User talk:Floquenbeam

MEH

Folly, thou conquerest, and I must yield! Against stupidity the very gods Themselves contend in vain. --Friedrich Schiller

Administrators' newsletter – December 2021

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

Administrator changes

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

that self-important jerk User:Floquenbeam (if Jimbo or WMF had their way)

Technical news

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

Arbitration

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

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Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:24, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

For sale by... well, not exactly owner, but....

An NFT of me unblocking Fram. I will improve on the WMF's wise counsel and actually conduct the auction on Wikipedia (for transparency). --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:36, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

If you've ever seen the animated Jimbo head template you might get a kick out of this User talk:Martinevans123#If you've seen the AN/I thread. I hope you have a pleasant weekend F. MarnetteD|Talk 20:46, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

The first real reason I've wished I was more technically competent in a while. I want one. Meanwhile, not gonna bid while you're here? Bidding starts at 10 quatloos. There is a reserve price. --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:55, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Also, mine closes on the 14th, so this is actually the first auction of a WP edit. False advertising by Christie's. --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:58, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

RexxS could have done it. 😟. Or ask Johnuniq. (I'm not sure it would be fair to ping him.) Bishonen | tålk 21:10, 3 December 2021 (UTC).

• I bid 15 quatloos. -- User:Completely legitimate non-sockpuppet account 21:13, 3 December 2021 (UTC)
• 20! -- User:Another completly legit account unrelated to Floquenbeam 21:13, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Yowzaa quatloos, Now that takes me back :-) MarnetteD|Talk 22:42, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Reading all those thousand-word “who cares? not me!” AN/I comments has worn me out. I need a nice refreshing drink to pep me up, how about you? 28bytes (talk) 02:03, 4 December 2021 (UTC)

Lol. Perhaps I'll decorate my user page with all the thousands of de minimus (or whatever the term is) logos on commons, and see if I can trick them all into thinking I'm a Wikipedia influencer. Even with the expected kickback to the WMF Board, I should still make out pretty well. DAMN. That Sprite was refreshing! I'd recommend it to everyone. Maybe I should nominate it for WP:TFP. --Floquenbeam (talk) 02:11, 4 December 2021 (UTC)

Figured I'd have less of a chance of edit-conflicting here. You did the right thing, Floq. Double standards are never good, and the optics of this are terrible. (An NFT? Seriously?) Stay well and all the best, Miniapolis 02:23, 4 December 2021 (UTC)

Thank you, Miniapolis, this comes at a good time. After a while, being pinged to the main page, not because there's a question for you, but to make absolutely sure that you see someone thinks you should be WP:SLAPped, gets old. Spirits were flagging, and this legit helped. Luckily, someone bought me a bottle of Disaronno a little while ago. I'd never had it in my long shletered life, and... I like it. Think I'll settle down with a bottle and watch the Wheel of Time. I'd never heard of that either, maybe I'll get lucky twice. Cheers, and goodnight. --Floquenbeam (talk) 02:30, 4 December 2021 (UTC)

Good stuff. When we were first married, a friend brought us a bottle every time he visited. We're wine drinkers mostly, and when we were packing to move we poured most of it down the sink; I kick myself every time I think of it Enjoy! Miniapolis 16:32, 4 December 2021 (UTC)

• Ugh. Just read the Slate article, where they mention our new First Wikipedia edit article, inspired by (and more than 1/3 about) Jimbo's auction. And of course it will be appearing on our Main Page as a DYK. The advertising seed Jimbo planted on his talk page is bearing fruit. --Floquenbeam (talk) 14:14, 9 December 2021 (UTC)
• If anyone wants a NFT of a unique artwork recreating my recollection of coining the phrase "ANI flu", I'm open to all reasonable offers. I can throw in the first use of the term "Bradspeak" as a freebie. (In all seriousness, what sort of idiot would pay for this? I'm inclined to think that if anyone's stupid enough to give Jimmy cash for something that's a transparent scam even by his standards, then they shouldn't be allowed near money and are probably better off being separated from it. To be honest, if history is any guide then if anyone's stupid enough to give Jimmy cash for anything, then they shouldn't be allowed near money and are probably better off being separated from it) ‑ Iridescent 16:21, 9 December 2021 (UTC)

  Reading that link, it seems like I could have an Etherium (sp?) auction for an NFT of a unique artwork recreating my muse-like inspiration of your coining (ha!) "ANI flu". Or I'd accept 10% of whatever you get for yours, if you're worried about diluting the value. There are several ethically and intellectually questionable things involved in Jimbo's auction; while I agree one of them is that someone willing to spend money on these things kind of deserves what they get, that doesn't mean someone like Jimbo deserves the money instead. --Floquenbeam (talk) 16:40, 9 December 2021 (UTC)

