MediaWiki talk:Wikimedia-copyrightwarning/Archive 1

1

Suggestion to add to copyrightwarning:

You are also agreeing to abide by the (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Submission_Standards_(a)">Submission Standards</a>) and (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Terms_of_use_(a)">Terms of Use</a>).

— Alex756 [http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Alex756 talk] 00:29, 4 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I disagree with this. First, both of those texts are drafts. Second, we don't want to force more terms on first-time or anonymous contributors than are absolutely necessary (i.e. legal junk and important warnings). Third, the Copyrightwarning is long enough already, almost too long. silsor 01:15, Feb 4, 2004 (UTC)

This addition is only 63 characters of screen real estate, as well the copyrightwarning could be shortened, "Please note that all" and "considered to be" and ", then" can all be removed. Replace "You are also promising us that" with "You promise" and "from a resource that nobody" with" from resources nobody" and even with the new text the warning will be shorter than it is now. — Alex756 [http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Alex756 talk] 14:06, 6 Feb 2004 (UTC)

We need to still finalize the drafts and then have the board of trustees approve them. --mav

If we take out anything that is not clearly new material on these two pages and leave the terms and standards that already exist then those changes would not require the approval of the Board of Trustees. This would be useful as new users should be given the means to "easily" understand the rules around here, rather than having to search through many pages to learn these basics that most web sites post on their pages along with disclaimers. As the disclaimer change occurred without "Board" approval, other changes can also occur without board approval, no? — Alex756 [http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Alex756 talk] 14:06, 6 Feb 2004 (UTC)

In theory yes. But then we have to decide what is new and what is not. That will take time. --mav

Proposed shortened version

This is 394 characters long vs. 440 for the present version (a savings of 46 precious characters):

All contributions to Wikipedia are released under the GNU Free Documentation License (see $1 for details). If you don't want your writing to be edited mercilessly and redistributed at will, then do not submit it. By submitting your work you promise you wrote it yourself, or copied it from <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_domain">public domain</a> resources — this does not include most web pages. DO NOT SUBMIT COPYRIGHTED WORK WITHOUT PERMISSION!

— Alex756 [http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Alex756 talk] 03:57, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Looks good to me. --mav

Non-controversial versions

Here is my attempt at a non-controversial versions of these texts:

Wikipedia:Terms of use (a), and

Wikipedia:Submission Standards (a).

Comments? — Alex756 [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Alex756 talk] 07:38, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Look much better to me. Jamesday 02:32, 22 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Webby awards

=> Wikipedia talk:Webby Awards

At the bottom of the editing-an-article page, there's a link that says: "Vote for Wikipedia at the People's Choice Webby Awards". The Webby Awards actually call it the People's Voice (as can be verified by hitting the link, which points to [1]). Should be a fairly easy change for someone with the right powers. --Etaoin 01:12, 28 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Done. Thanks for pointing it out. :) Angela. 01:18, Apr 28, 2004 (UTC)

Phraseology

"By submitting your work you promise you wrote it yourself, or copied it from public domain resources ..."

"Promise?" Pinky promise, cross your heart, hope to die? At the very least, this sentence is missing a conjunction, but I think the wording ventures beyond "casual" into "poor." Verbs like "attest" or "affirm" preserve the informal character of this message without making us out to be a bunch of schoolyard pals.

Also, if one "copie[s] it from public domain resources," it's not exactly one's "work," is it? Thoughts?

Austin Hair 23:16, Aug 7, 2004 (UTC)

---

I suggest:

By making a submission to Wikipedia, you guarantee [affirm] that you wrote it yourself, or that you copied it from public domain resources—these do not include a majority of web pages.

In addition, I find the phrase "bad edits" childish. What is a "bad" edit? I suggest using the phrase "poor edit" (indicating something "bad" with the quality of writing) or "vandalism" or some other such thing, but not "bad." Furthermore, we need to get rid of the blot that is anti-Commonwealth English, i.e. the use of "practice" instead of "practise." -- Emsworth 22:34, 13 Aug 2004 (UTC)

---

Perhaps:

"By submitting content to Wikipedia, you affirm that your submission is your own work, or content copied from public domain resources. Be advised that the majority of Web pages do not qualify as public domain resources."

Short, concise, and I believe much clearer. The repetitive phrasing is intetional, and in my opinion appropriate to the emphasis we're trying to convey.

I'm open to replacements for the word "practice," but keep in mind that simply replacing it with "practise" is as anti-American as the alternative is anti-Commonwealth.

Austin Hair 23:32, Aug 14, 2004 (UTC)

Also, this doesn't cover the cases of using other GFDL or CC licensed work that is permitted to be freely distributed including distribution of modified versions. -- WhiteDragon 18:48, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Special characters

I am not sure we should have them in the English Wikipedia. Most articles are not going to be using them, and they clutter up the page. Dori | Talk 18:17, Nov 6, 2004 (UTC)

I agree, they use too much screen space, divert too much attention and are simply too annoying to make up for the tiny amount of use they would receive. Heck, they don't even do anything in my browser. silsor 18:48, Nov 6, 2004 (UTC)

It's true that most articles won't include characters with diacritics; however, a significant number will (any page including substantial French, German, Spanish, etc.), and their utility in those cases might balance the small amount of screen real estate that they occupy. The Æ ligature will certainly be useful, since proper English typography can and does use it. I'm not sure how the eth, the thorn, the curly quotes, and the dashes will interact with various browsers—I know some browsers change those to gibberish upon submission. —No-One Jones ^(m) 18:54, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

There is definitely a place for these characters in Wikipedia, I just don't feel that that place is on every edit page. silsor 19:10, Nov 6, 2004 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Special characters bar for people expressing support for the addition.

Personally I think there should be a way of customizing this for each individual user (perhaps under "Preferences"). Not everyone needs it, and people who do need to work with special characters are likely to have their own ideas on what characters they need. -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 22:41, Nov 6, 2004 (UTC)

Indeed, i for one would like alot of mathematical symbols but am not going to put it in the public bar because it would not be useful but to a small audiance, however having something might just get people used to and and push for an official sofware feature;) -- Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 14:38, 2004 Nov 9 (UTC)

Well, as I said on VP, I've added a few more that were requested (graves and circumflexes and so on). Some sort of "opt out" software thing would be an excellent idea, particularly if you could pick particular sub-sets of the characters. -- ALoan (Talk) 15:18, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

What about the superscript circle ° used in °C and °F? I think that one would be immensely helpful for a lot of writers. -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 21:21, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

And what about a set of fractions more than the bare-bones 1/4, 1/2 and 3/4? Apwoolrich 18:49, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

It seems that this page will simply bloat to infiniteness. :D Do you think we should allow this (you know, have a five-line-long box at the bottom of every page?) Personally I'm trying to imagine it and I don't think it's that bad of an idea — if you don't need it, then just ignore it; if you do need it then it's a lifesaver. -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 19:16, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

At the moment it is about one line, just under or just over depending on screen/window width. More than that would be a problem, I think, until you can switch it on or off, although having said that, the rest of the "Copyrightwarning" message is around 7 lines... Where will it stop? Cuneiform? Hieroglyphics? -- ALoan (Talk) 20:01, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The obvious problem with a very long special character bar is, it would obscure the more important part of this message: the copyright warning. We probably don't want that to happen. —No-One Jones ^(m) 20:21, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Then I guess we'll have to wait for the next software update... is there some way of bringing this up to the developers? -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 20:38, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

Yes, file it at mediazilla. -- Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 15:22, 2004 Nov 15 (UTC)

I think the characterline should go for reasons stated by User:Dori and User:Silsor and KISS, to make it a software preference would be even worse though.--Dittaeva 16:21, 22 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Don't! In its short existence it has already proven itself invaluably useful to me. -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 16:35, Nov 22, 2004 (UTC)

Hear, hear; I wholeheartedly agree with Ran! Like him, I have used the very practical char line feature for writing e.g. German names, whose special letters I don't have easy access to on my Norwegian keyboard. Along the same train of thought, I think other non-German-language-speakers and non-Scandinavians who writes on German or Nordic/Scand. people/places/history could profit from the feature, since I see far to much of names and places being misrepresented with 'ue's (for 'ü'), 'ae's (for 'æ') etc, etc.

Regarding the question of 'infinite' expansion of the line, with maths symbols, etc, I think the correct use of written human languages commands a special respect above academically developed symbol languages, so I feel that the restriction of the special char insertion feature to letters (of non-English languages) is a sound one. Thus, my conclusion is: keep! --Wernher 01:15, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

As this template is protected, can a sysop please fix Í so that it only inserts that character. --Zigger 15:40, 2004 Nov 23 (UTC)

Fixed, I think... ÍÍÍÍÍíí ... yep — Kate Turner | Talk 15:46, 2004 Nov 23 (UTC)

Argh. There's something strange going on with the char insertion feature right now. All the chars output 'Ã<some other special char, but not necessarily the intended one>'. Might it be my browser misbehaving? (however, it has worked nicely with this feature up to now). Anyone know anything about this? --Wernher 01:39, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I'm having the exact same problem. This is what I get when I click on the first twelve characters: Ã?áÃ&#137;éÃ?íÃ&#147;óÃ&#154;úÃ?ý

-- ran (talk) 04:12, Feb 4, 2005 (UTC)

I had this problem ( running IE6.0 ) with the Classic skin; it works when I switch to CologneBlue. Joestynes 04:57, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

---

I'd like to express my thanks to those who added the special characters bar. Editing was a chore before. To those who think it's useless: go and learn a language. Chamaeleon 03:41, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)

---

I propose adding <charinsert>“+”</charinsert>, and maybe the same with ‘+’. It’s quite useful on the wiki that I run. —Fleminra 03:59, July 20, 2005 (UTC)

Ask people to cite sources when they edit

On December 17, Dwheeler proposed adding this to the end:

Please cite your sources so others can check your work.

Dwheeler's rationale was that most other problems (not sufficiently NPOV, etc.) can be fixed by others, but it's often difficult for others to figure out where a contributor got their information. And as noted in how to edit a page: "Please cite your sources so others can check and extend your work. Most Wikipedia articles currently lack good references. This contributes to Wikipedia's single greatest criticism that it is not a reliable source. Please help by researching, preferably online and in print resources to find the best references available for the article you are working on. Then cite them in proper form, and consider inline citation for contentious facts. There is no consensus on the best way to do that, but anything is better than nothing. You can either use inline citation in academic form such as (Example, 2004, pp 22-23) or as a superscript to a footnote that you place at the end of an article." Dwheeler also noted that "Now that Wikipedia has grown into a remarkable encyclopedia, one of the major complaints by others is its lack of references. So, let's fix that; I think this minor template change could actually help."

After 4 days, absolutely nobody complained, so Dwheeler went ahead and made the change on 2004-12-21. He said, "after a little while, we should be able to see if its benefits outweigh the negatives of yet more text at the bottom."

After trying it out for a number of days, more people liked the citation reminder than didn't like it. As of 2004-12-30:

• For the citation reminder: Dwheeler, Soren9580, Whosyourjudas, Emerman
• Against the citation reminder: Chris 73.

This list of people for and against is listed here, not in Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals), because the Village Pump stuff eventually disappears. Besides, documenting this in the discussion page of the text being changed should make it easier to find later, if anyone needs to.

Whosyourjudas liked the idea, but wanted the format prettied up. Others have prettied up the format since Whosyourjudas made his comments, and Whosyourjudas is now satisfied with the format.

Expanded special characters list

This is what I have added:

Insert: Á á É é Í í Ó ó Ú ú   À à È è Ì ì Ò ò Ù ù    â Ê ê Î î Ô ô Û û   Ä ä Ë ë Ï ï Ö ö Ü ü   ß   à ã Ñ ñ Õ õ   Ç ç Ģ ģ Ķ ķ Ļ ļ Ņ ņ Ŗ ŗ Ş ş Ţ ţ   Ć ć Ĺ ĺ Ń ń Ŕ ŕ Ś ś Ý ý Ź ź   Đ đ   Ů ů   Č č Ď ď Ľ ľ Ň ň Ř ř Š š Ť ť Ž ž   Ǎ ǎ Ě ě Ǐ ǐ Ǒ ǒ Ǔ ǔ   Ā ā Ē ē Ī ī Ō ō Ū ū   ǖ ǘ ǚ ǜ   Ĉ ĉ Ĝ ĝ Ĥ ĥ Ĵ ĵ Ŝ ŝ Ŵ ŵ Ŷ ŷ   Ă ă Ğ ğ Ŭ ŭ   Ċ ċ Ė ė Ġ ġ İ ı Ż ż   Ą ą Ę ę Į į Ų ų   Ł ł   Ő ő Ű ű   Ŀ ŀ   Ħ ħ   Ð ð Þ þ   Œ œ   Æ æ Ø ø Å å   – — …   [] [[]] {{}}   ~ | °   ± − × ² ³   €  

It takes up 1 to 1 1/2 extra lines in most browsers. That's not nothing, but it's less space than the "Templates used on this page" feature uses if even one template is used on the page. Added: In any case, in most routine edits it is rarely necessary to scroll past the "Save page" button; the content below it does not change from one edit to the next.

This table supports all national languages of each country in Europe (including Turkey) that use the Latin alphabet, as well as Catalan, Esperanto and Welsh (which have significant Wikipedias) and pinyin, but not necessarily all minority languages in Europe or non-European languages or Greek or Cyrillic. The latter should go into a different table to avoid making this one take up too much screen space.

Note, most of these characters are in actual use in English Wikipedia, primarily to show the correct orthography of names in the original language: see for instance Lech Walesa.

Note, the ordering of the special characters is not random, but represents a compromise among the various languages that may use the same special characters.

