retain it? The reason why I ask is that I intend to use Huggle (heard good things about it), which is why I've requested rollback. (also, just wondering for my own curiosity: I was advised on WP:DISCORD that pending changes was harder to get than rollback, but I got pending changes with almost zero record of reviewing edits or antivandalism. Is there something amiss in what I've been doing since then? Or is it purely a time based thing?) Thanks! Leijurv (talk) 00:27, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

Ah, I might have misunderstood you. I misread the could give you ... let's not do things by halves. I'll ask again later, please disregard the above :) Leijurv (talk) 00:36, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
Hi Leijurv, I was hoping for 1 month of Twinkle editing, to directly grant rollback without a time limit. 🙂 I hope that's okay too?
Regarding the Discord advice, I'm not sure what it is based on; a personal experience by one or multiple users might not be a universal rule. I'd say that generally, the opposite is true, as the possible damage of using Huggle incorrectly is much higher than the possible damage of nullifying pending changes protection. At the bottom of Special:PermanentLink/969790930, I have recently described possible concerns in this regard, and a worst case scenario. The existence of {{subst:RFPR|rvw}} (see Template:RFPR, second last row) seems to confirm my impression: There is a standardized template for users who are granted "pending changes reviewer", but not yet "rollbacker" permissions. You may like to forward this message to the Discord user(s), who may of course also disagree. I guess this question can not be answered objectively.
Not granting rollback yet is really just a time based thing. If someone had made 6000 correct rollbacks on their first day at Wikipedia, they wouldn't be granted the permission either: The duration is important, as users might complain about a bad revert weeks later, and dealing with such a situation (or not encountering one for over a month) is one of the most important challenges in my opinion.
There is no requirement to use the rollback button, or even any tool, when you have obtained access. It is a trust-based permission that was once only obtainable as a part of the administrator toolset. As such, accountability and quality are much more valuable than quantity, for those who have proven their eligibility.
So do feel free to ask in a month, and I'll very likely grant the permission permanently.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:43, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
(PS / edit conflict: No worries at all) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:43, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
PPS: redWarn is fine too, this is not meant to be restricted to Twinkle, only to non-rollback tools. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:44, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
Sounds fine to me. Thanks for explaining. Just three days ago I actually fixed the bug where RedWarn would inconsistently display sometimes below or sometimes above Twinkle. I may get back to RedWarn + Twinkle at the same time, who knows. :) And good to hear that it's just time based: I definitely get what you're saying about people coming back weeks later to inquire, that actually just happened today. Anyway, thanks, and see you in a month! Leijurv (talk) 00:57, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
(I would normally just have clicked the "Thanks" button, but I really have to say: Having fixed a coding bug in the tool is impressive and a good sign indicating that someone knows what they are doing. Instead of just using the software, you take the time to investigate, and even fix, problems that arise during usage. Very happily looking forward to the new request. Doesn't have to be exactly a month; three weeks are fine.) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:07, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

Peekaboo

Hey, I suppose you’d remember what I’m here for. I’m writing to you after a week as you said. Idell (talk) 07:10, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

Yup 🙂  Done ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:44, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

article Kevin Behr

Hello ToBeFree, I found the site about myself (Draft: Kevin Behr). Can you tell me the status from this article and can u explain me, what is here todo? Thank you --KevinBehr (talk) 16:19, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

KevinBehr, did you pay for the creation / editing of the article? Whom? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:03, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Page block

Hi there, I saw you blocked me from editing a page, but I thought it was within the three-revert rule, and I documented my actions on the talk page and in the request for protection. Is there anything I can do in the future to avoid a block? Iangcarroll (talk) 19:08, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi Iangcarroll, thanks for asking. The blocks only affect edits to that specific article; you're welcome and encouraged to reach a consensus for inclusion on the article's talk page. You have correctly taken the first step for such a discussion.
The blocks are meant to encourage discussion and prevent further edit warring (which is by no means limited to a definition of three reverts in 24 hours); per WP:EW#Administrator_guidance, I had to consider all sides of the dispute equally.
I have also implemented the requested protection, although semi-protection in combination with the blocks seems to be sufficient to prevent edit warring for now. If the edit warring persists after this action, please report it at the edit warring noticeboard or the protection noticeboard.
To answer the original question, my main concern with your edits, specifically, was the repeated (1, 2, 3) re-introduction of challenged material without having achieved consensus for its inclusion (WP:ONUS). The three-revert rule is a convenient limit for occasions when an edit war is happening fairly quickly, but it is not a definition of "edit warring", and it is perfectly possible to engage in an edit war without breaking the three-revert rule, or even coming close to doing so. Ideas for avoiding edit warring can be found at WP:AVOIDEDITWAR and WP:Dispute resolution. While it shouldn't be the main intention behind proper dispute resolution, this also achieves the requested goal of "avoiding a block" in the future. 😉
Thanks again for starting a discussion and requesting protection. Don't worry too much about it, I think this will be resolved relatively easily with a third opinion or similar approaches.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:22, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Edit Block Follow Up

Hello ToBeFree. I appear to be blocked from editing a biography page for removing content in violation of BLP policy for living persons, which states: "The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content." I believe my actions are in line with BLP policy and do not want an edit war. Is there a way to prevent this page from potentially being abused with similar content in the future? Data L!nk (talk) 20:24, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi Data L!nk, thank you too for asking. The advice in the section above might already answer many open questions.
It is correct that "The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content." This does not only apply to biographies; it applies to all articles (WP:ONUS). For this reason, restoring disputed content without discussion (Special:Diff/970496333) is inappropriate and not justifiable by the BLP policy. Most users who are engaged in an edit war believe that their actions are in line with policies; edit warring is disruptive even if you are certain that you are right.
The page is currently protected in two ways: Iangcarroll, 73.15.145.179 and you can not directly edit it for two weeks and are encouraged to find a consensus at Talk:Jasmina Vujic before editing the article again. Thank you very much for adding a message there already, but the discussion seems to be focused on pure contradiction, which is unlikely to lead to consensus (see File:Disputeresolution.svg / WP:RCD). Additionally, the page is protected from edits by unregistered and new editors for a month, to prevent others joining the previous edit war.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:38, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
Thank you ToBeFree! The advice above is helpful in guiding my thoughts.
Thank you for clarifying the broader content policy. I have clarified my comment in the page's Talk section to reflect the policy.
I appreciate the page's stasis/protection at the moment to allow editors to reach consensus on the Talk page. I'll continue engaging via the article's Talk page to reach consensus on disputed content.Data L!nk (talk) 21:23, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
Thank you very much, Data L!nk, for the kind feedback and the discussion. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:25, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
Followup: I'm now very positively impressed by the argumentation style, civilly and policy-based, and asking for additional sources which might make the decision easier, or the lack of which might be helpful to notice. If the discussion comes to an argumentative standstill (disagreement after the arguments have been exchanged), I'll request a third opinion at WP:3O. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:34, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – August 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2020).

