The following is an automatically-generated compilation of all talk pages for the Signpost issue dated 2020-01-27. For general Signpost discussion, see Wikipedia talk:Signpost.
Thanks for this article! I enjoyed reading some of these articles, several of which covered topics I had never heard of. Overall, they present a strong endorsement of the view that Wikipedia can be a unique force for good, a sui generis example of collaboration and learning enabled by technology. Ganesha811 (talk) 04:49, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
While many people, no doubt, think that the importance of this encyclopedia is so bound up with current affairs, I don't. Where is the medical coverage in this list, for example? One of my hobbyhorses is the perpetual "media-pedia" tension. Let's recall, always, that what we do is produce reference material; for all those things that people need to look up. Charles Matthews (talk) 06:41, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
By definition, our million newest articles are skewed to things that have become notable since we passed the five million mark. It would be difficult for a truly important article that could have been written ten years ago to make this list. There are of course lots of less important articles that have been written since we passed the five million mark, but which could have been written years earlier. A list of most important articles on the pedia should have much less of a current affairs focus than a list of most important articles from among our most recent million. So when I was invited to contribute to this article I wrote about an article that someone had created about a major recent event, rather than the article I started on an Irish hillfortϢereSpielChequers 09:01, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Shrug. Science and technology progress all the time, bringing previously marginal topics into the limelight. The humanities break new ground. More than that, the pool of available reliable sources constantly grows. But even more than those factors, people with all sorts of expertise join Wikipedia and contribute. There is a "books of the year" genre of journalism, which I stopped taking seriously when I realised it was more about the agenda of the person choosing, than what you should read. We're all entitled to our opinions (and anyway, the article-as-unit is a bad fit with a hypertext site). Charles Matthews (talk) 14:50, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yes they progress, and sometimes that requires completely new articles. But when previously marginal topics come into the limelight they don't necessarily get new articles - often existing ones improve or change. There certainly have been some STEM ones in the last million articles, if we had had an astronomer among the people who put this together we might have had ʻOumuamua and an archaeologist might have picked something new, but the two newish important archaeological articles I looked at were both in the 5 million. I suspect that it is difficult for generalists like longterm Wikipedians to pick an important new article that isn't new because it is current. ϢereSpielChequers 12:02, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
This is exactly why my favorite article in the list above is Matrilineal society of Meghalaya; a subject that is not 'in the news' or anything like that, and is both historic and current. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 10:38, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Older articles are important too of course. I personally nominated Greta Thunberg not because her biography is super important but because she is representative of an issue which is in my opinion the most important issue in the world right now. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:20, 30 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
While no one questions the need for articles on women and the need for women editors, is Maria Elise Turner Lauder really the 6,000,000th article or is just a good advert for Wikipedia which happened to be created around the time of the 6,000,000th article? Giano(talk) 13:59, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Giano, there is some discussion about this at Wikipedia talk:Six million articles. I'd summarise it as a photofinish and a close decision, with a number of editors trying to click save at exactly the right second. It is a reasonable assumption that only a tiny proportion of the articles created that week were created by editors who were watching the relevant counter and trying to get the 6 millionth. ϢereSpielChequers 14:53, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. Most fortuitous. I think I'll name my next horse The Lady in Red and hope you are adjudicating at the finishing post. Giano(talk) 15:07, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Well to continue the racing metaphor: I suspect had we known of the ten or so runners, it wouldn't have been very hard to pick the winner. Giano(talk) 15:22, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I oppose a moratorium on all new articles about businesses. I am an editor who has written several articles about notable businesses without having any conflict of interest other than being an occasional customer of those businesses. This is an encyclopedia with six million articles and we should be improving rather than curtailing our neutral coverage of notable businesses. I am all in favor of monitoring disclosed paid editors, blocking undisclosed paid editors, deleting spam and promotional content, and enforcing NPOV. But for Smallbones or anyone else to tell me that I am not allowed to write a neutral well-referenced article about a notable business is not acceptable to me in any way, shape or form. Cullen328Let's discuss it 02:20, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Cullen - I don't like a moratorium either - but what's the alternative? We have banned Wiki-PR for 6 years and nothing has been done. Nobody will enforce the community's ban on the very worst offender. Nobody really even tells us how they decided not to do anything. Well the WMF said nobody of the community members that they informed asked them to do anything, but it's real hard to even find out who those people are. Smallbones(smalltalk) 03:01, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
In the 2-1/2 years that I have been an administrator, I have blocked over 1000 spammers and deleted over 1000 promotional articles and drafts. I am doing my part, every single day. Some administators do much more, because I am a very slow and careful worker. Cullen328Let's discuss it 08:19, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Without supporting or opposing any particular action, less extreme alternatives would include things like limiting creation to extended-confirmed editors, or to those with a specific user right such as 'autopatrolled'. Sunrise(talk) 16:37, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I also oppose a total moratorium, but I understand the frustration with the crapflood of spam and puff. However, I did notice this portion: The WMF position is that they will only take action, based on requests made by the English Wikipedia community through its usual governing processes. How about we start an RfC to ask them to take action? Doesn't need to be complex, just "This group is banned by our community; they're openly defying the ban and have said as much in the media, please get Legal or whoever else is needed after them." At that point, they'll no longer have a "Well, nobody asked us to do anything" excuse. SeraphimbladeTalk to me 02:30, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'd like to see such an RfC as well, but suspect we'll need to do a lot more. Smallbones(smalltalk) 03:03, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Smallbones: which WMF official said they would only take action based on requests made through usual governing processes? EllenCT (talk) 04:28, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I generally do not deal directly with the top tier folks, though it has happened, see e.g. my interview with K. Maher in May(?). I appreciate the work that the folks I deal with at the WMF do, and I think they are good people trying their best to do their job, though the organization may be a bit crazy at times. In short, I really can't say. The flip side of this is that I would never ambush these folks. They had a pretty good idea what this column was going to be about, and I'm pretty sure their bosses did as well. I was getting the straight "organizational line." Smallbones(smalltalk) 05:16, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Smallbones: understood, if they might not have thought that they were speaking for attribution, sure. But if you think it's an authoritative statement, why do you suspect we will need to do a lot more, and, do what more? EllenCT (talk) 07:07, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for creating the RfC and I'll note that the !votes are now 19-0 in favor. Someone said "keep it open for a month" so that a larger number of votes can accrue, but I'll suggest, for the sake of time, to snow close it at 100-0.
