w:Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)/Archive 82#Wikidata edits: P- and Q-numbers

With T236087 XTools is going to get a histogram of a user's edit sizes soon. This will be a bar chart. For screen real estate reasons, it's max ~12 bars. The idea is that each bar gives the number of edits in a certain size interval. My question is: which intervals do you think we should use? The current code uses 200-width intervals (0-200, 200-400, &c), up to 1800-2000, and lumps the rest into >2000.

The issue with fixed-width intervals is they don't allow much granularity for smaller edits (e.g., separating the +1 typo fix from the +120 paragraph addition). I was thinking also of perhaps something exponential like 0-20, 20-40, 40-80, 80-160, 160-320, 320-640, 640-1280, 1280-2560, >2560. What do you think could be more meaningful to users, and why? Welcoming suggestions. Thanks, — Alien  3
3 3 16:33, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

:Just looking at my most recent mainspace contributions, the <10 typo fix or minor c/e shows up, then from 10-100 there's larger copyedits, adding categories, and formatting tweaks. The adding text+adding source seems to start from perhaps 200. I have a small number of +2000 edits which seem meaningfully distinct from say reverting page blanking vandalism, so I'd put the final bin a bit higher. CMD (talk) 02:32, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

:: Thanks for the answer! When you say "higher", where would that be? 3K? 4K? 10K? Just asking for a general order of magnitude. — Alien  3
3 3 09:09, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

:::Probably something like 5K or 10K? Maybe someone has an existing histogram this could be based on. CMD (talk) 12:15, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

:What about negatives? A few years ago I looked at my edits (in mainspace) and found that my median change was −3 bytes. —Tamfang (talk) 23:33, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

:: This would be in absolute value, i.e. putting -1 with +1. Else it takes twice as much width. We could do both positive and negative, but then we'd have pretty low granularity (could only have about 6 bars on either side). — Alien  3
3 3 05:43, 30 April 2025 (UTC)

:::Could you split the bars in two? Top colour is positive and bottom colour is negative. 80.76.122.163 (talk) 08:45, 1 May 2025 (UTC)

:::: We could, I think. Question would be, what do we do with 0? is it positive or negative? — Alien  3
3 3 09:25, 1 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::Centered/split? I agree that positive/negative above/below the horizontal axis was also where my mind went immediately. -- Avocado (talk) 22:27, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::: Yup, that's done (see discussion below). Currently the zero is put between the additions and the x-axis in the 0-10 interval, in a separate colour.

:::::: Splitting the zero bar (as in half-above and half-below) is not doable with our library without some meh hacks I'd really like to avoid. — Alien  3
3 3 09:49, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::Centred, obviously. —Tamfang (talk) 19:18, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::: A lot of stuff's happened in the last two weeks, see below (currently looks [https://github.com/x-tools/xtools/pull/514#issuecomment-2848507955 like this]). Centering the zero isn't really doable without some very ugly hacking, though, in the end, so it'll have to stick with the pos. — Alien  3
3 3 19:26, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

:I like the exponential (or semi-log?) better than a straight division. Most of our edits are actually small.

:What I really wish is that we could get numbers for changes to readable prose (e.g., not fiddling with whitespace and template formatting). WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:25, 1 May 2025 (UTC)

:: Sadly, that's just not doable on a statistical scale. The best possible in reasonable time would be a bit below 100 edits, which is not a lot.

:: If you're ready to wait something like at least 30 seconds for it, we could make a separate tool that does this.

{{outdent|::}} Update: now looks [https://private-user-images.githubusercontent.com/145840578/439613376-5396718f-7115-4af1-9449-9b053ace8f41.png?jwt=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpc3MiOiJnaXRodWIuY29tIiwiYXVkIjoicmF3LmdpdGh1YnVzZXJjb250ZW50LmNvbSIsImtleSI6ImtleTUiLCJleHAiOjE3NDYxMDc4MDYsIm5iZiI6MTc0NjEwNzUwNiwicGF0aCI6Ii8xNDU4NDA1NzgvNDM5NjEzMzc2LTUzOTY3MThmLTcxMTUtNGFmMS05NDQ5LTliMDUzYWNlOGY0MS5wbmc_WC1BbXotQWxnb3JpdGhtPUFXUzQtSE1BQy1TSEEyNTYmWC1BbXotQ3JlZGVudGlhbD1BS0lBVkNPRFlMU0E1M1BRSzRaQSUyRjIwMjUwNTAxJTJGdXMtZWFzdC0xJTJGczMlMkZhd3M0X3JlcXVlc3QmWC1BbXotRGF0ZT0yMDI1MDUwMVQxMzUxNDZaJlgtQW16LUV4cGlyZXM9MzAwJlgtQW16LVNpZ25hdHVyZT1kNWE5NTY1NjA0MzY1ZDA4MmZjYmFmZDQwYjI2YzNkZWU4NzFmZWY0NDI2ZmEwZjBhY2RjMDBmMzg2ZWU3OTBhJlgtQW16LVNpZ25lZEhlYWRlcnM9aG9zdCJ9.CDN0CTnObtNpJlFHXh5RByL5OrNTtgLXGJ57Jw7OlQk like this]. Other suggestions? — Alien  3
3 3 13:29, 1 May 2025 (UTC)

:The link doesn't work.

:Instead of a separate tool (I greedily want all the tools, but would I use it often enough to justify your efforts? I'm not sure, in this case), I wonder if it would be possible to add Special:Tags to non-prose changes. Something like the "Undo" tag, which is calculated later? WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:53, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

:: Well, my bad for the link. [https://github.com/x-tools/xtools/pull/514#issuecomment-2844621917 This one] should work.

:: Adding tags is beyond our capacity (should ask the mw people), but I get the use of it. I'm wondering, though: is a non-prose change a change that changes no prose, or that also changes something that isn't prose? — Alien  3
3 3 05:36, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

:::The red/green color choice in the diagram probably needs to be checked for Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Accessibility purposes. Could the red/minus items hang down below the 0 line?

:::About non-prose changes: I don't want to be bothered with edits like these: [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ronald_Ferguson_(economist)&curid=30885566&diff=1283944298&oldid=1243911297][https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mirror_test&curid=976335&diff=1288387525&oldid=1288385856][https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Multiple_chemical_sensitivity&curid=57628&diff=1287743484&oldid=1285322006][https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Minimal_residual_disease&curid=15354259&diff=1287480094&oldid=1285015321][https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Midwifery&curid=19391&diff=1287018302&oldid=1279352920][https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rosemarie_Zens&diff=prev&oldid=1286552908]. I do want to see edits like this one: [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Henneh_Kyereh_Kwaku&diff=prev&oldid=1287277040] WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:27, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

:::: [https://github.com/x-tools/xtools/pull/514#issuecomment-2848507955 Current histogram], after some color tweaking and putting the neg below the 0 line. (Actually, it was the grey that was really problematic for accessibility). — Alien  3
3 3 08:16, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::That shape is a little easier for me to understand at a glance.

:::::Does the new color scheme work for someone with Red–green color blindness? WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:41, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::: Yes; I checked. Still clearly distinguishable. — Alien  3
3 3 22:55, 3 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::Thanks. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:08, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

Many thanks to everyone for all the input! Will probably go out in the next deployment or two. — Alien  3
3 3 12:29, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

: {{u|Alien333}}, where you say,

:: {{talk quote|For screen real estate reasons, it's max ~12 bars}}

: Please correct me if I am wrong, but I presume this max value is due to the assumption that the bar chart must be displayed with vertical bars, in which case your max value of 12 is reasonable, because the bars would become too narrow or merge if there were a lot more than that, especially in the case of mobile users with much narrower screens.

{{tracked|T394066}}

: But is this assumption necessary? I don't think it is. Please see {{Phab|T394066}} and this horizontal bar chart demo, in which case the 12 bsr limit goes away. I assume XTools is not using the Chart extension, but the same argument applies. An ideal design imho should be able to handle a param {{para|mode|vertical}} as opt-in, and flip the chart 90 degrees, or at least, be robust enough and forward-thinking in the initial release not to prevent it from being easily added in a later enhancement. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 07:21, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

:: We do use horizontal bar charts most of the time (cf yearmonth counts).

:: But look where this goes in the edit counter: in the general stats sections; this would replace the two edit size pie charts. Which are 200px tall.

:: So using vertical bars would mean either a) making the bars less than 10px tall, which believe me makes them unreadable; or b) forcing everyone to scroll a lot.

:: So in a nutshell vertical real estate is even more constrained than horizontal real estate; hence the conscious choice to use a vertical bar chart and not a horizontal bar chart.

:: (Also, for information, changing bar dimension with ChartJS (which we use) is ridiculously easy, so there is zero risk of preventing future updates.)

:: I would also argue that we have to put some higher limit anyhow, because else we'd be adding a lot of empty bars just to show that the user did one +200K rvv. — Alien  3
3 3 07:31, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

::: Even if you do not flip, in response to {{u|Tamfang}}'s question about negative values, you said:

:::: {{talk quote|this would be in absolute value, i.e. putting -1 with +1. Else it takes twice as much width. We could do both positive and negative, but then we'd have pretty low granularity (could only have about 6 bars on either side).}}

::: but that isn't necessarily the case, iiuc. In horizontal mode, if your y-axis 0-byte change value were centered vertically (well, it should be at y=max pos. value + min neg. value / 2) then you could display negative values below the y=0 line with no increase in width, retaining twelve bars, even without flipping to vertical orientation. {{ec|2}} Mathglot (talk) 07:45, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

:::: I'd say try to look at the current output I linked above; it does currently do that in the end :). — Alien  3
3 3 07:48, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

::::: Imho, the choice is not only between a) and b). Couldn't one collapse the section to minimize scrolling and allow access to the totality of the data? Mobile users (already the majority, iiuc) already have all sections collapsed; I don't see a collapsed section being a huge burden for desktop users to click '[show]', in exchange for the benefit of minimizing scrolling past a long chart. {{ec}} Mathglot (talk) 08:02, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::: We could give a button for the whole data, I suppose.

:::::: Adding an optional full scrollable chart does free us from all real estate concerns, though.

