Meta:Requests for help from a sysop or bureaucrat

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Requests for help from a sysop or bureaucrat (at Meta-Wiki only)

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Meta-Wiki has a small active community. When a normal user requires the assistance of an administrator or bureaucrat for some particular task, it is not always easy to find one. This page helps users find one when they need one; asking specific admins directly via their talk pages is one way to elicit a fast response. It is only for assistance required at Meta-Wiki, help for other wikis needs to be requested at those wikis.

• Before posting to this page, make sure your comment doesn't belong at one of these specific request pages:
  • Requests for (translation/central notice/interface) adminship on this Meta-Wiki
  • Requests for CheckUser information on this Meta-Wiki
  • Requests for oversight of edits on this Meta-Wiki
  • General requests for permissions on other wikis
  • Requests for CentralNotice banners and campaigns
• Import is currently enabled in this wiki from some projects. From other wikis, you will need to copy and paste your materials by hand but please remember to add a link, as a permanent link, and the history of the page being imported in the edit summary to avoid copyright violations.
• To report vandalism on Meta: please click here. For immediate assistance, join #wikimedia-meta^connect and use !admin@meta to notify administrators.
• To report cross-wiki vandalism see Steward requests/Miscellaneous.

See also: Stewards' noticeboard, Access to nonpublic personal data policy noticeboard, Category:Meta-Wiki policies, Category:Global policies

General requests for: help from a Meta sysop or bureaucrat · deletion (speedy deletions: local · multilingual) · URL blacklisting · new languages · interwiki map

Personal requests for: username changes · permissions (global) · bot status · adminship on Meta · CheckUser information (local) · local administrator help

Cooperation requests for: comments (local) (global) · translation

Meta-Wiki maintenance announcements [edit]

General maintenance announcements:

(as of 18 April 2025)

• Assistance with Meta-Wiki maintenance is always welcome.
• Many files awaiting review for basic {{information}}, source and license.

---

Discussions:

(as of 18 April 2025)

• Proposal to amend Meta-Wiki's inactivity policy (April 11, 2023).

(Last updated: 2023-11-09)

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Please find answered requests in the archives (this month).

SpBot archives all sections tagged with {{Section resolved|1=~~~~}} after 1 day and sections whose most recent comment is older than 10 days.

Is it possible to locate a user by an old nickname?

Hello! I have a nickname "324324324323c" related to a WMF projects. However, I failed to locate any mentions and any edits of this nickhame. They were, probably, in Russian encyclopedic articles. I know that I've probably filled a rename request for this user to stewards due to inactivity, but I am not sure.

I even have a password, but I can't post it publicly. That was my old account.

Is it possible to somehow find out what was the new nickname for this user? If that's the wrong place to request this, where should I do the request? Thank you. QuestioningSomeone (talk) 11:44, 12 April 2025 (UTC)

@QuestioningSomeone: If by nickname you mean username, then it is possible to find any renamed user's new username from Special:Log/renameuser by entering the user's old username in the Target field. However this is not possible for very old usernames such as those before SUL finalisation. – Svārtava (tɕ) 12:06, 12 April 2025 (UTC)

Thanks.

It might be that my data is somehow wrong, and, while I posted the nickname, I don't remember something important about it. Maybe the nickname I mentioned was never registered actually, somehow, despite my data. I edited approximately in 2018 and after.

If there is no other way to locate the account, this can be closed.

For Russian citizens and other affected people (legal notice): I've accidentally posted a link to a WMF Page of a Project. Please never think that the information at the Page was "accurate". The information doesn't represent my opinion and should be viewed as an example of "WMF's problematic/wrong information" (according to Russian government). I disagree with the information. I view the information with criticism. The information wasn't proven/confirmed by Russian governmental sources and may be "inaccurate". Posting of a link to a page of WMF's site was a mistake that I regret. The link was never meant to commit any unlawful actions and was quickly removed from the last page version when problematic content on the page was noticed. According to the current Russian law, we can't say that information about any so-called "wars" or "invasions" is "accurate and correct", we can't say that the terms used on the pages are "accurate and correct", that the political events are described "correctly", and we can't say that the data about any so-called deaths and so-called causes of political actions, or any other political events is "accurate, correct and proven by Russian governmental sources". Please do not rely on any such information anywhere worldwide where Russian law is in force. Also note that, regardless of the WMF's opinion on the matter, posting of such information may be a violation of WMF's terms of use, even when WMF doesn't regard it as a violation. At WMF's projects, it's technically not possible to hide an edit from public view without people with extended rights. I also hereby demand a hide of all edits of this account from public view, if possible. QuestioningSomeone (talk) 13:40, 12 April 2025 (UTC)

If you find any page you edited, you can look at the page history of the page, and it will show all the edits, and who made them. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:25, 12 April 2025 (UTC)

Event organizer for TheJackNation

Global user: TheJackNation (talk • contribs • User rights • global contributions • CentralAuth • block log)

Reason for request: I am writing to request event organizer right

Criteria met: •⁠ ⁠No active blocks: No •⁠ ⁠Global edits: 1,976 •⁠ ⁠Additional Criteria: interest in organizing.

