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Wikipedia:Simple talk/Archive 128

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Extension of Wikipedia Asian Month contest

In consideration of a week-long internet block in Iran, Wikipedia Asian Month 2019 contest has been extended for a week past November. The articles submitted till 7th December 2019, 23:59 UTC will be accepted by the fountain tools of the participating wikis.

Please help us translate and spread this message in your local language.

Wikipedia Asian Month International Team

--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 14:16, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

So far, I think there are just the two of us here on Simple. Anyone else want to join in now that we have extra time? --Gotanda (talk) 00:36, 2 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Ask for help

Can someone move User:轻语者/Li Yugang to Li Yugang without preserving the redirect? If possible, please give me suggestions on improving this article, thanks. 轻语者 (talk) 15:22, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think it's quite ready for mainspace. It needs categories, for one thing. It also needs copy editing for grammar, clarity, and spelling. Also, only admins can do a move like this without preserving the redirect, but if a redirect is left you can just ask for it to be deleted via quick deletion. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:37, 27 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

186.193.52.83

This new IP user 186.193.52.83 has gone on a quest to create a lot of redirect pages. Most seem unnecessary and many give multiple level and circular redirects. As an example try North American English. I am not sure what should be done. The IP address is in Brazil, no idea if that is relevant. Brian R Hunter (talk) 05:25, 2 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The user has been blocked and all the pages he created have been deleted. -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 16:29, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Book sources special page

The search an ISBN number page Special:Booksources produces three destinations AddALL, Barnes & Noble, and Amazon.com. These are all US suppliers. Is it possible to add other sites e.g. Amazon.co.uk, waterstones.com, and so on? -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 16:27, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah that is the default from mediawiki. I have done some work and it is global now. -DJSasso (talk) 17:04, 3 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
thanks... all ok now -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 13:52, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

it used to be that we had to / could add language links. Now it is apparently done automatically. This can be a problem. For example, Aport (a variety of apple) is linked to an English Wikipedia page about nautical terms. How can I, a human and not a bot, correct this and similar errors? Kdammers (talk) 12:52, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Kdammers: Below the languages link should be a change links link... this allow you to change/correct/add language links. I've look at EN: and there is nothing about the apple, aport is a redirect page to the ship thing. I suggest you create the apple page on EN: -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 13:43, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Kdammers: Language links are now kept on Wikidata. It looks like Zaxxon0 made the incorrect link. I have removed it. I don't see an article on enwiki for this apple. If there is one on another Wikipedia, you can make the link. I have a list of the steps for doing this at User:Auntof6/How to#Interwiki language links for new pages. If you have any questions, feel free to ask. --Auntof6 (talk) 15:20, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Help regarding article creation

I have recently created the article Jamie Vardy. But I have spotted out some problems which I am unfamiliar to. One of the major issues is that it does not link to the articles of the person in other languages which makes it accessibility poor. Your help will be much appreciated. Please make sure to state what you did to make that happen as that will help me in future projects. Thanks for your attention. ClumsyMind (talk) 14:40, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@ClumsyMind: It looks like the links are there now. For future reference, you can make these links following the steps described at User:Auntof6/How to#Interwiki language links for new page
One other thing: that page needs further work to be appropriate for this wiki, such as using the categories we have here and using the headings we use. You can find help for this at Wikipedia:How to copy from another Wikipedia. --Auntof6 (talk) 15:28, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Auntof6 Actually I don't get the latter sentence in your reply. I have read the article you suggested. But actually I am not copying anything from Wikipedia other than statistics and I verify that too from [1]. I think the article is ready but if you find any fault then you are free to report me on my talk page. Once again, Thanks. ClumsyMind (talk) 16:20, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
What she was trying to get at was that we don't use "External links" here. We use "Other websites". And you put a number of red linked categories on the page, we don't put red linked categories on pages and we don't create categories here until we have at a bare minimum three articles, but ideally many more. -DJSasso (talk) 18:14, 4 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Ask for help

Can everyone close Wikipedia:Requests for deletion/Requests/2019/Idiot? I found this request when checking my recent edits and I didn't remember this behavior. Thank you. 轻语者 (talk) 09:39, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

as it is, it will run for another week; there are no comments or votes on it yet. Also note that other Wikipedias have articles on 'idiot', so we might end up keeping the article. --Eptalon (talk) 09:42, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
No I mean: I don't have the impression of mentioning or deleting this page. And I don't think the reason is true. So can someone else close the request? 轻语者 (talk) 13:35, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I know on the English Wikipedia, there is Earwig's copyright violation detector. Is there an equivalent tool for the Simple English Wikipedia where I can check new articles for copyright violations? If there isn't any, I am willing to ask the developer of the tool to make one for Simple English Wikipedia. Please ping me in your response. Interstellarity (talk) 23:36, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

AFAIK, you should be able to use that tool here. Masumrezarock100 (talk) 23:38, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Masumrezarock100: Thank you. Is there a user script where I can link it on the top bar or the sidebar? Interstellarity (talk) 23:40, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I use m:MoreMenu to add link to that tool and other tools. Not sure if this will work here though since the language is same (en). I can create a script if you want. Masumrezarock100 (talk) 23:43, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Masumrezarock100: Have you tried it yourself? If you have no success, you can make a script that will make it work. Interstellarity (talk) 23:45, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
My apologies for not checking it. MoreMenu seems to work fine and it links to the correct page. You should be able to use Copyvio detector tool. Masumrezarock100 (talk) 23:53, 7 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Masumrezarock100: Thank you for your help. Interstellarity (talk) 00:03, 8 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Be careful using it here as many of our pages will closely match en.wiki and are not necessarily copyright violations. -DJSasso (talk) 16:54, 10 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Why can't the page on Communism be edited?

Wikipedia says, "very few pages are blocked from editing." Why is Communism in this special class of subjects that can't be edited by the public? Does Wikipedia think the concepts of Communism are so perfect they are above repoach? Communism is not above reproach. The fact I am not allowed to edit this page is one of the reasons I don't donate money to Wikipedia, and I am PROUD not to do so. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2603:3024:16cd:8000:a185:22ea:6a62:7d49 (talk • contribs)

It can be edited by anyone, you are on the wrong wiki if you think its protected form editing here. Assuming you are talking about English wikipedia, IP editors are blocked from editing it there due to the high percentage of vandalism on the page. If you want to edit the page you are required to have an account. -DJSasso (talk) 16:19, 13 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Donations

Can Wikipedia make a Venmo for donations? I feel like that would make it super easy to donate. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.62.73.156 (talk • contribs) 01:49, 14 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, and Welcome to wikipedia! Wikimedia already has its own donation page, which accepts Card, PayPal, and Amazon Pay. Hope that helped! rollingbarrels (talk) 00:00, 16 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Cousin

I've had a look at our page and at the En wiki version. It seems to me that our page is too detailed and too verbal. In contrast, the En wiki page used diagrams more and seems easier to understand. They have obviously put a lot of work into it. I think we should move towards their version. Comments? Macdonald-ross (talk) 12:24, 19 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. The charts on the enwiki version are especially helpful. Desertborn (talk) 13:12, 19 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I've cut most of the prose out. The second diagram got from En wiki seems to do the job well. Maybe we don't even need the first diagram. Macdonald-ross (talk) 07:31, 21 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

How to compare same category vs. en.wp

I've created the Category:People with multiple sclerosis and am populating it by manually adding the category to individual pages (14 15 thus far). The same category exists in the English WP, presently with 137 pages. My query: is there an automated method for checking which of those pages has a page in other WPs, specifically Simple English? -- Cheers, Deborahjay (talk) 16:11, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Deborahjay: See quarry:query/40792 (you can customize it). I added remaining pages to the category. Ahmadtalk 20:31, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

How do I upload a file to the Simple English Wikipedia instead of the Wikimedia Commons?

I want to upload an image to the Simple English Wikipedia instead of the Wikimedia Commons because though it is copyrighted it is the subject of an article and I believe it qualifies for fair use. How do I do this? Beaneater (contact me) (see my edits) 21:15, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

We do not have local uploading. Vermont (talk) 22:45, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Where do I put a quick deletion template if I want to delete an article? How are these templates formatted?

I am familiar with the quick deletion criteria but am not sure about the proper way to go about requesting quick deletion.

Beaneater (contact me) (see my edits) 05:08, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Beaneater00: put the quick deletion template at the start of the article. Format it like this: {{qd|qd reason(may be the number or a custom reason)}}. You can use Wikipedia's Twinkle tool once you are autoconfirmed so that it is easier to do so. Just hover above "TW" and select "QD". I hope this helps you. Nigos (talk · contribs) 05:38, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Please do not use a custom reason. Quick deletions can be done only for cases that fit one of the defined QD criteria. If a case does not fit any of them, you can use the RFD process. If it's something really obvious that does not fit, you can try asking at WP:AN for a deletion; an admin may or may not delete the page based on such a request. --Auntof6 (talk) 08:29, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Also, put it on the main article page, not the talk page as you did with Gurnard. In the case of that article I have started a discussion on the talk page to suggest merging with Gurnard, Isle of Wight, a better solution that just deleting the page. Brian R Hunter (talk) 10:19, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Duplicte page due to name misspelling, requires merge?

