Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/2013-02-11/News and notes

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  • and yet, the Gibraltar related DYKs persist on the mainpage. i wonder how much Bamkin would charge to instruct me on how to effectively exploit the main page for profit. 174.141.213.12 (talk) 07:06, 13 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thanks for this article Ed - I found the report heavy going and gave up, but you've provided a good summary of what non-WMUK people need to know (and, of course, this experience is relevant to the other Wikimedia associations). Nick-D (talk) 07:52, 13 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • Thanks Nick. I focused on the conflict of interest parts of the report because I felt even a summary of everything in there would be heavy reading. :-) Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 08:09, 13 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • To the best of my knowledge, WMUK doesn't do monthly reports to the Foundation. --RexxS (talk) 14:50, 13 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Working Paper – Descriptive Chronology on Conflicts of Interest (Governance Review of Wikimedia UK)
      • It's on pp. 20–21 of the Descriptive Chronology that was released along with the review: "We have not found any explicit mention of any potential conflicts in the monthly reports the UK chapter submitted to the Wikimedia Foundation between the beginning of the year and August 2012, nor specific mention at the time of the resignation of Roger Bamkin as Chair." --Andreas JN466 20:00, 13 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • Looks like Compass got that wrong then. --RexxS (talk) 20:52, 13 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Five days ago, when WMUK was soliciting community input, I asked some fairly straightforward questions about wikitown projects on the Meta page set up for discussion of the report. Stevie Benton of WMUK told me "I'll take a look at your questions and will answer them if I'm able. If I'm not, I'll see if I can prompt someone who can". That was three days ago. WMUK staff and trustees have posted on the page since then, but no one seems to be addressing my query. The questions aren't very difficult and I would expect any of the trustees to be able to answer them without difficulty. This isn't the first time that I have tried to find out something which should be easily available information -- the status of a "memorandum of understanding" with Monmouthshire County Council -- and been met with less than "transparency and openness". See for example User_talk:Jimbo_Wales/Archive_117#WMF_involvement_with_Gibraltarpedia and User_talk:Jimbo_Wales/Archive_118#WMUK_and_Mounmouthshire_County_Council_Memorandum_of_Understanding. The Compass Partnership report makes some excellent recommendations, but there needs to be a change of culture at WMUK. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 18:05, 13 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  • See also Wikipediocracy's reporting on the topic. Cla68 (talk) 22:37, 13 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I sincerely hope that future US and Canadian regional or state/province chapters will learn from the mistakes made by the WMUK, and that the WMF will invest more in helping these groups avoid scandal. Well-meaning people can sometimes end up hurting their own cause, or in some cases be led astray by seemingly nice people who have ulterior motives. --SB_Johnny | talk✌ 01:12, 14 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • If it's any help to Delicious carbuncle, the WMUK minutes of 26 July 2012 (at wmuk:Minutes 26Jul12 ) pretty much summarise the present situation with the MOUs, Chepstowpedia, and so on, because all of those issues he is concerned about were more or less 'frozen' soon after that time and certainly before the next board meeting. Now that we have the Governance Review and the QRpedia agreement, it would probably be reasonable to review all those issues in the light of lessons learned. I very much doubt that there is any appetite for rushing into any of that though. --RexxS (talk) 03:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • I've seen that and it's no help at all. In fact, I think it may be at odds with later statements. I'm still waiting for someone to answer some rather simple and not unreasonable questions. It is puzzling to me why it seems so difficult to get answers, and even more puzzling to me that dues-paying members of WMUK would accept such behaviour from the management and board of WMUK. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 03:37, 14 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Ongoing Gibraltarpedia hooks on the main page[edit]

Note that Gibraltarpedia hooks have never stopped, except for a brief period in September and early October.

Overall, the main page has seen the following monthly numbers of Gibraltarpedia hooks:

  • July: 7
  • August: 17
  • September: 12
  • October: 11
  • November: 13
  • December: 8
  • January: 12
  • February to date: 6

For a list of recent Gibraltar hooks, see Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know/Gibraltar-related_DYKs#List_of_Gibraltarpedia_hooks_November_through_February.

Since October, when Gibraltar hooks were resumed after a three-week gap, Gibraltar hooks have been subject to special rules (for example, limiting them to one a day, and requiring two reviewers). As can be seen from the above figures, they have continued to be a regular feature on the main page. In fact, The Register reported today that they have readers writing in who have spotted the latest "Gibraltar plug" on the Wikipedia main page.

Even so, there is currently an RfC on a DYK subpage discussing whether the special rules for Gibraltar hooks should be waived, e.g. to allow more than one Gibraltar hook per day on the main page: Wikipedia talk:Did you know/Gibraltar-related DYKs. It seems crazy to me, but there you go. Andreas JN466 01:24, 14 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

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