Administrator changes

added Red Phoenix
readded Euryalus • SQL
removed Jujutacular • Monty845 • Rettetast • Madchester

Oversight changes

readded GB fan
removed Keegan • Opabinia regalis • Premeditated Chaos

Guideline and policy news

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 08:21, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 2 August 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:26, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-32

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • All queries to the Wikidata Query Service failed between 17:50 and 17:59 UTC on Thursday 23 July. Some queries failed during a longer period. [198]
  • Interlanguage links were ordered incorrectly for the past few weeks. This problem was also mentioned in Tech News two weeks ago. The problem is now fixed. [199]
  • There is a problem with the global preferences for the "Use Legacy Vector" option. Developers are working on fixing it. [200]
  • A bug in the Wikibase extension had disabled the "move" and "create" types of protection in the main (Gallery) namespace on Wikimedia Commons. New protections could not be added, and existing protections were not enforced, allowing some page moves and page creations that should not have been possible. This has now been fixed. [201]

Changes later this week

  • The video player will change to be simpler and more modern. This week, the current beta feature will become the video player for everyone on most non-Wikipedia wikis. The old player will be removed. [202]
  • Users' global.js and global.css pages will now also be loaded on the mobile site. You can read documentation for how to avoid applying styles to the mobile skin. [203]
  • Advanced item In the MonoBook skin, the searchGoButton identifier is now searchButton. This may affect CSS and JS gadgets. Migration instructions can be found in T255953. This was previously mentioned in issue 27.
  • Advanced item Bot operators can use Pywikibot to regularly archive discussions. The behavior when the bot uses counter to prevent large archives was changed. [204]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from August 4. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from August 5. It will be on all wikis from August 6 (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

15:43, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for removing the block

Hello, ToBeFree. Thank you so much.

I will once again apologize to Mr. Drat8sub on his talk page. Thank you for helping me. Thank you.

BRICK93 (talk) 23:10, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

Hey BRICK93, no worries. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:30, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
This is for your valuable efforts on countering Vandalism and protecting Wikipedia from it's threats. I appreciate your effort. You are a defender of Wikipedia. Thank you. PATH SLOPU 10:13, 3 August 2020 (UTC)
Hey Path slopu, thank you very much. 😄 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:30, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

Hello

Hope you are staying safe! :) Signed,The4lines |||| (You Asked?) (What I have Done.) 02:34, 4 August 2020 (UTC)

Hey The4lines, yup. Same to you. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:11, 4 August 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Wikipedia policies and guidelines request for comment

Your feedback is requested at Wikipedia talk:External links on a "Wikipedia policies and guidelines" request for comment. Thank you for helping out!
You were randomly selected to receive this invitation from the list of Feedback Request Service subscribers. If you'd like not to receive these messages any more, you can opt out at any time by removing your name.

Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) | Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. | Sent at 07:30, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

Range block

Hi ToBeFree, thanks for the block of 2600:1700:bfa1:aeb0::/64 (talk · contribs · WHOIS). Did you meant to block them for 2 years? Seemed long for an edit-warring block, and I thought you maybe meant 2 weeks. — Wug·a·po·des​ 23:54, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

Hi Wugapodes, thanks for asking – I originally thought of a month, but then noticed that the IP address seems to be very statically used for such behavior for a very long period of time, and decided to enforce an unblock request, practically an indefinite block as far as that's possible. The chance of someone else randomly receiving the same IPv6 /64 block during these two years is probably small enough for this to be justifiable. Please correct me if I have overlooked something. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:17, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Looking at their racist contributions again, I'm pretty sure it was the right decision. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:38, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-33

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • FileImporter and FileExporter became standard features on all Wikis during the first week of August. They help you transfer files from local wikis to Wikimedia Commons with the original file information and history intact. [205]

Problems

  • The mobile skin displays a message at the bottom of the page about who edited last. This message showed raw wikitext. This has now been fixed. Some messages in Structured Discussions and content translation may still appear as raw wikitext. Developers are working on it. [206]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from August 11. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from August 12. It will be on all wikis from August 13 (calendar).

Future changes

  • All wikis will be read-only for a few minutes on September 1. This is planned between 13:30 and 15:30 UTC. More information will be published in Tech News and will also be posted on individual wikis in the coming weeks. [207][208]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:06, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

Disruptive IP

This person [209] has returned again with new [210] vandalising the cast as usual, also uses socker accounts like User:Narasimhamannadiyar and User:Keralacinelovers Media. Please block this new range, will surely come back with new IP as it is the pattern. 2409:4073:2E8C:1E51:D92C:2735:CD12:FB1E (talk) 17:49, 13 August 2020 (UTC)

Hi 2409:4073:2E8C:1E51:D92C:2735:CD12:FB1E, thank you for the report! A rangeblock will be created if it is proven to be necessary; WP:AIV or WP:SPI are probably the best place to report such recurrence. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:54, 13 August 2020 (UTC)

Page Edit Follow Up

Hello ToBeFree. It appears that another party has added the exact same information to the article on Jasmina Vujic that we have been debating in the Talk section. Here is the link to the change. I know that you locked new users out from editing the page, but could you also lock the page overall and remove this controversial information until we have finished our discussion in the coming weeks in the Talk section of the page? Data L!nk (talk) 04:27, 14 August 2020 (UTC)

Hi Data L!nk, hasn't the discussion ended with an independent opinion being added to it? It seems that afterwards, noone saw a need to continue discussing for almost two weeks, and the independent editor still has the last word on the talk page since then. A possible concern about your complaint may be "not hearing" the reached consensus. I personally recommend to disengage or to provide very good new policy-based arguments in the discussion instead of requesting administrative intervention. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:08, 14 August 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia username policy

I am Aniket Jagtap. I am the creator of the page AutoTune World. Actually i have concerns about the username i have chosen. As the AutoTune World, represents the name of company, which completely owned by me. In fact. i truly wanted to contribute the Wikipedia community. I don't seem any issues with the name i have chosen. I don't want to do any branding or so, but just want to genuinely contribute to the community.

I doubt if my page is not per username policy, then you may find no of wikipedia pages are running as per company name. if they can run? how i can't?

However, i can give the necessary proofs claiming the business/company owned by me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AutoTune World (talk • contribs) 15:51, 16 August 2020 (UTC)

Hi AutoTune World,
Usernames that unambiguously represent the name of a company, group, institution or product are not permitted because they are considered promotional.
Please change your username, using the form at Special:GlobalRenameRequest.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:41, 16 August 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-34

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • If you revert an edit using the undo link your edit is marked with an undo tag. This will now only happen if you don't change anything in the edit window before publishing the undo. This is to keep users from marking edits as undos when they actually do something else. [211]
  • The new OOUI version will not work with Internet Explorer 8. This means the wikis will look strange and not work well in Internet Explorer 8. This was reported in Tech/News/2020/17. This is because keeping the wikis working with very old browsers creates other problems. [212]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 18 August. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 19 August. It will be on all wikis from 20 August (calendar).

Future changes

  • All wikis will be read-only for a few minutes on September 1. This is planned between 13:30 and 15:30 UTC. More information will be published in Tech News and will also be posted on individual wikis next week. This is a reminder. You can help by translating the announcement message. [213][214]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

20:40, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

CherokeeJack1

You blocked this user not long ago and his edits are still causing a number of problems. Several recent warnings have been issued and they've all been seemingly ignored, as the problem edits continue. Can you take a look? All the best. SolarFlashDiscussion 17:05, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

Hi SolarFlash, thank you very much for the update. I'm afraid that summary-less reverts (WP:ROLLBACKUSE), standard level 4 warnings and following a user through Wikipedia to check if they made a mistake in good faith again is not a good way to deal with this situation; taking a part in this by blocking the user indefinitely would probably be an excessive reaction close to hounding. Please let other editors deal with the issue(s); there will be an ANI discussion and a block soon enough if necessary. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:36, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

Checking in on rollback

Hi ToBeFree! Just wanted to check in (after just over 3 weeks) about this. :) Have been twinkling since then. Leijurv (talk) 08:04, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

 Done 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:54, 19 August 2020 (UTC)

why?

