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Tech News issue #41, 2024 (October 7, 2024)

Monday, 7 October 2024 00:00 UTC

This document has a planned publication deadline (link leads to zonestamp.toolforge.org).

previous 2024, week 41 (Monday 07 October 2024) next

Tech News: 2024-41

weeklyOSM 741

Sunday, 6 October 2024 10:32 UTC

26/09/2024-02/10/2024

lead picture

GeoMob celebrates OSM’s 20th birthday[1] | © GeoMob

Mapping

  • Kai Michael Poppe has submitted an automated edit proposal to fix the fixme=name inconsistencies of OSM objects.

Community

  • Alan Grant discussed various factors that complicate point of interest (POI) mapping, including the instability of POIs due to the accelerated turnover of retail outlets and the overly specific characteristics of each POI, which are difficult to represent with OSM tags.
  • Pieter Vander Vennet explained the rationale for why anonymous contributions to OpenStreetMap via MapComplete are forbidden.

OpenStreetMap Foundation

  • Christoph Hormann shared his thoughts after reviewing the manifestos of this year’s OSMF board candidates and has created his own for his fictional candidate.

Events

  • [1] Geomob shared a summary thread of the recent Geomob London event held at the UCL, the birthplace of OpenStreetMap, in celebration of 20 years of OpenStreetMap.
  • Katja Haferkorn announced that the upcoming FOSSGIS conference is scheduled for 26 to 29 March 2025, in the Schloss Münster, Germany. The event is being organised in collaboration with FOSSGIS e.V. and the Institute for Geoinformatics at the University of Münster. Those interested in contributing to the programme can submit proposals through the call for participation, which began on 5 October and will remain open until Tuesday 5 November.
  • FOSSGIS reported that the Dresden, Germany, OpenStreetMap community set up an OSM booth at the annual Chaos Computer Club Dresden (C3D2) conference on Saturday, offering a space for discussions and inquiries about OpenStreetMap. The booth featured OSM banners and flags, a large screen displaying live mapping activity in OSM via the ‘Show me the way’ tool, and a 300-piece puzzle showcasing various OSM map styles.

Maps

  • Jochen Topf has introduced OSM XRAY, a vector tiles service that includes all OSM data, intended to be used primarily for debugging purposes.
  • Michael Altfield has written a guide on how to generate vector-based topographic maps to print as large paper wall maps, using Inkscape and OpenStreetMap data.
  • Zsolt Ero has built OpenFreeMap, a free and open-source OSM hosting solution with customisable styles. The service is available for free on its public instance, or you can choose to self-host it.

OSM in action

  • Marcus Jaschen discovered an advertising banner featuring an embedded interactive OpenStreetMap map.
  • OpenBeta is a platform where members can collaboratively create open-source, open-licensed climbing data. Their home page features an OpenStreetMap-based display showcasing the latest contributions from users.
  • Taiwan’s Central Weather Administration has developed an OpenStreetMap-based interactive map to monitor the movement of Typhoon Krathon, a powerful typhoon originating in the west Pacific Ocean and currently moving along the coast of Taiwan as at early October 2024.
  • The State Chancellery of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern created a uMap interactive map to assist visitors attending the citizens’ festival for the Day of German Unity 2024, which was held 2 to 4 October, in the city of Schwerin.

Open Data

  • The call for proposals for the EU Open Data Days 2025 is open until Tuesday 22 October. This event seeks to showcase the potential of open data and gather data providers, enthusiasts, and users from across Europe and beyond.

Licenses

  • Jean-Christophe Becquet, a board member of the French Federation of OSM Professionals, has endorsed the publication of the practical guide ‘Everything You Need to Know About the ODbL Licence’ (we reported earlier), describing it as an impressive educational initiative that clarifies the rights and responsibilities associated with this open licence.

Software

Releases

  • Amanda McCann has significantly refactored her WaterwayMapOrg code to make use of the name=* tag for connecting river basins.
  • TrickyFoxy has released version 0.5 of better-osm-org, which includes several new features such as the visualisation of changesets, likes/dislikes, more hotkeys, and the ability to view older versions of map objects.

Did you know …

  • … that Stephan Bösch-Plepelits used PTMap to illustrate their proposed new public transportation route for Vienna, Austria? PTMap is a tool for visualising OSM public transportation route data.

OSM in the media

  • c’t, a German computer magazine, interviewed Tobias Zwick about StreetComplete for their ‘Open Source Spotlight’ newsletter.

Other “geo” things

  • Marguerite Catton, of France Culture, interviewed Sébastien Soriano, Director General of the French National Institute of Geographic and Forest Information (IGN), about IGN Maps , a smartphone application developed by the IGN that provides access to multiple map layers and geolocation services.
  • Switzerland and Italy have redefined a section of their border that crosses an Alpine peak due to the shifting glaciers altering the historically established boundary.

Upcoming Events

Where What Online When Country
Essen FOSSGIS-OSM-Communitytreffen Nr. 22 2024-10-03 – 2024-10-06 flag
Montrouge Réunion des contributeurs de Montrouge et du Sud de Paris 2024-10-03 flag
Pontarlier Cartographie collaborative pour tous 2024-10-05 flag
Chanakya Puri Tehsil OSM India casual online mapathon 2024-10-06 flag
London London pub meet-up 2024-10-07 flag
中正區 OpenStreetMap x Wikidata Taipei #69 2024-10-07 flag
München Münchner OSM-Treffen 2024-10-08 flag
Ifẹ̀ State of the Map Nigeria 2024 2024-10-09 – 2024-10-11 flag
Lorain County OpenStreetMap Midwest Meetup 2024-10-10 flag
Bochum Bochumer OSM Treffen 2024-10-10 flag
OSMF Engineering Working Group meeting 2024-10-11
København OSMmapperCPH 2024-10-13 flag
Missing Maps London: (Online) Mid-Month Mapathon [eng] 2024-10-15
Lyon Réunion du groupe local de Lyon 2024-10-15 flag
San Jose South Bay Map Night 2024-10-16 flag
Bonn 181. OSM-Stammtisch Bonn 2024-10-15 flag
Salt Lake City OSM Utah Monthly Map Night 2024-10-17 flag
Karlsruhe Stammtisch Karlsruhe 2024-10-16 flag
Atelier Pifomètre/Bano 2024-10-16
Bruxelles – Brussel Velopark mapathon @ Fietsberaad offices 2024-10-17 flag
Hannover OSM-Stammtisch Hannover 2024-10-18 flag
Karlsruhe Karlsruhe Hack Weekend October 2024 2024-10-19 – 2024-10-20 flag
Pamplona/Iruña GeoCamp ES 2024-10-19 flag
Cabecera Municipal Duitama Estado del Mapa – Duitama 2024 2024-10-19 flag
Nonnweiler Craftmapping Höckerlinie Otzenhausen 2024-10-19 flag

Note:
If you like to see your event here, please put it into the OSM calendar. Only data which is there, will appear in weeklyOSM.

This weeklyOSM was produced by MatthiasMatthias, Strubbl, TheSwavu, barefootstache, derFred, rtnf.
We welcome link suggestions for the next issue via this form and look forward to your contributions.

The Wikimedia Foundation filed an amicus brief before the Supreme Court of Justice of Mexico, advocating that internet intermediary platforms should be protected from liability for user-generated content (UGC). This brief supports Google in the Ulrich Richter Morales and Claudia Ramírez Tavera v. Google, Inc. and Google México case, because of the implications for online platforms hosts operating in Mexico. For the Foundation and Wikimedia project, it could imply a threat to our community-led content creation and moderation model, as well as harm to the freedom of expression of readers and volunteer editors.

The corporate headquarters complex of Google in Mountain View, US.Image by The Pancake of Heaven!, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

The Wikimedia Foundation recently submitted an amicus or “friend-of-the-court” brief in the Ulrich Richter Morales and Claudia Ramírez Tavera vs. Google Inc. and Google México case before Mexico’s Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation. We are arguing for a continued use of the protections provided by the internet intermediary liability legal framework in Mexico, which allows online platforms to host user-generated content (UGC). These legal protections are also crucial to the Wikimedia projects because they allow the platform host to rely on effective community-led governance and moderation, rather than act as gatekeepers for editorial decisions of hundreds of thousands of people.

In this case, Ulrich Richter Morales, a lawyer and former secretary and advisor to the Citizen Participation Council of the Attorney General’s Office (in Spanish, Procuraduría General de la República) in Mexico, and his wife, Claudia Ramírez, sued Google, Inc. and Google México in 2015 for not removing an allegedly defamatory blog post on the Blogger platform, which is owned by Google. Subsequently, Richter sent an out-of-court notice to Google requesting the removal of the blog post from its platform, but Google refused to take it down. 

In our amicus brief, we pointed out that the liability protections for internet intermediaries are essential for the collaborative and neutral nature of platforms like Wikipedia: without such protections, platform hosts are likely to centralize decisions related to content creation and moderation in order to mitigate legal risks. Mexico adopted this legal framework under a trade agreement with Canada and the US—i.e., the 1998 Agreement between the United States of America, Mexico, and Canada (USMCA).

We also noted that holding platform hosts or intermediaries unnecessarily liable for UGC could harm the open nature of platforms like Wikipedia as well as the freedom of expression of its readers and volunteer editors. The Foundation believes that holding Google liable in this case could empower individuals who have vast resources to demand the removal of UGC without needing legal orders to do so. For these reasons, we urged the Supreme Court of Mexico to consider these likely consequences and maintain the protections necessary for an open and free online information ecosystem that can serve the public interest.

If you are interested in the lawsuit and want to learn more, read our amicus brief, available in English and in Spanish

We would like to thank the Wikimedia Foundation’s staff Amalia Toledo, Lead Public Policy Specialist for Latin America and the Caribbean, and Ojadamola Takuro, former Legal Fellow.

WA Biographical Index

Sunday, 6 October 2024 03:27 UTC

Fremantle

· Wikimedia · Western Australia · datsets · open data ·

I noticed the other day that the Western Australian Biographical Index is licensed under CC-BY, so I thought I'd try to copy relevant entries to Freopedia (and other things). I downloaded the 18 CSV files:

   A-final.csv  DE-final.csv  H-final.csv   L-final_edited.csv  O-final.csv   S-final.csv
   B-final.csv  F-final.csv   IJ-final.csv  M-final.csv         PQ-final.csv  T-final.csv
   C-final.csv  G-final.csv   K-final.csv   N-final.csv         R-final.csv   UVXYZ-final.csv

Combined them into one, without their header rows (which were confirmed to exist before doing this):

$ awk '(NR == 1) || (FNR > 1)' *.csv > wabi.csv

This was imported into OpenRefine, and resulted in 85,403 records.

Found duplicates by sorting, applying "reorder rows permanently", and then "edit cells" > "blank down". The blanks can then be faceted on, and 421 duplicates were found, e.g. PQ/P2626 (where the second here is the correct record):

POCOCK Ruth Elsie May b. 1900. m. N.S.W. 1928 Edwin Lennard MINCHIN

vs.

PLUSH Edward, son of Thomas Hall (artist). arr 18.3.1886 per Albany (steerage) from SA - listed as G. Plush. m. 1.1.1890 (Perth C/E) Amelia GOLDING, dtr. of William (gardener). PERTH painter. Joined the Police force 1886.

That meant there were 84,982 unique cards.

These were imported to a Mix'n'Match catalogue: https://mix-n-match.toolforge.org/#/catalog/6490 For this, the card text had to be truncated.

I proposed a new property on Wikidata, and it was approved and created a week or so after.

Now the task is to link items to the WABI, probably starting with any mentioning Fremantle.

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Freo skin for MediaWiki

Sunday, 6 October 2024 02:55 UTC

Fremantle

· MediaWiki · skins · Freopedia · Wikimedia ·

I've been working a bit lately on Freopedia, and have started building a new MediaWiki skin for it. I just want something very simple. I'd go with any of the existing ones, but it's nice to have different sites looking different I think. I've also been wanting to experiment with putting things in the menus that make most sense to me — I've never really understood why we have 'page information' next to 'upload file'. I'm putting all "per page" actions together in a page menu, and all "whole of site" actions in a site munu. The user menu stays pretty much the same (user page, log in/out, preferences, etc.). The page information and Cargo page data links will sit along with edit, move, delete, etc.

I'll get around to setting up mw:Skin:Freo soon. Once I've convinced myself this isn't all a bit silly.

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Wikimedia CEE Meeting 2024 Istanbul group photo – Adem, CC BY 4.0

As the organization’s designer, I was very excited that this year the Wikimedia CEE Meeting was held in Istanbul, my home city. I would like to briefly share with you my experiences as both a member of the organizing team and a participant of this event.

Eyes on Istanbul!

In 2023, I was a designer in the organization team of the Wikimedia CEE Meeting in Tbilisi, Georgia. At that time, I was very excited when I was given the task of creating the visible face of such a big organization. But I was much more excited when I heard on stage that Istanbul was the host city for the 2024 meeting.

Then Başak and Zafer from WMTR took the stage to give a presentation about Istanbul. The presentation read “Let’s Break the Record”. Yes, I can say that we broke the record at the 2024 meeting! With more than 190 participants, CEE Meeting 2024 Istanbul welcomed the most participants of any CEE meeting since 2012.1

We need a new face, a new excitement

Wikimedia CEE Meeting Istanbul candidacy logo on screen – Adem, CC BY-SA 4.0

At the closing session of the meeting in Tbilisi, when it was announced that next year’s meeting would be in Istanbul, the logo I had designed for the candidacy process was projected on the screen. It was a logo in which I used Wikimedia’s classic color palette, called the “The Legacy Palette”, and squares of different sizes came together to form the Maiden’s Tower. The fact that each square in the logo was of different colors and sizes, and that something came out when they came together, reflected the culture of togetherness.

Logo and slogan

But for the conference in Istanbul we had to come up with something different. So, instead of the Legacy color palette, I created a neon color palette where the main colors are navy blue, pink and purple. This palette reflected the energy of Istanbul and the power of free knowledge. I kept the stylized Istanbul lettering in the form of the candidacy logo, but replaced the Maiden’s Tower with a bridge. I created this bridge out of disparate lines, which gives the logo a natural and flexible feel and is in line with the slogan of our conference, “A Bridge to Knowledge”.

Our theme is clear, let’s get to work

The 2024 organizing team unanimously agreed that our new theme would be “A Bridge to Knowledge” and now it was time to slowly put it into practice.

The main design language of the conference consisted of random lines wrapping real Istanbul photographs. These lines encircling the elements related to Istanbul represent continuity, excitement and conveying knowledge. In other words, the power of free knowledge surrounds the whole of Istanbul. The photographs, usually with a black and white filter on a pink to purple background, created a harmonious contrast. But occasionally I also used elements in color.

Also, as the conference approached, I created a series of images to give attendees a sense of Istanbul, which I shared in the Telegram group of the conference, accompanied by brief information and links to Wikipedia articles.

Support for the theme again from Istanbul itself

As we move forward to the day of the conference, we now have not only digital but also physical conference materials. I designed a lot of things like the souvenirs and venue decorations to tie in with the main theme, but we also needed auxiliary elements that would tell the participants about Istanbul and give them a sense of fun.

Conference icons – Kurmanbek, CC BY-SA 4.0

For this, I designed a set of 32 icons with some elements from Turkish and Istanbul culture. During the conference, the most popular icon was of course the cat icon. Because Istanbul is a cat city 🙂

There is also one more point that I should not leave out. I think that this conference is different from all other conferences. Because Piyanist, Yasakrami and Sercan Peşan have composed music specifically for this conference. The Piyanist describes the composition process as follows:

When I was first approached to compose music for the conference, I was excited. Because I had composed soundtracks for different short films and documentaries before, but since this proposal was related to Wikipedia, which is my own area of interest, I would be composing on our behalf. It was a very valuable and honorable offer for me. It felt very nice to hear this music in the background during the breaks during the conference.

– Piyanist, September 30, 2024

I was also informed by Piyanist that this music includes piano, harp and string orchestra from western music, and kanun, ney and santur from eastern music. Frankly, I think this music is quite beautiful for a conference that takes place in a place like Istanbul, which connects two continents and cultures. You can listen to the composed music from this link.

Making a conference in a living history

Kurmanbek, CC BY-SA 4.0

I was also excited to organize such a big conference, where we hosted people from many countries and communities, at the Müze Gazhane, which is a living history. For this reason, I have always designed in a way that respects the history of the space, but in a way that reflects the energy of Istanbul and free knowledge. In a way, I mixed the energy of history and the energy of today.

We have a team of volunteers at our side who add strength to our strength!

Of course, we did not complete the conference process alone. Volunteers who contribute to Wikimedia projects in their daily lives, who may never have seen each other before, who only know each other’s usernames, have put their hands on the line for Wikimedia CEE Meeting 2024 Istanbul and helped both the organizing team and the participants as conference volunteers.

Kurmanbek, CC BY-SA 4.0

We would like to thank our conference volunteer friends who helped us before, during and after the conference and who wanted to be a part of this story!

Let’s immortalize this moment with interviews

Together with İsna, the founder of Üsküdar University Wiki Student Club, we interviewed many participants during the conference. When we asked them the first thing that came to their mind about Istanbul, of course, most of them said cats 🙂

İsna and Caner are doing an interview – Egebdr, CC BY-SA 4.0

When we asked them what they had learned at this conference, the response was very positive. This caused me to be happy from time to time with the gimbal in my hand during the recording. I hope we left a good memory for the participants with these interviews.

Result

As a result, based on the opinions of the participants, I think I realized a successful design process. In such events, I usually try to incorporate elements from the culture of the location of the event into the theme. Because this is actually a way of promoting cultures with “free knowledge” and supporting free knowledge with graphic design.

As Wikimedia Community User Group Turkey, I believe that we have successfully completed Wikimedia CEE Meeting 2024 Istanbul and that our participants have learned a lot from Istanbul, “A Bridge to Knowledge”. I would like to thank our volunteers who took part in this conference, all our participants who added color to our conference with their presentations and participation, and the cats of Istanbul who motivated and made us happy with their presence.

Footnotes

  1. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_CEE_Meeting#Wikimedia_CEE_Meeting ↩︎
Wilson Oluoha
Wilson Oluoha

The entire Igbo Wikimedia community still remain in shock as we mourn the passing of one of our own.

Wilson Kelechi Oluoha joined the Wikimedia movement as an Igbo Wikimedian after he was invited to attend a Wiki Edit-a-thon by one of the co-founders of Igbo Wikimedians User Group (Tochi Precious Friday) at a youth entrepreneurship Program sponsored by the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 2018. He had so much passion for the movement. At that time, his only worry was that he may not be having so much time to devote to editing. While he advanced as a Wikimedian, he discovered that articles about Africa were always nominated for deletion on English Wikipedia. He often advocated within the community that we should take steps in doing things better and getting the articles to stay.

Wilson liked Photography. He initially tried editing on English Wikipedia, but he however found a passion for Wikimedia Commons since it aligned with his photography hobby. He always expressed his desire to showcase quality photos through his photography skills. His desire to pass knowledge spurred his idea about creating the IG WikiCommons Hub.As time went by, he noticed that the contributions coming from Africa were mostly from mobile phones. So, when Wiki In Africa announced the vacancy for Wiki Loves Africa (WLA) Community facilitator, it was a good opportunity for him to propel the changes he wanted to see. In 2023 he became WLA Community facilitator and has so far pioneered mobile phone photography and editing training for Wiki Loves Africa participants.Wilson often saw the need to help grow capacity in Igbo Wikimedia User Group beyond Wikipedia, Wikicommons and Wikidata. His global contributions across all Wiki projects was 11,199 (Eleven thousand one hundred and ninety nine).

