Wikiversity:Colloquium

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I posted an edit request there 5 months ago, so I’ll be taking it to this page. ~2026-28640-56 (talk) 23:33, 12 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

What exactly is the problem? I don't understand what needs to change and why. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:35, 12 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Pinging @Atcovi, @Jtneill and @Juandev for further input. Someone is requesting a modification to MediaWiki:Protectedpagetext to use {{Protected page text}}, but we might need to discuss whether to use the template. In the meantime, I'll start a sandbox version of the protected page text template. Codename Noreste (discuss • contribs) 23:19, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Sounds good -- Jtneill - Talk - c 04:13, 15 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

+1 Jtneill. —Atcovi (Talk - Contribs) 12:59, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

As many of you know, and mentioned here at the Colloquium, our sister project Wikinews recently closed, with all 31 active editions made read-only. User:BigKrow has asked about the prospect of writing news stories here and I suggested that since we already have School:Journalism and some resources related to the broader topic of journalism. I would like to propose that we have continued and indefinite space for citizen journalism by essentially repurposing Wikinews into a sub-project here. The only special infrastructure that Wikinews required was mw:Extension:DynamicPageList, which was deactivated and caused issues due to a lack of maintenance.

I will add this proposal to the site banner, but I recognize that that may be a conflict of interest, so if anyone requests that I remove it, I will. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 05:30, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

I would like to see this conversation go for at least 30 days to establish a consensus. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 05:35, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

• Support as proposer (with BK's inspiration). I think that an ongoing experiment in citizen journalism is a fit and appropriate use of this site. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 05:35, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
• Support, hope to seeing ideas about this, and thank you @Koavf BigKrow (discuss • contribs) 11:08, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
• Support Other than perhaps inflating the total number of pages reported, I see the idea of "practicing journalism" a worthy and relevant activity within the domain of Wikiversity. IanVG (discuss • contribs) 21:41, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
• Support Conditional on development of (a) community guidelines that ensure alignment with Wikiversity's purpose, and (b) clear, nested page-naming structures for projects. More detail below. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 11:48, 15 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
• Contra This proposal doesn't seem interested in expanding educational materials in journalism, but rather in providing space and protection for Wikinews contributors. But this is contrary to the goals of Wikiversity, and I'm not sure it's a good idea, even with regard to WMF. If WMF decides to close a project and another community lets it run on its domain, that's a bit of an undermining of WMF's and the community's decisions. Given that Wikiversity has had several conflicts with other communities and WMF in its history, I'm against it.--Juandev (discuss • contribs) 18:59, 15 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
• Contra This seems like a proposal to continue the mission of WikiNews, but not a proposal specifically to improve Wikiversity. I concur with Juandev's comments. --mikeu ^talk 20:29, 30 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Definitely worthy of discussion, so I have no problem with the proposal in the sitenotice.

Initial questions:

• Does this proposal include importing English Wikinews content e.g., to Wikinews subpages?
• What are "active editions"?
• How can Wikiversity navigate the concerns that lead to the closure of Wikinews?
• Are any changes to the scope of Wikinews proposed?
• How does Wikinews fit with the Wikiversity:Mission? What aligns well? Where might there be tension?
  • e.g., I'm not sure that a page like User:BigKrow/Manchester City moves two points behind Arsenal in and of itself will serve as an educational resource.

-- Jtneill - Talk - c 05:52, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

• Does this proposal include importing English Wikinews content e.g., to Wikinews subpages?

• No, not at this time.

• What are "active editions"?

• There were 30 other active editions of Wikinews in addition to English (e.g. n:es:) at the time of universal closure (2026-05-04).

• How can Wikiversity navigate the concerns that lead to the closure of Wikinews?

• One of the biggest issues was the problems with DPL, which is now irrelevant. Another was the lack of activity, which can be ameliorated by having it be part of an existing project instead of its own domain (e.g. some editions of Wikipedia host their own Wikinews already and those projects were not impacted by the closure).

• Are any changes to the scope of Wikinews proposed?

• Not at this juncture. I would also propose as far as implemention goes that we would request a new namespace and that the material be more-or-less sequestered into its own ongoing project, like Wikijournal is or like the Cookbook and Wikijunior are at our sister b:.

