User talk:ToBeFree/A/7
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Greta Thunberg - protection inconsistency?
As I could see in this template, the page about Greta Thunberg should be extended confirmed protected. However, it's now just autoconfirmed protected which makes the related editnotice template inconsistent with current protection level.
Should I request EC protection at WP:RFPP?
Sincerely, 79.191.125.253 (talk) 18:58, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- Hi 79.191.125.253, this is fine: The key is "parts of this page". The notice is only about content related to the Arab-Israeli conflict (WP:CT/A-I). If users persistently violate the restriction, an increase in protection may be needed, but at the moment, this is only enforced by semi-protection and reverting the contributions of autoconfirmed users who add something about the topic to the page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:12, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- Understood, have a good day (or night :D)!
- 79.191.125.253 (talk) 19:23, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- You too, thanks for asking! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:24, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
COI and promotional issues at Emmanuel Kelly
Article apparently is being edited by employees of his production company. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:04, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, on a quick look, the current revision seems to be more promotional than the original version, and the editor who had edit warred with two accounts is now blocked from editing the page. If you carefully check if the content is verifiable, feel free to restore the pre-edit-war revision. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:35, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- When I have time, I'll see about creating a neutral version which incorporates both. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:38, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- Unless somebody beats me to it. :) –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:39, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
A Request .....
Administrator ToBeFree, i pray i'm not disturbing and hope you could spare a moment to read my appeal for the rollback feature on the en. platform;
I am kindly requesting you for rollback priviledges to gain an upper-hand in reverting abuse to pages and articles in a more advanced procedure. Wikipedia is a great community that has huge potential, and as long as Everyone follows the policies and rules, We could have a greater impact, not just on society, but on influencing the lives of other people that use the encyclopedia. It is in my favorable duty to contribute to this project by keeping Wikipedia's pages clean and free from vandalism, poorly unsourced content, mispelling errors, and other activity that violates our Rules. Re-assuring the fact that all editors, including myself, New or experienced, follow and excersise the rules on the platform. And with my skills added to the team of rollback editors, I'm inclined to believe that this website will even live to inspire the future generation. Thank you for acknowledging my request.
I humbly look forward to your response. Criticize 16:46, 15 July 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Criticize, thank you very much for the kind request. I'm not a deity though, nor a fearsome magical being with sovereign power over what happens on Wikipedia.

- May I ask if there's any language in addition to English you're also fluent in? I mean, your English is great but I see from capitalization and wording it's probably not your native language and your account isn't active on any other wiki, so I wonder. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:22, 15 July 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you for the valuable response, ToBeFree.
- No, i'm afraid you're sadly mistaken. English is my main language respectively. I understand some of my first context impressions stated in my topic opener are considered an error to the nature of grammar. I do this mass capitalization as a modification to emphasize a word (in other terms; make them stand out). Honest! I truly hope you understand this.
- However, I personally belong to the en. platform as it works perfectly for my activity.
- The other Wikipedia language platforms I am attached on, were accessed in search of an article I personally failed to find on the English website.
- I Greatly look forward to your response, once again
Criticize 00:13, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- ToBeFree... ?? Criticize 19:32, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks for the clarification!
Done ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:44, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- Yes. Thank you ToBeFree.
- And thank you for making that beneficial tweak on my user page.
- I vastly appreciate all that you do on Wikipedia.
- Wishing you a pleasant week.
__Criticize 21:01, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- No problem, thank you very much for the kind words. To you too! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:25, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- I Greatly look forward to your response, once again
Query about page protection
Why have you applied extended-confirmed page protection to Adult human female? Sweet6970 (talk) 12:48, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Sweet6970, because it had been edited disruptively by Molikog who turned out to be a sockpuppet of Golikom who appears to be a sockpuppet of Orchomen, and by Mazerks, who is a sockpuppet of Benga502, and because most of the disruptive contributions would have been prevented by the protection but not by semi-protection. Also, the topic is obviously contentious, so protecting it under WP:CT/GG to prevent further disruption seems like a good idea at least for now. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:39, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- I thought that protection was only applied when there was no alternative to prevent disruption? Any disruption could surely have been deal with by measures against the disruptive editors – and Molikog has now been blocked as a sock of Orchomen (he was open about being Golikom). Mazerks was blocked in February. Disruption in gensex is not limited to editors with fewer than 500 edits. There has not been a decision that this topic is reserved for EC editors. So I see no justification for the protection. What is the procedure for challenging a decision to protect a page? Sweet6970 (talk) 21:45, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
- Sweet6970, the policy for when this protection can be applied is at WP:ECP. Measures against the disruptive editors had been tried and resulted in block evasion. As described at WP:ECP, Wikipedia:Contentious topics § Standard set and WP:CT/GG, page protection
at any level
is an authorized measure against disruption in this known-contentious topic area. The procedure for challenging a decision to protect a page can be found at Wikipedia:Contentious topics § Changing or revoking a contentious topic restriction. If all of this is new to you, I'd recommend reading the relevant section of the protection policy and at least some details about the Contentious Topics procedures before deciding whether the decision needs to be challenged or you just learned something new. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:10, 16 July 2025 (UTC)- I don’t appreciate your sarcasm. My comment was addressed to Raladic. And I was not explaining anything – I was quoting a policy. Sweet6970 (talk) 20:51, 17 July 2025 (UTC)
- And I replied there with the policy explanation on @BusterD's talk page - even though it shouldn't have been necessary - you can't just selectively pick the policy sentences you like and omit the ones you don't like from policy, that's called WP:WIKILAWYERING.
- Why did you reply here instead of directly responding to ToBeFree's comment on the other talk page? Raladic (talk) 20:58, 17 July 2025 (UTC)
- That's okay. I think this can be archived. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:01, 17 July 2025 (UTC)
- ToBeFree – you owe me an apology. Sweet6970 (talk) 21:04, 17 July 2025 (UTC)
- I misunderstood who your message was directed at, so I thought you were quoting WP:ECP to BusterD, which, as you have clarified, is not the case. I'm sorry for the unnecessary ... yeah, I think sarcasm is the right word. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:22, 17 July 2025 (UTC)
- ToBeFree – you owe me an apology. Sweet6970 (talk) 21:04, 17 July 2025 (UTC)
- That's okay. I think this can be archived. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:01, 17 July 2025 (UTC)
- I don’t appreciate your sarcasm. My comment was addressed to Raladic. And I was not explaining anything – I was quoting a policy. Sweet6970 (talk) 20:51, 17 July 2025 (UTC)
- Sweet6970, the policy for when this protection can be applied is at WP:ECP. Measures against the disruptive editors had been tried and resulted in block evasion. As described at WP:ECP, Wikipedia:Contentious topics § Standard set and WP:CT/GG, page protection
- I thought that protection was only applied when there was no alternative to prevent disruption? Any disruption could surely have been deal with by measures against the disruptive editors – and Molikog has now been blocked as a sock of Orchomen (he was open about being Golikom). Mazerks was blocked in February. Disruption in gensex is not limited to editors with fewer than 500 edits. There has not been a decision that this topic is reserved for EC editors. So I see no justification for the protection. What is the procedure for challenging a decision to protect a page? Sweet6970 (talk) 21:45, 16 July 2025 (UTC)
The Signpost: 18 July 2025
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Talk:Bobby Farrell
Is this a loutsock agreeing with its master? –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:32, 18 July 2025 (UTC)
- Skywatcher68, checkusers are prohibited from publicly connecting IP addresses to accounts. If there is a behavioral connection to a blocked user, you can simply revert; if there is a behavioral connection to a non-blocked user, you can use {{uw-login}} on both users' talk pages and perhaps point out your concern in the discussion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:40, 18 July 2025 (UTC)
wp:onus question
Hello, thanks for your help at the edit war page. I have a question regarding wp:onus though - I originally reverted the edit after the user removed the text without an explanation and Huggle alerted me to it, and Huggle has an option for "unexplained deletion of content" so I used that. Later they gave a reason, so fair enough. But wp:onus seems to suggest I should not be using that option or reverting those kinds of edits at all using Huggle, should I avoid those kind of edits on Huggle in the future? -- NotCharizard 🗨 15:03, 19 July 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Notcharizard, all good. The user is now blocked because they have a habit of intentionally making edits that are as un-revertable as possible while insulting other editors and especially the quality of their English. It's not their first account blocked for this.
- Restoring referenced content after an unexplained removal is generally fine, although even in such situations, you are legally responsible for material you add to Wikipedia. If possible, you should check if the source actually directly supports the content, and if the source is at least not obviously unreliable on first look (a self-published blog post from someone else than the article subject, ...).
- If you notice that someone selectively removes something that might be controversial, such as crime accusations, statements about sexuality, diseases or other things an article subject (company, person, ...) wouldn't want to see in an article about them, then you're probably not dealing with a vandal. You might be looking at an edit of someone with a conflict of interest, or someone actually just caring about neutrality. In such cases, you can restore the content, and you can use Huggle to do so if you choose the "unexplained deletion of content" reason or explain your restoration in similar ways. But if you do this, prepare to get involved in a complicated discussion where you either fully participate or lose. As soon as someone has voiced a good-faith concern about the content while removing it again, you should not restore the content again.
- And as if thinking about all of these things didn't slow down recent changes patrolling enough, you should then even also create a section on the talk page about your restoration and invite the removing editor to it. Not by reverting, but by leaving a message on their talk page.
- My identity is something between "public" and "at least not a big secret", and I live in a country where insulting someone is a criminal offense. I always avoided restoring content when patrolling recent changes. It's usually not worth the trouble; there are ten other edits waiting to be reverted for each questionable removal of content from a biography. I prefer zero information to wrong information, and surprisingly often the removal of an entire section improves the article more than it damages it.
- Restoring content is for people who write the article, not for drive-by patrollers. But that's just my personal biased opinion and I have often been thankful for people daring to restore content while I dealt with the behavioral issues of the COI user.
- Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:39, 19 July 2025 (UTC)- This is such a detailed and easy-to-understand response, thank you so much! You have a wonderful way of explaining complex things, I really appreciate the time you took to help me here :) -- NotCharizard 🗨 08:53, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
Wow, thank you very much for the heart-warming feedback! I guess we managed to make the sockpuppetry unintentionally result in something positive.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:58, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
- This is such a detailed and easy-to-understand response, thank you so much! You have a wonderful way of explaining complex things, I really appreciate the time you took to help me here :) -- NotCharizard 🗨 08:53, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
Diff viewer
Hello, ToBeFree. I’m a recent changes patroller. Considering how long you’ve been on the platform, aside from AntiVandal and Huggle, what other diff viewer scripts can you recommend? - Arcrev1 (talk) 12:35, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Arcrev1, thanks for asking! There is Ultraviolet (previously "RedWarn"), but I haven't tried more than installing it and opening a few menus. It does seem to offer some handy options like directly reporting diffs to User:Emergency via e-mail; I haven't seen such a feature elsewhere yet.
- When I was granted the ability to block, I mostly stopped patrolling the recent changes list and focused on processing reports at WP:AIV (or currently primarily WP:ANEW). But there are situations where I see people reporting the same sockpuppeteer again and again, and then I go looking: Can I catch new socks before they're reported? For this, instead of starting Huggle, I often use the Recent Changes page, which was improved enormously by the addition of color filters and machine learning:
- Likely bad faith, latest revision
- Not extended confirmed, latest revision, colorized by faith
- Not extended confirmed, manual revert, colorized by faith
- Not extended confirmed, using antivandalism tools, unlikely ones and rollback in red
- Creation of accounts (yellow) and non-article pages (red: likely with issues or in bad faith)
- Reverted, extended confirmed (article talk in yellow, user talk in orange)
- You might have tried this already, but perhaps the list contains some new ideas. I used to link to my dashboard on my user page in the past, but you may have seen that one already back then.
- Good luck!
~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:33, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree: Thank you for your suggestions. I usually edit on mobile because I don’t have my own device that can support the more advanced scripts. On the recent changes patrol page, I often end up tapping the wrong button since everything is manual, you have to tap each diff link one by one, right? That’s how I do it on mobile, and sometimes instead of tapping the diff, I accidentally press the rollback button. That’s why I’m looking for a good recent changes tool where the diff opens automatically. Tools like AntiVandal and Huggle already have that, right? Are there any other tools like that? Thank you! - Arcrev1 (talk) 15:03, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
- Arcrev1, you use Huggle on mobile? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:32, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
- Oh, I think I understand. I misread/misunderstood that. Hm. As long as you are already using the advanced mobile view, I'm afraid I don't have ideas how to improve this. Wikipedia is still burdensome to maintain without keyboard and mouse; this may be impossible to fix completely. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:45, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
- Arcrev1, you use Huggle on mobile? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:32, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree: Thank you for your suggestions. I usually edit on mobile because I don’t have my own device that can support the more advanced scripts. On the recent changes patrol page, I often end up tapping the wrong button since everything is manual, you have to tap each diff link one by one, right? That’s how I do it on mobile, and sometimes instead of tapping the diff, I accidentally press the rollback button. That’s why I’m looking for a good recent changes tool where the diff opens automatically. Tools like AntiVandal and Huggle already have that, right? Are there any other tools like that? Thank you! - Arcrev1 (talk) 15:03, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree: No, I actually use Huggle on a laptop, but since I’m not mainly a laptop user, I use AntiVandal on mobile. These are the only two scripts I know that can load recent changes with the diff (user's revision) already opened. On the default recent changes page, you still have to tap the “diff” link to view the revision, but I don’t know of any other scripts that can do that automatically. But it’s okay if there are no other tools aside from the default recent changes page. Thank you anyway for your help. By the way, how do you make the recent changes page show colors? - Arcrev1 (talk) 17:09, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
- Ah okay. No problem. Regarding recent changes colors, that's a bit hidden in the menu where you select what you want to see. There are marker pen icons at the right of each entry that allow you to colorize the results. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:34, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree: No, I actually use Huggle on a laptop, but since I’m not mainly a laptop user, I use AntiVandal on mobile. These are the only two scripts I know that can load recent changes with the diff (user's revision) already opened. On the default recent changes page, you still have to tap the “diff” link to view the revision, but I don’t know of any other scripts that can do that automatically. But it’s okay if there are no other tools aside from the default recent changes page. Thank you anyway for your help. By the way, how do you make the recent changes page show colors? - Arcrev1 (talk) 17:09, 20 July 2025 (UTC)
2600:8801:2995:1A00::/64
Hi ToBeFree! I wonder if I could impose on you get some assistance again. This editor 2600:8801:2995:1A00::/64 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has been making a lot of edits over the last few days in articles about hotels and casinos, mostly changing information about ownership. All the edits are unsourced, and some of them clearly disagree with what existing sources say. In a discussion on their talk page, they told me to "not change anything (or add anything) at W Las Vegas without my permission. This violates my rules.
" I explained WP:OWN to them, and explained that edits need to be supported by sources. However their responses show no understanding of what I'm saying, and much of what they write is actually fairly incomprehensible to me. Even when I tried asking a specific question about where they got the information supporting a particular edit, their response did not answer the question at all. I wonder if I could trouble you to take a look at the conversation here and see if you can do something to help this editor. CodeTalker (talk) 02:21, 21 July 2025 (UTC)
- Hi CodeTalker, I think this could be handled without looking (too closely) at the OWNership aspect. Their edits were reverted for lacking sources, a highly common thing to happen on Wikipedia, and if it persists, the usual "request page protection at WP:RFPP or report an edit war at WP:ANEW" applies. The user is discussing on the talk page and doesn't seem to be doing so just to tell everyone they're the article owner. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:55, 21 July 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-30
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About Bobby Farrell
I remembered to take a look at the article and re-removed the content sourced to the Daily Mirror. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:48, 22 July 2025 (UTC)
- Whoops! It was Emmanuel Kelly I said I would look at! –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:53, 22 July 2025 (UTC)
- Finished there. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 22:55, 22 July 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks for the notification! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:56, 23 July 2025 (UTC)
- Finished there. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 22:55, 22 July 2025 (UTC)
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180.150.36.182
180.150.36.182 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)
Hi, I came across this IPs edits and was wondering if you could check their edits to see if it's still being used by Hawthorne 41 (talk · contribs). Thanks. 71.59.186.230 (talk) 15:28, 29 July 2025 (UTC)
- Hi 71.59.186.230, the connection was purely behavioral (I performed no checkuser actions), and if I see correctly, based simply on the revision history of the "Creed (perfume)" redirect. If there are similarly clear signs of the same user continuing to edit, please click here to create a sockpuppetry investigation. This link works even without an account. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:34, 29 July 2025 (UTC)
- OK. I made the SPI page: Wikipedia talk:Sockpuppet investigations/Hawthorne 41. Could you please move it from the talkpage to the mainspace? Thanks. 71.59.186.230 (talk) 15:42, 29 July 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much! It's now at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Hawthorne 41. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:08, 29 July 2025 (UTC)
- OK. I made the SPI page: Wikipedia talk:Sockpuppet investigations/Hawthorne 41. Could you please move it from the talkpage to the mainspace? Thanks. 71.59.186.230 (talk) 15:42, 29 July 2025 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2025 Issue 14


Upcoming and current events and conversations
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MediaWiki message delivery 21:02, 29 July 2025 (UTC)
Alec Fairweather
Just letting you know about an SPI and a BLP hoax, complete with an AI-generated image of the supposed subject. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:18, 29 July 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much! Please don't empty the talk pages of articles proposed for speedy deletion though, at least if they contain a statement objecting to the deletion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:03, 29 July 2025 (UTC)
Re. meritless report
Thoughts on this. In truth, when Untamed1910 first left me a final-level warning, besides wondering why it was a final level instantly (and then immediately followed by a terrible ANEW), I thought they'd just named the wrong article and didn't realise hitting 3RR =/= exceeding it. But no, they really seem to think that any and all edits which could constitute reversion of some material, regardless of what the edits are, count towards 3RR. For a user who's been here three years and is incredibly active in reporting others, that's a bit concerning. I have thought about it a little, if maybe with the timing it was Ikhouvanjou14 calling on another user to report me as some kind of attempt at tag-team harassment - separately, Ikhouvanjou14's (earlier) AIV report is absolutely inappropriate and abusing the system - but having thought on it, I don't think so. Just a drive-by user with poor understanding of 3RR and coincidental timing. Kingsif (talk) 04:37, 30 July 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Kingsif, reversion of any material, unless done in consecutive edits, counts towards the three-revert rule. If you remove a section, someone restores it, you remove a paragraph somewhere else, someone re-adds it, you re-add content that had been removed three years ago, someone makes an unrelated edit and you then re-remove the section, you have technically violated the three-revert rule. Are you aware of this or are we in disagreement about its (unnecessarily strict) wording? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:40, 30 July 2025 (UTC)
- We're in agreement. If I was unclear, there's (as yet) no user who I reverted/they reverted me back anywhere at the article being reported, is what I mean (in addition to the zero-sum effort of DR) by meritless. (Besides all the edits being consecutive). Kingsif (talk) 04:49, 30 July 2025 (UTC)
- Okay, all good then; this wasn't entirely clear to me both from your initial reply to the ANEW report and the message here. I agree that even with strictest-possible interpretation, there was no 3RR violation there. I'm currently mainly waiting for Untamed1910 to reply that they aren't able to provide the requested diffs of the violation and misunderstood the rule. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:53, 30 July 2025 (UTC)
- We're in agreement. If I was unclear, there's (as yet) no user who I reverted/they reverted me back anywhere at the article being reported, is what I mean (in addition to the zero-sum effort of DR) by meritless. (Besides all the edits being consecutive). Kingsif (talk) 04:49, 30 July 2025 (UTC)
Brigitte Macron – again
I think we're done here. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 00:33, 31 July 2025 (UTC)
~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:53, 31 July 2025 (UTC)
Kingsif
I think he WP:OWN the UEFA Women's Euro 2022 final and UEFA Women's Euro 2025 final, implicitly insisting that only his edits that are correct and others shall never dispute them. I am tired of debating with him. I really hope you as an admin can be neutral in solving this. Thanks. Ikhouvanjou14 (talk) 15:12, 3 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Ikhouvanjou14, have you ever edited Talk:UEFA Women's Euro 2022 final or Talk:UEFA Women's Euro 2025 final? How can you be tired of doing something you haven't even tried yet? But in general, if you're tired of a discussion, you can always disengage from it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:24, 3 August 2025 (UTC)
- Talking to him is like talking to a statue, because he insists on his edits and whatever I did have been reverted to his version of text, even if it is against the usual standard of an article's lead (compare UEFA Women's Euro 2022 final and UEFA Euro 2024 final, I tried to make both articles' (2022 and 2025) lead similar to the 2024 one, but he always reject it and gaslights me as if I always mess up his work). Ikhouvanjou14 (talk) 16:28, 3 August 2025 (UTC)
- Ikhouvanjou14, instead of using other articles' states as an argument (which is a very weak argument on a community-generated website where lots of articles have lots of problems), you can choose to:
- discuss on the article's talk page, or
- disengage from the conflict.
- There's no other advice you'll receive from me, so please stop asking. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:36, 3 August 2025 (UTC)
- Ikhouvanjou14, instead of using other articles' states as an argument (which is a very weak argument on a community-generated website where lots of articles have lots of problems), you can choose to:
- Talking to him is like talking to a statue, because he insists on his edits and whatever I did have been reverted to his version of text, even if it is against the usual standard of an article's lead (compare UEFA Women's Euro 2022 final and UEFA Euro 2024 final, I tried to make both articles' (2022 and 2025) lead similar to the 2024 one, but he always reject it and gaslights me as if I always mess up his work). Ikhouvanjou14 (talk) 16:28, 3 August 2025 (UTC)
Hoaxer SPI
Hey, just wanted to let you know that I started an SPI regarding a hoaxer you blocked. Two suspected socks are still active and the most recent is from today. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:21, 4 August 2025 (UTC)
- Now blocked by Izno. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:39, 4 August 2025 (UTC)
- Oh! Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:33, 4 August 2025 (UTC)
Kevin Sessums
Article is being edited by two IPs, one of which claims to be the subject. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:16, 4 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification! Turns out the content was added by Onlythefactswriter, a single-purpose account for adding negative content to biographies of living people. I understand Arjayay's revert; I'm less sure about JeffSpaceman's revert and I'd say Dmartin969 shouldn't have reverted at least without an edit summary. But fortunately, the article has a talk page and three users in favor of adding the material can probably quickly document their consensus there so it can be restored in a WP:BLPRESTORE-compatible way. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:56, 4 August 2025 (UTC)
Rollback...
Hello ToBeFree, unsure if you would accept or deny my request, but as I was informed to contact you 1 August 2025, I am hereby asking later due to my vacation, I will keep this short, as I've wasted your time on previous, but I have learned from my mistakes and wish to move on from them to start a new journey, by using Huggle and other various softwares, I understand if this gets denied I have to wait until the new year, respond when you have time, no rush!
Thanks,
Valorrr (lets chat) 04:24, 4 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Valorrr, thanks for asking! I've had a look at the context and the user talk page history again. Mmmh well.
- It's okay but if you receive complaints, please take them seriously; they may well be right. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:42, 4 August 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-32
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- Editors can now enable the User Info card. This feature adds an icon next to usernames on history pages and similar user-contribution log pages. When you tap or click on the icon, it displays data related to that user account such as the number of edits, reverted edits, blocks, and more. It's part of a broader project to make it easier for moderators to evaluate account trustworthiness. The feature can be enabled in your global preferences, and later this week it will be available in local preferences.
- Everybody is invited to share comments on Collaborative Contributions, a project recently launched by the Connection team. The project aims to create a new way to display the impact of collaborative editing activities (such as edit-a-thons, backlog drives, and WikiProjects) on the wikis. Post your comments on the project talk page.
- Administrators can now define the default block duration for temporary accounts. To do that, they need to create a page named
MediaWiki:Ipb-default-expiry-temporary-accountand use a value defined inMediaWiki:Ipboptions. This allows administrators to easily block temporary accounts for 90 days, which is functionally equivalent to an indefinite block. The advantage of this solution is that it does not clutter Special:BlockList. More documentation is available.
View all 27 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week.
Updates for technical contributors
- Gadgets can now include
.vuefiles. This makes it easier to develop modern user interfaces using Vue.js, in particular using Codex, the official design system of Wikimedia. Codex icons can be loaded through the gadget definition. The documentation has examples. For user scripts that use Vue.js, an API module now exists to load Codex icons. - Module developers can now use a Lua interface to simplify the preparation of Lua modules for translation on Meta-Wiki. This improvement makes it easier for translators to find and edit module strings without dealing with raw Lua code. It helps prevent mistakes that could break the module during translation. Module developers and translators are invited to watch the demo video, read more about translatable modules to understand how it works, refer to Meta-Wiki's Module:User Wikimedia project for example usage, and share their feedback on how well it addresses the challenges in their workflow. The interface still has some performance issues, so it should not be used in widely used modules yet.
- Developers of external tools that connect to Wikimedia pages must set a user-agent that complies with the user-agent policy. This policy will start to be more strongly enforced in August because of external crawlers that are overusing Wikimedia's resources. Tools that are hosted on Wikimedia's Toolforge or Cloud VPS will not be affected by this for now, but should still set a user-agent. More technical details are available, and related questions are welcome in that task.
- Parsoid Read Views is going to be rolling out to some smaller Wikipedias over the next few weeks, following the successful transition of Wikivoyages and Wiktionaries to Parsoid Read Views. For more information, see the Parsoid/Parser Unification project page.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Meetings and events
- Wikimania 2025 will run from August 6–9. The program is available for you to plan which sessions you want to attend. Most sessions will be live-streamed, with exceptions for those that show the "no camera" icon. If you are joining online to watch live-streams and use the interactive features, please register for a free virtual ticket. For example, you may be interested in technical sessions such as:
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 03:37, 5 August 2025 (UTC)
Kevin Sessums, per above
Sorry about restoring that content. I saw that the subject had removed it, and I was operating under the section of WP:PUBLICFIGURE stating, "If an allegation or incident is noteworthy, relevant, and well documented, it belongs in the article, even if it is negative and the subject dislikes all mention of it." I felt that this was also a WP:COI issue, per my warning on the IP's talk page, but I appreciate the clarification above. Thank you. JeffSpaceman (talk) 11:22, 5 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi JeffSpaceman, all good, thanks for the clarification and you may well be right about that content belonging on the page. I'd just like to be able to point to a consensus when overriding their concerns with a page protection. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:02, 5 August 2025 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – August 2025
News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2025).
- Following a request for comment, a new speedy deletion criterion, G15, has been enacted. It applies to pages generated by a large language model (LLM) without human review.
- Following a request for comment, there is a new policy outlining the granting of permissions to view the IP addresses of temporary accounts. Temporary account deployment on the English Wikipedia is currently scheduled for September 2025, and editors can request access to the permission ahead of time. Admins are encouraged to keep an eye on the request page; there will likely be a flood of editors requesting the permission when they realize they can no longer see IP addresses.
- Administrators can now restrict the "Add a Link" feature to newcomers. The "Add a Link" Structured Task helps new account holders get started with editing. Administrators can configure this setting in the Community Configuration page.
- The arbitration case Indian military history has been closed.
- South Asia (WP:CT/SA) is designated a contentious topic. The topic area is specifically defined as
All pages related to the region of South Asia (India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal), broadly construed, including but not limited to history, politics, ethnicity, and social groups.
- The contentious topic designations for Sri Lanka (SL) and India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan (IPA) are folded into this new contentious topic.
- The community-authorized general sanctions regarding South Asian social groups (GS/CASTE) are rescinded and folded into this new contentious topic.
- South Asia (WP:CT/SA) is designated a contentious topic. The topic area is specifically defined as
- The arbitration case Article titles and capitalisation 2 has been opened. Evidence submissions in this case closed on 31 July.
- The arbitration case Transgender healthcare and people has been opened. Evidence submissions in this case will close on 11 August.
- Wikimania 2025 is happening in Nairobi, Kenya, and online from August 6 to August 9. This year marks 20 years of Wikimania. Interested users can join the online event. Registration for the virtual event is free and will remain open throughout Wikimania. You can register here now.
Iqbal Survé
Hey, you might want to take a look at the Controversies section here. I just removed some WP:BLPGOSSIP + WP:SYNTH. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:12, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- Oh, there's also a COIN discussion regarding the editor responsible for adding that. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:21, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- Also see my user talk. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:59, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- Just noticed the BLPN discussion. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:35, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- What a chaos. Thanks. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:43, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- Just noticed the BLPN discussion. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:35, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- Also see my user talk. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:59, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
Discussion at Wikipedia:Edit filter noticeboard § Merge proposal of filter 766 into filter 11
You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Edit filter noticeboard § Merge proposal of filter 766 into filter 11. RaschenTechner (talk) 12:57, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:31, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
COVID WP:FRINGE IP-hopper from Minneapolis
These Minneapolis-based IPs have been adding COVID nonsense to articles about the recently deceased:
- 65.128.207.191 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)
- 67.4.225.76 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)
- 67.4.224.194 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)
- –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:35, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- (talk page watcher) I've seen this pretty often while doing RCP -- not so much the emoji edit summaries but the "Guinea pig" summary edits are more familiar. @Skywatcher68, you should consider reporting these to AIV as LTA (or just as vandalism in general). --tony 14:45, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah, very likely the same one from last month. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:16, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- Wikipedia talk:Long-term abuse#Budding COVID misinformation LTA added. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:30, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks! Yeah, AIV reports for these please; I can't do much 5 hours later. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:12, 7 August 2025 (UTC)
- Ser! blocked the most recent for a week and the complete list has also been posted to WT:FTN as suggested by Johnuniq. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:17, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
- Skywatcher68, can I add contribution links and/or {{ip}} to the list here and there? The raw numbers are surprisingly cumbersome to deal with. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:32, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
- Do what you need; no problem. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:34, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
- Done, thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:38, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
- Do what you need; no problem. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:34, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
- Skywatcher68, can I add contribution links and/or {{ip}} to the list here and there? The raw numbers are surprisingly cumbersome to deal with. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:32, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
- Ser! blocked the most recent for a week and the complete list has also been posted to WT:FTN as suggested by Johnuniq. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:17, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
The Signpost: 9 August 2025
- News and notes: Court order snips out part of Wikipedia article, editors debate whether to frame shreds or pulp them
Plus a mysterious CheckUser incident, and the news with Wikinews.
- Discussion report: News from ANI, AN, RSN, BLPN, ELN, FTN, and NPOVN
A review of June, July and August.
- Disinformation report: The article in the most languages
Who is this guy?
- Community view: News from the Villages Pump
Threads since June.
- In the media: Disgrace, dive bars, deceased despots, and diverse dispatches
And slop.
- Crossword: Accidental typography
It's not a conlang, it's a crossword puzzle.
- Comix: best-laid schemes o' wikis an' men
gang aft agley, an' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain, for promis'd joy!
- Traffic report: I'm not the antichrist or the Superman
Everybody's Somebody's Fool.
Charisse Mills
Looks like a couple of partial blocks are needed: 2001:579:9230:118:0:0:0:0/64 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS) & 2001:579:92C4:18:0:0:0:0/64 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS). Thanks for that useful template tip, by the way. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:28, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, no problem regarding the template; thanks for the notification and the links. Regarding the content or blocking these, though, I don't think so. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:08, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
- Sorry, I overlooked Special:Diff/1305376797, which is a good diff. And the removal of the unsourced birth date. Thanks for these.

There's always something positive. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:12, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
- Sorry, I overlooked Special:Diff/1305376797, which is a good diff. And the removal of the unsourced birth date. Thanks for these.
Misgendering at Brendan Rodgers
Seems to me that the edits by 92.40.193.17 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS) need to be revdeled. Both of todays IP editors have already been reported to WP:AIV. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:28, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for the notification – I have semi-protected the page now and wouldn't object to someone revision-deleting the edits, but I personally think at least WP:RD2 is not fulfilled by, oh my god, calling someone female. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:44, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
- As long as it's not done towards a trans person, that is, of course. Deadnaming or fabricating a complex hoax is a different thing than childishly calling a cis male person female as an obvious attempted insult. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:47, 8 August 2025 (UTC)
- Huh. Could've sworn I saw something about him being trans rather than just cross-dressing. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:41, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
- You may even be right about that, I didn't check again. And removing such claims from the revision history doesn't damage the encyclopedia either. I think it depends on the situation/context, and how obvious the vandalism is. There's no fixed rule for this. Content that's revision-deletable on one page may be absurd enough to not qualify for revision deletion on a different page. The diffs I had checked were absurd enough to me. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:19, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
- Huh. Could've sworn I saw something about him being trans rather than just cross-dressing. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:41, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
Grayfell Dispute
Hi ToBeFree,
It's nice to meet you! I just made this account because I'm in a protracted discussion with Grayfell about use of a source. You stepped in and as I'm new to the site (well, new to editing, long time reader) — I'd love to understand Wikipedia's dispute resolution mechanisms. You can read on his talk page the contours of the dispute. I admit I may be understanding the WP:SPS policy incorrectly, but it appears there's a colorable argument for what I'm saying — I don't think this is something Grayfell is willing to entertain.
Can you please provide guidance on how we ought proceed?
Thanks so much : - ) WikiNixon37 (talk) 16:39, 10 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello WikiNixon37, welcome to Wikipedia; thank you very much for creating an account and asking.
- Imagine for a moment that maxraskin.com was blacklisted from use on Wikipedia. Technically, preventing anyone from adding it due to earlier mass-addition of links to the website.
- Which questions would you then have, and which steps would you like to take?
- Or asked differently: Imagining that using maxraskin.com was absolutely not an option, why would this impact your Wikipedia editing noticeably? Where does the focus on using that specific source come from? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:51, 10 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi,
- Thank you for the clear questioning and framing. Please tell me if I'm writing too much or too little.
- The simple way I would answer is that there is information available through the Raskin interviews that I believe is a) valuable to a Wikipedia page and is b) not available for sourcing elsewhere for various reasons. I'm happy to provide examples if you'd like, but as I understand the WP:SPS rules, if there are reputed sources that cite the subject matter expert, self-publication is not a categorical prohibition. In this case, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, among others, have cited some of the important facts that these interviews contain and Raskin has published his personal interviews in the WSJ as well as other newspapers. Examples of such facts include self-described religious beliefs.
- The next question is where the focus comes from — to be honest I am a fan and discovered this whole edit warring thing when someone wrote about it on an email chain we have of friends reading the interviews. She explained how she got into it with a Wikipedia editor from a few years ago when she was trying to add information that she wasn't seeing elsewhere. I think the example at the time was about Al Franken's belief in God. Then I went on and I saw all these good facts taken down and have since become sucked down the rabbit hole.
- I understand some people may have put up information that was trivial (e.g., Al Franken's self-reported perfect SAT scores, lol), but some things seem a tragedy to remove (e.g., the self-reported reason for Nobel Laureate's loss of faith in God or the reason for Curtis Yarvin's pen name which was only reported by the secondary source after the interview came out). WikiNixon37 (talk) 02:40, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
an email chain we have of friends reading the interviews
, really? WikiNixon37, you're almost shouting "I have edited Wikipedia under a different username before" or "I have an undisclosed connection to the website".- I think the best advice I can currently provide is to have a look at the Task Center and the community portal for ideas unrelated to the website, and to contribute independently of it for a while, and if it's just to prove that you're not only here to promote the website.
- But to answer the original question, you'd need to convince others, perhaps a third opinion, that adding content from this source, or linking to it, is needed in a specific biography. This needs to be documented on the talk page of that biography, and then the content can be added with the consensus found on the talk page. Restoring it where it has been removed without seeking a consensus first is not an option (WP:ONUS, WP:BLPRESTORE). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:40, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi,
- So I disclosed my connection to the website — I'm a paying subscriber and a fan who is involved in the community.
- I guess my understanding from all of this is that there are two separate issues —1) the merits of the additions on their own 2) the individual contributor's bona fides/good faith.
- I checked out the Task Center and it actually looks like fun, so while I had just planned to get involved in this issue, I think I'll stick around and report back if that's what you advise!
- Thank you for all your help with this — you were very helpful and straightforward. WikiNixon37 (talk) 13:53, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
- I'd like to copyedit the Jimmy Page biography – is there a template/example of a quality biography page so I can see how to model it? WikiNixon37 (talk) 15:41, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
- Cool! The tags had been added by Fortuna imperatrix mundi in Special:Diff/1292225789; perhaps they can provide details about the most noticeable issues. The best place to discuss them is probably the article's talk page, Talk:Jimmy Page. A list of the newest featured articles about living people is here and might serve as examples of very well-written articles (top 0.1%). There is a manual of style for biographies and articles in general, but these are huge. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:34, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
- I'd like to copyedit the Jimmy Page biography – is there a template/example of a quality biography page so I can see how to model it? WikiNixon37 (talk) 15:41, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-33
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- The WikiEditor toolbar now includes its keyboard shortcuts in the tooltips for its buttons. This will help to improve the discoverability of this feature.
- The Product and Technology Advisory Council published a set of proposed experiments the Wikimedia Foundation can try to improve communication with community. Feedback on the proposals are welcomed until August 22 on this talk page.
- The search bar on the Minerva skin (mobile) has been updated to use the same type-ahead search component that is used on the Vector 2022 skin. There are no changes in search functionality but there are minor visual changes. Specifically, the close-search button has been changed from an "X" to a back arrow. This helps to distinguish it from the other "X" button that is used to clear any text.
- Editors on some wikis will see a new toggle for "Group results by page" on watchlist, related changes, and recent changes pages. This is an A/B experiment that is planned to start on August 11, and will run for 3–6 weeks on the Bengali, Chinese, Czech, French, Greek, Portuguese, and Urdu Wikipedias. The experiment will examine how making this feature more discoverable might affect editors' ability to find the edits they are looking for.
View all 31 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week.
Updates for technical contributors
- The multiwiki datasets of Unicode data have been moved to Category:Unicode Module Datasets on Wikimedia Commons, to follow the idea of "One common data source, multiple local wikis". Most wikis have been updated to use the Commons version. You can ask questions at the talkpage.
- Lua code can add warnings when something is wrong, by using the
mw.addWarning()function. It is now possible to add more than one warning, instead of new warnings replacing old ones. If you maintain a Lua module that used warnings, you should check it still works as expected.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 23:26, 11 August 2025 (UTC)
BLP edit war at Celeste Kidd
I'm not even going to try to figure out what's going on there; leaving that up to an admin. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:38, 13 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, turns out the account is a sock of Nimchimpski. Thank you very much for the notification. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:32, 13 August 2025 (UTC)
Block period expiration
Hello ToBeFree, You mentioned before in an email that you were willing to self revert to display my comments on the Big Brother 26 talk page once my block period has expired. I am here to let you know my block period has expired. If you are able to self revert and display my previous comment on the talk that will be great.Welcometothenewmillenium (talk) 22:51, 13 August 2025 (UTC)
- Oh, it's been a week already, sorry. Welcome back, Welcometothenewmillenium.
Done ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:24, 13 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you and yes time flies by. I have been on my best behavior since then. Welcometothenewmillenium (talk) 12:22, 14 August 2025 (UTC)
JKDefrag changes
Hi ToBeFree,
I noticed Your changes to the "JKDefrag" artice. I quite don't understand what's wrong with the deleted passage concerning newer Windows OS versions. JKDefrag only uses the internal Windows defragmentation api, which is still valid and supported in current Windows versions. So it's only the defragmentation algorithm, which could mess things up. Same as simple "contig" but tries to be be smarter. So, what could possibly go wrong? (TM) ;-) OK, worst case scenario for me is, it defragments "bad", making things worse, when it comes to acces times. But, else?
The original author isn't working on this project anymore, so obviously, he cannot, or more likely doesn't want to, make any statements regarding modern OS. But there's to my best knowledge nothing in the source code which would confilict with modern OS. Well, of course, I wouldn't risk all my money to this :-P, but I think the warning in prior versions of the JKDefrag is enough to keep wikipedia from being sued. So, I wonder if we could readd a paragrah which adresses this issue. Maybe with a kind of "results may be unsatisfying" or else warning....
Looking forward to hear from you,
Nick
Nikolas75 (talk) 19:02, 15 August 2025 (UTC)
- Quick addition: Ich habe gerade gesehen, Du kommst auch aus NRW. Natürlich können wir auch auf Deutsch schreiben ;-) Nikolas75 (talk) 19:09, 15 August 2025 (UTC)
- English please
~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:14, 15 August 2025 (UTC)
- English please
- Hi Nikolas75, thanks for asking! All I'm looking for is a reliable source that directly supports the content. If there is a specific statement I had removed and you are aware of a source directly supporting the statement, please let me know! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:15, 15 August 2025 (UTC)
Ken Whitman
Just wanted to let you know that some, apparently including the subject himself, have put a WP:RESUME here. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:42, 15 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for the notification! While I currently see no need to revert, it's good to see that this is also at WP:COIN and people will have a look at it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:21, 15 August 2025 (UTC)
Someone is NOTHERE
Hello ToBeFree,
I came across the edits of "SunshineeDarkness" (SD), whose full edit history consist only of removing info about Germans/Germany (also when properly sourced), see e.g., here, here and here. The user sent me a general message after being reverted and having ignored my initial talk page message, but SD dodged the issue, only saying later that they find that "articles about Germans contain exaggerated descriptions" (which is subjective, not a specific German issue, and what does it even mean?). Playing innocent at first (the general/not sincere message), suddenly altering the tone when caught, and eventually saying their real reason (somewhat) is the typical behaviour of someone who is in the wrong IMO. Furthermore, SD also removed for example a normal photo, or simply lied (a simple search, and a reliable source indicated that the founder was, indeed, a German immigrant), and lied again (and probably a few times more). It's also odd that when it's said that a company is German, it's "irritating". Lastly, SD lists some odd and, frankly, nonsense reasons why an article should be deleted, an example of I just don't like it. I fear that this WP:SPA just doesn't like Germans and is NOTHERE, and deserves a block. Cheers, Eem dik doun in toene (talk) 05:06, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Eem dik doun in toene, thank you very much for your message, but please use WP:ANI for such reports. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:52, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
Stan Bharti
An editor, who appears to be the subject, is making a privacy claim on the page. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:07, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hmmm it's a very unspecific claim and the user seems to seek the removal of everything in the article. I have semi-protected the page for now. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:14, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
Hida Viloria
Just letting you know about the WP:SPA here. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:13, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, I'm happy about Unpredictable9877 having created an account! As long as they always edit logged-in from now on, all is fine. The edit war is interesting, though, and I think WP:BLPRESTORE is on Unpredictable9877's side at the moment. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:25, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-34
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
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- Later this week, people who are logged-in and have the "Discussion tools" Beta Feature enabled will gain the ability to "Thank" individual comments directly from talk pages, rather than needing to navigate to page history. Learn more about this feature.
- An A/B test comparing two versions of the desktop donate link launched on testwiki on 12 August and on English Wikipedia 14 August for 0.1% of logged out users on the desktop site. The experiment will run for three weeks, ending on 12 September.
- An A/A test to measure the baseline for reader retention was launched 12 August using Experimentation Lab. This measures the percentage of users who revisit a wiki after their initial visit over a 14-day period. No visual changes are expected. The experiment will run through 31 August.
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MediaWiki message delivery 00:34, 19 August 2025 (UTC)
Christian Horner
Why do I get the feeling that I'm being sealioned by a loutsock? –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:19, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, I'd need more than a feeling to check, and I couldn't share such results with you. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:45, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- I wouldn't expect you to share anything but an anonymous editor (2A09:5E41:146:5E20:9D52:A11E:1EE8:A0D6 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)) who suddenly started throwing accusations of edit warring over a simple restoration of sourced content is mighty strange. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:04, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- I agree it's strange but there's not even an account which has made similar edits before if I see correctly; there's nothing I could check against and no real reason to check blindly. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:12, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah, I tried checking edits from that range and couldn't find anything similar, either. Does sound like they've been here before; could just be an overly enthusiastic fan. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:21, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- I do think they're an experienced editor, I just have no idea if they have an account they're hiding. These are clearly not their first Wikipedia edits. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:27, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- Let's see what the IP does now that @Joseph2302: reverted all their edits. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 11:49, 19 August 2025 (UTC)
- I do think they're an experienced editor, I just have no idea if they have an account they're hiding. These are clearly not their first Wikipedia edits. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:27, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah, I tried checking edits from that range and couldn't find anything similar, either. Does sound like they've been here before; could just be an overly enthusiastic fan. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:21, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- I agree it's strange but there's not even an account which has made similar edits before if I see correctly; there's nothing I could check against and no real reason to check blindly. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:12, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
- I wouldn't expect you to share anything but an anonymous editor (2A09:5E41:146:5E20:9D52:A11E:1EE8:A0D6 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)) who suddenly started throwing accusations of edit warring over a simple restoration of sourced content is mighty strange. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:04, 18 August 2025 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2025 Issue 15


Special Wikimania issue This is a special Wikimania issue of the Bulletin. We'll be back to our regular format in the next issue
- Wikimania Nairobi: Catch up on missed sessions of Wikimania 2025 by checking session pages in the program. These links will be replaced by Commons links when the uploads are finished.
- Meet the Wikimedians of the Year 2025: The Wikimedian of the Year awards give us an opportunity to pause, taking a moment to recognize people who make our mission possible. Learn about all of this year's winners.
- Highlights: Daily highlights from Wikimania:
- Product and Tech: Wikimania 2025 sessions about Product and Tech you can watch, with links to the recordings.
- Affiliate Strategy: Wikimania 2025 Brings Affiliate Strategy Recommendations into Focus.
- Twentieth edition of Wikimania: Celebrating humans who make Wikipedia possible.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Research · Web · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Tech News: Some of the latest update from Tech News week 31, 32, and 33: The Wikimedia Commons community has decided to block cross-wiki uploads to Wikimedia Commons, for all users without autoconfirmed rights on that wiki, starting on August 16; The WikiEditor toolbar now includes its keyboard shortcuts in the tooltips for its buttons. This will help to improve the discoverability of this feature.
- Collaborative Contributions: Share your comments on Collaborative Contributions. This project aims to create a new way to display the impact of collaborative editing activities (such as edit-a-thons, backlog drives, and WikiProjects) on the wikis.
- PTAC: The Product and Technology Advisory Council published a set of proposed experiments the Wikimedia Foundation can try to improve communication with community. Feedback on the proposals are welcomed until August 22.
- Watchlists and Recent Changes: The Foundation will be focusing on wishes related to Watchlists and Recent Changes pages over the next few months. Please read the latest update, and if you have ideas, please submit a wish on the topic.
- Wikifunctions: The Foundation is working on demonstrating functions that generate sentences and fragments in several languages. This is a considerable step towards creating text for Abstract Wikipedia.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · list of movement events
- Wikimedia Futures Lab: The Wikimedia Futures Lab is a process and convening co-designed by the Wikimedia Foundation and Wikimedia Deutschland that will help us all learn more about global trends and discuss potential movement-wide responses. You can apply now to join the in-person convening hosted on January 30 – February 1, 2026 in Frankfurt, Germany with participants from affiliates, contributors and external experts.
- Don't Blink: The latest developments from around the world about protecting the Wikimedia model, its people and its values.
- Language and Internationalization: Read about language support for new languages and other highlights from the July 2025 edition of the Language and internationalization newsletter.
- Language Community: The next language community meeting will be held on August 29 at 15:00 UTC.
- UK Online Safety Act: The High Court of Justice has dismissed the Wikimedia Foundation's challenge to the UK's Online Safety Act (OSA) Categorisation Regulations. While the decision does not provide the immediate legal protections for Wikipedia that we hoped for, the Court’s ruling emphasized the responsibility of Ofcom and the UK government to ensure Wikipedia is protected as the OSA is implemented.
Board and Board committee updates
See Wikimedia Foundation Board noticeboard · Affiliations Committee Newsletter
- Affcom News: Read the latest issue of AffCom News (April-June 2025), the newsletter that distributes relevant news and events about the work of Wikimedia's Affiliations Committee.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
See also: Diff blog · Goings-on · Planet Wikimedia · Signpost (en) · Kurier (de) · Actualités du Wiktionnaire (fr) · Regards sur l’actualité de la Wikimedia (fr) · Wikimag (fr) · Education · GLAM · The Wikipedia Library · Milestones · Wikidata · Central and Eastern Europe · other newsletters
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MediaWiki message delivery 19:39, 19 August 2025 (UTC)
Terrance Simien
Hi, just letting you know about the newly-registered editor claiming to be the subject. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:42, 19 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:48, 19 August 2025 (UTC)
Feedback request: Wikipedia policies and guidelines request for comment

