This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
I support this, which should be fairly uncontroversial. The only real way to tell at the moment whether someone used the listing editor is the formatting of the edit summary, but changetags are far better in my opinion for this. //shb (t|c|m)21:10, 16 January 2026 (UTC)reply
I support it. We had it in it:voy (now disabled) and it was useful especially during the initial phase to find & correct erroneous behavior caused by temporary bugs. Andyrom75 (talk) 14:50, 21 January 2026 (UTC)reply
One curiosity: in it:voy we have the tag "Listing Editor" "Defined by the software", while here in en:voy there is "wikivoyage-listingeditor" "Applied manually by users and bots". @Jdlrobson, I suppose the second one has been created using the Create button.
Yes, if you have the ability to uniform them that would be great @Andyrom75. I don't seem to have that permission! I don't mind what the tag is - as long as one exists!:-) Jdlrobson (talk) 00:52, 26 January 2026 (UTC)reply
@Jdlrobson, since I wasn't able to modify the one in it:voy (because it's "Defined by the software"), I've substitute the one in en:voy. Now both tags are "Listing Editor". Andyrom75 (talk) 08:26, 26 January 2026 (UTC)reply
Maybe some of you will want to read the project page and the discussion I'm having with Lucy Iwuala. I don't mean for anyone to gang up on her, so don't do that, but I shouldn't be speaking into a void with none of you knowing what we're discussing. Ikan Kekek (talk) 15:24, 30 December 2025 (UTC)reply
We had this conversation before in April 2024. As I pointed out in that conversation back then, someone who's unfamiliar with our project didn't do consultation with the community before running an event. This time it looks like a "good intention, bad execution" event. OhanaUnitedTalk page04:43, 31 December 2025 (UTC)reply
I’d argue that there is a limit for how much we should tolerate events that are in good intentions. These events only waste time from project regulars trying to clean up all their mess for limited new travel content. If these bad executions are repeated (as has been the case with various Nigeria expeditions from this same group of editors), I sadly think we shouldn’t hesitate to potentially explore implementing community bans. //shb (t|c|m)05:37, 31 December 2025 (UTC)reply
What is a community ban and how could it be done? I'm not seeing it. Besides, the whole problem is that we didn't know about this project in advance, so it took us a while to deduce what was happening and figure out how much of it was plagiarism and/or violated WV:What is an article. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:47, 31 December 2025 (UTC)reply
Community ban is basically synonymous with a user ban. There’s a few other things Lucy has done that I do not feel the slightest comfortable with her organizing an event on this project that I will nominate her for a user ban when I come home. //shb (t|c|m)13:40, 31 December 2025 (UTC)reply
I disagree with bannng Lucy. In the discussion, she's been cooperative and is doing what we are asking. The issues the Nigeria team have made are genuine mistakes, not bad faith vandalism, and can be corrected in the future if the event is repeated.
Lucy sits on the Regional Grants Committee. Members on the committee make funding decisions for grant applications in the regions, providing knowledge and expertise to applicants to support successful movement activities (emphasis are mine). I think we all agree that this event is harmful to Wikivoyage and unsuccessful due to most articles created being out-of-scope or copyright violations. Although the role is likely voluntary (i.e. not compensated), the event was covered by prizes that is likely paid through a grant by WMF. Given that she edited this project, she really should have known what is acceptable and what isn't, and should have proactively identified these issues with the event organizer. Is there a way to communicate to grants team that inexperienced editors with minimal Wikivoyage editing should consult with the community first and seek approval prior to approving the grant? In my real life work, I evaluate grants on Northern Canada research projects that includes Indigenous population. If the proposal doesn't consult with the stakeholders and local community members, the grant proposal gets a really low score or downright rejected. User:Piotrus/User:Hanyangprofessor2 does his classes the proper way: giving us a heads-up in advance, helps communicate rules to students and resolve issues soon after it emerges. This is the proper way to run engagement events. The WikiForHumanRights 2025 in Nigeria is a bad example of how an event was run (no notice, organizer abandons their duty to monitor, community has to spend time and effort to cleanup). How can a member of the regional grants committee not spot this issue? OhanaUnitedTalk page15:53, 1 January 2026 (UTC)reply
Why is no Wikivoyager on the Regional Grants Committee? Is there a way to appeal above their heads? Who is just above them on the Wikimedia hierarchy? Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:48, 1 January 2026 (UTC)reply
How would we ban any of these projects effectively if a huge part of the problem is that we usually don't know about them in advance and just figure out they're going on because of the nature of a group of recent edits? Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:52, 2 January 2026 (UTC)reply
Grants are usually not given if the lead organisers are blocked on at least one project with good reason, which is why I've brought it up in this thread before (though I now realise that wasn't super obvious). Or we could potentially explore making Wikivoyage:Organising events a full policy (a step up from a guideline) and mandate the notification (or the organisers risk facing a block, hindering their ability for future grants). Saves us a lot of time cleaning up their mess. //shb (t|c|m)02:21, 4 January 2026 (UTC)reply
Absolutely. Let's make that a policy going forward and make it absolutely clear that they need to get and take into account our input while the project is proposed and not later. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:06, 4 January 2026 (UTC)reply
Could this be framed such that it's a requirement for grants involving Wikivoyage from the grant side without needing to change guideline on our side? We're already a small project and I don't want to impose more roadblocks to innocent event organizers who will further bring more editors to our project just because WMF grant recipients didn't follow the rules. OhanaUnitedTalk page05:32, 4 January 2026 (UTC)reply
It would be good if it could, but as User:AlasdairW pointed out, this project was not funded, yet it still caused havoc on this site. So requiring due consultations for funding is not sufficient. Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:13, 4 January 2026 (UTC)reply
It seems obvious that any project that wants to make substantial edits to a WMF project like Wikivoyage should consult with the community. WMF has a long history of accepting poor grants, some of then little better than scams, as long as they come from Global South or some broadly understood unpriviliged group:( This is just one of many, many examples (and that coincides with their reduction of funding to important stuff like WikiJournals). Now, everything can be done better, and nothing is perfect; so it would be nice to figure we can improve this. Side note: I do not get any funds for my class project, in case anyone is wondering, it's all done by me in my capacity as the volunteer (the university doesn't care either). One would hope that folks who actually get $$$ for this could try to at least match volunteers... Piotrus (talk) 06:06, 2 January 2026 (UTC)reply
@OhanaUnited: I agree that what's happened is wrong — I'm only advocating against banning the organizer, not for supporting the event in its current state. I agree that we need to see changes from participating events. --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 17:31, 2 January 2026 (UTC)reply
@SHB2000 and also for the record, I feel like you have other personal grudges or whatever that hinders you from approaching this issue from a a neutral point of view even when it is clearly stated that this project was not organised by me neither was the page in question created by me. I find this offensive and would appreciate you approach this discussion neutrally without getting me mix-up in issues and if perhaps you have a personal problem with me, I suggest you reach out to me via my email, let's discuss rather than tarnishing my image and my name.
