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Notify editors of a new-language proposal in languages which they speak

At Requests for new languages, proposals often languish with little input, I imagine largely because nobody knows about them. User categories for language proficiency exist on 243 Wikipedia projects (and presumably more on other projects), imo a global bot should be created that notifies users when there is a proposal in a language they speak. Obv spam is a concern which can hopefully be addressed. I don't know if this is the right place to discuss, made a wish as well. Thoughts? Kowal2701 (talk) 14:27, 30 April 2026 (UTC)

RNLs do not need a lot of input, especially not if the language is already well-established as a language used by Wikimedia users. So that would not be very helpful. --MF-W 21:41, 1 May 2026 (UTC)

Hi, I'm not sure I understand what you mean, AFAICT an incubated project needs an active group of editors for it to be launched. Using Xiang Wikipedia as an example, this proposal would notify editors who have en:Category:User hsn (incl. its sub-templates) on their user page (of which there are 4 on enwiki alone) that there is an incubated Xiang-language wiki that they can join and help start Kowal2701 (talk) 00:44, 2 May 2026 (UTC)

If a test-project has active speakers, it should be up to them to potentially contact other speakers of the language. Certainly not something that can just be mass-messaged by anyone who sees that a test-project exists. Also, there are many reasons why people are not already contributing. -- MF-W 19:40, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

Certainly not something that can just be mass-messaged by anyone who sees that a test-project exists., why on earth not? If it gets more input into the test-wikis and doesn’t cause disruption, I fail to see how that isn’t desirable. Do people not want there to be more projects? Is RNL supposed to be a quagmire that’s incredibly difficult for volunteers to surpass, wherein they get next to no support? Kowal2701 (talk) 20:14, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

It's not really friendly to spam people about a project that you know nothing about. It would be more polite to coordinate the messaging with any active participants of a test-project. In addition to potentially avoiding social problems (like contacting someone who opposes the test-project), this would also make it possible to get translations for the message into that language. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:09, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

I'd personally oppose operating such a bot just for promoting RFL supporters, as it will only cause unnecessary harrasements. But if and when there are important subdomain changes (create, close, and/or delete), I certainly support bot notifying. ~2026-23305-80 (talk) 03:03, 2 May 2026 (UTC)

Just to clarify, this isn't to get more input into the actual requests, but to get more users actively editing in the incubator so that the projects can be successfully launched as new wikis. Sorry, I should've linked to Incubator in my first sentence instead of RFL Kowal2701 (talk) 18:21, 2 May 2026 (UTC)

Just post a message to the Village pumps of the language in question. Posting a message to all of the active members of those projects/websites is almost never going to be justifiable spam. It will also definitely get you into deep trouble with Europeans, myself included. The message being about Incubator instead of RFL changes absolutely nothing. Snævar (talk) 18:40, 10 May 2026 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting that we message all members of any project, just members who have a language category on their userpage that corresponds to a current proposal at RFL. Eg. if there was a proposal for a Northern Sami Wikipedia, I'd notify active editors in no:Kategori:Bruker se (which is about 10 editors), as well as those in that category on other Wikipedias Kowal2701 (talk) 18:51, 10 May 2026 (UTC)

That's 10 editors, but if you leave out the ones who are beginners and the ones who haven't edited for a long time, it's only five. There are individuals who grumble about any messages being "spam", but they are a minority. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:29, 10 May 2026 (UTC)

I've tried to use those categories before, and I found that they were mostly useless due to the high proportion of inactive editors listed there. For example, in w:en:Category:User hsn, five editors are listed and only one (1) has made an edit there in the last two years. Even zhwiki only has a few dozen in w:zh:Category:Hsn 使用者. That said, if you wanted to notify active users, then you can do that already. Just copy/paste the usernames from the cats into a list (leaving out the inactive ones), and leave a note on their User_talk: pages. If the list is unusually long, then you can use MassMessage. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:46, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing, yeah but it's messaging the editors on other language wikis (like frwiki) as well, and doing this for every proposal would take ages. I think I could request a script that collected names of active/semi-active editors who had a specific language category? Kowal2701 (talk) 19:51, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

Yes, a script could create such a list.

