Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)

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Year range for two consecutive years

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Recently a single user moved 497 249 figure skating pages that had xxxx–xx year in title to xxxx–xxxx without discussion. I requested they be moved back, but was told I should start a discussion on village pump first.

• Per conclusion of previous RFC, "applications such as sports seasons, fiscal years, and consecutive years use the two-year date range convention without problems. These applications can continue to do so." I'm okay fine with continuing that, and thus request the undiscussed moves to be reverted.
• Mover's argument has been that MOS:DATERANGE prefers xxxx–xxxx. My reading of MOS: it states xxxx–xxxx is the general format and it states xxxx–xx may be used for two consecutive years. Guidelines does not say xxxx–xxxx is preferred to xxxx–xx for two consecutive years.
• Looking at other Wikipedia article titles, xxxx–xx is the established preferred format for two consecutive years and xxxx–xxxx for three or more years. (Searching on "2017–18", I found many examples, e.g. 2017–18 Men's Hockey League season, 2017–18 NBA season, 2017–18 Premier League, 2017–18 UEFA Champions League, 2017–18 La Liga, 2017–18 EFL Cup, 2017–18 NFL playoffs, 2017–18 Manchester City F.C. season, 2017–18 Formula E season, etc. As for "2017–2018", I only found a few non-sports articles using that format, though many non-sports articles used "2017–18" format, e.g. 2017–18 Australian region cyclone season and 2017–18 North Korea crisis.) And until a few hours ago, figure skating articles fell in the xxxx–xx camp.

To focus the discussion, I'm particularly interested in titles of sports articles that have a two consecutive years range in the title. For consistency, I feel all these articles should use the same format, either xxxx–xx or xxxx–xxxx. Currently, from my searches, xxxx–xx is the preferred format. I believe for consistency (and since it's okay with the MOS), the figure skating should be reverted to their original page names. Alternatively, all other pages with this issue (presumably several thousand pages) should be moved to xxxx–xxxx format.
Thus I'm asking everyone what format should be used? Thank you all, 15zulu (talk) 00:01, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

Edited above to correct number of pages moved. Initially I counted the number of lines in user contributions which lists each page moved as two contributions. So total number of pages moved was 249. Sorry for any confusion, 15zulu (talk) 04:37, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Should sports articles use xxxx–xxxx or xxxx–xx date format for two consecutive years? — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 09:36, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

I believe the move to 2015-2016 was justified. Years and year ranges should be spelt out in full to avoid ambiguity. Examples of problems include 2004-05 (could mean May 2004) and 1999-00 (wtf). The solution is to spell these years out in full, and for consistency it should be done always. If thousands of pages are named incorrectly, the sooner we get started with fixing them the better. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 04:59, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

• Question is too broad WP:DATERANGE is already clear that XXXX-XX is OK: "Two-digit ending years (1881–82, but never 1881–882 or 1881–2) may be used in any of the following cases: (1) two consecutive years; ..." Its applicability for a given sport should be based on the conventions of that sport in reliable sources. Prescribing a specific format for all sports is undue. WikiProject National Basketball Association and WikiProject College Basketball use XXXX-XX.—Bagumba (talk) 05:58, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

@Bagumba: The 500 articles that were unilaterally moved are mainly about figure skating. This RfC is intended to clarify the situation on sports articles title date format before deciding to revert a non-trivial number of moves. The question is deliberately broad for overall consistency. The current guideline which says xxxx-xx "may be used" but that in general xxxx-xxxx is "preferred" is not at all helpful when dealing with such a large number of good faith moves. — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 08:23, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

It is a mistake to generalize it about sports. It should be dependent on the convention of the specific domain e.g. ice skating. With all due respect to WP:BB, it seems over-aggressive to change 500 articles in the same domain en masse without first asking about its background and the fact that it maybe "right". If, in fact, they made these changes and already aware of the MOS:DATERANGE exception, it also seems rash to make widespread changes from an accepted format to their self-described "preferred" style without dropping a note at the affected WikiProjects.—Bagumba (talk) 10:33, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

@Bagumba: There does not appear to be a specific guideline for skating articles and I am not aware of any notification or discussion that occured beforehand. At the same time, 500 moves is a lot to undo without a good reason. What do you suggest is done moving forward? — Frayæ (Talk/Spjall) 10:45, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

I think this is a figure skating issue, and not a general or sports issue. The orginal mass move failed WP:RMUM: It seems unlikely that anyone would reasonably disagree with the move. There was not a problem per WP:DATERANGE, which allows XXXX–XX, and it's debatable if this is an improvement when 500 some-odd figure skating articles were already consistently named. The onus is on the orginal mover to gain consensus for the new XXXX–XXXX title. This could have been done at WP:RM, but the RfC is already open, so let's go from here.—Bagumba (talk) 10:29, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

The previous RFC was regarding all year ranges xxxx–xx, so this question about sports is significantly less broad. As of right now, figure skating has no guidelines in place on Wikipedia and a single user unilaterally decided to move approximately 500 pages from xxxx–xx to xxxx–xxxx. Going by my original research, isu.org primarily uses xxxx/xx format while news sources use xxxx-xx format. The figure skating WikiProject is mostly defunct and it's likely most people editing figure skating pages will not see any question posed there. Regardless, while specific sports can have their own format, I feel that we should have generic/default Wikipedia guidelines too. 15zulu (talk) 08:08, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

FWIW, I went and left a notification of this RfC at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Figure_Skating.—Bagumba (talk) 10:10, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

I noticed that not all events that span two years have the second year in their articles. 2008 NFL season is one such example. At what point do we include the second year in the title?

I'm under the impression that it's included if a significant portion of the event takes place in the second year. In other words, an event that starts in October and ends in January would probably do with just the first year. Would I be correct? --Ixfd64 (talk) 18:42, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

The conventions at Wikipedia obey the conventions outside of Wikipedia. The NFL, by convention, only calls its seasons by one year, even though the playoffs extend into the next year. Wikipedia did not invent or create this convention in the naming of its articles, it merely followed the existing convention. That's how we do everything here. We don't make up things, and then create our own reasons why we made them up, we obey what reliable sources do. --Jayron32 18:51, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation. However, what about other events that don't have an official naming convention?

For example, suppose there is a large series of protests in Washington D.C. that lasts from October 2020 to April 2021. Would the article be titled "2020-2021 Washington D.C. protests" or just "2020 Washington D.C. protests"? --Ixfd64 (talk) 18:57, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

I have no idea. It would depend on what reliable sources were already calling the events. Show me what they are called when sources outside of Wikipedia write about them. --Jayron32 19:03, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

A descriptive title like that may be constructed owing to the absence of a single recognizable name for the series of events, or a recognizable name which is unsuitable for Wikipedia due to NPOV or BLP issues. In such cases I'd follow MOS and use 2020–21 Washington D.C. protests (don't forget the en dash!). – Reidgreg (talk) 17:35, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

• Use whatever form the RS use – as discussed above. For the figure skating example, the ISU seems to use XXXX/XX (their web site is a mess but that's what the cited ISU sources use for example at 2015–2016 Grand Prix of Figure Skating Final). I'm not crazy about the slash but that's what they use. Kendall-K1 (talk) 00:29, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

  As I mentioned above, while ISU primarily uses xxxx/xx format, news sources for figure skating (including general news sources & figure skating specific sources) use xxxx-xx format. Also other figure skating organizations, like USFSA and Skate Canada, use dash. While one primary source uses slash, the majority of reliable secondary sources use dash. 15zulu (talk) 04:08, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

  We do not use slashes to indicate date ranges per DATERANGE. No comment on the actual concerns in this RFC, but that's a solid "we do not use slashes, ever". --Izno (talk) 16:24, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

  A slash may be used in place of an en dash for adjacent years when supported by a majority of sources, per MOS:SLASH and MOS:DATERANGE (special periods), but the former also generally discourages slashes which are one of those troublesome characters than can be interpreted as markup (along with ampersands, numeros, etc). If sources use a mix of styles, better to stay consistent with Wikipedia's broadly accepted style of xxxx–xx. – Reidgreg (talk) 17:35, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

• Support xxxx–xx (with en dash, not a hyphen as in many of the above examples) as spelled out in MOS:DATERANGE. While 2004-05 is confusing and might be May 2004, the dash in 2004–05 indicates this is a range MOS:ENTO. The xxxx–xx format is particularly good for periods of less than a year which overlap calendar years, like fiscal year 2004–05, the winter (northern hemisphere) of 2004–05, and sports and television seasons. If it describes a period of 366 days or more, though, or if there are any clarity issues, I'd tend to use xxxx–xxxx. MOS is a guideline, and exceptions can be made if the context leads to confusion. I'm just not seeing why there would be any confusion here, or any reason to vary from the established style guideline. Adhering to the style guideline gives Wikipedia a consistent and professional look, and is meant to help avoid silly style warring. – Reidgreg (talk) 17:35, 12 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Agree. Normal English-language usage should prevail absent a much stronger rationale than has been suggested. 121a0012 (talk) 03:36, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
• Support xxxx–xxxx - The range of xxxx–xxxx should be used, as the goal of any written text is to be as clear as possible and that presents the most clear title. The distinction the previous editor said about periods of more than 366 days would be lost on most editors; I've been editing here for years and I've never known that might be a reason for such usage. A previous example of 1999-00 is also a clear example where this just fails and looks bad. There is no title space shortage issues (titles aren't long and this isn't print), other date ranges (in non-consecutive years) use this style and per WP:CONSISTENCY would also work better and this would also eliminate the may be used [...] issue which just leads to endless page-by-page fighting over meaningless issues. --Gonnym (talk) 11:46, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

  Well put. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 12:02, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

• Support xxxx-xx, not only for two consecutive years, but for ranges of years within the same decade, and maybe more. What's wrong with 1939-45, for example? I reject the notion that it's ambiguous. Sure, out of context 2002-05 could mean May 2005 as well as 2002-2005 in some contexts, but in most if not all cases the context makes it obvious, and xxxx-xx is just as WP:PRECISE as xxxx-xxxx, and is obviously more WP:CONCISE. I'll concede crossing a century boundary probably should use xxxx-xxxx (e.g., 1997-2002), but that should be treated as an exception, not a rule that affects all other ranges. --В²C ☎ 18:17, 25 September 2018 (UTC)
• Support xxxx-xx for two consecutive years, for sure. For years spanning centuries, you need xxxx-xxxx. In between, don't care, doesn't matter, editors should do what they like and leave alone what they find. We should probably say exactly that in the guidelines. That's my story, but some additional points:

• Argh, don't say reliable sources when you mean notable sources (or scholarly sources). Since it's not a question of whether xxxx-xx or xxxx-xxxx is true, reliability does not enter the equation. Readership and maybe scholarly standing do. The difference can matter in these discussions, so correct terminology is helpful.
• But anyway, sources are used here for content. If sources all say an event occurred on the eighth day of October in 1881, we report that in the article. If the sources all use the format "October 8th, 1881" we ignore that formatting. Of course we do. We have our own style guide, and don't/shouldn't much care what style guide the editor of the Podunk Times happens to use. (Or rather: what the outside world is a data point, but only that. If virtually everyone uses a particular format, that's a reasonable argument for us using that format too -- not proof, but a reasonable argument.. If it's like 75%-25% or something, forget it, ignore that.) Official use, too.. in the spirit of WP:OFFICIALNAME, who cares if the 43 Man Squamish League uses 2017-2018? They don't get to tell us how to write. If they used 2017-8, should we use that then? 2017-018? MMXVII-III? The official use is a minor data point, but no more.
• Big trout to the editor who changed all those pages -- this is roiling the text for no purpose, substituting their own personal idiosyncratic preference for the personal idiosyncratic preference of the person who originally titled the articles. This is pointless and stop doing that. The pages should be rolled back on principle -- it's important to support WP:BRD on principle precisely to quash this sort of behavior -- and then take the argument to talk (actually the person wanting the change should do this). FWIW I don't even think that WP:BOLD should apply to title changes in the first place -- as we see here, it can be a massive headache.

So absent a clear rule, let the person who did the actual work of the project -- you know, actually researching, writing, and titling those articles -- at least the satisfaction of titling them as they think works best. We'll give the same courtesy to you. Within reasonable guidelines -- it's reasonable to allow a between xxxx-xx or xxxx-xxxx, but not allow xxxx-xxx or roman numerals, because those are weird and hard to read. Herostratus (talk) 03:40, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

• Who cares? use either. I respect MOS and page style discussions, but this is one of them where I think an RfC causes more effort than it is worth and we don’t need a community consensus for it. Stick with whatever the stable title is. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:45, 26 September 2018 (UTC)
  • ... an RfC causes more effort than it is worth ...: I reiterate my original point that the question posed by this RfC was too broad for the specific problem at hand, so it follows that this has not been productive.—Bagumba (talk) 04:36, 26 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Well, the stable titles for the figure skating articles for years has been xxxx–xx. As previously stated, a single user unilaterally & without discussion decided to change the format for ~500 pages. I was told that pages cannot be changed back without discussion, thus we're having this discussion. While Bagumba stated it's too broad to have generic guideline for sports, others above are discussing making guideline even broader, for all topics not just sports. Wikipedia MOS is very broad on purpose and while projects can have their own MOS, there should be some generic rules for when there isn't any project MOS. 15zulu (talk) 07:30, 26 September 2018 (UTC)
    • 15zulu, whomever told you that was wrong. Per WP:RMUM, if the title wasn't stable (read: the move took place within the last month) they should have been reverted to their original stable titles. TonyBallioni (talk) 01:23, 30 September 2018 (UTC)
• Support xxxx-xx for two consecutive years, for sure. For years spanning centuries, you need xxxx-xxxx. per WP:COMMONNAME used in the vast majority of the main stream media discussing cricket. --DBigXrayᗙ 19:32, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose xxxx-xx The new version is ugly and was done without consensus, and also pointless. Per BRD, this mass move should be reverted and the other editor should really be here. – FenixFeather ^{(talk)(Contribs)} 00:07, 13 October 2018 (UTC)

Um, "xxxx-xx" is the old version (and supported by previous RfC for sport seasons & similar), "xxxx-xxxx" is the new version (to which 500 pages were moved without discussion). As for the other editor, they participated in discussion at WP:RMT (which occurred after the moves) where I stated that I posted here, but feel free to contact them. 15zulu (talk) 21:50, 13 October 2018 (UTC)

Oh, oops. In that case, the pages should still be moved back to the old title because it's not nice to just move a bunch of pages like that for no reason. I would support this mass renaming if it had been done with consensus. – FenixFeather ^{(talk)(Contribs)} 20:03, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

• Keep all the digits – elision of digits is pointless in our digital medium where space is relatively free. This kind of abbreviation does not help clarity or readability. Dicklyon (talk) 04:26, 13 October 2018 (UTC)
• Neutral on xxxx-xx for two consecutive years (not too huge a fan, but it's fine), but for any period that spans more than two years (or two centuries), STRONGLY SUPPORT the full xxxx-xxxx. Paintspot Infez (talk) 15:38, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
• Keep all the digits by default; permit tabular data exceptions when it's only a two-year span. The compressed format can be appropriate in tables, some lists, and maybe infoboxes to save space (I'm being purposefully rather inclusive about what "tabular data" means). It should never be used when the -xx part is -01 through -12, except when applied consistently to a bunch of other tabular data in same format in the same material, because something like "2002–03" and "1911–12" are completely indistinguishable from hyphenated YYYY-MM dates in many fonts. This also applies to "2002/03" dating as used in some contexts; always use 2002/2003. "Use what the sources use" is ridiculous; we'd end up with randomly conflicting date formats, even in the same paragraph in many cases, and this idea has been rejected many times before at WT:MOSNUM, etc. In short, if we just adopted whatever style a numerical majority of sources applied, to every style question, we would have no Manual of Style at all, and our articles on Star Trek would be written exactly the way they are at a Star Trek wiki, our legal articles would be written in impenetrable legalese, etc., etc. WP uses sources for facts, not how we write about them.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:58, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

So to summarize above (please correct me if I misstated your opinion):

• 15zulu (me): move should've been discussed & should be undone; RS, i.e. figure skating news articles, use xxxx-xx
• Frayæ: any further action should be discussed before moves undone or other moves made
• Dondervogel 2: move was good; all articles should be moved to xxxx–xxxx
• Bagumba: move should've been discussed; each sport/project should decide based on RS
• Ixfd64: comment/question
• Jayron32: titles based on RS
• Kendall-K1: titles based on RS, ISU uses XXXX/XX
• Reidgreg: xxxx–xx
• 121a0012: xxxx–xx
• Gonnym: xxxx–xxxx
• Born2cycle: xxxx–xx
• Herostratus: xxxx–xx; move should've been discussed
• TonyBallioni: move should've been discussed & should've been undone; stick to stable title
• DBigXray: xxxx–xx
• FenixFeather: xxxx–xxxx but move should've been discussed
• Dicklyon: xxxx–xxxx
• Paintspot: neutral for two consecutive years

Majority agree that the move should have been discussed first. Not counting myself, 5 editors stated articles should be xxxx–xx, 4 editors stated articles should be moved to xxxx–xxxx, 3 editors stated titles should be based on RS (which from my observations of figure skating news articles would mean xxxx–xx), 1 editor stated titles should be go back to stable state (i.e. xxxx–xx), and the rest were neutral/comments/questions. From that I conclude: figure skating articles should be moved back to xxxx–xx and any similar moves should be discussed first. Further thoughts? Thanks, 15zulu (talk) 11:03, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Obviously my above summary does not count additions made after I wrote it (including additions posted above the summary). Please do not edit or add to the list I created since that creates errors in my concluding paragraph. Thank you, 15zulu (talk) 12:11, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

@15zulu: Thanks for taking the time to summarize this. As far as my position, since the move wasn't discuss and WP:DATERANGE allows xxxx-xx, the affected figure skating pages should revert back to their original xxxx-xx, given that there is no consensus for xxxx-xxxx. This is consistent with WP:RMUM: If you disagree with such a move, and the new title has not been in place for a long time, you may revert the move. Regards.—Bagumba (talk) 10:23, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

• xxxx-xx - Such a big and potentially controversial move should've been discussed first. 4 digits are not necessary in the second year in the range, especially for consecutive years. Matt14451 (talk) 13:08, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
• Use either format for consecutive years, as allowed by MOS. Source conformity can be a weighing factor. Undiscussed mass-moves should be reverted, and a standard WP:RM discussion should be opened. — JFG ^talk 23:51, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
• xxxx-xx is clear and concise. SportingFlyer talk 04:56, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
• The discussion regarding RS is irrelevant IMO because this is about writing style. We have our own house style, intended to promote uniformity across the English Wikipedia. For this house style my preference was and remains xxxx-xxxx, across the board, because it removes all ambiguity (there could be exceptions permitting xxxx-xx, but only where space is of the essence). Second best is xxxx-xx, again for all articles. The present mix of xxxx-xxxx for some articles and xxxx-xx (or even xxxx/xx?) for others is untidy and unencyclopaedic, and fails to achieve the objective of uniformity. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 15:46, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
• There is now a proposal at WT:MOSNUM to amend the MoS to bar the use of YYYY-01 thru YYYY-12 in articles and titles ("unless in close proximity to other ranges in this format that end with numbers outside the 01–12 range"). Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers#Clarifying date ranges in YYYY–YY format. 80.41.128.3 (talk) 12:53, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
• Per WP:NAMINGCRITERIA: Article titles are based on how reliable English-language sources refer to the article's subject. For the most part, people searching for a season article will most likely be searching under its common name, not a wikipedia MOS guideline for a numbering/dating system. Vice versa, people outside of that region's dating style probably will not be searching for the article at all if they do not already know the common name. Many seasons that last between consecutive years are most commonly called xxxx–xx (in North America at least). So based on that, using XXXX–XX when used in the majority of reliable source meets the Recognizability, Naturalness, Precision, and Conciseness pillars of WP:NAMINGCRITERIA as well as the WP:COMMONNAME. Furthermore, most of the articles that are called "XXXX–XX season" clarify the extent of the time frame with phrases in the lead (ex: the season lasts from October 2018 until April 2019) and a duration parameter in the infobox, which should clear up any potential confusion to meaning of the title. I am pretty sure that is exactly why the "consecutive year exclusion" exists in DATERANGE in the first place. Yosemiter (talk) 23:28, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

  What they search for is irrelevant; redirects exist for a reason. We have five, not one, naming criteria and they're all co-equal. If the most common name fails one or more of them, we use the second-most common. More to the point here, however: WP:AT is not a style policy. Never has been, never will be. Otherwise we would have no MoS, or at least nothing in it could ever apply to titles. Yet in reality we cite it about 100 times per day at RM, and we do in fact apply MoS to titles; it's the most common ruleset we apply to titles (probably more MoS than AT arguments are applied, and accepted, at RM, since moves more often involve style twiddles like over-capitalization or mis-hyphenation than a completely wrong name having been chosen). The naming conventions pages that deal with style, such as WP:NCCAPS, are simply summaries of MoS points as they apply to titles, and are derived from MoS, not vice versa. In short, you do not understand our title policy, the applicability of our guidelines, or how WP article titling works.