Actually, there shouldn't be any doubt whether the WMF was speaking for attribution. I just don't like putting the spotlight on individuals whose name wouldn't be recognized by many people, nor do I think that parsing out the supposed exact meaning of the words usually helps. But I'm sure I could find five more WMF attributable quotes from at least 2 people saying essentially this " From our perspective, we are doing everything within existing processes developed by the community regarding paid editing." Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:55, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I think we should leave the RfC open for a fixed period -- say 3 days, or maybe even as long as a week -- to allow everyone who might be interested to take a stand. Especially since at the rate people have been signing it may receive 100 votes within a few hours, & leaving it open for 3 days might attract many hundreds of votes. -- llywrch (talk) 21:24, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
While I commend the WMF for deferring to community processes on this... If anyone is to start an RfC, I recommend writing it up as a group, for, shall we say, safety reasons. --Yair rand (talk) 05:55, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Why are you striking things out? I'm not scared of the big bad WMF; I've disagreed with them on plenty of occasions. I think they're wrong on some things, but they've hardly kicked me off for it. I wouldn't ask anyone to do something I wouldn't do myself. And while I've disagreed with WMF on more than one occasion, I hardly think they're petty tyrants bent on revenge. They've screwed up on some occasions, but they do want the Wikimedia projects to succeed. SeraphimbladeTalk to me 09:50, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I only meant to indicate that I had gone ahead with the request I had earlier asked of you. EllenCT (talk) 15:58, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
One thing we could do, short of a moratorium, is introduce higher sourcing requirements for businesses. For example, all articles about businesses would need multiple high-quality independent sources covering a period of at least one year (for the sake of argument); lower quality sources would not be included at all; and "me too" sources that were clearly the result of press releases would count as one source only. SarahSV(talk) 02:39, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
that's the obvious answer. WP:NCORP specifically says independent sourcing, not barely-rechurned press releases, etc. The trouble is that it's too subjective to enforce collectively. The sourcing practices on cryptocurrency articles work well there, and might be usable if we can get the editors to collectively enforce something like that - David Gerard (talk) 10:46, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) Although I can't support a total moratorium, I understand the reasoning behind it. More articles don't necessarily make a better encyclopedia. Miniapolis 02:43, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It seems to me that if the WMF were to ban Status, then breach of this ban would infringe the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. All the best: RichFarmbrough (the apparently calm and reasonable) 03:02, 27 January 2020 (UTC).[reply]
They already have, and it already does, but WMF Legal isn't willing to enforce it unless we make a request by our "usual governing processes." EllenCT (talk) 03:06, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
(ec)Both the community and the WMF have banned Status Labs, the cease-and-desist order says it all and it just repeats the community ban. Smallbones(smalltalk) 03:11, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Sadly, though—in a view I express solely on the basis of personal anecdotal evidence at this time, but it's legit personally experienced professional anecdotal evidence—it would be a tough job to convince a currently sitting federal judge to allow a CFAA claim past the motion-to-dismiss stage based on a unilateral cease-and-desist order with respect to terms-of-use violations like this that don't involve stealing financial information, personal medical information, trade secrets, or something equally objectionable. I kinda-sorta do this stuff for a living IRL (and won't self-out any further) and these are crazy hard claims to move past the initial procedural-roadblock stage if no one has literally/tangibly/demonstrably/understandably suffered monetary damages. This stinks but federal judges tend to be way overworked and more inclined to pay attention to their criminal dockets than their civil ones, and it would take a really vibrant advocate in front of a really tech-savvy (and probably young) judge to be able to move forward with this. Long story short: We, as community members, are in the best position to make these buzzword-vocabularied spammers take their "bold solutions" else-the-heck-where. - Julietdeltalima(talk) 22:09, 12 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I am also opposed to an outright moratorium. However, I do concur that this is a serious problem. I have long supported a no exceptions ban on paid editing. In the case of business related articles perhaps we might consider posting some sort of disclaimer or notice near the top of the page alerting readers that although the practice is prohibited, it is known that some articles dealing with business and finance are edited by parties attempting to slant the presentation of the subject, or words to that effect. -Ad Orientem (talk) 03:09, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Ad Orientem, the other positive point to a flat out ban on paid editing is that, if we had such a rule, organizations like Upwork have already told us that they would remove requests for Wikipedia writing since they won't accept requests which if fulfilled would breach another site's terms of use. SeraphimbladeTalk to me 03:38, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I think there is merit in tightening the sourcing requirements for articles about existing businesses, making that similar to the policy for living persons: "All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be supported by an inline citation to a reliable, published source. Contentious material about [existing businesses] that is unsourced or poorly sourced — whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable — should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion." -- John Broughton(♫♫) 03:47, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Support the moratorium on the grounds that, although its damaging to the project to stop making articles about businesses, its more damaging to have the current situation. Pissed that the Foundation won't do anything, since an RfC has no real chance of a supermajority (the Foundation knows this), because:
Lot of people don't care, and since they don't care are inclined to be against something drasic like this
Lot of people are of the mind "the solution is for editors to roll back individual bad edits, not to make blanket judgements; judge the edit, not the editor" which of course is naive
This project attracts libertarians to a certain extent, and libertarians are of the mind that anything a business organization does (including this sort of thing) is both their right and usually a net benefit to society, overall
There are probably plenty, or anyway some, accounts that are run by the spammers just for voting against solutions like this
But, you never know until you try. Herostratus (talk) 04:09, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I never understood to desire to have a Wikipedia article. Anyone can add controversial or negative sources that might otherwise be less visible (eg. Europe Business Assembly). See also this study:
"Crowd Governance", a study finds that after the creation of a Wikipedia article about a publicly traded company, its stock price drops. Apparently, insiders and institutional investors see an article (ie. transparency) as signifying they no longer have an edge on investing information.