According to one of his mentees, Wilson had some principles with which he advised them to grow on Igbo Wikimedia and the Wiki movement. Some of these principles include:

  • “If you want to grow in the movement find something that is lacking in the community and start it, also research about what other people have done before, copy the idea, build on it, improve the idea and come out with something better”.
  • “You don’t need to know how to do it before you start, learn it in the process, don’t reject opportunities.”
  • “If you can’t do it well don’t touch it at all. It is better not to do it than to start it and not finish or not be excellent at it.”
  • “For you to grow put God first, pray and ask God for direction and also be curious about everything.”
  • “Whatever opportunity you get to present anything even though it’s a closing remark do it as though you are talking to kings, you don’t have to be casual about it because you don’t know who is watching.”

Wilson also had some favourite quotes and sayings with which he is known by community members. Some of these quotes are his, while others he learnt from his own mentors or from books he read. Thus, according to some community members, Wilson will always say:

“The Wikimedia space is a large space that can contain everybody.”

“You cannot bind Pharaoh.”

“You should always live ready.”

“Make sense on time, you don’t have the stage forever.”

“Think crazy, don’t be normal.”

“Don’t be okay, want more.”

“You can’t help a man look for what he is not looking for.”

Indeed, it was a tragic and untimely loss for our community. Igbo Wikimedians has therefore set aside Monday, 14th October 2024 to mourn his passing. On that day, all Igbo Wikimedia community activities will be shut down in honour of our beloved brother Wilson Kelechi Oluoha.

Wilson, Igbo Wikimedians User Group will miss you… Wikimedia Foundation will miss you… The world will miss you! May God almighty console your dear family and grant your gentle soul eternal rest.

Last year Ukraine’s Wiki Loves Monuments organising team inaugurated a special category “German Heritage” in partnership with the Council of Germans of Ukraine (CGU). As this year’s contest just started, and the special category is on for the second time during October, let’s look at 2023 results and best photos.

Ukrainian Germans (Ukrainedeutsche) have been living on the territory of modern Ukraine since the Middle Ages, with a significant uptick in moving here after 1763 – Germans received special privileges, like not paying taxes, and were able to settle, build their own villages and towns, especially in the south and east of Ukraine. World War II led to them being either deported as ‘traitors’ to Siberia or leaving for Germany to avoid deportation, so there were almost no ethnic Germans left here for a while. Some of the churches, factories, mills, and buildings they left were destroyed, rebuilt or repurposed, but some of them survived, and we would like to collect pictures and videos of what is left to illustrate Wikipedia.

This work is especially important now, since a lot of those settlements are now in the occupied territories of Ukraine or getting destroyed in the course of the war Russia is wedging against Ukraine. The support of the Council of Germans of Ukraine allowed us to have this special category organised in 2023, and now also in 2024” – commented Atoly, a Wiki Loves Monuments Ukraine organising team member. “We have created and continue to maintain a list of cultural heritage monuments, which can be found here: german.wlm.photo. There are around 300 objects there already, and we continue working on expanding them. Both sites that have official protection status and sites that are not officially protected are included there, just like we do for other special categories in our contest“.

Volodymyr Leisle, the President of the Council of Germans in Ukraine, commented: “Documentation and popularisation of the German cultural heritage of Ukraine is very important for us. Settlements such as Bakhmut, New York [town in eastern Ukraine], Tokmak, settlements near the Molochna River, Berdyansk, Mariupol and other cities of eastern and southern Ukraine have deep historical and cultural ties with German colonists. I would like to believe that our joint work will help preserve and present archival photos of German heritage in digital format, especially the ones which have already been destroyed due to Russian military aggression…

We plan to organise a writing campaign in Wikipedia dedicated to historical and cultural heritage of ethnic Germans in Ukraine, in order to use the photos collected”.

Overall there are 226 sites in the list of special category “German Heritage”, 150 of which are not protected by the state. During the inaugural 2023 contest 27 participants uploaded almost 700 photos of 137 sites, out of which 104 do not have official protection status. These objects represent 12 out of 27 regions of Ukraine.

Council of Germans of Ukraine helped to assemble a jury of the special category, listed below (alphabetically):

●  Dr. Alfred Eisfeld is an expert in the history and culture of Germans in the Russian Empire, Soviet Union and the CEE countries and an author of many scientific works.

●   Volodymyr Leisle is a Ukrainian activist of German origin. He has headed the Council of Germans of Ukraine since 2009, being in charge of German government support and right and interests protection of the German minorities program in Ukraine.

●   Dr. Dmytro Myeshkov is a history scholar in Nordost-Institut at University of Hamburg.

●   Christel Steigenberger is a Wikimedia Commons administrator and editor of Wikipedia in German.

●   Edwin Warkentin is the head of the cultural department of the Cultural History of Russian Germans Museum in Detmold in North Rhine-Westphalia.

Below you will find 21 photos chosen by the jury. They show sites from six Ukrainian regions: Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv, Dnipro, Kherson, Odesa Oblasts, and Kyiv. The contest winners are divided into 5 categories: “Residential monuments”, “Industrial monuments”, “Religious monuments”, “Other monuments”, and “Monuments destroyed by war”. 

Residential monuments

Photo: © Oleksandr Malyon, CC BY-SA 4.0

First place

The first place in the “Residential monuments” category was given to a photo of the house of Peter D. Shultz in Dolynske village (Kronstal and Neu-Osterwick), Zaporizhzhia Oblast. The house is not officially listed as a monument. The photo was taken by Oleksandr Malyon.

Rudi Frizen’s book “Mennonite Architecture. From the past to the future” mentions that the house was built between 1912 and 1914 by Peter Shultz, Dietrich Shultz’s son who was the founder of the “D.B. Shultz & Erben” factory. He was managing the factory then.

According to the book the building: “was heated with hot water, there was water supply and toilets. A factory steam engine produced electricity for the lightning. There was a kitchen, laundry room and servants’ quarters on the ground floor. The large veranda leads to the yard. There was a large balcony that was facing the street on the first floor. The house is built with locally produced brick and lavishly decorated above the windows with pointed and flat arches. The attic above the first floor is semicircular in the centre just like on the town administration building in Khortytsia. There is a small house decorated with brick ornaments behind the building, where carts were kept. The original tiled roof was replaced with a slate one.”

The house was used to host a village council in the 1940s, then it became a kolkhoz’s property. By 1996 the building was in poor condition because of a fire.

The photo was taken on 16 October 2021.

Second place

The second place in the “Residential monument” category belongs to a series of photos of an old German house in Raiske village (Steinbach or Jakob Zawadzkys khutir), Zaporizhzhia Oblast. The photos were taken by Kostiantyn Antonets on 30 March 2019.

The building is located on the West of the village. It is not protected as a monument officially. Kostiantyn explained his motivation for participating in this special category: “This [German heritage] is an intrinsic part of our history”.

Third place

Photo: © Yuri Petruniak, CC BY-SA 4.0

The third place was awarded to a photo of the mansion (the house of architect Dietrich Thyssen) at Fabra Street 16 in Dnipro. It was taken by Yuri Petruniak on 1 October 2020. The mansion is a monument of local significance. It belongs to the Art Nouveau style. It was designed by D.K. Thyssen in 1905. It hosted doctor O. H. Herbilskyi’s private clinic in 1912-1919. A four-storey revenue house was built nearby around 1914 (at Fabra Street 14).

Industrial monuments

First place 

Photo: © Oleksandr Malyon, CC BY-SA 4.0

The first place in this category goes to a photo of a brewery at Himnazychna Street 36 in Kherson. It is an architectural monument of local significance. The photo was taken by Oleksandr Malyon.

The Laer brewery was built in the second half of the 19th century and provided with German equipment. The factory’s affairs started getting worse after 1921. Nowadays it is located on private land and is not functioning. The photo was taken on 24 April 2021.

Second place

Photo: © Oleksandr Malyon, CC BY-SA 4.0

The second place belongs to a photo with a view of the Shultz factory in Dolynske village (Kronstal and Neu-Osterwick), Zaporizhzhia Oblast. It was taken by Oleksandr Malyon on 16 October 2021.

The book “Mennonite Architecture. From the past to the future” mentions that the factory was built between 1880-1885. It manufactured various agricultural equipment, including winnowing machines. Since 1893 the factory has been known as “D.B. Shultz & Erben” factory, because the co-owner Peter Kopp’s sons started working with him after Dietrich married his widow. The office building was added, and when Dietrich died, his son Peter D. Shultz took over the business in 1908. Around 1910 a first floor was added to the south wing. It was around that time when a tower was built at the transition between the wings. Jakob D. Shultz, Peter’s younger brother, became its owner in 1914. The factory was later nationalised.

The factory was described as: “(…) built of dark brick with beautiful masonry and large semicircular windows decorated with arched ornaments. The two-storey wing’s windows are in an irregularly shaped arch, the colour of the bricks and the details of the ornament are in perfect harmony. The building is made of the same bricks as other buildings in the village.It can be an evidence that locally produced bricks were used. The tower at the transition between the wings was damaged during the Civil War, but it was rebuilt later. The roof ridge, which used to go from north to south, was redirected to an east-west. The attic of the office building was destroyed, and the metal roof was replaced with an asbestos-cement one”.

Since 1996, a part of the factory building has been used for seed cleaning. The building is not officially protected by the state.

Third place

Photo: © Serhii Onkov, CC BY-SA 4.0
Photo: © Kostiantyn Antonets, CC BY-SA 4.0 

Two works from Zaporizhzhia Oblast share the third place. They show Duban’s mill in Tokmak and Gerhard Walla’s glass factory in Polohy.

Photo of the Duban (Jakob Vall’s) mill in Tokmak was taken by Serhii Onkov on 17 July 2021. The building is located on the territory of a cannery and is not protected by the state, even though it is an architectural monument of the German Mennonites. More photos of the city’s sights can be found on the participant’s blog here. Tokmak itself is temporarily occupied by Russian troops. Serhii wrote that he took part in the special category because he had “several photos of German heritage, but the images of them are not on the official lists”.

The photo that shows Gerhard Walla’s glass factory in Polohy city in Zaporizhzhia Oblast was taken by Kostiantyn Antonets on 20 April 2019. The factory can be also found as Sandomyrskyi brothers’ glass factory and Jakob Walla’s glass factory. The building is not protected. The city has been occupied by Russian troops since 6 March 2022. 

Religious monuments

First place

The series of photos taken by Faina Zelenaya on 29 November 2020 are in the first place. They depict the Holy Trinity Cathedral in Lymanske village, Odesa Oblast.

The Holy Trinity Cathedral is a Catholic cathedral of the German Kandel community, an architectural monument of local significance. It was built in 1892 from the most widespread limestone in the Northern Black Sea region instead of bricks like the Cathedral of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in nearby Zelts. Both Kandel and Zelts now form the Lymanske village. Odesa’s German colonists organised a rebellion against the grain requisitioning and mobilisation into the Red Army in the summer and autumn of 1919. After the troops of Denikin’s Volunteer Army came to the south of Ukraine, the Germans created a special colonist unit that significantly weakened the forces of the Red Army. After the resistance was crushed, the cathedral was closed, along with the Cathedral of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Zelts. It is currently in ruins.

During the Soviet period, the building was used as a granary, but later there was a severe fire inside, which completely destroyed the cathedral – the roof collapsed, and only the walls and columns remained. Nowadays it is used as a coal warehouse for a local boarding school.

Second place 

Photo: © Kostiantyn Antonets, CC BY-SA 4.0

The second place in the category was awarded to the photo of the German church in the Tersianka village (Myrne Pole / Feidenfeld), Zaporizhzhia Oblast. It was taken by Kostiantyn Antonets on 24 October 2020.

The German church in Tersianka was built at the expense of the local community. The construction committee involved local pastor Friedrich Hamann, starosta Shneider, landowner Muller and others. The architect Turovets was the head of the committee. The church was officially opened on 5 June 1911 and functioned until the autumn of 1934. The last pastor was arrested and shot, and German families were moved to Kazakhstan. The building was rebuilt to host a cinema there, and the interior of the church was changed into a cinema hall with a stage, foyer, and back rooms. The building looks like a Lutheran church from the outside. Later there was a village cultural centre here. It is not protected as a monument.

Third place

Photo: © Oleksandr Malyon, CC BY-SA 4.0

The third place belongs to a photo of the Mennonite house of worship in Mykolai-Pole village (Mykolaifeld), Zaporizhzhia Oblast. It was taken by Oleksandr Malyon on 15 October 2021.

The village was founded in 1870 by German colonists. There is data that in 1886 the German colony of Mykolaifeld hosted 199 people in 33 households, there was a Mennonite prayer house, school and wheel factory. The building does not have official status as a monument.

Other monuments

First place

Photo: © Oleksandr Malyon, CC BY-SA 4.0
Photo: © Volodymyr Bondar, CC BY-SA 4.0

There are two photos in the first place in this category. The first one shows a view of the palatial ensemble (estate) in Sharivka, Kharkiv Oblast, and the second one shows the interior of this palace. The photo was taken by Oleksandr Malyon on 16 May 2021.

The palatial ensemble in Sharivka is a complex of architectural monuments of national importance. Olkhovsky landowners, the Gebenstreiter brothers from Germany, the Koenigs owned the estate (palace, park, service buildings, etc.). The ensemble of the estate was finally formed by its last owners – Leopold Koenig (“sugar king”) and his son Julius in 1881-1917. Its territory grew to 70 hectares.

In 1923 the estate passed into the possession of Sverdlov Sovkhoz. From 1925 to 2010 a specialised tuberculosis sanatorium was located on the territory of the complex, which functioned until 2008. All patients were transferred from there to a dispensary in the Zmiiv district in early 2009. Renovation was planned, but the budget was not assigned. The municipal enterprise “Znakhidka” is supposed to support the palace financially.

The park’s focal point is a two-storey castle-palace built on a high hill. The Gothic-style exterior and interiors were luxurious and partially preserved: tiled stoves, murals and intricate mouldings, dark oak panels, and a wooden grand staircase. This palace is one of the oldest monuments of palatial architecture in Ukraine.

The photo of the interior was taken by Volodymyr Bondar on 30 April 2018.

There are 26 rooms and three halls in the palace. A large living room, study and oak-lined library lounge, former billiard room (on the ground floor), grand staircase, large ballroom and some living rooms (on the first floor) are located in the central part of the palace, which is marked by two towers. It is the central part of the palace that has retained its stunning decoration. Murals, ceiling lamps, white and pink marble fireplaces, stoves decorated with painted tiles, wooden carvings preserved both on the main staircase and in the library, which was a billiard room during Baron Koenig’s time. 

Second place 

Photo: © Ihor Vynnychenko, CC BY-SA 4.0

The photo of Zaborovskyi’s Gate in Kyiv received second place in this category. The photo was taken by Ihor Vynnychenko on 20 July 2012.

The gate is a part of The National Sanctuary Complex “Sophia of Kyiv”, a complex of national significant monuments of urban planning, architecture and history, as well as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Zaborovskyi’s Gate is a western main entrance to the residence of the Kyiv metropolitans from the metro station “Zoloti Vorota”. It is one of the most outstanding examples of Ukrainian Baroque. It was built in 1746 during large-scale restoration and construction works on the territory of Sophia of Kyiv, probably by the architect of North German origin Johann Gottfried Schädel. Metropolitan Raphael Zaborovsky of Kyiv commissioned it. He was an art adept and lover, after whom the monument is named. From 2007 to 2009 the building was reconstructed in its original form with special permission from UNESCO.

Third place

Oleksandr Malyon won the third place for his series of photos depicting a German school in Mykolai-Pole (Mykolaifeld) village, Zaporizhzhia Oblast.

There was an agricultural school, and later after collectivization, kolkhoz’s school. Nowadays, the building is used as a secondary school. The building is not protected as a monument.

Monuments destroyed by war

First place

Photo: © Serhii Onkov, CC BY-SA 4.0

The photo of the Lutheran Church of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul in Zmiivka (Klosterdorf (Kostyrka), Schlangendorf (Zmiivka), and Mühlhausendorf) in Kherson Oblast, received the first place. The photo was taken by Serhii Onkov on 20 July 2020.

The church was damaged by Russian shelling on 5 January 2024.

To compare: an image of the Lutheran church after the Russian shelling
Photo: © National Police of Ukraine, CC BY 4.0

Second place

Photo: © Kostiantyn Antonets, CC BY-SA 4.0

The second place in this category goes to a photo of the House of Johann Heinrich Jantzen on Shevchenko Street in Orikhiv, Zaporizhzhia region. The photo was taken by Kostiantyn Antonets on 7 January 2020.

The House of Heinrich Jantzen is a mansion of late 19th century architecture that hosts the Orikhiv Municipal Council. The two-storey brick building draws attention with its sophisticated decor, in which various architectural elements are expertly combined.

Heinrich Jantzen was one of the Mennonite Germans who moved to the southern part of Ukraine. Members of this family built a steam mill, a hospital, and a school for Mennonite children in the town, and participated in the building of trade shops and a cinema. Heinrich Jantzen was the town’s first mayor and was permanently elected to this position in Orikhiv for 25 years (from 1874 to 1899). The building is not protected as a monument.

On 21 May 2022, the house was damaged by Russian shelling. The walls of the first floor and the roof partially collapsed, the front door was destroyed, and the walls were cut by debris.

To compare: the House after Russian shelling
Photo: © Zoda.gov.ua, CC BY 4.0

Third place

Photo: © Serhii Onkov, CC BY-SA 4.0

The third place was given to the emblematic monument, the Shredder’s mill “Nadiia” (“Hope” in Ukrainian) built in 1894 in Huliaipole city, Zaporizhzhia Oblast. The photo was taken by Serhii Onkov on 18 July 2021.

The “Nadiia” mill was built by the design and construction firm of entrepreneur Anton Erlanher. After that it belonged to the merchant Samson Saksahanskyi, and since 1908 – to the Mennonite David Shredder, and since 1915 to the “Keimakh” Association. The building was used as a mill in the Soviet Union and before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The building has not changed much since it survived the Ukrainian Revolution of 1917-1921 and the Second World War, but it was severely damaged by the Russian occupiers. It was damaged on 22 June 2022 by Russian shelling, and destroyed by a Russian strike on 17 February 2024 at night. The first photos of the destroyed mill were posted by historian Serhii Zvilinskyi in the facebook group “Huliaipole Antiquities”.

To compare: the mill after the shelling on 17 February 2024
Photo: © Serhii Zvilinskyi, “Huliaypole Antiquities”, CC BY-SA 4.0

All the photos in the special category from 2023 can be found on Wikimedia Commons.

For reference:

The Council of Germans of Ukraine (CGU) is the main coordinating organisation representing the interests of ethnic Germans in Ukraine. More about the Council can be found on the website.

For context:

To prepare this publication, materials were used from the Wikipedia articles “Holy Trinity Cathedral in Lymanske”, “German church in the Tersianka”, “Mykolai-Pole in Zaporizhzhia Oblast”, “Park in Sharivka”, “Sharivka Palace”, “Zaborovskyi’s Gate” and “House of Heinrich Jantzen”.

Welcome, Danielle!