  We do not, in fact, apply reasoning like "If the majority of sources spell something the XYZ way, then WP must do it too." We routinely, nearly daily, reject that reasoning. For a style matter to be "imposed" on Wikipedia by off-site stylization, the style in question must be found with nearly complete consistency in all reliable sources for the case in question (e.g., virtually no one writes "Ipod" in professional-grade publications, thus we write "iPod" like everyone else does, despite it being weird from an English-language-norms perspective). We never, ever have that sort of near-unanimous consistency in sources for the date formatting of sports seasons, TV-show seasons, election cycles, fiscal years, or any other circumstance in which people want to use confusing and inconsistent abbreviated date formats. The only practical use for them on Wikipedia is in tabular data, and only then when space is at a premium, and enough of them are used in one place that no one can be confused into thinking that something like "2002–03" is a YYYY-MM date.

  The rather recent (and recurrently controversial) "consecutive year exclusion" exists in DATERANGE because people who don't understand any of this stuff have gnashed their special-interest (mostly sports wikiproject) teeth long enough that they've tendentiously worn out reasoned opposition and gotten their pet peeve inserted. I'll happily bet real money this will not last, because the result is a stupid, reader-confusing, editor-frustrating mess that serves no one's interests. It serves no interest at all other than making a handful of editors happy that they get (for now) to mimic what they see in a football or TV magazine. Cf. actual policy at WP:NOT#NEWS: "Wikipedia is not written in news style." That includes sports and entertainment journalism, and that, in turn, includes their lazy, ambiguous date formatting.

  PS: I say all this as someone who founded a sports wikiproject, and regularly edits TV-related articles. This isn't about topics, but about the specialized-style fallacy, the nonsense idea that sources reliable for facts about a topic are somehow the most reliable sources for how to write about that topic for a general audience, when they are really often the worst, being representative of only how specialists write for other specialists in the same area (be that professionals in science/law/etc., or fans in sports/sci-fi/hip-hop/etc.). Failure to understand that specialist writing does not dictate WP writing style is the proximal cause of about 90% of style-related squabbling on Wikipedia.
   — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:14, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Official websites that violate copyright

Editors in this thread appear to be of the opinion that is is permitted to link to websites which violate copyright so long as it is the official website of the subject of the article. Citing WP:COPYLINK:

In articles about a website, it is acceptable to include a link to that website even if there are possible copyright violations somewhere on the site.

This is at odds with WP:ELOFFICIAL:

These links are normally exempt from the links normally to be avoided, but they are not exempt from the restrictions on linking.

WP:ELNEVER in turn states:

material that violates the copyrights of others per contributors' rights and obligations should not be linked, whether in an external-links section or in a citation

Furthermore, copyright violations is part of the TOU and is therefore not an issue which is subject to consensus.

Simply put, if there is a local policy that permits copyright violating links, then the local policy is wrong, and should be changed or ignored. GMG^talk 14:31, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

• The official website link itself does not violate copyright. Same reason while why some youtube links violate copyright that does not mean we can't link to "youtube.com" or other youtube links. Technically, one could also link to sci-hub pdfs of public domain material etc Galobtter (pingó mió) 14:41, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

• And YouTube has a regime in place to detect and remove copyright violating material, even if it lags behind uploads. This is not the case when linking to a site for which the violation of copyright is their core purpose, and who is frequently changing domains in order to avoid enforcement of copyright laws. Linking to such as sight is helping to bypass the copyright protections they are trying to avoid, and is therefore contributory copyright infringement. GMG^talk 14:54, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

• I have yet to find anything indicating that simply linking to a website that contains copyrighted material on one of its other pages has been ruled contributory copyright infringement. Directly linking to copyrighted material on another page definitely has, but the homepage of a service that simply can be used to obtain copyrighted material? Seems more like original research than anything explicitly established in policy. --tronvillain (talk) 16:58, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
• There are plenty of old copyright violations on Youtube. As a matter of fact, I'm listening to one right now, and furthermore it's easily reachable using Youtube's native search, in much the same way that copyright violations are accessible on Sci-Hub using that site's search bar. Daß Wölf 02:07, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

• There's no conflict with WP:ELNEVER: no material that violates the copyrights of others is being linked to. Unless you can tell us how to click through to copyrighted material from those pages? --tronvillain (talk) 15:08, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
  • This is the crucial point - the mainpages of Sci-Hub and The Pirate Bay do not contain any copyrighted material. SmartSE (talk) 15:10, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
    • And unlike The Pirate Bay, you can't browse to anything on Sci-Hub. --tronvillain (talk) 15:13, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
      • Yes, you can. Note the dozen-plus links to journals on their home page, because it is a website whose purpose is to violate copyright. GMG^talk 15:15, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
        • I'm not seeing a "dozen-plus links to journals on their home page", and I'm looking pretty carefully. There's the search area, the "About" section, the "Ideas" section, the "Community" section, the "Donate" section, and some share buttons. Where are these links? --tronvillain (talk) 15:26, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
          • Are you looking at their original website, or one of the dozen alternate domains they've registered to circumvent copyright law? GMG^talk 15:31, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
            • I'm looking at the pages you removed. Unless for some reason we're talking about different websites that weren't being linked to? --tronvillain (talk) 15:35, 16 October 2018 (UTC); edited 15:46, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
              • Regardless, the claim that the link is not copyright violating is hollow when the entire point of the site linked to is to violate copyright. GMG^talk 15:53, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
                • So these links you're talking about don't exist in the pages you removed? Great, I'm not just missing something obvious. It's really not hollow, when the policy you're citing is about linking to material that violates the copyrights of others, not to websites that can potentially be used to obtain such material. --tronvillain (talk) 16:00, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
                  • Except that courts have ruled that providing a service by which the public can easily and illicitly access copyrighted works is itself copyright violating. GMG^talk 16:07, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
                    • So, you're arguing for expanding WP:ELNEVER beyond not linking to copyrighted material to not linking to anything that might provide be used to access copyrighted material? I thought you were arguing for changing WP:COPYLINK, but okay. --tronvillain (talk) 16:21, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
                      • ELNEVER covers material that violates the copyrights of others. There is no change to ELNEVER necessary. There is already precedent that these services themselves, including this service in particular is copyright violating. GMG^talk 16:24, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
                        • That decision clearly says that Sci-Hub violated the American Chemical Society's copyright by distributing their copyrighted material, but it doesn't follow from that that their homepage in and of itself constitutes material that violates the copyrights of others. That particular interpretation presumably needs some consensus, or a clarification of the terms of use. --tronvillain (talk) 16:58, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
                          • The Pirate Bay ruling above does clearly state that these services qualify as a public broadcast for the purposes of copyright. The services themselves are copyright violating, and these sites serve no other purpose other than to facilitate the violation of copyright. GMG^talk 17:03, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
                            • Really? No other purpose? How do you explain the following link to a torrent of the GIMP v5.12 Open Source Image Editor, downloaded from The Pirate Bay? [1] --Guy Macon (talk) 13:31, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

                              Yeah, the "torrent sites = piracy" canard is silly. All sorts of things are distributed on them, including public domain material, and copyrighted material explicitly permitted to be distributed on them. It goes from silly to sillier when people try to blame the medium itself, the BitTorrent protocols.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  20:39, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

                              • Example text Yes, we are all very lucky that these sites are being dragged through court, banned in multiple countries, constantly having their domains shut down and relocating, all so they can bravely provide us with legal content. (Didn't Pirate Bay try to buy their own nation once?) God bless them. God bless them every one. GMG^talk 20:47, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• It seems to me that this is a question that should be bumped up to the WMF’s attorneys. Blueboar (talk) 16:46, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
  • You might be right there. --tronvillain (talk) 16:58, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
    • I'm not sure we're going to get much more than a boiler plate statement, but ping User:Jrogers (WMF) anyway in case they'd like to weigh in. GMG^talk 18:03, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
• Why would we link to a site that is known solely for hosting copyright material illegally? This link has no encyclopaedic utility. What are people going to do if they click the link? All they will find there is self-serving claims by a site that is, bluntly, criminal. Guy (Help!) 11:01, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

@JzG: Sci-Hub probably has more "encyclopedic utility" than Wikipedia. And saying "what are people going to do if they click the link?" is no different than saying "what will people do if they read the article?" Or "what will people do if they hear the name?" Obviously, they might look for it. Gee, that would be a shame. Violating "intellectual property" is the same kind of illegality as violating a slave-owner's carnal property. Wnt (talk) 01:26, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

What rot. The link on the Sci-Hub article is largely decorative. Clicking it says less about the site than we do because it presents the site from a perspective that is objectively incorrect. Contributory copyright infringement is also a thing. Guy (Help!) 16:02, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

Looking at the site is an objectively incorrect way of learning about the site? A link is "decorative" ... and that's why you're fired up to delete it? If what you say has a meaning, I'm not convinced at this point. Wnt (talk) 02:58, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

• If the site's reason to exist is to distribute material clearly against copyright, we should not link to it at all. Site's where copyright violations may exist but that is not the reason or function of the site and particular now due to actions of the site's operators, like YouTube or Researchgate, we can link to. --Masem (t) 11:13, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

  Masem - What's your opinion when this is say, the official site of the subject in question. For instance, we have an article on The Pirate Bay, which has a official website to that page. Pages like WireShare also have a similar page setup. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 11:24, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

  I removed the links on the Pirate Bay article also, but was reverted. GMG^talk 11:26, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

  If it is the official site, we should not include and probably have a message why no link is included. Wires are seems to be a client that can be used to violate copyright, but requires users to give that material, so it's less of a prolem. --Masem (t) 11:31, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

  Wireshare/Limewire is an opensource P2P client. By that reasoning literally every P2P client can be said to be 'used to violate copyright' - as can every web browser, archive tool (winrar) etc. The difference is that Pirate Bay exists only to provide direct links to copyright infringing material (with a smidgeon of public domain) and SciHub similar (and actually hosts copyright infringing material itself). Only in death does duty end (talk) 11:36, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

  And the 'official' link, if it can be called such on wireshare is to its source page at github. Github hosts a huge array of opensource projects. I dont think anyone is going to suggest we start removing github links as it enables copyright infringement are they? Only in death does duty end (talk) 11:40, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

• Include these links is my official vote. The text in the "Restrictions on linking" section should be taken to mean that you should not include a link if and only if clicking the link would directly cause the user to download [including as extended content directly included within a web page] copyright-infringing material. Not because he might find out more about how or where to do so or read some philosophy or download some program that might make it easier for him to decide to do so. Wnt (talk) 01:29, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

• That would be a reasonable interpretation of both WP:ELOFFICIAL and WP:COPYLINK. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 01:34, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

• I also vote that these links should be included: It should not be the role of Wikipedia editors to police the copyright behaviour of readers. If clicking on a link does not automatically trigger a copyright violation, and if there is no clear instruction from WP legal that this is not permitted, then Wikipedia users should be entrusted to make their own decisions with the information available.Kyle MoJo (talk) 08:51, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

• If it is legal under US law for Wikipedia to link to the homepage of these websites, then these links should be included as they are for any other website. If we permit ourselves to censor links based on moral objections to the site's contents (as opposed to legal objections) then this will be a never-ending debate. (Which objectionable site's official links should we remove next, Pornhub's, AlphaBay's?) Sizeofint (talk) 15:50, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

• I think there's a distinction to be made between linking to a page that is itself a copyright violation, and linking to a service that sometimes hosts copyright violations somewhere on it. For me, the difference is between linking to the main YouTube page (which has no copyright violations) and linking to a video on YouTube that is itself a copyright violation. If the page we link to is itself kosher, there's no reason we shouldn't link to it (provided it meets other policies and guidelines, yada yada). --Jayron32 16:14, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

That misses the main thrust of the issue though. YouTube is a legitimate site that happens to have some copyrighted material on it (so is Wikipedia if we're being honest). No one is raising a fuss in that regard. The problem is when we have a site whose core purpose is the violation of copyright, and which courts have ruled are in-and-of themselves copyright violating services. That's potentially legally problematic, especially for sites that have been blocked in multiple countries, and for whom our article is likely higher in search results than their actual website.

I don't expect legal to actually give us an opinion on the matter, although I have emailed them and notified them of this thread. (Legal, in my experience, doesn't express much of an opinion on copyright unless they have a takedown notice in hand.) But just because legal won't preempt themselves in public on an issue they may have to one day argue in court, doesn't mean this doesn't have foreseeable potential legal implications. GMG^talk 00:06, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

I think the en.wiki community is neither required, nor particularly competent, to judge fine legal niceties like this. If the Foundation lawyers are worried about it, they'll let us know; it's certainly been pointed out to them. If they're not, I don't see why we should be. --Trovatore (talk) 00:18, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Even if there is some lawsuit out there by the ACS (one of the worst offenders in terms of paywalled articles), that would only speak to their liability to ACS about ACS articles according to a court far from Sci-Hub's own country. A private lawsuit between those parties could not have produced an overall determination of the "core purpose" of the site as some kind of law or regulation that everyone else is supposed to know about or follow. I think that the core purpose of the site is obvious: it is meant to allow people all over the world to share the text of articles to which they have access with people who express their interest; in other words, it is an interlibrary loan site very similar in nature and operation to WP:WikiProject Resource Exchange or ResearchGate, though more efficient. While American Chemical Society may be eager to extract a few dollars from peasants particularly desperate to see some article, this foolish crusade comes at a substantial cost -- because what is the ordinary voter going to do who hears about a chemical controversy and runs into a paywall telling him he's not allowed to see the publicly funded science for himself? He is going to do what any intelligent person would do in that situation and conclude that "chemicals are bad for you." You can't blame a person for having a stupid point of view when you have hired guns standing over him to force him to be stupid. But I digress. Wnt (talk) 20:44, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Interlibrary loan terms are agreed to in contracts and subscription packages, and have various restrictions (and generally a charge on the part of the borrowing library, explicitly to protect copyright). Sci-hub, by it's own admission, has none of that. Every source agrees that it's intentionally and knowingly violating copyright laws on the articles. There's never been a colorable legal argument made by Sci-Hub or any of its defenders to the contrary; indeed, part of its justification is that those laws are unjust, harmful and deserve to be defeated, but not that they aren't being violated as they currently exist. That's it's whole reason for existence. The fact that I think modern copyright law is insane (which it is) doesn't change that it is the law at the moment.Just a Rube (talk) 11:46, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

To the best of my knowledge, any such guidelines are not universally followed even in the United States, and it is worth noting that Sci-Hub is not in the United States and is free to follow whatever legal standards its country adopts for Fair Use. The site has not been shut down, its maintainers have not been arrested, and so the only question is whether your national network is going to censor foreign traffic because it contains dangerous information, or ban local discussion of how to access such networks. Wnt (talk) 03:10, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

• No link the site's entire purpose is to violate copyright law. There is no non-infringing purpose behind it. Anyone who wants to find the site can find it easily without including a link.Just a Rube (talk) 11:46, 22 October 2018 (UTC)
  • Really? No non-infringing purpose? How do you explain the following link to a torrent of the GIMP v5.12 Open Source Image Editor, downloaded from The Pirate Bay? [2] --Guy Macon (talk) 13:31, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
    • Given that Gimp is only at v2.10, one has to ask out legit that is. It is known that software pirates often rename files to mask what they offer, this looks like such a case. --Masem (t) 13:36, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
      • I don't want to delve into nitty gritty of version numbers of package components, so I'll just cite Darkwood, TPB AFK, 3D printer data distributed on Pirate Bay. I'm sure there are other "legitimate" uses. (Well, you can argue the last isn't legitimate since the data is banned in the U.S. under the 1st and 2nd amendments, but Pirate Bay isn't in the U.S., and the U.S. actually targeted one person only, so... but Wikipedia made me take out Infowars' link to the topic that came up, because you know that's fake news ... computers are all about the owner of the computer telling everyone else what to do for no reason at all, so I shouldn't be surprised at any of you any more. You live to serve your Master, period.) Wnt (talk) 03:29, 27 October 2018 (UTC)
• Do not link to any dedicated copyright violating service. I'm not above admitting to using Sci-Hub, or the Pirate's Bay on occasion, but that should not be taken as any sort of push to legitimize them. If there is no other significant service offered by the site, then there is no encyclopedic value offered by including the link. Peer-to-peer networks and clients are not dedicated copyright violating services, but -like YouTube or google image search- are services which are frequently misused for that purpose. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 12:43, 22 October 2018 (UTC)
• Yes link. The purpose of the link is key. You can't use a link to point to infringing content relevant to some article, but of course you can use a link to identify and access a site itself. Alsee (talk) 01:27, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

• Yes link - Linking to a domain is not infringeing copyright. What our readers do once they navigate to a site is up to them. It would be pretty stupid for a website article not to have the URL - it's one of the fundamental pieces of information about the topic and we are not meeting our readers' expectations if we do not include them. If there are legal issues with us linking to the, them WMF legal will let us know, but the fact that these links have been present so long indicates that they are not. SmartSE (talk) 12:11, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

• Yes Link. Even a site like The Pirate Bay has legitimate uses. For example, it is the fastest way to download older versions of Slackware Linux. And a site like Google can easily be used to find copyright-infringing material. --Guy Macon (talk) 12:36, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
• No link - It’s not just that the admitted purpose of the site is to violate copyright, and linking to the site aides and abets illegal activity; but the site is used for spreading malware. O3000 (talk) 13:25, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

• Yes Link. It seems like a silly political statement to leave the link missing and looks like an error.Sushilover2000 (talk) 14:29, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
• Well here's the Foundation Legal response:

I'm a bit late replying, but thought I'd offer a couple thoughts. First, the actual legal doctrine is nigh-impossible to do anything with. Links like this vary by country, and the current doctrine in Europe asks questions about the specific knowledge of the person doing the linking and whether the link is for commercial purposes, among other things. I would suggest that the Foundation is not going to overrule the community if people think that specific links are appropriate and important for an encyclopedia article on a notable topic, but there is a chance we could receive legal demands in specific cases that cause us to have to change something, which we would evaluate on a case by case basis if it came up. Also, just as a matter of community good will, if you know that a particular Wikipedia page is being used as a hub to facilitate copyright infringement for some reason, it's probably good to make changes to prevent that, regardless of the specifics of what the law says.

For whatever difference that makes to anyone. GMG^talk 21:25, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

It means I really regret that Mike Godwin, a couple of months after dissing the FBI on our behalf, somehow ended up bundled off to a loony bin. He was never prone to mumble! Nor would he have been one to contemplate retreating without a fight based on mere demands from the right-placed parties. But that kind of private law isn't something you can try to anticipate -- they're nonetheless saying they'll do whatever whenever, and we can go back to our regularly scheduled article unless and until they make it a ruin. Wnt (talk) 03:04, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

Also, just as a matter of community good will, if you know that a particular Wikipedia page is being used as a hub to facilitate copyright infringement for some reason, it's probably good to make changes to prevent that, regardless of the specifics of what the law says And what about WP:NOTCENSORED?