• How does Wikinews fit with the Wikiversity:Mission? What aligns well? Where might there be tension?
  • e.g., I'm not sure that a page like Story/Manchester City moves two points behind Arsenal in and of itself will serve as an educational resource.

• The process of citizen journalists practicing their craft in real-time and collaborating with others to do so is itself an education activity. We would essentially be hosting a real-time experiment in citizen journalism, online communities, and collaborative learning in addition to the prospect of spreading educational information from someone actually reading the news. I would propose that we could also make a more deliberate attempt to engage with learning about what does and doesn't work with collaborative news writing by experimentation (e.g. audio news, syndicating to other sites, incorporating freely-licensed news from other sources, writing hyper-local news, writing briefs versus longer-term reportage) and also seeing if the problems noted in the Task Force report that recommended closure can be overcome. Note that we have already done some local investigation about and learning about wiki-based journalism on Wikinews here at Journalism studies and Wikinews. We could continue that learning and refine the process, including incorporating journalism students from universities. As for tensions, Wikinews is the only sister project that must be done with a quick turn-around: if you take a long time to transcribe a book, that's just how long it takes, but if you take a long time to write news, it ceases to be news entirely. Wikiversity has been a very slow-growing project that has definitely had some successes but has generally come together over a long period with most learning resources being individual passion projects (or sometimes, frankly, crankery) which would not work with collaborative news that requires more than just a single editor writing whatever he feels like.

Please let me know any other questions/concerns and any other editors feel free to give your own perspective. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 06:13, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thanks, Justin — it is food for thought.

In attempting to understand how we've arrived here, I've summarised some of the background on this page: Wikinews.

Perhaps it could be helpful to flesh out more of the vision / ideas / possibilities / challenges on that page? -- Jtneill - Talk - c 11:49, 14 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

• Having given it some thought, in principle, I support hosting citizen journalism on Wikiversity where it is clearly connected to a learning project and/or constitutes original research, both of which align strongly with Wikiversity’s educational mission.
• My chief concern is the potential for news content that is not clearly linked to the purpose of Wikiversity. To avoid this, some community-agreed guidelines would be prudent. These need not be overly restrictive; they should support boldness and experimentation while helping ensure alignment with Wikiversity's purpose.
• Given the reported low and declining activity on Wikinews, it seems unlikely that English Wikiversity would be overwhelmed by an influx of news-related editing. My impression is that English Wikinews was the most active edition, but even so, many contributors are likely to disperse to other projects or cease editing altogether. A modest migration of interested editors to Wikiversity seems manageable.
• At this stage, I do not think a dedicated namespace is necessary. Subpages under Wikinews or nested pages under relevant learning or research projects, or user-space draft pages should be suitable. I agree that Wikijournal offers a useful model, as do several existing course structures on Wikiversity.
• I support User:Koavf’s suggestions about framing Wikinews activity explicitly around learning. This would create a distinctive space for experimenting with collaborative news production in ways that are pedagogically meaningful. I agree that the journalism studies and Wikinews project developed by David and Leigh Blackall through the University of Wollongong is an excellent example of the intersection between Wikiversity and Wikinews. The Wikinews page could evolve into a hub for such projects.
• I've tidied the Wikinews category and merged some content into the Wikinews page. As part of a reinvigoration effort, please review these and related resources such as Category:Journalism and School:Journalism.
• A further argument in favour of this initiative is that Wikipedia explicitly excludes both news reporting and original research. So, there is value in maintaining spaces within the Wikimedia ecosystem where these forms of knowledge production can be openly developed and curated. Such work can, in turn, generate valuable evidence and source material that may later inform Wikipedia articles.
• The closure of WMF-hosted Wikinews does not imply that open wiki-based news curation lacks value. Indeed, the closure documentation appears supportive of experimentation with alternative news models across Wikimedia projects, including through Wikipedia and Wikidata. In that context, Wikiversity seems a natural home for a Wikinews experiment, provided it is clearly grounded in learning and/or research.

