Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)

PSA: More malware found on archive[.]today

It has recently come to light that Archive[.]today is serving malware (apparently ClickFix pages) when visiting certain PDF links. This has been discussed on Hacker News.

If you still use Archive[.]today to read paywalled articles, now is the time to stop doing so. Xacaranda (talk) 00:43, 29 October 2026 (UTC)

A recent edit at Archive.today mentioned the issue with a reddit reference. Less than ideal as a reliable source but very valid for anyone interested: https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/1xhf6qp/archivetoday_links_going_forward/ Johnuniq (talk) 01:27, 29 October 2026 (UTC)

I can verify that they are doing this; the comment at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50280058 reproduces on my computer. Sure, my own OR isn't a reliable source either, but at least it proves that this wasn't made up. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 01:39, 29 October 2026 (UTC)

@Pppery: can you reproduce it on the .onion URL? sapphaline (talk) 15:34, 30 October 2026 (UTC)

I can't reproduce the behavior even on the non-onion URL today. I couldn't get the onion URL to load as I kept running into CAPTCHAs. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 15:58, 30 October 2026 (UTC)

Thanks. If there is 1% chance that they are doing it, I will not touch it. Yesterday, all my dreams... (talk) 03:32, 30 October 2026 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Archive.today guidance. Most but not quite all of the original links are now 'hidden' (i.e., still visible in the raw wikitext but not displayed to unsuspecting readers). Please help out by checking out your favorite articles and removing/replacing them. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:33, 30 October 2026 (UTC)

Seems to be the same thing as on BTDigg (owned by the same person) when connecting from certain countries, but a lot less blatant. sapphaline (talk) 15:34, 30 October 2026 (UTC)

As I noted on r/Seattle, the title is very misleading.

archive.today is not serving malware. archive.today is redirecting to an advertising network, and that ad network is sometimes redirecting to malicious websites. archive.today has no control over the ultimate destination of the redirects.

The blame for these redirects lies with the advertising network, not archive.today In solidarity Iam-py-test (talk, she/her) 23:33, 31 October 2026 (UTC)

Archive.today shouldn't be modifying links in archived pages to point to an advertising network either. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 15:43, 5 November 2026 (UTC)

? That is not really what they are doing. This is the advertising network's fault, not them. They do not seem to be "modifying links" or anything, they update said links and those links unfortunately now link to malware. Again, not archive.today's issue. Ilov3gam3z (talk) 16:01, 5 November 2026 (UTC)

Outbound links on snapshots always go through archive.is/o/ redirects. The purpose of that is to check if the link is on the archive; if it is, it redirects to that snapshot. If not, it redirects to the intended destination. This is not new, and it is entirely benign. The difference is that between some time earlier this year and late October, those /o/ links could also go to an advertising network. The links on the snapshots themselves were unchanged; they were not "modifying links in archived pages". In any case, archive.today appears to have stopped the redirects. In solidarity Iam-py-test (talk, she/her) 16:06, 5 November 2026 (UTC)

My point stands, links in archived articles should go to the link source or archives of the link source, not an advertising network. That choice was entirely archive.today's fault, even if the malware wasn't. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 15:52, 9 November 2026 (UTC)

This doesn't seem to have anything to do with archive.today. Uninformed reddit moderators. PARAKANYAA (talk) 14:38, 3 November 2026 (UTC)

Archive.today is not doing this. There are reasons to dislike the site, but this is not one of them. Ilov3gam3z (talk) 16:20, 3 November 2026 (UTC)

Uptrust HQ made a thanks graph for wikipedia editors

https://wiki.uptrusthq.com/about
seems they've made a thanks graph. I already posted on Help talk:Notifications/Thanks, but thought i could xpost here. User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 17:19, 4 November 2026 (UTC)

clicked around a bit and my impression is that this is vibe-coded nonsense. if any of these "trust ratings" actually mean anything it's buried underneath the incomprehensible llm-ese. i looked myself up and apparently 37% of the pull on this list comes from communities that don’t claim Ltbdl, 9% of my thanks go to the Contentious Topics community, and my least trusted article is Proper Preparation and Planning (The Boys episode). and 1.4 thanks of evidence? what is four-tenths of a thank? ltbdl (talk) 15:13, 5 November 2026 (UTC)