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Not a sockpuppet
I am NOT using multiple accounts. I am one person with one account Itstheschist (talk) 23:11, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Itstheschist, thank you very much for the clarification! I was mostly concerned about how you found the discussion about the Zak Smith article. It must have been through a path that others took too. Perhaps a public message on Twitter/X or something like this? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:24, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you ToBeFree. I follow various art museums and arcitects on Instagram, onenof which shared a post about Zak Smith's verdict being on a Canadian site. Went down a but of a wormhole, ending up here today. Itstheschist (talk) 23:34, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- Ah well, that explains it. Itstheschist, please be aware that even with best intentions, you're currently perceived as part of a large group of similarly-acting users with few other contributions outside the dispute, which can lead to you being affected by measures that would normally not have affected you personally. For example, if the group acts disruptively, such as by harassing one specific contributor with messages on their talk page, even one single edit can suddenly lead to a block from editing that would normally have been reserved for cases where you continue after a warning.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:40, 20 August 2025 (UTC)For the purpose of dispute resolution when there is uncertainty whether a party is one user with sockpuppets or several users with similar editing habits they may be treated as one user with sockpuppets.
— Wikipedia:Sockpuppetry § Meatpuppetry
- Thank you ToBeFree. I follow various art museums and arcitects on Instagram, onenof which shared a post about Zak Smith's verdict being on a Canadian site. Went down a but of a wormhole, ending up here today. Itstheschist (talk) 23:34, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
A quick message
Hello! Didn't get a response on my talk page so I thought I should hop over here and sure enough, some other folks did talk to you here. I wanted to allay your concerns and while I have't done a ton of edits, I am looking to get more acquainted with the platform. Thank you! Cairnesteak (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 23:45, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Cairnesteak, thank you very much for the clarification! I was mostly concerned about how you found the discussion about the Zak Smith article. It must have been through a path that others took too. Perhaps a public message on Twitter/X or something like this? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:48, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- I saw some information on Instagram, and went and located the court decision on Canlii, and ended up here - I had located some old screenshots I took of errors on the list of Egyptian deities so I had some other edits I wanted to make as well. Cairnesteak (talk) 23:55, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- All right, thank you very much. Cairnesteak, please have a look at the advice towards Itstheschist above; it applies to you as well then. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:56, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- Okay, thank you - I will go look at that. Cairnesteak (talk) 23:57, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- All right, thank you very much. Cairnesteak, please have a look at the advice towards Itstheschist above; it applies to you as well then. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:56, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- I saw some information on Instagram, and went and located the court decision on Canlii, and ended up here - I had located some old screenshots I took of errors on the list of Egyptian deities so I had some other edits I wanted to make as well. Cairnesteak (talk) 23:55, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
Not sock puppet
Hi, you messaged on my page asking if I'm using multiple accounts. I wasn't sure if I should respond there or here. I think I had another Wikipedia account years ago but I lost access to it and create this one about a year ago - it's the only one I'm using now. Ansible52 (talk) 23:11, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Ansible52, thank you very much for the clarification! I was mostly concerned about how you found the discussion about the Zak Smith article. It must have been through a path that others took too. Perhaps a public message on Twitter/X or something like this? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:24, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- Yes, there was a post on Instagram about the court case being decided. I took an interest in the situation and discovered the conversation going on in the talk page. Ansible52 (talk) 00:39, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks, please see the section above and below for details. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:02, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Yes, there was a post on Instagram about the court case being decided. I took an interest in the situation and discovered the conversation going on in the talk page. Ansible52 (talk) 00:39, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
Follow-up on revert
Just looking for a bit of clarification about you reverted my hatting - was asilvering's suggestion ("Sariel Xilo, you might want to just hat the previous discussion and start again") incorrect? Thanks! Sariel Xilo (talk) 00:01, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Sariel Xilo, oh, uh. I could have noticed this too. I think neither Asilvering nor me when reading their comment were thinking about a fully-involved editor being in a position to close the discussion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:05, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- No worries! Sariel Xilo (talk) 00:07, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- @Sariel Xilo, I meant hatting, as in, using {{cot}} and {{cob}} to collapse the socked parts. I'll do that for you now. -- asilvering (talk) 00:24, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Wow, I see where WP:HATTING goes now, and I guess I have been using this word wrong for years. Cool. Blame's on me. -- asilvering (talk) 00:38, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks for collapsing at the talk page! I've definitely seen hatting used as both a suggestion for closing an entire discussion and as a suggestion for just collapsing parts of a discussion so it is on me for assuming the maximalist approach. Sariel Xilo (talk) 00:52, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- I guess the etymology of the HATTING shortcut is "hidden-archive-top"-ing, which is weird as adding {{hidden archive top}} tags, with emphasis on "hidden", is not what a closure usually does. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:06, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks for collapsing at the talk page! I've definitely seen hatting used as both a suggestion for closing an entire discussion and as a suggestion for just collapsing parts of a discussion so it is on me for assuming the maximalist approach. Sariel Xilo (talk) 00:52, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Wow, I see where WP:HATTING goes now, and I guess I have been using this word wrong for years. Cool. Blame's on me. -- asilvering (talk) 00:38, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
Why restore the page with damaging information?
Per your request -- I am repeating the question here:
Hi. First, thank you for flagging this as a contentious topic. I have read above that wiki norms are more strictly enforced. Great and thank goodness. I don't believe in people's lives being affected over opinion. May I ask... if a subject is designated as a contentious topic -- May i understand why then the page was locked with "damaging" information on a living person rather than having the burden or proof laid on those who wanted the information reinstated? please and thank you. Slacker13 (talk) 01:25, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Slacker13, thanks! Anywhere on-wiki is fine. I had replied on your talk page by quoting my original e-mail, but that was a quote from when the question hadn't been asked publicly. I didn't mean to say that publicly asking on your talk page wasn't enough. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:07, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
Account verification
Hello. I received a message concerned that I may have multiple accounts. I can assure wiki that this is my only account. Is there a way that I can verify this? Thank you. Friendlypup13 (talk) 02:44, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Friendlypup13, thank you very much for the clarification! I was mostly concerned about how you found the discussion about the Zak Smith article. It must have been through a path that others took too. Perhaps a public message on Twitter/X or something like this? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:02, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
In over my head
To be honest, I feel a bit in over my head trying to do the right thing, Help in any capacity would be appreciated. Slacker13 (talk) 02:48, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- I think you need a new RfC. Please start one at Talk:Zak Smith. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:04, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
Suspected sockpuppetry
Hi Tobefree, just a note to let you know that I have reported the two users mentioned for sockpuppetry investigation. Thank you for responding so quickly and for attempting, as best as you could, to keep the discussion dignified.
warmly, s Slacker13 (talk) 00:04, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Oh noes. :)
- Slacker13, you're overdoing it... But someone else will have a look and explain. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:07, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- The closed SPI for the record. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:06, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
Zack Smith
Hi TBF. I have no hard evidence, but I strongly suspect that there is some off-Wiki canvassing going on. The sudden arrival of all of these low edit count users in this frankly obscure page is making me think meat-puppetry. The irony, is that I think the puppets are basically on the right side of this issue. Thanks for locking the page. However the current discussion ends, and I'm now INVOLVED; I think the page should be EC protected indefinitely. Well, I'm off to bed. -Ad Orientem (talk) 06:29, 22 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Ad Orientem, most of them appear to come from Instagram; at least they said so in sections above. Extended-confirmed protection sounds good to me and will probably be automatically restored when the protection ends. I think I'll downgrade to it shortly before that happens, though. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:38, 22 August 2025 (UTC)
My talk page comment
Re: - fair enough. - MrOllie (talk) 23:00, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:01, 20 August 2025 (UTC)- MrOllie, Slacker13 has now removed their comment too. In hindsight, my edit summary has been unnecessarily harsh for example by writing "anything" instead of "the situation". It was written relatively hastily; I normally use proper en dashes instead of two minuses, so I didn't even take the time for that. I think I was trying to prevent yet another reply from conflicting with the edit. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:22, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- Well, they tried, but what they actually did was remove quite a lot of comments and then get reverted. But I suppose I appreciate the effort. MrOllie (talk) 23:30, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- I should have checked instead of relying on an email notification. I think this diff should fix it and the edit summary explains what probably happened there. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:33, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
- Well, they tried, but what they actually did was remove quite a lot of comments and then get reverted. But I suppose I appreciate the effort. MrOllie (talk) 23:30, 20 August 2025 (UTC)
New message to ToBeFree
I read your note about doing a new rfc. I thought carefully before editing Zak's page because it very much is a hornets nest. I don't believe an RFC will help because the main advocates of including the controversial information are entrenched. They are not motivated by the rules of Wikipedia -- they just don't like this person. So we can do an rfc, but my guess is the same conversation will play out in pretty much the same way. Is that what you want? Do you think that will be helpful? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Slacker13 (talk • contribs) 11:32, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Slacker13, either Wikipedia's community (which is far larger than those you have met so far, and which would be notified about the RfC) is horribly unfixably biased and an RfC will never help – then you can give up, but then please stop messaging me!
- Or there's hope and you take it. These two options. In your next edit, I'd be happy to see the creation of an RfC, not another message here. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:32, 21 August 2025 (UTC)
- I implore you to be just. The page has for years been weaponized against a living person. I'm cutting and pasting what I posted on the talk page here, so it doesn't get buried. I apologize in advance if that is inappropriate. But I very much feel like we have a life in our hands.
- 1. There is already an issue with unproven accusations left within a BLP
- 2. There is already an issue with the original source (a removed Polygon article) being an appropriate source for such a serious allegation.
- 3. There are next to zero reliable sources, and zero in mainstream media – that have covered the court case before or after the verdict. This speaks precisely to my original claim which is that Smith is not a public person by virtue that no mainstream media is covering him.
- 4. Resorting to a primary source is, in this context, is yet another way to bend over backwards to justify the inclusion of contentious material that should not have been part of the BLP in the first place.
- Inclusion of the unproven accusations and weaponizing this page has already damaged this person (not in a maybe sense, but in a real, measurable sense).
- Finally, because there has been no mainstream media coverage of this, inclusion of the original source and or the court decision then effective turns Wikipedia in a news source – which is against one of it’s 5 pillars.
- As everyone knows, the social effect of advertising that accusations were made—even if they were disproved—is basically as bad for a subject as saying they are true. This is Wikipedia's rationale for excluding unproved accusations from BLP in the first place.
- This is both against the rules and unnecessarily harmful to the article's real, living subject. Slacker13 (talk) 16:38, 22 August 2025 (UTC)
- Slacker13, I imagine the following will happen:
- an RFC will be created at the weekend
- page protection will expire or be downgraded to extended-confirmed protection on Monday
- you will remove the material while the RfC is still running, pointing to WP:3RRNO #7
- I will re-fully-protect the page in response, and I personally won't block you because I don't block people for the removal of disputed BLP content (I'd else have done so far earlier).
- Does that seem like a realistic prediction? Great. Should I encourage you to do this? I don't know. You risk being blocked for edit warring. Not by me though. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:45, 22 August 2025 (UTC)
- Slacker13, I imagine the following will happen:
Happy First Edit Day!
| Happy First Edit Day! Hi ToBeFree! On behalf of the Birthday Committee, I'd like to wish you a very happy anniversary of the day you made your first edit and became a Wikipedian! DaniloDaysOfOurLives (talk) 02:02, 23 August 2025 (UTC) |
![]()
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Thank you very much, DaniloDaysOfOurLives! I had forgotten when it was! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:21, 23 August 2025 (UTC)
- You're very welcome! :) DaniloDaysOfOurLives (talk) 02:24, 23 August 2025 (UTC)
- The edit is a bit tough to find; it's at (2010-08-23, 08:40:09 CEST at de:Federal Bureau of Investigation). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:25, 23 August 2025 (UTC)
Zak Smith RFC
I have finally started one. Slacker13 (talk) 23:29, 23 August 2025 (UTC)
- Slacker13, were you aware that MrOllie had already agreed to do so when creating the RfC? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:28, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- I understood three things: 1. It was suggested that an RFC would be a good idea. 2. It was suggested that I should make an RFC. 3. That it was possible that MrOllie was making one. However, after waiting for an RFC from MrOllie, and not seeing one. I decided to create one. It was my understanding that an RFC was a good idea for the discussion, not particularly who was making it. Slacker13 (talk) 02:40, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- This is generally true, thank you for the clarification and for creating an RfC. It's why I had asked you to create one, but (like my request for talk page messages instead of e-mails), this went unheard while you continued to discuss on the talk page. Which is why I then asked MrOllie to start an RfC (and implicitly to reduce the amount of unnecessary pre-RfC meta-discussion on the article's talk page). When you then even replied to the message in which I had requested an RfC instead of further replies, I lost any expectation of you creating it, and I was relatively fine with that as MrOllie would have had the experience to formulate a neutral, useful RfC and was waiting for the matter to cool down and for the meatpuppetry to decrease, which also seemed more reasonable the longer I thought about their choice. So I had initially pushed for an RfC, found an experienced user who agreed to create it and everything seemed well-organized until you changed your mind and created a non-neutral RfC before the neutral one could be created. To me personally, this looks as if you had done so to improve the position of your standpoint, to obtain a kind of first-mover advantage you suddenly saw running away.
- And if that's the case, please don't expect me to be happy about the notification. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:53, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- @Slacker13 This is still fixable. Just retract the RFC (you can do this by removing the rfc tags and adding a note) - or alternately say you agree to that here or on the talk page and I can help you with removing the tag if you're uncertain of how to do it. Then in a week we can have another go at it. RFCs take a long time - usually a month - so this is a slow process anyway. I for one would not revert if the disputed section were removed in the mean time. - MrOllie (talk) 03:00, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- If that's the result, that seems like a great offer to me. Slacker13, I'm sorry for having insisted on you creating an RfC. I should have expected this to become far more complex than it initially seemed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:04, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- I need some time to think about this. Please give me a minute. Slacker13 (talk) 03:21, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- What if we just changed it to this: (and took out the term "unproven?")
- == RfC about removing allegations in a BLP ==
- Should allegations in this BLP be removed from the page (the subject was recently exonerated in court)? Slacker13 (talk) 03:54, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Slacker13, how many minutes ago was your last message to an AI (ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, whatever) or someone related to the article subject? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:13, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- I don't know what that means. The comment was that the RFC was not neutral. I'm wondering rather than scrapping the whole thing, we make it neutral. I'm wondering if removing the word" unproven" makes it neutral. Slacker13 (talk) 04:18, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- I'm wondering where that idea comes from, since either you suddenly noticed a neutrality problem or intentionally created a non-neutral RfC. And if you suddenly noticed it, I wonder who or what suggested that specifically changing this word would fix the issue. I wonder if between "Please give me a minute" and the subsequent proposal, there was any kind of off-Wikipedia communication, even if just with an AI. The AI concern isn't new, it was voiced on the article's talk page before at least once. Phrased more directly, I wonder if there's someone or something giving you bad advice. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:22, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Why did it take me a minute? I asked someone to help me write a neutral RFC, and then looked at it and did it myself. Slacker13 (talk) 04:22, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- See, as I expected. This explains a few things in my eyes but it's not prohibited. It was just becoming obvious. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:24, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- So, with that clarified – someone giving you advice in the background, or less neutrally phrased from my personal perspective, someone giving you advice of such low quality that it becomes noticeable you can't have had the bad ideas yourself – perhaps you could again, using your own mind, consider MrOllie's offer. I'll get some sleep in the meantime. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:26, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Again, I don't know what that means. It is obvious that this is my first RFC, yes, the person I asked to help me draft a more neutral version was Ad Orientem. Slacker13 (talk) 04:32, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- See, as I expected. This explains a few things in my eyes but it's not prohibited. It was just becoming obvious. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:24, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- You said it in your comment above. When I posted the rfc, i asked Ad Orientem to look at it. They seemed to think it was fine -- and even then I sugggested I was happy to change the wording -- you can view the exchange. I'm happy to be flexible and fix it. It is true that I'm doing reaching into how to make an RFC more neutral. I'm happy to take suggestions. Slacker13 (talk) 04:28, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Oh come on, now my 04:26 message looks as if it was about Ad Orientem. I thought "someone" in your confirmation is an AI or a personal friend. I didn't check Ad Orientem's advice yet but they surely didn't say removing the word makes the RfC fine. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:32, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- No they didn't. I'm trying to find a compromise. Slacker13 (talk) 04:33, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- MrOllie offered a good one. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:34, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- In writing something more neutral (per your comment). I'm trying to also make it simple. Slacker13 (talk) 04:34, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- May I have a chance to do that? (write something more neutral) Slacker13 (talk) 04:36, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- You can't really fix that RfC anymore by changing the initial question others have already replied to, and if the change is only removing that word, then you couldn't have fixed the RfC with this approach even when it was new.
- You can discuss a neutral wording for another RfC with MrOllie for sure? Their offer was to have another go "in a week", you both surely have time for finding a neutral wording until then? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:38, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- FWIW here's my advice from my last comment on my talk page...
I think you should contact an uninvolved admin and ask them to close the RfC based on the concerns raised. Beyond which I'd let someone else write it and post it. This needs to wait at least a week. There's too much emotion involved here and the level of obvious off wiki canvassing is going to make an immediate RfC problematic.
This is turning into a bit of a time sink. I will keep an eye on the page and when the next RfC is posted, I may have something to say. -Ad Orientem (talk) 04:49, 24 August 2025 (UTC)- I don't see 'obvious off wiki canvassing'—this page was swarmed by editors when the original accusations were made and now it is swarmed again—in both cases, news was announced, I don't see why this would require canvassing. I also don't understand why a 'problematic' RC is bad and, still, no-one has explained why we're even having one if it is non-binding. Slacker13 (talk) 08:12, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- And to be honest, this comes back to my original issue of doing an RFC in the first place. What you Tobefree and Ad Orientem are seeing -- is normal. It is precisely why I haven't wanted to go near this page. I've been to the RPG forums briefly to see what all of the commotion was about and there definitely is a faction of people who will stop at nothing to make sure this person experiences as much damage as possible -- and it seems to have been edited and maintained to keep that status quo. There are niche RPG forums where the mere mention of his name gets you banned. They call him "he who must not be named" and "Voldemort" -- all based on the accusations that he just prevailed against in court. If you are hoping that this will slow down or go away in a week or a few weeks time -- it won't. They won't stop. Even the new sources that were brought up as relevant, at least one is written from a person from that same RPG scene. It is a mess. That is not of my doing -- so I do think its a bit unfair to blame the chaos on my word choices. What I am fundamentally trying to do, is allow the win in court to allow a living person to live without anymore undue damage.
- Slacker13 (talk) 09:23, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- @Tobefree -- you basically suggested I trust the system. That I haven't me "all the editors" yet. It's just me. I can't speak for the others that are jumping Smith's page. But I alone, cannot fight a mob intent on pulling up every single reference, no matter how obscure (or not) whose original distribution is minimal -- to ensure that Wikipedia's maximal distribution spreads what they want spread. I'm trying to do the right thing. Slacker13 (talk) 09:32, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- It should also be noted that although both have significant editing history with Wikipedia --both MrOllie and Sariel Xilo (the two main editors of Smith's page) have deep connections to the role playing game (RPG) scene -- evidenced by their Wiki editing history. Slacker13 (talk) 10:38, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- I am not accusing either of anything. Slacker13 (talk) 10:40, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- That's completely baseless. I've edited the Zak Smith article exactly -3- times. I came to it in the first place because I was responding to the first RFC on that talk page. I am absolutely certain you have no evidence of my 'deep connections' to RPGs because I have none. - MrOllie (talk) 11:25, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Again, I am not accusing you. I did a search of the editors to see who had role playing connections. I found several under your name. It is possible that I misundertood them. It doesn't seem like The page has gone through many edits in general since the last RFC. From the archive it seems that many who have tried, are reverted. It is good you were able to get yours to stick. Please understand my caution -- I thankfully haven't been a target of the RPG mob, but I've seen what they can do. Slacker13 (talk) 11:32, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- FWIW -- what i found was a reverted edit for Robotech Role Playing game, and off-wiki -- a MrOllie listed as a contributor to Elder Scrolls, a role playing (video) game. Slacker13 (talk) 11:48, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Slacker13, the last part of your latest comment is an outing attempt that normally qualifies for suppression. I would normally remove this, and I will remove it if MrOllie requests so. That said, it's probably absurd enough and in response to an already-existing denial above so I guess MrOllie would prefer to have the opportunity to respond rather than it being removed and you continuing to believe in a big conspiracy.
- Afterwards, I want to see no more messages while the RfC is running on my talk page about the RfC, and I'll revert edits that add them. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:30, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Oh god Slacker13, you're referring to the automatically generated list of contributors of the article The Elder Scrolls appearing in a PDF generated from the Wikipedia article. MrOllie's name is included for legal reasons because they contributed to the page with three diffs (, , ) as part of their >250,000 recent changes patrolling contributions removing spam and vandalism.
- Please leave me alone with this nonsense until someone closed your RfC. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:37, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- No, don't suppress it. I suspect the diff will need to be discussed at a noticeboard sooner or later. MrOllie (talk) 12:57, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks for the openness/permission. When it became clear that by "contributor to Elder Scrolls, a role playing (video) game" they actually meant "contributor to the article about Elder Scrolls on Wikipedia", it lost its suppressibility anyway, I'd say. When I refer to articles, I usually actively try to prevent such misunderstandings by referring to "the article about [wikilink]" rather than the wikilink title only. More people should do so. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:00, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- FWIW -- what i found was a reverted edit for Robotech Role Playing game, and off-wiki -- a MrOllie listed as a contributor to Elder Scrolls, a role playing (video) game. Slacker13 (talk) 11:48, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Again, I am not accusing you. I did a search of the editors to see who had role playing connections. I found several under your name. It is possible that I misundertood them. It doesn't seem like The page has gone through many edits in general since the last RFC. From the archive it seems that many who have tried, are reverted. It is good you were able to get yours to stick. Please understand my caution -- I thankfully haven't been a target of the RPG mob, but I've seen what they can do. Slacker13 (talk) 11:32, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- That's completely baseless. I've edited the Zak Smith article exactly -3- times. I came to it in the first place because I was responding to the first RFC on that talk page. I am absolutely certain you have no evidence of my 'deep connections' to RPGs because I have none. - MrOllie (talk) 11:25, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- I am not accusing either of anything. Slacker13 (talk) 10:40, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- It should also be noted that although both have significant editing history with Wikipedia --both MrOllie and Sariel Xilo (the two main editors of Smith's page) have deep connections to the role playing game (RPG) scene -- evidenced by their Wiki editing history. Slacker13 (talk) 10:38, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- @Tobefree -- you basically suggested I trust the system. That I haven't me "all the editors" yet. It's just me. I can't speak for the others that are jumping Smith's page. But I alone, cannot fight a mob intent on pulling up every single reference, no matter how obscure (or not) whose original distribution is minimal -- to ensure that Wikipedia's maximal distribution spreads what they want spread. I'm trying to do the right thing. Slacker13 (talk) 09:32, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- I don't see 'obvious off wiki canvassing'—this page was swarmed by editors when the original accusations were made and now it is swarmed again—in both cases, news was announced, I don't see why this would require canvassing. I also don't understand why a 'problematic' RC is bad and, still, no-one has explained why we're even having one if it is non-binding. Slacker13 (talk) 08:12, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- FWIW here's my advice from my last comment on my talk page...
- May I have a chance to do that? (write something more neutral) Slacker13 (talk) 04:36, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- No they didn't. I'm trying to find a compromise. Slacker13 (talk) 04:33, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Oh come on, now my 04:26 message looks as if it was about Ad Orientem. I thought "someone" in your confirmation is an AI or a personal friend. I didn't check Ad Orientem's advice yet but they surely didn't say removing the word makes the RfC fine. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:32, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- I don't know what that means. The comment was that the RFC was not neutral. I'm wondering rather than scrapping the whole thing, we make it neutral. I'm wondering if removing the word" unproven" makes it neutral. Slacker13 (talk) 04:18, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Slacker13, how many minutes ago was your last message to an AI (ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, whatever) or someone related to the article subject? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:13, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- I need some time to think about this. Please give me a minute. Slacker13 (talk) 03:21, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- If that's the result, that seems like a great offer to me. Slacker13, I'm sorry for having insisted on you creating an RfC. I should have expected this to become far more complex than it initially seemed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:04, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- @Slacker13 This is still fixable. Just retract the RFC (you can do this by removing the rfc tags and adding a note) - or alternately say you agree to that here or on the talk page and I can help you with removing the tag if you're uncertain of how to do it. Then in a week we can have another go at it. RFCs take a long time - usually a month - so this is a slow process anyway. I for one would not revert if the disputed section were removed in the mean time. - MrOllie (talk) 03:00, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- I understood three things: 1. It was suggested that an RFC would be a good idea. 2. It was suggested that I should make an RFC. 3. That it was possible that MrOllie was making one. However, after waiting for an RFC from MrOllie, and not seeing one. I decided to create one. It was my understanding that an RFC was a good idea for the discussion, not particularly who was making it. Slacker13 (talk) 02:40, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
Slacker13 started a discussion on Smith's talk where they claimed "Historically, the page has been edited and controlled by people with ties to the RPG community". Then like an hour later (I guess because I hadn't engaged with discussion), Slacker13 posted on my talk saying I must have an undisclosed COI ("I also know that you have ties to the RPG scene"). I don't have a COI simply because tabletop games are one of my primary wiki focuses. Given the WP:HOUNDING/WP:ASPERSIONS, I've requested they not post more on my talk page (outside of like required templates per WP:USERTALKSTOP). Flagging it here because of the discussion about Slacker13's identical COI post on MrOllie's talk. Sariel Xilo (talk) 15:35, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Considering my anonymity on this platform has been compromised and considering I have written professionally about D&D I was also concerned that my interest in neutrality was being impugned. I have spoken at Slacker13's page, suggesting they WP:FOC and avoid attacking the reputation of specific editors who disagree with them. I very sincerely hope this advice is received in good faith. Simonm223 (talk) 16:12, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
User:Trangabellam's talk page
Would you be inclined to protecting this editor's talk page? A recent post seemed threatening and/or insulting(I didn't waste the time translating the non-English portion). --Kansas Bear (talk) 21:56, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Kansas Bear, hmmm. I'd be generally fine with semi-protecting a retired user's talk page as the usual reason for not protecting user talk pages is that the user may have made a bad edit and needs to be reachable by complaining unregistered users. Which doesn't happen if the user doesn't edit. But one single such diff in a year isn't a good argument for protection yet. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:47, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- OK. --Kansas Bear (talk) 00:49, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
Edit Warring in Zak Smith RFC
Hello. User: Simonm223 is collapsing editor comments that disagree with theirs in the active RFC. I have reported them to the edit warring board and placed a notice on their page. Thank you. Slacker13 (talk) 14:40, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- -- disregard this notice. Wasn't Simonm223 --- Slacker13 (talk) 15:06, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- It is obvious I am not tecnically adept here. Please note there is a notice for active canvassing from an online hate mob to start messing with the wikipedia page here:
- https://bsky.app/profile/silveralethia.puppygirls.online/post/3lxa32x4l3k2u
- collapsing of the votes, I believe started happening at this time. Slacker13 (talk) 15:24, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
AN/I notice
FYI I mentioned you in the AN/I thread about Slacker13. Here. Simonm223 (talk) 16:56, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks for the notification. I guess an ANI discussion was bound to happen sooner or later. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:08, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- I am sincere sorry it came to this. Simonm223 (talk) 19:12, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- That's kind, but it's no problem. Both the RfC and the ANI discussion increase visibility for experienced editors who haven't looked at the matter yet, and with all the canvassing/meatpuppetry stuff going on, I guess wider attention is the best for the encyclopedia that one could wish for. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:14, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- I am sincere sorry it came to this. Simonm223 (talk) 19:12, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-35
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MediaWiki message delivery 00:09, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
Zak Smith
Looking at the log, when the full protection expires, can we convert it to 30/500? I can put it on my calendar and ask at RFPP if you prefer. Not sure what the best way to deal with this stuff is. Thanks, Polygnotus (talk) 23:38, 24 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Polygnotus, thanks for asking. This is a good idea. It will probably happen automatically because the page was extended-confirmed protected before and Protection Helper Bot restores such protections. I'll probably downgrade to extended-confirmed protection before it expires, though. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:42, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- Ah, it is rare to see an adminbot in the wild. Thanks! Polygnotus (talk) 03:03, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- Feel like removing the WP:DOB? Lead, infobox and cats, there's not a cite in sight. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:46, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Gråbergs Gråa Sång, removing an unsourced date of birth is probably always a good idea. Thanks for noticing this. Regarding protection, uh, I'll let it expire and wait a few minutes for the bot. Re-protecting in case of further edit warring after protection truly expired is probably better than manually downgrading and then upgrading again, from a proof-of-necessity perspective. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:17, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- The bot works :) Gråbergs Gråa Sång, you wanted to make an edit. If the remaining protection had been longer, I'd have evaluated it as an edit request but it was so close to unprotection. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:12, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
- The page is re-protected and the edit request is implemented as a matter of caution. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:18, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
- The bot works :) Gråbergs Gråa Sång, you wanted to make an edit. If the remaining protection had been longer, I'd have evaluated it as an edit request but it was so close to unprotection. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:12, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Gråbergs Gråa Sång, removing an unsourced date of birth is probably always a good idea. Thanks for noticing this. Regarding protection, uh, I'll let it expire and wait a few minutes for the bot. Re-protecting in case of further edit warring after protection truly expired is probably better than manually downgrading and then upgrading again, from a proof-of-necessity perspective. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:17, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
Evander Kane
A pair of Canadian IPs have been removing large swaths of content, essentially claiming "fake news". They might have a (misguided) point – is all that undue weight? –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:35, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- The diff is huge and "false information" may be a bad-faith description of text that summarizes (rather than confirming) accusations. I didn't closely check the content, though, and I opened none of the sources. I assume that Igor123121, Gommeh, Oshwah and Stickymatch, the latest of whom is currently legally responsible for the content they have (re-)added, have done more thorough checking than me. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:40, 25 August 2025 (UTC)
- I looked at some of the content, and from what I saw, it was all referenced and appeared to be in order. I see this happen quite a bit; users will remove content like this and make statements like this (or none at all) in their edit summaries. This is why I restored the content. I typically ask the user to discuss the removal on the article's talk page, but it looks like I didn't do so this time. ~Oshwah~(talk) (contribs) 19:48, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Oshwah, I think it's all good; I just wanted to point out that, despite recent changes patrollers often seemingly being unaware of this, there are situations in which one doesn't want to be the person who added the material to the page, and these situations can't be ruled out by just checking if there are reference tags. Most of these reverts happen so shortly after the removal that it's impossible for the restoring editor to have actually checked the sources. I'm not saying people are or should be forced to do that when reverting vandalism, only that I personally would be more careful than most recent changes patrollers seem to be when restoring material about living people. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:53, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
- I definitely try and be as careful as possible with content removal - especially with BLPs. The last thing I want to do is restore unreferenced contentious material or be responsible for BLP issues or other serious matters. No thanks... lol. I agree with you and I've seen the same thing; patrollers will quickly assume that the removal was in bad faith and then race to restore it without checking anything out first. They definitely need to be careful; I've had to leave a handful of messages to patrollers in order to point out issues with their reverts. Nonetheless, I appreciate the response. :-) ~Oshwah~(talk) (contribs) 20:02, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:04, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
- I definitely try and be as careful as possible with content removal - especially with BLPs. The last thing I want to do is restore unreferenced contentious material or be responsible for BLP issues or other serious matters. No thanks... lol. I agree with you and I've seen the same thing; patrollers will quickly assume that the removal was in bad faith and then race to restore it without checking anything out first. They definitely need to be careful; I've had to leave a handful of messages to patrollers in order to point out issues with their reverts. Nonetheless, I appreciate the response. :-) ~Oshwah~(talk) (contribs) 20:02, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Oshwah, I think it's all good; I just wanted to point out that, despite recent changes patrollers often seemingly being unaware of this, there are situations in which one doesn't want to be the person who added the material to the page, and these situations can't be ruled out by just checking if there are reference tags. Most of these reverts happen so shortly after the removal that it's impossible for the restoring editor to have actually checked the sources. I'm not saying people are or should be forced to do that when reverting vandalism, only that I personally would be more careful than most recent changes patrollers seem to be when restoring material about living people. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:53, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
- I looked at some of the content, and from what I saw, it was all referenced and appeared to be in order. I see this happen quite a bit; users will remove content like this and make statements like this (or none at all) in their edit summaries. This is why I restored the content. I typically ask the user to discuss the removal on the article's talk page, but it looks like I didn't do so this time. ~Oshwah~(talk) (contribs) 19:48, 26 August 2025 (UTC)
Permission to edit protected page
Hellohope this message finds you well. I am a returning editor who has come to your talk page in regards to the Little Einsteins article. I feel the article in its current form does not have enough information regarding show, and I would like to replace the brief overview with a more detailed synopsis, and reinstate a character list. However, I am hesitant on doing this because another editor named MrOllie started gatekeeping the article early last year, controlling what information could go onto the page and frequently starting edit wars. He made the page almost impossible to edit for a good while, and many other editors of the page share this belief. However, ever since you protected the page and MrOllie seems to have backed off since then, I have been wanting to finally expand in the page to make it a more comprehensive source of information. Please let me know if this would be possible; if not, that's okay. But, I would just like proof that I got permission to add new information on the page, because I would rather not spend hours improving the article only to have it undone by MrOllie seconds later. JHFF-622 (talk) 15:08, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello JHFF-622, if the goal is to avoid
improving the article only to have it undone by MrOllie seconds later
, the best approach is to propose what you'd like to do on the article's talk page, to invite MrOllie to the new section on the article's talk page by informing them on their user talk page, and to wait for their response on the article's talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:33, 28 August 2025 (UTC)- FYI, this topic has a surprising amount of sock activity. See Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Piper Bechtel/Archive. MrOllie (talk) 19:55, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- Huh, interesting. Thanks. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:45, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- FYI, this topic has a surprising amount of sock activity. See Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Piper Bechtel/Archive. MrOllie (talk) 19:55, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
Request: Please consider banning (or atleast warning) user khogen2410 and removing protection on page
- Hi,
- You had protected the page Param Sundari (film).
- Sorry, but that doesn't help in this case. The user @Khogen2410 who has been edit warring can still continue to edit the page since he has 500+ edits.
- I cannot edit as I have close to 200 edits, but not 500+
- Request you to temp ban user @Khogen2410 (or atleast warn) for WP:3RR and unlock the protected page.
- He is the only user edit warring.
Thanks
Computeracct (talk) 06:06, 31 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Computeracct, I think the article benefits from being edited less frequently at the moment. You can click here to create an edit request. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:21, 31 August 2025 (UTC)
- Hi @ToBeFree
- I will try creating edit request(s) Hopefully a request doesn't take much time to process.
- But I request you to temp ban @Khogen2410 or atleast warn him for edit warring WP:3RR as he is free to edit right now, unlike me.
- Computeracct (talk) 15:49, 31 August 2025 (UTC)
- Computeracct, is there currently an ongoing edit war or are you asking for a punitive block? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:43, 31 August 2025 (UTC)
- A temp block would be puntive and preventive since @Khogen2410 has edit rights.
- But if you are not inclined for a temp block, can you please atleast warn him?
- Thanks
- Computeracct (talk) 17:52, 31 August 2025 (UTC)
- I have now asked them to respond to others' concerns () and will block Khogen2410 if they continue editing while ignoring the messages. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:15, 31 August 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks a lot.
- Regards
- Computeracct (talk) 18:18, 31 August 2025 (UTC)
- I have now asked them to respond to others' concerns () and will block Khogen2410 if they continue editing while ignoring the messages. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:15, 31 August 2025 (UTC)
- Computeracct, is there currently an ongoing edit war or are you asking for a punitive block? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:43, 31 August 2025 (UTC)
103.226.161.212
Hey, this IP appeared on my watchlist today. You had previously blocked it for a year, but it came back, with most of its edits made after the expiry of the block being reverted. I believe it's a school IP, not just because of its behaviour but also because it's edited Draft:St Peters College, Cranbourne. Per WHOIS, they're part of the range 103.226.160.0/22, which appears to be used by several private schools in Melbourne. Would you consider blocking either the single IP or its range? Interestingly, this edit from the single IP (which I caught) is a perfect demonstration of what concerns me about the new temporary accounts system, as it's just past the three-month cutoff beyond which IP data will be unavailable ... let alone the other edits by that IP and range. Graham87 (talk) 08:24, 1 September 2025 (UTC)
- Also, checking my contribs to your talk page came up with this discussion about my block of the school IP range 203.54.128.0/17. In my spot-check of their last 100 edits (which go back just eleven days), 93 of them have been reverted. Could you please re-block that one (but as discussed, with account creation unblocked and talk page access enabled)? Thanks. See their block log. The latter one could go to AIV, I guess, but it's not a going concern right at this minute because it's not school-time where the IP address is right now. Graham87 (talk) 09:09, 1 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Graham87, I have re-blocked 103.226.161.212 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS) for two years, but I'd avoid re-blocking such large ranges on direct request; I think a quick discussion at WP:ANI would be better. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:39, 1 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks. Fair enough re the larger range; I've started a discussion there. Graham87 (talk) 10:02, 1 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Graham87, I have re-blocked 103.226.161.212 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS) for two years, but I'd avoid re-blocking such large ranges on direct request; I think a quick discussion at WP:ANI would be better. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:39, 1 September 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-36
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- The Editing team wants to compile a list of templates, jargon terms, and policies used in edit summaries when a copyright violation is removed. This will help them identify the number of edits reverted due to copyright issues. We invite community members from the following Wikis to list these terms in T402601, or to share their list with Trizek_(WMF): Arabic Wikipedia, Czech Wikipedia, German Wikipedia, English Wikipedia, Spanish Wikipedia, Persian Wikipedia, French Wikipedia, Hebrew Wikipedia, Indonesian Wikipedia, Italian Wikipedia, Japanese Wikipedia, Korean Wikipedia, Dutch Wikipedia, Polish Wikipedia, Portuguese Wikipedia, Turkish Wikipedia, Ukrainian Wikipedia, Vietnamese Wikipedia, Chinese Wikipedia. This project is open until September 9th 2025.
Updates for editors
- The CampaignEvents extension has been enabled for all Wikisources. The extension makes it easier to organize and participate in collaborative activities, like edit-a-thons and WikiProjects, on the wikis. The extension has three features: Event Registration, Collaboration List, and Invitation List. To request the extension for your wiki, visit the Deployment information page.
- The lists in the footer of the editing interface, such as "Templates used on this page," will now be organized into columns when there is enough space. This enhancement minimizes scrolling when editing lengthy articles on Wikipedia.
- On September 3rd, 2025 we will increase the sampling percentages of our group by toggle experiment of the
Special:RecentChanges,Special:Watchlist, andSpecial:RelatedChangespages on the Chinese, French, and Portuguese Wikipedias to 100 percent, allowing more editors to be part of this experiment. This adjustment is intended to ensure we have sufficient data to make informed decisions when evaluating the experiment results. - Upon clicking an empty search bar, logged-out users will see suggestions of articles for further reading on English Wikipedia beginning the week of September 22. The feature will be available on both desktop and mobile. All non-English wikis received this change in June and July. The goal is to make it easier for users to find articles. Learn more.
View all 37 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week.
Updates for technical contributors
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
In depth
- Wikifunctions now has a new capability called "lightweight enumeration types", an enumeration type is simply a fixed set of values that's in the type's definition. This capability makes it quick and easy to define such a type, and allows for the reuse of values that are already present in Wikidata. Here is a newsletter to learn more.
- The latest Readers Newsletter is now available. This edition includes: the formation of two new teams — Reader Growth and Reader Experience; insights into declining pageviews and account creations; highlights from the Wikimania Nairobi panel on improving the reading experience; upcoming experiments to engage new and existing readers; and more.
Meetings and events
- Spotlight on some Wikimania 2025 Sessions:
- Identifying AI-generated text by searching for ISBNs whose checksums fail: Mathias Schindler of WMDE shared tools to help communities search for these.
- La durabilité du mouvement Wikimedia face aux défis actuels et futurs: This session explored how Wikimedia can stay a trusted source of knowledge in the age of generative AI, information overload, and disinformation.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 20:47, 1 September 2025 (UTC)
Help or Advice
Hey I'm a new user as you know and I'm part of the discussion on the Zak Smith page Sariel Xilo is collapsing comments claiming they're LLM is that something you can work on or that id put under edit warring- there are several others doing this as well and I'm just wondering if that's appropriate. Garlikgoblin (talk) 05:51, 1 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Garlikgoblin, the edit summary of Special:Diff/1308933559 is accurate. The discussion will be closed by someone completely uninvolved who will also have a look at whatever is collapsed and get an own overview of the situation. Edit warring about whether something is visible directly or only on click is pointless. Please find something else to do while waiting for the RfC to conclude. The Task Center and the community portal contain ideas. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:34, 1 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you for your feedback and for clarifying. Garlikgoblin (talk) 22:00, 1 September 2025 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2025 Issue 16



Upcoming and current events and conversations
Let's Talk continues
- Wikimedia Futures Lab: Apply before Sep 4 to join The Wikimedia Futures Lab, the in-person convening hosted on January 30 – February 1, 2026 in Frankfurt, Germany with participants from affiliates, contributors and external experts, to learn more about global trends and discuss potential movement-wide responses.
- Wikimania 2026: The theme and date for Wikimania 2026 have been decided: Liberté, Équité, Fiabilité (Freedom, Equity, Reliability). This edition will take place in Paris, from July 21 to July 25, 2026.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Research · Web · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Tech News: Some of the latest updates from Tech News week 34 and 35: An A/B test comparing two versions of the desktop donate link launched on testwiki and English Wikipedia for 0.1% of logged out users on the desktop site. The experiment will run for three weeks, ending on 12 September; Administrators can now access the Special:BlockedExternalDomains page from the Special:CommunityConfiguration list page. This makes it easier to find.
- Spread Wikilove, thank comments: A new improvement was added to the "Discussion tools" Beta feature; it is now possible to thank a user for their comment. This new feature is released for a 3-months long test.
- Community Wishlist: Template authors can now use additional CSS properties, since the CSS sanitizer used by TemplateStyles was updated. These improvements are a Community Wishlist wish.
- Wikipedia Mobile Apps: The Android app team has launched a new experiment in Italy that lets logged-out readers of Italian and English Wikipedia set their own donation reminders based on how often they read. This new approach responds to feedback from donors who say their motivation to give is tied to their reading habits. Instead of one-size-fits-all banners, readers can now choose reminders that fit their own usage, all while keeping their privacy intact.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · list of movement events
- Wikipedia 25: To celebrate Wikipedia’s 25th birthday, the Wikimedia Foundation is adding several resources to the Wikipedia 25 Meta-Wiki hub.
- The Wikipedia Library: Collections from Dow Jones & Company, including the The Wall Street Journal, are now available to editors who are eligible for The Wikipedia Library.
- Don't Blink: The latest developments from around the world about protecting the Wikimedia model, its people and its values.
Board and Board committee updates
See Wikimedia Foundation Board noticeboard · Affiliations Committee Newsletter
- Affiliate recognition: The recognition of new User Groups, Chapters, and Thematic Organizations is paused until March 31, 2026.
- Board of Trustees selection: The voting period for the upcoming Board selection process will now open on October 8 and close October 23.
- New Board member: Wikimedia Foundation welcomes incoming Board Trustee Mayree Clark.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
See also: Diff blog · Goings-on · Planet Wikimedia · Signpost (en) · Kurier (de) · Actualités du Wiktionnaire (fr) · Regards sur l’actualité de la Wikimedia (fr) · Wikimag (fr) · Education · GLAM · The Wikipedia Library · Milestones · Wikidata · Central and Eastern Europe · other newsletters
Subscribe or unsubscribe · Help translate
For information about the Bulletin and to read previous editions, see the project page on Meta-Wiki. Let askcac
wikimedia.org know if you have any feedback or suggestions for improvement!
MediaWiki message delivery 18:13, 2 September 2025 (UTC)
Bruce Hensel
Giving you a heads-up about the apparent whitewashing. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:19, 3 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, I'm relatively certain that there's undisclosed paid editing among the recent edits. Thanks for the notification and please let me know if this continues. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:08, 3 September 2025 (UTC)
Point taken
Frankly I don't think I've ever struck another edito's comment in an RfC and hopefully never will feel compelled to again. Frankly I have never seen an RfC plagued with both this much canvassing and antics like duplicate !votes to such an extent before. I notified the editor immediately of what I had sone and why but you are entirely correct I should have been far clearer on-page. So mea culpa to that. Simonm223 (talk) 21:58, 2 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Simonm223, I had only noticed it because of the user talk page notification on my watchlist. All good. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:59, 2 September 2025 (UTC)
- I've created something for reference. BusterD (talk) 21:38, 3 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:47, 3 September 2025 (UTC)
- SPIs are not really my thing but the pattern here is unmistakable. The subject has largely written and maintained their own BLP since the first hours. With the exception of Emperor and the active defenders, virtually every substantive contribution has been made by a meat- or sock puppet. IMHO, of course. BusterD (talk) 22:09, 3 September 2025 (UTC)
- I think you are right; my current hope is that community attention and a thoughtful, experienced RfC closure will lead to a situation where it doesn't matter anymore if an edit comes from a sockpuppet or not, and those ignoring the consensus can be blocked independently of whether they're socks. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:14, 3 September 2025 (UTC)
- SPIs are not really my thing but the pattern here is unmistakable. The subject has largely written and maintained their own BLP since the first hours. With the exception of Emperor and the active defenders, virtually every substantive contribution has been made by a meat- or sock puppet. IMHO, of course. BusterD (talk) 22:09, 3 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:47, 3 September 2025 (UTC)
- I've created something for reference. BusterD (talk) 21:38, 3 September 2025 (UTC)
Junior Pope
More "agility" stuff added yesterday; SPI initiated. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 11:10, 4 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:52, 4 September 2025 (UTC)
Information?
Noticed your ping asking for that, but not sure what you were thinking of, or if you seemed to imply the site didn't verify the claim? As it seemed to do, even if not explicitly under each player, just in the title, and intro (I really don't know anything beyond this, as sports isn't an interest; also, apology for not replying to your email, I thought of waiting to see if they edited before acting, but then they were handled a few hours later, anyway, and I forgot to reply; next time feel free to act, though, if technical results are clear...) ~Lofty abyss 19:44, 5 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Lofty abyss, the edit summary of Special:Diff/1309666897 was meant to be a courtesy ping for your information, not a request for information
I just wanted to let you know that the content added in Special:Diff/1309650456 doesn't seem to be directly supported by the source added. Specifically, nothing in the source seems to say who was the "first". Thus, the general reliability of the source, while questionable already, seemed to be irrelevant for deciding if Cassiopeia's reverts were edit warring or exempt by WP:3RRNO #7, and if 2A00:8B40:64BF:0:C4B1:D216:CDDD:E256's edits were intentionally incorrect. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:38, 5 September 2025 (UTC)
- (As 2A00:8B40:64BF:0:C4B1:D216:CDDD:E256 was clearly edit warring, and probably edit warring unsourced content into a biography, I then just blocked without caring much about whether it's actually vandalism or not) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:41, 5 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi, I had informed the editor on their talk page that the source does not mention " the first" as the source states a list of Muslim players - see here, after their second edit, but the editor continuing to add "the first" in the article. Regards. Cassiopeia talk 23:35, 5 September 2025 (UTC)
- (As 2A00:8B40:64BF:0:C4B1:D216:CDDD:E256 was clearly edit warring, and probably edit warring unsourced content into a biography, I then just blocked without caring much about whether it's actually vandalism or not) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:41, 5 September 2025 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – September 2025
News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2025).
- An RfC is open on whether use of emojis with no encyclopedic value in mainspace and draftspace (e.g., at the start of paragraphs or in place of bullet points) should be added as a criterion under G15.
- Administrators can now access the Special:BlockedExternalDomains page from the Special:CommunityConfiguration list page. This makes it easier to find. T393240
- The arbitration case Article titles and capitalisation 2 has been closed.
- An RfC is in progress to amend the structure, rules, and procedures of the Arbitration Committee election and resolve any issues not covered by existing rules.
ANI (disregard, as I have walked away from the overall ANI discussion)
There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. ClarkKentWannabe (talk) 03:18, 4 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks for the notification. For the record, the discussion was merged to . ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:29, 4 September 2025 (UTC)
- Just to give you a heads up...
- After some consideration, I'm dropping my complaint against you (and I will reluctantly deal with the 2 week edit block for Homer Glen), but on your advice, I'm keeping the complaint against Magnolia677 for edit warring & disruptive editing. ClarkKentWannabe (talk) 00:32, 5 September 2025 (UTC)
- ClarkKentWannabe, you have referred to this as my "advice" multiple times, but the quoted statement
You may convince someone else that a block of others is needed of course, and I'd be fine with that too.
isn't meant to be encouragement of doing so; I was only making clear that my personal decision not to take action doesn't prevent other administrators from taking action. For the same reasons that made me block only one editor in the dispute, I'd be surprised if anyone partially blocked Magnolia677 from a page they stopped editing and sought help about. If any sanctions against Magnolia677 are needed, if I understand your actual concerns correctly, they wouldn't be blocks. I'm not going to explain these thoughts further though, because it might be mistaken as advice again. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:44, 5 September 2025 (UTC)- So, on second thought, I decided to remove the comments I had previously left here in response to your most recent remark to me. As a result, I am requesting you close Magnolia677's ANI complaint against me (not sure if you'd advise anyone else who comes across that ANI post to contribute their opinion to the discussion I launched on the talk page for the USCITIES WikiProject), while leaving my ANI complaint against Magnolia677 active.
- And so, my honest hope is:
- 1) as a result of my ANI complaint against Magnolia677, there is *some* worthwhile discipline given to him for his actions (edit warring & disruptive editing), with the Homer Glen, Orland Park, & Midlothian articles, since it's my belief that his actions for all three articles overall show he isn't exactly completely innocent
- 2) with the discussion I launched on the USCITIES WikiProject talkpage, either: a) a community consensus can be reached stating the elected officials information does in fact belong in the Homer Glen article, meaning Magnolia677's stance on the USCITIES guideline is wrong, or b) someone involved in the USCITIES WikiProject can finally "clear the air" (as it were) as to whether or not Magnolia677's stance on USCITIES guideline is correct. ClarkKentWannabe (talk) 08:06, 6 September 2025 (UTC)
- ClarkKentWannabe, you have referred to this as my "advice" multiple times, but the quoted statement
ToBeFree, you are a respected admin. Is there some way you could get this editor to leave me alone?
In mid-August, I told ClarkKentWannabe to stop plotting against User:Sbmeirow, User:Reywas92 and myself, and drop the stick, yet here they are still wanting "discipline" given to me for edit warring and disruptive editing. I wasn't even the one that reverted them at Homer Glen, Illinois, it was User:C.Fred.
Yesterday, ClarkKentWannabe canvassed four editors to join this discussion targeting me.
I'm getting the sense ClarkKentWannabe is obsessed with vengeance, not building an encyclopedia. Any help you can give to get them to drop the stick would be appreciated. Thanks. Magnolia677 (talk) 11:21, 6 September 2025 (UTC)
- It was not my intent to canvass people to join a discussion about Magnolia677's stance; I was inviting editors who had commented on his ANI discussion to join in the discussion on the USCITIES WikiProject talk page. And, I had explained that I was consulting with other editors (Uraveragejoe) about how to deal with Magnolia677, Reywas92, and Sbmeirow's actions. In the end, all I ask is a ruling be made, from someone involved in the USCITIES WikiProject, about Magnolia677's stance (as far as whether it's right or wrong) on USCITIES guideline when it comes to information about elected officials. Once we find out whether or not his stance is correct, I will never again go anywhere near him, or even Reywas92 and Sbmeirow, for that matter. ClarkKentWannabe (talk) 12:26, 6 September 2025 (UTC)
- And, considering the fact that one of the editors from his ANI discussion even suggested he drop the stick, as far as defending what sounds like his incorrect stance on USCITIES guideline.
- Oh, and I'm sure that it was Magnolia677 that reverted my edit about elected officials. ClarkKentWannabe (talk) 12:29, 6 September 2025 (UTC)
- And, my desire is not "vengeance"; I simply want to know who is correct about USCITIES guideline when it comes to information about elected official. As soon as that is determined, the article for Homer Glen can be edit accordingly, and then I'll move on to other topics on here. ClarkKentWannabe (talk) 12:34, 6 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Magnolia677, I stopped talking to ClarkKentWannabe because they refuse to get the point and believe expressing opinions is against policy. Any further administrative action from my side would be too involved. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:20, 6 September 2025 (UTC)
- (As a matter of fairness, the above-linked comment was retracted, but – forgive me the framing but that's what it looks like to me – only when they noticed that they do want me to administrate as long as it's in their favor ()). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:24, 6 September 2025 (UTC)
- And, if I can respond to your latest comment...
- It pretty much stopped being about you right around the time when I ended up withdrawing my complaint against you & just now, when I asked you to close Magnolia677's complaint against me.
- The latest comments I made was more about the discussion currently going on at the USCITIES WikiProject talkpage. It's always been my stance that Magnolia677 is wrong, based on the wording of the guideline at USCITIES. And, the discussion at the USCITIES talkpage is my attempt at finding out if either a) community consensus states that he's wrong, or b) someone involved in the USCITIES WikiProject can straighten things out, as far as who's in the right. ClarkKentWannabe (talk) 21:28, 6 September 2025 (UTC)
- If I'm allowed to respond to the "failure to get the point" charge... I'd like to point out there has been an ANI discussion about my behavior as it relates to my editing of the content of the Homer Glen article, and community consensus for that discussion so far seems to be that Magnolia677 is incorrect in his interpretation of guideline for the USCITIES WikiProject and needs to cease their behavior based on said interpretation. ClarkKentWannabe (talk) 15:41, 6 September 2025 (UTC)
- (As a matter of fairness, the above-linked comment was retracted, but – forgive me the framing but that's what it looks like to me – only when they noticed that they do want me to administrate as long as it's in their favor ()). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:24, 6 September 2025 (UTC)
ErickTheMerrick
Re your block of them yesterday, I suspect they are now socking as 2A02:3100:2FFB:2500:C0C8:7F8:B9D1:BB76 (talk · contribs). Two of the three articles (Kaishintō and National Democratic Party (Japan)) have overlap with Erick's previous edits and the edits are in the same vein as their ones on Freedom Bloc (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), i.e. restoring a load of unsourced (or dubiously sourced) information to the infobox, as well as in line with their history of adding/editing ideologies to infoboxes. It looks a fairly straightforward DUCK to me, but perhaps I'm overly suspicious. Cheers, Number 57 17:05, 7 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Number 57, thanks for the notification! Whether sockpuppetry or not, it's clearly disruptive and I have blocked the /64. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:34, 7 September 2025 (UTC)
The Signpost: 9 September 2025
- News and notes: Wikimedia Foundation loses a round in court
UK Online Safety Act remains undefeated.
- In the media: Congress probes, mayor whitewashed, AI stinks
Plus Wiki rules, Wiki Spin, and physicists get street cred!
- Disinformation report: A guide for Congress
The price of Liberty is eternal vigilance.
- Recent research: Minority-language Wikipedias, and Wikidata for botanists
And other new research findings.
- Technology report: A new way to read Wikisource
Tis true: there's magic in the web of it.
- Traffic report: Check out some new Weapons, weapon of choice
With the usual mix of war, death, super heroes, a belt, and Wednesday.
- Essay: The one question
It's an easy one.
Tech News: 2025-37
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- The Editing team is working on a new check: Paste check. This check informs newcomers who paste text into Wikipedia that the content might not be accepted. This check is an effort to increase the likelihood that the new content people are adding to Wikipedia is aligned with the Movement's commitment to offering information under a free content license. This check will soon be tested at a few wikis. If your community is interested in this test, please tell us in this task, or contact the team.
Updates for editors
Later this week, users of the "Improved Syntax Highlighting" beta feature will be able to use a linting tool to see errors or other potential problems in wikitext in real time. See the help page for more information.
When browsing a wiki (like en.wikipedia.org), the software responds in one of two ways: a desktop page, or a redirect to a mobile version on an "m" domain (likeen.m.wikipedia.org). Over the next three weeks, MediaWiki will start displaying the mobile version to mobile devices directly on the standard domain, without this redirect. This change does not affect existing m-dot URLs, or the "Desktop view" opt-out. Learn more.- When an edit changes the categories of a page, the changes to the category membership counts are now happening asynchronously. This improves the speed of saving edits, especially when moving many pages to or from the same category, and reduces the risk of site outages, but it means that the counts can show outdated information for a few minutes.
- Edits on Wikidata to qualifiers (properties and values) and references (properties and values) in a Wikidata item statement will now not add entries to the RecentChanges or Watchlist pages on all other Wikis. This is a temporary change to improve performance while other solutions are created. Wikidata's own pages remain unchanged. Learn more.
- Japanese-language wikis have had a major upgrade to the way that search works. The new search should generally give more accurate and more relevant search results.
View all 31 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week.
Updates for technical contributors
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 01:11, 9 September 2025 (UTC)
Matthew Louis Siegel
One editor is claiming that the article conflates two different Matt Siegels. Seems to me that the editor is the one who is confused. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:33, 9 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thanks for the notification! You may be right but let's keep the disputed information out of the article until that's cleared. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:55, 9 September 2025 (UTC)
Justin Cox
Just a heads-up that the article is being edited by an IP apparently claiming to be the subject. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:29, 10 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:16, 10 September 2025 (UTC)
Mark Welsh
Seems we have a new editor from an IP who doesn't know how to properly format references. As far as I can tell, except for the questionable reliability of Texas Scorecard, the content and references are valid but I won't have time to correct the formatting until I'm off work. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:33, 11 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, I've had a look at the article's history for a while now but would currently not protect the page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:14, 12 September 2025 (UTC)
UTRS appeal #106241
is one of yours, if you're available to comment. Thanks. -- asilvering (talk) 00:08, 12 September 2025 (UTC)
~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:53, 12 September 2025 (UTC)- Mh. Hi asilvering, I was in a hurry yesterday. The current state of Noritandas's talk page doesn't give me much hope and I have no idea why someone would so insistently want to regain access to enwiki if editing a Wikipedia in their native language is completely not an option and the language barrier is so visibly high. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:38, 12 September 2025 (UTC)
- Sigh. It did look like their English had improved, but this is just as clueless as ever. -- asilvering (talk) 22:54, 12 September 2025 (UTC)
- meh -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 23:39, 12 September 2025 (UTC)
- Sigh. It did look like their English had improved, but this is just as clueless as ever. -- asilvering (talk) 22:54, 12 September 2025 (UTC)
Gladys Patricia Abdel Rahim Garzón
Hey, this article appears to only exist as a way to promote the subject. The primary contributors are an editor who shares their name with the official website (Pabdelrahim123 (talk · contribs)) and an IP (181.55.249.23 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)) which geolocates to the subject's birthplace. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 23:15, 13 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much! Oshwah has semi-protected the page and Gommeh's deletion proposal is still on the page; as long as that's the case, I'd avoid digging into this further. Same if a regular deletion discussion ensues from this. If there is no such community attention on the article anymore, I might have another look. In most cases, editors who join for the promotion of one single mainspace article subject lose their interest in Wikipedia if the article is deleted. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:13, 14 September 2025 (UTC)
- I thought about it a little more and am going to change it to a regular AFD to see what others feel about it. Feel free to vote on it at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gladys Patricia Abdel Rahim Garzón. Gommeh 📖/🎮 02:57, 14 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much, Gommeh! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:16, 14 September 2025 (UTC)
- I thought about it a little more and am going to change it to a regular AFD to see what others feel about it. Feel free to vote on it at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gladys Patricia Abdel Rahim Garzón. Gommeh 📖/🎮 02:57, 14 September 2025 (UTC)
TheHistorianEditor
Hi. ToBeFree. Nice to meet you. I am a new editor. And I have something. I really think the page was too negative on Robert M. LaFollette that was undid. I believed the editor to make it more positive because many people around him really support him. People kept blocking him, but he just did not know how to answer or justify the change properly. Can you please help me, so we can solve the problem together? Please be nice to me and please don't block me. All I want is understand both sides. Thank you so much. I would love to talk to you more. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 03:09, 11 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hello TheHistorianEditor, I think you might be looking for the article's talk page, where you could create a new section to discuss the issue. Feel free to invite those who have reverted to the discussion, for example using {{Please see}} on their user talk pages. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:38, 11 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi. Sorry I haven't talked for long. Is it okay if I revert to the editor's fixed script of him. He lives in Madison and is a big fan of the politician. He read books about him at the library that praises him more, and I think it's a more accurate telling of him. He wasn't trying to cause chaos and wars, it's just that all the other users kept reverting it, with little explanation or reason, and I don't think it's nice of them to do it. Please, can you let me be free to fix the change. I am asking the nicest as possible. Thanks for understanding. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 00:39, 14 September 2025 (UTC)
- TheHistorianEditor, I'm surprised by your approach. Why aren't you asking the user on their talk page if reverting is fine with them, and have a discussion on the article's talk page if it isn't? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:05, 14 September 2025 (UTC)
- Because none of them is an admin who reverted the edit and blocked the user. I'm scared if I go back, and change the page this user's version he interprets as, you would most likely revert, start an edit war with me, and soon block me if I don't ask for permission. Besides, many of the comments and people on the talk page are dated 10-20 years ago, and have most likely retired and won't mind if I set into the user's version. From what I see, I am doing the people on the talk page a favor my making this change. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 01:49, 14 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi. Can you please respond to me? I really want to edit to the user's version. I do not support vandalism and edit warring at all. In fact, I deeply oppose and think they are a stain on Wikipedia. I just believe the user's version was historically more accurate and more respectful to his legacy. Thank you for understanding for me. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 02:44, 15 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi. I did it. I made the change. Hope you'll accept it. I care about Wikipedia a lot, I think it's a useful website. I oppose edit warring and vandalism as much as you do, but changes should be made and should reflect on history more. I also added more detail, and expressed more admiration for him on the page. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 03:25, 15 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you, To Be Free. For letting me keep the edit. Doing the best I can for Wikipedia. You are so nice to me. I just want Wikipedia to be in a better and kinder place. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 03:33, 15 September 2025 (UTC)
- Good morning. Okay. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:29, 15 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you, To Be Free. For letting me keep the edit. Doing the best I can for Wikipedia. You are so nice to me. I just want Wikipedia to be in a better and kinder place. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 03:33, 15 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi. I did it. I made the change. Hope you'll accept it. I care about Wikipedia a lot, I think it's a useful website. I oppose edit warring and vandalism as much as you do, but changes should be made and should reflect on history more. I also added more detail, and expressed more admiration for him on the page. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 03:25, 15 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi. Can you please respond to me? I really want to edit to the user's version. I do not support vandalism and edit warring at all. In fact, I deeply oppose and think they are a stain on Wikipedia. I just believe the user's version was historically more accurate and more respectful to his legacy. Thank you for understanding for me. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 02:44, 15 September 2025 (UTC)
- Because none of them is an admin who reverted the edit and blocked the user. I'm scared if I go back, and change the page this user's version he interprets as, you would most likely revert, start an edit war with me, and soon block me if I don't ask for permission. Besides, many of the comments and people on the talk page are dated 10-20 years ago, and have most likely retired and won't mind if I set into the user's version. From what I see, I am doing the people on the talk page a favor my making this change. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 01:49, 14 September 2025 (UTC)
- TheHistorianEditor, I'm surprised by your approach. Why aren't you asking the user on their talk page if reverting is fine with them, and have a discussion on the article's talk page if it isn't? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:05, 14 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi. Sorry I haven't talked for long. Is it okay if I revert to the editor's fixed script of him. He lives in Madison and is a big fan of the politician. He read books about him at the library that praises him more, and I think it's a more accurate telling of him. He wasn't trying to cause chaos and wars, it's just that all the other users kept reverting it, with little explanation or reason, and I don't think it's nice of them to do it. Please, can you let me be free to fix the change. I am asking the nicest as possible. Thanks for understanding. TheHistorianEditor (talk) 00:39, 14 September 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-38
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- References lists that are made using the
<references/>tag will now automatically display with columns in Vector 2022 when readers are using its 'standard' settings for text-size and page-width. - Starting in the week of October 6, on small wikis and medium wikis that have the CampaignEvents extension enabled, all autoconfirmed users will be able to use Event Registration as an organizer. No changes will be made for large wikis unless requested in Phabricator. This change is being made to make it easier for more people to use Event Registration, especially on wikis that are less likely to have policies related to the Event Organizer right. Learn more.
- Users that search using regular expressions (regex) can now use additional features including:
- for the
intitle:keyword: metacharacters for start-of-line (^) and end-of-line ($) anchors - for both
intitle:andinsource:keywords: shorthand character classes for digits (\d), whitespace (\s), and word characters (\w); and escape codes for line feed (\r), newline (\n), tab (\t), and unicode (e.g.\uHHHH).
- for the
- When you search for text that looks like an IP, the system will now show search results. It used to take you to the contributions for that IP instead of showing search results.
- All wikis will be read-only for a few minutes on September 24. This is planned at 15:00 UTC. This is for the datacenter server switchover backup tests which happen twice a year. You can read more about the background and details of this process on the Diff blog.
View all 24 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, a bug was fixed that affected users who used the page-tabs to switch from wikitext editing of a section into the visualeditor.
Updates for technical contributors
- The MediaWiki Interfaces team is redesigning the Wikimedia REST API Sandbox with Codex. If you have feedback on improvements for the API documentation or what makes developer experiences smooth (or frustrating), you’re invited to join an upcoming discovery interview, or leave feedback onwiki. Learn more.
- Edits to Wikidata aliases (an alternative name for an item or a property) will now be shown in RecentChanges and Watchlist entries on other wikis less often, reducing unnecessary notifications. This will reduce the overall quantity of 'noisy' entries. Wikidata's own pages remain unchanged. Learn more.
- The new Unicode 17.0 version has been released. The datasets on Commons for the Module:Unicode data have been updated. Wikipedias that do not use the Commons datasets should either update their own data or switch to the Commons datasets.
- Users of the Wikimedia Enterprise Structured Contents endpoints can now access Parsed Tables. The new Parsed Tables feature extracts and represents Wikipedia tables in structured JSON. This improves machine accessibility as part of the Structured Contents initiative. Structured Contents output is freely available through the On-demand API, or through Wikimedia Cloud Services.
- A dataset of English Wikipedia biographical information from Wikimedia Enterprise has been published on Kaggle, for evaluation and research. This provides structured data from more than 1.5 million biographies, including birth and death dates, education, affiliations, careers, awards, and more (from a June 2024 snapshot).
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Meetings and events
- Scholarship applications for Wikimania 2026 in Paris, France, are open until October 31.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 17:03, 15 September 2025 (UTC)
Tony Todd
Apparently a relative is trying to remove the circumstances of Mr. Todd's death in November, claiming a privacy issue. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:43, 16 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, Thanks for the notification! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:48, 16 September 2025 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2025 Issue 17

