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Welcome to the 42nd edition of my talk page. Please leave me a message below and I will generally reply on your talk page. Although my email address is enabled, I do not check often (so I may be slow in replying to email and very much prefer to have conversations here). I am not around much, so it may take me a while to reply or respond to requests. Please note that while I will do a peer review on just about any article if asked, it will often take me a week or more, and I do not have the time to do copyedits. If you want me to review an article, please open a peer review on it first. Thanks for stopping by and happy editing!Ruhrfisch_><>°^°21:25, 31 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

• Census QuickFacts
• Social Capital Variables Spreadsheet for 2014, PennState College of Agricultural Sciences, Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development
• Social Capital Project: Social Capital Index Data spreadsheet accompanying the U.S. Congress, Joint Economic Committee, Social Capital Project. “The Geography of Social Capital in America.” Report prepared by the Vice Chairman’s staff, 115th Cong., 2nd Sess. (April 2018)
• Religious statistics by county
• PeakVisor, search for "X County" to find high points in a county
• ebird, gives bird species lists for each county
• Midwest Herbaria, search to generate plant species lists for each county
• Mycoportal, search to generate fungus and bryophyte species lists
• NASS QuickStats database, gives agricultural figures by county for many data points
• bestplaces.net--Epiphyllumlover (talk)21:32, 31 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hello,Ruhrfisch,

I still can't quite figure out what happened with all of your recent moves of archived user talk pages but between yesterday and today I have deleted 88 pages of broken redirects for some nonexistent user account,User:Archive 41, that led to or from your archived talk pages. Since you are an admin, you could have deleted them yourself or at least tagged them for deletion. Check mydeletion log for archived user talk page under your username or the Archive 41 username. You moved the same pages 3 or 4 times, I think you should have known by not leaving a redirect in the final move that all of those pages created in earlier, incorrect moves would be turned into broken redirects. User pages that are broken redirects are not handled by a bot but must be deleted by an admin.

I guess I'm just saying, please do not do this again! Thanks.Liz^Read!Talk!02:35, 2 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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

Administrator changes Dreamy Jazz •Newslinger •Rosguill Deor •Spartaz •Xeno Angusmclellan •clpo13 •Edgar181 •Matthewedwards •NCurse

CheckUser changes Bradv •Casliber •David Fuchs •Maxim •Newyorkbrad •SoWhy •Xeno Oversight changes Bradv •Casliber •DGG •David Fuchs •Maxim •Newyorkbrad •SoWhy •Xeno Someguy1221

Guideline and policy news

• Arequest for comment asks whetherpartial blocks should be enabled on the English Wikipedia. If enabled, this functionality would allow administrators to block users from editing specific pages or namespaces, rather than the entire site.
• Aproposal asks whether admins who don't use their tools for a significant period of time (e.g. five years) should have the toolset procedurally removed.
• Following asuccessful RfC, a whitelist is now available for users whoseredirects will be autopatrolled by a bot, removing them from thenew pages patrol queue. Admins can add such users toWikipedia:New pages patrol/Redirect whitelist after a discussion following the guidelines atWikipedia talk:New pages patrol/Redirect whitelist.

Arbitration

• Thefourth case on Palestine-Israel articles wasclosed. The case consolidated all previous remedies under one heading, which should make them easier to understand, apply, and enforce. In particular, the distinction between "primary articles" and "related content" has been clarified, with the former beingthe entire set of articles whose topic relates to the Arab-Israeli conflict, broadly interpreted rather thanreasonably construed.
• Following the2019 Arbitration Committee elections, the following editors have been appointed to the Arbitration Committee:Beeblebrox,Bradv,Casliber,David Fuchs,DGG,KrakatoaKatie,Maxim,Newyorkbrad,SoWhy,Worm That Turned,Xeno.

Miscellaneous

• This issue marks three full years of theAdmin newsletter. Thanks for reading!

I just read a review you performed atTalk:Avery Coonley School#FAC suggestions ("Ruhrfisch comments") almost 10 years ago and wish I would have seen it a long time ago. I do a lot of maintenance on lower class articles to work them in a direction that may allow a better class assessment. I do a lot of work in the appendices sections and noted your comments"Usually Notes are separated from References by a (sub)header of some sort". While we have many ways to present an article I have noted some have started using full sections for those related to "References". A "Bibliography" section or sub-section has been used within the "References" section instead of "Works cited" or "References cited" and I have been making changes perMOS:NOTES. It is a small change but with valid reasoning that is largely unopposed.

Anyway, I enjoyed reading your detailed suggestions and will dissect some of it for future use. Thanks,Otr500 (talk)07:07, 31 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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

Administrator changes Ergo Sum •Nick Moyes •QEDK •Wugapodes Dennis Brown Aude •BrownHairedGirl •CALR •Jengod •John Reaves •J.smith •Kim Dent-Brown •K1Bond007 •MECU •Refdoc •RHaworth

CheckUser changes Opabinia regalis •Premeditated Chaos Interface administrator changes Ragesoss

Guideline and policy news

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

Technical news

• Twinkle now supportspartial blocking. There is a small checkbox that toggles the "partial" status for both blocks and templating. There is currently one template:{{uw-pblock}}.
• When trying to move a page, if the target title already exists then a warning message is shown. The warning message will now include a link to the target title.[1]

Arbitration

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

Miscellaneous

• Voting in the2020 Steward elections will begin on 08 February 2020, 14:00 (UTC) and end on 28 February 2020, 13:59 (UTC). Theconfirmation process of current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automaticallycheck your eligibility to vote.
• The English Wikipedia has reachedsix million articles. Thank you everyone for your contributions!

This is to let you know that the above article has been scheduled astoday's featured article for March 19, 2020. Please check the article needs no amendments. If you're interested in editing the main page text, you're welcome to do so atWikipedia:Today's featured article/March 19, 2020.—Wehwalt (talk)20:40, 24 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I logged onto wikiepdia today for the first time in a few weeks and was happy to see this article as the featured article. Congratulations.Gerry D (talk)03:00, 19 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks so much - I'm pretty sure you're the one who found the photo on the Main Page (from Nicholas T on Flickr) plus help with reviewing it back in the day. Hope you're doing well in this weird time.Ruhrfisch_><>°^°04:03, 19 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for a lovely article! --Gerda Arendt (talk)07:31, 19 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

You're very welcome - thanks for letting me knowRuhrfisch_><>°^°12:42, 19 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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

Administrator changes Money emoji Athaenara •DeltaQuad Fishhead64 •Kudpung •Mikaey Bureaucrat changes DeltaQuad

CheckUser changes DeltaQuad Oversight changes DeltaQuad

Guideline and policy news

• Following anRfC, the blocking policy was changed to state that sysopsmust not undo or alter CheckUser or Oversight blocks, rather thanshould not.
• Arequest for comment confirmed that sandboxes of established but inactive editors may not be blanked due solely to inactivity.

Technical news

• Following adiscussion, Twinkle's default CSD behavior will soon change, most likely this week. After the change, Twinkle will default to "tagging mode" if there isno CSD tag present, and default to "deletion mode" if thereis a CSD tag present. You will be able to always default to "deletion mode" (the current behavior) using yourTwinkle preferences.

Miscellaneous

• Following the2020 Steward Elections, the following editors have been appointed as stewards:BRPever,Krd,Martin Urbanec,MusikAnimal,Sakretsu,Sotiale, andTks4Fish. There are a total of seven editors that have been appointed as stewards, the most since 2014.
• The 2020 appointees for theOmbudsman commission areAjraddatz andUzoma Ozurumba; they will serve for one year.

