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Latest comment: 2 years ago by Ruslik0 in topic Update on Opted-out of global sysop wikis
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SRG archives

The current SRG archive is >600 kB and over 1000 threads long. Time to set up by-week archives? ~~~~
User:1234qwer1234qwer4 (talk)
10:29, 28 July 2021 (UTC)Reply

Restoring; not sure why this got archived without any reply. Can we please do something about this? ~~~~
User:1234qwer1234qwer4 (talk)
11:17, 17 September 2021 (UTC)Reply
Probably, yes. Ruslik (talk) 13:16, 17 September 2021 (UTC)Reply
@1234qwer1234qwer4 I'd agree with weekly archives. I'm not sure if @جار الله's @JarBot supports that though. Could that be clarified, please? Best, Martin Urbanec (talk) 22:20, 2 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Hi @Martin Urbanec: I will schedule the bot to archives SRG page weekly. It may take several days before scheduling the task. Best>--جار الله (talk) 00:04, 3 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
That would mean changing the naming scheme in the middle of the year, right? What do we do with pages like Steward requests/Global/2021-10? ~~~~
User:1234qwer1234qwer4 (talk)
10:55, 3 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
@جار الله I'm not 100% sure we understood each other well -- the intention is to have one archive page per week (instead of current per month). Would that be possible?
@1234qwer1234qwer4 It's first week of October, so I'd just move that to the archive page for first week of October. Martin Urbanec (talk) 17:48, 3 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
The problem is that a month does not have exactly four weeks. It would make more sense to name the archives by calendar week. ~~~~
User:1234qwer1234qwer4 (talk)
17:57, 3 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
@Martin Urbanec: I understand you now, you want to make archive pages archive according to weeks of the year instead of months, yes this is possible. Such as Steward requests/Global/2021-w50, Steward requests/Global/2021-w51 and so on.--جار الله (talk) 19:18, 3 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
@1234qwer1234qwer4, Ruslik0, Martin Urbanec, and جار الله: We now have Steward requests/Global/2021-w41, but the header says "This is a discussion archive first created on Error: Invalid time.," can we get Template:Archive header modified to reflect the new naming? -- Jeff G. ツ (please ping or talk to me) 23:32, 17 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

What is "lock evasion"?

Lock evasion is a redlink but it's used as a rationale for locks occasionally. At Global locks it says that evasion of a global ban is reason for a lock, but not 'evading' a "global lock". A specific context is Steward_requests/Global/2021-05#Global_lock_for_Kashmorwiki where I asked this question before AmandaNP locked the account and neither the blocking admin or locking steward answered the question. That editor wasn't being disruptive at all, so the and are actively vandalizing now or obviously are otherwise being disruptive on multiple wikis are candidates for a global lock criteria was obviously not met. I saw some more "lock evasion" locks (by Amanda, but I'm guessing other stewards do these too) on my watchlist so posing the question now. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 09:34, 30 September 2021 (UTC)Reply

ProcrastinatingReader really? Lock evasion is synonymous to block evasion. Does everything need to be minutely defined? If someone has their account locked, you think that we should gives them a free pass to continue editing with a sockpuppet? That is naive. It is up to the steward's judgment to what they do with the sockpuppet accounts and that seems reasonable.  — billinghurst sDrewth 11:22, 30 September 2021 (UTC)Reply
I will also note that the section you are referencing is the "making requests" section, and is not meant to limit a steward's action. That section would not necessarily mention user unidentified lock evasion, as that is typically only evident from checkuser data.  — billinghurst sDrewth 12:24, 30 September 2021 (UTC)Reply
Completely serious, yeah. The guidance talks about global ban evasion, it seems like it would talk about lock evasion if it meant to talk about lock evasion. Then you get circular issues, as in that case, where local projects won’t consider an unblock due to ‘lock evasion’ and stewards won’t unlock because a local project hasn’t unblocked the editor. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 15:04, 1 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
You're missing the point. That list is guidance for when someone can request a lock. That's it. It is not there to give guidance to stewards.

