Water cooler

2009 2010 2011 2012

Initial

We need somewhere for random chatter, so here is somewhere! --Tango 22:52, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Gift Aid

Typo: "Don't forget that if you pay Income Tax at the higher rate you are likely to be able to claim ..." should read "likely". 92.5.50.132 10:20, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

So if you want to do a direct debit and claim gift aid what then? There is no box on the form for this.

If you honestly want people to enter personal details into this form, you need to encrypt the website. 78.105.210.252 22:59, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Apart from the typo, I'd like to say also as far as I understand it (and I have asked Her Majesty several times, the BBC Moneybox programme on a phone-in, and various charities) if you are a higher rate taxpayer you can declare the donation on the tax return (and should) but the charity does not get the difference of the basic rate and higher rate tax from Her Majesty – you do. (And then can give that to the charity if you wish, which presumably you could also claim as gift aided, in reductio ad infinitum ad nauseao). I hope this may be heplful to anyone in a similar position, sorry I cannot be more definitive. 82.29.185.61 17:03, 27 November 2011 (UTC) (More often en:User:SimonTrew)

Powerpoint Presentations

I'm new here, although not new to Wikimedia; did some anonymous editing from mid-2004 to end of 2005, haven't really had a proper account, did have some on http://en.wikipedia.org but never had email attached to any of them, so can't use them ever again, but I have just come back to Wikimedia now. Anyway, I'm someone who's into IT and can create a PPT file, which could be uploaded here if anyone wants them, in LocalSettings.php, we'd have to enable .ppt files.

Anyone interested in the idea? --Kexford 16:16, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

It would be great if you could assist with creating presentations - as per the message I just left on your talk page, both the Schools Project and Workplace Learning Lunches need presentations writing.

Do we want to use powerpoint files for this, given that they're tied to software that isn't freely available? Would it be better to stick to PDF files here on the wiki? Mike Peel 15:26, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

I agree, PDFs would be better. In addition to being a freer format they don't have the same negative connotations that Powerpoint presentations have. I was thinking about presentations a few days ago (in relation to that Italy thing that fell through) - should we put together a template so we can have a consistent look and feel to any presentations we give? That, and it would save time when make them if we didn't have to reinvent the wheel. --Tango 23:03, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

• Regarding PDFs, using Serif PagePlus's latest versions is a fairly low-budget, but high-quality way to do this. --Kexford 09:49, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Low budget? Why should we need any budget at all? There are plenty of free options. --Tango 15:01, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

for example? Saga City 17:10, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

PDFCreator is a prime example. Quatermass 20:11, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Usability

Hi all. Two thoughts on usability: 1) should we switch to using the Vector skin (the beta) here as default? 2) should we use LiquidThreads? Mike Peel 16:25, 7 November 2009 (UTC)

• Beta skin? Absolutely! enWN was first to go totally over to it, the biggest issues are getting used to the moved search box and page move/protect hidden in a drop-down.
• LiquidThreads? Not yet; "conventional" page history links don't work with this.

However, I don't know if anyone has done a Vector skin for WordPress. That might be a prerequisite before changing - just so there's a consistent look-n-feel between blog and site. (I'd also like to "steal" such a blog skin for wikinewsie.org). --Brian McNeil 13:14, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Considering I wrote the current (custom) monobook skin for WordPress, I don't think that putting together a vector version will be a problem... Although if you want to use it on other sites, I'll have to tidy it up first (it currently pulls stylesheets etc. from a fixed URL)... Mike Peel 14:03, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Havign just used LiquidThreads on the Strategy Wiki I thoughts it was a great improvement and would like to suggest it's adopted here. However, I saw Brian's comments above about it not working with conventional page history links - what does that mean? AndrewRT 17:44, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Paying for images

