User talk:Brandon

Hi Brandon

Great Panda pic!

I was wondering if you could just keep an eye on shahid malik which you're semi-protecting. Some subtle but negative edits attempted. I've left a reasonable message on the relevant talk page but I'm a novice....

thank you.

Brotherblog (talk) 05:07, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

Hello!

Hello Wiki Administrator, I was wondering if you're still on! Nick2crosby (talk) 03:28, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

Yes! Brandon (talk) 05:52, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

Hi Brandon, are you available to chat today on Thursday? If so, please specify a time and if not can you let me when you will be on?! I need your help with something!!

<+Jeske_C___> gave me your info. 

Thank you, Sebubuntu Sebubuntu (talk) 13:28, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi! What can I help you with? Brandon (talk) 20:18, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi Brandon, I am wondering if you could help me with getting the following page back on? I actually do not know why it was taken down. I work directly under Nassim Haramein, and have a neutral, clear, informative wiki-friendly write up that I could send you for your review. Your help is much appreciative.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Nassim_Haramein_%282nd_nomination%29 Sebubuntu (talk) 18:08, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

Hi Brandon, what should I do with Technophant? Thank you, Seb.Sebubuntu (talk) 19:25, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Hi Brandon, can you let me know if I should continue waiting for Technophant or if I should contact anyone else? The page was deleted in 2008 and a lot has changed since then! There is a movie coming out https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-connected-universe-film#/story and we are excited to also put this in Wiki. If possible, please let me know what my next steps are, I kindly thank you for all your help.22:34, 8 September 2015 (UTC)~Seb — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sebubuntu (talk • contribs)

Standard Offer unblock request for Technophant

Technophant (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log)

Technophant has requested an unblock under the standard offer. As one of about 60 editors who has contributed to User talk:Technophant you may have an interest in this request. Sent by user:PBS via -- MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:48, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Hello, Technophant! Is there anything I should do to enable the process or has a request for the page to be unblocked been sent? (sorry, totally new to this...) Thank you so much! Sebhia19:20, 1 September 2015 (UTC)~ 19:19, 1 September 2015 (UTC)~

Invitation to subscribe to the edit filter mailing list

Hi, as a user in the edit filter manager user group we wanted to let you know about the new wikipedia-en-editfilters mailing list. As part of our recent efforts to improve the use of edit filters on the English Wikipedia it has been established as a venue for internal discussion by edit filter managers regarding private filters (those only viewable by administrators and edit filter managers) and also as a means by which non-admins can ask questions about hidden filters that wouldn't be appropriate to discuss on-wiki. As an edit filter manager we encourage you to subscribe; the more users we have in the mailing list the more useful it will be to the community. If you subscribe we will send a short email to you through Wikipedia to confirm your subscription, but let us know if you'd prefer another method of verification. I'd also like to take the opportunity to invite you to contribute to the proposed guideline for edit filter use at WP:Edit filter/Draft and the associated talk page. Thank you! Sam Walton (talk) and MusikAnimal ^talk 18:22, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

ArbCom elections are now open!

Hi,
You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:04, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

Anonymous (group)

I see you implemented a indefinite page protection in 2009 for Anonymous (group)- please remove it. Thank you ! --ChristopheT (talk) 13:44, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

Hi Brandon. See here. ÷seresin 21:28, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, seresin! Brandon (talk) 02:02, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

NSO Group has been nominated for Did You Know

Hello, Brandon. NSO Group, an article you either created or to which you significantly contributed,has been nominated to appear on Wikipedia's Main Page as part of Did you know. You can see the hook and the discussion here. You are welcome to participate! Thank you. APersonBot (talk!) 12:02, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

DYK for NSO Group

On 16 September 2016, Did you know was updated with a fact from the article NSO Group, which you recently created, substantially expanded, or brought to good article status. The fact was ... that the Israeli software company NSO Group has been identified as the possible developer of the iOS spyware Pegasus? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/NSO Group. You are welcome to check how many page hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, NSO Group), and it may be added to the statistics page if the total is over 5,000. Finally, if you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please feel free to suggest it on the Did you know talk page.

Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 00:04, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

DYK for Pegasus (spyware)

On 16 September 2016, Did you know was updated with a fact from the article Pegasus (spyware), which you recently created, substantially expanded, or brought to good article status. The fact was ... that the Israeli software company NSO Group has been identified as the possible developer of the iOS spyware Pegasus? You are welcome to check how many page hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, Pegasus (spyware)), and it may be added to the statistics page if the total is over 5,000. Finally, if you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please feel free to suggest it on the Did you know talk page.

Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 00:06, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

Extended confirmed protection

Hello, Brandon. This message is intended to notify administrators of important changes to the protection policy.

Extended confirmed protection (also known as "30/500 protection") is a new level of page protection that only allows edits from accounts at least 30 days old and with 500 edits. The automatically assigned "extended confirmed" user right was created for this purpose. The protection level was created following this community discussion with the primary intention of enforcing various arbitration remedies that prohibited editors under the "30 days/500 edits" threshold to edit certain topic areas.

In July and August 2016, a request for comment established consensus for community use of the new protection level. Administrators are authorized to apply extended confirmed protection to combat any form of disruption (e.g. vandalism, sock puppetry, edit warring, etc.) on any topic, subject to the following conditions:

• Extended confirmed protection may only be used in cases where semi-protection has proven ineffective. It should not be used as a first resort.
• A bot will post a notification at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard of each use. MusikBot currently does this by updating a report, which is transcluded onto the noticeboard.

Please review the protection policy carefully before using this new level of protection on pages. Thank you.
This message was sent to the administrators' mass message list. To opt-out of future messages, please remove yourself from the list. 17:48, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Two-Factor Authentication now available for admins

Hello,

Please note that TOTP based two-factor authentication is now available for all administrators. In light of the recent compromised accounts, you are encouraged to add this additional layer of security to your account. It may be enabled on your preferences page in the "User profile" tab under the "Basic information" section. For basic instructions on how to enable two-factor authentication, please see the developing help page for additional information. Important: Be sure to record the two-factor authentication key and the single use keys. If you lose your two factor authentication and do not have the keys, it's possible that your account will not be recoverable. Furthermore, you are encouraged to utilize a unique password and two-factor authentication for the email account associated with your Wikimedia account. This measure will assist in safeguarding your account from malicious password resets. Comments, questions, and concerns may be directed to the thread on the administrators' noticeboard. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:34, 12 November 2016 (UTC)

A new user right for New Page Patrollers

Hi Brandon.

A new user group, New Page Reviewer, has been created in a move to greatly improve the standard of new page patrolling. The user right can be granted by any admin at PERM. It is highly recommended that admins look beyond the simple numerical threshold and satisfy themselves that the candidates have the required skills of communication and an advanced knowledge of notability and deletion. Admins are automatically included in this user right.

It is anticipated that this user right will significantly reduce the work load of admins who patrol the performance of the patrollers. However,due to the complexity of the rollout, some rights may have been accorded that may later need to be withdrawn, so some help will still be needed to some extent when discovering wrongly applied deletion tags or inappropriate pages that escape the attention of less experienced reviewers, and above all, hasty and bitey tagging for maintenance. User warnings are available here but very often a friendly custom message works best.

If you have any questions about this user right, don't hesitate to join us at WT:NPR. (Sent to all admins).MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:47, 15 November 2016 (UTC)

ArbCom Elections 2016: Voting now open!

