Wikipedia talk:Deceased Wikipedians

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Note this page was also once erroneously nominated at AFD and speedily kept on procedural grounds.

Astanhope

User:Astanhope, named Adam Stanhope on his Userpage, passed away in 2014 as per his obituary. Additionally, his Facebook page that's linked on his Userpage is set as a "Remembering" profile. BaduFerreira (talk) 21:31, 18 December 2024 (UTC)

Lock requested charlotte ^👸♥ 21:46, 9 March 2025 (UTC)

Pvmoutside

On August 29, 2023, PVmoutside made his last edits to the project before abruptly disappearing. This seemed out of character for me, so I googled the name and found a Pinterest profile with the same username. I typed the individual's name, and found an obituary dated to August 30, 2023 of an individual with that name. In the obituary, it said that he was into Biology, which matches Pvmoutside's interests. I don't want to link anything because that is WP:OUTING. Someone might need to globally lock his account. The Knowledge Pirate (talk) 21:34, 9 March 2025 (UTC)

Evidence has been presented to the OS team, ticket:2025030910004445. The situation does appear to be as described. Primefac (talk) 01:45, 10 March 2025 (UTC)

We should presumably make the usual request at m:Steward requests/Global. Will they need anything from the OS team? (I'd normally expect this message to be sufficient.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:00, 10 March 2025 (UTC)

Include a link to the ticket, they can contact us directly with that reference if they need to see but can't do so directly. Thryduulf (talk) 02:12, 10 March 2025 (UTC)

I've posted a note at m:Steward requests/Global. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:53, 12 March 2025 (UTC)

That has now been actioned. Thryduulf (talk) 23:51, 14 March 2025 (UTC)

Will an obituary be created? The Knowledge Pirate (talk) 23:57, 14 March 2025 (UTC)

Anyone may write an obituary. As WhatamIdoing notes in the section below, the best obituaries are written by people who were friends or worked closely with them, so if that describes you then I encourage you to do so. Thryduulf (talk) 01:29, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

User:Wetman

If you take a look, here, you'll see that editor User:Rstreete identifies as Wetman's brother and reports that Wetman died in July 2023. I'm trying to advise them here on possible next steps. But I've no idea how the relationship, and the death, should be verified. Wetman was a very prolific editor (2003-2023), and created over 2,400 articles,[1] so their death should probably be noted, subject to the family's wishes. I'd be very grateful if someone could advise on these points. KJP1 (talk) 06:58, 11 March 2025 (UTC)

Oh no. One of the finest, funniest, most insightful editors I met in my early days here. Sad indeed. Antandrus (talk) 14:47, 11 March 2025 (UTC)

Back in February of 2013 User Wetman was awarded the Editor of the Week (see his talk page). At that time Wetman commented with words that expressed the human side of Wikipedia editing. I share them to honor his memory.Buster7 ^Chat 19:54, 11 March 2025 (UTC)

"""Well, I've laughed out loud editing at Wikipedia (thank you especially Giano), and I've paced up and down furiously at Wikipedia (though not lately) but this is the first time I've teared up.""" ...--Wetman (talk) 04:30, 17 February 2013 (UTC)

@KJP1, the usual process is: Someone just writes an entry.

I think it's best if it's written by a friend. They're usually a few sentences long. For late discoveries, I believe we usually post them in the year of death, rather than the year in which we find out. You should be confident that the claim is true, of course, but if you are, then please "be bold".

Wikipedia:Deceased Wikipedians/Guidelines has a list of steps for marking the page, etc. Any editor can take those steps. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:31, 11 March 2025 (UTC)

Thanks, that is helpful. I’ve let User:Rstreete know and they can decide what they want to do. KJP1 (talk) 07:02, 12 March 2025 (UTC)

Alvinrakoff

Alvinrakoff has stated that Alvin Rakoff is their own biography, but apart from that, there's no real evidence that this account actually belonged to Rakoff - who, according to the article, died in October 2024, a mere 6 months after their most recent edit (which also happens to be the aforementioned diff). Not familiar with this kind of thing, so any input would be warmly welcomed. Cheers, it's lio! | talk | work 13:15, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for the note, @HKLionel. Usually, we don't add editors unless they've made at least a few hundred edits. However, if it's someone you personally remember fondly, then we can make an exception. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:01, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

...or if they are personally pretty distinguished, which he might well count as... Johnbod (talk) 21:58, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

Oppose. This person only made several edits about himself], his wife and his films, i.e., essentially used wikipedia as a media for self-promo. I clicked a random line and what I see? "Rakoff, the award-winning director countered "she would not, regrettably, take any sort of direction"." --Altenmann >talk 22:08, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

On this page, we're not really voting, so voting-type comments are out of place.

This page isn't just for noting the deaths of editors whose contributions we agree with. It tends to work that way on average, because few editors want to write about people they've been in conflict with, but making edits that others disagree with is not an absolute disqualification. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:03, 27 March 2025 (UTC)

Memorialised by mistake?

I understand we have policies and guidelines in place to prevent this from happening, but if for any reason my user page is memorialised while I am still alive how can this be fixed? Since my account would be globally locked, I would not be able to log in to let the community know of their mistake. John Kryten (talk) 16:04, 26 March 2025 (UTC)

In the unlikely event that your account is mistakenly locked for any reason, the next step would be to contact stewardswikimedia.org per the instructions at m:SRG. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 16:09, 26 March 2025 (UTC)

Thank you John Kryten (talk) 16:15, 26 March 2025 (UTC)

Should a likely murder/suicide be included?