Hi Ruhrfish: Good to see you back! I always know, when I see a covered bridge article on the main page, that it's going to be one of yours. ;)MeegsC (talk)21:39, 19 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks MeegsC, it feels good to be doing more here.Ruhrfisch_><>°^°22:24, 19 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I've got what I think is highly helpful information I want to add to an article, but need someone who understands Wikipedia, science, prudent safety consideration, & how to collaborate. And willing to search through data & such for the next while. And having OneNote 2010 would really help! I've collected a lot of linked information!I’m feeling the urgency to get the info out. Need help & it looked like you might have relevant experience! I'll keep looking for others, too. I’m super-green at Wikipedia, so please forgive if I’m using wrong channels to contact!Please let me know as soon as you can!! Thanks!Field In (talk)10:59, 23 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Wanted to update that I've posted additions on the Chlorine Dioxide and Sodium Chlorite pages, helped by advice you gave. (Thanks!) If you have any addiitional suggestions, please let me know  :-)— Precedingunsigned comment added byField In (talk •contribs)16:41, 28 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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

Administrator changes Cabayi •Lee Vilenski Boing! said Zebedee Jonny-mt •MarkGallagher •PeaceNT Money emoji →Moneytrees Bureaucrat changes SilkTork •WereSpielChequers

CheckUser changes NativeForeigner Oversight changes Someguy1221 Daniel Case

Guideline and policy news

• There is anongoing request for comment to streamline the source deprecation and blacklisting process.

Technical news

• There is a plan fornew requirements for user signatures. You cangive feedback.

Arbitration

• Following thebanning of an editor by the WMF last year, the Arbitration Committeeresolved to hold aArbcom RfC regarding on-wiki harassment. A draft RfC has been posted atWikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Anti-harassment RfC (Draft) and not open to comments from the community yet. Interested editors can comment on the RfC itself on its talk page.

Miscellaneous

• The WMF has begun apilot report of the pages most visited through various social media platforms to help with anti-vandalism and anti-disinformation efforts. Thereport is updated daily and will be available through the end of May.

Hello, Ruhrfisch. Please check your email; you've got mail!
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You canremove this notice at any time by removing the{{You've got mail}} or{{ygm}} template.

Smallbones_(smalltalk)04:10, 21 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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

Administrator changes

Gnangarra •Kaisershatner •Malcolmxl5

CheckUser changes

Callanecc

Oversight changes

HJ Mitchell

Guideline and policy news

• Discretionary sanctions have beenauthorized for all pages and edits related to COVID-19, to be logged atWP:GS/COVID19.
• Following arecent discussion on Meta-Wiki, theedit filter maintainer global group has been created.
• Arequest for comment has been proposed to create a newmain page editor usergroup.
• Arequest for comment has been proposed to make thebureaucrat activity requirements more strict.

Technical news

• TheEditing team has been working onthe talk pages project. You canreview the proposed design and share your thoughts on the talk page.
• Enterprisey created a script that will show a link to the proper Special:Undelete page when viewing a since-deleted revision, seeUser:Enterprisey/link-deleted-revs.

Miscellaneous

• Arequest for comment closed with consensus to create a Village Pump-style page for communication with the Wikimedia Foundation.

This is to let you know that theBlack Moshannon State Park article has been scheduled astoday's featured article for June 26, 2020. Please check the article needs no amendments. If you're interested in editing the main page text, you're welcome to do so atWikipedia:Today's featured article/June 26, 2020.—Wehwalt (talk)00:59, 23 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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

Administrator changes

CaptainEek •Creffett •Cwmhiraeth

Anna Frodesiak •Buckshot06 •Ronhjones •SQL

CheckUser changes

SQL

Guideline and policy news

• Arequest for comment asks whether theUnblock Ticket Request System (UTRS) should allowed any unblock request or just private appeals.
• The Wikimedia Foundationannounced that they will develop a universal code of conduct for all WMF projects. There is an openlocal discussion regarding the same.

Arbitration

• Amotion was passed to enact a500/30 restriction onarticles related to the history of Jews and antisemitism in Poland during World War II (1933–45), including the Holocaust in Poland. Article talk pages where disruption occurs may also be managed with the stated restriction.

Precious

Eight years!

--Gerda Arendt (talk)05:05, 6 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Gerda! Still appreciated 8 years later -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°16:31, 23 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you today forBlack Moshannon State Park, - a nice place to retreat to on the day ofa funeral I can't attend because of the restriction. --Gerda Arendt (talk)11:19, 26 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry for your loss and thanks for your kind words. -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°13:51, 26 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Ruhrfisch. We met about ten years ago on theSentence spacing article—my first try at a Featured Article. I hope this message finds you well.

I just (re)nominated for FA an article on a 35-year-old play-by-mail (PBM) game calledHyborian War (still active!) for my second try at a Featured Article—about ten years after Sentence spacing. I took a fascination to the PBM genre last year. I pulled the article's first nomination—mostly because a reviewer asked for more context on the broader play-by-mail genre and setting. When ready, one of the FAC mentors gave it a thorough peer review before I renominated. However, other than an image review I'm a bit concerned it may sit unreviewed to the end because it's a pretty niche topic. If you review FA candidates, and you have time in the next week or two, I wouldwelcome a review. Thanks for your time.Airborne84 (talk)03:50, 19 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I will try to take a look at it and make some comments, but I have to look at / clean up an article first, before it is on the Main Page as TFA in a few days. -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°16:33, 23 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

That would be just fine. Greatly appreciated!Airborne84 (talk)20:36, 23 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Ruhrfisch. If you have time, would greatly appreciateyour review on this. It's kind of a niche topic, but Gog the Mild who's on hand at nomination is kind of an SME on the topic and so even if you're only OK with just reviewing the prose or other limited review, I'll take what I can get at this point. Thanks for your time.Airborne84 (talk)05:19, 3 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I am looking at the article now. Sorry for the delay, -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°19:05, 3 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Really appreciate the hard look at theHyborian War nomination. The article is certainly improved as a result, and I greatly appreciate the additional review!Airborne84 (talk)02:28, 6 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

You are very welcome, the pleasure was mine - it was fun to get involved in FAC again and I really enjoyed reading and reviewing the article and learning about PBM. Please don't wait 10 years for your next FA ;-) -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°02:48, 6 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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

Administrator changes Malcolmxl5 John •TheCoffee •Tim! Creffett →GeneralNotability DeltaQuad →AmandaNP

CheckUser changes Bbb23 Interface administrator changes TonyBallioni

Guideline and policy news

• Arequest for comment is in progress to remove theT2 (template that misrepresents established policy)speedy deletion criterion.

Technical news

• Protection templates on mainspace pages are now automatically added byUser:MusikBot II (BRFA).

Arbitration

• Following thebanning of an editor by the WMF last year, the Arbitration Committeeresolved to hold anRfC regarding on-wiki harassment. The RfC has been posted atWikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Anti-harassment RfC and is open to comments from the community.
• TheMedicine case wasclosed, with aremedy authorizingstandard discretionary sanctions forall discussions about pharmaceutical drug prices and pricing and for edits adding, changing, or removing pharmaceutical drug prices or pricing from articles.

Hello,Ruhrfisch! It's still not quite in my mind FA quality, but with your invaluable comments from peer review, I have made many of your suggested changes (view my response at peer review for the changes I did not make). Please have another look atManganese, Minnesota. Best Regards,DrGregMN (talk)02:02, 19 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Feel free to have yet another look, and see my comments on the peer review page! Best Regards,DrGregMN (talk)02:19, 8 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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

Administrator changes

Red Phoenix

Euryalus •SQL

Jujutacular •Monty845 •Rettetast •Madchester

Oversight changes

GB fan

Keegan •Opabinia regalis •Premeditated Chaos

Guideline and policy news

• There is an openrequest for comment to decide whether to increase the minimum duration a sanction discussion has to remain open (currently 24 hours).
• Speedy deletion criterionT2 (template that misrepresents established policy) has been repealed following arequest for comment.
• Speedy deletion criterionX2 (pages created by the content translation tool) has been repealed following adiscussion.
• There is a proposal torestrict proposed deletion to confirmed users.

		The Reviewer Barnstar
		I am awarding you this barnstar to thank you for your very useful suggestions and comments in the peer review ofManganese, MinnesotaDrGregMN (talk)02:19, 8 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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

Administrator changes

Eddie891

Angela •Jcw69 •Just Chilling •Philg88 •Viajero

CheckUser changes

SQL

Guideline and policy news

• Following arequest for comment, the minimum length forsite ban discussions was increased to 72 hours, up from 24.
• Arequest for comment is ongoing to determine whetherpaid editorsmust orshould use thearticles for creation process.
• Arequest for comment is open to resolve inconsistencies between thedraftification andalternative to deletion processes.

Arbitration

• Arequest for comment is open to provide an opportunity to amend the structure, rules, and procedures of the2020 English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee election and to resolve any issues not covered by existing rules.
• An openrequest for comment asks whether active Arbitrators may serve on theTrust and Safety Case Review Committee orOmbudsman commission.