Sorry to bother everyone, just a quick question. On a point of principle, will the chapter consider requests for content partnerships which involve a monetary sweetener? I couldn't find any guidance on this from WMF HQ, but there must be some somewhere. Obviously, it would be done on a case-by-case basis, as a last resort and so forth, but are you - er - allowed to? Thanks, Jarry1250 11:53, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Direct money transfers, i.e. paying for the content: no. Cultural partnerships are all about two-way beneficial relationships; I don't see money helping particularly there. Plus, there's the obligation to make sure that all of the charity's money is spent on charitable activities. However, doing joint activities where WMUK pays some of the costs would seem reasonable to me - e.g. events, carrying out digitization, etc. Mike Peel 12:31, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

I think there's also the problem of licensing: I don't think WMUK (or even the WMF) has the power to "buy" content off someone on behalf of Creative Commons or Free Software Foundation to make the content available as free stuff! --Deryck Chan 12:21, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

Wikimania 2010

Hey folks, just wondering if anyone would be interested in taking a group trip to Poland in the summer for Wikimania? Colds7ream 08:33, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

I would be interested. I think we should try and organise a semi-official UK delegation. --Tango 16:28, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Ditto. Mike Peel 16:43, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Excellent! :-) Unless anyone else wants to do it, I'll volunteer to have a go at organising the thing (I took my entire AstroSoc over to Florida last summer to see STS-128). Could we discuss it at the next board meeting? Colds7ream 11:45, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good. I've been thinking we should contact a few airlines and see if anyone wants to give us cheap/free flights. Let's discuss it at the meeting after next - the next one really needs to be about the budget, we've put it off too long already. --Tango 17:25, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Any more developments? Colds7ream 16:46, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Not yet. Perhaps it would be worth having a specific (short) IRC meeting to start planning this at some point, rather than waiting for a board meeting? Mike Peel 16:54, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, that's probably a good idea. I propose Monday evening, 8pm. --Tango 14:22, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

I won't be able to make that. Counter offer: some time over the weekend? Mike Peel 14:24, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm very flexible. It would be best if you suggest a specific time. --Tango 14:59, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Had to cancel my reservation, such a pity. aleichem 17:14, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

American English

Is the usage of the word "license" as a noun on the wiki and blog posts intentional? I shudder every time I read it on a British site. But I could appreciate it if it were deliberate (internationalisation?). Jarry1250 19:23, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

It's probably a mistake. When you spend too much time online you end up accidentally picking up American spellings, however much you try to resist it. Can you give examples of where it is used? In some cases, it might be used because it is the WMF, an American organisation, granting the licence, so we use their name for it. In descriptions, rather than names, it should use the British spelling. --Tango 21:08, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Members userbox

I've created a small userbox at Wikipedia:en:User:Fæ/Userboxes/WMUK rather than using the current page-wide banner. It would be neat if there were a way of confirming membership and at the same time protect privacy through some sort of Chinese wall process. Fæ 09:59, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Anonymous page creation

Hi all, I've had to delete three spam/vandalism pages in the past two days alone so was wondering about disabling page creation by anoymous users. I can't see any reason why to not do this, as any initiative proposals should be created by a logged-in member. Thoughts? Rock drum (talk • contribs) 19:27, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

On :en I feel that WP:HUMAN tends to be frequently side-stepped, however I have no such feelings about WMUK which is a space intended for creation by its subscribing members though with (hopefully) much wider readership. Consequently I would not object to some constraints on contributions here, though something as weak as enforcing CAPTCHA for all IP edits might be sufficient to deter 80% of casual vandals. Fæ 22:10, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

This is something I've opposed in the past, as I think we should aim to be as open as possible to all. However, to be honest, over the last few years we've seen very little benefits from letting anonymous people edit the site at all, let alone the issue of creating new pages. Of course, I'm not suggesting that we stop all IP edits! So, I agree that it's sensible to disable new page creation by anon users, so long as that still lets them create talk pages. Mike Peel 22:26, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Chapter board meetings - format

Hi everyone, I am Alan Walker, a director from Wikimedia Canada. We are in the process of figuring out how to hold our directors meetings with respect to process and format. I see this chapter has some seniority and I am interested in hearing from anyone who has any thoughts to share on this subject. It seems your chapter uses a mix of mailing list, the wiki and Skype. The best way to reach me is by email or by my Wikimedia Canada Talk Page. Alan.ca 15:09, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Does any UK resident want a free 1 year subscription to the London Review of Books?