First, we group by diacritics (acute, then grave, then circumflex, etc) rather than by letters (A, then E, then I, etc). This is because with small fonts, it can be quite hard to distinguish between, say, o-circumflex, o-tilde and o-double-acute if they are all next to each other, but much easier if all the circumflexes are in one group and all the tildes are in another. Second we try to cluster all the characters used by the same language as close together as possible: French, Spanish, Italian, German eszet next to umlauts, Portuguese tildes next to c-cedilla, Polish letters, Czech and Croatian and other Slavic-language letters close to each other. Where splitting is necessary, we try to split into only two separate clusters, as for pinyin, Turkish, Hungarian, Swedish. Finally we group vowel-diacritics and consonant-diacritics separately for the same diacritic, both for greater clarity and because the same languages often don't use both.

-- Curps 01:30, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I understand the theory, but I don't think it works well. It makes it very hard to find any one character because it means scanning through the entire list. I definitely vote for putting everything in pseudo-alphabetical order, A's first, then B's, etc. With punctuation at the end. I also think it should be not be in small tags. This will avoid the hard-to-see problem. Also, Maybe we should have more characters, particularly IPA characters for entering pronunciations. Of course, we can't fit the entire Unicode Plane 1 in a little box, but honestly there are probably just as many people entering IPA as are entering Turkish, or Esperanto, for that matter. Nohat 02:51, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Here's a quick mock-up in pseudo-alphabetical order including IPA symbols. Maybe we could make it hideable, like the TOC. Nohat 03:26, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Insert: Á À Â Ä Ã Ǎ Ā Ă Å Ą Æ ʙ β ɓ á à â ä ã ǎ ā ă å ą ɐ æ ɑ ɒ Ç Ć Č Ĉ Ċ ç ć č ĉ ċ ɕ ɔ Đ Ď Ð đ ď ð ɖ ɗ É È Ê Ë Ě Ē Ė Ę € é è ê ë ě ē ė ę ə ɚ ɘ ɛ ɜ ɞ Ģ Ĝ Ğ Ġ ɢ ʛ ģ ĝ ğ ġ ɠ Ĥ Ħ ʜ ĥ ħ ɦ ɧ ɥ Î Í Ì Ï ľ Ǐ Ī İ Į ɪ í ì î ï ı ǐ ī į ɨ Ĵ ĵ ɟ ʄ ʝ Ķ ķ Ļ Ĺ Ľ Ŀ Ł ʟ ļ ĺ ŀ ł ɬ ɭ ɮ ɱ Ñ Ņ Ń Ň ɴ ñ ņ ń ň ɳ ɲ ŋ Ó Ò Ô Ö Õ Ǒ Ō Ő Ø θ ʘ Œ ɶ ó ò ô ö õ ǒ ō ő ø ɵ ɸ œ Þ þ Ŗ Ŕ Ř ʀ ʁ ŗ ŕ ř ɾ ɽ ɹ ɻ ɺ Ş Ś Š Ŝ ʃ ş ś š ŝ ʂ ß Ţ Ť ţ ť ʈ Ú Ù Û Ü Ů Ų Ű Ǔ Ū Ŭ ú ù û ü ǖ ǘ ǚ ǜ ů ǔ ų ű ū ŭ ʉ ʊ ʋ ʌ Ŵ ŵ ʍ ɯ ɰ χ ɣ Ý Ŷ ʏ ý ŷ ʎ Ź Ž Ż ź ž ż ʐ ʑ ʒ – — … ʔ ʡ ʕ ʢ [] [[]] {{}} ~ | ǂ ǁ ˈ ˌ ː ° ± − × ² ³ ʰ ʷ ʲ

You have grouped some lowercase-L diacritics among the capital-I diacritics. -- Curps 09:38, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Letters used by various languages are:

es: Á á É é Í í Ó ó Ú ú   Ü ü   Ñ ñ  
pt: Á á É é Í í Ó ó Ú ú   Â â Ê ê Ô ô   Ü ü   Ç ç   Ã ã Õ õ
fr: É é   À à È è Ù ù    â Ê ê Î î Ô ô Û û   Ä ä Ë ë Ï ï Ö ö Ü ü   Ç ç   Œ œ  
de: Ä ä Ö ö Ü ü   ß
it: É é   À à È è Ò ò Ù ù
da: Æ æ Ø ø Å å
no: Æ æ Ø ø Å å
sv: Å å Ä ä Ö ö Ü ü
fi: Å å Ä ä Ö ö Ü ü Š š Ž ž
is: Ð ð Þ þ
pl: Ą ą Ć ć Ę ę Ł ł Ń ń Ó ó Ś ś Ź ź Ż ż
cs: Á á Č č Ď ď É é Ě ě Í í Ň ň Ó ó Ř ř Š š Ť ť Ú ú Ů ů Ý ý Ž ž
sk: Á á Ä ä Č č Ď ď É é Í í Ĺ ĺ Ľ ľ Ň ň Ó ó Ô ô Ŕ ŕ Š š Ť ť Ú ú Ý ý Ž ž
hu: Á á É é Í í Ó ó Ú ú   Ö ö Ü ü   Ő ő Ű ű
sl: Č č Š š Ž ž  
hr: Č č Ć ć Đ đ Š š Ž ž  
sq: Ç ç Ë ë  
tr: Ç ç Ğ ğ İ ı Ö ö Ş ş Ü ü  
ro: Ă ă Â â Î î Ş ş Ţ ţ  
lt: Ą ą Č č Ę ę Ė ė Į į Š š Ų ų Ū ū Ž ž  
lv: Ā ā Č č Ē ē Ģ ģ Ī ī Ķ ķ Ļ ļ Ņ ņ Ŗ ŗ Š š Ū ū Ž ž  
et: Š š Ž ž Õ õ Ä ä Ö ö Ü ü  
ml: Ċ ċ Ġ ġ Ħ ħ Ż ż  
zh: Ā ā Ē ē Ī ī Ō ō Ū ū   Á á É é Í í Ó ó Ú ú   Ǎ ǎ Ě ě Ǐ ǐ Ǒ ǒ Ǔ ǔ   À à È è Ì ì Ò ò Ù ù   ǖ ǘ ǚ ǜ
ca: À à Ç ç È è É é Í í Ï ï Ŀ ŀ Ò ò Ó ó Ú ú Ü ü  
eo: Ĉ ĉ Ĝ ĝ Ĥ ĥ Ĵ ĵ Ŝ ŝ Ŭ ŭ  
cy: Ŵ ŵ Ŷ ŷ  

-- Curps 02:03, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[Austin Hair removed Œ œ, &ndash, &mdash; and &hellip;, and removed Œ œ from the list of special characters used by French, and Š š Ž ž from the list of special characters used by Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian].

Regarding Œ œ, &ndash, &mdash;, they have been there for a while, and Š š Ž ž are used in several other languages in any case (and my sources, including Estonian alphabet, Latvian alphabet and Lithuanian alphabet do seem to indicate that they're used in those languages.] -- Curps 04:30, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)

You're right about stripping certain characters; I regretably neglected to change my character set back to ISO-8859-1 after editing under the NeXT encoding. It was neither intentional nor a usual behavior of lynx. My apologies. A.D.H. (t&m) 05:19, Feb 15, 2005 (UTC)

That's seven lines at the standard 80 columns, and as someone who uses lynx for his everyday editing, I find that excessive. Perhaps it's time to make this a special behavior, governed by the same user preference as the edit bar. ADH (t&m) 03:41, Feb 15, 2005 (UTC)

But I think in most routine edits you would not need to scroll past the "Save page" button... anything below that is usually ignored, no? -- Curps 04:30, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I posted this on User talk:Austin Hair before I saw this discussion here: isn't it possible to add something like the following to the style sheet for your preferred skin (User:Austin Hair/standard.css or User:Austin Hair/monobook.css or whatever):

#siteNotice, #editpage-copywarn

{

display: none;

}

(I pinched this from User:Eequor/standard.css) This should disable the Copyrightwarning message in the relevant skin. HTH. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:06, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Being bold

I'm just going to be bold and make my version live. Lots of people see it so if it's unpopular I'm sure we'll hear soon enough. If you have a major problem with it, please feel free to change it back, I guess, or demand I do so if you can't. Nohat 08:37, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Curps, literally at the last possible moment, dissuaded me from this plan. Nohat 08:54, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

My argument was roughly as follows:

There are several problems... how to tell Croatian D-stroke apart from Icelandic Eth, for instance? Or perhaps some people might confuse β for ß also. Also, the letters needed by any one given language are much more scattered all over the place in your version... in particular, it's a much more disruptive change for common Western European languages like German or French, which were left undisturbed by my own recent change.

Also, you accidentally grouped some lowercase-L diacritics among the capital-I diacritics, but this is easily fixed.

Finally, the biggest problem encountered was that a number of people strongly objected to the special characters being normal size instead of small-font. And if small fonts must be used, then grouping characters alphabetically by letter instead of by diacritic results in illegibility and problems distinguishing characters, as already noted in the rationale for my own changes. -- Curps 09:03, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I saw that, but grouping them the way you did doesn't really make them more legible. It just groups them differently. Nohat 09:16, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

No, the way I did it is more legible and gives speakers of a particular language important information they need to distinguish special characters when a small font is used. If a Portuguese-speaker sees A-tilde near O-tilde, it's easier to tell that these are tildes than if O-tilde is next to Hungarian O-double-acute; similarly O-double-acute next to U-double-acute is an important cue for Hungarian-speakers. If we're forced to use a small font, a consecutive string of the same diacritics makes it a lot easier to tell what that diacritic is. -- Curps 09:25, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps the developers could give us #editpage-specialchars (and Mediawiki:Specialchars) separate from #editpage-copywarn and Mediawiki:Copyrightwarning, so that everyone could adjust their CSS preferences accordingly. -- Curps 09:03, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I also would like to add that we should probably force text-decoration: none !important, because the underlines are only going to make these harder to read, plus they're not really links, they're more like buttons. Comments on this idea? Curps also says that people will most likely only be working on one language at a time. This is probably true, but I don't think that the best logical result of that is to arange them the way he has. It makes it very hard to find a particular character if you don't already know where it is—it requires scanning the entire list. I recognize the idea of putting all the characters with the same diacritic together makes it easier to figure out what diacritic it is, but I don't think that it necessarily holds. The over-tilde and the over-macron are probably indistinguishible in the small size in most fonts. Grouping all the over-macron letters separately from the over-tilde letters doesn't really make it easier to see that two letters that appear the same actually are different. The only way to do that is to make the letters bigger.

Actually, it does make it easier. There's no "N-macron", so if you see A-tilde, N-tilde, O-tilde grouped together, it's a pretty big clue that these are tildes (after all, Portuguese speakers will be familiar with Spanish N-tilde). Similarly, there's no "E-tilde", so seeing AEIOU-macron grouped together is a pretty big clue that these are not tildes. You're right that it would be nice to make the special characters normal size, but I think if we do, that'll just get reverted. The current scheme is the only practical one as long as we're forced to stick to the small font. Which unfortunately I think we are. I have left a message at User talk:Brion VIBBER asking about the possibility of CSS-customizing the special characters section (maybe a future software release). -- Curps 09:35, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Suggestion perhaps what we need is a set of overlaying divs for each task—one for each language, one for IPA, one for math, maybe even one for cyrillic and one for greek (I don't think east asian character sets would be well-suited to this input format though (maybe Kana?). Then we could have a series of links that activate the different overlays. This would of course require a code change because we can't have javascript on this page (I think). If there is interest in this idea I could make a mock-up. Nohat 09:01, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Forcing text-decoration: none would be nice, but I think we need to ask a developer how to accomplish this... maybe User:Brion VIBBER could tell us.

If you want Greek and Cyrillic, here it is... but there's no space for them, a number of people object to the space already used for special characters.