Stewards are locking vandals, and problematic editors, and doing it upon request or through some of their CU checks of problematic xwiki accounts. If they are finding sockpuppets, they are sockpuppets, and they are making the assessment of what to do. At a local wiki there should be no need to block a locked account, and if it is blocked first then so be it. Stewards would not typically be pursuing a user only at one wiki. The cases like you mention are very rare, and those users can email stewards.  — billinghurst sDrewth 16:26, 1 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

If I remember correctly, the editor in question said they emailed stewards multiple times and didn’t get an answer. It’s quite literally limbo. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 22:29, 1 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
If you have concerns about how stewards are managing their mail queue, probably better that as a straight request and conversation, rather than a surrogate argument. Stewards should answer reasonable questions about their processes, and should be able to summarily tell the community about the state of their mail queue.  — billinghurst sDrewth 23:40, 1 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
My own straight request here was to see how these locks work, since (as I said before) it seems like these just put editors into limbo. I posed a specific question before (which I thought was quite reasonable) at the link I gave but Amanda silently locked without answering it. So I'd like an answer to that, ideally by a steward. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 14:27, 2 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Hello @ProcrastinatingReader, a steward speaking. Thanks for your question – I'm trying to answer it below. Please note I'm not @AmandaNP, and I can't speak on her behalf – everything I say here is my own interpretation of the facts.
As far as I can see, the reason for the Kashmorwiki lock is simple: the CU block by @Mz7 shows English Wikipedia (as a project) considers the reincarnation as a disruptive one. Since the user previously contributed as Shahoodu, which is also locked (by myself), and is not active elsewhere, it's enough to justify a lock (in addition to that, [1] is also an interesting summary of the user's history).
For an appeal, personally, I do unlock accounts when a local appeals procedure was successful (especially on big established wikis, like English Wikipedia); [2] is an example of a previous case of a CU block+lock. I generally refer users to pursue local appeal first if possible -- that's because locals usually know the appellant better than the locking steward.
I think English Wikipedia should feel free to resolve the appeal as it wishes to -- if the block is removed, the account will very likely be unlocked (unless @AmandaNP knows something that I was unable to find even after thorough review). If on-wiki access is required for the appeal procedure (ie. if off-wiki process, like UTRS and/or AC, is not acceptable for some reason), I can imagine unlocking the account temporarily solely for the purposes of the appeal.
For the email queue, unfortunately, it's currently filled with a lot of mails (nearly a thousand of them) . We're aware of the problem, unfortunately, it takes some time to process them all, and we're all hard-working volunteers . I'll find an email from Kashmorwiki and reply to them later today.
I hope this all makes sense. Let me know if you have any other questions. Best, Martin Urbanec (talk) 22:18, 2 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Probably worth considering less hard blocking so many ranges and doing so so often with the only means of contact being email. That you have 1000 email sounds like you have an upstream problem that needs addressing.  — billinghurst sDrewth 06:37, 4 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
@Billinghurst We're aware of that issue, and discussing potential solutions internally (one of the options is using a better-scaling unblock system), but so far, no decision has been made. Martin Urbanec (talk) 08:41, 4 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I am reflecting, not criticising. I am just reporting what I am seeing when attending to local block requests that are global requests, and the number of hard hard hard blocks that I am seeing, and comparing it to my time with that button. There are positive and negative consequences for actions and inactions. I would say that while looser restrictions let through some more spam or more LTAs, it also blocks less valid users, and there is a larger volunteer pool to manage these issues.  — billinghurst sDrewth 11:09, 4 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Thanks Martin. I don't believe the editor was blocked for disruption. IIRC they had an entirely productive 6 month (undiscovered socking) tenure, and were blocked due to a violation of the socking policy since they had an active block on an old account. That's a problem the enwiki community should deal with, but the focus here (from my perspective) is the unblock appeal and then the global lock by Amanda.
The unblock appeal was declined for two reasons: 1) global lock evasion; 2) (allegedly) lying about not being related to a specific sockpuppet account. The appeal was declined by a non-CU, and multiple CUs said the alleged account was unrelated, so I think it's safe to ignore 2. 1 creates a bit of a catch-22. I mean here is a comment by another steward saying There is no such thing as lock evasion. To the extent the purpose of locks is to prevent disruption, it's very hard to argue that this account (regardless of whether it should be unblocked on the enwiki project) was actually disrupting the Wikimedia projects.
That aside, how do you suggest an editor in that situation resolve their situation? If the stewards can't deal with the mail queues, and local projects won't consider appeals from glocked editors, and stewards don't unlock accounts unless a local project says it is willing to consider an appeal, are you saying there needs to be a consensus at en:AN or something saying "we will hear an appeal from X editor" before stewards will unlock, and then the editor can appeal, and then they can potentially be unblocked? (I suppose en has UTRS which you might accept, but say for non-UTRS projects). ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 08:55, 8 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I am quite sure that it is not true that "local projects won't consider appeals from glocked editors". The practice that I have seen, at least on enwiki, is that, if an editor is glocked, they may appeal their block via UTRS, and if a local sysop wants to reinstate TPA, or unblock, the sysop may mail a steward, who unlocks the account as per the request. JavaHurricane 09:03, 8 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
And for other projects: if I recall correctly, most wikis of at least medium size have a mailing list set aside for unblocks, which basically functions like a UTRS. JavaHurricane 09:13, 8 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Independent from the above discussion about this specific issue, Meta-Wiki really lacks a lot of the definition-related policy and guideline pages that content wikis have, both in terms of local and global actions. We have no specific policies for a majority of actions admins make, and a decent amount of actions that stewards make. It's been something I've been thinking about proposing, specifically for Meta-Wiki local policies (blocking policy, socking policy, rules for editing pages officially organized/affiliated, an actual admin removal policy that isn't just for inactivity, etc.), but that would require significant global community input and a lot of individual work to organize it. I suppose we could make a list of common but officially undefined terms, making sure to note it as a non-policy/guideline essay, to help users unfamiliar with Meta and steward work get along better. Best regards, and happy editing, Vermont (talk) 17:44, 8 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I'll be happy to assist if needed @Vermont. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 12:16, 11 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Global locks needs a fundamental rewrite and there are not many user clear about the proper relationship between local block and global lock. Unfortuanely even I collected a number of cases that global locks may be doubtful, I still have no idea how a formal lock policy should be.--GZWDer (talk) 11:32, 14 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I don't think we need a global lock policy but yes, I agree the relationship between global lock and local blocks needs to be clearer. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 09:49, 15 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Lock evasion? There is no such thing as lock evasion. ~~~~
User:1234qwer1234qwer4 (talk)
17:24, 14 October 2021 (UTC)
Reply