We presently have:

How to resolve this? I made the interwiki link in Wikidata to the misspelled page, anticipating a move after merge or whatever needs to be done. -- Cheers, Deborahjay (talk) 18:55, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I did try by renaming the redirect but there is no option not to leave a redirect page to it... so I put it back again. Looks like it needs an admin to do this. Brian R Hunter (talk) 19:39, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Move done. Thanks for catching the duplicate. --Auntof6 (talk) 20:57, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Curious about something

Why was Dino249 blocked? It doesn't seem like his latest account did anything notable.--Derpdart56 (talk) 22:27, 1 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Derpdart56: We don't seem to have that user registered here. Could it be that they were blocked on a different site? --Auntof6 (talk) 00:39, 2 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Remember Tobecloud? That sock? What did his original account get blocked for?--Derpdart56 (talk) 16:13, 2 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Derpdart56: ToBeCloud was blocked for being a sockpuppet of Dino245, who was blocked per the one-strike rule, who was blocked from ENwiki due to abusing multiple accounts (i.e. creating sockpuppets). Computer Fizz (talk) 01:44, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hi everyone. Is there a tool to change references from a link to a fully formatted entry? They have that on the English Wikipedia. Sociable Song (talk) 06:53, 2 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Sociable Song:Wikipedia:Refill works here too, just choose the language to be simple and that's okay. For me I use citer also. Hope this helps. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 07:06, 2 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

More admins needed

Looking at the new changes, I think we surely need more admins. Of course, we do have active admins, but the thing is that we need more. 2019 is over with zero successful nominations for advanced permissions (administrator, bureaucrat, checkuser and oversighter). I see vandals and/or disruptive editors, disrupting Wikipedia, and we can do nothing but to revert their edits, and they may repeat it many, many times - with no online admin to take care of them. A steward just took action and blocked (then glocked) a vandal who just wouldn't stop vandalizing Wikipedia. We have also opted-out of global sysop user group, so global sysops can do nothing with their tools here. So, as a newbie here, I see only three ways to solve this:

  1. To start recruiting new admins; and/or
  2. To opt-in the global sysop user group; and/or
  3. To create another user group called eliminators with limited administrative rights

I personally do not suggest the second and third way at all. I've been at the Persian Wikipedia, where the community had a "no-admin" problem. Instead of choosing more admins, the community decided to create a new user group called "eliminators", with certain administrative rights. The result of the decision is that becoming an eliminator is practically a requirement for becoming an admin (more bureaucracy), and that the community doesn't support adminship requests easily (again, more bureaucracy). I personally think it's a bad thing, because admin right is not a big deal and should be granted to trusted and competent users easily. So, as a newbie here, I wanted to invite experienced and established users to nominate themselves for admin right, since I don't see anyone doing it, and I think every project needs some new administrators every once in a while to be "fresh". Ahmadtalk 20:17, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The user we are talking about, it a well-known LTA, and I can't remember when he made productive edits any more. The other one (which I just blocked beforehand) is probably unrelated to the LTA. This is a small wiki, where we have realtively many admins compared to the number of active editors. We opted ot of global sysop, as we wanted that local people (who know the procedures, which are sometimes different) take care of the situation. In my opinion, of the options you cite, only number 3 is viable; as it adds more bureaucracy, we are unlikely to adopt it. We also need to look at how often such situations occur (to my knowledge there are only a handful of die-hard LTAs). --Eptalon (talk) 20:31, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
And you have not been part of the wiki for very long. If we feel the need, we will take action, but it will be editors who have contributed over time who will be best placed to judge this. Macdonald-ross (talk) 20:41, 6 January 2020 (UTC).[reply]
I see, I'm not a long-term contributor to this project yet. I don't think that things here are too slow, but I think more admins are always useful for the project. More admins usually mean more eyes on the wiki, and that can help in emergencies. This is not limited to this recent LTA. It's a "general" thing, in my humble opinion. I think administrative tasks aren't limited to backlogs. A part of it is checking recent changes to see if there is anything wrong going on. I know, that might sound like "perfection", and I know it somehow is, but I think it's possible, especially in small and medium projects like Simple English Wikipedia. Also, sometimes the project needs an immediate action, such as blocking a vandal who just does not stop. In such cases, I see little or no benefit in getting into edit wars with the vandal, as they will revert your edit again and again. I mean, having more admins doesn't hurt, but will certainly help us, in my humble opinion. Ahmadtalk 22:12, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I will say it's absolutely undeniably true that we need more admins, period. There have been as many as 37 pending QD requests at one time, vandals going eleven days without being blocked, it's starting to get ridiculous.
As for the eliminators group, the problem with admins is that "no big deal" doesn't really apply in 2020 with all the dangerous permissions admins have gotten. When someone creates an RfA, you have to ask yourself, "Do I trust this person to edit the main page?", "Do I trust this person to import pages?", "Do I trust this person to run JavaScript code on my computer?", and a bunch of other stuff that makes adminship more of a big deal than it originally was. The eliminator group, while possibly creating more bureaucracy in that implementation, is an interesting idea to tinker with to allow trusted editors to take care of vandals without having access to the full mop. If I remember correctly, I've heard about some other WMF wikis that allow rollbackers to delete pages under 5,000 edits, and block users from editing. You may think I'm biased with that implementation as I myself am a rollbacker, but I've had this opinion before I even had rollback, and that it would be better geared toward there than patroller, due to the nature of their already existing roles.
I've asked to nominate other people for admin and they always decline, but I haven't nominated myself at all because of paranoia. If anyone doesn't have any major objections to me being an admin, I may try nominating myself in the coming days. I've heard the concern from Eptalon that there are a perfectly fine amount of admins, but in practice the experience seems to differ.Computer Fizz (talk) 21:07, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Admins can't edit JavaScript pages, that's something only interface admins can do (we don't have any local interface admins, so I think only global interface editors can do it here). But yes, that can be a dangerous thing, says the user from fawiki, a project where a trusted user once (before interface admin right being introduced) used project's main JavaScript to mine cryptocurrencies. However, I still think administrative rights aren't that sensitive for trusted users. Of course, one may block everyone, delete the main page and fill it with nonsense, but for how long? There will be an emergency removal of tools by stewards, and an indefinite block, of course. Besides, we don't see many of them - just few users that can be dealt with easily. Many members of this small group do not abuse their rights so that they won't have it removed. In a recent case at English Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons, a sockpuppeter admin was blocked indefinitely, though, as far as I know, they didn't abuse their tools. I can't remember any case of such abuse in recent years (except once, by a template editor, at Persian Wikipedia; he is currently glocked by WMF's office action). I mean, if we choose good users, we will most probably never face such abuse of rights.
Well yes, in theory, having an eliminator user group seems to be a very good idea. However, I personally think it is not. As time goes by, almost all trusted users gradually request for this right and get it. It actually results in a weird situation. Some administrative backlogs, such as QD, will be handled mainly (or only) by eliminators, and that will result in admins becoming inactive. At the same time, since eliminators don't have access to some administrative tools, they can't do their job perfectly. Since admins are no longer very active, eliminators need to wait for a long time to solve a small issue. This can be more serious here, as Simple English Wikipedia is a rather small project with a smaller active community. So, if all rollbackers here are going to get the eliminator flag gradually, why shouldn't we just grant them the mop? It's not really a big deal in my opinion, even for 2020.
I see no concerns here, and I think you should self-nominate yourself for adminship. Anyways, we surely need some boldness in this area! Besides, the whole RfA thing is not a big deal either ;) Ahmadtalk 22:12, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Interface Admins is a temporary flag here granted only for specific tasks for a short period of time which is why you don't see any listed. As for your comment about not seeing many bad admins, we have actually had a number on this wiki. Smaller wikis are especially prone to them because its easier to manipulate the voting process. Often through drive by voting from editors not familiar with a users edit history on this wiki or through other worse means like specific canvassing. We have removed a number of admins here in the past. Generally here we view getting adminship as a bigger deal in some ways then even en.wiki does (which at this point is nearly impossible). In a small community like this often the bigger issue isn't about how they will treat the tools as much as how much they fit with the community and interact with the community, an admin can cause huge damage on a wiki with a lower editor count without ever abusing the actual tools.-DJSasso (talk) 12:30, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
For #1, everyone is free to nominate themself or someone else, rest is up to the community. #2 and #3 are not feasible and may cause problems in the future. We have discussed #2 plenty of times already and adding eliminators will increase bureaucracy so I suggest people go for adminship instead, there really isn't much difference.--BRP ever 22:00, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. The proper solution, in my opinion, is nothing but choosing more admins. Other solutions will solve the issue temporarily, but will create a greater issue: a community not willing to grant the admin rights to its trusted users. Ahmadtalk 22:14, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at the numbers, we are probably at the level where 30-40% of the active, non-vandal regular editors have the admin flag (not talking about bureaucrat,checkuser, oversighter). While we have actually worked out a guideline (Criteria for Adminship), I think it is important to make sure those becoming admins are trusted editors, and that the level of admins to active,regular editors does not grow much more). In short: If we want more (active,regularly editing) admins, we need to grow our base of active, regular editors as well. --Eptalon (talk) 22:50, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
As a rollbacker and editor I think that we do not need another category of admin-type user. I do not see any excess delay on qd pages and current admins do an excellent job. My main issue that I see too little content creation compared with vandal activity. So encouraging more content creators would be good. I know that it is controversial to suggest it but requiring account registration to edit pages would stop a lot a vandals and free up time to create valid content. How much content is added by IP users? -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 23:31, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
No, we cannot limit page creation to registered users only here, as we have very productive IP editors here. It will not work like commons / enwp. I certainly hate to have an AFC system here if we do ACPERM. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:11, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Ahmad252: That's an interesting thing to mention about how Eliminators may hurt admins. However, wouldn't that mean the existance of admins would retire bureaucrats? It's an interesting thing that can't be seen without actual in-practice, but of course adding and deleting user groups certainly aren't something to be "experimenting" with. I have also nominated myself for admin like you recommended to--the entire community's input is requested there. I now think it may be most wise to change the existing groups instead of trying to create new ones. While I've heard importing pages can corrupt the DB if used maliciously, I'm not entirely sure about that. Computer Fizz (talk) 23:40, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Brian R Hunter: Not requiring account creation is in the founding statement, it would require a lot to change that (like meta-layer). It's not entirely known how much constructive edits are done by IP users (the last good statistic was in February 2007). But I am fairly sure this wiki is much higher than most others. Computer Fizz (talk) 23:40, 6 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Computer Fizz: Yes, I was not really proposing the blanket ban, it would need a very long debate by the community and is not needed unless the vandalism to content creation proportions got too much to manage. It would be interesting to have stats on edits by IP, edits by account and rolled back/undone proportions. If someone would like to write the code. Brian R Hunter (talk) 00:23, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Brian R Hunter: That's not something a machine can determine easily. I am writing code to do that (gathering automated data then using humans to fill the rest) for ENwiki. I could try doing the same for simplewiki once that's finished. Computer Fizz (talk) 00:25, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Computer Fizz: That sounds interesting. I am a programmer, so if I can be of assistance please let me know. Brian R Hunter (talk) 00:33, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Brian R Hunter: More "content-user"s are surely appreciated on any project, and we surely have problems in that field. I'll personally try to do some content work every once in a while, but we do need more people doing that. About restricting IPs completely, I think it's not possible, and I personally oppose it because I think they are not that harmful. However, I think restricting IPs from creating new pages is a good idea. In addition, I think even if the community accepts that, WMF won't.
@Computer Fizz: Bureaucrats are somehow different. They have just a handful of tasks to do; things like granting adminship or bot flag, and these aren't "urgent" matters. Admins and 'crats have little effect on each other in my opinion, because their tasks don't overlap. Importing pages can harm things, but good-faith admins who aren't familiar with technical stuff usually don't use it at all, and because of its slow nature, any kind of bad-faith abuse can be dealt with, without huge damage to the project. And thanks for self-nominating for adminship. On a side note, do we have a en:Template:Centralized discussion-stuff for important news? Ahmadtalk 08:40, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
We don't need crats, nor IA or coders to implement accounts only page creation, enwp model can be adopted or commons, it should be a local consensus and then to fabricator. However, WMF will for sure push back, enwp managed to do so by having AFC, Draftspace which I think clearly cannot work here and too much bureaucracy. We do have local IA rights, it can be granted by crats to themselves or admins for temp period only for very specific tasks. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:15, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah Template Interface Editors is a temporary flag here, only granted when needed for a specific task. -DJSasso (talk) 11:52, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • I will just say I find current balance of admins vs non-admins quite reasonable, but yes, we can use the help of some users here, I have some in mind. my criterion is basically they have a clue and not a jerk, with good distribution of maintenance work as well as content creation which close to 50% of our new articles are created by that handful of editors. I will oppose this to be GS wiki as GS will not understand the nuances well (although we have many of our admins holding GS or even Stewards). I will not think eliminator is a good idea, we tend to need blocking more than deletion. I will say the lack of content creators and maintainers is worse than admins.--Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:09, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with this comment by Camouflaged Mirage, so will support it rather than making my own statement. Desertborn (talk) 18:13, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • This entire section is a perfect example of why GS is not a good fit for this wiki, people coming from other wiki's especially English often don't understand the culture of this wiki and end up causing endless amounts of headaches here. Our amount of admins if anything is still too high for the number of active editors we have here. Currently more than half of our active editors are admins. Very rarely does vandalism sit too long, certainly judging by the Christmas holiday period is not a very accurate determination that we don't catch things fast enough as that is always going to be a time of the year when things aren't as quick to be caught. More admins are not always a good solution, in the past we had many more admins, and the number of admins we had actually caused many problems. So much so that one of the reasons we eventually came up with an inactivity policy was so that we could cut down on the number of admins we had through attrition. And I definitely don't want an eliminators group, we already have a bad enough issue with bad deletions by admins, nevermind giving that right to more users who aren't admins. -DJSasso (talk) 11:42, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Lol "37 pending QD requests at one time, vandals going eleven days without being blocked, it's starting to get ridiculous" - I'm still nervously awaiting the decision on my Patroller request from almost 3 years ago XD --Crasstun (talk | contributions) 13:35, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • To be fair, and I can't speak for other admins, but that was likely not done because you haven't done a tonne of article creation here yet on which to judge. Patroller requires a history of content creation here in order to be granted it. -DJSasso (talk) 14:02, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • I also have to say that I clear the quick deletion requests every morning; usually we have 8-12 pages threre, but as you say: I have seen up to about 30 pages. That said: A QD request is rarely time-critical, most of them are what I'd call "Graffitti". Most, if not all get cleared within a day or two. The real problem of this wiki is not that vandalism is not being dealt with in a timely manner, the real problem is that we need to increase the number of active regulars from currently 25-30. Doubling, within half a year would be nice, but that's probably wishful thinking.--Eptalon (talk) 20:04, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Eptalon: True, it's not absolutely time-sensitive in the minutes, but it still would be nice to have them cleared fast. Longest time I've seen was about 36 hours once before Macdonald-ross cleared them. If you want more people editing this wiki though, there's not much to do here obviously (i.e. preaching to the choir, everyone here already edits the wiki). One place to start would most likely be the english wikipedia. There was talk about having some sorry of embassy there, but I don't know if that ever got finished. Computer Fizz (talk) 20:10, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I surely see a pattern of backlog-clearing here, which is a good thing and I do appreciate it. I was more focused on "urgent" tasks - things like persistent vandals, LTAs etc. It's normal for admins not be online all the day long, and there's nothing wrong with it, so I obviously QD backlogs, and generally, deletion backlogs, are usually non-urgent matters (unless, for example, some LTA decides to out experienced users). But yes, we surely do have a lack of active users. I think that might be a result of people not being familiar with Simple English Wikipedia. Ahmadtalk 21:28, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
ok i can see this is an emergency, so i am ready. make me admin and i will save the wiki :) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.77.212.17 (talk • contribs)
Not sure we really have an issue with "urgent" issues either. It is pretty rare for us not to catch LTAs, persistent vandals pretty quickly. On the rare occasion that we don't because we happen to have a gap where none are around usually a steward does it for us. The biggest reason I hear from editors on English wiki as to why they don't come here to edit is that most editors on here are just here to play the game of wack a vandal or are just rearranging deck chairs in terms of the gnome like tasks they do. Most of them say they would give Simple a try if the editors here would actually focus on article content rather than administrative like stuff. The only way we are ever going to attract more editors here is to improve our articles. Until we do that, we will continue to be the wiki known as the place where people come to try and collect hats so they can take the step to the "real" english wikipedia or to stewardship etc. Or where they come to try and refurbish their reputation to return to en.wiki after being blocked there. A minor comment on the QD discussion, QD really just means a delete with a lack of discussion, it is not going to be instant all the time, nor should it be sometimes. Sometimes admins leave articles they themselves don't feel comfortable deleting so that other admins can look at them. The number of articles in QD are very rarely an issue, and it should never be a race to make sure they are deleted (excepting exceptionally bad stuff, libel etc obviously). That being said that QD queue rarely fills up that much. Eptalon usually takes care in the mornings Euro time. I end up covering early morning to late afternoon NA time. And a number of people cover the evenings NA time and there are a few who generally take care of Asia time. I don't really buy that you saw a tonne of QDs sitting for 36 hours. You might see an individual one which admins have not yet made a decision on. -DJSasso (talk) 02:37, 8 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I previously gave some of my thoughts in the ongoing RfA, so I am not going to repeat myself here; a point about the QD situation though - as highlighted above, quick deletion does not mean "quick" in the time sensitive sense. It is meant to be an alternative to the RfD process so that the community does not waste their time debating whether to delete an obviously nonsensical article. On the surface it may appear that EN is doing a better job than us at processing CSD candidates (if we were to calculate based on a CSD candidate/total articles ratio), but that would be looking at the wrong place on EN. Non-autoconfirmed editors are no longer allowed to create new articles, so that's where the Draft namespace (and en:Wikipedia:WikiProject Articles for creation) comes in. There are currently 3700+ pending submissions (that is to say, Draft articles waiting for an experienced editor to review/re-review), with a 4+ month backlog. Chenzw  Talk  13:53, 8 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Interface administrators