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

Administrator changes

Ajpolino •LuK3

Jackmcbarn

Ad Orientem •Harej •Lid •Lomn •Mentoz86 •Oliver Pereira •XJaM

There'sNoTime →TheresNoTime

Guideline and policy news

• Arequest for comment found consensus thatincubation as an alternative to deletion should generally only be recommended whendraftification is appropriate, namely1) if the result of a deletion discussion is to draftify; or 2) if the article is newly created.

Technical news

• Thefilter log now provides links to view diffs of deleted revisions (phab:T261630).

Arbitration

• The2020 CheckUser and Oversight appointment process has begun. The community consultation period will take place from September 27th to October 7th.
• Following arequest for comment, sitting Committee members may not serve on either theOmbuds Commission or theWMF Case Review Committee. The Arbitration Committeepassed a motion implementing those resultsinto their procedures.

Miscellaneous

• TheUniversal Code of Conduct draft is open forcommunity review and comment until October 6th, 2020.
• Office actions may now be appealed to theInterim Trust & Safety Case Review Committee.

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

Administrator changes John M Wolfson Bduke •Nilfanion •Philosopher •Rspeer •Yunshui Interface administrator changes Ragesoss TonyBallioni

CheckUser changes EdJohnston •Oshwah •Yamla Yunshui Oversight changes Anarchyte Yunshui

Guideline and policy news

• Community sanctions nowauthorize administrators to place under indefinite semiprotectionany article on a beauty pageant, or biography of a person known as a beauty pageant contestant, which has been edited by asockpuppet account orlogged-out sockpuppet, to be logged atWP:GS/PAGEANT.

Technical news

• Sysops willonce again be able to view the deleted history of JS/CSS pages; this was restricted tointerface administrators when that group was introduced.
• Twinkle's block module now includes the ability to note the specific case when applying adiscretionary sanctions block and/or template.
• Sysops will be able to useSpecial:CreateLocalAccount tocreate a local account for a global user that is prevented from auto-creation locally (such as by a filter or range block). Administrators that are not sure if such a creation is appropriate should contact a checkuser.

Arbitration

• The2020 Arbitration Committee Elections process has begun. Eligible editors will be able tonominate themselves as candidates from November 8 through November 17. The voting period will run from November 23 through December 6.
• TheAnti-harassment RfC has concluded with asummary of the feedback provided.

Miscellaneous

• A reminder thatstandard discretionary sanctions areauthorized for all edits about, and all pages related to post-1932 politics of the United States and closely related people. (American Politics 2 Arbitration case).

Hello! Voting in the2020 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on Monday, 7 December 2020. Alleligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once. TheArbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting theWikipedia 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 imposesite bans,topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. Thearbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate in the 2020 election, please reviewthe candidates and submit your choices on thevoting page. If you no longer wish to receive these messages, you may add{{NoACEMM}} to your user talk page.MediaWiki message delivery (talk)01:16, 24 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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

Administrator changes

Andrwsc •Anetode •GoldenRing •JzG •LinguistAtLarge •Nehrams2020

Interface administrator changes

Izno

Guideline and policy news

• There is arequest for comment in progress to either removeT3 (duplicated and hardcoded instances) as aspeedy deletion criterion or eliminate its seven-day waiting period.

Technical news

• Voting for proposals in the2021 Community Wishlist Survey, which determines what software the Wikimedia Foundation's Community Tech team will work on next year, will take place from 8 December through 21 December. In particular, there are sections regardingadministrators andanti-harassment.

Arbitration

• Voting in the2020 Arbitration Committee Elections is open to eligible editors until Monday 23:59, 7 December 2020 UTC. Please reviewthe candidates and, if you wish to do so, submit your choices on thevoting page.

I Am Half-Sick of Shadows, Said the Lady of Shalott		Happy holidays

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

Administrator changes Hammersoft Andres •Brion VIBBER •Rkitko •Thatcher

CheckUser changes Barkeep49 •BDD •CaptainEek •Primefac Oversight changes Barkeep49 •BDD •CaptainEek Joe Roe

Guideline and policy news

• Speedy deletion criterionT3 (duplication and hardcoded instances) has been repealed following arequest for comment.

Technical news

• You can now put pages on your watchlistfor a limited period of time.

Arbitration

• Bymotion,standard discretionary sanctions have been temporarilyauthorizedfor all pages relating to theHorn of Africa (defined as including Ethiopia, Somalia, Eritrea, Djibouti, and adjoining areas if involved in related disputes). The effectiveness of the discretionary sanctions can be evaluated on the request by any editor after March 1, 2021 (or sooner if for a good reason).
• Following the2020 Arbitration Committee elections, the following editors have been appointed to the Arbitration Committee:Barkeep49,BDD,Bradv,CaptainEek,L235,Maxim,Primefac.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2021).

Administrator changes Hog Farm Mattflaschen •Nandesuka •Savidan •Wangi

CheckUser changes Berean Hunter •Xeno Oversight changes Someguy1221 •Xeno

Arbitration

• Thestandard discretionary sanctions authorized forAmerican Politics wereamended by motion to coverpost-1992 politics of United States and closely related people, replacing the 1932 cutoff.

Miscellaneous

• Voting in the2021 Steward elections will begin on 05 February 2021, 14:00 (UTC) and end on 26 February 2021, 13:59 (UTC). Theconfirmation process of current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automaticallycheck your eligibility to vote.
• Wikipedia has now been around for20 years, and recently saw its billionth edit!

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2021).

Administrator changes

TJMSmith

Boing! said Zebedee •Hiberniantears •Lear's Fool •Only •WGFinley

Interface administrator changes

AmandaNP

Guideline and policy news

• Arequest for comment is open that proposes a process for the community to revoke administrative permissions. This follows a2019 RfC in favor of creating one such a policy.
• Arequest for comment is in progress to removeF7 (invalid fair-use claim)subcriterion a, which covers immediate deletion of non-free media with invalid fair-use tags.
• Arequest for comment seeks to grantpage movers thedelete-redirect userright, which allows moving a page over a single-revision redirect, regardless of that redirect's target. The full proposal is atWikipedia:Page mover/delete-redirect.
• Arequest for comment asks if sysops mayplace the General sanctions/Coronavirus disease 2019 editnotice template on pages in scope that do not have page-specific sanctions?
• There is adiscussion in progress concerning automatic protection of each day's featured article withPending Changesprotection.

Technical news

• When blocking an IPv6 address withTwinkle, there is now a checkbox with the option tojust block the /64 range. When doing so, you can still leave a block template on the initial, single IP address' talkpage.
• When protecting a page with Twinkle, you can now add a note if doing so was in response to a request atWP:RfPP, and even link to the specific revision.
• There have beena number ofreported issues withPending Changes. Most problems setting protection appear to have been resolved (phab:T273317) but other issues with autoaccepting edits persist (phab:T275322).

Arbitration

• Bymotion, thediscretionary sanctions originally authorized under theGamerGate case arenow authorized under a newGender and sexuality case, with sanctionsauthorized for all edits about, and all pages related to, any gender-related dispute or controversy and associated people. Sanctions issued under GamerGate are now considered Gender and sexuality sanctions.
• TheKurds and Kurdistan case wasclosed,authorizingstandard discretionary sanctions forthe topics of Kurds and Kurdistan, broadly construed.

Miscellaneous

• Following the2021 Steward Elections, the following editors have been appointed as stewards:AmandaNP,Operator873,Stanglavine,Teles, andWiki13.

Thank you for having improved and supportedCarmen, with Bizet's music "expressing the emotions and suffering of his characters" asBrian worded it. --Gerda Arendt (talk)16:16, 3 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Gerda, I do miss Brian, but am thankful for the many fine articles he left us. -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°16:32, 3 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Exactly, and I'm happy that we can show them now more than once. Which one would you suggest to present next? --Gerda Arendt (talk)16:49, 3 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hmmm. Since one of his music article's is TFA now, perhaps a polar exploration-related article, like the one onErnest Shackleton (I did not check to see when it was last TFA) -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°17:01, 3 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

good idea, birthday 15 February, last appeared 2012 - anything closer? --Gerda Arendt (talk)17:06, 3 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Danke, aber keine Ahnung ;-) -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°14:07, 4 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Never mind. I looked intoKathleen Ferrier - remembering how furious Brian was when she was scheduled with 45 minutes notice, on her centenary, imagine. Aber - her day 22 April is (practically) given to Earth Day - so another one for next years. I settled withPercy Grainger so far. --Gerda Arendt (talk)14:14, 4 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Percy's a good one too - thanks. -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°03:31, 5 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

A friend of mine pointed me at his music, long ago, -my first article, DYK? He is looking forward to a livestream concert tomorrow, his chamber music. --Gerda Arendt (talk)08:38, 5 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2021).