Additional information:

--~~ TheJackNation (talk) 10:59, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

@TheJackNation: What will you organize? – Phương Linh (T · C · CA · L · B) 11:01, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

AfroCreatives Wikiproject 2025 in Rwanda TheJackNation (talk) 11:03, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

Done – Phương Linh (T · C · CA · L · B) 11:12, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

Thank you! TheJackNation (talk) 11:17, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

 This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. – Phương Linh (T · C · CA · L · B) 11:12, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

Unblocking on Turkish Wikipedia

I tried submitting an appeal on https://utrs.wmcloud.org/ but never received a verification email, even after multiple attempts. Can someone from the UTRS team or the global community assist me with this issue? My appeal is regarding a block on Turkish Wikipedia under the username Buzutku. Buzutku (talk) 12:11, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

@Buzutku: You have been blocked for abusing multiple accounts in Turkish Wikipedia. You should ask for unblock there, Meta admins or stewards can't help you much. Apologize. – Phương Linh (T · C · CA · L · B) 12:13, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

This. Note, trwiki doesn't participate in "UTRS" so putting a request there, just like putting a request here - will not be able to be completed. — xaosflux ^Talk 12:23, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

Thank you for the responses.

However, I would like to respectfully object to the way this matter is being handled. I was indefinitely blocked on Turkish Wikipedia with the claim that I am a sockpuppet. This is not true, and I was never presented with any behavioral or technical evidence.

I made several attempts to appeal through UTRS and Meta, and I’ve now been told that Turkish Wikipedia does not accept appeals through UTRS, and that I should just \"apologize\" and move on.

But apologizing for something I did not do is against the spirit of Wikimedia's core values—transparency, fairness, and due process. There is no justification for asking someone to confess to something they are innocent of, simply to be unblocked.

My account was blocked without proper evidence, and all global appeal channels seem to be closed to me. I have therefore opened a formal Request for Comment to ask for a review of this situation.

Link: [[1]]

I kindly ask the Meta-Wiki community to consider whether the handling of this case is in line with Wikimedia's principles.

Thank you. Buzutku (talk) 12:25, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

If you need more input then just create RFC page. As I said above, Meta admins and stewards cannot help you here. – Phương Linh (T · C · CA · L · B) 12:28, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

Note: The malformed link above goes to a malformed RFC here if anyone is interested: Requests for comment/Unfair Block and Appeal Failure on Turkish Wikipedia. — xaosflux ^Talk 12:29, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

And now, Requests for comment/Unfair block and failed appeal on Turkish Wikipedia. — xaosflux ^Talk 21:44, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

 This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. — xaosflux ^Talk 12:23, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

New AbuseFilter: Distant translations

I've seen some edits to translation pages that are obviously not translations because they are very distant in size, and have warned the users. I think this would be better prevented by an abuse filter. This filter would prevent edits where the total length of the replaced lines is less than 75% or more than 150% of what it replaced, which is what the edits I warned users about had in common.

Example edits: Special:Diff/28565369 Special:Diff/28564157

Faster than Thunder (talk) 01:08, 18 April 2025 (UTC) (edited)

Please provide some example diffs of what you think the AF should stop. — xaosflux ^Talk 01:19, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

Provided! If you find any more edits, feel free to add them to my original message. Faster than Thunder (talk) 01:34, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

Event organizer for NellySelem

Global user: NellySelem (talk • contribs • User rights • global contributions • CentralAuth • block log)

Reason for request: I am organizing an in-the-classroom editathon for a Computational Biology grant

Criteria met:

• No active blocks: No
• Global edits: 464
• Additional Criteria: grant recipient, and interest in organizing.

--NellySelem (talk) 11:59, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

Done – Phương Linh (T · C · CA · L · B) 12:01, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

 This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. – Phương Linh (T · C · CA · L · B) 12:01, 18 April 2025 (UTC)