And for the record, based on this long thread, it is obvious that the people engaging in this thread has limited knowledge of the roles of Regional Funding Committee member with regards to Rapid Fund. Lucy Iwuala (talk) 13:06, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
You are the only name on that page that we recognized, you have a fair amount of experience on this site, yet you don't seem to understand basic things about it and instructed participants in a way that clearly did not produce good results. No-one has a "grudge" against you, and if you're mad at us for having this discussion that you didn't know about, you now understand how we feel about your being involved in the planning of an event that caused havoc here without ever informing us about its existence! There is no userban thread for you and if you notice, most of the discussion was against the idea and in my opinion it was dropped, but you are not helping yourself by how you reacted here, but more importantly by not even promising to give us advance notice of any future Wikivoyage-editing event you are involved with or know about! Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:35, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
You [Lucy] also couldn't even have the basic courtesy to even admit your projects were problematic. I did indeed drop the idea, but now your behaviour in this thread by failure to take responsibility makes me reconsider, certainly not helped by your past track record either. //shb (t|c|m)21:35, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
@SHB2000 now you keep on getting me mixed-up once more. Now, I see no reason to claim ownership of project I am a trainer to and not even the creator of the page in question. I didn't see you dropping the idea in any of your comments so far and you have proven me right again that you might have a personal disposition in this context, hence your insistence on dragging me in to take responsibility for an action that has been specifically stated that I was not the originator of.
And I still say it again, if you have personal issue with me, do well to use my email and get me in the know rather than making allegation of past track record I am yet to figure out. It will be better you present your case in a clear statement so that I will admit my error than dragging my name to the mud. I expect that is what assuming good faith interprets to. Lucy Iwuala (talk) 22:15, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
Instead of being defensive, you should confront the fact that there have been 3 major editing events involving but organized from outside this site having to do with Africa, and instead of helping us have a larger amount of reliable coverage of that vast continent, all 3 events have been disasters. You have given us no reason to hope that you will inform us at any point about another such event, if you are part of it or know about it. So what are we supposed to think about you? And now you're picking fights here, which -is- a basis for a userban nomination if someone wants to start one. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:37, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
Hi @Ikan Kekek I responded to your suggestion of reaching out to the community and informing them about an upcoming WV event here. And from all my interaction with the community right from the onset of my contributing to the WV, I don't think there has been any point at which corrections are suggested and I declined.
What @SHB2000 translated as my fight is my requesting for what crime I committed that was not part of the current discussion he brought up. Which would have saved us all the stress if he had stated it earlier. Lucy Iwuala (talk) 23:50, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
@Ikan Kekek in this instance, I can only interpret is as a grudge as what I also expected from whoever that tagged me to first check who created the page in question and not just the name which was stated as TRAINER. If you can also go back to that discussion thread I responded of taking your advice into consideration and the next thing I saw is a question of what do I mean. Now tell me where I am getting it wrong in my response. Corrections were dished out which I also adhered to and even going to the said page to delete what was added by the user and now you are telling me that I am not compliant.
Your bringing this up here and saying that you're not bringing it up for me to be ganged up is quite understood, but I also believe that I should have been tagged so that I will be able to follow the conversation and clarify whatever accusation that will likely come out from this discussion. Lucy Iwuala (talk) 22:24, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
@SHB2000 before you go ahead and make this kind of accusation (which I will interpret it as), I would also appreciate you go ahead and list out other ATROCITIES I have committed that would warrant me a ban so that I and others will know about it. I will also, expect you to adhere to the friendly space policy when you start listing out all my sins. Lucy Iwuala (talk) 12:53, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
I'm sorry, but I don't believe you're in any position to talk about "adhering to the friendly space" when in that same breath you try to hunt for a possible conflict with another Wikivoyager. Not to mention that it's all about a message that they, just a few hours later, admitted being wrong about. Others have already suggested you familiarise yourself more with our project. I would like to suggest for you to add WV:FUN to your essential reading. Cherry-picking remarks just to get angry at someone is unbcoming of anyone with any kind of authority. ― Wauteurz (talk)22:18, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
@Wauteurz I didn't see any form of resolution on the part of @SHB2000 based on his response as when he was being informed that I was not actually the one that created this page. Now, for any none Wikivoyager stumbling on this thread, it is quite obvious that his response in this discussion is not one borne out of correction, as his first statement capture... as if I am on their radar and now is a perfect time to go at it, hence my citing the friendly space policy which I believe in this scenario I did not see being adhered to. Lucy Iwuala (talk) 22:31, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
SHB can defend himself if he so desires. I'm not here to do that for him. I like to think I know him pretty well though, and I belive he will not throw baseless accusations out into the open like that. I invite him to back them up if he wishes to.
It's your behaviour that I commented about though. I'd suggest you reflect on that instead of others' behaviour. This started as a simple discussion which you've now made all about yourself. We're all here to make a travel guide. How about you? ― Wauteurz (talk)22:56, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
Lucy, I'm sorry, but did you somehow completely glaze over this? And I concur that if you're going to cite the Friendly space policy, you should at least apply the same courtesy to others yourself (which also, by the way, is a guideline for in-person events, not on-wiki, where our own policy takes precedent). //shb (t|c|m)23:20, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
@SHB2000 I read this. I also expect fairness to be allowed to clear myself from whatever that you already allotted me. And if seeking for clarity on what you have mixed me up with is now tagged as fighting, then I wonder how one can clarify herself from issues like this. Lucy Iwuala (talk) 23:32, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
Sure: serious copyright violations on enwiki, suspected paid editing (and your behaviour in that thread is the exact same you're exhibiting here...some things don't change I guess?) and writing an AI-generated U4C nomination (these are all things I found within 2 minutes). All of these things only waste the community's time, and while these are cross-wiki, what it demonstrates to us is that your behaviour fundamentally has not changed. We're a much smaller community and have fewer resources to be dealing with disruptive behaviour – disruptive behaviour you seem to be overtly defensive of, as indicated by your replies to Ikan. //shb (t|c|m)23:30, 15 January 2026 (UTC)reply
@SHB2000 I'm glad you're bringing all these up here. Which I believe would have been very fair of you to have pointed it out all these while so that I can know where I err. I also believe that each of the pages tagged has my responses for everyone to read.