I have added a bit more to the above page, and clarified what this WMF-wide change means (and does not mean) for users ("editing technical information" is not really a good way to describe the user group). As it is now, this group can only be added by a bureaucrat. Discussion on how this right is handled can be found on Wikipedia:Simple talk/Archive 124, though I think it is safe that there is general agreement (from ST and current practice) to handle it in the same way as how flood is handled (i.e. a temporary right given on a as-needed basis).

If the expansion of the page looks fine, it would be great if another administrator can go ahead and tag it with {{policy}}, to close the loop here. Chenzw  Talk  17:52, 9 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Looks fine, you didn't change the intent at all. We must have forgot to put the tag on after the discussion on how to handle it. But its there now. -DJSasso (talk) 18:05, 9 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Normal administrators are still able to edit JSON, just not CSS and JS based on Special:ListGroupRights. I added this bit from the page footnotes to make it clearer. To be honest, why some still think it's technical is that it was originally called technical admins (on meta discussion page and elsewhere) and then WMF changes it to interface admins. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 18:27, 9 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Good catch. -DJSasso (talk) 18:36, 9 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Help with fancy code maths

Could anyone better at wikicode than me tell me why the time generator at Wikipedia:One hundred and seventy-five thousand articles isn't working? Beaneater (contact me) (see my edits) 05:39, 13 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Beaneater00: You are dividing by zero because you include "({{NUMBEROFARTICLES:R}} - 153469" and we have 153,469 articles now. It's not clear to me what kind of formula you are trying to have... Please write out the formula using just numbers and operands and I can help you. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 05:50, 13 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Koavf: I have fixed the problem by removing the - 153469 part from the equation. Thanks for alerting me to this. Beaneater (contact me) (see my edits) 05:59, 13 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Request for permission question

A few weeks back I submitted an unsuccessful request for rollback. Prior to reapplying I'd expect the last request needs to be archived so as not to overwrite it/remove it from the record. Are past requests archived on a schedule, or is that something I would be able to move to an archive page myself? I couldn't find any information about the process on the related pages. Thanks, Brantmeierz (talk) 21:07, 15 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see why it would need to be archived at all. If you feel you're ready, just make a request now. But I'm not actually 100% sure on this as my first request for rollback was accepted. Computer Fizz (talk) 21:14, 15 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
There's no need to archive anything immediately. Feel free to raise a new request. Chenzw  Talk  00:16, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Brantmeierz: I think I should clarify that while you are free to create a new request, you should not be removing the old request from the RFP page. There is nothing stopping a page from having the same section header, so both requests can co-exist. Chenzw  Talk  01:57, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Chenzw: Ah, that's part of what I was confused about, thanks. I restored the content from the previous request. Brantmeierz (talk) 01:59, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion on enwiki village pump about Simple English Wikipedia

I think some of you may be interested in a discussion they are having over on enwiki, so I am posting the link here.