Administrator changes

Alexandria •Happyme22 •RexxS

Guideline and policy news

• Following arequest for comment,F7 (invalid fair-use claim)subcriterion a has been deprecated; it covered immediate deletion of non-free media with invalid fair-use tags.
• Following arequest for comment,page movers were granted thedelete-redirect userright, which allows moving a page over a single-revision redirect, regardless of that redirect's target.

Technical news

• When you move a page that many editors have on their watchlist the history can be split and it might also not be possible to move it again for a while. This is because of ajob queue problem. (T278350)
• Code to support some very oldweb browsers is being removed. This could cause issues in those browsers. (T277803)

Arbitration

• Acommunity consultation on the Arbitration Committeediscretionary sanctions procedure is open until April 25.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2021).

Administrator changes

Enchanter •Carlossuarez46

Interface administrator changes

Ragesoss

Guideline and policy news

• Followingan RfC, consensus was found that third party appeals are allowed but discouraged.
• The 2021 Desysop Policy RfC was closed with no consensus.Consensus was found in a previous RfC for a community based desysop procedure, though the procedure proposed in the 2021 RfC did not gain consensus.

Technical news

• The user groupoversight will be renamed tosuppress. This is fortechnical reasons. You can comment atT112147 if you have objections.

Arbitration

• Thecommunity consultation on the Arbitration Committeediscretionary sanctions procedure was closed, and an initial draft based on feedback from the now closed consultation is expected to be released in early June to early July for community review.

Precious

Nine years!

--Gerda Arendt (talk)06:42, 6 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you Gerda! -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°16:28, 6 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2021).

Administrator changes

Ashleyyoursmile •Less Unless

Husond •MattWade •MJCdetroit •Carioca •Vague Rant •Kingboyk •Thunderboltz •Gwen Gale •AniMate •SlimVirgin (deceased)

Guideline and policy news

• Consensus was reached to deprecateWikipedia:Editor assistance.
• Following aRequest for Comment the Book namespace was deprecated.

Technical news

• Wikimedia previously used theIRC networkFreenode. However, due to changes over who controlled the network with reports of a forceful takeover by several ex-staff members, theWikimedia IRC Group Contacts decided to move to the newLibera Chat network. It has been reported that Wikimedia related channels on Freenode have been forcibly taken over if they pointed members to Libera. There is amigration guide and Wikimediadiscussions about this.

Arbitration

• After aClarification request, the Arbitration Committee modifiedRemedy 5 of theAntisemitism in Poland case. This means sourcing expectations are adiscretionary sanction instead of being present on all articles. It also details using the talk page or theReliable Sources Noticeboard to discuss disputed sources.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2021).

Administrator changes Trialpears AGK •Eliz81 •Mulad •ThaddeusB •Vianello •Who Lacrimosus →Ikuzaf Interface administrator changes Ragesoss

CheckUser changes AGK •DGG Oversighter changes AGK

Guideline and policy news

• Consensus has been reached to delete all books in the book namespace. There was rough consensus that the deleted books should still be available on request atWP:REFUND even after the namespace is removed.
• AnRfC is open to discuss the next steps following a trial which automatically applied pending changes toTFAs.

Technical news

• IP addresses of unregistered users are tobe hidden from everyone. There is a rough draft of howIP addresses may be shown to users who need to see them. This currently details allowing administrators, checkusers, stewards and those with a new usergroup to view the full IP address of unregistered users. Editors with at least 500 edits and an account over a year old will be able to see all but the end of the IP address in the proposal. The ability to see the IP addresses hidden behind the mask would be dependent on agreeing to not share the parts of the IP address they can see with those who do not have access to the same information. Accessing part of or the full IP address of a masked editor would also be logged. Comments on the draft are being welcomedat the talk page.

Arbitration

• The community authorisedCOVID-19 general sanctions have been superseded by theCOVID-19 discretionary sanctions following amotion at a case request. Alerts given and sanctions placed under the community authorised general sanctions are now considered alerts for and sanctions under the new discretionary sanctions.

Hello,Ruhrfisch! I believe I have this article sourced as best as possible; I have askedJonesey95 for a copy edit prior to FAC submission. I think it's ready. Thanks for all your help back in Peer Review!DrGregMN (talk)20:51, 23 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2021).

Administrator changes BusterD Kees08 •Nickshanks •Protonk •Schissel •Ultraexactzz •Wknight94

CheckUser changes TheresNoTime Oversighter changes TheresNoTime ST47

Guideline and policy news

• AnRfC is open to add a delay of one week from nomination to deletion forG13 speedy deletions.

Technical news

• Last week all wikis were very slow or not accessible for 30 minutes. This was due to server lag caused by regeneratingdynamic lists on the Russian Wikinews after a large bulk import. (T287380)

Arbitration

• Following anamendment request, the committee has clarified that the Talk page exception to the500/30 rule inremedy 5 of the Palestine-Israel articles 4 case does not apply torequested move discussions.

Miscellaneous

• You can vote for candidates in the2021 Board of Trustees elections from 4 August to 17 August. Four community elected seats are up for election.

...to get to know it.

During a research for an article in the English WP I accidentally found your username 'Ruhrfisch'.

I simply couldn't ignore that strange sounding word, because I have a deep personal relation to theRuhrgebiet – but what is a 'Ruhrfisch'? I couldn't believe your explanation, but of course you are right, and now I know what a 'Ruhrfisch' is ;)!

Meant as a little friendly gesture you get theRÜHRFISCH with the necessary Umlaut directly from my keyboard :).Viele Grüße aus Deutschland!Daniel aka --Taigatrommel (talk)20:30, 4 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Daniel, thanks for your note and always nice to hear from others. Glad to hear my German name explanation makes sense to a native speaker (my German is good, but definitely not error free). I've visited the Ruhrgebiet often in my trips to Germany - I've always wanted to ride the Schwebebahn in Wuppertal, but haven't gotten to do so yet. Take care, -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°12:04, 18 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2021).

Administrator changes

Jake Wartenberg

Emperor •Viridian Bovary

Ashleyyoursmile →Viridian Bovary

Guideline and policy news

• Feedback is requested on theUniversal Code of Conduct enforcement draft by theUniversal Code of Conduct Phase 2 drafting committee.
• ARfC is open on whether to allow administrators to use extended confirmed protection onhigh-risk templates.
• Adiscussion is open to decide when, if ever, should discord logs be eligible for removal when posted onwiki (including whether to oversight them)
• ARfC on the next steps after the trial ofpending changes onTFAs has resulted in a 30 day trial of automatic semi protection for TFAs.

Technical news

• The Score extension has been re-enabled on public wikis. It has been updated, but has been placed in safe mode to address unresolved security issues. Further information on the security issues can be found on themediawiki page.

Arbitration

• A request for comment is in progress to provide an opportunity to amend the structure, rules, and procedures ofthe Arbitration Committee election and resolve any issues not covered by existing rules. Comments and new proposals are welcome.

Miscellaneous

• The2021 RfA review is now open for comments.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2021).

Administrator changes Blablubbs Alvestrand •Black Falcon •Deathphoenix •Dppowell •Mark Arsten •JGHowes (deceased)

Oversighter changes Callanecc Mkdw Interface administrator changes Galobtter

Guideline and policy news

• Followingan RfC, extended confirmed protection may be used preemptively on certainhigh-risk templates.
• Followinga discussion at the Village Pump, there is consensus to treat discord logs the same as IRC logs. This means that discord logs will be oversighted if posted onwiki.

Technical news

• DiscussionTools has supersededEnterprisey's reply-link script. Editors may switch using the "Discussion tools" checkbox underPreferences →Beta features.