Looking for Scrutineers

It's that time of the year again and the Electoral Commissioners are looking for 3 brave victims to serve as Scrutineers for the English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee Elections. Do I have any takers? Please specify if you would prefer to be a primary Scrutineer, or a reserve scrutineer. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 00:43, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

@Cyberpower678 Count me in :). Martin Urbanec (talk) 08:55, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I'm not brave, but you can use me where you need me O_o --Sotiale (talk) 11:28, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I can be a reserve scrutineer, since I was one last year and enwiki prefers if it's not the same every year. —Thanks for the fish! talkcontribs 22:58, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Of course, I'm also happy to step out for another steward to do the job instead, as I also was a scrutineer last year. Martin Urbanec (talk) 23:57, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I can serve as reserve - not the main. I dunno what's gonna happen IRL later this year, so I'd rather not be the main one (Sorry Tks4Fish!). I can probably accommodate if there is no other option though. — regards, Revi 21:47, 20 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
You know, enwiki ACE scrutineer-ing is not a pleasant job (We all know that, I think?) and since this has been on the radar for +10 days, those who are interested already volunteered to enter, I'd like to assume. — regards, Revi 00:04, 29 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I know how unpleasant it is and I know that it's likely those that offered are the only candidates willing to volunteer. Just want to make sure we have our bases covered in terms of available scrutineers. I'll go and update the enwiki page with the appointed scrutineers. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 00:18, 29 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Thank you to those scrutineers who are willing to spend time doing this. It's a very behind the scenes job that I know is difficult. It is appreciated. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 00:26, 29 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

Effect of Apple’s iCloud Private Relay

SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 21:34, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