Upcoming and current events and conversations
Let's Talk continues
- Wikimania 2026: The scholarship application for Wikimania 2026 is open. Apply now by October 31.
- Wikipedia 25: Help us find inspiring stories to share during birthday celebrations by September 23.
- Wikimedia Research Showcase: "Readers and Readership Research" will be the featured theme for the next research showcase taking place on September 24 at 16:30 UTC.
- Update to banner and logo policies: Feedback is requested on proposed policy and documentation updates regarding the use of banners and logos for advocacy purposes.
- GLAM Wiki 2025: The registration for GLAM Wiki Conference is open until September 30.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Product Safety and Integrity · Readers · Research · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org

- Better bot detection: How we are improving bot detection and replacing our CAPTCHA.
- Temporary Accounts: Temporary accounts are now deployed to almost all wikis except the last 11.
- User Info: This new feature displays data related to a user account when you tap or click on the "user avatar" icon button next to a username. It's meant to be useful for different users with extended rights as well as newcomers.
- Newsletter highlights: The latest Readers Newsletter is now available. It includes considerations about Wikipedia's declining pageviews in the recent years, how the Foundation and communities may work on addressing this together, and the formation of two new teams — Reader Growth and Reader Experience.
- Activity Tab Experiment: The Foundation launched an experiment testing a new Activity tab in the Wikipedia Android app to our beta testers. Instead of only showing editing activity, this tab also surfaces insights about reading and donation behavior.
- Search Suggestions: To make it easier for users to find articles, logged-out users on both desktop and mobile will see suggestions of articles for further reading on English Wikipedia beginning the week of September 22. All non-English wikis received this update in June and July.
- Paste Check: The Foundation is working on a new check: Paste check. This check informs newcomers who paste text into Wikipedia that the content might not be accepted to ensure it is aligned with the Movement's values. This check will soon be tested at a few wikis.
- CampaignEvents extension: The CampaignEvents extension has been enabled for all Wikisources. The extension makes it easier to organize and participate in collaborative activities, like edit-a-thons and WikiProjects, on the wikis. To request the extension for your wiki, visit the information page.
- Structured Task: The Add a Link Structured Task has been fully released at English Wikipedia. This release is an important step in making editing more accessible for new contributors, especially on mobile.
- Tech News: Read more updates from Tech News week 36 and 37.
- Wikifunctions: Wikifunctions is now available on 65 Wiktionaries and has a new capability to copy function calls from one Wikipedia to another.
- Multilingual Contributors: The Language and Product Localisation team is launching a CentralNotice campaign to attract multilingual contributors to specific Wikipedias. The campaign will feature regionally targeted banners to reach potential native speakers.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · list of movement events
- Global Resources: Introducing the interim Global Resource Distribution Committee (GRDC).
- Funding the Movement: Key Takeaways, Trends, and Lessons from FY 2024-2025 Community Fund Grants.
- Open Indonesia: Reflections on Open Indonesia, an event in Bandung gathering communities dedicated to advancing open knowledge to build the country's Open Knowledge Roadmap.
- WikiWomen*: Reflections from the WikiWomen* Summit 2025.
- Gender & AI: Is Gendering AI Possible? Reflections from the 2025 Gendering AI Conference.
- Wikipedia 25: What one centenarian can teach us about 25 years of Wikipedia.
- Knowledge Equity Fund: Wikimedia Ghana User Group receives Knowledge Equity Fund Connected Grant.
- Wikimania 2025: ESEAP First Timers at Wikimania Nairobi.
- César do Paço Lawsuit: Update about a lawsuit in Portugal and the Foundation's appeal to the European Court of Human Rights.
- UK Online Safety Act: The Wikimedia Foundation will not appeal the UK High Court’s decision to dismiss our challenge to the UK’s Online Safety Act (OSA) Categorisation Regulations.
Board and Board committee updates
See Wikimedia Foundation Board noticeboard · Affiliations Committee Newsletter
- August board meeting: Updates on board appointments and selection, CEO search, work to strengthen Wikipedia's approach to neutral point of view and updates on three pilots around more shared decision-making and shared accountability across the movement.
- New Endowment board members: Welcoming New Wikimedia Endowment Board Members, Kevin Bonebrake and Ike Kier.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
See also: Diff blog · Goings-on · Planet Wikimedia · Signpost (en) · Kurier (de) · Actualités du Wiktionnaire (fr) · Regards sur l’actualité de la Wikimedia (fr) · Wikimag (fr) · Education · GLAM · The Wikipedia Library · Milestones · Wikidata · Central and Eastern Europe · other newsletters
Subscribe or unsubscribe · Help translate
For information about the Bulletin and to read previous editions, see the project page on Meta-Wiki. Let askcac
wikimedia.org know if you have any feedback or suggestions for improvement!
MediaWiki message delivery 01:04, 17 September 2025 (UTC)
Question on an odd ongoing encounter
I've run into an odd issue & saw your name on the active WP:CONTACTCU so thought I would ask for help in determining if there's an issue. I'm participating in the NPP backlog and nominated an article for PROD & then AfD (the article was deleted). The PROD was removed by an IP account & another editor warned the article's creator about editing when logged out. Subsequently, an IP account in that range nominated an article I created for AfD & a different IP in the range voted in the AfD. While annoying, I was going to ignore it but then the same IP range popped up in another AfD I started to vote opposite my position. Does this seem like it has escalated to WP:FOLLOWING & if so, what is the recommended next step? Thanks! Sariel Xilo (talk) 21:02, 18 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Sariel Xilo, if I understand correctly, the suspicion is that the article creator removed a PROD, then voted "delete" in the AfD about their own article? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:46, 18 September 2025 (UTC)
- Ah no. The suspicion is the article creator removed the PROD as an IP but neither the creator nor the IP range interacted with the subsequent AfD. Instead, the IP range nominated an article I created for deletion & voted in that AfD. The same range has now voted "keep" in a different AfD I started (so interactions across 3 articles/AfDs). The range all starts with "102.91." & have the same ISP. Sariel Xilo (talk) 22:54, 18 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for notifying me about this, Sariel Xilo. Please let me know if this continues from an account or a new range or after the /19 rangeblock expires. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:29, 18 September 2025 (UTC)
- Will do! Thanks for taking a look. Sariel Xilo (talk) 23:38, 18 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for notifying me about this, Sariel Xilo. Please let me know if this continues from an account or a new range or after the /19 rangeblock expires. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:29, 18 September 2025 (UTC)
- Ah no. The suspicion is the article creator removed the PROD as an IP but neither the creator nor the IP range interacted with the subsequent AfD. Instead, the IP range nominated an article I created for deletion & voted in that AfD. The same range has now voted "keep" in a different AfD I started (so interactions across 3 articles/AfDs). The range all starts with "102.91." & have the same ISP. Sariel Xilo (talk) 22:54, 18 September 2025 (UTC)
Talk:Jack Posobiec
Somebody is throwing around the word "bias". I do not think it means what they think it means, at least where Wikipedia is concerned. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:25, 21 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:41, 21 September 2025 (UTC)
New message to ToBeFree
can you review my rollback request now Manualbadeditfix (talk) 19:24, 22 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks for the notification. I have replied there now :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:28, 22 September 2025 (UTC)
Fringe theories regarding the recent death of Yu Menglong
Hey, just wanted to let you know about my RfPP concerning the conspiracy theories which have started to creep in today. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:24, 22 September 2025 (UTC)
- Uh. Thanks for that request! Done for 3 months. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:15, 22 September 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-39
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- On September 24th at 15:00 UTC, all Wikimedia sites users will experience a brief read-only period due to a scheduled datacenter server switchover. The Wikimedia Foundation's Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) team will redirect all traffic from one primary server to its backup. You can listen to the switchover using the "Listen to Wikipedia" tool, where you will hear edits stop for a few minutes during the read-only phase, then resume. This twice-yearly datacenter server switchover ensures reliability by testing the backup datacenter, so that our sites can stay online even if the primary datacenter fails. You can read more about the process on the Diff blog.
Updates for editors
- Editors of 60 more Wiktionaries will soon be able to call functions from Wikifunctions and integrate them into their pages. A function takes one or more inputs and transforms them into a desired output, like adding numbers, converting miles to meters, calculating elapsed time, or declining a word into a case. They will join the other 65 Wiktionary language editions, which already have access to embedded Wikifunctions calls. Later this year, plans are in place to expand to more Wiktionaries and the Incubator.
- A new parser function has been added:
{{#contentmodel}}. Template editors and admins can use it to get the localized or canonical name of the content model of a specific page. The function makes it easier to create and edit system messages, such as MediaWiki:editinginterface, even when you switch types of pages, like wiki, JavaScript, CSS or JSON page. - Adding or editing a
DISPLAYTITLEfor an article using VisualEditor will no longer be broken. Editors who use VisualEditor mode to modify the{{DISPLAYTITLE}}would no longer have the literal text "DISPLAYTITLE" or its localized variant added to their articles. A list of pages that may have been affected and might need cleanup is documented in this ticket. - Beta users of the Wikipedia Android app can now try the redesigned Activity tab, which replaces the Edits tab. The new tab offers personalized insights into reading, editing, and donation activity, while simplifying navigation and making app use more engaging.
View all 12 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week.
Updates for technical contributors
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
In depth
- Wikifunctions users can now import many essential facts involving geo-coordinates, quantities and time values from Wikidata. This is made possible by the creation of Wikifunctions types for these values, which makes them available for use by functions in Wikifunctions. Learn more about how this works in this video and Wikifunctions' August 1 newsletter (for quantities) and August 22 newsletter (for geo-coordinates).
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 22:52, 22 September 2025 (UTC)
Communist state
There is a consensus on communist state, and there has been a noticeboard discussion. What are you doing? Either enforce WP Consensus and block him or do not involve yourself. He has already been repeatedly been blocked for edit warring and forcing his opinions on WP. Everyone agrees that "Communist state/Marxist-Leninst state" should be included.. and the article title is communist state. You wont see a single version that contradicts that. Start follow WP Consensus and actively involve yourself in the disputes that take place a 100% if you are going to involve yourself. TheUzbek (talk) 19:02, 22 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hello TheUzbek, the "government_type" parameter of the infobox of the article about the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic has been the subject of an edit war for weeks, including about whether it was a "unitary" or a "federal" communist state, such as in Special:Diff/1309523565. If there is a consensus for any state of that infobox parameter, please provide a link to it. If not, WP:BURDEN/WP:ONUS apply and the disputed content remains removed until a consensus is found. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:24, 22 September 2025 (UTC)
- Oh actually, the dispute is far older. And not even "communist state" was something everyone agreed on. Perhaps Nikkimaria has an idea how to resolve this. Start an RfC? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:08, 22 September 2025 (UTC)
- true that.. but again, no one is disputing that communist Czechoslovakia was communist. There is a consensus on that, but not the other clutter... TheUzbek (talk) 20:28, 22 September 2025 (UTC)
- TheUzbek, sorry, you're right. I have now restored the part everyone is fine with. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:04, 23 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you! It takes courage to admit to a mistake :) I will add that "communist state" is the only thing there is agreement on all the European communist states. Information on everything else should be included in a section that discusses the form of government. TheUzbek (talk) 10:36, 23 September 2025 (UTC)
- TheUzbek, sorry, you're right. I have now restored the part everyone is fine with. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:04, 23 September 2025 (UTC)
Original research at Wé Ani (recording artist)
Continually added by 199.88.52.18 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS), who claims to be a relative. I've already told them to put edit requests on the Talk page. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:35, 23 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification! The user seems to have replied at User talk:199.88.52.18; I think no action is needed at the moment. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:09, 24 September 2025 (UTC)
Brigitte Macron yet again
That Candace Owens lawsuit was readded today. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:39, 23 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hm. Bird244 is extended confirmed, so not even extended-confirmed protection would have prevented this. M.Bitton's Special:Diff/1313021075 seems to have been accepted without reverts, and the last such change was over two months ago. Setting up a protection that covers both this timespan and extended-confirmed editors would mean fully protecting the article for multiple months. I thus don't think there's anything I can do. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:12, 24 September 2025 (UTC)
- was I not supposed to add it? Bird244 (talk) 17:41, 24 September 2025 (UTC)
- Correct. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:56, 24 September 2025 (UTC)
- was I not supposed to add it? Bird244 (talk) 17:41, 24 September 2025 (UTC)
Revisiting Talk:Jack Posobiec
I don't know what the deal is with this Mjp1976 (talk · contribs) but it's evident that everyone who disagrees with this editor is a leftist communist. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 03:02, 27 September 2025 (UTC)
- Just send them to WP:AE if the behavior persists. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:49, 27 September 2025 (UTC)
Issues at Craig Parker
Hello. I’m very sorry to bother you yet again, but I honestly don’t know who else to bring this to… Seeing that BlueboyLINY reverted the previous edits again (without a discussion or consensus), I know that I am now meant to start a discussion on Craig Parker’s talk page to try to reach a consensus. But before I do, I wanted to ask — exactly how many discussions am I supposed to start? Because given the edits that BlueboyLINY has recently made to the article, I think it clearly shows that I cannot make even a minor edit to Craig Parker without him removing, changing, or reverting every single one of them. Is this meant to mean that I should start multiple discussions on the article’s talk page regarding all of these minor changes? I am really starting to feel like this is some sort of personal attack. He has done this repeatedly to any edits I have made for months. (Even to the few other pages I’ve edited when I was still using my IP address, before creating this account.) He seems to act as if he owns the page(s) and does not want to discuss, collaborate, or work with others. I just wanted to help add to an actor’s Wikipedia page that I respected and was knowledgeable about, but if this is how Wikipedia is meant to work, I really feel like I am fighting a losing battle.
Thank you for your time. NicR77 (talk) 15:16, 25 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi NicR77, a discussion on the article's talk page has a large benefit: Anyone can join and provide their opinion. Simply start a section there for one specific change you currently want to make. Propose making the change, explain why you'd like to make it. And then invite BlueboyLINY to the discussion with a message on their user talk page, like {{Please see}}. Not more. Then wait. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:22, 26 September 2025 (UTC)
Editor Monimutkaisuus and Olga Shishkina (musician)
I proposed deletion of the article over notability and a clear lack of references. Monimutkaisuus (talk · contribs) came along a few days earlier, added a bunch of references at the bottom of the article and removed the proposed deletion. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:58, 27 September 2025 (UTC)
- As pointed out in Special:Diff/1313819365, we'd need a regular deletion discussion in such cases. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:38, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Wanted to let you know that I just put a WP:PAID notice on Moni's user talk. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:50, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- I occasionally read things as saying the opposite of what they actually do; must've happened again with that deletion template. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:03, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks and no worries! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:20, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- COIN discussion now exists. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:24, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks and no worries! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:20, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
Titikaka3456/The admin's unilateral deletion of the Italian reporter’s page.
Dear Admin, I noticed that the majority of the information on Daniele Compatangelo’s Wikipedia page has been deleted, including content that had been documented with reliable references dating back to 2017. I believe this was not an appropriate decision. All the references were included and verifiable, many from Italian sources. Just because a reporter may not be widely known in the U.S., or because some references are in Italian, does not justify the removal of well-sourced information. It only takes a quick search to verify the reporter's credentials and relevance. As an Italian speaker who follows Mr. Compatangelo’s work closely — particularly his reporting from the White House — I was updating the page to reflect factual, sourced content. The removal of this information feels unjustified and, frankly, dismissive of non-English sources and international perspectives. This is not about personal views or opinions; it's about maintaining factual integrity on Wikipedia. I kindly ask that you reconsider restoring the removed content or at least engage in a proper discussion before such significant edits are made. Wikipedia is a collaborative platform, not a place for unilateral decisions based on subjective judgments. Thank you for your attention. I'm here to contribute constructively and learn. Titikaka3456 (talk) 21:50, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Titikaka3456, let's discuss this at Talk:Daniele Compatangelo § Promotion / résumé. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:56, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Dear User and Admin,
- I kindly invite you to review the links, which are in Italian, rather than repeatedly removing the page unilaterally—especially considering that the content has been available since 2017. I speak Italian and have been following this reporter online for years. If you are not familiar with him, that should not be a reason to simply delete information from the page without providing evidence that the information is incorrect.
- It’s important to approach this matter with fairness and understanding. There doesn’t seem to be any clear reason to take such action against a reporter who works from the White House. I hope we can work together to ensure that all information is treated respectfully and objectively.
- Thank you for your attention and cooperation. Titikaka3456 (talk) 21:59, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Titikaka3456, I had mentioned this directly above but I should clarify here again that I'm not acting as an administrator in this dispute and Skywatcher68 shouldn't have referred to me as "admin", especially not as the sole reason for reverting after a discussion on my talk page that led to my edit. That went less than optimal. Anyway: Let us please keep the content-related discussion on the article talk page, not on individual user talk pages like this one here. User talk pages are great for discussing conduct, which is why I had created a few sections on yours, but your concerns appear to be mostly about whether specific material is neutral and worth adding to an article. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:04, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
Josh Gracin
Apparently the subject is editing the article. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 03:59, 29 September 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for the notification, Skywatcher68. What a weird situation emerged there. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:42, 29 September 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-40
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- A major software upgrade has been made to Phabricator. The update introduces performance improvements, a refreshed search interface, enhancements to Maniphest task search, updates to user profile pages and project workboards, new Herald automation features, as well as general text input, mobile experience improvements and more.
Updates for editors
- The Community Tech team will release the new Community Wishlist extension on October 1, that will improve the way wishes will be submitted. The new extension will allow users to add tags to their wishes to better categorise them, and (in a future iteration) to filter them by status, tags and focus areas. It will also be possible to support individual wishes again, as requested by the community in many instances. The old system will be retired. There will be a brief period of downtime while the extension is deployed and wishes are migrated to the new system. You can read more about this in the latest update or you can consult the current documentation on MediaWiki.
- As announced on Diff blog, the production trial of the hCaptcha service for bot detection has begun. The trial is currently using hCaptcha to protect account creation on Chinese, Persian, Portuguese, Indonesian, Japanese, and Turkish Wikipedias, where it will replace our existing CAPTCHA (FancyCaptcha). The goal with the trial is to better block bots while also improving usability and accessibility for users who encounter CAPTCHA challenges.
- The CampaignEvents extension has been deployed to Wikimedia Commons. The extension makes it easier to organize and participate in collaborative activities, like edit-a-thons and WikiProjects, on the wikis. On Commons, anyone who is a registered user can use it as an event participant. To use it as an organizer, someone needs to have the event organizer right.
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Felipe Correa
Seems to me that the recent IP edits are correct in removing the misconduct allegations. I'm unable to find any secondary sources supporting them. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:44, 29 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much! Good catch and thank you very much for searching for sources too. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:12, 29 September 2025 (UTC)
146.200.134.81 possible block evasion
Hi ToBeFree,
146.200.134.81 had IP hopped to 146.200.134.71 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log). Just a few days ago (before the partially block ended), 146.200.134.71 are restoring the same edit as 146.200.134.81 (which you partially blocked from the The Wrong Paris) and ignoring the consensus on Talk:The Wrong Paris#Starring cast. Both IP addresses are in the same city. — YoungForever(talk) 16:06, 29 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi YoungForever, thanks for the notification! I have now semi-protected the article for 3 months. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:20, 29 September 2025 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2025 Issue 18

Upcoming and current events and conversations
Let's Talk continues
- CEE Meeting: Wikimedia CEE Meeting 2025 will be held in Thessaloniki, Greece, September 26-28.
- Learning Clinic: The next Let's Connect Learning Clinic will talk about "Mastering the Capacity Exchange (CapX) Tool" and will take place on September 30 at 13:00 UTC.
- Big Fat Brussels Meeting: The tenth in-person gathering of Wikimedians enthusiastic in free knowledge advocacy, Big Fat Brussels Meeting, will take place on October 3-4.
- Wikimedia Research Showcase: "Celebrating 13 Years: Wikidata’s Role in Learning and Culture" will be the featured theme for the next research showcase taking place on October 15 at 16:30 UTC.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Research · Web · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Tech News: Read updates from Tech News week 38 and 39.
- Wikifunctions: Wikifunctions is now available on 123 Wiktionary languages and have more than 3,000 functions available.
- Collaborative Contributions: A new feature, called Collaborative Contributions, allows editors to see the impact of their collaborative editing activities. It was live demoed earlier and you can follow instructions to test it out.
- CampaignEvents extension: The CampaignEvents extension was deployed to Wikimedia Commons and all Wikisources -80+ wikis.
- Event registration: Starting the week of October 6, on small and medium wikis that have the CampaignEvents extension enabled, all autoconfirmed users will be able to use Event Registration as an organizer. No changes will be made for large wikis unless requested in Phabricator. More information on Meta.
- Search Suggestions: Upon clicking an empty search bar, logged-out users now see suggestions of articles for further reading on all Wikipedias, in order to make it easier for users to find articles.
- Datacenter server switchover: A successful datacenter server switchover backup test took place on September 24.
- Activity Tab now on Android: Beta users of the Wikipedia Android app can now try the redesigned Activity tab, which replaces the Edits tab. The new tab offers personalized insights into reading, editing, and donation activity, while simplifying navigation and making app use more engaging.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · list of movement events
- Banners & Logos policies: The Wikimedia Foundation has published draft proposals for policies related to the use of banners and logo changes for advocacy purposes.
- Wikipedia 25: Wikimedia Foundation is creating playful, celebratory interventions on the Wikipedia portal page, the Wikipedia app, and potentially any interested Wikipedias to celebrate Wikipedia’s 25th birthday. Please share your inputs and add your username on the Talk page if you think your community would be interested in participating.
- Regional Funds: Welcoming new ESEAP Regional Funds Committee Members.
- Peer Learning: Reflections from Let’s Connect at Wikimania Nairobi 2025.
Annual Goals Progress on Effectiveness
See also: Progress on the annual plan
Board and Board committee updates
See Wikimedia Foundation Board noticeboard · Affiliations Committee Newsletter
- Wikimedia Georgia: Wikimedia Georgia becomes the newest Wikimedia Chapter.
Foundation statements
- Knowledge integrity: The Wikimedia Foundation launches a new series that explores how Wikipedia can inspire new standards of knowledge integrity for our times.
Highlights from other Movement curated newsletters & news
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- National award: Wikipedian and current chair of Wikimedia Deutschland, Alice Wiegand, receives the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany for her voluntary commitment to Wikipedia and the global Wikimedia movement.
- Supporting admins and patrollers: Motivating, training and networking – Wikimedia Ukraine’s plan to support Wikipedia admins and patrollers.
- Wikimania roundup: A roundup of Wikimania and this year's Wikimedians of the year by the French-speaking community's newsletter, Regards sur l’actualité du mouvement Wikimédia (Views on Wikimedia movement's events, or RAW).
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MediaWiki message delivery 16:26, 30 September 2025 (UTC)
Can Daniele Compatangelo be saved?
What a mess! Evidently created by Daniele Compatangelo (talk · contribs) himself with relatively recent support by Antonio68246 (talk · contribs) and Titikaka3456 (talk · contribs). Viewmont Viking (talk · contribs) tried to bring the article to Wikipedia standards but was reverted as "a hater" (paraphrased) by Antonio. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 22:15, 27 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, Antonio68246 has last edited over 5 months ago. I went ahead and removed most of the article's content as promotional, but that's something others can do too and now I'd be too involved to take any action. Please avoid asking me to do editorial work. If you'd like to remove something, remove it; if you would like to nominate for deletion because of a lack of notability, good luck digging through the Italian sources. I should probably not have touched this at all; it's a timesink. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:03, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Oh, I wasn't asking you to edit anything; just your opinion. I could have reverted back to the Viking's edit myself if you felt that was a good idea. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:29, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Ah well, all good. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:20, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Titikaka3456 (talk · contribs) restored content for similar reasons as Antonio; I've reverted to your version. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:29, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Looking at the history I see Robrob7578 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and Andrewikilover (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), I have little doubt there's probably a connection with the latest accounts. FDW777 (talk) 19:44, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi FDW777, oh! Thanks. I hadn't noticed this might even be block evasion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:30, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- " I personally edited this page — as I have done with many others... " I count two other articles under that name; did Titikaka just out themselves as a sock? –Skywatcher68 (talk) 04:34, 30 September 2025 (UTC)
- I don't know. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:48, 30 September 2025 (UTC)
- " I personally edited this page — as I have done with many others... " I count two other articles under that name; did Titikaka just out themselves as a sock? –Skywatcher68 (talk) 04:34, 30 September 2025 (UTC)
- Hi FDW777, oh! Thanks. I hadn't noticed this might even be block evasion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:30, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- I'm not acting as an admin there ... if the material was promotional in your view, perhaps that would have been a better reason for the edit summary ... well well. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:29, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Looking at the history I see Robrob7578 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and Andrewikilover (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), I have little doubt there's probably a connection with the latest accounts. FDW777 (talk) 19:44, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Titikaka3456 (talk · contribs) restored content for similar reasons as Antonio; I've reverted to your version. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:29, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Ah well, all good. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:20, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
- Oh, I wasn't asking you to edit anything; just your opinion. I could have reverted back to the Viking's edit myself if you felt that was a good idea. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:29, 28 September 2025 (UTC)
Stonewalling
Hi, can you review this TP-discussion titled "Di Lellio"? You don't need to read the very first paragraph in that section written four days ago, it is not in dispute. My hands are tied dealing with the editor, Ktrimi991, who won't even bother dealing with the concerns raised. This is very obvious stonewalling. Azor (talk). 19:38, 30 September 2025 (UTC)
- I know I am yet to get involved in that discussion, but please be aware that Azor has misrepresented sources in that article, and they have done so on numerous occasions on the same article in recent times. I am currently busy, but I will be adding to that section of the article with source precision later on when time permits.
- A while back, I asked you, ToBeFree, to deal with Azor’s constant cyclical edit-warring, stonewalling (which they ironically accuse another editor of) and disruptive behaviour in which they lack sufficient source work, since you took it upon yourself to block the both of us from that article temporarily a while ago. Nonetheless, you did not take any action, and Azor has continued with this behaviour. A brief glance at recent discussions and the edit history will show you that Azor keeps engaging in edit-wars over sourced content that was already discussed throughout the previous months, and maybe even years in some cases. Something needs to be done to curb this behaviour. Botushali (talk) 23:54, 30 September 2025 (UTC)
- In January 2024, almost two years ago, I had placed three-months blocks from editing this article and the same people are still fighting over the same page?
- Don't you have other things to do? Requesting topic bans for you both at WP:ANI perhaps? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:05, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- And what exactly in my behaviour warrants a topic ban here? Is that supposed to be a threat? Botushali (talk) 09:15, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- Treating the page as a battleground for two years, I guess. If you have behavioral concerns about each other, please raise them at WP:ANI. I'm not interested in doing so, so this is not a threat of anything; all I'm saying is you should probably disengage instead of focusing so strongly on a single article and others' behaviors in editing that one specific article. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:30, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- It is disappointing when, for example, Botushali changes the entire article to a version he prefers, despite knowing this is a continuous topic. Major disputable changes should go through an RfC, which I am the only one to initiate. I am not sure if the outcome will favor my version again, but at least it will be decided by a neutral editor. It is unfortunate that disputes persist, though I remain hopeful they can be handled more constructively. I didn’t expect this TP notification to turn out that way, sorry about that. Azor (talk). 19:26, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- And shortly after, the same version is added back by AlexBachmann. Consensus is not achieved by repeatedly inserting a preferred version, rewriting large parts of the article, and then edit-warring to keep it in place. These are huge changes, yet past discussions are being disregarded. This is exactly why the article keeps going in circles. I am all ears to any advice. Azor (talk). 20:19, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- Azor's revert is a failed attempt to remove constructive edits made by Botushali. He did not provide an appropriate explanation, which was the reason for my revert. It rather seemed like a one mistake = everything wrong argument with no real value. I carefully evaluated Botushali's improvements and find that they are completely eligible for Wikipedian standards. Ironically, Azor reasons with an argument which he himself had dismissed a few years ago when the opinion of Dejan Djokic was included (and still maintains).
In January 2024, almost two years ago, I had placed three-months blocks from editing this article and the same people are still fighting over the same page?
Sadly, yes. And when you compare the version of Jan 24 to now, it becomes evident that this article has been subject to the cleasing of everything Albanian. Literally every single discussion of the talk page is about removing something Albanian. Just for your consideration.- I also believe that this is the wrong venue for discussing. Thanks. AlexBachmann (talk) 20:32, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- It is. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:57, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- And shortly after, the same version is added back by AlexBachmann. Consensus is not achieved by repeatedly inserting a preferred version, rewriting large parts of the article, and then edit-warring to keep it in place. These are huge changes, yet past discussions are being disregarded. This is exactly why the article keeps going in circles. I am all ears to any advice. Azor (talk). 20:19, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- It is disappointing when, for example, Botushali changes the entire article to a version he prefers, despite knowing this is a continuous topic. Major disputable changes should go through an RfC, which I am the only one to initiate. I am not sure if the outcome will favor my version again, but at least it will be decided by a neutral editor. It is unfortunate that disputes persist, though I remain hopeful they can be handled more constructively. I didn’t expect this TP notification to turn out that way, sorry about that. Azor (talk). 19:26, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- Treating the page as a battleground for two years, I guess. If you have behavioral concerns about each other, please raise them at WP:ANI. I'm not interested in doing so, so this is not a threat of anything; all I'm saying is you should probably disengage instead of focusing so strongly on a single article and others' behaviors in editing that one specific article. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:30, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- And what exactly in my behaviour warrants a topic ban here? Is that supposed to be a threat? Botushali (talk) 09:15, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
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Have a look
HI, it is regarding this article. Today another (relatively new) user with EC rights showed up, and tried doing the same . It is OR, since according to the source, the subject wants a divorce, not that they are divorced. Don't know why why all this drama in a Wikipedia article
Facepalm . - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 20:34, 30 September 2025 (UTC)
- The BO77!, what are you doing there? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:01, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- The BO77! has continued editing without responding. Well, and without editing the article again. I guess this can be archived. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:31, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree, They got divorced multiple news sources are supporting this statement and I think we need to take some time for better source.🌟 𝒯𝐻𝐸 𝐵𝒪𝒮𝒮! 19:34, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi The BO77!, I guess a single reliable source would already have been sufficient. If there is none, what makes you so sure? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:40, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree, In this articles you can find the original post shared by his wife on facebook., and 🌟 𝒯𝐻𝐸 𝐵𝒪𝒮𝒮! 08:23, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- Well, at least the infobox parameter shouldn't list a spouse if the accuracy of that statement has been challenged in good faith and it lacks recent reliable citations, so I have removed it for now. The rest of the marriage-related content doesn't seem to (potentially incorrectly) state that the marriage still exists, so that should be fine.
- Adding content requires good sources and I'm not sure if these are. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:24, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- The original post by the subject's wife says nothing about the divorce. It is only in these unreliable sources that we see a WP:OR version of a supposed 'divorce'. These two sources (unavailable) are unreliable (and had been used by other IPs and COI users before). Only this one mentions that they are 'separated', though I'm not sure of its reliability, since the screenshot of the wife's post doesn't mention a 'separation' explicitly let alone a 'divorce', not to mention these posts are unavailable (hushed up).
- Note that there was a divorce rumor in 2019 that was covered in reliable sources, and that time it was the wife supposedly 'filing a divorce' against Biplab Deb, a claim posted by someone named Anupam Paul in Facebook, which was rubbished by both Biplab Deb and his wife Niti , and a police case was also filed against that offender . What if all this is just a rumour, publicity stunt or something.
- Third, I'm not sure why the spouse parameter has to be removed when the subject's marriage to that woman (Niti Deb) isn't contentious but a fact, not only confirmed by these flimsy unreliable sources presented by these by the army of COI/Sock/Meat editors but also by many reliable sources over the years (two RS above), including the Government of Tripura source here and verified handles of the subjects (the ). Also values like 'separated', 'divorced', 'died' are available to be used with the
|reason=parameter in the 'marriage' template. Removing the wife's name seems like the she never existed, something which these COI/Sock/Meat users and IPs were doing since the beginning. These reliable sources mention that the subject wants a divorce and the wife's social media quote (unavailable) seems to allude to it. So what I'd like to suggest for now as a "better compromise" (for lack of explcit) is use the 'separated' value as the reason in IB unless we have official confirmation of divorce, and expansion based on it.
- - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 12:17, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- I'm fine with anything that doesn't imply the marriage still exists unless there are recent reliable sources for this. This is a common and embarrassing issue with Wikipedia biographies of living people who have recently divorced, see also https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64033028 for a case where this absurdity went through the news. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:45, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- I did the needful changes. Myself came across quite a few such cases——divorces, birth-dates, birthplaces, birth-names, citizenship, profile-pics and the likes, where the ill-informed subjects of the articles chose to bash Wikipedia (they should understand that these articles belong to Wikipedia where Wiki rules apply). What they could have done was simply correct it through third-part sources or interviews (for the non-SPS stuff). Some did, actually, after reading my suggestions in the talk pages and elsewhere. Then there are some who would go to OTRS. I remember one Pakistani actress doing that because we reverted a host of fans reducing her age following an Instragram post where she "updated" her DoB. Nothing of that sort happened before. In another case concerning an Indian actor's BLP, a high profile case of litigation against his spouse's boss was removed by OTRS despite being longstanding and widely sourced. It was seemingly due since associated with the spouse' miscarriage while working under the said boss. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 15:30, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks!
- In some cases (or even most?), "simply" correcting something through third-party sources or interviews is not a thing. The easier it is to do so, the less independent the source obviously is. If I can just tell someone to write it, it's not an independent source and then suddenly also useless if that's the criterion. That said, WP:BLPSELFPUB may apply to claims of divorces. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:06, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- I did the needful changes. Myself came across quite a few such cases——divorces, birth-dates, birthplaces, birth-names, citizenship, profile-pics and the likes, where the ill-informed subjects of the articles chose to bash Wikipedia (they should understand that these articles belong to Wikipedia where Wiki rules apply). What they could have done was simply correct it through third-part sources or interviews (for the non-SPS stuff). Some did, actually, after reading my suggestions in the talk pages and elsewhere. Then there are some who would go to OTRS. I remember one Pakistani actress doing that because we reverted a host of fans reducing her age following an Instragram post where she "updated" her DoB. Nothing of that sort happened before. In another case concerning an Indian actor's BLP, a high profile case of litigation against his spouse's boss was removed by OTRS despite being longstanding and widely sourced. It was seemingly due since associated with the spouse' miscarriage while working under the said boss. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 15:30, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- I'm fine with anything that doesn't imply the marriage still exists unless there are recent reliable sources for this. This is a common and embarrassing issue with Wikipedia biographies of living people who have recently divorced, see also https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64033028 for a case where this absurdity went through the news. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:45, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree, In this articles you can find the original post shared by his wife on facebook., and 🌟 𝒯𝐻𝐸 𝐵𝒪𝒮𝒮! 08:23, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi The BO77!, I guess a single reliable source would already have been sufficient. If there is none, what makes you so sure? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:40, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree, They got divorced multiple news sources are supporting this statement and I think we need to take some time for better source.🌟 𝒯𝐻𝐸 𝐵𝒪𝒮𝒮! 19:34, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
- The BO77! has continued editing without responding. Well, and without editing the article again. I guess this can be archived. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:31, 1 October 2025 (UTC)
Checkuser?
Hi there, I've had it suggested that a CU might be in order for the article and talkpage for Rampal (spiritual leader) - but I've never done that before, and I'm somewhat shy and nervous, so I'm reaching out to you because we briefly crossed paths regarding Zak Smith and I'm marginally less shy and nervous reaching out to someone I've had interactions with. I see that you've got the permissions yourself; would you mind terribly taking a look, or pointing me in the right direction? NekoKatsun (nyaa) 14:44, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi NekoKatsun, thanks for asking! Ponyo was faster
Please do try WP:SPI for reporting the next case of sockpuppetry, it's even less personal than having to ask an individual checkuser and it ensures that the report is looked at, categorized, handled neutrally and quickly. Individual checkusers might be away or might lack the time to perform an investigation. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:04, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks very much (and I already thanked the edit but also thanks to Ponyo). I think I'm worried I'll be accused of not assuming enough good faith, so I overcompensate to the other side of things, hahaha. NekoKatsun (nyaa) 21:23, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- It's all good.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:37, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- It's all good.
- Thanks very much (and I already thanked the edit but also thanks to Ponyo). I think I'm worried I'll be accused of not assuming enough good faith, so I overcompensate to the other side of things, hahaha. NekoKatsun (nyaa) 21:23, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
Nate Henry
Apparently is being edited by Nate Henry himself. I would simply revert as WP:NOPROMO but one source (Kickstarter) is now blacklisted. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:55, 2 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, I think the best approach would be manually removing everything that seems unverifiable or promotional. I went ahead and removed the worst. And if possible, someone should provide sources or start a deletion discussion if a search led to none. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:37, 3 October 2025 (UTC)
Deutsch
Vinizex94
I noticed on your block message that the non-existence of the reference at Special:Diff/1314439185 was the final straw leading up to the block. However, I did see that there is an archived version of that reference located at Sky Sports' website; why not simply change the reference to add the archive URL instead of blocking them? I'm struggling to see how this could be related to using ChatGPT, could you clarify? Gommeh 📖 🎮 19:39, 3 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Gommeh, I didn't check if there's a copy in the Internet Archive but I'm not surprised that the reference had once existed, became part of ChatGPT and was thus used by a human who never tried to even open the link. It's also the reason why the access date is in the far past. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:04, 3 October 2025 (UTC)
Same IP at it again
Could you take a look at User_talk:73.194.17.8, whom you blocked earlier this year? The block has passed, and they're back to making the exact same unsourced edits. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 22:52, 3 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi NatGertler, Tamzin was faster
~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:17, 5 October 2025 (UTC)
About rollback length
how long does it have to be since the latest content dispute to get rollback done Manualbadeditfix (talk) 19:11, 4 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Manualbadeditfix, you're applying for additional rights to undo the contributions of others in an English encyclopedia; you're applying for additional tools in patrolling others' encyclopedia work. In my eyes, doing so requires at least some minimum effort at writing correct, professional English. Please treat Wikipedia more like a workplace, less like a videogame chat. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:21, 5 October 2025 (UTC)
- okay Manualbadeditfix (talk) 22:32, 5 October 2025 (UTC)
- That didn't yet work. I hope your message isn't the result of trying to implement this. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:55, 5 October 2025 (UTC)
- okay Manualbadeditfix (talk) 22:32, 5 October 2025 (UTC)
Survey
Hi and thanks for your recent participation in AfD. I would like to hear your thoughts about the process. Please check this survey if you are willing to respond.Czarking0 (talk) 02:16, 6 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Czarking0, thank you very much for the invitation! I assume this is about my comment at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Daniele Compatangelo and have now answered at User:Czarking0/Survey responses. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:59, 6 October 2025 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Transgender_healthcare_and_people/Proposed_decision#Aaron_Liu_admonished
Your comment says "Second choice to 19.2.". There is no 19.2. --GRuban (talk) 13:37, 6 October 2025 (UTC)
- Oops! I hadn't yet created 19.2 when typing this; it became "19.1" as there was no 19.1 yet. Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:48, 6 October 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-41
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- Paste Check is a new Edit Check feature to help avoid and fight copyright violations. When editors paste text into an article, Paste Check prompts them to confirm the origin and licensing of the content. Starting Wednesday, 8 October, 22 wikis will test Paste Check. Paste Check will help new volunteers understand and follow the policies and guidelines necessary to make constructive contributions to Wikipedia projects.
Updates for editors
- Mobile devices will receive mobile articles directly on the standard domain (like
en.wikipedia.org), instead of via a redirect to an "m" domain (likeen.m.wikipedia.org). This change improves performance. This week it will be enabled on Wikipedias. The existing mobile URLs and the "Desktop view" opt-out remain available. Learn more. - New date filters,
creationdate:andlasteditdate:, are now available in the wiki search engine. This allows users to filter search results by a page's first or last revision date. The filters support comparison operators (e.g.>2024) and relative dates (e.g.today-1d), making it easier to find recently updated content or pages within specific age ranges. - Wikifunctions now supports rich text in embedded calls across the 150 wikis where it's enabled. To showcase this, the team created a Latin declination table that Wiktionary editors can use to automatically generate noun forms, producing clear, formatted results — see an example output. If you need any help or have any feedback, please contact the Wikifunctions Team.
- An edit link will now appear inside the categories box on article pages for logged in users, which will directly launch the VisualEditor category dialog.
View all 34 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, there was a problem downloading pdf files last week and that has been resolved.
Updates for technical contributors
- The field
rev_sha1in the revision database table is being removed in favor ofcontent_sha1in the content database table. See the announcement for more information. - The Reader Experience team will roll out Dark Mode user interface on all Wikimedia sites on October 29, 2025. All anonymous users of Wikimedia sites will have the option to activate a color scheme that features light-colored text on a dark background. This is designed to provide a more comfortable reading experience, especially in low-light situations. Template authors and technical contributors are encouraged to learn how to make pages ready for Dark mode and address any compatibility issues found in templates in their wiki before the enablement. Please contact the Web team for questions or any support on this talk page before the enablement.
- Starting on Monday, October 6, API endpoints under the
rest.phppath will be rerouted through a new internal API Gateway. Individual wikis will be updated based on the standard release groups, with total traffic increased over time. This change is expected to be non-breaking and non-disruptive. If any issues are observed, please file a Phabricator ticket to the Service Ops team board.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 17:20, 6 October 2025 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – October 2025
News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2025).

- After a motion, arbitration enforcement page protections no longer need to be logged in the AELOG. A bot now automatically posts protections at WP:AELOG/P. To facilitate this bot, protection summaries must include a link to the relevant CT page (e.g.
[[WP:CT/BLP]]), and you will receive talk page reminders if you forget to specify the contentious topic but otherwise indicate it is an AE action.
About rollback
Should I request for rollback rights? I have more than 1,000 edits (most are reverts/warns) and the last time I participated in an edit war was more than one month ago. Manualbadeditfix (talk) 23:44, 8 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Manualbadeditfix, thank you very much for asking. Please have a look at User:ToBeFree/rollbackgiven. If you summarize these points in your own words (no AI) here in response to my message, I'll probably grant rollback for a month or two as a trial. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:49, 8 October 2025 (UTC)
- When getting the rollback right, users can now revert edits quickly without having to use Twinkle.
- When users rollback an edit, a warning should be given to the vandal. Otherwise, the rollback user right may be revoked.
- Using rollback to revert edits may upset or confuse a user. Rollbackers should respond to the vandal in their talk page if this happens.
- Since the rollback edit summary is not explained (and can't be updated), it should not be used to revert any good faith edits, including disruptive edits.
- Edit warring using the rollback option is discouraged, which usually happens during a content dispute. Since all rollbackers are expected to follow the three revert rule, it is best to file reports at WP:ANEW.
- If you encounter issues such as physical harm or private information (including passwords) while using rollback, please file a report at Special:EmailUser/Oversight or Special:EmailUser/Emergency.
- Manualbadeditfix (talk) 00:07, 9 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks!
Done until the end of the year. If you liked the trial and want to have rollback without expiry, please let me know on 29 December or any later date. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:18, 9 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you. Manualbadeditfix (talk) 00:18, 9 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks!
IP Vandalism
I may have been quick with the report. The useless edit does seem consistent with the vandalism the school's IP has done in the past. This is the first report I have ever made so what is the typical procedure? More vandalism edits must occur first? W00zles (talk) 02:17, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi W00zles, thanks for the report and the clarification. In some cases, perhaps even most, even a single edit resuming the behavior that led to the block is fine enough with me as a re-block reason. But in this specific case, without being able to provide a general rule to you, sorry, the address had been blocked for many years and resumed with something that could arguably even have been a good edit. I didn't check if the term has been linked further up on the same page, for example, which would make it a fine edit. The bar for a reblock from my side is very low, which is why I was surprised to see someone managing to submit a report below the bar. :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:38, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
Related to your comment here
ToBeFree, I think there is a misconception in your edit note here . I don't think I'm against sanctions as a whole. Rather I'm tend to speak up when I think sanctions are more than is needed. Something I disputed regarding the FoF is the claim that I was defending bad behavior (with the understanding I did screw up in one of the cases). I'm willing to take people to ANI if I think they are acting in a way that is a problem . But even in that case my concern is the problem goes away rather than being sanctioned. From that case, "My feeling is if you understand the CIVIL issues with your comments and you agree to follow CIVIL, AGF, FOC (comment on the content, not the editor in particular), and FORUM type comments, I see no reason for any sanctions. The best outcomes from an ANI are ones where an issue is understood and corrected.". Given that at least some of the incivility was directed at me I'm not trying to defending it. I do have a series of questions related to the tban. Where is the correct place to ask for clarification? Springee (talk) 05:22, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Springee, thank you very much for the clarification. My edit summary was an oversimplified attempt to explain why the removed comment was bad. I hadn't thought about it enough before sending it and wanted to undo having sent it at all, which is of course not possible on Wikipedia. Regarding clarification, I think the two main places you can ask at are the proposed decision's talk page and WP:ARCA, the latter always and even when the case is closed. If the case is about to be closed, waiting for it to be closed and then asking at ARCA might be preferable. The answers ar ARCA are also more authoritative than single arbitrators' responses on the proposed decision's talk page. Very simple questions about how bans work in general can instead be asked at the Teahouse, but that's really just for questions that could be answered by reading WP:BAN from top to bottom. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:09, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you. Regarding the FoF question and before this is closed, is it possible to change my FoF from "this leads them to frequently defend editors engaging in blatant disruption..." to "frequently call for lesser/no formal sections against editors...". I do think it's important to note that I call for the behavior to stop but perhaps I'm, perhaps unrealistically, optimistic that editors will change without the more severe sanctions. Springee (talk) 10:55, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- Springee, I think this is a matter of interpretation and yours isn't shared by a majority of the committee, but you can of course request this in your section on the proposed decision's talk page. I personally find it unlikely that the FoF is now going to be changed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:41, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks. Part of what I'm thinking about is how would I show this isn't an issue in the future? When an editor is tbanned for in one CTOP, one way to show they have changed their methods is to show how they handle similar conflicts correctly in a different CTOP. How would I go about demonstrating this isn't an ongoing problem at a future review? Springee (talk) 12:31, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- The premise about a "different CTOP" is ... questionable. "I was banned for conflicts in one area but don't worry, I went to another area to have conflicts there to prove how good I'm now at handling conflicts" won't lead to an unban. Far better would be conflict-less editing for years. The list of contentious topics doesn't exist to provide you with a list of other ways to play with fire, and it is absolutely not meant to encourage you to do so. Please stay away from them if you can. The Task Center and the community portal are full of ideas and none of them has to be done in any contentious topic area. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:58, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- I wasn't using the CTOP example to say, "look how much more civil my fights are here". Rather, I've seen editors who have successfully appealed tbans in one CTOPs area by both noting the issues that lead to the tban and pointing to clean work/handling issues acceptably in a different CTOP area. In my case there isn't really a parallel to ANI/ARE. How do I show that I'm no longer "frequently defending" bad behavior? I'm sorry if this is too many questions. Perhaps this is something to ask when the case isn't fresh. Springee (talk) 14:59, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- Ah, I see it now. I think from a "how to argue for getting unbanned" perspective, your noticeboard ban is more comparable to interaction bans than to topic bans. If you're interaction-banned from a specific user, the ban was placed with an already-existing understanding that your interactions towards others are fine. So your interactions with other users are not a useful argument for getting the interaction ban removed. Similarly, any argument into the direction "I would like to communicate with the user again" may fail; you had your chance and especially if the other user doesn't welcome the interactions, the ban would stay. The best argument for removing an interaction ban, or also a block from one specific page, is perhaps that being affected by a ban is a general problem affecting your standing and your ability to participate in the community. You would probably have to argue that despite having lost your interest in discussing others' conduct, you'd like to see the ban lifted because it is not longer necessary to prevent disruption and its collateral damage outweighs the benefits after all the time. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:11, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- I wasn't using the CTOP example to say, "look how much more civil my fights are here". Rather, I've seen editors who have successfully appealed tbans in one CTOPs area by both noting the issues that lead to the tban and pointing to clean work/handling issues acceptably in a different CTOP area. In my case there isn't really a parallel to ANI/ARE. How do I show that I'm no longer "frequently defending" bad behavior? I'm sorry if this is too many questions. Perhaps this is something to ask when the case isn't fresh. Springee (talk) 14:59, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- The premise about a "different CTOP" is ... questionable. "I was banned for conflicts in one area but don't worry, I went to another area to have conflicts there to prove how good I'm now at handling conflicts" won't lead to an unban. Far better would be conflict-less editing for years. The list of contentious topics doesn't exist to provide you with a list of other ways to play with fire, and it is absolutely not meant to encourage you to do so. Please stay away from them if you can. The Task Center and the community portal are full of ideas and none of them has to be done in any contentious topic area. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:58, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks. Part of what I'm thinking about is how would I show this isn't an issue in the future? When an editor is tbanned for in one CTOP, one way to show they have changed their methods is to show how they handle similar conflicts correctly in a different CTOP. How would I go about demonstrating this isn't an ongoing problem at a future review? Springee (talk) 12:31, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- Springee, I think this is a matter of interpretation and yours isn't shared by a majority of the committee, but you can of course request this in your section on the proposed decision's talk page. I personally find it unlikely that the FoF is now going to be changed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:41, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you. Regarding the FoF question and before this is closed, is it possible to change my FoF from "this leads them to frequently defend editors engaging in blatant disruption..." to "frequently call for lesser/no formal sections against editors...". I do think it's important to note that I call for the behavior to stop but perhaps I'm, perhaps unrealistically, optimistic that editors will change without the more severe sanctions. Springee (talk) 10:55, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
AN3
Hi, this is regarding https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Edit_warring#User:Enigma_orange_reported_by_User:Moxfyre_(Result:_protected)
You marked this case as "closed." Can you clarify what this means?
This page has been (1) protected for 2 days, and (2) left in the state where a lot of relevant information has been removed from it, which is preferred by the newly-created accounts but not by me or the other long-term editors who've disagreed with their edits. —Moxfyre (ǝɹʎℲxoɯ | contrib) 01:22, 11 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Moxfyre, whatever is left to be discussed about the page doesn't belong to the edit warring noticeboard. Concerns about which version was protected could be voiced on the protecting administrator's talk page, once (and without a huge debate between more users than the admin and yourself), or on the article's talk page, perhaps including a formal edit request, but not on the edit warring noticeboard if there is no edit war going on. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:26, 11 October 2025 (UTC)
- (And that said, as now also formally noted on your talk page, I think you'll need to have a look at WP:BLPRESTORE.) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:30, 11 October 2025 (UTC)
10gokk10
I'm 10gokk10 I have only two accounts 10gok10 and 10gokk10. I made 10gokk10 because I can't log into 10gok10 and Wikipedia say we send you verification email but don't send me email. If you want block my all my accounts block,but fo not block other poor people that has nothing to this 2A01:5EC0:1806:D3CB:1:0:7DE3:8243 (talk) 09:13, 11 October 2025 (UTC)
- If you want more explanation, you can ask me here and I answer it. 2A01:5EC0:1000:569B:1:0:7DF1:2C56 (talk) 09:27, 11 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you for the clarification. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:23, 11 October 2025 (UTC)
TheHistorianEditor sockpuppet
Just a heads up, I think it's likely TheHistorianEditor, who you indefinitely blocked October 1st, is continuing to use sockpuppets to edit Wikipedia. I reported one here, on the sockpuppet investigation page. There's a user called Expetite that made the exact same edits as TheHistorianEditor had made on the History of the United States page. The difference page of Expetite's edits here. These are almost identical to the previous edits made by TheHistorianEditor, seen here.
I'm inexperienced in reporting sockpuppet accounts so I'm not sure how many examples are needed for these sorts of reports. You were the one to finally indefinitely block TheHistorianEditor, so I thought it would be good to let you know. Senator Aldrich (talk) 00:03, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for creating the sockpuppet investigation and for the notification! Done. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:24, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-42
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- Last week, improvements to account security and two-factor authentication (2FA) features were enabled across all wikis. These changes include user interface improvements for Special:AccountSecurity, the support of multiple 2FA methods via authenticator apps and portable security keys (previously users could only enable one method), and a new Recovery Codes module which facilitates fewer account lockouts due to lost two-factor apps and devices. As part of the Account Security project, work is continuing through the rest of 2025 on further user experience improvements, and support for passkeys as an alternate second factor.
Updates for editors
- Another part of the Account security project is making 2FA generally available to all users. Along with editors with advanced privileges, such as administrators and bureaucrats, 40% of editors now have access to 2FA. You can check if you have access at Special:AccountSecurity. Instructions for activation are on the linked page. The plan is to continue increasing availability if it is determined that the user support capabilities are able to support global usage.
- This week, users at wikis where talk page Usability Improvements are already available by default (everywhere except the 12 wikis listed in T379264) will gain the ability to Thank a comment directly from the talk page it appears on. Before this change, Thanking could only be done by visiting the revision history of the talk page. You can learn more about this change.
- Users who have not verified their email address will soon be receiving monthly Notification reminders to do so. This is because users who have verified their email can more easily recover their account. These reminders will not be sent if the user is inactive or removes the unverified email from their account.
View all 21 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, a fix was made for an occasional error with saving translated paragraphs in the Content Translation tool, and the related error messages are now easier to see.
Updates for technical contributors
- The Unsupported Tools Working Group has chosen Video2Commons as the first tool for its pilot cycle. The group will explore ways to improve and sustain the tool over the coming months. Learn more on Meta.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 18:56, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
Feedback request: Wikipedia policies and guidelines request for comment

Your feedback is requested at Wikipedia talk:Speedy keep on a "Wikipedia policies and guidelines" request for comment. Thank you for helping out!
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(replacing Yapperbot) SodiumBot (botop|talk) 19:30, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
Kenny Chesney
Somebody from Illinois doesn't like parts of Mr. Chesney's personal life being in the article and has been trying to keep it out since at least April 2024.
- 69.174.145.23 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)
- 46.110.123.100 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)
- 46.110.123.75 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)
–Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:06, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thanks for the notification. The essay section you're referring to above and in your edit summary is about deletion discussions. The policy saying roughly the opposite about the content of articles about notable topics is WP:ONUS, arguably WP:UNDUE and anyway WP:BLPRESTORE. I have semi-protected the page for 2 years but removed what really seems irrelevant afterwards. At least without a consensus for restoring it, I don't see why this has been restored again and again. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:56, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
Another fringe fan
Vernon Coleman, Children's Health Defense, and RFK Jr. Most recently Mr. Coleman. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:17, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, Chuanist currently edits less than once per year. In case of persistent disruption, I think WP:ANI or WP:AE would be places to go, but at that edit rate, almost every kind of tendentious editing is better manageable than the countless unregistered contributions that lead to semi-protection elsewhere. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:18, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2025 Issue 19

Upcoming and current events and conversations
Let's Talk continues
- Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees Selection: Announcement of the final ballot for the 2025 Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees election and more answers about the decision. Eligible voters can vote between October 8 – October 23.
- Wikipedia 25: Are you planning to organize events to celebrate Wikipedia's 25th birthday? The Wikimedia Foundation offers grants to support active Wikimedia groups in organizing short-term, low-cost projects to celebrate this milestone. Applications are open until November 1.
- WikiConference North America 2025: WikiConference North America will take place from October 16–19 in New York City, USA.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Product Safety and Integrity · Readers · Research · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org