Wondering why you felt it was needed or helpful to modify a block I made over two years ago, where the user never edited again or appealed the block? [215] Seems very random and unnecessary. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:16, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

Hi Beeblebrox, I randomly found this via the unprotection request at WP:RFPP – I guess we both did? I was surprised about it being a soft block and didn't think much about adding the autoblock. Feel free to undo if this, for whatever reason, upsets you. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:53, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
Looking at all this again, the unnecessary change made your talk page message suddenly unexpectedly encourage block evasion, which was not my intention. I really didn't think much about this; the line of thought was a gnomish "Hm, this is pretty disruptive spam, I'd have hardblocked. Hm, I can still do so. Fixed." I'll restore your original block. It probably makes no difference at all; I now did a quick linksearch via XLinkBot's IRC interface and didn't even find a single occurrence of the URL ever having been added. I wanted to prevent further spam, but there was none, and there's probably none to be expected anymore. If the person behind the account ever intends to contribute constructively, or perhaps even already does so, a hardblock on that old spam account would technically make them a sockpuppeteer for no reason. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:03, 21 August 2020 (UTC)
All's well that ends well. For what it's worth, I don't recall what my reasoning was at the time but a hardblock certainly does not seem out of line as a response. Beeblebrox (talk) 15:13, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

Response

Hi ToBeFree, I didn't notice a moderator intervene on the page, although the controversial statements are still on the page, added by another party, which I suspect is just a continuation of the edit wars. Can you confirm that an independent third party has passed judgment on the content we discussed earlier? Thank you. Data L!nk (talk) 19:03, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

An independent third party has evaluated both sides' concerns and decided to restore some of the disputed content, explaining their decision on the talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:01, 22 August 2020 (UTC)

Happy First Edit Day!

Hey, ToBeFree. I'd like to wish you a wonderful First Edit Day on behalf of the Wikipedia Birthday Committee!
Have a great day! Megan Barris (Lets talk📧) 05:48, 23 August 2020 (UTC)
Actually this message was intended fo your mobile account, so take it on its behalf. Cheers Megan Barris (Lets talk📧) 05:50, 23 August 2020 (UTC)
Hey Synoman Barris, that's a cool surprise. I had completely forgotten about the calendar entry. 😄 Thank you very much for the kind message! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 06:05, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

Happy First Edit Day!

Happy First Edit Day!

Have a very happy first edit anniversary!

From the Birthday Committee, PATH SLOPU 10:29, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

😄 Thank you very much, Path slopu! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:30, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

Jasmina Vujic dispute continues

Hi there,

Hope you are well. The edit war on Jasmina Vujic seems to be continuing, as the user who disputed the content has now reverted it again, despite consensus agreeing it should be added. I do not want to revert the edit again, but I am growing frustrated that the user is clearly trying to censor this legitimate journalism from appearing on the page, and it is taking a lot of work to prevent this. Can the ban on this user editing the page be extended, and/or the protection level of the page increased? Iangcarroll (talk) 01:32, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

Hi Iangcarroll, thank you very much for the notification and for requesting page protection at WP:RFPP; I'd have done that too. I need a second opinion about this and have added a comment to the request. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:58, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-35

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 25 August. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 26 August. It will be on all wikis from 27 August (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:59, 24 August 2020 (UTC)

Shared use

I'll have you know, I'm in fact a role account for the Vermont Moose Collective Consciousness. Each day a new moose takes over the account, but we all have one brain anyways so it's practically the same person. Would you like to be assimilated? :-) Vermont (talk) 20:53, 29 August 2020 (UTC)

Hahaha, I didn't even ping you, Vermont! 😄 [1]
I do actually mention your name relatively often when declining such reports, though. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:14, 29 August 2020 (UTC)
Oh haha. This instance was mentioned to me off-wiki; I'm rarely on enwiki nowadays and wouldn't have seen it normally. Happy to know I'm being used as username precedent, lol. Best, Vermont (talk) 22:25, 29 August 2020 (UTC)
Heh, I figured as much 😊👍 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:26, 29 August 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 30 August 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:33, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

Editing news 2020 #4

Read this in another language • Subscription list for this multilingual newsletter

Reply tool

The number of comments posted with the Reply Tool from March through June 2020. People used the Reply Tool to post over 7,400 comments with the tool.

The Reply tool has been available as a Beta Feature at the Arabic, Dutch, French and Hungarian Wikipedias since 31 March 2020. The first analysis showed positive results.

  • More than 300 editors used the Reply tool at these four Wikipedias. They posted more than 7,400 replies during the study period.
  • Of the people who posted a comment with the Reply tool, about 70% of them used the tool multiple times. About 60% of them used it on multiple days.
  • Comments from Wikipedia editors are positive. One said, أعتقد أن الأداة تقدم فائدة ملحوظة؛ فهي تختصر الوقت لتقديم رد بدلًا من التنقل بالفأرة إلى وصلة تعديل القسم أو الصفحة، التي تكون بعيدة عن التعليق الأخير في الغالب، ويصل المساهم لصندوق التعديل بسرعة باستخدام الأداة. ("I think the tool has a significant impact; it saves time to reply while the classic way is to move with a mouse to the Edit link to edit the section or the page which is generally far away from the comment. And the user reaches to the edit box so quickly to use the Reply tool.")[216]

The Editing team released the Reply tool as a Beta Feature at eight other Wikipedias in early August. Those Wikipedias are in the Chinese, Czech, Georgian, Serbian, Sorani Kurdish, Swedish, Catalan, and Korean languages. If you would like to use the Reply tool at your wiki, please tell User talk:Whatamidoing (WMF).

The Reply tool is still in active development. Per request from the Dutch Wikipedia and other editors, you will be able to customize the edit summary. (The default edit summary is "Reply".) A "ping" feature is available in the Reply tool's visual editing mode. This feature searches for usernames. Per request from the Arabic Wikipedia, each wiki will be able to set its own preferred symbol for pinging editors. Per request from editors at the Japanese and Hungarian Wikipedias, each wiki can define a preferred signature prefix in the page MediaWiki:Discussiontools-signature-prefix. For example, some languages omit spaces before signatures. Other communities want to add a dash or a non-breaking space.

New requirements for user signatures

  • The new requirements for custom user signatures began on 6 July 2020. If you try to create a custom signature that does not meet the requirements, you will get an error message.
  • Existing custom signatures that do not meet the new requirements will be unaffected temporarily. Eventually, all custom signatures will need to meet the new requirements. You can check your signature and see lists of active editors whose custom signatures need to be corrected. Volunteers have been contacting editors who need to change their custom signatures. If you need to change your custom signature, then please read the help page.