:::::: So I don't really see how a horizontal bar chart helps in this case. Plus, the default data [https://github.com/x-tools/xtools/pull/514#issuecomment-2883145797 does look cramped] in a horizontal chart. I don't think making the default data have less bars is an improvement. — Alien  3
3 3 09:40, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::: I do not think it looks cramped; is it just a feeling you are getting, or are you measuring something? Maybe extending it to full screen width would make it look less cramped? And what do you mean by cramped, do you mean physically on the page the elements like bars and axes and text and so on are too close together or too small, or do you mean that there isn't enough room to easily represent the data at a resolution that tells the proper story about the data, or something else? Also, are you planning to make the edit size buckets fixed, or will the user be able to specify their own buckets when generating a chart (guessing the former)? Mathglot (talk) 20:05, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::: I meant cramped vertically, as in the labels being very close to each other and the bars being very narrow.

:::::::: Indeed, current plan is fixed buckets. We might do variable buckets later, but you have to admit current output is already a long way better than the current "<20" and ">1000". — Alien  3
3 3 11:06, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

I note that they comprise four of the most basic musical chords: A, D, F, and G. They are four of the first chords one learns on guitar, for example. Some aspiring songwriter(s) should write a song or two, including lyrics, using only the chords found in their respective titles.{{pb}}DGAF would be the funner of the two, and might be adopted as Wikipedia's anthem. {{small|Kidding, for those who don't know me.}} ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 09:43, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

:When you did mentionned the idea to adopt a music as Wikipedia's anthem.

:I didn't saw the part in small saying "Kidding, for those who don't know me.".

:So , I thought your was serious. The fact that I did misinterpreted you message at first reading.

:I consider this is a fun fact.

:DGAF is a reference to the humorous essay intitulated "Wikipedia:Don't-give-a-fuckism" ?

:AGF is a reference to what ? Anatole-berthe (talk) 12:16, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

::1. Yes. Or the general phrase "don't give a fuck", which occurs off-wiki and predates Wikipedia. 2. Wikipedia:Assume good faith. ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 12:22, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Thanks for your explanations !

:::I was certain that AGF was referring to something of essential and it was one of the most basic guideline.

:::But , I didn't understood it was that.

:::About the idea to compose a music and write lyrics for these things.

:::Is this a serious suggestion or a humoristic one ? Anatole-berthe (talk) 12:29, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

::::Serious. I was kidding only about the anthem. I'm not suggesting this helps the project in any way, which is why I'm on this page instead of WP:VPR. ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 12:33, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

::::Some (not all) ancestors of Don't give a fuck: Don't give a hoot, Don't give a darn, Don't give a damn, Don't give a shit, Don't give two shits, Don't give a rat's ass. It's like the original meme, Don't give [insert noun]. FYI for the French. ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 13:05, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::I don't think that there's a key where A, D, F and G chords all fit neatly. But if we omit F, we can write something in D Major involving D, G and A chords as I, IV, V respectively. If you're only interested in these notes, try C Major, F Major or B-flat major. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 16:34, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::Hey, I didn't say they need to be good songs. Call it contemporary music and all norms vanish instantly (which fits well with DGAF and maybe AGF). ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 22:38, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

[https://artsci.washington.edu/news/2025-05/challenge-peer-produced-websites Recent article on the University of Washington website.] Unsurprisingly, a fair amount about Wikipedia in there. - Jmabel | Talk 17:03, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

:Thanks for posting that link. Part of that article connects to the discussion above.

:It would be interesting to redo the IP study from 2006, about whether IP contributions are still a net positive (or, more realistically, by how positive they are). In particular, I worry about pipeline effects. About half of our existing experienced editors (including me) made their first edits as an IP. Making an IP edit, seeing that it's successful, and then creating an account to do more is a known pattern. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:23, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

::{{tq|About half of our existing experienced editors (including me) made their first edits as an IP.}} Me too. If registration had been required, I would have happily registered, knowing that I could abandon the account tomorrow if I decided I didn't want to edit any more. But it wasn't, so I didn't. So...{{pb}}I'm not in a position to embrace the pipeline effect theory based on a survey with a very small sample size (assuming that's where it originated). If it merely asked the question: "Did you make your first edits as an IP?", it omitted the necessary follow-up question: "If registration had been required, would you have registered?" See Response bias. ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 11:32, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

:::The 2006 study was about the value of edits made by IPs. It did not ask editors (registered or otherwise) anything. The 2006 study is part of the basis for Wikipedia:Perennial proposals#Prohibit unregistered users from editing.

:::I don't think that a question like "If registration had been required, would you have registered?" is necessarily a good idea. Retrospective recollection is not strong, and retrospective guesses about what you might have done under other circumstances is particularly weak. I believe the 2010-era usability: work ran an experiment in which some IPs were prompted to create an account after clicking the [Edit] button, but before making the edit. The result was a lot of abandoned edits (compared to IPs that were not prompted to create an account). WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:57, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

::::Well yeah, unsolicited pop-ups like that are annoying, even offensive. If I wanted to register, I would have already registered, so why are you hounding/distracting me with this? Every damn edit, I have to give the same damn answer to the same damn question. Am I running this computer, or is it running me? What genius designed this crap? I wouldn't reward/encourage such poor, user-unfriendly design by cooperating with it, and I might very well be annoyed enough to just leave in disgust. That's how I roll and I assure you I'm no freak, despite some public opinion. ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 22:22, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::I think you should probably read about the study design before making assumptions about how it was handled (e.g., "pop-ups"). WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:33, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::I felt it was safe to assume the thing required at least one additional click. If I was wrong, I sit corrected and strike "hounding" while retaining "distracting".{{pb}}But we're pretty far down the rabbit hole, distracting from the #1 question: "How badly does Wikipedia 2025 need unregistered editors?" If the answer is, "Not so much. The encyclopedia would not suffer significantly without them," there aren't any more questions other than the date of the change and how it should be advertised. ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 23:34, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::That's a big "if".

:::::::Generally speaking, openness increases the number of participants, and closed-ness decreases. But openness is not free, because there is a cost to being open to everyone, just like there would be cost to inviting anyone and everyone into your home.

:::::::The English Wikipedia's community size (as measured by registered editors) declined after the introduction of anti-vandal bots c. 2007 and has been mostly stable since c. 2013 (approximately since the deployment of the visual editor). We got a boost when the pandemic hit. However, there are hints that the numbers may be declining again. This might be driven by us, but it's probably significantly influenced by real-world factors (why would I edit text on Wikipedia, when I could post videos on Tik Tok?). Limiting participation might not be the best choice for this point in time. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:18, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::::The most reliable way to determine whether something will work: Try it and see. It never fails to yield the correct answer, so we can say it's 100% reliable. There is no evidence like empirical evidence—what happened, not what a majority of discussion participants think will probably happen. Eliminates all the speculative crystal-balling, trying to divine answers from a bunch of numbers, and so on. People always over-complicate things, which is a whole nuther discussion.{{pb}}So run a six-month trial and then show me where the encyclopedia suffered significantly. Then open the doors again and let all those IPs— the ones who didn't break down and register during the trial—help repair all the damage I caused by closing the doors for six months. If some IPs have been permanently turned off to editing because the doors were closed for six months, they will be replaced soon enough. 137,166,460 people were born in 2005, and virtually all of them will turn 20 this year (the rest are dead). 138,469,300 more next year. Et cetera.{{pb}}If nobody can show me the significant damage, using all the personpower, experience, and tools available, the damage is not significant. Perhaps extend the trial for another year and then take another look. ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 01:58, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::The effect is likely delayed. People will edit once, twice, ten times over the course of a year, or several years, before they decide to create an account. If a known pattern is to make IP edits occasionally one year, but register account in another year, when would you expect to see lost editors? Do you wait five years? (Also, if we ever required registration, I would expect some editors to insist that it never be reversed, because the resulting lower volume of edits is so much more convenient for them.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:14, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::{{tq|People will edit once, twice, ten times over the course of a year, or several years, before they decide to create an account.}} Again, it doesn't necessarily follow that they wouldn't register on Day 1 if they had to. This is more speculative crystal-balling for both of us. Try it and see.{{pb}}{{tq|when would you expect to see lost editors?}} I don't care about lost editors. I care about demonstrated, not "predicted" damage to the encyclopedia resulting from said loss. If you're saying six months would be too short, make it longer.{{pb}}{{tq|(Also, if we ever required registration, I would expect some editors to insist that it never be reversed, because the resulting lower volume of edits is so much more convenient for them.)}} If that's the consensus, so be it. If not, their "insistence" is easily ignored.{{pb}}When did WMF start caring about consensus in this matter? ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 04:16, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::Six months might be a reasonable length of time to identify a cohort, but the practical effect might not be visible for several years. Think about those charts showing what happens to population during a war: You end up with a permanent divot in the affected generation. Measuring that is more difficult in our case, but difficult to measure ≠ evidence that it's not happening.

:::::::::::The bigger problem is: What if this test is the straw that breaks the camel's back, and it destroys the community? I'd like to A/B test the whole world, but I also don't want to live in a world with a dying Wikipedia.

:::::::::::As for the practicalities, I point out that WP:Consensus can change, which means that a group of editors who swear up and down in January that they'll support turning on IP access again in July is also a group of editors who can come back in June and say they've changed their minds and would like to make the registration requirement permanent, and too bad for anyone who was relying on their good-faith promise six months ago.

:::::::::::It apparently hasn't occurred to you, but page protection doesn't require WMF approval, so whether they "care about consensus" is irrelevant.

:::::::::::Finally, please quit changing the timestamp on your comments. It is unnecessary and screws up Echo/Notifications for everyone using the [Subscribe] button. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:09, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::::The level of risk aversion at enwiki is truly remarkable. The result is a very safe, very stagnant project. If Wikipedia ever collapses, it will be under the accumulated weight of decades of unresolved problems, including many that could have been resolved with try it and see. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.{{pb}}Even when a trial fails, it leaves us with actual, real-world data that can be used to inform further discussion about the problem. This is distinct from little tests that don't duplicate real-world situations. So a trial either fixes the problem or teaches us something invaluable that we didn't know before.{{pb}}But I'm apparently boxing above my weight, so I'll withdraw now. Thanks for the timestamp tip; I thought I was doing something good, showing the time of last change. ―Mandruss ☎ IMO. 17:08, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::::You have reminded me about an old (c. 1900) joke about surgery: "The operation was a success, but the patient died."