  If past performance is any guide, he won't hold on to the money for long. His business history is an unbroken string of failures (Wikia is AFAIK the only profitable one, and that only became so after he left). Remember WikiTribune? The People's Operator? WT:Social? No, me neither. ‑ Iridescent 17:06, 9 December 2021 (UTC)

  I actually registered an account on wt.social recently out of morbid curiosity. It’s... not good. There are “delete” buttons next to other people’s posts, which I was tempted to click but didn’t. 28bytes (talk) 22:43, 9 December 2021 (UTC)

  To be fair, there is a delete button next to the above post too, sort of.... – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:12, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

• Hey Floq, you've made slashdot. Johnuniq (talk) 04:32, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

  That’s a first. At least, I think; the first I’m aware of anyway. The motherboard article isn’t a bad write up, as articles about WP by non-WPians go. And like WP, the comments so far read like an ANI discussion (except even less informed). —Floquenbeam (talk) 13:09, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

Administrators will no longer be autopatrolled

A recently closed Request for Comment (RFC) reached consensus to remove Autopatrolled from the administrator user group. You may, similarly as with Edit Filter Manager, choose to self-assign this permission to yourself. This will be implemented the week of December 13th, but if you wish to self-assign you may do so now. To find out when the change has gone live or if you have any questions please visit the Administrator's Noticeboard. 20:05, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

Smart. Me being autopatrolled is kind of crazy. --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:21, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

On second thought, this would be crazy if I was creating new articles. But the only pages I create are redirects, or user talk pages, or similar. It would be kind of crazy to make new page patrollers look thru that. I guess I'll assign it to myself after all. --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:31, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

Why am I talking to myself? --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:32, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure; perhaps I am kind of crazy. --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:32, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

Well let me jump in then :) Looks like Barkeep did it for you. I always forget that autopatrolled applies to the creation of all pages, not just articles. Pawnkingthree (talk) 22:56, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

I assigned it to myself for SPI tags. TonyBallioni (talk) 00:32, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

I assume, if I ever go completely against character and create a new article, I could either (a) un-approve the page, or (b) temporarily remove the right, save the page, and restore the right in order to get a pair of competent eyes on it. —Floquenbeam (talk) 00:41, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

• Every time we strip off a different "automatic" bit of the admin toolkit, we make adminship less and less attractive. I mean...every time. Frankly, I'm inclined to just go through and add autopatrolled to just about every administrator. I don't have the hours in the day to participate in all the RFCs around here, so I missed this one entirely, or I would have said "just because one admin screwed up doesn't mean that this is actually a problem that needs to be solved". Hundreds of people have now been punished because of the actions of one person. Risker (talk) 07:42, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

Not being autopatrolled is hardly a "punishment", certainly not when you can assign the right to yourself straightaway. And I know of, oh, at least 4 or 5 admins who shouldn't have the autopatrolled right. But in the past, it couldn't be removed without a desysop, which was in some of these cases overkill. At least now, if I come across admins creating copyvio's or too many otherwise problematic articles, I can at least ask for the removal of the right without needing to show enough "admin abuse" to get a desysop instead. Fram (talk) 08:08, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

I created new articles with very few problems for several years before some administrator gave me autopatrolled out of the blue, which seemed like an endorsement of my work. I was grateful. This was several years before I became an administrator. Today, out of the blue, Barkeep49 restored my autopatrolled, which seems like an endorsement of my work. I was grateful. Not sure why this change in the administrator's toolset really needed to take place, but what is done is done, I guess. Cullen328 (talk) 08:27, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

I think the advantage of removing autopatrolled is the admins who write content and those who are on the ball will either get given the right by someone else or be clueful enough to know whether or not they should self-assign. The "legacy admins" who are out of touch probably won't notice, and those are the sort of admins we would be better keeping an eye on to make sure they're up to speed on things. And I agree with Fram that it will make dealing with things like Neelixgate easier in future. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:47, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