• Here is an idea. Forbid any links to any site that may link to any other site that may link to copyright infringing material. That makes it simple: we can set up a bot that removes every citation on Wikipedia. No more arguing about sources if all the sources are removed! The only downside is that the copyright-industrial-complex will say that this is not good enough, and that we need to form death squads to kill suspected infringers. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:44, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

Your logical fallacy is: slippery slope. This site is dedicated to copyright violation. It's not about some links to a site that might hypothetically link to another site that violates copyright, it's about direct links to a site whose sole reason for existence is the systematic violation of copyright. Guy (Help!) 10:52, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

From between the serapham, JzG has judged the sole reason for existence of a site. Yup, these sites are only for copyright violation. Unless they're also for distributing documentaries and games legally, as I cited above, or more interestingly, for violating censorship not-laws against making a drawing of a gun that someone could use to program a 3D printer. Really, I think the 3D printing business could be Pirate Bay's biggest draw in a few years, because just think of all the stuff various governments will be looking to ban blueprints for. I mean, what if you could 3D print the little plastic thingamajjig that is absolutely required to close your microwave door and authorize its electronic Brain to allow you to turn it on and which is designed to break every 3 years to make you buy a new one? Making one the right length with the right curve to fit would violate, oh, patents, design patents, business model patents, and copyrights on their mode of operation, right? Somebody gotta ban it, and it'll turn up on Pirate Bay. Or what if you could 3D print eyeglasses that aren't within the legal range of farsightness to be sold cheaply on a rack at the drugstore, undermining the doctors' racket? Somebody gotta ban it. Or what if you could make something to bypass location tricking on a fancy new self-driving car and make it visit a location proles aren't allowed to? It would be out and out terrorism! What if you could download a banner opposing fascism or supporting democracy during the key period before the election in Brazil where such content is taken as obviously partisan against Bolsonaro? [3] Obviously gotta ban that, worldwide. So I see potential for all kinds of Illegal Activities On Pirate Bay that don't fall strictly into the realm of copyright violation. Wnt (talk) 12:49, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

And according to our Sci-Hub article, that website has a significant amount of public domain content that heretofore was hidden behind paywalls. Sizeofint (talk) 17:01, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

Foundation Legal isn't stopping us from linking, so legality isn't the issue here. To summarize the above discussion, it seems like those opposed to linking are mostly just making moralistic arguments in favor of attempting to police the behavior of our users. If this discussion is indeed such a moral judgement, then I suppose I'd toss my vote in favor. But of course, I was under the impression that Wikipedia is not censored. Benjamin (talk) 08:24, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

• "Should not" does not mean "must not". Stifle (talk) 10:05, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

• Yes Link. The site may indeed contain copyright-infringing material, but I find it unlikely that the site itself is a copyright violation, as some above seem to be arguing. If so, whose code did they copy? If it's that much of a problem, add a warning. --Auric talk 15:11, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Yes link to official websites, no matter their content. --NaBUru38 (talk) 20:20, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
• Yes, link to official websites regardless of their perceived copyright status. Wikipedia is not censored, and the home pages of official websites generally do not contain copyright violations. Any legal issues (which are highly unlikely) can be resolved through office actions instead of proactive censorship. — Newslinger talk 00:01, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
• Yes, link unless WMF legal says otherwise. The URL is a "vital statistic" of any website and should be included for the reader's information; providing a link to their homepage is not a way of endorsing or condoning the copyright-violating content. –dlthewave ☎ 19:15, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

Removing warnings on one's own talk page

One thing that has frequently happened to me is that I would be looking through a user's talk page before giving a warning, lo and behold, they were given a level 4 warning and I didn't know it because they blanked their talk page. It is extremely inefficient to browse diffs to see what warnings they were given. Per WP:BLANKING, people can delete warnings as evidence that they read the warn. I would like to propose a change to that policy that allows users to remove warnings only if the warned user and issuing user come to an agreement or a set amount of time has passed (lets say 6 hours) which allows recent changes patrollers to see if the user is a persistent problem or just a one off incident. Kyle Bryant (talk) 02:31, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Perennial proposals#Prohibit removal of warnings. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 10:13, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

If the WMF wanted to help us with this, they could easily make it so that a person just reading the talk page doesn't see the deleted warnings but a special button makes them visible. They could allow anyone to push that button, only extended confirmed users, or only admins.

I wonder, would a script be able to automate most of the work of searching the history for deleted warnings? --Guy Macon (talk) 10:56, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

• • Support proposal for button, as the warnings easily get deleted and out of view so making problematic editing situations difficult to judge Atlantic306 (talk)
• Meh... I don’t find it onerous to look in the talk page history to see if a user has received previous warnings. No big deal. Blueboar (talk) 14:14, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose; the purpose of a user talk page is to serve as a means of communication with that editor, not as a wall of shame documenting that editor's past mistakes. If the five seconds it takes you to click on "history" is too long for you, you're the one editing too quickly and without due care and attention. ‑ Iridescent 14:26, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose- If some chucklehead wanders by to plaster a frivolous warning on my talk page, of course I am going to remove it. Reyk _YO! 14:33, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

  Urge to warn frivolously...rising... –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 14:46, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose because it took all of my stockpile of self-control for the day not to go post a snarky warning on the OP's talk page and therefore it's all Wikipedia's fault I just ate a giant chocolate-chip cookie for lunch. Opabinia externa (talk) 21:37, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
• Question, how difficult would it be to just make a user script that looks at the page history and displays a list of warnings, from say the last 2 days, or maybe a configured amount? If possible it would remove the need for policy changes while allowing people who want/need the information to get to it easily. zchrykng (talk) 22:04, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose, but I would support adding a separate log for user warnings, with a tab visible to admins showing recent warnings to a given user. bd2412 T 22:30, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. I can't make much sense of the idea that if I give someone a warning I have to also have a discussion with them and come to an agreement about when they can remove the warning from their page. If I were an asshole, I could withhold that agreement indefinitely just to stick it to them. WP has plenty of assholes. More to the point, if I'm leaving someone a warning, I have way better things to do that have a pointless discussion with them about the archiving of their talk page. Especially since their disagreeableness and inability to work toward compromise with other editors may be the proximal cause of them receiving the warning. In short, WP:NOT#BUREACRACY.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:31, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - Would create more problem than it solves.
  The script ideas above aren't bad, but how often does a script-qualified editor who doesn't feel strongly about the need devote the time to create a script because there is a consensus among a few people at the Village Pump? I don't know. ―Mandruss ☎ 11:21, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
• Snow Oppose This would discourage users who get a warning from editing Wikipedia. —Eli355 (talk • contribs) 22:11, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

Request for comment on the specific term "fuck off" – sanctionable or not!

Resolved

 – Discussion already closed, without consensus for any policy change.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:55, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Discussion here.--David Tornheim (talk) 22:51, 27 October 2018 (UTC) [revised 09:19, 31 October 2018 (UTC)]

Expand criteria for women's teams/coaches/players in WP:NHOCKEY

Recently I dePRODed the Cara Morey article. Failure to meet WP:NHOCKEY was given as one of the reasons why it was proposed for deletion. Reading through the criteria, it appeared to me that there are no entries applicable to women's teams or coaches. When I stated this, I was told that the criteria for females was to have been in the Olympics or to have played in World championships. Considering this far narrower criteria for women, and the wider opportunities for men to have a presence on Wikipedia as notable players or coaches, it seems to me that more opportunities for participation in various competitions or leagues should be added to WP:NHOCKEY to be inclusive qualifiers of women's ice hockey, particularly as the organizations themselves are pushing for more females to participate in both playing and coaching. I am no expert on any sport by any means, but I am in favor of having more opportunities for women to have articles if they are indeed notable, so I thought I would present this here for more knowledgable editors to discuss. LovelyLillith (talk) 20:43, 28 October 2018 (UTC)

I think the first question has to be how popular women's ice hockey is as a spectator sport (which is how players would derive notability if not playing for their national sides). If enough people are watching the matches for the leagues to be fully-professional, then the leagues should probably be added to the list. If the leagues are semi-pro or amateur, then in all likelihood the players in them are unlikely to be given default notability. Number 57 21:50, 28 October 2018 (UTC)

@Number 57: In response to professional women's hockey as a spectator sport, four of five NWHL teams play in NHL teams' practice facility, with seating up to about 2000 max. The other is a local rec center in a Stamford park. As far as I tell, the NWHL does not publish attendance figures, however, those arena capacities are below what would be accepted for an expansion team in the ECHL, and are more in line with would be found in the Federal Hockey League or non-Major Junior ice hockey. (Although every game so far at the TRIA Rink for the Whitecaps have been reported as "sold-out", but with a four-game sample size.) As to "fully-professional", as of last season both the NWHL and CWHL pay player salaries, but not nearly enough for the players to not also need a second job in order to make a living. On the other hand, I don't agree that either being widely spectated or being well-paid directly implies notability per the WP:GNG, which is more about significant independent media coverage of each person as an individual. Although it can, and usually does, correlate (more spectators -> more media). Yosemiter (talk) 17:56, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Note the hockey-specific notability criteria are used as a predictor that the general notability guideline can be met. If it can be shown that the general notability guideline is met, the article can be kept. The hockey-specific criteria are just there to keep obvious cases from being quickly deleted, so they are set very conservatively. isaacl (talk) 21:54, 28 October 2018 (UTC)

I've also raised this issue in the past. I've never come across a criteria which extremely explicitly discriminates against women's sport before, and I've seen articles deleted because of it where a man in the exact same equivalent league with the exact same equivalent referencing would be a unanimous keep. It's an odd one out - I can't think of another notability criteria on Wikipedia period which specifically names only men's competitions as resulting in notability (and yet purports to cover women). I couldn't care less about hockey as an Australian, but it sits very badly with me. The Drover's Wife (talk) 00:08, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

WP:NBASKETBALL comes close. Players are notable if they play for the NBL but not the WNBL. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 05:29, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Which is absurd. The University of Canberra Capitals were far more likely to be household names in their area than the Sydney Kings were in theirs, with the newspaper and television coverage to boot. This is a perfect example of where the assumptions a minority of editors make break with reality. The Drover's Wife (talk) 08:52, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

For better or worse, the general notability guideline is based on a subject receiving suitable coverage in independent, non-routine, non-promotional, reliable sources. The sports-specific notability guidelines do not seek to replace the general notability guideline, so equivalence of achievements is not used to determine their criteria. The criteria are set based on their ability to predict the existence of suitable sources such that the general notability guideline is met. isaacl (talk) 08:44, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Except that they're not - they're based on an assumed notability, regardless of its relationship to actual sources. And this is is how you can have a male player considered notable and a female player considered not notable with the exact same sourcing - and a level of sourcing that is extremely common across Wikipedia's sports coverage generally at that. There is no reasonable basis for holding women to a higher sourcing standard than men for the sole reason that they're women. The Drover's Wife (talk) 08:52, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

If suitable non-routine, independent, non-promotional reliable sources can be produced, then the article can pass an article for deletion discussion. In addition to not setting a lower bar, the sports-specific notability guidelines are not used to set a higher bar, either. There are plenty of members of the hockey WikiProject who would love to have more coverage of women hockey players and would back up any discussion if the sources are there. isaacl (talk) 18:09, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

@The Drover's Wife: Except "a male player considered notable and a female player considered not notable with the exact same sourcing" is not true. In Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tatiana Rafter, I immediately pointed out two other male players with more coverage of the so-called "exact same sourcing" that were deleted (here and here) without argument in the same time frame. Yosemiter (talk) 19:03, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Number 57 is right. Quite frankly, most Women's sports receieve nowhere near as much coverage in sources of any kind compared to the equivalent Men's sports. It's not our job to give coverage to Women's sports where reliable sources don't just because the Men's equivalent gets covered by reliable sources. The WP:NSPORTS SNGs should make clear where coverage is equivalent (e.g Tennis), and where it isn't (most other sports). Iffy★Chat -- 12:09, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

• Is the criteria for women hockey players not also significant writing in reliable source texts? Is there some extra hurdle for writing articles about female hockey players? --Jayron32 14:05, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
  • This isn't about an extra hurdle. What WP:NHOCKEY provides is a substitute for significant writing in reliable sources. There just needs to be a record of having played at a certain level or in certain number of games, rather than an article discussing a given player. The criteria seem to be tied to the sizes of the audiences for the various leagues. Where audiences are large, this criteria is saying that players can be well-known in the Wikipedia sense because they have been seen by large numbers of people, rather than having in-depth written coverage. StarryGrandma (talk) 16:46, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
    • If you don't have reliable sources to add content to articles, where are you getting the information you are putting in articles? --Jayron32 16:50, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
      • The issue is notability. If a person is notable enough for an article, then local newspapers, interviews, team websites, and other sources that don't establish notability are fine for content. StarryGrandma (talk) 17:05, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
        • That's bass-ackwards. It is the newspapers and interviews and other sources that establish notability. Please read WP:GNG or WP:42 or the like. The lack of reliable, independent source texts is what determines whether or not we have an article. The only reason for the concept of notability to even exist at Wikipedia is to establish if we have enough useful source text to even bother writing the article. If the source text exists, we write it. If the source text does not, we don't. It's not more complicated than that; any confusion caused when understanding the concept of notability at Wikipedia is largely caused by people who couldn't find enough good source text to write articles about things, so tried to create loopholes in this otherwise sensible standard. --Jayron32 18:05, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
          • • Not really, the criteria is significant commentary, beyond WP:ROUTINE. Having a source that says Bob Smith scored two goals in a minor league game in a local newspaper is not the same as a, e.g. Newsweek interview with the person. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:12, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
              • That's about content not about notability. We would never write about the performance of a single, routine game in an article about an athlete. If the entirety of a person's life story exists entirely of such writing, then they aren't notable, per WP:GNG, no matter what their job title is. The whole point of notability is to establish that enough good content can be put in an article. You've just brought up an example of content that would never be added to an article. --Jayron32 18:26, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
    • The sports-specific notability guidelines do not provide a substitute for meeting the general notability guideline. They just provide a buffer to avoid quick deletion when there is very good reason to believe that the general notability guideline can be met. (This was the consensus agreement when the guidelines were created, and it has been affirmed many times since then.) isaacl (talk) 18:15, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Here's what I wrote in an earlier discussion.

Simply put, the caliber difference and the visibility of women's hockey/NWHL in general is what makes the NWHL players less notable than NHL players. The NWHL is a 3 year old league, 5 teams, with a 2.5 million dollar budget, which more or less bring it to par with the NHA. The NHL is over 100 year old, has 31 teams, and is considered the premier hockey league in the world, with revenues in the $2.5 billion range. While NHL teams are exclusively North American, it draws players from all over the world because no other league compares to it. Norway women don't train for years hoping to be part of the NWHL. While the NWHL may want to be the equivalent of the NHL for women, if you compare its status amongst in women's hockey, it falls short of the status of the NHL in men's hockey.

This still applies. When leagues have equal status in a sport, leagues should be treated as equivalent for notability. The top male/female leagues of tennis, badminton, ping pong, curling, bowling, etc... have equal status. The top male/female leagues of hockey, baseball, basketball, football, don't. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:19, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I don't really want to repeat what I wrote at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tatiana Rafter again, but the short version is that GNG-worthy coverage needed to consider ALL players in the CWHL and NWHL notable is too inconsistent. It is mostly relegated to coverage from the local NHL team's SBNation site, less than that of the NHL team's AHL affiliate, and tends to come from the more blog-like posts on that site rather than the paid editors (SBNation is a bit of mix these days). So the hockey project treats women hockey players on a case-by-case basis for GNG, some of which pass. Having spent some time trying to fix women's team pages this year in the CWHL, I have had a hard time finding reliable sources from as recent as 2010 (as I mentioned at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ice Hockey/Archive72#Looking for some clarification) when the CWHL appears to have only been consistently covered in personal blogs until a championship game. As discussed in that AfD, women's hockey gets about as much coverage on its own as a niche sport like water polo or lacrosse (which also do not have a SNG, but there may be other reasons for that). Yosemiter (talk) 18:41, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Also, as it pertains to women's teams, they are presumed notable in both the CWHL and NWHL. However, as I pointed out in the above archived discussion, finding reliable references for many of the teams from prior to about 2014 has been quite difficult. I challenge any editor to find what arenas the Quebec Phenix played their home games in reliable refs, without using any wikipedia references (because I had to fix them using recently, it was apparently wrong here for years). Yosemiter (talk) 14:47, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

A tricky situation here. Should NHOCKEY be gender blind or not, in its application to ice hockey? GoodDay (talk) 18:22, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

As much as it pains me to say it, no, it shouldn't. NHOCKEY, like all of NSPORTS, is essentially a shortcut to answering "does this person have enough non-routine coverage to make them notable per GNG?". While playing a game in the NHL or 200 games in the AHL is a pretty good indicator that the person gets non-routine coverage, thanks to bias in public interest (as reflected in the media), the same isn't true for women's hockey. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 18:34, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

Then there's the transgenders in ice hockey & how NHOCKEY should deal with them. GoodDay (talk) 19:01, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

Okay, so technically gender of the player doesn't actually matter, it's whether they play in a men's leage or a women's league. If a transgender person (or a woman for that matter) played in the NHL or 200 games in the AHL, for example, they would pass NHOCKEY. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 16:13, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

Harrison Browne did receive plenty of coverage in the NWHL as transgender, but not really for anything that could be written as a NSPORT-type SNG, just that fact that he was transgender and playing hockey. As for women in the AHL, if it were to happen, they would almost certainly (speculation of course) meet GNG for the rarity of it. In the times that women have played in the pro leagues that are traditionally male (as there are no league bylaws stating a player must be male), they have received coverage for it (Shannon Szabados, Manon Rhéaume). But I am also unaware of any female players that have played in the men's leagues (at any level) that did not also play for an Olympic team anyways. Yosemiter (talk) 16:32, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

• I come in here from two directions: first, as a partisan of women's hockey, where I wager I'm one of the few in this discussion to actually have been a season ticket holder for a women's collegiate team (Northeastern University) and certainly the only one to have seen the first woman to play in the American Hockey League (Erin Whitten for the Adirondack Red Wings) ... and second, as the original author of the NHOCKEY guideline. As such, editors like Ahecht and Yosemiter are exactly right. The purpose of NHOCKEY, as with the other NSPORTS guidelines, is solely "does this person have enough non-routine coverage to make them notable per GNG?". At the hockey Wikiproject, we've done extensive examinations -- because this question's been coming up time and time again -- of individual key players, and over and over again, the media just doesn't care. My classic example is that when the Boston team won the inaugural NWHL championship, in a city with intense media and sports coverage, neither of the Boston dailies reported it. It sucks, it's unfortunate, but there are no grounds beyond the ideological to make any changes here. Ravenswing 18:57, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

• As more evidence for what the current SNG implies, I previously linked Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Joey Anderson as a subject that failed NHOCKEY 3 months ago, had about 1,000 G-News mentions at the time, and was deleted without argument as WP:TOOSOON and only routine mentions. This is about 4-5 times as much coverage as a typical player in the NWHL that has won an award/achievement (because as Ravenswing said, we have looked into this often). Since being deleted, the subject debuted in an NHL game less than a week ago. The subject now has over 4,000 hits just by stepping on the ice. You do not see that kind of uptick in news coverage for any women's league, which if it did would at least imply that participating in that league presumes any player notability per the GNG. Yosemiter (talk) 13:46, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

