User talk:ToBeFree

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Tech News: 2024-21

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• The Nuke feature, which enables administrators to mass delete pages, will now correctly delete pages which were moved to another title. [1]
• New changes have been made to the UploadWizard in Wikimedia Commons: the overall layout has been improved, by following new styling and spacing for the form and its fields; the headers and helper text for each of the fields was changed; the Caption field is now a required field, and there is an option for users to copy their caption into the media description. [2][3]

Changes later this week

• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 21 May. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 22 May. It will be on all wikis from 23 May (calendar). [4][5]
• The HTML used to render all headings is being changed to improve accessibility. It will change on 22 May in some skins (Timeless, Modern, CologneBlue, Nostalgia, and Monobook). Please test gadgets on your wiki on these skins and report any related problems so that they can be resolved before this change is made in all other skins. The developers are also considering the introduction of a Gadget API for adding buttons to section titles if that would be helpful to tool creators, and would appreciate any input you have on that.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

MediaWiki message delivery 23:02, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

What's it called...

Hi there,

I know you're really busy, but please take a look at this discussion. I've changed my userboxes a couple days ago so some of the stuff there aren't the same anymore, but still. Is this showing respect to other editors and showing that they are here to build an encyclopedia? Thx.

I've also "think" that some of the userboxes were also the same from other users. What's it called when you copy userboxes from another user?

I would understand if Me Da Wikipedian does use this, for entertainment purposes .Myrealnamm (💬talk · ✏️contribs) at 23:20, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Hi Myrealnamm, no worries and thanks for asking!

This is a bit tricky.

The following is an oversimplification and not legal advice. All Wikipedia pages including your user page are irrevocably freely licensed, and everyone including huge companies is legally allowed to copy, publish, even print and sell them without even asking for your permission, as long as your username is mentioned as the author or a link to the original page is provided. So even if I sold copies of your userpage (with a link to it at the bottom) to people who pay me hundreds of dollar for them, I would be allowed to do that, I wouldn't have to inform you about it and I would be allowed to keep the entire money. So from a copyright perspective, this is generally fine and a simple edit summary like "I copied this from User:Myrealnamm" would be sufficient attribution. I see no attribution in the page's history yet, but that's a small mistake that can be fixed. See also: WP:CWW.

Additionally, someone might argue that simply adding userboxes to a page isn't even sufficiently original enough to qualify for copyright protection at all (threshold of originality).

So in a nutshell, let's forget about copyright. Your first thoughts may have been about copyright and how this surely must be forbidden, but when the source is a Wikipedia page, it usually isn't. You published the content under a free license, and people doing things with the content you didn't intend to be done is quickly part of the experience.

However, we surely agree that copying someone else's user page isn't a nice thing to do. User pages represent you as a person on Wikipedia, and if someone copies your user page, that feels like they're copying your identity. Putting on a mask that looks like your face. Perhaps you're looking for the term "impersonation", perhaps just "laziness". While you have freely licensed your content, you're a member of a community that has agreed on civil interactions and excluding those who disrupt the peace. And a member of that community is behaving in a way that feels rather unfriendly. Even if there is no strict policy against their specific behavior (contrary to signature forgery), talking to them and informing them how their behavior makes you feel is important.

I think you did the right thing when you chose to talk to Me Da Wikipedian at [6]. You also already correctly note that it's probably not a copyright issue yet still understandably upsetting.

It may help to put this into perspective. Copying userboxes is a bit different than copying a long user-specific text. Copying userboxes and topicons is a bit different than copying a custom background like mine, perhaps. Most userboxes and topicons are made for being copied; they're templates, and templates are usually created for being transcluded by anyone who would like to use them.

The user is blocked and can't fix the attribution in the history of their user page at the moment. And please allow them to have a pause from Wikipedia instead of constantly getting notified about user/talk page edits. Ideally, just let the situation be as is. The user has been informed that copying user pages can upset their creators and currently can't continue doing so anyway.

Best regards,
~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:19, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Wow, thanks for replying so fast! And yes, I knew there aren't copyright issues and all my work on this wiki is being published under CC BY-SA 4.0 and the GFDL (It says so near the "Reply" button I'm seeing right now, and also the "Publish" buttons). It was just a little upsetting to see other users using my userboxes that I've used from my userpage (impersonation was what I was looking for).
Ok, I'll leave things as is, since the user is blocked for a while and can't do much. A break for them is really necessary . Myrealnamm (💬talk · ✏️contribs) at 00:43, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

No problem. :) Thanks! ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:44, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I am going to step away

No further positive purpose will be achieved from my interacting with this editor. Thank you for your guidance. 🇺🇦 Fiddle^Timtrent Faddle^Talk to me 🇺🇦 21:49, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Timtrent, sorry. I didn't mean to send you away. I found it via AIV and was distracted by the disclosure discussion; I hope someone else will evaluate the report based on whether their editing is promotional and time-consuming enough to prevent it from continuing. Because that may well be the case and I didn't mean to deny that. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:57, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