- Mobile Editing: Insights on mobile web editing on Wikipedia in 2025 are now available. This report highlights that ~95% of IP mobile users editing via wikitext open the editor but make no changes at all, a vast untapped potential. It also pinpoints where contributors most often drop off.
- Dark Mode: Dark Mode user interface will be rolled out on all Wikimedia sites on October 29. All anonymous users of Wikimedia sites will have the option to activate a color scheme that features light-colored text on a dark background. This is designed to provide a more comfortable reading experience, especially in low-light situations.
- Community wishlist extension: The new Community Wishlist extension has been released. This will allow users to add tags to their wishes to better categorise them, and (in a future iteration) to filter them by status, tags and focus areas. It will also be possible to support individual wishes again, as requested by the community in many instances.
- Paste Check: 22 Wikis are now testing a new Edit Check feature, Paste Check, to help avoid and fight copyright violations. When editors paste text into an article, Paste Check prompts them to confirm the origin and licensing of the content.
- Tone Check: The Wikimedia Foundation is working on a new check for newcomers: Tone check. Using a prediction model, this check will encourage editors to improve the tone of their edits.
- Search Suggestions: Search Suggestions was deployed on English Wikipedia. Upon clicking an empty search bar, logged-out users see suggestions of articles for further reading. The feature is available on both desktop and mobile.
- Unsupported Tools Working Group: A new Unsupported Tools Working Group has been formed to help prioritize and review requests for support of unmaintained extensions, gadgets, bots, and tools. The group has chosen Video2Commons as the first tool for its pilot cycle. The group will explore ways to improve and sustain the tool over the coming months.
- Tech News: Read updates from Tech News week 40 and 41 including about Sub-referencing – a new feature to re-use references with different details.
- Wikimedia Research Showcase: Don't miss the next Wikimedia Research Showcase, "Celebrating 13 Years: Wikidata's Role in Learning and Culture" taking place on October 15 at 16:30 UTC.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · list of movement events
- Wikimania: Wikimania Nairobi has been featured in more than 100 stories across community platforms and international media outlets.
- Wikifunctions: Rich text is now available for embedded Wikifunctions calls across the 150 wikis where it’s enabled.
- WikiLearn: New Wikipedia online courses you can join to strengthen your Wikimedia editing skills.
- Human Rights: Making sure AI serves people and knowledge stays human: Wikimedia Foundation publishes a Human Rights Impact Assessment on the interaction of AI and machine learning with Wikimedia projects.
- Don't blink: The latest developments from around the world about protecting the Wikimedia model, its people and its values.
- Digital Safety & Privacy: Frequently Asked Questions about Wikimedia Foundation's Legal Work.
- Transparency Report: Wikimedia Foundation publishes its Latest Transparency Report.
- Privacy Policy: The Wikimedia Foundation Privacy Policy is getting a minor update in preparation for Temporary Accounts.
- Learning Clinic: Join the next Let's Connect Learning Clinic on the topic of "Mastering the Capacity Exchange (CapX) Tool (Part 2)" taking place on October 20 at 17:00 UTC.
Foundation statements
- Knowledge integrity: Lessons from Wikipedia on the 3 building blocks of trustworthy information. This is part of the new series from the Wikimedia Foundation that explores how Wikipedia can inspire new standards of knowledge integrity for our times.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
See also: Diff blog · Goings-on · Planet Wikimedia · Signpost (en) · Kurier (de) · Actualités du Wiktionnaire (fr) · Regards sur l’actualité de la Wikimedia (fr) · Wikimag (fr) · Education · GLAM · The Wikipedia Library · Milestones · Wikidata · Central and Eastern Europe · other newsletters
Subscribe or unsubscribe · Help translate
For information about the Bulletin and to read previous editions, see the project page on Meta-Wiki. Let askcac
wikimedia.org know if you have any feedback or suggestions for improvement!
MediaWiki message delivery 14:50, 14 October 2025 (UTC)
Trainsfan13
He’s back at it again just so you know. 2601:188:C405:F440:6D3B:D814:C719:8C30 (talk) 18:15, 15 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi 2601:188:C405:F440:6D3B:D814:C719:8C30, Mfield was faster. In general, a report at WP:ANEW is sufficient and I'll see it there sooner or later too. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:43, 16 October 2025 (UTC)
Mauk Kham Wah
Similar to Leroy Cronin, the subject was dismissed from his position due to an unspecified harassment complaint and editors have been removing that content. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:58, 16 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thanks for the notification! I've had a quick chat with Plasticwonder who had previously restored the content when the removal reason was less detailed and didn't even question the accuracy of the allegations. After the quick discussion, I'm fine with their decision. Details (and why I think your revert was problematic) can be found at . ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:31, 16 October 2025 (UTC)
Terje Rød-Larsen
Hey, just wanted to let you know that somebody's trying to keep the subject's connection to Jeffrey Epstein off the page. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:25, 17 October 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:41, 17 October 2025 (UTC)
Bezartanha
I told you the whole truth. But if you don't believe me ok I do what you say. Just click at it. And a massage show up and Need reason. What should I write? 2A01:5EC0:1001:70B2:1:0:9FC4:B77 (talk) 23:35, 17 October 2025 (UTC)
- I can not reply to your message any more 2A01:5EC0:1001:70B2:1:0:9FC4:B77 (talk) 23:36, 17 October 2025 (UTC)
- Because of that send massage here. And ask guidance 2A01:5EC0:1007:3AB:C2F:B70E:95A9:F27 (talk) 23:39, 17 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Bezartanha, you – as a person – are blocked. Not just the account. You may not edit Wikipedia for any other purpose than requesting an unblock on your talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:42, 17 October 2025 (UTC)
- Because of that send massage here. And ask guidance 2A01:5EC0:1007:3AB:C2F:B70E:95A9:F27 (talk) 23:39, 17 October 2025 (UTC)
Block 36.37.168.72
This IP has vandalized both a page and their own talk page. Revoke TPA too. Manualbadeditfix (talk) 05:25, 19 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Manualbadeditfix, reporting this at WP:AIV was a good idea, thanks. I (or any individual administrator in general) may not be active enough for such a notification to result in the needed quick block, even if I was active shortly before. In this case here, I was eating away from keyboard.
- Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 06:40, 19 October 2025 (UTC)
Heads up
As a heads up, Woovee and Aradicus77 have also been at it on the Glam rock page. I'm hoping that the block on the other two pages will have them pause there, as well, but I just wanted to give you a heads up. I've tried to intervene there.--3family6 (Talk to me|See what I have done) 12:32, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
- Since when? 3family6. I haven't touched that page in ages. You were the one going back and forth with Woovee there https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Glam_rock#The_%22Subgenre%22_term_in_the_lead. I'd advise a block at Goth subculture for me and Woovee if that's what you meant since that's the last place we had friction and maybe The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. I still don't understand why I'm being blocked when I was just adding information to the pages while Woovee was edit-warring. I opened talk page discussions and you can see from my last edit there . If this comes off antagonistic I'm sorry but let's assume you made a mistake linking that page, I still don't understand why I'm being pushed under the bus here. Additionally, you were the one who agreed with my edits and integrated them and ended the conflict, so why are you marking this as an ongoing edit war? This is just disingenous.
Glam rock talk page exchange was mostly you and Woovee . Also Woovee kept lying on my name. Even at me reporting him he claimed I removed a list of bands from progressive rock when I had actually only added two subgenres "brutal prog" and "avant prog" not removed anything. . He also claimed I was erasing mention of numerous bands in various articles. When I had only removed the unsourced list of post-punk bands from the lead at post-punk Aradicus77 (talk) 12:35, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
- There was also this I opened up https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#Persistent_bad_faith_assumption%2C_accusatory_language_and_edit-warring_by_User%3AWoovee which I have no clue what happened to as people just stopped replying, most users concluded that Woovee was the one being disruptive with only User:3family6 stating I was deserving of a block too. 3family6 even admitted he only really saw what happened at gothic rock and not what was going on other pages, Woovee was the one engaging the edit wars at post-punk. We opened several talk page discussions too only for him to be reverting information and not waiting for a WP:Third Opinion while I was focusing more on expanding the article, which I did by reformatting the lead and adding regional scenes and related genres.
- I think this can provide you more context User:ToBeFree Aradicus77 (talk) 12:46, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
Thanks for the notification and the ping at ANI. I wasn't aware there's already a (stale) discussion there about the issues that led to the ANEW report and my two blocks. I'll wait and see what happens next. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:39, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
Woovee
Please I don't want to step into the Starman (song) page, but Woovee has had an issue with my edits at The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars pertaining Bauhaus (band). He has now started removing this edit at Star Man . What do I do since I don't want to start another edit-war or endless talk page friction which will lead us to an interaction block. Aradicus77 (talk) 16:13, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Aradicus77, thank you very much for the notification and for asking instead of reverting. I currently can't dig into this as deep as I'd like to, and the only advice I can provide is that WP:DISENGAGE exists and that Wikipedia is not compulsory. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:38, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
- That is a fair point. At the same time, is there no guideline that would allow reverting the article to a version not edited by any of us? WP:DISENGAGE suggests stepping back to avoid conflict, but that can sometimes mean allowing disruptive edits to remain until someone else eventually addresses them. I have noticed that when disruptive edits are very obvious, they are often reverted quickly, but when the issues are more subtle, they sometimes remain.
- My main concern was reporting Woovee for disruptive editing, and although both of us were blocked, which I understand, I am unsure how to handle similar situations in the future. If he continues to make problematic edits, should I simply leave them in place? Would continued interaction risk both of us being blocked indefinitely?
- 3family6 suggested that I could bring such issues to the attention of relevant WikiProjects to get input or assistance from other editors, and that advice has been helpful. Aradicus77 (talk) 17:46, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
- The thing is, once you're in a situation where people are annoyed enough to consider an interaction ban, you can only lose by interacting further, at least if that interaction is (yet again) because of a conflict/dispute.
- There's a huge difference between what feels morally right and the least problematic approach, and the latter is letting it go even if you're completely right and they're completely wrong. Will the encyclopedia suffer from this? Perhaps. Sometimes, peace is more important than doing the right thing. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:12, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
- (Some people disagree, but some people are blocked.) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:13, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-43
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- To optimize how user data is stored in our databases, the saved preferences of users who haven't logged in for over five years and have fewer than 100 edits will be cleared. When those users return, default settings will apply.
View all 20 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, there was a broken link from the GlobalContributions interface message to the XTools GlobalContributions page which has now been fixed.
Updates for technical contributors
- The work to reroute all traffic to API endpoints under the
rest.phproute through a common API gateway is now complete. If any issues are observed, please file a phabricator ticket to the Service Ops team board. - Edits to Wikidata references or qualifiers will now be shown in RecentChanges and Watchlist entries on other wikis less often, reducing unnecessary notifications. This will reduce the overall quantity of 'noisy' entries. Wikidata's own pages remain unchanged.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 19:33, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
The Signpost: 20 October 2025
- News and notes: Board shuffles, LLM blocks increase, IPs are going away
And the "Global Resource Distribution Committee" emerges.
- Special report: The election that isn't
Two shortlisted WMF Board candidates removed from the ballot.
- Interview: The BoT bump
Who was bumped and why?
- In the media: An incident at WikiConference North America; WMF reports AI-related traffic drop and explains Wikipedia to US conservatives
...while Musk prepares to launch "Grokipedia".
- Traffic report: One click after another
Serial-killer miniseries, deceased scientist, government shutdowns and Sandalwood hit "Kantara" crowd the tubes.
- Humour: Wikipedia pay rates
Don't get too excited before you read this.
Categorization of AE protection actions needed (22 October 2025)
Hello ToBeFree,
I'm a bot that helps log arbitration enforcement (AE) protection actions on behalf of the Arbitration Committee. As a result of a September 2025 motion by the Arbitration Committee, administrators are no longer required to manually log AE protection actions. Instead, this bot is responsible for logging AE protections to the AE protection log.
While logging AE protections, this bot detected that you recently took the following page protection actions. These action(s) seemed to be AE actions based on the edit summaries, but the bot wasn't able to tell which arbitration case they related to:
If these were AE actions, please take a moment to log the appropriate topic code at the AE protection log. If they were not, feel free to remove the actions from the AE protection log, and optionally let the bot operator know about the false positives.
Going forward, in order to help this bot categorize AE actions, please include a link to the contentious topic under which the action was taken in the protection edit summary (for example, [[WP:CT/BLP]] or [[Wikipedia:Contentious topics/Biographies of Living Persons]]).
If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to the bot operator or to the arbitration clerks at the arbitration clerks' noticeboard.
Thank you! ClerkBot (talk) 23:55, 22 October 2025 (UTC)
Done by The Bushranger; I hope this edit to the config of the bot fixes the detection. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:20, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
Woovee (2)
I advise you extend me and Woovee's block to also encompass the Goth subculture page. It looks like Woovee wants to start another edit war by reverting that entire page to before I had contributed to it which is like 2 months of edits: Aradicus77 (talk) 00:55, 25 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Aradicus77, I'm not interested, sorry. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:36, 25 October 2025 (UTC)
Jaspal Rana
Hey, when you get a chance, mind reviewing this discussion on my Talk page? –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:52, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
- I suspect a WP:COI here. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:54, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, I've had a look but I'm not sure how I'd be able to meaningfully help there at the moment. I see walls of text and two users editing in good faith. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:00, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
- Just wondering if I'm on the right track there. :-) –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:36, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
- I really can't judge. If a dispute arises and protection is needed, I shouldn't have analyzed this, so I'm not looking too closely. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:05, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
- S'oaky, I'm pretty sure that any BLP and/or promotional issues have been satisfactorily covered. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:33, 25 October 2025 (UTC)
- I really can't judge. If a dispute arises and protection is needed, I shouldn't have analyzed this, so I'm not looking too closely. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:05, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
- Just wondering if I'm on the right track there. :-) –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:36, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, I've had a look but I'm not sure how I'd be able to meaningfully help there at the moment. I see walls of text and two users editing in good faith. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:00, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-44
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- The Wikipedia iOS app has launched an A/B/C test of improvements made to the tabbed browsing feature for select regions and languages. The test, named “More dynamic tabs”, explores new tab experiences and includes “Did you know” and “Because you read” article recommendations. You can read more on the project page.
- Autoconfirmed users on small and medium wikis with the CampaignEvents extension can now use Event Registration without the Event Organizer right. This feature lets organizers enable registration, manage participants, and lets users register with one click instead of signing event pages.
View all 31 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the issue of flashing colors when holding or pressing the arrow keys under the dark mode settings in Vector 2022 has been fixed.
Updates for technical contributors
- The CampaignEvents extension will be deployed to all remaining wikis during the week of 17 November 2025. The extension currently includes three features: Event Registration, Collaboration List, and Invitation List. For this rollout, Invitation List will not be enabled on Wikifunctions and MediaWiki unless requested by those communities. Visit the deployment page to learn more.
- The SwaggerUI-based REST sandbox experience is now live on all wiki projects. The sandbox can be accessed through the Special:RestSandbox page. Please report any issues to the MediaWiki Interfaces team board, or join the discussion on the project launch page.
- Transform endpoints with a trailing slash path in the MediaWiki REST API are now marked as deprecated. They will remain functional during this time, but removal is expected by the end of January 2026. All API users currently calling them are encouraged to transition to the non-trailing slash versions. Both endpoint variations can be found and tested using the REST Sandbox. See the MediaWiki REST API Deprecation page for more detailed information about the API deprecation policies and procedures.
- A dedicated changelog now exists for the MediaWiki REST API. The changelog provides an overview of these changes, making it easier for developers to keep track of improvements and iterations. Announcements will also continue to flow through the standard communication channels, including Tech News and email distribution lists, but can now be more easily referenced from a central location. If you have feedback about the style, structure, or content of this changelog, please join the discussion.
- Administrators can delete the tracking category which was previously added by the JsonConfig extension, as it is no longer used. See the categories linked from Q130635582. It is OK if there are still pages listed in the category as that is just a caching issue, and they will be automatically cleared out the next time each page is edited.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 19:28, 27 October 2025 (UTC)
Just a notification/update
I hope your day is going well! I just came to alert you that I re-installed Twinkle for one edit to start a WP:FfD. When I was blocked, I promised to hang up the gadget, so I just thought this one-off earns a mention just so you know I'm not going to go on a spree or something. Also here to just simply say hello and thank you for your patience. October/September 2025 was a wild ride for me (both on and off wiki). Babysharkb☩ss2 I am Thou, Thou art I 18:08, 27 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Babysharkboss2, thank you very much for the notification! All good. Creating a deletion discussion is a good use-case for Twinkle even if you don't want to continue using it for reverts. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:17, 27 October 2025 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2025 Issue 20

Upcoming and current events and conversations
Let's Talk continues
- Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees selection: Additional perspectives on current and future board selection processes.
- Global trends: We are seeing 8% declines in human page views on Wikipedia as some users don't directly visit Wikipedia to get information. Learn about this new user trend, how the Wikimedia Foundation anticipate these changes, and how you can help.
- WECUDI 2025: The second conference of Wikimedia, Education, and Digital Cultures will be held from October 29–31 in Mexico City, Mexico.
- GLAM Conference: Wiki GLAM Culture and Heritage Conference (WGCHC) will take place on 30 October – 1 November in Lisbon, Portugal.
- WikidataCon 2025: WikidataCon 2025 will take place online from October 31 – November 2.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Product Safety and Integrity · Readers · Research · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Making it easier to say thanks: Users on most wikis will now have the ability to thank a comment directly from the talk page it appears on. Before this change, thanking could only be done by visiting the revision history of the talk page.
- Account security: Improvements to account security and two-factor authentication (2FA) features were enabled across all wikis. Another part of the project is making 2FA generally available to all users. Along with editors with advanced privileges, such as administrators and bureaucrats, 40% of editors now have access to 2FA. You can check if you have access at Special:AccountSecurity.
- Abstract Wikipedia: The naming contest for the new Wikimedia project, known until now as Abstract Wikipedia, is ongoing. Voting is now open until November 3.
- Tech News: Read updates from Tech News week 42 and 43 including the community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week.
- Wikimedia apps: The Wikipedia iOS App launched an A/B/C test of improvements to the Tabbed browsing feature into Beta for select regions & languages. Called “More dynamic tabs”, the experiment adds user-requested improvements and introduces article recommendations within the tabs overview, showing “Did you know” or “Because you read” content depending on how many tabs are open.
- CampaignEvents extension: Campaignevents extension will be deployed to all remaining wikis during the week of 17 November 2025. The extension currently includes three features: Event Registration, Collaboration List, and Invitation List. For this rollout, Invitation List will not be enabled on Wikifunctions and MediaWiki unless requested by those communities.
- Event registration tool: Autoconfirmed users on small and medium wikis with the extension can now use Event Registration without the Event Organizer right. This feature lets organizers enable registration, manage participants, and lets users register with one click instead of signing event pages.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · list of movement events
- Digital safety: Explore how you can help make Wikimedia safer by taking our new self-paced course, Safety for Young Wikimedians.
- Wikimedia Core Curriculum: The Wikimedia Foundation has developed seven online video learning modules covering the core English Wikipedia policies. You are invited to use, adapt, and translate the course.
- Advocacy: The Wikimedia Foundation has signed onto a statement that calls on governments and UN bodies to keep discussions about the future of internet governance accessible to non-government actors like industry and civil society. This statement is part of ongoing joint advocacy with affiliates to influence UN discussions about the future of internet governance such as the Global Digital Compact campaign and WSIS+20 deliberations.
- GLAM: The Wikimedia Foundation and several affiliates have signed onto the Open Heritage Statement, which supports galleries, libraries, archives, and museums (GLAM institutions) to have the legal rights they need to collect, preserve, and provide access to cultural heritage.
Foundation statements
- How Wikipedia works: Wikimedia Foundation responds to questions about how Wikipedia works.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
See also: Diff blog · Goings-on · Planet Wikimedia · Signpost (en) · Kurier (de) · Actualités du Wiktionnaire (fr) · Regards sur l’actualité de la Wikimedia (fr) · Wikimag (fr) · Education · GLAM · The Wikipedia Library · Milestones · Wikidata · Central and Eastern Europe · other newsletters
Subscribe or unsubscribe · Help translate
For information about the Bulletin and to read previous editions, see the project page on Meta-Wiki. Let askcac
wikimedia.org know if you have any feedback or suggestions for improvement!
MediaWiki message delivery 16:08, 28 October 2025 (UTC)
Quick request
Hello, could you please delete my own User:Divinations/common.js? I no longer need it. Thanks, Divinations (talk) 01:03, 29 October 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Divinations, sure, done :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:07, 29 October 2025 (UTC)
Guide to temporary accounts
Hello, ToBeFree. This message is being sent to remind you of significant upcoming changes regarding logged-out editing.
Starting 4 November, logged-out editors will no longer have their IP address publicly displayed. Instead, they will have a temporary account (TA) associated with their edits. Users with some extended rights like administrators and CheckUsers, as well as users with the temporary account IP viewer (TAIV) user right will still be able to reveal temporary users' IP addresses and all contributions made by temporary accounts from a specific IP address or range.
How do temporary accounts work?
- When a logged-out user completes an edit or a logged action for the first time, a cookie will be set in this user's browser and a temporary account tied with this cookie will be automatically created for them. This account's name will follow the pattern:
~2025-12345-67(a tilde, year of creation, a number split into units of 5). - All subsequent actions by the temporary account user will be attributed to this username. The cookie will expire 90 days after its creation. As long as it exists, all edits made from this device will be attributed to this temporary account. It will be the same account even if the IP address changes, unless the user clears their cookies or uses a different device or web browser.
- A record of the IP address used at the time of each edit will be stored for 90 days after the edit. Users with the temporary account IP viewer (TAIV) user right will be able to see the underlying IP addresses.
- As a measure against vandalism, there are two limitations on the creation of temporary accounts:
- There has to be a minimum of 10 minutes between subsequent temporary account creations from the same IP (or /64 range in case of IPv6).
- There can be a maximum of 6 temporary accounts created from an IP (or /64 range) within a period of 24 hours.
Temporary account IP viewer user right
- Administrators may grant the temporary account IP viewer (TAIV) user right to non-administrators who meet the criteria for granting. Importantly, an editor must make an explicit request for the permission (e.g. at WP:PERM/TAIV)—administrators are not permitted to assign the right without a request.
- Administrators will automatically be able to see temporary account IP information once they have accepted the Access to Temporary Account IP Addresses Policy via Special:Preferences or via the onboarding dialog which comes up after temporary accounts are deployed.
Impact for administrators
- It will be possible to block many abusers by just blocking their temporary accounts. A blocked person won't be able to create new temporary accounts quickly if the admin selects the autoblock option.
- It will still be possible to block an IP address or IP range.
- Temporary accounts will not be retroactively applied to contributions made before the deployment. On Special:Contributions, you will be able to see existing IP user contributions, but not new contributions made by temporary accounts on that IP address. Instead, you should use Special:IPContributions for this (see a video about IPContributions in a gallery below).
Rules about IP information disclosure
- Publicizing an IP address gained through TAIV access is generally not allowed (e.g. ~2025-12345-67 previously edited as 192.0.2.1 or ~2025-12345-67's IP address is 192.0.2.1).
- Publicly linking a TA to another TA is allowed if "reasonably believed to be necessary". (e.g.
~2025-12345-67 and ~2025-12345-68 are likely the same person, so I am counting their reverts together toward 3RR
, but not Hey ~2025-12345-68, you did some good editing as ~2025-12345-67) - See Wikipedia:Temporary account IP viewer § What can and can't be said for more detailed guidelines.
Useful tools for patrollers
- It is possible to view if a user has opted-in to view temporary account IPs via the User Info card, available in Preferences → Appearance → Advanced options →
Enable the user info card
- This feature also makes it possible for anyone to see the approximate count of temporary accounts active on the same IP address range.
- Special:IPContributions allows viewing all edits and temporary accounts connected to a specific IP address or IP range.
- Similarly, Special:GlobalContributions supports global search for a given temporary account's activity.
- The auto-reveal feature (see video below) allows users with the right permissions to automatically reveal all IP addresses for a limited time window.
Videos
- How to use Special:IPContributions
- How automatic IP reveal works
- How to use IP Info
- How to use User Info
Further information and discussion
- For more information and discussion regarding this change, please see the announcement from the Wikimedia Foundation at Wikipedia:Village pump (WMF) § Temporary accounts rollout.
Most of this message was written by Mz7 (source). Thanks, 🎃 SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 02:48, 31 October 2025 (UTC)
Feedback request: Wikipedia policies and guidelines request for comment

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Tech News: 2025-45
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- Administrators will now find that Special:MergeHistory is now significantly more flexible about what it can merge. It can now merge sections taken from the middle of the history of the source (rather than only the start) and insert revisions anywhere in the history of the destination page (rather than only the start).
- For users with "Automatically subscribe to topics" enabled in their preferences, starting a new topic or adding a reply to an existing topic will now subscribe them to replies to that topic. Previously, this would only happen if the DiscussionTools "Add topic" or "Reply" widgets were used. When DiscussionTools was originally launched existing accounts were not opted in to automatic topic subscriptions, so this change should primarily affect newer accounts and users who have deliberately changed their preferences since that time.
- Scribunto modules can now be used to generate SVG images. This can be used to build charts, graphics and other visualizations dynamically through Lua, reducing the need to compose them externally and upload them as files.
- Wikimedia sites now provide all anonymous users with the option to enable a dark mode color scheme, featuring light-colored text on a dark background. This enhancement aims to deliver a more enjoyable reading experience, especially in dimly lit environments.
- Users with large watchlists have long faced timeouts when editing Special:EditWatchlist. The page now loads entries in smaller sections instead of all at once due to a paging update, allowing everyone to edit their watchlists smoothly. As part of the database update, sorting by expiry has been removed because it was over 100× slower than sorting by title. A community wish has been created to explore alternative ways to restore sort-by-expiry. If this feature is important to you, please support the wish!
View all 31 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the fixing of the persisting highlighting when using VisualEditor find and replace during a query.
Updates for technical contributors
- Since 2019 the Wikimedia URL Shortener at https://w.wiki is available for all Wikimedia wikis to create short links to articles, permalinks, diffs, etc. It is available in the sidebar as "Get shortened URL". There are 30 wikis that also install an older "ShortUrl" extension. The old extension will soon be removed. This means
/s/URLs will not be advertised under article titles via HTMLclass="title-shortlink". The/s/URLs will keep working. - On Thursday, October 30, the MediaWiki Interfaces and SRE Service Operations teams began rerouting Action API traffic through a common API gateway. Individual wikis will be updated based on the standard release groups, with total traffic increased over time. This change is expected to be non-breaking and non-disruptive. If any issues are observed, please file a Phabricator ticket to the Service Ops team board.
- MediaWiki Train deployments will pause for the final two weeks of 2025: 22 December and 29 December. Backport windows will also pause between Monday, 22 December 2025 and Thursday, 2 January 2026. A backport window is a scheduled time to add things like bug fixes and configuration changes. There are seven deployment trains remaining for 2025.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
In depth
- In 2025, the Wikimedia Foundation reported that AI systems and search engines increasingly use Wikipedia content without driving users to the site, contributing to an 8% drop in human pageviews compared to 2024. After detecting bots disguised as humans, Wikimedia updated its traffic data to reflect this shift. Read more about current user trends on Wikipedia in a Diff blog post.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 19:31, 3 November 2025 (UTC)
BLP vandal at Paul Harsley
Hey, what do you think about putting a partial block on 2A00:23C5:0:0:0:0:0:0/32 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS)? –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:06, 3 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, they edited another article too, so I made it a sitewide block. Was this at AIV and noone blocked? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:52, 3 November 2025 (UTC)
- No, I wasn't sure which range to put and didn't want to cast too wide of a net there. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 03:50, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- Oh, they likely used 2A00:23C5:C31A:301:8557:A1D5:6CF3:3895 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS) as well. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 03:52, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- Oh wait, /32? Uh. I thought /64, had clicked the article link in the title and checked the history, sorry.
- That range is indeed too wide for two addresses hitting one article without other vandalism justifying either page protection or such a wide rangeblock, I'd say. I have, however, blocked that second address (/64) now too.
- If this persists, I hope page protection will work. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:33, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – November 2025
News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2025).

- The speedy deletion criteria U5 has been repealed, with U6 and U7 replacing it. See the FAQ for more clarifications.
- Community-designated contentious topics may now be enforced and appealed at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard (AE) as a result of an RfC.
- You can enable a handy user info card next to usernames, which when clicked displays edit count, blocks, thanks, and other information. To enable this feature, visit Preferences → Appearance → Advanced options →
Enable the user info card
- The arbitration case Transgender healthcare and people has been closed
- Uninvolved administrators may impose an AE participation restriction on any thread at the Arbitration Enforcement noticeboard.
- An unreferenced articles backlog drive is happening in November 2025 to reduce the backlog of articles tagged with {{Unreferenced}}. You can help reduce the backlog by adding citations to these articles. Sign up to participate!
Woovee
Hi ToBeFree. Woovee has agreed to revert restrictions, so I'm comfortable unblocking them. They have, however, raised the issue of the interaction ban which I can see you are setting up with Aradicus77. Would you want the interaction ban to be part of the unblock conditions? SilkTork (talk) 09:27, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hi SilkTork, thank you very much. Yes I do. In my opinion, Woovee shouldn't be unblocked without an interaction ban from Aradicus77. I can't unilaterally impose such a ban as it's not a contentious topic they have been quarreling about. They would have to agree to it as a binding unblock condition or appeal the block to WP:AN. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:23, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- And, SilkTork, having had a look at the conversation again, if I see correctly they agreed to which revert restriction ... 3RR? Like, everyone else from unregistered to administrators? That's not a restriction, that's just an agreement to stick to the normal rules. That's the minimum expectation that doesn't need to be explicitly agreed to ... ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:28, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- I'm fine with leaving the unblock and conditions to you, ToBeFree. SilkTork (talk) 13:32, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- Sorry, I didn't mean to dismiss your good work and the barnstar is well-earned. You took the time to analyze the situation and to de-escalate it very well in my eyes. I just can't let one of these two revert freely at the expense of the other's sanity. If either of them is truly a horrible editor whose work must be reverted all the time, there's a huge community that can do so anyway. From what I've seen so far, it's mostly a personal incompatibility I can't blame a single person for. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:42, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- No worries. I didn't look closely at the conditions attached to your block, so I didn't see that an unblock was dependent on the interaction ban. I responded to Woovee's ping, and thought I was mainly dealing with edit warring. My awareness of the other person was only that they were someone that Woovee was edit warring with - I hadn't realised that it went beyond that (and I didn't look into that side of things). My appraisal was that they had only been blocked twice (the block log looks long, but it's just the two incidents, with blocks being adjusted), plus a couple of other related incidents, for edit warring. I wasn't aware of other disruptive behaviour, and - as they said to me - they have been around a while, and have made positive contributions which I was aware of. It was my fault for not looking deeply enough into the situation. You seem to have the matter under control now anyway, so I'm happy to leave it to you. SilkTork (talk) 21:58, 4 November 2025 (UTC)


~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:14, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- No worries. I didn't look closely at the conditions attached to your block, so I didn't see that an unblock was dependent on the interaction ban. I responded to Woovee's ping, and thought I was mainly dealing with edit warring. My awareness of the other person was only that they were someone that Woovee was edit warring with - I hadn't realised that it went beyond that (and I didn't look into that side of things). My appraisal was that they had only been blocked twice (the block log looks long, but it's just the two incidents, with blocks being adjusted), plus a couple of other related incidents, for edit warring. I wasn't aware of other disruptive behaviour, and - as they said to me - they have been around a while, and have made positive contributions which I was aware of. It was my fault for not looking deeply enough into the situation. You seem to have the matter under control now anyway, so I'm happy to leave it to you. SilkTork (talk) 21:58, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- Sorry, I didn't mean to dismiss your good work and the barnstar is well-earned. You took the time to analyze the situation and to de-escalate it very well in my eyes. I just can't let one of these two revert freely at the expense of the other's sanity. If either of them is truly a horrible editor whose work must be reverted all the time, there's a huge community that can do so anyway. From what I've seen so far, it's mostly a personal incompatibility I can't blame a single person for. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:42, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- I'm fine with leaving the unblock and conditions to you, ToBeFree. SilkTork (talk) 13:32, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
Warning banner
I'm well aware of the banner's purpose. It's breaking the Discussion Tools link for some reason. If you click on reply for the first report, it replies at the bottom instead of under the comment. I was going to place the warning into the main banner with some strong coloring. Daniel Quinlan (talk) 22:32, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Daniel Quinlan, my edit summary was not about the warning banner but the declined report. The warning was restored by an edit conflict. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:35, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- Nevermind. Your summary was unfortunately a little too easy to interpret in a very different way. I'll proceed with restoring the banner in the main banner. Daniel Quinlan (talk) 22:35, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- I noticed after sending it and had no idea how to correct this, so thanks for asking.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:36, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- Appreciate the explanation. It's no fun trying to edit noticeboards without Discussion Tools due to the edit conflicts. And the restored banner will hopefully be noticed by at least some reporters. Daniel Quinlan (talk) 22:56, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- Having a look ... ah, at the top of the page. Yeah well, I mean, people will notice and recent changes patrollers have probably been aware for a while and perhaps even requested the right to view IP addresses already. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:03, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- Appreciate the explanation. It's no fun trying to edit noticeboards without Discussion Tools due to the edit conflicts. And the restored banner will hopefully be noticed by at least some reporters. Daniel Quinlan (talk) 22:56, 4 November 2025 (UTC)
- I noticed after sending it and had no idea how to correct this, so thanks for asking.
why did you block me?
i just created my account yesterday i didnt even edit anything why did you block me? Rylanv (talk) 04:37, 6 November 2025 (UTC)
- (talk page stalker) @Rylanv: Your account was not and is not blocked. If it was, you would not be able to post your question on this User talk page. General Ization Talk 04:47, 6 November 2025 (UTC)
- (talk page watcher) @Rylanv: have you some other account that you're referring to is being blocked? If so, it would help to know what account it was so we can find out why. Thanks. -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 08:05, 6 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Rylanv, I see and understand what this is about, but any message you have seen should already have explained the situation. If you are willing to share your IP address, we can talk publicly about it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:41, 6 November 2025 (UTC)
- what happened is I got the notification that I was blocked then I made that post then I went to the page I was on before then the block disappeared. I'm confused Rylanv (talk) 22:40, 6 November 2025 (UTC)
- Rylanv, I guess you logged in. Perhaps automatically. You received a message that was meant for those who are not logged in. Again, if you'd like me to explain here why that message appeared, feel free to share your IP address. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:48, 6 November 2025 (UTC)
- thank you for your help Rylanv (talk) 22:55, 6 November 2025 (UTC)
- Rylanv, I guess you logged in. Perhaps automatically. You received a message that was meant for those who are not logged in. Again, if you'd like me to explain here why that message appeared, feel free to share your IP address. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:48, 6 November 2025 (UTC)
- what happened is I got the notification that I was blocked then I made that post then I went to the page I was on before then the block disappeared. I'm confused Rylanv (talk) 22:40, 6 November 2025 (UTC)
AR/CA
Hi ToBeFree, just a heads-up that Motion E at ARCA for Lightbreather had a wording change, that significantly changed its meaning. I didn't want to leave your vote there given it was voting on the prior wording, but just letting you know so you can re-vote. Sorry for the muck around. Thanks, Daniel (talk) 07:05, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Daniel, all good, thank you very much! I just noticed I had also forgotten to add my abstentions to the count in the template; fixed and re-voted now. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:09, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
FrequentFlyer
Worth removing their ability to create new account given their threat to create socks? Danners430 tweaks made 16:23, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Danners430, blocks come with account creation disabled by default. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:25, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
- Today I learned :D Danners430 tweaks made 16:26, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
- Well, technically they don't and the "account creation blocked" flag is explicitly displayed in the block log for most blocks, as that checkbox is enabled by default. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:27, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
- That makes sense - Every day is a school day... and every day is another day where I realise that I'm glad I'm not an admin (for the time being)! Much respect for the work you guys do! Danners430 tweaks made 16:28, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:28, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
- That makes sense - Every day is a school day... and every day is another day where I realise that I'm glad I'm not an admin (for the time being)! Much respect for the work you guys do! Danners430 tweaks made 16:28, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
- Well, technically they don't and the "account creation blocked" flag is explicitly displayed in the block log for most blocks, as that checkbox is enabled by default. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:27, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
- Today I learned :D Danners430 tweaks made 16:26, 8 November 2025 (UTC)
The Signpost: 10 November 2025
- News and notes: Temporary accounts go live and WMF board member self-suspends
ArbCom elections draw close, and Wikimania '27 in Santiago.
- Community view: Six Wikipedians' thoughts on Grokipedia, and the humanity of it all
It ain't a five course meal, according to one of our interviewees.
- Wikicup report: BeanieFan11, WikiCup victor of 2025, covers the results
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
- In the media: Jimbo's book, an argument about genocide, and a train of shame
Wikipedia's new rival, political controversy in Italy and other Wiki-reports.
- Recent research: Taking stock of the 2024–2025 research grants
$400,000 USD in total funding: what did we get?
- Opinion: With Grokipedia, top-down control of knowledge is new again
Does it shed any light on particular topics that are better suited to LLM-generation than others?
- Obituary: Struway
Rest in peace.
- Traffic report: The documentaried, the disowned, the deceased, Diwali and the Dodgers
You know your man is working hard, he's worth a deuce.
- Comix: Head of steam
'Sblood!
"Our sky is a canvas of peace"
Hello. I'm curious where these lines are from. Thank you, IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 22:57, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hi IOHANNVSVERVS, oh!
In case you had searched Google first: I just noticed I forgot to upload the lyrics to Genius. - The first line is 100% ChatGPT ... well ... based on a novel I wrote. The rest, uh, is more complicated.
- Some of that is from me, some of it is from an AI based on something I wrote years ago.
- They're on Spotify too. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:48, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- I'd upload them to Commons but I'm unsure about the copyright of Suno-generated songs. "Commercial license" doesn't mean public domain. Then again, it's AI output and thus perhaps copyright-free. Except when the AI accidentally quotes existing songs. A mess. From my personal side it would be freely licensed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:52, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- Cool. Thanks for sharing. IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 18:33, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- I'd upload them to Commons but I'm unsure about the copyright of Suno-generated songs. "Commercial license" doesn't mean public domain. Then again, it's AI output and thus perhaps copyright-free. Except when the AI accidentally quotes existing songs. A mess. From my personal side it would be freely licensed. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:52, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-46
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors

- Starting November 12, users will see a change in the appearance of talk pages on some Wikipedias. Almost all wikis have received this design change; English Wikipedia will get these changes later. You can read more on Diff. Users can opt out of these changes in their user preferences in "Show discussion activity".
- MediaWiki can now display a page indicator automatically while a page is protected. This feature is disabled by default. It can be enabled by community request.
- Using the "Show preview" or "Show changes" buttons in the wikitext editor will now carry over certain URL parameters like 'useskin', 'uselang' and 'section'. This update also fixes an issue where, if the browser crashed while previewing an edit to a single section, saving this edit could overwrite the entire page with just that section’s content.
- Wikivoyage wikis can use colored map markers in the article text. The text of these markers will now be shown in contrasting black or white color, instead of always being white. Local workarounds for the problem can be removed.
- The Activity tab in the Wikipedia Android app is now available for all users. The new tab offers personalized insights into reading, editing, and donation activity, while simplifying navigation and making app use more engaging.
- The Reader Growth team is launching an experiment called "Image browsing" to test how to make it easier for readers to browse and discover images on Wikipedia articles. This experiment, a mobile-only A/B test, will go live on English Wikipedia in the week of November 17 and will run for four weeks, affecting 0.05% of users on English wiki. The test launched on November 3 on Arabic, Chinese, French, Indonesian, and Vietnamese wikis, affecting up to 10% of users on those wikis.
View all 27 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example the inability to lock accounts on mobile sites has been fixed.
Updates for technical contributors
- Nominations are open on Wikitech for new Toolforge standards committee members. The committee oversees the Toolforge Right to fork policy and Abandoned tool policy among other duties. Nominations will remain open through 2025-11-28.
- The JWT issuer field in OAuth 2 access tokens for SUL wikis has been changed to
https://meta.wikimedia.org. Old access tokens will still work. - The JWT subject field in OAuth 2 access tokens will soon change from
<user id>tomw:<identity type>:<user id>, where<identity type>is typicallyCentralAuth:(for SUL wikis) orlocal:<wiki id>(for other wikis). This is to avoid conflicts between different user ID types, and to make OAuth 2 access tokens and thesessionJwtcookie more similar. Old access tokens will still work. - MediaWiki's block messages (blockedtext, blockedtext-partial, autoblockedtext, systemblockedtext, blockedtext-tempuser, autoblockedtext-tempuser) now support additional parameters indicating whether the user is blocked from editing their own user talk page
$9or emailing other users$10. - A
REL1_45branch for MediaWiki core and each of the extensions and skins in Wikimedia git has been created. This is the first step in the release process for MediaWiki 1.45.0, scheduled for late November 2025. If you are working on a critical bug fix or working on a new feature, you may need to take note of this change. - The process for generating CirrusSearch dumps has been updated due to slowing performance. If you encounter any issues migrating to the replacement dumps, please contact the Search Platform Team for support.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 20:36, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
Problematic user
Hi, regarding Snape2324 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) worth creating an ANI or are you able to try and talk some sense into them? See their contributions (and edit summaries), as well as their and my talk pages… Danners430 tweaks made 18:34, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Danners430, their message on your talk page is, uh, interesting. ANI is probably the place to go if verifiability continues to be an issue. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:11, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah they just added a whole bunch of sources that were obviously from ChatGPT (they still had the tracking parameters attached)… I'm not confident, but will do Danners430 tweaks made 19:34, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hi users @Danners430 @ToBeFree That was an accident that won't be repeated again. I admit my mistake and I apologize. I wish to continue editing and I will provide sources from now on for the first edit as I wasn't familiar with that specific policy. However, it gets really annoying when some users just revert all your edits after you work so hard to provide accurate information on this database. I have been doing edits for years and have even created multiple Wikipedia pages that were previously non-existent, such as Pars Air, Air1Air, and Bahregan Airport. I take interest in Iranian aviation and I would also like to add that aviation in Iran is an underreported industry and finding sources can be extremely challenging. I request patience and understanding from users in this regard and hope to continue making this database more informative. Thanks Snape2324 (talk) 19:43, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- Look, I'm more than happy to work with you, on one condition - can we stop comments like
Your policing every edit is getting out of hand
orOne of the worst editing sprees I've seen
- we both have to follow Wikipedia policies, and one of those is WP:AGF. I've been trying to do just that by attempting to discuss this on your talk page and replying on my talk page - I ask you reciprocate. - I suggest we forget all this, and have a discussion on my talk page (mostly because there's already a discussion there). Happy? Danners430 tweaks made 20:22, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- Look, I'm more than happy to work with you, on one condition - can we stop comments like
- Hi users @Danners430 @ToBeFree That was an accident that won't be repeated again. I admit my mistake and I apologize. I wish to continue editing and I will provide sources from now on for the first edit as I wasn't familiar with that specific policy. However, it gets really annoying when some users just revert all your edits after you work so hard to provide accurate information on this database. I have been doing edits for years and have even created multiple Wikipedia pages that were previously non-existent, such as Pars Air, Air1Air, and Bahregan Airport. I take interest in Iranian aviation and I would also like to add that aviation in Iran is an underreported industry and finding sources can be extremely challenging. I request patience and understanding from users in this regard and hope to continue making this database more informative. Thanks Snape2324 (talk) 19:43, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah they just added a whole bunch of sources that were obviously from ChatGPT (they still had the tracking parameters attached)… I'm not confident, but will do Danners430 tweaks made 19:34, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
Avoiding an edit war
Heading added ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:07, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
Goodday, I'm the user involved with User:IvanScrooge98 in those 2 pages that you protected yesterday. Now that my block has expired I wouldn't want to be blocked again by you or other admins for doing something wrong, so I'm here to ask you information about how should I deal with this case after the end of my block. It's clear that I'm not the one in the wrong about those edits, I've explained in detail the matter from the absence of sources for the other user's edits to the reasons of his indefinite block by ArbCom in Italian Wikipedia. So, what can I do to prevent the IPA of those Italian names from being continuedly disrupted by him? Unfortunately you protected the pages after he restored his versions by reverting mine, but I don't want to be the 1st one to restart and that's why I'm here asking you this question. Anything you can tell me will be helpful, so I'm thanking you in advance for giving me a hand to solve this issue. ~2025-32292-80 (talk) 19:00, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hello ~2025-32292-80, this is why I have semi-protected the pages. Please use the articles' talk pages to discuss each change you'd like to make, invite IvanScrooge98 to the discussion, ask them for reliable sources other than a Wikipedia how-to page that's not even a policy or guideline, remind them that disputed content lacking verification should probably be removed while under dispute at very least if the article is about a living person, and if neither of you can find reliable sources that directly support the pronunciation, then that's probably the end of the discussion. Else, you'll have to live with whatever the reliable sources say. If there are multiple that conflict with each other, good luck in finding a solution, perhaps request a third opinion if the discussion runs in circles. If IvanScrooge98 completely refuses to discuss, see WP:DISCFAIL for a helpful essay describing possible steps. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:07, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- You've been exhaustive, thanks! One last doubt, shouldn't the pages be reverted to the version previous to all the edits by User:IvanScrooge98 before starting discussions? ~2025-32405-50 (talk) 20:16, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- No problem. Restoring one specific version, nah. One of the articles, the one about Mahmood (singer), is a biography of a living person, so I have removed the IPA from it entirely for now. Beyond that, I don't think there's any urgency in restoring a specific revision before discussion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:23, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- We should keep the version based on the Wikipedia IPA page before you started challenging it. I already invited you to open a discussion at Help:IPA/Italian because you are challenging the entire system, not just those two transcriptions. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 20:33, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- IvanScrooge98, a help page is neither a definitive policy nor a reliable source, and you both even disagree about its interpretation. So at very least for the article about Mahmood (singer), you'll probably need to find a consensus at Talk:Mahmood (singer). Which should be easy to obtain if the issue is obvious. I guess Nardog agrees with you, for example. Documenting your agreement/consensus on the talk page should take a few minutes only and would resolve this. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:44, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- Their interpretation is that we shouldn’t use one of the symbols listed. Why list it then? It makes no sense and they should discuss there whether it is to be removed. That’s what I’m saying. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 21:02, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- IvanScrooge98, it isn't my task to argue on ~2025-32405-50's behalf, and my talk page is unsuitable for having the discussion, but they pointed to the footnote saying "/h/ is usually dropped" in response to that argument already. Not that it necessarily even matters, depending on how strictly editors think a help page should be followed for a specific article. There's no way around Talk:Mahmood (singer), sorry. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:08, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- Nope, I’m sorry. {{IPA|it}} links directly to Help:IPA/Italian, which was specially designed and must be followed for consistency if we want transcriptions to actually help the readers. It can’t be discussed on a case by case basis. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 21:11, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- I'll follow your advice and open a discussion in one of the talk pages. I'd like to point out just that the (unsourced) phrase "/h/ is usually dropped" on which he bases his whole argument was added as a footnote by "him" () on his own initiative and for his own convenience. I could have written in its place that /h/ is never ever pronounced if I'd edited that help page before him and my phrase wouldn't have been less authoritative than his. If you have any comments about this fact I'd be happy to read them before opening a nes discussion. ~2025-32420-94 (talk) 23:01, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- Nope, I’m sorry. {{IPA|it}} links directly to Help:IPA/Italian, which was specially designed and must be followed for consistency if we want transcriptions to actually help the readers. It can’t be discussed on a case by case basis. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 21:11, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- IvanScrooge98, it isn't my task to argue on ~2025-32405-50's behalf, and my talk page is unsuitable for having the discussion, but they pointed to the footnote saying "/h/ is usually dropped" in response to that argument already. Not that it necessarily even matters, depending on how strictly editors think a help page should be followed for a specific article. There's no way around Talk:Mahmood (singer), sorry. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:08, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- No, I just realized Help:IPA/Italian did include [h]. WP:IPAINTEGRITY is part of a guideline, thus part of PAG. Nardog (talk) 01:18, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- It includes /h/ because it was inserted by User:IvanScrooge98 himself. If you check any article of Wikipedia about Italian language you won't find at all any indication about the /h/ that Italians should pronounce. The truth is that for some foreign names that /h/ might be pronounced depending on the speaker, for example Heidi, while in all the other cases it's never pronounced, for example hotel. No source attests that Hack or Mahmood belong to the first case, so they belong to the general rule of a silent <h>. The admin did a good job in removing completely the IPA of Mahmood (the Egyptian pronunciation might have been left there since it wasn't challenged), now let's discuss about the IPA of Hack in the related talk page. ~2025-32586-08 (talk) 16:06, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah, as I said you should discuss that at the appropriate place (i.e. Help talk:IPA/Italian). No need to rant because your inconsistent edits were reverted – as they should until there is a different consensus on the system altogether. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 16:14, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- The admin's talk page isn't the place discussion about this subject, as he said. The right place is the talk page of "Margherita Hack", as he said. The help page is the wrong place too, the matter is precisely the IPA of the surname "Hack" in Italian. I've already started the discussion there, "there" is where you should discuss the subject. ~2025-32690-03 (talk) 22:30, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah, as I said you should discuss that at the appropriate place (i.e. Help talk:IPA/Italian). No need to rant because your inconsistent edits were reverted – as they should until there is a different consensus on the system altogether. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 16:14, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- It includes /h/ because it was inserted by User:IvanScrooge98 himself. If you check any article of Wikipedia about Italian language you won't find at all any indication about the /h/ that Italians should pronounce. The truth is that for some foreign names that /h/ might be pronounced depending on the speaker, for example Heidi, while in all the other cases it's never pronounced, for example hotel. No source attests that Hack or Mahmood belong to the first case, so they belong to the general rule of a silent <h>. The admin did a good job in removing completely the IPA of Mahmood (the Egyptian pronunciation might have been left there since it wasn't challenged), now let's discuss about the IPA of Hack in the related talk page. ~2025-32586-08 (talk) 16:06, 10 November 2025 (UTC)
- Their interpretation is that we shouldn’t use one of the symbols listed. Why list it then? It makes no sense and they should discuss there whether it is to be removed. That’s what I’m saying. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 21:02, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- IvanScrooge98, a help page is neither a definitive policy nor a reliable source, and you both even disagree about its interpretation. So at very least for the article about Mahmood (singer), you'll probably need to find a consensus at Talk:Mahmood (singer). Which should be easy to obtain if the issue is obvious. I guess Nardog agrees with you, for example. Documenting your agreement/consensus on the talk page should take a few minutes only and would resolve this. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:44, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- We should keep the version based on the Wikipedia IPA page before you started challenging it. I already invited you to open a discussion at Help:IPA/Italian because you are challenging the entire system, not just those two transcriptions. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 20:33, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- No problem. Restoring one specific version, nah. One of the articles, the one about Mahmood (singer), is a biography of a living person, so I have removed the IPA from it entirely for now. Beyond that, I don't think there's any urgency in restoring a specific revision before discussion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:23, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
- You've been exhaustive, thanks! One last doubt, shouldn't the pages be reverted to the version previous to all the edits by User:IvanScrooge98 before starting discussions? ~2025-32405-50 (talk) 20:16, 9 November 2025 (UTC)
Avoiding an edit war 2
Goodday, excuse me if I disturb you again about this issue. User:IvanScrooge98 was invited to join the discussion I opened in the talk page of "Margherita Hack" but he refuses to discuss there because he claims, wrongly, that the matter isn't the IPA of her surname but the help page for Italian IPA itself. Well, the matter is precisely the sourceless addition of the sound /h/ in "that" IPA, the interpretation of convenience of the general rule for this specific case, as I've explained in the previous thread. In other possible cases an addition of /h/ wouldn't have been challenged. What do you suggest that I do now? ~2025-32442-33 (talk) 12:24, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- If it was a biography of a living person, I could easily disagree; a consensus would have to be found on the article's talk page, even if that consensus is "whatever Help:IPA/Italian says". This consensus would have to be found before the content can be restored (WP:BLPRESTORE). Arguably, even in non-biograpghies, WP:BURDEN applies to IPAs at least as soon as their verifiability is questioned ("challenged") as described in the lead section of the verifiability policy.
- Neither WP:BLP's nor WP:V's requirements can be overridden by a help page even if that help page is part of a guideline, courtesy ping Nardog.
- How to continue depends strongly on whether you're trying to make a general point about Help:IPA/Italian or whether you have a problem with one specific article's IPA. If you're trying to make a point about a central page by starting a dispute about one specific article, you're disrupting Wikipedia to illustrate a point and should stop. If you genuinely care about one specific article's IPA, I wonder why you made the same change in two articles and if you really yet took the time to check for sources that could be used for that specific article instead of relying on general advice. If you didn't do that yet, your position is just as weak as the others'.
- The two affected pages (so far) are semi-protected to prevent you from edit warring, and with the IPA removed from the article about the living Mahmood (singer), there's no reason to make a change before having found a consensus. See if you can convince the others to make changes on your behalf. This is not an administrative matter anymore, and unless someone violates WP:BLPRESTORE or generally WP:BURDEN in a biography of a living person, I'm out. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:53, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- I'll explain better. I care about "these 2 articles IPA", both Hack and Mahmood. I'm speaking just about the IPA in Margherita Hack because you removed for caution the IPA in Mahmood (singer). The argument is the same for both: there's no source proving that, in Italian, those names may be pronounced both with and without /h/. "Heidi" is a name that in Italian may have both pronunciations. If User:IvanScrooge98 or anyone else finds a reliable source proving the possible pronunciation with /h/, I'll agree to leave that symbol in their IPA. But untill then, adding /h/ will be POV. Also adding an unreliable source such as a random recording taken from the Internet found with a cherry picking search would be POV. I'm not contesting the footnote "/h/ is usually dropped", because it's true. False is the interpretation given by User:IvanScrooge98, the user who included that phrase in the help page without any source so that he could apply his own criteria wherever he likes. You're free to search Wikipedia for any indication in articles about Italian of a possible pronunciation of /h/: nowhere you'll find a line confirming User:IvanScrooge98's argument (/h/ can always be pronounced); I did and didn't find anything (as I already knew). One last note: the IPA of Margherita Hack was originally without /h/, it was added by... Can you guess who? ~2025-32478-64 (talk) 17:18, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
Question
Hi, it's been a long time since we met. I hope you are well. A user wrote something strangely like this on my talk page. (Guck mal als Misch lem) Is this an insult or harassment or not? The reason I ask you this is because you are the only German I know. Kajmer05 (talk) 14:01, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Kajmer05, it's been a while :) I had to check where we interacted, seems to have been dealing with sockpuppetry in February. Thanks for asking; it's neither an understandable insult nor something that makes sense. Details can be found at the bottom of their talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:02, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- You helped me a lot with the socks problem, especially the SPI files, and thank you for helping me again now. :) Kajmer05 (talk) 16:50, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
Thank you for the kind feedback! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:39, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- You helped me a lot with the socks problem, especially the SPI files, and thank you for helping me again now. :) Kajmer05 (talk) 16:50, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
You running?
We need qualified people. You're qualified, and to the best of my knowledge also a person :) Toadspike [Talk] 16:56, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
Well.- I can't. I shouldn't. I've already been far less active than I had hoped to be. I can't do two more years of ArbCom, I need to get back to normalcy. I'll probably keep OS, I've probably grown too attached to the ability to checkuser in cases of edit warring with accounts and IP addresses, I couldn't ask a checkuser to have a look as they couldn't confirm or deny their findings so I need to make these checks myself ... so I'll probably keep OS and CU. Which doesn't exactly leave me detached from all the ArbCom-related stuff, but I'll try.
- The current list of candidates brings not a single oppose vote to my ballot and I hope it stays this way; your request is an honor, Toadspike, but I did everything I did on ArbCom and in cases etc cetera knowing that I wouldn't run again. This was clear to me from the beginning. It allowed me to act without regards to whether it would cause me to be re-elected or not. I could now change my mind and the decisions would remain the same, but I'd have betrayed myself and the person I hope to find during the next two years. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:45, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- And
- I think I have reached the point where I can admit that one of the reasons for running for ArbCom was getting CU/OS without having to ask ArbCom for it, through a community election. There was some drama years ago regarding my view on a rejected oversight request on dewiki, and there was additional drama regarding an oversighting on enwiki longer time ago, and I thought one of the (ex-)functionaries might notice and use any of this as a far-fetched but loudly-enough-yelled reason to oppose me getting OS or whatever. The current way of appointing CU/OS is too reliant on the opinions of non-functionaries still subscribed as a kind of "House of Lords" to the functionaries mailing list, and I was afraid that any of them could start a campaign against me behind the scenes.
- So I went to ArbCom not only for ArbCom but also for OS (and perhaps CU without wanting to deal with SPIs, which would have been a strange application). Which is fine but not something one would announce in their candidacy or immediately afterwards. It's something I can now say that I have (hopefully) proven worthy as a 2024-2025 arbitrator. Two good years and a good time to end them here. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:56, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- Courtesy ping Xaosflux who might find that particularly interesting and would be welcome to point to it as an argument if the discussion comes up again. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:58, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- Oh look. I found the source of that discussion again. It was one of the candidacy questions and I wrote
I also don't think that contacting ArbCom privately with an application is a less inviting and more frightening process than directly having to submit an application on a public page.
Hm. Thinking about it again, I think the "House of Lords" concern grew over time 2024-2025 as I saw criticism and the actual downsides of having such an institution. I do think, just as with administrator elections vs. RfAs, that a secret poll is a far more attractive option than public supports and opposes. I can't say for sure if writing this back then was done to avoid upsetting the wrong people or if I really thought there were no issues with that process. If it wasn't honest, something in me felt that replying differently would risk enough votes to be better avoided. That would be a shame. And a confirmation of Xaosflux's concerns. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:31, 11 November 2025 (UTC)- Maybe it would have gone too far away from my "ArbCom has majority support, say good things about them to be supported by the majority" strategy. I really don't know. The dishonesty that seems to be in the quoted reply might upset people. After the two years and with no intent of running again, I can just write freely about that. It doesn't matter anymore. Weird. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:34, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks for the ping :) I still hold what I think is a minority local opinion that arbcom should get out of the "investigations" mechanics to focus more on dispute resolution, making CUOS less abstracted away from the community. I'd be fine with open or secret CUOS elections as is done on many other projects. — xaosflux Talk 18:49, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- Oh look. I found the source of that discussion again. It was one of the candidacy questions and I wrote
- Oh and one more thing. I have seen the evidence the WMF gave to ArbCom regarding Fram's ban. The huge drama from back then. I thought it would be interesting; it isn't. I'm aware that's easily said and hard to believe but access to the details behind that case didn't change my life. There was an air of mystery around it and nothing mysterious within. I can't even say who was right or wrong back then. I lack an opinion about the arbitrators' decisions back then. I had a look once and never again. I think I couldn't even vote for or against Fram at a new RfA. I'm left weirdly indifferent from what I thought would enlighten me. Sometimes things become boring when accessible.
- Sorry, Fram, for talking about something that did have an enormous impact on you and the community's views on you in this way. I try to avoid using the terms "Fram" or "WP:FRAM" as if Fram was the name of the drama instead of a user's name. I didn't manage to completely avoid this depersonalization in my text above and I don't want to brag with things that affect you. I wrote this for you too and have no idea what you might think about it. I don't want to open old wounds either. Whatever. The two years were interesting and I wanted to note in hindsight that what some might view as the most interesting part is actually ... not. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:15, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
- Courtesy ping Xaosflux who might find that particularly interesting and would be welcome to point to it as an argument if the discussion comes up again. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:58, 11 November 2025 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2025 Issue 21