-- Jtneill - Talk - c 11:39, 15 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

My understanding towards Wikinews' failure is that everything takes too long to be approved for the publish status, which means that any breaking news would have already become days-old stale news. Wikinews has a brand recognition (for right or wrong reasons) than Wikiversity and I wonder how effective Wikiversity can attract the "Wikinews refugees" to edit here. And just a quick note on the governance. Since each Wikiversity language operates independently, each language has to vote & adopt this proposal independently. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 13:47, 15 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Your assessment about Wikinews is partially correct. I referenced it earlier, but to be explicit, there is a report by a task force on sister projects that outlines their concerns. There are a few, one of which was the nature of the staleness of news. Thanks also for clarifying that this proposal is only relevant to en.wv and is not binding or even proposed for other editions of Wikiversity. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 18:54, 15 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

• Note: I am not a regular here, and just visit Wikiversity for the WikiJournal project. Challenges of Wikinews included that it required timely reporting and fact-checking processes which differed greatly from the well-established ones in Wikipedia. Here in Wikiversity, there is the WikiJournal project, and that can take some some forms of journalism, just not breaking news reporting. I am in favor of salvaging parts of Wikinews if helpful. Could it, would it be feasible to adapt Wikijournal to accept some forms of news journalism, but just not the timed news reporting? For example, WikiJournal already is doing conference proceedings, and could likely do related event reports even months after the event ended. It could probably accept long-form investigative reporting, which is a sort of news that is not breaking news. I am not sure what the possibilities are, but I would prefer to build up systems that already work rather than import systems which had problems elsewhere. Thanks. Blue Rasberry (talk) 19:17, 22 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

  I agree that there are certain kinds of journalism that are perfectly valid and not time-bound like breaking news reporting, so that won't suffer from the issues noted before. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 21:15, 22 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Wikiversity:Deletions has been operating as a guideline. It has been revised and moved to Wikiversity:Deletion policy, consistent with naming conventions used across sister projects such as Wikipedia, Wikibooks, and Wikiquote. The speedy deletion criteria have also been updated for consistency with MediaWiki:Deletereason-dropdown.

This proposal is for the page to be formally adopted as Wikiversity policy.

Community feedback is invited, including suggestions for further improvements that may strengthen the proposed policy.

• Support Seems reasonable. If there's somehow something missed here, we can just amend it later. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 05:33, 18 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
• Support I don't see any issues with the policy. —Atcovi (Talk - Contribs) 16:07, 18 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

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Keegan (WMF) (talk) 17:15, 27 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

I would like to propose creating the user group autopatrolled (autopatrolled user), in which for non-curators and non-custodians, their page creations and file uploads would be automatically marked as patrolled by the MediaWiki software. Custodians may grant the user group, at their discretion, to users who create good quality pages that do not need frequent patrolling.

On a side note, the term autopatroller would be used, but because we don't have non-curator/custodian patrollers (as we rely on curators and custodians to patrol), I suggest on using the term autopatrolled user. Thoughts? Codename Noreste (discuss • contribs) 15:31, 29 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Support re: the name, I don't really understand the reasoning, so I am neutral on that. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 15:45, 29 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Regarding the name, this is because as we don't have the patroller user group, we rely on curators and custodians to patrol new pages and file uploads. Does that make sense? Codename Noreste (discuss • contribs) 16:39, 29 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Not really, but I don't think it's the most important thing. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 16:42, 29 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

We'll decide on the name later. Codename Noreste (discuss • contribs) 01:48, 30 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Oh, please don't let me stand in the way. I'm just not very smart, so don't hold up a matter on my account. I didn't want to derail the proposal, which is a fine and sensible one. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 04:16, 30 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

Support - sounds like a good idea

• Suggest adding a draft section about this group to Wikiversity:Patrolling. There is a statement in the Introduction of the page that I'm not sure if its correct and at least could be improved: "Wikiversity also uses an autopatrol right, meaning trusted users' contributions are automatically marked as checked so patrollers can focus on reviewing newer or anonymous editors."
• Regarding autopatroller vs autropatrolled user, what terms are used on similar WMF wiki projects?

-- Jtneill - Talk - c 11:28, 30 May 2026 (UTC)Reply

1. I would create a starting page about the user groups, with experienced editors expanding the page. A summarized part of that page would also be added to Wikiversity:Patrolling.
2. For a similar example, English Wikipedia uses the term Autopatrolled, just that term only.

Codename Noreste (discuss • contribs) 21:22, 30 May 2026 (UTC)Reply