• Splitting it off seems ultimately pretty harmless, I guess. Though I understand Risker's point, I'm not sure it matters very much in this particular case, where there is zero benefit to the holder of the right itself; the benefit is to the new page patrollers. I suppose there's an incremental benefit, and an incremental annoyance, and I don't really know what's actually bigger. I apparently don't have my ear to the ground, as I didn't know this discussion was happening either. --Floquenbeam (talk) 14:45, 8 December 2021 (UTC)
  • It was theoretically to make it so RfA will be easier to pass, which won't be the case. The people who oppose because of lack of content creation most of the time don't know how autopatrolled works from a technical level (if they know it exists at all, many don't.) Not a big deal, but I categorize this as a "kinda pointless change that doesn't really do anything and won't have it's intended impact." TonyBallioni (talk) 02:08, 9 December 2021 (UTC)
    • Of course–the "not enough content creation" objection is a rational choice (although often overdone) and fiddling with user rights has no effect on that. If anyone here is unaware, the discussions at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/2021 review/Proposals are being closed, presumably because the goal of being visible from space has been achieved. Johnuniq (talk) 02:30, 9 December 2021 (UTC)
      • Oh, I wasn't discounting that reasoning. I was simply saying that the idea that somehow it is linked to autopatrolled doesn't really understand the basis of the oppose (might as well ping Iridescent in for this since he has my preferred explanation of that oppose rationale.) TonyBallioni (talk) 02:41, 9 December 2021 (UTC)
        • If you're talking about my RFA boilerplate, I don't think editors who haven't had the experience of putting large amounts of work into an article, and/or defending their work against well-intentioned but wrong "improvements" or especially AFD, are in a position to empathise with quite why editors get so angry when their work's deleted and/or The Wrong Version gets protected, and I don't support users who don't add content to the mainspace being given powers to overrule those who do.. Whether or not the candidate is autopatrolled has nothing to do with it. ‑ Iridescent 06:56, 9 December 2021 (UTC)

          Incidentally, I suspect most of the people parroting some variation on "it won't increase the NPP workload because most admins will qualify for autopatrolled anyway so they can just be re-awarded it" have no conception of how strict the requirements are. It took me three years to meet "prior creation of 25 valid articles, not including redirects or disambiguation pages", and that was back in the days when there were still a lot of redlinks so it was actually possible to find topics on which a page didn't already exist. My most recent 25 ab nihilo page creations stretch back to 2010, and I'm more prolific than most when it comes to writing about niche topics where we're less likely already to have a page. ‑ Iridescent 16:44, 9 December 2021 (UTC)

          • Despite the fact that pretty much any "not enough content creation" requirement would completely disqualify me, it still makes a certain amount of sense. I see it as one way to show empathy with people who create content, and one way to show it isn't all about being able to more easily tell other people online what to do. It's just that, unlike Iri, I think there are other ways of having/developing empathy for people who create good content, and there are other ways of demonstrating those two things. --Floquenbeam (talk) 16:54, 9 December 2021 (UTC)
• One of the challenges of consensus-like decision-making traditions is that conversations are about whatever a consensus of people decide to talk about. During the first phase, consensus was reached that the diverse bundle of permissions within the sysop group resulted in scrutiny in a broad set of areas. This opened the door for any unbundling proposals to be made in the second phase. I feel that many supported the unbundling of autopatrolled as a good idea without concerning themselves if it would actually change any outcomes in requests for administrative privileges. As I said in my oppose, I don't think enough participant minds will be changed to have an effect. It might be a good idea for other reasons, but since the RfC was focused on RfA, the editors most affected—such as those involved in new page patrol—may not have weighed in. isaacl (talk) 05:06, 9 December 2021 (UTC)

That markup on your userpage

didn't seem to be in any template I could find, so I've created {{invisible bullet}} (shortcut {{i*}}) to make it more reusable. I've found it quite helpful at SPI when giving a list of accounts midway through a comment. CC Drmies. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she/they) 04:56, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

@Tamzin: that’s going to be really quite useful; I’d use that markup more if I didn’t have to go back to my user page to check it every time. You’ve made it much easier for me to be more accessibility conscious. Thank you. —Floquenbeam (talk) 18:30, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

The only annoying thing is that the HTML output still contains an empty <li>. I tried a few things that I thought might avoid that, but I gather it's not possible. I don't know enough about screenreaders to know if they'd just skip that bit. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she/they) 19:04, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

@Tamzin: I would have no idea; I only understand about 50% 10% 0.5% of the html in that template, and 0% of how screen readers work. I have no idea why an empty <li> is bad; is that the kind of "lint" thing people wander around talk pages complaining about about and fixing with bots? I wonder if there is a "this user uses a screenreader" user category, or a "this user knows stuff about screen readers" user category, to confirm how it reads. Or maybe ask at WT:WPACCESS what happens to it on a screenreader? Either way, thanks again. --Floquenbeam (talk) 22:04, 11 December 2021 (UTC)