Upcoming and current events and conversations
Let's Talk continues

- Wikimania 2027: Santiago, Chile is announced as the location for Wikimania 2027. The annual conference returns to Latin America after more than 10 years, following previous editions in Buenos Aires (2009) and Mexico City (2015).
- Wikidata recognized as a Digital Public Good: Wikidata became the second Wikimedia project to be officially recognized as a digital public good by the Digital Public Goods Alliance.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Product Safety and Integrity · Readers · Research · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Tech News: Read updates from Tech News week 44 and 45 including the community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week.
- Activity Tab: The Wikipedia Android app expands the new Activity tab to all users. It offers a complete view of your Wikipedia activity: reading time, saved articles, edits, and donation history (for known donors). This change aims to make Wikipedia a more engaging experience for readers and contributors alike, while keeping all personal data private and stored locally on your device.
- Tabbed browsing: Tabbed browsing is now available on the Wikipedia App for iOS. Tabs will let you keep more than one article open at a time, making it easier to explore complex topics, follow links without losing your place, and pick up where you left off.
- CampaignEvents extension: Autoconfirmed users on small and medium wikis with the CampaignEvents extension can now use Event Registration without the Event Organizer right. This feature lets organizers enable registration, manage participants, and lets users register with one click instead of signing event pages.
- Image browsing: The Wikimedia Foundation launched image browsing, an experiment that puts images on top of your Wikipedia article reading journey, on Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Indonesian, and Vietnamese Wikipedias.
- Temporary accounts: Temporary Accounts are now enabled on 1,000+ projects including English Wikipedia.
- Abstract Wikipedia naming contest: The first round of “abstract content wiki” naming vote has ended and the first legal review had begun to determine the 6 names that will make it to the second round on November 17.
- Wikifunctions: Wikifunctions is now deployed across 12 Wiktionaries and 4 Wikipedias.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · list of movement events

- Privacy in Wikipedia research: The Wikimedia Foundation published Privacy in Public: Navigating Research, Personal Data, and Safety on Wikipedia, a whitepaper which guides researchers in navigating privacy of Wikipedia editors in their research. Read the highlights and key takeaways for researchers and Wikipedians.
- Digital Safety: The Wikimedia Foundation is launching Digital Safety Office Hours to explore how to stay safe digitally, what does digital safety mean, what extra precautions can Wikimedians take. The first session will take place on November 28 at 9 AM and 7 PM UTC. Check out also our Digital Safety Resources Center to learn practical tips and tools you can use immediately.
- Volunteer roles for movement governance: The Movement governance committees are seeking new volunteers to support essential and high-impact work across the Wikimedia ecosystem. The current appointment cycle is open for the AffCom, Ombuds Commission, and Case Review Committee. Applications for these committees will remain open until December 11. The team will host a community conversation on November 26, at 3 AM UTC.
- Don't Blink: The latest developments from around the world about protecting the Wikimedia model, its people and its values.
- Wikimedia Core Curriculum: Want to learn how to edit Wikipedia? – A new free self-paced course, all in video with subtitles, is available from the Wikimedia Foundation!
Foundation statements
- Transparency builds trust: The latest edition from the series "Lessons from Wikipedia" explores how deep transparency has helped make Wikipedia one of the most trusted sources on the internet.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
See also: Diff blog · Goings-on · Planet Wikimedia · Signpost (en) · Kurier (de) · Actualités du Wiktionnaire (fr) · Regards sur l’actualité de la Wikimedia (fr) · Wikimag (fr) · Education · GLAM · The Wikipedia Library · Milestones · Wikidata · Central and Eastern Europe · other newsletters
Subscribe or unsubscribe · Help translate
For information about the Bulletin and to read previous editions, see the project page on Meta-Wiki. Let askcac
wikimedia.org know if you have any feedback or suggestions for improvement!
MediaWiki message delivery 23:05, 12 November 2025 (UTC)
Black Japanese
Thanks for locking this article, but it seems you locked the vandalised version. This edit here is heavily disputed and has been reverted numerous times. could you please revert it. Even though the user says "You never got consensus", they are actually the one acting against consensus ~2025-33214-55 (talk) 23:43, 13 November 2025 (UTC)
- ~2025-33214-55, I'll always protect the wrong version in some users' eyes. If you believe there is an uncontroversial change to be made for obvious reasons, you can click here to create an edit request and someone will help making it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:48, 13 November 2025 (UTC)
- In this case it's really the wrong version, I've already explained this to another admin yesterday. This is a longterm case of IP disruption https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Ser!#Black_Japanese ~2025-33214-55 (talk) 23:49, 13 November 2025 (UTC)
- The current version even uses the same photo twice, it's completely nonsensical ~2025-33214-55 (talk) 23:51, 13 November 2025 (UTC)
- Sooner or later, someone will fix it then. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:56, 13 November 2025 (UTC)
Follow-up on ANEW
Not sure if this is worth reopening my ANEW post for, but BlackVulcanX (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) appeared & reverted after the article was protected & I restored the status quo; the TA also wanted this information at the bottom of the section. It is such a silly thing to edit war over especially since I didn't restore the things that were really the crux of the edit wars (section heading, new sentence opening section, etc). Instead of doing a mea culpa about missing that the information was already in the section, the TA doubled down that it wasn't a duplication before deciding actually the original sentence was the duplicate...
Behaviorally they look the same: besides the above, in August & October BlackVulcanX removed a subsection heading, with the October edit being nearly identical to the TA's edits on Nov 4-5 (ex). If they are a single person, reopening the ANEW post probably makes sense since the TA had hit 4RR but I thought checking with you first (WP:CONTACTCU) was a better first step. Sariel Xilo (talk) 06:42, 14 November 2025 (UTC)
- This is, respectfully, nonsense. That line has been at the bottom of the section for a long time, so I partially reverted to keep it there. I've also never seen a "Sales" section that wasn't chronological. Sariel Xilo appears to be targeting his editing opponents in order to win some content agenda (?). Also, these two edits by Sariel Xilo constitute edit warring (look at the bottom, removing the exact same line).
- The talk discussion appears to be progressing nicely (and thank you for commenting there!), so if there is consensus to move that line it will be moved. I do not see the issue here. Lets use the talk page and work together. BlackVulcanX (talk) 07:49, 14 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Sariel Xilo and BlackVulcanX, I have read these messages but don't think there's currently any advice for me to provide or any action for me to take. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:16, 14 November 2025 (UTC)
order of guides
Regarding this edit: note the order within the template doesn't matter to the final output. The module implementing the template randomizes the order of the guides (whenever a new version of the page has to be generated). isaacl (talk) 03:56, 15 November 2025 (UTC)
- I noticed after saving :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:58, 15 November 2025 (UTC)
Trivia questions relating to a particular matter
Hi, ~ ToBeFree
I have some trivia questions for you. This is relating to editing I promise. I am going to ask two separate questions. It might seem rhetorical, but it's really to have a better understanding.
First question: Are you familiar with the congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez? If you not, no cheating. If you are are, then cool.
- What city was Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez born in?
Second question:
- Can you name a city that makes up five boroughs?
How have you been. I mentioned the last time we communicated that I felt that I could come to you regarding any questions or concerns. I am back. 😃
To be honest, I did have a dispute with another user. But I think I handled okay. It has been resolved for now.Welcometothenewmillenium (talk) 02:25, 14 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Welcometothenewmillenium, thanks for the quiz.

- To the first question: I have no idea. I did have a look after deciding that I have no idea and I see that there's currently a dispute about this question in the article, on the article's talk page and it even was at the administrators' noticeboard.
- To the second question: I think you're overestimating my knowledge about the USA. I couldn't even tell you what a borough is. We do have probably-similar levels of organization in Germany at least for communal voting purposes but I couldn't say how similar they are to US boroughs. The article about boroughs in general says
A borough is an administrative division in various English-speaking countries.
Well ...
I'm fine, thank you, and yes you can. I'm happy to hear that the conflict has been resolved though. The advice in the dispute resolution policy and the noticeboards listed there are probably more helpful than an individual administrator's talk page for such cases anyway. And when something ends up at WP:ANEW, I'll probably notice it there. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:11, 15 November 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree I am happy to answer your questions.
- Maybe, I shouldn't just assume what information individuals know and might not know. The answer to both of the questions is: New York City. To many people, it is considered one of the greatest cities in the world. Opinions are subjective and vary from person to person. It is in fact the most populated city in the United States, and one of the largest cities in the world.
- For that reason the city is divided into five boroughs:
- Manhattan, which is dubbed, 'the city' center.
- Brooklyn
- Queens
- The Bronx
- Staten Island
- Each borough represents a different branch of NYC. There's a highway bridge that connects each borough together.
- Yes, the dispute that got resolved was regarding, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, here is the link to learn more information about the congresswoman. Fascinating individual, and American politics can be very intense. Considering you are from Germany you probably have more knowledge about German politics than I do. Given the fact I am an American and know a lot about American politics. I am always willing to learn.
- I have learned that editing politicians page's can get heated, because politics is a contentious sometimes a divisive topic. That article has numerous of disputes and will continue to probably have more considering our current political atmosphere.
- Now, I know where to go to handle a similar situation occurs in the future. That information is very helpful. It is good to hear from you. I told you I felt that you can be someone I could reach out to regarding any question or concern I might have. I am glad to hear that you are doing good. Welcometothenewmillenium (talk) 06:57, 15 November 2025 (UTC)

~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:25, 15 November 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-47
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- The Reader Experience team is experimenting with reading lists on mobile web, allowing logged-in readers with no edits to save private lists of articles for later. The experiment is running on Arabic, Chinese, French, Indonesian, and Vietnamese Wikipedias since the week of 10 November, and will begin on English Wikipedia the week of 17 November.
- Users who can’t receive their email verification code during login can now get help by submitting a form on a new special page. This update is part of the Account Security initiative. If your account has an email address, please make sure you still have access to it. When logging in from a new device or location without 2FA, you may be asked to enter a 6-digit code sent by email to finish logging in. Learn more.
- One new wiki has been created: a Wikisource in Minangkabau (
s:min:)
View all 23 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week.
Updates for technical contributors
- As part of the Parser Unification project, the Content Transform Team rolled out Parsoid as the default parser to many low-traffic Wikipedias and is preparing the next step to high traffic ones. This message is an invitation for you to opt-in to Parsoid, as described in the Extension:ParserMigration documentation, and identify any issues you might encounter with your own workflow using bots, gadgets, or user scripts. Please, let us know through the "Report Visual Bug" link in the Tools sidebar or create a phab ticket and tag the Content Transform Team in Phabricator.
- Unsupported Tools: Several issues with Video2Commons have been fixed, including filename-related upload failures, black-video imports, and retry handling. AV1 support has also been added. Ongoing work focuses on backend stability, ffmpeg errors, subtitle imports, metadata handling, and playlist uploads. To track specific tasks, check the Phabricator board.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Meetings and events
- Save the date for the next Wikimedia Hackathon happening in Milan, Italy from May 1–3, 2026. Registration will open in January 2026. Scholarship applications are currently open, and will close on November 28, 2025. If you have any questions, please email hackathon@wikimedia.org.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 17:24, 17 November 2025 (UTC)
ArbCom 2025 Elections voter message
Hello! Voting in the 2025 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on Monday, 1 December 2025. 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 2025 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) 00:36, 18 November 2025 (UTC)
ANI block hasn't gone through
Hi! Black Kite intended to block this editor a few hours ago but it doesn't seem to have worked.
Since Black Kite is currently offline & hasn't seen the message on ANI about the block not being in place yet, are you able to help to pop that block on in the meantime?
The editor is continuing to edit without responding to messages, so this seems to be the only way to get their attention.
Apologies if this isn't the right process, I wasn't sure how best to get this resolved other than waiting for BK to come back online later. Blue Sonnet (talk) 18:59, 18 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Blue Sonnet (and Black Kite), done :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:04, 18 November 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you! Blue Sonnet (talk) 19:21, 18 November 2025 (UTC)
UTRS appeal #108452
What do you think about unblocking? Are they banned? Once unblocked, they'll need to ask the stewards about unlocking globally. Best, -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 17:08, 20 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Deepfriedokra, thank you very much for dealing with this.
- The user did everything in their power to make sure they stay blocked for as long as possible. Cross-wiki vandalism, sockpuppetry with three checkuser-confirmed accounts (AirmanKitten203, CoolWikipedianDude, WikipedianHelper123) and one proven behaviorally (HawkCop), courtesy vanishing to "Retired User 39432" and then returning, requiring the name change to be undone ...
- I'm not sure if the creation of the user pages of the sockpuppets counts as public documentation for WP:3X; if it does, the user is banned and would have to appeal to AN. Whatever.
- I'd be fine with unblocking them right away and seeing what happens, but I can't do so – technically (the global lock would still exist) and procedurally (if 3X applies). As 3X requires public documentation, anyone can evaluate this and no checkuser is needed to say whether they're banned or not.
- The user has wasted too much time for me to bother investigating further. Please don't message me about them again; I'm fine with any unban, unblock, whatever as long as it reduces the amount of time the community has to bend backwards for their habits. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:38, 20 November 2025 (UTC)
Help with a couple of editors
I thought maybe you could help with two tennis editors. One is PindoramaBoyy and the other is an IP ~2025-31096-91. They can't seem to work well and play together. My own talk page near the bottom has their pleads to stop the other guy. I have warned each of them about edit warring but I truly think they don't know the difference between vandalism and a content dispute. While they both occasionally go against Tennis Project guidelines there are many things Tennis Project leaves to the page editors so every article isn't a cookie cutter of another. They both also do a lot of good editing. But their fueding needs to stop. You can see it at page history 1, and page history 2, and page history 3, and page history 4. There are many more examples and they are building some anger on each other's talk pages.
I've tried to explain it to them but I have failed. Is there anything you can do short of blocking that could help them resolve this dispute? I hate blocks so maybe an explanation to them of what they are doing wrong and a final stern warning that if they revert each other again a 3-day block is coming? You actually have some power here so coming from you it could finally sink in. Maybe I'm all wrong about fault here and my judgement is faulty so I'll leave it in your hands as how best to handle things. If it doesn't work Ani is always there waiting but I always look at that as a last resort. Thanks. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:55, 20 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Fyunck(click), thank you very much for the notification. Seeking and asking for a non-block solution is noble but you did try and it didn't work, so I went ahead, placed some blocks and removed some of the unhelpful messages, pinging their author on removal. None of the blocks are permanent. Let's see what happens next. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:15, 20 November 2025 (UTC)
- That why I went to you. You guys know best how to resolve these things since you deal with it day in and day out. My thoughts are that I want these folks to work with each other and compromise. It seems like you always have to deal with bad things rather than good things at Wikipedia so thanks again for your time and effort. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:48, 20 November 2025 (UTC)
Thank you very much!- Well, some users work best when not interacting but of course that would be desirable. I recently dealt with an interaction ban and there was no winner. In cooperation and compromise, at least everyone wins something. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:23, 20 November 2025 (UTC)
- That why I went to you. You guys know best how to resolve these things since you deal with it day in and day out. My thoughts are that I want these folks to work with each other and compromise. It seems like you always have to deal with bad things rather than good things at Wikipedia so thanks again for your time and effort. Fyunck(click) (talk) 22:48, 20 November 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-48
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- Last week, the Wikimedia Search Team recreated the "DWIM" (Do What I Mean) gadget functionality server-side, for Russian and Hebrew Wikipedias. This feature adds cross-keyboard suggestions to the standard search-box suggestions. For example, searching for cxfcnmt on Russian Wikipedia will now add suggestions for счастье ("happiness") that the user probably intended. They plan to enable this feature for other Russian and Hebrew wikis this week.
- Later this week, users of the "Improved Syntax Highlighting" beta feature will have syntax highlighting available in DiscussionTools. This requires that the "Enable editing tools in source mode" preference be set.
- Campaign events extension – the set of tools for coordinating events and other on-wiki collaborations has now been deployed to all Wikimedia wikis. A new feature known as Collaborative contribution to help organizers and participants see the impact of activities has also been added. Join the upcoming learning session to see the new feature in action and share your feedback.
View all 24 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the bug which stopped CodeReviewBot from working, has now been fixed.
Updates for technical contributors
- Users of Wikimedia API can join a usability study to help validate the new design of Wikimedia REST API sandboxes. Interested participants should fill the recruitment survey.
- The MediaWiki Interfaces team is deprecating XSLT stylesheets within the Action API. Support for
format=xml&xlst={stylesheet}will be removed from Wikimedia projects by the end of November, 2025. In addition, it will soon be disabled by default in MediaWiki release versions: v1.43 (LTS), v1.44, and v1.45. Support for XSLT stylesheets will be fully removed from MediaWiki v1.46 (expected to release between April and May 2026). - The WDQS legacy endpoint (query-legacy-full.wikidata.org) will be decommissioned at the end of December 2025, and finally closed down on 7th January 2026. After this date, users should expect requests to query.wikidata.org that require the full graph to fail or return invalid results if they are not rewritten to use SPARQL federation. The team encourages users to ensure that tools and workflows use the supported WDQS endpoints (https://query.wikidata.org/ - Main graph or https://query-scholarly.wikidata.org/ - Scholarly graph). For support with migrating use cases, please review the Data Access and Request a Query pages for details and assistance on alternative access methods.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 15:54, 24 November 2025 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2025 Issue 22

Upcoming and current events and conversations
Let's Talk continues

- Board election: The 2025 Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees vote has elected two new trustees, Bobby Shabangu (Bobbyshabangu) and Michał Buczyński (Aegis Maelstrom), who will be appointed at the next Board meeting in December 2025.
- Wikipedia 25: Wikipedia is turning 25 and it’s time to party! Register now for Wikipedia’s 25th virtual birthday bash on 15 January at 16:00 UTC.
- Wikimedia Hackathon: The 2026 Wikimedia Hackathon will be taking place in person May 1 - 3, 2026 in Milan, Italy. Scholarship applications are open until November 28.
- Language Community: The next language community meeting will be held on November 28 at 16:00 UTC.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Product Safety and Integrity · Readers · Research · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Tech News: Some of the latest updates from Tech News week 46 and 47: Wikimedia Foundation is experimentating with reading lists on mobile web, allowing logged-in readers with no edits to save private lists of articles for later; One new wiki has been created: a Wikisource in Minangkabau.
- Wikifunctions: The second round of voting for naming the wiki with abstract content is kicking off with six name proposals to vote for.
- Reference check: The A/B test for reference check has begun on English Wikipedia and will run until December 17. This is a feature which prompts new editors to add citations before they publish an edit adding content to an article.
- Image browsing: Wikimedia Foundation is launching an experiment called "Image browsing" to test how to make it easier for readers to browse and discover images on Wikipedia articles. This experiment, a mobile-only A/B test, is taking place on on Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Indonesian, and Vietnamese wikis, affecting a small number of users.
- CampaignEvents extension: Campaign events extension is now available on all Wikimedia wikis. The extension offers tools for running and coordinating events and other on-wiki collaborations. These features include Event Registration, Collaboration List, and Invitation List, plus a new feature, Collaborative contribution, which helps organizers and participants see the impact of their collaborative activities. Join the upcoming learning session to see the new feature in action and share your feedback.
- Dark Mode: Dark mode is now available on all Wikimedia projects for all anonymous users! This enhancement aims to deliver a more enjoyable reading experience, especially in dimly lit environments. Learn how to activate this feature.
- Wikimedia Apps: The Activity tab in the Wikipedia Android app is now available for all users. The new tab offers personalized insights into reading, editing, and donation activity, while simplifying navigation and making app use more engaging.
- Usability Improvements: Improvements for talk pages is being rolled out. Users can opt out of these changes in their user preferences in “Show discussion activity.”
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · list of movement events
- Wikipedia 25 Press toolkit: Wikimedia Foundation is providing press toolkit as guidance and resources to Wikimedia volunteers and affiliates to spread the word about Wikipedia’s 25th birthday to local and regional media.
- Language and Internationalization: Read some key highlights from the October 2025 edition of the Language and internationalization newsletter.
- Information integrity: Wikimedia Project from South America Selected by the UNESCO Global Initiative for Information Integrity on Climate Change Fund.
- The Wikipedia Library: The Wikipedia Library team attended the CEE Meeting 2025 celebrated a new partnership with Times of Malta.
- Understanding movement organizers: Wikimedia Foundation concluded a literature review on organizers in the Wikimedia movement focused on capturing their personas, motivations, and impact in order to highlight best practices and opportunities for further support.
Annual Goals Progress on Effectiveness
See also: Progress on the annual plan
- Wikimedia Enterprise: Reef Media uses Wikimedia Enterprise Snapshot API to Fact Check and Verify Sources.
Board and Board committee updates
See Wikimedia Foundation Board noticeboard · Affiliations Committee Newsletter
- Affiliations Committee: Draft recommendations on three strategic areas that need continuous consideration to best support Wikimedia affiliates.
Foundation statements
- Lessons from Wikipedia: The latest edition from the series explores the art of disagreement and how Wikipedia navigates disputes.
- Artificial Intelligence: In the AI era, Wikipedia has never been more valuable. This explainer shows how human-created knowledge isn’t replaceable.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
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MediaWiki message delivery 17:30, 25 November 2025 (UTC)
silesian language
Pls stop this this edit war. Pls check information about user "Brat Forelli" he is supporter of President Nawrocki and he cannot be objective. Pls bring back all edits provided by user Jeanie0945. Ban all users that dont want to discuss and making edits that are motivated by political views. They are removes sources flat talk section. Kamil993eu (talk) 17:29, 28 November 2025 (UTC)
- "This user supports Law and Justice."
- "This user supports Karol Nawrocki. the President of Poland."
- "This user is a Nationalist." Kamil993eu (talk) 17:31, 28 November 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree, sorry to be disrupting you, but what is enough to warrant an action here? Kamil993eu posted a similar message on my talk page declaring:
You have like 0% moral rights to editing this article. You should be ban immediately
. I deleted it, and warned the user. But I see that this user has gone a bit further than just my talk page. - Also, @Kamil993eu, I believe you might have the wrong guy. Based on your edits, you believe that
"Ślōnsko godka" has become much more different than polish language
. Jeanie0945 was advancing the opposite view (that Silesian is very similar to/a dialect of Polish). Meanwhile this is an example of my edit. You assumed a lot based on nothing but my political views. At least you did not attack my faith though, so it's a start... Brat Forelli🦊 19:38, 28 November 2025 (UTC)- I might be overlooking something – have there been any edits to the article after my semi-protection? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:19, 28 November 2025 (UTC)
- There haven't been, Kamil993eu just wrote that out of nowhere. We did not have any direct interactions with each other. Looking at his (assuming, Kamil is a male name) contribs history, it seems the user was busy, came back today and saw the edits earlier this week, checked the user pages of people involved including me, and apparently concluded that my political userboxes deprive me of the 'moral right' to edit Wikipedia. Brat Forelli🦊 21:35, 28 November 2025 (UTC)
- Kamil993eu, Wikipedia is not a battleground and you'll have to deal with people from all over the world with opinions from all over the political spectrum arguing about the neutrality of your edits based on what sources say, not what they personally believe. If that's what you're looking for too, great. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:10, 29 November 2025 (UTC)
- (That said, I don't like political userboxes; they make it easy for people to put you into a labeled box inside their head instead of focusing on content.) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:12, 29 November 2025 (UTC)
- There haven't been, Kamil993eu just wrote that out of nowhere. We did not have any direct interactions with each other. Looking at his (assuming, Kamil is a male name) contribs history, it seems the user was busy, came back today and saw the edits earlier this week, checked the user pages of people involved including me, and apparently concluded that my political userboxes deprive me of the 'moral right' to edit Wikipedia. Brat Forelli🦊 21:35, 28 November 2025 (UTC)
- I might be overlooking something – have there been any edits to the article after my semi-protection? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:19, 28 November 2025 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree, sorry to be disrupting you, but what is enough to warrant an action here? Kamil993eu posted a similar message on my talk page declaring:
PP-dispute
Looks like you removed the pp-dispute template while reverting on Kamal Haasan, can you readd that? Z E T AC 17:21, 29 November 2025 (UTC)
- Hi HurricaneZeta, a bot automatically does this, but I have now also added it manually. Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:22, 29 November 2025 (UTC)
Feedback requests from the Feedback Request Service

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The Signpost: 1 December 2025
- News and notes: Election cycles come and go, and Wikimedia Foundation achieves record revenue in 2024–2025!
Admin and ArbCom elections upcoming, BoT elects two new members, task force advises to close Wikinews and keep Wikispore, and other news from the Wikimedia world.
- In the media: Wales walk-off, antisemitism, supernatural powers, feminism turmoil, saints, and sex
Plus mammoth mummy sex-change operation completed!
- Recent research: At least 80 million inconsistent facts on Wikipedia – can AI help find them?
And other recent publications about contradictions and retractions.
- Disinformation report: Epstein email exchanges planned strategy, edits and reported progress
At work on Wikipedia whitewashing. How much should they be paid?
- Traffic report: It's a family affair
Even in these times there is something to be thankful for!
- Book review: The Seven Rules of Trust
Jimmy Wales and Dan Gardner write a book inspired by Wikipedia. What's in it?
- From the archives: "I have been asked by Jeffrey Epstein ..."
The twists and turns of Epstein’s portrayal on Wikipedia.
- Humour: An interview with Wikipe-tan
A conversation about being the mascot of Wikipedia.
- Opinion: AI finds errors in 90% of Wikipedia's best articles
Using ChatGPT to fact-check a month's worth of Today's featured articles.
- Serendipity: Highlights from the itWikiCon 2025
A recap of the latest convention of the Italian Wiki-community, held in Catania from 7–9 November.
- Comix: Madness
It could happen to anyone.
Tech News: 2025-49
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- The Wikipedia Year in Review 2025 will be available on December 2 for users of iOS and Android Wikipedia apps, featuring new personalized insights, updated reading highlights, and refreshed designs. Learn more on the review's project page.
- The Growth team is working on improving the text and presentation of the Verification Email sent to new users to make them more welcoming, useful and informative. Some new text have been drafted for A/B testing and you can help by translating them. See Phabricator.
- Add a link will now be deployed at Japanese, Urdu and Chinese Wikipedias on December 2. Add a link is based on a prediction model that suggests links to be added to articles. While this feature has already been available on most Wikipedias, the prediction model could not support certain languages. A new model has now been developed to handle these languages, and it will be gradually rolled out to other Wikipedias over time. If you would like to know more, please contact Trizek (WMF).
View all 34 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the issue where search boxes on some Commons pages showed no results due to switch from SpecialSearch to MediaSearch, has now been fixed. - Two new wikis have been created:
- a Wikipedia in Toki Pona (
w:tok:) - a Wikiquote in Nigerian Pidgin (
q:pcm:)
- a Wikipedia in Toki Pona (
Updates for technical contributors
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
In depth
- The Wikimedia Foundation is in the early stages of exploring approaches to Article guidance. The initiative aims to identify interventions that could help new editors easily understand and apply existing Wikipedia practices and policies when creating an article. The project is in the exploration and early experimental design phase. All community members are encouraged to learn more about the project, and share their thoughts on the talk page.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 18:56, 1 December 2025 (UTC)
Belated thanks!
Hello ToBeFree! I only just spotted that you replied to me via email regarding that suspected sock-puppet, I do apologise profusely for the late reply! The email had gotten buried with other basic Wiki notification emails & I missed it. More used to responding to Wiki stuff on my talk page. I have replied now to the email itself but wanted to make sure you knew I was grateful for your help in this. Hated the idea you might think I simply ignored you. So sorry for my goof! Take care, LooksGreatInATurtleNeck (talk) 12:34, 1 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi LooksGreatInATurtleNeck, I had completely forgotten about this already.
All good! Thank you very much for the kind reply, timing irrelevant. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:47, 1 December 2025 (UTC)
Merge history for attributions
Hi there, can you take a look at both Draft:Cashero (TV series) and Cashero (TV Series)? And see if the history could be merge for attribution as I find some similarities. Also the latter's disambiguation is wrong.
HitmanSK47 is the user who mostly add contents on the draft then copy-paste it on to the mainspace article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by D.18th (talk • contribs) 08:43, 1 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi D.18th, you had correctly requested this using the {{History merge}} template, but the two pages appear to have existed next to each other for a while, and were edited independently of each other. We now have parallel histories that can't be properly merged. They can technically still be merged but the resulting diffs would be completely chaotic. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:53, 1 December 2025 (UTC)
Helen Hemphill
Just letting you know that someone claiming to be the subject would like her personal information removed from Wikipedia. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:38, 1 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, oh. This is a really valuable find. Thank you very much! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:26, 1 December 2025 (UTC)
Disengage
You are correct, I think that is the best option at this point. I was trying to follow standard dispute resolution procedure by discussing on the article talk page, but I agree it seems that's just not going to work. I'll step back and leave it with yourself for now, unless they do return to the article talk. Danners430 tweaks made 10:34, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Danners430, you don't have to disengage; I just wanted to note that discussion is optional if no further edits are made, so discussion isn't strictly 100% "required by policy". ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:04, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- I'm confused then - if I'm the editor disputing someone else's edits, but I can't edit due to edit warring rules, how is a dispute to be resolved? Danners430 tweaks made 21:06, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Danners430, all I'm saying is: If someone disagrees with an edit, they can either discuss or disengage. Noone is required by policy to discuss; they can simply walk away instead.
- You had written:
are you going to discuss this dispute as required by policy or not?
- If the user completely lost their interest in the conflict, they are not required by policy to keep discussing it. They can simply walk away. They just must not edit war.
- That all said, you may be looking for the essay WP:DISCFAIL. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:11, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Ah, so essentially if they don't engage, I wouldn't be in breach of 3RR if I restored the content, having attempted the discussion - even though it would have been my fourth revert? Danners430 tweaks made 21:17, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Danners430, the only part of my message where that question seems to be able to come from is the essay, is that correct? Are you asking for clarification about what the essay says? Because it doesn't say that but I understand how it could be interpreted that way. What the essay says is that after weeks of no editing, with multiple failed attempts to discuss, it may be justifiable to make one further revert. Which is completely irrelevant to the three-revert rule because that's about a 24-hour interval. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:22, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Aye apologies - I forgot when I wrote the above that 3RR is in 24 hours. That is in essence what I meant - to me a failed discussion isn't just in a few hours... it would be multiple days at least. Danners430 tweaks made 21:24, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Weeks, please. Then yes. And once. Not multiple times, re-starting the edit war. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:25, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Roger - every day is a school day :-) Danners430 tweaks made 21:27, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Weeks, please. Then yes. And once. Not multiple times, re-starting the edit war. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:25, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Aye apologies - I forgot when I wrote the above that 3RR is in 24 hours. That is in essence what I meant - to me a failed discussion isn't just in a few hours... it would be multiple days at least. Danners430 tweaks made 21:24, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Danners430, the only part of my message where that question seems to be able to come from is the essay, is that correct? Are you asking for clarification about what the essay says? Because it doesn't say that but I understand how it could be interpreted that way. What the essay says is that after weeks of no editing, with multiple failed attempts to discuss, it may be justifiable to make one further revert. Which is completely irrelevant to the three-revert rule because that's about a 24-hour interval. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:22, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Ah, so essentially if they don't engage, I wouldn't be in breach of 3RR if I restored the content, having attempted the discussion - even though it would have been my fourth revert? Danners430 tweaks made 21:17, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- I'm confused then - if I'm the editor disputing someone else's edits, but I can't edit due to edit warring rules, how is a dispute to be resolved? Danners430 tweaks made 21:06, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
AIV
Wow, I wasn't thinking about that semantic issue. Maybe I should just avoid using the word left. Or use full sentences when rapidly fighting vandals. Or maybe not :) Ilvekset (talk) 00:44, 4 December 2025 (UTC)
Whatever. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:44, 4 December 2025 (UTC)- (context) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:45, 4 December 2025 (UTC)
Warning message ettiquette
(context) Ah, what do people normally do? Just delete the talk page warnings? I thought that would feel sketchy. Has anyone written policy about this? Ilvekset (talk) 01:09, 4 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Ilvekset, you would certainly be allowed to (WP:UP#CMT), or to archive them. Collapsing them as incorrect is an unusual action that makes little sense if not done by someone else stumbling upon them. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:10, 4 December 2025 (UTC)
Pencilo
Hello, greetings, and I’m happy to speak with you again. I am now facing a similar problem on the Pencilo article as we previously encountered at Talk:Mauk Kham Wah. I believe page protection may be necessary here as well, just as you applied for Mauk Kham Wah.
At the moment, multiple IP editors are attempting to insert personal attacks and add poorly sourced content, including user-generated YouTube videos and one-sided political claims about a living person see also Myo Yan Naung Thein. We now have a proper discussion open on the talk page, and until consensus is reached, the article may need long-term protection. This topic is frequently targeted by vandalism and is one of the most commonly attacked pages related to Myanmar.
I would appreciate any advice or assistance you can offer. Thank you. Hteiktinhein (talk) 05:47, 4 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Hteiktinhein, your messages on their talk page are perfect. I have now semi-protected the page and removed the disputed content; let's see what happens next. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:14, 4 December 2025 (UTC)
Inspired writing fr ACE
Hallo Tobias! What impact did your voter guide maybe have on the voters? See here. How could the election process be improved? Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 10:15, 5 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Kudpung, thank you very much for the analysis and the cool graphs! Seven days of voting seem fine to me too. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:40, 5 December 2025 (UTC)
Regarding the Portuguese presidential poll discussion
Hi @ToBeFree, thanks for stepping in. I want to clarify my position because I think we may be talking past each other.
I’m not arguing that “everyone else is wrong because I’m right”; I’m arguing that several editors involved in these reverts are approaching the poll with political assumptions rather than policy.
Outside Wikipedia, there has been a strong push on social media calling this poll “fake” purely because the results favour a particular candidate. That sentiment has clearly spilled into editing behaviour. However: 1. The poll includes a technical sheet with a named responsible statistician who has conducted multiple prior Aximage polls (publicly verifiable). 2. No reliable source has challenged the poll’s authenticity. If someone used my name on a fake poll, I would react publicly (yet no such reaction exists). 3. The figures are methodologically plausible and consistent with recent polling patterns.
So my concern is not “I’m the only one going the right way,” but that policy-based evaluation is being overridden by political distrust, which violates WP:NPOV and WP:RS.
My request is simply that we treat this poll like any other: if it appears in reliable sources and no reliable source disputes its validity, then per WP:V it should remain included. When ERC publishes the full dataset, we can of course update or refine it as needed.
I hope this clarifies my perspective. I’m trying to follow policy, not push a result Games30Top (talk) 13:23, 3 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Games30Top, thank you very much for the detailed clarification. You wrote:
Opposing editors are repeatedly removing the same sourced poll as "fake" or "not credible" without any source showing fabrication, and are doing this instead of using the talk page. I have now stopped editing the article on this point and am seeking administrator input on how to handle this dispute.
— Special:Diff/1324487425- The answer is relatively simple, "by discussing on the article's talk page". And while edit warring is prohibited even if you are right, you're additionally on the wrong side of WP:ONUS:
The responsibility for achieving consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content.
— Wikipedia:Verifiability § Build consensus- So no matter how you look at this, whether from an "edit warring is prohibited" or a verifiability / content policy perspective, it is you who needs to discuss, it is you who needs to wait for a consensus, and it's you who has to stop editing and give up in case no consensus is found for your position.
- Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:19, 3 December 2025 (UTC)- On the procedural point, I fully agree with you on two things: (1) edit-warring is prohibited regardless of who is “right”, and (2) in a case of disputed inclusion, WP:ONUS means the burden is on those who want to add the material, not on those who prefer the status quo. That said, I had already stopped reverting on the article itself and moved the discussion to the talk page, which was exactly the process you are recommending.
- Where I think there is a nuance is how WP:ONUS interacts with WP:V and WP:RS once the sourcing situation has changed. When I first raised this at ANI, the main objection being used in the article was that the poll was “fake” or “not credible”, despite the fact that it was being reported by multiple outlets and had a full technical sheet with a named Aximage statistician. Since then, the ERC has published the official deposit of the poll (Depósito n.º 2025137 - “Sondagem sobre Eleições Presidenciais”, Aximage for Folha Nacional, work of field between 11 and 17 November), which confirms that this is a regular, registered presidential poll and not a fabrication. In other words, the verifiability and authenticity questions are now resolved at the highest possible level for Portuguese opinion polling: we have the commissioning outlet, the pollster, the named responsible person, and the ERC deposit all lining up.
- Given that, I do not read WP:ONUS as saying “because some editors dislike this result, it must be excluded indefinitely even when every reliability and verification criterion is satisfied”. What ONUS does say is that, where inclusion is disputed, the editors who want to include the content must provide solid sourcing and work towards consensus on how and whether it should appear. That is what I am trying to do now: I have laid out the sources (Folha Nacional, ECO, the Aximage fiche, and now ERC), and I am discussing on the talk page how to handle issues such as raw vs treated data and comparability with other polls. I am not continuing to re-insert the material over objections.
- If, after a reasonable discussion, there is no consensus to include the poll, I accept that the status quo version of the article prevails and that I should not add it. But I do think it is important to distinguish between “no consensus because the sources are weak or fail policy” and “no consensus because some editors are uncomfortable with the numbers despite ERC-level confirmation”. The former is a content-policy issue; the latter is essentially a weighting/representation issue, and that is exactly what we are now trying to resolve on the talk page.
- So I will of course respect the process you describe (no more edit warring, discussion first, and acceptance of whatever consensus emerges) but I also think that, now that the ERC deposit is public and confirms the poll’s legitimacy, WP:ONUS no longer cuts in the direction of treating it as a presumptively dubious source. The remaining question is not “is this a real poll?”, but “how, if at all, should a real, ERC-registered poll of this type be reflected in the article?”. That is the question I am focusing on in the article’s talk discussion Games30Top (talk) 18:55, 4 December 2025 (UTC)
- Games30Top, most of this, perhaps all, seems correct. You may have overlooked a distinction though. WP:ONUS is about verifiable content. WP:BURDEN is about a lack of verifiability. When verifiability itself is questioned, it's a BURDEN issue; when verifiability isn't disputed, ONUS is.
- However, both of these sections are part of the same policy, and both favor the removal of material when there's a lack of sources (BURDEN) or consensus (ONUS).
- You've mentioned "weighting"; there is WP:UNDUE about that too. It doesn't mention a preference for removal or inclusion, but if content is removed as "unduly weighted" and there is disagreement about the removal, we can apply ONUS again.
- I'm reading your message with the assumption that in some cases where you said ONUS, you meant the entire verifiability policy. Then it's right. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:26, 4 December 2025 (UTC)
- (Note: ONUS was originally not a separate section, just a shortcut to a paragraph; it was split off to "Build consensus" sometime in the last years. The larger heading is and was "Verifiability does not guarantee inclusion", which is a good summary.) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:29, 4 December 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you for the clarification. The distinction you make between BURDEN and ONUS is fair, and I agree with it. When I mentioned ONUS before I was really referring to the broader verifiability framework in that section, not trying to contradict BURDEN. Now that the ERC deposit is public, I see the remaining issue as one of inclusion/weighting rather than basic verifiability.
- No hard feelings here at all - I just wanted to speak up and make my reasoning explicit, and I’m happy to follow whatever consensus emerges Games30Top (talk) 13:32, 6 December 2025 (UTC)
Possible sockpuppet of User:Osapolo
Thank you for your help with User:Osapolo the other day. Just wanted to alert you about an SPI I've opened for User:I eat guacamole, whose first edit was a rather suspicious restoration of one of Osapolo's citation spam edits. -- Avocado (talk) 14:42, 6 December 2025 (UTC)
Issue with User:Buf92
Hey I'm not sure if you are free or interested in this. But I don't really have an issue with User:Buf92 but their behavior and accusations feels like they are trying to witch hunt me and frame me in a light that is not completely truthful. As seen by them going on other pages I've edited and trying to rally editors that had slight issues with me which was met with this response . Just letting you know so I could see if there was anything I could do that was aligned with the rules to mitigate this issue. Since they have been threatening an ANI report
Firstly, because of an edit that wasn't even mine this was what I had added when I made that page . Buf has attributed many diff edits to being mine, claiming he had to "clean up" the shoegaze page from original research by me when I had barely edited that page in the first place. He attributes small ce mistakes as being disruptive editing, when even he has made typos and mistakes on articles before. Many articles on Wikipedia at least in the music sphere have troves of issues but pinning it all on me because I edit a lot recently makes no sense. Aradicus77 (talk) 19:35, 6 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Aradicus77, thank you very much for the detailed description. As it's at ANI, I think there is nothing more to do; the community needs to have a look at the situation. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:44, 7 December 2025 (UTC)
Mandakini (actress) & FaisalAfrojQureshi (talk · contribs)
Their response to my warning on their User Talk indicates the user is editing on the subject's behalf. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:45, 7 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, the semi-protection will stop it for a few days; please let me know if it continues afterwards. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:22, 7 December 2025 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – December 2025
News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2025).

- Starting on November 4, the IP addresses of logged-out editors are no longer being publicly displayed. Instead, they will have a temporary account associated with their edits.
- Administrators will now find that Special:MergeHistory is now significantly more flexible about what it can merge. It can now merge sections taken from the middle of the history of the source (rather than only the start) and insert revisions anywhere in the history of the destination page (rather than only the start). T382958
- The December 2025 administrator elections are scheduled from Nov 25 – Dec 15.
- An Articles for Creation backlog drive is happening in December 2025, with over 1,000 drafts awaiting review from the past two months. In addition to AfC participants, all administrators and new page patrollers can help review using the Yet Another AFC Helper Script, which can be enabled in the Gadgets settings. Sign up here to participate!
Tech News: 2025-50
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- Anybody who wishes to secure their user account can now use two-factor authentication (2FA). This is available to all registered users of all Wikimedia projects. This is part of the Account Security initiative. Later, 2FA will be required for all users who can take security- or privacy-sensitive actions.
Updates for editors
- Following last week's deployments, the Add a link feature, which allows editors to add suggested links during editing, will be available to an additional 33 Wikipedias starting on 9 December. This expansion is possible thanks to the new prediction model that now supports all languages, including those that were previously not covered. While the feature has been available on most Wikipedias for some time, this rollout brings us closer to using the improved model everywhere. If you have any questions or would like more details please contact Trizek (WMF).
- Last week, the Search Platform team added transliterated as-you-type search suggestions to Georgian wikis. If there are only a few regular search suggestions, then queries in Latin or Cyrillic script are now rewritten into Georgian script to look for more matches. For example, searching for either bedniereba or бедниереба will now suggest the existing article about ბედნიერება ("happiness"). You can recommend other languages where transliterated suggestions would be useful on Phabricator for future development.
- Later this week, a controlled experiment will begin for editors on the 100 largest Wikipedias who are editing a section in the mobile web visual editor. 50% of these editors will notice a new "Edit full page" button that will enable them to expand their editing session to the whole page. This feature is intended to make it easier for people on mobile web to edit any article section, regardless of which section-edit icon they tapped to begin. The experiment will last ~4 weeks. You can find more details about the project.
- Later this week, the Reader Growth team will launch a mobile web experiment to expand all article sections by default (currently they are collapsed by default) and pin the section header the user is currently reading to the top of the page. The experiment will affect 10% of users on Arabic, Chinese, French, Indonesian, and Vietnamese Wikipedias.
- The Wikipedia Year in Review 2025, a feature in the Wikipedia mobile apps (iOS and Android) that provides users with a personalised summary of their engagement with Wikipedia over the year, is now available on the iOS and Android apps. This edition includes expanded personalised insights, improved reading highlights, new donor messaging, and updated designs. Open the app to view your Year in Review and explore your reading journey from 2025.
- A recent software bug caused edits made with VisualEditor to make unintended changes to wikitext, including removing whitespace and replacing spaces with underscores in wikilinks inside citations. This was partially fixed last week, and further fixes are in progress. Editors who used VisualEditor between November 28 and December 2 should review their edits for unexpected modifications.
View all 23 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the incorrect handling of URLs copied from the address bar of Microsoft Edge users, has been resolved.
Updates for technical contributors
- Starting this week, users of the "Improved Syntax Highlighting" beta feature will have CodeMirror as the editor for Lua, JavaScript, CSS, JSON and Vue content models, instead of CodeEditor. With this, the linters will be upgraded. This is part of a larger effort to eventually replace CodeEditor and provide a consistent code editing experience.
- Developers are encouraged to take the 2025 Developer Satisfaction Survey, which remains open until 5 January 2026. If you build software for the Wikimedia ecosystem and would like to share your experiences or feedback, your participation is greatly appreciated.
- 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.
MediaWiki message delivery 17:43, 8 December 2025 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
| The Admin's Barnstar | |
| For being an extremely hard worker, and an excellent problem solver. Salute! Plasticwonder (Cat got your tongue?) 15:48, 8 December 2025 (UTC) |
Hello Plasticwonder, thank you very much!
~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:49, 8 December 2025 (UTC)
Halle Bailey
Temporary account has been removing content related to DDG as "fluff". –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:39, 7 December 2025 (UTC)
- It seems to have stopped, but I'll have another look later. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:33, 8 December 2025 (UTC)
Apology
Hey! I would like to apologize to you for my previous actions. I am thankful to have been given this rare second chance and I hope to use it to do good for Wikipedia and am extremely sorry for the harm I caused and the time you had to take out of your day to deal with me. Again, I am very sorry for what I had done.
Elijah Wilder (talk) 18:32, 8 December 2025 (UTC)
- Wikipedia's patience is never-ending. Welcome back. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:47, 8 December 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you! I’m glad to be back! Elijah Wilder (talk) 21:06, 8 December 2025 (UTC)
A strange and very minor CSS issue
Hello, I'm a little too curious for my own good so I clicked on the audio recording at the bottom of your page. But I noticed some scrollbars appearing on the gradient div. For some reason I can't explain, the Firefox inspector blames the audio player chrome for overflowing the div (only after playing the file).
I couldn't refrain from messing around, and I suppose this might sweep it under the rug:
| − | <div style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 0; text-shadow: none;">[[File:Carinablau-tobefree.mp3|200px]]</p> | + | <div style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 0; text-shadow: none; overflow: hidden;">[[File:Carinablau-tobefree.mp3|200px]]</p> |
I'm not very good at CSS, but visually it seems to work okay, I don't see anything actually overflowing or clipping out.
I guess this doesn't really matter! Nice playing, though. I enjoyed the piece :) Mlkj (talk) 13:24, 9 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Mlkj! Thank you very much!