Wikipedia can actually harm the prospects of businesses and people. We need to do more to protect living businesses and people from unethical sharks who charge money to create an article without their understanding the risks. We need a general purpose living people/entity policy, beyond BLP, something like a LE (Live Entity) policy. -- GreenC 05:37, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The enhanced sourcing requirements of BLP has not stopped spam about businesspeople, thought leaders, motivational speakers, etc - which is the second biggest category of spammed subjects. There's also a problem with enforcement - what good is a rule when there aren't enough editors with the patience to enforce it? MER-C 08:03, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I would support a moratorium for new users. And by "new", I mean users with less than 1000 edits and a year of experience. There have to be clear-cut rules to combat this spam avalanche. Individual investigations and case-by-case scenarios are not working. Renata (talk) 09:32, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Hear, hear. Just go to any random stub category about businesses, a good chunk of the entries are WP:CORPSPAM. Of course, moratorium won't fly, but we need more people policing this type of content. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 09:36, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Let's have a bit more clarity here. I start plenty of new pages on historic businesses, and there is no reason for special measures to be taken here. So we are talking about existent businesses. I agree that it needs more people policing the area. I do a bit when I come across it because it really pisses me off. I also do my bit about corporate Wikipedia:Presentism, e.g. when a historically notable building or district is overly presented in terms of its contemporary corporate image and thus obscuring a more important historical narrative.Leutha (talk) 09:55, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'd Oppose any moratorium - we'd be hitting a significant number of editors writing excellent articles and wilfully adding a hole into the encyclopedia. More pragmatically, it would just cause the PR companies to focus on corrupting current business articles, while we wouldn't have any guarantee that genuine editors, deprived of their focus, would shift to counter it. There are absolutely some possible routes, all still very controversial: creation of a business article (not NORG) could be limited to EC editors. Creating EC socks for UPE...individuals... takes much longer. Alternatively, some form of BLP-equivalent is possible "corporate inline sourcing" (CIS), however that would be a staggering task to handle - we'd be overwhelmed. Perhaps require for new articles as a trial, and slowly roll backwards if it works? A sourcing increase short of CIS is one possibility. I specifically refute expansion of DS/GS to cover the whole area. Nosebagbear (talk) 11:04, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Restricting business article creation to extended-confirmed users sounds very promising. – Teratix₵ 12:54, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Question I generally oppose any proposals to create new policy, as I believe the Wiki already resembles Nomic far too much. But in this case, I see a proposal without any backing by metrics. I read new wiki articles every day. When I have free time, I use the "Random Article" button on my mobile. I've read hundreds of articles since the start of the year and not one of them was corpspam. That may be because of the superhuman efforts of the admins, or maybe its just not the problem that is being claimed? Can anyone say, for instance, for every 1000 new articles, how many call into this category? Maury Markowitz (talk)
Very, very rough calculation: ~6,000,000 (articles) ÷ ~24,000 (in Category:Articles with a promotional tone) = 250. 1 in 250 is promotional = 4 in 1000. A substantial amount of articles may be untagged, but this will be offset a bit by articles in the promotional cat not covering businesses. The proportion of spammy articles may also be higher for new articles (and the calculation overlooks articles that are quickly deleted without being tagged). So, on the whole, the ratio is probably a tad higher. For reference, in the same sample of articles you could expect to encounter around one FA and five GAs. – Teratix₵ 13:06, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Useful. I change question to oppose then. I would consider extended-confirmed, but it seems that simply moves the administration load from one place to another, I question whether this would change anything. Maury Markowitz (talk) 13:59, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Today, an article about one of the BBC's 100 Women was deleted. The subject is the executive director of an NGO – Divers Clean Action – which is helping to clean the ocean of plastic waste. Is that the sort of company you want to suppress? If you want to read that article, you'll now have to go to one of Wikipedia's mirrors such as this. This and other cases such as this show that our deletion processes are out of control. I can give lots more examples and they indicate that we need a moratorium on deletions not creations. If all such content is driven elsewhere then this is an existential threat to the project as search engines will always take people to where the content is, not where it isn't. If there's a disreputable company doing bad things then it is better that we cover it in an impartial way rather than readers having to go to a churnalist site or the company's own website. Andrew🐉(talk) 15:14, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
This is well written and merits consideration. Paid editing is a major time sink and distraction for Wikipedia community volunteer engagement, labor, attention, and brain cycles. I have an essay at Wikipedia:Measuring conflict of interest editing on Wikipedia calling for a conversation on the cost to volunteers of dealing with this low quality, low traffic, low impact content which is outside the scope of what volunteers want to support and what readers want to consume. I feel like a discussion on a moratorium should start with some consensus on the the cost of accepting this content. Paid editing is not something that we get for free, but something into which we invest our scarce money and labor. Corporations take undue advantage of this system which we designed for public benefit and general education. There is corporate exploitation here of Wikipedia, and if we had a conversation to determine how much we spend in this sector and compare that to our choices on other investments, then we could have a more informed conversation on how to respond to this exceptionally costly content. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:58, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
A moratorium won't solve the problem, it will just move the paid editors onto biographies of company employees or onto twisting the existing articles of rivals to make the new company seem more favourable. Perhaps we need a business equivalent of WP:BLP. From Hill To Shore (talk) 16:25, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
If the Foundation is willing to take action on our say-so, it makes a lot of sense to ask. I don't see the connection to any moratorium. I do worry that on-wiki anti-spam activities drive away good possible editors interested in areas where spam is a problem more than the effectively control spamming. WilyD 17:20, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The Foundation needs to file a lawsuit. These companies are illegally profiting off of Wikipedia when they violate our ToS. These are literally fraudulent activities conducted to turn a profit. The WMF has every right to sue because that's the only way this type of editing will stop; when there are real monetary penalties to what they're doing. Admittedly this goes against the spirit of the WP:NOLEGALTHREATS policy but in this case these people are no longer editors; they have been permanently banned. They are now vandals actively harming Wikipedia for pay. Grognard Extraordinaire Chess(talk) Ping when replying 19:09, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Restrict article creation to extended confirmed editors forcing new articles to go through AfC before they show up in search results. This would get rid of the worst of the spam that I see at NPP while allowing good faith contributors to keep up what they're doing. buidhe 19:41, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
When it comes to articles on businesses, the community could probably take a leaf out of the medicine WikiProject's books, specifically the WP:MEDRS guideline, which defines which sources are acceptable for medical articles. The obvious goal being to ensure that only accepted scientific information is presented, rather than quack doctors, tabloid (and other media) sensationalism, one-off studies, unproven herbal remedies, or other dubious content which could cause genuine harm to the public if taken as medically accurate. And by and large the guideline works, enforced with zeal by the regulars in that project. Our medical coverage is good and accurate. When it comes to businesses, particularly those that the public might trust with their money or security, we want to similarly present only mainstream accepted information, free from biased coverage, either pro or anti. Of course, even as I write this I realise that the body of research and sourcing on financial topics probably lacks the academic rigour and depth of the medical pantheon. But I'll hit save anyway, as there may be some mileage in tightening sourcing rules on a topic specific basis (and this would be preferable to outlawing new business articles altogether, which just creates an artificial boundary between the crappy content already here and possibly good content that may be written in future ) — Amakuru (talk) 19:44, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