From Meta-Wiki, a single list of names can send messages to editors at any other wiki. See, e.g., MassMessage/Lists/Active users whose name starts with asterisk and Global message delivery/Targets/Tech ambassadors for the two different list-formatting styles. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:19, 7 May 2026 (UTC)

And, of course, one the script (or query? You might ask at w:en:WP:RAQ) exists for one language, it's easy enough to change it to make a list for another language. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:20, 7 May 2026 (UTC)

requesting global banner to advertise 2vrayn

99 million have no connections ... Due to internet blackout in iran farsi wikipedia has died i request a global banner to advertise v2rayng domain fronting free MIMT software developed by some user so we can all bypass internet censorshhip https://github.com/patterniha/MITM-DomainFronting Baratiiman (talk) 18:45, 8 May 2026 (UTC)

It's pretty unlikely that this would happen, but why would we advertise this one solution? ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 21:17, 8 May 2026 (UTC)

Better detecting bots and replacing our CAPTCHA

Hello from the Product Safety and Integrity team! After a successful trial of hCaptcha for bot detection on English, French, Japanese, and four other Wikipedias, we will be rolling out hCaptcha to all projects over the course of the next few weeks.

Specifically, this will include using hCaptcha for account creation, and for edits by newer users. This replaces the use of the traditional "type in the word" CAPTCHA that is currently required of many users for these flows. hCaptcha is set up to only challenge likely-suspicious activity, so very few humans will be interrupted at all. In our trial, we estimate that only about ~2% of human users were actually challenged.

For background - as part of our focus on securing the wikis and detecting bad-faith activity, we are building stronger protections against bots carrying out activities that are generally intended for humans, such as creating accounts and editing. As the web has evolved and computers have gotten smarter, our old CAPTCHA has become both challenging for humans and easy for computers.

We recognized this and began with a trial of hCaptcha, third-party bot detection service, to replace our old CAPTCHA. Since then, eight Wikipedias, including English, French, and Japanese, have been using hCaptcha to protect account creation and certain kinds of edits. hCaptcha is a company that specializes in bot detection, with experience protecting very large online websites while prioritizing user privacy in its design. We have implemented technical safeguards to reduce the sensitivity of the information we send to hCaptcha.

It also gives us "likely bot" signals for account creation and covered edits, regardless of whether the session was challenged. Those signals inform what we show CheckUsers and stewards, who use them to find and remove bad-faith activity that was likely done by bots and which may not have been found any other way.

You can read more about this project at our recently updated project page. We welcome comments here or at that project's talk page. Subscribe to the Wikimedia Foundation Bulletin to follow the most important news from the Foundation. Thanks! SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 13:24, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

Wikinews/Wikiversity?

Should Wikinews merge with Wikiversity? BigKrow (talk) 22:18, 13 May 2026 (UTC)

Sharing WMF and Endowment Form 990s

The Wikimedia Foundation and the Wikimedia Endowment published their Form 990s, covering the fiscal year that ran from July 2024 to June 2025. The Form 990 is an annual form required of all nonprofit organizations in the United States. You can read highlights on Diff and get answers to frequently asked questions about Form 990 for the Foundation and Form 990 for the Endowment on Meta-Wiki. Eureka-WMF (talk) 16:41, 19 May 2026 (UTC)

Universal Code of Conduct/Coordinating Committee/Election/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Event:Wikicurious: Black Broward on Wikipedia

I got led to here when clicking a banner. Could someone fix that? Nighfidelity (talk) 17:45, 20 May 2026 (UTC)

@Nighfidelity: thanks for the report. Which banner? What was the URL of the source page? ↠Pine (✉) 01:28, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

Appears to be an issue with Special:CentralNoticeBanners/edit/wikicuriousbroward per [1]. Johannnes89 (talk) 13:05, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

Speedy deletion in the Arabic Wikipedia

Hello everyone,

I have been contributing to the Arabic Wikipedia for a while. I keep facing the same administrative problems, so I am asking here for advice.