If so, let me know at my talk page. You'll have to e-mail me your name & address, but otherwise no strings. Johnbod 14:50, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Interwiki links

Despite two requests above, w: still does not work as an interwiki link - eg. w:Haworth. Also, would it be possible to make en: also work - it does on the Commons - eg. en:Haworth. — RHaworth 23:46, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

I have just discovered that {{w}} is available (and now working properly) but I would still like the mods above. RHaworth 00:10, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Change Username

Can anyone tell me how to change my userna,e on this wiki? Thanks.Harrypotter 08:11, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

As you are harmonizing all your accounts under your SUL, I would ask (again?) in one bite at Wikipedia:USURP or Wikipedia:CHU/S. Complex cases are sometimes worth discussing on the associated talk page to ensure there is no misunderstanding of what you are asking for. Fæ 12:35, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Chapter scholarships

Hi there. I was wondering whether something like this was ever considered by WMUK. I think it's viable, and might alleviate the foundation's burden by a bit. :-) Mentifisto 21:09, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

No privacy policy

On IRC someone raised the issue of the lack of a page at Wikimedia:Privacy policy on this here wiki. I have no idea how to resolve this. Perhaps a board member can do so, or maybe we can nick something from Meta. Whatever. It's fairly likely that there's probably some legal requirement for us to have something in the privacy policy page. If not, it's still a link in the footer, so we should probably have something there or just have a page pointing to an overall Wikimedia privacy policy on Meta or on the Foundation site or something. Tom Morris 13:03, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

I think whatever Meta has to say is the default here. Is there a particularly good page to point to? Fæ 23:45, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

I've set the link to point the the WMF's general privacy policy. I figured it's better to have that than nothing at all. Regards, Rock drum (talk • contribs) 11:52, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Should we bid for Wikimania 2014?

Do people think we should or should not bid for Wikimania in 2014, and crucially are there people out there willing to put the time in to make this happen? If so please signup at Wikimania bid Thanks (This is the end result of a mailing list thread) WereSpielChequers 19:41, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Blog skin

Hi there, i am wondering if the blog's skin is released under a free licence and if so, where it can be downloaded.

Thanks, 78.144.19.28 15:14, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

Addenda for July Reports?

Hi all, (first post on here) Didn't realise there was a space to pass on this news but on 15th July Simon Smith Tagishsimon ran a Wikipedia workshop for post-graduate students of Archaeology, Cultural Heritage Management, Medieval Studies and Eighteenth Century Studies as part of the King's Manor Interdisciplinary Conference at the University of York. Simon was invited to participate after I met him at GLAM/NRM the month before. He generously did so free of charge. Feedback from the 15 participants was very positive and Simon stayed on for a workshop on interdisciplinary studies of the past and the conference's wine reception. PatHadley 08:26, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks - we spotted that when it was happening, but forgot to include it in this month's report. I'll add it in to the August report. :-) Congrats to Simon for doing the workshop, and thanks to yourself for arranging it. Also, welcome to the wiki! :-) Mike Peel 09:14, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

An invitation that isn't mine to make

Hi all, I'm not sure if this is the right place to post this but I was wondering about whether WMUK would be up for running a wikilounge/some sort of promo-presence at the year's biggest archaeology conference in Birmingham just before Christmas CentralTAG2010? I'm not an organiser for the conference but am co-running a session on social media and other web 2.0 tech in archaeology. It'd be great to have some wikipedians to direct curious archaeologists to after our session! It would also be a great place to promote projects such as User:Johnbod's Ice Age Art and Bronze Age projects. You'd have to contact the organisers (via the website above) soon as I believe they are trying to put together the schedule and facilities. It'd be a great thing to see! PatHadley 13:37, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Pat, I'm going to punt this around the right folks for follow-up. Cheers Fæ 21:57, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Email watchlist notification