Next: New discussion tool

Next, the team will be working on a tool for quickly and easily starting a new discussion section to a talk page. To follow the development of this new tool, please put the New Discussion Tool project page on your watchlist.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk)

15:10, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-36

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • This is a reminder. All wikis will be read-only for a few minutes on September 1. This is planned between 14:00 and 15:00 UTC. Please check on the details on the announcement message. [217][218]

Changes later this week

  • There is no new MediaWiki version this week.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

20:08, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

How are you sir?

Fylindfotberserk (talk) 16:48, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Oh hey Fylindfotberserk! 😊 That's very kind. I'm fine, just currently very busy off-wiki, but I'm pretty happy about the situation. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:56, 1 September 2020 (UTC)
Nice.. I was unwell actually. Started editing again from 8th August. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 17:09, 1 September 2020 (UTC)
Oh. Well, welcome back. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:16, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Yes you did make an error

And I explained why very clearly and gave you citations. Additionally, I am a scientist, so I know how to control for bias.

to that end, the only bias that I can find here is yours. Perhaps you can explain to me, how your erasure/edit is NOT biased? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.64.10.47 (talk) 19:10, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Hi 74.64.10.47, I had already answered this at User_talk:ToBeFree/A/2#Bruce's_Beach. It has been archived; I'll update the link on your talk page. Thanks again for asking. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:15, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Admin's Barnstar
For your hard work as an administrator on Wikipedia! livelikemusic (TALK!) 18:58, 1 September 2020 (UTC)
😄 Thank you very much, livelikemusic, that made my evening. I'd give you a barnstar for the reports too, but technically, that would have been ANI stuff. You know this, of course. 😉 I'm in two minds about them as I can never resist actually having a close look at them, and as they always turn out to be about an actual, persistent problem. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:05, 1 September 2020 (UTC)
On second thought, this one seems to have been made for you. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:12, 1 September 2020 (UTC)
Thank you very much for the WikiLove, as well! I am aware ;-) livelikemusic (TALK!) 20:07, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2020).

Administrator changes

added Eddie891
removed Angela • Jcw69 • Just Chilling • Philg88 • Viajero

CheckUser changes

readded SQL

Guideline and policy news

Arbitration

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 09:57, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

Draft:JioTV

You resubmitted this draft for review. Did you review it, and are you recommending that it be accepted (in which case we need to discuss), or are you merely resubmitting it because that is what the author is requesting? (In the latter case, we should discuss anyway. I will comment within 24 hours, but not within two hours.) Robert McClenon (talk) 19:17, 3 September 2020 (UTC)

Hi Robert McClenon, purely the latter! They seem to have asked for a (new, second, independent) review of the current state of the article. This seems to be a legitimate request done only technically incorrectly, and I just implemented the technical part of it.
When I declined AFCs, I was always happy about someone re-reviewing the article and coming to the same conclusion after resubmission. It has always put me in a much more comfortable position when discussing the situation with the author on IRC. At the same time, the authors have often valued the independent re-review process which ensures neutrality and professionality. A reviewer can make a mistake; two reviewers coming to the same conclusion create a better impression especially when there is a dispute about notability guidelines. For this reason, I hope there's not much to discuss but rather to wait. 😉 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:29, 3 September 2020 (UTC)
Thank you. In that case, I will leave comments but allow another reviewer to make the decision. In looking the draft over, they have made a good case for expanding the parent article, and not really a case for a separate article. They have a very plausible reason for wanting a separate article, which however is contrary to the second pillar of Wikipedia. They want what I will call a tone fork, a fork to an article that has a more positive tone than the parent article. Of course they want that. That is what they are paid to ask for. This may be a case anyway where I may no longer be neutral to the editor. They have done multiple passive-aggressive things that annoy me, basically wanting to be walked through writing the article, and then they insulted the reviewers in general by saying to Google on JioTV, but maybe a new reviewer will not realize that they were insulted. Okay. I will comment and not review. Robert McClenon (talk) 23:08, 3 September 2020 (UTC)

Das Uberkanone

Hello,

If the meaning of this term hasn't been puzzled out after all this time, it's safe to conclude it's meaningless. If you exterminated the term, WP would be all the better for it.Georgejdorner (talk) 17:43, 4 September 2020 (UTC)

Georgejdorner, Thank you very much 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:28, 4 September 2020 (UTC)
You deserve the thanks; you're the one improving WP.Georgejdorner (talk) 18:36, 4 September 2020 (UTC)
I might add, that my investigation of the number of victories needed for official recognition by German High Command was not the reputed ten for der Uberkanone, but a more realistic four.Georgejdorner (talk) 06:34, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-37

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • Normally pages can be moved to a title that has no existing page yet or to a page that has only one revision, which is a redirect to the page to be moved. A new user right allows editors to move pages over one-revision pages that redirect to anywhere. [219]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 8 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 9 September. It will be on all wikis from 10 September (calendar).
  • Advanced item All MediaWiki API modules will now use watchlist instead of watch. This was inconsistent before. [220]

Future changes

  • The Wikipedia Android app team might work on patrolling tools in the future. You can let them know what tools would be useful for you or for less experienced patrollers. See the page on mediawiki.org.
  • OTRS will be updated to a new version. This will probably take around two days. OTRS agents will not have access to the system during these days. Emails that come in during the update will be delivered when the update is done. The plan is to start around 08:00 UTC on 14 September. This could change. [221]
  • The Wikipedia Android app will send push notifications if users want them. This could help you see for example when someone wrote on your talk page or your edit was reverted. This will need Google Play Services to work. It will also be possible to get the app without Google Play Services but push notifications will not work. Google Play Services is also used to make the app work for Android 4.4 users. [222][223]
  • Advanced item Wikimedia code review could move to GitLab. It would be hosted on Wikimedia servers. You can take part in the consultation.
  • Advanced item Dropdown menus in the Vector skin use a .menu class. This will not work in the future. Scripts can use nav ul instead. .vectorTabs and .vectorMenu will also not work. Some scripts need to be updated. You can read more in Phabricator.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

15:59, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

2601:1C2:4E00:B89:D079:95A0:153D:FC43 has given you a cookie! Cookies promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. You can spread the WikiLove by giving someone else a cookie, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend.

To spread the goodness of cookies, you can add {{subst:Cookie}} to someone's talk page with a friendly message, or eat this cookie on the giver's talk page with {{subst:munch}}!