Even when events are badly organized, they have the potential to bring us new long-term contributors. There is value to us being hospitable even when we have to enforce important rules. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:11, 31 December 2025 (UTC)reply
In theory, but can you think of any truly helpful users who have become regulars as a result of bad projects organized outside of Wikivoyage without consultation with us? Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:06, 31 December 2025 (UTC)reply
Agreed, the number of new productive long-term editors we’ve gained from these poorly
To be fair, though, that's true of any expedition with a specified time duration, including the previous one in South Korea. However, that expedition still had a great impact on our coverage in several Asian countries.
And to be fair, I don't think any of my students became contributors (I don't keep tabs, but at least here, we would notice them). 99.99% of such projects pretty much are about one off effor; a few folks can make an occasional edit here and there, but to get a proper highly active volunteer, that's... one in a million? Don't expect it to happen. Piotrus (talk) 06:08, 2 January 2026 (UTC)reply
It's probably less than that, since Wiki Edu classes have had fewer than a million students and more than one reasonably active long-term editor (maybe not consistently 100 edits/month, but more than 100 edits/year). WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:48, 3 January 2026 (UTC)reply
I had forgotten the specifics of that thread - thanks for linking it! But this has been a repeated problem with campaigns to add content on places in Africa without discussion on Wikivoyage beforehand. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:37, 31 December 2025 (UTC)reply
I have been looking at some of the grant applications on meta:Grants:Regions/Sub-Saharan Africa. One of the questions being answered in applications is "11. How did you discuss the idea of your project with your community members and/or any relevant groups? Please describe steps taken and provide links to any on-wiki community discussion(s) about the proposal. (required) You need to inform the community and/or group, discuss the project with them, and involve them in planning this proposal. You also need to align the activities with other projects happening in the planned area of implementation to ensure collaboration within the community." Some application have said that they announced their plans on meta:Talk:Wikimedia User Group Nigeria, which does appear to get any actual feedback.
I think we need to have a clear policy on how we expect to be consulted before grant applications are submitted. This could be an addition to Wikivoyage:Organising events or a separate similar page. It would be better to have a dedicated page for the consultation rather than doing this in the pub. Then anybody can readily note an objection if a grant application is made for something involving WV without consultation - members of a grant committee should be able to quickly see whether or not our policy has been followed.
Thanks very much for looking into this and for your thoughts! I think it's fine for there to be a dedicated page to discuss possible editing events that would take place on or include Wikivoyage, but the thread on that page should also be linked here or possibly on Requests for comment for greater visibility. Ikan Kekek (talk) 16:25, 2 January 2026 (UTC)reply
Level of participation, borrowed from w:Public participation (decision making) I think I found the grant page for the current funded project, which is meta:Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/WikiForHumanRights 2025 in Nigeria (ID: 23478676). It lists semmy1960 as the applicant and Lucy being the trainer and reviewer for Wikivoyage. semmy1960 only has 191 edits in our project and has not edited here since January 2022. @AlasdairW Sorry for being blunt here. Posting a notice on the meta:Talk:Wikimedia User Group Nigeria doesn't really count as consultation or engagement with the community. That page appears to be lightly visited and monitored, as shown by lack of replies in overwhelming majority of the 580+ conversations in the past 4 years on that page. This type of informing or consultation ranks low in the public participation, and sometimes characterized as "tokenism" or "checkbox exercise". In my view, the "Wikivoyage Nigeria Awareness:Promoting Open Travel Knowledge" (POTK) would have scored higher than the "WikiForHumanRights 2025 in Nigeria" (WfHR 2025) that we're discussing because POTK organizer, Favourdare123 has more Wikivoyage experience than semmy1960 or Lucy. Favourdare123 has over 1000 edits here and last edited in November 2025. This highlights another uncomfortable question for the grant committee's evaluation process. Why is POTK, a project requiring fewer funding, well-planned and experienced contributor/organizer's rapid grant funding being denied while WMF funds projects with newbies training newbies? OhanaUnitedTalk page19:58, 2 January 2026 (UTC)reply
It sounds like some clarification might be in order to differentiate between "talk to your organization's members" and "talk to the project/website you plan to contribute to". Both of these could be "talk to your community".
I think what we're looking for is a step in the process that says something like "If you're planning to hold a training event or contest, please add a link showing that you announced this plan on the wikis where the editing will happen"?
How did you discuss the idea of your project with your community members and/or any relevant groups? Please describe steps taken and provide links to any on-wiki community discussion(s) about the proposal. (required) You need to inform the community and/or group, discuss the project with them, and involve them in planning this proposal. You also need to align the activities with other projects happening in the planned area of implementation to ensure collaboration within the community.
Often, this kind of notification includes relevant affiliate members and on-wiki communication notification spaces or listings of events, but the exact places varies depending on the project and Wikimedia community involved. What I am hearing here is a need for applicants to provide more direct notification on Wikivoyage, and potentially to revise the language of this question to make this requirement clearer. To support this, what page(s) are best to use for informing Wikivoyage community members about proposed events? One other related matter I wanted to note is that community notifications for Rapid Funds often result in no community feedback for the organizer. This is not necessarily a problem, but we still feel it is important to for organizers to extend an opportunity for community feedback and comments on funded projects where needed. I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 22:53, 8 January 2026 (UTC)reply
I JethroBT (WMF), that sounds correct. We think that there needs to be a small clarification in the general process.
This page (our "village pump") is the best, most visible place to post about editing events (or anything, really) for the English Wikivoyage. I believe this is true for all the languages of Wikivoyage, but of course each language requires a separate notification, because they don't read ours, and we don't read theirs. Notifications don't need to be elaborate ("Hey, we're planning an event. See m:Link if you're interested in the details" will do), though for this particular Wikivoyage, event planners should expect us to give them lots of friendly advice.
I don't think that Willy's account is active here, so the ping probably didn't go through. Please pass him a link in Slack or e-mail when you have a moment. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:30, 9 January 2026 (UTC)reply
@WhatamIdoing: Thanks for this response, and I've already contacted him separately about this matter. I also wanted to offer one other consideration for the future. While Wikivoyage is focused on less compared to other Wikimedia projects in funded work, we do see it sometimes come up in proposals. Depending on how many proposals we receive, it could mean that this board will end up receiving a lot of individual notices from organizers. This might be OK for now, but in the future, if it ends up creating a lot of clutter so that it's challenging to read other notices or discussions relevant to Wikivoyage, the community may want to consider designating a separate place in the future specific to proposed events. Just something to keep in mind for the future. I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 17:59, 9 January 2026 (UTC)reply
I think we could handle an average of one notice per week on this board, but if we need to split it off, we might point them at the talk page for Wikivoyage:Expeditions.