:::::::::::::An experiment that could actually kill Wikipedia, even if it would allow is to have "further discussion" about what could have been done, except the experimented-upon patient is now dead, isn't a reasonable experiment. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:38, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::::{{tq|The level of risk aversion at enwiki is truly remarkable.}} Sounds about right. I'd expect the oldest, biggest project (enwiki) to be more ossified than the other projects. –Novem Linguae (talk) 18:55, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::{{Tq|If some IPs have been permanently turned off to editing because the doors were closed for six months, they will be replaced soon enough.}} I don't think these folks would be replaced. If you add barriers to anything, it will cause there to be less of that. I think ip editing restrictions are more like a trade-off. For example, maybe we lose 20% productive edits but we also get 30% less vandalism. And maybe saving experienced editor time of cleaning up vandalism makes it worth it. Or maybe not. It's hard to tell in advance what the exact mix is. –Novem Linguae (talk) 14:19, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::I agree.

::::::::::To add more complexity to your scenario: a lot of high-volume editors don't write content. For example, I spend more time chatting on background pages than adding content. Other people spend their days tweaking wikitext and templates, or reverting vandalism.

::::::::::Before the introduction of the anti-vandal bots, we had thousands of editors who reverted vandalism. Since then, we've needed fewer people to do this, especially for the simple cases. There are some bad effects from this (e.g., humans who don't have "poop vandalism" as their mental anchor for what real vandalism is start applying the label of vandalism to edits that don't meet the definition at Wikipedia:Vandalism; we reduced the number of human-to-human comments on User_talk: pages and increased the number of boilerplate templates, which became more strident and off-putting), but there are obviously good effects. But I think that experience shows us that the scenario isn't "Alice would like to write articles, but she's so busy reverting vandalism that she can't do that". Instead, the scenario is "Alice doesn't want garbage in Wikipedia, and if we can find a way to make that happen without needing her to revert so much garbage, then she'll cheerfully quit entirely."

::::::::::Another thing that I'd like to see is an analysis of who writes articles. Not who "edits", but "who adds sentences and paragraphs and sources". If an article gets 50 edits over the course of five years, but only one of the edits is a human who writes a sentence, who is that human? I suspect that for many articles, it's a relatively inexperienced editor. Power users like me tend to wander away from content editing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:32, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::I would hypothesize that power users tend to specialize, and that there are some power users that specialize in content creation. So I don't necessarily think it's a given that new content is often/usually/always written by a newcomer. –Novem Linguae (talk) 18:57, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::::I'm convinced that it's not 'always', but I wonder whether it's 'disproportionately'. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:16, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::On the other hand, with almost 20 years under my belt, I still prefer adding content, although that often means rewriting and expanding articles (and sometimes finally improving stubs I created years ago) rather than starting new ones. Donald Albury 19:02, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

Hello everyone. I’ve created a preliminary article, but I can’t transfer it to the main environment. This article is a translation of a [https://fa.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D9%85%D8%BA%E2%80%8C%DA%A9%D8%B4%DB%8C Persian article]. Can someone help me? I’d be grateful. The title of the article is MAGOPHONIA. Thistimefo (talk) 02:03, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

:@Thistimefo The draft looks like it has been submitted for review. It takes a bit for people to review these articles, just remain patient. Gaismagorm (talk) 19:28, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

:User:Thistimefo, the reason why you can't create an article in mainspace is that you are not yet confirmed. This usually happens automatically after you have made 10 edits, and 4 days after the first one. The draft looks good to me at first glance (I haven't yet looked enough to move it to mainspace) except for the title, which should only have the first letter capitalised. I don't know if I will have enough time to accept it in the next few days, but if not please be patient, as Gaismagorm says. Phil Bridger (talk) 20:24, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

Hi. This is a new place for me to go, so I need to ask a question. I have found an image upload here, for the logo of a company called the Victorian Funds Management Corporation. The uploader has stated that the image fails to pass the threshold of originality, and is considered to be Public Domain in the US.

My question stems down to this: How can an image which is stated to be in copyright on the (governmental) website which owns it, permitted to be used in a public domain setting, without violating the intellectual property rights of the creator of that image? Their website makes it clear that "This website, including its design, layout, text and images and all intellectual property rights in that material, is owned by or licensed to VFMC. Permission to reproduce in part or whole any document or information on this website must be sought from VFMC in advance."

How can Wikipedia get round this by using rules that apply in the territory where it is based, rather than following the rules applicable in the country where the image originated?

Thanks for any insight you may be able to give me.

Dane|Geld 21:34, 20 May 2025 (UTC)

:It's quite common for people and groups to claim blanket copyright over whole websites. It doesn't mean that everything in the site is actually theirs or even copyrightable at all. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 21:39, 20 May 2025 (UTC)

The "Did You Know..." section has had something like 3 or 4 Jilly Cooper related posts over the last couple of weeks. Do we really need that many centered around one author? It seems like after one, the space could be used for a fresh topic. 130.156.51.193 (talk) 16:16, 21 May 2025 (UTC)

:Briefly looking at the archive for May, Jilly Cooper or her novels were mentioned in the "Did You Know..." section on May 21st, May 20th, May 17th, May 15th, and May 7th. This does seem excessive Spritestraw (talk) 16:34, 21 May 2025 (UTC)

:: Wikipedia's Did You Know section's content is determined by what topics people write about. If one prolific worker writes 5 articles about Jilly Cooper that meet the DYK criteria, then they will all get shown in recognition of that work. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 16:48, 21 May 2025 (UTC)

:::That's the problem with the DYK section. It seems to exist for the purpose of giving recognition to editors rather than for the benefit of readers. Phil Bridger (talk) 20:11, 21 May 2025 (UTC)

::::You would think that editors would have the sense not to nominate every article just because they can, but to only nominate those articles with the best hooks. Or to hold articles in draft space and release them in a more staggered fashion. But I guess the virtual shiny sticker for having a DYK is just too splendiferously magnificent to pass up. --User:Khajidha (talk) (contributions) 15:49, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

:::It is a very common way of working for content creators. Having obtained the sources for one topic, it becomes straightforward to update more, related articles. DYK is a showcase of what the community is working on, so no problem. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 23:06, 21 May 2025 (UTC)

::::Very true. DYK does try to space things out so May 20 and May 21 are likely a mistake, but it takes a lot of work to create these lists and manpower is short. If anyone thinks things could be improved and wants to try their hand at curating a DYK set, they should give it a go. CMD (talk) 02:19, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

::Also, a more appropriate venue would be WT:DYK. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:49, 21 May 2025 (UTC)

Note — I am not complaining about this situation! I mention names only to give some context.

In [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard&oldid=1291779126#Request_to_Create_Draft%3ABinod_Tamu_Ballu this section], an IP asked for help with the title blacklist, and User:Liz replied with "can you try creating a version in your User space? I'm not sure if that's okay for IP accounts but I'd try that". Is that okay for IP accounts? Should we be suggesting this? From a technical perspective I don't expect any problems. I just don't remember ever seeing IPs creating userspace or usertalkspace pages, and I have no idea if it's a good idea. I think I've once or twice seen user talk archives for stable IPs with long-term histories, but I can't bring up any examples, so I have no idea whether these were created by their "owners" or by other people. Note that my point is pages in IP userspace, not IPs creating pages in userspace; if it's okay to have these pages, I assume it's okay for IPs to create or edit them. Nyttend (talk) 10:47, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

:I can't see anything wrong per-se with IPs creating userspace subpages, but I should point out that temporary accounts are coming so whatever advice is given here will be largely moot when that happens. The timing has not yet been nailed down; as far as I can tell, TA is supposed to get rolled out on enwiki around the end of this year. RoySmith (talk) 11:55, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

Hello! I remember stumbling upon a Wikipedia essay about users coming back after long-ago blocks. There were several examples of users who had been blocked as children for vandalism and returned years later as adults, and their blocks were lifted because this was obviously reasonable. I remember there was one case study where a user got blocked for block evasion because they somehow identified themselves as a new account of a blocked user, but the old account had been blocked when they were 9 or something like that, and everyone agreed that lifting the block was reasonable. I think the essay was about users coming back unannounced, keeping their heads down, and avoiding problematic behaviour. I've tried searching but can't find it - does anyone know what I'm referring to? Thanks! Helpful Cat🐈(talk) 21:08, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

:Maybe Wikipedia:Standard offer -- GreenC 21:47, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

::Sounds more like Wikipedia:Clean start. —Cryptic 22:55, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

:Wikipedia:Quiet return addresses this topic. I'm sure I've seen another one somewhere. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 22:59, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

::Probably this one: User:Tamzin/Adverse possession unblock. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 23:44, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Thank you! It was the two you linked to (User:Worm That Turned/Quiet return and User:Tamzin/Adverse possession unblock). No wonder I couldn't find them, because they were in userspace. Helpful Cat🐈(talk) 06:20, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?search=insource%3A%2Fcanoo%5C.net%2F canoo.net (dead, 7 hits)] vs Canoo (dead too). Is it the same company or not? What to do with the dead references on 7 pages? Taylor 49 (talk) 16:14, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

: Well I found Q36486216 (7 wikis, plus a least one never connected to that item) and Q1033575 (1 wiki) "Canoonet was an online dictionary with an attached grammar for the German language. The basic dictionary of Canoonet contained approximately 250,000 entries, which corresponded to more than 3 million word forms with over 25,000 application examples, the meaning information and synonyms for over 100,000 keywords and descriptions of linguistic terms. At the beginning of 2020 canoonet was discontinued and part of the content was acquired by LEO GmbH". Taylor 49 (talk) 16:26, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

:CanooNet (canoo.net) apparently did not renew their domain at the end of July, 2019. There seems to be a comprehensive record of its pages up to then on the Internet Archive, accessible through the Wayback Machine. Donald Albury 16:34, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

:See :Template:Webarchive recovering links to dead webpages. Donald Albury 16:42, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

[https://officechai.com/ai/chatgpt-only-website-among-top-10-most-visited-to-see-increase-in-users-all-others-decline/ Recent news reports say that] traffic to AI website ChatGPT has surpassed Wikipedia.org. I used to derive pleasure from providing information to the whole world ... I had no qualms about donating hundreds, even thousands of hours of my time: I did it proudly. It seemed noble.

But now Wikipedia is one of the primary sources of raw data for the AI models. In a couple of years, almost all people will directly ask an AI tool (which will rely heavily on Wikipedia articles) and bypass Wikipedia altogether. It is inevitable; can't stop progress. Granted, the work of WP editors is still (indirectly) helping millions of people around the globe ... even when people go through AI to get the information.