So random. 😄 Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:29, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
You're welcome 😄 2601:1C2:4E00:B89:D079:95A0:153D:FC43 (talk) 21:38, 8 September 2020 (UTC)

Feedback request: Wikipedia policies and guidelines request for comment

Your feedback is requested at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history on a "Wikipedia policies and guidelines" request for comment. Thank you for helping out!
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Tech News: 2020-38

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • The Wikipedia apps briefly showed pages without CSS last week. This meant they looked wrong. It was quickly fixed but cached pages without CSS were shown for a few hours. [224][225]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 15 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 16 September. It will be on all wikis from 17 September (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:18, 14 September 2020 (UTC)

Hi - Request for Box Latch Products review

Hi, I have connected with you in the past about requesting an article to be written. I thought I disclosed everything and my affiliation. But someone messaged me saying note: did not submit an independent request in request for business articles. which I did and now Box Latch Products is not in the request page. Can you tell me what I did wrong or did someone select the company to write about and it disappears off the request board? Thanks for your help JanelleP7 (talk) 15:41, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

Hi JanelleP7, I'm forwarding your request to the reverting editor. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:30, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
(they have not edited Wikipedia for a few weeks, and it might take some time for them to respond. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:25, 12 August 2020 (UTC))

 Done (Special:Diff/977735817/977738851) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:39, 14 September 2020 (UTC)

You've got mail

Hello, ToBeFree/A. Please check your email; you've got mail!
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template. Scott Davis Talk 15:46, 21 September 2020 (UTC)
(answered :) ) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:42, 21 September 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-39

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • There is a new tag for reverted edits. For example you can see it in the recent changes feed or in the article history. It is added to edits when they have been undone, rollbacked or manually reverted to an older version of the page. [226][227]

Changes later this week

  • The number of times you can do something in a period of time on wiki is limited. This could be the number of edits per minute or the number of users you email in a day. Some users are not affected by all limits because of their user rights. They could soon see the limit even if it does not affect them. [228]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 22 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 23 September. It will be on all wikis from 24 September (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

21:26, 21 September 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for feedback

Hi ToBeFree, Thanks for taking the time to explain the issues around my username, and conflict of interest. It's much appreciated as a new user. That all makes perfect sense and I'll be sure to follow your advice. Thanks again, BottleGreenWebsites (talk) 17:31, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

Hi BottleGreenWebsites, Thank you very much for the transparency and the kind feedback. 🙂 A user had requested an administrative, username-based block at WP:UAA, but that would only have complicated the situation, since you had already provided a proper disclosure and made contributions to Wikipedia. The "rename request" process is the easiest way to preserve all contributions under one single account, while fixing the username issue at the same time. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:55, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

Old vandal with persistent trolling

Again I am sorry, for bothering you, but the situation is out of control. If you remember this ip vandal issue, which you'd sent to ANI later where it was agreed that it's a problem but ended without a solution. Why I'm bringing this to you again, because this person (who claimed to have dynamic ip at the ANI) is trolling at talk pages of Indian editors associated with Indian football articles, specifically ArsenalFan700, ArnabSaha, SAIKAT MARINERS DEY. I used to ignore or sometime give a reply to his comment (basically some kind of request or using wikipedia as forum) at my talk page.

But after this where the person calling AF700 a monster or even cringe statement towards Spike 'em at his talk page, I though it will be foolish to keep silent, I don't want AF700, Arnab or Spike go through same stress as the person behind that Ip has harassed me a lot before, now targetting these guys. I think it has also sent such similar request or asking editors to do this and that at GiantSnowman, Cwmhiraeth, Ymblanter, BlameRuiner or Fenix down's talk pages. If you people also can address how to deal this issue, it would be better. I think if possible a threaded range block or some kind of step should be taken.


Some of his used ips are added below (there are many): 78.1/2:

83.131:

89.172:

93.142/143:

Again, please pardon me to bother you or any other editor who want to remain uninvolved in the matter. Thank you all. Drat8sub (talk) 20:59, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

Block evasion reverted ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:06, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
This guy is talking in a manner as if he is my boss User talk:ArnabSaha#updates
Another IP evading: 78.1.16.35 --ArsenalFan700 (talk) 15:52, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
AS5391 / Croatian Telecom Inc. (IPv4 prefixes)
Blocked for 3 months: "{{rangeblock}}: To prevent further [[WP:Harassment|harassment]] from this network, anonymous editing has been disabled from your IP address. You need to log in to edit Wikipedia. See [[Wikipedia:Request an account]] if necessary."
Please do not directly report further incidents on my talk page; please create a report at WP:ANI or WP:SPI instead. You can link to this section (here or in my talk page archive) to explain the problem to others. Only after creating a report, please notify me about the report.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:46, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
ToBeFree, thanks once again as always for your valuable time and effort, what you did was much needed since so many users affected. And I know for tranparency and more justified way is to open the case at ANI or SPI, we will surely go for it next time, if similar issues happened. Thank you. Drat8sub (talk) 19:51, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
Thank you very much for the kind feedback and the report, Drat8sub. No worries, and don't let them get you down. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:59, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

Kanonen

Hello,

Not Uberkanone as we were discussing previously, but I found the following on page 13 of Jagdgeschwader Nr II: Jagdeschwader "Berthold": "Reinhold Jorke...entered the ranks of the ten-victory Kanonen...."

Georgejdorner (talk) 19:26, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

Hey Georgejdorner, thank you very much for the research and update! 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:57, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
Ah, just ran across it. Ran across another example just after I zapped you. Apparently, Greg vanWyngarden favors it.Georgejdorner (talk) 22:59, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

Kevin Moon (singer) and user Goldenstrawberry789

Good call, and nice work digging into the Kevin Moon (singer) thing  :) .......cheers, PKT(alk) 01:51, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

Hey PKT, thank you for the kind message 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:52, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

FX Street

For this revision https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Hodl&type=revision&diff=980443992&oldid=980440786

It is for FX Street, not Forbes. Can you review please to see if RS? I was under the impression they were a reliable source but since you wrote Forbes maybe it's a mistake. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by NeedAUsername44 (talk • contribs) 16:27, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

Hi NeedAUsername44, thanks for asking! Sorry, I hadn't noticed that, among the Forbes-re-reverts, there was a "FX Street" one. To me personally, the source doesn't make a reliable impression either, but I didn't thoroughly investigate this. A past discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_214#Forex_trading_websites, however, seems to confirm my initial impression.
Cryptocurrency is a very divisive, controversial topic on Wikipedia. I forgot to notify you about this; there is a standard notice I should have provided on your talk page for information.
I hope this helps; feel free to ask if any new questions arise.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:04, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 September 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:48, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 September 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:54, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-40

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Admins can now see links to diffs of deleted revisions on Special:AbuseLog. This uses the interface of Special:Undelete. [229]
  • Editors are automatically added to some user groups. For example editors are added to autoconfirmed users when they have edited enough times and long enough. Abuse filters can hinder users from automatically getting user rights for a period of time. They can also remove rights user have. Wikis can now ask to change how long this period of time is for their wiki in Phabricator. It is currently five days. [230]

Problems

  • Last year some abuse filters stopped working because of a new change. If they tried to use variables that were unavailable for that action they would fail. This has now been fixed. [231]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 29 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 30 September. It will be on all wikis from 1 October (calendar).

Future changes

  • You can't see the language links to other language versions from the talk page or history page. They are also not shown when you edit an article. This could change. It is not decided if for example the history page should link to another history page or to the article. You can take part in the discussion in Phabricator.
  • The link colours could change. This is to make the difference between links and other text more clear. You can read more in Phabricator.
  • In your preferences you can choose to get different notifications on the web or by email. You will see Apps as one of the alternatives later this week. This is because the Android and iOS Wikipedia apps will use push notifications for those who want them. You can see the preferences on the test wiki. The goal is to have push notifications on Android in October and on iOS in early 2021. [232]
  • You can soon put pages on your watchlist for a limited time. This could be useful if you want to watch something for a shorter time but don't want it on your watchlist forever. It now works on mediawiki.org and will come to more wikis later. You can read more and see when it will come to other wikis.
  • You can see what Wikimedians think are the best new technical tools this year. You can also nominate them.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

21:23, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2020).