I thought we had agreed above that all proposed events involving edits to this Wikivoyage should be announced on the talk page of Wikivoyage:Organizing events, with a link to the thread here in the Travellers' pub, but let's make a clear decision. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:24, 9 January 2026 (UTC)reply
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Annual review of the Universal Code of Conduct and Enforcement Guidelines
I am writing to you to let you know the annual review period for the Universal Code of Conduct and Enforcement Guidelines is open now. You can make suggestions for changes through 9 February 2026. This is the first step of several to be taken for the annual review. Read more information and find a conversation to join on the UCoC page on Meta.
Looks like a few moments ago, an attack (I'd rather name it "shooting in your own feet":-) ) happened and wiki's are in degraded mode. No user javascript ATM. More info... -- andree18:33, 5 March 2026 (UTC)reply
Many wikis were in read-only mode (see phab:T419143). Glad at least the damage has been reverted. It was a genuine mistake, though; shit happens I guess. Must say though that trying to edit m:SRG without scripts feels...painful. //shb (t|c|m)21:05, 5 March 2026 (UTC)reply
And running random code with staff privilege on internet connected machines as part of a security review sounds odd in itself, to say the least. I assume they cannot tell too much detail, at that might reveal vulnerabilities, if not in the system itself, at least in how privileges are handled by WMF staff. I still hope that they disclose as much as possible when such vulnerabilities have been handled. The vulnerabilities should be examined as a matter of urgency and dealt with as soon as practicable, but if a culture change is needed, the changes may need time to settle. However, the incident should not be forgotten until such a report is published. This is not a private company where such incidents can be seen as business secrets. –LPfi (talk) 20:35, 6 March 2026 (UTC)reply
What I don't understand with all of this is why they needed to load a userscript onto the site js to test it for malicious code. //shb (t|c|m)22:38, 6 March 2026 (UTC)reply
My understanding is that the malicious code copied itself to the site js, as it was run with sufficient privileges. Otherwise it had just infected the user's (common.)js. –LPfi (talk) 07:50, 10 March 2026 (UTC)reply
There're test wikis for this reason. At the very least, even after loading this malicious userscript, the vulnerability would only be nuking pages on the test wiki and not on an actual wiki. OhanaUnitedTalk page06:44, 8 March 2026 (UTC)reply
I only found out about Special:EditChecks today, and I must say I'm pretty pleased with the PasteCheck.js script (which warns users for copypasted text). However, underneath it, I notice there's a ToneCheck.js script, which, based on the description, is based on a BERT model, linking to m:NPOV, which is not a policy on Wikivoyage. Is there a way to configure this such that it reflects Wikivoyage:Be fair instead of NPOV? (cc @Andyrom75, Jdlrobson:) //shb (t|c|m)11:52, 14 March 2026 (UTC)reply
That's the Editing team's work, so you want to ping @Quiddity (WMF) and @PPelberg (WMF). Because the writing style is intentionally different, we might not want it here.
Several of the usual EditChecks are irrelevant, including addReference (we want the opposite: warn people if they add any), convertReference (we have no citation templates), externalLink (these are wanted), and probably yearLink (as irrelevant, because there are no articles for any years, and therefore no possibility of linking to the wrong one). WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:32, 14 March 2026 (UTC)reply
Thanks, both. It looks like the ToneCheck issue is partially covered at phab:T419812 (ToneCheck is only active at 3 pilot-wikipedia projects currently, and only intended for Wikipedias for now), and I'll file some related bug-reports next week about improving the overall clarity/accuracy of that new Special page for non-Wikipedias. Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 19:31, 14 March 2026 (UTC)reply
+1, @Quiddity (WMF): thank you for making us aware of this issue, @SHB2000 + @WhatamIdoing. You should notice this fixed before this week is over.
Just to be clear, tomorrow's the date when the list will stop showing all the things that aren't being used here. Actually getting more of them to be useful here will take much longer. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:15, 18 March 2026 (UTC)reply
The SPTF is disbanded after running the public consultation for closing Wikinews. Well, I think Wikinews users still have to archive the content since the SPTF's decision doesn't get negated by being dissolved. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 02:28, 4 February 2026 (UTC)reply
Task forces are meant to be short-term groups. Of course it was disbanded when its work was done. And as Sbb says, that doesn't invalidate any of its findings or negate any of its recommendations.
BTW, it's always been the Board of Trustees for the Wikimedia Foundation, and not the SPTF, that will be deciding whether to archive Wikinews. There are about four board meetings a year, and they also pass resolutions outside of meetings. The most recent meeting was in December, so it's possible that the decision has already been taken, but from a general how-boards-work POV, I'd actually expect it to happen in the next meeting. They'll probably want to make that decision before they set the budget for the next year (which is traditionally their second meeting of the calendar year), because their decision might affect the budget (e.g., one-time expenses if they decided to support a fork to a new organization). WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:47, 4 February 2026 (UTC)reply
A bit of a late reply, but I do think it's safe to say Wikinews is dead. Despite issues with the consultation process, I don't think there's anything saving it now (and like you I also expect the decision to come anytime in the next upcoming month or two). But I do really hope that Board takes feedback from this, were a similar task force in the future to be appointed (and definitely not with 2 sanctioned/self-sanctioned members and 1 very inactive user out of 6). //shb (t|c|m)21:47, 6 February 2026 (UTC)reply
The task force only had five non-Board members on it. One is a former WMF board trustee, one is a former steward, one practically is the French Wiktionary, and the other two I don't know well. One of those got into some trouble last year, but if it were possible for the WMF to magically know, in 2023, that an editor would be desysopped in 2025, then I think those powers could probably be put to better use than merely not appointing him to a temporary committee. (Victoria, who posted the list of appointed volunteers, is a community-selected WMF board trustee, having been a top vote-getter in 2021 and 2024. If you think that's a problem [I don't], then remember that the next time you hear someone saying that all WMF trustees should be elected by editors.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:14, 7 February 2026 (UTC)reply
Late to the conversation. I wouldn't give much too much thought about the composition of the task force members. The task force selects members themselves without an open election so it's basically a cabal/echo chamber. New vacancies were not advertised and simply appointed via a secret process. I have given a bigger breakdown on why the task force failed (and not just from Wikinews's perspective) in this comment. OhanaUnitedTalk page14:04, 17 March 2026 (UTC)reply
I wonder what makes you think that task force "failed". I suspect that they achieved the only thing they were really meant to do.