Desertborn (talk) 10:27, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Infobox import

Hi, Could someone kindly import everything from en:Template:Infobox adult biography to Template:Infobox adult biography as the infobox here is currently using the "[[File:Example.jpg|thumb|Caption]]" format which has long been deprecated on EN,
Many thanks, –Davey2010Talk 18:32, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

That template is merged into infobox person on en. I have redirected it here too. Because of where I am editing from at the moment. I won't go to the pages and see if there is any funkiness in pages using it. But I will tonight if no one else does before me. -DJSasso (talk) 18:43, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Djsasso, Oops sorry completely missed the redirect despite visiting the infobox on EN!, Many thanks for merging/updating it,
Everything looks fine here but given I missed the redirect it's probably best you or someone else rechecks later lol,
Many thanks for your help :), –Davey2010Talk 19:07, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki Loves Folklore

 

Hello Folks,

Wiki Loves Love is back again in 2020 iteration as Wiki Loves Folklore from 1 February, 2020 - 29 February, 2020. Join us to celebrate the local cultural heritage of your region with the theme of folklore in the international photography contest at Wikimedia Commons. Images, videos and audios representing different forms of folk cultures and new forms of heritage that haven’t otherwise been documented so far are welcome submissions in Wiki Loves Folklore. Learn more about the contest at Meta-Wiki and Commons.

Kind regards,
Wiki Loves Folklore International Team
— Tulsi Bhagat (contribs | talk)
sent using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 06:15, 18 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Transnistria -> Pridnestrovie

A lot of pages, links, etc. referencing the breakaway state Transnistria have been being renamed to Pridnestrovie, which seems innocuous at face value, but seems to be a controversial change after looking into it (based on the disputed status of the territory). I checked the English Wikipedia's talk page for the subject (here) and it looks like they ran into the same controversy there in the past, and settled on using Transnistria as the page name because it's what it is most commonly known as in English. Is the consensus (or rather, lack of consensus to move) there grounds to change the references back to "Transnistria" rather than "Pridnestrovie" here as well? Brantmeierz (talk) 01:24, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

No there as not. Agreed that this is a controversial change and also one that makes this wiki more complicated (as Transnistria is the more common name). —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 01:50, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Koavf: Sorry, I'm confused as to what you were showing with that link. Are you bringing up references to that name in pages? To be more specific, the edits I'm calling into question seem to be all those of 31.31.2.57 (which is geolocated to Moldova, another reason the change may be controversial). Brantmeierz (talk) 01:56, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Brantmeierz: You asked about there being a lack of consensus to move these pages and I answered with the link, "No, no one discussed it: see how there are virtually no references to the word 'Pridnestrovie' on this wiki" and then I additionally said, "Since there was no consensus for this change and it is controversial, it should be undone". I'm sorry if the way I worded it was too implicit or if I come across as condescending here: I'm just trying to be clear. Thanks for asking. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 02:12, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Koavf: Oh, my intent with the question was more about whether the consensus on enwiki should apply to our pages here. I do get what you're saying about the absence of consensus for something controversial being grounds for change though too. And apologies if my message came across as if I thought that; I just saw the text "No there as not" on the link and was confused, and it can be hard to convey tone. I do appreciate your clarification, thank you! Brantmeierz (talk) 02:28, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Got it. We're on the same page. I think that absent a local policy on x here at simple.wp, we should generally follow en.wp, yes. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 03:33, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That is actually a guideline here WP:FOLLOW. -DJSasso (talk) 12:35, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Djsasso. I knew I've seen it in practice but didn't know there was that simple of a formal guideline. Brantmeierz (talk) 14:36, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Now it doesn't exactly apply to this situation because that guideline is talking about guidelines/policies from en as opposed to consensus based things. But as a general rule of thumb, unless there is a reason why simple is different (ie simpler english, more general page than the English one etc.) then article titles generally follow en.wiki. -DJSasso (talk) 18:16, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
┌─────────────────────────────────┘
 Hello all,by common reasoning, let's use the name 'Transnistria', because that's what the entity (country/state?) is known as in most of the world. We are talking about an unrecognized country, to my knolwedge only three other (also unrecognized) entities recognize it. No one outside the region will know it as 'Pridnestrovie'. --Eptalon (talk) 17:46, 22 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Movement Learning and Leadership Development Project

Hello

The Wikimedia Foundation’s Community Development team is seeking to learn more about the way volunteers learn and develop into the many different roles that exist in the movement. Our goal is to build a movement informed framework that provides shared clarity and outlines accessible pathways on how to grow and develop skills within the movement. To this end, we are looking to speak with you, our community to learn about your journey as a Wikimedia volunteer. Whether you joined yesterday or have been here from the very start, we want to hear about the many ways volunteers join and contribute to our movement.

To learn more about the project, please visit the Meta page. If you are interested in participating in the project, please complete this simple Google form. Although we may not be able to speak to everyone who expresses interest, we encourage you to complete this short form if you are interested in participating!

-- LMiranda (WMF) (talk) 19:01, 22 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Lack of updates on Kansas City Chiefs and Super Bowl LIV

Why on earth has nobody bothered to update the Super Bowl LIV page or the Kansas City Chiefs page? The 49ers are playing the Chiefs in the Super Bowl. You guys should go update that page and the Kansas City Chiefs page because the Chiefs will play the 49ers in the Super Bowl. —Lauren600 (talk) 02:09, 23 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Lauren600, the community unfortunately isn't as active and as large here as it could/should be. You could update it, though, if you want to. :) Vermont (talk) 02:31, 23 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Why only me? You guys can go help do it as well. --Lauren600 (talk) 02:46, 23 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
No one said only you. Everyone here is a volunteer, and they work on pages that they have the time for and interest in. If no one has the time or interest, then the updates don't get done. You apparently have the interest, so Vermont suggested that you could do it. If you don't have the time, that's fine, just don't complain about other people who also don't have the time. --Auntof6 (talk) 03:30, 23 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

"Your edit is now saved"

I think all of us will see this when we save a change here. Given we don't use edit but change here is there anyway to change it to "Your change is now saved"? Perhaps need translatewiki.net which I don't have an account there? Thanks much.--Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:45, 24 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I have made the change to MediaWiki:Postedit-confirmation-saved‎. Chenzw  Talk  10:23, 24 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
If all instances of edit are set to "change", should revertpage be set to say "Reverted changes by......."? Computer Fizz (talk) 07:31, 26 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

"Draft" merge

Hi, I've recently finished an article, however I was wondering if a few users could look it over, because this is my first ever mainspace article that I've worked on long term. Please leave a comment on my talk page, or on the article's talk page. Thanks. rollingbarrels (talk) 04:21, 25 January 2020 (UTC) ( Current Version | Draft Version )[reply]

Because nobody said anything, I'm going to move it now. Revert it if you think it's necessary. Thanks rollingbarrels (talk) 17:24, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@FNAFPUPPETMASTER: When you want feedback like this, it would help if you gave people more than two days to respond. Seven days is a common amount of time. --Auntof6 (talk) 18:14, 27 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

"movie" vs. "film" in category names

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.
  •  (change conflict)  Closing remarks: Apologies for the delay between the addition of the archiving templates and my subsequent closing remarks (basically this chunk of text you are reading now), but some discussions deserve more than a simple closing sentence, especially when they are this long (in both duration and text length). A more detailed closing statement also potentially makes the lives of future editors easier when digging into community archives.
  • Firstly I would like to note that the film vs movie debate is not an ENGVAR issue. ENGVAR, among other things, states that it is not acceptable to edit-war between styles which are both accepted styles. Quoting from Arbcom in 2006: Where Wikipedia does not mandate a specific style, editors should not attempt to convert Wikipedia to their own preferred style.
  • The community has historically supported the use of "movie" instead of "film" in article titles. While the exact reasoning behind the choice of word has changed somewhat over time (participants in RfD Log 2 preferred "movie" largely due to the fact that fewer articles were in the "film" category, though there was also mention that "movie" is simpler), it doesn't change the fact that the consensus established back then was to use "movie". Therefore it follows that article titles should not use "film", since only one of these words can be in the article title at any point of time. This is further supported by the mass rename in 2008 (Wikipedia:Simple_talk/Archive_39#American_vs._United_States), which was subsequently confirmed in a later thread (Wikipedia:Simple_talk/Archive_39#Movie/film_changes). Ironically, Truth'soutthere foresaw that this issue had the potential to cause confusion in future and suggested that a new guideline be created to specifically record the word preference. Alas, that did not happen, and formalization of the change, as far as I can tell, was limited to this diff in MOS.
  • There has been no consensus in this thread to switch to the use of "film".
  • While it is technically correct to say that the community never expressly banned the use of "film" in articles, en:MOS:ARTCON states that within a given article the conventions of one particular variety of English should be followed consistently, so it is a de facto ban on the use of the word. The point here is that the use of English varieties in articles should be internally consistent. Obvious exceptions apply such as when referring to proper nouns (e.g. various film festivals, academic journals).
  • Regarding short film: this appears to be something which the community back then did not address (and I suspect, did not anticipate at all). In the spirit of maintain it in the absence of consensus to the contrary (en:MOS:RETAIN) "short film" should not be renamed en masse to "short movie" (or vice versa) until a subsequent discussion decides on the exact usage of the term. That is not to say that "short film" is an exception to MOS. In this case the community did not decide on anything and an editor just so happened to create short film in 2015. It is worth considering whether "short film" is to be seen as a standalone noun or an adjective + noun combination.
  • Guidelines, technically speaking, have less prescriptive power compared to policy, but that is not to say that guidelines are optional. It is bad form to go against guidelines without good reason, since guidelines are the product of community consensus.
  • Special mention goes to Thrasymedes for their tireless work in digging through the community archives.