• The current situation for the two women's pro leagues is very much like the infancy of men's pro leagues 100 years ago. Reliable sources for that time period are iffy and few in many cases (look at the player stubs from back then), but NHOCKEY presumes notability for that older era, so there does appear to be a double standard there. Obviously, women's leagues do not get the attention that men's do, but a lot of that is strict repetition of the same stories, games, etc. In women's hockey we are missing an opportunity to be encyclopedic and document this initial period by imposing the same standard on women's that we do on men's. A lot of these women players are pioneers just like those early male players. If we applied the same standard, then most of those early male players probably should not be in Wikipedia. And is that what we really want? I would rather be encyclopedic and over-include than under-include in this instance. Alaney2k (talk) 17:01, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @Alaney2k: I don't necessarily disagree agree with you about the older players, but media coverage from 100 years ago vs. now is apples to pineapples, they sound related but have nearly nothing in common. 100 years ago, media coverage of the pro leagues is somewhat assumed, and when asked, editors have been able to dig out print archives of coverage. The general media was definitely more localized and there was less routine coverage articles as the United States was not as sports obsessed (as there were very few teams in any sports). It somewhat implies that any coverage of a player then would be greater than routine. Obviously, it was also well before the proliferation of blogs and personal editorials causing an over saturation of routine, non-independent, and marginally reliable sources. So maybe that part of the SNG should be removed, but historically-based GNG arguments are always hard to make because a lot of it is that they were likely covered in GNG sources, but it is both difficult to prove or disprove without going to a library. That is most definitely not the case with the NWHL or CWHL, which have only been around for the last 11 years. Yosemiter (talk) 22:45, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @Yosemiter: The content for many of the players for 100 years ago is mostly just stats. A mention of a player back then would basically be termed routine reporting. There were no biographical articles. Often I had to dig that out of obituaries from 50 years later. I'm not pushing for mass inclusion of women or a mass removal of men. I just think we can't apply the same standard to a fully-developed commercialized industry to a nascent one. And as I've pointed out, NHOCKEY already does this for early men's play. It should do something similar for current women's play. NHOCKEY actually is very forgiving to players who've only played a single game in the NHL also. That is a low standard and it certainly undercuts any argument that NHOCKEY is a very good indicator of general notablity. Most single-game players in the NHL from before the 1950s are very difficult to find anything other than very minimal coverage. Alaney2k (talk) 00:48, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
• I strongly support this. We're currently at a point where some of the best women's hockey players in the world aren't allowed to have articles because they fail WP:NHOCKEY, and the community at AfD tends to interpret WP:NHOCKEY very strictly. Recently there were several articles deleted that I swear passed WP:GNG with coverage in Sports Illustrated, ESPN, et cetera, for women playing at the highest level of the sport. We don't need to adjust the SNG all that much either - I would propose award winners in the NWHL/CWHL/European leagues and making sure we look at WP:GNG when considering when an article is appropriate as opposed to the strict deletionist interpretation of the SNG. SportingFlyer talk 23:13, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
  • The women you mention aren't allowed articles because independent reliable sources aren't talking about them, not because of a failing of WP:NHOCKEY, and the purpose of NHOCKEY isn't to WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS. If articles are deleted that pass WP:GNG, that is a failing of WP:AfD, not NHOCKEY (since NHOCKEY says at the top "Failing to meet the criteria in this guideline means that notability will need to be established in other ways (e.g. the general notability guideline, or other, topic-specific, notability guidelines)"). --Ahecht (TALK
    PAGE) 16:13, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
  • NWHL awards are not particularly well covered. A cursory google search for the 2017 winners led me to primary sources, blog entries and some local news coverage about the MVP, specifically. I love women's hockey with a passion, but the coverage isn't there. Saying that some top women's players don't qualify doesn't seem correct. If objective sources are calling someone one of the top players in the world, there should be sufficient material to establish notability, regardless of NHOCKEY. Per the example further up - I don't think Harrison Browne passes NHOCKEY, but he has enough coverage for an article. I would support explicit mention in NHOCKEY about what level of women's hockey qualifies (if this hasn't been added already) - which at the moment, I think should be top level international play. Canada Hky (talk) 18:22, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
    • We actually did a search of award winners and leading scorers for the NWHL awhile back and we couldn't find enough sources on all of them. Now of course some of them had sources, but in order to be a new line in any of the NSPORTS criteria the generally agreed idea is that GNG has to be met for 99.999 percent of the people it applies to. Now I forget how many we found sources for but I think it was more than half of the women's players who had won awards in the NWHL didn't have sources found for them. The media just doesn't cover it. As Ravenswing mentions above, when even the local paper doesn't mention the local team won the championship, its pretty hard to say that media is covering the players when they aren't even covering the team all that much. -DJSasso (talk) 15:24, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
      • I agree on the lack of reliable coverage for NWHL award winners. I was disagreeing with the previous statement that this means some of the top women's hockey players in the world don't qualify for articles. The top players generally qualify, but not all the NWHL award winners are top players in the world. Canada Hky (talk) 16:05, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
  • A typical AfD for a woman hockey player usually goes like this:

    Nomination: Person appears to fail GNG based on lack of significant coverage in independent media, recives many mentions and routine coverage in blogs. Also subsequently fails NHOCKEY by not participating in the senior level IIHF tournament and no Olympic appearances. (paraphrased of course, sometimes it is simply "Fails GNG. Also fails NHOCKEY").

    Comment: They play in the highest level they can play in, should meet the spirit of NSPORT.

    *Reply to Comment: To meet NSPORT, it implies they must meet GNG. No evidence this league receives significant coverage, mostly just mentions and tons of routine coverage from the The Ice Garden (an SB Nation women's hockey blog). See this AfD.

    Keep: But they are a significant person because it is the top level national league. (An NFOOTY phrasing often used, an odd misconception that the coverage of any hockey league is anywhere close to the most popular sport in the world, such as when it was used as a Keep for the Turkish league here.)

    *Reply: See above response about GNG. And there are no "national" pro leagues in North America for hockey. They operate independent of a national governing body and usually have teams in both Canada and the United States.

    Keep: [An assortment of reliable sources, each with a mention or maybe a paragraph/quote from subject].

    *Reply: No real significant depth of coverage in multiple, just mentions.

    And it usually goes on like this ad nauseam. Some are good arguments for borderline coverage, but almost always it comes back to "men at the same level meet the SNG, why not women?" And the simple answer is simply: "Because unfortunately, the general media has decided not cover these teams or players anywhere close to their traditional leagues making coverage too inconsistent to create a hard-set SNG". Yosemiter (talk) 17:35, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

If I understand it correctly. We're being asked to treat female hockey players equally with male hockey players, by not treating female hockey players equally (i.e give them exemptions) with male hockey players. GoodDay (talk) 20:17, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

• @SportingFlyer:, I'd like to address a comment of yours from a few days back. While other editors answered what I would have, there's a principle here: no one is "entitled" to an article. Leaving aside examples in this discussion how curiously flexible some inclusionists have been in defining "best women's hockey players," there is no group, gender, nationality, ethnicity or faith community entitled to have the provisions of WP:V or WP:GNG waived in their favor, Just Because. Ravenswing 09:09, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• @Ravenswing: I agree with you. That being said, I think there are players who play in the NWHL who do individually pass WP:GNG who have articles deleted recently. The problem with the "media doesn't cover this!" argument is that it looks at women's hockey as a group instead of looking at the individuals in the group who would pass WP:GNG. I was particularly disappointed with the deletion of the Katie Fitzgerald article, for instance. As I noted above, the bigger issue in my mind is in my experience hockey AfDs are based around whether someone passes the hockey SNG or not and either don't consider GNG or consider non-routine coverage as routine in identifying GNG. SportingFlyer talk 10:01, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

RfC on schools' inclusion criteria

Should Wikipedia have one set of criteria about articles on schools up to and including the high school level and a different set for articles on schools of higher education? (I.e. beyond high school, e.g. universities.) -The Gnome (talk) 12:46, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Background

This follows a series of discussions and RfCs in other pages, over the years. (See "Links to relevant threads," herebelow.) This RfC tries to take on the issue of school notability and inclusion of schools articles in Wikipedia slowly and piecemeal. It is posted here following the suggestion that the PUMP is the appropriate place for such a broad-policy question. Editors are encouraged to add to the link-sections below if they believe something is amiss.

List to relevant threads

• RfC: secondary school notability (8/1-23/2/2017)
• Discussion: Schools in, forever (21/4/2018-open)
• RfC: Schools' inherent notability (11/10-3/11/2018)

List to relevant policies, guidelines, essays

• WP:N; WP:ORG; WP:NSCHOOL, a sub-section of WP:ORG; WP:SCHOOLOUTCOMES; WP:NHS (essay).

Ping-o-mat

Notifying editors who got involved in past discussions:

• Cordless Larry, Cullen328, King of Hearts, Jbhunley, TonyBallioni, Sandstein, RileyBugz, Rhododendrites, Masem, Alanscottwalker, Jytdog, ansh666, Finnusertop, Edison, Alarics, Wugapodes, ThePlatypusofDoom, Chris troutman, Jonesey95, Starblind, Samwalton9, Ealdgyth, PamD, czar, Aircorn, Peter James, TheCatalyst31, Blackmane, Anne Delong. -The Gnome (talk) 06:24, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Paste, Narutolovehinata5, Only in death, Hullaballoo Wolfowitz, Graeme Bartlett, Kudpung, The Banner, ClemRutter, Beyond My Ken, MelanieN, DGG, Necrothesp, Thincat, SNUGGUMS, Noyster, Seraphimblade, Eustachiusz, Kaldari, Arxiloxos, JaconaFrere, This, that and the other, WhisperToMe, Northamerica1000, Dodger67, Carrite, Alansohn, Spirit of Eagle, Hobit. -The Gnome (talk) 06:24, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Beeblebrox, NewYorkActuary, Mz7, Izno, Reyk, Andrew Davidson, Bbb23, Stevietheman, Scribolt, Unscintillating, Nick-D, Enterprisey, MB, Altamel, Dicklyon, Lankiveil, SkyWarrior, Ad Orientem, Marvellous Spider-Man, Trackinfo, First Light, SMcCandlish, Lemongirl942, Sjakkalle, RGloucester, HandsomeBoy, XXN, David Tornheim, J947, JimMillerJr, John Carter, LindsayH. -The Gnome (talk) 06:25, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Chrisvls, The Whispering Wind, Ivanvector, JzG, Neljack, Bkonrad, Kusma, Just Chilling, Sitush, Carrite, Patar knight, Barry Ne, Necrothesp, DIYeditor, Atlantic306, Insertcleverphrasehere, Egaoblai, Domdeparis, Ravenswing, Galobtter, Alanscottwalker, K.e.coffman, Nosebagbear, Legacypac, Blueboar, AngusWOOF, AReaderOutThataway, Federalist51, Vexations, Redrose64, Paulmcdonald, Milowent, Johnpacklambert, Acnetj, Eastmain. -The Gnome (talk) 06:26, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Survey

• No need - Both types of institution should be covered by WP:ORG. Blueboar (talk) 13:09, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
• No need every possible article which could ever be written is already covered by WP:42. If a SNG contravenes that principle, it is wrong, and if an SNG agrees with it, it is redundant. --Jayron32 04:55, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
• Remove distinction: they should just comply to WP:NORG. I'd also support removing the pesky exemption from CSD for schools that are patently non-notable. StraussInTheHouse (talk) 16:08, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
• Need: It is easier with some criteria that can be applied directly to avoid endless discussions about relevant articles that however gets a request for deletion or to avoid creating articles that are clearly not notable. Within sports there are criteria about which competitions or divisions give presumed notability to a player. For schools there are quite good criteria on Swedish Wikipedia (I know that each Wikipedia has its own rules.): sv:Wikipedia:Relevanskriterier#Skolor_och_andra_institutioner_för_lärande and sv:Wikipedia:Att_skriva_om_utbildning#Skolor_och_lärosäten. Hopefully Google translates them reasonable well, but here is a summary:

1. Universities etc: Presumed to be notable
2. Secondary schools: In some cases (old ..) presumed to be notable
3. Primary schools: not notable (should be in the article about the administrative unit to which they belong, as well as the not notable secondary schools)
4. School buildings: if built by some famous architect

The GNG is quite abstract, so there is need for concrete criteria. Per W (talk) 11:10, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

• No need, using NORG for both, per Blueboar/Jayron32. I will point out there have been past attempts to have school-specific notability guidelines, but these never gained consensus (per what Per W is describing). --Masem (t) 06:32, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Uncertain what to use for specific criteria, if any at all other than WP:GNG. I should however note that simply being verified to exist DOES NOT make any educational institution inherently notable enough to warrant a page. We shouldn't presume something is article-worthy just because it's a college/university/school. Perhaps WP:NSCHOOL could make a more explicit note of this. Snuggums (talk / edits) 06:36, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• I'm not sure if we do need a SNG for schools (I'm leaning towards yes), but I'd rather that we don't allow articles on every single secondary school. There has to be a cut-off somewhere. Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 06:40, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• Yes schools are not just ORGs they are a special kind of organization that attract articles. Everyone would like to see their high school and University on Wikipedia. Schools tend to produce notable graduates. They are important infrastructure like highways and town councils and they play an important role in building communities. Wikipedia does a public service by covering schools because it allows some verification that people are listing real schools on their resumes and not diploma mills. I believe every legitimate post sec degree granting school should have a page, while high schools and elementry schools should be covered within a page on their school district. If there is no school district (say an independant/private school) high schools should have pages and elementary schools not. I strongly favor a bright line rule like WP:GEOLAND rather than a fuzzy guideline that results in endless debates about the notability of this or that school, how reliable the sources are and so on. Why is school X notable while school Y across town in the same district is not? Sports and crime stories are going to decide notability if we have a fuzzy rule. Legacypac (talk) 06:41, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• "Everyone would like to see their high school and University on Wikipedia". While that may be true for most, I can recall cases at OTRS where teachers have contacted us asking for the article on their school to be deleted because it is a target for vandalism. Just the other day, I removed some highly derogatory content from Berachampa Deulia Uchcha Vidyalaya that had gone unnoticed for more than a year. This is partly why I think we should focus on quality over quantity with schools articles. Cordless Larry (talk) 08:09, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• I lean toward "no need" but am open to being convinced otherwise, mainly because of the years of dispute history involving this stuff. In the views of those who think we need special rules for schools, please explain a) why NORG isn't good enough, and b) why it can't just be fixed in NORG instead of in a probably pointless WP:POLICYFORK that we'd be likely to merge anyway. On the above detailed proposition, I don't agree with Per W's summary. No secondary schools are "presumed to be notable". If one is very old and has a richly detailed RS track record, it is notable because of the RS coverage – it is demonstrated not presumed to be notable. I don't think even universities should be presumed to be notable, since various things call themselves universities that are not one. If something with "College" or "University" or "Institute" in its name turns out to be notable it's because we verified the RS coverage of it and demonstrated it to be notable, not because we presumed it was notable. Mountain ranges and heads of state are presumptively notable because of what they are, of their scope in the grand scheme of things. I agree that primary schools are presumptively non-notable, i.e., that it's going to take really strong RS showing to demonstrate that one is. That said, NORG seems to already have all this covered.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  06:53, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
  • Comment: Assigning qualitative attributes to higher educational institutions must be the work of sources considered by Wikipedia to be reliable; it's certainly not within an editor's scope of authority since that would be their own, personal judgement. In case no such third-party, independent assessors of higher-education quality exist, we have to decide what to do, in view of what SMcCandlish rightly points out above ("various things call themselves universities that are not one"). -The Gnome (talk) 12:11, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

    Definitely not an idle concern. I ran into this right before the wikibreak I just returned from (a religious, borderline cult thing that got permission to build a "university" in one country or another, but which is really an indoctrination farm and money-suction device). There is some coverage of it (though probably based on press releases by the religious group and/or the govt. that approved their permits and stuff); an editor unaware of the organization's nature might easily be fooled into assuming it really was an instititution of higher learning. This is very similar to all the charter schools being run by for-profit companies, just with a religious instead of commercial focus.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  19:30, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

• Clarification:

1. Universities and colleges: Presumed to be notable
2. Secondary schools (including defunct institutions): Presumed to be notable
3. Primary schools: Some AfD's have been ridiculous and overzealous in squashing notability of some lower level schools that have achieved significant coverage. I am frequently astounded at the serial blindness of a certain class of editors who cannot see a long list of sources, obviously achieving the basics of WP:GNG. Instead they only see the hard gospel of a WP:SCHOOLOUTCOMES, with no room for reason.

Because we have that class of editor roaming the back pages of AfDs (looking to cause trouble), we cannot provide them any further ammunition for their arguments. No wiggle room, no further limitations they can misinterpret as an excuse to censor additional wikipedia content. I will note, on the many school articles I have tried to create or improve, I have not found the same consistent set of sources for school information that are available for other common subjects. Government lists are frequently years out of date and incomplete. Many sources are community generated and don't meet the standard of WP:RS. And the best sources for a specific school ultimately resolve back to WP:PRIMARY where your quality and consistency may vary. I know of probably a dozen or more large schools that have no articles and that have been that way for a decade. Why? The sources to create even the most cursory stub just aren't available to me or anyone else who looks. I've personally written to many schools suggesting they write their own article . . . make it a class project. Tell the world the story of your school and find the local sources to back it up. It has worked a few times, but most of the time it is ignored. With that inconsistency of sources, additional limitations to our criteria are not warranted or useful. Trackinfo (talk) 07:04, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Please see my comment just above yours. It's highly dubious that any of these things are presumed notable, certainly not below the university level and even that's iffy because not everything with that word in its name is a legit institution. PS: Deletion is not determined by a conspiratorial cabal of roaming troublemakers, but by general community consensus at AfD. If someone makes compelling arguments for deletion and no one can mount a compelling reason to keep then the article should in fact be deleted. You seem to be making an argument against Wikipedia operating the way Wikipedia operates.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:26, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

• No need A key problem with having different rules for different tiers of education is that the institutions within those tiers differ wildly. For instance, while US high schools seem to be huge, Australian ones tend to be relatively small (hence a major issue I have with editors who argue that high schools are automatically notable - maybe they are in the US, but not in Australia). The size of higher education institutions in Australia varies from about 73,000 students at Monash University to dozens at some private sector tertiary education providers, so obviously the same rules can't apply to all. WP:ORG does a good job, and there's no need to treat educational institutions in a special way. Nick-D (talk) 07:17, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Please close this before it becomes a huge mess like the last RfC on this issue some things are just best not talked about in a large RfC and are best found out through practice. Divisive issues where massive RfCs have consistently not reached any consensus are one of them. Also, NORG explicitly does not apply to schools as was part of the consensus adopting the new standards. TonyBallioni (talk) 08:38, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• No point. This is a battle that was lost over a decade ago, and the notion that secondary schools of whatever size or importance are exempt from any notability standards or sourcing requirements is about as set in concrete as any COMMONOUTCOME on Wikipedia. Waste of time and breath to hash it out yet again. Ravenswing 08:42, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• No. In actual fact, the criteria we usually use cover (a) primary and middle schools, and (b) secondary schools and tertiary institutions. We usually consider (b) to be notable and (a) not to be. -- Necrothesp (talk) 08:46, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

@Necrothesp: where are the criteria that are used? --Per W (talk) 12:41, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• No need - Both types of institution should be covered by WP:ORG. But it should be a good idea to get rid of SCHOOLOUTCOMES as it is too often misused as a policy to keep schools, even when horribly written and unsourced. The Banner talk 09:45, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• I agree with TonyBallioni, and I think the specific line he is referring to in WP:ORG is The scope of this guideline covers all groups of people organized together for a purpose with the exception of non-profit educational institutions ... (emphasis mine). Mz7 (talk) 12:34, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

The problem with that highlighted sentence is that the ORG guideline subsequently goes into some detail about schools... in fact it has an entire sub-section devoted to them... so (despite the highlighted sentence) it is obvious that schools ARE considered within the scope of the ORG guideline. I think that sentence will need to be removed, but that is for another discussion. Blueboar (talk) 17:05, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, point taken. Mz7 (talk) 03:39, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• No per Necrothesp's comments. Over six years ago I perused 100s of high school AfDs which I compiled in an essay and concluded that no matter what anyone ever says and how many RfCs and dramafest discussions we have, verifiable high school articles that aren't just a one-sentence piece of crap are almost ALWAYS kept. --Milowent • ^hasspoken 12:55, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Good survey! So a well-written article (with enough verifiable content) about a high school should be kept. Couldn't we then state somewhere that high schools are presumed to be notable? Then we can avoid lots of discussions. --Per W (talk) 14:39, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Note that the phrase "presumed to be notable" does not mean "is inherently notable". A presumption of notability simply means we should give a school article the benefit of the doubt... waiting to delete until we have done due diligence in searching for sources (per WP:BEFORE). Blueboar (talk) 17:05, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• It would be interesting to repeat that exercise now, Milowent. Just in the past 24 hours, we've had Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kishorchak Banamali High School closed as delete and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Shayama Prasad Shikshayatan High School as merge. Cordless Larry (talk) 09:21, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Cordless Larry: See, and that's exactly what I was talking about below, about schools in non-English speaking countries. We delete them because we don't have or can't read the foreign-language sources. But I can guarantee you such schools would have been kept if they were in Anglophone countries. In effect, if we insist on GNG for high schools we are institutionalizing WP:Systemic bias. --MelanieN (talk) 10:07, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

But if we can't read the sources, then I don't see what we can base articles on. I'm also not sure that the issue is about not being able to read the sources, because we have some regular school AfD participants who have the language skills necessary to read local sources, but rather that the sources often don't exist online, so we can't access them. Cordless Larry (talk) 10:10, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Cordless Larry: The only thing I've seen changing is that more articles are being created these days for high schools in far flung non-English speaking places without available online sourcing. Those have always candidates for deletion. When the "are high schools notable?!?" debate began 15 years ago with the VfD for Union County Magnet High Schools, editors were debating mainstream large American high schools. E.g., Jimbo Wales made the argument in November 2003 that Randolph School could have an article. No one would dream of sending something like that to AfD today. I screenshotted the article deleted via Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kishorchak Banamali High School, it was unsourced, there was no option but to delete. If someone wants to spend their time on wikipedia tracking down stubs to Indonesian and Indian high schools without sourcing, they will get them deleted.--Milowent • ^hasspoken 14:01, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Yes, true enough about Kishorchak Banamali High School, which was pretty much my argument there too, Milowent. Some editors will still argue for keep even in such circumstances, however - including admins, which worries me. Cordless Larry (talk) 14:39, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

