Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[John Mark Vandenberg]

On Fri, Jun 19, 2015 at 12:22 AM, Andy Mabbett
 wrote:
> [I'm posting this here because although the experiences described
> relate to en.WP, I'm sure it applies to other projects as well]
>
>
> I have trained over 100 people to edit Wikipedia this year; in around
> a dozen different sessions.
>
> Not a single session has occurred, when someone has not had a problem
> with our CAPTCHA interface. Often, several editors in a single sesison
> are confused.
>
> A user saves an edit, and the system responds with the requirement for
> them to complete a CAPTCHA .

Andy, have any of your sessions been using the VisualEditor?  I always
steered away from VE when conducting wiki training, but I hear it has
improved and maybe you've been using it during your training.

Is that part of the problem?  I see an old and very neglected task
about that here:

https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T72266

Seems bizarre that task is still unresolved when WMF is proposing to
enable VisualEditor for new accounts.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_%28proposals%29#Gradually_enabling_VisualEditor_for_new_accounts

--
John Vandenberg

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Dennis During]

Partially OT: re " Sadly it got marked as resolved because there was
something that looked similar to developers, though not of course to
potential users."

I've had a similar experience at Phabricator with respect to dump problems.

Phabricator as it is used is really for WMF pros only, even though users
are often referred there to initiate bug reports.

On Fri, Jun 19, 2015 at 8:54 AM, WereSpielChequers <
werespielchequ...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I'm tempted to point out that this mainly affects new editors who cite
> their edits, other new editors will get bitten in other ways. But the
> internet is not the best venue for irony.
>
> More practically, if you have a tame admin on tap then you can reduce this
> and other problems at editathons by setting those new accounts as
> "confirmed". And yes I know we also have a shortage of admins, and also
> that it is likely that only a tiny proportion of the editors we lose
> through this are at editathons.
>
> Earlier this year as a result of the glam organisers event in Paris I made
> a proposal at bugzilla for an event organisers useright. This would have
> allowed us to circumvent this problem at those editathons that are targeted
> at newbies, and it got widely endorsed by GLAM editors from several
> languages. Sadly it got marked as resolved because there was something that
> looked similar to developers, though not of course to potential users. If
> anyone here knows how to bypass phabricator or how to mark a phabricator
> request as unresolved and still much wanted, then the link is
> https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T91928 alternatively perhaps we could
> persuade the education community to endorse it, it should be just as useful
> to them and they seem to have more clout with the WMF than the GLAM
> community.
>
> As for whether the capcha is useful in keeping out spammers, remember
> there are two capcha steps, one when you open a new account and the other
> when you use that to add links. Presumably any spam program that can pass
> the first hurdle can pass the second. But for new good faith human editors
> each capcha is a possible lost edit/editor. It would be good to test
> dropping the capcha requirement for adding new links, alternatively perhaps
> we could whitelist certain domains as likely to be reliable sources and
> unlikely to be spam.
>
> Regards
>
> Jonathan
>
>
> >
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Glaisher]

On 06/19/2015 05:54 PM, WereSpielChequers wrote:

Earlier this year as a result of the glam organisers event in Paris I
made a proposal at bugzilla for an event organisers useright. This
would have allowed us to circumvent this problem at those editathons
that are targeted at newbies, and it got widely endorsed by GLAM
editors from several languages. Sadly it got marked as resolved
because there was something that looked similar to developers, though
not of course to potential users. If anyone here knows how to bypass
phabricator or how to mark a phabricator request as unresolved and
still much wanted, then the link is
https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T91928 alternatively perhaps we
could persuade the education community to endorse it, it should be
just as useful to them and they seem to have more clout with the WMF
than the GLAM community.



I'm sorry that that task was closed (and that there has been no recent 
activity on it - excluding today's) but it really is a duplicate and was 
asking for functionality which ThrottleOverride extension already has 
(with other features). Phabricator tasks generally should ask for one 
single feature per task so that it is easy for developers to implement 
it. This particular task had lots of requests in it so it's not very 
clear. The extension is currently not deployed on Wikimedia wikis 
because it lacks some basic functionality like modifying and logging. 
You could probably file smaller tasks asking for several features which 
would allow the event organizer group to be implemented for real.