Anybody know why I can't set my preferences to notify me when a page on my watchlist is changed, and if that can be fixed? I could do without another watchlist to check! Thanks, HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 17:08, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

That's interesting. I think there may be a dev around who knows why! (I suspect we're missing some extension or aren't running the same MW version as other WM projects. Deryck Chan 17:10, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

This function is controlled by $wgEnotifWatchlist (and if you like $wgEnotifMinorEdits too). I think it should take ~5 mins to do once someone gets around to it. (idk if they'll want "consensus" or maybe just some verifiable claim that the request came from a board member. or maybe no proof at all, really don't know. certainly something that looks official wouldn't hurt) Jeremyb 05:39, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

I've put in a bugzilla request to resolve this - hopefully shouldn't take too long for them to do. :-) Mike Peel 10:06, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

... and, fixed. Thanks to User:Reedy. :-) Mike Peel 20:07, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Charity number

Worth mentioning?

See Main page. --Fæ 08:24, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Special:WantedTemplates

Can someone explain how this special page is created and why we want all the templates listed? Thanks --Fæ 09:54, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

It is generated based on calls to templates that don't exist. See the links for where the templates were called from, which hopefully shows why they're wanted. ;-) Note that those in blue that are struck through already exist (and will be removed from the WantedTemplates list when it's next updated). Mike Peel 12:20, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

As to why User:Rich Farmbrough is copying over lots of templates to the wiki at the moment (which I presume is the reason behind your message) - that's a separate question best asked to him. ;-) Mike Peel 12:22, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Cool, I think some of these are a bit pointless on this wiki, but I'm happy with others so I'll focus on more urgent matters. --Fæ 13:48, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Disclosure in sitenotice

Why has the disclosure been put in the sitenotice? It is really necessary to have it there? Isn't it normal to put those kind of things out of the way at the bottom of a page? Also, if it does need to be there, is it right that it should be dismissable? Either it needs to be there, or it doesn't, I can't see why it would be the choice of the visitor. --Tango 18:37, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Oh, that's a weird thing to do with a sitenotice. I'd like to understand the rationale or if it was some sort of mistake. Reverted it back to empty in the meantime. --Fæ 18:40, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

I see nothing wrong with it being dismissable. Like lots of stuff, once you've read it you've read it. But maybe it should jusdt belong on About Wikimedia UK. Rich Farmbrough, 14:09, 10 December 2011 (UTC).

I think those notices tend to re-appear every time you log back in which could be a pain. Otherwise the wiki would have to lay down local cookies, probably not a reliable or welcome way of doing things. --Fæ 23:38, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

The ideal thing would be for this to go into the page footer - but I can't see how to do that aside from templates. As far as I understand matters, we have to include it wherever the content is formal/on behalf of WMUK, which probably means most pages here (e.g. it should probably be on the minutes, but probably not on the Wikimania bid pages). The site notice definitely isn't the best place for it, though. Mike Peel 00:28, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

We could try adding it to MediaWiki:Wikimedia-copyright, I think that would pretty much do it. --Tango 05:21, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Yup, that did it, thanks for pointing it out. :-) Mike Peel 12:52, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

User:WOSlinker

If WOSlinker is a bot, could its owner please create a user page explaining why and what it is up to? Thanks --Fæ 21:53, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

No, I'm not a bot. What I'm doing is updating occurences of the -moz-border-radius style (which gives the boxes rounded corners) to use the {{border-radius}} template instead which contains border-radius, -moz-border-radius & -webkit-border-radius styles. This will then mean that the rounded corners, which used to only show up in Firefox & other Mozilla browsers, will also show up on IE 9+, Chrome & Safari. -- WOSlinker 23:56, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

Actually, a lot of the styling code that's on the pages could be moved into Mediawiki:Common.css which would make the pages a bit neater. -- WOSlinker 23:57, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

That sounds like a good idea. If you leave detailed instructions on my talk page, I can make the necessary changes to Common.css (I know a little CSS, but I've never done much with Common.css). Thanks for your help! --Tango 05:27, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Admins