But what bothers me is: the owners/C-suite executives of the AI companies are getting exceedingly wealthy, off the back of free labor from Wikipedia editors. What was once noble, now feels like exploitation. Noleander (talk) 17:28, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

:That is the nature of all such projects. Surely you're not surprised people are actually taking us up on the "even commercially" clause of the CC-BY-SA license we use? RoySmith (talk) 19:26, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

::You don't actually have to be "surprised" to decide that something feels icky to you. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:33, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

::@RoySmith No, I'm not surprised, just saddened. Sure, WP was always copied & used freely, even by commercial ventures. But the AI companies are massively profitable (Google, Microsoft, Facebook, etc) ... in the past, companies that copied WP for profit seemed marginal, and not exploitive.

::Another thing that is changing is that people used to visit the WP web site(s) a lot; but that seems to be declining due to AI (so says the recent internet stats) ... one can image - 5 years in the future - that users never visit the WP web sites, and instead get all of that same info from AI portals. In that scenario: WP is simply raw data for AI, and WP editors are exploited drones.

::Much of the pride of being a WP editor will disappear in that scenario, at least for me. Noleander (talk) 23:07, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Hard to say if AI summaries will steal 20% of our traffic or 50% or whatever. Or it could be a big nothing burger. Microsoft used to think that tablets would replace most desktop computers too (think Windows 8). Sometimes hype cycles (new technologies) flop pretty spectacularly after the initial hype. –Novem Linguae (talk) 23:38, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

::::@Novem Linguae You're right about the hype possibility: Hard to predict what the digital world will be like 10 or 20 years from now.

::::I enjoy editing WP, it is a hobby. I'm not suggesting that editors should be paid by massively profitable AI companies ... But wouldn't it be nice if the AI companies made some donations to Wikimedia Foundation in recognition of the value of the WP raw data? Noleander (talk) 23:47, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

::::I do not think it can just be called hype. Since I'm in college, I can confidently say that no one around me does their assignments the traditional way now. Everyone uses ChatGPT or whatever, even if it is known to hallucinate or spit rubbish sometimes. If this is the confidence with which people are using AI now, and such is their dependency on it, it is extremely difficult to revert back to when there was no AI. And all those tech giants pushing AI summaries over anything else doesn't help either. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 01:58, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Anecdotally, I stopped visiting Wikipedia for general reference when the default layout redesign was launched. I find it harder to read and navigate, but I don't care to create an account just for that. I think the change coincided with the rise in popularity of LLMs, so if I'm in any way representative, that might be a significant factor too. I doubt most people care about it as much as I do and most people are probably used to it by now, but maybe it had some effect. 207.11.240.2 (talk) 08:59, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

:Bloggers and commercial sites (some, not all) have been copying from us without attribution for years. What seems to have changed is that search engines now prioritize their own LLMs over WP. Running LLMs is quite expensive, however. [https://www.gzeromedia.com/gzero-ai/will-ai-companies-ever-be-profitable This article] is six months old, but I suspect the companies pushing LLMs haven't seen a profit yet. Whether they will in the foreseeable future is a question I can't answer. Donald Albury 22:07, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

::@Donald Albury - Isn't it true that the biggest AI companies are Google, Microsoft, Musk, and Facebook? (OpenAI/ChatGPT is partially owned by Microsoft, I believe). Those are huge, profitable companies, and their executives make big $$$$$. Sure, they may stick their AI work into subsidiaries that lose money on paper, but the parent companies continue to be profitable. And the loss-leader AI subsidiaries drive customers to the parent apps/websites, which have ads, etc.

::Example: in the future, most questions that people type into Google web site will be run thru Google's AI. I foresee Google's AI using WP as a primary source. So WP editors are working - unpaid - for Google. It is bothersome that most Google employee get paid, but WP editors would not. Noleander (talk) 23:17, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

:::But, will they continue to pump money into running LLMs if they do not become profitable? Big companies will pour money into developing products, but if the products do not become profitable within some period, they will cut their losses. So the questions are, when or if will LLMs become profitable to operate, and if they do not become profitable, will one or more companies continue to subsidize them because of other perceived benefits? Donald Albury 02:22, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Google (and much of the rest of the word) runs on Linux. Does it bother you that Linux developers don't get paid? If you don't want people to make money off your volunteer efforts, find projects to contribute to which don't allow commercial use. RoySmith (talk) 13:16, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

::::You're right: there are many examples of billionaires profiting from the free labor of volunteers. But that doesn't make it fair or ethical. The 1% oligarchs shouldn't be able to hoard 99% of the planet's wealth .... Nothing wrong with pointing that profiteering off free labor is happening here in the context of Wikipedia.

::::Volunteer scientists around the world for centuries have built-up useful, global knowledge without pay. But were oligarchs routinely profiting from that? Yeah, probably sometimes, but not it was not common.

::::In addition to the issue of "should AI companies pay WP for its content" is a related issue of ''"It's kinda sad that visits to WP articles are gradually diminishing as people shift to AI portals".

::::The same thing happening to WP is also happening with Stack Exchange ... for the past decade a very popular online resource (built by volunteers) for engineers ... but now its web traffic is dropping because its user base is shifting to AI portals. Noleander (talk) 13:42, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

:{{tq|But now Wikipedia is one of the primary sources of raw data for the AI models.}} Is it? I mean, that would be a scandal for anyone trying to push such AI as reliable because even Wikipedia says Wikipedia isn't a reliable source. So I'm both surprised and a bit suspicious about that claim. At any rate, it would make more sense for AI to be told to follow all the references cited on Wikipedia and glean from them. Largoplazo (talk) 22:36, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

::@Largoplazo I hope you're right. But I am pretty sure that AI _is_ using WP as a primary source of its data. For the past 2 months I've tried using AI a couple dozen times to find new sources for research I'm working on, and at least 80% of the results are facts (generally correct) that include a "source link" (a kind of AI footnote) pointing to a WP article (often the article I'm working on :-) Noleander (talk) 23:10, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

:The open source movement in general has pros and cons. People we don't want to use our open source work using our open source work is certainly one of the cons. Won't stop me from editing though. –Novem Linguae (talk) 23:39, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

:Just as an interesting aside, of the court cases challenging whether using copyrighted materials consistitutes fair use, the courts seem to be siding for creators. If this holds, then arguably any AI that has used WP content needs to follow up by including necessary attribution licenses per CC-By, or otherwise seek an exemption license from WMF. Nothings final yet though. Masem (t) 00:00, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

::Yeah, I've been following that legal issue closely. That is a battle between titans: on the one hand Google/Microsoft/Facebook: on the other hand: Hollywood/Music/authors. The "fair use" exception is so broad, who knows how SCOTUS will ultimately rule. I was happy to see a court decision in Australia about 2 years ago where they forced search engines (Google, etc) to pay $$$ to news sources, when the search app was earning massive revenue for merely listing the news articles, and paying nothing for the content.... that at time when newspapers are dying at an alarming rate. Noleander (talk) 00:48, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

:It doesn't have any effect on my ability to write Wikipedia articles or other people's ability to read them, so I don't see why it should make any difference to me. User:Thebiguglyalien/Wikipedia is not about page views. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 🛸 02:22, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

::Most of us who edit Wikipedia were sucked into it while we used to read it. A generation that never visits Wikipedia to read it would not feel the urge or need to edit contents here. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 02:29, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Ever since AI exploded, I've started to understand how the editors of Encyclopedia Britannica (hardcopy) must have felt in the 1980s ... wondering if your entire medium will become irrelevant.

:::I wonder if AI will continue to make lots of mistakes, leading to increased attention to the quality of the raw data (especially WP articles) ... if so, WP will become more important, not to say more often viewed. Noleander (talk) 02:58, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

::::On the other hand, the Wikipedia screenshot as a questionable source has been dethroned by llm screenshots, so we've got no longer being the generic lowest common denominator going for us. CMD (talk) 10:25, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::-) Donald Albury 15:01, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

::::I read an article in The Guardian a few weeks ago that said that AI hallucinations are not going to go away as time goes on, and might even get worse. I'll see if I can find the page. Cremastra (u — c) 12:52, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::And the hits keep coming: from [https://www.npr.org/2025/05/20/nx-s1-5405022/fake-summer-reading-list-ai the summer reading booklist.] Donald Albury 16:51, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::Ah yes, that was a good one. I didn't find the Guardian article but there are [https://www.newscientist.com/article/2479545-ai-hallucinations-are-getting-worse-and-theyre-here-to-stay/ New Scientist] and other articles with the same premise. Cremastra (u — c) 22:50, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

:Since I discovered that it is possible to get paid (to the tune of a 5 figure sum in a matter of a few months), for stumping frontier LLMs on a platform that I won't name (but whose clients undoubtedly include OpenAI, Google, Meta etc.) my editing on wikipedia has all but ceased. The latest LLMs are data hungry, they have pretty much exhausted all open sources of information. Polyamorph (talk) 15:09, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

:I think the remarkable aspect isn't that businesses take advantage of free work (they've been doing that forever), but that so many people have been willing to contribute their work for anyone to freely use (which I wouldn't have predicted at Wikipedia's genesis). For Linux, there's a huge network effect that makes it beneficial to its contributors, but there's nothing equivalent for Wikipedia at the scale of its volunteer base. This probably makes Wikipedia vulnerable to disenchantment, and as others have said, losing readers through less prominent positioning in search results affects recruitment of new editors. isaacl (talk) 16:46, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

::[https://artsci.washington.edu/news/2025-05/challenge-peer-produced-websites This article about peer-produced websites] (posted by Jmabel below) might interest some of you. It says that @Benjamin Mako Hill "is also noticing new challenges on the horizon, most notably the trend of AI content being listed first in web search results, ahead of Wikipedia — a particularly galling development given that generative AI is built using sites like Wikipedia that provide freely available content." WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:21, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

:I don't think this is a major concern. Obviously, the foundational model companies and governments will all get together to organize a substantial universal basic income for everyone based on the radical abundance that is just a few years away now. You can probably see early signs of the likelihood of success for these happy days of abundance, benevolence, and good governance, the communist hi-tech work-free utopia I was promised as a child, in the way the One Big Beautiful Bill Act tries to optimize for equity... I don't mind Wikipedia data being part of the training sets, or part of the retrieval augmented responses, but it's especially galling when LLMs provide an A/B test as a response - do you like this answer or the other answer? - I mean, come on, why is the model asking me, I'm an idiot, which it should already know from some of the stupid questions I've asked. Anyway, synthetic data probably dwarfs the Wikipedia data by now. Sean.hoyland (talk) 18:41, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Country and ethnic flags are commonly used to represent languages (including here, with examples including the {{tlx|Wikipedias in Germanic languages}} and {{tlx|Wikipedias in Romance languages}} navboxes), with common examples including [later edit] using the flag of the US or the UK to represent English, the flag of Japan for Japanese [end of later edit. Sr. Knowthing ¿señor? 00:48, 25 May 2025 (UTC)], and so on.