As for skipping CAPTCHA, this functionality is already available through 
'skipcaptcha' right (which all autoconfirmed users have). If you want to 
ask for a new group, you can make a proposal on a local discussions 
venue like village pump. This user group (event organizer) would be able 
to grant users 'confirmed' group to other users so that the new users do 
not have to go through CAPTCHAs while trying to edit. If there is 
consensus for it, you can file a task on Phabricator to get the new 
group implemented.



As for whether the capcha is useful in keeping out spammers, remember
there are two capcha steps, one when you open a new account and the
other when you use that to add links. Presumably any spam program
that can pass the first hurdle can pass the second. But for new good
faith human editors each capcha is a possible lost edit/editor.


I also do agree that CAPTCHAs are not very user friendly and is bad for 
good faith newbie human editors. I have also sometimes had trouble 
solving CAPTCHAs myself on some occassions. However, spambots which are 
able to pass in one CAPTCHA test can easily pass the same type of 
CAPTCHA again so we can't assume that all accounts which are able to 
solve the captcha at registration are not bots. Currently, a non-trivial 
amount of time is spent by our wiki administrators and stewards just for 
fighting these spambots so we can't just turn CAPTCHAs completely.



It would be good to test dropping the capcha requirement for adding new
links, alternatively perhaps we could whitelist certain domains as
likely to be reliable sources and unlikely to be spam.



Whitelisting certain links is also currently technically available. See 
English Wikipedia's whitelist page for example [1] but this is not 
really used probably because many users are not aware of this feature.


It is also possible to exempt certain IP addresses or ranges from 
CAPTCHAs but this is only currently doable through server-side config 
but I don't remember seeing a request asking an IP to be whitelisted for 
an editathon. We could probably allow this whitelist list to also be 
also modified on wiki so that event organizers can ask for it without 
going through the hassle of asking on Phabricator and getting it 
deployed in a timely fashion. I've filed this as a task. [2] I would 
also like to suggest that editathon organizers ask for the IPs to be 
whitelisted on Phabricator when organizing events.


I think that using these suggestions I mentioned above would help in 
this issue during editathons but I'm not sure we've lots of alternatives 
for regular edits. We could probably allow all users with a confirmed 
email to bypass the captchas. What does others think about this idea?


There is a problem with CAPTCHAs but disabling CAPTCHAs completely is 
definitely not the solution, imo.


1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Captcha-addurl-whitelist
2. https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T103122

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Sydney Poore]

Hi,

I agree with Andrew that is not practical to whitelist ip addresses as a
primary method of overcoming account creation/ CAPTCHA issues at events.
Organizers often will not know the ip range in advance because of changes
in the address, or last minute changes in the location of the event.

The solution(s) needs to be something that is easy to use for people with
minimal tech knowledge so we can expand the group of people who are
sponsoring and holding events.

This problem goes back to a core issue that effect outreach efforts:
Wikipedia was originally set up to be edited by people sitting alone with a
PC/laptop.

Although today many outreach efforts are directed at group events or
partner organizations, these new editors still need to fit into polices and
a tech environment where editing solo is the norm.

To attract different groups of people to WMF projects, changing methods of
dealing with group editing or the new account creation experience needs to
be a priority.

Sydney

Sydney

Sydney Poore
User:FloNight
Wikipedian in Residence
at Cochrane Collaboration

On Fri, Jun 19, 2015 at 2:24 PM, Andrew Gray 
wrote:

> It's true that events *can* get whitelisted, but this is a very
> complex method. It relies on the organiser knowing the IP ranges in
> advance, and knowing who to contact at WMF - and on WMF having the
> time to deal with it. It would rapidly break down if we needed to use
> this method for every small training session. (I used to do two or
> three workshops a week...)
>
> Andrew.
>
> On 19 June 2015 at 19:16, Benjamin Lees  wrote:
> > Events sometimes get whitelisted for account creation purposes:
> > https://noc.wikimedia.org/conf/throttle.php.txt
> > The exceptions there there could be made to set $wgCaptchaWhitelistIP
> too.
> >
> > On Fri, Jun 19, 2015 at 8:54 AM, WereSpielChequers
> >  wrote:
> >> alternatively perhaps we could whitelist certain domains as likely to
> be reliable sources and unlikely to be spam.
> > There actually already is a whitelist ($wgCaptchaWhitelist in
> > https://noc.wikimedia.org/conf/CommonSettings.php.txt).
> > Unfortunately, as far as I know, there's no on-wiki way to change it,
> > but you could always compile a list of domains and submit it through
> > Phabricator.
> >
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>
>
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>   andrew.g...@dunelm.org.uk
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Andrew Gray]