--Chenzw  Talk  15:09, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  • Addendum: since it was pointed out on my talk page (Special:PermaLink/6806518#"movie"_vs._"film"_in_category_names_closing) I should clarify that the word movie is still preferred to film in article text because "film" can have different meanings depending on the context, and thus not simple. This was alluded to in RfD Log 2, ST archive 18, and subsequently confirmed in archive 35. In fact at the time of the archive 18 discussion it appeared that editors were already copyediting "film" to "movie", though the article titles were not fully updated to reflect this, presumably due to the additional work involved in page moves. It would be more accurate to say The community has historically supported the use of "movie" instead of "film" in articles instead. Chenzw  Talk  16:58, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Are the words "movie" and "film" identical and interchangeable, or is "movie" considered simpler English? I just performed a rename move on Category:2011 anime movies because the English WP calls it en:Category:2011 anime films and I consider it preferable for the two to have an identical name. Then I saw all the subcategories here in Category:Anime movies by year, all "movies." Is there a guideline here, or guidance? Thank you, Deborahjay (talk) 20:19, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

There is no consenus on simple. Some editors are strongly of the opionion that the word film should not be used in any item on moving pictures and that we should consistently use movie. They believe that readers may be confused as the word film has other meanings than a moving picture show. Other editors have equally strong opinions that film is a universally recognised word for a moving image story, many of the awards and instituions use the word film and not movie and that the context of the article is clearly about moving pictures and not about a thin layer of coating. I think that either can be used, with film being the natural word to use for British films and movie more suited to American movies. To avoid confusion the item should include an explanation in the lead that "film is another word for movie" or "movie is another word for film". As far as categories are concerned the consistent use of movie to group films and movies seems a good idea. -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 23:30, 22 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
It is a long-standing practice here to use movie, except in things like direct quotes and proper names of things (such as Sundance Film Festival). It is not a case of British vs. American English: here in the US we use both terms. We certainly wouldn't do our ESL readers any good if we mixed the terms. The fact that new editors come here from enwiki and get tripped up by the different language used here and disagree with it does not mean there is no consensus. And keep in mind that there is no requirement that category names here match those used by enwiki. If it helps, think of Simple English as a separate language, just like Spanish is separate from English. --Auntof6 (talk) 09:10, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
As many of our readers are learning English as a second language ESL we should take every opportunity to explain potentially confusing words such as film and movie which they will come across in the real world. Deprecating a commonly used word does a diservice to those learners. We are not inventing a new language, just providing access to information to those new to English. ESL students need additional explanation not a dumbed down encyclopedia. -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 10:05, 23 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Despite the comment of Brian above long standing consensus is to use movie instead of film. And yes we treat Simple English as a distinct variation of the English language. The entire purpose of Simple English wikipedia is essentially to be a "dumbed" down version of English wikipedia in terms of the language used. We try our best to only use words from the Wikipedia:Basic English combined wordlist. However that is certainly not always practical so we often make choices on what word is the best word to use when there are multiple words for the same thing. The result is usually the words with the least ambiguity. And we would never use something like "film is another word for movie" in an article except the main movie article as that would be adding complexity and redundancy if we used it in every article where we used one or the other. Remember this wiki is about using a Simple concise subset of the English language, we aren't specifically here to teach ESL, although that is the natural outcome of using a concise shortened wordlist. -DJSasso (talk) 15:23, 30 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Although some editors claim 'consensus' I have not seen anything on simple other than the two views being put forward (see archived discussions) with no final resolution. Neither 'movie' nor 'film' exist in Wikipedia:Basic English combined wordlist and so we need to explain the use of these words. 'film' is the older word used by most of the world and in all awarding bodies such as BAFTA and Academy awards citations. 'movie' is deeemed simpler. I would be interested in any ESL teachers from the UK providing another viewpoint. As a UK teacher, I have asked friends and the consensus is that the more common word is 'film' and that it is unlikely to cause confusion when refering to motion pictures. My view is that either can be used, the preference being on context. Where there is possible confusion, explain it. Brian R Hunter (talk) 21:37, 31 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I am also of this opinion. A previous discussion was archived before most had even read my opinion, which was:

"Film" is the standard word in British English for what American English calls a movie. There's no doubt about that, and it is not ambiguous. Context in language determines meaning: many words do have more than one possible meaning. The word 'movie' sticks out like a sore thumb in a page which is otherwise in British English. We should "go with En wiki" as we do in many other debates".

Macdonald-ross (talk) 14:22, 1 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

But context is also difficult for English learners to get. That is why we try to use words that have only one meaning, or at least as few meanings as possible.
And if we always "go with enwiki" there's no reason for this work to exist. --Auntof6 (talk) 16:38, 1 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
This is exactly it, context is not simple, which is why we try to remove the need for it when possible. This is a case where we can remove the need for it. -DJSasso (talk) 12:53, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
In English 'film' has two other meanings, which are unrelated to motion picture/movie. We shouldn't complicate our lives and use 'movie' wherever possible (with the possible exception of 'film festival', as 'movie festival' looks funny). It looks like we are flogging a dead horse; most of the active regular editors agree...--Eptalon (talk) 13:16, 7 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure that 'film' having other meanings makes it more difficult for students to understand. This is because the two other meanings ('thin layer' and 'photography medium'?) are more rarely used ('photography medium' especially nowadays) and not commonly learnt until the student is more advanced. As another example, consider the word 'habit'. The 'action performed regularly' meaning is much more common than the other meanings, and children and English beginners only learn this meaning. Even if we use the word 'movie' for the noun, we still have to use the verb 'film' (e.g., in the article Babe (movie), where we say "Babe was filmed at…"). One could argue that using 'film' is simpler since we can use this for both the noun and verb, so the learner does not have to learn two unrelated words. As well as 'film festival', we also have the issue that a short film seems to be called this in all Anglophone countries. If we look at the American English corpus, 'short film' is still used much more than 'short movie' (see Ngram Viewer). I guess this is why the 'short film' article is called this despite the 'movie' policy on this wiki. Perhaps 'movie' is used more for feature films than for shorter films? Even if we look at 'film' and 'movie' in American English, 'film' (be it verb or noun) is still used over twice as many times as 'movie'. In that sense, English learners will be confronted with 'film' more (either in verb or noun form), so if we were to opt for the most common word, it would be 'film'. A popular English learning wordlist, the Oxford 3000, has both 'film' and 'movie'. I think it would be good to gather some opinions from children and beginner ESL students on this issue on what they think would be best. Although I agree Simple English is effectively a variety of English, we define its rules on this wiki so we can change things if we want to. Having said this, I shall certainly stick with the movie policy (unless it changes one day) since this is what most people agree with. --Thrasymedes (talk) 00:03, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
You present a compelling argument that I mostly agree with. I would point out that there is no policy to use movie on this wiki, just a convention amongst long term editors. I still promote the use of 'film' or 'movie' as appropriate in the article and promote in article explanation or linking to the movie page from the word film. -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 02:36, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
This is an important point we need to clarify. There is nothing in the manual of style about it, but I was under the impression that it is a de facto policy which we cannot deviate from, even though there is no policy page. For example, I started The King's Speech with 'film' and it was changed to use 'movie'. Were I to have changed the article back to have something like "film (movie)", I think this would have been reverted again. Would administrators please clarify the situation? Perhaps we are in need of a policy or guideline? --Thrasymedes (talk) 12:23, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It was the result of many discussions in the past. As such there is consensus for doing that. Not all consensus discussions end up in an actual policy page or guideline page, in this particular case I believe there has been discussion on how exactly a page to explain preferred words would be laid out and we never came to a conclusion on how to structure such a page. That doesn't however mean there is no consensus that movie should be used. There very much is and has been since the early 2000s. You are correct in your statement that if you were to use film you would almost definitely see that it gets changed to movie. -DJSasso (talk) 12:57, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Having looked through the past and recent debates (thank you to the user that found the archived discussion for me), I have not found any consensus position for the consistent use of either word. Re-reading the title of this discussion I would vote for consistency in category names and that it should be 'movie' (as now). For artcicles I would vote for allowing either word, so long as 'movie' had an explanation that it means 'film' (as it does on its article page). -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 14:06, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Well at this point we are just going around in circles. The discussion they linked to in the more recent discussion is only one of many that have been had. They all end with essentially the same consensus to use movie instead of film or with a lack of consensus to change to a new consensus (ie the recent discussions) which means status quo remains per the usual methods for consensus on a wiki. -DJSasso (talk) 17:10, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps we could just flip a coin. More seriously, I don't see how it matters much. We've already expended a lot of community time on this discussion, and it's unlikely to greatly affect any reader. Vermont (talk) 18:15, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
If changes are being reverted consistently with no option for disagreement, it is a rule, whether it is written or not. I know not all consensus discussions end up with a guideline, but I think here we are in need of one to stop going round in circles and so editors know what to do. A sentence or two in the manual of style might do the trick, possibly as a bullet point in the "Miscellaneous notes" sections. I think what Auntof6 has written already would be fine: "We use the word "movie" instead of "film" when talking about motion pictures. "Film" can be used for the actual medium that a movie is (or at least used to be) recorded onto. It can also be used for the act of recording the movie." Among the people in this discussion, there seems to be a 3:3 split on the proposition, so perhaps we could have a vote on whether to include Auntof6's sentences into the manual of style? Then we can determine what the rest of the community thinks and put this issue to bed, which I agree is tiresome because it has been discussed repeatedly. Or shall we just put those sentences in there without a vote if a vote is not appropriate? --Thrasymedes (talk) 18:45, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
To be honest it is already there for article titles. Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Movies. Could just expand on what it says there, though it is in the titles section so probably not. -DJSasso (talk) 18:47, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I know it's not a vote for consensus but if it helps I am with remaining with movie. I think it's the objective of SEWP to be simple, and I prefer either movie or film, not both. Let's end this discussion which is clearly going nowhere. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 18:58, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Djsasso:   Done The article titles section uses the word 'movie', but it does not say anything about having to use 'movie' instead of 'film', hence the discussion here. Yes, I thought the same. Assuming there is a consensus for 'movie', I added a slightly edited version of Auntof6's sentences to the National varieties of English section. Feel free to improve it and move it to a better place. With this, I think we have answered Deborahjay's question. --Thrasymedes (talk) 21:24, 16 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Thrasymedes: I do not see consenus for the overwriting of 'film' with 'movie' EXCEPT in the use of categories, where it makes perfect sense to be consistent. I would support a vote if people feel strongly that the word 'film' when refering to motion pictures should be banned. My vote is for both words to be allowed, consistent use of one choice within a page and links to alternative. Brian R Hunter (talk) 20:20, 17 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Since there is disagreement between editors on whether there is a consensus to ban 'film' and not much dissection of arguments, a poll may assist here to focus discussion on the pros and cons of using only 'movie' and establish a consensus. I agree it does not matter much either way, but we need to be clear if 'film' is banned or not so we can answer Deborahjay's question and move forward with everyone knowing what to do. Thus, I offer the following proposal. --Thrasymedes (talk) 16:30, 18 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
 Proposal: We should use only the word 'movie' instead of 'film' when talking about motion pictures. That is, the use of 'film' in this context should be forbidden.

