User talk:Mdennis (WMF)

Question for you

Hi Maggie, I pinged you here but I'm not sure whether it worked. There is a proposal to create a new arbitrator usergroup which would include the ability to see the CheckUser log (checkuser-log), the suppression log (suppressionlog) and overighted entries in the abuse filter log (abusefilter-hidden-log). The question is, would the WMF allow the CU and OS rights to be unbundled in this way? Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 03:41, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

I will pursue, Callanecc, and get back with you ASAP. :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 14:40, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

Hello, Callanecc. I realize that the discussion has now closed, but fwiw the WMF would not block this. --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 21:02, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

Contributions Team

Hey Mdennis, I was looking around Wikipedia today, and I came across the Contributions Team. I noticed it was inactive, and it did interest me, and I was just wondering if you knew of anything like that that is still active? Thanks, JQTriple7 (talk) 10:08, 27 November 2015 (UTC)

Hi, JQTriple7. :) I've really heard nothing about that initiative since signing up as willing to help facilitate as staff in 2011, which is a shame, because I think that could have gone good places. I suspect it needed a couple of people who were willing and able to drive it. Staff focus these days tends to be more on global initiatives, but that doesn't mean there's not a place for strong, community-driven focuses on individual projects and that staff can't find ways to assist with them.

In terms of what is still active, you might want to check out Outreach wiki, where education,GLAM and Wikipedia Loves Libraries outreach is documented. These groups work on projects to increase contribution in more focused areas than the general improvement envisioned by the Contributions Team. :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 13:58, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

It is a shame... I've been looking around and found quite a few of these projects, but they are all defunct or inactive. Would love to see something like it again, though. JQTriple7 ^talk 00:48, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

Question

Would it be possible to devise some sort of hover box or color scheme or some such thing like that to allow people looking at the user rights log to see what rights a user has if they don't have a box checked for the tool but have it as apart of bundle? For example, I don't have "rollback" checked, but I do have the tool because its part of the admin kit. Adding a hover box or a green background on lines for rights I have but do not have checked could be useful in helping people see what tools contributors have and have not. TomStar81 (Talk) 11:52, 28 November 2015 (UTC)

Hi, TomStar81. :) I would imagine it's entirely possible, but will always be a question of who would develop it (a tool that community could put together? WMF engineers?) and at what priority. The WMF generally takes on tech needs that serve a broad need that require resourcing community hackers do not have (either because the job is complicated or because there's just not volunteers who combine the skills and interest). This is the kind of work that m:Community Tech is designed to do, if there is demand, but they are currently in the voting stage of proposals already submitted to them. (If you're interested in voting on any of the open proposals, I'd recommend popping by m:2015 Community Wishlist Survey.)

Possibly the next step in pursuing a request like that would be filing a Phabricator feature request. mw:How to report a bug talks a bit about how. :) You might want to check at WP:VPT first to see if there's anybody aware of work already being done on such a feature. --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 13:46, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

Removal of copyright violation words from If You Give a Mouse a Cookie

Hi Mdennis (WMF), I have added some words about the above at Talk:If You Give a Mouse a Cookie as a comment/response to an ip who talked of the violation. Hope this is okay? ps. i like kittens as well as mice

Coolabahapple (talk) 06:04, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

As do I, Coolabahapple! :) And thank you. I wasn't aware that the copyright issue had been seen by anyone except the publisher. :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 12:41, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

DMCA takedown notice on Ranking of Universities in the United Kingdom

Hi Maggie,

Thank you for leaving an explanation behind on my talk page as to why parts of my edits had to be removed.

Sorry, I realised beforehand that the Times/Sunday Times rankings were under a DMCA takedown notice however I thought that it would've been permissible given that the Milkround posts the top 50 universities according to the Times/Sunday Times with no paywall and because all 12 of those universities had the Times/Sunday Times ranking on their respective wikipedia pages. Would it be possible to just say that the university is within the top 3/5/10 according to the Times/Sunday Times ranking? Otherwise, the third column of the table would look awkward. EmyRussell (talk) 16:08, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Hi, EmyRussell. :) I can understand why you might draw that conclusion. Lack of paywall doesn't mean they don't have license for the use - nor, conversely, that they do. They may be hosting it in violation just as we once did. But even if they do have license, the copyright holder gets to decide who may host the material and under what conditions. They can display it for free at one site and refuse to display it at all at another if they choose. Additionally, mention within articles that a school holds a ranking on the list is different from creating the list, as WP:TOP100 notes.

The Wikimedia Foundation legal team is not able to give legal advice on specific content, unfortunately, so they cannot opine on whether this might infringe on copyright. But I did ask them if - if such statements were made - we would be required to remove them from the article under the existing DMCA. While a partial recreation of the table (even an updated one) does require removal under that DMCA, such general statements would not be, although if the publisher challenged the use of the material it might need to be removed as well.

In terms of whether it's a good idea to include, I'll note that I am active in copyright work in my volunteer role, but because of my involvement with this article on behalf of the WMF, I cannot opine on the question of compliance with policy or guideline here. I'd have to recuse myself from that role. You might want to ask for feedback at WT:Copyright problems if you have concerns. --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 20:58, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Hi Maggie,

Thank for your quick reply and looking into this more! :) In that case, I will make no further edits on the table.

I would just like to inform you that I have come across other wikipedia pages such as Golden triangle and Russell Group which may also be in violation of the DMCA in case you would like to take a look. Thanks for your time! EmyRussell (talk) 18:43, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

NPP on other Wiikis

Hi Maggie. I wonder if you could find out for me what the French and German Wikipedias call their New Page Patrol / New Page Curation systems so that I can take a look and compare. I am trilingual but without knowing what they call them I don't know where to start. Many thanks. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 04:47, 20 December 2015 (UTC)

Hi, Kudpung กุดผึ้ง. German seems to be linked from the languages list at Wikipedia:New_pages_patrol - Wikipedia:Eingangskontrolle. I don't know about the French, but can ask a French colleague if he knows. :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 13:13, 21 December 2015 (UTC)

Fair-use status of Timed Text

Hello Mdennis, would you take a look at Wikipedia_talk:Non-free_content#Fair-use_status_of_Timed_Text, regarding the fair use status of Timed Text (the literal captions for audio and video files). Thank you, — xaosflux ^Talk 13:02, 21 December 2015 (UTC)

Responded there, but inquiry sent. :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 13:13, 21 December 2015 (UTC)