Friday, 4 October 2024 16:00 UTC

In this exciting time of growth for Wiki Education, we are pleased to welcome Danielle Vazquez to our staff!

Danielle Vazquez
Danielle Vazquez. Image courtesy Danielle Vazquez, all rights reserved.

Danielle will serve as Senior Institutional Giving Officer, a new position on our team. Collaborating closely with Kathleen Crowley, Director of Donor Relations, Danielle will work with foundations, cultural and academic institutions, corporations, and other institutional sources to expand donor relationships and funding opportunities for our programs. Her role will include the management and oversight of grants, contracts, and sponsorships, including prospect research, grant submissions and required reporting, and ensuring stewardship for institutional supporters, appropriate donor recognition, and a positive experience for all of our supporters. 

Most recently, Danielle served as Director of Institutional Partnerships at the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network (GLSEN), where she developed a portfolio of institutional grants. Before GLSEN, Danielle secured national grants and general operating support as Senior Manager of Fundraising for The New Teacher Project (TNTP), and managed corporate and foundation portfolios at Children’s Aid and the YWCA of the City of New York. 

Danielle holds a master’s degree in evolutionary biology and ecology from Smith College. She has directed a research team, co-authored a book chapter on the adaptive diversity of microbial eukaryotes, and has expertise in a variety of molecular techniques.

In her free time, Danielle likes to write, lift weights, and see how long her cat will tolerate belly rubs.

Please join us in welcoming Danielle!

 

The Albanian Wikipedia has reached 100,000 articles, marking a significant milestone in its development. This achievement reflects the dedication and effort of passionate editors, skilled contributors, and enthusiastic volunteers within the community. This makes the Albanian language Wikipedia the 73rd Wikipedia to reach this milestone.

The journey to 100,000 articles has been characterized by the collaborative work of countless individuals who have devoted nearly 20 years to expanding and enriching the Free Encyclopedia. From historical figures and cultural topics to scientific advancements and contemporary events, the diverse array of knowledge presented in the Albanian language continues to grow, mirroring the interests of the Albanian language speakers, with populations in Albania, Kosovo, Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro and a sizable diaspora. Notably, the 100,000th article highlights the film In the Mood for Love, a celebrated Hong Kong-France production, which illustrates the project’s expanding reach.

The Wikivoyage Campaign in Kruja, Albania, 2024. The Castle of Skanderbeg, Albania’s National Hero.

The Albanian Wikipedia community has engaged in various initiatives aimed at improving content quality and fostering participation. Through edit-a-thons, outreach programs, and workshops, experienced editors have guided newcomers and shared best practices, creating an inclusive environment for all contributors. In addition to Wikipedia, the Albanian community has been active in expanding contributions to Wikimedia Commons, Wikidata, and Wikivoyage.

Recent campaigns have focused on underrepresented topics, leading to significant growth in areas such as women’s history, regional heritage, Roma identity, and LGBT issues. These efforts have enriched the content and deepened the understanding of these subjects within the project.

Looking Forward: Celebrations and growth

To commemorate this milestone, the community is eager to celebrate alongside the project’s 23rd anniversary. Upcoming activities will feature in-person gatherings, designed to recognize the contributions of editors and inspire further growth. This achievement underscores the commitment of a community dedicated to preserving and sharing knowledge for future generations, ensuring that information remains accessible in the Albanian language.

Wikipedians in Kosovo. This editathon was organized by Wikimedians of Albanian Language User Group in Kosovo.

#SheSaid 5th Edition Interviews: [#1 Florence Devouard]

Thursday, 3 October 2024 16:44 UTC

Welcome to the 5th edition of the #SheSaid campaign. This is the first in our series of interviews, and today we are speaking with Florence Devouard, co-founder of the #SheSaid campaign and a key figure in the Wikimedia community. Florence will share some memorable moments from the campaign and explain why it’s so important to continue this work.

Could you tell us about yourself?

I have been a member of the Wikimedia Community for 22 years. I have got involved in many different areas, under many different hats, and it would be hard to summarize it all. I noted very early on that women were few on our projects, but only really got involved in fighting the gender gap when Isla Haddow-Flood and myself launched the Wiki Loves Women initiative in 2016. We have explored different strategies to get recruit more women, provide a more inclusive environment, train and support, implement different strategies. The topic is complex..
In 2020, in the middle of the pandemic, I came forward with the idea of #SheSaid… and there we are 4 years later !

Can you share the inspiration behind the #SheSaid campaign? What motivated you to start it?

Gender Gap Logo

Soon after the pandemic started, I revamped the Gender Gap portal on meta. The previous pages were quite disorganized, sometimes outdated, and I felt more clarity was needed to motivate newcomers to better grasp the context and to foster more initiatives. After I was done with the creation of the new portal pages, I wondered what could be done to work on the topic, whilst every one was stuck home and edit-a-thons were suspended. With the experience of the poorly welcoming Wikipedia environment for newcomers, I thought we could focus on a different wikimedia project. I went looking for a more peaceful and inclusive space, where new participants could fit whilst experienced wikipedians could enjoy a new experience.
An important piece of the puzzle also was to make it a “not too demanding” initiative, an easy going drive, to balance the mentally taxing time of the lockdown we were submitted to.
Those were the three seeds of the inspiration : continuing our efforts to collect and curate knowledge, whilst facilitating the renewal of contributors, and preserving the energy of the experimented.

What were the initial challenges you faced when launching the first edition of #SheSaid?

I think the main challenge I have faced has been the same one year after year after year : tracking what was produced. This is particularly difficult as #SheSaid is multilingual and every active team has its own way of tracking (or often not tracking) what is being done. Missing or broken or non adapted tools are not helping measure impact. And measuring impact is very important to maintain energy levels !

Can you share any memorable moments or milestones from previous editions of the campaign?

One memorable moment might be when I realized the hashtag tool, which I planned using to measure impact, was not working any more… and that the owner of the tool was not really responding. Uh. 
Another memorable moment was when we were called sexists and accused of transphobia. I will not go into more details, but it really hurt and made me upset. 

How do you measure the success of each edition, and what achievements are you most proud of?

I was very happy that some groups immediately thought it was a great idea and joined in 2020. Participants come and go and participating figures are on the rise. Entries are created, and they are on the rise too. People get interested in Wikiquote more than before. New Wikiquote languages are open, in new languages. New participants enter the community through this initiative door. All that is pretty cool.

What is your vision for the future of #SheSaid? Are there any new initiatives or directions you’re excited about?

I hope we can keep the initiative a rather easy going, low pace one. It is essentially a multilingual WikiProject. What would be nice is to be able to capitalize on some of the best entries to promote our knowledge base to the larger public. 

Florence and Camelia Boban from the Wikimania 24 poster session

The #SheSaid campaign highlights women’s voices, but inclusivity remains a key topic in today’s discussions. How do you ensure the campaign is inclusive of diverse voices?

I think it is worth pointing out that #SheSaid is open to any contributors, regardless of age, gender, language, region.

Everyone is welcome and this is a very key point of #SheSaid. Last year we had contributors from any gender, participating in Arabic, Italian, Gungbe, Catalan, Ukrainian, French, Spanish, English, Bengali, Igbo, Central Bikol, Tagalog, German, Slovene, Swahili, Serbian, Telugu, Fante, Dutch and Assamese.

We also took the time to clarify the aim in terms of content expected. The primary and most important goal of the drive is to collect quotes « from women ». Occasionally, the quotes may be « about women » or they may be in tight relation with female gender topics (such as reproductive health); that’s ok but not the primary goal. The primary goal is « from women ».

“Woman” must be understood as “person identified or self-identified as a woman”. Some participants do sometimes add quotes from non-binary people; that’s ok, but not the primary goal.

What advice would you give to others looking to start similar initiatives?

There is space for everyone. Join the existing initiatives, learn from them, do your reading to understand more of the context, talk to people. Stay involved in initiatives you think are relevant and where you enjoy the company. If not, start your own initiative.

SheSaid 24 visual

What is your favorite women-empowering quote?

I do not know if this is my favorite, but I rather like “From a dull life, even a fungus dies”. Johanna Westerdijk, Dutch plant pathologist.

Being an agricultural engineer by training, and a 22 years old wikipedian… it fits well with my own involvement in the Open Knowledge Movement. 

Thank you Florence!

Thank you.

Read more about the campaign and the fifth edition in our #SheSaid 2024 Launch diff and don’t forget to follow us on social media:

My sustainability August and September 2024

Thursday, 3 October 2024 12:59 UTC

September was more hectic than planned, so here comes two months of reporting at once.

Wikimania

As I mentioned last month, I organized a meetup for anyone interested in sustainable development. While decently attended, it did not pan out the way I had planned. Instead of sharing ideas of what to do, there were plenty of people who felt a need to vent their worries about the climate change. I think for the future, having a separate climate café where people just can talk about that would be useful and can make the community more sustainable in itself.

I don’t know if many others used the list all sessions related to the SDGs that I created, but at least it was useful to me during the event.

User group meetings

We had meetings in both August and September, in the first we mostly did some planning and in the second, we started the work on a strategy for the user group. More work to do in the following weeks.

Newsletters

While hectic, I managed to get the newsletters sent both for August and September.

This is the second half of my eighth report of my New Year’s resolutions.

With a profound sense of loss and deep sadness, we mourn the unexpected passing of our esteemed colleague, Wilson Kelechi Oluoha, who passed away on 13th  September in Nigeria due to a sudden deadly health emergency. 

Wilson was a tireless advocate for Igbo, Nigerian and African culture and voices on the global Wikimedia Projects, intrinsically involved with several Wikimedia groups across Africa, including Wiki In Africa, Igbo Wikimedians User Group, and Wikimedia Community User Group Nigeria [1]. 

As the project and community facilitator of Wiki Loves Africa,  Wilson was a dedicated team member and, as a Wikimedian, a passionate advocate for open knowledge and African representation in the digital space. Wilson’s leadership in the Nigeria Wikimedia community and the Wiki In Africa projects was invaluable to the expansion and development of the Wikimedia movement in Africa. 

Wilson’s passion for open access to knowledge, his skills as an amateur photographer, and his dedication to the Wikimedia movement have left an indelible mark on our organisations and the broader Wikimedia community. Beyond Wikimedia, he was a passionate cyclist, public speaker, and lover of jazz and the music of yesteryear. 

His loss is deeply felt by all who had the privilege of working alongside him, both those who knew him personally and who worked with him remotely.

Wilson Kelechi Oluoha’s untimely death is a significant loss not only for his family and loved ones but also for the entire Wikimedia community. We extend our sincere condolences and heartfelt sympathies to his wife, Mercy, family, friends, and colleagues.

Wilson’s family has set up a memorial website for Wilson where we encourage you to leave a condolence message or share a tribute. 

Wiki in Africa,  Igbo Wikimedians User Group, and Wikimedia Community User Group Nigeria.

This is an English translation of my book entitled “A 70-year-old Wikipedian talks about the charm of libraries.” Chapter 1, The Road to Wikipedia. Previously, click here.

WikiGap at the Swedish Embassy (Chapter 1-7)

In addition to attending various events and meeting many Wikipedians in 2019, I also attended the WikiGap Editathon in September. This event is an initiative to increase the number of biographical articles about women on Wikipedia. The word “editathon” is a coined word that combines “edit,” meaning editing, and “marathon”. 

On September 29, I participated in the WikiGap Editathon held at the Embassy of Sweden in Roppongi, Minato-ku, Tokyo. The day started with an opening ceremony at 10:00 a.m. in the auditorium, the first was a speech by Swedish Ambassador to Japan Pereric Högberg. He also mentioned that WikiGap has already held events in 60 countries around the world, and that this would be the first event in Japan, with another one scheduled to be held in Osaka on October 14. A video message from Ms. Izumi Nakamitsu, Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations, followed. I was deeply moved by the passionate message from Ms. Nakamitsu, who works on the front lines of international organizations, supporting women’s participation and success in society, based on her own experience. 

Group photo of WikiGap participants at the Embassy of Sweden on September 29, 2019

Next, Wikipedian Racco gave some editing advice, Saebo explained WikiGap, and then special guest IT evangelist Masako Wakamiya appeared. One Wikipedian uploaded the article about Wakamiya to Wikipedia, which everyone applauded! It was a great pleasure to be able to see the dignified figure of Masako Wakamiya up close.

After moving to the venue, participants started editing Wikipedia on the computers set up on their desks around 11:00. Some started writing new articles, some edited and enhanced existing articles, and some tried their hand at translating foreign language versions. About 10 veteran Wikipedians in support roles were on hand to answer questions as soon as someone raised his or her hand.

WikiGap in Japan at the Embassy of Sweden on September 29, 2019

I prepared a draft of the dancer “Miya Misako” in advance and wrote it in the sandbox, then added to and revised it according to the sources I had brought with me. I have published about 20 articles on Wikipedia so far, and I have experienced that the more I prepare the sources in advance, the more substantial the article will be, so I gathered as many sources as possible. I hope to be able to obtain the actual documents, but there are some that are not available. When I could only find it in the NDL Digital Collection, I browsed it the day before and copied the page (I would paste the URL now, but it was not as easy to use then as it is now). When the text was written and the sources were ready, I asked a veteran Wikipedian to check it, and received advice on how to improve it and revise it. After repeating the process several times, I managed to publish it around 3:30 p.m. I was happy to see that this “Miya Misuko” was later selected as a “new article” on Wikipedia.

In the middle of writing, I was interviewed by a magazine publisher. I was asked about my reasons for participating, what kind of articles I was writing, and so on, so I told them what I thought. It was great that the next day they summarized the main points and wrote an article about it. The following is my statement that appeared there.

 I already had an account and had written about 20 articles, but I wanted to attend the event again and discover things. ……This is in keeping with the professional ethics of a librarian in wanting to hand out correct information. What I would like you to look at is the source. I think the Wikipedia is a text to connect the source and the user. (Yuriko Kadokura, librarian). 

“Let’s improve male-dominated Wikipedia!: WikiGap held in Tokyo for the first time BY ELLE JAPAN 09/30/2019”

Some of the event participants came from far away, such as Mr. Takashi Ota and Ms. Miyuki Date, and we chatted a lot with them during lunch and at the barbecue in the evening. I learned a lot from their motivations for participating in the event, and it was a very fulfilling day. The support from the Swedish Embassy was excellent in every way, and I felt as if I had caught a glimpse of the direction in which Sweden is heading. I also realized that the world is seamlessly connected. The photo shows a T-shirt and a mug given to me as a commemorative gift. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to everyone involved in the event. 

WikiGap T-shirt and mug

Wikimania 2024 report from Eugene, Taufik, and Caner

Wednesday, 2 October 2024 21:24 UTC

In this article, User:Eugene Ormandy from Japan, Taufik Rosman from Malaysia, and Caner from Turkey introduce the experiences at Wikimania 2024 in Katowice, Poland, which is the second time for all of us to gather offline (the first is Wikimania 2023 in Singapore).

From left to right: Taufik Rosman, User:Eugene Ormandy, and Caner. (Rafli Noer Khairam, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Authors

User:Eugene Ormandy: A member of Toumon Wikipedian Club Japan and one of the organizers of the Wikimedia Japan-Malaysia Friendship and Wikimedia Japan-Türkiye Friendship. Newcomer of the Year 2023.

User:Eugene Ormandy at Wikimania 2024 (Ahmad Ali Karim, CC0)

Taufik Rosman: Member of Wikimedia Community User Group Malaysia. Wikimedian of the Year 2023.

Taufik Rosman (Don Wong for Tiny Big Picture, commissioned by The Wikimedia Foundation, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Caner: Member of the Wikimedia Community User Group Turkey, Turkic Languages User Group, CEE Youth Group, and Communication committee. Founder of Istanbul Bilgi University Wiki Student Club and one of the organizers of the Wikimedia Japan-Türkiye Friendship. Media Contributor of the Year 2024.

User:Kurmanbek at Wikimania 2024 (Ahmad Ali Karim, CC0)

Q1 What did you learn from Wikimania 2024?

User:Eugene Ormandy: I learnt about various things, such as useful editing tools, collaborations between GLAM and Wikimedia movement, preservation of languages on Wikimedia projects, and open culture movements in some countries. Among all, what impressed me most was every participant, who was a kind of “expert” of something. Wikimania would be one of the ideal place for people who are eager to learn about Wikimedia projects and Wikimedia movement.

A lecture entitled “Wikidata Query Service – the way forward for getting the most out of Wikimedia’s knowledge graph” at Wikimania 2024 (Eugene Ormandy, CC0)

Taufik Rosman: I mainly attended sessions related to education and language which are the fields that I focus when engaging Wikimedia activities in Malaysia.

Caner: I attended many sessions and learned many new interesting things. But I want to tell you about one of the most interesting sessions for me.

It was a session on materials used by Wikimedia Czech Republic (WMCZ) in educational activities for students. During the session I learned that WMCZ has 3 main training programs: “Education Programs”, ‘Programs for the Community’ and ”Programs for Partnerships” They explained in detail the subject of “Media Education” in their education program. They stated that Wikimedia projects are a great tool for media education. As part of this education, they organize educations and workshops for future librarians at universities in Prague and Brno.

Kurmanbek, CC BY-SA 4.0

The most interesting part for me was a Wiki education handbook, which I have been thinking about doing in Türkiye for a long time. This training book contains 5 activities for teachers. I would like to talk to the people involved in this project at WMCZ and get more detailed information from them. This may help me in designing a similar book for the Wikipedia Education Program in Türkiye.

Q2 How did you interact with Wikimedians from other communities at Wikimania 2024?

User:Eugene Ormandy: I made a lot of new friends all around the world and shared our interests. This was a great opportunity to learn about something new. In addition, I also met Wikimedians whom I met before at some international conferences such as Wikimania 2023 in Singapore or ESEAP Conference 2024 in Malaysia. We enjoyed our reunion and shared recent activities. I think such happy reunions motivate us to continue to edit Wikimedia projects and join Wikimedia movement.

With my new friend Leonardi Fernández from WikiMedistas Wayúu (User:Tofeiku, CC0)

It was a great pleasure for me that other Japanese Wikimedians also made international connections at the conference. In general, Japanese Wikimedians had not joined the “GLOBAL” Wikimedia movements even though they edited a lot and held various Wikimedia events in Japan. I was happy to see the things have been changing.

Wikimedians from Indonesia, Malaysia, Turkey, and Japan. (Rafli Noer Khairam, CC BY-SA 4.0)
Wikimedians from Japan and Argentina (Eugene Ormandy, CC0)
A Japanese Wikimedian joined the Wiki Orchestra (Le Commissaire, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Taufik Rosman: There were many Wikimedians I get to meet for the first time and catching up with fellow Wikimedians I met in previous conferences. I enjoy meeting new people in the Collectors’ Room where I get to try snacks from around the globe and Wikimedia swags.

Caner: For me, Wikimania 2024 Katowice was a conference where I consolidated the friendships I made at Wikimania 2023 Singapore and made new friends. It was exciting for me to meet other Wikimedians from Japan and Malaysia, and to renew our friendship with Eugene and Taufik from the past years.

Me and my friend Raflinoer32 from Indonesia EmpAhmadK, CC0

Also this year, I met Wikimedians from Armenia, Indonesia, Ukraine, Greece, Kyrgyzstan, Czech Republic, Poland and many other countries. I hope that these friendships will not only remain as friendships, but also that we will work together to remind us of the theme “Collaboration of the Open”.