Arbitration

• Amotion has standardised the 500/30 (extended confirmed) restrictions placed by the Arbitration Committee. The standardised restriction is now listed inthe Arbitration Committee's procedures.
• Following the closure of theIranian politics case, standard discretionary sanctionsare authorized for all edits about, and all pages related to, post-1978 Iranian politics, broadly construed.
• The Arbitration Committeeencourages uninvolved administrators to use the discretionary sanctions procedure in topic areas where it is authorised to facilitate consensus in RfCs. This includes, but is not limited to, enforcing sectioned comments, word/diff limits and moratoriums on a particular topic from being brought in an RfC for up to a year.

Miscellaneous

• Editorshave approved expanding the trial of Growth Features from 2% of new accounts to 25%, and the share of newcomers getting mentorship from 2% to 5%. Experienced editors are invited toadd themselves to the mentor list.
• Thecommunity consultation phase of the 2021 CheckUser and Oversight appointments process is open for editors to provide comments and ask questions to candidates.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2021).

Administrator changes Clpo13 Brian0918 •JDoorjam •Karanacs •MrDarcy •Mindspillage Interface administrator changes Evad37

CheckUser changes Dreamy Jazz •Ferret •GeneralNotability •Girth Summit •RoySmith Oversight changes Dreamy Jazz •LuK3

Guideline and policy news

• Phase 2 of the 2021RfA review has commenced which will discuss potential solutions to address the 8 issuesfound in Phase 1. Proposed solutions that achieve consensus will be implemented and you may propose solutions till 07 November 2021.

Technical news

• Toolhub is a catalogue of tools which can be used on Wikimedia wikis. It is athttps://toolhub.wikimedia.org/.

Arbitration

• GeneralNotability,Mz7 andCyberpower678 have been appointed to theElectoral Commission for the2021 Arbitration Committee Elections.Ivanvector andJohn M Wolfson are reserve commissioners.
• Eligible editors are invited to self-nominate themselves to standin the 2021 Arbitration Committee elections from 07 November 2021 until 16 November 2021.

Miscellaneous

• The2021 CheckUser and Oversight appointments process has concluded with the appointment of five new CheckUsers and two new Oversighters.

You are one of four editors who greatly encouraged me in my early months here and provided heart-warming support both before and duringmy RfA, which I looked at today for the first time in several years. I don't know if you realize how important that was and is to me. I am very glad, both on my own account and for the good of the encyclopedia as a whole, that you are still around. –Athaenara ✉20:57, 2 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks so much Athaenara, it is always a pleasure to hear from you and I appreciate your kind words. Congrats on the anniversary of your RfA and Merry Christmas (still a bit early). -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°03:21, 29 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hello! Voting in the2021 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on Monday, 6 December 2021. Alleligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once. TheArbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting theWikipedia 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 imposesite bans,topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. Thearbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate in the 2021 election, please reviewthe candidates and submit your choices on thevoting page. If you no longer wish to receive these messages, you may add{{NoACEMM}} to your user talk page.MediaWiki message delivery (talk)00:02, 23 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2021).

Administrator changes

A Train •Berean Hunter •Epbr123 •GermanJoe •Sanchom •Mysid

Technical news

• Unregistered editors using the mobile website are now able to receive notices to indicate they have talk page messages. The notice looks similar to what is already present on desktop, and will be displayed on when viewing any page except mainspace and when editing any page. (T284642)
• The limit on the number of emails a user can send per day has been made global instead of per-wiki to help prevent abuse. (T293866)

Arbitration

• Voting in the2021 Arbitration Committee Elections is open until 23:59, 06 December 2021 (UTC).
• The already authorized standarddiscretionary sanctions for all pages relating to theHorn of Africa (defined as including Ethiopia, Somalia, Eritrea, Djibouti, and adjoining areas if involved in related disputes), broadly construed,have been made permanent.

Arecently closed Request for Comment (RFC) reached consensus to removeAutopatrolled from the administrator user group. You may, similarly as withEdit Filter Manager, choose toself-assign this permission to yourself. This will be implemented the week of December 13th, but if you wish to self-assign you may do so now. To find out when the change has gone live or if you have any questions please visit theAdministrator's Noticeboard. 20:06, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

Template:CF/February 2015 peer reviews has beennominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion atthe entry on the Templates for discussion page.Q28 (talk)00:24, 15 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (December 2021).

Administrator changes Amalthea •Ihcoyc (deceased) •Kateshortforbob •Kirill Lokshin •Rifleman 82 •Ryan Norton •Wrp103 Interface administrator changes Mr. Stradivarius

CheckUser changes Cabayi •Donald Albury •Enterprisey •Izno •Wugapodes Opabinia regalis Casliber •David Fuchs •Newyorkbrad •SoWhy Oversighter changes Cabayi •Donald Albury •Enterprisey •Izno •Wugapodes Opabinia regalis Casliber •David Fuchs •Newyorkbrad •SoWhy

Guideline and policy news

• Following consensus at the2021 RfA review, the autopatrolled user righthas been removed from the administrators user group; admins can grant themselves the autopatrolled permission if they wish to remain autopatrolled.

• Additionally, consensus forproposal 6C of the 2021 RfA review has led to the creation of anadministrative action review process. The purpose of this process will be to review individual administrator actions and individual actions taken by users holdingadvanced permissions.

Arbitration

• Following the2021 Arbitration Committee elections, the following editors have been appointed to the Arbitration Committee:Beeblebrox,Cabayi,Donald Albury,Enterprisey,Izno,Opabinia regalis,Worm That Turned,Wugapodes.

Miscellaneous

• Thefunctionaries email list (functionaries-enlists.wikimedia.org) will no longer accept incoming emails apart from those sent by list members and WMF staff. Private concerns, apart from those requiring oversight, should be directly sent tothe Arbitration Committee.

Hi!

You get this message because you are an admin on a Wikimedia wiki.

When someone edits a Wikimedia wiki without being logged in today, we show their IP address. As you may already know, we will not be able to do this in the future. This is a decision by the Wikimedia Foundation Legal department, because norms and regulations for privacy online have changed.

Instead of the IP we will show a masked identity. You as an adminwill still be able to access the IP. There will also be a new user right for those who need to see the full IPs of unregistered users to fight vandalism, harassment and spam without being admins. Patrollers will also see part of the IP even without this user right. We are also working onbetter tools to help.

If you have not seen it before, you canread more on Meta. If you want to make sure you don’t miss technical changes on the Wikimedia wikis, you cansubscribe tothe weekly technical newsletter.

We havetwo suggested ways this identity could work.We would appreciate your feedback on which way you think would work best for you and your wiki, now and in the future. You canlet us know on the talk page. You can write in your language. The suggestions were posted in October and we will decide after 17 January.

Thank you. /Johan (WMF)

18:13, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2022).

Administrator changes AustralianRupert •Cimon Avaro •Euryalus •Jehochman •Nunh-huh 28bytes Bureaucrat changes 28bytes

Interface administrator changes Evad37 •Galobtter Ragesoss

Guideline and policy news

• TheUniversal Code of Conduct enforcement guidelines have been published for consideration. Voting to ratify this guideline is planned to take place 7 March to 21 March. Comments can be made onthe talk page.

Technical news

• The user groupoversight will be renamedsuppress in around 3 weeks. This will not affect the name shown to users and is simply a change in the technical name of the user group. The change is being made fortechnical reasons. You can commentin Phabricator if you have objections.
• The Reply Tool feature, which is a part of Discussion Tools, will be opt-out for everyone logged in or logged out starting 7 February 2022. Editors wishing to comment on this can do so in the relevantVillage Pump discussion.

Arbitration

• Community input is requested on several motions aimed at addressingdiscretionary sanctions that are no longer needed or overly broad.
• The Arbitration Committee haspublished a generalised comment regarding successful appeals of sanctions that it can review (such as checkuser blocks).
• A motion related to theAntisemitism in Poland case was passed following adeclined case request.

Miscellaneous

• Voting in the2022 Steward elections will begin on 07 February 2022, 14:00 (UTC) and end on 26 February 2022, 13:59 (UTC). Theconfirmation process of current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automaticallycheck your eligibility to vote.
• Voting in the2022 Community Wishlist Survey is open until 11 February 2022.