It's true that events *can* get whitelisted, but this is a very
complex method. It relies on the organiser knowing the IP ranges in
advance, and knowing who to contact at WMF - and on WMF having the
time to deal with it. It would rapidly break down if we needed to use
this method for every small training session. (I used to do two or
three workshops a week...)

Andrew.

On 19 June 2015 at 19:16, Benjamin Lees  wrote:
> Events sometimes get whitelisted for account creation purposes:
> https://noc.wikimedia.org/conf/throttle.php.txt
> The exceptions there there could be made to set $wgCaptchaWhitelistIP too.
>
> On Fri, Jun 19, 2015 at 8:54 AM, WereSpielChequers
>  wrote:
>> alternatively perhaps we could whitelist certain domains as likely to be 
>> reliable sources and unlikely to be spam.
> There actually already is a whitelist ($wgCaptchaWhitelist in
> https://noc.wikimedia.org/conf/CommonSettings.php.txt).
> Unfortunately, as far as I know, there's no on-wiki way to change it,
> but you could always compile a list of domains and submit it through
> Phabricator.
>
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> 



-- 
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  andrew.g...@dunelm.org.uk

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Benjamin Lees]

Events sometimes get whitelisted for account creation purposes:
https://noc.wikimedia.org/conf/throttle.php.txt
The exceptions there there could be made to set $wgCaptchaWhitelistIP too.

On Fri, Jun 19, 2015 at 8:54 AM, WereSpielChequers
 wrote:
> alternatively perhaps we could whitelist certain domains as likely to be 
> reliable sources and unlikely to be spam.
There actually already is a whitelist ($wgCaptchaWhitelist in
https://noc.wikimedia.org/conf/CommonSettings.php.txt).
Unfortunately, as far as I know, there's no on-wiki way to change it,
but you could always compile a list of domains and submit it through
Phabricator.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Ricordisamoa]

Yes, I think it's a great idea!
T34695  has been assigned to 
me for a while, but I'd use some help.


Il 19/06/2015 16:17, Eduardo Testart ha scritto:

Hi all,

I know this might be a bit off topic but I'll risk it anyways.

One told me a couple weeks ago that CAPTCHA (at least one CAPTCHA) was
created or used to transcribe documents bit by bit, each word you enter
corresponds to a two word link, that when it reaches so many equal
responses is marked as resolved and moved to the next word on a document.

Wouldn't be wonderful if we could use this idea to transcribe documents in
Wikisource, create our own CAPTCHA for the benefit of our own projects.

Also, filling up a CAPTCHA this way, would make it count as one more edit.

Thus we will be more synergetic towards our own efforts, and have a CAPTCHA
might make sense overall if needed.

Please fill free to separate the thread or correct me, since I only used my
friends story as a source.

Best!

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Andy Mabbett]

On 19 June 2015 at 14:58, Andy Mabbett  wrote:
> On 19 June 2015 at 13:54, WereSpielChequers  
> wrote:
>
>> Earlier this year as a result of the glam organisers event in Paris I made a 
>> proposal at bugzilla for an event organisers useright. This would have 
>> allowed us to circumvent this problem at those editathons that are targeted 
>> at newbies, and it got widely endorsed by GLAM editors from several 
>> languages. Sadly it got marked as resolved because there was something that 
>> looked similar to developers, though not of course to potential users. If 
>> anyone here knows how to bypass phabricator or how to mark a phabricator 
>> request as unresolved and still much wanted, then the link is 
>> https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T91928
>
> I've reopened it - please comment there.

It's been closed again. Nonetheless, please do comment.

