Ground Zero

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Community Wishlist Survey 2021: Invitation

The 2021 Community Wishlist Survey is now open! This survey is the process where communities decide what the Community Tech team should work on over the next year. We encourage everyone to submit proposals until the deadline on 30 November, or comment on other proposals to help make them better. The communities will vote on the proposals between 8 December and 21 December.

The Community Tech team is focused on tools for experienced Wikimedia editors. You can write proposals in any language, and we will translate them for you. Thank you, and we look forward to seeing your proposals!

SGrabarczuk (WMF)

18:26, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

Community Wishlist Survey 2021

We invite all registered users to vote on the 2021 Community Wishlist Survey. You can vote from now until 21 December for as many different wishes as you want.

In the Survey, wishes for new and improved tools for experienced editors are collected. After the voting, we will do our best to grant your wishes. We will start with the most popular ones.

We, the Community Tech, are one of the Wikimedia Foundation teams. We create and improve editing and wiki moderation tools. What we work on is decided based on results of the Community Wishlist Survey. Once a year, you can submit wishes. After two weeks, you can vote on the ones that you're most interested in. Next, we choose wishes from the survey to work on. Some of the wishes may be granted by volunteer developers or other teams.

We are waiting for your votes. Thank you!

SGrabarczuk (WMF)

16:08, 11 December 2020 (UTC)

Re:CW's disgraceful rant at the pub on en.voy

Hi there, I just wanted to just say that CW's comment was completely unacceptable, and I am so sorry for what the scrutiny you've been going through just for making Wikivoyage a better place for the traveller. In my opinion, I found it as a rant, and the second question was an honesty question that CW failed.

This message is just to say that you did nothing wrong, and I'm saying it here so CW doesn't realize this message. And thanks for making Wikivoyage for the benefit of the traveller, and I'm glad that you and tt! chose not to get involved in the fight.

Anyway, enjoy your break, and it's well deserved for the hard work you've done :)

Cheers, SHB2000 (talk | contibs | en.wikivoyage | en.wikipedia) 00:14, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

@SHB2000: thank you for this message. I always second-guess myself in situations like this. Am I over-reacting? Should I just let it slide, or should I call someone out? It is very helpful to hear from you and TT on this. I'll be back tomorrow. Ground Zero (talk) 16:23, 23 July 2021 (UTC)

No you're not overreacting, and there was a moment where I felt like stripping CW's autopatroller status for a personal attack. Anyway, I'll catch ya 'morrow. SHB2000 (talk | contibs | en.wikivoyage | en.wikipedia) 01:01, 24 July 2021 (UTC)

GZ, I've given CW a warning and asked them to reconsider their way of writing messages. Did I miss anything? Cheers, SHB2000 (talk | contibs | en.wikivoyage | en.wikipedia) 09:57, 27 July 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for your support and encouragement in this matter. I think it is better that each concerned editor address him in their own way, so I won't comment on what you write to him. I am fed up that so much time has been wasted on someone who contributes so little. I will be back with WiFi tomorrow, so I will return to regular contributing. I hope you are staying safe, and that things in Aus start improving. Ground Zero (talk) 22:14, 27 July 2021 (UTC)

Thanks, and hope you get your Wi-Fi soon. Yeah, things have been going alright with Covid here, with the lockdown being eased in 4 cities, with tightened restrictions in the fifth (and sadly that is where I live). Take care :) SHB2000 (talk | contibs | en.wikivoyage | en.wikipedia) 12:14, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

I can finally truly understand how harsh messages end up going for such small things after being scrutinised for just added subheadings to my very own messages. Sorry you had to go through all that last month. SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 08:23, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

@SHB2000: I hear you. I kind of see their point about the subheadings issue, but the way Nelson went about it was unnecessary and hostile, and other editors are focusing on the issue, rather than the approach, which I think is the bigger problem here.

I find that spending some time focusing on content over organisational and policy matters helps me get out of that negative space.

Nelson is, at least, a very constructive editor who adds a lot of content, but he was out of line. Keep your chin up. Ground Zero (talk) 13:16, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

yeah. thanks for the message. Now I've got to deal with AnotherEditor144 who claims that I'm not an active editor on nawiki and that it should be closed (in actual fact I've been the most active editor there so how ironic!) SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 13:19, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

Although thinking about it, it wasn't really Nelson who argued against this, but rather LPfi who started a huge fuss on this. Nelson just removed them, although he only went along when LPfi started. SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 00:27, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

Clarification

When you meant "We've decided to use UK English for European articles because the EU as an organisation uses UK English. We shouldn't spend time revisiting this just because one contributor has made an unsubstantiated claim to try to change this policy. I think that contributors who participate in policy discussions should accept the decisions the community has made, and not ignore them", is that one contributor HS? (who seems to never get along with policies). Just for clarification. SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 10:57, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