For that matter, what makes you think there were any "new vacancies"? Unlike the US Supreme Court, task forces don't have a set, limited size. If the group is working closely with someone, then it makes sense to make them be part of the group. The second most senior person for the WMF's entire technical division could not be easily replaced by any volunteer contributor, so your realistic choices are "appoint him", "keep it a secret", or "have an election just for show, with all the other candidates disqualified because they can't do what he can (e.g., assign WMF staff to study technical migration plans)". Which would you choose under those circumstances? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:34, 17 March 2026 (UTC)reply
I'll keep my reply here short since I have written extensively in the linked comment on Meta. The objective of the sister project was immense. It was, for the first time, allowing non-trustees to determine whether to open new sister project(s). At the same time, it's going to determine, for the very first time*, whether a project be closed. You absolutely need to ensure that the task force selection process is representative of the community and not selected through backdoor channels or knowing the right people because the result and impact is immense. The failure of the task force in both objectives further fracture the Wikinews community and set the adoption of new sister project process back by at least 2-3 years while proposals have been waiting for 7 years (and we're complaining about drop in human traffic because of AI while ignoring new ideas and projects that could counter the drop). Not to mention that the conduct by some of the selected task force members were less then stellar to say the least.
I don't think the objective was immense. I suspect that the actual, if unwritten, objective was to figure out whether Wikinews should be closed. The founder of Wikinews thought it was a failed experiment some 15 years ago. People have been talking about closing it for approximately forever. If you'd said to me five years ago, and especially at any point after Pi zero died, "Huh, the Board is setting up a committee to look at opening and closing non-Wikipedias", my first thought would have been "I bet they'll be looking at finally getting rid of Wikinews". This shouldn't be a surprise to anyone who has been paying attention to Wikinews.
The SPTF made recommendations to a Board committee. They did not make decisions. There have always been non-trustees making recommendations. It's now up to the committee to vote on whether to take this recommendation, or a different one, to the Board for a vote. (There are also 131 other closed wikis.)
I don't agree that all stakeholders have to be at the table when the question is whether to fire one of the stakeholders for under-performance. I bet you wouldn't expect that for a real-world job, either.
I was an advisor in the SPTF, not a full member, only BoT members had voting rights in the SPTF. In the limited meetings I attended, decisions were already made, so my contributions were minimal, mainly promoting community consultations about their decisions, which proved ineffective since SPTF decisions were pre-determined.
Upon my sanction, I was immediately removed, missing subsequent meetings. While I agree that sanctioned individuals shouldn't be part of such bodies, at the time I still had community trust and always focused on small communities.
Btw, there was a proposal for a Sister Projects Committee (SPC); I suggest promoting initiatives like this, because WMF should not have task forces that override community wishes.
I think the WMF should override some community wishes, because some of them are bad. Five or ten years ago, the WMF had to override a community decision to block all "out" gay editors on sight. Before that, they had to explain to another community that it wasn't okay for them to punish women for editing articles about sex, even if their culture thought that was immodest behavior. Each community must meet the minimum standards, even if it "wishes" to do otherwise. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:50, 26 March 2026 (UTC)reply
@Asamboi: Also not sure if anyone has alerted you on FtT's latest misdeeds with off-wiki harassment, but some of it does involve you (happy to send evidence by email if you want) //shb (t|c|m)04:43, 22 March 2026 (UTC)reply
This Café meetup will be approximately two hours long. Attendees may choose to attend only for a part. Please see the Café page for more information, including how to register.
If you're thinking about attending: That's 10:00AM Saturday in New York, 7:00AM Saturday in California, 10:00PM Saturday in Perth, and 2:00AM Sunday in Auckland. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:17, 29 March 2026 (UTC)reply
Thanks. I've done the same where I can and made relevant phab: tasks. I still have the vain hope that we can come back some day: if Wikivoyage can be adopted, Wikinews could be re-adopted. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯06:22, 31 March 2026 (UTC)reply
There are several proposals to fork it to a new site; at least two groups appear to have plausible proposals, and everyone wants to get the rights to the trademarks (which the WMF has previously refused, but at some level, everything's negotiable). WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:47, 31 March 2026 (UTC)reply
I'm shocked to see this. Why can't we let enough users, to contribute to Wikinews, despite being in a normal state? In my own opinion, Wikinews should be kept active and editable. This project was launched in November 8, 2004, crazy that it lasted for about 22 years! Are there any WMF projects closed down also in the past, besides Wikinews anyway? Further beyond, I believe that a lot of users, are active on Wikipedia, Wiktionary, and here in Wikivoyage, rather than the Wikinews as of 2026. To have a feeling, I'm definitely going to miss this project, after it got set permanently to read-only mode. Unfortunately, there are not going to have as many articles or stories reviewed, since I heard from the WMF that this site only had about 2-3 reviewers a month. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 03:44, 2 April 2026 (UTC)reply
More than 100 wikis have been shut down/made read-only over the years. However, AFAIK this is the first time that an entire multilingual content project has been shut down. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:05, 2 April 2026 (UTC)reply
@WhatamIdoing Exactly, the first one for entire multilingual content project to shut down. But do you know another the reason on why did Wikinews shut down? We all read this announcement from the the Board of Trustees noticeboard, and I seen these responses that they consider migrating to Miraheze. Although there were some feedback, I believe that there should be more users contributing to Wikinews, since there are not much them active on this project. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 21:48, 3 April 2026 (UTC)reply
This is the reason that Wikinews shut down: The Wikinews project was a failure.
@Koavf @WhatamIdoing Thank you. Having few writers, news articles, and readers, is very shocking to me, since how much news stories and articles, can be accessible throughout the Internet under Google Search Engine, such as CNN, BBC, NBC News, The New York Times, Daily Mail, Voyage, Vox, Wired, NPR, SFGate, ESPN, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, New York Post, Huffpost, Daily News, and Forbes, which are read by millions of people. I don't understand the lower view count for Wikinews articles, despite being a free project since 2004. I guess that this project was a failure, and need to migrate to Miraheze. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 03:07, 5 April 2026 (UTC)reply
The sister project Wikinews was scheduled to close in May. For context, each new page on that wiki is a news report and a few days after the event, unlike Wikipedia, it gets read-only and no longer editable. There were user engagement issues because it was hard to get new pages approved when there are only 2 or 3 reviewers active and news is not approved if it is over a week old , and also users lack awareness who else is from their own continent, do not make meaningful connections.
Main complaint from WMF is "Wikipedia does such a great job at news writing anyway" though I personally do not agree with it, their page format is not a news report as it stays editable forever and one page actually is an encyclopedic history page and not about one event. plus Wikinews allows photo essays about super local events which Wikipedia does not. I think they are all valuable additions to meet the content freedom and knowledge freedom mission of the Wikimedia movement.