-- 
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Eduardo Testart]

Hi all,

I know this might be a bit off topic but I'll risk it anyways.

One told me a couple weeks ago that CAPTCHA (at least one CAPTCHA) was
created or used to transcribe documents bit by bit, each word you enter
corresponds to a two word link, that when it reaches so many equal
responses is marked as resolved and moved to the next word on a document.

Wouldn't be wonderful if we could use this idea to transcribe documents in
Wikisource, create our own CAPTCHA for the benefit of our own projects.

Also, filling up a CAPTCHA this way, would make it count as one more edit.

Thus we will be more synergetic towards our own efforts, and have a CAPTCHA
might make sense overall if needed.

Please fill free to separate the thread or correct me, since I only used my
friends story as a source.

Best!
El jun. 19, 2015 10:59 AM, "Andy Mabbett" 
escribió:

> On 19 June 2015 at 13:54, WereSpielChequers 
> wrote:
>
> > Earlier this year as a result of the glam organisers event in Paris I
> made a proposal at bugzilla for an event organisers useright. This would
> have allowed us to circumvent this problem at those editathons that are
> targeted at newbies, and it got widely endorsed by GLAM editors from
> several languages. Sadly it got marked as resolved because there was
> something that looked similar to developers, though not of course to
> potential users. If anyone here knows how to bypass phabricator or how to
> mark a phabricator request as unresolved and still much wanted, then the
> link is https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T91928
>
> I've reopened it - please comment there.
>
> --
> Andy Mabbett
> @pigsonthewing
> http://pigsonthewing.org.uk
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Hong, Yongmin]

ThrottleOverride extension is not deployed on WMF cluster[1] so your best
bet is to create a new bug which is already deployed on WMF cluster.

[1] this means even if this is fixed, you will not see the fixed code on
wikimedia wikis.

--
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-- Sent from Android --
2015. 6. 19. 오후 11:31에 "Andy Mabbett" 님이 작성:

> On 19 June 2015 at 14:58, Andy Mabbett  wrote:
> > On 19 June 2015 at 13:54, WereSpielChequers 
> wrote:
> >
> >> Earlier this year as a result of the glam organisers event in Paris I
> made a proposal at bugzilla for an event organisers useright. This would
> have allowed us to circumvent this problem at those editathons that are
> targeted at newbies, and it got widely endorsed by GLAM editors from
> several languages. Sadly it got marked as resolved because there was
> something that looked similar to developers, though not of course to
> potential users. If anyone here knows how to bypass phabricator or how to
> mark a phabricator request as unresolved and still much wanted, then the
> link is https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T91928
> >
> > I've reopened it - please comment there.
>
> It's been closed again. Nonetheless, please do comment.
>
> --
> Andy Mabbett
> @pigsonthewing
> http://pigsonthewing.org.uk
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Andy Mabbett]

On 19 June 2015 at 13:54, WereSpielChequers  wrote:

> Earlier this year as a result of the glam organisers event in Paris I made a 
> proposal at bugzilla for an event organisers useright. This would have 
> allowed us to circumvent this problem at those editathons that are targeted 
> at newbies, and it got widely endorsed by GLAM editors from several 
> languages. Sadly it got marked as resolved because there was something that 
> looked similar to developers, though not of course to potential users. If 
> anyone here knows how to bypass phabricator or how to mark a phabricator 
> request as unresolved and still much wanted, then the link is 
> https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T91928

I've reopened it - please comment there.

-- 
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Jane Darnell]

Interesting. I see that you opened the task for the user-right, but this is
a result of a decision to make a catch-all fix for several problems. I
think the capcha problem is extremely annoying and goes way beyond the
scope of the one-off edit-a-thon, so this specific issue should have its
own task number. "Tame admins" are rarely on tap so not a solution for the
user-right but does the throttle override work now? I can't see where that
fix is confirmed anywhere.