Hi, Wikimedia:Administrators is our currently very short and simple process for :wmuk sysops. I'm wondering if we should add a constraint that any administrator completely inactive on the site for more than 12 months will have their sysop privilege expire (they can request them again if they become active). This would avoid the risk of an indefinite number of floating unused sysop accounts. Any views on this change or suggestions for other, simple, improvements? --Fæ 15:46, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

I think that would be a good idea. In addition to the usual powers admins have on wikis, admins here also have a ability to edit "official" pages that are protected because the chapter has legal duties to make sure they say the right things. That's a serious power, so it makes sense to keep close tabs on who has it. Unused admin accounts carry two risks - the admin could come back but be out of touch so make serious mistakes, or the account could get hacked and the admin powers used for malicious purposes (of course, that can happen with active accounts too, but with active accounts the gain from them being able to do administrative tasks outweighs the risk, there isn't really any gain from inactive accounts). --Tango 17:33, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

Done --Fæ 00:10, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Foundation listing

Could someone tweak http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Local_chapters to say that we are a charity? Not in my SUL for some reason. Thanks --Fæ 22:04, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Done. The WMF wiki doesn't use SUL since it is closed for general editing - you need a separate login for it. Mike Peel 00:02, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Wikimania 2012 scholarships

The Wikimania 2012 scholarships page is now online. I'm aware that last year Wikimedia UK helped fund some scholarships on top of those provided by the Foundation budget. According to the FAQ, this year chapter scholarships will universally use the same application system as Foundation scholarships, and that applicants will automatically be considered for chapter scholarships as well, where available. Is Wikimedia UK planning to participate in this? CT Cooper · talk 21:29, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

We have a budget that will support people's attendance at Wikimania 2012, but we haven't yet had chance to discuss the details (such as the number of scholarships, the criteria, and the application method). I'd personally love to see us participating in the main application system, but the timing of this may sadly mean that this isn't possible and we may have to make use of an independent application system. In particular, the board's attention is currently focused on the Fundraising and Funds Dissemination discussion, as well as UK-specific activities, that have prevented us from discussing Wikimania 2012 thus far. Mike Peel 21:51, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm not to fussed about applying multiple times as necessary, and I understand the board has plenty of other things to think about. Thank you for your quick response. CT Cooper · talk 22:22, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Mike: If you want to do a separate application process, that's okay I guess. Or we can allow you to review UK applicants (after Feb 16) to the main scholarship system and select some. Either way, please let us know so we can plan accordingly. Cheers. Aude 21:06, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

I'll see what we can do - but there's so much going on right now that this probably needs to wait at least a week or so before we can start to think about this in any detail. Mike Peel 00:55, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

To wrap this up: we are offering scholarships via the main Wikimania scholarships program - so please apply there. :-) Thanks. Mike Peel 20:18, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

Excellent, that should make things easier for applicants. CT Cooper · talk 23:07, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

Huge foot

Every page on WMUK includes 3 lines saying "Wikimedia UK is the operating name of Wiki UK Limited, a Charitable Company registered in England and Wales. Registered Company No. 6741827. Registered Charity No.1144513. Registered Office: 4th Floor, Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street, London EC2A 4LT" in the footer. Do we really need to do this, it seems unsightly? By the way, the Main page duplicates all this information in the body, which seems doubly unsightly. --Fæ 21:26, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes. Or at least: the information in that text needs to be on official pages (and correspondence). It doesn't need to be duplicated, though - so can probably be removed from the body of pages. Mike Peel 21:45, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm wondering if it can be shrunk down, I'm not sure the Co. no., C. no. and full postal address all need to be there as opposed to on a linked contact page. It might also just be shrunk to an even smaller font or just wrapped in a way that does not take up three separate lines. --Fæ 22:57, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

I thought the address, charity number, and registered name had to be on all official pages and that seems to be the easiest way to put them there. I don't see the extra few lines at the bottom as a big deal—it's about the same as is taken up by This page was last modified on 16 January 2012 at 06:24. 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. at the bottom of Wikipedia. Harry Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 02:12, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Friendly Space policy