Insert: Α α Β β Γ γ Δ δ Ε ε Ζ ζ Η η Θ θ Ι ι Κ κ Λ λ Μ μ Ν ν Ξ ξ Ο ο Π π Ρ ρ Σ σ ς Τ τ Υ υ Φ φ Χ χ Ψ ψ Ω ω   А а Б б В в Г г Д д Е е Ё ё Ж ж З з И и Й й К к Л л М м Н н О о П п Р р С с Т т У у Ф ф Х х Ц ц Ч ч Ш ш Щ щ Ъ ъ Ы ы Ь ь Э э Ю ю Я я   Ґ ґ Є є І і Ї ї Ў ў   Ђ ђ Ј ј Љ љ Њ њ Ћ ћ Џ џ   Ѓ ѓ Ѕ ѕ Ќ ќ

-- Curps 09:08, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

---

Proposal

I've a modest proposal for amending the special characters list with the middle dot (&#183; or &middot;). It doesn't seem like such a big change, but I'm mentioning it here because millions of people see the list and most of them, I surmise, don't use it. Making it bigger might only serve to distract people from more important things, like the crucial caveat that one's writing will be edited mercilessly. Furthermore, we must recognize that, when we do trivial things like adding a couple-pixel midpoint to the special characters list, precedents sometimes get established that result in harm. Doing so could encourage others to add their own 'pet characters' to the list, leading to bloat and even less usability, which is why I'm unsure, now, how to proceed. Here's how the two versions, old and new, would look:

Insert: Á á É é Í í Ó ó Ú ú   À à È è Ì ì Ò ò Ù ù    â Ê ê Î î Ô ô Û û   Ä ä Ë ë Ï ï Ö ö Ü ü   ß   à ã Ñ ñ Õ õ   Ç ç Ģ ģ Ķ ķ Ļ ļ Ņ ņ Ŗ ŗ Ş ş Ţ ţ   Ć ć Ĺ ĺ Ń ń Ŕ ŕ Ś ś Ý ý Ź ź   Đ đ   Ů ů   Č č Ď ď Ľ ľ Ň ň Ř ř Š š Ť ť Ž ž   Ǎ ǎ Ě ě Ǐ ǐ Ǒ ǒ Ǔ ǔ   Ā ā Ē ē Ī ī Ō ō Ū ū   ǖ ǘ ǚ ǜ   Ĉ ĉ Ĝ ĝ Ĥ ĥ Ĵ ĵ Ŝ ŝ Ŵ ŵ Ŷ ŷ   Ă ă Ğ ğ Ŭ ŭ   Ċ ċ Ė ė Ġ ġ İ ı Ż ż   Ą ą Ę ę Į į Ų ų   Ł ł   Ő ő Ű ű   Ŀ ŀ   Ħ ħ   Ð ð Þ þ   Œ œ   Æ æ Ø ø Å å   – — …   [] [[]] {{}}   ~ | °   ± − × ² ³   €  

to

Insert: Á á É é Í í Ó ó Ú ú   À à È è Ì ì Ò ò Ù ù    â Ê ê Î î Ô ô Û û   Ä ä Ë ë Ï ï Ö ö Ü ü   ß   à ã Ñ ñ Õ õ   Ç ç Ģ ģ Ķ ķ Ļ ļ Ņ ņ Ŗ ŗ Ş ş Ţ ţ   Ć ć Ĺ ĺ Ń ń Ŕ ŕ Ś ś Ý ý Ź ź   Đ đ   Ů ů   Č č Ď ď Ľ ľ Ň ň Ř ř Š š Ť ť Ž ž   Ǎ ǎ Ě ě Ǐ ǐ Ǒ ǒ Ǔ ǔ   Ā ā Ē ē Ī ī Ō ō Ū ū   ǖ ǘ ǚ ǜ   Ĉ ĉ Ĝ ĝ Ĥ ĥ Ĵ ĵ Ŝ ŝ Ŵ ŵ Ŷ ŷ   Ă ă Ğ ğ Ŭ ŭ   Ċ ċ Ė ė Ġ ġ İ ı Ż ż   Ą ą Ę ę Į į Ų ų   Ł ł   Ő ő Ű ű   Ŀ ŀ   Ħ ħ   Ð ð Þ þ   Œ œ   Æ æ Ø ø Å å   – — … ·   [] [[]] {{}}   ~ | °   ± − × ² ³   €  

The second has &middot; added to the '&ndash; &mdash; &hellip;' subset; this subset was chosen because it seems to make sense there. The named character identity reference was chosen for consistency with the other items in the subset and for consistency with current usage in WP. I'm kind of surprised that the rest of the set is such a jumble of direct keyboard inputs and numeric and named references, but it's no big deal. :-)

So, if there are no unresolved objections, made anywhere, to my knowledge, in one month, I'll add the midpoint to the list, which is not to say that I would object to someone subsequently removing it for a good reason. BTW, I originally argued for midpoint use here; ALoan kindly pointed me to this page. Chris Roy 00:36, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

On second thought, my own comment on how adding the midpoint could establish a dangerous precedent does count as an 'unresolved objection'. Unless I or someone else convinces me otherwise, I will not add the midpoint to the special characters list. Chris Roy 03:54, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Few essential Lithuanian characters missing

There are already most of lithuanian specific characters in the page:

Ą ą Ę ę Į į Ų ų  

But few are missing and those are most essential as those are not correctly replaced by most browsers (it saves Š, but in Unicode lithuanian character Š should be replaced with &#352;, otherwise in interwiki links make incorrect URLs; it applies also for š, Ž and ž). So I suggest to extend the block (example was above) to make it:

Ą ą Ę ę Į į Š š Ų ų Ž ž  

After such change it would be much easier to add lithuanian interwiki links. Thanks. Knutux 08:57, 2005 Mar 31 (UTC)

Hmmm

Maybe you shoud add someting like http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Copyrightwarning , they have [[Category:]] , <gallery>, and signature code. And ofcourse some Cyrilic letters like this Љ-Њ-Џ-Ш-Ђ-Ч-Ћ, we use this in Serbian wiki. Thanks --Sasa Stefanovic 17:44, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

Vandal warning.

Considering how much vandalism occurs, I am surprised that there is not a clear warning against vandalism. Vandalism is a major problem, and having a better warning may make potential vandals to think twice. Instead, there is only the minor "bad edits to articles are watched for and will be quickly removed." message. I propose a message like this to make it clearer that vandalism is unwelcome.

DO NOT COMMIT VANDALISM. DOING SO COULD LEAD TO YOU BEING BLOCKED FROM EDITING.

NSR 12:45, 14 May 2005 (UTC)

Proposed change

Based on discussions at WP talk:CP, feedback on wikipedia-l, and the note above, I propose the following version, which changes formatting and order, but changes content only by adding the note regarding vandalism as proposed above. The idea with the colored box is shamelessly stolen from the German WP. Rl 13:21, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Insert: Á á É é Í í Ó ó Ú ú   À à È è Ì ì Ò ò Ù ù    â Ê ê Î î Ô ô Û û   Ä ä Ë ë Ï ï Ö ö Ü ü   ß   à ã Ñ ñ Õ õ   Ç ç Ģ ģ Ķ ķ Ļ ļ Ņ ņ Ŗ ŗ Ş ş Ţ ţ   Ć ć Ĺ ĺ Ń ń Ŕ ŕ Ś ś Ý ý Ź ź   Đ đ   Ů ů   Č č Ď ď Ľ ľ Ň ň Ř ř Š š Ť ť Ž ž   Ǎ ǎ Ě ě Ǐ ǐ Ǒ ǒ Ǔ ǔ   Ā ā Ē ē Ī ī Ō ō Ū ū   ǖ ǘ ǚ ǜ   Ĉ ĉ Ĝ ĝ Ĥ ĥ Ĵ ĵ Ŝ ŝ Ŵ ŵ Ŷ ŷ   Ă ă Ğ ğ Ŭ ŭ   Ċ ċ Ė ė Ġ ġ İ ı Ż ż   Ą ą Ę ę Į į Ų ų   Ł ł   Ő ő Ű ű   Ŀ ŀ   Ħ ħ   Ð ð Þ þ   Œ œ   Æ æ Ø ø Å å   – — …   [] [[]] {{}}   ~ | °   ± − × ¹ ² ³   €  

Note:

• Your changes will be visible immediately. For testing, please use the sandbox.
• You are encouraged to create, expand, and improve upon articles; however, bad edits to articles are watched for and will be quickly removed. Do not commit vandalism. doing so could lead to you being blocked from editing.
• If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly and redistributed at will, do not submit it.
• Please cite your sources so others can check your work.

---

DO NOT SUBMIT COPYRIGHTED WORK WITHOUT PERMISSION!

• All contributions to any page on Wikipedia are released under the GNU Free Documentation License (see $1 for details).
• By submitting your work you promise you wrote it yourself, or copied it from public domain resources — this does not include most web pages.

Yet Another Proposal

I would like to advocate for a proposal similar to user NSR's proposal above, except for dealing with copyvios:

PLEASE DO NOT COPY AND PASTE CONTENT WITHOUT RECEIVING PERMISSION.

I would like to suggest that this occur at the very top of edit pages, where new users can't help but see it. WP:CP is constantly being filled up by the contributions of well meaning anons who just don't understand about copyright and who don't bother to scroll down to the bottom of the page where the warning about the GFDL license occurs.

func(talk) 7 July 2005 21:01 (UTC)

Agreed. --Phroziac ^(talk) 15:03, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

IPA symbols

I would really like to see this "character palette," as I call it, include all of the International Phonetic Alphabet symbols. My interests, erratic as they are, are right now focusing on the IPA. Denelson83 06:18, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

I agree, that would be nice. --Phroziac ^(talk) 15:03, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

Unfortunately, some people already object to its length as it is now. And others would like Cyrillic, Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, etc. etc. instead, and we can't fit everything. The solution would be to allow users to customize this. I think this would need an update to Mediawiki software, to allow specifying it in Special:Preferences... I don't think that CSS alone could do it (or perhaps it can? I'm discussing this idea with User:Plugwash).

If a Mediawiki change is needed, the person to talk to might be User:Brion VIBBER, who first implemented the idea. [2]

-- Curps 16:08, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

More recent news: for IPA, see User:Func/wpfunc/addipaextensions.js, which can be added to your [[User:YOU/monobook.js]] file. Similar ideas can be used for Greek, Cyrillic or any other set of symbols. -- Curps 00:37, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Why don't we use the Wiktionary approach, where different groups of characters can be accessed using a drop-down menu?  Denelson83  00:11, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

Section symbol (§)

I have a small request: can the section symbol (§) be added to the character bar? It would be of immense convenience to those of us who write about statutes and other sources of law. -- BD2412 ^talk 22:07, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

OK, it's been added. -- Curps 00:34, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Many thanks!!! -- BD2412 ^talk 00:35, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Proposed addition

Until the MediaWiki software includes the capability of displaying the last diff on the article's Editing page (in order to allow users to check if the last edit was vandalism), I suggest that we add in a comment urging editors to check that the last edit was not vandalism. If everyone did this, it would definitely cut down significantly on the number of missed vandalisms (including sneaky vandalisms, since an article's editors are likely to know more about the subject than the RC patrol). In the future, I hope MediaWiki makes it automatic (displaying the last diff below the editing box, with red changes text clearly visible), and even provides a check box to administrators to "rollback the last edit" while still allowing them to edit the page. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-10-7 16:26

Unfortunately, I doubt anyone reads the boilerplate text under "Your changes will be visible immediately" text, except maybe newbies. It hardly ever changes in any meaningful way, so it gets ignored, and usually it's simply invisible because it's below the scroll window. So this will be pretty ineffective.

Your Mediawiki suggestion is interesting, you should post it at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical). One drawback is that a large multicolor diff popping up automatically could be very confusing to casual or inexperienced editors, and if it's large enough it can cause long delays or timeouts. Vandals could deliberately create large diffs for this purpose. -- Curps 16:46, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Well, it could be an option that is turned on in the preferences, then. Anon vandals wouldn't know about it. Large vandalisms are always encountered anyways, so I don't see how this is any different in that respect. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-10-7 17:14

Proposed removal

Is there really a need for the text "Your changes will be visible immediately"? I'm for keeping these messages as short as possible, thus encouraging people to actually read them. Is anyone against removing this text? — BRIAN0918 • 2005-10-7 16:33

Perhaps some newbies actually read it, once. After that, no one expects it to change... it's not a place to put news or messages. Even if few people read it, it doesn't do much harm, because it's usually below the bottom of the scroll window, so it doesn't really take up screen space.

For legal purposes I think we very definitely do need to keep the copyright and GFDL stuff. -- Curps 16:52, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

How about replacing the generally useless "Your changes will be visible immediately" with the arguably useful "Please check that the last edit wasn't vandalism". I really believe this will help cut down on vandalism, including sneaky vandalism. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-10-7 17:16

Insert special chars box to my own wiki

Hi, I was wondering how to add the "insert special chars" box to my wiki. When I add it to my page all I get is a bunch of "charinsert" tags... the javascript (or whatever) isn't converting it over. See: [3] Thanks. David Bergan 05:34, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Nevermind. I got it. The answer was found here. David Bergan 06:27, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

New version

Soon (in less than 24 hours?), this template will appear above the Edit summary box. This change was decided by MediaWiki/Wikimedia so that they could be assured editors were seeing a copyright warning before clicking submit (on lower resolution screens, the warning is off-screen). The character-insert toolbox that is currently here will exist at MediaWiki:Edittools. Thus, not only should the character-insert toolbox be removed from here, but this template should also be drastically shortened. Only the key points should be here, while the rest of the content should be moved below the Submit button, which would mean putting them in the Edittools template. So, what are the key points that should remain here?

Based on our most recent endeavors, I think the key points should include: copyright warning and citing sources notice, at least.

Maybe it could be worded in a way to look like an agreement, such as "I confirm that this text was not copied directly from a copyrighted source, and that citations have been included."... or something along those lines. Didn't the image upload page used to say something like that?