WP:NCORP makes much more sense when you read it as a list of particular spammy nonsense that Wikipedia spammers have tried previously. These spammers are determined and persistent - David Gerard (talk) 20:22, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
One more thing - if we can't deal with the typical Upwork freelance spam, which we can't already and is one level down in sophistication than Status Labs, then our chances of deterring state sponsored disinformation are precisely zero. MER-C 21:05, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Well said, Smallbones. I wonder how the German WP is going with its different approach. I recall that they've historically allowed companies to register a transparent username to edit their own articles. Does that system still protect us from the commercial leaches? Tony(talk) 06:18, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Support. This is a microcosm of democracy and its Achilles heel. Openness and transparency will inevitably be abused by those with the time and money to do so. Idealism becomes self-defeating, because to fight the problem we need resources we just do not have. The pragmatic solution is therefore to retrench. No shame at all in that. On the contrary. Rollo (talk) 07:18, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
We are far too tolerant of dubious sources in business articles. I'm fairly certain that a number of supposedly reliable sources take payments to publish content from PR agencies. When an article about a company based in Dubai is nominated for deletion on 19 January 2020, an Indian newspaper has an article about them on January 27, 2020 5:28 pm (local time, 11:58 UTC). An IP then posts that as a source barely 6 hours later, 17:50 (UTC) But we still consider The Statesman (India) a reliable source. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vexations (talk • contribs) 13:00, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
We should have a much, much higher bar for inclusion. In general, but more so for for-profit organizations, and people. - Nabla (talk) 18:02, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Our problem of promotionalism has not been much with the mighty. The likes of General Motors and Samsung, and their top officers, are clearly notable and carefully watched. Same goes for stars of show business. They have little need for paid promotion and little chance of success with it. The big problem we've been having is with the little ones, the marginal artists, actors, politicians, corporate promoters and such who want to climb to the other side of the margin of name recognition. For those, the risk of bad publicity is minor; they have no reputation to lose and much to gain. A moratorium on new BLP, new corporate articles, new medical procedures would be rather a blunt instrument, depriving us of genuine contributions. Better to apply the principles that propel the existing biographical and medical rules. Jim.henderson (talk) 18:28, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Hooray for the 15th anniversary of this newspaper, The Signpost, which is indeed the achievement of the month! It is not at all to be taken for granted that this valuable internal service has been continued at that high quality standards for all these years. Thank you to the editoring team! - And I do appreciate the critical edge of the editor's campaign against biz spammers and WMF staff members who wash their hands in the manner of Pontius Pilate. We need debates like that again and again. -- Just N. (talk) 22:56, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Justus Nussbaum: On behalf of all Signpost writers, thanks! It is always nice to get a birthday card. This was quite an important issue for us: 6,000,000; WLM; top 50 articles of 2019; ... We got so busy we didn't have time to write up anything for our anniversary, though we did reprint the 10th anniversary article - a history of The Signpost I promise we'll fill in the next 5 years in the next issue. Smallbones(smalltalk) 02:51, 29 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Paid editing is not and never has been a problem. Content in violation of the core pillars of Wikipedia is a big problem, and yes, money can motivate people to edit in their bias, but it's not the only motivator. I have absolutely gutted a lot of one-sided business articles that I'm sure the creator was not paid to write, and I know there is similar cruft in many other areas, like gaming and fan spaces. I don't find it difficult to identify when the writing isn't from a neutral point of view, or the sources are neither reliable nor verifiable. I don't give a rat's patootie why bad articles exist; I try to improve them, and occasionally recommend their deletion. Rather than wringing hands over how to identify and thwart motives (which is not only difficult, but downright Orwellian), the focus should be on editor recruitment. Consensus breeds bureaucracy, which continues to become a larger and more imposing barrier to editing the encyclopedia that anyone can edit. Focus on problems that can be fixed.~TPW 03:06, 30 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
A moratorium is indeed a bad idea. To my opinion, it would be sufficient when admins respond far better on AfDs for spam. Now it is too often that you get a response like "the problem can be solved by normal editing" while that is not the case. In most cases - in my experience - the ones making that claim never alter a letter to make an article less spammy. Effectively, that approach is protecting the spam and spammer. So what I advocate is not a soft approach (fix it though editing), but a hard and sometimes harsh approach towards spam and spammers (blocks, protections, removals). The Bannertalk 17:49, 1 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose we need to solve this instead with a clamp down on RS. We have unofficially implemented a strict RS only policy for Cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, etc and all others that fall under WP:GS/Crypto and it has worked great. I think if we did this for all articles in the business category, it would also solve the problem. Smallbones (talk·contribs) has been around in the crypto space for some time and has seen that it worked. Thanks Jtbobwaysf (talk) 18:23, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
You were one of the editors I was thinking of when I noted that even pro-crypto editors are just sick of the spam. When I explain Wikipedia's practices to outside crypto advocates, I generally include "spammers mean we can't have nice things" - David Gerard (talk) 22:00, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Having contributed a few photos myself, I'm amazed by the quality of the winners. My feeling, however, is that even a poorer-quality photo is better than none. Peter Flass (talk) 23:07, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
In all seriousness, did this interview have to be reclassified as a humour piece? --qedk (t桜c) 16:24, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@QEDK: Replying in all seriousness. I am very much committed to getting a Humor column going in The Signpost. Perhaps this is another failed experiment on my part, but I'm going to keep on trying until enough folks tell me to stop. If anybody wants a shot at writing a humor column, please check in at the submissions page, or the Newsroom talk page, or email me. We were a bit worried that the six-millionth article would not come through before publication, so we looked to alternative stories about 6 million articles that we could run before the actual 6 millionth article, and found the prediction page. From there we got the idea of an interview and got back the funniest response I've seen for a long time. I didn't think it was appropriate for an interview story, which are usually quite serious. So we ended up here. End of serious comment. Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:16, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
No pressure, honestly, I found it to be fresh (a bit less on the humour, but that's just fine). And, fwiw I'm all for the humour column, albeit my tastes lie in obscure xkcd comics and sex experts giving advice to newlyweds on the Sunday edition. Best, qedk (t桜c) 18:27, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Smallbones: I support being classified as humor. better to get a gold star in Hell than a participation trophy in Heaven.Mercurywoodrose (talk) 16:49, 31 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@QEDK: Thanks! It looks like you'd be perfect for the job! I like the xkcd comics that I've seen, and I'd love to get a few of those in The Signpost. But there's so many that I find them hard to pick one and when I did I tried to find the right place to ask for a CC-by license and must have failed (they are now CC-by-NC). Smallbones(smalltalk) 19:49, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Smallbones: Hey Smallbones, long-time listener, first-time caller. I trust you remember me. :-) I've got Randall's contact info somewhere. I'll dig it up and shoot it your way, along with an introduction note. -Philippe (talk) 07:11, 31 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@QEDK: Give it a little time, and Mr. Monroe will likely produce an xkcd comic about the Signpost. Eventually, every Nerd-Adjacent topic will be the subject of an xkcd, and thus inch towards having a wikipedia article about it. Recursion calls.Mercurywoodrose (talk) 16:45, 31 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
All this sounds wonderful to me. If I were to suggest topics for a comic on The Signpost, I'd say look at our last Humour column Jimbo and Larry walk into a bar ..., I particularly like:
What do you call a paid editor who won't accept cash? - A check user.