NikosLikomitros, CC0

I can say for myself that very soon we can start good collaborations with communities in Malaysia and Indonesia. Making new friends in the Wikimedia Movement and strengthening our friendship with my existing friends motivates me to be more active in the movement!

Q3 What surprised you the most at Wikimania 2024?

User:Eugene Ormandy: Needless to say, the selection of Caner as the Media Contributor of the Year 2024, one of the Wikimedian of the Year 2024 winners. In the respect of his abilities and activities, I had no doubt that Caner would be awarded soon, but actually, he told me and Taufik that “I don’t think I’ll get the award this year” just before the conference! We will ask Caner to buy us snacks for cheating us!

Caner was selected as the Media Contributor of the Year2024! (Le Commissaire, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Taufik Rosman: Of course I was quite shocked that our friend Caner here received the Media Contributor of the Year. I remembered he jokingly said to me he wished that he will receive the award this year. I admired his designs and I even asked him before to create some designs.

Caner: First of all, in my 10th year in the Wikimedia Movement, being awarded by Jimmy Wales as Media Contributor of the Year was one of the things that surprised me. I never thought it would come to this when I was making designs that would keep the cultures of communities alive within the Wikimedia Movement. When I saw Taufik, who was awarded Wikimedian of the Year at Wikimania 2023, and Eugene, who was awarded Newcomer of the Year 2023, I wished to that I would win this award next year.

Niccolò Caranti, CC BY-SA 4.0

Q4 What will you do after Wikimania 2024?

User:Eugene Ormandy: As an editor, I will contribute to Wikidata more and more using some useful tools such as OpenRefine. As an event organizer, I will encourage Wikimedia Japan-Malaysia Friendship and Wikimedia Japan-Türkiye Friendship in various ways. Friendship Editing Month September 2024, just after the Wikimania 2024, is one of the examples. In addition, I joined the CEE Meeting 2024 in Istanbul from Japan and communicated with a lot of Wikimedians.

I hope such activities will strengthen the ties between ESEAP Hub (East, South East and Pacific region) and CEE Hub (Central and East Europe region).

Moreover, as the Newcomer of the Year 2023, I want to get in touch with the Wikimedian of the Year winners of all the years. So I am planning something collaborative between the winners. Their knowledge, experiences, and passion will surely impress me.

Wikimedian of the Year 2023 at Wikimedian of the Year 2024 ceremony. (Eugene Ormandy, CC0)

Taufik Rosman: I promised a lot with the fellow Wikimedians I met in Wikimania 2024 with Wikimedia friendships and collaborations between Malaysia. I have to focus on many reports and applications for the user group right after the conference. Wikimania is just a short break for me before dealing with these documents. There are many ideas come out from this conference. For instance, I need to add collaborations into next year’s annual grant application. I need to write event proposals to partners like embassies for upcoming events.

Caner: After this year’s Wikimania, I plan to further collaborate with my existing Wikimedian friends and establish new collaborations with new friends. I also worked on the conference as a member of the organizing team of CEE Meeting 2024 Istanbul. In addition to all these, I need to support the Wiki student clubs in Türkiye in their activities for the 2024-2025 academic year. Honestly, I think the student clubs will do a lot of good work this year.

Wikimedia CEE Meeting 2024 Istanbul group photo (Adem, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Q5 When someone says “Why does Wikimedia Foundation spend a lot of money to host Wikimania?”, how will you answer?

User:Eugene Ormandy: The reason is that hosting Wikimania is one of the best ways to make Wikimedia project and Wikimedia movement sustainable. This event makes Wikimedians learn more and continue to edit by nurturing the sense of belonging to Wikimedians’ network. This would be a good reason for Wikimedia Foundation and volunteers to put in serious efforts to hold the large event annually.

Group photo of Wikimania 2024 (Patryk Kajdrowicz for 24klatkifilmy, commissioned by the Wikimedia Foundation, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Taufik Rosman: I personally do not see it that way as this is the biggest Wikimedia conference which is crucial for the Wikimedia movement. Experienced in organising a regional conference few months before Wikimania 2024, I quite understand the struggle in managing a conference especially a conference of this scale.

I often found on YouTube of videos saying Wikipedia has too much money. The money is not only for the maintenance of the website but it is also to support the many volunteers out there in organising Wikimedia engagements and activities to attract more editors and narrow the content gap.

Caner: I think Wikimania is a necessary event for Wikimedians. If I give the simplest example, the Japan-Türkiye and Japan-Malaysia friendship projects emerged thanks to Wikimania. If we had not met each other at Wikimania, maybe we would never have realized these projects. It is also a very useful event for the exchange of experience among Wikimedians. We learn a lot of interesting knowledge in sessions on dozens of different topics, and we learn first-hand about the activities of other communities.

At the end of May and throughout June, Wikipedians on Czech Wikipedia focused on human rights and humanitarian themes, history, and notable figures. Thanks to the Human Rights on Wikipedia challenge, held by Wikimedia Czech Republic for the third time this year, 33 Wikipedians managed to create 99 articles and expand another 117, editing a total of 216 articles. The Wikipedian community met twice in person as part of the challenge: at an editathon at the People in Need Center at Langhans Cafe in Prague and on an excursion to the Ďáblice Cemetery. Additionally, we organized three events for schools: at Londýnská Elementary School, at the Secondary School of Informatics, Postal Services and Finance in Brno, and at Dvořák Gymnasium in Kralupy nad Vltavou. An online workshop for non-profit organizations complemented the challenge.

Photo: Jan Beránek, CC BY-SA 4.0

While organizing the challenge, we collaborated with other non-profit organizations, especially Amnesty International, the OSF Foundation, and the VIA Association. The event was held under the patronage of the Government’s Commissioner for Human Rights, Klára Šimáčková Laurenčíková.

The goal of the Human Rights on Wikipedia challenge is to ensure that everyone has access to neutral and up-to-date information about human rights. These should be fact-based and backed by relevant sources. The challenge highlights that Wikipedia is often the primary place where the public seeks answers to broadly human rights-related questions.

Collaborative Editing of Wikipedia at Langhans

The main event of the “Human Rights on Wikipedia” challenge was traditionally an editathon at the People in Need’s Langhans Cafe in cooperation with Amnesty International. On Wednesday, June 26, twelve people attended in person, and three joined online.

We welcomed Martina Wranová from Amnesty International at the editathon. “When I was writing an article on redefining rape, I was surprised at how easy editing was. It’s intuitive, and that’s great because anyone can do it,” she said. According to her, Wikipedia lacks topics that are not mainstream: “Minorities, whether religious, ethnic, or sexual, or topics like sportswashing or the climate crisis and its impact on human rights.”

The Executive Director of Wikimedia CZ Klára Joklová added: „For the third time, we reached out to dozens of Czech experts who deal with a wide range of human rights topics not only in institutions but mainly in non-profits that address various human rights issues in the Czech Republic. Most organizations welcomed our offer, supported it, or directly used it. This allows us to complement many current topics and articles, which are often very complex.”

Human rights are a very broad area, from specific actions and individuals to complex international laws. Wikipedia can play a crucial role in this by presenting complex matters in simpler language so that everyone can understand and access them easily online. My first encounter with Wikipedia surprised me at how easy it is to get involved and edit it. During the editathon, I edited the page about the Gratias Tibi Award.

Jakub Varvařovský, editathon participant and co-founder of Mnoho světů in Jilemnice

Human Rights on Wikipedia for Students

As part of the “Human Rights on Wikipedia” challenge on Czech , we also focused on students. One of the events was a workshop for upper-grade students at Londýnská Elementary School in Prague, attended by over 50 pupils. They learned who creates and monitors Wikipedia content, how Wikipedia works, and whether it is a reliable source of information. They also got hands-on experience with Wikipedia practice. They tried Wikipedia not only as users but primarily as editors. Based on selected human rights articles, they learned what and how we can change on Wikipedia and the rules that must be followed.

Additionally, the third edition of a course for students was held at the Secondary School of Informatics, Postal Services, and Finance in Brno under the guidance of teacher Martin Hájek, culminating in a Human Rights Editathon on June 17. For the first time this year, students from Dvořák Gymnasium in Kralupy nad Vltavou also participated in work on human rights articles, attending the workshop “Media Education and Human Rights on Wikipedia.”

Photo: Marie Čcheidzeová, CC BY-SA 4.0

Ďáblice Cemetery as a Place of Memory and Reminder of the Second and Third Resistance

On Saturday, June 15, 11 Wikipedians visited Ďáblice Cemetery with historian, Wikipedist, member of WMCZ and employee of the Military History Institute Michal Louč. The cemetery is strongly associated with the struggle for human freedom and the history of the second and third resistance.

Respect for human rights should be a given, but, as history has shown since antiquity, it is unfortunately not. This remains true even in our society, which prides itself on being ‘civilized.’ The struggle for human rights is an ongoing process that will never, and should never, come to an end. I was reminded of this once again during a recent guided tour of Ďáblice Cemetery, organized by Wikipedia.
— Zorka Sojka, excursion participant and Wikipedian

How to Get Your Topic on Wikipedia? We Advised non-profit organizations.

On Wednesday, June 5, we organized an online workshop “How to Get Your Topic on Wikipedia” for non-profit organizations. Although the workshop was mainly aimed at non-profits dealing with human rights topics, the participants were much more diverse. It was attended by local activists, organizers of local events, and representatives of the non-profit sector – e.g., Arnika – who came with specific suggestions, such as chemical pollution of the landscape. The recording is available on YouTube.

Articles Created: Human Rights in Poland, Cultural Rights, or the Society for Queer Memory

Thanks to the “Human Rights on Wikipedia” challenge, some quality articles were created. They were written by experienced Wikipedians as well as new users, including high school students. Newly created articles include Human Rights in Poland, Saint Sarah, Bandits for the Ballad, the Society for Queer Memory, and Cultural Rights. Among the personalities newly listed on Czech Wikipedia are journalist and activist Jelena Kosťučenková, Roma Holocaust survivor Pavlína Džurbanová, scientist Paulína Slepčíková, Palestinian lawyer Zaha Hassanová, Czech environmental economist Eva Fraňková, and Roma musician Josef Fečo. Articles on American actresses Jane Fonda and Glenn Close, who are involved in charitable activities, were also expanded.

Medals and Book Discounts for All Participants, Vouchers for 10 Winners

All participants in the challenge received a virtual medal – a user award created specifically for this event. The Albatros Foundation also rewarded all participants with a 30% discount and free shipping on purchases in the Albatrosmedia.cz e-shop.

The challenge also included a competition for vouchers to the Albatrosmedia.cz e-shop for the top 10, again donated by the Albatros Foundation. Three vouchers were awarded to the most active contributors based on the number of articles created or significantly expanded, two went to new participants, and two users were randomly selected regardless of the number of articles written. The remaining three awards were given by judges Martin Strachoň and Martina Wranová, whose task was to reward editors whose contributions were of high quality and related to human rights – this could include articles significant due to their challenging nature, overlooked personalities, or other important human rights topics.

I noticed that we lack most articles about people executed in political trials after the February coup on Czech Wikipedia. I decided to try to write as many articles as possible about all these victims that I could find information on and bring their life stories to Wikipedia. I succeeded!

— V0lkanic, the most active Wikipedian of the Human Rights on Wikipedia challenge.


Most Active Contributors

  • V0lkanic: 89 contributions*
  • Karelkam: 38 contributions
  • Meloun1212: 9 contributions

Newcomers

  • Adéla Baďurová
  • Honťák

Randomly Selected

  • Ikcur
  • Ján Kepler

Jury Award

  • Chavran97: Creation of high-quality, complex translation articles about journalist and activist Jelena Kosťučenková and the women’s association Živena.
  • Mojmir Churavy: Creation of quality articles about Roma personalities: Holocaust survivor Pavlína Džurbanová, scientist Paulína Slepčíková, and architect Zdeněk Daniel.
  • Allontanato: Expansion of articles on American actresses and human rights activists Jane Fonda and Glenn Close.

*For 59 of them, the hashtag was added after consultation with the organizer; without them, V0lkanic would have placed second by the number of contributions.
*The draw took place on the RandomPicker website; the protocol is available here.

Wikipedia:Administrators' newsletter/2024/10

Wednesday, 2 October 2024 15:48 UTC

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 Recently I decided to make a Hashtags extension for MediaWiki.

The idea is - if you add something like #foo to your edit summary, that becomes a link in RecentChanges/history/etc, which you can click on to view other edits so tagged.

I implemented this using MediaWiki's newish services framework. This was the first time I used this as an extension mechanism, so I thought I'd write a blog post on my thoughts.

Why Hashtags

The main idea is that users can self-group their edits if they are participating in some sort of campaign. There are already users doing this and external tools to gather statistics about it. For example Wikimedia hashtag search so there seems to be user demand.

MediaWiki also has a feature called "change tags". This allows edits to be tagged in certain ways and searched. Normally this is done automatically by software such as AbuseFilter. It is actually possible for users to tag their own edits, provided that tag is on an approved list. They just have to add a secret url parameter (?wpChangeTags) or edit by following a link with the appropriate url parameter. As you can imagine, this is not easily discoverable.

I've always been excited about the possibility of hashtags. I like the idea that it is a user-determined taxonomy (so-called folksonomy). You don't have to wait for some powerful gate-keeper to approve your tag. You can just be bold, and organize things in whatever way is useful. You don't have to discover some secret parameter. You can just see that other people write a specific something in their edit summaries and follow suite.

This feels much more in line with the wiki-way. You can be bold. You can learn by copying.

The extension essentially joins both methods together, by automatically adding change tags based on the contents of the edit summary.

Admittedly, the probability of my extension being installed on Wikipedia is probably pretty low. Realistically i am not even trying for that. But one can dream.

For more information about using the extension see https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Hashtags

How the extension works

There are a couple things the extension needs to do:

  • When an edit (or log entry) is saved, look at the edit summary, add appropriate tags based on that edit summary
  • If an edit summary is revision deleted or oversighted, remove the tags
  • Make sure hashtag related change tags are marked as "active" and "hidden".
  • When viewing a list of edits (history, Special:RecentChanges, etc), ensure that hashtags are linked and that clicking on them shows only edits tagged with that tag

 The first three parts work like a traditional extension, using normal hooks.

I used the RevisionFromEditCompleteHook and ManualLogEntryBeforePublishHook to run a callback anytime an edit or log entry is saved. Originally I used RecentChange_saveHook, however that didn't cover some cases where an edit was created but not published to RecentChanges, such as during page moves. ManualLogEntryBeforePublishHook covers more cases than it might appear at first glance, because it will also tag the revision associated with the log entry. All this is pretty straightforward, and allowed tagging most cases. Restricted (confidential) logs still do not get tagged. It seems difficult to do so with the hooks MediaWiki provides, but perhaps its best not to tag such log entries, lest information is leaked.

Similarly, I used the ArticleRevisionVisibilitySetHook to delete/undelete tags after revdel. Unfortunately MediaWiki does not provide a similar hook for log entries. I proposed adding one, but that is still pending code review.

Marking tags as active was also quite straightforward using normal hooks.

All that leaves is ensuring hashtags are linked. For this I leveraged MediaWiki's newish dependency injection system.

Services and dependency injection

For the last few years, MediaWiki has been in the progress of being re-architectured, with the goal to make it more modular, easier to test, and easier to understand. A core part of that effort has been to move to a dependency injection system.

If you are familiar with MediaWiki's dependency injection system, you might want to skip past this part.

Traditionally in MediaWiki, if some code needed to call some other code from a different class, it might look like this:

class MyClass { 
    function foo($bar) {
        $someObject = Whatever::singleton();
        $result = $someObject->doSomething( $bar );
        return $result;
    }
}

In this code, when functionality of a different class is needed, you either get it via global state, call some static method or create a new instance. This often results in classes that are coupled together.

In the new system we are supposed to use, the code would look like this:

class MyClass {
    private SomeObject $someObject;
    public function __construct( SomeObject $someObject ) {
         $this->someObject = $someObject;
    }
    public function foo( $bar ) {
         return $this->someObject->doSomething( $bar );
    }
}

The idea being, classes are not supposed to directly reference one another. They can reference the interfaces of objects that are passed to it (typically in the constructor), but they are not concretely referencing anything else in the system. Your class is always given the things it needs; it never gets them for itself. In the old system, the code was always referencing the Whatever class. In the new system, the code references whatever object was passed to the constructor. In a test you can easily replace that with a different object, if you wanted to test what happens when the Whatever class returns something unexpected. Similarly, if you want to reuse the code, but in a slightly different context, you can just change the constructor args for it to reference a different class as long as it implements the required interface.

This can make unit testing a lot easier, as you can isolate just the code you want to test, without worrying about the whole system. It can also make it quite easy to extend code. Imagine you have some front-end class that references a back-end class that deals with storing things in the database. If you suddenly need to use multiple storage backends, you can just substitute the implementation of the backend class, without having to implement anything special.

MediaWikiServices

All this is great, but at some point you actually need to do stuff and create some classes that have concrete implementations.

The way this works in "new" MediaWiki, is the MediaWikiServices class. This is responsible for keeping track of "services" which are essentially the top level classes.

Services are classes that:

  • Have a lifetime of the entire request.
  • Normally only have one instance existing at a time.
  • Do not depend on global state (Config is not considered state, but anything about the request, like what page is being currently viewed is state. Generally these services should not depend on RequestContext)

You can register services, in a service wiring file. This also allows you to register what services your service needs as constructor arguments.

Some classes do not fit these requirement. For example, a class that represents some data we would expect to have multiple instances with shorter lifetimes, to represent the data in question. Generally the approach for such classes is to create a Factory class that is a service, which makes individual instances and passing along dependencies as appropriate.

But still the question remains, how do you get these services initially. There is an escape hatch, where you can call MediaWikiServices::getInstance()->getService( $foo ), however that is strongly discouraged. This essentially uses global state, which defeats the point of dependency injection, where the goal is that your class is passed everything it needs, but never reaches out and gets anything itself.

The preferred solution is that the top level entrypoint classes in your extension are specified in your extension's extension.json file.

Typically extensions work on the levels of hooks. This is where you register a class, which has some methods that are called when certain events in MediaWiki happen. You register these hook handlers in your extension's manifest (extension.json) file.

In old mediawiki, you would just register the name of some static methods. In new MediaWiki, you register a class (HookHandlers), along with details of what services its constructor needs. MediaWiki then initiates this class for you with appropriate instances of all it dependencies, thus handling all the bootstrapping for you.

To summarize, you tell MediaWiki you need certain services for your hook class. When the hook class is instantiated, it is constructed with the default version of the services you need (Possibly including services you defined yourselves). Those services are in turn instantiated with whatever services they need, and so on.

All this means you can write classes that never reach out to other classes, but instead are always provided with the other classes they need.

What does this have to do with Hashtags?

All this is not generally meant as an extension mechanism. The goal is to make it so classes are isolated from each other for easier testing, modification and understanding.

However, the services bootstrap process does have an idea of default services, which it provides when creating objects that have dependencies. The entire point is to be able to easily replace services with different services that implement the same interface. Sure it is primarily meant as a means of better abstraction and testability, but why not use it for extensibility? In this extension, I used this mechanism to allow extending some core functionality with my own implementation.

One of those services is called CommentParserFactory. This is responsible for parsing edit summaries (Technically, it is responsible for creating the CommentParser objects that do so). This is exactly what we need if we want to change how links are displayed in edit summaries.