Administrator changes

added Ajpolino • LuK3
readded Jackmcbarn
removed Ad Orientem • Harej • Lid • Lomn • Mentoz86 • Oliver Pereira • XJaM
renamed There'sNoTime → TheresNoTime

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:43, 1 October 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-41

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • There is a new tool where you can see which home wiki users have in discussions on Meta. This can help show which communities are not part of the discussion on wikis where we make decisions that affect many other wikis.
  • You can now thank users for file uploads or for changing the language of a page. [233]

Problems

  • There were many errors with the new MediaWiki version last week. The new version was rolled back. Updates that should have happened last week are late. [234]
  • Everyone was logged out. This was because a user reported being logged in to someone else's account. The problem should be fixed now. [235]
  • Advanced item Many pages have JavaScript errors. You can read more and now see a list of user scripts with errors.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 6 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 7 October. It will be on all wikis from 8 October (calendar).
  • Letters immediately after a link are shown as part of the link. For example the entire word in [[Child]]ren is linked. On Arabic wikis this works at both the start and end of a word. Previously on Arabic wikis numbers and other non-letter Unicode characters were shown as part of the link at the start of a word but not at the end. Now only Latin and Arabic letters will extend links on Arabic wikis. [236]

Future changes

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:24, 5 October 2020 (UTC)

User 00852aa again

He did it again. This time he's on another user 103.84.190.181 on List of active Pakistan Navy ships. Please make Semi Protection on that page.Mr. Samerkov (talk) 03:05, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

 Done; please report the situation at WP:ANEW instead of specific administrators' talk pages if it continues. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:37, 12 October 2020 (UTC)
Sure and thank you !.Mr. Samerkov (talk) 08:15, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-42

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • Because of the problems with the MediaWiki version two weeks ago last week's updates are also late. [238][239][240]

Changes later this week

  • Live previews didn't show the templates used in the preview if you just edited a section. This has now been fixed. You can also test CSS and JavaScript pages even if you have the live preview enabled. Previously this didn't work well. [241][242]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 13 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 14 October. It will be on all wikis from 15 October (calendar).

Future changes

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

15:23, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

to.ToBeFree

Thank you for your advice. I am not vandalism user. At first, the image of the album cover of the song "DNA" by BTS was the image of the Korean album. But the Japanese changed most of BTS's songs into Japanese album images. It seems trivial, but it is certainly unjust and intentional. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Samuraja01 (talk • contribs) 18:48, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

Hi Samuraja01, no worries. Feel free to reply to Ashleyyoursmile at User_talk:Ashleyyoursmile#TO_Ashleyyoursmile. I just reviewed a bot-generated report at WP:AIV, noticed that you're not a vandal, informed you about Ashleyyoursmile's message and removed the report (Special:Diff/983172004). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:01, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

Small edit on vaddi raju Wikipedia page edit

Sir, 

        Vadde raju are SURYAVAMSAM KSHERTIA Santhosh kotakonda (talk) 16:13, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
I have no idea what you are trying to tell me. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:23, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-43

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 20 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 21 October. It will be on all wikis from 22 October (calendar).

Future changes

  • You will be able to read but not to edit the wikis for up to an hour on 27 October around 14:00 (UTC). It will probably be shorter than an hour. [244]
  • Advanced item In the AbuseFilter extension, the rmspecials() function will be updated soon so that it does not remove the "space" character. Wikis are advised to wrap all the uses of rmspecials() with rmwhitespace() wherever necessary to keep filters' behavior unchanged. You can use the search function on Special:AbuseFilter to locate its usage. [245]
  • Some gadgets and user-scripts use the HTML div with the ID #jump-to-nav. This div will be removed soon. Maintainers should replace these uses with either #siteSub or #mw-content-text. A list of affected scripts is at the top of phab:T265373.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:30, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Loi Krathong

Thanks a lot for giving me the suggestion. I would love to do following what you told. Let's me ask a question, please. What should we (wikipedia users) do when the information we edited by adding new reliable sources was reverted by those who can stand the truth? The conflicts between Thailand and Cambodia for this cultural topic seem serious and boring. To sir, with love. Anuwater (talk) 14:37, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

Hi Anuwater,
The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content.
Ideas for resolving conflicts can be found at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:30, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for dealing with the Conan vandal!

Hello. I'm the (former) IP user who reported the IP who was inserting false information in Conan articles (as well as other articles). I was worried that when I reported them, it would be dismissed as an edit war between two quarrelling IPs - I didn't expect such quick action, or a barn-star. Thank you so much!LordKulgur (talk) 19:23, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

Hey LordKulgur,
Thank you very much for your kind feedback and the report! You're welcome, and I'm happy to see that you have created an account after this experience. If you have any questions in the future, please let me know.
I personally like the community portal and the Task Center; perhaps you'll enjoy them too. They contain so many ideas!
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:27, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-44

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • You will be able to read but not to edit the wikis for up to an hour on October 27 around 14:00 (UTC). It will probably be shorter than an hour. [246]
  • Last week, links to "diffs" from mobile watchlists and recentchanges were linking to page-revisions instead of diffs. This has now been fixed. [247]

Changes later this week

  • There is no new MediaWiki version this week.

Future changes

  • Since the introduction of the interface administrators user group in 2018, administrators couldn’t view the deleted history of CSS/JS pages. Now they can. [248]
  • There was a problem with the Change Tags. The software would apply the "Reverted" tag to any page actions such as page-protection changes if they came directly after a reverted edit. This has now been fixed for new edits. [249]
  • The Reply tool will be offered as an opt-in Beta Feature on most Wikipedias in November. Another announcement will be made once the date is finalized. [250]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:37, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Loy Krathong's Etymology & History sections disputes

Thank you so much @ToBeFree for your advices! By the way, I dont know how to solve this as well since the Article Loy Krathong is telling a fabricated history to Wikipedia readers since the article is using the LEGEND written in 19th century to illustrate that the festival is originated from Sukhothai (13th century). And this already proven to be recently invented in 19th century and claimed the origin of the festival is being from Sukhothai? Newly researches and studies conducted from independent Thai historian and researchers since 2017 found that the festival is actually originated from Angkor with the empirical evidences depicted on Bayon temple's bas relief. (refers to the references cited)

In the Etymology section, the editor Anuwater is trying to find similar Chinese word with similar pronunciation to claim that the word "krathong" is derived from old Chinese although that Chinese word means "lamp" while the word "krathong" refers to "a container made from banana leaves" and none of his sources directly/ indirectly confirmed the word krathong is originated from this old Chinese word. Many sources already proved the word "krathong" derived from Khmer word "kantong" which has the same meaning such as the definition given by the Royal Academy of Thailand (the content has recently removed) as seen in the citations. Now I saw Anuwater is trying to claim that The Loy Krathong is originated from a tradition of Tang Dynasty (7-10th century) to first Thai kingdom of Sukhothai (founded in 13th century). Is it logical that Tang Dynasty collapsed since 10th century and the Kingdom of Sukhothai founded in 13th century got this tradition from Tang Dynasty which collapsed some 300 years before Sukhothai even existed???