— BRIAN0918 • 2005-11-30 11:48

I've moved the charinsert bits out, but this message could still use some cleanup. --Brion 03:38, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Ouch - I can't speak for anyone else, but don't care for it. Slows me down some. But, if this is the way it is to be, I'll learn to cope. BD2412 T 03:41, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

One-liner version

I've made this much shorter like I said earlier, but please discuss it further. This is simply a temporary change so that the whole place doesn't go bonkers over the large chunk of text. We all know it should be shorter than it was, but what should be kept/removed/changed? Note: anything that should be removed can go into MediaWiki:Edittools, like it is now. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 03:48

BD2412's reply

For me, this is much better, with a single line between the text box and the edit summary - I don't have to scroll very far down just to save the page. I think a second line would fit just as well, with no ill effect. BD2412 T 03:52, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

• Alright. What else from the old list do you think should be in these lines? Obviously a copyright warning. I also think that citing verifiable, reliable sources should be there. Maybe a link to the sandbox? — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 03:56
  • Why not just a notice that there are additional comments further down the page? BD2412 T 04:09, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
    • That might be a good idea, though a bit redundant. Let's see what others suggest. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 04:13

Carnildo's reply

It's got a few problems. The big one I see is the "does not contain copyrighted work". Taken literally, that means that nobody can edit any page: all previous versions of the page are copyrighted, but licensed under the GFDL. It also means that people can't import articles from other GFDL sources, such as the Comixpedia wiki. --Carnildo 04:11, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

• Not exactly. It says "this edit", not "this page". Maybe "my changes" instead? — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 04:12
  • Carnildo's point could be covered by saying instead "I affirm that this edit does not violate any copyright". BD2412 T 04:16, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
    • Alright, that sounds good. Thanks. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 04:24

Geni's reply

I don't affirm anything. I'm trying to clean up some vadalism thats all. I have no idea if the edit is based on verifiable sources or not and at best I can say it doesn't read like a copyvio. Inserdently It looks stupid on tlak pages. What was wrong with what we had before? just kill the who thing and put it in the edit tools template.Geni 04:17, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

• It's up above to make sure there's *something* where a visible link to the privacy and copyright policies can be put that will in fact be visible on screen before you submit an edit. On a small screen it's very easy to make edits without ever scrolling below the buttons, and if we want to pretend we really mean it with the existence of privacy policies and the license they need to be visible. --Brion 04:21, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
• It's essential for the foundation to inform people about what they are allowed or forbidden to do... and this warning has to be displayed above a long tail of twenty templates. --Elian (told to quote from IRC) 04:23, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
• Discussion (not involving myself) led to this being put above the Edit summary field though. Don't kill it just because you don't like the current form. It can be made workable, so help make it workable. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 04:17
  • Can it with the "I affirm" stuff. After the last mess caused by people useing overly legalistic terms I think it is safe to say they are best avoided.
    • But what do you suggest it be replaced with? — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 05:04
      • have a look.Geni 05:07, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
        • I'd still put copyright first (it's a more serious concern) - and bold it: Please make sure your changes do not violate any copyright and are are based on verifiable sources. (note also period at end). BD2412 T 05:12, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
          • Agreed. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 05:18

Could the GFDL link be bolded, perhaps? The other links are, which makes it look a little unbalanced. BD2412 T 03:15, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Done.--Sean|Black 03:19, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Excellent! Thanks. BD2412 T 03:23, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Erm...

I don't quite particularly like the changes. First, there's already a link to Wikipedia:Cite sources below; isn't that redundant? Can't one or the other be removed? Second, there's also a link to Wikipedia:Copyrights below, under a huge title that already says "DO NOT SUBMIT COPYRIGHTED WORK WITHOUT PERMISSION" It's redundant to restate the same thing with the same link again. Finally, I don't exactly like the warning right above the edit summary box. It makes it look cluttered, in my opinion; haven't all warnings been agreed to be below? (Oh, by the way, Brian, can you point me to the previous discussion you mentioned above?) Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 22:38, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

I mostly agree. Also, the "Templates used on this page" link is now too low to be very useful. But it's not a big enough deal to really bother me.--Sean|Black 22:47, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

I thought copyright was infringed rather than violated. I wish someone had had the good mind to announce this somewhere before the change. I mean, who ever added this page to their watchlist? -Splash^talk 22:51, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

I completely agree. When I saw the changes, it took me quite a while to track down this MediaWiki page; I posted a notice on WP:AN today to draw more people to the right spot. To be frank, I don't really like the changes because of the aforementioned reasons. Thoughts? Flcelloguy (A note?) 22:53, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Not all infringements are actionable - a fair use might technically infringe but nevertheless not violate. I prefer violate anyway, as it's got a harsher sound, which I find more likely to dissuade potential copyers. BD2412 T 22:57, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

The advantage to having a short message before the edit box is that there's no way you can submit without reading it. What I would like is a quick mention of the GFDL. Superm401 | Talk 23:04, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

But all that is already mentioned below - do we need to have redundant messages? Flcelloguy (A note?) 23:16, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

It is not redundant. The need for it to be above the Submit button is so that everyone can be assured that people actually saw the copyright warning before clicking submit. On most lower resolutions, the warning is off-screen. Didn't you read any of the long discussion above??? (not being harsh, just can't believe you missed it) — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-3 00:15

A GFDL notice might be good, although it is clearly mentioned at the top of Wikipedia:Copyrights. Let's see what others think of this idea before going forward with it. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-3 00:30

See Brion's comments above. This wasn't a change by an admin, but by the MediaWiki/Wikimedia people. Unless you hear otherwise from the MediaWiki/Wikimedia folks, it's safe to assume that it is to remain intact as it currently is, at least providing a copyright warning. We had sufficient warning about this (here, on Village pump, and earliest of all, in at least one of the mailing lists), so I don't understand why nobody bothered to reply before it came about (See #New version above). — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-2 23:59

(afer edit conflict) But there is already a copyright warning below the edit summary box. I'm glad that our developers added the capability for us to add a warning, but that doesn't necessarily mean we need to use it. Did the Board mandate that we needed a new warning? Unless the Board mandates us to do so, I don't think we should feel compelled to add in the changes — sure, it gives us more options and might be a good idea, but that doesn't mean we have to do it. I, for one, feel that it is a bit redundant and clutters up the page even more. Regarding the notice — I know there was some discussion about this on the mailing list a few weeks ago and a change was made and then reverted, but today (when I clicked edit) was the first I was aware of the changes. Did you announce them anywhere else? Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 00:11, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

• My message above said that I announced it here and on Village Pump, and there was an announcement about it on the mailing lists and in IRC. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-3 00:15
• Alright, if your complaint is the duplication of the same message, the 2nd message can be change so it isn't a duplicate. This was also just suggested by brion on #mediawiki. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-3 00:17
• The point is not to have duplicate bits, after all. The point is to have a brief link to the copyright and privacy policies in a visible place. That's it. --brion (copied with permission from #mediawiki) 00:19, 3 December 2005 (UTC)
• Also, please note that I do not feel compelled in any way. I have been in favor of such changes for quite a while now, and support this completely. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-3 00:25

Ok, the duplicate copyright notice in MediaWiki:Edittools has been removed as per the complaints above. Any other suggestions for improvements? How about making the text here <small>? This would make the text less conspicuous, and allow the option to add more if people want. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-3 00:22

OK, that's better. Thanks! I still don't agree with having the line above the rest of the warnings, however — is there a specific reason (besides emphasizing it) why the line shouldn't be moved to the last section? It shouldn't take importance over the other tips and warnings, and is very awkward above the edit summary box. Thoughts? Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 00:41, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I've stated the reason 3 times now, Brion has stated it twice, and another user has stated it once: Before this change, the copyright warning was off the screen for most people (below everything else), so they did not even have to see it before clicking Submit. This forces them to read the copyright warning, and to have links to the copyright policy above the Submit button. It's that simple. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-3 01:00

The reason is WP:CP. Anything that might reduce that is worth a try.Geni 07:19, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

• You may compare the german version perhaps. - Peter 08:30, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

Multiple lines

Is there anyway to prevent the warning from spilling over onto a second line?--Sean|Black 05:07, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

GFDL link

Should the GFDL link point to Wikipedia:Text of the GNU Free Documentation License rather than to the Wikipedia article on the GFDL? --Carnildo 22:48, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Good point. I think it should - after all the Copyright link points to Wikipedia:Copyrights rather than our article on the same. BD2412 T 23:14, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Licence or License

Oxford English Dictionary, Dictionary.com, and Google all point clearly to License. Our article on GFDL is even called the GNU Free Documentation License. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-8 00:23

My original rationale for changing it is that licence is a noun form and license is a verb form. [[Sam Korn]] 00:25, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Oxford says the verb is an s. And they're British :) — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-8 00:33

I say we split the difference and spell it with a 'k': "licenke" --Carnildo 01:00, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

I prefer license, for no reason that I can reduce to specifics. I suppose we could evade the question by using "release" instead, but that's a legally different proposition. BD2412 T 01:03, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Really, Carnildo, if we were going to split the difference it would be licensce. Or, um, Lisencse. Or maybe licenxe. Wait... I have it! L1c3nz! bd2412 T 13:52, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

U.S. authorities follow Webster in prescribing license for all cases, of course. As for the U.K. authorities: Gowers doesn't cover the subject, but Fowler, Partridge, and Reader's Digest all say to use license for the verb, which is the case here. Uncle G 02:31, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Both licence and license are equally acceptable. Brian0918, please familiarise yourself with the Manual of Style's guidelines, which states if something "...is predominantly written in one type of English, aim to conform to that type rather than provoking conflict by changing to another". Licence is a valid spelling, and all you appear to be doing here is pushing your own spelling on top of others (and accusing others of "nonsense"[4]). I don't think you're conducting yourself as an administrator should. Talrias (t | e | c) 12:17, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

• I agree that, were it a noun, "licence" would be acceptable. However, here it is a verb, and "license" is the far more common verbal form in the U.K., as Uncle G demonstrates above. "Licence" is valid, but very rare. Why not use the more common and equally correct version? It has the added advantage of also not annoying our American cousins. I changed it, I am British, and I changed it because that is the normal British spelling of the word. [[Sam Korn]] 12:37, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
• It is you who are provoking conflict by pushing an unsourced spelling for the verb form. You have yet to provide one source that says licence is the proper spelling for the verb in America OR in Britain. Meanwhile, we have provided numerous sources which show that, whether in America or Britain, the preferred spelling for the verb is license. Can you provide one source for the proper verb spelling? I acknowledge that it can be spelled with a c in noun form, but not in verb form. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-9 13:30

I hereby nominate this exchange for WP:LAME. android79 13:48, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

I second the nomination.--Sean|Black 21:20, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Oh give it a break, there's nothing to talk about - whether you speak American or British English, the verb form is undeniably spelt with an 's'. Enochlau 14:10, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

I didn't provide a source, Brian0918, because you yourself said you used dictionary.com. Searching for licence on that website says quite clearly "n. & v." - which means noun and verb. I agree that license is an acceptable alternate spelling. The point remains that Brian0918 has acted in bad faith, accusing people of "pushing nonsense" or "provoking conflict", defined edits as minor when in a dispute, selectively ignored evidence, and ignored the manual of style which makes it quite clear what should be done in the case of spelling disputes. I am very disappointed in the way Brian0918 has behaved. Talrias (t | e | c) 14:34, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

• Really, tho, license makes more sense - it's not incorrect in British English, whereas licence is certainly incorrect in American English. Of course, I am biased... but trying very hard not to be! bd2412 T 14:39, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

• No, he had sources to back up his position. You had none. You acted in bad faith, he did not. Just let this go before you lose all respect you have. You are causing an edit war over one letter. Even if you weren't wrong, edit warring over such silly stuff is not helpful in the least. - Taxman ^Talk 14:40, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

• As has clearly been shown, license is the only predominant spelling of the verb form. That should be the end of it. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-12-9 14:41

We've attempted to resolve this on IRC, and I am quite happy for 'license' to be used. We discussed whether 'licence' is a valid form for the verb, and Brian0918 didn't accept that licence could ever be a verb. I'm still a bit disappointed about the way this has progressed, but I feel it's been much ado about nothing. Cheers, Talrias (t | e | c) 15:19, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

This controversy aside, I respectfully request that editors not replace the word license with another term - a license creates a specific kind of legal relationship, and an agreement to license has different connotations than an agreement to "place" or "put" or "release". Please trust your IP lawyer on this one. bd2412 T 19:56, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Shucks, does that mean I'm too late? Kim Bruning 05:29, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Position on section-editing pages

When you're creating a new section on a page (for example, [5]), the warning is currently between the edit box and the "Save Page" buttons. This makes it easy to ignore, particularly since the edit box can be taller than the page. Could this warning be moved to the *top* of the section-edit page layout instead? I wasn't able to figure out how to do this. -- Creidieki 20:43, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly and redistributed, do not submit it.

I've restored the above wording because I think it's needed. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 14:15, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

• Needed, maybe, but redundant to what's at the bottom of the page - and it clutters up that space between the edit window and the save/preview buttons. I think it was fine where it was. bd2412 T 14:16, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
  • • This is exactly what I was afraid of - instruction creep. We already have all that material below the edit summary box, and repeating it above not only is redundant but clutters up the page even more. The only reason material was moved above the box was to place emphasis on the GFDL and sources. I've gone ahead and reverted until we can get a consensus about whether this should stay below the edit summary or be moved. THanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 15:43, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
    • P.S. I've archived this talk page, as it was getting pretty long. Flcelloguy (A note?) 16:11, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
      • Agreed, but reverted where? I still see it! bd2412 T 15:46, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Original research?

A mention of no original research was added to the warning today. I'm not too sure I agree with the change, because we already have a warning about sources - original research, by definition, has no sources. Thoughts on whether we should mention WP:NOR? Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 15:35, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

• Strictly speaking, original research may have sources, but the sources are tertiary to the point of the research - I can point to sources, for example, supporting point A and point B, and contend that if these are true, that proves my point C. On the other hand, I don't think the original research warning is necessary in this section - maybe further down, below the edit buttons? bd2412 T 15:40, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Hmm, OK. I agree with moving it down - that seems like a good idea. Thoughts, or should I be bold and go ahead and do it? Flcelloguy (A note?) 15:46, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
    • Boldness rocks! bd2412 T 15:52, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
      • Alright, I'll be bold and move it. :-) Flcelloguy (A note?) 15:55, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
        • I agree; leave it out. — Dan | talk 18:23, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Any particular reason? Dan100 (Talk) 23:51, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

No, no reason. I just thought, since we're both named Dan, that I'd take the opposite side as you in order to confuse anyone who happens to be reading this discussion. — Dan | talk 17:41, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I'd prefer to keep it in the copyrightwarning. It's a fact that IPs love to add OR, and we need a prominent warning. It's true that asking for sources precludes OR, but I didn't think of that when I read it and don't expect everyone else does either.

What's the down side to having it there?