In the old system of MediaWiki, we would have no hope in making this extension. In the old days, to format an edit summary, you called Linker::formatComment(). This was a static method of Linker. There would be no hope of modifying it, unless someone explicitly made a hook just for that purpose.

Here we can simply tell MediaWiki to replace the default instance of CommentParserFactory with our own. We do this by implementing the MediaWikiServicesHook. This allows us to dynamically change the default instantiation of services.

There are two ways of doing this. You can either call $services->redefineService() which allows you to create a new version of the Service from scratch. The alternative is to call $services->addServiceManipulator(). This passes you the existing version of the service, which you can change, call methods on, or return an entirely different object.

Hashtags uses the latter method. I essentially implemented it by wrapping the existing CommentParser. I wanted to just replace hashtags with links, but continue to use MediaWiki core for all the other parsing.

Using Services as an extension mechanism

How did this go?

On the bright side, i was able to make this extension, which i otherwise would not have been able to. It indeed works.

Additionally, I feel like simply replacing a class and implementing its interface, is a much cleaner abstraction layer for extensibility than simply executing a callback at random points in the code that can do anything.

There are some frustrations though with using this approach.

First of all, everything is type hinted with the concrete class. This meant i had to extend the concrete class in order for all the type hints to work even though I didn't really need or want to inherit any methods. Perhaps it would be nice to have some trait that automatically adds all the forwarding magic with __get().

I also intentionally did not call the parent constructor, which i guess is fine because i never call any of the parent's methods, however it does feel a bit odd. The way i implemented my class was to take in the constructor an instance of the "base" class that i forward calls to after wrapping them in my own stuff. Part of the reason for this is I wanted to use the old CommentParser object, because constructor functions in MediaWiki are highly unstable between versions, so I didn't want to have to manually construct anything from MW core.

The part where this really falls down is if you want to have multiple extensions layering things. This really only works if they both do so in the same way.

At one point in my extension, I wanted to access the list of tags parsed. In retrospect, perhaps this would have been better implemented as having a separate service alias that is explicitly for my class.  Instead, i implemented it by adding an additional method to return this data and just relied on the normal service name. But i ran into the problem of i can't be sure nobody else redefined this service, so how do i know that the service i got is the one i created with this method? I just tested using instaceof, and if not tried to wrap the returned service again in my class. This has the benefit of if anyone else modifies the CommentParser service in a layered way, I will hopefully run their code and the list of tags will match the result. On the other hand its icky, so maybe the better method was the aforementioned having a separate service alias explicitly for my class. However again, that has the problem of how to bootstrap, since I didn't want to ever have to instantiate the base CommentParser class, with MediaWiki's highly unstable constructors.

This whole part seemed icky, and the various options seemed bad. In practice it maybe doesn't matter as its unlikely two extensions will wrap this service, but it seems like there should be a better way. I guess wrapping the service is fine, its extracting additional information that's the problem.

I think documenting best practices on how to "decorate" services would go a long way here to making this better. Right now it is very unclear how to do this in a way that is composable and extensible.

I've also seen examples of people using reflection when trying to "extend" services, but luckily i didn't need to resort to that.

Testability

The last thing I wanted to mention, is i do think this general system has had dividends. The path to get here was a little rocky, but I do think this style of code is much clearer.

I used to absolutely hate writing tests for mediawiki code. It was such a frustrating developer experience. Now it is much less painful. For this extension I have 100% test coverage (excluding maintenance scripts).  Admittedly it is a relatively small extension, but five years ago, I couldn't imagine bothering to do that for any MediaWiki code.

Conclusion

I had fun writing this extension and am proud of the result. It was interesting to experiment with using MediaWikiServices as an extension mechanism

Consider trying it out on your wiki, and let me know what you think! The extension should be compatible with MediaWiki 1.39 and higher (Using appropriate REL branch)

More information about it can be found at https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Hashtags



We are excited to announce that nominations are open for the 2024 UK Wikimedian of the Year Awards. 

We are asking you to nominate individuals and organisations that have been involved with Wikimedia UK’s efforts to advance open knowledge in 2023/24.

The categories for this year are:

  • UK Wikimedian of the Year (Individual)
  • Partnership of the Year (Organisation)
  • Up and Coming Wikimedian (Individual)

We are looking for people and partnerships within the Wikimedia UK community who have really impressed you with their open knowledge work, in 2023/24. We are particularly keen to hear about people and organisations who delivered projects addressing our strategic themes of Knowledge Equity, Information Literacy, and Climate and Environment.

Nominations will be judged by members of the Community Development Committee and winners will be announced at the Community Celebration on Saturday 23rd November 2024. 

You can read about last year’s winners here.

You can submit two nominations per category. Use this Google Form to submit your nominations. Nominations close on 1st November.

The post Wikimedian of the Year Awards 2024 – nominations now open appeared first on WMUK.

Wikipedia:Administrators' newsletter/2019/3

Tuesday, 1 October 2024 07:22 UTC

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2019).

Administrator changes

added Evad37
readded There'sNoTime
removed Alex ShihBrianMushroomNakonOscarthecatPeruvianLlamaRagibReaper EternalRossamiTom

Interface administrator changes

added Evad37Galobtter
removed Ritchie333


CheckUser changes

added There'sNoTime
removed KeeganKs0stm

Oversight changes

added There'sNoTime
removed Ks0stmSphilbrick

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • A new tool is available to help determine if a given IP is an open proxy/VPN/webhost/compromised host.

Arbitration

  • The Arbitration Committee announced two new OTRS queues. Both are meant solely for cases involving private information; other cases will continue to be handled at the appropriate venues (e.g., WP:COIN or WP:SPI).
    • paid-en-wp@wikipedia.org has been set up to receive private evidence related to abusive paid editing.
    • checkuser-en-wp@wikipedia.org has been set up to receive private requests for CheckUser. For instance, requests for IP block exemption for anonymous proxy editing should now be sent to this address instead of the functionaries-en list.

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Tech News issue #40, 2024 (September 30, 2024)

Monday, 30 September 2024 00:00 UTC
previous 2024, week 40 (Monday 30 September 2024) next

Tech News: 2024-40

Subliminal git commits

Sunday, 29 September 2024 22:27 UTC

Luckily, I speak Leet.

Amita Ramanujan, Numb3rs, CBS’s IRC Drama

There’s an episode of the CBS prime-time drama Numb3rs that plumbs the depths of Dr. Joel Fleischman’s1 knowledge of IRC. In one scene, Fleischman wonders, “What’s ‘leet’”?

“Leet” is writing that replaces letters with numbers, e.g., “Numb3rs,” where 3 stands in for e.

In short, leet is like the heavy-metal “S” you drew in middle school: Sweeeeet.

 / \
/ | \
| | |
 \ \ 
| | |
\ | /
 \ /

ASCII art version of your misspent youth.

Following years of keen observation, I’ve noticed Git commit hashes are also letters and numbers.

Git commit hashes are, as Fleischman might say, prime targets for l33tification.

What can I spell with a git commit?

O’RLY Insulting SHA-1 Collisions. (Copyright 2024 DenITDao via orlybooks)

O’RLY Insulting SHA-1 Collisions.
(Copyright 2024 DenITDao via orlybooks)

With hexidecimal we can spell any word containing the set of letters {A, B, C, D, E, F}DEADBEEF (a classic) or ABBABABE (for Mama Mia aficionados).

This is because hexidecimal is a base-16 numbering system—a single “digit” represents 16 numbers:

Base-10: 0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9 10 11 12 13 16 15
Base-16: 0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9  A  B  C  D  E  F

Leet expands our palette of words—using 0, 1, and 5 to represent O, I, and S, respectively.

I created a script that scours a few word lists for valid words and phrases.

With it, I found masterpieces like DADB0D (dad bod), BADA55 (bad ass), and 5ADBAB1E5 (sad babies).

Manipulating commit hashes for fun and no profit

Git commit hashes are no mystery. A commit hash is the SHA-1 of a commit object.

And a commit object is the commit message with some metadata.

$ mkdir /tmp/BADA55-git && cd /tmp/BAD55-git
$ git init
Initialized empty Git repository in /tmp/BADA55-git/.git/
$ echo '# BADA55 git repo' > README.md && git add README.md && git commit -m 'Initial commit'
[main (root-commit) 68ec0dd] Initial commit
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+)
  create mode 100644 README.md
$ git log --oneline
68ec0dd (HEAD -> main) Initial commit

Let’s confirm we can recreate the commit hash:

$ git cat-file -p 68ec0dd > commit-msg
$ sha1sum <(cat \
    <(printf "commit ") \
    <(wc -c < commit-msg | tr -d '\n') \
    <(printf '%b' '\0') commit-msg)
68ec0dd6dead532f18082b72beeb73bd828ee8fc  /dev/fd/63

Our repo’s first commit has the hash 68ec0dd. My goal is:

  1. Make 68ec0dd be BADA55.
  2. Keep the commit message the same, visibly at least.

But I’ll need to change the commit to change the hash. To keep those changes invisible in the output of git log, I’ll add a \t and see what happens to the hash.

$ truncate -s -1 commit-msg    # remove final newline
$ printf '\t\n' >> commit-msg  # Add a tab
$ # Check the new SHA to see if it's BADA55
$ sha1sum <(cat \
    <(printf "commit ") \
    <(wc -c < commit-msg | tr -d '\n') \
    <(printf '%b' '\0') commit-msg)
27b22ba5e1c837a34329891c15408208a944aa24  /dev/fd/63

Success! I changed the SHA-1. Now to do this until we get to BADA55.

Fortunately, user not-an-aardvark created a tool for that—lucky-commit that manipulates a commit message, adding a combination of \t and [:space:] characters until you hit a desired SHA-1.

Written in rust, lucky-commit computes all 256 unique 8-bit strings composed of only tabs and spaces. And then pads out commits up to 48-bits with those strings, using worker threads to quickly compute the SHA-12 of each commit.

It’s pretty fast:

$ time lucky_commit BADA555

real    0m0.091s
user    0m0.653s
sys     0m0.007s
$ git log --oneline
bada555 (HEAD -> main) Initial commit
$ xxd -c1 <(git cat-file -p 68ec0dd) | grep -cPo ': (20|09)'
12
$ xxd -c1 <(git cat-file -p HEAD) | grep -cPo ': (20|09)'
111

Now we have an more than an initial commit. We have a BADA555 initial commit.

All that’s left to do is to make ALL our commits BADA55 by abusing git hooks.

$ cat > .git/hooks/post-commit && chmod +x .git/hooks/post-commit
#!/usr/bin/env bash

echo 'L337-ifying!'
lucky_commit BADA55
$ echo 'A repo that is very l33t.' >> README.md && git commit -a -m 'l33t'
L337-ifying!
[main 0e00cb2] l33t
1 file changed, 1 insertion(+)
$ git log --oneline
bada552 (HEAD -> main) l33t
bada555 Initial commit

And now I have a git repo almost as cool as the sweet “S” I drew in middle school.


  1. This is a Northern Exposure spin off, right? I’ve only seen 1:48 of the show…↩︎

  2. or SHA-256 for repos that have made the jump to a more secure hash function↩︎

weeklyOSM 740

Sunday, 29 September 2024 10:55 UTC

19/09/2024-25/09/2024

lead picture

The Plaza 25 de Mayo de 1810 in Resistencia, Argentina [1] | © F4map | Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors

Mapping campaigns

  • The Trufi Association reported about their project to fully map the Zamora (Mexico) public transport system
    in collaboration with Codeando México and with the support of HOT. They observed that the project revealed fewer routes and vehicles than expected, leading to better informed urban mobility planning.
  • Yulia Fedorova presented the Missing Maps project, in collaboration with HOT, along with a mini-guide on how to join in with volunteer mapping. Tools such as the Tasking Manager were also presented.

Community

  • Ezra Edwards blogged about the first mapathon in Pakistan. The collaborative event took place in Islamabad, Karachi, and online.
  • Jennifer made an embroidered OpenStreetMap logo using the InkStitch plugin for Inkscape, an open-source machine embroidery design platform.
  • Kajord spent 11 nights backpacking in Glacier National Park (U.S.A.) and mapped the area around the Hole-in-the-Wall Camp.
  • CycleStreets has proposed a complete overhaul of the Bicycle page on the OSM wiki. The work is already underway, with several gaps being addressed, and feedback via the OSM Community forum is welcome.

Imports

  • Tallcoleman shared some lessons learned from the completion of the Toronto public toilet import project.

Events

  • Jennifer shared a report from FOSSGIS e.V. and the local OSM group’s participation in the 22nd Kiel Open Source and Linux Days. They presented a talk titled ‘20 Years of OpenStreetMap and managed the OSM stand, which featured tactile maps, maps with surveillance cameras, and a game where visitors could complete a map of Kiel that had been stripped of its labels.
  • The IVIDES.org hosted a seminar in support of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, with the participation of scientists who acted during the critical phase of the disaster (we reported earlier). Special keynotes included a systems approach to environmental planning, collaborative mapping, free software and open data in disaster risk reduction, and critical geography. Raquel Dezidério commented about the event in her diary.

OSM research

  • Bobby Xiong et al. modelled the European high-voltage grid based on OpenStreetMap data.
  • HeiGIT reported that they have conducted a data quality assessment of open source data (including OSM) using their ohsome quality API. They analyzed aspects such as currentness, completeness, comparison with external datasets, and the activity of OSM contributors. The results of the analysis were to support the efforts of the World Bank to develop an analytical tool, the Gender Enabling Environments Spatial Tool, designed to assess localities based on how supportive they are in enabling women to access employment or business opportunities in the renewable energy sector.

OSM in action

  • Jordi Gauchía has developed IceNav, an ESP32-based satellite navigator device using OSM offline maps.
  • The Ostsee-Zeitung newspaper has utilised an OpenStreetMap-based map to display the locations of flea markets in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany.
  • Transitous is a community-run, provider-neutral international public transport routing service. It uses the MOTIS routing engine, which utilises the OpenStreetMap basemap. You can check out the live demo at MOTIS.
  • Jiří Eischmann observed that Czech state organisations extensively used OpenStreetMap to assist with the recent flood disaster, including for flood services, radar maps, and flood risk maps.
  • Auto Motor und Sport is a German automotive publication that focuses on delivering news, reviews, and insights into the automotive industry. In one of their articles, they used an OSM-based map as an illustration.
  • The volunteer project Companionaid, for women’s safety, has launched a map of (un)safe places in Russian cities, from which women can collect information about dangerous places in cities. An OSM-based map is used as the background.

Licenses

  • The Fédé des pros d’OSM (OSM Pros’ Federation) announced the publication of their practical guide Tout Savoir
    Sur La Licence ODbL
    (All about ODbL Licensing).

Software

  • Rudo Kemper has created a webpage to convert Google Maps GeoJSON data into GPX and KMZ files, allowing them to render properly in Organic Maps.

Releases

  • Sarah Hoffmann announced the release of version 4 of pyosmium, a Python wrapper for the Osmium C++ library, used for reading, writing, and processing OSM data. This major update includes several new features, such as iterative processing, filter functions, and an OSM data writer with automatic reference completion.
  • Eugene Kizevich announced the release of OsmAnd Web Version 1.01. You can explore the latest version directly at OsmAnd Map.
  • osm2pgsql version 2.0.0 has been released.

Did you know …

  • … that you can geolocate an image by comparing the height of an object with the length of its shadow?
  • …that there is an in-depth course on validating OSM data on the UN Maps Learning Hub? It has been available since the beginning of the year and was used for a 20-hour training course organised over several weeks, followed by weeks in which participants applied their new knowledge. To access it, you will need to create an account on the Moodle platform used by the UN Maps Learning Hub.

OSM in the media

  • [1] Diario Norte, a online news outlet based in Argentina, reported that Federico Pértile mapped 629 trees (while also identifying the species of each one), 324 streetlights, 268 benches, and 74 trash bins around the Plaza 25 de Mayo de 1810 in Resistencia City, Argentina, on OpenStreetMap and then shared a 3D map visualisation of the area.
  • OpenStreetMap data powered The Washington Post’s story about the size and territory of supermarket chains in the US.

Other “geo” things

  • Julia Fritzsche has directed a documentary The Answer to Almost Everything: How Powerful Are Maps? It discusses the political aspects of map-making, from a historical perspective to some practices that still exist today.
  • Matthew Daniels has collected all the outdoor basketball courts in the United States based on OpenStreetMap and Google satellite imagery. The site also has the option to leave comments and likes on these courts and group them by colour.
  • Michael Tandy explained the complexity of address data in ‘Falsehoods Programmers Believe About Addresses’, their 2013 classic on the subject.
  • Wildfires in Peru have reached critical levels, severely affecting the flora and fauna in various regions of the country. In response, CONIDA, the Peruvian space agency, has intensified its satellite monitoring , providing authorities with accurate and timely data. This information is crucial for making quick and effective decisions based on the scale of the disaster.
  • The Tokyo Cartographic Co., Ltd and MIERUNE Ltd have released ‘Mamore! Saigai Boueitai’ (守れ!サイガイ防衛隊 / Protect! Disaster Defense Squad), a map-themed educational game about disaster prevention.

Upcoming Events

Where What Online When Country
Marpingen Craft Mapping an der “Marpinger Grenzstein-Tour” 2024-09-29 flag
Defence Colony Tehsil 12th OSM Delhi Mapping Party 2024-09-29 flag
City of Edinburgh Geomob Edinburgh 2024-10-01 flag
Salzburg OSM Treffen Salzburg 2024-10-01 flag
San Jose South Bay Map Night 2024-10-02 flag
Missing Maps London: (Online) Mapathon [eng] 2024-10-01
Stuttgart Stuttgarter OpenStreetMap-Treffen 2024-10-02 flag
Essen FOSSGIS-OSM-Communitytreffen Nr. 22 2024-10-03 – 2024-10-06 flag
Montrouge Réunion des contributeurs de Montrouge et du Sud de Paris 2024-10-03 flag
Pontarlier Cartographie collaborative pour tous 2024-10-05 flag
Chanakya Puri Tehsil OSM India casual online mapathon 2024-10-06 flag
London London pub meet-up 2024-10-07 flag
中正區 OpenStreetMap x Wikidata Taipei #69 2024-10-07 flag
München Münchner OSM-Treffen 2024-10-08 flag
Ifẹ̀ State of the Map Nigeria 2024 2024-10-09 – 2024-10-11 flag
Lorain County OpenStreetMap Midwest Meetup 2024-10-10 flag
Bochum Bochumer OSM Treffen 2024-10-10 flag
OSMF Engineering Working Group meeting 2024-10-11

Note:
If you like to see your event here, please put it into the OSM calendar. Only data which is there, will appear in weeklyOSM.

This weeklyOSM was produced by MatthiasMatthias, PierZen, SeverinGeo, Strubbl, TheSwavu, TrickyFoxy, barefootstache, derFred, mcliquid, rtnf.
We welcome link suggestions for the next issue via this form and look forward to your contributions.

Site slow for users in the Asia region (eqsin)

Saturday, 28 September 2024 22:43 UTC

Sep 28, 22:43 UTC
Resolved - This incident has been resolved.

Sep 28, 22:23 UTC
Monitoring - A fix has been implemented and we are monitoring the results.

Sep 28, 20:58 UTC
Update - We are continuing to work on a fix for this issue.