Again, all the sources used in the history section (so I divided into 2, Legend & Origin) are all from Thai sources, NONE of the source is from Khmer source! Hope you can help in this dispute, best regards! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Andrew 1115 (talk • contribs) 14:10, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Hi Andrew 1115,
Thanks for starting a discussion at Talk:Loi_Krathong#Question_of_the_Accuracy_of_"Etymology"_and_"History"_section. I would strike-through the first sentence.
The detailed explanation above should probably be copied to the talk page discussion as well. I have no opinion on this.
It's just an essay, but WP:DISCFAIL is very useful!
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:52, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Pakatan Harapan

Hi Sir, I know You block me due to Edit war few monthes ago and Im sorry. But now I really need you cause i can't risk again. That User Chio Bo is Denial again about PSB Allied With PH but No Sources has said yet. But I was Suspected that User Chio bo is also a Sockpuppet to user that i have been facing with. I Don't mean to say this but Will you sort it out ?. Cause user Chio Bo keeps repeating again and again.Mr. Samerkov (talk) 12:16, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Hi Mr. Samerkov, thanks for the notification. Sadly, I can't find a discussion on the article's talk page, Talk:Pakatan Harapan. I recommend starting one. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:10, 31 October 2020 (UTC)
Welcome, im will remind of that.Mr. Samerkov (talk) 14:10, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2020

News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2020).

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:53, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 1 November 2020

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:53, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-45

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • You can no longer read Wikimedia wikis if your browser uses very old TLS. This is because it is a security problem for everyone. It could lead to downgrade attacks. Since October 29, 2020, users who use old TLS versions will not be able to connect to Wikimedia projects. A list of browser recommendations is available. All modern operating systems and browsers are always able to reach Wikimedia projects. [251]
  • Advanced item There is a new automatic tracking category available: Pages with non-numeric formatnum arguments. It collects pages which use the {{formatnum}} parser function with invalid (non-numeric) input, e.g. {{formatnum:TECHNEWS}}. Note that {{formatnum:123,456}} is also invalid input: as described in the documentation, the argument should be unformatted so that it can be reliably and correctly localised. The tracking category will help identify problematic usage and double-formatting. The new tracking category's name can be translated at translatewiki. [252]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from November 3. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from November 4. It will be on all wikis from November 5 (calendar).
  • Administrators and stewards will be able to use a special page (Special:CreateLocalAccount) to force local account creation for a global account. This is useful when account creation is blocked for that user (by a block or a filter). [253]
  • The Reply tool will be offered as an opt-in Beta Feature on most Wikipedias on November 4. This change excludes the English, Russian, and German-language Wikipedias, plus a few smaller Wikipedias with special circumstances. You can read the help page and the troubleshooting guide for more information. [254]

Future changes

  • A discussion has been restarted about using a Unicode minus sign (− U+2212) in the output of {{formatnum}} when it is given a negative argument. [255]
  • In the future IP addresses of unregistered users will not be shown for everyone. They will get an alias instead. There will be a new user right or an opt-in function for more vandal fighters to see the IPs of unregistered users. There would be some criteria for who gets the user right or opt-in. There will also be other new tools to help handle vandalism. This is early in the process and the developers are still collecting information from the communities before they suggest solutions.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:08, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Thanks

Hola. Thanks for the action on Abu Dhabi and its problematic weather. FWIW, I did actually provide the IP with edit summaries in response to some pretty clearly OR edits - and had had a very similar issue [256] with an IP recently - I actually thought, from the pattern of edits and interaction, it was likely the same IP user. Anyway, all well now. Best Alexandermcnabb (talk) 10:09, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi Alexandermcnabb, you're welcome. The range's contributions do indeed look pretty familiar. 🙂 With the block of 2001:8F8:172D:EB5C::/64 and the "expectations" of the unblock request in place, I guess there's nothing left to do... 🎶 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:06, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Tech News: 2020-46

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • There is no new MediaWiki version this week.

Future changes

  • You can see reference previews. This shows a preview of the footnote when you hover over it. This has been a beta feature. It will move out of beta and be enabled by default. There will be an option not to use it. The developers are looking for small or medium-sized wikis to be the first ones. You can let them know if your wiki is interested. [257]
  • From November 16 the categories will not be sorted in order for a short time. This is because the developers are upgrading to a new version of the internationalisation library. They will use a script to fix the existing categories. This can take a few hours or a few days depending on how big the wiki is. You can read more. [258][259]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

15:49, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Football for friendship

Hello! Thank you so much for your comment about Football for friendship, much appreciate this! I understand your concern and very agree with how it may look like. Actually I have no connections with Football for friendship, especially I don't have any benefits or intention to make my adds look like promotion. I'm a football lover and I have kids who are into football, that's how I knew about this programme. And I decided to add information about it. This information is true though, and I spent time to find the links which confirm that this is reliable information. So I believe that my adds are providing the informational value to the community, and I'm sure it can be useful for those who are into football. If you think this information looks like promo I kindly ask you to tell me what should I change/correct. If not I kindly ask to bring my changes back. Thank you so much for your time. --AntonBall (talk) 01:37, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Hey AntonBall, thank you very much for the clarification. You probably do not have a conflict of interest (COI) and can freely ignore the COI advice.
Also, thank you very much for the amount of time and work invested into the detailed description of Football for Friendship.
However, the article was pretty promotional, and it still remains unbalanced in favor of the programme. My concern is that it looked like a marketing catalogue, and that this problem has not yet been completely solved.
I'm afraid that re-adding the removed content would not benefit the article's neutrality, specifically its undue weight towards minor details that sound nice to the reader but are practically irrelevant.
My exact changes can be found at Special:Diff/985379728/988041003. For example, I have removed a completely oversized, non-encyclopedic list (Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information). Also, the amount of detail in describing the seasons seemed to be excessive to me. If each of the seasons is notable enough for such a detailed description, they should be moved to separate articles. I don't think they should, though; I just think the detail needed to be reduced to the encyclopedically relevant points.
Sentences like "The International Children's Forum Football for Friendship was attended by Viktor Zubkov (chairman of the board of directors of PJSC Gazprom)" are just name-dropping in my opinion. Wikipedia has an entire article about name-dropping, and I personally find it to describe such content pretty accurately.
As you do not have a conflict of interest, you are more than welcome to continue directly editing and improving the article. If editorial questions arise, feel free to start a discussion on the article's talk page, Talk:Football for Friendship. Interestingly, the first discussion on that page is titled as "Gazprom PR". That was in 2019, but I'm apparently not the only person with neutrality concerns. If you take the concerns into account, as you are interested in the topic and knowledgeable about the matter, you are probably the ideal person to deal with this situation. The removal of the content might be off-putting first, but in the end, discussions and collaborations like this one are what makes Wikipedia strong.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:37, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

No, sadly its not

After editing here for 13 years its not an option anymore sadly, especially if a user as a history of warning notices. Best regards! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.174.173.179 (talk) 21:29, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

You may like to have a look at the coffee message to see it's an option. 🙂 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:45, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Berlin & UFC...

Sections merged as they are practically about the same topic, just from two different perspectives. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:41, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Good day you all. First of all, thanks for constructive critisism. Actually this is the fisrt time I've responded to any of these. But you're nice text at the coffee-part did the trick.