However, country and ethnic flags do not represent languages. As the name suggests, they represent countries, which is particularly problematic in many circumstances:

• For languages which are spoken in many countries (such as English, Spanish or French), that means a specific country or countries are seen subjectively as "more representative" of the language than others. Spanish, for example, is usually represented with the flag of Spain, despite the fact that three other countries have more Spanish speakers than Spain and, within Spain itself, many other languages are commonly spoken besides Castilian.
• For countries where many languages are widely spoken only there (such as South Africa or India), country flags become even more problematic as they can be associated with nationalistic assimilation (such as using the Indian flag to represent Hindi) or simply using country flags for less commonly spoken languages within those countries (such as using the South African flag for Afrikaans).
• For languages spoken in countries with uniquely marked national identities (such as Serbo-Croatian), using any country's flag can be also misconstrued as endorsement for either one or other form of nationalism.
• For countries which are uniquely controversial in the international stage (such as China, Israel or Russia), using their national flags to represent the languages they speak may be misconstrued as endorsing those countries' political stances or actions, particularly by people personally affected by those countries' actions (such as the Taiwanese, Palestinians, Ukrainians, etc.)
• For lingua francas with no native speakers (such as MSA), using the flag of any country to represent them is inappropriate as no country actually speaks that language as a national tongue.
• For countries where a language used to be commonly spoken but not anymore (such as using the Colombian flag for Muysccubun), using said country's flag is not appropriate either, as that language is not representative of its country's modern population, and usually the modern country is not representative of the people whose language went extinct.
• For languages spoken by groups which do not have any unique official symbology (such as Yiddish, Pennsylvania Dutch or Alemannic German), using any flag to represent them in the encyclopedia is original research (tho, to be honest, I think WP:OR applies to using flags for languages in general).

The only case where I can see using flags to represent languages as acceptable is when a flag has been chosen specifically to represent a language, such as the Verda Stelo for Esperanto.

And so, I come here to discuss the use of non-official flags to represent languages, which I believe should not be done in Wikipedia as it constitutes original research, plus the reasons enlisted above. Sr. Knowthing ¿señor? 00:23, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

:These are all good observations. There is a long section at MOS:FLAG.It says they should only be used when the subject is a nation. And says don't use a flag when it might be ambiguous or controversial or not clear. Both these are a problem for languages. Perhaps add something in the "Inappropriate use" section, -- GreenC 01:36, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

:Per MOS:ICONDECORATION: {{tq|Icons should serve an encyclopedic purpose and not merely be decorative. They should provide additional useful information on the article subject, serve as visual cues that aid the reader's comprehension, or improve navigation.}} On first use, they must indicate the country associated with the flag (MOS:WORDPRECEDENCE). If they are not being used where words alone would convey the same information, then they are redundant and primarily decorative. Per MOS:FLAGS, with some exceptions, they should not be used in infoboxes (per MOS:FLAGS). Flags can serve a useful purpose if they act as a "key" or "shorthand" for information in different sections of a table or infobox. MOS:MILFLAGS gives clarification on this, which also has some degree of general applicability. Apart from the issues identified by the OP as to why the use of flags in an infobox for a language would be problematic, the prevailing P&G does not support their use in such an infobox. Furthermore, it would not support their use elsewhere in the article if the use was redundant (being presented with text) and therefore primarily decorative. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:40, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

:I think that MOS:FLAG sometimes gets invoked a bit overenthusiastically to remove country flags, but this feels a pretty open-and-shut example of where we generally agree they should be avoided. I think you can just go ahead and remove them.

:Having said that I'm also not sure if it's a widespread problem - these two templates seem to have had them added by the same user relatively recently, and I don't recall seeing them very commonly elsewhere, so maybe this is an unusual case. Andrew Gray (talk) 11:53, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

::Looking at :Muscogean languages, I see that :Choctaw language and :Muscogee language each have both the US and their respective tribal flags in the infobox under official languages. No idea how many other language articles have flags in their infoboxes Donald Albury 14:49, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Very few do… and likely none should. Blueboar (talk) 14:56, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

:::: It seems to be common practice for flags to be used in the {{para|nation}} and {{para|minority}} fields of {{tl|Infobox language}}. Back in 2015 when that infobox was added to AnomieBOT's FlagIconRemover task, those two fields were called out as exceptions to the bot-removal of flags. OTOH, :Choctaw language and :Muscogee language may be misusing the {{para|nation}} field to indicate sub-national regions; that'd be a question for someone more familiar with the infobox. Anomie⚔ 15:29, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

::::: Pinging User:Kwamikagami to this discussion as the one who made the bot request back in the day, since they're still active. Anomie⚔ 15:36, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::the point of the flag is not to id the language, but as a visual aid to id the country. language flags like the esperanto one would be added as an illustration of the language, not as an id in the country or region list.

::::::afaik we haven't used flags for official countries in years, mainly because ppl keep abusing them and arguing over trivia that is merely meant to be a visual aid. i don't know where the discussion is where we decided to stop.

::::::i wouldn't be opposed to re-instituting flags, but we'd need clear and precise criteria. there is general agreement across wp that flags should only be used for de jure and de facto official usage. so e.g. for cherokee, we might have the flags of the various tribal jurisdictions of the cherokee nation, but not of the u.s.a., which doesn't use cherokee in an official capacity. and then those flags would probably only be acceptable in the 'official language' section, not in the region or country sections. and then we'd be back to chronic edit wars with ppl who don't like the criteria, or who insist that the language is official where it isn't — kwami (talk) 20:18, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::: {{tq|q=y|afaik we haven't used flags for official countries in years}} FYI, there are 223 articles that are likely to still have flags for official countries (i.e. articles where AnomieBOT's FlagIconRemover task has logged "nothing to do" for an article with "language" in its title). If we don't want to allow flags in {{tl|Infobox language}} {{para|nation}} and {{para|minority}} anymore, I can update the bot to let it clean those up. Anomie⚔ 21:49, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::::i don't remember where the discussion was, and there may have been a more recent consensus. we should probably start a discussion at the wiki project if we want to make a permanent decision — kwami (talk) 22:00, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::::: Sounds like a good plan to me. Anomie⚔ 22:05, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::i added a notice there linking back here — kwami (talk) 22:17, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

Hi. I know I am not that active editing here but I'm a sysop in two other sites, one is relatively big. I think since the English Wikipedia is the biggest I figure some of you maybe able to respond. I'm looking for an input and views how to handle my decreased motivation and general repulsion, disgust to Wikipedia and its sister projects. Because I think I was abused? maltreated? I still don't understand, treated like that by a chapter, volunteer committees, and WMF. I feel like, I can't justify my 14 years being a moron, like being duped, and making contribution anymore. Since this is not about articles or local policies, I'm posting this here. I'm sorry if this is not the right place to ask because I think posting this on Wikipedia:Village pump (WMF) would be like facing the perpetrators head-on. I posted similarly before on Meta with fewer responses. Thank you.

RXerself (talk) 15:50, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

:Take a break. After a while, if you miss it, come back. If you don't miss it, find something else to do. RoySmith (talk) 15:54, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

::{{ping|RoySmith}}, {{ping|Donald Albury}} Yes, I tried. But links to Wikipedia and the other sites are everywhere. It comes out on web search results, on group chats with strangers, even the late Norm MacDonald named it in a comedy special I tried to watch. It is not that I'm tired or bored or annoyed or demoralized, I feel demeaned.

::RXerself (talk) 03:56, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

:I endorse RoySmith's advice. Thirty years ago I started telling myself and others that if you no longer enjoy what you are doing, drop it and find something else. I've grown tired of WP more than once in the past 20 years and drifted away, often going months without making an edit, and then returned to active editing. Do try to not burn any bridges, however satisfying that feel at the time. Donald Albury 16:21, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

::Apart from offering good general advice, as RoySmith and Donald Albury have done, there's not much we can do if you don't provide any specifics. Another piece of general advice to follow is to remember that chapters, volunteer committees and the WMF are not Wikipedia. We (including you) are. Phil Bridger (talk) 16:27, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

:::{{ping|Phil Bridger}} Yeah that's the thing. I feel like my edits, beside of whoever has benefited from it, also have been exploited to:

:::1) enrich WMF and some of its employees without users like me be benefited from their supposed responsibility; and

:::2) enable a local chapter to hold large power enough to make threats and mistreat me with impunity, with which,

:::3) the inability or incapacity of certain volunteer committees to oversee the behaviors of WMF and chapters.

:::And I feel like these aren't minor things from which I can recover any desire to contribute. It's harder when these even stemmed out from something happened IRL.

:::RXerself (talk) 03:56, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

:I soldiered on for years, motivated by the knowledge that what I was doing was helping our readers but slowly realising that the WMF was exploiting us mercilessly. Finally, it got too much and I simply walked away. I may return one day if the volunteers who make Wikipedia regain some control, or join a credible fork if one appears, but I've found plenty of other enjoyable and productive uses for my time. As others have said, if you're not enjoying your time here, it may be time to tidy up your work in progress and move on, but consider making the occasional edit to keep your eye in and try not to burn bridges. An editor who leaves in good standing will always be welcomed back. Certes (talk) 12:14, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

::@Certes: I don't think we volunteers will ever regain some control if we don't care and don't push. I want to move on but like I said above, I simply can't, Wikipedia mentioned everywhere. I want to tell a lot. I feel like nothing will be done after, the problems are in us editors as well where we are making room for the exploitation to go on, for abuses to go on. I agree a lot with what you said in your profile page and it's a shame to this site and community that you had to do that.

::RXerself (talk) 16:53, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

Hello! I often try to trim the backlog on :Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting and have noticed that recently (past 6+ months) a lot more draft articles have been added with references sections like as can be seen here. As these articles tend to be written by new editors, my impression is that there's a tutorial somewhere instructing editors to do this (or maybe a feature of the visual editor, though that feels unlikely). I haven't started looking through tutorials yet, but I'm curious if anyone here knows about this.