Yes i have no clue what any of whatever these metrics all means. Agree its likely vibecoded. User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 15:30, 5 November 2026 (UTC)

Vibe coded, and I believe most if not all of the text is LLM generated. "Both are real readings of the same person" is one of the most LLM sounding sentences I've read in a while, and I grade undergrads. GeogSage ^{(⚔Chat?⚔)} 05:57, 6 November 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, I have no idea what any of this means. What does it mean for a "community" to "claim" an editor? —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 21:43, 5 November 2026 (UTC)

I think four-tenths of a thank is when you briefly and slightly nod your head upwards towards someone while retaining resting face. It's nice that this group is trying stuff like this, but a 'thank' to 'trust' mapping is quite a leap. Still, it's fun to put in accounts blocked for employing deception via sockpuppetry. Sean.hoyland (talk) 04:32, 6 November 2026 (UTC)

I'm skeptical of something that has 0% of my edits in its corpus. It's not like I only edit niche topics. I also have no connection at all with the 2026 Iran war, so the "authoritiveness" at a glance is incredibly concerning. Most of those listed articles have nothing at all to do with me and make me look like I'm some insider on the most contentious American politics articles. Like, it's not that hard to take a look at the top ten articles in xTools. That would at least be a more accurate controversial articles list. You'd think a tool would at least take that aspect into consideration. I also have no idea what 37% of the pull on this list comes from communities that don’t claim Clovermoss. A feed that routed them to their own crowd would hide this. The field shows it. is supposed to mean, but I'm guessing it has something to do with how only 1% of the "weather and transport" community is aware of me, supposedly. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 22:53, 7 November 2026 (UTC)

I guess it's just a demo on a small subset. These guys seem to want to build a social network where feeds are 'trust' based. Sean.hoyland (talk) 05:39, 8 November 2026 (UTC)

This website seems to be just rubbish. Using thanks to signify "trust" is a horrible idea due to the fact that thanks are also used as a tool to review edits. I searched up my own name and I did not recognise nearly half of the names that came up as people I "trust". I don't think that this website has any use to us as of now. ғѳmɑɭʱɑυե (Any pronouns)ᵀᵃˡᵏ 21:37, 8 November 2026 (UTC)

I agree it doesn't seem reliable. The list of people I trust/who trust me is full of people I've had multiple polite disagreements with, because often I or they will thank the compromise edit that resolves the argument. I can in contrast think of many editors that I agree with much more often. Loki (talk) 21:20, 9 November 2026 (UTC)

Great points. A thank is at best a very weak proxy for "trust". In thinking about who I thank and who thanks me, more than anything it's a reflection of which editors I interact with most, especially on complex or contentious issues where there are a lot of content edits or back-and-forth discussions. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 00:09, 10 November 2026 (UTC)

Learning about LLMs - a free tutorial about technology that is reshaping the web, and significantly impacting Wikipedia

Hey everyone, I'm Selena Deckelmann, the chief product and technology officer at the Wikimedia Foundation, and this is just a personal recommendation. LLMs have a big impact on Wikipedia – on how internet users look for information, on patrollers, our policy discussions and so on. For those who want to understand more about how the technology works, here’s a short course I think is really good. A live tutorial tutorial with audience Q&A is scheduled for November 12, and a recording will be shared after. I've taken this tutorial in person recently, and what I found helpful about this course is that it defines a number of terms and differentiates between kinds of AI-related tech (like agents), without hyping or downplaying the capabilities. Generally, I've found it helpful to learn about how this technology works from more neutral sources than the companies that market & sell products built on top of LLMs. I hope some of you find this useful. SDeckelmann-WMF (talk) 18:05, 5 November 2026 (UTC)

It is not immediately clear what use LLMs have on wikipedia. Direct generation of either article or talk text is extremely discouraged, and though ive seen some editors use it to search and summarize long convos, or some auxiliary tasks it all feels like the gray zone between usefulness and yet more slop. User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 21:53, 5 November 2026 (UTC)