BTW I wonder how many people notice, let alone read, the text below the character selector... Dan100 (Talk) 18:11, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Instruction creep. The point of having the copyright warning was to add more prominence to the copyright links and GFDL, not to add every single warning we need in that area. It's best to keep the space between the edit box and edit summary as short as possible; that's why we have the warnings beneath. And sorry for taking so long to reply; it must have slipped my watchlist. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 17:12, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

But adding the NOR warning doesn't add extra lines! And this isn't instruction creep in its true sense. Dan100 (Talk) 13:27, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

It is, however, true that the shorter something is, the more people read it. [[Sam Korn]] 14:03, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

I don't deny that, but we're talking about four extra words! That's taking that logic to the extreme, no? Dan100 (Talk) 16:33, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

The warning is already too long, at a line and a half on a 1024x768 screen. If there's any re-wording that could get it down to a single line, I'd be all for it. --Carnildo 20:16, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Gah!

I don't know what you lot have managed to do to this particular message (which should just be left alone, dammit), but at present I get three successive warnings about different parts of enwiki policy before I can commit an edit. And yes, I've force-refreshed and purged and closed by browser and logged out. Stop playing. -Splash^talk 05:26, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

"Sources"

It's been pointed out (by a user called Rob on the talk page of WP:V) that while it's policy that information must be verifiable, it's only a guideline that you should quote a source. To quote SlimVirgin's response from the same talk page:

Regarding whether citing sources is mandatory, the policy is that people ought to (ideally) cite sources when they make an edit, but it's not mandatory. That is, if someone makes an edit and doesn't cite a source, you can't take them to the arbcom for a policy violation.

Therefore I've removed the sources link, as how it was worded before suggested that providing a source was mandatory. Dan100 (Talk) 10:14, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

• I re-added sources. The statement says "Content...must be based on verifiable sources." This doesn't say that the content must cite sources, just that the content must be based on verifiable sources. It may seem redundant, but it is an excuse to add a link to the page for citing sources, which was one of reasons this Copyrightwarning was created. — ₀₉₁₈^BRIAN • 2006-01-17 13:36

Minor Change

The current version is:

Content must not violate any copyright and must be verifiable. Your contributions will be licensed under the GFDL.

It would be better if it said:

Content must not violate any copyright and must be verifiable. You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL.

The latter is more legally valid, and only a tiny bit longer. Superm401 | Talk 00:40, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

• Please read the rest of the talk page. This has already been discussed. Uncle G 03:45, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
  • I've read the entire page. Can give me the section where this specific issue was discussed? I am not referring to the dispute over the spelling of "license." Note that my proposal uses the same spelling, just a different form. Superm401 | Talk 10:33, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
    • I don't want to nitpick but... "Your agree to license"? R.Koot 21:13, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
      • Good point, but now that we have that out of the way, I would really like the actual change to be made. Superm401 | Talk 03:02, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
        • Done. I wonder if it warrants a semicolon or a dash between the two sentences now? --HappyCamper 14:50, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
          • Thanks for making the change. As for punctuation, I'd prefer to keep it as is. Superm401 | Talk 19:44, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

"Version 1.2 or" etc..

[Incompatible licence conditions?]

This page says "Content must not violate any copyright and must be verifiable. You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL."

But the page at Wikipedia:Copyrights says "Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts."

This would seem to indicate that Wikipedia is applying conditions to the licence after the fact that the contributor hasn't agreed to. Unless I've missed something (which is possible), that's a serious problem. Irrevenant 11:43, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

One character change

{{editprotected}} add * just after GFDL and add *<nowiki>*<nowiki>Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts. to MediaWiki:Edittools.Geni 02:25, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

May I suggest using an anchor link. For example:

[[#copyright|*]]

here, and

<nowiki /><span id="copyright" />*Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts.

to Edittools, if this change is correct, copyright-wise. Gracenotes^T § 02:29, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

 Done - added anchor link as well as reverse anchor link, plus nifty CSS highlighting when clicked. —Quarl ^(talk) 2007-03-16 09:09Z

Remove asterisk.

{{Editprotected}}How about linking "GFDL" to #copyright, and then link Wikipedia:Text of the GNU Free Documentation License at the #copyright section? -- Jeandré, 2007-03-17t11:28z

 Done —Quarl ^(talk) 2007-03-17 11:47Z

Wikipedia is not a repository of links

I think all Wikipedians should be reminded each time they edit an article that Wikipedia is not a repository of links. I know that this is not Wikipedia's most important policy/guideline, but I have seen quite a few articles lately in which excessive external links seem to have been a problem. Among them have been pro-life and transsexualism. I don't know if it would be feasible to include a statement about this on the editing page, but it's just an idea.

Andrea Parton 04:37, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Strong copyright warning.

It seems odd that Wikipedia has a fairly weak copyright warning (compared to other Wikis), and we do get hundreds of copy and paste copyvios a day, so I think stronger wording is needed. Meta uses:

You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource. DO NOT SUBMIT COPYRIGHTED WORK WITHOUT PERMISSION!

I would like to change the current wording to something like that. If there's no discussion in a day or two I will do it. --W.marsh 16:50, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

I have seen numerous Wikipedia pages that appear to have been copied, more or less directly, from copyrighted websites. I agree that a stronger warning is necessary. Andrea Parton 22:02, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

No; the usage on meta is the MediaWiki default. The reason that isn't used is because we the current version is brief and concise, while conveying the same information. (See above discussion for why a short message, conveying the same info as a long one, is better.) In addition, we don't want to scare off any newcomers. Meta is very unlike Wikipedia; most people there are already experienced editors. On the other hand, we shouldn't discourage new people who stumble upon Wikipedia from editing because of a harsh and excessive warning when a much more polite and shorter one will suffice. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 01:18, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

I respectfully disagree. People aren't getting the message that copying and pasting articles from random websites is not supposed to happen... doing newpage patrol or any kind of maintenence will make this rather clear. So it would seem that a better warning is needed. Moreover, many of these people will rewrite the article once warned about the copyright issues, it's just that we rarely warn them quickly enough, due to the massive flood of new pages. --W.marsh 01:39, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

People will still submit copyrighted material, but a line must be drawn at how big and bold the warning should be. The briefer and more concise (while conveying the same information), the better. The current version does that, and the point is reiterated below the char box ("Only public domain resources can be copied without permission—this does not include most web pages."). I don't think there's a reason to change this wording. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 01:55, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Am I not being clear? The most popular Wiki should not have the weakest and least informative warnings. Most people don't think of copying and pasting random text as a copyvio, after all, they do it on their blog, forums, etc. and no one ever bats an eyebrow. The copyvio notice should tell them specifically not to do that. We get hundreds of copyvios every day... obviously the current warning isn't doing a good enough job, so I think we need to at least try something stronger and see if that helps. --W.marsh 14:28, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

The question is, what is our goal with this warning? From my view, the goal is to protect Wikipedia from vicarious liability for coyright infringement, which the existing warning effectively does. Folks been warned - that's our duty. We hunt and knock out copyvios to make the encyclopedia better, but it is the poster of such material who bears whatever legal risk accompanies such posting. BD2412T 14:42, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

But copyvios can cause a lot of problems. If they aren't detected, that can get slightly altered over time and eventually integrated into articles, and a year later we discover we have to scrap a good article because copyvio text is entrenched in it. Also it presents a poor picture of Wikipedia if people find lots of obvious copy and pastes from other websites sitting out in the open. I don't think we should be okay with hundreds of copyvios a day, many of them sitting undetected for months. --W.marsh 16:29, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I totally agree that copyvios can cause a lot of problems, having seen quite a few and removed some that were unnoticed initially. However, a line has to be drawn somewhere; we could easily ask a user to confirm ten times that what they submitted wasn't a copyvio. While that example is a bit extreme, I'm just using it to point out that the warning should convey the appropriate information in as consise a statement as possible. In addition, we also need to consider the ramifications of using an excessively blunt and strong statement; we don't want to scare away potential new contributors. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 02:09, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree that there is a point where warnings are pointless, some people will never read them or care... but I don't think until we try it that we can say that a more informative notice wouldn't help, because most people don't mean to do anything wrong, they just don't see copying and pasting stuff as a copyvio. And right now, I don't think the article creation process does much to tell them that it is a copyvio... we have very soft messages, softer than the defaults, softer than most any Wiki out there... and our maintenence backlogs are bigger than the entire contents of almost any Wiki (partially) as a result. We should be careful of having soft, unhelpful messages... doing very little to help well intentioned people avoid creating bad articles is bad for the project long-term. --W.marsh 03:09, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

The English Wikipedia is three times larger than the German Wikipedia, and gets twice as much traffic as all other Wikipedias combined. That might have something to do with the problems it's having. --Carnildo 07:33, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Well duh, but I don't think having much softer warnings helps, especially considering our traffic level. Consider Commons [6] and Wikinews [7]. I honestly don't understand the resistance against a more obvious and helpful message on Wikipedia-en. --W.marsh 13:12, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

As I said above, I don't disagree at all that copyvios are a problem and should absolutely not be allowed. However, I disagree that the proposed changes would be helpful: it makes a consise statement longer while saying the same thing, won't necessarily help reduce the problem, and is quite strong, scaring away potentially contributors. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 01:26, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't currently explain that copying and pasting IS a copyvio, like I've said. I think most "copyvios" are just simple misunderstands... many of which would be stopped with a better warning. So the proposed changes would be helpful. At least in my opinion. We'd only really know if we tried. --W.marsh 02:03, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, the text further down does sort of explain that... not sure that everyknow knows what public domain means. Still, I think ginormous letters and more obvious placement might be our only hope... though I understand that would never happen. :-) --W.marsh 02:06, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Add that copyrighted content will be deleted.

In order to make clear that copyrighted content will not just sit there in what users think is the laissez-faire freedom of a wiki, it should be added that: "Content must not violate any copyright or it will be deleted." (emphasis added) Perhaps having "deleted" be in bold. —Centrx→talk • 04:31, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, this would be a good idea. It would prevent (to a certain extent) new users from adding copyright content indiscriminately. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 10:10, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Personally, I think the warning is long enough as it is, and that the "will be deleted", while true, isn't entirely necessary. JYolkowski // talk 21:12, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the length is the only issue I think. The purpose is, though, that under the current message a user will very well think "Whatever, I will still add it and, look there it is on the page. So nothing happened, yay, the message was a scare tactic and I got away with it." Saying it will be deleted tells them that there is an effective reason why there is no point in posting it: it will disappear. I do like the nice short current message though. —Centrx→talk • 03:07, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

can't we put thin in below "Your changes will be visible immediately."?Geni 19:21, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

I doubt many people read that now that the Insert character box is so big. There are a ton of copyvio's, almost all by well-meaning people who at least would not have uploaded the inevitably deleted copyvio, and best would have rewritten or summarized the addition and would not have been scared off by the rapid deleting response to their contributions. "Content must not violate any copyright" is clear from a professional or legal standpoint, but it doesn't make anyone pause to think that just about everything, including that website they just read, is copyrighted and can't be uploaded here. It would save a lot of everyone's time to have an effective message in the first place that informs them they can't upload that. Something like "Do not post text you copied from a website, it will be deleted." —Centrx→talk • 04:47, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

It used to have a message DO NOT SUBMIT COPYRIGHTED WORK WITHOUT PERMISSION!. Perhaps it does not need to be so capitally bold, but something strong is needed. —Centrx→talk • 04:10, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

I feel that the term deleted should be bolded as well as capitalized to emphasis the action which will be taken. This will definitely deter users on posting copyright content. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 14:50, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Just as a note, on the other side of the coin, we should also not accept works that are *not* copyrighted (short of public domain). GFDL only works for copyrighted content. :-) Kim Bruning 15:07, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Can you please explain why it is not right to accept works that are NOT copyrighted? Could the reason be that the copyright status of such works are unclear? --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 18:33, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

GFDL and CC* are licences for copyrighted information. No copyright, no licence. :-) Kim Bruning 14:01, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

As anyone who does newpage patrol can tell you, a lot of people aren't getting the message that pasting articles from other websites is rarely a good thing. Many people who do it don't see it as a copyvio, because hey, they do that on their blog, their favorite web forum, etc. and no one ever cares. So when we say "Don't violate a copyright" they say "Okay, I won't!" yet do it anyway. We can have gigantic warning text, similar to the image warning screen, and that would probably help explain what a copyvio actually is. But ultimately, as we see with images, some people are just gonna do it anyway... so the solution will unfortunatly just be that we have to deal with copyvios better. User:Where has a bot that maintains Wikipedia:Suspected copyright violations, I think we need A) more patrollers there and B) maybe another bot, if Where thinks it would improve the yield.

We also should probably have a warning screen when someone tries to upload an article with no formatting. But that will essentially never happen..... --W.marsh 14:09, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Can you please clarify why you think this will never happen? What are the negative consequences of having a warning screen? Would it discourage the newbies from staying in this project? --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 04:37, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Well there's huge resistance towards changing the article creation process, for whatever reason. People think it would mean fewer articles if say, a screen said "You didn't format this article at all" and so on, or even if there was bigger warning text and so on. We still give people just a blank box and no real help... apparently there's little interest from the devs/powers that be in improving this situation. --W.marsh 05:12, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Sources on talk pages?

From WP:HD:

Does content on talk pages have to be based on verifiable sources? Does it have to be under the GFDL? The edit page says it does but that doesn't make sense. MUSICAL 10:56, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

In response to this I tweaked the wording [8] (including adding "Article" to the first sentence) to:

Article content must not violate any copyright and must be based on verifiable sources. You agree to license all contributions under the GFDL.

BD2412 deleted "Article" [9] on the grounds that all contributions must not violate any copyrights. Does anyone object to:

You agree to not violate any copyright and to license your contributions under the GFDL. Articles must be based on verifiable sources.