- It took me a while to reproduce the scrollbar issue, and I then implemented your fix and now I can't reproduce it anymore! And I didn't know Firefox can point out which element causes an overflow!
- Is it fixed now? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:52, 10 December 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you, it is =) Mlkj (talk) 10:13, 10 December 2025 (UTC)
~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:30, 10 December 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you, it is =) Mlkj (talk) 10:13, 10 December 2025 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2025 Issue 23


Upcoming and current events and conversations
Let's Talk continues
- CEO appointment: The Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees has appointed Bernadette Meehan as the new CEO of the Wikimedia Foundation. She will be meeting communities around the puzzle globe when she officially joins on January 20, 2026.
- Wikipedia's 25th birthday party: Join the virtual celebration for games, prizes, musical performances, volunteer spotlights, data visualization, surprise guests and more. January 15 at 16:00 UTC. Register on Meta.
- Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees: Join the next Conversation with the Trustees on December 11 at 17:30 UTC.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Product Safety and Integrity · Readers · Research · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Wishathon: 15 patches were written and 5 merged, as part of a Wishathon for the Community Wishlist. One wish from the community was completed ("Preview page with this template" should not work with pages that do not transclude the template), and three more now have a clearer path forward.
- Activity Tab on Mobile App: The Wikipedia iOS app is running an experiment that replaces the History tab with a redesigned Activity tab. This new tab surfaces personalized insights about reading, editing, and donations — all stored locally on your device for privacy. The goal is to see whether the new experience increases engagement and retention among logged-in readers.
- Wikipedia Year in Review in Apps: The Wikipedia Year in Review 2025 is now available for the iOS and Android apps. This year introduces new personalized insights, updated reading highlights, and refreshed designs.
- Add a Link: A feature that suggests links to be added to articles based on a prediction model, Add a link, has been deployed at Japanese, Urdu and Chinese Wikipedias. While this feature has already been available on most Wikipedias, the prediction model could not support certain languages. A new model has now been developed to handle these languages, and it will be gradually rolled out to other Wikipedias over time.
- Abstract Wikipedia: The second round of voting on the name of Abstract Wikipedia concluded with Abstract Wikipedia as the top-voted name with 100 votes, followed by Wikigenerator with 91 votes. The name for the wiki project will now remain Abstract Wikipedia.
- Anti-vandalism tool: Automoderator, now has the option to choose between two machine learning models to power the software on wikis using the tool.
- Tools to support newcomers: Newcomers failing to add a citation to support added content has been one of the most common mistakes on Wikipedia. Reference Check, a tool that prompts them to add a citation before publishing an edit, has gone live for an A/B test on English Wikipedia.
- Tech News: Latest updates from Tech News week 48 and week 49 include the Foundation working on improving the text and presentation of the Verification Email sent to new users to make them more welcoming, useful, and informative; and two new wikis being created: a Wikipedia in Toki Pona and a Wikiquote in Nigerian Pidgin.
- Infrastructure: Unifying our mobile and desktop domains achieved 20% faster mobile response times, improved SEO, and reduced infrastructure load.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · list of movement events
- Legal win in France: Wikimedia Foundation secures crucial legal win in France against legal attacks on freedom of speech.
- CEE Hub: Overview of three years of growth, learning, and regional impact of CEE Hub.
- Don't Blink: The latest developments from around the world about protecting the Wikimedia model, its people and its values.
- Digital Violence: How the Wikimedia movement is responding to digital gender based violence.
- Wikimedia Research Showcase: The next research showcase will feature a special panel on "Experimentation on Wikipedia" and will take place on December 10 at 17:30 UTC.
Annual Goals Progress on Effectiveness
See also: Progress on the annual plan
- Audit Report: Key takeaways from the Foundation’s audit report for fiscal year 2024-2025.
- Wikimedia Enterprise: Wikimedia Enterprise Financial Report for fiscal year 2024-2025.
- Annual Plan Progress: A look back at progress made against the plan during the second half of our fiscal year. Up to date regular updates are included in the Foundation Bulletin.
Board and Board committee updates
See Wikimedia Foundation Board noticeboard · Affiliations Committee Newsletter
- Sister Projects Task Force: Results of the consultation about Wikispore and Wikinews: No immediate changes should be made to Wikispore's current technical setup and archive all editions of Wikinews, preserving their content.
Foundation statements
- Wikipedia's unique revenue model: How is Wikipedia funded and how does the Wikimedia Foundation use donations to Wikipedia?
- Most read articles: Wikipedia’s most-read articles of 2025.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
See also: Diff blog · Goings-on · Planet Wikimedia · Signpost (en) · Kurier (de) · Actualités du Wiktionnaire (fr) · Regards sur l’actualité de la Wikimedia (fr) · Wikimag (fr) · Education · GLAM · The Wikipedia Library · Milestones · Wikidata · Central and Eastern Europe · other newsletters
Subscribe or unsubscribe · Help translate
For information about the Bulletin and to read previous editions, see the project page on Meta-Wiki. Let askcac
wikimedia.org know if you have any feedback or suggestions for improvement!
MediaWiki message delivery 04:50, 11 December 2025 (UTC)
Kevin Anderson (American politician)
Seems we have a temporary account attempting to whitewash the article for tenuous reasons. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 21:40, 10 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification! Your opinion would be welcome at the article's talk page (currently sadly empty). If a consensus for inclusion is found, it will persist as the page is now semi-protected. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:52, 10 December 2025 (UTC)
- Okay, done. At least this one stopped just short of crying "tabloid". –Skywatcher68 (talk) 14:00, 11 December 2025 (UTC)
Extreme edit warring?
Hello! I see you're active at WP:AN3 and regularly deal with edit-warring. I came upon whatever this is, but it seems the users weren't warned about edit-warring until now. Should I file a report at AN3, should the article be full-protected for a bit, or maybe something else? Thank you! Children Will Listen (🐄 talk, 🫘 contribs) 02:10, 13 December 2025 (UTC)
- Anyway, I found the page through , which also catches other egregious cases like this one. Children Will Listen (🐄 talk, 🫘 contribs) 02:38, 13 December 2025 (UTC)
- Huh, that's an interesting query. Thanks for sharing, ChildrenWillListen!
- Regarding the two cases you've linked to, I've had a look and placed some blocks and a page protection. But in general, warning is probably the best approach; both of these cases were relatively stale when you found them. Edit warring noticeboard reports without the behavior having continued after at least one warning are probably not advisable. Even if the edit war is currently active, placing a warning on the participants' talk pages and waiting for further reverts will usually not hurt. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:27, 13 December 2025 (UTC)
- Sure, I'll keep that in mind. Thank you so much, Children Will Listen (🐄 talk, 🫘 contribs) 03:29, 13 December 2025 (UTC)
AIV decline
Responding to this, I should clarify that I wasn't saying a block would be out of policy, just that I didn't think it was necessary and that the report was a bit premature (as per the guidance in the AIV banner). Two joke edits in two minutes from a new account falls into the may be blocked
discretionary area of WP:DISRUPTONLY for me, especially when they stopped shortly after being warned. We've all seen examples of some solid editors that started out a bit rough. Cheers. Daniel Quinlan (talk) 07:36, 15 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Daniel Quinlan, the diffs in question (template, quick undo on the expectable revert) look like an elaborate trolling attempt by either a non-newbie or someone who invested at least two minutes of reading into getting their vandalism right. It may take the community a while to notice further attempts; the next one might be a fake source replacing a {{cn}} tag. If I perceived the user as an actual probable danger for the encyclopedia I'd have blocked, though. It seems unlikely that they continue in any way; the account is perhaps already abandoned. The only reason I pinged you in slight protest was that BangJan1999 had made an understandable decision to report and received an answer that practically asked them not to report similar issues to AIV again. Which, looking at all the actually-bad AIV reports that appear there every day, seemed to complain to the wrong person somehow. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:52, 15 December 2025 (UTC)
- My main point is perhaps that the reported user clearly didn't need a warning to learn that their editing was disruptive. It's very hard to me personally to invent a scenario in which the second diff didn't give the intentional nature of the disruption away. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:55, 15 December 2025 (UTC)
- I don't disagree with what you're saying about the vandalism itself, but I thought it was worth seeing whether the warning would be sufficient for this particular case. For context, I used the
nsresponse as being the closest to the situation, but I can see how that template plus my addition could read as discouraging. The ping was mostly intended to explain and make sure they saw the response so they would know to re-report if the vandal continued. It also might make sense to split up thensresponse since there's a long distance betweeninappropriately warned
and the range of cases thatinsufficiently warned
covers (and I wouldn't even use that phrase if I was writing a new response for this situation). - @BangJan1999: Just to be clear, my response was not meant to be a rebuke of bringing that report to AIV. Like ToBeFree mentioned, we see some really bad reports on AIV. And this report was close to the point where I would issue a block. Regards. Daniel Quinlan (talk) 09:25, 15 December 2025 (UTC)
it's all good. Yeah, "removing for now; please let me know if this continues" is one of my most common edit summaries when removing this type of reports. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:13, 15 December 2025 (UTC)
- I don't disagree with what you're saying about the vandalism itself, but I thought it was worth seeing whether the warning would be sufficient for this particular case. For context, I used the
- My main point is perhaps that the reported user clearly didn't need a warning to learn that their editing was disruptive. It's very hard to me personally to invent a scenario in which the second diff didn't give the intentional nature of the disruption away. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:55, 15 December 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-51
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
View all 18 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, one of the fixes addressed an issue for temporary accounts adding an external URL, which triggered an hCaptcha request in more cases than intended, and did not display the required popup on the first attempt to publish the edit.
Updates for technical contributors
- To improve database and site performance, external links to Wikimedia projects will no longer be stored in the database. This means they will not be searchable in Special:LinkSearch, will not be checked by the Spam Blacklist or AbuseFilter as new links, and will not be in the
externallinkstable on database replicas. In the future this may be extended to other highly-linked trusted websites on a per-wiki basis, such as Creative Commons links on Wikimedia Commons.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 19:01, 15 December 2025 (UTC)
The Signpost: 17 December 2025
- Interview: Part 1: Bernadette Meehan
Say hello to the new WMF CEO.
- News and notes: We're gonna have a party!
And a new WMF CEO!
- In the media: The "bigg" bosses: Robertsky and the Pope
Pay up, big guys!
- Traffic report: Death and stranger things
And going for the FIFA prize!
- Gallery: A feast of holidays and carols
Something old and something new!
- Obituary: Michal Lewi (Iwelam) and Alan R. King (A R King)
Rest in peace.
- Concept: List of xxtreme sports (redirected from Electrojousting)
You are viewing an old revision of this page, as edited on 2065-11-10 04:33:10.
- Comix: display: flex-inline;
ampersand nb semicolon ampersand nb semicolon ampersand nb semicolon
Reporting user User:Cynthiaromualdez for vandalism
This user has vandalized many Filipino-related pages on pageantry. This user has discredited the Miss Universe wins of Pia Wurtzbach (indicating only as 1st runner up) and Catriona Gray (as otherwise a representative of Australia). Her edits also noted that Ariadna (Miss Colombia) was the MU 2015. GrldDB (talk) 07:58, 16 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hello GrldDB, please create a new section at WP:ANI with diff links as evidence, and notify the user about your report as described there. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:12, 17 December 2025 (UTC)
federal republic of kabylia
Hello, I am reaching out to request your assistance with creating a Wikipedia page about the Federal Republic of Kabylia, proclaimed on 14 December 2025 by the MAK and the Kabyle Provisional Government (Anavad). I have already drafted the full article in proper Wikipedia syntax and gathered all reliable, third-party sources (press articles, official documents, constitutional texts). The content follows Wikipedia’s neutrality, verifiability, and notability guidelines. If you have time, could you help publish the page, or at least review and format it so that it can be accepted into the main encyclopedia?
Here is the draft text: 👉 https://www.kabylie-gouv.org/
https://tamendawt.kabylie-gouv.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/KABYLE-CONSTITUTION_ENGLISH-VERSION_14062022.pdf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movement_for_the_Self-Determination_of_Kabylie https://siwel.info/declaration-dindependance-de-la-kabylie-la-commission-salue-une-journee-historique-tenue-dans-le-respect-du-cadre-legal_71577.html https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/interview-of-ferhat-mehenni-president-of-kabylie/ https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/the-israel-of-north-africa-just-declared-independence-the-west-cant-ignore-it/ https://www.lemonde.fr/en/le-monde-africa/article/2025/12/15/algerian-self-determination-movement-announces-independence-of-kabylie-in-paris_6748521_124.html https://siwel.info/historic-kabylia-officially-proclaims-its-independence_71510.html https://unpo.org/member/kabylia/
Thank you very much for your time and expertise.
Please let me know if you need additional information.
Kind regards, Bylkaboy (talk) 00:42, 18 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Bylkaboy, why me specifically? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:10, 18 December 2025 (UTC)
- FOR Hello ToBeFree,Thank you for your quick reply.I contacted you specifically because you are an active and experienced administrator on the French (and English) Wikipedia, and you often handle sensitive topics related to neutrality, edit conflicts, or the creation of controversial articles. I thought you would be particularly well-placed to objectively assess the relevance of such a page and, if it is deemed acceptable, to create it in a protected or supervised manner to avoid edit wars or immediate deletions from the outset.My intention is absolutely not to bypass the rules, but on the contrary to strictly adhere to them—especially neutrality (WP:NPOV). A page on the "Federal Republic of Kabylia" (unilaterally proclaimed on 14 December 2025) must present:
- facts reported by reliable secondary sources (Le Monde, Le Figaro, Reuters, etc.);
- the viewpoint of the MAK/Anavad;
- the viewpoint of the Algerian authorities (who consider it a separatist declaration with no legal effect);
- the lack of international recognition.
- I am fully aware that the topic is highly controversial, and I do not want to create a biased or promotional article. That is precisely why I would prefer an experienced and impartial editor like you to take the initiative, rather than creating it myself and risking immediate conflict.If you believe the page does not yet meet the notability criteria or that it is better to wait for more media coverage, I will fully understand and respect your decision.Thank you again for your work on the project, and best regards!Sincerely, Bylkaboy (talk) 01:50, 18 December 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for the clarification, Bylkaboy, but I'm only an administrator at the English (not the French) Wikipedia, and I rarely review drafts at the moment. I think the recommendation might have come from an AI, and I'd like to know which AI it was – ChatGPT, Copilot, Grok ...? Anyway, you have successfully submitted the draft article about the Federal Republic of Kabylia and it will be reviewed, but it's currently one of 685 drafts waiting for review, so this may take a month or two. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:10, 18 December 2025 (UTC)
Request for comment
Thanks for the tips. Would you be able to check that I've done this right? Talk:Operation Raise the Colours - Wikipedia Stirchley.resident (talk) 22:52, 18 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Stirchley.resident, thanks for asking and thank you very much for creating the RfC. I have split the question from your opinion by modifying your message slightly; please check if it is still fine with you or if there's something you'd like to adjust. If you're fine with how it looks now, all you need to do now is waiting for others to provide their opinions. This may take a while; users will be randomly notified by a bot for the next days. A common mistake is to reply to each of them; please avoid replying to their messages unless they ask questions. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:05, 18 December 2025 (UTC)
- That's fine by me. It makes it clearer what my opinion is on the matter now. Thanks. Stirchley.resident (talk) 23:08, 18 December 2025 (UTC)
- Perfect; no problem and good luck with the RfC. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:10, 18 December 2025 (UTC)
- That's fine by me. It makes it clearer what my opinion is on the matter now. Thanks. Stirchley.resident (talk) 23:08, 18 December 2025 (UTC)
Sendnoots49
Has a point about their username and Sendnoots. Which of course, does not change the vandalistic nature of their edits. -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 06:58, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- UTRS appeal #109227 is closed. After reading their talk page, I'm considering re blocking it's not here instead of the username I violation. Unless of course there's something about that username I am missing. Best, -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 07:05, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Deepfriedokra, just because the pun exists in other places of the Internet including apparently t-shirts (which I was not aware of), that's still unlikely to be an in-universe thing or official merchandise. And while Spongebob and other children shows on TV do occasionally include adult humor, I'd be surprised if you can point me to an exact Pingu episode minute/second timestamp where Pingu audibly asks someone to "send nudes". ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:09, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
Regarding my message on Docmoates' talk page
What does 'CMT' in "WP:UP#CMT" mean? Light (talk) 04:39, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- (context)
- Hi LightandSalvation, I think it means "comment"; the section heading is "Removal of comments, notices, and warnings". ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:41, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah but (from my understanding, please correct if incorrect) I didn't remove anything Light (talk) 04:44, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Oh sorry, I should have been more precise about what I referred to. You wrote, in response to someone asking someone else to stay off their talk page, an explanation about how a user doesn't actually own any page on Wikipedia. Which, while true, doesn't prevent someone from asking someone else to stay off their talk page, and such wishes should be respected. The linked section and the one below it explain how a user may deal with messages on their talk page, which includes removing them on sight, and that others should respect wishes to stay off a user's talk page. Ignoring such a wish is a form of harassment (see also WP:HUSH).
- So while you are theoretically right about a lack of ownership, the explanation – especially after the long discussion about harassment that had concluded a few sections below your message and only minutes ago – was more likely to unnecessarily re-fuel a fire than providing any helpful information. Same for the bare list of policy links, some of which even were redundant (edit warring policy, then another, then a subsection of the edit warring policy). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:16, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- No, I was not aware of the whole situation and block appeal (and discussion thereafter), I just saw that he was claiming to own the user page when he doesn't. Light (talk) 05:38, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- And threatening to involve admins (which I now realise was to respond to the situation) Light (talk) 05:39, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- No worries, but that's why I had removed the message. Regarding
he was claiming to own the user page
, that was just your interpretation of the textYou need to stay off of my page
, which is not necessarily a claim of ownership but clearly a request not to be messaged again, and that request was okay. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 06:13, 19 December 2025 (UTC)- No, I fully understand
"stay off my page"
was not a claim of ownership in that context. Abni (talk) 06:36, 19 December 2025 (UTC)- Ah well. All good then. Thanks for the clarification! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 06:37, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- No problem! Thanks for all you've done for this project!! Abni (talk) 06:53, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- My 10th thank, let's gooo! Abni (talk) 18:00, 19 December 2025 (UTC)

~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:03, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- You can use emojis? Abni (talk) 18:04, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Well, I'd treat Wikipedia as a workplace rather than a gaming online forum, and the others here as colleagues rather than other gamers. But that doesn't mean emoji are never useful. I have collected my favorites at User:ToBeFree/s.css; feel free to copy this to a .css file in your own userspace (others can't edit your ".css" files, so you don't need to be afraid of someone modifying them maliciously before you copy them). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:06, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Wikimedia Commons has a huge table with more. If you write them like me, with "alt" tag containing an actual emoji, then blind people can see them too (their screen readers can then explain to them that there is an emoji there, and which one it is). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:08, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- I understand WP:NOT, I'm just wondering if emojis are allowed to be used. Abni (talk) 01:30, 20 December 2025 (UTC)
- With the things I wrote above in mind, sure. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:40, 20 December 2025 (UTC)
- I just said to myself: "Lemme go eat, and play a game, unless a Wikipedia notification comes", I haven't even gotten up to go to the kitchen bro :/ but alrighty. Abni (talk) 01:43, 20 December 2025 (UTC)
~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:10, 20 December 2025 (UTC)
- I just said to myself: "Lemme go eat, and play a game, unless a Wikipedia notification comes", I haven't even gotten up to go to the kitchen bro :/ but alrighty. Abni (talk) 01:43, 20 December 2025 (UTC)
- With the things I wrote above in mind, sure. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:40, 20 December 2025 (UTC)
- I understand WP:NOT, I'm just wondering if emojis are allowed to be used. Abni (talk) 01:30, 20 December 2025 (UTC)
- Wikimedia Commons has a huge table with more. If you write them like me, with "alt" tag containing an actual emoji, then blind people can see them too (their screen readers can then explain to them that there is an emoji there, and which one it is). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:08, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Well, I'd treat Wikipedia as a workplace rather than a gaming online forum, and the others here as colleagues rather than other gamers. But that doesn't mean emoji are never useful. I have collected my favorites at User:ToBeFree/s.css; feel free to copy this to a .css file in your own userspace (others can't edit your ".css" files, so you don't need to be afraid of someone modifying them maliciously before you copy them). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:06, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- You can use emojis? Abni (talk) 18:04, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- My 10th thank, let's gooo! Abni (talk) 18:00, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- No problem! Thanks for all you've done for this project!! Abni (talk) 06:53, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Ah well. All good then. Thanks for the clarification! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 06:37, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- No, I fully understand
- No, I was not aware of the whole situation and block appeal (and discussion thereafter), I just saw that he was claiming to own the user page when he doesn't. Light (talk) 05:38, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah but (from my understanding, please correct if incorrect) I didn't remove anything Light (talk) 04:44, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
Barnstar
![]() |
The Barnstar of Diplomacy | |
| During a very tense and heated debate the other night regarding edit warring and a block, you showed great diplomacy by working through the issues with both editors. I appreciate you talking through everything with me and explaining policy to me that I did not understand. Docmoates (talk) 20:37, 20 December 2025 (UTC) |
Hello Docmoates, thank you very much! That's a bit ... unexpected in response to an unnecessary block where that explanation would have sufficed. ![]()
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:05, 20 December 2025 (UTC)
ANEW
Original heading: raw URL ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:02, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
Why wasn't DeFacto blocked as well? 3rr is a firm red line as i understand it, and the only exception is BLP violations. Doug Weller talk 12:43, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Doug Weller, in their dispute with Stirchley.resident, there have been three reverts by DeFacto within 24 hours, not more than three. If the temporary account was Stirchley.resident (I didn't check), that would be bordering sockpuppetry. While the three-revert rule isn't strictly limited to reverts of the same content and someone could be blocked for reverting four independent edits within 24 hours, I'm also not strictly required to block for violations of it. I am never required to use my tools and I sometimes avoid doing so against the side that has enforced WP:ONUS or WP:BURDEN. Because while the verifiability policy doesn't allow edit warring and there's no exception to the three-revert rule for enforcing it outside of BLPs, it does have a non-zero meaning to me when determining who is the main issue in a conflict. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:02, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Maybe I'm misunderstanding what counts as a revert, but I saw four - three of my edits and one other. Stirchley.resident (talk) 16:09, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- That's what I said. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:15, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Yes, sorry, I see that now. I was misreading the four as a hypothetical. Stirchley.resident (talk) 16:17, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Anyway, hopefully we've found a way forward with the request for comment in any case. Stirchley.resident (talk) 16:20, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Oh! Five other users have already commented and more are probably coming. That's good to see. Thanks again for starting the RfC. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:37, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Dirty glasses, misread 16 as 18! Doug Weller talk 18:03, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Ah well. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:09, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah. Bad day for me. I tried going out walking with my wife and dogs and more or less knocked myself out. I’m getting weaker. My community nurse suggested I should do some walking but I overdid it. Doug Weller talk 18:36, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Oh no!


- Damn. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:38, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Sorry, this is Doug, can't login on Chrome right now. Sanity check please, how many reverts did DeFacto make on the 18th? https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Operation_Raise_the_Colours&action=history ~2025-42064-07 (talk) 10:47, 21 December 2025 (UTC)
- Confirming it's me. Doug Weller talk 13:32, 21 December 2025 (UTC)
- 1, 2, 3, 4

- But that's what I wrote 16:02, 19 December above; the fourth revert is of an edit ~2025-33349-43 made. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:43, 21 December 2025 (UTC)
- So you did. Not sure I agree about ONUS, but ok. Doug Weller talk 18:46, 21 December 2025 (UTC)
- 1, 2, 3, 4
- Confirming it's me. Doug Weller talk 13:32, 21 December 2025 (UTC)
- Sorry, this is Doug, can't login on Chrome right now. Sanity check please, how many reverts did DeFacto make on the 18th? https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Operation_Raise_the_Colours&action=history ~2025-42064-07 (talk) 10:47, 21 December 2025 (UTC)
- Oh no!
- Yeah. Bad day for me. I tried going out walking with my wife and dogs and more or less knocked myself out. I’m getting weaker. My community nurse suggested I should do some walking but I overdid it. Doug Weller talk 18:36, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Ah well. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:09, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Dirty glasses, misread 16 as 18! Doug Weller talk 18:03, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Oh! Five other users have already commented and more are probably coming. That's good to see. Thanks again for starting the RfC. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:37, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- That's what I said. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:15, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
- Maybe I'm misunderstanding what counts as a revert, but I saw four - three of my edits and one other. Stirchley.resident (talk) 16:09, 19 December 2025 (UTC)
Happy holidays!
ToBeFree, I am quite sad that I won't get to serve alongside you on ArbCom, but I am glad that I got a couple of weeks with you on arbcom-en. Thank you for being a highly generous spreader of wikilove
, which I know many people appreciate. It has been a wild ride, and perhaps you will join in Kevin's footsteps by rejoining the clerk team
. The best to you and yours this holiday season ![]()
, and happy new year ![]()
HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 01:08, 22 December 2025 (UTC)
- What the fuck
Did you just send personalized greetings to fifty users while fixing article code errors encountered during the personalization?! - HouseBlaster, I already had a feeling you're mad when you signed up for clerkship, and it was confirmed when you ran for ArbCom, but this is beyond it.
- Enough Internet for today. Merry Christmas! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:19, 22 December 2025 (UTC)
Strange things afoot at Denzil Douglas and on User Talk
I could use some assistance here. So, I reverted WP:FLOWERY edits which went against MOS:DOCTOR and left a welcome message to the editor regarding the WP:NPOV. Next thing I know, there are messages on the relevant User Talk pages, in which the editor is defending themselves against a non-existent WP:COI message. I can't even... –Skywatcher68 (talk) 02:14, 22 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification! The message appears to be at User talk:Monikabatraa § March 2024, another account's talk page. Whatever is happening there, I have extended-confirmed protected the article for a year and we can see what happens next. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:29, 22 December 2025 (UTC)
- Okay – Skywatcher68, the user has now disclosed that the Monikabatraa account is their old account and they didn't know how to change the username, so they created a new one. That's okay. This explains the response to a message the new account didn't get. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:27, 22 December 2025 (UTC)
Tech News: 2025-52
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
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View all 16 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the crash that occurred when tapping "First Steps" in the Wikipedia Android Year in Review has now been fixed, and the feature opens as expected.
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- Interface elements such as diffs and categories generated by MediaWiki used to have the attribute
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There is no new MediaWiki version this week or next week.
Meetings and events
- The Wikimedia Hackathon Northwestern Europe 2026 will take place on 13-14 March 2026 in Arnhem, the Netherlands. Applications just opened mid-December and will close in mid-January or earlier if capacity is reached. With space for approximately 100 participants, early application is encouraged.
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MediaWiki message delivery 21:43, 22 December 2025 (UTC)
Season's Greetings


Whether you celebrate Christmas, Diwali, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa,
Festivus (for the rest of us!) or even the Saturnalia,
here's hoping your holiday time is wonderful and
- especially -
that the New Year will be an improvement on the old.
CHEERS! Katniss May the odds be ever in your favor ♥ 15:19, 22 December 2025 (UTC)
{{subst:User:Shearonink/Holiday}} to your friends' talk pages.Hi KatnissEverdeen, long time no see!
Thank you very much for the cute holiday card! I love the cat's expression and the dog is just cute. Hello there ^.^
Happy Holidays and a Happy New 2026 to you and yours too!
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:27, 22 December 2025 (UTC)
FrequentFlyer93
Asking you since you’ve had interactions with this user before - could you take a look at their deletions at Talk:Hawaiian Airlines where they’ve been deleting their comments on the talk page even though it’s part of a larger discussion? Danners430 tweaks made 23:13, 22 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Danners430, thank you very much for the notification. Done. You might argue that the removals were exempt from the edit warring policy as obvious vandalism, but I wouldn't be sure about that; your description of the editing as "disruptive" is definitely correct and they may have acted with good intentions. Which, then, puts you past WP:3RR though. Please keep it in mind. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:14, 23 December 2025 (UTC)
- Noted, and trout accepted - thanks :) Danners430 tweaks made 08:56, 23 December 2025 (UTC)
Happy holidays
| Hi ToBeFree/A Season's Greetings and all the best for 2026 | ||
| Wherever you are and whatever you believe in (or don't), reach out for peace on this little planet of ours! HAPPY HOLIDAYS 🥳 Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 04:39, 23 December 2025 (UTC) |
Hey Kudpung, thank you very much! I love star nebulas!
Happy Holidays to you too!
~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:58, 23 December 2025 (UTC)
Season's Greetings
| Merry Christmas and a Prosperous 2026! | |
|
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 2026. Spread the love by adding {{subst:Seasonal Greetings}} to other user talk pages. |
Abishe (talk) 08:07, 25 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Abishe, thank you very much!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you too!
~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:44, 25 December 2025 (UTC)
Your Userpage
I think your unregistered editor warning on your usrpagre IPs changing ranges is unnecessary due to the temp accounts. Thanks! FrizzBTalk 03:25, 26 December 2025 (UTC)
- Oops, I had forgotten about the text and have now removed it from my user page. Thank you very much, FrizzB! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:31, 26 December 2025 (UTC)
Page protection request
@ToBeFree Hello, sorry to bother you again. Could you please take a look at Talk:Phuket Gazette?
The article may need page protection from non-extended confirmed users. A vandalism-prone user has repeatedly reverted sourced content without engaging in content-based discussion. Despite multiple attempts to discuss the sources and material, they have declined to do so.
Instead, their comments focus on personal allegations against several long-standing editors, accusing them of involvement in visa-related scams in Thailand, without providing any evidence or addressing the article’s sources or content. They should have commented on the sources or the content, but instead their only comment was that “the editors are scammers from a visa center.”
Thank you very much for your time and help. Hteiktinhein (talk) 12:02, 27 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Hteiktinhein, please request actions on central noticeboards instead of my (or any specific administrator's) talk page. It sounds as if WP:ANEW, WP:RFPP and WP:ANI may be relevant. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:48, 27 December 2025 (UTC)
RFPP
Hi there - when you protect a page from a request at RFPP, it'd be appreciated if you can note on the RFPP page that it was done - I marked Gordyene as not done as only part of the article fell under WP:GS/KURD (not having noted yet the earlier Kurd-related disruption in other portions of the article, to be fair) only to notice you had already ECR'd it earlier when adding other protection notes to the GS page. Thanks! - The Bushranger One ping only 00:56, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi The Bushranger, oh! Sorry, I had seen that request and forgot to mark it as done. I came from WP:ANEW though! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:02, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- No worries! - The Bushranger One ping only 01:03, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- (and yes, as only parts of the article relate to the area and this was just in response to disruption, it's limited to a year. So I agree with declining to do so indefinitely.) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:03, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- The article's talk page has a ctop warning, and the user who was blocked today was consistently adding content related to Kurds to the article. As @The Bushranger stated, while the article itself doesn't fall into this GS, the disruptive edits always focused on it. Thank you for protecting the page. Kajmer05 (talk) 01:17, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- To be fair, that talk page notice lacked
|section=yes(). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:37, 29 December 2025 (UTC)- Thank you again. ☺️ Kajmer05 (talk) 08:07, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- To be fair, that talk page notice lacked
- The article's talk page has a ctop warning, and the user who was blocked today was consistently adding content related to Kurds to the article. As @The Bushranger stated, while the article itself doesn't fall into this GS, the disruptive edits always focused on it. Thank you for protecting the page. Kajmer05 (talk) 01:17, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
About rollback
I would like to renew rollback rights since today is December 29. Manualbadeditfix (talk) 19:57, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Manualbadeditfix, nice to meet you again! How was the trial, did you encounter any difficult situations, was anyone unhappy about a rollback, how did you deal with it? Mind sharing one or two examples of situations where having rollback was useful and/or how you would like to use it in the future? Or perhaps of a situation where you intentionally didn't rollback with a default summary because it wouldn't have been okay to do so (WP:ROLLBACKUSE). Thank you very much in advance! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:14, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- My rollback trial helped me with reverting a lot.
- I had a difficult situation when an IP continued vandalizing a draft and their own talk page. Despite AIV reports, no administrator blocked the IP for a long time. I had to follow the three-revert rule, which was challenging. I was also caught in a content dispute.
- The same IP was unhappy about a rollback and reverted what rollbacks I made.
- I used rollback as a useful option to quickly revert blatant vandalism without having to go through the confirmation seen when using the undo option. I also used rollback as a way to revert multiple vandalism edits while no rollbackers used it to revert each edit one by one.
- I would like to use rollback to continue quickly reverting vandalism and to handle incidents such as personal information and threats of physical harm.
- I used other edit summaries when using rollback during cases of good faith edits and unsourced content in BLPs.
- Manualbadeditfix (talk) 05:24, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you very much!
- Oh, I found the draft. Draft:SPRUNKI (2025 film), right? That's one of the rare cases where WP:3RRNO #4 applied, so while there was little point in not waiting for an administrator to deal with the situation, ChildrenWillListen didn't violate the three-revert rule there either. That's okay.
- Theoretically, neither personal information nor threats of physical harm are listed as exceptions at WP:3RRNO, nor explicitly as reasons for rollbacking at WP:ROLLBACKUSE. However, as the "reason for reverting is absolutely clear" in these cases, and as drawing attention to the publication of personal information with an edit summary needs to be avoided, these are fine examples.
- Regarding other edit summaries when dealing with good faith edits and unsourced content: Perfect.
Done! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:33, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
Block
Recently you have blocked me for editing Anti-Russian sentiment.
The only user who expressed concern regarding my edits does not participate in the consensus as can be seen in the Talk page, and yet he didn't mention any concerns regarding that specific edit you have blocked me for.
I have stated my reasons for that change and I don't see your block as justified. Gigman (talk) 01:10, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hello Glebushko0703, we'll see what happens next. If the paragraph is restored or someone complains, the block is fine. If suddenly noone objects to its removal anymore, we can have this discussion, but it's too early to say this. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:16, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- Rsk6400, thoughts? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:16, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- This doesn't justify the 3 month block for a single edit. Gigman (talk) 01:20, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- QED. LordCollaboration has restored the paragraph in Special:Diff/1329795332 and you remain rightfully blocked. You've been doing this for a while (see the block summary / notification for the diff) and had been blocked for the same behavior three times in two months. If you think it's excessive, feel free to appeal. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:21, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- The page in question deviates significantly from the format of other Anti-national sentiment articles, neglecting Wiki's rules.
- Certain group of users eagerly prevents any edits, by questioning the slightest change to a page (like an image) and not participating in consensus. This way they're able to keep the messy status quo they favor. Instead of a neutral postition by encouraging everyone to improve it and engage in consensus you're playing into their hands.
- Your actions as admin seem very one-sided. Of course I think the 3 month block for 1 edit in 3 weeks is too excessive. Gigman (talk) 01:36, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- When I see someone coming back from a block and removing the block message from their talk page, I have a quick look at their latest contributions. If these continue the behavior the block was for, I place another block. The last one was for 2 weeks, sitewide. The issue seemed to be isolated to one article, so I didn't choose another sitewide block. You'll survive being required to submit edit requests in case you want to make constructive, non-controversial changes to this 1 of 7,112,717 articles. You'll hopefully also not get into trouble by edit warring elsewhere while blocked for edit warring. Think of the three months as a kind of probation. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:46, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- You're basically prohibiting me from even slightest contributions to that page until I get a permission from that single specific user who disagrees, since nobody else is participating.
- And even that specific user doesn't contrinute to consensus process themself...
- Last block I got was for edit warring, I didn't edit war this time yet still got blocked. If my contribution was to be removed, I'd start RFC regarding nescessary changes to this page.
- I think the situation we have is not as unambiguous to say how you had mercy on my sinner soul Gigman (talk) 01:59, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- The {{edit partially-blocked}} template allows you to draw the attention of uninvolved other editors to the talk page in case there's an easy change to be made.
- If you think you have not edit warred, let another administrator have a look. It's extremely unlikely that my opinion will change through this discussion here; it's comparatively more likely that another administrator agrees with you. The {{unblock}} template exists for this purpose. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:14, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- How was I supposed to know that I can get banned for editing the page after my ban has expired? You didn't warn me that I'm not allowed to make any changes in future.
- I checked the Talk page, saw no new messages, so I proceeded to remove content that goes against the rules but wasn't mentioned in the discussion (deliberately not reverting any of my controversial changes) Gigman (talk) 04:00, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- Glebushko0703, the discussion starts running in circles. What you describe as "not reverting any of my controversial changes" is and and and . See how identical these are? Allegedly not controversial but reverted four times? Please stop trying to argue about this with me. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:38, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- Now I see...
- It seems like after 2 weeks I forgot that this part was deemed to be controversial too. I had no intention of edit warring just after I got unbanned, I genuinely thought users had no problem with it.
- Unlike other changes made by me, edit in question wasn't specifically adressed in Talk page, emphasis there was mostly on phrasing in lead section and image.
- I admit my guilt, yet I still think that 3 month topic ban is too much for a single edit. Please consider reconsidering your decision. I'm required to discuss this matter with you before putting this issue on admin action review by rules. Gigman (talk) 05:11, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- Okay.
- I'm open to reconsidering the duration after some time has passed. For now, the block is fine in my eyes. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:49, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- Since you asked me for "thoughts", I'd like to mention that Talk:Anti-Russian_sentiment#Some_individuals_may_have_prejudice_or_hatred_against_Russians_due_to_history shows that I participated in the discussion, contrary to what they said in their opening statement. I'm also under the impression that they are more interested in long discussions than in reaching a consensus (see my unanswered question for the specific problems they see on Dec 7, 7:50, repeated Dec 8, 16:32.) Thanks for your quick reaction. Rsk6400 (talk) 07:28, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- You didn't leave any replies since my original block so it's not a real participation. Just compare the ammount of your messages to mine. All this time I tried to get something from you, and all you had to offer is placing the controvercial parts in "", it's just laughable.
- And yeah I have answered your question long time ago and for some reason you still claim I didn't. Gigman (talk) 08:10, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- By the way, user who have reverted my change said he opposes the topic ban on me Special:Diff/1330124790. Gigman (talk) 18:14, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- Glebushko0703, it's not a topic ban (which would prohibit you from discussing on the article's talk page); it's just a one-page partial block. The use of the term "topic ban" doesn't exactly imply that the person using the term knows what they're talking about. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:44, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- Then it's my mistake. Still I think this user implies that he's against any current block. Gigman (talk) 21:12, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- You quite literally told LordCollaboration that if they opposed your block on this page that you would delete a sockpuppet investigation that you created about them – one I might add, that seemed less like an actual concern and more in retaliation for their participation and the opinions they expressed at the recent Baltic States Infoboxes Manual of Style RFC and the more recent Talk:Kaja Kallas#How should her (and family) biography reflect that Estonia was under Soviet (and Nazi German) occupation from 1940 to 1991? discussion. This has been an ongoing issue with you to openly accuse other editors of being sockpuppets or openly cast aspersions when they disagree with you or have countering opinions. In the case of LordCollaboration, you either didn't fully suspect they were a sockpuppet, or didn't particularly care, so long as they did something to your benefit. Per your tak page: Please stop insinuating that I might be a sock puppet: "If you oppose my topic ban, please express your opinion at User talk:ToBeFree#Block, and I'll remove my suspicions from the notice board." You did, in fact, remove your suspicion from the noticeboard when they (reluctantly) agreed to state they felt you shouldn't have a topic ban. Your behavior has been rather outrageous, in my opinion, and I feel as though mods should be made aware of it. ExRat (talk) 23:04, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- The first part is correct.
- I saw that user around anywhere I go quite often, and it's just so happens to be after the RFC with a lot of suckpppets took place. + The speed of this my edit being reverted after the admin stated "we'll see what happens next. If the paragraph is restored or someone complains, the block is fine" seemed to me rather suspicious.
- But there's no point of framing my behaviour as a blackmail, I've stated my reasoninng in the discussion on my page and this user insisted not to be investigated, so I dropped the case. I still have plenty of evidence but I won't continue to push through since the user was nice to me. Gigman (talk) 07:31, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- At least 349 editors get notified about changes to this page here, and 312 users get notified about changes to the Anti-Russian sentiment article. Where it came from, only LordCollaboration knows.
- Glebushko0703, can you see why people are unhappy about statements such as
I still have plenty of evidence but I won't continue to push through since the user was nice to me
, and how close such a statement is to "If you are not nice to me, I'll publish evidence"? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:40, 30 December 2025 (UTC)- As I said their presence around me was persistent, not unique to this page. I had socks following around me before in related (similar) articles as seen here Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/3 Löwi (some of them have even participated in the same discussion as him), so I have a full right to be suspicious.
- What's important is user that reverted my changes said he opposes the block and he didn't know I was banned, I didn't ask him to, I just said my reasons to keep willingly gather evidence against him, but at the moment I withhold any further investigation. Gigman (talk) 07:44, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- Okay. Whatever. If there's evidence, please do either provide it at SPI or stay silent about it; hinting at the existence of evidence is almost certain to sound like a threat, whether intentionally or not. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:56, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
The speed of this my edit being reverted after the admin stated "we'll see what happens next. If the paragraph is restored or someone complains, the block is fine" seemed to me rather suspicious
- This isn't true. My edit occurred 10 minutes before this was said. (My edit was at 1:06, that statement was at 1:16). Unless if I have a crystal ball, there is simply no way this is related at all.
I saw that user around anywhere I go quite often... their presence around me was persistent, not unique to this page.
- As far as I recall, after the RFC, we had three interactions/same areas of posting before you said I might be a sock puppet.
- 1) On the Incidents noticeboard, when you implicitly accused me and someone else of being a user's "friends you bring to battle for you country" (related to the three of us disagreeing with the RFC closure), to which I responded by asking you to provide evidence or strike it (you did neither). See: Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive1209#c-Glebushko0703-20251206191200-Chrisahn-20251206185900
- 2) On Kaja Kallas, where we had a long discussion on the talk page about including accusations of Anti-Russian sentiment. (Which, by the way, is when I added that article to my watchlist.) See: Talk:Kaja Kallas#c-Glebushko0703-20251208083300-It's own section
- 3) Finally, my revert of your edit on the Anti-Russian sentiment article.
- And my interest in this topic area has nothing to do with you. I was not highly active here until mid-June of this year. But before then, I pretty much only edited in the post-Soviet topic area and Indonesia-related topics. Before June, I made 17 edits in 2025, 13 of which were in the post-Soviet space.... etc. You were not active during this time.
this user insisted not to be investigated, so I dropped the case. I still have plenty of evidence
- I thought we agreed no more mention of sock puppetry? As I said, I did not want to waste admin time, as I deeply respect the admins of Wikipedia. But since you insist on continuing to insinuate that I am a sock puppet, despite being told many times to stop (including by an admin, who called it harassment and said that you would be blocked if it continued), and this continues to waste admin time, please start a sock puppet investigation on me. You can add in a separate investigation for me being canvassed, no doubt there is secret evidence of that too, perhaps with even more crystal balls being utilized. Otherwise, please strike these comments and stop making any accusations (insinuated or otherwise) about me. Thank you. LordCollaboration (talk) 15:19, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- 1. It is true, and one user I have accused was indeed involved with sockpupets. You behaved similarly, so it's logical to also suspect you.
- 2. I see, but my question is - are you adding every article to your watchlist after you see my edit on it?
- 3. ToBeFree decided that the first user to remove my edit will justify my block. It's just so happened to be you, but because of the timing and our previous encounters, I thought that you did it specifically to keep me banned after seeing his message.
- 4. I did and I keep my promise, but now people want to frame me as if I have blackmailed you to confess that you opposed the block, so I must naturally explain the situation. Maybe you should've indeed just posted a message yourself instead of asking to diff our discussion. Gigman (talk) 18:37, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
You behaved similarly, so it's logical to also suspect you.
- Stop saying this without evidence. You have posted zero diffs showing my "similar" behavior.
I see, but my question is - are you adding every article to your watchlist after you see my edit on it?
- No, I add pages to my watchlist when I am interested in them, as I just showed I was in this topic area long before we interacted.
ToBeFree decided that the first user to remove my edit will justify my block. It's just so happened to be you, but because of the ttiming and our previous encounters, I thought that you did it specifically to keep me banned after seeing his message.
- Again, my edit was before he "decided" that, so it is obviously unrelated.
I did and I keep my promise
- You did not. You posted that you have evidence, which is absolutely accusing me of being a potential sock. And now again you say I engaged in similar behavior. I am again requesting that you post this "evidence" or strike your comments.
but now people want to frame me as if I have blackmailed you to confess that you opposed the block
- I don't know about blackmail, but it was certainly a quid pro quo for your request that I post here. In any case, defending against this does not require you to falsely claim that you have secret evidence showing I am a potential sock puppet. LordCollaboration (talk) 18:56, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- Similar behaviour in this case means you being on his side and you supposedly following me. Which of course can be just coincidences but still. Perhaps "plenty of evidence" was the wrong phrasing on my side like the "topic ban". Should've said "plenty of reasons".
- If you want me to find your exact diffs, it will automatically mean i'm investigating you, and you asked me not to (and i'm not in the mood myself tbh). Gigman (talk) 19:26, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- So your "similar behavior" is voting a way you disagree with on an RFC and "supposedly" following you. Supposedly according to who? As far as I can tell, we've had three interactions since then, one of which you initiated by accusing me of being canvassed, which you also posted no evidence for.
If you want me to find your exact diffs, it will automatically mean i'm investigating you, and you asked me not to
- My request was not to waste admin time. As I said hours ago, given that you are incapable of following what we agreed on, I am now requesting that you make an investigation. So, yes, post the diffs.
i'm not in the mood myself tbh
How convenient. You do seem to be in the mood for continually insinuating that I might be a sock though. LordCollaboration (talk) 19:45, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- You quite literally told LordCollaboration that if they opposed your block on this page that you would delete a sockpuppet investigation that you created about them – one I might add, that seemed less like an actual concern and more in retaliation for their participation and the opinions they expressed at the recent Baltic States Infoboxes Manual of Style RFC and the more recent Talk:Kaja Kallas#How should her (and family) biography reflect that Estonia was under Soviet (and Nazi German) occupation from 1940 to 1991? discussion. This has been an ongoing issue with you to openly accuse other editors of being sockpuppets or openly cast aspersions when they disagree with you or have countering opinions. In the case of LordCollaboration, you either didn't fully suspect they were a sockpuppet, or didn't particularly care, so long as they did something to your benefit. Per your tak page: Please stop insinuating that I might be a sock puppet: "If you oppose my topic ban, please express your opinion at User talk:ToBeFree#Block, and I'll remove my suspicions from the notice board." You did, in fact, remove your suspicion from the noticeboard when they (reluctantly) agreed to state they felt you shouldn't have a topic ban. Your behavior has been rather outrageous, in my opinion, and I feel as though mods should be made aware of it. ExRat (talk) 23:04, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- Then it's my mistake. Still I think this user implies that he's against any current block. Gigman (talk) 21:12, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- Glebushko0703, it's not a topic ban (which would prohibit you from discussing on the article's talk page); it's just a one-page partial block. The use of the term "topic ban" doesn't exactly imply that the person using the term knows what they're talking about. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:44, 29 December 2025 (UTC)
- Since you asked me for "thoughts", I'd like to mention that Talk:Anti-Russian_sentiment#Some_individuals_may_have_prejudice_or_hatred_against_Russians_due_to_history shows that I participated in the discussion, contrary to what they said in their opening statement. I'm also under the impression that they are more interested in long discussions than in reaching a consensus (see my unanswered question for the specific problems they see on Dec 7, 7:50, repeated Dec 8, 16:32.) Thanks for your quick reaction. Rsk6400 (talk) 07:28, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- Glebushko0703, the discussion starts running in circles. What you describe as "not reverting any of my controversial changes" is and and and . See how identical these are? Allegedly not controversial but reverted four times? Please stop trying to argue about this with me. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 04:38, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- When I see someone coming back from a block and removing the block message from their talk page, I have a quick look at their latest contributions. If these continue the behavior the block was for, I place another block. The last one was for 2 weeks, sitewide. The issue seemed to be isolated to one article, so I didn't choose another sitewide block. You'll survive being required to submit edit requests in case you want to make constructive, non-controversial changes to this 1 of 7,112,717 articles. You'll hopefully also not get into trouble by edit warring elsewhere while blocked for edit warring. Think of the three months as a kind of probation. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:46, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- QED. LordCollaboration has restored the paragraph in Special:Diff/1329795332 and you remain rightfully blocked. You've been doing this for a while (see the block summary / notification for the diff) and had been blocked for the same behavior three times in two months. If you think it's excessive, feel free to appeal. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:21, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- This doesn't justify the 3 month block for a single edit. Gigman (talk) 01:20, 28 December 2025 (UTC)
- Supposedly according to me. I see you in discussions I partipitate in, I see your comments under topics I start, I see you reverting my edits on some of the pages. You should agree this looks rather weird.
- You sure seem to be in the mood to insinuate how I'm still insinuating you being a sock, after the investigation system principle was explained to you by a different admin. Total vibe change from yesterday.
- I can launch an investigation into you if you want, but certainly not in the nearest future. Gigman (talk) 19:50, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- Yes, please launch the investigation. And until you do, stop saying anything about me and sock puppetry. Not "plenty of evidence", not "suspicion list", not "logical reasons to suspect", all of which you posted after you were warned this was harassment. I do not want to hear anything at all until this is posted. LordCollaboration (talk) 20:00, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- I've literally just explained to you what I meant by "evidence" and you still hold your line...
- Harassment is publically accusing users to be socks, and I don't do that anymore. It's not a harrasment to suspect users of being "odd". Gigman (talk) 20:05, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- The 20:00 message was a pretty fine end to this conversation; I'm also fine with Glebushko0703 having a final word after that but it should be done now. The 20:00 request is reasonable and matches what I had written at 07:56, so we've reached a point where the discussion really ends in a circle. In the hope of not upsetting people with this decision, I'll delete further replies. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:07, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- Yes, please launch the investigation. And until you do, stop saying anything about me and sock puppetry. Not "plenty of evidence", not "suspicion list", not "logical reasons to suspect", all of which you posted after you were warned this was harassment. I do not want to hear anything at all until this is posted. LordCollaboration (talk) 20:00, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
Been reading this discussion 'here' & at LordCollaboration's talkpage. In future, please use WP:outdents'. GoodDay (talk) 21:04, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
- How could I forget that some people use Wikipedia with a fixed-width design and/or on anything else than a wide 4k screen. But the solution for that is obviously changing the setting and getting a larger screen! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:11, 30 December 2025 (UTC)
Wishing you a happy 2026!
- MMXXII Lunar Calendar
Have a great 2026 and thanks for your continued contributions to Wikipedia.

– Background color is Very Peri (#6868ab), Pantone's 2026 Color of the year
– CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 15:25, 31 December 2025 (UTC)
Thank you very much, CAPTAIN RAJU! Happy 2026 to you too!
~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:47, 31 December 2025 (UTC)
Wishing you a happy 2026!
- MMXXVI Lunar Calendar
Have a great 2026 and thanks for your continued contributions to Wikipedia.

– Background color is Very Peri (#6868ab), Pantone's 2026 Color of the year
– 𝙳.𝟷𝟾𝚝𝚑 (𝚃𝚊𝚕𝚔) 18:39, 31 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi D.18th, thank you very much!
Happy New Year to you too! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:06, 31 December 2025 (UTC)
Don Frye
Hey @ToBeFree, first off, Happy New Years. Second, I just wanted to let you know that the same user has started making the same changes to Don Frye's article which caused the original edit war weeks ago without discussing first. GOAT Bones231012 (talk) 18:52, 31 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hello GOAT Bones231012, Happy New Year to you too! Thank you very much for notifying me instead of reverting. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:05, 31 December 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you, appreciate it! GOAT Bones231012 (talk) 19:14, 31 December 2025 (UTC)
Happy New Year, ToBeFree!


ToBeFree,
Have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable New Year, and thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia.
Sariel Xilo (talk) 19:20, 31 December 2025 (UTC)
Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year fireworks}} to user talk pages.
Sariel Xilo (talk) 19:20, 31 December 2025 (UTC)
- Hi Sariel Xilo, thank you very much!
Best wishes for 2026 to you and yours!
~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:54, 1 January 2026 (UTC)
Wishing you a positive outlook for the new year, 2026
Happy New Year!
Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year snowman}} to people's talk pages with a friendly message.
- Iggy the Swan!
Thank you very much and to you too! Happy 2026!
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:11, 1 January 2026 (UTC)
Frequentflyer93
Just letting you know about this user that you pblocked a couple weeks ago for edit warring… just for info, have a look at the talk page discussion they’ve removed at User talk:Frequentflyer93, and their edit history at Hawaiian Airlines. They obviously don’t want to interact with me, which is fine… but wanting to make you aware they seem not to be taking any notice of the edit warring policy. Danners430 tweaks made 19:55, 3 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Danners430, I think the conflict has reached a point where WP:ANI is the place to go. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:47, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
- Roger - I'll do that if our paths cross again Danners430 tweaks made 07:14, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
Question about partial block
Hello ToBeFree, I was considering starting an AE report for some questionable edits and incivility at the page you put a block on me for. I did request the case be taken at dispute resolution, but it was closed. Does the partial block mean I don’t have standing for AE until it’s stale anyway? Mikewem (talk) 07:45, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hello Mikewem, it's not a topic ban – you are intentionally not blocked from the talk page of the article to allow you discussing the page and its edits, so creating an AE report is almost explicitly still allowed. No worries. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:49, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
- Was the main reason for the block 3 reverts on the 31st-1st? Mikewem (talk) 07:55, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hm, it is the general/overall image when looking at the contribution list. I rarely count reverts per 24 hours; the main point is that you had reached a situation in which further disagreement would have had to be discussed and you kept reverting, at the end even with an edit summary implying that the reverted editor is a troll who doesn't deserve even an explanation about the revert. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:12, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
- Their edit summary seemed objectively trollish to me. And I admit I had shorter patience due to their previous incivility and other bizarre edits. Mikewem (talk) 08:28, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hm, it is the general/overall image when looking at the contribution list. I rarely count reverts per 24 hours; the main point is that you had reached a situation in which further disagreement would have had to be discussed and you kept reverting, at the end even with an edit summary implying that the reverted editor is a troll who doesn't deserve even an explanation about the revert. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:12, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
- Was the main reason for the block 3 reverts on the 31st-1st? Mikewem (talk) 07:55, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
Protection applied to articles on 2026 US Strikes in Venezuala
Hello,
You have applied WP:ECP to 2026 United States strikes in Venezuela and Talk:2026 United States strikes in Venezuela. I am requesting that you reconsider your decision, particularly in regard to the talk page.
I believe that, particularly in regard to the talk page, WP:SEMI would have sufficed, and WP:ECP is too burdensome to apply on a current topic, particularly on its talk page, without evidence that WP:SEMI does not suffice. By WP:ECPing the talk page, it's incredibly difficult for any page edits to go about the normal cycle of discussion and consensus. Protecting the talk page encourages edits to be made without consensus because consensus is impossible to obtain, because a majority of editors are blocked from discussion.
This is particularly important when there are move or edit discussions being held, because such decisions are purported as being supported by consensus when in fact most users were blocked from the discussion. These move and edit requests then, per policy, shouldn't be duplicated when your protection expires because "consensus has been recently reached".
I understand your rationale is that the page is a WP:CT/AP contentious topic, but I still believe that semi-protection was more appropriate to apply in the first instance using such rationale, and that WP:ECP should be based on some form of evidence.
Thanks, Geordannik (talk) 08:31, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hello Geordannik, the article protection is limited to two weeks and the talk page protection is not mine. The article was semi-protected when I upgraded its protection, and editing/maintenance was still extremely hard with the flood of edits going on even at that level of protection. Even today, 9 hours into 2026-01-06 UTC, 97 edits have been made by extended-confirmed editors through the protection. That's over 10 edits per hour; decreasing protection would currently lead to a chaos. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:03, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
slow motion edit warring + OR
Hi, idk what to do here, this is far too minor to warrant taking to ANI and maybe out of scope of ANEW.
Sigehelmus (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) at Madagascar has been slow motion edit warring in their own original research for months now
- 14 Oct, reverted by Swatjester
- 17 Oct, reverted by Nikkimaria
- 17 Oct and adds source that doesn't verify, reverted by Nikkimaria
- 19 Oct, reverted by Swatjester
- 19 Oct, reverted by Nikkimaria
- 20 Oct, reverted by Kowal2701
- 4 Nov, reverted by Nikkimaria
- 5 Nov, reverted by Kowal2701
- 22 Nov w summary "Lo and behold, I was right all along. Thanks EB", source doesn't verify, reverted by Kowal2701
- 5 Jan citing another WP article
I've warned + explained 20 Oct and 22 Nov to no response, not including people's edit summaries. I don't know whether it's CIR or trolling, nor whether a page block would stop disruption since they seem to be doing this on other pages . Apologies if you're busy Kowal2701 (talk) 00:42, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- @Kowal2701 Thank you for the tag, hello. I have done nothing that is not consistent with the page cited. The matter is as simple as possible: I have literally only added a word that is entirely consistent with the entire page and how Madagascar is described everywhere. Please see File:Forms of government.svg, where Madagascar is very clearly marked as military junta. If this is wrong, and Madagascar since the coup is somehow just a regular old republic, it's a very grave miscategorization that needs to be addressed. Yet please pardon my candor, but to characterize this elucidation which is entirely within WP:NPOV (and obfuscation of the fact is arguably to the contrary of that principle) as "trolling" is borderline gaslighting. WP:SPADE applies here, I believe. I have done nothing which other articles don't already plainly say. Again, I thank you for the attention, but there is nothing original that was mined here, there is nothing de novo, and to put it bluntly this all feels pretty silly. It is dishonest (and inconsistent with similar countries) to categorize the state of Madagascar as a civilian Republic when it's under nominal military control, plain and simple. That's literally it. Of course you're more than free to disagree with this, but it's rather odd to expend so much effort on this series of events and text than to even try resolving the inconsistency with other articles. That's just not good! (Edit: I had Coup Belt marked here but it seems that status for the state was removed recently, but it used to be there. If this is an ambiguous situation it ought to be marked as such. If the graph is outdated it's kinda a big deal to be on such a basic article like Government)~Sıgehelmus♗(Tøk) 00:50, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- By the way, I am fully 100% that to this day EB (Britannica) quite literally does mark Madagascar as "transitional military government" "Source doesn't verify"? Either you didn't look, or mistakenly looked elsewhere,or that's a lie. Is Britannica itself not WP:RS anymore? ~Sıgehelmus♗(Tøk) 00:57, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- Here's a Bloomberg article (as mainstream as it gets) from just two weeks ago that plainly calls Madagascar a military gov in title. Theore I reflect on this, the more ridiculous it all seems: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-12-22/russia-sends-arms-shipment-to-madagascar-s-military-government ~Sıgehelmus♗(Tøk) 01:00, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- You used that Britannica article to verify "statocratic". I agree this is silly. All you needed to do was add cited prose to the body about it and summarise that in the infobox per WP:IBP. At the 10th time, after ignoring attempts at discussion, it certainly felt like trolling Kowal2701 (talk) 01:18, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- Okay, but is a junta not merely a subtype of stratocracy? If anything, stratocracy is the milder synonym that I thought accommodated the situation while abiding by the source. The infobox is for the average lazy reader too for key takeaways, WP has written about this. I was just trying to convey consistency. ~Sıgehelmus♗(Tøk) 01:40, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- P.S. to just spit it out, I'm sorry, but the last several months have just been personally very rough. It's no excuse for dysfunctional communication and disregarding protocol, but I genuinely felt fazed and incompetent to go by the usual protocol in favor of something I saw then as "obvious" that didn't add "meat" to the article not already present. ~Sıgehelmus♗(Tøk) 03:55, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- That’s okay, don’t worry about it. Just remember for the future, I try not to use WP:BLUESKY for anything because of stuff like this Kowal2701 (talk) 04:02, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- P.S. to just spit it out, I'm sorry, but the last several months have just been personally very rough. It's no excuse for dysfunctional communication and disregarding protocol, but I genuinely felt fazed and incompetent to go by the usual protocol in favor of something I saw then as "obvious" that didn't add "meat" to the article not already present. ~Sıgehelmus♗(Tøk) 03:55, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- Okay, but is a junta not merely a subtype of stratocracy? If anything, stratocracy is the milder synonym that I thought accommodated the situation while abiding by the source. The infobox is for the average lazy reader too for key takeaways, WP has written about this. I was just trying to convey consistency. ~Sıgehelmus♗(Tøk) 01:40, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- You used that Britannica article to verify "statocratic". I agree this is silly. All you needed to do was add cited prose to the body about it and summarise that in the infobox per WP:IBP. At the 10th time, after ignoring attempts at discussion, it certainly felt like trolling Kowal2701 (talk) 01:18, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hello Kowal2701 and Sigehelmus, I could see why it would appear at WP:ANI or WP:ANEW, and I think both noticeboards are potentially suitable for this type of report. If you would currently like to avoid making one, though, which is a perfectly fine decision perhaps avoiding unnecessary heat, I'd like to avoid taking any action here either. It would probably be inappropriate if my response to your "far too minor to warrant taking to ANI" was to place sanctions. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:07, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
Phillip Ensler
Not sure what's going on here but three TAs have been rewriting the Career section as if they're campaigning for him. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 15:23, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:50, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
Logged out view of your talk page
When I saw your user talk page from my mobile phone, I saw different text at the top of the page compared to the view when I am currently logged in. I am wondering if you can do something about the presence of the text "your IP address might change" as they are not linked to any more logged out editing. Temporary accounts are guaranteed to change though. Iggy (Swan) (Contribs) 19:55, 6 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Iggy the Swan, are you sure you haven't looked at a cached version in your mobile browser's history or something? The text should be gone since a few weeks 🤔 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 02:23, 7 January 2026 (UTC)
- Looks like you've only removed that text from your userpage. When I viewed the source of your talk page, third group of source code I can still see that IP address paragraph. Iggy (Swan) (Contribs) 07:55, 7 January 2026 (UTC)
- Oh, I should read properly 🙂 I thought this was about my user page and had forgotten there's such a notice on my talk page too. It's now gone. Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:30, 7 January 2026 (UTC)
- Looks like you've only removed that text from your userpage. When I viewed the source of your talk page, third group of source code I can still see that IP address paragraph. Iggy (Swan) (Contribs) 07:55, 7 January 2026 (UTC)
SoryuuWT Edit Warring and WP:PA
Hi, thanks for protecting Sukhoi Su-47. I'm a little confused, however. Soryuu clearly breached 3RR. They've also engaged in ABF and what seem to me to be personal attacks. My cautions regarding those seem to have just further agitated them. Since you seem to feel a block is not warranted, would you be willing to reinforce the WP:EW and WP:PA warnings I gave at their talk page? I'm not looking forward to fielding their aggressive remarks otherwise. EducatedRedneck (talk) 12:06, 7 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi EducatedRedneck, SoryuuWT hasn't edited any page since the protection, and the protected revision is the one before their edits. I'd like to wait and see what happens next. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:34, 7 January 2026 (UTC)
- Okay, fair enough. If it's okay, I'll let you know if there's further behavioral problems. Thanks again for your help; it's much appreciated! EducatedRedneck (talk) 12:35, 7 January 2026 (UTC)
- Please do! No worries. 🙂🍀 ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:36, 7 January 2026 (UTC)
- Okay, fair enough. If it's okay, I'll let you know if there's further behavioral problems. Thanks again for your help; it's much appreciated! EducatedRedneck (talk) 12:35, 7 January 2026 (UTC)
Opinion polling for the next United Kingdom general election
Please unprotect this article. There is no reason for it to be protected at the present time. ~2025-41479-54 (talk) 23:48, 7 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hello ~2025-41479-54, I had protected the page in response to disruption. If you had created an account for the edits made so far, you'd already be autoconfirmed and could edit the page. Creating an account does not even require an e-mail address, just setting a username and a password. If you create an account and let me know here, I'll manually confirm it so you don't have to make 10 more edits before you can edit the page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 06:19, 8 January 2026 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – January 2026
News and updates for administrators from the past month (December 2025).
- All general sanctions imposed by the community may now be enforced at the Arbitration Enforcement noticeboard (WP:AE) as a result of a recent RfC.
- Due to the result of a recent RFC, the administrator recall process is amended to extend the deadline for a re-request for adminship to 30 days or the next administrator election, whichever is later.
- Changes to the Access to Temporary Account IP Addresses Policy's disclosure rules include broadening the consecutive-blocks exception to cover all admin actions and removing the requirement to revision-delete permissible disclosures once they become unnecessary (instead requiring only their removal). See WP:TAIVDISCLOSE for more information.
- Following the 2025 Arbitration Committee elections, the following editors have been elected to the Arbitration Committee: Aoidh, Asilvering, Girth Summit, Guerillero, HJ Mitchell, HouseBlaster, Izno, Sdrqaz, SilverLocust.
- The arbitration case Pbsouthwood has been suspended.
Notice of Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents discussion
There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The thread is Frequentflyer93 - persistent personal attacks. Danners430 tweaks made 12:41, 9 January 2026 (UTC)
- Letting you know since I pinged you in the thread as the previously blocking admin Danners430 tweaks made 12:41, 9 January 2026 (UTC)
- Oh well. Thanks for the notification! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:30, 9 January 2026 (UTC)
ANI notice
There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The thread is Houndering suspicion. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 00:37, 11 January 2026 (UTC)
- Thanks for the notification and the detailed comment there. From a purely technical perspective, I guess voorts wasn't in a position to close the thread after an indefinite ban was proposed. But I'm also not interested in fueling that fire any further. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 07:09, 11 January 2026 (UTC)
Tech News: 2026-03
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- The Wikimedia Foundation has shared some guiding questions for the July 2026–June 2027 Annual Plan on Meta and Diff. These focus on global trends, faster and healthier experimentation, better support for newcomers, strengthening editors and advanced users, improving collaboration across projects, and growing and retaining readership. Feedback and ideas are welcome on the talk page.
Updates for editors
- As part of the current work of Community Tech team on the Multiple watchlists project, the display of EditWatchlist will be updated as a first step towards multiple watchlists. Additionally, the pagination on Search will be updated too, as a part of the work on the Revamp pagination / page navigation wish.
- The Global Watchlist is a MediaWiki extension that lets you see your watchlists from different wikis on the same page. It was recently updated to look more like the regular Watchlist, such as preparing it for temporary accounts in IP masking (including rerouting user links to contributions pages), making page titles bold, and opening links in edit summaries and tags in new browser tabs.
View all 28 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the issue where global blocks did not have the option to disable sending emails, has now been fixed, and will be available for use in the week of January 13.
Updates for technical contributors
- The VisualEditor citation tool and Reference Previews now support "map" as a reference type.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki/MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 19:31, 12 January 2026 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2026 Issue 1