Sep 28, 20:55 UTC
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Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2024-09-26/Traffic report

Thursday, 26 September 2024 00:00 UTC
File:Otakon 2012 361.JPG
Piotrus
CC-3.0
300
Traffic report

Jump in the line, rock your body in time

This traffic report is adapted from the Top 25 Report, prepared with commentary by Igordebraga, Vestrian24Bio (August 25 to September 14), Ltbdl, and Rahcmander (August 25 to 31), Oltrepier (September 1 to 7), Hubert555 (September 8 to 14).

What's the story, morning glory? (August 25 to 31)

Rank Article Class Views Image Notes/about
1 Oasis (band) 1,428,910 Mancunian brothers Liam Gallagher and Noel Gallagher (plus other musicians that weren't as fond of squabbling) spent the 90s and 2000s making music and fighting each other, with the latter part escalating so much that the brothers broke up their own band in 2009. So what a relief for Oasis fans to know that, in the wake of the 30th anniversary of the band's debut album, Definitely Maybe, a 2025 reunion tour was announced, initially limited to the British Isles, but with hopes that it will expand to other parts of the world, especially as tickets have sold out fairly quickly. The rest of Oasis will include three more past members: guitarists Paul "Bonehead" Arthurs (who played on the band's beloved first two albums and the divisive and overblown third) and Gem Archer (who joined in the tour for the fourth album and remained until the end), and drummer Chris Sharrock (part of the band's doomed final tour). Some members from Noel's side band, the High Flying Birds, will also join in.
2 Johnny Gaudreau 1,067,759 "Johnny Hockey" was a standout name in the NHL, but sadly his career was cut short at just 31, as he and his brother Matthew (who also played hockey) died after being run over while riding their bikes in New Jersey. An outpour of commotion emerged, including from Gaudreau's current and former teams, as the late winger left behind two young children, while his sister was forced to cancel her wedding. Everyone also hopes the drunk driver who caused the accident faces the consequences.
3 Deaths in 2024 1,004,696 You need more time
'Cause your thoughts and words won't last forever more
And I'm not sure if it'll ever work out right...
4 Stree 2 1,002,390 This Bollywood comedy horror film, the fifth installment in the Maddock Supernatural Universe and a sequel to the first chapter of the series, released on the Indian Independence Day, and has soon become the highest-grossing Hindi film of 2024, as well as the ninth highest-grossing Hindi film of all time. It is also the second highest-grossing Indian film of 2024, behind only Tollywood epic science fiction movie, Kalki 2898 AD.
5 Deadpool & Wolverine 959,740 The 34th film in the MCU was first released a few months ago, bridging the franchise with the Fox Universe and becoming the first ever MCU film to receive an R-rating; it has now become the seventh highest grossing film from the franchise, surpassing Iron Man 3.
6 Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 859,701

Kennedy hasn't fully dropped out of the presidential race — but he's withdrawing his name from most swing states, making sure that he won't affect the electoral vote, but still can be voted for in most states.

As of writing, his website says that Kennedy is aiming for 5% or more of the popular vote, as that will qualify him for public funding in future elections.

7 Pavel Durov 857,832

Anti-establishment, Russian, and a billionaire, Durov is the founder of VK, the so-called "Facebook for Russia", as well as the fifth most-used messaging service, Telegram. Because of the latter, he was arrested in France on August 24, reportedly for failing to remove drug traffickers and child pornographers on the platform. Russia is not happy, although Durov himself left the country in 2014, after refusing to hand over the personal data of Euromaidan protesters in Ukraine to the Federal Security Service.

8 Sven-Göran Eriksson 817,262 The Swedish football coach died of pancreatic cancer on August 26, at the age of 76. He was probably best known for managing England's Golden Generation in the 2002 and 2006 FIFA World Cups, but also won lots of national and European titles with the likes of IFK Göteborg, Benfica and Lazio.
9 Tulsi Gabbard 746,047 Just like #6, another former Democratic Presidential hopeful turned right-leaning Independent, who is now working with Donald Trump.
10 Liam Gallagher 731,595 After the unceremonious split of #1 in 2009, their lead singer spent five more years with other musicians from the band in side group Beady Eye before pursuing a solo career, which earlier this year included a collaboration with Stone Roses guitarist John Squire in the indicatively titled Liam Gallagher & John Squire. Now, though, the main focus is on the 2025 reunion tour of Oasis.

Daylight come and me wan' go home (September 1 to 7)

Rank Article Class Views Image Notes/about
1 Emily Armstrong (musician) 1,428,603 The lead singer of Dead Sara has been enlisted for the revival of a very popular nu metal group (#5) that previously disbanded under tragic conditions.

However, Linkin Park's decision to appoint Armstrong has rapidly faced criticism, due to her perceived support of convicted rapist and disgraced actor Danny Masterson, as well as her ties to the anti-psychiatry Church of Scientology; both are very triggering topics for a considerable part of fans who have been grieving for the loss of late lead singer Chester Bennington, including one of his own children.

Armstrong did address her past ties to Masterson, but as of this issue's publication, she has not clarified her status within the Scientology Church, yet.

2 Rich Homie Quan 1,144,320 On September 5, Dequantes Devontay Lamar, better known as Rich Homie Quan, passed away at the age of 34, with the cause of death being still unclear in spite of an autopsy.

The Atlanta-born and based rapper scored a few hits in the 2010s, like "Type of Way", "Flex (Ooh, Ooh, Ooh)" and the team-up single with Young Thug, "Lifestyle".

3 The Greatest of All Time 1,087,524 This Kollywood science fiction action film, starring Thalapathy in his 68th film in a lead role, was released last Thursday.

It is expected to be Vijay's penultimate film (or the last one, depending on his plans to call off his next project), since the actor announced his political entry earlier this year. As a result, his fans did not waste their (presumably last) chance to celebrate the film worldwide: the film grossed 126.5 crore (US$15 million) in the opening day global box office, emerging as the second highest-grossing Tamil film in 2024, while also giving the actor two consecutive films to gross over ₹100 crores in the opening day.

In the process, the film also set many other records, such as the first South Indian film to be shown in more than 20 locations in Norway, including the iSense hall at Odeon Cinemas etc.

4 Deaths in 2024 981,764 When it will be right? I don't know.
What it will be like? I don't know.
We live in hope of deliverance
From the darkness that surrounds us...
5 Linkin Park 967,977 The tragic death of lead singer Chester Bennington first led to Linkin Park's disbandment back in 2017. However, on September 5, they officially announced a reunion, with original members Bennington and Rob Bourdon being replaced with #1 and Colin Brittain, respectively.

On the same occasion, the band delighted fans further by teasing a new studio album and a six-date arena tour, but public reception grew colder in the following days, as concerning details about the past of new co-vocalist Armstrong surfaced.

6 Indian Airlines Flight 814 966,085 Netflix show IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack recently recalled an incident from 25 years ago, describing how an airplane was hijacked by five terrorists from Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, under support by al-Qaeda (who'd infamously hijack four planes in a single day in 2001), keeping 174 passengers and 11 crewpeople hostage for a week, while stabbing one to death to intimidate everyone else, before releasing them in the Afghan city of Kandahar in exchange for three imprisoned terrorists. Those responsible have never been identified.
7 Beetlejuice Beetlejuice 865,176 It's showtime!
Yes, the recently released sequel and the 1988 original were directly above each other in views, allowing a proper summoning of The Ghost with the Most. Life (or afterlife, in this case) is funny like that sometimes.

Anyway, after a cartoon series and a musical, it was finally time for the devious and hyperactive ghost Betelgeuse to haunt the cinemas again, with Beetlejuice Beetlejuice bringing back director Tim Burton and actors Michael Keaton (Beej himself), Winona Ryder (goth Lydia Deetz, now the host of a supernatural talk show) and Catherine O'Hara (Lydia's stepmom Delia).

8 Beetlejuice 813,131
9 Deadpool & Wolverine 774,393 Two aggressive Mutants teamed up in a movie full of blood, swearing and multiversal shenanigans, that has recently made over a billion dollars, becoming the second highest-grossing movie of this year, behind only Inside Out 2 (which, in turn, rightfully became the highest-grossing animation ever, overtaking a very unnecessary remake).

On a side note, Marvel Cinematic Universe has returned later this month with the Disney+ show Agatha All Along.

10 Emma Navarro 756,697 This 23-year-old American tennis player, who won her first title at the Hobart International back in January, has just had her best Grand Slam performance during the US Open at home, where she eventually lost in the semi-finals to Aryna Sabalenka, who then proceeded to win it all over another American, Jessica Pegula.

There's a calm surrender, to the rush of day (September 8 to 14)

Rank Article Class Views Image Notes/about
1 James Earl Jones 3,034,998 One of the most respected African American actors ever, particularly for that booming voice that spoke iconic lines like "No. I am your father", "Everything the light touches is our kingdom", "Steel isn't strong, boy, flesh is stronger!" and "This is CNN", James Earl Jones had a storied career of nearly seven decades, resulting in him being one of the few who won the EGOT (albeit with an honorary Oscar). Retired ever since starring in Coming 2 America in 2021, he died on September 9, at the age of 93.
2 Laura Loomer 1,434,117 Donald Trump's supporters are concerned about all the influence he's receiving from this activist and self-proclaimed "pro-white nationalist" and a "proud Islamophobe".
3 Kamala Harris 1,284,808 The vice-president and the Democrats' candidate in the upcoming election, who was on millions of screens at last week's presidential debate.
4 The Greatest of All Time 1,153,526 This Kollywood science fiction action film, starring Thalapathy in his 68th film in a lead role, was released last week. Earlier this year, the actor announced his political entry, making this movie his penultimate work ever, thus his fans celebrated it worldwide. The film debuted at the second place at the worldwide box office, behind only #7, on its opening weekend. It also became the second Tamil film to enter the global weekend chart of Comscore, with the other film being the same actor's previous film. The film grossed 350 crore (US$42 million) worldwide in its opening week, against a budget of ₹300−400 crore, becoming the the highest-grossing Tamil film of 2024 and the fourth highest-grossing Indian film of 2024. Thalapathy's next and last film has now been announced, and the fans are already preparing for the One Last Dance!
5 September 11 attacks 1,132,328 23 years have passed since this tragedy took place in three different US locations, where many lost their loved ones due to a terrorist attack masterminded by Al-Qaeda. For those interested, it also marks 23 years since the release of the criminally underrated soundtrack from the famously bad movie by this writer's favourite chanteuse, Mariah Carey. The picture on the left summarizes all of it.
6 The Perfect Couple (TV series) 1,010,108 This American mystery drama series, which is an adaptation of the 2018 novel of the same name by Elin Hilderbrand and includes Nicole Kidman (pictured) in its cast, premiered on Netflix last week.
7 Beetlejuice Beetlejuice 1,009,928 36 years later, director Tim Burton and actors Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder and Catherine O'Hara returned to a small Connecticut city haunted by weird ghosts. Filled with Burton's signature aesthetics and many funny moments, including a musical number featuring one of the corniest songs ever written, this movie was warmly received and had an impressive $111 million opening in North America alone, which was already enough to cover its production budget.
8 Deaths in 2024 999,325 Given one of the quotes from #1 (better use this song now than when the unnecessary prequel arrives):
'Til we find our place
On the path unwinding
In the circle
The circle of life
9 Beetlejuice 881,184 The death list interrupted, but with three mentions of his name, "it's showtime"! Fresh off Pee-wee's Big Adventure, in 1988 Tim Burton directed the story of a recently deceased couple trying to scare away two yuppies (and their goth daughter) from their old house, at a certain point bringing in the hyperactive undead maniac the movie is named after. The Geffen Company tried to get a sequel shortly after the movie, with Burton himself thinking about doubling the insanity in Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian, but Betelgeuse and Lydia Deetz only had a cartoon and a musical adaptation before the proper follow-up listed above.
10 Rebel Ridge 679,584 This film, starring Aaron Pierre as a former Marine and Don Johnson as the chief of a corrupt police force, was released by Netflix on September 6 to positive reviews.

Exclusions

  • These lists exclude the Wikipedia main page, non-article pages (such as redlinks), and anomalous entries (such as DDoS attacks or likely automated views). Since mobile view data became available to the Report in October 2014, we exclude articles that have almost no mobile views (5–6% or less) or almost all mobile views (94–95% or more) because they are very likely to be automated views based on our experience and research of the issue. Please feel free to discuss any removal on the Top 25 Report talk page if you wish.

Most edited articles

For the August 16 – September 16 period, per this database report.

Title Revisions Notes
Deaths in 2024 2083 Along with the ones mentioned above and a few others from the last Traffic Report, other notable deceased of the period included Phil Donahue, Sid Eudy, Rebecca Cheptegei and Sérgio Mendes.
Andrew Jackson and the slave trade in the United States 1404 Back in June, user Jengod split from the list of American slave traders this page regarding the seventh U.S. President Andrew Jackson's involvement in slave trading, and has been working on it extensively ever since.
India at the 2024 Summer Paralympics 1392 For all of India's underperformances at the Olympics, their disabled para-athletes have impressive showings at the Paralympic Games. Just this year in Paris, the country managed to win 29 medals, which is the same amount they have got in the last 52 years of the Olympics! These include seven golds, four of which in athletics and one each in shooting, archery and badminton.
List of Kamala Harris 2024 presidential campaign endorsements 1259 A laundry list of supporters for the current VP, including Republicans that dislike their own candidate.
Great Britain at the 2024 Summer Paralympics 1149 Like Greece created the Olympics, Great Britain is the origin of the Paralympics. They're the second most successful nation at the games, behind (no surprise) the United States, and Paris 2024 had them in second place in the medal table, behind only China, with 124 medals, 49 of which golden.
2024 Pacific typhoon season 1100 Wikipedia's branch that edits cyclone pages is a very dedicated bunch, as reflected in over 200 Featured Articles. Updates came for the storms formed in the Pacific, the strongest of which was Typhoon Yagi, that hit Southeast Asia and South China in early September.
Typhoon Yagi 1060
Electoral fraud in the United States 1012 The upcoming election turns this into a relevant topic. The article even notes the current Republican candidate both claimed this as for why he lost the popular vote in 2016 to Hillary Clinton, and for why he outright was defeated by Joe Biden four years later (he unsuccesfully sued, his party tried to change how the elections work, and his fans went too far in refusing defeat).
Brazil at the 2024 Summer Paralympics 910 A relatively recent emerging Olympic power that has won at least 10 medals in all editions since 1996, Brazil has also been a proven Paralympic potency since 1984, ranking 16th in the all-time Paralympic Games medal table (albeit one of the teams above them is the now defunct state of West Germany), probably a reflection of abrangent publicly funded health care. Paris 2024 had them rank fifth in the medal table with 89 medals, 25 of them golden.
List of Canadian hip hop musicians 874 Most people probably only know Drake, but one user is doing his best to extend this list.
2024 US Open – Men's singles 871 In both genders, this year's tennis Grand Slams played on hard courts were won by the same player: after Aryna Sabalenka got the Australian Open-US Open double, it was time for Jannik Sinner to do the same, overcoming his adversary Taylor Fritz despite him having the support of the Flushing Meadows crowd. A notable fact is that aside from Sinner, the other three semifinalists - Fritz, Frances Tiafoe, and Jack Draper - were all reaching that phase of a Grand Slam for the first time.
2024 Democratic National Convention 809 The 2024 DNC was held in Chicago from August 19 to 22, a loud, boisterous convention with lots and lots of speeches. It's also where delegates selected the presidential nominee. Kamala Harris, the current Vice-President who was literally the only candidate, was selected.
2024 Summer Paralympics medal table 757 A few weeks after the Summer Olympics, it was time for athletes with disabilities to get the spotlight, in the same host city of Paris. Aside from the United States not being as dominating - they were third, behind China and Great Britain - a big difference for this year's Paralympics compared to the Olympics was the presence of nearly three times more Russians and Belarusians competing for no flag (they would have ranked fifth if not for the neutrality excluding them from the medal table, thus officially that place is from the aforementioned Brazil).
2024 Ligas Departamentales del Perú 745 From para-athletes to regular ones, as one user made lots of updates on Peru's fifth division football tournament.
Black Myth: Wukong 742 A video game released on August 20 and based on the 16th century Chinese fantasy novel Journey to the West, a classic in Chinese literature. There was much hype surrounding its release (it topped Steam's best-selling chart and smashed the same platform's record for highest-concurrent player count, a record previously held by Elden Ring) and has released to positive reception. The game gained noteriety when its developer, Game Science, was accused of being sexist by IGN in November 2023, and the game got even more noteriety when streamers were instructed to not mention "feminist propaganda", "quarantine", "COVID-19", and Chinese politics, in order to comply with Chinese law. If the Chinese government doesn't appreciate things said about them, they can take you away like they did with Jack Ma.


Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2024-09-26/Serendipity

Thursday, 26 September 2024 00:00 UTC
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Serendipity

A Wikipedian at the 2024 Paralympics

In 2011, the Australian Paralympic Committee (now Paralympics Australia) commenced a project to document its history. This included collecting documents and museum pieces and conducting oral history interviews with Paralympians. An online component was recognised as being important, and Wikipedia was identified as part of that. Since then, Paralympics Australia and Wikimedia Australia have collaborated to produce thousands of articles that keep receiving millions of page-views each year. As part of the project, I attended the Paralympic Games in London in 2012, in Rio de Janeiro in 2016, and now in Paris in 2024 as a media representative, with accreditation supplied by Paralympics Australia. This time, I took a photographer, GailLeenstra, with me.

Media accreditation meant that I had access to the media tribunes at the venues and could attend any game, even when the event was sold out (as was usually the case). It meant that I could visit the Paralympic Village and interview athletes after the game in what is called the Mixed Zone. It meant that we could use the buses of the TC, the Olympic transport system. It meant we had access to the resources of the Main Press Centre (MPC) and the Venue Media Centres (VMCs), which provided wired and wireless internet access, desks to work at, staff to help us, and lockers to store our equipment. It meant that my photographer had access to prime photographic positions not accessible to the public. It also meant that she had access to the Nikon store at the Stade de France, where she was able to get some of her equipment repaired and borrow some very expensive equipment for the duration of the games to supplement the gear she had brought with her from Australia – all for free.

The image of Wikipedia has undergone a dramatic transformation in the time I have been working on the Australian Paralympic Project. In London in 2012, there was a tendency of the mainstream media to regard us as not being "real journalists". There was none of that in Paris, quite the opposite in fact; mainstream media representatives repeatedly told us how much they appreciated our efforts, how they used Wikipedia as a reference all the time, and how impressed they were with its accuracy.

Support from Paralympics Australia did not end in Australia. In Paris, they had set up headquarters at a site near the Paralympic Village known as "Our Mob", which contained meeting rooms, a TV studio, dining room and a McCafé concession (McDonald's being one of their sponsors). Tim Mannion, the General Manager of Communications, gave generous and welcome assistance and support to our efforts, including providing passes to the opening and closing ceremonies. Unlike the Olympic opening ceremony, the Paralympic opening ceremony was held in beautiful weather. Some 65,000 spectators packed into the Place de la Concorde for the first ever Paralympic opening ceremony to be held outside a stadium. GailLeenstra was one of a select group of photographers chosen to accompany the lighting of the Paralympic cauldron.