On Fri, Jun 19, 2015 at 2:54 PM, WereSpielChequers <
werespielchequ...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I'm tempted to point out that this mainly affects new editors who cite
> their edits, other new editors will get bitten in other ways. But the
> internet is not the best venue for irony.
>
> More practically, if you have a tame admin on tap then you can reduce this
> and other problems at editathons by setting those new accounts as
> "confirmed". And yes I know we also have a shortage of admins, and also
> that it is likely that only a tiny proportion of the editors we lose
> through this are at editathons.
>
> Earlier this year as a result of the glam organisers event in Paris I made
> a proposal at bugzilla for an event organisers useright. This would have
> allowed us to circumvent this problem at those editathons that are targeted
> at newbies, and it got widely endorsed by GLAM editors from several
> languages. Sadly it got marked as resolved because there was something that
> looked similar to developers, though not of course to potential users. If
> anyone here knows how to bypass phabricator or how to mark a phabricator
> request as unresolved and still much wanted, then the link is
> https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T91928 alternatively perhaps we could
> persuade the education community to endorse it, it should be just as useful
> to them and they seem to have more clout with the WMF than the GLAM
> community.
>
> As for whether the capcha is useful in keeping out spammers, remember
> there are two capcha steps, one when you open a new account and the other
> when you use that to add links. Presumably any spam program that can pass
> the first hurdle can pass the second. But for new good faith human editors
> each capcha is a possible lost edit/editor. It would be good to test
> dropping the capcha requirement for adding new links, alternatively perhaps
> we could whitelist certain domains as likely to be reliable sources and
> unlikely to be spam.
>
> Regards
>
> Jonathan
>
>
> >
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[WereSpielChequers]

I'm tempted to point out that this mainly affects new editors who cite their 
edits, other new editors will get bitten in other ways. But the internet is not 
the best venue for irony.

More practically, if you have a tame admin on tap then you can reduce this and 
other problems at editathons by setting those new accounts as "confirmed". And 
yes I know we also have a shortage of admins, and also that it is likely that 
only a tiny proportion of the editors we lose through this are at editathons.

Earlier this year as a result of the glam organisers event in Paris I made a 
proposal at bugzilla for an event organisers useright. This would have allowed 
us to circumvent this problem at those editathons that are targeted at newbies, 
and it got widely endorsed by GLAM editors from several languages. Sadly it got 
marked as resolved because there was something that looked similar to 
developers, though not of course to potential users. If anyone here knows how 
to bypass phabricator or how to mark a phabricator request as unresolved and 
still much wanted, then the link is https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T91928 
alternatively perhaps we could persuade the education community to endorse it, 
it should be just as useful to them and they seem to have more clout with the 
WMF than the GLAM community.

As for whether the capcha is useful in keeping out spammers, remember there are 
two capcha steps, one when you open a new account and the other when you use 
that to add links. Presumably any spam program that can pass the first hurdle 
can pass the second. But for new good faith human editors each capcha is a 
possible lost edit/editor. It would be good to test dropping the capcha 
requirement for adding new links, alternatively perhaps we could whitelist 
certain domains as likely to be reliable sources and unlikely to be spam. 

Regards

Jonathan 


> 
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Hong, Yongmin]

Cluebot only exists on English Wikipedia, and remember that English
Wikipedia is not a standard, just another wmf wiki with the largest
userbase.

--
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2015. 6. 19. 오전 6:06에 "James Heilman" 님이 작성:

> Yes CAPTCHA is a pain. Yes it prevents bots from spamming us.
>
> The question is does cluebot provide us sufficient defence such that
> CAPTCHA is not needed?
>
> --
> James Heilman
> MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian
>
> Starting July 2015 I am a board member of the Wikimedia Foundation
> My emails; however, do not represent the official position of the WMF
>
> The Wikipedia Open Textbook of Medicine
> www.opentextbookofmedicine.com
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Andy Mabbett]

"
On 18 June 2015 at 22:25, Legoktm  wrote:
>>> It's actually not useless:
>>> 
>>
>> And again, that refers to CAPTCHA used for creating new accounts, not
>> the one under discussion.
>
> Um, no it doesn't? It referred to *all* CAPTCHAs.

Really? It refers to "the CAPTCHA", singular, when the CAPTCHA under
disussion was that for sign-ups. It also quotes:

>> With SUL, disabling captcha for account creation on one wiki
>> effectively means we have disabled it on all wikis (create account on
>> testwiki, visit enwiki, you're autocreated, edit!).