Highlights
- Wikipedia turns 25: Time to start the party! Join the virtual celebration featuring musical performances, games, and more on January 15 at 16:00 UTC. and The party will be live interpreted into Arabic, Chinese, French, Spanish, and Portuguese.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Product Safety and Integrity · Readers · Research · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Annual planning: Key questions for the Wikimedia movement to shape the Wikimedia Foundation’s 2026-2027 annual goals. Join the discussion on-wiki.
- Hackathon:
- Apply to join the Northwestern Europe 2026 Hackathon from March 13-14 in Arnhem, the Netherlands. Application will close mid-January 2026 or earlier based on event capacity.
- General Registration for the 2026 Wikimedia Hackathon is now open! The hackathon will take place in Milan, Italy from May 1 - 3, 2026. Event details can be found here and registration will remain open until March 30th or until event capacity is reached.
- Semantic search: Wikimedia Foundation is working on making it easier to find the information readers want.
- Tech News: Latest updates from Tech News week 50, week 51, and week 52 include that now edit filters can be set to automatically suppress their details which will help oversighters to prevent doxxing.
- Wikifunctions: The first Wikifunctions Volunteers' Corner of the next year will take place on February 9.
- Blazegraph Migration: To support the migration away from Blazegraph as the backend of Wikidata Query Service (WDQS), we are hosting regular calls starting on January 27. Wikidata users and tool maintainers are are invited to join, ask questions, and share migration-related concerns.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · list of movement events · The Wikipedia Library
- Upcoming Conferences: Announcing the six Wikimedia conferences funded for 2026 in the first round.
- Wikimania 2026: A glimpse on what the team is currently working on to prepare for Wikimania 2026 in Paris.
- Public Policy: Explore the resources available for public policy advocacy work, including explainers that describe key policy positions, guides on how to build a campaign or write a policy brief, and examples of open letters submitted to governments.
- Don't Blink: The latest developments from around the world about protecting the Wikimedia model, its people and its values.
- Public-Interest content: The Project Gayatri content expansion program brought 7,656 new articles on Indonesian Wikipedia.
- Wikimedia Research Showcase: The research showcase will return on January 22 at 17:30 UTC with the theme "Celebrating 25 Years of Wikipedia and the Research Behind It".
- Wikimedia Research Report: The Wikimedia Foundation has published its 13th bi-annual Research Report, highlighting the work completed during the first six months of this fiscal year.
Annual Goals Progress on Effectiveness
See also: Past issues of the bulletin for progress on the annual plan
- Wikimedia Enterprise: Read the full annual wrap-up of 2025 of Wikimedia Enterprise and how the year marked a fundamental shift in open knowledge.
Board and Board committee updates
See Wikimedia Foundation Board noticeboard · Affiliations Committee Newsletter
- Board of Trustees: Wikimedia Foundation welcomes two new Board Trustees Bobby Shabangu and Michał Buczyński.
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MediaWiki message delivery 00:30, 14 January 2026 (UTC)
The Signpost: 15 January 2026
- News and notes: Wikipedia's 25th anniversary is here!
Where does the time go?
- Special report: Wikipedia at 25: A Wake-Up Call
The internet is booming. We are not.
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The campaign to get all of our top-importance medical articles up to B-class or above.
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Really?
Happy 25th Anniversary of Wikipedia!!
Feel free to read my story at User:Interstellarity/My Story and join in for some Wikipedia-related fun. I hope you like it. Interstellarity (talk) 01:40, 16 January 2026 (UTC)
- Thanks for sharing!
I do! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 06:24, 16 January 2026 (UTC)
Talk:Margherita Hack#Pronunciation
Hello, I'm the user who reported User:IvanScrooge98 (banned from Italian Wikipedia for his attitude) for his POV about the IPA of the Italian scientist Margherita Hack. You protected the page to prevent disruption but the result was letting only "he" free to edit the page at his own will. I opened a discussion in the talk page and other users said their opinion: User:IvanScrooge98's edit to the IPA wasn't accepted by anyone ([ˈ(h)ak]), everyone wanted to restore the IPA previous to his edit ([ˈak]). He couldn't accept this consensus, so he entirely removed the IPA. Nobody agreed with that decision but he won't accept nor respect any decision by other users, which is precisely the attitude which caused his ban from his native Wikipedia. You can read directly the discussion to verify what I'm saying. I've written to you, the admin who protected the page, to ask for your intervention in this issue, I hope that you'll be able to do something about that. ~2026-19615-1 (talk) 22:39, 9 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hello ~2026-19615-1, I would currently like to, at least temporarily, avoid further involvement in the matter. If there is a persisting behavioral issue you'd like to report, please do so at WP:ANI and notify IvanScrooge98 about your report. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:11, 10 January 2026 (UTC)
- Ok, then I won't involve you again in this issue. But you might at least remove the 1-year protection, then: the vandal User:IvanScrooge98 is the one taking advantage of a semi-protection allowing him to fully remove an IPA when the community (like the sources) doesn't agree with "his" version of that IPA... ~2026-19615-1 (talk) 18:36, 12 January 2026 (UTC)
- I understand the request, but IvanScrooge98 is not a vandal and I don't think that removing semi-protection would cause anything else than an edit war. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:06, 13 January 2026 (UTC)
- 'User:IvanScrooge98 is not a vandal' ~2026-19615-1 (talk) 18:04, 14 January 2026 (UTC)
- Yes, "Personal attacks: repeated, uncooperative behavior (refuses ArbCom resolutions), WP:NONQUI" is not a vandalism block. Stubbornness with good intentions isn't the same as bad-faith editing, and we don't call it "vandalism". Apparently neither here nor there. So please lead by example and focus on content instead. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:24, 14 January 2026 (UTC)
- No, "Langdurig structureel vandalisme: Italian cross wiki accent vandal" is a vandalism block. He was identified as a vandal over a decade ago; while we were talking he even managed to get blocked (again) here too... But I don't want to continue talking about him: as you said the IPA issue must be discussed in the talk page regardless of that vandal. If I've been writing here during this week it was only to show you that he's actually a "vandal", if you still don't think he is then I'll get over it. Good night! ~2026-19615-1 (talk) 17:51, 16 January 2026 (UTC)
"Bad faith"
At what point do you go from accusing someone of 'assuming' bad faith to acknowledging evidence of bad faith, so that the assumption is reasonable? A cursory look of @Theonewithreason's edit history has him almost exclusively preoccupied with identifying individuals as Serbian , , , , and in the past they seem to have been as quick to escalate to administrative procedurals as they were with my edits, where they went from mischaracterizing them as "new account vandalism" to a sudden pivot to accusing me of being a sockpuppet with some ulterior motive, and completely blindsided me. My 'objection' wasn't one to be noted, but actively questioning the judgment of whoever decided to simply block both of us. I take that to be you.
The current state of the article is now in favor, and he now has stopped engaging in conversation since has no reason to try and reach a consensus, and at no point was even trying. It's really unreasonable to look at my edits and suggest I was not attempting to improve the content of the article, provide evidence for my edits, and attempt to reach a consensus with someone that was actively hostile and belligerent.
I would like to understand the process to appeal what I feel has been poor judgment on your part. Breadpachinko (talk) 19:39, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Breadpachinko, there may be a dozen ways to approach the situation, but if you're asking me for advice: Wait 48 hours, ignore your sockpuppetry concerns and create a discussion at WP:ANI if, after the 48 hours, you are certain that a discussion about the behavior in general and across articles needs to be held. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:48, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- It's a Monday (working day) in 48 hours. Do I take the suggestion to simply be a well-intended 'cool down' or is there some procedural reason to wait for 48 hours? (Aside: If I have time I have time, but the burden has already been shifted onto me to double-check something I would assume would make more sense to already be a part of an administrator's workflow/process in the first place. The net effect might be that over a long time period you're going to see people unwilling to take the time to follow up with matters such as these. That would be exactly what someone like Theonewithreason would be counting on, and would explain why he had the audacity to act as he did in the first place. We would all do better to consider second-order effects.) Breadpachinko (talk) 20:00, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- If the day of the week is an issue, wait a week? Yes, this is about cooling down. If the issue is persistent, there's enough time to address it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:21, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- Then there isn't really any need to wait. It's unserious to suggest I need to cool down. I followed the processes and continue to follow the processes in good-faith, and you have someone who effectively 'kamikazed' themselves to get a desired outcome of an article. I'll be appealing my ban and filing ANI, and questioning your approach here will necessarily be part of both. Breadpachinko (talk) 20:24, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- The need to wait has been proven by your message here and an appeal that was declined less than 15 minutes after its creation. You are partially blocked, not banned. Please do take your time, even if it's just to gather information. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:45, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- A spade is a spade whether we wait 10 minutes or 10 centuries. Your advice that I should take time and gather information is something an you yourself should have done in the first place. The net effect of all this is that you have article that is currently at odds with sources and have incentivized counterparty to continue to undertake belligerent methodologies. The only proposed remedy is that I am obliged to undergo a series of policies, forms, arbitrations, and appeals (all of which I am not necessarily familiar with) in the service of a self-evidently good-faith edit, to counter a self-evidently incorrect reversion. Why don't you, as an administrator, intervene more actively in the current situation? Breadpachinko (talk) 20:57, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- Breadpachinko, if I understand your message correctly, you're saying that my actions – placing two partial blocks from one article – had the effect of keeping an article in a state undesirable to you. The partial block on Theonewithreason won't be the one you refer to, so you appear to say that the partial block on your account has an actual effect on the state of the article, which ... proves the need for the action. You are currently running against a wall. I dealt with the edit warring on the edit warring noticeboard and I'm sure that if there is a persistent behavioral problem, you can describe it at ANI and it will be dealt with, but this takes calmness and preparation, both of which evidently have not arrived yet. Which is perfectly fine and not something I'm complaining about, just pointing out with an advice to wait. Whether that's 48 hours, a week, anything that has an effect changing your current situation. Appealing the block by complaining about others' behavior and complaining about the decline on the declining administrator's talk page afterwards is all part of the current unfortunate state. From my personal view, nothing procedural but genuine advice, you should not continue editing Wikipedia today. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:08, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- That's a mischaracterization. The current state of the article is one which is contrary to its own sources, as provided in the original edit explanation and as discussed on the talk page. The partial block on Theonewithreason is the one I am referring to. He reverted the article three times, fourth while logged out, and then disengaged from the conversation upon administrator intervention that resulted in the article being 'locked' to a state that is contrary to its own sources.
- The idea that I am obliged to undertake an investigation and provide evidence of Theonewithreason as a belligerent editor via some additional format is unserious. Your characterization that it's my fault for not having "calmness and preparation" that the article is currently invalid is also unserious and I will take offense here, since you have no meaningful evidence that I am not calm or unprepared. Sufficient evidence is already brought to your attention. You, as an administrator, have far more time, familiarity, and capability to undertake the processes you recommend I do, or else direct these suggestions to someone else you would know to be able capable to undertake them.
- I am interested in fixing a factual inaccuracy in the Wikipedia article for Monica Seles. I am interested in taking the time to amend it, and providing evidence, sources, and discussion to that end. I am not interested in pursuing ANI, or trying to persuade yourself or any other administrator to take initiative for something which should be your own responsibilities, and there's no reason that Wikipedia should maintain inaccuracies in its articles for good-faith editors being unwilling to humor these excessive bureaucratic burdens. Breadpachinko (talk) 21:21, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- Breadpachinko, if I understand your message correctly, you're saying that my actions – placing two partial blocks from one article – had the effect of keeping an article in a state undesirable to you. The partial block on Theonewithreason won't be the one you refer to, so you appear to say that the partial block on your account has an actual effect on the state of the article, which ... proves the need for the action. You are currently running against a wall. I dealt with the edit warring on the edit warring noticeboard and I'm sure that if there is a persistent behavioral problem, you can describe it at ANI and it will be dealt with, but this takes calmness and preparation, both of which evidently have not arrived yet. Which is perfectly fine and not something I'm complaining about, just pointing out with an advice to wait. Whether that's 48 hours, a week, anything that has an effect changing your current situation. Appealing the block by complaining about others' behavior and complaining about the decline on the declining administrator's talk page afterwards is all part of the current unfortunate state. From my personal view, nothing procedural but genuine advice, you should not continue editing Wikipedia today. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:08, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- A spade is a spade whether we wait 10 minutes or 10 centuries. Your advice that I should take time and gather information is something an you yourself should have done in the first place. The net effect of all this is that you have article that is currently at odds with sources and have incentivized counterparty to continue to undertake belligerent methodologies. The only proposed remedy is that I am obliged to undergo a series of policies, forms, arbitrations, and appeals (all of which I am not necessarily familiar with) in the service of a self-evidently good-faith edit, to counter a self-evidently incorrect reversion. Why don't you, as an administrator, intervene more actively in the current situation? Breadpachinko (talk) 20:57, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- The need to wait has been proven by your message here and an appeal that was declined less than 15 minutes after its creation. You are partially blocked, not banned. Please do take your time, even if it's just to gather information. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:45, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- Then there isn't really any need to wait. It's unserious to suggest I need to cool down. I followed the processes and continue to follow the processes in good-faith, and you have someone who effectively 'kamikazed' themselves to get a desired outcome of an article. I'll be appealing my ban and filing ANI, and questioning your approach here will necessarily be part of both. Breadpachinko (talk) 20:24, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- If the day of the week is an issue, wait a week? Yes, this is about cooling down. If the issue is persistent, there's enough time to address it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:21, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- It's a Monday (working day) in 48 hours. Do I take the suggestion to simply be a well-intended 'cool down' or is there some procedural reason to wait for 48 hours? (Aside: If I have time I have time, but the burden has already been shifted onto me to double-check something I would assume would make more sense to already be a part of an administrator's workflow/process in the first place. The net effect might be that over a long time period you're going to see people unwilling to take the time to follow up with matters such as these. That would be exactly what someone like Theonewithreason would be counting on, and would explain why he had the audacity to act as he did in the first place. We would all do better to consider second-order effects.) Breadpachinko (talk) 20:00, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- (and Theonewithreason, when you read this, please don't respond to the message above, neither here nor elsewhere; it can't help at the moment. If an ANI discussion is created, that is the place to make your case.) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:50, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
MN fraud scandals
Hi TBF, can you check to see whether there's logged-out editing occurring at the 2020s Minnesota fraud scandals page? These temp accounts and one user account are all very likely to be the same person:
- ~2026-70971
- ~2026-65095
- ~2025-43572-55
- ~2026-10942-6
- ~2026-11493-0
- ~2026-19229-6 (p-blocked for 72 hours due to edit-warring )
- Lunarscarlet
- ~2026-24594-2
- ~2026-32437-2
Thanks! Some1 (talk) 12:31, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Some1, I did have similar suspicions but it ended mattering with protection and a partial block, and I didn't compare the edit summaries closely enough to notice they're also similarly written. Lunarscarlet, if you have edited in this conflict while logged out of your account, please note that doing so is prohibited (Wikipedia:Sockpuppetry § Editing while logged out in order to mislead) and if it happened anywhere else again, it could quickly lead to an indefinite-duration sitewide block. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:45, 17 January 2026 (UTC)
Hi TBF (again). Are editors not allowed to make changes to the lead while an RfC regarding the entire lead is still ongoing ? Is the entire lead uneditable until the RfC concludes?
Are you able to check whether the temp account who started the RfC is the same user as the Lunarscarlet account?
Thanks, Some1 (talk) 13:03, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hello Some1, what is your actual question? You seem to be asking for things to conclude something else from. Please ask about that something instead.
- Regarding temporary accounts and registered accounts, I can check but I wouldn't be able to inform you about the result. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:17, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- Sorry, I should've been more clear. This RfC was opened after the page was unprotected: Talk:2020s_Minnesota_fraud_scandals#RFC_-_Lead regarding two versions of the lead. I made some changes to the lead and was reverted by another editor with the edit summary "Revert during ongoing RfC". So I guess this is where my questions come in: Are editors not allowed to make any changes to the lead while an RfC concerning the entire lead is still ongoing ? In other words, is the entire lead uneditable until the RfC concludes?
- And yes, please check out the temp account and the Lunarscarlet account. If they are the same person, then they have !voted twice in the RfC. Some1 (talk) 13:23, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- The diff is rather large and changes more than just the lead. Did you copy its text from a previous revision or did you manually make all these changes in one diff? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:37, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- The former, I copied parts from the previous version but then added some things back from the other version. Some1 (talk) 13:41, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- Okay. Some1, I think that makes the answer relatively simple – shortly after page protection expired, you made a (partial, but still a) revert to earlier content others had objected to. Which, independently of whether there's an RfC running about it, sounds inappropriate to me. Whether reverting your (partial) revert made things better or just fueled the fire further, I don't know. Ethiopian Epic has 588 edits and should perhaps do less adventurous things than jumping into a dispute on a page only 87 edits after they passed the minimum mark to edit there at all. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:16, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- Thanks for answering. I'm assuming now that the lead is frozen in place and is unable to be edited until the RfC concludes, which isn't for at least another 30 days. (I'll probably lose interest in the article by then, which I guess is a good thing.)
- Since I'm on your talk page, and if you have time, do you think you could take a look at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/EkkoJinxZaun? It has been open for two months now. Some1 (talk) 15:31, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
I ... uh ... didn't say that. Which doesn't mean it's not true. But that's your conclusion after a message that was explicitly not about the RfC. The RfC is, admittedly though, perhaps the only way a change would get through.- Regarding the SPI, the checkuser part was apparently already done. There are 778 non-checkuser admins and you're not asking one of them :) Sorry, but I really can't. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:44, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- No worries, that's fine if you can't. It seems like a complicated case if the other two SPI archives and the ANI thread are taken into consideration, so I don't blame admins for not wanting to deal with that. We're all volunteers here after all. Anyway, have a great day ToBeFree, thanks for answering my questions. Some1 (talk) 16:01, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- Thank you and no worries; you too! :) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:07, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- No worries, that's fine if you can't. It seems like a complicated case if the other two SPI archives and the ANI thread are taken into consideration, so I don't blame admins for not wanting to deal with that. We're all volunteers here after all. Anyway, have a great day ToBeFree, thanks for answering my questions. Some1 (talk) 16:01, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- Okay. Some1, I think that makes the answer relatively simple – shortly after page protection expired, you made a (partial, but still a) revert to earlier content others had objected to. Which, independently of whether there's an RfC running about it, sounds inappropriate to me. Whether reverting your (partial) revert made things better or just fueled the fire further, I don't know. Ethiopian Epic has 588 edits and should perhaps do less adventurous things than jumping into a dispute on a page only 87 edits after they passed the minimum mark to edit there at all. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:16, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- The former, I copied parts from the previous version but then added some things back from the other version. Some1 (talk) 13:41, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
- The diff is rather large and changes more than just the lead. Did you copy its text from a previous revision or did you manually make all these changes in one diff? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:37, 18 January 2026 (UTC)
Feedback request: Wikipedia proposals request for comment

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Tech News: 2026-04
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- The tray shown on Special:Diff in mobile view has been redesigned. It is now collapsed by default, and incorporates a link to undo the edit being viewed, making it easier for mobile editors and reviewers to take action while keeping the interface uncluttered.
- The Global Watchlist lets you view your watchlists from multiple wikis on one page. The extension continues to improve — it now automatically determines the text direction (ensuring correct display of sites with unusual domain names) and shows detailed descriptions for log actions. Later this week, a new permanent link for page creations and CSS classes for each entry element will be added.
View all 32 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the previously observed issue in Vector 2022, where anchor link targets were obscured by the sticky header, has now been addressed.
Updates for technical contributors
- As mentioned in the October 2025 deprecation announcement, MediaWiki Interfaces team will begin sunsetting all transform endpoints containing a trailing slash from the MediaWiki REST API the week of January 26. Changes are expected to roll out to all wikis on or before January 30th. All API users currently calling them are encouraged to transition to the non-trailing slash versions. Both endpoint variations can be found, compared, and tested using the REST Sandbox. If you have questions or encounter any problems, please file a ticket in Phabricator to the #MW-Interfaces-Team board.
- Interactive reference documentation for the Wikimedia REST API has moved. Requests to API docs previously hosted through RESTBase (e.g.:
https://en.wikipedia.org/api/rest_v1/) are now redirected to the REST Sandbox. - The WMF Wikidata Platform team (WDP) has published its January 2026 newsletter. It includes updates on the legacy full-graph endpoint decommissioning, the User-Agent policy change, the monthly Blazegraph migration office hours, and efforts to reduce regressions caused by the legacy endpoint shutdown. As a reminder, you can subscribe to the WDP newsletter!
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Meetings and events
- The Wikimedia Hackathon Northwestern Europe 2026 will take place on 13-14 March 2026 in Arnhem, the Netherlands. Applications opened mid-December and will close soon or when capacity is reached. It's a two-day, technically oriented hackathon bringing together Wikimedians from the region. Hope to see you there!
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 20:28, 19 January 2026 (UTC)
hi
can you please deal with this nonsense which is obviously the same person as this one? TURKEYDICAE🦃 20:32, 19 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Praxidicae, I usually don't (see the edit notice)

- That said, done. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:32, 19 January 2026 (UTC)
thank you.
I would like to take the opportunity to apologise for my behaviour it was a poor demonstration of who I am as an editor and i thank you for making me see that, I'm fine with the page block but I thought I'd at least apologise.
thank you. Laddyfisher (talk) 17:48, 20 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Laddyfisher, this is very kind and no worries. You were not blocked, the page was protected. Your block log is empty. As long as the edit warring doesn't continue, all is good.
~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:25, 20 January 2026 (UTC)
- well once again thank you anyway Laddyfisher (talk) 00:08, 21 January 2026 (UTC)
TA whitewashing Carolina Amesty
See this edit summary in particular; the disputed content specifically states that charges were dropped. "Continuing to reference it as an active or unresolved matter" is clearly not an appropriate reason for removal. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:28, 21 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification. I have semi-protected the page for a year for now. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:56, 21 January 2026 (UTC)
Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas
Hi, you remember what happened on that page, i just want to tell you i will not touch that page but it do not change the fact it was the dungeons instead of "her room" (in the scene and the word dungeons is heard), so i wonder if you can write the dungeons on that page? Because if it is written by you it will be respected, will you help? Animelover96 (talk) 17:42, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Animelover96, thanks for asking! Looking at Special:Diff/1324085309, this would be a change someone else has already objected to, so it would need to be discussed at Talk:Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas. It's fine and a good idea not to touch the article for now, but would you mind creating a new section on that talk page, explaining the reason why it should be "her room", perhaps with a source to prove what you say? Even if it's just the minute-and-second timestamp of where that happens in the movie. Anything others can verify. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:33, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- You misunderstand or written wrong about "her room" it is in fact the dungeons, because of the scene in the movie and the beast said "you will rot in this dungeon forever" to Belle, i watched the movie and you can see that scene on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJjTSbW-PNY&list=PLLtB04dm_J7Ovh_LK34brO1wJ7DP0Dfup&index=14 Animelover96 (talk) 18:47, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- Sorry, and thanks for the clarification. I meant: Would you mind creating a new section at Talk:Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas, explaining the reason why it should be "the dungeons"? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:59, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- I can try, so if i write dungeons on the page and write in the summary that i have your permission and write the youtube clip in it, is that ok? Animelover96 (talk) 20:12, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- No! That's not at all what I said. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:47, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- I know what you said, what i meant i add new section on talk page and then edit on the page by adding dungeons, then i write in the summary to prove i got your permission without causing any trouble. Unless you do this instead of me, so should i or you add section on talk page and then edit dungeons on the main page? Animelover96 (talk) 10:09, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- Animelover96, you haven't edited the talk page yet. Doing so is the only advice I provided. No editing of the article at all for now. And then patience. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:30, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- Ok. Animelover96 (talk) 12:32, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- Have added now, how long do i have to wait for it to be written dungeons on the article? Animelover96 (talk) 17:19, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- Thank you very much. However, please stop using my name as if I had endorsed either "her room" or "the dungeons"; I have removed this in Special:Diff/1334786002. You have an opinion, you have a source, you created a discussion, others might join, I have no stance.
- I have now invited ~2025-37163-27 to the discussion (). If they don't reply within, say, 2 weeks, you can try once again to restore your preferred change if you'd like to follow the advice of the essay WP:DISCFAIL. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:30, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- Ok. Animelover96 (talk) 17:47, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- Does it mean if ~2025-37163-27 do not reply in 2 weeks i can write dungeons on the article? Animelover96 (talk) 18:36, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- If noone objects to the change on the talk page, trying once (not twice, not edit warring) may be fine, but please don't mention my name or claim anyone had supported the change when doing so. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:18, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- Ok. Animelover96 (talk) 19:22, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- If noone objects to the change on the talk page, trying once (not twice, not edit warring) may be fine, but please don't mention my name or claim anyone had supported the change when doing so. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:18, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- Animelover96, you haven't edited the talk page yet. Doing so is the only advice I provided. No editing of the article at all for now. And then patience. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:30, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- I know what you said, what i meant i add new section on talk page and then edit on the page by adding dungeons, then i write in the summary to prove i got your permission without causing any trouble. Unless you do this instead of me, so should i or you add section on talk page and then edit dungeons on the main page? Animelover96 (talk) 10:09, 25 January 2026 (UTC)
- No! That's not at all what I said. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:47, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- I can try, so if i write dungeons on the page and write in the summary that i have your permission and write the youtube clip in it, is that ok? Animelover96 (talk) 20:12, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- Sorry, and thanks for the clarification. I meant: Would you mind creating a new section at Talk:Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas, explaining the reason why it should be "the dungeons"? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:59, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- You misunderstand or written wrong about "her room" it is in fact the dungeons, because of the scene in the movie and the beast said "you will rot in this dungeon forever" to Belle, i watched the movie and you can see that scene on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJjTSbW-PNY&list=PLLtB04dm_J7Ovh_LK34brO1wJ7DP0Dfup&index=14 Animelover96 (talk) 18:47, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
Tech News: 2026-05
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- Wikimedia Foundation invites comments on proposed future of the Product and Technology Advisory Council until 28 February.
- All users with registered accounts can now use passkeys for two-factor authentication (2FA). Passkeys are a simple way to log in without using a second device. They verify the user's identity using a fingerprint, face scan, or a PIN code. To set up a passkey, first set up a regular 2FA method. Currently, to log in with a passkey, users must also use a password. Later this quarter, passwordless login will allow users to log in with a single click and a passkey. Users with advanced rights will also be required to have 2FA enabled. This is part of the Account Security project.
- Unregistered contributors on blocked IPs or blocked IP ranges can now interact on-wiki to appeal a block by creating a temporary account to appeal a block on the user talk page, unless the "prevent this user from editing their own talk page" is enabled. This solves the problem of logged-out users unable to use the default unblock process via user talk page.
View all 20 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) methods description on the management page has been updated. It is now clearer and easier for users to understand and make use of.
Updates for technical contributors
- A new AbuseFilter variable,
account_type, has been added to provide a reliable way to determine the account type being created in thecreateaccountandautocreateaccountactions. As part of this change, the variableaccountnamehas been renamed toaccount_name, andaccountnameis now deprecated. Edit filter managers should update any filters that use hardcoded account type checks or the deprecated variable. - Image thumbnails that are requested in non-standard sizes, and using non-standard methods such as direct requests to
upload.wikimedia.org/…will stop working in the near future. This change is to prevent ongoing external abuse by web-scrapers and bots. Some users with custom CSS/JS, Interface Admins who can fix gadgets and local skins, and Tool-authors, will need to update their code to use standard thumbnail sizes. Details, search-links, and examples of how to fix them, are available in the task.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 21:16, 26 January 2026 (UTC)
Edit warring
Hi, I suspect there’s crossed wires here. This is something that does happen somewhat regularly - when there’s an edit war ongoing, I’ve seen numerous editors jump in with the sole goal of trying to get the editors to discuss, which was what I was trying to do by leaving notices and messages on the talk pages, as well as the edit summaries. The comment in the article talk is primarily because I don’t want to get involved in yet another discussion - I do feel the revert was correct as I feel the content shouldn’t have been added in its current form, but my main goal was to get the two editors discussing.
If that is the wrong tactic, then by all means I’m happy to accept a trouting. Danners430 tweaks made 17:06, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Danners430, thanks. But this is different than someone, for example, enforcing WP:BLPRESTORE when there is a BLP dispute, or perhaps also someone removing any disputed content with WP:ONUS in mind. If you have no own position about which number is verifiable, Special:Diff/1334227848 and Special:Diff/1334393717 are not acceptable. You are responsible for your own contributions and the existence of an edit war is not a justification for a revert by itself. Trying to get editors to discuss is perfect, but if messages on their user talk page don't help in changing their behavior, reporting it is the next step. The reported edit war shows relatively clearly why attempting to revert to a stable revision without being able to enforce that decision is problematic: It fails, and all it did was adding to the disruption. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:13, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- Ok, I’ll take that on board - I do wonder though, what would be the correct course of action to take if editors are edit warring, I’m not personally sure what version is correct, but they’re not responding to talk page prompts and continue regardless? Danners430 tweaks made 17:16, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- Well, it takes multiple editors to edit war, and in situations like the given one, there's no urgency in having any of both revisions being displayed to readers. My favorite approach when there's a disputed sentence, number or infobox parameter is to remove it. That's something you may be able to reasonably do when there's such a fight: Remove the number and insist that none is restored without a consensus. That's something that might be actually productive / helping the encyclopedia, and something that the edit warriors might simply not have in mind as an option. Something that does have to come from someone not caring as much. And it's also different as you then actually have an own position to argue for.
- You might argue that without your participation, Ich-Du-De wouldn't be blocked now, and the block might have been necessary in your eyes, so your actions led to something you found necessary. But if you look at that situation in honesty, adding fuel to a fire to draw firefighters' attention to it may be a well-intended but clearly not a good response to a fire, and if there is a way to resolve a situation without a block, throwing that opportunity away is negative. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:25, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- Aye given what you're saying I would agree with the last point - for that I apologise. But in the same breath, thank you also for the advice - regardless of what happened, I've learned something new… and I suspect given the area of the encyclopaedia I mostly work in (sourcing) it'll come in handy! Danners430 tweaks made 17:29, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- No worries and thank you very much!
~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:48, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- No worries and thank you very much!
- Aye given what you're saying I would agree with the last point - for that I apologise. But in the same breath, thank you also for the advice - regardless of what happened, I've learned something new… and I suspect given the area of the encyclopaedia I mostly work in (sourcing) it'll come in handy! Danners430 tweaks made 17:29, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- If you want to provide helpful advice to the more reasonable, policy-focusing, experienced side in such an edit war, you can give them a link to WP:DISCFAIL, which might be a very helpful essay in their situtation. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:27, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- Ok, I’ll take that on board - I do wonder though, what would be the correct course of action to take if editors are edit warring, I’m not personally sure what version is correct, but they’re not responding to talk page prompts and continue regardless? Danners430 tweaks made 17:16, 24 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi @ToBeFree - needing a bit of advice again I'm afraid... another user, this time a new user so obviously and absolutely editing in good faith, simply presumably not knowing PAGs (we all start somewhere!)... but first unsourced and now using a perennially unreliable source at Air Cambodia. Tried pinging them on their talk page, leaving edit summaries, everything, with no response. Suspect WP:THEYCANTHEARYOU as they're on mobile... what's the best way to proceed? Danners430 tweaks made 16:07, 26 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Danners430, WP:DISCFAIL is a good essay and the article's talk page is currently empty. I see you tried to contact the user on their user talk page, but that seems to have failed and the result is an edit war without a corresponding article talk page discussion. There's no magic trick for such situations but that essay is really helpful, and there's not much advice I can provide beyond it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:09, 27 January 2026 (UTC)
Related edit warring
Hi! As you were involved in addressing the edit warring at 2020s Minnesota fraud scandals, I wanted to let you know that there's some related edit warring now ongoing at Feeding Our Future which you may want to take a look at. As an admin who is WP:INVOLVED I cannot take action myself. —Ganesha811 (talk) 18:25, 28 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Ganesha811, thanks for the notification! Its a new trap turns out to be a sockpuppet. I have now semi-protected the page for a year; please let me know if that turns out to be insufficient. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:11, 28 January 2026 (UTC)
Why did you lock me and restored a page that is an obvious editorial (as admitted in the talk page) and has no sources ?
You lock me out of wikipedia because I was removing paragraphs from an obvious editorial wiki page for the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, their Chief Communication Officer is on the talk page trying to figure out how to add sections to their website so they can be used on the wiki page.
The majority of the sources is either not available or points at their own website, rather than addressing this you blocked me.
Obvious bias.
~2026-45400-4 (talk) 19:01, 28 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hello ~2026-45400-4, could you show me the diff link where exactly I "restored" a page? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:14, 28 January 2026 (UTC)
- Actually what their Communications Director said at Talk:Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative#Updates is significantly different to what you allege, since they are emphatically not
trying to figure out how to add sections to their website
. Furthermore there is zero evidence that person has ever edited the article, despite you repeatedly making that allegation without any evidence. FDW777 (talk) 21:34, 28 January 2026 (UTC)- how come you don't mention anything about the lack of sources (not even unreliable) literally missing? Or the fact that the other sources link to their website? Interesting.
- How is a page allowed on Wikipedia without sources ? ~2026-45400-4 (talk) 22:58, 28 January 2026 (UTC)
- Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative#References suggests you are being somewhat economical with the truth. FDW777 (talk) 23:24, 28 January 2026 (UTC)
- At least a part of your complaints is objectively incorrect ("You Cannot undo a PROD without providing a reason", I allegedly "restored a page" above when all I did was semi-protecting it and adding a lock icon).
- I have directly addressed two things you wrote because they are wrong. A good foundation for continuing the discussion would be you admitting that your approach to PRODs was against the proposed deletion policy and that at least one of the actions you accused me of didn't happen. I'm uninterested in a goalpost-shifting conversation where you write multiple incorrect things and then ignore when I address them, and I will remove further messages that fail to acknowledge that you entered the conversation based on false premises. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:58, 28 January 2026 (UTC)
The Signpost: 29 January 2026
- Traffic report: The most viewed articles of 2025
Everybody had a hard year, everybody had a good time.
- News and notes: Good news... but also bad news for the Public Domain
Benvenuto Betty Boop, arrivederci Italian Photos.
- News from Diff: Solving puzzles together
Maryana Iskander says farewell.
- In the media: Every view on the 25th anniversary of everything
Media about hard-core nerds, a place with paragraphs, baby globes, and wikipedes.
- Comix: Perspectives
Everybody has one.
The Unforgiven
Hello, ToBeFree! I've once again come for two reasons; I have temporarily re-installed Twinkle, and I'd like to thank you. The Twinkle thing is quite easily to explain: I was really anxious about the entire process of AfD so I used Twinkle to streamline it (Feel free to check out Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Durban Taxi crash if you wish) and have not used it for any rollback purposes per your suggestion.
Secondly, I'd like to thank you. Last year was a lot for me mentally/emotionally and I at times brought that into Wikipedia which backfired. 2026 is a fresh year. Today is Friday, January 30th, the last day I'll be in Derby, Kansas as I move over the weekend to Texas. You've given really good advice in the small interactions we've had and I'm grateful.
As a final note; the section header is a Metallica reference. It and its two sequel songs are worth a listen. Swee☩ Amber|Bbyshrkbss2 14:26, 30 January 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Babysharkboss2, that's very kind, thank you very much!


- I have now listened to the three songs; the third one is my favorite. I like its musical style, different than the other two ones that start almost identically. But if their story is meant to be a description of what Wikipedia is to a newcomer, that's dark.
- Kansas to Texas is quite a distance to me. Perhaps normal on a USA scale, but about the largest bee-line you could draw through any two points in Germany. I hope the journey went well!

- Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:21, 31 January 2026 (UTC)- Oh, I didn’t mean for it to be dark, just couldn’t think of a good title so applied one of my favorite songs. I saw a YouTube short earlier about how someone donated for the first time recently because of the amount of ai and misinformation rising.
- I move tomorrow and the Uhaul is all packed. Again, thanks for everything you’ve done to help me and countless other editors! ☩he one, Babysharkboss2 23:33, 31 January 2026 (UTC)

- Aww.

~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:07, 1 February 2026 (UTC)
Your close
I’ve added the Talk page entry on that article as you requested. The BRD page seems to state things the other way around stating: “Your edit might be reverted. The editor reverting you should be specific about their reasons in the edit summary or on the talk page.“ Czarking is the editor reverting and he had not started Talk page since Jan 17. For future reference, does not BRD require him to have started Talk page on or about Jan 17? ErnestKrause (talk) 04:10, 1 February 2026 (UTC)
- Hello ErnestKrause, thank you very much for starting the discussion on the article's talk page. Using the article's talk page instead of individual user talk pages has two main advantages: The conversation can focus on content (rather than a specific user's conduct) and others can join, perhaps as a third opinion or an RfC.
- Regarding "BRD", you seem to be referring to an essay; an essay can't "require" anything. I prefer looking at policies. The verifiability policy and its section "WP:ONUS" is one of them. That said, yes, in an ideal world everyone would start a talk page discussion about their disagreements. In an ideal world, people don't edit war and instead immediately discuss things. You had both edit warred and you could both have been blocked in response, but talking seemed to be a less destructive path forwards. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:37, 1 February 2026 (UTC)
Tech News: 2026-06
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- The "Page information" feature, which gives validating information about a page (example), now automatically includes a table of contents. If there is a local MediaWiki:Pageinfo-header page created by individual users, it can now be removed.
View all 21 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, VisualEditor previously added bold or italic formatting inside link descriptions, making the wikicode complex. This has now been fixed.
Updates for technical contributors
- There was no XML dump on 20 January. Additionally, from now on, dumps will be generated once per month only.
- The MediaWiki Interfaces team removed support for all transform endpoints containing a trailing slash from the MediaWiki REST API. All API users currently calling those endpoints are encouraged to transition to the non-trailing slash versions. If you have questions or encounter any problems, please file a ticket in phabricator to the #MW-Interfaces-Team board.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Weekly highlight
- Users are reminded that the Wikimedia Foundation has shared some guiding questions for the July 2026–June 2027 Annual Plan on Meta and Diff. These focus on global trends, faster and healthier experimentation, better support for newcomers, strengthening editors and advanced users, improving collaboration across projects, and growing and retaining readership. Feedback and ideas are welcome on the talk page.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 17:42, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
Question
I was going to email you about this, but saw the warnings on the email this user screen. Hypothetically speaking, if someone was indefinitely topic banned (in particular from one very specific article) in an arbitration case in 2007 and never successfully appealed it and they've been editing away in that area for the best part of 16 years including nearly 100 edits to that very specific article, is there much point in filing a report or would it be best not to poke the bear since if nobody else seems to care why should I get involved? FDW777 (talk) 20:31, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- Hi FDW777, thanks for asking here, I do think that's the best place. The described situation sounds like a timebomb that should be resolved. If there were truly no issues with the nearly 100 edits, there's no need to revert them but the user must stop editing that article instead of judging this themselves. And then properly adhere to the ban for a year perhaps, so they have a basis for an appeal, and then create one at WP:ARCA. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:35, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- The nearly 100 edits cover every year since 2008, there's no way I'm wasting my time figuring out what needs reverting especially since it's an article I have zero investment in. Emailed the arbitration committee and I'll let them decide on the best way forward. FDW777 (talk) 20:53, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- May I guess which answer you'll receive after a week of discussion? :)
Unless there are privacy concerns or other factors that are unsuitable for public discussion, emails sent to the Committee about violations will not be acted upon and may be discarded without a response by the Committee. As a general principle, good-faith reports will be directed to AR/CA, and other reports will be ignored.
— Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Procedures § Direct violation reports- I'm curious; please let me know if and when that actually happens. They might be faster than a week and perhaps mention WP:AE.
- I think the only non-public action you can perform that actually has an effect is sending the banned user an e-mail pointing to the idea above (stopping to violate the ban, then waiting some time and then appealing it). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:56, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- To be honest I never saw that, but I didn't email them asking for action to be taken. More a "this is happening, does anyone really care and what should I do?" type situation. I think with the current blocking system it's a straighforward case of issuing a block for that page now anyway (my original post was slightly incorrect, I assumed it was a "broadly construed" as that's the language I'm used to seeing but it's actually only a ban from one page). FDW777 (talk) 21:02, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- You might hate me for this but I couldn't resist doing the research and identifying the user. And I'd like to be more open about this. We're probably talking about Skinny McGee's ban from the Midnight Syndicate. I have now reminded them of the ban in Special:Diff/1336271614 on their talk page and unless they continue editing the page, that should already be a fine solution. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:17, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- Well the breadcrumbs were there to be followed... FDW777 (talk) 21:21, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- I thought you'd have at least obfuscated the year of the decision.
Thank you very much for noticing this and for the careful approach taken in response. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:22, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- I thought you'd have at least obfuscated the year of the decision.
- Well the breadcrumbs were there to be followed... FDW777 (talk) 21:21, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- You might hate me for this but I couldn't resist doing the research and identifying the user. And I'd like to be more open about this. We're probably talking about Skinny McGee's ban from the Midnight Syndicate. I have now reminded them of the ban in Special:Diff/1336271614 on their talk page and unless they continue editing the page, that should already be a fine solution. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:17, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- To be honest I never saw that, but I didn't email them asking for action to be taken. More a "this is happening, does anyone really care and what should I do?" type situation. I think with the current blocking system it's a straighforward case of issuing a block for that page now anyway (my original post was slightly incorrect, I assumed it was a "broadly construed" as that's the language I'm used to seeing but it's actually only a ban from one page). FDW777 (talk) 21:02, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
- The nearly 100 edits cover every year since 2008, there's no way I'm wasting my time figuring out what needs reverting especially since it's an article I have zero investment in. Emailed the arbitration committee and I'll let them decide on the best way forward. FDW777 (talk) 20:53, 2 February 2026 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2026 Issue 2