Yep. I see a thread discussing European spelling emerging just because HS made some claim. I think his "policies are for other people" attitude should be called out whenever he tries to tell other people what to do. In any event, it's his word against the EU's here. I know which view matters. Ground Zero (talk) 11:31, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

Given that the EU officially uses British spelling and he knows that himself (based on what he uses), it's either he can't read the heading and the proposal properly (I don't know how many times did I specify "spelling", but it was a fair lot) or as what you mentioned, chooses to dominate his own policies against everyone else. SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 11:46, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

@SHB2000: Ground Zero (talk) 11:41, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

@SHB2000: HS and I have a lot of history. He seems to want to edit on his own terms. I waver between trying stay away from him, and feeling I should call him out for his uncollaborative behaviour. I have given up hope that he will respect other contributors. I'm not concerned about his sniping. I stand behind what I wrote, and will ignore his comments. He has ignored me and others for a long time. Ground Zero (talk) 12:42, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

Looking at some old threads, I can only see his uncollaborative behaviour all the time, and often a third person having to inject (often LPfi saying "both of you, Stop it!"). I still think he hasn't learned all those years from... idk. (and I feel like HS is given more leeway than what other wikis would have done. I was taken to c:COM:ANU on Monday for moving a file name from harbor to harbour because Victoria Harbour (in BC, not SA) is spelled as Harbour not Harbor, with their reasoning cited as "unnecessary".) SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 12:49, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

had a look at voy:en:Frequent flyer program, seems like he's really against British spelling (to be frank, I prefer "Frequent flyer program", but it's the authors choice per "no preference".) Made a proposal to switch back.

but if I may ask, what started all this? Was it just something that you proposed and he didn't like or something, because he seems to be against other contributors as well. SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 02:34, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, he uses only US spelling without regard to policy. When I came to Wikivoyage, like many newbies my principal contributions were copyediting and formatting. He prefers to write in what I see as being an unnecessarily wordy and convoluted style -- long, complex sentences. I think that a travel guide should take a more concise and more direct approach to providing information. I was probably too aggressive in my editing, and pissed off a couple of contributors who don't like having their contributions edited. HS is one of them. He wasn't very interested in discussing changes, and began to use the revert button as a cudgel. This led to him losing the ability to revert edits, something he blames on me, although he was the one abusing the privilege. It's all very tedious. I'm travelling within Canada at the moment, so I'm not editing as much as I normally do, but I'm trying to keep up with a few things. Thanks for your work to keep Canada a thoroughly usable guide. Ground Zero (talk) 03:09, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

What's strange about him is that I've seen him use British spelling at times. And when you mean "this led to him losing the ability to revert edits", did he have his patroller right revoked?

But anyway, enjoy your travels :) I guess now domestic travelling is going to be the new norm for some time (there's people in Western Australia who don't even leave their state...) SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 03:47, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

Yes, I guess it was patrolled status. Maybe it's just European and American articles where he uses U.S. spelling. Provincial borders generally reopened a few months ago, but Northwest Territories is still closed. Unfortunately cases are surging again in Saskatchewan and Aleberta, which are the least-vaccinated but reopened things too early, so we're not driving further west anyway. We arrived in Manitoba yesterday, and will turn around here. Ground Zero (talk) 12:00, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

Does the hobbit even contribute to articles outside those ranges you mentioned? Anyway, enjoy your travelling. I probably will be stuck in lockdown for another three months... but at least vaccination rates are picking up in NSW, and I can see the Milky Way faintly from my frontyard these days. Oh and to be honest, I'm not surprised why the NWT is still closed (given the high indigenous population as opposed to the rest of the country) SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 12:10, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

He contributes to Central America articles, too, which would use US spelling. By the way, I checked out this issue. I see the point being made about not changing file names. Because readers don't see the file names, changing the spelling seems to be a low value-added activity, and if doing so breaks a link, I think it would be up to you to fix the links of you change a file name.

But taking you to Commons ANU to deal with this was really hostile. This is the problem I had with CW who never raised any concern with me about redirecting one Japanese article before attacking me in the pub. I did a zoom call with a few of the Nigeria project editors. One of the comments that came out of that was that "Wikivoyage is much friendlier than Wikipedia", which I think is a good strategy for retaining contributors. Ground Zero (talk) 12:41, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

True. Although incorrect spellings do also harm search engine optimization, although that issue was mostly sorted out after I decided I could not go arguing with Ymblanter anyway. (I'm still confused though, because the link to the old file name should just redirect to the new one.)