But maybe I have a different sense of humor than most. Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:00, 31 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That for this, agree completely. Only allowing reliable sources is key to keeping WP high quality. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:56, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That discussion is in a section of reddit (/r/bitcoin) that censors posts that are critical of the BTC flavor of bitcoin, and blocks many critics (like me) from posting. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 00:39, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Am I the only one who finds it ironic how you point out that ever having owned a cryptocurrency is a conflict of interest but for some reason your extremely biased and negative view, painting the entire cryptosphere as cultists, scammers and shills while praising r/Buttcoin, is no problem at all? In my opinion it's this kind of stuff that gives Wikipedia a bad reputation and makes newcomers feel not welcome here. Should WP:RS be enforced and spam be minimized? Of course! Just like for any other article on WP. Doesn't mean it's necessary to take a big dump on the entire topic... SPLETTE :]How's my driving? 20:41, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It is indeed the case that not being an advocate of a subject does not count as a conflict of interest, but literally having a financial interest in your hodling going up does. Your surprise at this is a problem with you, not with WP:COI. Also given I don't advertise my stuff at Wikipedia - I have a link on my user page, and I linked my article on Libra in an RS at Talk:Libra (digital currency), but that's the grand total. I know it's a standard thing that keeps on happening, but I'm perpetually amazed at advocates of fringe areas, like cryptocurrency, who seriously think that only advocates should be allowed to write about their favourite thing on Wikipedia. You'd almost think their main interest was promotion of their favourite thing, not Wikipedia - David Gerard (talk) 23:03, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It is indeed the case that not being an advocate of a subject does not count as a conflict of interest A conflict of interest arises whenever a person's role as a Wikipedia editor comes into conflict with some other external role. It's the potential for having this battle of roles from within the editor themself — a battle which can tax an editor's perception and judgement (both of which are indispensible attributes for contemplating article quality) — these should be the only criteria for when a COI exists. Regards, Spintendo 02:10, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
There are plenty of crypto people who seem literally unable to understand that Wikipedia actually hates spam, and try to make out there's a conspiracy going on. They didn't contact me for that piece, you'll be amazed to hear - David Gerard (talk) 18:36, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry to be late, but is "hodlings" a typo? AnonMoos (talk) 22:50, 25 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The heading "New Wikipedia Visual Design" is misleading. It implies that the design firm has been hired to revise the user interface ("visual design") of Wikipedia. In fact, the firm has been been hired to help with "research on the state of Wikimedia brands." The deliverables are "Brand research and positioning analysis", "Brand strategy documents", and "Brand voice & messaging guidelines".
The leadership of the Wikimedia Foundation appears to have concluded that "Wikimedia" has very low brand recognition, while "Wikipedia" is the opposite. The solution, one gets the sense, is to add "Wikipedia" (somehow) to all the brands of the foundation, including the foundation itself. So, for example, "Wikipedia Foundation", "Wikipedia Wikisource", and "Wikipedia Commons". [And no, none of this has been openly declared; I'm reading between the lines.] -- John Broughton(♫♫) 04:06, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That Crypto article did make me chuckle, though I couldn't determine if curry-eating was intended as a negative or a positive. Nosebagbear (talk) 11:50, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Re Beware of malware above, a few days ago I replaced links on allegedly-poisoned web site kodak-worldDOTcom with its archive version and/or the the artist's current official web site on the Russian and other affected Wikipedias' articles for en:Kodak Black, specifically uk, pending change, fr, and ru. I may have missed one, so it would probably be a good idea if someone could scan all articles on all wikis for mention of the allegedly-poisoned site. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 22:52, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
“Wikimedia" has very low brand recognition, while "Wikipedia" is the opposite. This indeed is my experience. Talking with fellow fans of bicycling, astronomy, photography, trains, whatever, everybody knows what Wikipedia is except the ones who think we are Wikileaks. Only insiders ever heard of Wikimedia. “I wanted to contribute to Wikipedia but somehow it came up as Wikimedia so I stopped. Did some scammer use a similar name trying to cheat me?” When telling newbies how to upload their pictures I get “Eh? I’m trying to put a picture into Wikipedia. Is this Wikimedia Commons the wrong thing?” Think how much confusion arises when I’m not there to explain. So, yes, WMF ought to rename as WPF, and WM Commons ought to rename to WP Commons because outsiders have reason to deal with those entities. Those bits of the WM empire that want to be completely inward facing and unknown to the general public should continue using a name that confuses, mystifies, and repels ignorant curiosity. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jim.henderson (talk • contribs) 00:23, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Reaching a whopping 6 million article milestone is a fabulous extraordinary team effort. It was achieved just eight days after 19th anniversary of the Wikipedia. Congrats to experienced editor Rosie who is also a valuable prominent member of Women in Red campaign for creating milestone article Maria Elise Turner Lauder which is surely the talk of the town. Hope Wikipedia will break more records like this in the future. Abishe (talk) 03:26, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The note about Citizendium reminds me of Churchill's quote about democracy: "No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.…" for which you can substitute "wikipedia" for "democracy" and "encyclopedia" for "government". Nigej (talk) 08:56, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I think some of the words in Rosietep's statment should be blue linked, especially where she refers to "this list". --LukeSurltc 13:13, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Rosiestep has made a real difference to WP. Tony(talk) 06:20, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
’’Decided by consensus.’’ Well, I guess that is a good deal shorter than ‘’Selected tendentiously out of several possible candidates, since we don’t really know which was the actual six millionth, and want to pick one that checks off all the right boxes’’, but a good deal less honest as well.