Support

  • Support for all the reasons that have already been mentioned ad naseum. I would like to point out that the assumption is actually incorrect that movie is only a north american thing. We have had editors from numerous european countries and Asian countries that mention their words for motion pictures more closely translate to movie than film. -DJSasso (talk) 20:27, 19 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • So I decided to look further into it since someone mentioned to me on IRC that Australia uses movie. Turns out they use it 83% of the time. What I found is someone actually did a study on this very topic. And results that I am sure will shock the two opposes below. In the United Kingdom movie is actually used 53% of the time in google searches and the year over year trend in news articles actually shows that usage is increasing in the UK. Here is an interactive map for how often either word is used in various countries. Looking at the map it becomes very clear the most common word in almost the entire world except a few outlying countries is movie. While some countries are split almost evenly like the UK. -DJSasso (talk) 11:58, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. 'Movie' has a clear meaning and is generally used in most of the places. Youtube, Amazon, Netflix all use the term Movie so I think using it is better idea.--BRP ever 12:46, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • After much thought, I feel that the easier is the meaning of the word, the better it is. The more common is the word, the simpler it is is also true. I also feel the status quo if maintained will be more effective in this project. Hence, support. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 14:26, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose

  1.   Oppose For reasons discussed above, which I summarize here:
    • 'Film' is well-understood by speakers of all national varities of English. In the 2009 American English corpus on Google Books Ngram Viewer, it appears (either as a noun or verb) over twice as many times as 'movie'. Using the overall more common, standard word is one of the underlying principles of Simple English.
    • We can use 'film' to describe works of all lengths, whereas 'movie' is generally limited to feature films and not used for short films. Also, festivals are almost always called 'film festivals' (see list of film festivals). If we want to stick with one word for simplicity, 'film' can be used more broadly.
    • We have to use the verb 'film' in articles, so it is simpler to use the related noun 'film' instead of the unrelated 'movie'.
    • 'Film' having the other meanings of 'thin layer' and 'photographic medium' does not make it harder for English learners to understand. The other meanings are rare and only learnt when students are more advanced. Hence, they will not get confused when reading articles about motion pictures. For this reason, I do not agree with the argument that, because 'movie' has only one meaning, it is simpler than 'film'.
    • Since 'movie' is only standard in North America and is not the standard word in Australia or the UK, for example, this proposal forces articles written in Australian and British English to use 'movie', breaking the principle from the manual of style where "if there is a strong relationship to a specific region or dialect, use that dialect". On the other hand, 'film' is understood in all Anglophone countries since it is the older and more established word, so could be used in American articles too.
    • 'Film' is the standard word in academia. For example, a US academic journal is called Film Criticism. The academic discipline film studies is called so in all Anglophone countries. --Thrasymedes (talk) 16:30, 18 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    • In response to DJSasso's comment, I said "'movie' is only standard in North America". This only refers to English since this is the language under consideration. I did not say or assume anything about other languages. If anyone wants to see translations of 'movie' in other languages, please take a look at the translations section on Wiktionary. As you can see on that page, numerous European and other languages have translations closer to 'film' too. Our readers have lots of different native languages. We are only comparing the meanings and usage of English words here. --Thrasymedes (talk) 22:20, 19 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
      • Except we are not just considering English. We have to take into account ease of which those coming from other languages will understand the word. As such it is a very important marker. That being said, as I have since added above, movie is actually the most common in English in most of the world, even the UK (though slightly). -DJSasso (talk) 13:10, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
        • Since many other people will find 'film' closer to their native language's word, this depends on what native language the person has. To do this properly, we would have to quantify how many readers we have from different locations and work out, for each language, whether 'film' or 'movie' is the closer word. But this still does not address the meanings and usage of the two English words, which are different. In terms of meaning, 'film' is broader and, in terms of usage, the word 'movie' is more common in the UK and the US in some situations, like the Web, but not others, like books. More on this below. --Thrasymedes (talk) 19:56, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    • In response to DJSasso's second comment, Web searches and encyclopedias are different situations. I have already read articles like this, which describes the trends, so I am well aware of them. In the 2012 British English corpus, 'film' was used over 6 times as much as 'movie' in the UK (Google Ngrams). If we compare this to the stephenfollows.com article and look at 2012, it does not match up. The situations are different. For example, Google searches are informal and 'movie' is a more informal word, Google is an American search engine so users might use the American word (GB American spelling example) and UK users often want to find American movies, which are very popular there and around the world. On the other hand, books are generally more formal so writers use the standard word, hence why Ngrams shows a different story. Academic works in English still use 'film' even in the United States, which is why enWP uses it even for US films. There is certainly an increase in the use of 'movie' in British and Australian English, especially Australian, but 'film' remains the standard for formal works in both countries. Since we are an encyclopedia, if we want to use only one word, we should go for 'film' because it is the standard word used in academia, has a broader meaning than 'movie' and is just as simple. --Thrasymedes (talk) 19:56, 21 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  2.   Oppose For reasons given above. Simple should aim to explain words not on the common list. Neither movie nor film is on that list, so both words need explanation where used. A link to the movie page should be sufficient. -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 19:48, 18 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Comments
  • Weird that someone start a proposal just to oppose the proposal. I rather Thrasymedes start a proposal which him/her supports. This seems pointless to me. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 08:58, 19 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • @Camouflaged Mirage: I think @Thrasymedes: wants to bring this long running discussion to a conclusion and proposed formal agreement for what he believes some users have claimed is the consensus. If passed then when could remove all mention of film in relation to motion pictures (which some editors have claimed to want); if failed then we could allow both words to be used (as other editors have wanted, perhaps with clarification on when to use which word) -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 12:20, 19 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    • Seems quite complicated, why not be more straightforward and put what you want as a proposal? --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 12:58, 19 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
      • @Camouflaged Mirage: Some editors already believe that there is a consensus for the proposal and are acting in line with it already, so I proposed it on the back of the discussion above to gather points of view from the community and to see if there is a consensus for it. I encourage editors to consider the proposal and the discussion above, and give their view. If there is a consensus for this, we can put it into the manual of style so everyone knows. If not, we can consider other proposals. I agree that proposing something I disagree with is a little unusual, but I did not think it was worth proposing something else if there was a consensus for this. We can give some time for people to think things through and give their views on this proposal, and take things from there. --Thrasymedes (talk) 19:35, 19 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
        • The issue with doing it as you have is that a consensus can already exist, and the lack of consensus in a new discussion to go one way or the other in a new discussion just means the old consensus still holds. In other words you actually need consensus to change from the existing consensus. -DJSasso (talk) 20:27, 19 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
          • No consensus to delete something normally results in it being kept. Surely a lack of consensus to ban something means that it is not banned? It seems over the top to require a proposal to allow something if people have already not established a consensus to ban it. But if that's the case, fair enough. Either way, we'll see what happens with this and go from there. --Thrasymedes (talk) 22:20, 19 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
            • Speaking of RFD, this seems to be a DRV rather than RFD. The previous discussion have a consensus to use Movies rather than Films. The previous discussion can be seen as a RFD. For DRV, no consensus to do anything defaults the article to be deleted (if RFD result is delete) or article to be kept (if RFD results is to keep). So I will say it need to have a consensus to use both or use films to overturn the previous consensus. For me, I don't really know how to participate in this. We try to be simple here, so the lesser the words with similiar meaning and can be replaceable, the better. I think my take is, use either films / movies, not both. Obviously if it's XXX Film Festival or Best Film Awards, such should still stay per films (i.e. for proper name or terms, use what is given). For titles, I hope there will be a standard (i.e. XXX (Movie) or XXX (Flim) but not both. Obvious exceptions still applies like if a movie is called The Best Film, surely we don't have to change to The Best Movie. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 15:53, 20 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Closure

The proposal has been up for 11 days now, and no more comments have been made for a while. It seems to me that there is a consensus for the proposal. Do other editors agree? If so, we can add it back to the manual of style. --Thrasymedes (talk) 18:34, 29 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I have to disagree... there is no clear consensus. It seems few editors are interested at all and there is strong feeling on both sides. I have seen no good arguments from any language learning perspective to ban the use of the word film in relation to motion pictures. -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 19:46, 29 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I feel there is no consensus to change anything. That being the case, things should continue as per our existing practice. --Auntof6 (talk) 20:40, 29 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Sounds good to me. To clarify what our existing practice is, do we agree with this as a closing summary?
  • movie – feature film/motion picture, running time > 40 minutes (based on AMPAS definition), to be used in all articles about a particular feature film and to be used in all categories; using the verb 'film' and talking about 'film' as a photographic medium is allowed
  • film – artwork made of recorded moving images of any running time, word that covers both 'movie' and 'short film'; 'film' may needed rarely in academic contexts (e.g. film studies) but not to be used normally
  • short film – film with a running time of ≤ 40 minutes (based on AMPAS definition); 'short film' seems to be a technical term here so 'film' can be used in this context, hence why our article is titled that way
  • short movie – a movie that is short, e.g., 65 minutes, compared to a more normal 90 minutes --Thrasymedes (talk) 21:46, 29 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
More or !ess. The existing practice is to use movie to refer to a motion picture of any length. That applies to article and category names as well as text in articles. It does not apply to quotations or to official names of things (for example Cannes Film Festival). --Auntof6 (talk) 00:14, 30 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
 OK, I have now updated the manual of style to include the old consensus. Please feel free to improve what I added. To answer your question, Deborahjay, and for future reference, here is a more detailed summary of how we have to use the words on this wiki:

  • movie – artwork made of recorded moving images of any running time; word that covers works of all lengths, including short films and feature films; word to be used in the text of articles, in article titles in brackets and in category names; usually, we use 'movie' for feature films and 'short film' for films < 40 minutes in duration, but we can use 'movie' to describe them both
  • film – artwork made of recorded moving images of any running time; 'film' may needed rarely in academic contexts (e.g. film studies) but is banned from being used in general; 'film' can be used in quotations and official names, e.g., Cannes Film Festival; using the verb 'film' and talking about 'film' as a photographic medium is allowed
  • short film – film with a running time < 40 minutes (based on AMPAS definition); 'short film' is a technical term so 'film' can be used in the phrase 'short film'
  • short movie – a movie that is short, e.g., for a feature film, 65 minutes, compared to a more normal 90 minutes; for clarity, we usually use 'short film' for a film < 40 minutes in duration --Thrasymedes (talk) 15:21, 1 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I am sorry, but I do not see this as consensus. You have banned the word film (with minor exceptions) when there is no consensus for this. Although some editors have made this claim it is based on a few vocal editors with almost equally small numbers objecting to that view. -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 18:02, 1 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I guess there is no consensus now, but (as discussed in the Comments section above) several editors have said that this is a case where the old consensus applies. That is, unless there is a new consensus to allow something, it remains banned via the old consensus, even if there is no longer a consensus for the old proposal. Camouflaged Mirage gave the analogy of page deletion, where there has to be a consensus to allow a page to be brought back rather than no consensus. I have not personally banned it and, as you know, disagree with the ban completely. Instead, it is the community's old consensus that has banned it. Some editors do not tolerate any deviation from the ban, so I have simply written down what others are already enforcing. The only option now, as far as I am aware, is for you to make another proposal which allows the use of 'film', as DJSasso said above. If this gets a consensus, things will change. Unless that happens, the ban is in force, written or unwritten. --Thrasymedes (talk) 21:15, 1 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
My argument is that there was never a consensus to ban 'film'. When I asked editors who changed pages to show me where it had been previously agreed, the only eveidence was inconclusive. That is, some editors think that there is consensus to ban 'film' and others think there isn't. Edits using either word have remained on this wiki. With a lack of consensus to ban 'film' it should remain available for some use alongside 'movie' where that is more appropriate. Brian R Hunter (talk) 21:38, 1 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
OK. Auntof6 has just undone my change to the manual of style saying "wrong section, incorrect summary ("short film" not an exception)". At this point, I don't know what is allowed and what is not. Since the 'short film' article has been called that since 2015 with no complaints (?) and Auntof6 did not mention it above, I assumed (wrongly) that 'short film' was allowed. Please could someone add a correct summary to the right section of the manual of style? This has been a very long discussion. I'm just trying to establish what is and is not allowed within articles to make things clear for editors, and I'm sorry if I've done this poorly. I think the main reason that this topic is discussed over and over again is because it is not clear, and editors are having 'film' within articles changed to 'movie' without a guideline. Regarding the consensus issue, I've done some digging at Simple Talk and tried to list the previous discussions below (though I've likely missed some) along with an attempted summary:
  • 2006 – RFD Log 2 – TBCΦ and Netoholic prefer to use 'film' for categories; Blockinblox and zephyr2k prefer to use 'movie' for categories; no consensus (?), but the result is to use 'movie' for categories
  • 2007 – Archive 18 – a few comments with no consensus on banning 'film' in articles; Creol mentions "we shifted categories to use the word movie due to the ambiguity issue"
  • 2008 – Archive 35 – American Eagle suggests using 'film' in categories to match enWP; The Rambling Man agrees; Tygrrr, Creol and Cassandra prefer using 'movie'; no consensus on banning 'film' in articles
  • 2008 – Archive 39 – another 'film' versus 'movie' category discussion; Synergy and The Rambling Man seem to prefer 'film'; Cassandra, Creol, Razorflame seem to prefer 'movie'; the discussion also touches on articles and there seems to be a consensus to use 'movie' in article titles; accordingly, tholly starts to rename articles with 'movie'
  • 2010 – Archive 80 – another 'film' versus 'movie' category discussion; the Rambling Man mentions that there is a previous consensus to use 'movie' for categories; Synergy, Griffinofwales, Bluegoblin7 and Yottie seem to prefer 'film'; Kansan, The Rambling Man, Eptalon, Peterdownunder seem to prefer 'movie'; the discussion seems to end with a consensus for using 'movie', but it is not very clear whether this applies within articles too; 2010 was when I joined and I think, by then, all articles were using 'movie' in the text too
  • 2011 – Archive 93 – reminder to use 'movie' in article titles
  • 2011 – Archive 94 – reminder of previous consensus to use 'movie' for category names
  • 2019 – Archive 127 – discussion mentions a previous consensus to use 'movie' both in category names and within articles
Does that help us? Based on this, I would say Archive 39 might be where the consensus to use 'movie' within articles began, but it is not very clear. --Thrasymedes (talk) 00:12, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I think you have proved my point. There is no clear consensus for removing the word 'film' when describing a motion picture. My view/proposal:

  • Category names should always use 'movie'. I can see no reason to have a mixture of uses. 'film' would be equally fine but most (all) currently use movie.
  • Title names can use whichever the pages creator chooses as a best fit. There should be a redirect from a page with the alternate.
  • content can use either, but should link to the existing page movie to explain the words usage.

Let's stop randomly changing the simple word 'film' when there is no evidence that it confuses anyone learning the language. -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 12:26, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  •   Support We would have a consistent word for category names (without the job of renaming them all). We would also give editors the freedom to use both words in articles and article titles, which will be less divisive and will conform with WP:ENGVAR. 'Film' is just as simple as 'movie'; learners learn them as synonyms initially and do not get confused. Neither word is part of the combined wordlist, so we generally link 'film' and 'movie' to the movie article anyway, which explains the concept for anyone who does not understand it. Banning 'film', which is preferred in academic books and journals, and which we have to use as a verb, is unhelpful and divisive. This proposal sounds like a sensible compromise and a good way for the wiki to move forward. --Thrasymedes (talk) 17:55, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • There was consensus before this discussion. There was no consensus to change in this discussion. I think the topic is closed at this point. Beyond one very vocal user who wants to change what has clearly been consensus and practice for many years. We require consensus to change from the current editing practices. -DJSasso (talk) 13:29, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not change it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No more changes should be made to this discussion.

I am not sure where the 'discussion' for this is continuing. It seems that an admin has made an executive decision about prior and current consensus and got bored with the debate. Editors have asked for clarity... but the only arguments put forward for banning 'film' are that the few previous active users got used to it being 'movie'. It seems a poor argument, Brian R Hunter (talk) 14:06, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Calm down, the closure statement is still pending. It isn't executive decision, the closer is uninvolved. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 14:10, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Camouflaged Mirage: apologies -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 14:15, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah you might want to check your facts before you start throwing around personal attacks. It wasn't me who closed the discussion. -DJSasso (talk) 14:23, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Djsasso: apologies -- Brian R Hunter (talk) 14:25, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hermann Göring on the main page and demotion discussion

Hermann_Göring has come back around on the front page. It has been flagged for demotion for over three months, but many editors may not have noticed because the template was not added at first. The discussion is here. It would be good if a few more editors could have a look, and then the proposal can be closed. Thanks. --Gotanda (talk) 01:14, 26 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

It's ugly with that template, can we temp take out that template or replace it with another page in the time being. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 13:40, 28 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I have closed the discussion with no consensus to demote. Chenzw  Talk  08:27, 30 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Warning on article that I can't figure out how to get rid of

At the bottom of the Prishtina article, there's a warning about a reference group that is named but does not exist. I cannot figure out how to fix the problem which is resulting in this warning. Any help would be appreciated. Beaneater (contact me) (see my edits) 8 Kislev 5785 / 05:37, 30 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Beaneater00: Warning's gone now. Thanks for pointing it out. Computer Fizz (talk) 05:38, 30 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

New articles by 2A02:C7F:148C:6800::/64

Over the past few weeks, an anonymous editor from this /64 range has been creating new articles about actors and TV series, particularly those with ties to ITV. I have to admit that I feel rather conflicted about the series of edits; new contributions (especially brand new articles!) are welcome, but I notice that most of the writing is subpar and suggests some form of automated translation (or just poor command of the English language?). In addition, some of the new articles contain errors in birthdates/years, such as:

I am not really sure what is going on here, and the intentions of the anonymous editor. Nevertheless, all of the articles do appear to need review, be it for verification of facts, copyediting, or wikification.

I have reviewed the anon's contributions since 20 January and note that all of these subjects do appear to be indeed notable, and that these subjects also have articles on EN. I would also like to point out that the /64 range is currently blocked on EN for "disruptive editing". Chenzw  Talk  14:41, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah I was going to look the other day into why it was blocked on en.wiki. And see if it matched what was happening here and block here if the case. But I haven't had the time to dig yet. -DJSasso (talk) 13:43, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Seen some, I think it's sort of poor command of language. Factual errors are there. Hard to nuke also, can we just have a tag or whatsoever to monitor as I reckon to clean up will take time. Doesn't seems malicious though. I know it's ipv6 but is there any way to engage them? --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 13:58, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I have blocked as it appears they were having the same issues as on en. With birth dates etc being incorrect enough times as to not appear to be accidents. -DJSasso (talk) 14:33, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Statistics for last year...