I should point out the relay isn't just restricted to Safari. It's a network wide implementation at the OS level, which means ALL traffic from ALL apps are getting relayed. I disabled mine for my home network as I think it's unnecessary but most Apple users will not be aware of it. Given how many people use Apple products on Wikipedia, I think your underestimating the number of users getting impacted by this. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 22:22, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Cyberpower678, really? My understanding was that the relay function only applied to Safari; announcements have been quite insistent that this is not a VPN, just a web traffic anonymizer. GeneralNotability (talk) 22:23, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Maybe I misunderstood the implementation of the relay. I thought it was meant to hide all traffic network wide, not just web activity. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 22:24, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
It is indeed just Safari and only for people who a) pay for an iCloud subscription and b) opt in. Blablubbs (talk) 22:29, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
The vast majority of people won't have a clue what this is, and when faced with a question like, "Do you want to turn on safer internet browsing?" will indeed opt in. I mean, who doesn't want safer internet browsing? The IS0 7-layer model isn't gospel, but the transport layer should just be for moving bits from one place to another. If you want to start enforcing access permissions, you need to be doing that somewhere higher in the stack. If you're making application-level decisions based on IP addresses for anything more important than, "Which movie listings should I show the user?", you're doing it wrong. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RoySmith (talk) 22:48, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I think we need to distinguish between macOS (where my understanding is that it is just Safari) and iOS (where it might be more since Safari is more deeply integrated into the OS). --Rschen7754 04:25, 19 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I'm not sure how criticising Apple's decisions is helpful in this context. ~~~~
User:1234qwer1234qwer4 (talk)
20:52, 19 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
To clarify, all iCloud Private Relay IP addresses are already hardblocked, both globally and on the English Wikipedia, and will continue to be. It's just the use of them that will increase over time. This is a similar problem to the days of web accelerators like w:WP:GWE and Opera Mini, but at least those have a site-specific opt-out. As of now, iCloud Private Relay is all-or-nothing. AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 23:44, 18 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
@SGrabarczuk (WMF): If I were completely honest, there is a need to talk about this on a more wider scale. Currently we have 280 pending stewards tickets for use of an IP blocked as a proxy. That is an underestimate as only search queries are used to filter that. To me, this is a running problem. We should not have that many tickets pending for just global blocks on proxies. But then again, we also have the blocking of a major Tmobile IPv6 range 2607:fb80/32 both globally and on enwiki. So the amount of exemption requests (for an account or IPBE) for it all together are insane. I was going to bring this up at the next stewards meeting with the WMF (courtesy ping: @JSutherland (WMF):) but this brings up the issue again. Personally I see this as needing a wider discussion on what is and isn't blocked and mitigation methods (like maybe ACC exemptions where an email has to be provided that is removed 7 days after the request to root out LTAs or something). Not a perfect idea, but a start of an idea on what we could do. So I thought I would raise this point and i'm hoping for input from other stewards too. -- Amanda (aka DQ) 01:38, 19 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Thank you for all your comments above. Could I cut them and paste into Talk:Apple iCloud Private Relay? It might be easier for everyone interested to participate in a centralized discussion. I was thinking of transcluding this section. I'm sure you know the drawbacks of such a solution. SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 14:27, 19 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I think you would get less participation from moving them over. But you could. Maybe some quotes of things you want to highlight too could help that page. -- Amanda (aka DQ) 20:55, 19 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
@AmandaNP, I particularly like the "if I were completely honest" part. Let's be completely honest and go back to your opinion "there is a need to talk about this on a more wider scale" and "what is and isn't blocked and mitigation methods". Would you like to elaborate on that? SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 19:34, 28 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
With that so called 'ip masking' (LOL) I started to believe we should just follow steps with orgs like OSM and require registration to edit. But yeah - we have to deal with the stuff right now - and there should be something done by WMF (because we the Stewards are simply too weak and small in number compared to the malicious party utilizing that proxies so we end up all-or-nothing solution) to help us pinpoint the malicious party, or to deter them utilizing the proxies. (And no, I ain't go to yet another talk page) — regards, Revi 00:06, 20 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
Alright, you're the hosts here. The more comfortable participation, the better. I've let my colleagues know that there is this discussion. SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 00:26, 20 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
For example, you could start with dealing with T243863: Templates used in global block summaries should only reference Meta templates. and it will give a better notification why their contributions are blocked when they are on 1.1.1.1 Warp+, iCloud stuff, Opera Mini, etc etc. — regards, Revi 22:39, 20 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

Why do I have two different IP addresses?