The word used was "impact", and even if you put aside all questions of use, it is very clear that LLMs are having a huge impact on Wikipedia. Our readership is declining, perhaps shifting in as yet unknown ways, agents are creating accounts, we are no longer able to handle the COI edit request queue, etc. I haven't taken this particular course, but if people have time and interest it's a subject probably worth keeping up with in the same way that we try to understand say copyright laws or accessibility standards. CMD (talk) 23:43, 5 November 2026 (UTC)

It's only time before a Wikipedia competitor combines Wikipedia + Grokipedia ie. a mixture of machine with humans in control. Already happening society wide. The main issue is editors leaning on the chatbots "world knowledge". By design LLM world knowledge is limited and prone to error. There are other ways that is precise. Thus a matter of education how to use AI. -- GreenC 19:00, 8 November 2026 (UTC)

Hi @SDeckelmann-WMF, is the tutorial available now in an asynchronous way? Dw31415 (talk) 02:33, 6 November 2026 (UTC)

It doesn't look like it, but the page says it'll be available afterwards on KGI’s YouTube channel. ThadeusOfNazereth(he/him)^{Talk to Me!} 13:22, 6 November 2026 (UTC)

Virtual meeting about organizing events

Hi everyone.

I'm going to be presenting as part of a virtual meeting with Crystal from WikiCurious on November 18 at 8 pm EST. It's the first outreach session of the m:Wikimedia North America Hub, although if you have questions about that initiative, I'll need to direct those questions to someone who is more familiar with its internal workings than I am.

What I'm trying to get at here is that we want the demographics of this meeting to not just be people who are active on Telegram, Discord, affiliates, etc. There is a place for us, too. And I think it's important that we have more people with extensive on-wiki experience when it comes to event planning. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 22:43, 7 November 2026 (UTC), edited to provide link to timezone convertor

• Here is a link to the event page. ༄ᨒ𖠰 Pine (✉) 16:46, 14 November 2026 (UTC)
• Hi @Alan Colin Arce (WMCA): would you like to add this event to meta:Wikimedia North America Hub/Events? The event location is listed as online instead of US, CA, or MX, which may be why the event doesn't automatically populate in the NA Hub events list. Perhaps you can figure out how to resolve this. ༄ᨒ𖠰 Pine (✉) 03:28, 14 November 2026 (UTC)

Any existing essays about "Wikipedia" not being a monolith?

I see people complaining to "Wikipedia" in talk pages a lot, often accusing us of being malicious in some way. Obviously such complaints are mistaken and almost always unhelpfully vague. I'm considering writing an essay that editors can link to to respond to such messages. I'm thinking of titling it "Wikipedia doesn't exist" or "There is no such thing as Wikipedia". Does such an essay already exist? Wreaderick (talk) 11:09, 8 November 2026 (UTC)

Not that I'm aware of. WP:GONNADONATE is probably the most similar in concept. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 14:23, 8 November 2026 (UTC)

there should be one distinguishing Wikipedia, the 'movement', and the WMF if there isn't already, nothing in Category:Essays about what Wikipedia is Kowal2701 (talk, contribs) 17:33, 8 November 2026 (UTC)

Not sure if this is what you are talking about, but have you seen WP:TINC and WP:CABALS? Blueboar (talk) 18:06, 8 November 2026 (UTC)

Wikipedia, like any community, absolutely does have a cabal. It's called the Iron Law of Oligarchy. People understand this, if only intuitively, and to deny it comes across as Charles Baudelaire's famous quote "the finest trick of the devil is to persuade you that he does not exist". Denial only reinforces the conspiracy theory - who but someone from the Oligarchy would be writing an essay denying its own existence! -- GreenC 18:35, 8 November 2026 (UTC)

The difference here being that the oligarchs in questions are editors that have shown their worth. I'm just some guy. But people listen to me because my word has been shown to mean something. So it's a merit-based oligarchy. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:08, 9 November 2026 (UTC)

it's also diffuse enough and has decent (wrong word) mechanisms for expelling people deemed to be unconstructive that capture is very difficult/nearly impossible Kowal2701 (talk, contribs) 16:23, 9 November 2026 (UTC)