Hello, Brandon. Voting in the 2016 Arbitration Committee elections is open from Monday, 00:00, 21 November through Sunday, 23:59, 4 December to all unblocked users who have registered an account before Wednesday, 00:00, 28 October 2016 and have made at least 150 mainspace edits before Sunday, 00:00, 1 November 2016.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2016 election, please review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:08, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis

Hi Brandon. You were the admin who Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis per Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis back in March 2009. The article was created a few years later in April 2013, so I'm wondering if the re-creation is a significant improvement over the version you deleted or if the article should be tagged per WP:G4. Thanks in advance. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:05, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

The article as it exists today is substantially different from the article I deleted in 2009. Brandon (talk) 01:57, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Thanks Brandon for checking on this. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:47, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Unprotect request

Hi, Brandon,

Could you remove indefinite semi-protection from /b/? You protected it in 2008, but vandalism has not been a significant problem since. Perhaps pending changes is all that is required, if even that. Best, Mark Schierbecker (talk) 02:09, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Done. If this works, its truly the end of an era. Brandon (talk) 02:23, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter - February 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2017). This first issue is being sent out to all administrators, if you wish to keep receiving it please subscribe. Your feedback is welcomed.

Administrator changes

NinjaRobotPirate • Schwede66 • K6ka • Ealdgyth • Ferret • Cyberpower678 • Mz7 • Primefac • Dodger67

Briangotts • JeremyA • BU Rob13

Guideline and policy news

• A discussion to workshop proposals to amend the administrator inactivity policy at Wikipedia talk:Administrators has been in process since late December 2016.
• Wikipedia:Pending changes/Request for Comment 2016 closed with no consensus for implementing Pending changes level 2 with new criteria for use.
• Following an RfC, an activity requirement is now in place for bots and bot operators.

Technical news

• When performing some administrative actions the reason field briefly gave suggestions as text was typed. This change has since been reverted so that issues with the implementation can be addressed. (T34950)
• Following the latest RfC concluding that Pending Changes 2 should not be used on the English Wikipedia, an RfC closed with consensus to remove the options for using it from the page protection interface, a change which has now been made. (T156448)
• The Foundation has announced a new community health initiative to combat harassment. This should bring numerous improvements to tools for admins and CheckUsers in 2017.

Arbitration

• The Arbitration Committee released a response to the Wikimedia Foundation's statement on paid editing and outing.

Obituaries

• JohnCD (John Cameron Deas) passed away on 30 December 2016. John began editing Wikipedia seriously during 2007 and became an administrator in November 2009.

---

Discuss this newsletter • Subscribe • Archive

13:37, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Database reports/Uncategorized categories/Configuration

To editors Brandon and MZMcBride: This database report script consistently returns a few non-existent categories, as well as Category:Contents, which is uncategorized by design. Any chance of one of you modifying the script to prevent this? Not a big problem, just wondering. —swpb^T 15:51, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

Hi swpb. It's certainly possibly to do additional filtering on the database report output to account for the "zombie" database rows and to remove "Category:Contents". The relevant code is here, I believe: <https://github.com/mzmcbride/database-reports/blob/073bfb5ed9e4baaf0549007b59c9d343f5385d47/reports/general/uncatcats.py>. I doubt Brandon or I will be quick to fix this. --MZMcBride (talk) 16:48, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

Ultra-Conservative listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Ultra-Conservative. Since you had some involvement with the Ultra-Conservative redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion if you have not already done so. - CHAMPION ^{(talk) (contributions) (logs)} 02:54, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

ArbCom 2017 election voter message

Hello, Brandon. Voting in the 2017 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 10 December. All users who registered an account before Saturday, 28 October 2017, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Wednesday, 1 November 2017 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2017 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:42, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

CONFUSION IN AN ARTICLE

Hello i need authorization to modify an article in wikipedia about naturism because this topic is confusing and need to be modified, what shall i do? Sincerly, Naturista2018 (talk) 15:45, 23 May 2018 (UTC)

ArbCom 2018 election voter message

Hello, Brandon. Voting in the 2018 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 3 December. All users who registered an account before Sunday, 28 October 2018, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Thursday, 1 November 2018 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2018 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:42, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

Bot Approvals Group inactivity notice

Hi Brandon,

Please see Wikipedia_talk:Bot_Approvals_Group#Bulk_inactivity_removals regarding our new activity requirements based on the recent RFC. This will impact your BAG membership, unless you meet the activity requirements in the next 7 days. SQL^{Query me!} 00:54, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

In the spirit of the principle of least privilege, please remove me whenever convenient. Brandon (talk) 10:24, 18 December 2018 (UTC)