Thanks!
Daℤyzzos (✉️ • 📤) 23:07, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

:Drafts made with LLMs sometimes add the references like that. Current Examples of Drafts clearly written with LLMs: Lambadi language, Josef von Rickenbach, Caligomos Art. Nobody (talk) 08:53, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

::Nice catch. I went ahead and tagged all those drafts {{t|LLM}}, and I added this tell to WP:AITELLS. –Novem Linguae (talk) 18:02, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

: {{Thank you}} to both of the above!{{snd}}Daℤyzzos (✉️ • 📤) 21:56, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

{{User:ClueBot III/DoNotArchiveUntil|1749282825}}

{{CSS image crop

|Image = Porto (45829468064).gif

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At this writing, there were {{formatnum:{{1x|{{formatnum:6,991,903|R}}}}}} articles in the encyclopedia, and as you are reading, there are now {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}. There are {{#expr: 7000000 - {{formatnum:{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}|R}} }} left to go to hit the big 7M! We did it! Who will be the lucky one to make the seven millionth edit article?? Mathglot (talk) 07:09, 10 May 2025 (UTC)   {{tooltip|File:Toicon-icon-stone-pin.svg|Pinned until 7 June.}}

: P.S. If you are sitting here hitting reload to see the number change, you might need to {{purge}} the page instead. While you do that, you can [http://listen.hatnote.com/ listen to the calming sound] of Wikipedia being edited. Mathglot (talk) 08:41, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:Surely we've hit our 7th million edit! I have a list of notable article topics and I might get to some of them, so I'll try and chip away at a quarter of a percent. CMD (talk) 09:03, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::Yes, we're up into the region of 1.2 thousand million edits now (specifically, {{NUMBEROFEDITS}}). I suspect that Mathglot meant "seven millionth article" when they wrote "seven millionth edit". --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 13:31, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::: Big 'oops!' on my part. Of course I meant article, thanks for the correction. Someone trout me! Mathglot (talk) 18:36, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::::100px CMD (talk) 02:31, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

::::: Gawrsh, thanks; I needed that!   [wipes trout juice and a few silvery scales off chin...]   Mathglot (talk) 02:38, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

:I wonder what % of those articles don't meet the WP:Notability guidelines... Some1 (talk) 14:17, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::Probably a smaller number than the number of articles that could meet the notability guidelines that don't yet exist, so it should all balance out in some way. CMD (talk) 17:35, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:What is the seventh million article ? Anatole-berthe (talk) 09:40, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

::That's being figured out at Wikipedia talk:Seven million articles. CMD (talk) 09:59, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Thanks ! Anatole-berthe (talk) 13:25, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

File:Candy corn in a jar.png

Anyone want to take a guess at when it will happen? You'll probably at least qualify for the Barnstar of Arbitrary Achievement, and bragging rights (at least, until we get to 8 million). Cast your bets... Mathglot (talk) 03:56, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

• I'll start. 12:53, 5 June 2025 (UTC) {{snd}} that's my guess! Mathglot (talk) 04:07, 11 May 2025 (UTC)
• Put me down for May 18th, 2025. Cremastra (u — c) 17:03, 11 May 2025 (UTC)
• Place my bet for May 26. -- GreenC 17:54, 12 May 2025 (UTC)
• It will be in Spring 2026 earliest and we will be hitting 7 mil by Autumun 2026.--85.99.19.82 (talk) 06:40, 15 May 2025 (UTC)
• Just for fun: https://chatgpt.com/share/68259512-662c-8005-bf31-eacdc0261058 RoySmith (talk) 07:19, 15 May 2025 (UTC)
• : That is fun, and just recording it here (in case CGPT links go stale at some point; do they?):
• :: "{{xt|Wikipedia is projected to reach 7 million articles in approximately 12 to 13 days, around May 27–28, 2025.}}" ^{(emphasis added)}
• : Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 08:05, 15 May 2025 (UTC)
• :: Looks like you won the prediction contest, Roy, but given that you had an assist from AI, maybe we should split the prize between you and {{u|GreenC}}? {{wink}} Mathglot (talk) 03:19, 28 May 2025 (UTC)
• :::I had a good estimate on this because I wrote the program that generates Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by article count which every month creates this Special:Diff/1283573529/1288390779 which has been consistent in number of new articles. The unknown was AfD and time of day. The nearly accurate guess suggests my program is working as it should which is a fine prize. -- GreenC 04:23, 28 May 2025 (UTC)
• :::I, for one, welcome our new AI overlords. RoySmith (talk) 11:02, 28 May 2025 (UTC)
• Having carried out zero further research or looked at numbers, putting my bet on 8 June, World Oceans Day, which celebrates another international commons. CMD (talk) 02:22, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

:Before May 31, 2025 There’s only like 600 to go so it’ll happen soon 2001:8003:B15F:8000:9D9F:CA90:2C03:989C (talk) 10:53, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

• Let me plug Wikipedia:Pools. 7 million and it's corresponding topic are Closed but plenty of future ones to add your predictions to. Brightgalrs (/braɪtˈɡæl.ərˌɛs/)^[ᴛ]

What are we going to do for that. A party maybe or something else.

Therealbubb1e (talk) 02:16, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

:I think that wait is the best. The count itself isn't essential.

:The seventh million article will be there one day. But the count doesn't matter.
Anatole-berthe (talk) 05:25, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

:Do we have a special globe logo ready for the occassion? Ca ^{talk to me!} 11:06, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

:Some discussion over what happens to the main page over at Talk:Main Page. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 01:45, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

…but that will take a while.

Current number of registered users: {{NUMBEROFUSERS}} (last time I looked at the stats to see how close we are to 7000000 pages, this was at around 41–42 million) 2001:8003:B15F:8000:14DF:43D6:D80B:3FF0 (talk) 10:40, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

:I checked it a few minutes ago — must be a few million off of my estimate (nearly 49.2 million now) 2001:8003:B15F:8000:14DF:43D6:D80B:3FF0 (talk) 10:42, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

::A few minutes before posting [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_(miscellaneous)#c-2001:8003:B15F:8000:14DF:43D6:D80B:3FF0-20250527104000-Next_is_most_likely_50_million_registered_users…] I mean… 2001:8003:B15F:8000:9D9F:CA90:2C03:989C (talk) 10:58, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Among these accounts. How many of these were used in the year 2025 ?

:::I suppose that approximately 95-99,99% weren't used in the year 2025. Anatole-berthe (talk) 18:32, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

According to the counter on the Main Page, we've hit 7 million articles. Woohoo. Go us :) –Novem Linguae (talk) 03:06, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

: Yes, we have, cue the fireworks! Mathglot (talk) 03:13, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

::02:26 UTC on May 28, 2025. Just a random Wikipedian^(talk) 03:15, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

:Anyone know what the 7th million article was (and who created it)? –Novem Linguae (talk) 03:29, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

:: I was wondering the same thing. They should get some kind of acknowledgement on their Talk page. What happened at the six millionth edit, what did they do then? Mathglot (talk) 04:09, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

:: {{u|Coffee}}, do you recall how it was determined that {{u|Rosiestep}} had created Maria Elise Turner Lauder, the 6 millionth article, according to this discussion? There is also: Wikipedia:Six million articles. Watch Wikipedia talk:Seven million articles#Hashing out the 7 millionth article. Mathglot (talk) 04:29, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Doing it quick and dirty (i.e. just counting backwards 116, which is at what it is at now), I think it may be Drazhnawski rural council created by {{u|Altenmann}}, plus or minus a couple (which are also similar articles created by Altenmann). This count is not entirely accurate of course, so take that with a grain of salt, but it was definitely in that sequence of article creations. Another possibility is Nikolay Alyokhin by {{u|BeanieFan11}}, which is within the margin-of-error (the margin-of-error being that the article count in Special:Statistics has a delay). Curbon7 (talk) 04:33, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

::::What's up with the Belarus theme? Cremastra (u — c) 12:34, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::Perhaps rather than one article, the real winner should be our coverage of Belarus. CMD (talk) 12:55, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

::See the discussion over at the talk page of WP:7M. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 04:49, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

{{Million article milestones navbox}}

Hi ,I answer why this user Minorax removed the tag {{t|Trademark}} in this logo (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Old_logo_American_Eagle_(airline_brand)_2002.png&diff=prev&oldid=1292332449 ) ,i see the symbol trademark in the right side? (google translator) AbchyZa22 (talk) 05:35, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

:@AbchyZa22 It would have been better to ask @Minorax this question directly on their user talk page, as they are best placed to answer it.

:Trademarks generally require you to use the registered mark, otherwise the trademark is rights are lost, e.g. in the US if you haven't used a trademark for 3 years it is removed, see Trademark#Maintaining registration. A logo from 2002 which is not in current use shouldn't have any remaining trademark rights. 86.23.109.101 (talk) 22:09, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

:{{tl|Trademarked}} is generally used for files that are in the public domain or ineligible for copyright as logos are still subject to trademark protection despite not being copyrightable. {{tl|Non-free logo}} already covers that. --Min☠︎rax^«¦talk¦» 02:28, 29 May 2025 (UTC)

::Thank you. AbchyZa22 (talk) 06:35, 29 May 2025 (UTC)

I was going to write an article on Henry Benvenuti when I discovered Everybody Wiki has its own "Henry Banger Benvenuti" article which looks like a perfectly reasonable one to just import. We used to have our own Henry Banger Benvenuti, long since deleted for copyvio, but the Everybody Wiki version doesn't look like it's based on that. Everybody Wiki is CC BY-SA 3.0 so as far as I can tell there's no problem with copying it. The only issue I can think of is that we're CC SA-BY 4.0; is that close enough to satisfy the "Share Alike" constraint?