Does anyone have counter suggestions with regard to adopting the WMF policy for dealing with harassment at events (wmf:Friendly_space_policy)? A variation was recently created for DC m:GLAMcamp_DC/Friendly_space_policy. Unless we have a reason to create a UK variation, the WMF policy could be linked to from the Events page. --Fæ 08:27, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

I think the need to create a UK-specific version is pretty clear - e.g. from a quick look it needs to say 'Wikimedia UK' rather that 'Wikimedia Foundation', give the appropriate contact details, and be generalised to include all events rather than just conferences. It also needs to have links to the relevant UK law. There's also a couple of general changes that we'd need to make to our event organisation if we adopt this policy - e.g. ensuring that all organisers are clearly identified (by a badge according to that policy - we may want to go for T-shirts instead or similar). So I'd suggest creating a copy of it here and pointing people towards it for discussion, with the aim of putting it forward for adoption at the 11 February board meeting. Mike Peel 14:11, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

I've copied it over to here and adapted it a little for UK needs, although there is still more work to be done. Regards, Rock drum (talk • contribs) 15:24, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, I suggest further discussion for improvement is at Talk:Friendly space policy rather than here. --Fæ 15:40, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

2012 election

Would anyone care to look at setting up the 2012 election pages for questions and candidate statements? The Board Interest day (11th February) is not that far away and having these pages to refer to would probably be a good idea when explaining our election process. If anyone has ideas of how to improve the way this works, now might be a good time to put these forward. --Fæ 11:12, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

UK Wikimedian of the Year 2012

Thoughts? Corrections - Comments welcomed Victuallers 17:13, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Comparison of UK NDA with WMF NDA

According to Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2012-02-20/Special_report, the WMF is in the habit of asking Wikimedians to sign a NDA for access to some data. Perhaps someone could track it down on-wiki (assuming it has been openly published) so that we can review Non Disclosure Agreement against their best practice? Thanks --Fæ (talk) 11:09, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

I signed their NDA when I was helping out with some fundraising stuff while visiting their office. I don't have an electronic copy, and I don't know where the paper copy is. I made them modify their standard one before I would sign it (to make it clearer than it referred onto to things related to what I was doing in the office). While the non-disclosure stuff in pretty much what you would expect, they also have a non-disparagement clause. I discussed it with Mike Godwin (who was general counsel at the time - Geoff might have changed the standard agreement after he took over), who explained that they idea was to stop people using their privileged information to attack the WMF (as Danny Wool once did, if your wiki-memory goes back that far). I can see the logic in that (which is why I did eventually sign it, once appropriately restricted). --Tango (talk) 14:33, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

I was talking to Geoff about this at the finance meeting last weekend. I've dropped him an email to follow up on that and to see what's available here. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 18:06, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

House style

For this website and WMUK reports (e.g. the next Annual Report in production) and documents it would be useful to define a local Manual of Style including topics such as colour, plain English, when to use logo variations and so forth. Obviously if it can piggy-back on existing WMF or Wikipedia guidelines then we can simply defer to those pages. Has any of this been mentioned on another page or would it be useful to start creating it from scratch? --Fæ (talk) 11:21, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps the new comms person could prepare something? It would be good to have some community consultation, but most of it should be pretty uncontroversial. --Tango (talk) 19:15, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Compliance with blocks and bans elsewhere

At the moment blocks or bans on :wmuk would be considered on a case by case basis. Is there any reason for us to consider the status of long term blocks or bans on Wikimedia projects such as the English Wikipedia or Wikimedia Commons? Considering that :en is so closely entwined with most of our events, it might be sensible to take the status of a contributor on that project into account when considering how an account should be handled on this wiki. In particular someone with a history of deliberately disrupting those main projects can be argued to be in a default status of failing to comply with the :wmuk defined mission and values. --Fæ (talk) 10:37, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