• Keep the current understanding: institutions of higher learning (degree granting) and secondary schools (diploma granting) should be presumed to be notable, if there is confirmation of their existence and status. This practice 1) prevents endless arguments because high schools and colleges, like professional sports figures, virtually always turn out in a search to have enough coverage to qualify, and 2) helps to get around our inherent bias against non-English-speaking countries, since even though coverage likely exists, it can be hard to find in the non-English press. MelanieN (talk) 17:24, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• (@MelanieN:, where is the current understanding? --Per W (talk) 18:52, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• I sincerely doubt that the "current understanding" is that all high schools and above possess inherent notability. But I could be wrong. -The Gnome (talk) 19:57, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• Keep as is. Agree with MelanieN on all issues. In fact I'd like to take her comment above and frame it somewhere. Hobit (talk) 18:08, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• Different set (NOT NORG) - Secondary schools and definitely accredited universities should be presumed notable status. Classifying them in with WP:NORG is wildly OTT and also sets them a higher level of standards to meet when the circumstances for those stricter requirements is less likely to occur. I haven't marked this as "Keep" like MelanieN since there is such disagreement as well as partial rollback from this position that "Keep" is itself a level of dispute. Nosebagbear (talk) 18:21, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
• No – GNG suffices. Nothing should be 'presumed' notable. If it doesn't meet GNG, it doesn't belong on Wikipedia. RGloucester — ☎ 03:33, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

On the contrary, there are many traditional and accepted special guidelines at enwiki that define notability in ways other than GNG - for example, WP:NACADEMICS. This is not a new or startling concept, it is long-established practice; see WP:SNG. There are many special guidelines for specific categories of article that "presume notability" if certain criteria are met - for example, playing a professional sport at the highest level. The rationale behind this presumption is that such people will virtually always be found to have received coverage that meets GNG, so let's just accept that and not get into thousands of individual arguments about it. The nutshell at WP:NSPORTS spells it out very clearly: "An athlete is presumed to be notable if the person has actively participated in a major amateur or professional competition or won a significant honor, as listed on this page, and so is likely to have received significant coverage in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject." That is also the rationale behind presuming notability for high schools and colleges. --MelanieN (talk) 09:59, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Did you ever consider that perhaps I do not agree with the way such guidelines are used? I'm being asked this question in the context of schools, and in the context of schools, I do not believe anything other than GNG is required. We can discuss sport when someone opens an RfC on that subject. If a school does not meet GNG, it does not need a Wikipedia article. Wikipedia is not a directory. In any case, like others here, I would also be satisfied by bringing schools formally under WP:ORG, if that's preferable. RGloucester — ☎ 15:30, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Um... folks... Schools already ARE covered formally under WP:ORG... See WP:NSCHOOLS. Blueboar (talk) 16:04, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

It seems somewhat ambiguous at the moment, given the "exception of non-profit educational institutions" caveat in the lead. What I meant is that I'd be fine with clarifying WP:ORG to the effect above. RGloucester — ☎ 16:21, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

For the sports-specific notability guideline in particular, it does not define notability in a way other than the general notability guideline. It provides guidance on when it is highly likely that the general notability guideline can be met with a sufficient search for suitable sources. It was discussed last year in this venue, and the closing statement once again affirmed this in the context of WP:NSPORTS (as has been discussed many times since, the closing statement overstepped in its broader conclusions for all subject-specific notability guidelines). isaacl (talk) 17:13, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

That's correct, and also applies to virtually all other SNG (subject-specific notability guidelines). There are a handful of divergent ones, like WP:NACADEMIC, and the level of consensus they enjoy is disputed. For the record, I think we need them in some cases when facts about the real world make it otherwise more difficult to have the articles we need – e.g. the fact that mega-influential scientists in their field often get no mainstream news coverage of any kind, just get cited thousands of times by other researchers. But it's a rare divergence from GNG. It will take a lot of community input to figure out whether such a variance should apply to a topic, and will require a community consensus that something is quite different about that topic. We've been over schools so many times I don't think consensus is likely to change in favor of doing so. They aren't different in any salient way from other organizations, other than they inspire some Wikipedians to consider them "important". (Anyone new-ish around here: see WP:Notability/Historical and WP:ITSIMPORTANT for how "include it because it's important" has been received by the community for the last decade and a half.)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  12:56, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

• Yes: Need separate standards to facilitate discussion and consensus - Many of the comments above don't answer the question being posed, namely, whether there should be separate standards for high schools and post-secondary institutions. I think there should because it will facilitate a more focused discussion. Even for those think that WP:NOTABILITY, WP:ORG and other guidelines adequately cover the field, should recognize that others disagree and have reasons for that disagreement. Those reasons (and the objections to them) are, I think, different for high schools and universities, and it would be helpful to discuss them separately, acknowledging (at least) the possibility of different guidelines for each. My (admittedly brief) involvement and review of past attempts to reach consensus makes it clear that the differences make discussing any particular proposal more difficult.Federalist51 (talk) 21:36, 14 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment There may be some validity to "schools being an important part of the infastructure". However living in Detroit, Michigan I live in a place where there have been several fly-by-night charter high schools, so I am less convinced than some that all schools that are at the high school level are notable. I also have seen way too many articles that have only been sourced to show a place exists survive on the theory better sources could be found, while no one even tries to find such sources. We need much clearer policies.John Pack Lambert (talk) 05:22, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

  Agreed on both points. We have no policy or guideline suggesting that schools of any kind are presumptive notable, and a clear guideline (WP:NORG#Schools) stating the opposite, yet some AfD respondents persist in trying to presume their notability.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  12:56, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

• No need for yet more bureaucracy and instruction creep and oppose the desire and intent to override clear consensus at AFD by shovelling on more and more red tape Atlantic306 (talk) 17:30, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

  If, instead of vagueness, some kind of "clear consensus" exists either way, it would be most helpful for the conduct of AfD participants, as well as for this RfC's progress, to have hard, arithmetical data. -The Gnome (talk) 12:01, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Of what? There's no doubt that we have a clear consensus; it's codified at WP:NORG#Schools. This is rehash is just another thing that needs to be listed at WP:PERENNIAL.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  19:36, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Atlantic306 claims that there is "clear consensus at AfD" (emphasis added], but this is previcely the root of the problem. Although WP:NSCHOOLS seems adequately clear (it's not entirely clear, since it asks for A or B or A&B), the recent historical record in AfDs shows that decisions can go, actually, every which way depending on who takes part in each discussion, what is the subject's nationality, etc. And this is how and why the quest for clarity started. The background is in the links in the Relevant Threads section above. It all has come down to whether or not the criteria should be the same for both high schools and colleges of any kind. And here we are. -The Gnome (talk) 13:59, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

General discussion

• FYI, pings don't go above the count of 50. I'd guess the above ping-o-mat didn't get every one (I wasn't hit). --Izno (talk) 13:53, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Greetings, Izno. I'd appreciate any help from anyone in fixing this. I should note here that these were not pings per se but mere full-style usernames. Perhaps that helps. Thanks in advance. -The Gnome (talk) 14:02, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Linking to userpage is a ping, the above did not go through because the count is above 50. Instead of trying to fix that I would advise to just remove the section, it's unnecessary. –Ammarpad (talk) 14:27, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Would it work to break the list into smaller groups of pings? Blueboar (talk) 15:08, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Yes, but even then not in one edit. Each smaller group if they'll add up beyond 50 in one edit, it won't work. My rough count shows there's around 120 editors above; so you can ping batch of 40 in 3 separate edits. –Ammarpad (talk) 15:25, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, all. I'll get to it. Take care. -The Gnome (talk) 07:03, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Sad to say, that probably didn't work. Each edit has to be signed - see WP:PING Note that the post containing a link to a user page must be signed; if the mention is not on a completely new line with a new signature, no notification will be sent. (Multiple mentions on the same new line with new sig are fine.) 92.19.25.230 (talk) 22:05, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you, 92.19.25.230. I did the multiple, signed edits. Take care. -The Gnome (talk) 06:28, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Ammarpad, IMVHO the issue is quite important and participants in past discussions on it should be informed of this RfC's opening. Take care. -The Gnome (talk) 07:11, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

The Gnome's ping worked that time 8 mins ago. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 06:33, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the confirmation, Graeme Bartlett. -The Gnome (talk) 10:27, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't know if all the pings worked (I was notified) I just think you should have called it pingamajig. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 10:33, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Noted for next time, Ivanvector! -The Gnome (talk) 13:13, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

• An obvious thing, maybe, but if language is changed, we need grandfathering of existing school articles , giving them say, 2-3 years of time before they are treated under NORG/GNG under this potential change. --Masem (t) 17:13, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Indeed, 24 months is probably the way to go. My heart bleeds at the thought of having a deluge re-enter AfD. Nosebagbear (talk)

• What is the driver in this discussion? What is the problem if a few less notable schools are included - are the servers running out of space? Policies and uniformity should support and enhance the information in the encyclopaedia, not reduce it. As a final aside; when I see the acres of text devoted to arguing fine (if not irrelevant) points I do wonder if the time could not have been better spent working on articles. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 08:31, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Greetings, Martin of Sheffield. Wikipedia's policies and guidelines are evidently not driven by web space availability; otherwise, we would have significantly fewer rules and guidelines. The "driver" of this discussion is quite clear, as one could see by diving into past discussions on the issue, linked above. Take care. -The Gnome (talk) 09:44, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

You haven't explained why you feel the need to remove information though. It reads as if you are just trying to establish rules because you believe there need to be rules. Quoting conflicting policies as if they were reasons appears on the surface to indicate a bureaucratic rather than encyclopaedic approach. I would suggest that a better approach is only to disallow that which harms the encyclopaedia, and I have yet to be convinced that a few lines about an otherwise obscure school (which will of course be notable to many thousands of present and former pupils, parents and teachers) harms the encyclopaedia. Verifiability is important as a safeguard of our credibility but notability is a subjective assessment. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 10:02, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Greetings, Martin of Sheffield. I did not express any kind of "need to remove information." Where do you get that? (If what you say comes from a hard inclusionist perspective I will not entertain it much, thank you. It simply does not pay to argue with editors who insist that all information has a place in Wikipedia, e.g. "Come on, some stub article about a non-notable subject does not harm the encyclopaedia".) But, more importantly, if the policies are indeed "conflicting", as you say, isn't this a reason to resolve the conflicts and get clarity? -The Gnome (talk) 05:51, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

• This is a perennial subject of discussion, and has been for a decade or more. Looking at the list above I see that it has been discussed at least three times in the last year, and this is a fourth. In one of those discussions, namely this one, the closers decided that even though the opinions for-and-against NSCHOOLOUTCOMES were about equally balanced numerically, the conclusion was to overturn that longstanding practice. Then people seized on that one (out of dozens) discussion and its barely-supported* conclusion to change the wording at various guidelines to say that, hey, secondary schools aren't presumed notable after all. Looking at the discussion here, I see that opinion is still about evenly balanced, and that many/most of us were not even aware that the longstanding guideline had been overturned on the basis of one RfC. This is immensely frustrating. How are those of us who care about this supposed to keep up? If I wouldn't have known about this discussion, either, except for the ping-o-mat kindly sent out above (thank you, The Gnome). --MelanieN (talk) 10:33, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

*Quoting from the closure: "Based on the discussion, we find that the community is leaning towards rejecting the statement posed in the RFC, but this stops short of a rough consensus. Whether or not the community has actually formed a consensus to reject the statement posed in the RFC is a distinction without a difference." --MelanieN (talk) 10:45, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Partial blocks and bans

Moved to Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab)

 – More appropriate there, per user suggestion

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Funplussmart (talk • contribs) 20:27, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

Small logos and svg

Sorry to bring this up again, but I never got a good answer the many times I asked:

We upload a logo. It is too big. We reduce it to something like 200x200 so nobody can use it commercially. Then someone tags it for conversion to svg. That format allows it to be any size, high quality, highly reproducible.

Is there a link to the discussion that makes sense of this? Thanks. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 11:45, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't think anything has changed since you asked this question in 2015 at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 119#Non-free image resolution.

A summary, for those seeing this for the first time: Non-free SVGs have long been a point of contention, and I'm not aware of any past conversations that have reached a firm consensus. Some past discussions include:

• Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab)/Archive 12#Disallow non-free SVGs
• Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 123#RfC: SVG as appropriate format for non-free files?
• Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 119#Non-free image resolution

There are generally three factions in such discussions:

1. Non-free vector images are ok as long as they don't contain detail that isn't needed to render at appropriate sizes.
2. Non-free vector images are never ok because simple shapes (such as circles) can be rendered at arbitrary sizes without pixelization artifacts.
3. Non-free vector images are only ok if they were created by the copyright/trademark holder, even if the editor-created SVG generates an image indistinguishable from the official logo when rendered at appropriate sizes.

I subscribe to the first view, and IMO that's the view that mostly has consensus. HTH, although I suspect it doesn't help all that much. Anomie⚔ 14:00, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

The way NFC had treated these is that the only allowable SVG that are non-free are logos in SVG or equivalent form (like EPS) publicly made available by the company/entity that would have appropriate ownership of that label (for example, a parent company with a subsidiary's logo). The rationale for this is that normally non-frees must be of small resolution, so SVG is already an incompatible format with that. But if a entity publishes its logo in an SVG format, we have allowed that to be uploaded and used as logos. We do not allow any other recreations of non-free logos into SVG from a non-SVG format, so anyone asking for a conversion of a logo to SVG should be immediately denied due to this. Recreations can introduce elements that were not a part of the original logo or mis-represent the logo, and that's a problem. (That's why it's okay with those logos that fail to pass the threshold of originality and fall into uncopyrightable, because their reproduction should not introduce any misrepresentation). --Masem (t) 14:40, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I was trying to head off another round of everyone just repeating what they always say... Sigh. Anomie⚔ 03:32, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Masem's summary of the NFC take (assuming it's accurate :-) is actually helpful for anyone not already mired in that discussion.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:54, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

As far as I know Masem's view is just another view, which I had already summarized as #3. As for an "NFC take", the only thing I see on WP:NFC is concern about taking a vectorized logo from a third-party site because that might be subject to two copyrights (on the image itself and on the SVG "code"). It says nothing about editor-created vector images with any potential "code" copyright explicitly released as PD or licensed under a free license (which, technically, may be freer, like a freely-licensed photo of a copyrighted sculpture versus a non-free photo by the sculptor), and says nothing about any concern over recreations "introduc[ing] elements". Anomie⚔ 13:50, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Didn't follow the whole thing, and I don't particularly care how it's resolved, but how about non-free SVGs are converted to low-res PNGs? Much like a lot of free PNGs are converted to SVGs? Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 14:36, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

FREER (which you mentioned) is meant to capture what I've described. The only thing it really doesn't say is about that this use of SVG should only be for logos, no other non-free SVG is allowed. --Masem (t) 15:56, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Thank you all for the comments. I know I've been a bit slow to understand this. Actually, I still do not. Perhaps an individual case will help me. What about this image: File:UofTsystem seal.svg

Thanks, and thanks for your patience with me. I'm really struggling to understand. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 21:56, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Anyone? If I uploaded a png of File:UofTsystem seal.svg that was 400x400, it would be fuzzy and unusable commercially, and it would be tagged for reduction to 200x200. So, is pretty darn sharp File:UofTsystem seal.svg, not only allowed, but someone spent time replacing the old fuzzy with that one. None of this makes sense to me. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:17, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Oh, and what's the point of svg? To save server load? Well, we have tons of photos in articles. What's a 200x200 photo to a server? And this conversion takes time for users to do. Plus, they are commercially usable. We waited years for a freebie of Kim Jong Un because of non-free rules. Now we have zillions of high res svgs. And this has been going on for years without getting sorted out.

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:19, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

It has nothing to do with file space, but by non-free policy. SVGs are scalable vector graphics, meaning they could have infinite resolution. We can force a resolution by converting it to a PNG or other image format of a specific size, but we cannot convert a PNG back to a SVG as that conversion is lossy in that fashion, outside of actually recreating the SVG from drawing over the PNG, but that's a step we do not allow.. We do not want editors using non-free SVG in general due to the infinite scaling factor, but we have exceptional cases for logos of an entity provided by that entity. --Masem (t) 07:01, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Hi Masem. I think I understand. So, the only svgs we have are ones provided by the organizations? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 20:59, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

According to Masem. As far as I know there has never actually been consensus on that. Anomie⚔ 21:54, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

"Resolution" of an SVG makes about as much sense as asking about the pixel size of an audio file or a text excerpt. Anomie⚔ 21:54, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

For audio files we also look at things like encoding quality (and why we use both an open source encoder and require that be set at very lossy settings for non-free files). The resolution of SVGs is infinite, which is a problem for when we seek low resolution non-free. --Masem (t) 05:43, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

You appear to have completely missed the point. Anomie⚔ 12:26, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

Where the graphic being represented can be defined entirely mathmatically, agreed the concept of resolution is irrelevant. In cases where the underlying graphic was, say, hand-drawn and then traced to create the SVG, there can be a resolution beyond which the SVG will no longer accurately represent the original. isaacl (talk) 23:06, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

Baidu Baike is NOT a Reliable Source

I am a Chinese Wikipedian and I find that in English Wikipedia there are a number of articles about Chinese people and firms citing Baidu Baike as reference. Though many about China can be found on Baidu Baike, which is much "larger" than Wikipedia considering NUMBERS of items included, in fact, Baidu Baike itself are thought to be unreliable in China so that in Chinese Wikipedia it hasn't and will never appear in reference lists. Citing Baidu Baike is no better than citing Wikipedia.

I suggest not using Baidu Baike as a reference anymore. GnolizX (talk) 05:04, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

@GnolizX: Welcome to the English Wikipedia. From my understanding, Baidu Baike is a user generated source, which our reliable sourcing guidelines already recommend not using. That said, the English Wikipedia is too large for anyone to properly monitor, so new users do sometimes add it without knowing about our reliable sourcing guidelines. Ian.thomson (talk) 05:11, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Then what to do with those articles having already cited Baidu Baike? Will there ever be a robot that can automatically remove the Refs? Just search "百度百科" and we'll get lots of articles with this problem. This is much more terrible because these pages may later be translated to other languages. GnolizX (talk) 05:29, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

If there is a consensus that they are all without exception damaging and useless, you could ask addition to the MediaWiki:Spam-blacklist. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 07:11, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

But exception exists, for example, Baidu Baike is cited in Baidu Baike to explain its policy. GnolizX (talk) 08:36, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Exceptions can be made for specific addresses. Citing Baidu on its own article about its own policy would be an acceptable use and would qualify for an exception. Only in death does duty end (talk) 19:15, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

There are currently 2928 pages on English Wikipedia linked http://baike.baidu.com pages and also 643 pages linked https://baike.baidu.com pages according to Special:LinkSearch although a few of them are user pages or talk pages, or as an intermediate source for fair use images source. Someone probably need to check all 3500 of them and remove most of them. Amazingly someone linked it as source on reference desk. C933103 (talk) 07:38, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Yeah what an amazing number.... So the next step is, that all the 3500+ pages need to be checked... by human beings??? GnolizX (talk) 08:18, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

The number is closer to 1900 in mainspace. You can make a WP:Bot request to remove uses. I think there is at least one bot that will do it.

There are at least 600 other pages which reference baidu.com also which may not be appropriate, as from my review of Baidu the company does not much reliable to say--but that would definitely need human review. I would support blacklisting the domain given the quantity. --Izno (talk) 16:59, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

The links should not just be removed, but instead replaced by other references to support the statements in the articles. If the statement is untrue, then it should be removed along with the bad reference. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 23:29, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

When I have done this previously for what was a patently unreliable source, I simply replaced the offending ref with {{cn}}. --Izno (talk) 23:44, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

We have a page somewhere for listing unreliable sources that are also popular magazines and websites. I think it's also used for generating blacklist entries.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:23, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Part of the problem is it can be difficult to know what exactly is being supported by this unreliable source - for example in Second Sino-Japanese War it is one of nine! references supporting the fact that the Republican Chinese employed suicide tactics against the Japanses - it takes someone who can look at the sources, most in Chinese, to see what can be kept and what removed.Nigel Ish (talk) 22:40, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Baidu Baike is a phenomenally lousy source and should never be allowed here. It is a wiki and where the content there is sourced, the sources are often rubbish. Maybe blacklisting it should be considered.