When I go to the English Wikipedia, my IP address is a blocked proxy (18.191.0.0/16), and when I try to say something I don't have tpa because of a global block. However, on every other Wikimedia wiki it's my normal, Floridan IP address. I don't know why that's happening, so can you change the proxy block to anonymous only so I can say the caught by proxy thing. Blazikeye535 (talk) 16:32, 22 October 2021 (UTC)Reply

That sounds like something is wrong on your end. Have you tried editing with other browsers? Or incognito mode? Some extension spoofing IP? It generally doesn't make sense to use AWS IP on enwiki and use broadband IP on other wikis, so sounds like your end. — regards, Revi 23:33, 22 October 2021 (UTC)Reply
I'm expeiriencing the same problem as well. Tellslola (talk) 17:43, 1 November 2021 (UTC)Reply

Update on Opted-out of global sysop wikis

I suggest updating the list as follows. I didn't include wikis that were previously opted-in or opted-out by local community decision according to the log. I've set them according to the List of ... on Meta. Local wikis with more or less than 10 admins may change from time to time if there is no local community decision according to Global sysops process.

Opted-out wikis
shwiki – 12 admins
bewiki – 10 admins
hywiki – 11 admins
uzwiki – 11 admins
astwiki – 10 admins
swwiki – 14 admins (this wiki has been removed from the list because it wasn't active before.)
itwikiquote – 11 admins
eswikisource – 10 admins
arwikisource – 10 admins
dewikiversity – 12 admins
dewikivoyage – 13 admins

Opted-in wikis
bswiki – 9 admins
skwiki – 9 admins
glwiki - 7 admins
kawiki – 4 admins
lmowiki – 8 admins
dewikibooks – 8 admins
frwikibooks – 7 admins
plwikiquote - 8 admins
cswiktionary – 4 admins

Regards. --Uncitoyentalk 12:26, 1 November 2021 (UTC)Reply

Do you suggest that we remove the wikis in the first list and add wikis in the second list? Ruslik (talk) 19:55, 4 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
I suggest add the wikis in the first list to the set, and remove the wikis in the second list from the set. You'd better double-check these wikis to make sure they're not inaccurate in terms of admin numbers or local community decision. --Uncitoyentalk 07:49, 5 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
cswiktionary has opted out per Global sysops/Local discussions. --Rschen7754 18:05, 5 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
And the policy for opting out should be more than a local discussion, there needs to be some performance criteria and minimum numbers; as similarly there should be automatic points where opt-out ceases. Probably needs a range of minimum and maximums for these to happen. This is a problem that is next cab off the rank for solving after 10+ years deteriorating. We fixed standards for AAR and this should follow a similar path.  — billinghurst sDrewth 00:32, 6 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
I would definitely support opening a global RfC to better clarify policy on how specific projects can opt in or out of the GS wikiset. Vermont (talk) 01:45, 6 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
We need a two-prong strategy: 1) enforce the rules that we already have, which is <10 admins or <3 active admins AND no opt-out. Stewards (admittedly including myself when I was one) were reluctant to enforce the <10 admins part of it, but GS says they can. 2) open a RFC to address these issues that have come up. What if they opt out but then all the admins go inactive? What if a project hits 0 admins? What sort of consensus (i.e. number of votes) is needed to go one way or the other? --Rschen7754 02:05, 6 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
The way that the GS page is written they are separate paragraphs and talk about the operation of the people, and how to remove a wiki. I don't see that there is anything to impose which is why I think we need some criteria at which A) a wiki can consider whether to start an OPT-OUT discussion. Then B) some criteria by which a wiki needs to maintain that OPT-OUT. Now whether A = B or A > B is a matter for such an RFC. Similarly, whether it is automatic fallback when the criteria is passed, or it is something that is checked once a year.  — billinghurst sDrewth 10:02, 6 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
Per GS#Scope, 'By default, global sysops may use this global user group's permissions on wikis that meet one or both of the following criteria: fewer than ten administrators exist; or fewer than three administrators have made a logged action within the past two months. The set is not mentioned here and is only a technical means used to implement this. I don't see any problem with enforcing the criteria, and the fewer than three administrators criterion was enforced multiple times over the last several years. --Rschen7754 06:48, 8 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
Do these numbers include temporal admins? Ruslik (talk) 20:58, 9 November 2021 (UTC)Reply

User:Stephensuleeman, RIP

Our colleague User:Stephensuleeman has sadly died (reported here: [3]); please lock their user page, etc. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 21:39, 8 November 2021 (UTC)Reply

Already done by Bsadowski1. Rest in peace. stanglavine msg 00:35, 9 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
Checkmark This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. stanglavine msg 00:35, 9 November 2021 (UTC)Reply