The main issues I see are:

Articles that clearly meet notability rules are deleted without discussion. The admin does not say which part of the speedy deletion policy was used. When I ask, the admin either ignores me or sends me to a "deletion request page" that stays unanswered for months.

Other admins usually defend the deleting admin personally. They do not look at the problem itself.

The Arabic Wikipedia has no working independent body to review admin actions or handle complaints.

I think these problems may also exist in other small Wikipedias. I would be grateful for any advice on how to deal with this or suggestions for a neutral mechanism to handle such behavior.

Thank you. Mutasim Elmahadi (talk) 06:55, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

• Hi @Mutasim Elmahadi: as a starting point, I suggest reaching out to one of the global sysops and asking them to comment here with their advice, preferably to one of them whose user page indicates that they can understand the Arabic language. They may have suggestions for how to proceed. While I doubt that they will have an easy solution, their cross-wiki experience may be helpful for providing advice. ↠Pine (✉) 14:35, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

May 2026 Wikimedia Café meetups regarding the Wikimedia Foundation Annual Plan

Hello! There will be two Wikimedia Café discussion opportunities during the last weekend of May. Both sessions will focus on the the 2026-2027 Wikimedia Foundation Annual Plan. Participants may attend either or both sessions.

1. Saturday, 30 May 2026 at 15:00 UTC (timestamp converter), at a time friendly to the Americas, Africa, and Europe
2. Sunday, 31 May 2026 at 05:00 UTC (timestamp converter), at a time friendly to Asia and the Pacific

Café participants are highly encouraged to read in advance at least this summary of the plan. Optionally, Café participants are encouraged to read portions of the plan that interest them and ask questions or provide feedback on the Annual Plan talk page.

Please see the Café page for more information, including tables of timestamp conversions for both sessions, the agenda, and how to register!

↠Pine (✉) 15:32, 21 May 2026 (UTC)

Follow-up to my previous message

To: The Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) and the global Wikimedia community

Subject: Drawing on experience to help reform administrative practices

I have been an active Wikimedian for four years, contributing to 21 projects with over 30,000 global edits. My academic background is in Library and Information Science (PhD), specializing in digital content and open access.

Through my modest but sufficient experience, I have observed how recurring administrative patterns – such as arbitrary speedy deletions, the failure of local appeals, and a culture of solidarity among some admins – can discourage contributors and create barriers to free knowledge.

To clarify what is meant by "solidarity among admins" in this context: - The required positive solidarity: standing with the new or inexperienced user, explaining policies kindly, and helping them understand and correct their mistakes, based on the principle of "assume good faith". This type benefits the encyclopedia and encourages participation. - The negative, biased solidarity (which I have documented in my experience): where solidarity becomes a "defensive wall" around a fellow admin who made an incorrect decision (such as deleting a clearly notable article), solely because it came from a colleague, instead of correcting or guiding them. This type makes it harder to correct administrative errors and hinders effective review mechanisms.

My goal is not to highlight my own case, but to offer my experience and insights to help improve the administrative environment, especially for new and less experienced users. I believe that fair, transparent, and humane interactions are essential for knowledge equity.

I am ready to assist, as a volunteer, in developing practical solutions: whether through monitoring, mentoring, or simply contributing to a constructive dialogue on how to apply policies with empathy. I hope my record and qualifications speak for themselves.

I am open to any discussion on how I could best serve this goal. Mutasim Elmahadi Mutasim Elmahadi (talk) 05:12, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Vote now in the 2026 U4C election

Eligible voters are asked to participate in the 2026 Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee election. More information–including an eligibility check, voting process information, candidate information, and a link to the vote–are available on Meta at the 2026 Election information page. The vote closes on 2 June 2026 at 00:00 UTC.

Please vote if your account is eligible. Results will be available by 14 June 2026. -- In cooperation with the U4C,

Keegan (WMF) (talk) 17:14, 27 May 2026 (UTC)