And I am wondering if it would be suitable to make a News: namespace here and, unlike what Wikinews did, try to aggressively make visual maps of where the events are, as well as where the users are from (they add a point on a map and there is a map of all events, and another map with all users). Now with the Kartographer feature this may be visually appealing and doable from programming point of view.
Maybe that helps users to connect better and also then Wikinews does not have to move to external site like miraheze. For wikivoyage this could mean a bit more traffic and maybe more users expanding the pages about travel destinations.
Main software difference is usage of FlaggedRevs in that namespace and the volunteer peer reviewers would need to apply for access to be allowed to approve or decline page revisions.
this was not yet discussed within Wikinews itself and I am just wondering what you think.
Hoping this is helpful and you can support or give some ideas.
I'm not sure WV is the best place for generic news. Sure, most of the time news is about some place on the Earth, but likely there aren't enough people here (interested) to do any significant reviews? Thus probably quite a bit of politics stuff (which we seem to actively avoid around here) would flow in...
Maybe if we agreed that it's only news about local events (festivals, happenings, temporary exhibitions) and not "random events" (protests, wars, natural disasters...)? -- andree09:46, 31 March 2026 (UTC)reply
That might makes sense if local events like festivals, happenings and temporary exhibitions are covered here, and we already cover international ones like Olympic Games, FIFA World Cup, World's Fair, etc. Protests, wars and disasters may be covered, but they should be restricted to official advisories, which directly affect travel. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 09:55, 31 March 2026 (UTC)reply
I agree that posting news here is a big stretch, but for what it's worth, about a half-dozen Wikipedias host their own local version of Wikinews. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯11:13, 31 March 2026 (UTC)reply
We are excited to announce that Wiki Loves Bangla 2026 has started! This year’s theme focuses on Bengal festivals, inviting participants to capture and share images and videos of the diverse cultural celebrations across Bengal.
Wiki Loves Bangla is an international photography contest on Wikimedia Commons aimed at documenting Bengali culture and heritage worldwide. It is organised annually as part of the Bangla Culture and Heritage Collation Program, with a dedicated theme each year.
How You Can Participate, it's easy and simple, and every upload contributes to the world's largest free knowledge repository:
Seconded, would be even more amazing if some of those photos submitted can be used in some of our articles here. Either way, all the best, Moheen. //shb (t|c|m)04:52, 22 April 2026 (UTC)reply
I agree and stated as much in comments at the link. Why don't we adopt a local policy that _any_ use of AI, very much including for "basic copy editing" and machine translation, must be disclosed? I'd be willing to tolerate spellcheck and grammar check if those are considered AI, but nothing else should be accepted without disclosure (or at all, if I had my druthers). We don't want people's writing style to be chucked in favor of bots. Ikan Kekek (talk) 08:50, 26 April 2026 (UTC)reply
Hence why I supported the opt-out policy. It might not be bad on this wiki where there is an active community to clean up after AI use, but I'm in the midst of a weeks-long effort of cleaning up after someone who mass-spammed AI translations of Interlingua (see this), which I've been slacking on a bit, but the whole mass translations are absolutely disruptive and something I'd never want to see again. //shb (t|c|m)09:25, 26 April 2026 (UTC)reply
No, we don't. And even if they pass, we need to write our own. What bothers me about "disclosure" is that it adds deadweight to affected edits, especially when the edit itself is minor. Can a label be used for the purpose? –LPfi (talk) 11:51, 26 April 2026 (UTC)reply
Would you allow photos, where some obstruction has been removed by an AI tool? What about finding sources when researching some off destination? May I use AI to construct a table or diagram? May my dyslectic friend have an AI point out possible spelling errors? May one use a voice-to-text AI if typing is difficult because of that accident?
As AI is getting common, restrictions on its use will interfere with established workflows of some, soon many, contributors. Thus we need to identify the things we absolutely don't want done with AI or assisted by AI, and those where AI assistance isn't a problem.
I oppose all of AI's use as far as LLMs are concerned, but for researching off wiki you can't control that, and it is helpful. AI shouldn't be used to construct a table or diagram. A dyslexic person may use it to use this voice to text typing,
I think they should make the wording more specific and inclusive for this new regulation.
COORDINATE ME, a wikidata contest for adding geolocation data in 26 chosen countries. Since we use that data & may have data in listings that could be on WD, perhaps some people here could help. Pashley (talk) 04:12, 12 May 2026 (UTC)reply
This contest is wrought with problems, like tracking inaccuracies and errors, unresponsive organizer and delayed prize awards. Take a look at the contest's talk page in previous years to see all the issues it had. I have spoken against funding this year's contest due to fiscal and logistical mismanagement. OhanaUnitedTalk page14:52, 12 May 2026 (UTC)reply
Out of ~300000 listings we have around 4000 are like that - that we have WD for them, but the WD doesn't have coords... Now the question is, if we want to blindly export that, or what.....:) -- andree20:56, 12 May 2026 (UTC)reply
I looked over your list. I'm concerned about the candidate who has an active U4C case, of course, but also about the number of candidates who didn't answer the questions. That suggests that they would struggle to do the work.
It depends, I suppose. Meta doesn't prohibit canvassing, but the overwhelming opinion was that Uncle's canvassing in his NVM application was disruptive enough that it demonstrated a severe lack of understanding for what the role actually was (since NVMs are appointed, not voted in, so consensus isn't really something for the U4C to take into consideration). A massive shame, honestly, because he was one of the more qualified candidates that I had in m:User:SHB2000/U4C guide 2025, one that could've actually had a chance for the SSA seat this year if it weren't for that. //shb (t|c|m)00:03, 29 May 2026 (UTC)reply
A possible editorial action against WMF for laying off Union staff
You should be aware that there's currently a major upheaval over the alleged layoff of Community Tech staff by WMF. They're also discussing imitating a editorial strike in solidarity on Wikipedia because the staff that were laid off are members of the Wiki Workers United union, which was formed just last week and in the process of organization. You might want to get to know them. So far, both have over 50 and 160 signatures, and both will be growing over the coming days. It's getting very significant, and it could impact this wiki, too.