A discussion is taking place as to whether the articleCentral Mountains Shared Use Trails System is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according toWikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should bedeleted.

The article will be discussed atWikipedia:Articles for deletion/Central Mountains Shared Use Trails System until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article.

---DOOMSDAYER520 (TALK|CONTRIBS)02:50, 6 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2022).

Administrator changes Modussiccandi BOZ •Brookie (deceased) •Jackmcbarn •Jamesday •Jonathunder •Master of Puppets •Saravask

CheckUser changes Callanecc Oversighter changes Callanecc

Guideline and policy news

• A RfC is open to change the wording ofrevision deletion criterion 1 to remove the sentence relating to non-infringing contributions.
• A RfC is open to discuss prohibiting draftification of articles over 90 days old.

Technical news

• The deployment of the reply tool as an opt-out feature, as announced in last month's newsletter, has been delayed to 7 March. Feedback and comments are being welcomed atWikipedia talk:Talk pages project. (T296645)
• Special:Nuke will now allow the selection of standard deletion reasons to be used when mass-deleting pages. This was aCommunity Wishlist Survey request from 2022. (T25020)
• The ability to undelete the talk page when undeleting a page usingSpecial:Undelete or the API will be added soon. This changewas requested in the 2021 Community Wishlist Survey. (T295389)

Arbitration

• Several unused discretionary sanctions and article probation remedies have been rescinded. This follows the community feedback from the2021 Discretionary Sanctions review.

Miscellaneous

• The 2022 appointees for theOmbuds commission areÉrico,Faendalimas,Galahad,Infinite0694,Mykola7,Olugold,Udehb andZabe as regular members andAmeisenigel andJJMC89 as advisory members.
• Following the2022 Steward Elections, the following editors have been appointed as stewards:AntiCompositeNumber,BRPever,Hasley,TheresNoTime, andVermont.
• The 2022Community Wishlist Survey results have been published alongsidethe ranking of prioritized proposals.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2022).

Administrator changes Firefly •Sdrqaz Ad Orientem Geschichte •Ryan Postlethwaite •Sabine's Sunbird •Wassupwestcoast

Interface administrator changes Evad37

Guideline and policy news

• An RfC is open proposing a change to the minimumactivity requirements for administrators.

Technical news

• Access toSpecial:RevisionDelete has been expanded to include users who have thedeletelogentry anddeletedhistory rights. This means that those in theResearcher user group andCheckusers who are not administrators can now accessSpecial:RevisionDelete. The users able to view the special page after this change are the 3 users in the Researcher group, as there are currently no checkusers who are not already administrators. (T301928)
• When viewing deleted revisions or diffs onSpecial:Undelete a back link to the undelete page for the associated page is now present. (T284114)

Arbitration

• Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Procedures § Opening of proceedings has been updated to reflect current practice following amotion.
• A arbitration case regardingSkepticism and coordinated editing has been closed.
• A arbitration case regardingWikiProject Tropical Cyclones has been opened.

Miscellaneous

• Voting for theUniversal Code of Conduct Enforcement guidelines has closed, and theresults were that 56.98% of voters supported the guidelines. The results of this vote mean theWikimedia Foundation Board will now review the guidelines.

22:53, 15 April 2022 (UTC)

I have nominatedLarrys Creek for afeatured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meetsfeatured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process arehere.Hog Farm_Talk15:20, 22 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2022).

Administrator changes Colin M David.Monniaux •Fribbler •Grue •Kpjas •West.andrew.g

CheckUser changes Ks0stm Oversighter changes Ks0stm

Guideline and policy news

• Following anRfC, a change has been made to theadministrators inactivity policy. Under the new policy, if an administrator has not made at least 100 edits over a period of 5 years they may be desysopped for inactivity.
• Following adiscussion on thebureaucrat's noticeboard, a change has been made to thebureaucrats inactivity policy.

Technical news

• The ability to undelete the associated talk page when undeleting a page has been added. This was the11th wish of the 2021 Community Wishlist Survey.
• A public status system for WMF wikis has been created. It is located athttps://www.wikimediastatus.net/ and is hosted separately to WMF wikis so in the case of an outage it will remain viewable.

Arbitration

• Remedy 2 of theSt Christopher case has been rescinded following amotion. The remedy previously authorised administrators to place a ban on single-purpose accounts who were disruptively editing on the articleSt Christopher Iba Mar Diop College of Medicine or related pages from those pages.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2022).

Administrator changes Tamzin Barek •Darkwind •Geometry guy •ProcseeBot •RoyBoy •Sean Whitton •Valereee •Visorstuff •WAvegetarian Sn0wflake →VersedFenrir

CheckUser changes Ivanvector

Guideline and policy news

• Several areas of improvement collated fromcommunity member votes have been identified in theUniversal Code of Conduct Enforcement guidelines. The areas of improvement have been sent back for review and you areinvited to provide input on these areas.

Technical news

• Administrators using the mobile web interface can now accessSpecial:Block directly from user pages. (T307341)
• TheIP Info feature has beendeployed to all wikis as a Beta Feature. Any autoconfirmed user may enable the feature using the "IP info" checkbox underPreferences →Beta features. Autoconfirmed users will be able to access basic information about an IP address that includes the country and connection method. Those with advanced privileges (admin, bureaucrat, checkuser) will have access to extra information that includes the Internet Service Provider and more specific location.

Arbitration

• Remedy 2 of theRachel Marsden case has been rescinded following amotion. The remedy previously authorised administrators to delete or reduce to a stub, together with their talk pages, articles related toRachel Marsden when they violateWikipedia's biographies of living persons policy.
• An arbitration case regardingWikiProject Tropical Cyclones has been closed.

Ten years ago,you were found precious. That's what you are, always. --Gerda Arendt (talk)21:15, 7 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks (as always), -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°03:16, 16 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, I have just found (through Commons) your sandbox page aboutA Harvest of Death, as I wasbeginning to gather material for a new article for fr.wikipedia. It's a really great job ! I hope you don't mind if I borrow some of your stuff and good ideas. I have been recently working on other war / political photographs,here andthere. Thanks, see you soon,Sijysuis (talk)09:20, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Sijysuis, thanks for letting me know. Hopefully I will be able to add more to my sandbox this summer and move it to en article space. I do not speak French, so I cannot really read your draft. Good luck (Bon chance!), -Ruhrfisch_><>°^°03:20, 16 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2022).

Administrator changes AA •Gwalla •Ioeth •Laurascudder •Moriori (deceased) •Nat •Rfl Drilnoth →AFigureOfBlue Bureaucrat changes Lee Vilenski

Interface administrator changes Nihiltres

Technical news

• user_global_editcount is a new variable that can be used inabuse filters to avoid affecting globally active users. (T130439)

Arbitration

• An arbitration case regardingconduct in deletion-related editing has been opened.

Miscellaneous

• The New Pages Patrol queue has around 10,000 articles to be reviewed. As all administrators have the patrol right, please consider helping out. The queue ishere. For further information on the state of the project, see the latestNPP newsletter.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2022).

Administrator changes

Valereee

Anthony Appleyard (deceased) •Capitalistroadster •Samsara

Guideline and policy news

• An RfC has been closed with consensus to add javascript that will show edit notices for editors editing via a mobile device. This only works for users using a mobile browser, so iOS app editors will still not be able to see edit notices.
• An RfC has been closed with the consensus that train stations are not inherently notable.

Technical news

• TheWikimania 2022 Hackathon will take place virtually from 11 August to 14 August.
• Administrators will now see links on user pages for "Change block" and "Unblock user" instead of just "Block user" if the user is already blocked. (T308570)

Arbitration

• The arbitration case requestGeschichte has been automatically closed after a 3 month suspension of the case.

Miscellaneous

• You can vote for candidates in the2022 Board of Trustees elections from 16 August to 30 August. Two community elected seats are up for election.
• Wikimania 2022 is taking place virtually from 11 August to 14 August. The schedule for wikimania is listedhere. There are also a number ofin-person events associated with Wikimania around the world.
• Tech tip: When revision-deleting on desktop, hold⇧ Shift between clicking two checkboxes to select every box in that range.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2022).