I wrote an essay about people complaining about "elite" editors. I didn't put too much thought into it and it never got to a stage I liked but I'll give the link anyway: "You can't edit Wikipedia because of elite editors" Cheers, Jason Quinn (talk) 17:04, 10 November 2026 (UTC)

That’s great. People mistake us for a more traditional type of institution with editor hierarchy/senior editors, robust quality checks, and some agenda to push. One reason I love Wikipedia is because no editor is above any other, everything is determined by the strength of arguments you make (which is gained through experience). Wreaderick (talk) 17:39, 10 November 2026 (UTC)

Discussion at Template talk:R § Make subreferencing the default

 You are invited to join the discussion at Template talk:R § Make subreferencing the default. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 15:59, 9 November 2026 (UTC)

Succession boxes for executions in US murder articles

Recently, I noticed that some articles about murders in the United States have at the bottom succession boxes for the executions, by state and nationwide. Normally, such boxes are used for clear successions (presidents, popes, champions), thiings where you literally or figuratively take over the crown: I don't think it should be used for basically unrelated things, like executions, plane crashes, ... But others disagree. Thoughts? Fram (talk) 08:57, 10 November 2026 (UTC)

Eh, are executions "basically unrelated"? They're a pre-planned thing by the state. And it goes on biography articles, but then because of BIO1E we name some biography articles as event articles even if the only thing the sources cover is the person. Now, I never liked any succession boxes, we should just get rid of them generally, but I don't think this use is worse. PARAKANYAA (talk) 16:29, 10 November 2026 (UTC)

Executed murderer 2 doesn't take over some position, title, award, ... from executed murderer 1 (and there is no reason multiple executione can't be had on the same day either). "Succession" is normally for something where there can only be one holder of the title at a time, and then it is passed to a new holder. Here they are basically unrelated events, execution 2 is in no way dependent on execution 1 and the status of execution one doesn't change after execution 2 (you have a current king and a former king of Belgium, you don't have a current executed murderer and a former executed murderer). Fram (talk) 16:48, 10 November 2026 (UTC)

"Succession" is normally for something where there can only be one holder of the title at a time, and then it is passed to a new holder that is not the only definition of succession and I do not see it written anywhere that that is the definition the succession boxes use? Executions are in a succession in that it is "a number of persons or things that follow each other in sequence". Execution has stopped and started and different laws take effect and sources frequently focus on who was executed and when in relation to each other. PARAKANYAA (talk) 16:53, 10 November 2026 (UTC)

All events of course take place in a chronological sequence. I feel it is most useful, though, only to link events within a chain of succession when there is a common history and context linking the events, in which the chronology plays a significant role. Personally, I don't think chronological order has a significant enough role to link causes of death in a chain of succession. isaacl (talk) 17:21, 10 November 2026 (UTC)

I agree with Fram. Just because events can be sorted into chronological order does not mean they form a chain of succession. RoySmith (talk) 17:29, 10 November 2026 (UTC)

Agree, and support removal. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:52, 11 November 2026 (UTC)

If we're talking about use, none of these boxes are useful at all, especially chain of succession type ones. They're formatted badly, impossible to maintain and stuck at a place in the article where no one reads them. I do not think anyone actually uses them for anything. In all cases where they are used for "chain of succession" it is also in the infobox, where people can actually look at it and isn't formatted terribly.