As and when situations arise, then that information should be taken into consideration - but I don't think there's a need for us to take any sort of proactive approach here. Mike Peel (talk) 10:53, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

No disagreement and should it arise, then I think we ought to take into account any long term disruptive history elsewhere to judge how accounts can be trusted for this wiki. In contrast, for Commons the community deliberately ignore the status of current blocks or bans on other projects as irrelevant unless there has been agreement on :meta for a global ban (which we ought to comply with). In general, our contributor community is likely to stay small, so I doubt this will become a significant policy matter. --Fæ (talk) 12:36, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. We should consider each case on its own merits, but it makes sense to take conduct on other sites into account. --Tango (talk) 19:18, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Request for bot flag

Hi all! Please may User:Thehelpfulbot have the bot flag, I can run a double redirect fixer to empty Special:DoubleRedirects, this already runs without problems on the English Wikipedia and Meta-Wiki. On a site note, could an admin tweak Sidebar from Membership|Join from 'Membership|Join us? The latter sounds a bit more friendly. It may also be a good idea to add a link to the Board itself, so directly under "Organisation". The Helpful One 23:47, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

Sure, sounds good, thanks for volunteering to fix these. :-) The only problem is that User:Thehelpfulbot is not currently registered on this wiki, though (the userpage exists, but not the user account). If you can create the account, then I'll set the bot flag for it.

On the sidebar changes: I've changed it to read 'Join us'. I'm not sure about linking to Board since there's already rather a lot of links in the sidebar...

Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 10:04, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

Huh! I was sure that I had logged in on this wiki. Thehelpfulbot (talk) 10:48, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

Done. Mike Peel (talk) 00:50, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Random ideas page

Random ideas<-- things we could consider.Geni (talk) 23:01, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Request for comment

I am drafting a proposal at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Pine/drafts/ENWP_Board_of_Education and would like input from chapters. I would appreciate comments on the talk page. Thank you! Pine (talk) 10:52, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

How do we reduce the creeping "legalese" of our constitution and policy documents?

Hi, I have raised a question around how better to handle difficult wording on our key documents at Talk:Articles_of_Association#Difficult_legal_language, though I'm thinking that this is a more general problem that could do with rather more plain English advocacy. Anyone have good ideas on how to make this guff a bit more digestible? Cheers --Fæ (talk) 11:17, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Does Navigation popups work for you on WMUK?

I just tried out Navigation popups (check your preferences, gadgets) but it does not display correctly for me, in fact it leaves a nasty mess of un-wiped text for every internal link I hover over. Anyone have a fix? --Fæ (talk) 13:46, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

I've had a look and they don't work for me either. Pretty nasty! --Stevie Benton (talk) 15:34, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

This is something I've noticed with the popups on some other wikis, too. Does some custom CSS need to be added to MediaWiki:Common.css? Rock drum (talk • contribs) 15:53, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

How commonly is the water cooler used?

Hello everyone. As you may be aware I'm working on reviewing our communications and writing our comms strategy at the moment. One thing I wanted to take a look at in my examination of the WMUK wiki is the water cooler. I'd like to get a handle on how many people come here. So, if you're reading this before Friday 8 June, would you please pop a note here? Many thanks. --Stevie Benton (talk) 15:36, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm afraid this test isn't going to work. A lot of us follow this wiki by keeping an eye on recent changes, so having lots of people posting here will attract more people. It's not the kind of page that you specifically go to to see if anything interesting has been posted. You come here when you notice it on recent changes or your watchlist. --Tango (talk) 15:58, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

That in itself will have some value for me actually. I want to see how something on here develops in real time and how many people will respond to something without being directly pointed there. Thanks for the heads-up though, I appreciate it :) --Stevie Benton (talk) 16:06, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

You might be better off looking through the page history and seeing how actual discussions here developed. Asking people to respond is very artificial, which will severely limit the usefulness of your results. (I'm an actuary in real life, so I have a thing about statistically well-designed studies!) --Tango (talk) 17:33, 31 May 2012 (UTC)