Regarding the Berlin-Brandenburg discussion; To me an additional naming besides the geograpfic name i sonly needed when there are multiple airports in the very same city (e.g. London and Paris). For Berlin that isn't the case (anymore), so no reason to do so. The message that that's the "official" naming and therefore it should be done seems even more far fetched to me to be honest. The official name of our main-airport in the Netherlands e.g. is "Schiphol". I surely never ever saw that reference in any destinations-overview. It's always "Amsterdam" (while Schiphol isn't even situated in the Amsterdam municipaly...). But OK, I understand that naming obvioulsy has a better exposure and clarifying strength.

The other "correction" is almost laughable to me. It's about the Glory Kickboxing- and UFC broadcasting in the Netherlands. Well, trust me, as a Dutch native and big fan of both, I know where to watch it. But hey, if someone else thinks to know it better and reverse it instantly, be my guest. Fine with me, I won't touch it again and accept the fact that our beloved Wikipedia is incorrect on that.

Again, as stated earlier, this is the first time ever fo rme to respond to these kind of messages, so perhaps I'm doing this incorrect or inconclusive. If so, please let me know so I can learn. Sorry for (probably) some bad English since I'm a Netherlands' resident and English isn't my first laguage.

Best regards! Luukmlgn (talk) 01:37, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Greetings from Germany. 😄
Luukmlgn, thank you very much for your detailed, kind response. I can definitely understand that replying to the other messages might neither have seemed necessary nor interesting at all.
Regarding Berlin/Berlin-Brandenburg, I agree with you, but I don't really care about the topic – I guess you also don't care enough to get upset by the reverts. It fascinates me that it does upset some editor(s). Well, that happens all the time, but a short reply like "Oh, okay" can already make a difference: If the complainant can be sure that it won't happen again, they're usually fine with the situation. If they only get ignored, they become more upset and start asking for administrative action. This leads to completely unnecessary escalation of minor disputes, and frustration on three sides: The ignoring editor just wants to edit in peace, but suddenly they're part of an administrative process. The complaining editor wants to push a change, but is met with a lack of understanding for their issue. And the administrator(s) dealing with the complaint just shakes their head about communication problems that don't exist in a face-to-face discussion between mature people. In a nutshell, a lot of problems wouldn't exist if people talked to each other (without verbally killing their discussion partners in the process).
Regarding broadcasting, verifiability does not require citations for all statements, so you didn't make a mistake by omitting them. When someone challenged the addition, the need for a citation was created. That's also fine; it is legitimate to question article content that lacks a citation, and it is fine to do so by removing the content. And then the content was re-added with the requested citation, perfect. An ideal example of how it should work, actually.
The English Wikipedia is a wonderful opportunity to practise English, especially in discussions behind the scenes. If you like to, of course. Wikipedia is not a compulsory part of your life. 🙂
That said, as far as I can judge, if at all, there's not much left to practise.
Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:11, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Fortaleza Airport

Dear ToBeFree, thanks for your help. Fortaleza Airport has had a long history of problemas due to CBG17, alias Gabilucena, alias SeasSoul, alias 2.203.242.68, alias 88.68.182.54. These are the names I can spot, there might be others. (Brunoptsem (talk) 19:19, 10 November 2020 (UTC))

Oh, that's interesting, I didn't see these yet. No worries and thank you for the information, Brunoptsem – or perhaps they're all different people and it's just a honeypot for problematic editors. 😄
At least SeasSoul, who refused to participate in any discussion or talking with others, doesn't seem to be 88.68.182.54 to me, for... reasons... I wish 88.68.182.54 had stayed silent instead. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:29, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

user:2A01:4C8:446:E985:0:0:0:0/64

That IP belongs to Samlaptop. I would recommend reporting to m: SRG, because he is globally locked. I may also recommend it be a hardblock, so he can’t edit in a logged in account. Thanks. HurricaneTracker495 (talk) 20:51, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi HurricaneTracker495, thanks for the notice; a hardblock can't hurt indeed. Regarding SRG, uh... Do feel free to. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:53, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
I would also recommend disabling email just in case any account on the range decides to harass anyone via email. HurricaneTracker495 (talk) 20:54, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
HurricaneTracker495, meh. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:56, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Congrats!

Congrats on being admin for a year. Per your recall, you are now eligible for recall. Can you please fix it so that it no longer says it may not be edited? HurricaneTracker495 (talk) 17:35, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Hey HurricaneTracker495, thank you very much. 😃 Of course. I had in mind that's something to do in the next days or weeks, but I didn't closely watch the end date. The page is now open for editing; I hope you're not asking to make the first vote because I didn't emailblock the /64. 😉 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:54, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
Lol, nope. But I was carefully monitoring it. If anyone is wondering about the email block(for talk page stalkers)see here. --HurricaneTracker495 (talk) 17:59, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
:) I would say "sadly not everyone provides a similar procedure", but I can't yet speak from experience – I can only note that it does seem to work pretty well on the German Wikipedia, using the same criteria. Perhaps it only works there because it's a standardized procedure many users know about. On the other hand, the English Wikipedia has more users who can vote, and probably more users who are upset in case of tool misuse or excessive inactivity. It's mostly about inactivity, I think. Classical blocks and ArbCom can deal with tool misuse, but they are ineffective against administrators who game the system by making an edit every eleven months. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:13, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
Generally it can also be for tool misuse when ArbCom would be ineffective. It’s easier to have a recall procedure. Many people have different ways-some users only let certain people due it. GeneralNotability will instantly recall if someone who encouraged him to run in RFA tells him to resign. One user lets anyone put it to WP: BN and if 3 bueracrats agree, they resign. This can be for mild tool misuse, and if you ever get other permissions(like Checkuser), it will work for that. Note though that rollback does not count. HurricaneTracker495 (talk) 18:51, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Affiliation Issue

Hello!

Yes, I am affiliated with the company. However, I did my best to make sure the article is as objective as possible and have deleted excessive citations leading to the company website. I hope this is okay with the moderators as I did my best to follow the standards. I've disclosed this affiliation on my page. Thank you, and have a great day. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Info-03051995 (talk • contribs) 09:24, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi Info-03051995, thanks for the disclosure and welcome to Wikipedia. 🙂 Please make sure that your disclosure and editing actually conforms to WP:PAID and WP:COI. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:11, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
Thank you, ToBeFree! I'm checking it now. :) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Info-03051995 (talk • contribs) 10:17, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
Hi, ToBeFree! Is there a chance for my article to be published after I comply with the guidelines? :) Thank you! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Info-03051995 (talk • contribs) 17:17, 13 November 2020 (UTC)
Hey Info-03051995, thanks again, especially for the contributions to Game design. 😊 Regarding the draft, that mainly depends on the notability criteria summarized at WP:42. As a rule of thumb, if employees have to create an article about their company, the company is likely not notable yet – someone without a conflict of interest would else already have created an article. However, the draft could suddenly become an article if this changes in the future, and perhaps the company is an exception to the rule of thumb. Let's see what a reviewer says; sadly the queue is currently very long and we may need to wait three months for a result. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:20, 13 November 2020 (UTC)
Info-03051995, I reviewed your draft and sadly had to decline it. Please see relevant subjective guidelines at WP:NORG. ToBeFree has already pointed out the answer to life, the universe, and everything. Thank you. ─ The Aafī on Mobile (talk) 20:35, 13 November 2020 (UTC)
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