> I would recommend you read
> 
> which has some more details.

So two things were disabled, and a change was noted. We don't know
which of those two things caused the change. We have no evidence as to
whether or not disabling the CAPTCHA *just* for (signed in) editors
saving an edit would have a negative effect.

-- 
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Legoktm]

On 06/18/2015 10:48 AM, Andy Mabbett wrote:
> On 18 June 2015 at 18:20, Legoktm  wrote:
> 
>>> Switching it off would thus be an immediate improvement.
>>
>> It's actually not useless:
>> 
> 
> And again, that refers to CAPTCHA used for creating new accounts, not
> the one under discussion.

Um, no it doesn't? It referred to *all* CAPTCHAs. I would recommend you
read

which has some more details.

-- Legoktm

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[James Heilman]

Yes CAPTCHA is a pain. Yes it prevents bots from spamming us.

The question is does cluebot provide us sufficient defence such that
CAPTCHA is not needed?

-- 
James Heilman
MD, CCFP-EM, Wikipedian

Starting July 2015 I am a board member of the Wikimedia Foundation
My emails; however, do not represent the official position of the WMF

The Wikipedia Open Textbook of Medicine
www.opentextbookofmedicine.com

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Andy Mabbett]

On 18 June 2015 at 18:20, Legoktm  wrote:

>> Switching it off would thus be an immediate improvement.
>
> It's actually not useless:
> 

And again, that refers to CAPTCHA used for creating new accounts, not
the one under discussion.

-- 
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Legoktm]

On 06/18/2015 09:03 AM, David Gerard wrote:
> That is, we already know for a fact that it's literally worse than useless.
> 
> Switching it off would thus be an immediate improvement.

It's actually not useless:


-- Legoktm

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Samuel Klein]

On Thu, Jun 18, 2015 at 9:07 AM, Pharos 
wrote:

> I'm here to confirm that I've seen the same issue in over almost every
> wiki-workshop.
>

Seconded.  I can't remember one that didn't run into this.
Especially for editors thoughtful enough to try to link their sources.

Part of the problem is the lack of prominence of the notice, and also the
> CAPTCHA often being hidden "below the fold".
>
> I would not be averse to experiment in just turning it off for a bit.
>

+100.  Seems like an easy thing to spot-test.
Both turning it off and varying interfaces elements.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Andy Mabbett]

On 18 June 2015 at 16:57, Dan Garry  wrote:

> Previous discussions on this topic:
> https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2014-November/079318.html

That appears to be a disusison of teh CAPTCHA encountered during
account registration, which has a very different user-interface

-- 
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Pharos]

I'm here to confirm that I've seen the same issue in over almost every
wiki-workshop.

Part of the problem is the lack of prominence of the notice, and also the
CAPTCHA often being hidden "below the fold".

I would not be averse to experiment in just turning it off for a bit.

Thanks,
Pharos

On Thu, Jun 18, 2015 at 11:58 AM, Pine W  wrote:

> You might want check if there is already a bug listed for this under
>
> https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/tag/mediawiki-extensions-confirmedit-(captcha-extension)/
> ,
> and if not then create a new one. (:
>
> Pine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[David Gerard]

On 18 June 2015 at 15:22, Andy Mabbett  wrote:

> Not a single session has occurred, when someone has not had a problem
> with our CAPTCHA interface. Often, several editors in a single sesison
> are confused.



I recall from November's discussion that not only does the captcha
keep humans out, it's trivially solvable by spambots using OCR.

That is, we already know for a fact that it's literally worse than useless.

Switching it off would thus be an immediate improvement.