Hello all, Let me sum up the pageviews for last year: Above 1 million hits each:

Above 500.000 hits each:

No matter what we discussed about (language complexity, sentence structure, etc.) the articls above are the "Winners". So if you are a regular contributor here, please have a look at the pageviews, which lists the 90-odd other articles as well.--Eptalon (talk) 23:46, 4 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Request for Review

Hi, can somebody review the changes I Made at the "Nigger" Wikipedia article? Apologies if there is a better place to request this, yet. want I want to make sure the wording is correct, especially on such a sensitive article like this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.180.116.2 (talk • contribs) 17:47, 12 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Page move request

Can any administrator please move Palestine to Palestine (region) and move Palestine (disambiguation) to Palestine to avoid confusion. ColorfulSmoke (talk) 16:10, 8 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The disambiguation page isn't in the right format. I see this as logical move though.--Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 07:20, 9 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed by myself.--Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 11:42, 9 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Wait, but why is Palestine not the diambig now? I think it should be. Computer Fizz (talk) 20:26, 10 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Why hasn't Palestine became a disambiguation like the en wiki? Palestine can mean more different things. ColorfulSmoke (talk) 20:06, 12 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Pages featuring Category:U.S. Counties with long url

I've noticed that 7 pages of US cities feature this category, but I don't really understand what "long URL" means for a city. Does anyone else get this? If not the category should probably be removed. Reception123 (talk) 20:42, 12 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

It's a tracking category that doesn't hurt anything. I just created the category, and it has an explanation on it. I don't understand the need for it, but it's assigned by a template and removing it from there would make template maintenance more difficult. --Auntof6 (talk) 06:35, 13 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the answer, I just wasn't sure about what URL meant but now I get it refers to the web URL of the county. Reception123 (talk) 06:38, 13 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I generally just fix the issue when that category fills up every so often and haven't bothered creating the category. It just means that there is stuff after the end of the domain name usually. Its often a very quick fix. For example I just fixed one that had https://bathcounty.ky.gov/Pages/default.aspx when the /Pages/default.aspx was unnecessary to get to where you were going. So the fix was just to remove it. Because the category is just anything over 29 characters long it is possible (see Lawrence County, Arkansas) that some things will never be removed from the category, but its almost always the case that you can fix it so it can be removed. To Auntof6s confusion for the need for it, its a category that makes sure people aren't putting a subpage of a page in the web parameter instead of the main page. -DJSasso (talk) 12:46, 14 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Using paywalled sources as references

Some publications such as the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal cannot be read by people who are not paid subscribers. This means that our readers cannot verify the contents of articles when these sources are used.

Can anyone offer any guidance? I apologize if this topic has been discussed before.

Thanks in advance , Ottawahitech (talk) 02:48, 17 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I find that archive.is is excellent when it comes to getting past paywalls (and it works with the sources mentioned above + the Globe and Mail as a test) so perhaps leaving an archived link in the reference might be useful. Can't think of a proper solution at the moment but I'm thinking this could be an easy duct-tape solution for the time being. Hiàn (talk) 05:20, 17 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
See en:WP:PAYWALL, which says:

Some reliable sources may not be easily accessible. For example, an online source may require payment, and a print-only source may be available only in university libraries. Rare historical sources may even be available only in special museum collections and archives. Do not reject reliable sources just because they are difficult or costly to access. If you have trouble accessing a source, others may be able to do so on your behalf (see en:WikiProject Resource Exchange).

Also see en:Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Cost, which includes the following:

Reliable sources must be able to be verified. This does not mean that any particular person at any given moment must be capable of verifying them.

--Auntof6 (talk) 10:00, 17 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Removing a question posted by someone else

The following is an academic question that I would like to discuss here:

I guess I am more sensitive than others to the removal of someone else’s question on this talk page. I have had my own comments removed from wiki discussions before, not because they were offensive, but because they were considered trolling/ignorant by another participant.

It is my opinion that questions should not be removed from this talk page. Removing someone’s post can be viewed as a slight by that person. We should always assume good faith since no one understands the motives of someone who posts a question. After all the introduction says:

This is the place to ask any questions you have about the Simple English Wikipedia. Any general discussions or anything of community interest is also appropriate here

The worst that can happen is that no one responds to the question.

Thanks in advance for taking the time to participate.Ottawahitech (talk) 20:59, 17 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Ottawahitech: Generally stuff is only removed from here if it's considered vandalim, spam, or such. Can you give any diff links? Computer Fizz (talk) 21:53, 17 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Old discussions are removed (archived) after some time. Obvious Vandalism will also be removed. Everything else should stay.--Eptalon (talk) 15:12, 19 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Reagan National University

Is this organization worth an article? All i know about it is a longish article in USA Today: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/education/2020/02/15/college-accreditation-department-education-betsy-devos-south-dakota-sioux-falls/4746906002/ if it is agreed that an article should be written, I could give it a go. Kdammers (talk) 09:26, 19 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I have read through the article, and it certainly sounds interesting. Vaguely reminds me of a en:Diploma mill. The problem I see though: While stories such as U.S. universities awarding scholarships/admission for "donations" can be put in a section of the respective universities, I currenlty don't see how we can convert this story into an encyclopedic article. And yes, given its reach, USA Today is certainly a reliable source.--Eptalon (talk) 11:33, 19 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I saw several good sources in google search, why not Kdammers you just start at User:Kdammers/Reagan National University and we have a look? I think it's promising. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 11:42, 19 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Combine changes in draft page to live page

I wrote a (hopefully) easier to understand version of Wikipedia:Disruptive changing in my sandbox. Is there a way to merge/combine my changes with the new page? /ToxiBoi (talk) 02:21, 23 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@ToxiBoi: You would have to do it manually, so I would copy over what you aren't changing to your sandbox, then copy everything and replace it. This is what I did when I made major edits to SpaceX (See User:FNAFPUPPETMASTER/Drafts/SpaceX). Hope this helps! rollingbarrels (talk) 04:13, 23 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
To say it simpler. Copy what is in your sandbox and paste it over top of what is in the article currently. Removing anything unnecessary like the draft template. -DJSasso (talk) 15:07, 23 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Additional interface for edit conflicts on talk pages

Sorry, for writing this text in English. If you could help to translate it, it would be appreciated.

You might know the new interface for edit conflicts (currently a beta feature). Now, Wikimedia Germany is designing an additional interface to solve edit conflicts on talk pages. This interface is shown to you when you write on a discussion page and another person writes a discussion post in the same line and saves it before you do. With this additional editing conflict interface you can adjust the order of the comments and edit your comment. We are inviting everyone to have a look at the planned feature. Let us know what you think on our central feedback page! -- For the Technical Wishes Team: Max Klemm (WMDE) 14:15, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Max Klemm (WMDE): as noted here and on enwikibooks, it will not be that nice to have this message of "Sorry, I am writting in English" in English based projects. What I can suggest to you is to have 2 separate MMS Lists - one for English based projects and another for the rest. Will be better next time. Feel free to ask me for help on meta page or here regarding MMS. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 17:14, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Ignore the above, they aren't locally registered...Let me speak to them in their meta page then.--Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 17:15, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I like the idea, edit conflicts are always somewhat annoying and I'm glad a feature to make it less annoying is being worked on. Reception123 (talk) 17:26, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Me too, I think leaving a note on the meta page linked above as the "central feedback page" will encourage the team. They don't necessary monitor here. @Reception123:--Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 17:28, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Camouflaged Mirage: Yeah, I'll write something next to your message. Reception123 (talk) 17:41, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Newsletter

Hi, I'd like to ask if anyone would like to help make a newsletter based on the old Simple News. I'd also like to ask your opinion on such a newsletter. Thank you. rollingbarrels (talk) 04:32, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I believe there was a discussion on this a few months back but I could be miss-remembering. Most people were not interested as there is not enough news to create a newsletter here and it just takes up what little volunteer hours we already have for not any real gain. Anything worth knowing about on this wiki all happens on Simple Talk for the most part anyway, its not like en.wiki where stuff is happening on a million boards. Simple News died because we couldn't keep it going when we had many many more editors than we have now. -DJSasso (talk) 13:53, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Happy for such newsletter but what the content will be. It was hard to justify with this little amount of content. I will say it may cause drama, see enwp Signpost and zhwp Qiuwen, will lead to some sort of drama somehow about content and editorial control. --Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 13:56, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Then perhaps a summary of simple talk, posted on simple talk every month? rollingbarrels (talk) 17:09, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
That would be redundant as most sections would already still be on Simple Talk and those that aren't can easily be accessed in the archive. -DJSasso (talk) 17:11, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough. rollingbarrels (talk) 17:13, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
┌─────────────────────────────────┘
 I see two options: A team of (new, probably) editors try to get articles that are easy to understand about "current" events, and second, once or twice a month we point (the new editors we don't have) to the arteas of Wikipedia that work less smoothly. Before doing a newsletter though, I'd revive ther Did you know, so that perhaps every other week we get a new set of items? --Eptalon (talk) 17:22, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I've created a wikiproject to encourage users to contribute. User:FNAFPUPPETMASTER/Wikiproject Did You Know... rollingbarrels (talk) 18:24, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Good idea to make DYK more lively, I encourage other editors to try translate from en the latest DYKs as newer topics attract more eyes? And the wikiproject is not needed as we have Wikipedia:Did_you_know?--Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 10:44, 27 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Timeline of World War II

I have added a note on the talk page of this list-type page. It explains that the list has ambiguity which has caused dates to be (arguably) wrongly added. Our list should follow the En version more closely, perhaps. Macdonald-ross (talk) 08:56, 27 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Template help needed for another project

Hi, I am setting up a special interest wiki on Miraheze, and am having touble getting a simple infobox template to work properly. Is there someone who understands this and could help me with it? If you can, send me an email and I';ll get back to you.--Peterdownunder (talk) 11:03, 28 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Peterdownunder: I know someone at Miraheze that can help, you could probably contact Void as he's pretty good with infoboxes. Reception123 (talk) 13:08, 28 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, will do! :) Peterdownunder (talk) 22:37, 28 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Problem now sorted, thankyou.--Peterdownunder (talk) 07:07, 29 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Five Year Plan

Not sure what to do with this, this is taken from en:Five-year plans for the national economy of the Soviet Union and I wanted to simplify if only the issue is that there were also five year plans in other countries other than the Soviet Union, so should that page be moved to "Five Year Plan in the Soviet Union", or should we just describe what a five year plan is and then have a "For example, the Soviet Union had them..."? Reception123 (talk) 18:24, 28 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I generally move things to the name en.wiki uses unless there is a reason to use something else. In this case its reasonable to rename it. -DJSasso (talk) 19:08, 28 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I try to do this too, but I'm not sure of any times to use a different name besides movie vs. film. Are there any other instances? Computer Fizz (talk) 07:21, 29 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
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