To the Nigeria Expedition, totally forgot about that ;). Miss those times. I guess that cafe will be sitting there for some time... SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 13:35, 13 September 2021 (UTC)

CW again on voy:Wikivoyage talk:Spelling

"It is the English Wiki not the French Wiki. Every English speaker knows the word "cafe". That doesn't change just because they travel to Europe. We don't really need to use accents on cafe in any articles."

Don't know what to say about that... Hope we don't have another HS again. Although is it just me, or is that like saying, forget British/Canadian/Australian or whatever spelling and universally use American. SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 00:56, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

Take a look at CW's contributions. They are mostly arguing about policy and administrative matters. On occasion, he contributes travel content to Japanese articles, which is useful. As we saw from the "Redirect cult" thing, he'd rather argue long and hard about something than implement a simple solution on an article. For this reason, I try to avoid him.

You don't have to win every point in an argument. A decision will be made by consensus, and if one person disagrees, they have to accept the consensus of others. I think he is an outlier on this issue. Ground Zero (talk) 01:04, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

I'd definitely agree and I'd think HS may also fit in that outlier thing, although HS at least, doesn't do long winded rants in the pub and does some content work rather than CW who does very little apart from arguing. Although earlier we didn't have much Japanese editors, although we've now got Tai123.123 who for the most part, can be arguably considered one of our most valuable Japanese contributors. SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 01:32, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

And I should say that I looked at CW's recent contributions, and it does look like he is contributing more travel content these days. Ground Zero (talk) 01:36, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

Seems like it, although, for the most part, their attitude hasn't changed SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 01:45, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

And sigh, their comment on

Do you really think that Miami, St Louis (Missouri), Cheyenne, Phoenix, Boston, Honolulu (and random eastern PA locations) are not diverse enough representatives? They are located in very different parts of the country. If you're suggesting that I left out majority-accent usage cities either by chance or on purpose, you are welcome to look up whatever "other" cities you are thinking of. I'll add Portland (18/22), San Francisco (23/24) and Baltimore (21/24), but I don't think it's fair to dismiss my evidence (which is already much better than just citing a dictionary) on the basis that I didn't cite every US city. There is no need to be cheeky. Just cite all of your counterexamples of cities where the accented word is preferred. Otherwise, it's fair to assume this is a consistent trend. The fact that I chose cities and they clearly favor the unaccented word though, should show that it's not likely to skew away from the unaccented "cafe" given that cities have more residents and visitors from around the world. I suspect if I chose smaller towns, it would push the results even further in favor of the unaccented.

Looks like they'd rather argue on anything to be honest. I'd rather questioned them because they never mentioned about cities where a lot of people speak French as a second language, but... it seems they can't assume good faith. SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 13:42, 26 September 2021 (UTC)

@SHB2000: I've encountered people in the wikisphere who place their "own experience" ahead of authoritative dictionaries. I have no idea what to do with them. If M-W isn't good enough for our American friends, nothing will be.

On another note, I am avoiding the Cycling in France VfD because I don't need another tiresome persecution complex tirade from HS, but thank you for bringing that forward. This is another classic case of "I'm just going to dump this garbage here and let someone else clean it up". Ground Zero (talk) 23:20, 26 September 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, very true. Now I've got to deal with WhatamIdoing trying to make a policy change solely based on what I'm doing. Thankfully, I've got more people with me, against her proposal. Re the cycling article, I actually didn't realise that it was started by HS. Just found it in voy:Special:ShortPages SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 23:49, 26 September 2021 (UTC)

But thanks for all your support on the templates thread :). It seems to them that redirects are the same thing as ordinary templates which are "too hard for newbies" while they have never even asked me to stop on my talk page (infact, no one has asked me to stop, only slow down which isn't quite the same thing). SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 00:34, 28 September 2021 (UTC)

More edit-a-thon's about Nigeria on Wikivoyage

Given that you were one of the most active editors in helping out for the Nigeria Expedition three months back, just an FYI but Edriiic has proposed a new proposal Grants:Project/Rapid/Nigeria Transportation and Recreation Expedition meaning another Nigeria edit-a-thon for Wikivoyage. (I miss those days, and I'd love to have some more expeditions like that, and here it is) SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 08:12, 4 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads-up. Ground Zero (talk) 12:33, 4 October 2021 (UTC)

I actually didn't notice this until I was doing some recent changes patrolling here. SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 00:31, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Hello

Hi, GZ, sorry for the excessive messaging, but I sent you an email. Do you mind if you could take a look at it and get back to me sometime (want to know how to prevent this in the future). Best, --SHB2000 (talk | contribs) 12:02, 14 March 2024 (UTC)