- d.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Pine W]

You might want check if there is already a bug listed for this under
https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/tag/mediawiki-extensions-confirmedit-(captcha-extension)/,
and if not then create a new one. (:

Pine
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Dan Garry]

Previous discussions on this topic:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2014-November/079318.html

Dan

On 18 June 2015 at 07:22, Andy Mabbett  wrote:

> [I'm posting this here because although the experiences described
> relate to en.WP, I'm sure it applies to other projects as well]
>
>
> I have trained over 100 people to edit Wikipedia this year; in around
> a dozen different sessions.
>
> Not a single session has occurred, when someone has not had a problem
> with our CAPTCHA interface. Often, several editors in a single sesison
> are confused.
>
> A user saves an edit, and the system responds with the requirement for
> them to complete a CAPTCHA .
>
> Sometimes, they do not realise what has happened (the paragraphs
> beginning with the words "Your edit includes new external links..."
> seem insufficiently prominent), or they do not understand what is
> being asked of them (what words are they being asked to retype?), or
> they do not see the very small box where they are supposed to enter
> the CAPTCHA (on my screen, in Firefox and signed out, it is
> pre-populated with "Enter the words yc", where the "c" is half of a
> letter "o").
>
> Naturally I am then able to assist them, but a user editing alone may
> simply abandon the task in frustration.
>
> I urge each of you to try this, by editing while logged out
>
> I suggest the WMF conduct some urgent usability tests around this
> feature, and either redesign or remove it.
>
> --
> Andy Mabbett
> @pigsonthewing
> http://pigsonthewing.org.uk
>
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> 




-- 
Dan Garry
Product Manager, Discovery
Wikimedia Foundation
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Lane Rasberry]

Hello,

I confirm that the CAPTCHA has problems.

When someone is asked to do one, it is not clear why, and there is a
strange and non-intuitive disconnect between saving the article initially,
entering the CAPTCHA, and saving again. It is hard to explain but something
odd happens in Wikipedia that does not happen in other websites with other
CAPTCHAs- text is not clear and there is an extra step which seems
extraneous.

I also consistently encounter this problem in outreach to new users. The
problem is related to new users submitting external links.

yours,



On Thu, Jun 18, 2015 at 10:22 AM, Andy Mabbett 
wrote:

> [I'm posting this here because although the experiences described
> relate to en.WP, I'm sure it applies to other projects as well]
>
>
> I have trained over 100 people to edit Wikipedia this year; in around
> a dozen different sessions.
>
> Not a single session has occurred, when someone has not had a problem
> with our CAPTCHA interface. Often, several editors in a single sesison
> are confused.
>
> A user saves an edit, and the system responds with the requirement for
> them to complete a CAPTCHA .
>
> Sometimes, they do not realise what has happened (the paragraphs
> beginning with the words "Your edit includes new external links..."
> seem insufficiently prominent), or they do not understand what is
> being asked of them (what words are they being asked to retype?), or
> they do not see the very small box where they are supposed to enter
> the CAPTCHA (on my screen, in Firefox and signed out, it is
> pre-populated with "Enter the words yc", where the "c" is half of a
> letter "o").
>
> Naturally I am then able to assist them, but a user editing alone may
> simply abandon the task in frustration.
>
> I urge each of you to try this, by editing while logged out
>
> I suggest the WMF conduct some urgent usability tests around this
> feature, and either redesign or remove it.
>
> --
> Andy Mabbett
> @pigsonthewing
> http://pigsonthewing.org.uk
>
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> 




-- 
Lane Rasberry
user:bluerasberry on Wikipedia
206.801.0814
l...@bluerasberry.com
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[Wikimedia-l] CAPTCHA issues discouraging new editors

[Andy Mabbett]

[I'm posting this here because although the experiences described
relate to en.WP, I'm sure it applies to other projects as well]


I have trained over 100 people to edit Wikipedia this year; in around
a dozen different sessions.

Not a single session has occurred, when someone has not had a problem
with our CAPTCHA interface. Often, several editors in a single sesison
are confused.

A user saves an edit, and the system responds with the requirement for
them to complete a CAPTCHA .

Sometimes, they do not realise what has happened (the paragraphs
beginning with the words "Your edit includes new external links..."
seem insufficiently prominent), or they do not understand what is
being asked of them (what words are they being asked to retype?), or
they do not see the very small box where they are supposed to enter
the CAPTCHA (on my screen, in Firefox and signed out, it is
pre-populated with "Enter the words yc", where the "c" is half of a
letter "o").

Naturally I am then able to assist them, but a user editing alone may
simply abandon the task in frustration.

I urge each of you to try this, by editing while logged out

I suggest the WMF conduct some urgent usability tests around this
feature, and either redesign or remove it.

-- 
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk

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