Can we have a bot replace <ref>https://baike.baidu.com/item/cat</ref> with {{cn}} or some other solution? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 22:03, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

• I'm totally for blacklisting and throwing out a bot to replace citations with CN tags but don't those discussions usually happen at WP:RSN? Ian.thomson (talk) 22:16, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Hi Ian.thomson. I suppose so. What should we do? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:17, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

• For other baidu URL, hi.baidu.com is a IM tool with blog which is usually not a reliable source, post.baidu.com and tieba.baidu.com is an online forum which are also not a reliable source, baijiahao.baidu.com is a self-publishing platformwhich is mostly not a reliable source (note that it might also be used by some organization/etc.), and wenku.baidu.com is a document sharing platform (source might be reliable if the citation format is changed to cite a proper URL) C933103 (talk) 08:16, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

I started a post here at RSN. I suggest we hat this to prevent the discussion from taking place in two places at once. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 21:09, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

"Increase" and "Decrease" in rank.

As discussed in Template talk:Infobox website#AlexaRank, currently some Wikipedia use "decrease" to indicate improvement in rank. For instance, If a website was previously ranked #10 in certain ranking, and it now become the #1 site in the world, then editors would put a symbol next to the rank to indicate its ranking have been "decreased" from #10 to #1. However to me it seems like the interpretation doesn't make sense, as the ranking of the website was actually increased from the #10 to #1. Wouldn't it be better to use the symbol to show the website gained places in ranking? C933103 (talk) 07:26, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Why not simply use “rise” and “fall”? Blueboar (talk) 12:27, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

The OP is saying that it's counter-intuitive to indicate an improvement with a "down" arrow. I would tend to agree. Not sure whether this qualifies as forum shopping, maybe a discussion notice here would have been better? ―Mandruss ☎ 13:12, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Strongly concur with C933103 and Mandruss. Furthermore, this is against MOS:ICONS. We never use icons in ways that can be misleading to readers.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  14:20, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Yeah it would probably be better to link the discussion back from the original talk page so that the discussion would be linked to anyone who are interested. The lack of people to discuss the matter (as well as actually talking about what can be done) on the template talk page was the reason for me to start this section to talk about this issue here. C933103 (talk) 16:35, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

"High rank" means a small number, and "top rank" means the first in rank. --NaBUru38 (talk) 20:31, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

Transcluding article content into other articles

At Joseph Gordon-Levitt part of the Hitrecord section is transcluded from another article. Something similar happens at Transgender#Scientific studies of transsexuality. I had never come across this before in article space. There is a help page Wikipedia:Transclusion, which mentions the Gordon-Levitt article as an example. There are also templates Template:Transcluded section (links 735 articles [4])and Template:Transcluding article (links 11 articles [5]) so it is used somewhat. Zinc is a featured article and uses it for the common cold section. It seems odd and while I would enjoy using it to keep consistency in articles from areas I edit I think it could have some drawbacks. It makes the assumption that the content should always exactly match the transcluded article and makes editing the target sections difficult. It also means that changes made to another article would affect an article you watchlist without notifying you. There may be others too. I am curious as to whether there are any guidelines or policies to using this technique or if it is just used so little that most editors are, like me until now, unaware that it was viable. AIRcorn (talk) 09:01, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Transclusion is heavily used in entertainment-related articles. For an example see MOS:TVOVERVIEW in the guidelines for writing about television programs: If a separate List of episodes article exists, the series overview table should be presented at the top of that article below the lead, in a section labeled "Series overview", then transcluded to the episodes section at the main article. This sometimes leads to problems with references, if named references are used but the full reference is not in the transcluded section. StarryGrandma (talk) 20:48, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

In general I don't think it is a good idea due to the problems mentioned above, and the confusion it causes to editors. However I don't think we need a policy to support or preclude it. Using templates transcluded into the two articles seems better than transcluding one into the other. This will prevent edits on one article trashing the other. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 23:33, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the replies StarryGrandma and Graeme Bartlett. Sorry it took so long for me to get back to this. I am assuming this is a case-by-case situation at the moment. I may look at editing or discussing options at Wikipedia:Transclusion as I feel it needs something a bit more concrete about when and how to use it. The Gordon-Levitt example in particular looks like a very poor use and when combined with the strange passive ownership hidden text it is probably detrimental to improving the article. I also find the TV overview use a bit strange. I could understand transcluding for rapidly changing information that needs to be presented on multiple pages, but at best you are looking at one update a year for most TV shows. Anyway it is good to know there isn't much in the way of existing policy that needs to be negotiated first in this area.. AIRcorn (talk) 21:44, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

RFC: Should BAG members have an activity requirement?

Please comment at the RFC. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:45, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

MILHIST guidance pages

A discussion is currently underway at Wikiproject Military History concerning guideline status of the MILHIST Content guide and Notability guide. –dlthewave ☎ 21:43, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

Single use templates

There is a discussion over at WT:Template namespace § Single use template that would probably benefit from broader input. Anyone here is welcome to contribute or advertise it more broadly. Or you can ping me and let me know where else I should put a notice. Thanks, and happy editing. YBG (talk) 23:05, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposal/RfC: Should we allow WP:PROD in the draftspace?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

After what is turning out to be an unsuccessful proposal at Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Proposal/RfC - Extend WP:U5 to the draftspace, I have come up with something new. I reckon that we should allow proposed deletions in the draftspace. This will ensure that things like WP:NOTESSAY, WP:NOTWEBHOST and WP:NOTHOWTO trash can be PRODed instead of having to go into WP:MfD. Also, WP:PROD has a seven-day wait most of the time before the page is deleted so it can mean that things can be deleted after seven days with proposed deletions in the draftspace without having to go to WP:MfD for basic things like WP:NOTESSAY, WP:NOTWEBHOST and WP:NOTHOWTO which have no chance and obviously will get deleted. Pkbwcgs (talk) 16:23, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

• Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't we have that discussion already fairly recently? Regards SoWhy 16:58, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @SoWhy: I don't think we had that discussion recently. Pkbwcgs (talk) 17:18, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
  • I'm certain we have. I've been trying to find it since this was posted, though, and "draft" and "proposed" and "deletion" and even "prod" are all so commonly mentioned on VP in unrelated contexts that it's effectively impossible to search for. There's this, but I don't think it's what I'm remembering. —Cryptic 17:36, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - Nobody watches drafts aside from the page creator in the vast majority of cases, so if they're inactive in those 7 days, this is basically just an easy all-purpose deletion timer. There's already an issue with our existing policies and guidelines being pushed too far and blatantly misapplied. PROD has even less oversight than CSD or MfD, because in CSD an admin is responsible to make sure it qualifies; PROD is just a countdown. The fact remains that almost nobody will ever see a page in draftspace, so there's little urgency to delete edge cases (those which aren't obviously problematic enough to qualify for existing CSD). As I said in my opposition to the other proposal, the benefit to deleting drafts that aren't obvious candidates for CSD is minimal (which isn't to say non-existent), but far, far less benefit than deletion of a problematic mainspace page. On the other hand, the potential damage to new user experience is the same. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 17:03, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @Rhododendrites: I am talking about drafts which are spam and other quick-fail criteria like WP:NOTESSAY, WP:VANDALISM, WP:NOTWEBHOST and WP:NOTHOWTO which have no chance ever. PROD does not apply to drafts that are not quick-fail. Pkbwcgs (talk) 17:18, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Rhododendrites, especially on the point of user experience. Also would like to add that no draft that is not accepted at AfC has any chance ever, as they all get cleaned out after 6 months by G13 anyways. I don't understand the need to proliferate redundant deletion mechanisms. A2soup (talk) 18:29, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Rhododendrites and A2soup. WP:NOTESSAY and WP:NOTHOWTO are subjective and not everything that could be deleted that way should be - they could be fixed, or moved to user, help or project space (depending on subject). The problems with using WP:NOTWEBHOST as a deletion criterion have been explained to you at length in the CSD proposal and you've seemingly either not listened or not understood. Vandalism can and should be speedily deleted under criterion G3 and spam can and should be deleted under criterion G11 - as repeatedly explained in your previous proposal. One of the major failings of that proposal was a lack of demonstrated need, and you've not even attempted to demonstrate the need for this one either. Thryduulf (talk) 18:32, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
  • We need this so that instead of taking drafts that can be obviously deleted to WP:MfD and flooding it, a PROD tag can be applied and it can be deleted after seven days. We are talking proposed deletion which isn't speedy deletion. The seven days also give time to the creator to address the problems of the draft and if the creator wants to improve it, the PROD tag can be removed. Pkbwcgs (talk) 18:58, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
    • Say, for example, that you have a draft that is clearly WP:NOTESSAY but not covered by existing CSD criteria. Either the creator is interested in keeping the draft or the creator is not interested in keeping the draft. If the creator is interested in keeping the draft, they will remove your PROD tag and MfD will be necessary if you wish to seek deletion (personally I think we should let such drafts stick around, but that's a different question). If the creator is not interested in keeping the draft, it will be deleted per G13 in 6 months anyways. The only function of your proposal is to accelerate the G13 timeline. This is 100% redundant and therefore WP:CREEP, and also the RfC that created G13 clearly showed no consensus for a shorter timeline. A2soup (talk) 19:10, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
      • G13 is for any draft that has not been edited for six months or more. This is not how PROD will work so it is not redundant and PROD can be declined by any admin if there is no valid reason for deletion. Just because a draft is declined, it doesn't mean that a PROD tag should be added. This is not how this proposal works. For example, if you see a homework assignment in the draftspace, then a PROD tag can be added instead of taking it to MfD and it should be deleted that way. Pkbwcgs (talk) 19:18, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per my more eloquent colleagues. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 19:01, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. This would serve no purpose whatsoever. A draft that is not defamatory, a copyvio, or otherwise a speedy case, can sit in draftspace forever, provided it is worked on from time to time. The reason for this is that it is possible that it might eventually be improved enough to merit being an article. The rule allowing for deletion of abandoned drafts already works with respect for those that are not improved. bd2412 T 19:32, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @BD2412: So, even a WP:NOTESSAY or WP:NOTHOWTO or WP:NOTWEBHOST violations "might eventually be improved enough to merit being an article"? Pkbwcgs (talk) 19:44, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
    • Looks like the fourth or fifth failed proposal. Hopeless at creating proposals. Pkbwcgs (talk) 19:47, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
      • If the subject matter is not a speedy case, than any of those situations might resolve into encyclopedic coverage of a subject. bd2412 T 19:57, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
      • Keep in mind "creating proposals" is not an end in itself. Your value to the encyclopedia comes from your work to improve it, not your work to modify its policies. I think you will find working to improve the encyclopedia a more fulfilling and rewarding pursuit. A2soup (talk) 20:03, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment I've in the past supported DraftPROD, but someone else made the point that a DraftPROD would get even less oversight, i.e. traffic, than mainspace PRODs. The underlying problem here is the sheer amount of garbage in draftspace, the overfilling of MfD with junk drafts, and the problems existing with the G13 criterion. For that reason I would be against a DraftPROD, per se, but would support Draft-specific CSD. PrussianOwl (talk) 21:26, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @PrussianOwl: I'm not convinced that MfD is being overfilled - almost all of what was there from draftspace was either not uncontroversially supported for deletion or being deleted for subjective reasons, both of which are incompatible with any form of CSD. Indeed in all the recent discussions nobody has even attempted an objective definition of "junk" or explained why waiting for G13 is actually problematic. Thryduulf (talk) 22:00, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
    • "Junk" is basically the useless stuff that lies in the draftspace like WP:NOTESSAY and WP:NOTWEBHOST stuff that is a waste of time for AfC reviewers to have to go through and has no chance of improvement. This also applies to homework assignments which I have seen quite a few of in the last couple of days. It's the stuff which floods pending AfC drafts everyday which is literally a waste of time to go through and the worst thing is that it is even more of a waste of time for those useless drafts (or "junk") to be re-submitted again and again. I will still keep the RfC open for the new draft-specific CSD but this is another idea if the other doesn't succeed. However, by the looks of it, both won't succeed. A AfC reviewer can spend time better look into a draft which looks promising and the creator is willing to spend rather than "junk". Pkbwcgs (talk) 22:31, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
      • That's a definition of junk but it doesn't even approach being an objective one. NOTESSAY and NOTWEBHOST are subjective guidelines, "useless stuff", "waste of time", "no chance of improvement" are all inherently subjective on their own let alone when sat on top of oneanother. Homework assignments come in many, many different forms some blindingly obviously not encyclopaedia material but some that could easily become so, meaning it's not a useful criterion for this. Thryduulf (talk) 01:12, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support as a step in the right direction. What we need is for deletion in draftspace to operate using meaningful criteria rather than the delete-everything-after-six-months logic. – Uanfala (talk) 01:21, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose another deletionist proposal. It's the thin end of the wedge for those who want to delete the entire wiki! OK, that was silly, but generally speaking there is no benefit to moving further in the deletionist direction. Jack N. Stock (talk) 01:31, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose Draft space is a safe place to incubate drafts - I don't have any problems in theory with expanding the type of things which can be speedy deleted in draft space, but PROD for any draft article would invite disaster IMO. SportingFlyer talk 01:48, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @SportingFlyer: Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Proposal/RfC - Extend WP:U5 to the draftspace is still an option. This proposal is to expand PROD onto the draftspace; the other one is to expand quick-fail criteria which has no chance of going to the mainspace to be speedy deleted (WP:NOTWEBHOST sort of stuff). Pkbwcgs (talk) 08:45, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - the draft is supposed to be a building space - so of course articles frequently won't be appropriate. Additionally, since it's not an article usually the only watchlisted editor is the creator. What if they don't log-in for a week? Not to mention how overwhelmed a DraftPROD would be - the drafts would never get a fair glance at. Nosebagbear (talk) 10:46, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose yet more beauracracy, no need for quick removals from draftspace where they are supposed to be given more time for development and the poor content is out of view of most of the public Atlantic306 (talk) 17:36, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose for basically the same reasons I opposed the U5 extension. If G10, G11, or G12 doesn't apply, then there's absolutely no reason not to leave stuff in draftspace until the G13 clock eventually rolls around. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 20:27, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose G13s and Speedy deletes at MFD seem to work just as well. JC7V (talk) 20:30, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose Drafts do not get the same watchers as articles, so it would mostly be a death sentence for negligent writers. MFD at least gets a central discussion. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 09:38, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Comment MfD is not overrun NOT for lack of junk to MfD but for lack of dedicated volunteers willing to clean up the vast piles of junk. See Wikipedia:WikiProject_Abandoned_Drafts/Stale_drafts for a huge list of spam, webhost, attack pages etc, and even a few good topics. Legacypac (talk) 20:55, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
  • None of which is evidence that PROD for draft space or expanding speedy deletion to a subjective subset are anything like good ideas. Thryduulf (talk) 22:35, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @Legacypac: I think a better proposal to help deal with that particular backlog would be to expand G13 (delete after six months with no edits) to pages with {{Userspace draft}}, which is a much more reasonable proposal than expanding PROD. The technical deletion of userspace pages for inactivity is a bit more controversial than deleting draftspace pages, but since there's a dedicated group going through stale userspace drafts looking for anything worth salvaging, it might be a bit more palatable. Perhaps offer a {{do not delete}} tag that could be placed by any editor interested in retaining it for whatever reason? Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 23:35, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose as per everyone above - The current process(es) works fine IMHO. –Davey2010^Talk 23:22, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose there is no need for this and it will cause many, many, many, many more problems than it will solve. Jacona (talk) 02:37, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

We don't need to be using PRODs in draftspace.

• Oppose per the above. If a draft is WP:NOTESSAY, WP:NOTHOWTO, etc. and is submitted for review, we decline it, not delete it. I think that's kind of the point of draftspace. ^Semi_Hypercube ✎ 02:48, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Discussion of cross-referencing COMMONNAME and MOS

FYI

 – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see: Wikipedia talk:Article titles#Clarifying that UCRN is not a style policy

Purpose: A proposal, which would not substantively change any policy in any way, to add a cross reference from WP:Article titles (AT) to WP:Manual of Style (MoS), specifically in WP:Article titles#Use commonly recognizable names (UCRN a.k.a. COMMONNAME). AT and the naming convention pages have numerous cross-references to MoS, but one is not present in this section, despite WP:Requested moves (RM) discussions most often being about style matters and determined by MoS (unless the base name is more seriously wrong for WP:CRITERIA policy reasons). Lack of such a cross-reference has led to a great deal of avoidable confusion and repetitive conflict.

Rationale summary: The purpose of the cross-reference is to help new editors understand our policies and guidelines relating to stylistic questions as they apply to article titles. Many editors incorrectly cite UCRN for matters not covered there but at MoS, and even do strange things like argue that MoS can't apply to titles, or that it's in conflict with AT, when of course we apply MoS to titles every single day, and parts of it are specifically about them. RM is the most frequent use of many MoS guidelines, including virtually everything in MOS:TM (trademarks). Our naming conventions guidelines that deal with style (WP:NCCAPS, etc.) are derived from and summarize the corresponding MoS guidelines. The only reason for any perceived rules conflict is lack of a cross-reference from one page to another. It's actually aberrant for us to lack one in this section.