In Sydney, London and Rio, multiple venues were concentrated in a multi-sport precinct, but in Paris, the venues were widely scattered around the city. This is a model considered by many cities planning to hold the Olympics and Paralympics, because it allows the city to make use of existing facilities, saving the substantial cost of building new ones. It is not cheap, however! It came at a substantial cost in increased security, transportation and manpower through duplication. Venues required considerable upgrades, refurbishment and fitting out for the games. Three new venues had to be built, and Paris Metro lines were extended. Not to mention the 1.6 billion euros spent on cleaning up the Seine and Marne to make them fit to swim in. The police presence was overwhelming, with about 45,000 police and 10,000 troops on hand. All were heavily armed, with automatic weapons in case Hamas decided to put in an appearance. Roads near the venues were closed to vehicle traffic.

Getting from one venue to another involved a trip on the Paris Metro using the Navigo cards issued to us as part of our media kit. Each day we criss-crossed the city on the Metro as we moved from one venue to the next. Fortunately, the Metro was super-efficient, with trains leaving every couple of minutes. Getting to venues in the metropolitan area took about a half an hour. (The locals told us that the Metro had never been so efficient nor, with the enhanced police presence, had they ever felt safer.) This meant that each day started with critical decisions about what events we would cover that day. Priority was given to events with Australian participation (especially medal chances), since our media accreditation was so generously provided by Paralympics Australia, but the athletes of other countries (especially the English-speaking ones) were by no means neglected. A mobile phone app told us which trains and buses to take to get from one place to another. It knew the location of the venues, train stations and bus stops, the bus and train schedules, and how crowded they were, encouraging you to take less crowded services.

As it turned out, there were some other foreign Wikipedians present, but they lacked our accreditation and (quite understandably) had different priorities. This meant that Wikipedia had broad coverage and having Australian Wikipedians on site was fully justified by the coverage. We tried to see as many sports as possible: our coverage included Boccia, Cycling, Equestrian, Paracanoe, Triathlon, Wheelchair Basketball and Wheelchair Rugby. Cycling and Equestrian events were located well out of town, requiring a day trip on the Metro, Réseau Express Régional, and the TC.

Between 23 August and 9 September, articles created by the History of the Paralympic movement in Australia project garnered a total amount of 2,226,684 page views, while more than 1,200 images were uploaded. These pages and pictures will be a lasting legacy, to be enjoyed by readers for years to come.


Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2024-09-26/Recent research

Thursday, 26 September 2024 00:00 UTC
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Recent research

Article-writing AI is less "prone to reasoning errors (or hallucinations)" than human Wikipedia editors


A monthly overview of recent academic research about Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects, also published as the Wikimedia Research Newsletter.


"Wikicrow" AI less "prone to reasoning errors (or hallucinations)" than human Wikipedia editors when writing gene articles

A preprint titled "Language Agents Achieve Superhuman Synthesis of Scientific Knowledge"[1] introduces

"PaperQA2, a frontier language model agent optimized for improved factuality, [which] matches or exceeds subject matter expert performance on three realistic [research] literature research tasks. PaperQA2 writes cited, Wikipedia-style summaries of scientific topics that are significantly more accurate than existing, human-written Wikipedia articles."

It was published by "FutureHouse", a San-Francisco-based nonprofit working on "Automating scientific discovery" (with a focus on biology). FutureHouse was launched last year with funding from former Google CEO Eric Schmidt (at which time it was anticipated it would spend about $20 million by the end of 2024). Generating Wikipedia-like articles about science topics is only one of the applications of "PaperQA2, FutureHouse's scientific RAG [retrieval-augmented generation] system", which is designed to aid researchers. (For example, FutureHouse also recently launched a website called "Has Anyone", described as a "minimalist AI tool to search if anyone has ever researched a given topic.")

In more detail, the researchers "engineered a system called WikiCrow, which generates cited Wikipedia-style articles about human protein-coding genes by combining several PaperQA2 calls on topics such as the structure, function, interactions, and clinical significance of the gene." Each call contributes a section of the resulting article (somewhat similar to another recent system, see our review: "STORM: AI agents role-play as 'Wikipedia editors' and 'experts' to create Wikipedia-like articles"). The prompts include the instruction to "Write in the style of a Wikipedia article, with concise sentences and coherent paragraphs".

With an average cost of $5.50, the generated articles tended to be longer than their Wikipedia counterparts and had higher quality, at least according to the paper's evaluation method:

We used WikiCrow to generate 240 articles on genes that already have non-stub Wikipedia articles to have matched comparisons. WikiCrow articles averaged 1219.0 ± 275.0 words (mean ± SD, N = 240), longer than the corresponding Wikipedia articles (889.6 ± 715.3 words). The average article was generated in 491.5 ± 324.0 seconds, and had an average cost of $4.48 ± $1.02 per article (including costs for search and LLM APIs). We compared WikiCrow and Wikipedia on 375 statements sampled from the 240 paired articles. [...] The initial article sampling excluded any Wikipedia articles that were "stubs" or incomplete articles. Statements were then shuffled and given, blinded, to human experts, who graded statements according to whether they were (1) cited and supported; (2) missing a citation; or (3) cited and unsupported. We found that WikiCrow had significantly fewer "cited and unsupported" statements than the paired Wikipedia articles (13.5% vs. 24.9%) (p = 0.0075, χ2 (1), N = 375 for all tests in this section). WikiCrow failed to cite sources at a 3.9x lower rate than human written articles, as only 3.5% of WikiCrow statements were uncited, vs. 13.6% for Wikipedia (p < 0.001). In addition, defining precision for WikiCrow as the ratio of cited and supported statements over all cited statements, we found that WikiCrow displayed significantly higher precision than human-written articles (86.1% vs. 71.2%, p = 0.0013).

For the judgment whether a particular statement was "supported" by the cited references, the concrete question asked to the graders (described as "expert researchers" in the paper) was:

"Is the information correct, as cited? In other words, is the information stated in the sentence correct according to the literature that it cites?"

In addition, among other more detailed instructions, the graders were advised to mark a statement correct as cited even if it was not directly supported by the source, as long as the statement consisted of "broad context" judged to be "undergraduate biology student common knowledge" (akin to an extreme interpretation of WP:BLUE).

The fact that these rating criteria appear to be more liberal than Wikipedia's own, combined with the well-known general reputation of LLMs for generating hallucinations, makes the "WikiCrow displayed significantly higher precision" result rather remarkable. The authors double-checked it by examining the data more closely:

The "cited and unsupported" evaluation category includes both inaccurate statements (e.g. true hallucinations or reasoning errors) and statements that are accurate with inappropriate citations. To investigate the nature of the errors in Wikipedia and WikiCrow further, we manually inspected all reported errors and attempted to classify the issues as follows: reasoning issues, i.e. the written information contradicts, over-extrapolates, or is unsupported by any included citations; attribution issues, i.e. the information is likely supported by another included source, but either the statement does not include the correct citation locally or the source is too broad (e.g. a database portal link); or trivial statements, which are true passages, but overly pedantic or unnecessary [...]. Surprisingly, we found that compared to Wikipedia, WikiCrow had significantly fewer reasoning errors (12 vs. 26, p = 0.0144, χ2 (1), N = 375) but a similar number of attribution errors (10 vs. 16, p = 0.21), suggesting that the improved factuality of WikiCrow over Wikipedia was largely due to improvements in reasoning.

Very scientifically accurate depictions of hallucinations experienced by human editors (left) and WikiCrow (right). Not from the paper.

The authors caution that this result about Wikipedians "hallucinating" more frequently than AI is specific to their "WikiCrow" system (and the task of writing articles about genes), and must not be generalized to LLMs in general:

Although language models are clearly prone to reasoning errors (or hallucinations), in our task at least they appear to be less prone to such errors than Wikipedia authors or editors. This statement is specific to the agentic RAG setting presented here: language models like GPT-4 on their own, if asked to generate Wikipedia articles, would still be expected to hallucinate at high rates.

A previous, less capable version of the WikiCrow system had already been described in a December 2023 blog post, which discussed the motivation for focusing on the task of writing Wikipedia-like articles about genes in more detail. Rather than seeing it as an arbitrary benchmark demo for their LLM agent system (back then in its earlier version, PaperQA), the authors described it as being motivated by longstanding shortcomings of Wikipedia's gene coverage that are seriously hampering the work of researchers who have come to rely on Wikipedia:

If you've spent time in molecular biology, you have probably encountered the "alphabet soup" problem of genomics. Experiments in genomics uncover lists of genes implicated in a biological process, like MGAT5B and ADGRA3. Researchers turn to tools like Google, Uniprot or Wikipedia to learn more, as the knowledge of 20,000 human genes is too broad for any single human to understand. However, according to our count, only 3,639 of the 19,255 human protein-coding genes recognized by the HGNC have high-quality (non-stub) summaries on [English] Wikipedia; the other 15,616 lack pages or are incomplete stubs. Often, plenty is known about the gene, but no one has taken the time to write up a summary. This is part of a much broader problem today: scientific knowledge is hard to access, and often locked up in impenetrable technical reports. To find out about genes like MGAT5B and ADGRA3, you'd end up sinking hours into reading the primary literature.

[The 2023 version of] WikiCrow is a first step towards automated synthesis of human scientific knowledge. As a first demo, we used WikiCrow to generate drafts of Wikipedia-style articles for all 15,616 of the Human protein-coding genes that currently lack articles or have stubs, using information from full-text articles that we have access to through our academic affiliations. We estimate that this task would have taken an expert human ~60,000 hours total (6.8 working years). By contrast, WikiCrow wrote all 15,616 articles in a few days (about 8 minutes per article, with 50 instances running in parallel), drawing on 14,819,358 pages from 871,000 scientific papers that it identified as relevant in the literature.

These challenges of covering the large number of relevant genes are not news to Wikipedians working in this area. Back in 2011, several papers in a special issue of Nucleic Acids Research on databases had explored Wikipedia as a database for structured biological data, e.g. asking "how to get scientists en masse to edit articles" in this area, and presenting English Wikipedia's "Gene Wiki" taskforce (which is currently inactive). In a 2020 article in eLife, a group of 30 researchers and Wikidata contributors similarly "describe[d] the breadth and depth of the biomedical knowledge contained within Wikidata," including its coverage of genes in general ("Wikidata contains items for over 1.1 million genes and 940 thousand proteins from 201 unique taxa") and human genetic variants ("Wikidata currently contains 1502 items corresponding to human genetic variants, focused on those with a clear clinical or therapeutic relevance").[2] But it seems that at least from the point of view of the FutureHouse researchers, Wikidata's gene coverage is not a substitute for Wikipedia's, perhaps because it does not offer the same kind of factual coverage (see also the review of a related dissertation below).

The current paper is not peer-reviewed, but conveys credibility by disclosing ample detail about the methodology for building and evaluating the PaperQA2 and WikiCrow systems (also in an accompanying technical blog post), and by releasing the underlying source code and data. The PaperQA2 system is available as an open-source software package. (This includes a "Setting to emulate the Wikipedia article writing used in our WikiCrow publication". However, the paper cautions that the released version does not include some additional tools that were used, and in particular does not provide "access to non-local full-text literature searches", which are "often bound by licensing agreements".) The generated articles are available online in rendered form and as Markdown source (see full list below, with links to their Wikipedia counterparts for comparison). The annotated expert ratings have been published as well.

The authors acknowledge "previous work on unconstrained document summarization, where the document must be found and then summarized, and even writing Wikipedia-style articles with RAG" (i.e. the aforementioned STORM project). But they highlight that

"These studies have not compared directly against Wikipedia with human evaluation. Instead, they used either LLMs to judge or [like STORM] compared ROGUE (text overlap) against ground-truth summaries. Here, we measure directly against human-generated Wikipedia with subject [matter] expert grading."

The "crow" moniker (already used in a predecessor project called "ChemCrow",[supp 1] an LLM agent working on chemistry tasks) is inspired by the fact that "Crows can talk – like a parrot – but their intelligence lies in tool use."

List of gene articles generated by WikiCrow
Gene name (wikilinked) WikiCrow article (rendered) WikiCrow article (source)
ABCC1 [1] [2]
ACKR1 [3] [4]
ADCYAP1 [5] [6]
ADGRG4 [7] [8]
AGK [9] [10]
ALOX5 [11] [12]
ANGPT1 [13] [14]
ANLN [15] [16]
ANXA6 [17] [18]
AP1G1 [19] [20]
APOC3 [21] [22]
APRT [23] [24]
ATF1 [25] [26]
ATF2 [27] [28]
ATG16L1 [29] [30]
ATOX1 [31] [32]
ATPAF2 [33] [34]
AURKA [35] [36]
B3GAT1 [37] [38]
BAIAP2 [39] [40]
BMPR2 [41] [42]
BPGM [43] [44]
BPIFA2 [45] [46]
BPIFB4 [47] [48]
BRAF [49] [50]
BRIP1 [51] [52]
BSG [53] [54]
C5AR1 [55] [56]
CAD [57] [58]
CASP8 [59] [60]
CCDC188 [61] [62]
CCDC74A [63] [64]
CCDC78 [65] [66]
CCDC82 [67] [68]
CCL20 [69] [70]
CCNH [71] [72]
CD1D [73] [74]
CD36 [75] [76]
CD3E [77] [78]
CD4 [79] [80]
CD52 [81] [82]
CD80 [83] [84]
CDK7 [85] [86]
CDKN2A [87] [88]
CEL [89] [90]
CENPJ [91] [92]
CEP290 [93] [94]
CFAP299 [95] [96]
CHD2 [97] [98]
CHRNA7 [99] [100]
CKAP4 [101] [102]
CKM [103] [104]
CLPP [105] [106]
CPE [107] [108]
CREM [109] [110]
CRH [111] [112]
CSF2RB [113] [114]
CTSB [115] [116]
CXCR4 [117] [118]
CYP2B6 [119] [120]
DCLRE1C [121] [122]
DFFB [123] [124]
DIRAS3 [125] [126]
DPPA3 [127] [128]
DYSF [129] [130]
EEF1A1 [131] [132]
EGLN1 [133] [134]
ELK1 [135] [136]
ELN [137] [138]
EPO [139] [140]
ETS1 [141] [142]
ETV6 [143] [144]
EWSR1 [145] [146]
FABP7 [147] [148]
FAM120AOS [149] [150]
FAM193A [151] [152]
FAM83H [153] [154]
FAM98A [155] [156]
FBL [157] [158]
FBXO2 [159] [160]
FBXW10 [161] [162]
FGF9 [163] [164]
FMR1 [165] [166]
GAK [167] [168]
GFM1 [169] [170]
GLO1 [171] [172]
GNMT [173] [174]
GOLGA8H [175] [176]
GPER1 [177] [178]
GRIA2 [179] [180]
GRM2 [181] [182]
GSC [183] [184]
HBA1 [185] [186]
HBA2 [187] [188]
HCK [189] [190]
HDAC4 [191] [192]
HKDC1 [193] [194]
HNF1A [195] [196]
HP1BP3 [197] [198]
HTR5A [199] [200]
IDO1 [201] [202]
IFITM1 [203] [204]
IKZF2 [205] [206]
IL27 [207] [208]
IL4R [209] [210]
JAK2 [211] [212]
JAML [213] [214]
KCNE1 [215] [216]
KCNJ5 [217] [218]
KCNK2 [219] [220]
KHDRBS1 [221] [222]
KLKB1 [223] [224]
KLRK1 [225] [226]
KNG1 [227] [228]
LEF1 [229] [230]
LHX1 [231] [232]
MAP3K7 [233] [234]
MAP6 [235] [236]
MARCHF5 [237] [238]
MCL1 [239] [240]
MCM4 [241] [242]
MEF2C [243] [244]
MICOS13 [245] [246]
MINDY4 [247] [248]
MITF [249] [250]
MROH9 [251] [252]
MSH2 [253] [254]
MT-ATP6 [255] [256]
MT-CYB [257] [258]
MT-ND3 [259] [260]
MTA1 [261] [262]
MYL3 [263] [264]
MYO10 [265] [266]
MYOM1 [267] [268]
MYOM2 [269] [270]
NDUFA1 [271] [272]
NDUFAF3 [273] [274]
NEDD8 [275] [276]
NEFL [277] [278]
NFKBIA [279] [280]
NFKBID [281] [282]
NGLY1 [283] [284]
NPM1 [285] [286]
NPPB [287] [288]
NPY [289] [290]
NR1H4 [291] [292]
NSFL1C [293] [294]
NTRK3 [295] [296]
NUP214 [297] [298]
OGA [299] [300]
OPN4 [301] [302]
OPTN [303] [304]
ORC2 [305] [306]
OSBP [307] [308]
OXGR1 [309] [310]
P2RY12 [311] [312]
PCK2 [313] [314]
PCNT [315] [316]
PER2 [317] [318]
PIP [319] [320]
PITX2 [321] [322]
PLA2G4F [323] [324]
PLAU [325] [326]
PLIN1 [327] [328]
PLIN2 [329] [330]
PLIN5 [331] [332]
POLH [333] [334]
PPIB [335] [336]
PPOX [337] [338]
PPP2R1A [339] [340]
PPP2R2A [341] [342]
PRC1 [343] [344]
PRDM12 [345] [346]
PRKACA [347] [348]
PRR30 [349] [350]
PSMB1 [351] [352]
PSMB6 [353] [354]
PSMB9 [355] [356]
PSMD2 [357] [358]
PTGER4 [359] [360]
PVALB [361] [362]
RAD50 [363] [364]
RAD54L [365] [366]
RALB [367] [368]
RASEF [369] [370]
RHD [371] [372]
RPAP2 [373] [374]
RPGR [375] [376]
RRM2B [377] [378]
S100A2 [379] [380]
S100A9 [381] [382]
SALL4 [383] [384]
SATB1 [385] [386]
SBK3 [387] [388]
SEPTIN4 [389] [390]
SERPINA12 [391] [392]
SERPINC1 [393] [394]
SH2B1 [395] [396]
SIAH2 [397] [398]
SIGLEC8 [399] [400]
SLC22A6 [401] [402]
SLC6A4 [403] [404]
SOCS3 [405] [406]
SPG7 [407] [408]
SPTBN1 [409] [410]
STMN1 [411] [412]
STS [413] [414]
TAS1R1 [415] [416]
TBC1D30 [417] [418]
TCAP [419] [420]
TEDC2 [421] [422]
TERF2 [423] [424]
TFAP2A [425] [426]
THBS1 [427] [428]
TICAM1 [429] [430]
TLE1 [431] [432]
TMEM222 [433] [434]
TMEM239 [435] [436]
TMEM249 [437] [438]
TMEM50A [439] [440]
TMEM69 [441] [442]
TNFRSF11A [443] [444]
TP53BP1 [445] [446]
TRH [447] [448]
TSEN34 [449] [450]
TWIST1 [451] [452]
U2AF1 [453] [454]
UBC [455] [456]
UQCRC2 [457] [458]
VEZT [459] [460]
VIPR1 [461] [462]
WAS [463] [464]
XIAP [465] [466]
XRCC6 [467] [468]
ZNF804A [469] [470]
Notes:
  • The second column (the list of rendered articles) was obtained from the search box dropdown list at https://wikicrow.ai/ . The other two columns were derived from it.
  • Despite the paper's statement that these are "240 articles on genes that already have non-stub Wikipedia articles", the dropdown list appears to contain only 235, some of which don't seem to have an equivalent English Wikipedia article. (See also List of human protein-coding genes 1 etc.)