Highlights
Let's Talk continues
- Annual planning: The Annual Plan is the Wikimedia Foundation’s description of what we hope to achieve in the coming year. This is a time of urgency and focus for the Wikimedia projects and we invite you to shape this plan together with us.
- Year 2 of PTAC: As it reached its first year, Product & Technology Advisory Council (PTAC) shared a retrospective and proposed future improvements.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Product Safety and Integrity · Readers · Research · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Account security: All users with registered accounts can now use passkeys for two-factor authentication (2FA), providing a simple and secure way to log in.
- Wikifunctions: An overview of the quarterly plan (January–March) and how it connects to the broader goals for Abstract Wikipedia and Wikifunctions.
- Tech News: Latest updates from Tech News week 03, 04 and 05 include unregistered contributors on blocked IPs can now interact on-wiki to appeal a block by creating a temporary account.
- Collaborative contributions: Wikimedia Foundation is hosting a learning session to share new releases around collaborative contributions and discuss future project ideas.
- Structured task: The Revise Tone Structured Task is now live in A/B testing on pilot wikis: English, Arabic, Portuguese, and French Wikipedia. It helps new editors improve promotional language in existing articles through a quiz style onboarding experience and a guided in article suggestion.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · The Wikipedia Library · list of movement events
- Wikimania 2026: Call for sessions is open until March 1.
- Wikipedia 25: Wikipedia celebrates 25 years of knowledge at its best with docuseries, time capsule, and more.
- Virtual celebration: In case you missed it, over 10,000 people have watched the virtual celebration that brought together generations of Wikimedians, featured an ode to the talk page, a dramatic reading of a real talk page, a Magnetikpunk song dedicated to Wikipedia, a passing of the cake baton from Maryana to Bernadette, "The Birthday Cake Song" and more. All of it written and performed by humans of Wikimedia.
- Birthday mascot: Meet the Wikimedian whose casual sketch inspired Wikipedia’s 25th birthday mascot.
- Legal: Learn about two recent submissions advocating the need for proportionality in Brazil’s new online child safety law.
- Policy: The Global Advocacy team shared a report from digital policy organization InternetLab about the intersection between the open knowledge movement and public interest journalism.
- Global Resource Distribution Committee: Refreshed Funding Principles are ready for review.
Annual Goals Progress on Effectiveness
See also: Progress on the annual plan
- Solving puzzles together: A final reflection from Maryana Iskander.
- Wikimedia Enterprise: Mistral AI and Wikimedia Enterprise announced a new strategic partnership.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
See also: Diff blog · Goings-on · Planet Wikimedia · Signpost (en) · Kurier (de) · Actualités du Wiktionnaire (fr) · Regards sur l’actualité de la Wikimedia (fr) · Wikimag (fr) · Education · GLAM · Milestones · Wikidata · Central and Eastern Europe · other newsletters
Subscribe or unsubscribe · Help translate
For information about the Bulletin and to read previous editions, see the project page on Meta-Wiki. Let foundationbulletin
wikimedia.org know if you have any feedback or suggestions for improvement!
MediaWiki message delivery 02:05, 4 February 2026 (UTC)
Adrienne Adams (politician)
You might want to take a look at recent TA edits, particularly the removal of this paragraph as "poorly written and irrelevant". –Skywatcher68 (talk) 16:22, 5 February 2026 (UTC)
- It looks like all involved editors are discussing this at Talk:Adrienne Adams (politician) § Inappropriate reverts at the moment, so there's nothing to do. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:59, 6 February 2026 (UTC)
Highguard
Hi ToBeFree,
I'll take the block, but can I just ask why you've removed all of the reviews from the reception section that weren't actually disputed? The only bit that was disputed were previews that were previously present. Rambling Rambler (talk) 20:54, 5 February 2026 (UTC)
- Hello Rambling Rambler, I tried to perform selective removals in such cases in the past, but there was at least one complaint that doing so leaves the boundaries of WP:PREFER, which only allows (fully) restoring a pre-dispute revision or leaving everything untouched. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:59, 5 February 2026 (UTC)
- Fair enough. It's just a weird look because it leaves it in the situation where we have a review section that now contains no reviews. Rambling Rambler (talk) 21:02, 5 February 2026 (UTC)
- That reads as if it was an empty section, which it isn't (permanent link). Else, I'd have said removing an empty section would be a simple uncontroversial edit request ({{edit fully-protected}}) for the article's talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:28, 5 February 2026 (UTC)
- That's the point here though, the content currently in that section almost entirely consists of "first impressions" pieces and previews, which are not full reviews (the content issue I was undertaking to resolve). The only true review from that prior version is Push Square, which I kept in subsequent versions and then added further proper reviews in addition to it. Rambling Rambler (talk) 21:38, 5 February 2026 (UTC)
- @ToBeFree I've been desiring to avoid broaching the other editor in this and sticking to discussing the content but it seems they're now just actively watching my contributions and are now tagging me with backhanded insults on their own talk page ("I'm very glad you've finally raised some genuine concerns") while seeking to continue prosecuting the issue. Seems like they're just actively trying to prod me into an argument at this point. Rambling Rambler (talk) 15:34, 6 February 2026 (UTC)
- I have now reduced their block to the article namespace so the discussion can happen on the article's talk page instead of a user talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:37, 6 February 2026 (UTC)
- It really doesn't seem like a discussion, but just a bunch of backhanded remarks. Even before that they're claiming they don't have a problem with my changes other than how badly written they are... Rambling Rambler (talk) 15:38, 6 February 2026 (UTC)
- Thank you for easing the conditions. As I said earlier, I wouldn't mind if the administrator returning your version of the article; I'm willing to compromise if it helps resolve the issue and allow the article to continue its development. I just want to hear your position so I can respond to it in the discussion. For example, clarifying the "different tones" or "misrepresentation of a full review" you mentioned might help me understand how the critical section could be formulated more coherently avoiding another argument between us, since at the moment it simply consists of a list of quotes from reviews from various sources without any overall idea. Solaire the knight (talk) 16:55, 6 February 2026 (UTC)
- The article's talk page, please – I'm fine with your message here as the discussion was about you and you should have the opportunity to state your position, but now that this has been done, let's move this to Talk:Highguard. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:57, 6 February 2026 (UTC)
- Thank you for easing the conditions. As I said earlier, I wouldn't mind if the administrator returning your version of the article; I'm willing to compromise if it helps resolve the issue and allow the article to continue its development. I just want to hear your position so I can respond to it in the discussion. For example, clarifying the "different tones" or "misrepresentation of a full review" you mentioned might help me understand how the critical section could be formulated more coherently avoiding another argument between us, since at the moment it simply consists of a list of quotes from reviews from various sources without any overall idea. Solaire the knight (talk) 16:55, 6 February 2026 (UTC)
- It really doesn't seem like a discussion, but just a bunch of backhanded remarks. Even before that they're claiming they don't have a problem with my changes other than how badly written they are... Rambling Rambler (talk) 15:38, 6 February 2026 (UTC)
- I have now reduced their block to the article namespace so the discussion can happen on the article's talk page instead of a user talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:37, 6 February 2026 (UTC)
- That reads as if it was an empty section, which it isn't (permanent link). Else, I'd have said removing an empty section would be a simple uncontroversial edit request ({{edit fully-protected}}) for the article's talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:28, 5 February 2026 (UTC)
- Fair enough. It's just a weird look because it leaves it in the situation where we have a review section that now contains no reviews. Rambling Rambler (talk) 21:02, 5 February 2026 (UTC)
Tech News: 2026-07
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
Logged-in contributors who manage large or complex watchlists can now organise and filter watched pages in ways that improve their workflows with the new Watchlist labels feature. By adding custom labels (for example: pages you created, pages being monitored for vandalism, or discussion pages) users can more quickly identify what needs attention, reduce cognitive load, and respond more efficiently. This improves watchlist usability, especially for highly active editors.- A new feature available on Special:Contributions shows temporary accounts that are likely operated by the same person, and so makes patrolling less time-consuming. Upon checking contributions of a temporary account, users with access to temporary account IP addresses can now see a view of contributions from the related temporary accounts. The feature looks up all the IPs associated with a given temporary account within the data retention period and shows all the contributions of all temporary accounts that have used these IPs. Learn more.
- When editors preview a wikitext edit, the reminder box that they are only seeing a preview (which is shown at the top), now has a grey/neutral background instead of a yellow/warning background. This makes it easier to distinguish preview notes from actual warnings (for example, edit conflicts or problematic redirect targets), which will now be shown in separate warning or error boxes.
- The Global Watchlist lets you view your watchlists from multiple wikis on one page. The extension continues to improve — it now properly supports more than one Wikibase site, for example both Wikidata and testwikidata. In addition, issues regarding text direction have been fixed for users who prefer Wikidata or other Wikibase sites in right-to-left (RTL) languages.
- The automatic "magic links" for ISBN, RFC, and PMID numbers have been deprecated in wikitext since 2021 due to inflexibility and difficulties with localization. Several wikis have successfully replaced RFC and PMID magic links with equivalent external links, but a template was often required to replace the functionality of the ISBN magic link. There is now a new built-in parser function
{{#isbn}}available to replace the basic functionality of the ISBN magic link. This makes it easier for wikis who wish to migrate off of the deprecated magic link functionality to do so. - Two new wikis have been created:
View all 23 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week.
Updates for technical contributors
- A new global user group has been created: Local bots. It will be used internally by the software to allow community bots to bypass rate limits that are applied to abusive web scrapers. Accounts that are approved as bots on at least one Wikimedia wiki will be automatically added to this group. It will not change what user permissions the bot has.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Meetings and events
- The MediaWiki Users and Developers Conference, Spring 2026 will be held March 25–27 in Salt Lake City, USA. This event is organized by and for the third-party MediaWiki community. You can propose sessions and register to attend.
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MediaWiki message delivery 23:29, 9 February 2026 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – February 2026
News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2026).
- Due to the result of a recent motion, a rough consensus of administrators at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard may impose an expanded topic ban on Israel, Israelis, Jews, Judaism, Palestine, Palestinians, Islam, and/or Arabs, if an editor's Arab-Israeli conflict topic ban is determined to be insufficient to prevent disruption. At least one diff per area expanded into should be cited.
- Voting in the 2026 Steward elections started on 06 February 2026 at 14:00 (UTC) and will end on 27 February 2026 at 14:00 (UTC). The confirmation process for current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automatically check your eligibility to vote.
The one who started it all.
Hi, i did what you said and waited two weeks and made one edit on Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas, but ~2026-90278-2 changed to the highly suspicious "her room" words despite the evidence and source, which i suspect if it is ~2025-35125-30 (and ~2025-37163-27) who started all of this, can you check this out for me and edit the article back to my edit (so that the edit by you will be respected)? Animelover96 (talk) 08:34, 10 February 2026 (UTC)
- Hello Animelover96, I have now semi-protected the article for a year to prevent further disruptive editing without discussion by the unregistered editor. I won't take any action beyond this and I don't want you to use my name or my words as justification for reverting. We've had this discussion before; my words and name are not here to be used for "respect" by others. If you want to revert again, you can do so of course, but that's your personal decision and your own edit. Don't mention me if you do so. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:40, 10 February 2026 (UTC)
- Thank you, also i know what you said to me before but it is fine. Animelover96 (talk) 18:50, 10 February 2026 (UTC)
User refusing to discuss, doing edit warring and disruptive editing
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.
Hi, ToBeFree! Since you previously helped me, I would love if you help me again to solve this problem.
Recently, I reported edit warring at Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring (now archived without a significant solution); the reported user (Whathever2) has been previously warned, reported, and blocked for doing disruptive editing and edit warring, so I considered not to create a talk page topic (something you suggested me and later I did), and asked to create one instead.
Revisions where I asked to discuss: #1, #2 (I even linked the talk page), and #3. There are 4 revisions where I warned about: edit warring, three revert rule, disruptive editing and several attempts to get consensus. Topic of the talk page: here (created six days ago and ignored).
The user is absolutely willing to violate the 3RR (despite several warnings), create edit warring and get blocked just to not get consensus: "I will not comment further on this, and will not engage in any talk to the other user".
You already know about the incident, and, as I know, this is the same as looking for other administrator at WP:ANI or WP:ANEW. I don't want to damage the article's consistency, do a fifth revert or simply get involved in edit warring anymore, just to keep accurate and strongly sourced information but it seems to be practically impossible, thank you for your support and attention. :) IDontDoDoja (talk) 20:50, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- Hi IDontDoDoja, thank you very much for the notification. I have now provided Whathever2 with an incentive to discuss or disengage instead of reverting. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:56, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- It's sad that this is what wikipedia has become, a place when admin cannot even verify a source to see if it's true or not. There can be no consensus possibility when the other user is not engaging in good faith and has openly lied about the source I provided. Also why only I'm being blocked if the other user is also committing edit warring?
- I have provided sources for my claim. Senna Tower is already under construction, there's even a video on the source I linked showing the active construction site. The construction started almost 5 months ago, and is in the foundation phase more specifically. Anyone can verify this on youtube, just search for: "Execution of the Foundations of the SENNA TOWER - Diaphragm Wall". There's many sources documenting the under construction status of this building, from articles to videos. The other user just refuses to verify them, and he even lied about the contents of the article I linked, saying that it doesn't say that the construction started. This is a lie not only the article states clearly that the construction started it even has an embedded video showing the machines working on the soil to prepare the diaphragm wall.
- In resume all my edition are made in good faith, and my claim is supported by the source I provided. The source can be verified by anyone, just open the link read the article and watch the video embedded.
- Some additional sources and evidence of my claim that this building is under construction:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo1ojHC0Zvw
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmPY0eKABIk
- https://ndmais.com.br/economia/senna-tower-comecam-em-sc-as-obras-do-residencial-mais-alto-do-mundo/ (in portuguese)
- https://en.clickpetroleoegas.com.br/Scene-Tower%3A-See-how-the-tallest-residential-building-in-the-world-is-being-built-in-Balne%C3%A1rio-Cambori%C3%BA--with-a-foundation-40-meters-deep.-MHBB01/ Whathever2 (talk) 21:36, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- I am absolutely tired of this, since you are repeating the same fallacies for the thousandth time instead of discussing properly, I can just copy and paste my previous answers, so let's do so:
- 1. If you are SO right (as you try to look), why can't you just discuss anything properly and then look for an administrator to decide?
- 2. You can not say your edits were made in good faith when you have been previously warned, reported, and blocked for doing disruptive editing and edit warring being absolutely aware of both, is that good faith? Am I wrong for asking to discuss properly and get consensus?
- 3. I am not lying, the source you cited expected a construction of the proposed skyscraper later, it did not state it was under construction. There are videos of a supposed construction since 2023, when it was named "Triumph Tower", but do you see a single floor built in those almost three years? If the supposed construction looked the same in 2023 as today, then why SkyscraperCenter and SkyscraperPage (main sources on skyscrapers according to WP:SKY) have not stated that supposed construction in almost three years? Your argument literally tries to ignore the most reliable sources in any way possible, when that is exactly what Wikipedia tries to prioritize.
- You absolutely ignore what WP:RS, WP:EW, WP:CONSENSUS and WP:SKY state. IDontDoDoja (talk) 22:18, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- ToBeFree, do you see a pattern in everything he says? Lol I can not even take this seriously, I'm sorry if this is annoying for you, I did not expect his behavior.
- 1. He says I am not doing anything in good faith, then: why am I just restoring the previous edit? Why am I begging to discuss properly? Why am I looking for an administrator to decide what is wrong and what is right? Why am I proritizing Wikipedia articles and highly reliable sources?
- 2. Look at his revisions, everything is copy and paste, he can't even read the Wikipedia articles I cite or state anything more than WP:OTHERCONTENT.
- 3. He ignores the 3RR (5 total reverts), he ignores that Wikipedia prioritizes main reliable sources over another ones, he ignores the talk page which is indispensable when two ideas contrast, he ignores the fact that his copy and paste WP:OTHERCONTENT argument is incorrect.
- 4. He says his edits are in good faith when he literally wants edit warring and has been reported, warned and blocked several times because he can not discuss anything properly.
- I am tired. IDontDoDoja (talk) 22:30, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- Most of this is about content and should be on the article's talk page, but then only about content and not about user behavior. The behavioral aspects of this dispute should probably be ignored by both sides because they lead nowhere. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:32, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- You're right, I guess talking about him is kinda ad hominem. This is the second time he writes his bunch of nothing in the wrong site (just as he did in WP:ANEW) instead of here. This is like the thousandth time I beg him to discuss properly on the talk page but he refuses to discuss there just as he stated again here ("Again, I will not engage in any talk to the other user").
- Apparently there is nothing to do if he beats around the bush. IDontDoDoja (talk) 22:45, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- Well, disengaging is always a fine option. Continuing to revert while staying away from an article's talk page is not. So if that happens again, I'd block again. If it happens in multiple articles, it's a sitewide block. If it doesn't stop, it's an indefinite block. Noone is required to discuss with others; we call this "Wikipedia is not compulsory". But if someone does choose to edit and encounters a conflict, they can stay away or discuss. No other option. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:52, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- How can we engage in good faith discussion about sources if the other user lies about them, and refuses to verify them. Anyone can open the links I provided and verify the dates and the information available in the articles. I'm not trying to be combative or resort to personal attacks, but he's lying, with no shame whatsoever, he's abusing the wikipedia process to drag the discussion for months, this is similar how some people misuse the justice system with abusive litigation. Why wikipedia has not a mechanism to detect and prevent this type of abusive use of the dispute system? Also why it's so difficult to verify a source and see if what an user is claiming is supported by the sources that he's providing?
- I have provided sources for my claim. All my editions are made in good faith, and my claim is supported by the source I provided. The source can be verified by anyone, just open the link read the article and watch the video embedded.
- Here are the sources and evidence of my claim that this building is under construction:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo1ojHC0Zvw
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmPY0eKABIk
- https://ndmais.com.br/economia/senna-tower-comecam-em-sc-as-obras-do-residencial-mais-alto-do-mundo/ (in portuguese)
- https://en.clickpetroleoegas.com.br/Scene-Tower%3A-See-how-the-tallest-residential-building-in-the-world-is-being-built-in-Balne%C3%A1rio-Cambori%C3%BA--with-a-foundation-40-meters-deep.-MHBB01/ Whathever2 (talk) 00:24, 15 February 2026 (UTC)
- Spamming exactly the same text already debunked again? Lol, are not you tired of that? Why do you prefer rely on fallacies, poor sources and spam instead of sourcing properly, reading what the Wikipedia articles state, and discussing properly?
- The same reply if it is necessary:
- I know about the project since 2023 when it was first named Triumph Tower, and I have saw biased (like you) user generated content stating saying Triumph Tower was under construction since 2023; in those three years, how many floors have been built? we can not even say 0.1, and when main sources like SkyscraperPage (stop ignoring it just like you ignored me and you ignore consensus or wikipedia articles) and Skyscraper Center (by the highly reliable CTBUH) state the opposite, we can not state it is under construction.
- Your only sources are blogs and user generated content, ignoring Wikipedia:Reliable sources and the sources suggested on Wikipedia:WikiProject Skyscrapers; further, your only arguments are literally fallacies already debunked or exposed on Wikipedia articles (such as WP:OTHERCONTENT).
- I'm not abusing on anything, saying that proves you know nothing about Wikipedia's guidelines, every time I state something I link the Wikipedia article, what is the problem with that? IDontDoDoja (talk) 00:40, 15 February 2026 (UTC)
- As you can see, he literally ignores me (because he can not discuss anything knowing he is wrong) and instead he copies and paste the same fallacies to administrators. There is nothing to discuss and he can not edit the article, so I guess the problem is over... at least here.
- Now the problem is that his undiscussed and poorly sourced statements (now reverted) are also displayed on:
- • List of tallest buildings#Under construction
- • List of buildings with 100 floors or more#Under construction
- • List of tallest residential buildings#Under construction
- • List of supertall skyscrapers#Supertall skyscrapers under construction
- As well as on the portuguese version of Senna Tower. Since he is not blocked there and he will revert refusing to get consensus, willing to do edit warring and to violate the 3RR, what can I do? Particularly on the portuguese version. IDontDoDoja (talk) 22:58, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- Another point that he's lying. He's trying to imply that I'm the only user that has make changes in the Senna Tower pages to change the status of this building to "under construction". But this is simply not true, in the German article of the Senna Tower it was other users that changed the status of this building to "under construction" it was not me. The same for the Spanish article, it was other users that changed first the status of Senna Tower to "under construction", it was not me. Why this happened? Because it's already common knowledge for the people who are interested in this kind of buildings that the Senna Tower is already under construction, there's articles and videos as recent as from 2 weeks ago showing the active construction site and machines doing the foundation work. He's the one that is refusing to verify the sources provided, and have lied repeatedly about the content of the sources.
- Again here are the sources:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo1ojHC0Zvw
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmPY0eKABIk
- https://ndmais.com.br/economia/senna-tower-comecam-em-sc-as-obras-do-residencial-mais-alto-do-mundo/ (in portuguese)
- https://en.clickpetroleoegas.com.br/Scene-Tower%3A-See-how-the-tallest-residential-building-in-the-world-is-being-built-in-Balne%C3%A1rio-Cambori%C3%BA--with-a-foundation-40-meters-deep.-MHBB01/ Whathever2 (talk) 23:54, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- Now it is so ironic how you try to make look that you are right but you can't even prove it properly, and how your only argument are literally fallacies.
- 1. First fallacy: Using your same logic, the original revision of the Senna Tower in the English Wikipedia (the most popular, verified, edited, and better sourced wikipedia by far) stated that the skyscraper is still proposed and not under construction, shouldn't you trust on that since according to you that is "common knowledge"? By the way I never said you were the only one who believed that.
- 2. The Spanish Wikipedia does not display that innacurate information anymore since several months and the original editor literally thanked me for fixing the information, so your argument is literally incorrect.
- Again, Wikipedia prioritizes the most reliable sources so repeating the same bunch of nothing (a YouTube video which is WP:UGC and a WP:BLOG source, both are poorly sourced) does not help at all. IDontDoDoja (talk) 00:12, 15 February 2026 (UTC)
- Well, disengaging is always a fine option. Continuing to revert while staying away from an article's talk page is not. So if that happens again, I'd block again. If it happens in multiple articles, it's a sitewide block. If it doesn't stop, it's an indefinite block. Noone is required to discuss with others; we call this "Wikipedia is not compulsory". But if someone does choose to edit and encounters a conflict, they can stay away or discuss. No other option. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:52, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- He's lying again. He said that the videos of the construction site being active exist since 2023, but this is not true. All the sources both the photos and videos that shows the machines and the construction site being manipulated are recent. All the sources I provided are from recent dates, from September of 2025 to just 2 weeks ago in the most recent youtube video. And all of them confirm that this building in being constructed, in the foundation stage more specifically. The construction started in September 2025 and is on going.
- Again, how can we engage in good faith discussion about sources if the other user lies about them, and refuses to verify them. Anyone can open the links I provided and verify the dates and the information available in the articles. I'm not trying to be combative or resort to personal attacks, but he's lying, with no shame whatsoever, he's abusing the wikipedia process to drag the discussion for months, this is similar how some people misuse the justice system with abusive litigation. Why wikipedia has not a mechanism to detect and prevent this type of abusive use of the dispute system? Also why it's so difficult to verify a source and see if what an user is claiming is supported by the sources that he's providing? Whathever2 (talk) 23:23, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- I know about the project since 2023 when it was first named Triumph Tower, and I have saw biased (like you) user generated content stating saying Triumph Tower was under construction since 2023; in those three years, how many floors have been built? we can not even say 0.1, and when main sources like SkyscraperPage (stop ignoring it just like you ignored me and you ignore consensus or wikipedia articles) and Skyscraper Center (by the highly reliable CTBUH) state the opposite, we can not state it is under construction.
- Your only sources are blogs and user generated content, ignoring Wikipedia:Reliable sources and the sources suggested on Wikipedia:WikiProject Skyscrapers; further, your only arguments are literally fallacies already debunked or exposed on Wikipedia articles (such as WP:OTHERCONTENT).
- I'm not abusing on anything, saying that proves you know nothing about Wikipedia's guidelines, every time I state something I link the Wikipedia article, what is the problem with that? IDontDoDoja (talk) 00:25, 15 February 2026 (UTC)
- Most of this is about content and should be on the article's talk page, but then only about content and not about user behavior. The behavioral aspects of this dispute should probably be ignored by both sides because they lead nowhere. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:32, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- I have already explained the reasons why the source Skyscraper Center should not be used as a type of "exclusive" source specially for projects that are under construction, in many occasions this source lags behind and doesn't reflect changes that are happening on the ground, which are relatively common in this types of projects. For instance the Burj Binghatti has changed it's official projected height, in the Skyscraper Center source it shows projected height of 594 meters, but this is not true anymore, in other sources and in the official page of the project it shows that the current planned height is 557 meters. So this is why the english article of Burj Binghatti doesn't use Skyscraper Center as a source, there's no reference at all to Skyscraper Center in the article of the Burj Binghatti, and I don't see any other user creating a problem about this fact.
- Sometimes it takes more than a year for Skyscraper Center to update the status of a building even if the building is well under construction. As I said in many occasions they lag behind or just have outdated information about the projects details. This is why other sources are needed to provide an up to date information about the details and the status of the buildings. Also it's important to notice that Skyscraper Center is not the "official" source for the articles related to skyscrapers, there's nothing anywhere that states that this source should be the only one used in the articles related to skyscrapers.
- Again, I will not engage in any talk to the other user, this talks are fruitless and take to nowhere when the other person is not engaging in good faith, he openly lied about the sources I provided more than one time. All the information and evidence necessary to make the correct decision is already presented by me. Whathever2 (talk) 22:15, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
- The proper way to deal with a disruptive editor in a content dispute is to provide your arguments on the article's talk page, discuss until the discussion runs in circles, strictly focus on content instead of making accusations, ignore accusations towards you on the article's talk page, and then request a third opinion or start a formal request for comment. It may take some time, but if your position is right, it should be easy to gain a consensus just by providing arguments and inviting other users to the discussion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:23, 14 February 2026 (UTC)
Tech News: 2026-08
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- The SRE Team will be performing a cleanup of Wikimedia's Etherpad instance, the web-based editor for real-time collaborative document editing. All pads will be permanently deleted after 30 April, 2026 – if there are still migration projects in progress at that point the team can revisit the date on a case by case basis. Please create local backups of any content you wish to keep, as deleted data cannot be recovered. This cleanup helps reduce database size and minimize infrastructure footprint. Etherpad will continue to support real-time collaboration, but long-term storage should not be expected. Additional cleanups may occur in the future without prior notice.
Updates for editors
- The Information Retrieval team will be launching an Android mobile app experiment that tests hybrid search capabilities which can handle both semantic and keyword queries. The improvement of on-platform search will enable readers to find what they’re looking for directly on Wikipedia more easily. The experiment will first be launched on Greek Wikipedia in late February, followed by English, French, and Portuguese in March. Read more on Diff blog.
- The Reader Growth team will run an experiment for mobile web users, that adds a table of contents and automatically expands all article sections, to learn more about navigation issues they face. The test will be available on Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Indonesian, and Vietnamese Wikipedias.
- Previously, site notices (MediaWiki:Sitenotice and MediaWiki:Anonnotice) would only render on the desktop site. Now, they will render on all platforms. Users on mobile web will now see these notices and be informed. Site administrators should be prepared to test and fix notices on mobile devices to avoid interference with articles. To opt out, interface admins can add
#siteNotice { display: none; }to MediaWiki:Minerva.css.
View all 19 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, an issue on Special:RecentChanges has been fixed. Previously, clicking hide in the active filters caused the "view new changes since…" button to disappear, though it should have remained visible. The button now behaves as expected.
Updates for technical contributors
- New documentation is now available to help editors debug on-site search features. It supports troubleshooting when pages do not appear in results, when ranking seems unexpected, and when you need to inspect what content is being indexed, helping make search behavior easier to understand and analyze. Learn more.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
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MediaWiki message delivery 19:15, 16 February 2026 (UTC)
The Signpost: 17 February 2026
- In the media: Global powers see Wikipedia as fundamental target for manipulation
Attempted Wikipedia shenanigans apparent from Epstein, AI, various governments.
- News and notes: Discussions open for the next WMF Annual Plan
Plus, WikiFlix going places, steady progress on older FAs and other news from the Wikimedia world.
- Serendipity: Maintenance crews continue to slog through Wikipedia's oldest Featured Articles
Hundreds of old FAs have been triaged since project began, but thousands remain — and they need reviewers.
- Disinformation report: Epstein's obsessions
The sex offender's attempts to whitewash Wikipedia run deeper than we first thought.
- Technology report: Wikidata Graph Split and how we address major challenges
A personal perspective on a major update to the Wikimedia social machine.
- Traffic report: Deaths, killings, films, and the Olympics
I'll have the usual!
- Opinion: Incoming Incurables
A poem for Wikipedia Day 2026.
- Crossword: Pop quiz
Sharpen your pencil. How well do you really know Wikipedia?
- Comix: herculean
efforts.
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2026 Issue 3


Highlights
- Wikipedia Library: Wikipedia Library gained new content partnerships, restored access to the British Newspaper Archive, and added an Arabic language academic resource with more than 7 million records.
- Gender gap: The Celebrate Women 2026 campaign will run from March 1–31 to advance the achievements of the women’s rights and gender equity movement globally.
- Annual Planning: The Annual Plan is the Wikimedia Foundation’s description of what we hope to achieve in the coming year. We invite you to shape this plan together with us. Between now and the end of June 2026, we will have continuous conversations about how global trends may shape our future, how we can experiment, adapt and respond together.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Product Safety and Integrity · Readers · Research · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Patrolling improvements: A new feature available on Special:Contributions shows temporary accounts that are likely operated by the same person, and so makes patrolling less time-consuming.
- Wikifunctions: How Abstract Wikipedia articles can be integrated into Wikipedia language editions to enable Wikipedians to write an abstract article once and have it available in many languages.
- Suggestion Mode: A new Beta Feature for the VisualEditor, Suggestion Mode, is now available on English Wikipedia for experienced editors. This features proactively suggests actions that people can consider taking to improve Wikipedia articles, such as "add citation", "improve tone", or "fix an ambiguous link".
- WDQS Blazegraph Migration: As part of the migration away from Blazegraph (the current backend of the Wikidata Query Service), an initial evaluation of open-source triple store candidates has been completed. Using the published evaluation methodology, performance, stability, and compatibility was assessed.
- Tech News: Latest updates from Tech News week 06 and 07 include the new Watchlist labels feature that allows logged-in contributors to organise and filter watched pages in ways that improve their workflows. They also link to the 44 community submitted tasks that were resolved over the last two weeks.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · The Wikipedia Library · list of movement events

- Funding Principles: The interim Global Resource Distribution Committee (GRDC) has published a first version of the Funding Principles which guides the broader grantmaking ecosystem across the Wikimedia Movement. Share your feedback in the Discussion page.
- Wikipedia 25: Celebrating 25 years of Wikipedia in Warsaw.
- Responsible AI: Why the Global Index on Responsible AI matters for Wikimedians.
- Open Knowledge: Why the Open Knowledge Movement and Public Interest Journalism must unite forces. Shared principles and interdependence, points of convergence and the path forward.
- Journalism Awards: Applications for the Open the Knowledge Journalism Awards are now open until March 1. Presented by the International Center for Journalists in partnership with the Wikimedia Foundation, the awards seek to recognize African journalists whose reporting helps close knowledge gaps about Africa on Wikipedia.
- UN General Assembly: Wikimedia Foundation was invited to speak at the UN General Assembly (UNGA) hall about Wikipedia’s role in global digital governance.
- Advocacy: Wikimedia Foundation has adopted new and updated policies regarding the use of banners, logo changes, and blackouts on the projects, particularly for advocacy purposes. Specifically, the new "Use of Wikimedia sites for advocacy purposes" policy, and updates to the guidelines for CentralNotice usage and requesting wiki configuration changes. The policies establish clearer processes for advocacy activities, and require notification of Foundation staff for some proposed uses of the Wikimedia sites.
Annual Goals Progress on Effectiveness
See also: Progress on the annual plan
- Wikimedia Futures Lab: Reflections from a Wikimedian who attended the Wikimedia Futures Lab.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
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MediaWiki message delivery 23:26, 17 February 2026 (UTC)
Joey Concepcion
Greetings! Seems to me that Deceiverdeceiver (talk · contribs) needs a partial block due to the fact that they continually ignore the AfD decision. I think this was the third time; there might be a COI here as well. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:06, 20 February 2026 (UTC)
- The third time on that account, that is ... Thanks for the notification! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:24, 20 February 2026 (UTC)
Request to remove information from ParaNorman Wikipedia page
Dear ToBeFree, Please allow me to apologize for the situation that took place regarding the edit war that occurred, I apologize for being part of that. Therefore, I am asking that you or Wikipedia removes the title " character designer" from Thibault Leclercq's name in the section about ParaNorman: The Thrifting on the ParaNorman Wikipedia page, and that he is referred to as his credit given as Director according to his IMDb page: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm8240835/ I would like to point out that Thibault Leclercq's current employment status as a Character Designer at LAIKA Studios is irrelevant in this case, as it is subject to change: Thibault Leclercq for whatever reason could leave LAIKA Studios and work for another studio as a Director, a Production Designer, a Visual Development Artist, etc. or even remain at LAIKA Studios and work as a Director, a Production Designer, a Visual Development Artist, etc. What is relevant however in this case, are the credits given to the artists by the studios for the films they work on, and Thibault Leclercq is credited as Director for ParaNorman: The Thrifting not as a Character Designer. I am requesting that Wikipedia makes this change to protect the integrity and reputation of the original artist who is credited as Character Designer for ParaNorman, and to prevent any misconceptions where someone for example looking at the ParaNorman Wikipedia page just might think that Thibault Leclercq is the ParaNorman Character Designer. I am hoping that Wikipedia honors my request and makes this adjustment. Fmjar9k (talk) 06:22, 23 February 2026 (UTC)
- Hello Fmjar9k, Thank you for your message – if I see correctly, you have requested this at Talk:ParaNorman, which is the best place to do so. The page is currently not protected and you are currently not blocked, so if the edit is uncontroversial, you can probably just make it. I didn't thoroughly check this, but it seems to be unrelated to the earlier dispute that led to protection and the block. If you suspect it might be a controversial change, discussing it first is of course a good idea. Else, or if noone objects for a week or two, feel free to be bold. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:20, 23 February 2026 (UTC)
Tech News: 2026-09
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- Reference Check has been deployed to English Wikipedia, completing its rollout across all Wikipedias. The feature prompts newcomers to add a citation before publishing new content, helping reduce common citation-related reverts and improve verifiability. In A/B testing, the impact was substantial: newcomers shown Reference Check were approximately 2.2 times more likely to include a reference on desktop and about 17.5 times more likely on mobile web.
Updates for editors
- The InterwikiSorting extension, which allowed for the sorting of interwiki links, has been undeployed from Wikipedia. As a result, editors who had enabled interwiki link sorting in non-compact mode (full list format) will now see links reordered. The links moving forward will be listed in the alphabetical order of language code.
- Later this week, people who are editing a page-section using the mobile visual editor, will notice a new "Edit full page" button. When tapped, you will be able to edit the entire article. This helps when the change you want to make is outside the section you initially opened.
- The Reader Experience team is inviting editors to assess whether dark mode should still be considered "beta" on their wiki, based on their experience of how well it functions on desktop and mobile. If the feature is deemed mature, editors can update the interface messages in
MediaWiki:skin-theme-descriptionandMediaWiki:Vector-night-mode-beta-tagto indicate that dark mode is ready and no longer considered beta. - The improved Activity tab which displays user-insights is now available to all users of the Wikipedia iOS app (version 7.9.0 and later). Following earlier A/B testing that showed higher account creation among users with access to the feature, it has been rolled out to 100% of users along with some updates. The Activity tab now shows your edited articles in the timeline, offers editing impact insights like contribution counts and article view trends, and customization options to improve in-app experience for users.
View all 21 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, a bug that prevented DiscussionTools from working on mobile has now been fixed, restoring full functionality.
Updates for technical contributors
- The Global Watchlist lets you view your watchlists from multiple wikis on one page. The extension that makes this possible continues to improve. The latest upgrade is the inclusion of a new hook,
ext.globalwatchlist.rebuild, which fires after each watchlist rebuild. This allows you to run gadgets and user scripts for the Special page.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 19:02, 23 February 2026 (UTC)
Vandalism
Hi, there is vandalism going on Tarzan II article, if you look at edit history, i think it is the same person who did on Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas article, nothing more than causing harm, can you look at this and the person? Animelover96 (talk) 08:28, 24 February 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Animelover96, yeah, it's them. They are linked through ~2026-90278-2 who has made the following three edits:
- Thank you very much for the notification. If you see similar situations, please request page protection at WP:RFPP and mention in your request that it is someone making the same edits as ~2026-90278-2, which intentionally add misinformation to movie summaries. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:48, 24 February 2026 (UTC)
ParaNorman Wikipedia page
Dear ToBeFree, I am asking that you or Wikipedia to please remove " character designer" from Thibault Leclercq's name, he is credited not as a character designer but as Director for ParaNorman: The Thrifting, according to his IMDb page: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm8240835/ Thibault Leclercq did not work on ParaNorman (2012) which the Wikipedia page is dedicated to, and he was not credited as a Character Designer for ParaNorman: The Thrifting, which make sense since he did not create the three main characters for the short film. I am asking that you make this change so I am not accused of being part of an edit war. What I am speaking is the truth, and Wikipedia should not perpetuate erroneous information. Fmjar9k (talk) 21:22, 24 February 2026 (UTC)
- Hello Fmjar9k, I think I have answered this at User_talk:ToBeFree/A/7#Request_to_remove_information_from_ParaNorman_Wikipedia_page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:25, 24 February 2026 (UTC)
- Dear ToBeFree,
- This character called Luca, is not featured in ParaNorman (2012) and he is not actually featured in ParaNorman: The Thrifting, so, I do not think it is not necessary to mention him on the Wikipedia page dedicated to ParaNorman (2012). If it is possible, I am asking that Thibault Leclercq is referred to as his credit given as Director, and since Luca is not featured in ParaNorman: The Thrifting, or in ParaNorman (2012) that section be removed as well. Fmjar9k (talk) 00:05, 25 February 2026 (UTC)
- I am not the right person to discuss content with, and my user talk page is unlikely to be a good location for finding a consensus about article content. This is why the article's talk page exists, and messages there shouldn't be directed towards me as I personally neither have an opinion on the content nor would I want to have one. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:26, 25 February 2026 (UTC)
- Dear ToBeFree, I am talking to you on here because I do not want to be accused of being part of an edit war. It seems like others are allowed to edit war however, and someone just edited out what you corrected on the ParaNorman page. What I am saying is the truth, and Thibault Leckercq’s IMDb page is a credible source, and he is credited as Director not as Character Designer for ParaNorman: The Thrifting, and the character Luca is not featured in this short or in the original film. Fmjar9k (talk) 18:33, 25 February 2026 (UTC)
- Fmjar9k, discussing on the article's talk page is obviously not edit warring. If you tried discussing and noone replied after weeks, please let me know. If you tried discussing and people disagreed, bad luck, find something else to edit about. If you didn't try, stop asking me about it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:50, 25 February 2026 (UTC)
- Dear ToBeFree,
- I did leave a comment already on the article’s talk page, and the individual who is currently editing the comments on the ParaNorman Wikipedia page, disregarded my credible IMDb source, and disregarded my valid concerns about harming the reputation of the original artist who is the credited Character Designer for ParaNorman. Fmjar9k (talk) 21:41, 25 February 2026 (UTC)
- Fmjar9k, is there anything else than ParaNorman you're interested in editing Wikipedia about? If so, please do for a while. If not, please find a different website or activity to spend your time on. Please stop contacting me about ParaNorman. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:24, 26 February 2026 (UTC)
- Fmjar9k, discussing on the article's talk page is obviously not edit warring. If you tried discussing and noone replied after weeks, please let me know. If you tried discussing and people disagreed, bad luck, find something else to edit about. If you didn't try, stop asking me about it. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:50, 25 February 2026 (UTC)
- Dear ToBeFree, I am talking to you on here because I do not want to be accused of being part of an edit war. It seems like others are allowed to edit war however, and someone just edited out what you corrected on the ParaNorman page. What I am saying is the truth, and Thibault Leckercq’s IMDb page is a credible source, and he is credited as Director not as Character Designer for ParaNorman: The Thrifting, and the character Luca is not featured in this short or in the original film. Fmjar9k (talk) 18:33, 25 February 2026 (UTC)
- I am not the right person to discuss content with, and my user talk page is unlikely to be a good location for finding a consensus about article content. This is why the article's talk page exists, and messages there shouldn't be directed towards me as I personally neither have an opinion on the content nor would I want to have one. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 09:26, 25 February 2026 (UTC)
Email from blocked user
Hi ToBeFree,
yesterday (26 February), I've got two identical strange emails with the subject 'Wikipedia email from user "Free Ukraine"' and the footer 'This email was sent by user "En.wikieditor2" (<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:En.wikieditor2>) on the English Wikipedia to user "Cyfal"', requesting me I should apply some modifications in the article cassata. How could this be, because you blocked user En.wikieditor2 already on 18 January (and a user "Free Ukraine" does not exist)? Doesn't blocking a user also prevents sending emails?
BTW, I assume you are an administrator of the English Wikipedia, because only these can block accounts? Although I didn't find that on your user page. So I hope you can answer my questions...
--Cyfal (talk) 11:19, 27 February 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Cyfal, thank you very much for the notification! In case of email abuse, forwarding the e-mail as attachment (such as by dragging it from the list of e-mails into the new-e-mail window in most clients) to the Arbitration Committee is probably the best approach as the metadata included in that attachment can be used for verifying that it was sent, and the Arbitration Committee is responsible for dealing with such non-public evidence. That said, all checkusers can at least see when e-mails have been sent, and if they have been sent to the same user. Based on what you wrote and the checkuser data of the account, I have now blocked En.wikieditor2 from sending e-mails.
- Blocking a user does not disable sending e-mails by default; that's an additional option that is rarely used. Even users whose access to their own talk page has been disabled can usually still use e-mails to appeal their block (WP:UTRS). And while it wouldn't have helped in the given case, I do recommend opening your Wikipedia preferences and prohibiting very new accounts (non-autoconfirmed users) from sending you e-mails. You can additionally use Special:Mute/Username (replacing Username by the name) to prevent someone from e-mailing or pinging you.
- There's a toolbox on every user's talk page, here too, which contains two very useful links: "Mute this user" and "View user groups". Try the latter here please. :)
- Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:56, 27 February 2026 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for your detailed explanations and hints, and your work, and especially for the hint to "View user groups"! --Cyfal (talk) 13:18, 27 February 2026 (UTC)

~ ToBeFree (talk) 14:12, 27 February 2026 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for your detailed explanations and hints, and your work, and especially for the hint to "View user groups"! --Cyfal (talk) 13:18, 27 February 2026 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – March 2026
News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2026).

- Following an RfC, the web archival service archive.today has been deprecated; links to the site should be removed.
- A request for comment is open to discuss retiring CSD criterion R3 in favour of handling such redirects through RfD.
- Following a motion, remedy 9.1 of the Conduct in deletion-related editing case has been amended to limit TenPoundHammer to one XfD nomination or PROD per 24-hour period.
- Following a motion, the Iskandar323 further POV pushing motion has been rescinded.
- The Arbitration Committee has passed a housekeeping motion rescinding a number of outdated remedies and enforcement provisions across multiple legacy cases. In most instances, existing sanctions remain in force and continue to be appealable through the usual processes, while some case-specific remedies were amended or clarified.
- Following the 2026 Steward Elections, the following editors have been appointed as stewards: A09, AmandaNP, Barras, Count Count, M7, SHB2000, Teles and VIGNERON.
- An Unreferenced articles backlog drive is taking place in March 2026 to reduce the backlog of articles tagged with {{Unreferenced}}. You can help reduce the backlog by adding citations to these articles. Sign up to participate!
RFPP
Cyberbot I appears to be broken with regards to RFPP - there's "Requesting immediate archiving..." tags from 18:51 yesterday on it. - The Bushranger One ping only 07:42, 2 March 2026 (UTC)
- Hi The Bushranger, oh. Mh. I have now manually archived the sections. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:08, 2 March 2026 (UTC)
/aɪ təʊld ju/
I don't want to tell you that I told you but... I told you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ~2026-13575-61 (talk) 16:14, 1 March 2026 (UTC)
- Hello ~2026-13388-59, no matter how often you say the opposite and no matter how often and long they get blocked for personal attacks and disruptive editing, IvanScrooge98 is not a vandal. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 16:35, 1 March 2026 (UTC)
- Allow me to agree with the sysops who blocked indefinitely that vandal in "2" different projects, and to disagree with you. But I hope you'll have fun dealing with your new not-vandal pal from now on as you're already doing right now, enjoy yourself! — Preceding unsigned comment added by ~2026-13575-61 (talk) 16:14, 2 March 2026 (UTC)
Tech News: 2026-10
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- Wikipedia 25 Birthday mode is now live on Betawi, Breton, Chinese, Czech, Dutch, English, French, Gorontalo, Indonesian, Italian, Luxembourgish, Madurese, Sicilian, Spanish, Thai, and Vietnamese Wikipedias! This limited-time campaign feature celebrates 25 years of Wikipedia with a birthday mascot, Baby Globe. When turned on, Baby Globe is shown on ~2,500 articles, waiting to be discovered by readers. Communities can choose to turn Birthday mode on by getting consensus from their community and asking an admin to enable the feature and customize it via community configuration on the local wiki.
Updates for editors
- Sub-referencing, a new feature to re-use references with different details has been released to Swedish Wikipedia, Polish Wikipedia and a couple of other wikis. You can try the feature on these projects or on testwiki and betawiki. Learnings from the first pilot wiki German Wikipedia have been published in a report. Reach out to the Wikimedia Deutschland team if you are interested in becoming a pilot wiki.
- Paste Check will become available at all Wikipedias this week. The feature prompts newcomers who are pasting text they are not likely to have written into VisualEditor to consider whether doing so risks a copyright violation. Paste Check tags all edits where it is shown for potential review. Local administrators can configure various aspects of the feature via Special:EditChecks. Research across 22 wikis found that Paste Check resulted in an 18% decrease in relative reverted-edits compared to the control group. Translators can help to localize this and related features.
- The Reader Experience team will be standardizing the user menu in the top right for all mobile users so that it is closer to the desktop experience. Currently this user menu is only visible to users with Advanced Mobile Controls (AMC) turned on. The only change is that a couple buttons previously in the left-side menu will move to the top right for users who do not have AMC turned on. This change is expected to go out March 9 and seeks to improve the user interface.
- Starting in the week of March 2, the emails sent out when an email address was added, removed, or changed for an account will switch to a substantially nicer and clearer HTML email from the prior plaintext one.
- Notifications are currently limited to 2,000 historic entries per user, and extend back to 2013 when the feature was released. This is going to be changed to only store Notifications from the last 5 years, but up to 10,000 of them. This will help with long-term infrastructure health and help to prevent more recent notifications from disappearing too soon.
- The Global Watchlist which lets you view your watchlists from multiple wikis on a single page continues to see improvements. The latest update improves label usage experience. The extension now allows activating the language fallback system for Wikidata items without labels in the viewed language, and showing those labels in the user’s preferred Wikidata language if no
uselang=URL parameter is provided. - The Wikipedia Android team has started a beta test of hybrid search on Greek Wikipedia. Hybrid search capabilities can handle both semantic and keyword queries enabling readers to find what they’re looking for directly on Wikipedia more easily.
- For security reasons, members of certain user groups are required to have two-factor authentication (2FA) enabled. Currently, 2FA is required to use the group, but not to be a member of it. Given that this model still has some vulnerabilities, the situation will gradually change in March. Members of these groups will be unable to disable last 2FA method on their account, and it will be impossible to add users without 2FA to these groups. Users will still be able to add new authentication methods or remove them, as long as at least one method is continuously enabled. In the second half of March, users without 2FA will be removed from these groups. This applies to: CentralNotice administrators, checkusers, interface administrators, suppressors, Wikidata staff, Wikifunctions staff, WMF Office IT and WMF Trust & Safety. Nothing will change for other users. See the linked task for deployment schedule.
View all 27 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the issue preventing users from creating an instance in Wikibase.cloud has now been fixed.
Updates for technical contributors
- To help ensure fair use of infrastructure, over the next month the Wikimedia Foundation will implement global API rate limits across our APIs. In early March, stricter limits will be applied to unidentified requests from outside Toolforge/WMCS and API requests that are made from web browsers. In April, higher limits will be applied to identified traffic. These limits are intentionally set as high as possible to minimise impact on the community. Bots running in Toolforge/WMCS or with the bot user right on any wiki should not be affected for now. However, all developers are advised to follow updated best practices. For more information, see Wikimedia APIs/Rate limits.
- The Wikidata Query Service Linked Data Fragment (LDF) endpoint will be decommissioned in February. This endpoint served limited traffic, which was successfully migrated to other data access methods that were better suited to support existing use cases. The hardware used to support the LDF endpoint will be reallocated to support the ongoing backend migration efforts.
- The new Parsoid parser continues to be deployed to additional wikis, improving platform sustainability and making it easier to introduce new reading and editing features. Parsoid is now the default parser on 488 WMF wikis (268 Wikipedias), now covering more than 10% of all Wikipedia page views.
- The process and criteria for requesting exceptional access to the high volume feed of the Wikimedia Enterprise APIs (at no cost for mission-aligned usecases), have now been published. This is to provide more thorough and clearer documentation for users.
- Tech Blog, the blog dedicated to the Wikimedia technical community will be migrating to Diff, the community news and event blog. The migration should be complete in April 2026, after which new posts will be accepted for publishing. Readers will be able to access posts – old and new – on the landing page at https://diff.wikimedia.org/techblog.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 17:50, 2 March 2026 (UTC)
Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin 2026 Issue 4


Highlights
Let's Talk continues
- Birthday mode: This limited-time campaign feature celebrates 25 years of Wikipedia with a birthday mascot, Baby Globe. When turned on, Baby Globe is shown on ~2,500 articles, waiting to be discovered by readers. The feature is available for all Wikipedias to customise through Community Configuration until 6 April 2026. So far 17 Wikipedias have joined in the fun.
- Wikipedia's 25th birthday party celebrated on Commons: Content from the January 15th global birthday party selected as Media of the day.
Annual Goals Progress on Infrastructure
See also newsletters: Wikimedia Apps · Growth · Product Safety and Integrity · Readers · Research · Wikifunctions & Abstract Wikipedia · Tech News · Language and Internationalization · other newsletters on MediaWiki.org
- Etherpad cleanup: For security and performance reasons, all current pads on Wikimedia’s Etherpad instance, the web-based "ephemeral" editor for real-time collaborative document editing, will be permanently deleted after 30 April. We will continue running this Etherpad instance to support events and other short-term collaboration, but will be periodically deleting data going forward. If you have content in Etherpad you want to keep, please create local backups, as data will be permanently deleted and will not be able to be recovered.
- Activity tab: Wikipedia iOS app has rolled out the improved Activity tab to all users in version 7.9.0. A/B test results showed increased account creation among users with access to the feature. Updates include enhanced editing impact insights, module customization, and relocation of History into the Search tab.
- Reference Check: The feature Reference Check has been deployed to all Wikipedias. In A/B testing, the impact was substantial: newcomers shown Reference Check were approximately 2.2 times more likely to include a reference on desktop (or acknowledge/explain why they did not) and about 17.5 times more likely on mobile web.
- Semantic search: The Foundation has launched a limited Android mobile app experiment that tests hybrid search capabilities which can handle both semantic and keyword queries. The Phase 1 beta is now live on Greek Wikipedia. The goal is to understand whether combining meaning-based retrieval with keyword search helps readers find information more effectively. Testing will expand to English, French, and Portuguese Wikipedias in March.
- Navigation experience: The Foundation will run an experiment for mobile web users, that adds a table of contents and automatically expands all article sections, to learn more about navigation issues they face. The test will be available on Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Indonesian, and Vietnamese Wikipedias.

- Site notices: Site notices (MediaWiki:Sitenotice and MediaWiki:Anonnotice) now will render on all platforms, not just on the desktop site. Users on mobile web will now see these notices and be informed.
- Tech News: Latest updates from Tech News week 08 and 09 include the new “Edit full page” button for people who are editing a page-section using the mobile visual editor. They also link to the 40 community submitted tasks that were resolved over the last two weeks.
- Wikifunctions: Abstract Wikipedia is going to have its public preview within the next few weeks, here is the preview.
Annual Goals Progress on Volunteer Support
See also blogs: Global Advocacy blog · Global Advocacy Newsletter · Policy blog · WikiLearn News · The Wikipedia Library · list of movement events
- Gender gap: The Celebrate Women 2026 is coming! The Wikimedia Foundation will host a kick-off celebration that will work as a welcome session for both organizers and participants on March 5 at 13:00 UTC.
- Language: New edition of the Language and internationalization newsletter highlights new feature developments and improvements in various language-related technical projects.
- Let’s Connect Learning Clinic: Watch the recordings of past learning clinics about Wikipedia’s 25th Birthday Tool and Strengthening Local-Language Admin Communities.
- Wikimedia Research Showcase: You can watch the recording of this month research showcase whose theme is about "AI and Communities".
- Hubs: Lessons from hub pilots.
- Banners & logo policies: Wikimedia Foundation has adopted new and updated policies regarding the use of banners, logo changes, and blackouts on the projects, particularly for advocacy purposes.
- Digital Safety: The next edition of Digital Safety Office Hours will be on Mar 27 at 9:00 UTC and 19:00 UTC. The session will explore practical threat modelling: a structured way to think about risks, assess your exposure, and make informed choices.
Annual Goals Progress on Effectiveness
See also: Progress on the annual plan
- Wikimedia Enterprise: Ecosia Enriches Search Results and AI Answers with Wikimedia Enterprise.
- Human centered AI: Members of the Wikimedia Enterprise team presented on "Wikipedia in the Age of AI and Bots" at the seminar of Stanford’s Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence.
- Inclusive AI: Advancing Open, Inclusive AI with Free and Open Knowledge at the India AI Impact Summit 2026.
Other Movement curated newsletters & news
See also: Diff blog · Goings-on · Planet Wikimedia · Signpost (en) · Kurier (de) · Actualités du Wiktionnaire (fr) · Regards sur l’actualité de la Wikimedia (fr) · Wikimag (fr) · Education · GLAM · Milestones · Wikidata · Central and Eastern Europe · other newsletters
Subscribe or unsubscribe · Help translate
For information about the Bulletin and to read previous editions, see the project page on Meta-Wiki. Let foundationbulletin
wikimedia.org know if you have any feedback or suggestions for improvement!
MediaWiki message delivery 12:36, 3 March 2026 (UTC)
Michael Zapruder
Article is being edited by someone claiming to be the subject. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 17:02, 3 March 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification. I don't think there's a need for administrative action at this time, but I have informed Michael Zapruder about relevant policies and guidelines on their user talk page now (permanent link). If you encounter a similar case, you can probably also just take this approach. Best regards, ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:08, 3 March 2026 (UTC)
General question on Banning process
I ran across this: User talk:Tenebrae#Community ban violation and am contacting you because you posted it. I have no interest/knowledge/ax-to-grind, just a rabbit hole I ran down, but I wandered around trying to understand the process, and why this editor had been banned. Is there an arbitration discussion somewhere that can reviewed? I didn't find warnings etc. in archived talk pages. Thanks in advance for the guidance. • Bobsd • (talk) 17:14, 4 March 2026 (UTC)
- (talk page watcher) They were community banned as the result of an AN discussion. There's an easy-to-miss "discussion at AN" link at the very top of their talk page within the block banner. tony 17:21, 4 March 2026 (UTC)
- Thanks! Sadly, some of the links in the discussion are broken. Bobsd, if I remember correctly, in a nutshell, Tenebrae had edited with a strong conflict of interest and used anti-harassment policies to get others sanctioned for uncovering the dirty secret. The Arbitration Committee stepped in and clarified that Tenebrae has a clear conflict of interest, and the community reacted by banning the user from the entire English Wikipedia. See also , . ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:28, 4 March 2026 (UTC)
- You are being generous on the "easy-to-miss", which I certainly did! That's what I was looking for. Thanks! • Bobsd • (talk) 20:18, 4 March 2026 (UTC)
- To be fair, it's also linked in the block reason above the user's contribution list, but it's not much less hidden there. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:26, 4 March 2026 (UTC)
Tech News: 2026-11
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Weekly highlight
- All wikis will be read-only for a few minutes on Wednesday, 25 March 2026 at 15:00 UTC. This is for the datacenter server switchover backup tests, which happen twice a year. During the switchover, all Wikimedia website traffic is shifted from one primary data center to the backup data center to test availability and prevent service disruption even in emergencies.
- Last week, all wikis had 2 hours of read-only time, and extended unavailability for user-scripts and gadgets. This was due to a security incident which has since been resolved. Work is ongoing to prevent re-occurrences. For current information please see the post on the Stewards' noticeboard (translations).
Updates for editors
- Users facing multiple blocks on mobile will now see the reasons for each block separately, instead of a generic message. This helps them understand why they are blocked and what steps they can take to resolve the issue. For example, users affected for using common VPNs (such as iCloud Private Relay) will receive clearer guidance on what they need to do to start editing again.
- Later this week, Suggestion Mode will become available as a beta feature within the visual editor at all Wikipedias. This feature proactively suggests various types of actions that people can consider taking to improve Wikipedia articles, and learn about related guidelines. The feature is locally configurable, and can also be locally expanded with custom Suggestions. Current settings can be seen at Special:EditChecks and there are instructions for how administrators can customize the links to point to local guidelines. The feature is connected to Edit check which suggests improvements while someone is writing new content. In the future, the Editing team plans to evaluate the feature's impact with newcomers through a controlled experiment.
View all 23 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the issue where the cursor became misaligned during the use of CodeMirror’s syntax highlighting, which makes wikitext and code easier to read, has now been fixed. This problem specifically affected users who defined a font rule in a custom stylesheet while creating a new topic with DiscussionTools.
Updates for technical contributors
- API rate limiting update: To help ensure fair use of infrastructure, global API rate limits will be applied this week to requests without a compliant User-Agent that originate from outside Toolforge/WMCS and to unauthenticated requests made from web browsers. Higher limits will be applied to identified traffic in April. Bots running in Toolforge/WMCS or with the bot user right on any wiki should not be affected for now. However, all developers are advised to follow updated best practices. For more information, see Wikimedia APIs/Rate limits.
- The new GraphQL API has been released. The API was developed as a flexible alternative to select features of the Wikidata Query Service (WDQS), to improve developer experience and foster adaptability, and efficient data access. Try it out and give feedback. You can also sign up for usability tests.
- The PTAC Unsupported Tools Working Group continued improvements to Video2Commons in February, with fixes addressing authentication errors, large-file handling, task queue visibility, and clearer upload behavior. Work is still ongoing in some areas, including changes related to deprecated server-side uploads. Read this update to learn more.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
In depth
- The Article Guidance team invites experienced Wikipedia editors from selected pilot wikis and interested contributors from other Wikipedias to fill out this questionnaire which is available in English, Arabic, Bengali, Japanese, Portuguese, Persian, and Turkish. Your answers will help the team customize guidance for less experienced editors and help them learn community policies and practices while creating an article. Learn more on the project page.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 18:51, 9 March 2026 (UTC)
Lisa Barlow
Various TAs have been trying to keep a lawsuit involving the subject off the page practically since it was added last month. I've been trying to get the most recent TA to specify what is incorrect about it, to no avail. Decided to let you know what's been happening rather than reverting again. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 19:34, 9 March 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification. Thewealthysocialite wrote the text; I think they should start a discussion on the article's talk page and have now asked them to do so. In the meantime, I don't think that TonySt or you should revert; please wait for the talk page discussion to exist first, then join it, and a consensus for inclusion should be quick and simple to find. When that's present, the content can probably be restored. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:52, 9 March 2026 (UTC)
The Signpost: 10 March 2026
- Interview: Bernadette Meehan, new Wikimedia Foundation CEO
Part 2.
- News and notes: Security testing unleashes computer worm on Meta-wiki
Dormant worm awakes; a sketchy archiving site struck; ether burns.
- Special report: What actually happened during the Wikimedia security incident?
A horrifying exploit took place, which could have had catastrophic and far-reaching consequences if used maliciously; instead, it seems to have happened by accident and was used for childish vandalism. How did this happen, and what did the script actually do?
- In the media: Indonesian government blocks Wikimedia logins; archive site scoured from Wikipedia after owner runs malware
As well as controversy over LLM translations.
- Recent research: To wiki, perchance to groki
Comparisons continue.
- Obituary: Madhav Gadgil, Fredrick Brennan, Mark Miller, Chip Berlet
Rest in peace.
- Opinion: Interface administrators and trusting trust
Potential attacks are the logical consequence of giving a group of users unlimited control over JavaScript.
- Technology report: English Wikipedia deprecates archive.today after DDoS against blog, altered content
After the archive site launched a DDoS campaign against a small blog in January 2026, a request for comment was started, with consensus to deprecate the site used almost 700 thousand times.
- Op-ed: Why is "Trypsin-sensitive photosynthetic activities in chloroplast membranes" cited in "List of tallest buildings in Chicago"?
The answer is slop.
- Essay: The pursuit of a button click
Volunteering for Wikipedia has its rewards. The thank-button, for example.
- In focus: Short descriptions: One year later
A discussion of the challenge set forth to the Wikipedia community one year ago!
- WikiProject report: Unreferenced articles backlog drive
Unreferenced articles in English Wikipedia - help us in the backlog drive!
- Community view: Speaking of planning ...
The WMF planning process is underway.
- Traffic report: Over the mountain, kissing silver inlaid clouds
Death and the Winter Olympics.
- Crossword: "It will never happen"
Want to take a break?
- Comix: BRIEn't
Or is it.
Sani Sha'aban
Hey, I'm sure what's happening here but various editors – both logged-out and -in – have been trying to keep the Controversy section out for nearly a year. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:03, 10 March 2026 (UTC)
- Hello Skywatcher68, I won't judge if that content needs to be in the article eventually, but if it is re-added, that should probably ideally be the result of a discussion at Talk:Sani Sha'aban or at least an attempt to discuss it there. I have semi-protected the page for now. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 10:40, 11 March 2026 (UTC)
Endemic COVID-19
Hello,
You removed my "Edit fully-protected"-request on the talk page of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Endemic_COVID-19
I'd ask you to please have a closer look at this matter.
- Firstly, your edit also removed previous comments from the talk page.
- As described in my report at https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Edit_warring&oldid=1343697306 the following had happened:
• We had a lengthy discussion on the topic (spanning over two sections) for two to three weeks in February,
• Whatamidoing's version was the consensus of the discussion: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Endemic_COVID-19&oldid=1340359392
• That version was live for three weeks until this week.
• Then a sock (which was banned) together with Roxy_the_dog kept reverting that without participating in the discussion, and admin Ponyo reinstated the good version: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Endemic_COVID-19&oldid=1343363600
• Then Roxy_the_dog started the edit war. He reverted without participating in the discussion (his only participation was a personal attack).
- I'm asking that you please reinstate the good version, as requested, and please fix the talk page, where you've accidentally removed a part of my comments that was older.
Thank you Worstbull (talk) 22:11, 15 March 2026 (UTC)
- According to standard practice regarding edit warring, the page should be restored to the WP:STATUSQUO, which is the last stable version before the disruptive edits began. Reverting to a version pushed by a now-banned sock violates the core principle of reverting WP:VAND. Also I think my older talk page edits were deleted my mistake (WP:TPO). Worstbull (talk) 22:43, 15 March 2026 (UTC)
- Hello Worstbull, WP:STATUSQUO is part of an essay, not a policy or guideline. The actual standard practice is described at WP:Protection policy § Full protection.
- Nothing in the banning policy prohibits an article from ever containing content that had once been added by a banned user. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:42, 16 March 2026 (UTC)
- Hello, that's not what I was saying.
- I'm saying that you reverted to the wrong version, and you threatened me at: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Endemic_COVID-19&diff=prev&oldid=1343698016
- ("you're close to a block or a topic ban if you continue this way. You should not describe the changes as vandalism (or now "vandalism-like" as if that was much better), full protection is in place due to a dispute and the request template is for uncontroversial changes")
- for following the rules: "Editors convinced that [...] protection has rewarded edit warring or disruption by establishing a contentious revision, may identify a stable version prior to the edit war and request reversion to that version." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Protection_policy
- - which is exactly what I did - I added the "Edit fully-protected"-block and you deleted it. I **did** explain - I'd rather go as far as to even say "document" - the circumstances thoroughly!
- The locked version *was actually* the resulting version of something we'd treat as vandalism in the German Wiki, which is my home: using a sock for an edit war. The sock got banned, another admin restored the *good* version.
- (I actually wrote "vandalism-like" - being perfectly aware that I don't know the exact definitions here in the English wiki.)
- After the edit war you restored the *bad* version: result from the banned sock's action, post-edit war version, not pre-edit war version.
- I was not perfectly familiar with the exact definition of vandalism here, because it doesn't really matter to me usually as a regular user; the important thing is that I did not talk about Roxy_the_dog here, but about the banned sock when referring to "vandalism-like"! And I find it quite disturbing that I get threatened for that (referring to the admin-reverted edits of a banned sock as "vandalism-like", whether it's bureaucratically 100% correct or not, I'm thankful if you can shed light on that please).
- May I ask you kindly, to take a quiet moment later this week to read through what I've explained above in detail about what happened. Worstbull (talk) 04:48, 16 March 2026 (UTC)
- Worstbull, sorry, I had overlooked the part of the protection policy that suggested the addition of the {{edit fully-protected}} template. You had previously been warned not to describe others' edits as vandalism and your response was to describe them as "vandalism-like". Perhaps the term you are looking for is "disruptive". Anyway – your fine-to-make request has been declined. Please keep discussing the content instead of focusing on other users' behavior. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 05:38, 16 March 2026 (UTC)
- Regarding the removal of talk page messages, the edit summary of Special:Diff/1343698016 is accurate and the indentation of your lines was broken, so I'm not even sure where exactly I'd restore the unproblematic parts of your message. You can, however, do so by using the "Reply" link next to whichever message you were replying to, and copying text from the last lines of that diff as they were fine. Just please avoid describing other discussion participants' edits as vandalism or throwing a big yellow inapplicable template into the discussion. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 03:51, 16 March 2026 (UTC)
Tech News: 2026-12
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Updates for editors
- The Improved Syntax Highlighting beta feature, also known as CodeMirror 6, has been used for wikitext syntax highlighting since November 2024. It will be promoted out of beta by May 2026 in order to bring improvements and new features to all editors who use the standard syntax highlighter. If you have any questions or concerns about promoting the feature out of beta, please share.
- Some changes to local user groups are performed by stewards on Meta-Wiki and logged there only. Now, interwiki rights changes will be logged both on Meta-Wiki and the wiki of the target user to make it easier to access a full record of user's rights changes on a local wiki. Past log entries for such changes will be backfilled in the coming weeks.
- On wikis using Flagged Revisions, the number of pending changes shown on Special:PendingChanges previously counted pages which were no longer pending review, because they have been removed from the system without being reviewed, e.g. due to being deleted, moved to a different namespace, or due to wiki configuration changes. The count will be correct now. On some wikis the number shown will be much smaller than before. There should be no change to the list of pages itself.
- Wikifunctions composition language has been rewritten, resulting in a new version of the language. This change aims to increase service stability by reducing the orchestrator's memory consumption. This rewrite also enables substantial latency reduction, code simplification, and better abstractions, which will open the door to later feature additions. Read more about the changes.
- Users can now sort search results alphabetically by page title. The update gives an additional option to finding pages more easily and quickly. Previously, results could be sorted by Edit date, Creation date, or Relevance. To use the new option, open 'Advanced Search' on the search results page and select 'Alphabetically' under 'Sorting Order'.
View all 28 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, the bug that prevented UploadWizard on Wikimedia Commons from importing files from Flickr has now been fixed.
Updates for technical contributors
- A new special page, Special:LintTemplateErrors, has been created to list transcluded pages that are flagged as containing lint errors to help users discover them easily. The list is sorted by the number of transclusions with errors. For example: Special:LintTemplateErrors/night-mode-unaware-background-color.
- Users of the Improved Syntax Highlighting beta feature have been using CodeMirror instead of CodeEditor for syntax highlighting when editing JavaScript, CSS, JSON, Vue and Lua content pages, for some time now. Along with promoting CodeMirror 6 out of beta, the plan is to replace CodeEditor as the standard editor for these content models by May 2026. Feedback or concerns are welcome.
- The CodeMirror JavaScript modules will soon be upgraded to CodeMirror 6. Leading up to the upgrade, loading the
ext.CodeMirrororext.CodeMirror.libmodules from gadgets and user scripts was deprecated in July 2025. The use of theext.CodeMirror.switchhook was also deprecated in March 2025. Contributors can now make their scripts or gadgets compatible with CodeMirror 6. See the migration guide for more information. - The MediaWiki Interfaces team is expanding coverage of REST API module definitions to include extension APIs. REST API modules are groups of related endpoints that can be independently managed and versioned. Modules now exist for GrowthExperiments and Wikifunctions APIs. As we migrate extension APIs to this structure, documentation will move out of the main MediaWiki OpenAPI spec and REST Sandbox view, and will instead be accessible via module-specific options in the dropdown on the REST Sandbox (i.e., Special:RestSandbox, available on all wiki projects).
- The Scribunto extension provides different pieces of information about the wiki where the module is being used via the mw.site library. Starting last week, the library also provides a way of accessing the wiki ID that can be used to facilitate cross-wiki module maintenance.
Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki
In depth
- The 2026 Coolest Tool Award celebrating outstanding community tools, is now open for nominations! Nominate your favorite tool using the nomination survey form by 23 March 2026. For more information on privacy and data handling, please see the survey privacy statement.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 19:34, 16 March 2026 (UTC)
Elisabeth Maier
Hey, just letting you know that a TA claiming to be the subject has made a WP:PRIVACY claim. –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:56, 16 March 2026 (UTC)
- Hi Skywatcher68, thank you very much for the notification. There are two interesting aspects to this:
- The revision history of de:Elisabeth Maier (Skeletonpilotin)
- The non-removal of the only information I had in mind when I saw your message, the birth date.
- I think there is currently nothing for me to do there, but please let me know if this continues. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:17, 16 March 2026 (UTC)