After that, if you agree to join in solidarity (and at the moment, pretty much a significant portion of Wikipedians are already in it), inform the WWU and the CWA. Tell them everything they need to know going back years - and include all known heavy-handed incidents involving the WMF and the Wikis. After that... beats me because of my lack of first-hand experience with labor unions and the like, but as a certain little shark might say: Murr. (Bite the hand that feeds. And I know where they hide the donuts.)2601AC47 (talk) 19:27, 21 May 2026 (UTC)reply
Thanks for posting here. But I think we should keep solidarity with a union separate from any grievances any of us might have about supposedly heavy-handed actions by the WMF involving the operation of wikis. My only grievance regarding the treatment of Wikivoyage that I can think of is that it can get lost in the shuffle. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:45, 21 May 2026 (UTC)reply
Thanks for posting here – for anyone reading, I'd absolutely urge you all to sign yourself in solidarity with WMF staff by adding your name at m:Wiki Workers United#Solidarity (I'd already done so before the ping). What happened yesterday absolutely reeked of corporatism and union-busting. //shb (t|c|m)22:37, 21 May 2026 (UTC)reply
I am not presently a member of the en.wp community and I would not seek to have anyone edit by proxy there for me or anything like that, but I want to register somewhere that I stand in solidarity with organized labor. There should probably be a phab: ticket to reform the entire Wikimedia Foundation into a worker-owned co-operative non-profit. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯02:46, 22 May 2026 (UTC)reply
I find this sort of discussion frustrating, because so few people seem to know what they're talking about. For example, Justin, forgive me for picking on you, but the WMF can't be reformed into "a worker-owned co-operative non-profit", because public charities in the US can't technically be "owned" by anyone. I suggest that anyone who wants to support labor rights would do well to learn more about the subject, and then talk to their own elected politicians about making it structurally feasible to have a labor union that crosses national borders – not merely a federation of locals that coordinate with each other (which is what "international" labor unions are), but an actual single organization, operating under the same rules, so you don't get the lone employee in this country having a "union" of me, myself, and I or the near-impossibility of writing a contract that is the same for everyone. It's bad enough that US states have different rules (e.g., layoffs above a certain size in California require 60 calendar days' [fully paid] advance notice); it's almost impossible to reconcile different national laws.
Then you have the problem of people having different cultural conceptions of what a union is supposed to do for you. Is the labor union supposed to get you higher pay, or fairer conditions [which can mean lower pay and worse working conditions for previously privileged staff], or prevent staff from being fired, or organize social events, or help you get your next job, or something else? I know one municipal labor union whose negotiations are done by senior employees that "accidentally" preferred themselves for vacation scheduling, higher pay, and never having to work holidays and weekends for years. I know a couple of people at another organization who are pushing for a union; they seem to mostly be afraid that they will get fired someday but not understand why they were fired (I'm objectively doing well at the parts of my job that I think are important; why should my manager's opinion, or that fact that all my teammates keep quitting to get away from me, be relevant?).
Apologies for the long post, but: please, don't assume that whatever your local laws or views of unions are would be relevant to any situation that extends outside of your home area. It's really enormously complicated. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:55, 22 May 2026 (UTC)reply
It's not picking on me, but you are wrong factually: you can have a worker self-directed non-profit 501(c)3 in the United States. I am generally opposed to any hierarchy that models the way that capitalist businesses can unilaterally hire and fire. Maybe these workers still needed to be fired for some reason, but that should be decided by a democratic process. What that looks like will be different from organization to organization (e.g. a grievances board, administrative leave while under review, managers who are elected on a periodic basis and given the power to hire and fire by the working class, etc.), but when it comes to someone's basic livelihood and the fact that most of us live under wage slavery, then I don't want anyone getting fired without a democratic process behind it or at the very least some kind of extraordinary emergency reason. Additionally, for what it's worth, California (where the WMF are based) has laws specifically designed to help incorporate for-profit businesses as a co-op, so I would imagine that if someone wanted to create a worker self-directed non-profit, that would probably be the easiest place in the United States to do it. Lastly, I don't know why you seem to assume that I don't live in California. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯21:39, 22 May 2026 (UTC)reply
"Self-directed" and "owned" are different things.
I make no assumptions about where you are; I give the California example because it's one that I know exists in my state and that I know does not exist everywhere. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:08, 23 May 2026 (UTC)reply
By "worker-owned co-op", I am distinguishing it from a member co-op like a grocery co-op or a credit union or a co-op apartment complex. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯23:04, 24 May 2026 (UTC)reply
On the question of what Wikivoyage needs:
The OP is already blocked on two wikis for trolling and disruptive editing. Their contributions here this year are to import drama that is not directly related to us. This has happened a few times before with other editors (e.g., complaints about software changes).
The Simple English Wikipedia has a rule called "1STRIKE" that applies to people who have already been blocked elsewhere (almost always the English Wikipedia), and then bring their bad behavior to Simple. Maybe we should consider adopting a similar rule. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:56, 22 May 2026 (UTC)reply
They haven't done anything blockable or even against any guidelines here, and to be clear, you're suggesting we should indefinitely block them for informing us about layoffs and anti-union actions? Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:03, 22 May 2026 (UTC)reply
I'm suggesting that when someone says "Tell [an external organization] everything they need to know going back years - and include all known heavy-handed incidents involving the WMF and the Wikis", that this is more like "drama-mongering" than "informing".