A honest representative article, though, might have been about somebody’s favorite Pokemon, so maybe this is the lesser evil. Qwirkle (talk) 05:44, 30 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you Rosiestep! This has warmed my encyclopedic heart. ~Kvng (talk) 16:02, 1 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The WMF spouts this corporate nonsense but I'm glad Signpost mirrors it here so it can be openly criticized, unlike what happens in WMF-run spaces. I would hope WMF would build the capacity to be honest for once, and stop running the scary fundraising pitches every Christmas season, or perhaps recognize that they are not a grant-making tech company. WMF talks about motivations, but they block our admins out of process, ignore the community's complaints, and they can't even be bothered to thank contributors once a year. I think the home office ought to really think about how money has corrupted each and every one of them. Chris Troutman (talk) 17:13, 30 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Born 1937! I thought Brian was a year younger than I am (b. 1952), and – wicked old creature – he didn't disabuse me of this error. He certainly didn't look like 1937 vintage, as anyone who met him in recent years will surely agree. And meeting him was such a treat. He was a member of Middlesex CCC, and I cherish the memory of him absenting himself from a county match at Lord's to join me for a long lunch at an Italian restaurant in St John's Wood High Street. There were other convivial and fairly disgraceful outings, too, though one often met him en route to or coming back from visiting ailing old friends. As for his contributions to Wikipedia, the word "incomparable" cannot be avoided – not only his 100+ featured articles, but his year-in-year-out encouragement, guidance and kindness when reviewing other editors' articles. Not that "kindness" meant any diminution of his rigorous standards. I once suggested that an FAC article on some sporting topic or other might be permitted a less elevated standard of prose than those on more intellectual subjects and BB gently ticked me off for sloppy thinking. He was right of course. Several of us have put his FAs on our watchlists and will strive to preserve his matchless articles in good order. He leaves a magnificent legacy, but he leaves a BB-shaped gap too, and he will be missed so much by countless people here, including Tim riley talk 23:41, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'm happy that we did indeed get out 6 millionth article! I also got "attacked" by 4 golden retriever puppies, which was a very adorable menace, albeit less Wikipedia-oriented! Nosebagbear (talk) 12:01, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'm happy to have discovered Saul Bass through a well-written and engaging page on en.wikipedia. And I'm happy my spouse (a non-wikipedian) told me "Well, why don't you thank the person who wrote it?". The page has a robust edit history, I'm hoping my comment on the talk page thanking everyone will be seen as an expression of wikilove, not a disruptive use of the page! Robincantin (talk) 16:06, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Whilst it was pleasing to have got through my 'Request for Adminship' this week, what has actually made me really happy is the humour that can sometimes spontaneously occur between editors who have never met one another, except here on Wikipedia. I keep going back to this particular interchange between myself and Cullen328 for a really good chuckle. (We are not vastly dissimilar in age.) The thread is entitled:"Sheesh! I heard RFA could be a vicious place, but you've stooped so low!". I'd like to think that someone else finds it at least mildly amusing. Nick Moyes (talk) 21:20, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
News cycles and the 6 million article milestone[edit]
In case anyone wonders about this, "On the bright side" and What's making you happy this week? have weekly cycles that start at 0:01 UTC on Sundays, while current schedule for The Signpost calls for publication on the last Saturday of the month. The six millionth article was published on 23 January, which was after that week's WMYHTW had been published to Wikimedia-l and the corresponding content was in this Signpost issue's "On the bright side". The next issue of "On the bright side" in The Signpost will include coverage of the 6 million article milestone that is similar to this WMYHTW email that User:Clovermoss sent to Wikimedia-l. ↠Pine(✉) 04:48, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
From the Murić et al. "Collaboration Drives Individual Productivity" (or as above, "People tend to do more when collaborating with more people") paper: a "Project is either a repository on GitHub or a page on Wikipedia." So editors who edit pages edited by more editors tend to edit more pages. Perhaps causation flows from editing more pages to editing pages edited by more editors, instead of the other way around as stated in the third paragraph of the conclusion without any causal analysis in support. (I.e., individual productivity drives collaboration instead.) EllenCT (talk) 03:51, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Good point, EllenCT. This is one of the reasons edit-a-thons have been so great. = paul2520 (talk) 20:03, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Paul2520: Yes that makes sense if the causation flows from collaboration to productivity as the authors state. But this is one of those frustrating papers that spends a lot of redundant effort demonstrating the correlation without analyzing the causation. It's so ripe for a senior or graduate level paper on causal research which is so often neglected. I'm going to show it to WT:WPSTATS and see if someone wants to try that. EllenCT (talk) 23:07, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That's a lot to digest! Bearian (talk) 14:32, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Many technical articles on Wikipedia have the problems identified in the Opportunistic Learning piece. Good general suggestions for improvements. I'm especially active in removing tangential information, fixing terminology issues and improving leads. ~Kvng (talk) 14:40, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
"Familiarity of content" is not generally compatible with "flexibility and innovation." If the mobile site and apps are not "geared towards today's internet users" then what would be? EllenCT (talk) 03:21, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
This essay put into well written words a few concerns I've had. The scarcity of volunteer time as a solution: "On Wikipedia, the solution is to throw volunteers at it until it is fixed, somehow, eventually...Crowdsourcing isn't the reason Wikipedia succeeded and we can't simply throw it at every problem as if it were magic." And the fact that we have a lot of bureaucracy and can't necessarily tap into more volunteers to fix what ills us: "Over the last two decades, however, Wikipedia's institutional culture has exchanged flexibility for bureaucracy and established volunteers have set themselves up as the new gatekeepers. Collectively they form a Team Encarta stifling innovation in favor of ossification." I'm glad the Signpost was able to secure the right to publish this. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 03:38, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