Update: One actual policy change has been proposed in this thread, which would actually make AT become a style policy on a particular point. This is not part of the original cross-reference proposal. If you wish to support or oppose one proposal but not the other, please be clear as to which.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:50, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

RfC: Citation styles

Should Wikipedia:Citing sources have an explanatory guideline with a set of accepted citation/footnote styles, with the lists of allowed formats and structures to be decided by future RfCs? Jc86035 (talk) 18:12, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Survey (RfC: Citation styles)

• Tentative support. Allowing virtually any citation/footnote style to be used can be unnecessarily confusing for contributors, especially new users: while various citation formats are widely used in the English-language publications of many disciplines, and there is obviously good reason for different formats to be used in Wikipedia articles, obscure styles and little-used templates like {{ran}} can make it more difficult for contributors to add to the articles in which they are used. The lack of guidance has also resulted in a lack of consistency in reference group names, mostly for footnotes and primary sources ("note 1", "notes 1", "n 1", "‡ 1", "a", "A", ...). Jc86035 (talk) 18:12, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support as long as there is a documented mechanism to review adding additional styles as needed to the list. Ideally, certain more obscure formats should indicate which topic areas they should or should not be used on. --Masem (t) 18:26, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support, per Masem. If any style that is currently used in a topic area is being discussed for inclusion on the list then editors working in that topic area should be explicitly invited to take part in the discussion. Thryduulf (talk) 18:45, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support – there needs to be a centralized plan to learn how the different styles work, and to suggest not using odd variants. Dicklyon (talk) 18:49, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Who determines whether a variant is “odd”? Blueboar (talk) 19:07, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

@Blueboar: per the opening post in the RfC, which styles are allowed, which are not allowed and which are allowed only in certain areas will be determined by consensus of future discussions. This RfC is only about establishing the framework so as to avoid objections to specific styles being on one or another list don't derail the whole lists (if there is a consensus for the lists) and/or to avoid wasting time discussing which should be where (if there is consensus against the lists). Thryduulf (talk) 20:52, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

• This is a huge can of worms - while there is probably some benefit in reigning in some of the more "unusual" citing standards, this has the potential to result in a lot of bad blood and pain if not handled perfectly. We have WP:CITEVAR for a reason .Nigel Ish (talk) 21:00, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support The standards should be stated and a move made towards the preferred style, and all those variants can be gradually converted to something that looks and works in a consistent way. Failure to use the styles is not necessarily and problem for the editor or article, but instead an opportunity to get it done in a better way. Certainly for FA standard there should be a preferred citation style to use. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 09:36, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Questions:

1. is this meant to require citations being added in specific formats? We've always accepted plain text or bare URLs as references, as long as enough information is provided to identify the source;
2. is this meant to be a sitewide requirement policy, or just a best practice/manual of style? I.e. are we going to start trying to sanction editors who use a different citation format? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:04, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

My impression is that we "accept" almost anything, but that we also advise converting to a recommended and consistent style. We even have bots trying to to that for bare URLs for example. Style guidance points the way to go, but doesn't hit anyone over the head for not going that way. Dicklyon (talk) 19:10, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

My reading of how this is proposed is when we are talking an article at GA or FA. An article is progress is going to likely have a lot of variation in style, include bare URLS, which is fine - our citation approaches are highly complex and not easy to parse. But once you start talking quality, then a consistent style, and ideally one supported by consensus should be used. Certainly early on in an article's development, editors should be aware of what citation style to go for to minimize the pain of updating all the styles at the point of GA/FA. --Masem (t) 21:05, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

• @Ivanvector, Masem, and Dicklyon: No, this probably shouldn't be a requirement – the actual policy change might be something like "please use these styles and formats; if an article doesn't use a listed style or a listed format then the article may be changed so that it does". I've changed the RfC question (it originally said "include a list of", which would have been inappropriate for a policy). Jc86035's alternate account (talk) 11:25, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

Much better. As per Dicklyon we need to accept poor references, particularly from newbie editors, and then seek to improve them. It doesn't take much effort to bring up a bare URL and generate a {{cite web}} or {{citation}} and the associated <ref>/</ref> or {{sfn}} reference. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 11:39, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

I guess I don't know what's proposed to change. It's already recommended (and best practice for featured content) to be consistent within an article. Is the proposal just for making a list of suggested citation styles? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:24, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

• Strong Oppose. WP:CREEP. Violates the spirit and principle of WP:CITEVAR. I use non-code Chicago Manual of Style footnotes. Honestly, we are lucky if bare URLs get filled out at all, and editors who use ReFill don't even give the date or publication of the citation. There are variety of stylebooks for citations, and even the more revered ones vary between themselves. There's no reason to force people to choose from a list of "allowed" styles. This is just going to lead to more trouble and edit-warring. We can certainly give examples/samples, but to enforce a list of "allowed" choices is just asking for trouble, and edit-wars galore. Softlavender (talk) 11:52, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Even stronger oppose. We have over 2000 different citation templates, all of which are currently "approved", plus all the non-template hand-formatted citations. I would support it if we picked a single wiki-wide citation format and deprecated all others, as the short-term disruption of mass conversion would be justified by the long-term stability of an end to arguments over WP:CITEVAR and confusion about which style to use on any given article, but I can't see anything good coming of a proposal to allow whichever small handful of editors bothers to turn up to an RFC to unilaterally decide that some of those 2000 templates are "approved" and some aren't. (Aside from anything else, if there will still be more than one "approved" citation style, how do we decide to which of those we're going to convert all the articles using now-banned styles?) By causing the huge disruption of a mass-conversion, without the benefit of a unified citation style at the end of it, this is just going to cause a huge amount of bad feeling for no apparent benefit. And when I say "huge disruption", I mean it; the most commonly-used citation template, {{cite book}}, is used on approximately 1,000,000 articles, meaning that even if we settled on this as the standard going forward it would still mean 80% of articles would be non-compliant and need to have their references reformatted. ‑ Iridescent 12:10, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

  Most commonly used is actually {{Cite web}}, on 3 million pages. I think you're exaggerating the number of articles that don't use citation style 1 references - a lot of pages that don't use it have bare url references or simply don't have any. TBH I think we should settle things down to using CS1 for formatting references - it is the de facto standard and what visual editor and reftoolbar use - and a choice of citing references using <ref>...</ref> or using {{sfn}}; but the acrimony generated through doing that is probably more work than worth it. Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:43, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

  Also, Iridescent, vast majority of the "2000 citation templates" are just {{Cs1 wrapper}}s (or external links templates like {{Britannica}} and other things that are not really citation templates) - not a different style. Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:55, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

  I'd think it obvious that we're talking acceptable citation template families. There's probably a dozen plus variations of "cite web", but that's all one family. Same with CS1 references. --Masem (t) 05:46, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose per Softlavender. We are still not at a position where references are provided when they need to be. Laying down standards of reference formatting will exacerbate the situation as new editors will give up rather than jump through what they see as unnecessary hoops. Nthep (talk) 13:30, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

  99% of new editors if they are formatting references, use Citation Style 1 (which of course will be an allowed style); nobody is suggesting that new editor's edits should be rejected or that the first thing that new editors should be explained to is what citation style to use. Like with the MOS, it would be mainly experienced editors who fix edits to make them conform with the style. New editors are anyways explained how to/told to use {{cite web}} etc. Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:49, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

  New editors would continue to drop in bare URLs as they do now, most of them being unaware of or apathetic about any relevant guidelines. What we're debating is what happens if and when those are cleaned up. The effect on new users is thus zero. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:23, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose per Iri and SL. Ealdgyth - Talk 13:36, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support Getting rid of obscure styles to make it easier for new editors editing those pages and for consistency across Wikipedia. This really wouldn't affect the vast majority of edits, editors, or pages, but only the few thousand pages that use things like {{ran}} or in text parenthetical citing (which are IMO very reader unfriendly); at-least initially, we can allow a broad range of styles with the exception of some obscure ones. The amount of articles that use things other than Help:CS1 and Help:CS2 and such is quite small. Galobtter (pingó mió) 14:25, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - The purpose of a citation is to point the reader to a source which verifies our content. As long as a citation does this, it is acceptable. The style is irrelevant. Blueboar (talk) 15:24, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support wp:citing sources is a guideline not a policy so it doesn't force anything at all, those arguments don't make sense. Guidelines are routinely ignored if editors wish. The purpose of a guideline is to show best practice. A list of best practice citation styles is not only a good idea, why isn't it there already. -- GreenC 15:37, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Strong oppose. A wide variety of citation styles is in use in the academic and publishing worlds, and we accommodate that here relatively peacefully. We have help pages on referencing for newcomers and these can be improved. But forcing an "approved list" of citation styles on Wikipedia seems like a recipe for creating conflict where there is little at the moment. I feel the proposed RfCs on which styles to "allow", with the goal of eliminating some editor's favorite ways of citing sources, would create an Infobox-like situation. StarryGrandma (talk) 16:36, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

  Comment. Adding or linking Wikipedia:Citing sources to a guideline clearly explaining the easiest ways add references with the current state of our tools would be a good idea. (Visual Editor has improved considerably for example; one can now see the references in the reference list after entering them.) A single RfC could be held to decide which methods to recommend there. StarryGrandma (talk) 17:04, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose: The purpose of citations is to make it possible to verify content. Consistency within an article is much more important to that end, and also good for other reasons. Yes, we can speculate styles that are strictly speaking consistent but totally absurd (say, Bluebook in a non-legal article, in CamelCase, encoded with ROT13, and all the punctuation swapped for emojis) but I'd assume that good-faith editors don't do such a thing. As for obscure citation styles hindering the addition of content out of fear of messing up with the existing WP:CITEVAR (yes, merely a guideline as pointed above, but one with a super strong consensus and observance)? I'm not sure if I buy that argument. Editors are supposed to WP:BEBOLD and add content and let others iron out the wrinkles that they don't know how to fix. I see (and fix) articles with slightly inconsistent CITEVAR all the time precisely because editors have added content even if they didn't know all the intricacies of that article's citation style. On the contrary, I've never seen anyone actually complaining about not contributing content because they didn't know how a citation style works. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 17:53, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• I think this RFC might be the wrong question--I don't need to make an RFC to get permission to ask certain questions, I should just ask those questions. I would rather see us start to chip at the problem instead of a massive RFC to ask about giving carte blanche to deprecate or retain certain citation styles (and I'll throw "formats" in too). Why don't we figure out whether we should use vertical citations first? (And if we do, where we should, or could.) That seems like an easier question to answer. --Izno (talk) 18:58, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

  Sigh... We have had that discussion (over horizontal vs vertical) multiple times in the last few years... the result was consistently that both are acceptable. Blueboar (talk) 19:14, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

  Not really, and certainly not at that page. A handful of "format versus kind of citation" type discussions, but never anything which would give concrete guidance to "use vertical citations for everything" or "use only in WP:LDR" or "do not use within prose". I'm not looking for "can we use it?" only, I'm looking for "when?", and that's never been answered, though I think there's a common sense answer at this time that everyone probably would settle on and agree to add to the guideline if they would only discuss the point. --Izno (talk) 19:31, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

  Either way, that's just one example. There are other questions we could sensibly ask of the same sort that still bypass this overarching RFC that just don't need permission to be asked. --Izno (talk) 19:38, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support - It's quite possible for the community to establish a minimum set of citation styles that will suffice for most known cases. More freedom than that doesn't decrease edit-warring, it increases it. Most editors will respect a content guideline even if they disagree with it, for the sake of site-wide consistency. The project has established an arbitrary "Wikipedia way" for everything from article titles to order of article elements, I see relatively little edit-warring in those areas (except in edge cases not clearly addressed by the PAG), and there is little question that the encyclopedia has benefited from that consistency. Editors accustomed to using title case in titles and headings adapt to sentence case when editing Wikipedia, and so on, and this is not an excessive burden for members of the most adaptable species on the planet. This situation is no different.
  There are PAGs that are obsolescent, and many that are unnecessarily complex. If the community would put some ongoing effort into reduction and simplification of existing PAGs, WP:CREEP would be far less of an issue; we would simply trade bad PAGs for better PAGs. I support that. ―Mandruss ☎ 19:16, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose, per Nigel Ish. As he said, we have CITEVAR for a reason. SarahSV ^(talk) 22:05, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per everyone above - If the source is adequate and does the job in verifying whatever that claim is then that's perfect in my books - The style is all but irrelevant. –Davey2010^Talk 23:18, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose per Softlavender and Iridescent. Beyond the obvious WP:CITEVAR issue, implementing this would be a nightmare. There are literally thousands of different citation styles in common use around enwiki, just a list of them all would be a massive undertaking, let alone a brief guide for every single one. And, frankly, I'm just glad when an article has citations, even if they're just bare URLs. Nathan2055^{talk - contribs} 08:14, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
• @Izno: If anyone wants to close this RfC early for asking the wrong question I'm fine with that, although I'm not sure what should happen afterwards. Jc86035's alternate account (talk) 08:38, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose for now per WP:CREEP. I haven't seen a situation where this policy would be needed. --Jayron32 12:05, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
• Question The proposal does not appear to me to be a change to policy, but a mere suggestion that preferred methods by presented. The !votes seem to be addressing something much stronger. Would this explanatory guideline require of particular formats? Would it prohibit the use of some formats? Jacona (talk) 15:35, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
  • The proposal appears to suggest a "suggestion" now, with more detailed and prescriptive controls coming later as a result of follow-up RFCs. Of course one danger is that editors will take any suggestions, however mild, as policy and use it to force changes through.Nigel Ish (talk) 15:48, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
    • Indeed. That which is not forbidden is mandatory. Every "optional" rule is always a mandatory rule once it is in a fixed form. --Jayron32 17:12, 20 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - Solution looking for a problem. Beyond My Ken (talk) 19:54, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Strong Oppose This will make editing Wikipedia much harder. —Eli355 (talk • contribs) 22:15, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

Bans imposed as unblock conditions

Administrators often impose or suggest editing restrictions on blocked editors, either of their own accord or accepting suggestions from the editors themselves, as "conditions" to accepting an unblock request. We sometimes log these (see Wikipedia:Editing restrictions) as "voluntary" bans or as "unblock conditions" (or sometimes not at all). I think these sorts of unblock conditions are a good use of admin discretion, but I've realized recently that there does not actually seem to be any support for these sorts of ban in the banning policy. According to the policy (see #Authority to ban), bans may be imposed either by community consensus, or by admins acting under authority of the arbitration committee in designated topics (discretionary sanctions). They can also be imposed by Jimbo or the WMF but let's not get into that.

I propose that a bullet be added to this section, specifying that an administrator acting under their own authority may impose a relevant editing restriction (a ban) as a condition to a user being unblocked, if the administrator believes that such a sanction will prevent disruption related to that user's block. This would bring the banning policy in line with the blocking policy (see #Conditional unblock). Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:00, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Support if and only if the same with the agreement of the blocked user wording from WP:CONDUNBLOCK is included. Otherwise, you're giving individual admins the power to unilaterally decree what other editors may and may not do, which is a Really Bad Idea; except in the cases of the most blatant vandalism, it's rare to find any situation in which every admin will agree on what does and doesn't constitute disruption, so what you'd effectively be doing is giving a massive first-mover-advantage incentive for every self-appointed social engineer to impose their personal standards of what constitutes 'disruption' every time a ban appeal comes up. ‑ Iridescent 19:27, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Just copy the appropriate text from CONDUNBLOCK, which is where this authority comes from. No need to reinvent the wheel. Also, agree with Iri on not giving individual admins the authority to ban without consent or ArbCom authorization. TonyBallioni (talk) 19:41, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

• (edit conflict)Support with Iridescent's qualifier. It's de facto (and not a bad idea) so might as well make it de jure (with Iridescent's restriction to prevent it from becoming a bad idea). This would be useful in separating users who are WP:NOTHERE vs those who just cannot safely handle a particular topic at the moment. Even if this practice did not already exist:
  - If they don't agree to the topic ban then they must not be interested in contributing to the encyclopedia in general but specifically engaging in whatever behavior got them blocked.
  - If they agree to the topic ban and break it, then we have enough WP:ROPE to block them and let God handle their appeals.
  - If they agree to the topic ban and then give up on all activity (as sometimes happens after TBANs), then there's no difference between that and leaving them blocked -- except that we're not "punishing" them.
  - If they agree to the ban and abide by it, they have a chance of becoming productive editors, which should be the primary goal for any interaction with other editors.
  In any case, it is a net gain for the site. Ian.thomson (talk) 19:46, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

• @Ian.thomson, I don't agree with If they don't agree to the topic ban then they must not be interested in contributing to the encyclopedia in general but specifically engaging in whatever behavior got them blocked in the slightest. If they don't agree to the topic ban, they may just feel that its scope is too broad or inappropriate, and may well feel that for good reason; I've seen some truly goofy topic ban proposals in my time, and having a single admin make the call rather than an AN/ANI discussion means the checks and balances of the rest of the community explaining why the proposed topic ban is unworkable won't be there. ‑ Iridescent 19:59, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

@Iridescent: Ok, what about the specification "if they don't agree to a perfectly reasonable topic-ban"...? Like, yeah, if someone is being disruptive at just (clicks random article) Paromitar Ek Din, a proposal to ban them from all articles relating to either India or movies would be extreme, but (depending on the kind of disruption) "movies by Aparna Sen" or "movies starring Rituparna Sengupta" or even just a topic ban relating to that one movie would probably be a good indication whether or not the user is too hyper-focused on that topic to want to be useful elsewhere. Ian.thomson (talk) 20:07, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

Sure, but it's fair to see their side as well, and if they have a reasonable objection to the topic ban we should treat it as such, even if we don't necessarily accept their proposed wording. To take a fictional but eminently plausible hypothetical, imagine editor Foo has spent most of their editing career writing about old cowboy movies, but then got sucked into Trumpian edit-wars and eventually got banned under WP:ARBAPDS. They appeal their ban, and the admin Bar agrees to unblock subject to a topic ban using the standard wording of all pages related to post-1932 politics of the United States and closely related people, broadly construed. Editor Foo complains that they can't accept this, since this definition will include Ronald Reagan and Clint Eastwood, making it impossible to return to their favorite topic of cowboy movies even though their edits there were universally accepted as uncontroversial. In this case admin Bar's initial complaint is completely reasonable since it's using standard Arbcom-mandated wording, but there wouldn't be anything vexatious about editor Foo refusing to accept it. (This kind of thing used to come up all the damn time back when The Troubles was still a hot topic—since virtually every person of consequence in Northern Ireland was linked to the conflict in some way or another, topic bans had the de facto effect of banning editors from anything historical or biographical.) ‑ Iridescent 20:22, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

I can't recall a wording for it (other than WP:COMMONSENSE) but I've been given mixed messages as to whether pages that cover multiple topics are treated as divided territory or the worst possible topic. There's some city that's a sister city to Jerusalem. When an edit war broke out in that article over whether Jerusalem is in Israel or Palestine, I got fussed at for citing the Arbcom DS for the Palestinian/Israeli conflict, even though everyone (except a few WP:SPAs) agreed that locking the page was necessary to stop the edit war (though I still don't understand why I was the first to lock the Two-state solution article!). Still, I've also seen plenty of cases where someone got in trouble for editing part unrelated to a DS of an article that was partly covered by a DS. If the topic ban is being implemented through this and not through discretionary sanctions and the editor has a proven history of improving cowboy movie articles (or whatever), the hypothetical admin should be willing to say "ok, you can still edit the parts of the Eastwood and Reagan articles from before they entered politics, except when they made political statements during their acting careers." (Looking a non-cowboy Arnold Schwarzenegger, acting careers after entering politics might too much of a gray area, though, IMO). Ian.thomson (talk) 20:46, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support with Iridescent's qualifier per everything Iridescent has said in this discussion. Thryduulf (talk) 20:48, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose Too big a grant of authority to individual admins. Topic bans should require a community process. --Trovatore (talk) 20:56, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
  • This is already policy. All Ivanvector is suggesting is what amounts to a cross-reference in the banning policy. Opposing this wouldn't stop conditional unblocks. TonyBallioni (talk) 21:46, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• What Iri and Tony said. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 21:44, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
• This is already policy, no harm cross referencing it at the banning policy as well. If the blocked editor is unwilling to accept the proposed unblock conditions, they have the option of waiting out their block (if not indefinite) or not agreeing, which will result in their appeal being declined, at which time they can request further review (whether indef or time-limited). Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 21:50, 17 November 2018 (UTC)
  • Indeed, unblock conditions can result from a negotiation of the details - e.g. tweaks to boundaries, clarifications, etc. (e.g. I recall one user suggesting a slightly different wording to avoid potential confusion between the plain English meaning of a word and the more specific meaning of that word as a term of art in the topic area concerned) and this is a Good Thing as restrictions both 'sides' are happy with are far more likely to be adhered to. Thryduulf (talk) 23:07, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support Iridescent's version, to ensure this does not get out of hand. — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 05:45, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
• Good points everyone! I think we're all pretty much in agreement with Iridescent. One last sticking point is that bans are meant to be community sanctions, but in this situation we have a ban imposed by an agreement of two editors (the blocked user and the unblocking admin). In my view such a ban should still require a discussion at a community noticeboard to lift the ban, the same as with other bans enacted by the community. That's basically current practice anyway, I'm just thinking about how to update the banning policy to match. Is there any opposition to that? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:23, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @Ivanvector: I assume you mean adding a sentence along the lines of appeals should be made at AN? If so, what about time-limited bans? Thryduulf (talk) 13:43, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

• I'm thinking of adding a line item under "authority to ban" describing this situation, and in that case the appeal method is already in the policy. I guess the line item would need to specify that this sort of ban is to be considered a ban imposed by the community. Reviewing just now, maybe it's better for this to be a separate subsection (e.g. "unblock conditions") like how we have a "bans for repeated block evasion" section. As for time-limited bans, I don't think a distinction needs to be made. I personally don't do time-limited bans, the way I see it if there's consensus for someone to be banned then they need to actively convince the community to unban them in the future, but I do know that time-definite bans are a thing we do. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:52, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support Iridescent's but not community ban lifting - I disagree in thinking that a community agreement should be required to remove the conditional partial bans. If nothing else, it makes no logical sense because of the existence of time-limited bans (as they'd be removed without any involvement of the community along the way so there's no fundamental community link to the bans). I would say the individual is entitled to appeal to either the admin or the community to remove an indef T-ban (et al) but that's their choice. I suppose any admin doing this could say "indef requiring community removal" but that would seem a bit iffy. Nosebagbear (talk) 19:22, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposal on overly long entries in lists

FYI

 – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Lists#Overly long list items

Gist: Add brief advice about what to do about excessively large items in lists, to either WP:Manual of Style/Lists or WP:Summary style.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:25, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposal to tighten administrator inactivity procedure

Yeah, I know, WP:PERENNIAL. But after yet another compromised inactive admin account ran amok over the project today, I feel like this should be revisited. The account in question did not have a logged action in over 2 years, and had made only 5 edits in 2017 and one in 2018. The policy as currently worded reads:

Administrators who have made neither edits nor administrative actions for at least 12 months may be desysopped. Subject to the lengthy inactivity consideration below, this desysopping is not to be considered permanent, or a reflection on the user's use of, or rights to, the admin tools. The admin must be contacted on their user talk page and via e-mail (if possible) one month before the request for desysopping and again several days before the desysopping goes into effect. Desysopping on inactivity grounds should be handled by English Wikipedia bureaucrats. The summary in the user rights log should make it clear that the desysopping is purely procedural.