On its own merits I think the only use case where this isn't redundant is such successions as executions, where you wouldn't have cause to link them in the infobox. But can't we just get rid of all of them? Who uses these instead of infobox links? PARAKANYAA (talk) 18:04, 10 November 2026 (UTC)

I would agree that this seems conceptually strange in the context of executions (whether this is on the articles about the murders or about the murderers, which I am guessing also happens). I would support removing them. Andrew Gray (talk) 00:01, 11 November 2026 (UTC)

I also agree that succession boxes should not be used for events linked only by temporal happenstance. CMD (talk) 03:35, 11 November 2026 (UTC)

Succession boxes should be used only for when a person or entity replaces another person or entity in an office, role, or position. Latest person executed does not qualify. Donald Albury 16:47, 11 November 2026 (UTC)

I agree completely. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 02:21, 13 November 2026 (UTC)

It's natural to compare a predecessor and a successor in office: did the actions and experiences of the predecessor affect the choice and actions of their successor? Succession boxes create hyperlinks that reflect this intrinsic relevance. I don't see that the same connection exists between adjacent members in a chronological list of executions, and I don't think this is a good use of succession boxes. Choess (talk) 05:15, 14 November 2026 (UTC)

November 2026 Wikimedia Café: the Newcomer homepage & Home experience

The Wikimedia Foundation's Contributor teams are migrating the Newcomer homepage to a new experience called Home. This page will evolve with users, introducing them to new personalized opportunities based on their interests, and helping them develop into experienced contributors.

In November 21–22 sessions of the Wikimedia Café, Kirsten Stoller (senior product manager, Growth) and Sam Walton (senior product manager, Moderator Tools) will share an overview of this feature, plans for its future, and demos of interactive prototypes which we can explore together.

A quote which I hope will inspire your attendance or at least good wishes, from Grace Hopper: "The most important thing I've accomplished, other than building the compiler, is training young people. They come to me, you know, and say, 'Do you think we can do this?' I say, 'Try it.' And I back 'em up. They need that. I keep track of them as they get older and I stir 'em up at intervals so they don't forget to take chances."

This month's schedule:

• Session A: 21 November at 16:00 UTC (timestamp converter), at a time friendly to the Americas, Africa, and Europe
• Session B: 22 November at 04:00 UTC (timestamp converter), at a time friendly to Asia and the Pacific

Please see the Café page for more information, including how to register!

Attendees of the Café are encouraged to bring a favorite beverage. (In the eternal words of Captain Picard, "Tea, Earl Grey, hot.")

To subscribe or unsubscribe for Café notices on your talk page please go here.

༄ᨒ𖠰 Pine (✉) 23:43, 11 November 2026 (UTC)

Pine or Kirsten, could one of you please comment on how this will impact the Mentorship program other than window-dressing like links, etc., which obviously will change. Mentorship is mentioned at mw:Home, but only that the module will move (along with the others) to their new, er, home, which is to be expected. Mathglot (talk) 23:15, 13 November 2026 (UTC)

@Mathglot Good question! Replacing Special:Homepage with Special:Home will have not include any fundamental changes to the Mentorship program. The UI looks slightly different from the newcomer perspective, but the underlying logic remains unchanged. All Mentor-Mentee assignments will remain unchanged and each wiki's current configuration is preserved: Special:CommunityConfiguration/Mentorship.

We made a few minor changes to the Mentor module UI that we hope will help address the frequency of newcomers misunderstanding Mentorship: T400835 Improving Understanding that Mentors are humans, not chat bots.

You can see images of the revised Mentor module UI here: T435309 Update visual design of PersonalDashboard Mentorship module.

And as of yesterday, you can also test Home by enabling the feature in Beta here: Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-betafeatures, and then visit Special:Home. KStoller-WMF (talk) 00:57, 14 November 2026 (UTC)

U.S. nationwide aviation ground stop on November 13

The U.S. FAA has issued a nationwide ground stop for all planes in the country today. No doubt this is notable and we will have an article about it shortly, or maybe by the time I finish typing. Turn on your TV, or see 2026 in aviation#November. Mathglot (talk) 22:44, 13 November 2026 (UTC)

Portal:Current events is ←thataway, where you'd see we already have one at 2026 FAA communication outage. —Cryptic 22:49, 13 November 2026 (UTC)

Global ban for XiaoFui

Hello. There is an ongoing meta:global ban request on Metawiki for XiaoFui, who was blocked on enwiki for [...] consistent incivility and casting aspersions ever since mainspace block. Discussion is at meta:Requests for comment/Global ban for XiaoFui. Thanks for commenting. Best regards, Peterxy（talk） 11:20, 15 November 2026 (UTC)