One thing I noticed teaching undergraduates about Wikipedia was how intimidating they found the markup. Back in the late 1990s an early 2000s, people used to often view the markup of web pages they visited. Today all you'll see is a mass of Javascript and CSS. Hawkeye7(discuss) 04:25, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It's not just a matter of attracting new editors, we need editors of the "correct" type. Attracting dogmatic editors, unable to compromise, will get us nowhere. We need editors who are prepared to accept the "consensus" aspect of Wikipedia. Similarly we already have editors that have a negative impact on the project, by driving well-meaning editors away. Nigej (talk) 09:13, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Great article! I think it makes a good case for the necessity of the WP:Welcoming committee. That project, while vitally important, unfortunately does not seem to be active enough or to have the boldness that would be needed to make meaningful positive change. For instance, I recently pointed out that the standard welcome message currently points new users to four different introductions/tutorials with tons of overlap and four different places to seek help, creating choice paralysis and contributing to the sense that WP is a labyrinth. However, I haven't gotten any responses (positive or negative) to a proposed alternative. I also haven't seen any indication that bigger changes such as making the Visual Editor the default for new users are coming any time soon. Sorry for plugging my own comments, but I think some more attention to this area by people who care about expanding WP's user base could really be useful for fostering innovation and fighting back against the phenomenon Fernandez pinpoints so well in this essay. Sdkb (talk) 10:58, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
What an excellent article. It has caused at least one editor to take a good, hard look at how they interact on Wikipedia, especially with regards to consensus building and citing of policy. Should be compulsory reading for all "experienced editors". Gog the Mild (talk) 13:26, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Quite a nice article! I think it is a good and appropriately sombre expression of problems that many have recognized. Not knowing what else will be in the book, I don't want to make too big a fuss about what additional topics could or should have been included in this particular essay. (Women in Red?) My only nit to pick is about "Eternal September": as I understand it, that term does not refer to students overwhelming Usenet at the beginning of term. Rather, it refers to AOL offering Usenet access to its subscribers, resulting in a rush of new users that did not abate, like what happened at the beginning of every school year but without respite — thus, the September that never ended. XOR'easter (talk) 18:00, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Glad to see the term "jalt". Some days I wonder if I'm the only person to notice this effect on other Wikipedians as their attitude devolves in steps from enthusiastic & altruistic volunteer to the final stage of a problematic individual about to be banned from the project. (Of course, not all go thru this devolution: some leave Wikipedia for one of the other projects, where there is not as much interaction with others. And some oscillate back & forth, from frustration over matters such as having to provide their own materials to write articles while WMF collect living wages for doing not obviously improving anything, to indifference or stoicism over matters as a while, then back to frustration.) -- llywrch (talk) 22:03, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
"Jalt" is an interesting concept. Would like to see more exploration around the insight that initial altruism can become a sense of entitlement, and discussion about how this plays out with capacity building. If we want volunteers to be effective as outreach ambassadors, we need to ensure that highly committed volunteers are supported and recognized, not simply exploited. We might want to reconsider how we view things like transit fare, a souvenir mug or T-shirt, providing more scholarships, including partial support for attending events, support for purchase of reference materials for article writing, etc. We also need to ask ourselves some tough questions about the different outcomes in this community, where one subset of editors gets trolled and doxxed, another subset lives in isolation (or even poverty) due to internet/Wiki addiction, and meanwhile, other editors leverage interaction with Wikipedia into paid careers, lucrative business, professional, and academic opportunities, and fame. Oliveleaf4 (talk) 14:32, 1 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It is no accident that the text-heavy interface of today's Wikipedia looks much like it did in 2001 and is not geared towards today's internet users; it is a direct result of this resistance to change and innovation." One of my interests is adding photos and images to articles. Wikipedia is text-heavy because so many photo sites and photographers seem to want to copyright everything. It was because of this that every photo I take is licensed under creative commons. We need more freely-available photographs. Peter Flass (talk) 23:25, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I think the issue is that precisely the factors that Hill identifies as being the foundation for Wikipedia's success are also large contributors to its culture. The lack of ownership leads to decentralized, fragmented discussions and control by the so-called "obsessives." And as EllenCT suggests, the fact that everybody has a common notion of what an encyclopedia is means that anything that looks different is viewed with suspicion. So if those really are the things that made us successful, I don't know if there's an easy way to embrace the sort of change you want without giving them up. —Emufarmers(T/C) 05:00, 29 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
This is an excellent article – thanks to Robert for writing it and the Signpost for publishing it. If the rest of the Wikipedia@20 book is like this then I shall be getting a copy. To confront the "asshole consensus", please consider another book: The No Asshole Rule. Wikipedia has some rules of this sort, such as WP:CIVIL, but enforcement has been patchy. But currently there are three admins before Arbcom for being too obnoxious. The outcomes of those cases will be a sign of the times ... Andrew🐉(talk) 20:36, 29 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Andrew Davidson, some of those admins may not have been as obnoxious as your opinion portrays them - let Arbcom decide on that; some may have contributed significantly to what Wikipedia is today, in other ways than prolific creation of content, while other users have systematically contributed with impunity for years to making RfA the toxic process it has become. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 05:02, 1 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Well written, it's nice to see such a critical article, even though I disagree with a lot of the points made. Wikipedia's stable interface is effective and accessible even on modest computers, and many people (myself included) from the traditional open-source culture view the idea that interfaces need to constantly replaced as a form of consumerism and also counter-productive, in that it forces people to continuously re-learn how to do the same thing, fuelling the planned obsolescence and throw-away society culture associated with the rapid obsolescence of computers that aren't expected to do any more than they did two decades ago. In fact, I have been editing wikipedia on a iMac G4 for almost fifteen years now. Wikipedia's modest interface is accessible from text-mode browsers such as w3m and lynx, which run effectively on devices from 20 years ago. Flashy interfaces also usually require JavaScript, which is refused by many people for many reasons. [1][2]. Further, the syntax is extremely fast, flexible, and powerful to work with once you're experienced. Some computer science experts view user friendliness in tools as a weakness, since all tools must be learned. The juice (utility) of must be worth the squeeze (learning curve). Modern interfaces are often less useful than their uglier predecessors [3]. Concussious (talk) 02:26, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I