Administrator changes DanCherek •DatGuy •Femke •Z1720 Aldux •Graham Beards •Nyttend

Interface administrator changes Mr. Stradivarius

Guideline and policy news

• A discussion is open to define a process by which Vector 2022 can be made the default for all users.
• An RfC is open to gain consensus on whetherFox News isreliable for science and politics.

Technical news

• The impact report on the effects of disabling IP editing on the Persian (Farsi) Wikipedia has been released.
• The WMF is looking into making aPrivate Incident Reporting System (PIRS) system to improve the reporting of harmful incidents through easier and safer reporting. You can leave comments on the talk page by answering thequestions provided. Users who have faced harmful situations are also invited to join a PIRS interview to share the experience. To sign upplease emailMadalina Ana.

Arbitration

• An arbitration case regardingConduct in deletion-related editing has been closed. The Arbitration Committeepassed a remedy as part of the final decision to create a request for comment (RfC) on how to handle mass nominations at Articles for Deletion (AfD).
• The arbitration case requestJonathunder has been automatically closed after a 6 month suspension of the case.

Miscellaneous

• The new pages patrol (NPP) team has prepared an appeal to the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) for assistance with addressing Page Curation bugs and requested features. You are encouraged to read theopen letter before it is sent, and if you support it, consider signing it. It is not a discussion, just a signature will suffice.
• Voting for candidates for theWikimedia Board of Trustees is open until 6 September.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2022).

Administrator changes ScottishFinnishRadish Staxringold Ahoerstemeier (deceased) •Ched

Interface administrator changes Cyberpower678 CheckUser changes GorillaWarfare

Guideline and policy news

• Following an RfC, consensus was found that if the rationale for a block depends on information that is not available to all administrators, that information should be sent to theArbitration Committee, acheckuser or anoversighter for action (as applicable, perArbCom's recent updated guidance) instead of the administrator making the block.
• Following an RfC, consensus has been found that, in the context of politics and science, the reliability ofFoxNews.com is unclear and that additional considerations apply to its use.
• Community comment onthe revised Universal Code of Conduct enforcement guidelines is requested until 8 October.

Technical news

• TheArticles for creation helper script now automatically recognises administrator accounts which means your name does not need to be listed atWP:AFCP to help out. If you wish to help out at AFC, enable AFCH by navigating toPreferences →Gadgets and checking the "Yet Another AfC Helper Script" box.

Arbitration

• Remedy 8.1 of theMuhammad images case will be rescinded 1 November following amotion.
• A modification to the deletion RfC remedy in theConduct in deletion-related editing case has been made to reaffirm the independence of the RfC and allow the moderators to split the RfC in two.
• Thesecond phase of the2021-22 Discretionary Sanctions Review closes 3 October.

Miscellaneous

• An administrator's account was recently compromised. Administrators are encouraged to check that theirpasswords are secure, and reminded that ArbComreserves the right to not restore adminship in cases of poor account security. You can also usetwo-factor authentication (2FA) to provide an extra level of security.
• Self-nominations for theelectoral commission for the2022 Arbitration Committee elections open 2 October and close 8 October.
• You are invited to comment on candidates in the2022 CUOS appointments process.
• AnRfC is open to discuss whether to make Vector 2022 the default skin on desktop.
• Tech tip: You can do a fuzzy search of all deleted page titles atSpecial:Undelete.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2022).

Administrator changes

• 
  • Isabelle Belato
  • Whpq
• 
• 
  • Atama
  • Astronautics~enwiki
  • Athaenara
  • Eddie891
  • GraemeL
  • Marianocecowski
  • Natalya
  • Pratyeka
  • SB Johnny

Interface administrator changes

• TheresNoTime
• Ragesoss

CheckUser changes

• 
  • Blablubbs
  • Firefly
• Joe Roe

Oversight changes

• DGG

Guideline and policy news

• Thearticle creation at scale RfC opened on 3 October and will be open until at least 2 November.
• AnRfC is open to discuss having openrequests for adminship automatically placed on hold after the seven-day period has elapsed, pending closure or other action by abureaucrat.

Arbitration

• Eligible editors are invited to self-nominate themselves from 13 November 2022 until 22 November 2022 to standin the 2022 Arbitration Committee elections.
• Thearbitration case request titledAthaenara has been resolved bymotion.
• Thearbitration caseReversal and reinstatement of Athaenara's block has entered the proposed decision stage.
• AmandaNP,Mz7 andCyberpower678 have been appointed to theElectoral Commission for the2022 Arbitration Committee Elections.Xaosflux andDr vulpes are reserve commissioners.

Miscellaneous

• The2022 CheckUser and Oversight appointments process has concluded with the appointment of two new CheckUsers.
• You can add yourself tothe centralised page listing time zones of administrators.
• Tech tip: Wikimarkup in a block summary is parsed in the notice that the blockee sees. You can use templates with custom options to specify situations like{{rangeblock|create=yes}} or{{uw-ublock|contains profanity}}.

Hello! Voting in the2022 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on Monday, 12 December 2022. Alleligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

TheArbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting theWikipedia 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 imposesite bans,topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. Thearbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2022 election, please reviewthe candidates and submit your choices on thevoting page. If you no longer wish to receive these messages, you may add{{NoACEMM}} to your user talk page.MediaWiki message delivery (talk)00:21, 29 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2022).

Administrator changes

• Eddie891
• Euryalus
• TheresNoTime

• Alex.muller
• Excirial
• RedWordSmith
• Ron Ritzman
• TheresNoTime
• Stephen

Interface administrator changes

TheresNoTime

TheresNoTime

CheckUser changes

TheresNoTime

Oversight changes

TheresNoTime

Guideline and policy news

• Consensus has been found in an RfC to automatically place RfAs on hold after one week.
• Thearticle creation at scale RfC hasbeen closed.
• An RfC on the banners for the December 2022 fundraising campaign has been closed.

Technical news

• A new preference named "Enable limited width mode" has been added to theVector 2022 skin. The preference is also shown as a toggle on every page if your monitor is 1600 pixels or wider. When disabled it removes the whitespace added by Vector 2022 on the left and right of the page content. Disabling this preference has the same effect as enabling thewide-vector-2022 gadget. (T319449)

Arbitration

• Eligible users are invited tovote on candidates for the Arbitration Committee until 23:59 December 12, 2022 (UTC). Candidate statements can be seenhere.
• The proposed decision for the2021-22 review of the discretionary sanctions system is open.
• The arbitration caseReversal and reinstatement of Athaenara's block has been closed.
• The arbitration caseStephen has been opened and the proposed decision is expected 1 December 2022.
• Amotion has modified the procedures for contacting an admin facingLevel 2 desysop.

Miscellaneous

• Tech tip: A single IPv6 connection usually has access to a "subnet" of 18 quintillion IPs. Add/64 to the end of an IP inSpecial:Contributions to see all of a subnet's edits, andconsider blocking the whole subnet rather than an IP that may change within a minute.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (December 2022).

Administrator changes

• ComplexRational
• Extraordinary Writ

Stephen

• Andrew Yong
• Dbenbenn
• DESiegel
• GlassCobra
• Joe Decker
• Nancy
• Pathoschild
• StuffOfInterest
• William Pietri
• Wwwwolf
• Xdamr

Interface administrator changes

Nihiltres

CheckUser changes

Moneytrees

• Ivanvector
• SilkTork

Oversighter changes

• GeneralNotability
• Moneytrees

• Guerillero
• SilkTork

Guideline and policy news

• Speedy deletion criterionA5 (transwikied articles) has been repealed following anunopposed proposal.

Arbitration

• Following the2022 Arbitration Committee elections, the following editors have been appointed to the Arbitration Committee:Barkeep49,CaptainEek,GeneralNotability,Guerillero,L235,Moneytrees,Primefac,SilkTork.
• The2021-22 Discretionary Sanctions Review hasconcluded with many changes to thediscretionary sanctions procedure including a change of the name to "contentious topics". The changes are being implemented over the coming month.
• The arbitration caseStephen has been closed.

Miscellaneous

• Voting for theSound Logo has closed and the winner is expected to be announced February to April 2023.
• Tech tip: You can view information about IP addresses in a centralised location usingbullseye which won the Newcomer award in the recentCoolest Tool Awards.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2023).