If anyone can shorten the text, please do. -- Rick Block (talk) 20:18, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

It is my understanding that all content, whether on a user page, a talk page, wherever, must be released under the GFDL. Last year we banned a good contributor because he insisted on asserting a copyright interest in his talk page comments. As for verifiability, there are circumstances where this would apply to things not in the article space - some categories have headers which include assertions of fact, and the content of some templates has the same effect (e.g. if a template lists all the #1 songs by a band, I'd better be able to verify that this status applies to the songs so listed. Also, Portal space falls under the same constraints as article space - is there a term that captures all of the space where people can look for facty stuff? bd2412 T 21:40, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

"Content", in its technical, Wikipedic sense. Whilst precise enough in the "jargon", it's not so clear to newbies. -Splash - tk 21:51, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

e.g. not so clear to those at whom the warning is most directly aimed. bd2412 T 22:08, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Am I hearing the suggested version is not acceptable? I agree about all contributions being GFDL and mean for the suggested version to say this (I guess it could say all submissions rather than your contributions). Assuming the first sentence is OK, would we rather have the second sentence be more precise (but wordier), e.g. Encyclopedic content must be based on verifiable sources. -- Rick Block (talk) 22:09, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Hmmmm, better, but that sounds like a truism - how about Encyclopedia content instead of Encyclopedic content? bd2412 T 13:10, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Sorry for missing the discussion, as I've been extremely busy and haven't had a chance to edit in quite a while... only two weeks late! :-) Seriously, though, I don't like the current version and wording. It seems like the discussion just dropped off suddenly after June became July. The current version sounds like a command (well, it is a command): it uses the imperative mood (twice), along with an exclamation point. The overall feel of the message is somewhat terse and "scary-sounding" to new users, while we should be promoting an opposite feeling: welcome to new contributors. I've gone ahead and been bold, rewording the message slightly while we (hopefully) continue the discussion. Thoughts? Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 04:36, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Unsourced content

There is discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Speedy_deletion_criterion_for_unsourced_articles of including a warning that unsourced content may be deleted. If this is done, it should be above the wiki mark-up, so that new editors will see it. There are several suggestions on wording. Septentrionalis 17:52, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

A simple message, like adding to the "encyclopedic content must be verifiable: cite your sources or it may be removed." with a link to WP:CITE would probably suffice. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 21:38, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I've already done this on MediaWiki:Newarticletext. As a blanket speedy deletion criteria the proposal is unworkable. This should not be displayed for all edits because there are many kinds of edits that would never warrant providing a source, and even for the ones that would it is not absolutely necessary that we put up a discouragement to editing. The bozos will still add their unsourced crap, but the kind of person who would actually be adding legitimate information would be the ones discouraged. —Centrx→talk • 21:49, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I think the goal is to get the editors, like I was, who mean well but forget that they have to specify where they got their information from. Not everyone adding good but unsourced information is a bozo, of course. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 21:57, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I was referring to having a policy of deleting all unsourced articles or all unsourced information. Adding a more explicit message about citing sources could be good, along the lines of "Please cite your sources", but nothing at all like "Any unsourced information will be deleted". —Centrx→talk • 22:10, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

WP:V already says that anything dubious and uncited may be removed, so it would be good to advise people what may happen if they don't cite, I think. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 22:39, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

One text could be Unsourced information may be removed without notice. Since this is true now under WP:V, as NightGyr points out, it may be a kindness to say so. Note the may, as opposed to will in the copyvio notice. Septentrionalis 01:37, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm fine with that. It might be a bit better to have Uncited information may be removed because I'm not sure "unsourced" is a real word, and we should try to keep this short. Thus (with a little rearranging to keep the GFDL release early), the whole text could be:

Content that violates any copyright will be deleted. You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL. Encyclopedic content must be verifiable; uncited information may be removed.

What does everyone think? Superm401 - Talk 00:02, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Too long. We're trying to keep this short enough that people might actually read it. --Carnildo 03:25, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

My favoured wording for this is "Content that violates any copyright will be deleted. You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL. Encyclopedic content must provide sources"; one word longer than the current version, and clearer about what is required. --ais523 16:15, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

What about situations where a person is helping by adding information, because regular editors of the article will notice it added and see a gap in the article coverage? Sometimes people don't have the sources right on hand, but they know the subject. Sources are needed, but the information should be there. Sometimes people don't even realize they can add a suggestion to the talk page. Also, we don't need people to add sources for re-wording or patently obvious descriptions. —Centrx→talk • 03:48, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Long term all information should have sources. Editors can achieve this by finding sources for info already in the article, or by removing unverified info (perhaps temporarily). Unverified ideas are probably best suggested on Talk. As for the warning itself, I like ais523's formulation. But a still shorter version could be:

How about a simple "Uncited information may be removed." ? Not too harsh. True. —Centrx→talk • 21:18, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

"Content that violates any copyright, or lacks sources, can be deleted. You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL." --Superm401 - Talk 02:47, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

But copyright infringements will be deleted (though, to a lesser extent unsourced articles will be deleted—or they will get sources and no longer be "unsourced") —Centrx→talk • 01:58, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Plagiarism

It occurs to me that this warning doesn't say people should credit sources if they are copying and pasting from them, even if that source has a free liscense. We've recently caught some flack for articles that do this and never mention where the text came from, as that is plagiarism. Also, many people upload stuff assuming they have permission, but never assert it... and this leads to a lot of wheel spinning as their stuff is quickly deleted.

I think better wording would help at least a little bit:

Do not copy text from other websites without permission. It will be deleted. Credit any source you legally copy from in the article.

But that seems to convoluted... any ideas? --W.marsh 19:34, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Just make it "Credit any source you legally copy." —Centrx→talk • 21:08, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Archives

I archived the page and added an archive box. --Meno25 05:48, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Attribution.

Wikipedia:Attribution has replaced Wikipedia:Verifiability. Please replace "Encyclopedic content must be verifiable." with "Encyclopedic content must be attributable to a reliable source." -- Jeandré, 2007-02-23t21:00z

Even better would be "Encyclopedic content must be attributed to a reliable source." -- Jeandré, 2007-02-23t21:08z

Done. Remember to use {{editprotected}} to get administrators' attention quicker. I only came here because I was going to make a similar change of my own accord! Picaroon 01:36, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

• I second the above, per heavy discussion on WP:ATT's talk page. >Radiant< 10:33, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

WP:ATT

Recommend removing the link to Wikipedia:Attribution in favor of the old link to Wikipedia:Verifiability. As it stands right now, ATT is a proposed policy. Frise 06:04, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Done. ^demon^{[omg plz]} 06:48, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Wordwrap

The footnote about GFDL (linking to MediaWiki:Edittools#copyright) seems slightly superfluous, might that be removed? In the interests of not overwhelming the editpage foot-instructions... We're used to its size (or hide it with css) but it's really quite overwhelming for new editors, as it currently is, and every reduction helps.

Also the superscript * causes an extra-large gap above the wordwrapped GFDL (at 1024x768 in firefox/linux): Example screenshot (see top left, above GFDL^*). Anything that can be done to shorten that line, would be beneficial. Thanks. --Quiddity 03:43, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Add "Cite your sources"

What do you think about adding a larger message under the current one to "Cite your sources"? —Centrx→talk • 18:09, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Bad idea. The message is already getting too long to read. --Carnildo 03:54, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

The idea is to put it below the current message on a new line, and in larger letters. Anyway, if the issue is that the message is already too long, "Encyclopedic content must be verifiable." can simply be replaced by "Cite your sources", which is much shorter and much clearer. It would also help with "Content that violates any copyright will be deleted.": all the people who copy text here from other websites do not read or understand "Content that violates any copyright will be deleted."; if they at least cite their sources—which is easy to understand and shorter—copyright infringements will be much easier to detect and delete. In trying to get a legalistic, passive-voiced message, we have instead a message that few read regardless of how short it is. —Centrx→talk • 02:49, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

A larger font is even worse. Instead of just being too long to read, the text will be difficult to read as well. --Carnildo 07:33, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Why? Section headers and article titles have a larger font and we still use those without trouble. Anyway, what about the other option, of replacing the third-person passive "Encyclopedic content must be verifiable" with "Cite your sources" or similar? —Centrx→talk • 04:16, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Section headers and article titles are meant to be read separately from the main text. The larger font size enables the user to focus on them or ignore them as appropriate. By putting two different fonts in close proximity as you are suggesting, you encourage people to read one or the other, but not both. --Carnildo 05:28, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Okay, but how about the other option of changing the somewhat cryptic "Encyclopedic contents must be verifiable" to something more like "Cite sources"? —Centrx→talk • 01:40, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Sounds good, if you can get it past the pedants. It reads the way it does right now because some people felt that any other wording could be interpreted to mean that talkpage posts had to cite sources. --Carnildo 06:42, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

I think this should have been done a year and a half ago when it was brought up. Have a read of Wikipedia:Improving referencing efforts. 6000 to 8000 articles a month are tagged with {{unreferenced}}, there is a two-and-a-half-year backlog for that template that shows no signs of being cleared and a large proportion of our articles have either all over them (rarely addressed, usually ends up staying for months if not years) or worse, have unsourced dubious facts that aren't even labelled as such. We tell contributors in the warning below the edit box that their additions should be verifiable but this is somewhat vague: there is no explicit instruction to cite sources. I've gone ahead and added this in, as part of the sentence beginning "encyclopedic content" to address Carnildo's concern that people will think it applies to pages outside the article namespace. If anyone is worried about a creeping mess of policy reminders under the edit box they can always chop "be verifiable and" out of the warning: it's better to tell contributors their content must actually be verified, not just potentially verifiable. We supposedly remove unsourced material but in reality it's left in abundance for years. Templates like should exist to give contributors a chance: unsourced information left in for months should just be removed, as our own policies state. If an instruction to cite sources had been added to this messages in June 2007 it might have saved us some of the vast amount of unsourced bullshit that gets added and never challenged or removed. — Trilobite 01:33, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

4 Gnus

a highlighted screenshot

crossposted to MediaWiki talk:Edittools#4 times now?

I'm wondering if we could reduce the 4 references to the GFDL in the editingfooter?

Anything that can be done to simplify and shorten this large instruction set, would be good. --Quiddity 05:57, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Agreed 100%. — Omegatron 06:01, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

Using namespace

I wonder if this system message supports ParserFunctions. If yes, we could make it "smarter" by looking at {{NAMESPACE}} like it's done e.g. in MediaWiki:Newarticletext. Then the current text wolud only be used in the main namespace, for talk pages it would say "remember to sign ...", and say some other useful things in other namespaces ∴ AlexSm 23:34, 26 November 2007 (UTC) {{editprotected}} I tried this in other project and it works. Can we please change this message for non-article namespaces? Something like

{{#switch:{{NAMESPACE}}
|{{ns:0}}=Content that violates any '''[[Wikipedia:Copyrights|copyright]]''' will be deleted. Encyclopedic content must be '''[[Wikipedia:Verifiability|verifiable]]'''. You agree to license your contributions under the '''<span id="ref-copyright">[[#copyright|GFDL<sup>*</sup>]]</span>'''.
|{{TALKSPACE}}=This is a [[Wikipedia:Talk page|talk page]]. Remember to [[Wikipedia:signatures|sign]] your posts by typing four tildes: <charinsert>~~~~</charinsert>
|You agree to license your contributions under the '''<span id="ref-copyright">[[#copyright|GFDL<sup>*</sup>]]</span>'''.
}}

That is, current message for articles, "remember to sign" for talk spaces and just GFDL notice for other namespaces ∴ AlexSm 21:59, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Mediawiki pages aren't watched very heavily. I think it would be better to ask about this on a village pump. The potential objection I see is that the GFDL applies to all contributions, including talk pages. — Carl (CBM · talk) 23:08, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Well, if no admin found this idea any good, I won't "fight" for it either. At least I implemented this in another language Wikipedia ∴ AlexSm 01:36, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

Even on talk pages you need the line "You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL". Jon513 (talk) 10:53, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, somebody already pointed mentioned this to me since then, so now I only propose to remove the other two sentences. —AlexSm 14:29, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

We also need to have the line discouraging copyright violations (a copyvio on a talk page is still a copyvio), and I would prefer to keep the verifiability line too. Superm401 - Talk 12:36, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

COI warning

Per Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard#COI_Warnings_must_be_put_on_all_pages_.28IMPORTANT.29, it seems perfectly reasonable to go ahead and add something. I suggest reordering the sentences and say:

Content that violates any copyright will be deleted. You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL^*. Encyclopedic content must be verifiable. We strongly advise against COI edits.

--Aude (talk) 22:59, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

No. This is not the place to list every Wikipedia policy. It's here as legal ass-covering so that people can't say they weren't aware that they were licensing their edits under the GFDL. --Carnildo 23:40, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Anonymous editors or newbies come here thinking "anyone can edit" and not aware of pitfalls like COI. We have Wikipedia:Congressional staffer edits, and now WikiScanner which can dig up stuff more easily and get people in trouble. Also, we have enough WP:VANITY, spam articles, people editing their own biographies, etc. We should make them more aware of these pitfalls before they make edits. Adding six words will help. Maybe it can be said in fewer words, maybe take out "strongly"? --Aude (talk) 00:43, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

By my count, Wikipedia has eight non-obvious editing-related policies that people should be aware of before they edit articles. Is there any reason to elevate the conflict-of-interest guidelines over policies such as WP:NOR or WP:OWN? By the time we get all the "essential" policies and guidelines listed, this will be a multi-paragraph block of text that nobody will ever read. --Carnildo 01:01, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

What are the consequences for someone that unknowingly violates WP:NOR, WP:OWN, etc? What are the potential consequences for someone that unknowingly violates COI? Especially from an IP address? Also, consequences for Wikipedia? --Aude (talk) 01:15, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Violating WP:OWN? Blocking. Violating WP:NOR? Blocking. Violating WP:COI? Embarassment. Consequences for Wikipedia? More publicity. --Carnildo 03:05, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Aside from the idea of whether that addition should be made - "COI" is not an acronym that the average person will understand, and I strongly oppose putting jargon in the interface.