For example, the WMF deployed the current MediaWiki desktop skin several years ago, and some people are still mad about this "heavy-handed incidents involving the WMF and the Wikis". The Russian Wikipedia is still running a pop-up message saying that this was deployed without their consent. Do you think that's relevant to either layoffs or unionizing? I don't. Some of the "heavy-handed incidents involving the WMF and the Wikis" even involved the team that's being dissolved. There are probably still people at the German-language Wikipedia who think that Comm Tech was wrong to decline their urgent wish for the wrong piece of software to be re-installed, when the actual problem was created by their own local interface admins. There are definitely some who are still mad that the WMF stopped two of their admins from wheel-warring over the site config years ago. But none of these "heavy-handed incidents involving the WMF and the Wikis" have anything to do with unionizing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:48, 24 May 2026 (UTC)reply
If you noticed, I addressed that above without saying they should be summarily blocked, and no-one has taken them up on that here, at any rate. Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:36, 24 May 2026 (UTC)reply
We already have WV:ONESTRIKE, by the way, but I really don't think bringing up the attention of the WMF's recent union busting actions is anywhere near disruptive to warrant an indefinitely. If it wasn't them, it almost certainly would've been brought up by someone else in the pub. //shb (t|c|m)21:09, 22 May 2026 (UTC)reply
While Simple English Wikivoyage sounds good on paper, the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) currently does not allow creation of Simple English projects other than Wikipedia and Wiktionary. Maybe we could host Simple English Wikivoyage under a separate namespace under English WV (similar to Wikijunior under Wikibooks), but the problem is that the English WV community is already small. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 06:26, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
I've always thought it's possible to potentially execute a multilingual Wikivoyage, but I suppose the need for that with modern translation software now present, is almost zero. //shb (t|c|m)07:18, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
The problem with translation software on Wikivoyage is that there's not always one-to-one translations of idiomatic expressions we tend to use in articles (as opposed to Wikipedia). For instance, there's no direct Bengali translation of "smorgasbord" used in India, leading me to reword its Bengali version for a similar expression (like a "forest of languages" instead of a "smorgasbord of languages"). Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 07:24, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
You should still be able to usually read between the lines, though. At least this is what I often end up doing when translating content from de or itwikivoyage. //shb (t|c|m)07:48, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
Simple English Wikibooks and Wikiquote were closed long time ago, and there has never been Simple English Wikiversity or Wikivoyage. However, you still have Wikijunior for child-oriented books, regular English Wikiquotes for simple English quotes (if there's any), and I guess there's a Wikijunior-like mechanism on regular English Wikiversity. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 08:11, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
Wikijunior is perhaps the only bit of Wikibooks (other than the Cookbook) that's functionally usable icl... //shb (t|c|m)08:54, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
In addition to the fact that the WMF would not allow projects like simple.wp today, the language in Wikivoyage should be very accessible and the concepts are generally pretty easy to understand, so I don't see the need for this as much as for an encyclopedia that covers literally every topic and could plausibly use simplified articles. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯07:34, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
Also, I no longer subscribe to the "Simple English" language ideology I once tried to. I rather focus on accessibility by making complex concepts easier. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 07:37, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
Yes, and that includes limiting your vocabulary to 1500-something words (BE 1500 or VOA Special English), or even less (BE 850). However, I sometimes find it limiting (maybe Orwellian), although I don't use any overly complicated expressions, and my focus is towards simplifying concepts rather than using simple words. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 08:16, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
This is part of why I think wikis like tokwiki (an experimental language crafted on the basis of minimising the amount of words used) are absolutely useless (see m:User:SHB2000/tokwiki if you want a full explanation) – you limit expression in a needless way when there's a clear alternative available that's more practical. //shb (t|c|m)08:57, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
The processes that created a city or landscape are often convoluted, but their description need not be. Difficult-to-read text on WV more often reflects muddle and "wikipeditis" than inherent complexity. The solution is to re-write in a way that's clear, engaging and relevant to the traveller, not to invent a whole separate site or pidgin language. Grahamsands (talk) 11:36, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
I'll give this idea a rather firm oppose. We do not have enough editors to readily support it. However, there is a valid concern about keeping the English here relatively simple.
Many of our readers will have English that is somewhat limited & quite a few editors are non-native speakers, though they all seem to have good to excellent English. Idioms are tricky in any language, so perhaps we should replace "take to his heels" with "run away" & so on. Cultural references are also tricky, whether Shakespeare or some blues tune; some of those need to be avoided or explained. Of course there is a trade-off here; we want a relaxed informal style & that implies idiomatic English with some cultural references. I'd say we are at least close to the correct balance already.
Expressions peculiar to one variety of English -- e.g. "lakh" in Subcontinent English -- should be explained if visitors are likely to encounter them, but generally avoided in our text. Expressions that vary across dialects -- does a car have a hood & trunk or bonnet & boot? -- involve judgement calls; in some contexts they are OK but in others they should be avoided or provided with a gloss. Pashley (talk) 14:45, 5 June 2026 (UTC)reply
Oppose - as per User:Pashley we do not have enough editors to support a "Simple" version. I checked a few statistics and found:
Product
Articles
Editors
English Wikipedia
7,191,087
278,463
Simple WIkipedia
281,811
3,759
Wikivoyage
180,828
985
Note - An "editor" is classed as somebody who has made at least one edit in the last 30 days.
This shows that in rough figures, for every Simple English editor, there are 80 English Wikipedia editors. If we were to translate this to Wikivoyage, we could expect between 10 and 15 editors on Simple English Wikivoyage which is not enough to sustain the project. Applying the same logic to number of articles, we might expect about 6000 articles - not enough to attract a reasonable readership.
The quality of articles in Simple English Wikipedia is poor - far too few meet the criteria of using "Simple English". Simple English is moreover bedevilled by there being no agreement as to whether the target audience are younger readers or readers for whom English is a second language. Translating this to the proposed Simple English Wikivoyage to whom should we target questions regarding drugs, trans people, red light districts etc - younger readers or adult readers for who Eglish is a second language?
Some of you may be interested in reading m:Writing clearly#Writing for translation. The idea is to make your writing straightforward enough that it would be easy to translate. Machine translation, in particular, does best with shorter, simpler sentences. This doesn't mean that every sentence must be short and simple, but it is helpful if the most important parts are short and simple. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:08, 6 June 2026 (UTC)reply
Another guide is w:The_Complete_Plain_Words, originally written for British civil servants but useful to anyone wanting to write more clearly. The original 1954 edition is out of copyright & available free online. There have been several revised editions; the latest (2014) is still in print & also available as an ebook. Pashley (talk) 19:47, 6 June 2026 (UTC)reply
I don't think there is a need for a Simple Wikivoyage. We should try to avoid complicated terms unless they are necessary and explained, or it should be clear that cultural or humorous sentences can be skipped over.
I have occasionally read Simple Wikipedia when looking for a short introduction to complex subject - for example w:Baseball is 173k, but w:simple:Baseball is 16k. There may be some huge cities where we could have a condensed guide giving the main attractions for a 1-2 day visit - we have 131 huge cities and I expect less than half need a simple version, so 50 simple articles could work. AlasdairW (talk) 20:50, 7 June 2026 (UTC)reply
The lede, or a sentence or two in Understand or See, should set out the chief attractions, as the likely reason you're there. Some guides go for "Blogstad in 48 hours, in 3 days" etc but I don't care for that style: if I know the chief attractions then I know how to organise my time. Grahamsands (talk) 10:56, 9 June 2026 (UTC)reply
Pub sweeper
For all of those here who have helped routinely clean up the pub (cc @Ground Zero, OhanaUnited:)...I've put together a script that helps speed up this process. The documentation is at User:SHB2000/pub sweeper, and the script can be installed by adding mw.loader.load('//en.wikivoyage.org/w/index.php?title=User:SHB2000/pub sweeper.js&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript') to Special:MyPage/common.js. The interface is also fairly user-friendly and doesn't require any technical skills at all.
Lovely. I will say that I just tried it and if you could make it detect namespaces or do something to make it automatically post to talk pages only, that would be good. (My stupid self just swept something to the main namespace, which is not ideal.) ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯13:59, 27 June 2026 (UTC)reply
Hey thanks for trying it out – as for the first one, I'm not sure actually (I somewhat just integrated the search bar onto the tool). I think that's also an issue with the second one, if it doesn't come up in the search bar, it won't come up here. I'll try and figure something out, though. //shb (t|c|m)00:17, 28 June 2026 (UTC)reply