And, sigh, it looks like I'm not allowed to link to Everybody Wiki because it's on the blacklist, which will make it annoying to provide proper attribution. RoySmith (talk) 15:45, 30 May 2025 (UTC)

:AFAIK CC BY-SA 3 may be republished under CC-BY SA 4. That remote article does not appear to have any licensing for their image. It doesn't look like that site has Special:Export configured, so we can't just to a transwiki (if you know more about exporting from that site let me know). — xaosflux ^Talk 16:11, 30 May 2025 (UTC)

::Yeah, the image has to stay behind. I was figuring I'd just copy-paste the wiki text. RoySmith (talk) 16:12, 30 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Although, I've started to discover that the article's author may have been drummed out of enwiki due to UPE and socking, so possibly this isn't a great idea to begin with. RoySmith (talk) 16:25, 30 May 2025 (UTC)

:: I have no idea why they disabled Special:Export, but it is possible to export via the API: https://en.everybodywiki.com/Special:ApiSandbox#action=query&format=json&export=1&exportnowrap=1&titles=Henry%20Banger%20Benvenuti&formatversion=2 * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 21:30, 30 May 2025 (UTC)

Hi, there's an open RFC about an AFC submission by User:Марат Джаныбекович Артыкбаев. Feel free to comment there. —Matrix(!) _{ping one}^{when replying} {u - t? - _uselessc} 20:52, 2 June 2025 (UTC)

: Seems like the same AI as Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 202#Policy Proposal: Copyright as Primary Proof of Authorship and Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 202#Rethinking Verifiability Standards for Inventor-Submitted AI Contributions. Anomie⚔ 23:53, 2 June 2025 (UTC)

:Closed —Matrix(!) _{ping one}^{when replying} {u - t? - _uselessc} 09:24, 3 June 2025 (UTC)

I've been overhauling the accelerationism article over the past few months to include ideas under its original definition which, while summarized in the intro paragraph, were otherwise pretty sparse for most of the article's existence as far as I can tell. I've been mostly alone in that, and now I want to get some general help from others on it, preferably from people with access to Wikipedia Library since public sources tend to be pretty sparse on specific info. Previously lacking Wikipedia Library access, I used some primaries which I think is justified by secondaries naming those authors/works as significant in the movement (considering the rules on WP:PRIMARY), but I nonetheless feel like I may be falling into just summarizing specific source texts in sequence rather than talking about the ideas/concepts more generally while referencing source texts. Plus, it takes time and energy to comb through papers for info I can use. The article could be improved a lot further with other people for second opinions on editing and for reading through papers. Shredlordsupreme (talk) 01:18, 2 June 2025 (UTC)

:@Shredlordsupreme If you need access to paywalled or offline sources, ask at WP:RX! Wikipedia Library sources are usually sent pretty quickly there. Toadspike [Talk] 09:23, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

:I worked on this article a bit in 2021. Glad to see the lead has improved. Have you tried posting at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Philosophy? The talk page looks a bit dead, but WikiProject talk pages can help connect subject matter experts better than general noticeboards sometimes. –Novem Linguae (talk) 08:13, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

We had a medium-sized spike in unique devices views this past month [https://pageviews.wmcloud.org/siteviews/?platform=all-sites&source=unique-devices&start=2016-01&end=2025-05&sites=en.wikipedia.org], but it's really noticeable on other projects [https://pageviews.wmcloud.org/siteviews/?platform=all-sites&source=unique-devices&start=2016-01&end=2025-05&sites=en.wikibooks.org|en.wikinews.org|en.wikiquote.org unique devices], [https://pageviews.wmcloud.org/siteviews/?platform=all-access&source=pageviews&agent=user&start=2016-01&end=2025-05&sites=en.wikibooks.org|en.wikinews.org|en.wikiquote.org pageviews]. This has to be some weird statistical artifact (I don't seriously believe Wikibooks has set a record high in readership), but what is going on? Cremastra (u — c) 01:26, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

:Interesting. In a few days, the Foundation should be publishing its monthly "Movement Metrics" report for May, which might shed further light on this (WMF analysts have access to internal data which can be helpful in assessing e.g. whether something might be bot traffic misclassified as coming from humans). For what's it's worth, the preceding [https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:April_2025_Wikimedia_movement_metrics.pdf&page=3 April 2025 report], in contrast, reported that {{tq|User pageviews declined by 3.9% year over year}} that month. (And also that "Automated pageviews" were down 41.4% YoY, somewhat in contrast to other narratives WMF pushed at the time.) Regards, HaeB (talk) 04:21, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

::A decline in (small) article page views plus a rise in downloads of images and videos = still a problem for server traffic. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:21, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

:I found this spike in a very unusual way: when running through the most viewed pages without the short description template, the views for last month have been unusually high. So even niche pages are getting viewed more now. You can find my initial comments here: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Short_description#Mildly_strange...] Cheers. LR.127 (talk) 03:59, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

Please join Talk:Muffin#RFC: What is the scope of this article? and tell us what you think should be found under the title Muffin. This is one of those rare RFCs in which your personal opinion is really wanted. Any clear decision will make me happy. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:06, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

Hey I have a question, https://www.slashfilm.com (/Film), part of Static Media, is a reliable source? Franar8 (talk) 17:20, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

:This question really belongs at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard (RS/N). Looking at references there to, it looks like it depends on what content from slashfilm you want to use and what you want to use it for. The determination of reliability for any source always depends on context, but it looks like slashfilm is in a particularly hazy zone that requires extra scrutiny when assessing reliability. So, ask at RS/N, linking what you want to use from slashfilm and where you want to use it. Donald Albury 18:52, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

:@Franar8, some previous discussions:

:*Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_416#Websites_owned_by_Static_Media

:*Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_272#Nickiswift.com

:*Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_418#Is_SVG.com_reliable?

:Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 18:53, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

:Looks fine. It appears to be a news website that [https://www.slashfilm.com/about/ has employees] and writes decent quality articles. –Novem Linguae (talk) 18:53, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

:: Thank you so much to both of you. --Franar8 (talk) 19:01, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I've run across what appears to be overexposure of a CDN's internal workings. There's a perfectly reasonable web page that describes California's state forests: https://www.fire.ca.gov/what-we-do/natural-resource-management/demonstration-state-forests .

But the actual content I want to cite is in a PDF it links to, "State Forest Overview Map", and its URL is:

https://34c031f8-c9fd-4018-8c5a-4159cdff6b0d-cdn-endpoint.azureedge.net/-/media/calfire-website/what-we-do/natural-resource-management/demostration-forests/files/resource-management---demonstration-state-forests.pdf?rev=147bfb62fb5d4e5dacd06b3818bc185c&hash=F0E97059CD9D40A8BCBE3E32CB624F4B

This seems suboptimal (not even counting the "demostration" misspelling). I'm concerned that if I use it as is, either it's subverting the CDN functionality (I know, not my problem), or it's going to break at the drop of a hat.

Any thoughts here? I'm really not sure if there's any other possible answer than "just use it and move on", but I wanted to see if anyone else has some clever ideas here. NapoliRoma (talk) 19:00, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

:I think all citations added to Wikipedia get archived by archive.org automatically after a couple hours/days. So if it does break it should be easy to add an archive link. Once the reference is archived, you can use a tool such as User:InternetArchiveBot to get the archive URL added to the citation (click "Run InternetArchiveBot on a specific Wikipedia article"). –Novem Linguae (talk) 19:12, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

::Makes sense, thanks. NapoliRoma (talk) 02:33, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

:An additional problem is that the link from https://www.fire.ca.gov/what-we-do/natural-resource-management/demonstration-state-forests to the PDF is what makes the PDF a reliable source. How should that be expressed in the citation(s)? Jruderman (talk) 21:19, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

::I hadn't really thought about a URL being part of the seal of legitimacy of a source, but I see how it could be considered in that light. For now, I've just used the standard {{tlx|cite web}} template, describing the web site as being the same California agency as for the page it's linked from. NapoliRoma (talk) 02:33, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

A contest will take place from July 1, 2025, to July 31, 2025, on Bangla Wiktionary to enrich its entries. A central notice request has been placed to target both English and Bangla Wikipedia users, including non-registered users from Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal. Thank you. Aishik Rehman (talk) 20:49, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

Have a look at [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Silambarasan&diff=prev&oldid=1295415118 these edits] to an article talk page.

Can anyone identify the language, and preferably provide a translation? Andrewa (talk) 05:48, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

:I suppose that this is a language spoken in India wrote in "Latin script" instead of one of the "Brahmic scripts".

:This is a bit like if you was writing English with "Cyrillic script".

:Concerning the "{{Diff|page|prev|1295415118|edit}}" that you shared with us.

:I don't know what is the language but I'm sure that this is one of the language spoken in India

:It sound like one of the many languages spoken there and the IP is in India.

:I saw the others edits made by this IP. This IP was not used to edit on another "Wikimedia project" than "Wikipedia in English".

:I found an "{{Diff|page|prev|1295414223|edit}}" that seems to include a bit of English.

:This is maybe a "English-based creole language" but I don't know if such language does exist in India.

:This is maybe a "Mixed language" but I don't know if such language does exist in India..

:This is maybe a text with many "loan words" from English.

:I think to the possibility that these two edits aren't wrote in the same language.

:Why not try with a characters converter in "brahmic scripts" to try many brahmic scripts and send the results to an automatic translator ?

:You can maybe find the language(s) used for these two edits with this method. Anatole-berthe (talk) 07:13, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

::Maybe Tamil. nenjinil vantha devathai might be நெஞ்சினில் வந்த தேவதை = The angel who came into my heart. Sean.hoyland (talk) 07:32, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

:::Concerning this "{{Diff|page|prev|1295415118|edit}}".

:::When I tried to identify the language of the text in "Latin script" with "Google translate". It did suggested me "Tamil" as a language.

:::Now , I read your message. I think that there are a high probability that the text was wrote in "Tamil" with "latin characters" instead of "Tamil script".

:::The other "{{Diff|page|prev|1295414223|edit}}" is maybe on the same subject because of the word "angel". Anatole-berthe (talk) 07:53, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

::Maybe song lyrics. Sean.hoyland (talk) 07:37, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

While I still have not identified the language, Goggle Translate eventually rendered it as

The angel who came to my heart mixed with life will come to hear with the moon that goes with the wind

Thanks to those who have helped. Andrewa (talk) 09:20, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

:You could try asking the person who posted it, either on the article talk page or the user talk page. It's unlikely, but you could possibly get a reply. Phil Bridger (talk) 09:30, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

::I think likewise that he can post a message on the "User talk page".

::Also , I think likewise that he can use ""Talk:Silambarasan"".

::These are good ideas even if I think that this is unlikely to expect an answer.

::I have another idea. The user under an IP address did made two edits when I'm writing these lines.

::Maybe , this user will continue to contribute. In this case , maybe we could get more material for a linguistical analysis. Anatole-berthe (talk) 10:03, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

:Imagine saying that to someone face to face, then just standing there staring at them to see what happens. Sean.hoyland (talk) 09:51, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

The language appears to be tamil. I'm guessing that Silambarasan is locally famous in India (or part of it) for singing that particular song, and that the IP who added these lyrics doesn't understand much about English Wikipedia, and it's a good question as to whether they understand English. We of course assume good faith and that they were trying to add relevant and accurate content.

Thanks again to all who have helped. Andrewa (talk) 10:18, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

:I don't know if "Silambarasan" did already singed this song.