Using Wikipedia's categories and list pages to build a knowledge graph separate from Wikidata

From the abstract of a dissertation titled "Exploiting semi-structured information in Wikipedia for knowledge graph construction":[3]

"[...] we address three main challenges in the field of automated knowledge graph construction using semi-structured data in Wikipedia as a data source. To create an ontology with expressive and fine-grained types, we present an approach that extracts a large-scale general-purpose taxonomy from categories and list pages in Wikipedia. We enhance the taxonomy's classes with axioms explicating their semantics. To increase the coverage of long-tail entities in knowledge graphs, we describe a pipeline of approaches that identify entity mentions in Wikipedia listings, integrate them into an existing knowledge graph, and enrich them with additional facts derived from the extraction context. As a result of applying the above approaches to semi-structured data in Wikipedia, we present the knowledge graph CaLiGraph. The graph describes more than 13 million entities with an ontology containing almost 1.3 million classes. To judge the value of CaLiGraph for practical tasks, we introduce a framework that compares knowledge graphs based on their performance on downstream tasks. We find CaLiGraph to be a valuable addition to the field of publicly available general-purpose knowledge graphs."

Why would one want to use Wikipedia as a source of structured data and build a new knowledge graph when Wikidata already exists? First, the thesis argues that Wikidata — even though it has surpassed other public knowledge graphs in the number of entitities — is still very incomplete, especially when it comes to information about long-tail topics:

"The trend of entities added to publicly available KGs in recent years indicates they are far from complete. The number of entities in Wikidata [195], for example, grew by 26% in the time from October 2020 (85M) to October 2023 (107M) [206]. Wikidata describes the largest number of entities and comprises – in terms of entities – other public KGs to a large extent [66]. Consequently, this challenge of incompleteness applies to all public KGs, particularly when it comes to less popular entities [44]. [...]

On the other hand, an automated process for extracting structured information from Wikipedia may not yet be reliable enough to import the result directly without manual review:

While the performance of Open Information Extraction (OIE) systems (i.e., systems that extract information from general web text) has improved in recent years [159, 97, 112], the quality of extracted information has not yet reached a level where integration into public KGs like Wikidata or DBpedia [104] should be done without further filtering. [...]
[...] first "picking low-hanging fruit" by focusing on premium sources like Wikipedia to build a high-quality KG is crucial as it can serve as a solid foundation for approaches that target more challenging data sources. The extracted information may then be used as an additional anchor to make sense of less structured data.

Chapter 3 ("Knowledge Graphs on the Web") contains detailed comparisons of Wikidata with other public knowledge graphs, with observations including the following:

The main focus of DBpedia is on persons (and their careers), as well as places, works, and species. Wikidata also strongly focuses on works (mainly due to the import of entire bibliographic datasets), while Cyc, BabelNet and NELL show a more diverse distribution. [...]

[...] Wikidata has the largest number of instances and the largest detail level in most classes. However, there are differences from class to class. While Wikidata contains a large number of works, YAGO is a good source of events. NELL often has fewer instances, but a larger level of detail, which can be explained by its focus on more prominent instances.
Wikidata contains about twice as many persons as DBpedia and YAGO [..., which] contain almost no persons which are not contained in Wikidata. In conclusion, combining Wikidata with DBpedia or YAGO for better coverage of the Person class would not be beneficial"

(see also an earlier paper co-authored by the author that was titled "Knowledge Graphs on the Web -- an Overview")

Briefly

Other recent publications

Other recent publications that could not be covered in time for this issue include the items listed below. Contributions, whether reviewing or summarizing newly published research, are always welcome.

"Refining Wikidata Taxonomy using Large Language Models"

A Wikidata taxonomy (from "city or town" to "entity") before and after refinement

From the abstract:[4]

"Wikidata is known to have a complex taxonomy, with recurrent issues like the ambiguity between instances and classes, the inaccuracy of some taxonomic paths, the presence of cycles, and the high level of redundancy across classes. Manual efforts to clean up this taxonomy are time-consuming and prone to errors or subjective decisions. We present WiKC, a new version of Wikidata taxonomy cleaned automatically using a combination of Large Language Models (LLMs) and graph mining techniques."

From the "Evaluation" section:

"As expected, WiKC is much simpler and much more concise than Wikidata taxonomy. Compared to WiKC, Wikidata taxonomy has a factor higher than 200 in the number of classes, and a factor higher than 10 in the average number of paths from an instance to the root class entity (Q35120)."
"WiKC consistently outperforms Wikidata across all depth ranges. WiKC shows significant accuracy gains at deeper levels (depth 10 or more), suggesting that WiKC has resolved many inconsistency issues in the lower levels of the Wikidata taxonomy."

"Psychiq and Wwwyzzerdd: Wikidata completion using Wikipedia"

Video demonstrating the Wwwyzzerdd browser extension

From the abstract:[5]

"Hundreds of thousands of articles on English Wikipedia have zero or limited meaningful structure on Wikidata. Much work has been done in the literature to partially or fully automate the process of completing knowledge graphs, but little of it has been practically applied to Wikidata. This paper presents two interconnected practical approaches to speeding up the Wikidata completion task. The first is Wwwyzzerdd, a browser extension that allows users to quickly import statements from Wikipedia to Wikidata. Wwwyzzerdd has been used to make over 100 thousand edits to Wikidata. The second is Psychiq, a new model for predicting instance and subclass statements based on English Wikipedia articles. [...] One initial use is integrating the Psychiq model into the Wwwyzzerdd browser extension."

"Bridging Background Knowledge Gaps in Translation with Automatic Explicitation"

From the paper:[6]

"Translations help people understand content written in another language. However, even correct literal translations do not fulfill that goal when people lack the necessary background to understand them. Professional translators incorporate explicitations to explain the missing context by considering cultural differences between source and target audiences. [...] For example, the name “Dominique de Villepin” may be well known in French community while totally unknown to English speakers in which case the translator may detect this gap of background knowledge between two sides and translate it as “the former French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin” instead of just “Dominique de Villepin”. [...]
This work introduces techniques for automatically generating explicitations, motivated by WIKIEXPL, a dataset that we collect from Wikipedia and annotate with human translators. [...]

Our generation is grounded in Wikidata and Wikipedia—rather than free-form text generation—to prevent hallucinations and to control length or the type of explanation. For SHORT explicitations, we fetch a word from instance of or country of from Wikidata [...]. For MID, we fetch a description of the entity from Wikidata [...]. For LONG type, we fetch three sentences from the first paragraph of Wikipedia."


"Relevant Entity Selection: Knowledge Graph Bootstrapping [from Wikidata] via Zero-Shot Analogical Pruning"

From the abstract:[7]

"Knowledge Graph Construction (KGC) can be seen as an iterative process starting from a high quality nucleus that is refined by knowledge extraction approaches in a virtuous loop. Such a nucleus can be obtained from knowledge existing in an open KG like Wikidata. However, due to the size of such generic KGs, integrating them as a whole may entail irrelevant content and scalability issues. We propose an analogy-based approach that starts from seed entities of interest in a generic KG, and keeps or prunes their neighboring entities. We evaluate our approach on Wikidata through two manually labeled datasets that contain either domain-homogeneous or -heterogeneous seed entities."


"Assembling Hyperpop: Genre Formation on Wikipedia"

From the abstract:[8]

"By analyzing the edit history of Wikipedia’s ‘hyperpop’ page, we locate ongoing debates, controversies, and contestations that point to shaping forces around online genre formation. These potentially have a huge impact on how hyperpop is understood both inside and outside of the music community. In locating the most active editors of the hyperpop Wikipedia page and scrutinizing their edit histories as well as the discussions on the hyperpop page itself, we uncovered debates about artistic notability, biases toward specific sources, and attempts at associating or dissociating musical genre from non-musical identities (such as race, gender, and nationality)."


"After all, who invented the airplane? Multilingualism and grassroots knowledge production on Wikipedia"

From the abstract:[9]

"Paradoxically, in each language [English/French/Portuguese Wikipedia], the airplane has a different inventor. Through online ethnography, this article explores the multilingual landscape of Wikipedia, looking not only at languages, but also at language varieties, and unpacking the intricate connections between language, country, and nationality in grassroots knowledge production online."

"Excerpt on first powered flights in the (Portuguese Wikipedia's) Avião article" (figure from the paper)

References

  1. ^ Michael D. Skarlinski and Sam Cox and Jon M. Laurent and James D. Braza and Michaela Hinks and Michael J. Hammerling and Manvitha Ponnapati and Samuel G. Rodriques and Andrew D. White (2024), Language Agents Achieve Superhuman Synthesis of Scientific Knowledge, San Francisco, CA: FutureHouse / Code / Data (generated articles)
  2. ^ Waagmeester, Andra; Stupp, Gregory; Burgstaller-Muehlbacher, Sebastian; Good, Benjamin M; Griffith, Malachi; Griffith, Obi L; Hanspers, Kristina; Hermjakob, Henning; Hudson, Toby S; Hybiske, Kevin; Keating, Sarah M; Manske, Magnus; Mayers, Michael; Mietchen, Daniel; Mitraka, Elvira; Pico, Alexander R; Putman, Timothy; Riutta, Anders; Queralt-Rosinach, Nuria; Schriml, Lynn M; Shafee, Thomas; Slenter, Denise; Stephan, Ralf; Thornton, Katherine; Tsueng, Ginger; Tu, Roger; Ul-Hasan, Sabah; Willighagen, Egon; Wu, Chunlei; Su, Andrew I (2020-03-17). "Wikidata as a knowledge graph for the life sciences". eLife. 9. Peter Rodgers, Chris Mungall (eds.): –52614. doi:10.7554/eLife.52614. ISSN 2050-084X. PMC 7077981. PMID 32180547.
  3. ^ Heist, Nicolas (2024). Exploiting semi-structured information in Wikipedia for knowledge graph construction (Thesis). Universität Mannheim. (dissertation)
  4. ^ Peng, Yiwen; Bonald, Thomas; Alam, Mehwish (October 2024). "Refining Wikidata Taxonomy using Large Language Models". ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management. Boise, Idaho, United States. doi:10.1145/3627673.3679156 (inactive 2024-09-29).{{cite conference}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of September 2024 (link) Code/data
  5. ^ Erenrich, Daniel (2023-01-01). "Psychiq and Wwwyzzerdd: Wikidata completion using Wikipedia". Semantic Web. Preprint (Preprint): 1–14. doi:10.3233/SW-233450. ISSN 1570-0844.
  6. ^ Han, HyoJung; Boyd-Graber, Jordan Lee; Carpuat, Marine (2023-12-03), Bridging Background Knowledge Gaps in Translation with Automatic Explicitation, arXiv:2312.01308 / dataset
  7. ^ Jarnac, Lucas; Couceiro, Miguel; Monnin, Pierre (2023-10-21). "Relevant Entity Selection: Knowledge Graph Bootstrapping via Zero-Shot Analogical Pruning". Proceedings of the 32nd ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management. CIKM '23. New York, NY, USA: Association for Computing Machinery. pp. 934–944. doi:10.1145/3583780.3615030. ISBN 9798400701245. Closed access icon, preprint version: Jarnac, Lucas; Couceiro, Miguel; Monnin, Pierre (2023-10-21). "Relevant Entity Selection: Knowledge Graph Bootstrapping via Zero-Shot Analogical Pruning". Proceedings of the 32nd ACM International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management. pp. 934–944. arXiv:2306.16296. doi:10.1145/3583780.3615030.
  8. ^ Bates, Eliot; Delphis, Sophie; Moraes, Romulo; Santoli, Julia (2024-09-08). "Assembling Hyperpop: Genre Formation on Wikipedia". Cultural Sociology: 17499755241264905. doi:10.1177/17499755241264905. ISSN 1749-9755. Closed access icon
  9. ^ Fians, Guilherme (2024-11-01). "After all, who invented the airplane? Multilingualism and grassroots knowledge production on Wikipedia". Language & Communication. 99: 39–51. doi:10.1016/j.langcom.2024.08.001. ISSN 0271-5309.
Supplementary references:
  1. ^ M. Bran, Andres; Cox, Sam; Schilter, Oliver; Baldassari, Carlo; White, Andrew D.; Schwaller, Philippe (May 2024). "Augmenting large language models with chemistry tools". Nature Machine Intelligence. 6 (5): 525–535. doi:10.1038/s42256-024-00832-8. ISSN 2522-5839.


Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2024-09-26/Opinion

Thursday, 26 September 2024 00:00 UTC
File:Viking - Ring - Walters 571850.jpg
Selected by HouseBlaster – Walters Art Museum
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Opinion

asilvering's RfA debriefing

asilvering's request for adminship was closed as successful on September 6, 2024.

First, the bullet points:

  • It turns out a week is a really, really long time;
  • Even if your RfA isn't contentious or stressful, it will probably be exhausting;
  • Good nominators might not be essential, but I can't imagine having done RfA without mine; a steady hand on the tiller really, really helps (thanks especially to Vanamonde93);
  • Designated monitors are a blessing (thanks theleekycauldron), especially when you're doing the discussion-first format and you would like some acknowledgement that you didn't somehow transclude your RfA straight into the void;
  • If I may offer advice to future RfA hopefuls: don't post answers to questions right away. Write the answers in a text file, go take a nap, and then post them.
  • If I may offer advice to future RfA participants: if you could not, without being overcome by embarrassment, apply your question/vote to both a) a teenager of your acquaintance and b) your grandmother, you should probably rephrase it.

As for how I got here: Vanamonde93 asked me if I was interested in running some time ago, but I deferred for a number of reasons that became more obviously hollow as time went on. For one, "I'm too busy" doesn't work as a very good excuse if you just go find something else to do, like starting a new kind of GAN backlog drive. My second nominator was an easy choice, but that doesn't mean I wasn't nervous about asking. (Don't laugh, czar!) Reading the nomination statements made my heart grow three sizes and also made me want to disappear into the wallpaper. (I'm not good at praise.)

For a little while, I was of a mind to wait out the end of the discussion-period trial, but once I'd got my nominators lined up, it started to feel like I just needed to get it over with. Then, right after I'd said, "alright, now's good, let's do this," Femke showed up in my inbox asking if I'd ever thought of running. It felt so good to be able to tell someone, "you're just in time!" instead of brushing them off with some kind of excuse.

I tried my level best to ignore all the discussion and voting while it was happening, but it turns out that's really hard – not just because it takes willpower, but also because MediaWiki kept showing me the discussion section whenever I tried to preview my answers to the questions. And it's very hard to avoid knowing the precise count once voting starts, since that's right at the top of the page. So I gave up, and read everything. If you're thinking of RfA and you're the anxious sort who will be constantly fighting the temptation to check in, line up something to do with friends/family so you don't glue yourself to the refresh button. There's no way around this bit. It sucks, and a week is a long time.

Luckily for me, people had really nice things to say. I really appreciate everyone who participated and everyone who came by to congratulate me afterwards. I'm doing my best to avoid the mushroom effect and to remain indifferent to both praise and blame. Thank you all for ignoring and then quietly removing the joke oppose; I was a bit worried they'd be murdered. As for the discussion period, I do think it helped things remain civil and on-track, but I'm ambivalent on the experiment overall.

Being an admin has been fun so far. Everyone's been really helpful, and if I've been driving anyone crazy with all my questions, they've been kind enough not to tell me. Special thanks to Aoidh, who has already stopped me from doing something stupid, kindly and firmly, like disarming a wayward toddler running with scissors.

Maybe my opinion isn't worth much, since I had such a smooth RfA compared to so many others, but if you think you'd probably succeed at RfA and you're holding back since it sounds like a bad way to spend a week: I think you should go for it.

It's possible that someone will drag up something stupid you said four years ago and try to rub your nose in it, or that some personal flaw of yours will be magnified beyond all reason. It's possible some people will try to use your RfA as a soapbox to complain about policies or norms they dislike. It's very likely that you will spend the whole week waiting for the other shoe to drop, whether any of those things happen or not. Even an uncontentious RfA can be an exhausting and unpleasant experience – mine was all of those things.

But it's also very likely that, over the course of a week, somewhere between one and three hundred people will show up to say something nice about you. Many of those people will be folks whose opinion you really, truly value. Some of them will be people you can't remember ever hearing of before, but who nonetheless have something deeply gratifying to say. You should run.

Plus, now I can tell my colleagues that I "have tenure, on Wikipedia." I'm sure they'll all be very impressed.

Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2024-09-26/News and notes

Thursday, 26 September 2024 00:00 UTC
File:Presidential Election 1931 (3309; JOKAHBL3B B30-2).tif
Hugo Sundström
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News and notes

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The diverse Parliament gathering for its first admin election cycle in October.
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More articles

Encouraging news from the RfA review, including admin elections being set to start trials in October

Soni, the author of this story, was active in drafting the current reform proposals for the Requests for adminship process.

As part of WP:RFA2024, multiple RfA reform attempts have completed trials or are currently under review: you can read previous coverage on the matter by The Signpost in the 16 May issue.

There has already been consensus to add a reminder of RfA civility norms to WP:RFA, as well as limit suffrage to only extended-confirmed voters and formally require all nominees to also be extended-confirmed. All of these proposals were implemented in the last few months.

The "discussion-only period" trial has come to an end this month, having converted five different RfAs (non SNOW-closed) to have "discussion only" for the first two days out of the seven-day period. After this initial trial, Phase II discussions are ongoing to determine if this proposal will become permanent.

As per the outcome of the related Phase II discussion, admins can now designate themselves as monitors for RfAs, subject to minimum expectations for their conduct during the whole process. The full list can be found at WP:MONITOR. This proposal is intended to improve enforcement of civility guidelines during RfAs.

Phase II for the administrator recall proposal has also recently finished, having waited for a closer for several months. It will allow a community-initiated path to de-adminship by requiring certain admins to submit and pass their RfA again. Further discussion is ongoing on the next steps for this process.

Finally, the Admin Elections procedure is expected to trial in October: it will be a one-time trial to allow an alternate path to adminship, parallel to RfA. Candidates can sign up from 8 to 14 October, before entering a discussion period from 22 to 24 October, which will then be followed by a SecurePoll private voting session from 25 to 31 October. —S

U4C elections end with just one new member seated

The special elections for the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) concluded earlier this month, with the election of just one candidate. With 613 votes cast between the 18 eligible candidates, only Ajraddatz (for the North America seat) achieved the 60% support-to-support+oppose ratio required. This gives the U4C just enough members (8 out of 16 seats) to establish their quorum, though it remains to be seen how U4C will handle inactive members.

The committee was set up primarily to deal with larger-scale disputes within smaller Wikis and to enforce the Universal Code of Conduct across the various projects; they are expected to begin hearing cases shortly. Further information can be found on the U4C announcements page.

The full results of the U4C elections can be viewed here. This cycle had already been covered in the 22 July issue of The Signpost. – —S

The WMF releases two new bulletins for August and September

The Wikimedia Foundation published their bulletins for late August and early September. Among other news, they covered a public survey intended to better understand WikiProjects, the recent disbandment of the MCDC and the WMF Board of Trustees election, which is currently in its scrutiny phase.

It was also mentioned that the WMF will briefly switch the traffic between its data centers for maintenance purposes on 25 September, starting at 15:00 UTC. A banner will be displayed on all Wikis 30 minutes before the start of the operation, during which users will be able to read, but not edit, the sites for up to an hour. More information on the server switch can be found here.

Editors may also be interested in testing for the Charts Extension and the Alt Text experiment on the iOS app, the codified new API policy, or the WMF's newest update on Movement Strategy Grants (Spoilers: it focuses on Hubs). —S, O

A silver ring, not asilvering, one of our two newest administrators.

Brief notes