That being ignored, this is a copyright warning, not a general warning - it should stay that way lest we fall down the slippery slope. Besides, the people who violate WP:COI seem often to ignore warnings given directly, let alone ones through the software.

On a personal note, I don't mind what this message says, as I have disabled it through CSS anyway. Nihiltres^{t.l} 20:49, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Should probably include that the GFDL is irrevocable

We're seeing a lot of "but I own the copyright!" sorts of complaints, and it takes a long time to make people realize that the GFDL is forever. As a result, I just changed the third sentence of this warning from "You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL" to "You irrevocably agree to release your contributions under the terms of the GFDL". (I am a bit iffy on the word "irrevocably"; it's not an easy term for beginning English speakers, and it's very legalistic, which might cause some native English speakers to gloss over it.)

It's a minor change, and it won't affect the people who gloss over everything anyway, but I think it could help reduce some of the silly complaints. Please feel free to rephrase or undo as appropriate. - Jredmond (talk) 15:31, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Insert objection to the length of the warning here. —Centrx→talk • 15:47, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

You're an admin, you can fix it. Be bold, etc. - Jredmond (talk) 15:53, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure the length is now distinctly too long or especially important, or how it would be fixed other than by simply deleting "irrevocably" which is rather important. —Centrx→talk • 16:05, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

"must cite sources"

WP:V only requires that sources must be included for quotes and material that is challenged or likely to be challenged. In addition, WP:BLP implies tighter standards for certain info in biographies. Facts that do not fall into one of these special categories still must be verifiable (meaning that the facts already appear in print) but there is no requirement that an explicit reference must be provided. — Carl (CBM · talk) 02:25, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

*frustrated sigh* (at Wikipedia, not at you) I laid out a rationale for this change above and decided it was best to be bold, since the discussion had been had a year and a half ago and nothing came of it. I didn't think it would be particularly controversial. Given the overwhelming rate at which unsourced facts are introduced into Wikipedia I think there is a real problem to be addressed here and changing this notice would be a good way of doing it. I refer you to Jimbo's opinion on this, quoted on WP:V:

I can NOT emphasize this enough. There seems to be a terrible bias among some editors that some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information is to be tagged with a 'needs a cite' tag. Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced. This is true of all information, but it is particularly true of negative information about living persons.

And some policy from WP:CITE:

If a claim is doubtful but not harmful to the whole article or to Wikipedia, use the {{fact}} tag, but remember to go back and remove the claim if no source is produced within a reasonable time.

In reality this almost never happens, hence the two-and-a-half-year backlog. Even though, as you say, contributors may not be required to cite sources in all circumstances, don't you think it would be very strongly advisable for us to ask this of editors, given what has already been said by Jimbo and WP:CITE (so I'm not making up policy here)? How's this for a compromise?

Encyclopedic content must be verifiable, so please cite your sources.

It's not long-winded, it's accurate in that it makes citing sources a request to aid verifiability rather than a blanket requirement, and it would help to address the massive problem Wikipedia has with this. What do you think? — Trilobite 15:56, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

The version with "please" sounds good to me. I agree with the sentiment of it. It was the "must" that I found difficult. — Carl (CBM · talk) 21:58, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Great, I'm glad you agree. I suppose the 'must' was technically inaccurate so I think this is an improvement. If there are no further objections here in the next day or two I'll make the change (at which point people will actually notice and someone will revert it back again...) — Trilobite 22:14, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Pointless. The average content adder isn't going to learn the ref code any time soon. Therefor we stick to the general principle that shorter is better.Geni 20:58, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

They don't need to. Haven't you ever seen articles where the contributor is unfamiliar with Wikipedia conventions and names their sources in a non-standard way, sometimes a note at the bottom of the article, sometimes even in the edit summary? Such partial attempts at referencing can be easily tidied by an experienced editor as part of the usual wikification process. They are greatly preferable to no sources at all, leading to an {{unreferenced}} or a sea of {{fact}}s which potentially stick around for years. I can't see what terrible harm adding five words to this message is going to do. We aren't adding a whole paragraph about ref templates here but a very brief word of advice, with a link to a page that explains things in detail for those who feel like following it. I think WP:CITE is a more useful page to link to than WP:V anyway - if people get the message that they really need to be saying where they got their information from they might think twice about adding stuff that's their own personal opinion or maybe their friend told them once. Are you suggesting that adding this short phrase will make no difference whatsoever to the constant flow of unsourced material? It is so bad that there is a two and a half year backlog of articles people have tagged as unreferenced that no one has got round to doing anything about. If you don't think an instruction to cite sources will make any difference why not get rid of the link to WP:V as well, since that presumably wouldn't be making any difference either? — Trilobite 02:15, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

I have but it's not exactly common and addming more text to the interface isn't going to change that. Most people don't consider citeing sources and nothing you can do willl change that.Geni 19:14, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Then you could equally say that mentioning copyright and verifiability won't help. Do you want to remove the whole notice? Plenty of people ignore those instructions but we have them there anyway because clearly there will be some people who do pay attention. I don't see how you can state a priori that telling people to cite their sources right next to the edit box will do nothing to make anyone consider doing it. As far as I can see, five words is such a tiny addition that even a tiny improvement in the referencing of contributions would justify it. We have a huge backlog of unreferenced articles and yet no one has thought to inform in suitably explicit terms otherwise policy-ignorant people who click the edit button that they need to name their sources. It strikes me as crazy. — Trilobite 01:41, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

But will it produce an improvement in the referencing of contributions? The longer the statement gets, the less likely it is that people will read it. --Carnildo (talk) 04:05, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

I think it's important to add a note on citing sources, as IPs and new users often - or rather, almost always - don't how how to properly cite sources. And it would probably increase sourcing, which is essential, especially for BLPs, as discussed at WT:CSD. What about something like this :
Content that violates any copyright will be deleted. You irrevocably agree to release your contributions under the GFDL^*.
Encyclopedic content must be verifiable, references are required for most claims, please cite your sources.

Cenarium (talk) 21:13, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose I oppose edit notice proliferation generally. Here I doubly oppose because the assumptions we make about who will source content, why and when are faulty. I suspect that a vast majority of new users or IP editors add content because they "know" it is true and don't bother citing it because the reference formatting is cumbersome, because it is 'common knowledge' in their discipline or because they are under what we would term the misapprehension that due to the nature of the wiki, someone else will come along to source it. Adding an edit notice will not change any of those mindsets and is likely (if it changes behavior at all) to just prevent a beneficial edit from being made. As much as it might infuriate all of us, we (the registered editors who are "active" on the project) represent a minority of the edits made to the encyclopedia and the norms we have established for sourcing content appear alien and binding to most people who aren't part of this little encultured group. If you don't believe me, ask someone who doesn't edit wikipedia how much of a given paragraph in an article needs an inline source. That doesn't mean that our opinions about sourcing are wrong (on the contrary, most peoples' assumptions about sourcing comes from reading books and the newspaper, two media which do not match our sourcing needs for various reasons and to varying degrees). It just means that we shouldn't expect the average new/non-frequent editor to share them. Adding a little note to the notice which appears under every edit made doesn't change this. Protonk (talk) 23:24, 12 April 2009 (UTC)
• Swap the penultimate comma for a semicolon and you have my support :D. This is not about forcing newbies to learn <ref>...</ref> tag syntax, this is about asking them to give us some clue about where they got their information from (and hopefully to help a few of them clock on to the fact that they must have actually got their information from somewhere). No matter how and where they put the reference, it's infinitely easier for an experienced editor to tidy it up than for them to find a whole new source from scratch. Happy‑melon 09:54, 17 April 2009 (UTC)
• bad idea The vast majority of content added is added by people who don't have the time or inclination to add sources. And the vast majority of that content is fine and simply needs to be eventually sourced. This will simply discourage the addition of otherwise good content. JoshuaZ (talk) 04:02, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Licensing transition

{{editprotected}} Please change notice to:

Per the licensing transition.

Note, if we do end up mirroring the legal code on the site locally like with the GFDL, you may change the link. I also provided a link for the requesting permission and made things a bit more detailed. ViperSnake151  Talk  00:51, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Not done: That's a huge difference to the current version, so this probably needs some discussion. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 13:51, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Hi, I am a sysop from Thai Wikipedia. Your new design is quite impressive, so we already adopted it here with some modification. --th:user:Taweetham 13:38, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, big templates like that so that we scare away any potential editor. Commons can use them, as they almost never actually edit content, and I really wonder how new users can find the 'save page' button there. Seriously though, the three lines from the message are legally sufficient and do their job well. No need for that. Cenarium (talk) 16:09, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

That's true considering your current English Copyrightwarning page. I don't think the new design is appropriate here since the text will be quadruple. However, for Thai Wikipedia, we have used such a very long text for some times, and we readily adopted your innovative design. Just want to tell ViperSnake151 that his stuff may not be useful here, but it useful for us. Thanks -- th:user:Taweetham17:15, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Length

This is getting longer. More and longer instructions means people are less likely to read them. Is there any way this can be shorter? --Apoc2400 (talk) 17:51, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

I have worked it down to three lines, although it wasn't the intent of my changes. Dekimasuよ! 03:44, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Could Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License 3.0 be shortened to CC-BY-SA 3.0 ? Cenarium (talk) 16:14, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

You can try it and see if anyone minds. I left that one when I changed GFDL because I figured that people who are used to GFDL might not be familiar with Creative Commons licensing yet. Dekimasuよ! 16:29, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

"You agree to be credited"

Why does this provision of the license need to be stated here, where the particular provision of the license were never stated here before? If this message must state that contributors agree to be credited minimally, surely the message must state that the contributor agrees for his contributions to be re-used by anyone for any purpose, and other important provisions, but these provisions are substantially part of the GFDL and were never included in this message. —Centrx→talk • 01:40, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Take it up with Erik, he has a strong opinion about that bit. Dragons flight (talk) 02:21, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Where is that opinion expressed if not here or at m:Licensing update? Why do you think there is any strong opinion on the inclusion of this provision? —Centrx→talk • 05:40, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

m:Talk:Licensing update/Implementation for one. Also at some length on one of the mailing lists (licom-l? foundation-l?), not sure which at the moment. Dragons flight (talk) 08:04, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

I find ample discussion of the provision itself, but no discussion of its inclusion in this message, or why it alone deserves special mention before all other provisions, where none were included before. The provision is present in the Terms of Use.

If this provision is unique because it alone is incorporated by the Creative Commons license, which lets the author reduce attribution under section 4(a), that fact and this provision may be better included at Wikipedia:Text of Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Presently, we can shorten and simplify this provision like:

You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license.

—Centrx→talk • 05:46, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Obsolete

Please note that on Wikimedia Foundation wikis, this message is replaced by MediaWiki:Wikimedia-copyrightwarning as of June 29, 2009.--Eloquence* 21:29, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

I have moved the previous page and the talk to the appropriate location, and restored your version. -- Luk ^talk 09:28, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I feel like the proper solution would be to move it back and mark as obsolete. I don't think meta:Licensing update/Implementation#Terms for edit screen allows for "content that violates any copyrights" and "verifiability" to be included in this message. — AlexSm 15:07, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Don't extra indications fall under the allowance for "Detailed instructions" mentioned below the main terms? Dekimasuよ! 15:17, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, individual communities are free to expand upon, stylize, and otherwise localize what appears here as long as they include at least the same basic elements provided by the WMF. Dragons flight (talk) 19:08, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

When I moved it both messages were identical (except for a comma). Keeping the proper history seemed like the right thing to do. -- Luk ^talk 15:56, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Encyclopedic content must be verifiable.

Question: Why does a "copyright warning" interface message declare that "Encyclopedic content must be verifiable."? Rd232 ^talk 15:01, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Also, am I right in thinking that MediaWiki:Copyrightwarning2 is also obsolete? Rd232 ^talk 15:05, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

It seems to be replaced by this page, and MediaWiki:Wikimedia-editpage-tos-summary, and the 3 bulleted points at the end of MediaWiki:Edittools. There's quite a bit of redundancy between these 3 sets of warnings. Cleanup endorsed ;)

There's some discussion at MediaWiki talk:Wikimedia-editpage-tos-summary - I'm going to collate those links into a template, to put on the talkpage of each, so that I/we don't have to hunt to find them all... -- Quiddity (talk) 19:27, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Warn people they are liable for defamation and other things

People don't understand that when they write on wikipedia, they are basically amateur journalists, with no training about the legal issues surrounding defamation and libel law. I would highly recommend linking to the Electronic Frontier Foundation 'bloggers legal guide' or other similar guide material. This is a massive, gaping hole just waiting for the law to come crashing down on some hapless person who thought the internet was free.

Example: see en:Gutnick_v_Dow_Jones (an Australian man sued US Company 'Dow Jones' for defamation, over an article published on the internet. He sued in an Australian court where libel law was extremely favorable for plaintiffs).