:This actor is a native Tamil speaker.

:Therefore , I think that there are a high probability that you did found the right hypothesis. Anatole-berthe (talk) 11:04, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

Hi everyone,

I am conducting research (for my Masters) on content-gaps related to orphan articles. I am doing my best with Wikidata, but I cannot seem to find the appropriate attribute or combination of attributes that would let me extract orphan articles.

For context: An orphan article is one that has no other articles referencing to it. (Wikipedia:Orphan)

Does anyone have any pointers?

So far, I am using following two lines of SPARQL to narrow down orphan articles, but when I check the resulting list of articles, any given article does have links when I look under What Links Here.

?article schema:about ?item .

?item wikibase:sitelinks ?linkcount .

FILTER (?linkcount = 0) MNSanchez (talk) 15:14, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

:Is either :Category:All_orphaned_articles or {{url|1=https://randomincategory.toolforge.org/All_orphaned_articles?site=en.wikipedia.org}} helpful to you? Peaceray (talk) 15:31, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

::Hi Peaceray! Thank you for the super quick response. I did look into this for the English Wikipedia. However, I need to extract the orphans from different languages. Spanish, for example does not use the categories for their orphans.

::I have so far found a very inefficient way to do it... And I am hoping to get some help from the community to optimize this! (I posted it on Request A Query). If you have any advice. I would be very grateful. MNSanchez (talk) 14:04, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

:@MNSanchez to add to the comment above, you can't do this through Wikidata - that does not have any information about article to article links on individual wikis. Using "wikibase:sitelinks" will get you the number of links on Wikidata to individual language versions of that article (and any Wikidata item with sitelinks=0 would this presumably have no linked Wikipedia article)

:You can get access to the individual wiki's link tables using Quarry - see eg [https://quarry.wmcloud.org/query/17477 this query] for orphaned talkpages on mediawiki.org - but it might be more practical to identify them here as pages in :Category:Orphaned articles, which is fairly up to date. Andrew Gray (talk) 09:13, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

::Hi Andrew!

::I actually did find a way to do it through Wikidata using the mwapi API in SPARQL. It works, but it is very slow and times out, which I am hoping to resolve with the help of the community (See here).

::I am curious about Quarry. I will have to play around with it to get familiar with it because I have been spending all my energy into the [https://query.wikidata.org/#SELECT%20%3Fitem%20%3Farticle_name%20%3Farticle%20%3Fpointer%20%3Fpointer_name%20%3Fis_redirect%0AWITH%20%7B%0A%20%20SELECT%20%3Fitem%20%3Farticle%20%3Farticle_name%20%3Flink%0A%20%20WHERE%20%7B%0A%20%20%20%20%3Fitem%20wdt%3AP31%20wd%3AQ5%20.%20%23instance%20is%20human%0A%20%20%20%20%3Fitem%20wdt%3AP21%20wd%3AQ6581072%20.%20%23sex%20is%20female%0A%20%20%20%20%3Fitem%20wdt%3AP106%20wd%3AQ40348%20.%20%23occupation%20is%20lawyer%0A%20%20%20%20%3Fitem%20wdt%3AP27%20wd%3AQ414%20.%20%23country%20is%20Argentina%0A%20%20%0A%20%20%20%20%3Farticle%20schema%3Aabout%20%3Fitem%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%3Farticle%20schema%3Aname%20%3Farticle_name%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%3Farticle%20schema%3AisPartOf%20%3Forphan_item_sitelinks_lang%20.%0A%20%20%20%20VALUES%20%3Fcomparison_langs%20%7B%3Chttps%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2F%3E%7D%20%23%3Chttps%3A%2F%2Fde.wikipedia.org%2F%3E%20%3Chttps%3A%2F%2Ffr.wikipedia.org%2F%3E%20%3Chttps%3A%2F%2Fes.wikipedia.org%2F%3E%7D%20.%0A%20%20%20%20FILTER%20%28%3Forphan_item_sitelinks_lang%20%3D%20%3Fcomparison_langs%29%0A%20%20%7D%0A%7D%20AS%20%25women%0AWITH%20%7B%0A%20%20SELECT%20%3Fitem%20%3Farticle_name%20%3Farticle%20%3Fpointer%20%3Fpointer_name%20%3Fis_redirect%0A%20%20WHERE%20%7B%0A%20%20%20%20INCLUDE%20%25women%0A%20%20%20%20OPTIONAL%0A%20%20%20%20%7B%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20SERVICE%20wikibase%3Amwapi%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%7B%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20bd%3AserviceParam%20wikibase%3Aapi%20%22Generator%22%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20bd%3AserviceParam%20wikibase%3Aendpoint%20%22en.wikipedia.org%22%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20bd%3AserviceParam%20mwapi%3Agenerator%20%22linkshere%22%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20bd%3AserviceParam%20mwapi%3Atitles%20%3Farticle_name%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%23bd%3AserviceParam%20mwapi%3Aglhlimit%20%22100%22%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20bd%3AserviceParam%20mwapi%3Aglhnamespace%20%220%22%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%3Fpointer_name%20wikibase%3AapiOutput%20mwapi%3Atitle%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%3Fpointer%20wikibase%3AapiOutputItem%20mwapi%3Aitem%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20bd%3AserviceParam%20wikibase%3Alimit%20%22once%22%20.%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%7D%0A%20%20%20%20%7D%0A%20%20%7D%0A%7D%20AS%20%25pointers_to%20WHERE%20%7B%0A%20%20INCLUDE%20%25pointers_to%0A%20%20%7B%0A%20%20%20%20SELECT%20%3Fitem%20%28COUNT%28%3Fpointer%29%20AS%20%3Fpointer_count%29%0A%20%20%20%20WHERE%0A%20%20%20%20%7B%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20INCLUDE%20%25pointers_to%0A%20%20%20%20%7D%0A%20%20%20%20GROUP%20by%20%3Fitem%0A%20%20%20%20HAVING%20%28%3Fpointer_count%20%3D%200%29%0A%20%20%7D%0A%7D SPARQL query] I mentioned earlier. If you have any advice either regarding how to get started with Quarry or about the SPARQL query, I would appreciate it a lot!

::Thank you! MNSanchez (talk) 14:09, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

:::Oh interesting! Yes, I had forgotten the magic of invoking the API within a query. I think for this particular use case it will be impractical - just too many articles involved if you're needing to look at "all women". I'll follow up over there. Andrew Gray (talk) 17:37, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

I feel like I/P articles have a very big issue of an excessive use of problematic sources, especially on less popular I/P articles. Usually these articles are either minor incidents from the ongoing Gaza war where the only reporting that is readily available is from problematic sources. The most common problematic sources are Al Jazeera English which is listen the Perennial sources page as biased on I/P and Middle East Eye which is 75% owned by the "former director for the Hamas-controlled Al-Quds TV" according to its Wikipedia Page. I could go ahead and try to change on of these articles but theres too many for me to get through, I feel like something more systematic and top down is needed. Denninithan (talk) 23:45, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

:You should probably get consensus before mass removing a generally reliable source. Perhaps others may disagree that the use of this source is a problem. –Novem Linguae (talk) 01:37, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

::Where would I even go to get consensus on something like that, I haven't really spent much time on the policies side of wikipedia usually I just write stuff. Denninithan (talk) 01:53, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

::: If it is about a particular use of a source, the article talk page is the place. If it is about then general use of a source, it is WP:RSN. However, before you start a section on a source at RSN you should read the previous discussions about those sources at RSN and also look at their entry in WP:RSP. If you don't have more to offer than was already discussed, you might consider whether restarting the same discussion again with the same evidence has a chance of a different outcome. Zero^talk 03:07, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

:Are there Israeli sources that you think may have the "excessive use" and "problematic" features from the ongoing Gaza war? I ask because the reporting environment in Israel is quite difficult right now in terms of reporting restrictions. Sean.hoyland (talk) 06:06, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

:It's important to remember that it's officially okay for sources to be biased (WP:RSBIASED). The goal is for Wikipedia editors to behave in an unbiased way, so that the result is an article in which Wikipedia editors have fairly and proportionately presented the views of all the reliable sources – including biased reliable sources. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:33, 15 June 2025 (UTC)

If I suspect that certain editors are undisclosed paid editors, what is the best way to handle that without causing undue drama? Nosferattus (talk) 16:20, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

:See {{section link|Wikipedia:Paid-contribution disclosure|Reporting undisclosed paid editors}} and Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Conflict of interest reports for steps to take. isaacl (talk) 16:56, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Is there a way to compile this info from the existing statistics? I am curious about the proportion of edits from each group (anonymous, autoconfirmed, extended confirmed, etc.) CVDX (talk) 23:10, 20 June 2025 (UTC)

:@CVDX, I suggest that you ask at Wikipedia:Request a query, and then put the answer in Wikipedia:Wikipedians (and/or other pages) so other editors will be able to find the answer later. You might need to make a few more decisions (e.g., whether you want to check only the article space, what about bots, what about AWB/Twinkle/scripts, etc.). WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:44, 20 June 2025 (UTC)

::Wikipedia:Who writes Wikipedia? is another page that might be appropriate for your results. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:11, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

:The analytics team [https://wikitech.wikimedia.org/wiki/Data_Platform/Data_Lake/Edits/MediaWiki_history_dumps maintains a denormalized dataset] which I think has what you need to do this, although you'll probably need their help to set up the appropriate Hadoop job. I'd start by getting in touch with them via [https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Data_Platform_Engineering/Intake_Process their contact page] RoySmith (talk) 00:14, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

::I agree. It looks like they have an easy way of figuring out what groups a user was in at a given time, which is difficult to do from the live database replicas for a single user and entirely impractical to do in bulk. —Cryptic 01:34, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

I'm 90% it was the product of a WMF project. IIRC: It was shaped like a triangle of squares, colored from green to red. One of the axises was the year/month of account creation; the other was, for a given date, the probability that the account was still active. I came past it around march of this year, but I can't find it anymore. Does that ring a bell to anyone? Thanks, — Alien  3
3 3 17:07, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

:Is it [https://retention.toolforge.org/enwiki https://retention.toolforge.org/enwiki]? I previously put a link to it under {{section link|Wikipedia:WikiProject Editor Retention|Resources}} so I could find it again. isaacl (talk) 17:39, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

:: Thanks you very much. That's exactly what I was looking for. :) — Alien  3
3 3 18:58, 21 June 2025 (UTC)