I think my interpretation was probably in order, but thank you for ameliorating it. There are times when we become ineffective with editors. I am obviously past that time with this one. I got bogged down in their arguments about life, the universe and everything and failed to let go of the stick! 🇺🇦 Fiddle^Timtrent Faddle^Talk to me 🇺🇦 22:01, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

The stepping away is only from this editor, you understand, lest you interpreted that as a broader intention. 🇺🇦 Fiddle^Timtrent Faddle^Talk to me 🇺🇦 22:02, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

It's all good. I have blocked now; they created a draft through the rejection twice and that was too much. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:03, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

I think your response was well measured. A partial block from the area will show whether they will be a generalist editor or not 🇺🇦 Fiddle^Timtrent Faddle^Talk to me 🇺🇦 22:04, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Oh, don't say that too early. The probability of the next edit being an article creation is high enough to make me reconsider the block settings. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:05, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Sometimes tempting providence has value 😈😇 🇺🇦 Fiddle^Timtrent Faddle^Talk to me 🇺🇦 22:06, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Yurii Melnyk, we shouldn't be talking behind your back. This is about you. Please find something different to contribute about than the International Journal of Science Annals. The block doesn't have to be a permanent stigma; it can be removed as soon as it has become clear that it's no longer needed to prevent you from promoting the journal. The Task Center and the community portal contain many ideas for a new start away from the conflict of interest. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 22:08, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

It's unfair and cynical. Yurii Melnyk (talk) 22:21, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Open heaven reflection

To my knowledge, Open heaven reflection's now-deleted userpage promotes a religious organization, which by search engine can be verified as real and active. I assumed that the account was promoting the organization with that webpage. I have not been informed by anything related to this user prior to encountering them on Wikipedia or outside Wikipedia besides my websearch. Air on White (talk) 22:52, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Hi Air on White, the full source code of the deleted page is "Experience the depth of God love in coming of Christ! Read these daily reflections to gain insight into the power of God's living word and reclaim spiritual renewal". It's pure plain text without links and without referring to an organization. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:56, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

It was promotional regardless as confirmed by the username. "These reflections" would be understood to be the "Open heaven reflection." Air on White (talk) 00:15, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

Tech News: 2024-22

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• Several bugs related to the latest updates to the UploadWizard on Wikimedia Commons have been fixed. For more information, see T365107 and T365119.
• In March 2024 a new addPortlet API was added to allow gadgets to create new portlets (menus) in the skin. In certain skins this can be used to create dropdowns. Gadget developers are invited to try it and give feedback.
• Some CSS in the Minerva skin has been removed to enable easier community configuration. Interface editors should check the rendering on mobile devices for aspects related to the classes: .collapsible, .multicol, .reflist, .coordinates, .topicon. Further details are available on replacement CSS if it is needed.

Changes later this week

• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 28 May. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 29 May. It will be on all wikis from 30 May (calendar). [7][8]
• When you visit a wiki where you don't yet have a local account, local rules such as edit filters can sometimes prevent your account from being created. Starting this week, MediaWiki takes your global rights into account when evaluating whether you can override such local rules. [9]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

MediaWiki message delivery 00:13, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

RUSUKR

Hi there. I have alerted User:Dmytrootamanenko two times on their talk page about the editing restriction due to WP:RUSUKR. One of the edits they made was particularly disruptive. When they continued to make edits in the topic area, I raised this on WP:ANI but no one was interested in taking action and this was left to be archived. They also never responded. Following this, they have continued to make edits explicitly about the war such as this. What is the best way to approach this and other similar situations in the future? Thanks. Mellk (talk) 18:07, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

Hi Mellk, thank you very much for the notification, and for informing and warning the user about the restriction. For contentious topics designated by the Arbitration Committee, I'd say WP:AE is the best place to go. This is sadly not an option for community-authorized general sanctions such as those described at WP:GS/RUSUKR, but ANI is normally fine for this. I hope the lack of action taken there is just an unusual case.

There is no template requirement for informing users about the RUSUKR restriction; I often used User:ToBeFree/RUSUKR introduction because none existed.

 Done ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:58, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

I see, thank you for explaining. I noticed that WP:RUSUKR was updated to include links to potentially useful templates; would there be any use case for Template:Gs/alert? It does not mention what the restrictions are, though, so I do not think it would be particularly useful in this case. Thanks again. Mellk (talk) 20:19, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

No problem. I've checked in the sandbox and {{subst:Gs/alert|rusukr}} ~~~~ does indeed not even inform the user about the restriction, so I think it's currently not useful. In case of general disruption, {{subst:alert/first|e-e}} is important: As soon as the user is formally aware, you can use WP:AE for reports about disruptive editing in the "Eastern Europe or the Balkans" area. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:59, 28 May 2024 (UTC)