Wikimedia is setting itself up for a lawsuit when some joe schmoe editor gets sued then sues wikimedia for not warning him/her. reposting with message board bump. Decora (talk) 20:07, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Edit request

{{edit protected}} MediaWiki:Wikimedia-copyrightwarning Could you remove the part about the WP:GFDL since text licensed under the GFDL is no longer compatible with Wikipedia and since WP:CC-BY-SA supersedes it. Regards, —Ғяіᴆaз'§Đøøм • Champagne? • 10:18am • 23:18, 25 October 2010 (UTC)

Not so. Currently material is jointly licensed under both the GFDL and the CC-BY-SA, as you will see if you look at the copyright notice immediately under the editing box while you are editing. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:32, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

That notice IS what I want edited, I understand full well a lot of material is dual licensed, however, per WP:CC-BY-SA the GFDL is no longer compatible with Wikipedia, if you take a look at the footer you will see it says,

"Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. See Terms of Use for details. Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization."

Nowhere does it mention the GFDL, I understand that it's been like this since the CC-BY-SA dual license system was introduced. —Ғяіᴆaз'§Đøøм • Champagne? • 4:25pm • 05:25, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Your premise is incorrect. Dual licensing is fully allowed, atm you are allowed to 'pick' the license under which you want to use the material, because the editors have granted you BOTH licenses. The compatibility issue that you point out, is with replacing one license with the other. So you cannot relicense pure CC-by-sa-3.0 material under the GFDL if you are not the original author, but the original author can grant you BOTH licenses at the same time. If you want people to only release all their material as CC-by-sa-3.0 when they commit, then you should probably raise a discussion on the Village pump, to get a wider consensus on the issue. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:15, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Ah thanks for the clarification :) Regards, —Ғяіᴆaз'§Đøøм • Champagne? • 9:23pm • 10:23, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Language Above the "Edit" Summary

The legal department would like to implement new language that would appear on the editing page of the various Wikimedia sites. For example, on the editing page of Wikipedia, we propose replacing the following language:

You irrevocably agree to release your contributions under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL. You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license. See the Terms of Use for details.

In its place, we would substitute:

By clicking the “Save Page” button, you are agreeing to the Terms of Use and the Privacy Policy, and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL. You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license.

Please note that we would keep the preceding language: Content that violates any copyrights will be deleted. Encyclopedic content must be verifiable.

These changes are part of our ongoing review of the website, and we hope they help ensure even greater clarity and consistency in language throughout the sites. Geoffbrigham (talk) 23:02, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Sounds OK to me. Amalthea 07:41, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

{{editprotected}} For the link to the Terms of use, could an interwiki be used instead? [[wikimedia:Terms of Use]] Also, would linking to the respective onwiki pages for the CC-A/SA 3.0 and GFDL licenses be appropriate? —James ^{(Talk • Contribs)} • 6:58pm • 08:58, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure I follow, it's already using interwiki links to wmf:Terms of Use and wmf:Privacy policy. Regarding the links to the license texts, I presume it is necessary to link to the actual license you agree to with every edit; an encyclopedic article describing the licenses is likely not enough. It should be OK though to add hatnotes to the license text pages, pointing at the respective mainspace articles. Amalthea 13:54, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Oops nevermind, I need to clear my cache. —James ^{(Talk • Contribs)} • 11:04pm • 13:04, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Hyperlink or URL sufficient?

Hi. :) A contributor at my talk page was a little concerned about potential confusion here, since attribution is not always given by a hyperlink or url. Since ToU is linked, the language is probably sufficient, but would it help to clarify matters to mention that a list of authors is also a possibility? Perhaps altering "You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license" to something like "You agree that a list of authors or a hyperlink/URL are sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license"? --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:06, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

I was the one that brought this up as I'd forgotten the full terms of use said an author list was OK and so was questioning some attribution where a list of authors had been used based on the text in this warning. I suspect many people won't read the full terms of use and it's not unreasonable, given the current language, to think that the URL/hyperlink method is the only method. I suspect technically we're OK given the linked terms of use but I think it would bring more clarity to normal editors if this was included. Dpmuk (talk) 13:21, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

I agree there's potential for confusion. Upon first reading of the line I took it to be saying that a URL is sufficient attribution for submitted CC content, which doesn't make sense. The line I guess is referring to possible future attributions to the original content they are about to submit. I propose that the whole wording be rephrased as

By clicking the "Save page" button, you agree to the Terms of Use and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL with the understanding that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient for attribution.

This is actually shorter, more succinct, and reads well. Jason Quinn (talk) 03:38, 28 September 2012 (UTC)

"Save Page" should be "Save page" to match the button

The text says, "By clicking the 'Save Page' button" but the actual button says "Save page". The capitalization is different. Jason Quinn (talk) 00:37, 28 September 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I just came here to say the same. Adding a {{sudo}} tag so that this can be resolved. To the passing admin: ideally it would actually transclude the message itself (MediaWiki:Savearticle). That means changing "Save Page" to "{{MediaWiki:Savearticle}}". Thank you! --MZMcBride (talk) 19:00, 7 December 2012 (UTC)

 Done Rjd0060 (talk) 07:10, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

<br> to <br />

There was a <br> recently added to this. Please change it to <br /> because any script that parses a wiki page as XML is broken, thanks. Gary King (talk · scripts) 03:28, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

At present we don't serve XML - we serve HTML 5.0, where both <br> and <br /> are valid. --Redrose64 (talk) 19:12, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Indeed, both are valid. Which is why I suggest using it with the slash, because some scripts read wiki pages as XML so they are easier for the scripts to navigate, etc., using XPath, for instance. Gary King (talk · scripts) 20:33, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

It may not be what you intended to say, but "any script that parses a wiki page as XML is broken" is indeed true. Anomie⚔ 03:40, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

Could we not just remove the br entirely? Breaking up those sentences is illogical - the second sentence flows directly from the previous in intent and meaning, and at some resolutions doing so also serves to make the copyright warning take up more space than it needs to. -— Isarra ༆ 07:58, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

See the discussion here for a rationale. And, sure, I've added a slash. Nobigdeal ;p. Ironholds (talk) 17:13, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

As the OP, I amended that discussion with a reply. I strongly disagree with the rationale given. Jason Quinn (talk) 20:05, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

Change text

I propose the text is changed to:

By clicking the "Save page" button, you agree to the Terms of Use and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL with the understanding that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient for attribution.

The current version has grammar, clarity, and type-setting issues (see User_talk:Ironholds#br_tag_in_MediaWiki:Wikimedia-copyrightwarning) which have gone unanswered. This a high-visibility template and it should be highly polished. Jason Quinn (talk) 19:19, 23 October 2012 (UTC)

Not done: First off, the green is awful (or was adding the green not part of your proposed edit?). Second, the underscores need to be removed from your proposed version. Most importantly, has your proposed wording been approved by Wikimedia Foundation's General Counsel? I could see changing "Save Page" to "Save page" to match MediaWiki:Savearticle, but the rest is a little more than typesetting issues and should be reviewed in case it subtly changes the meaning somehow. Anomie⚔ 01:04, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

The green is not part of the proposal. As for the underscores, it is immaterial to me if they stay or they go. I am unaware of any policy or guideline that says underscores should be removed. If there is one, please provide a link so I can read it. I'm glad you noticed the "Save page" issue which I forgot to explicitly mention. As for the Wikimedia Foundation's General Counsel, according to the wording of the edit warning template, an administrator should contact "Philippe Beaudette once they're ready to make a change, and permission will be granted if the change is safe." You are an administrator. I am not. If you would, please send the proposed wording on my behalf. Jason Quinn (talk) 03:17, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Ok, message sent. I don't know offhand where a guideline on underscores versus spaces in wikilinks might be, if it's even written down rather than just common practice; I'd guess it would be somewhere under WP:MOS. I do know changing the underscores to spaces is part of AWB's general fixes, and I personally find it makes the wikitext a bit more readable in most cases. Anomie⚔ 04:25, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Just to let you know, I've contacted the legal team. --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 10:53, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Hold the presses, there's one small issue. Attribution is required for CC-BY-SA 3.0 but GFDL's requirements are more complicated, so perhaps the very last part is better written as:

By clicking the "Save page" button, you agree to the Terms of Use and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL with the understanding that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient for CC-BY-SA 3.0 attribution.

The interplay between the CC-BY-SA 3.0 and GFDL is not obvious legally. So that very last part about attribution have to have special attention to make sure it's 100% kosher. Jason Quinn (talk) 17:18, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Duly updated legal. :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 17:29, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

It's so numbery, though. Personally I find the original wording of that part, calling it 'the creative commons license' a lot more friendly. Bit longer, but also less daunting:

By clicking the "Save page" button, you agree to the Terms of Use and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL with the understanding that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient for attribution under the Creative Commons license.

But maybe that's just me. -— Isarra ༆ 19:04, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

What about adding a wikilink to "Creative Commons license"? ···Vanischenu^「m/_Talk」 12:10, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

Linking to that could be good, but I like replacing the phrase "Creative Commons license" because the connection between "CC-BY-SA 3.0" and "Creative Commons" is not obvious for someone unfamiliar with copyright licenses. I suppose we could spell out "Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0", but I think that's unnecessary given that it's already wikilinked. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 08:39, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

With apologies for the delay, I come with response from legal. :) They see no issues with this proposed change. --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 17:50, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

INTEND TO MAKE CHANGE: I missed User:Mdennis (WMF)'s update that the response that the proposed new wording was okayed by the legal team. Barring no soundly justified objection, I intend to change the text to the last proposed wording above. Jason Quinn (talk) 16:27, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi, User:Philippe (WMF). You as given as the current necessary contact before any changes to the copyright message. As per the above discussion, I would like to see the copyright notice changed to:

By clicking the "Save page" button, you agree to the Terms of Use and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL with the understanding that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient for CC-BY-SA 3.0 attribution.

This change does NOT include the p tags used for the green border (or the green border itself). Just the text and the links highlighted in green. The change was approved last year but never implemented. As per the above, this change approves on the current version in several ways. Jason Quinn (talk) 01:55, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

@Jason Quinn: my only objection (which should be corrected either way) is that Creative Commons actually calls the license "CC BY-SA 3.0" (note the lack of hyphen between cc and by). Provided that is changed, I have no objection to the change you specify. Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 20:12, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

@Philippe (WMF): Ohhh... good catch. Here's what I am going to change it to then:

By clicking the "Save page" button, you agree to the Terms of Use and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL with the understanding that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient for CC BY-SA 3.0 attribution.

If there are no more tweaks, I will make the change. Thanks for the quick reply. Jason Quinn (talk) 21:13, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

Works for me. Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 22:04, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

 Done Jason Quinn (talk) 01:52, 2 April 2014 (UTC)

Plain English, please

While the legal force of the current message has no doubt been carefully crafted, I'd like to point out that the current text is pretty impenetrable to the average user. "Don't submit other people's copyrighted material." is the sort of thing that would be very useful to effectively communicate, and this message doesn't really attempt the job.

I'm tired of deleting cut-and-paste copyvios by new editors creating new articles. We need to tell people what our standards are, before we penalize them for ignorance, if we actually care about new editors. --j⚛e decker^talk 04:52, 4 March 2014 (UTC)

If the warning at the top of the edit box isn't working, why do you think that adding one at the bottom will help? --Carnildo (talk) 03:30, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

Well now, there I go, not paying attention. Sorry 'bout that. --j⚛e decker^talk 04:43, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 9 September 2016

Suggest changing:

<!-- Please do not change this text without talking to the Wikimedia Foundation's General Counsel!!!  Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. -->
<p>By clicking the "{{MediaWiki:Savearticle}}" button, you agree to the [[wmf:Terms_of_Use|Terms of Use]] and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the [[Wikipedia:Text_of_Creative_Commons_Attribution-ShareAlike_3.0_Unported_License|CC BY-SA 3.0 License]] and the [[Wikipedia:Text_of_the_GNU_Free_Documentation_License|GFDL]] with the understanding that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient for CC BY-SA 3.0 attribution.</p>

To:

<!-- Please do not change this text without talking to the Wikimedia Foundation's General Counsel!!! -->
<p>By clicking the "{{MediaWiki:Savearticle}}" or "{{MediaWiki:Savechanges}}" button, you agree to the [[wmf:Terms_of_Use|Terms of Use]] and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the [[Wikipedia:Text_of_Creative_Commons_Attribution-ShareAlike_3.0_Unported_License|CC BY-SA 3.0 License]] and the [[Wikipedia:Text_of_the_GNU_Free_Documentation_License|GFDL]] with the understanding that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient for CC BY-SA 3.0 attribution.</p>

This is to accommodate the interface change that may make the button use either of these labels now. — xaosflux ^Talk 02:46, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

 On hold Pending WP:OFFICE approval. — xaosflux ^Talk 02:49, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Disabled request pending approval — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 11:47, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

@Xaosflux: Something changed! VarunFEB2003 13:14, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

• Why can't we say, By saving this page, you agree...? I routinely save pages by hitting the return key on the edit summary line, not by pressing the "Save page" button. If we are concerned about precision, it would seem that I technically did not agree to the terms listed in the notice, since I saved the page without clicking the "Save page" button. Mz7 (talk) 14:55, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Agree VarunFEB2003 15:55, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

I'm fine with that too. Still waiting for WMF. — xaosflux ^Talk 16:39, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Hi @Xaosflux: Thank you for pinging me. I reviewed and actually believe that the following is the Legal-approved language, which can be found on Phabricator and doesn't specifically mention buttons so should work for both scenarios:

By saving changes, you agree to the [https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Terms_of_Use Terms of Use], and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_Creative_Commons_Attribution-ShareAlike_3.0_Unported_License CC BY-SA 3.0 License] and the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_the_GNU_Free_Documentation_License GFDL]. You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license.

Hope that helps! Mpaulson (WMF) (talk) 18:55, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Works for me. Thanks, Mz7 (talk) 19:48, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

 Done - Also removed the former staff name, referring to the position; used wikilinks for plain linking to documents. — xaosflux ^Talk 22:36, 9 September 2016 (UTC)