I propose modifying this to:

Administrators who have made no logged administrative actions for at least 12 months may be desysopped. Subject to the lengthy inactivity consideration below, this desysopping is not to be considered permanent, or a reflection on the user's use of, or rights to, the admin tools. Desysopping on inactivity grounds should be handled by English Wikipedia bureaucrats. The summary in the user rights log should make it clear that the desysopping is purely procedural.

References

The change removes the notification requirement, and the "edits" criterion. The effect is that admin accounts which don't use admin tools for 12 months will simply have the bit silently removed as a matter of security. We won't tell them we're about to do it, and then they won't log in and make one nonsense edit to hang on to the bit. Removal will just happen when they've been away long enough, and if they come back some time later and want to go back to adminning they just ask at BN and go through the 24-hour hold like anyone else whose bit has been voluntarily removed. In fact admins should be actively discouraged from "holding on to the bit" in this manner, but let's at least do this. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:51, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

Survey/discussion

• Support Given the length of time the inactivity policy has been around for now, I think it's reasonable to assume every active admin has heard of it, and nobody will be surprised if their rights expire, so provided this gets enough publicity in the right places, we should just do it. Also, as I just said on another thread, I think it would also be helpful to make two factor authentication mandatory for all admins, and desysop those who do not turn it on. It would stop this kind of disruption. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 18:09, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

I agree with the idea of desysoping (or at least warning) people for not using 2FA, but there would have to be some kind of cool-down period. Earlier this month, I had to get my phone replaced, meaning I went a day or so without 2FA. It simply wouldn't have been efficient to remove the bit for only 24 hours (especially because I was still active). Perhaps existing admins should get a month or two to set it up, all new admins get one week post RFA closure, and all admins that need to temporarily disable it also get a week. Anarchyte (talk | work) 23:12, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support though I fear that this is symbolic as all the inactive admins will come out of the woodwork to oppose. --Rschen7754 18:15, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose obviously seeing as not all admin actions are "logged" (for example edits to protected pages, statements in admin function such as WP:AE posts, "Stop this or I'll block you" threats and so on). Other projects which have such inactivity policies have had drama centered on whether non-logged admin actions count and there is the additional concern that such a policy would create an incentive to perform inappropriate but logged actions instead of appropriate but not logged actions. That, and I am sure we can count non-logged admin actions... Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 18:13, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  In that scenario (eg: "Hey, I was busy promoting DYKs from prep to queue, now I can't!") I think they should be able to get the tools back ASAP if they just ask at WP:BN. I'm not anticipating a rush. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 18:17, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  Yes, but if they're actively doing things that don't get logged for twelve straight months they clearly not actively using the tools, and as Ritchie said they can just ask for them back. It's not a disincentive to adminning, it's purely a security feature. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:53, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Ivanvector: be careful not to set up loop here as well - example: don't log anything for 12 months, then say "hey I'm back resysop me", then they don't use it right away - do we just pull it again? — xaosflux ^Talk 19:19, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  Process-wise we would likely only review these once a month, for what it's worth. — xaosflux ^Talk 19:20, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  Well, I'm not a 'crat, but I would say yes, create that loop. It's slightly better (security-wise) than the current loop of notify admin, "hey i'm not idle", then they spend another year idle with admin access. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:57, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support both this proposal and the additional requirement for 2FA by Ritchie333 above. Bradv 18:19, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
  • I agree with the 2FA requirement, but should that be a separate proposal? Jack N. Stock (talk) 18:34, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
  • Yes, that should be a separate proposal and has been a few times. As I understand it 2FA is still considered "beta", and there has been significant pushback whenever anyone suggests it be required for any level of account. (The functionaries email list blew up over this very recently, and that's only a few dozen users) Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:55, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

    WP:INTADMINs are required to have 2FA but that is only because of a mandate from the WMF Galobtter (pingó mió) 19:01, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  • Yes, the 2FA requirement should be a separate proposal. And it probably is premature, as 2FA is not even available to non-admins yet. Bradv 19:02, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support. We need to do something about all the hat collectors who refuse to give up their unused permissions. It's a security risk, and they can ask for their permissions back if they're actually doing something useful. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 18:27, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - TNT ^💖 18:52, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• I'm curious how many administrators presently meet this criteria? –xeno^talk 18:58, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Xeno: 288 per this list (including 4 'crats). — xaosflux ^Talk 19:05, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

• Ivanvector this should be an WP:RFC, and also on WP:CENT. Galobtter (pingó mió) 19:02, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

Good point. RfC banner added, and I'll advertise on CENT as soon as I figure out how that works. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:09, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

• Strong support This should be done to any account with advanced permissions, such as rollbackers and reviewers, not just admins. funplussmart (talk) 19:05, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• I suggest that this proposal should also modify the lengthy inactivity section to clarify that the clock for the three years of uninterrupted inactivity always starts with the last edit, and not with the last administrative action. isaacl (talk) 19:05, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support the original proposal per the nominator, oppose making 2FA mandatory. I'm presently unable to use it as my only compatible second device is away being repaired (due to an obese battery). There is also insufficient capacity at the WMF to handle users who have problems with it. Thryduulf (talk) 19:31, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose if you're going to get rid of the edit requirement then you need to have some sort of protection for admins who perform non-logged actions. We've had admins who only take part in admin actions that don't generate logs, such as editing the various bits of the main page. Such an admin would be desysopped even though they're still performing admin actions. Yes, they could ask for the admin tools back, but I don't see why they should have to every month just because of a badly drafted policy. Strictly this would also allow new admins and recently resysopped admins to be desysopped as well. Hut 8.5 21:01, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
  • I imagine the bureaucrats would just skip that admin each month, knowing that they are performing non-logged administative actions. As long as the number of these are low, it should be manageable. isaacl (talk) 22:47, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

• Sounds like a use case for Wikipedia:Interface administrators. If an admin exclusively edits interface pages and has no interest in performing logged actions, then in the interest of security, they should not retain the entire administrator tool set -FASTILY 21:48, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

• Interface admin allows people to edit interface pages, not ordinary full-protected pages. Furthermore interface admins can do a lot more damage than admins and you have to be an admin to be an interface admin. Hut 8.5 22:04, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

• Support, and Support 2-factor authentication as well. I'd prefer 6 months, but as some admins seem to think 12 months means one month, that would only confuse them. DuncanHill (talk) 21:05, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Strong Support. As Wikipedia's reputation and popularity continue to grow, it's imperative that we take security/user access controls more seriously. -FASTILY 21:51, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• I support this too. Taking out the notifying part is a good idea. BTW Esanchez7587 should have lost the bit a year ago. Drmies (talk) 21:57, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose The Administrators are still using their account. —Eli355 (talk • contribs) 22:19, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - We're not in 2006 anymore neither is this small fairly unknown website, We're currently the 5th visited website in the world and as such in this day and age this really shouldn't be happening, But compromises can and do happen everywhere so we're not always going to be tiptop in that respect, Anyway I support the modification/update. –Davey2010^Talk 23:02, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support it’s not that difficult to make the trip to CAT:EX or CAT:G7 so the inevitable “people will make dumb actions just to keep the bit” thing falls flat. Opppse anything about mandatory 2FA. I use it, but we would lose several functionaries if we required it not to mention countless admins. TonyBallioni (talk) 23:07, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support - Not sure how long it should be, but the constant gaming by inactive−but technically active−admins is counterproductive. Anarchyte (talk | work) 23:12, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. We want inactive admins to resume helping if and when they want to; there are life reasons someone may step away from the project, and not all will be willing to run the RfA gauntlet again as Opabinia regalis was. We don't want to encourage someone disaffected with the project but unwilling to surrender their tools to delete something or block someone just to keep them, even if it's an unquestioning response to a noticeboard request. Admins who do things like editing fully protected pages (not only DYK, but ERRORS comes to mind) are as useful as those who specialize in deleting and/or blocking, but the former don't appear in the easy to check log. (Nor does checking deleted contributions in evaluating how to speak to an editor, for that matter.) On the other hand I got lots of log entries for moving my own drafts to main space "without leaving a redirect". It's not a fair metric of admin activity. Desysopping for inactivity is also not an efficient way to protect against admin abuse: I recall one case where an admin ran wild including posting a philosophical musing to the Main Page. Emergency desysopping is the best strategy and less likely to lose us useful admins. And we already have that. I also recall seeing something about functionaries periodically testing admins' passwords for strength, but given other cases I recall, I doubt that's been being done. That would help (and would encourage those who don't have serious problems with two-factor authentication to take the step to get out of the resulting demands they change their single password). Also, admins are expected to have e-mail turned on; has any thought been given to bureaucrats' e-mailing those who don't appear to be using their tools, asking whether they would consider handing them in voluntarily? Yngvadottir (talk) 23:17, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
  • There is no need to run the RFA gauntlet again if you return with 2-3 years, that bit wont change. Thryduulf (talk) 23:22, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
  • (edit conflict) Yngvadottir, I think you're misunderstanding the proposal. This isn't "anyone who doesn't use their admin tools for a year has to re-run RFA", it's "anyone who doesn't use their admin tools for a year has to post a request at WP:BN for them to be turned on if they decide to start admin-ing again, and the crats will automatically do so". ‑ Iridescent 23:23, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
    • @Thryduulf and Iridescent: Ah. Thanks for clarifying. I've done some striking at the start. Yngvadottir (talk) 23:32, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• I would prefer to increase the requirement on what constitutes as "active". An editor who has six edits over two years should not be considered active enough to keep the tools. Mkdw ^talk 23:35, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support Use it or lose it. The current requirement of needing a single edit in a calendar year is routinely gamed and far too low of a bar for retaining advanced permissions that can cause wide-spread disruption. Having read through previous related discussions I have never seen anyone present a compelling argument against implementing more stringent requirements.-- Jezebel's Ponyo^{bons mots} 23:43, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support We have nearly 80 admins who have edited in the last 12 months but haven't performed a logged admin action for over five years (in a few cases, ten). All of those, unless they're performing a large amount of non-logged actions - which I doubt - need to lose the bit. There's even a few there who have never passed an RfA .... Black Kite (talk) 23:59, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support per nom and above supports. ZettaComposer (talk) 00:53, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support this system is easier to implement, prevents gaming, and has good rationale as per nom. --Tom (LT) (talk) 01:08, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
• I don't like the idea of -288 admins and -4 crats. I do like the idea of 2fa being mandatory. SQL^{Query me!} 02:34, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support. Removing privileges from admins who don't engage in any admin activity is a "paper loss", but a compromised account with privileges causes real harm. The standard proposed is still conservative and easy to meet. By comparison, some other WMF projects have requirements for admin actions every 6 months. (See meta:Admin activity review/Local inactivity policies for more information on other projects' policies.) --RL0919 (talk) 02:44, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
• Support. Re-requesting the bit if it's been removed is no big deal; compromised admin accounts meanwhile pose a much larger issue to the project. Home Lander (talk) 04:18, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. First off - This is very premature. Difficult cases make bad law; it's always a bad idea to respond to an event by immediately trying to create a policy that will prevent its recurrence. There has not yet been an analysis of what was going on here. We don't actually know if this is a compromised account; really, what we have is an admin account that acted in an unacceptable manner. Conclusions have been leapt to, and they have not yet been proven. Second - there's no evidence that this change will prevent future similar episodes. The vast majority of administrator accounts that required their privileges to be yanked were those of administrators who would easily have met these more stringent standards, let alone the current ones. Come back in a month, with greater research and good evidence that the proposal will likely prevent rogue administrator actions, and then we can talk. Risker (talk) 04:40, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

  We do know that the account was compromised (related phab task) but otherwise agreed that knee-jerk reactions aren't the way forward here. -- Ajraddatz (talk) 05:14, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

(Unfortunately the task is not visible to the public.) — regards, Revi 05:17, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose Having to ask for my bit back every month because I only edit protected pages is not an ideal scenario. Stephen 05:08, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

Questions about admin actions that are not logged as such

• Comment - In theory, I support tighter guidelines on whether or not an admin is really making use of their tools. However, as pointed out above by Jo-Jo Eumerus and others, there are certain actions that require admin access, but are not logged as admin actions. DYK is a prime example, as some editors have become admins specifically for helping out on that project. There are some admins I see using their tools at DYK, and don't run across them elsewhere, but are vital to assisting that project. Devise a tool that logs ALL admin usage of tools, and I might be more willing to support this. — Maile (talk) 19:50, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  DYK has come up a couple times. I'm not so familiar, but what do admins do at DYK that requires admin access but isn't logged? IMO it should be logged, or it should not require admin rights. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:58, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  They use editprotected. --Izno (talk) 20:01, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  Ah I see. Surely we could (should?) log edits to protected pages? Maybe that's a separate discussion too. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 20:10, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  @Ivanvector: technically they are already logged, just not in any manner that is easy to find. Obviously "group" edits (like MediaWiki:, .json files, etc) are easy to filter, but the other ones are not. I wonder if this is a red herring though (i.e. how many admins are completely inactive in all logged actions but still routinely use editprotected?) — xaosflux ^Talk 20:43, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  Does it require admin tools to create and maintain bots and scripts? That's also a key part of DYK. — Maile (talk) 20:37, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  I don't believe so, I think anyone can operate a bot if it's approved, unless it's a bot with admin rights. Scripts might require interface admin now, I'm not sure. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 21:08, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

The last 10 humans, and the operator of the last bot, to edit Template:Did you know, made their most recent logged admin action this long ago:

Admin	Last logged admin action	Days ago
Alex Shih	2018-11-18	4
Anarchyte	2018-11-22	0
Art LaPella	2018-07-13	132
Shubinator (operator of DYKUpdateBot)	2018-03-26	241
Dumelow	2018-11-05	17
Fish and karate	2018-11-21	1
Fram	2018-11-22	0
Gatoclass	2016-09-22	791
Huon	2018-11-21	1
Mike Peel	2018-11-09	13
Vanamonde93	2018-11-19	3

As you can see, Gatoclass is the only one who would lose their adminship with this proposal. Thryduulf (talk) 22:51, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

Thryduulf of the ones you list above, Shubinator is unique in that his bots keep the process running. He's the only one who would know what admin actions he's taken that don't show on his normal logs - but I think DYK would be up a creek without him behind the scenes. You don't list Wugapodes, and his logs look pretty active, but he operates WugBot that is also essential to the DYK processes. The others are directly involved in the edit protected areas of DYK that directly affect what appears on the Main Page. — Maile (talk) 01:34, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

I believe I wasn't listed because I'm not an admin, only pending changes and (recently) new page reviewer. WugBot doesn't have editprotected rights and doesn't need them as the approved page isn't under full protection, just the Queue for the mainpage. Wugapodes [t^hɑk] [ˈkan.ˌʧɹɪbz] 02:47, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

• Regarding the questions about logging, while it's not as easy of a log, we could make an edit filter such as ((action = edit) & (page_restrictions_edit = sysop)) to "log" protected edits such that they could be "counted" by any inactivity bots (which really is how we would look for inactives in practice). — xaosflux ^Talk 05:28, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

Separate section for comments that are only about 2FA

• Regarding 2FA, I don't remember (or just don't now, really) if anyone has access to stats on which accounts have it turned on or not. If we do, and we're not yet comfortable requiring it to be turned on for admins, maybe we can do something like enforce periodic password resets for admins that don't opt in. That's not part of this proposal, I'm just throwing out ideas. (I have 2FA turned on, ftr) Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:27, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

  Well, I have a password which can not be broken. I do not want to turn on TFA because I (almost) do not use a cell phone. I am not sure why WMF thinks they are more clever than I, and I am already unhappy with 2FA requirement for interface admins - I will possibly have to resign my interface admin rights, but if RFA is required for all admins, I am not sure what I am going to decide. If you want to lose admins with zero benefit, this is probably the way to go.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:33, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

• @Ivanvector: Way back in Feb '17, "203 out of the 1274 admins on English Wikipedia [had] enabled two-factor auth". Other tasks exist asking for a similar thing - TNT ^💖 19:37, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

This is a good discussion, but I've broken it out from the main proposal so as not to distract too much. I like our 2FA implementation because I always have my phone with me, and because my phone is also my authentication device for my office email, but of course it's not perfect for everyone. We could fall back on the "email you a code" type 2FA that some other sites use (Steam is one, and I hate it, my email server is slow) if it were possible to choose different authentication methods. Again, just a thought. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:55, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

In light of the number of reset requests I am wondering if the current 2FA methods run too high a risk of getting locked out of one's account. Besides, not all people are tech savvy enough to work with one device 2FA or have more than one device available at any time. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 20:36, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

• You would have lost me as an admin if you'd required TFA. Not only is it far beyond my level of technical comfort, and makes it all too easy to get locked out, I'm not going to spend $400 plus data plan for a smartphone for Wikipedia or anybody else. Massive imposition for little gain to the project in terms of security. Yngvadottir (talk) 22:55, 22 November 2018 (UTC)
• Ditto. I act as an admin as a favour to Wikipedia, sysop status isn't a favour Wikipedia does to me. I have no intention of committing to permanently owning—and having permanent access to—an expensive piece of technology which requires a permanent and expensive subscription. purely because Wikipedia is having one of its periodic bouts of security paranoia, and if that means someone else has to clean out CAT:EX instead of me I believe I can live with the loss. ‑ Iridescent 23:01, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

@Iridescent: I can understand where you, Ymblanter, and Yngvadottir are coming from in relation to having 2FA be a requirement, but it's not as much of a commitment as the ghastly WP:2FA leads on. The most popular applications for this process are for mobile (namely Google Authenticator and Authy), but PC-based applications exist too. There are a few listed here, and there are others, like WinAuth for Windows. If you use Google Chrome, Authy has an available plugin. Unfortunately, I was unable to find any for Mac (that were not already listed) or Firefox. I didn't bother looking for Safari ones, and Brave, along with Opera I believe, primarily use Chrome extensions. Internet Explorer/EDGE are both a mess, so I'd recommend to anyone using those to swap browsers anyway. If losing the codes is what your worry about, scratch codes are generated when you enable 2FA. Email these to yourself and you'll never lose access to your account, even if you lose or change device. Anarchyte (talk | work) 23:33, 22 November 2018 (UTC)

• Just noting as I did above that there are multiple functionaries that do not have 2FA, and for a variety of reasons, I would not even want to force this on CheckUsers or Oversighters, including but not limited to the fact that the security paranoia that Iridescent describes is very real and there are some plain insane ideas on functionary account security out there and there is a part of me that fears making this a requirement would be a slippery slope to some really dumb measures that would make a lot of people quit (yes, slippery slope is a bad argument, but WMF projects tend to make technical changes all at once if they ever happen.)
  That was all about functionaries, who I think should have a higher level of account security than admins because of the ability to access personal data. If we currently don't require CU/OS to do it, and I don't think we should, we certainly shouldn't extend the requirement to admins without those tools. TonyBallioni (talk) 01:36, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
• Wikipedia, and the entire Wikimedia movement, is committed to creating and maintaining a diverse community. That means including people who have limited access to technology (in some cases, even limited access to software), people who do not have a lot of money, people who live in countries where it is not legal to own certain types of technology (or could result in significant state surveillance if owned). This is not an abstract concept - I personally know administrators who live well below the poverty line, some of whom don't even own their own computers; others who can't afford to maintain a second piece of technology like a mobile phone; and still others who live in countries where using 2FA would probably result in their being incarcerated. Frankly, there's almost nothing that an admin account can do that will result in any real level of off-wiki scrutiny. Admin accounts that go rogue are pretty easily globally locked. I also completely and fully endorse everything that Iridescent said. This is security theatre and is completely out of proportion to the problem it's trying to solve. Risker (talk) 04:51, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
  • Risker, not to mention that the most recent confirmed account compromises involving stewards (which *actually* could have had real life implications given the potential access to CU data on multiple projects) could not have been stopped by 2FA. TonyBallioni (talk) 04:59, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
    • @TonyBallioni: Would you be able to link me to these compromises involving stewards? I haven't been keeping up, but I don't entirely understand how 2FA couldn't have stopped it (unless their computers were infected, in which case nothing would have prevented it as they were already logged in). Anarchyte (talk | work) 05:05, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

I can confirm it has happened, but currently there is no on-wiki postmortem. — regards, Revi 05:10, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

And I can confirm that even those stew with 2FA were compromised. I can't talk about the details per BEANS (and other security constraints). — regards, Revi 05:12, 23 November 2018 (UTC)