Administrator changes Gimmetrow Bjelleklang Bob the Wikipedian Leithp WhisperToMe 100 inactive admins

CheckUser changes BDD Bradv Donald Albury Maxim MusikAnimal Oversighter changes BDD Bradv Donald Albury Maxim

Guideline and policy news

• Followingan RfC, theadministrator policy now requires that prior written consent be gained from theArbitration Committee to mark a block as only appealable to the committee.
• Followinga community discussion, consensus has been found to impose theextended-confirmed restriction over the topic areas ofArmenia and Azerbaijan andKurds and Kurdistan.

Technical news

• The Vector 2022 skin has become the default for desktop users of the English Wikipedia.

Arbitration

• The arbitration caseArmenia-Azerbaijan 3 has been opened and the proposed decision is expected 24 February 2023.
• In December, thecontentious topics procedure was adopted which replaces theformer discretionary sanctions system. The contentious topics procedure is now in effect following an initialimplementation period. There isa detailed summary of the changes andadministrator instructions for the new procedure. The arbitration clerk team are taking suggestions, concerns, and unresolved questions about this new system attheir noticeboard.

Miscellaneous

• Voting in the2023 Steward elections will begin on 05 February 2023, 21:00 (UTC) and end on 26 February 2023, 21:00 (UTC). Theconfirmation process of current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automaticallycheck your eligibility to vote.
• Voting in the2023 Community Wishlist Survey will begin on 10 February 2023 and end on 24 February 2023. You can submit, discuss and revise proposals until 6 February 2023.
• Tech tip:Syntax highlighting is available in both the 2011 and 2017 Wikitext editors. It can help make editing paragraphs with many references or complicated templates easier.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2023).

Administrator changes The Wordsmith Fuhghettaboutit Spinningspark (deceased)

CheckUser changes Callanecc Oversighter changes Callanecc

Guideline and policy news

• Following arequest for comment,F10 (useless non-media files) has been deprecated.
• Following arequest for comment, the Portal CSD criteria (P1 (portal subject to CSD as an article) andP2 (underpopulated portal)) have been deprecated.
• Arequest for comment is open to discuss making theclosing instructions for therequested moves process a guideline.

Technical news

• The results of the2023 Community Wishlist Survey have beenposted.

Arbitration

• Remedy 11 ("Request for Comment") of theConduct in deletion-related editing case hasbeen rescinded.
• The proposed decision for theArmenia-Azerbaijan 3 case is expected 7 March 2023.
• A case related to theHolocaust in Poland is expected to be opened soon.

Miscellaneous

• The 2023 appointees for theOmbuds commission areAGK,Ameisenigel,Bennylin,Daniuu,Emufarmers,Faendalimas,JJMC89,MdsShakil,Minorax andRenvoy as regular members andZabe as advisory members.
• Following the2023 Steward Elections, the following editors have been appointed as stewards:Mykola7,Superpes15, andXaosflux.
• TheTerms of Use update cycle has started, whichincludes a[p]roposal for better addressing undisclosed paid editing. Feedback is being accepted until 24 April 2023.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2023).

Administrator changes Aoidh KillerChihuahua

CheckUser changes Ferret

Guideline and policy news

• Acommunity RfC is open to discuss whether reports primarily involvinggender-related disputes or controversies should be referred to theArbitration enforcement noticeboard.

Technical news

• Some olderweb browsers will not be able to useJavaScript on Wikimedia wikis starting this week. This mainly affects users ofInternet Explorer 11. (T178356)
• Therollback of Vector 2022 RfC has found no consensus to rollback to Vector legacy, but has found rough consensus to disable "limited width" mode by default.
• A link to the user'sSpecial:CentralAuth page will now appear in the subtitle links shown onSpecial:Contributions. This was voted #17 in theCommunity Wishlist Survey 2023.

Arbitration

• TheArmenia-Azerbaijan 3 case has been closed.
• A case aboutWorld War II and the history of Jews in Poland has been opened, with the first evidence phase closing 6 April 2023.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2023).

Administrator changes Spicy Ale jrb Dbachmann DGG (deceased) Jimbo Wales

CheckUser changes Jimbo Wales Oversighter changes Jimbo Wales

Guideline and policy news

• Arequest for comment about removing administrative privileges in specified situations is open for feedback.

Technical news

• Progress has started on thePage Triage improvement project. This is to address the concerns raised by the community in their2022 WMF letter that requested improvements be made to the tool.

Arbitration

• The proposed decision in theWorld War II and the history of Jews in Poland case is expected 11 May 2023.

Miscellaneous

• The Wikimedia Foundation annual plan 2023-2024 draft is open for comment and input through May 19. The final plan will be published in July 2023.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2023).

Administrator changes Ingenuity Ddstretch Prodego Resolute

CheckUser changes Courcelles

Guideline and policy news

• Followingan RfC, editors indefinitely site-banned bycommunity consensus will now have all rights, including sysop, removed.
• As a part of the Wikimedia Foundation'sIP Masking project, anew policy has been created that governs the access to temporary account IP addresses. Anassociated FAQ has been created and individual communities can increase the requirements to view temporary account IP addresses.

Technical news

• Bot operators and tool maintainers should schedule time in the coming months to test and update their tools for the effects ofIP masking. IP masking will not be deployed to any content wiki untilat least October 2023 and is unlikely to be deployed to the English Wikipedia until some time in 2024.

Arbitration

• The arbitration caseWorld War II and the history of Jews in Poland has been closed. The topic area of Polish history during World War II (1933-1945) and the history of Jews in Poland is subject to a "reliable source consensus-required" contentious topic restriction.

Miscellaneous

• Followinga community referendum, thearbitration policy has been modified to remove the ability for users to appeal remedies toJimbo Wales.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2023).

Administrator changes

Novem Linguae

• Deckiller
• Electionworld
• MBisanz
• Penwhale
• Raul654
• Roadrunner
• Viridae
• Yannismarou

Bureaucrat changes

MBisanz

Guideline and policy news

• Contributions to the English Wikipedia are now released under theCreative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-SA 4.0) license instead ofCC BY-SA 3.0. Contributions are still also released under theGFDL license.

Technical news

• Discussion is open regarding a proposedglobal policy regarding third-party resources. Third-party resources are computer resources that reside outside of Wikimedia production websites.

Arbitration

• Two arbitration cases are currently open. Proposed decisions are expected 5 July 2023 for theScottywong case and 9 July 2023 for theAlisonW case.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2023).

Administrator changes

Firefangledfeathers

• AlisonW
• Amberrock
• Closedmouth
• Scottywong

Interface administrator changes

Novem Linguae

Technical news

• The tag filter onSpecial:NewPages and revision history pages can now be inverted. This allows hiding edits made by automated tools. (T334338)
• Special:BlockedExternalDomains is a new tool that allows easier blocking of plain domains (and their subdomains). This is more easily searchable and is faster for the software to use than the existingMediaWiki:Spam-blacklist. It does not support regex (for complex cases), URL path-matching, or theMediaWiki:Spam-whitelist. (T337431)

Arbitration

• The arbitration cases namedScottywong andAlisonW closed 10 July and 16 July respectively.
• TheSmallCat dispute arbitration case is in the workshop phase.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2023).

Administrator changes Pppery Theleekycauldron Dwheeler G.A.S Royalbroil Ssd

CheckUser changes Bradv Oversighter changes Bradv

Guideline and policy news

• Followingan RfC,TFAs will be automatically semi-protected the day before it is on the main page and through the day after.
• A discussion atWP:VPP about revision deletion and oversight fordead names found that[s]ysops can choose to use revdel if, in their view, it's the right tool for this situation, and they need not default to oversight. But oversight could well be right where there's a particularly high risk to the person. Use your judgment.

Technical news

• Special:Contributions now shows the user's local edit count and the account's creation date. (T324166)

Arbitration

• TheSmallCat dispute case has closed. As part of the final decision, editors participating inXfD have been reminded to be careful about forminglocal consensus which may or may not reflect the broader community consensus. Regular closers ofXfD forums were also encouraged tonote when broader community discussion, or changes to policies and guidelines, would be helpful.

Miscellaneous

• Tech tip: The "Browse history interactively" banner shown at the top ofSpecial:Diff can be used to easily look through a history, assemble composite diffs, or find out what archive something wound up in.

News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2023).

Administrator changes

0xDeadbeef

Tamzin

Dennis Brown