also treasure the fact that it's possible to easily contribute to Wikipedia on a low-spec computer or a non-flagship smartphone. Wikipedia and wikicode's minimalist low-tech nature and resistance to change means that it has dodged the framework inflation which plagues all the trendy Web 2.0 interaction methods. After suffering through the loading hell and bloat on every household-name social media website it's refreshing to deal with an actually responsive (and not in the web design weasel sense of the word) article editing form. True, we're losing some potential editors by not having a trendy interface to compete with Facebook and Instagram, but we'd be losing some other editors if we had that, and let's face it, people active on such websites aren't particularly interested in writing an encyclopedia. Moreover, it's a well known fact in advertising that people distrust the slick and the neat. We could lose readers not only by fumbling the design, but also by being too good at it. I fancy we've actually done a much better job at this than we think. DaßWölf 18:41, 29 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I just heard something about this on On the Media regarding the "retro" interface of Craigslist [1]. It also happens to combat self-selection of folks with high-end computing devices, i.e. systemic bias here. ☆ Bri (talk) 00:06, 1 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]
You're presenting a false dilemma. There can be more than one editing interface. The simple fact is my parents might have some useful contributions they could make, but they are never ever going to understand wikitext, period. You're implying a WYSIWYG editor is merely a "trendy" thing, rather than something that enables an enormous portion of humanity to do something they simply can't otherwise. (There's a reason computers didn't become something everyone used daily until GUIs became widespread.) Try to edit in wikitext without using your eyes and/or hands sometime, something that some people are unable to do! (Amazingly, some people can edit this way, but it's quite a challenge.) Your attitude is basically what the essay is criticizing: "If people have issues contributing to the project as it is now, too bad. Buzz off; you obviously have nothing useful to add." --47.146.63.87 (talk) 04:48, 5 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia already has a WYSIWYG editor and even a more user-friendly wikitext editor. Judging from a look at recent changes, they together constitute a little under 10% of edits. I don't see either Concussious or me claiming that WYSIWYG cannot coexist with wikitext. We all seem to agree here that many people need more friendly means of editing and WP needs their contributions. There is however a disturbing trend of websites removing functionality in the opposite manner (I find myself more often than not confronted with the same attitude you confer when hoping to interact on Web 2.0 websites). Let's not forget that WP has not only become one of the world's most-visited websites, but has also single-handedly killed the for-profit encyclopedia market, while relying on wikitext in the face of VisualEditor and even longstanding rich text technologies like WordPress. DaßWölf 23:58, 5 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, sorry, I might have misunderstood you a little. I wonder how many "non-regulars" are drawn to the other editors. I've read anecdotes that a lot of people don't realize they could edit Wikipedia. Seems like this area could be helped by some research. --47.146.63.87 (talk) 07:02, 7 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]
An interesting article. I agree that ease of editing was a factor, but another thing which I think helped Wikipedia become the dominant online encyclopedia is its democracy. Even in the early days, the copyleft meant that the editors could fork it, so no-one could take it over or take it in a direction most of the editors did not want. HLHJ (talk) 04:47, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Concussious has an excellent point here. The fact that Wikipedia isn't the next incarnation of FaceTwitTube is a feature, not a bug. It is better to have an interface that is powerful, flexible, and portable, than one which is pretty. Now, of course, if we can add functionality without damaging that core, by all means. The article is inaccurate in that regard. The community did not object to Visual Editor and MediaViewer on principle, but rather because they were not yet sufficiently developed for use. Once those problems were fixed, community consensus was sought to enable those tools, and was obtained with relatively little fuss. So the objection wasn't "We never want this", it was "This is not yet ready for production use". So far as why Superprotect is still brought up, well, WMF can say all they want that they learned their lesson, but then...Oops! They did it again! (And the issues with a WMF overbearing attitude began even before those issues, too.) Once they demonstrate, by keeping hands off, that they actually learned from those mistakes, trust can be rebuilt. That will take time. SeraphimbladeTalk to me 04:08, 4 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
A bit late to the party, unfortunately, because this is a very thought provoking article. Many thanks to Robert Fernandez for writing this up. I don't know if Mr. Fernandez is one of WP's entrenched regulars, but if not I applaud even more his effort to come in and start the discussion. I spend fairly little time on WP compared to the majority of people commenting here, yet it still seems that I'm always running into the same people on Wikipedia, including Signpost bylines.
I absolutely agree that we need more non-asshole voices to break down the asshole consensus. However, I think some of this problem is not an avoidable behaviour problem among the self-selected regulars, as much as it is WP's spontaneous way of doing necessary HR work. The are many problems we don't have to deal with because we aren't an organisation with stratification via ranks, roles and seniority, but there are still those at which we can't wave the "we're a community" magic wand, and some people end up effectively volunteering to fill the role of the HR. (I'm not thrilled about people self-selecting for this role, but I'm also not thrilled about WMF -- despite it being one of the more competent organisations out there -- appointing its own for this job.) How good a job are these people doing? How do we judge what's necessary HR work and what's gatekeeping and acting out personal whims? A confounding factor is that by nature of their work, HR people always end up perceived as assholes. DaßWölf 18:41, 29 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Could someone please try to fix the fact that the page is made several times longer by the narrowness of the "About" column? Ionmars10 (talk) 02:56, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Ionmars10: I made it wider, hope this works better for readers now. ☆ Bri (talk) 02:15, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I think the authors are underestimating how controversial and polarizing puppies can be! Either way, excellent write-up and a really interesting list. I expected more Bollywood, if I'm being honest. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 12:25, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
If you are so inclined, please feel more than welcome to request a WikiProject interview below! Thanks for reading, Puddleglum 2.0 04:07, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
there are a fair number of editors who have to be reminded that sources are not required to be in English
@Nihonjoe, I sympathize. What do you think about adding a reminder of this and recommended search engines to the AfD {{delsort}} tag for countries like Japan? czar 17:43, 1 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