I was looking through old entries and found Wikipedia:Deceased Wikipedians/2009 § Glen Dillon (Glen Dillon), who died with his two children in a car crash. News coverage of Dillon's death, such as [2] and [3], characterizes it as a likely murder/suicide, noting that he was supposed to only be around his children supervised, and separately was facing charges of harassment and a request for a restraining order. I guess this raises two questions for us: 1) can anyone find anything that clarifies if the police ever ruled it a murder/suicide, and 2) if this was a case of a Wikipedian whose last act was to kill two children, is that someone we want to include here?

I can honestly see the case either way: You can make the case that we're all equal in death, that we have no way of knowing which good and bad things most of the people on this list might have done in their lives, and that the point is to honor people for their Wikipedia contributions and nothing else. Or you can argue that we should not honor a killer, much less a killer of children given our commitment to child protection. You could also argue that removing anyone from this list on moral grounds would create a slippery slope. Thoughts? -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 06:08, 1 April 2025 (UTC)

I don't think that the point is to "honor" people so much as to "remember" them.

In that lens, this person had 751 edits and edited for about a year. I probably wouldn't have added the entry in the first place. But other people probably would think this is enough. I believe the circumstances were not entirely unknown at the entry's creation, since they linked to a news story calling the deaths "suspicious". WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:48, 1 April 2025 (UTC)

Water under the bridge at this point, since the entry has been around since 2009, but Wikipedia is a much bigger place 16 years on than it was in 2008. I wouldn't've added him based on a news report, unless I knew him personally. If someone added something new today on a current user that cast them in a suspicious light, I'd probably delete it as BLP-adjacent (recently deceased). Jclemens (talk) 00:07, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

I agree with your last statement: "You could also argue that removing anyone from this list on moral grounds would create a slippery slope." -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷)

A dead Wikipedian is a dead Wikipedian. Furthermore, why ignore a minor positive action (editing WP) because it was committed by someone who also did something seriously wrong? Lova Falk (talk) 08:14, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

Curious question

If I DIE, but nobody knows me cuz I’m not popular, how will I let you guys know or you guys knowing me that I died? Thank you. Zappingsbrew000 (talk) 08:17, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

Just as a general thing in life, it's good to have a few people who know your preferences for what to do if you die. I have a Google Doc, which my partners have access to, which says which relatives to call first, my burial preferences, where to find my will, and what to do with my accounts on various websites. I suggest making such a document. You can then include a line like "Log in to my Wikipedia account and leave a post at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Deceased_Wikipedians saying that I have died". Hopefully, however, this will not be relevant for a long time. :) -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 08:24, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

Wow, That was quick! This is why I LOOOOOOOOOOOOVE Wikipedia! (Too bad it’s an enemy in my school and most institutions.). Thank you. Zappingsbrew000 (talk) 08:27, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

Herewhy

Herewhy (talk · contribs) Died of an aneurysm last Wednesday, per a Facebook message from User:Schwede66. A respected New Zealand Wikipedian.-Gadfium (talk) 09:28, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Cool the way BLPSOURCES doesn't apply to wikipedia editors. —Fortuna, imperatrix 14:45, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Her husband of 35 years gave me a call. I think he would know, even if we wouldn’t accept that for someone with a Wikipedia bio. But he did say that there will be a notice in The Press after a private service. Schwede66 15:57, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Sorry to hear this news. I did not know the person but first encountered her online only recently. RIP. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 23:41, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Martin of Sheffield

I came across the talk of Martin of Sheffield and saw this: someone announcing his death on 16 October 2024, using his account. What do we do? Martin had put up a health template on 20 May 2024, and written that he was in hospital on 4 June 2024. He worked in a quiet corner, the only other "private" notice on his talk was a season's greeting. What do we do? -- Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:36, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

The notice was placed over three months ago. As I understand it, someone would have had to log back into the account (e.g., with a password manager) to have access to make that one edit, the only edit since 30 July 2024. The obvious conclusion is that that is legitimate. Alternatives are possible, but require the editor to have decided to forego the account in a manner that leaves us to conclude his demise. Rather, the sad conclusion is that he did pass on, someone close to him noted it, and none of us noticed until Gerda did. Jclemens (talk) 06:42, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Grok was unable to locate a corresponding obituary. Jclemens (talk) 06:47, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Thank you for checking. Fowler&Fowler, you kindly sent a greeting to Martin more than once, do you know a bit more? I didn't see much conversation in the last 4 archives (of 11). Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:02, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Unfortunately, Gerda, I don't know more.

I do know that he used to watch my back as it were on some controversial South Asia articles, and then he stopped. Just earlier, he had come to my defense in a discussion and was mildly angry at everyone, including obliquely at me, for not having been more aggressive. I thought his silence after that indicated disappointment. In light of the discussion here, whose details I have not checked, it is quite likely that he did pass on. I'm deeply sorry to hear this and shall miss his unobtrusive but firm presence in the defense against POV promotion and in support of due weight. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 10:59, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

At the end of archive 7 (2017), he said "Good question. I was trained in an old fashioned library with a card index and every item _had_ to have an author so that the master card could be filed." --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:06, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

That's bad. It looks genuine. I recall noticing Martin's contributions but have had no interactions. I suggest that someone with a closer connection remove the Wikipedia Library newsletters posted after the 18 February 2025 announcement. I have unsubscribed the newsletter so no further issues should be received. Johnuniq (talk) 08:21, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Based on his user page, it seems that he was a change ringer based in Kent. I have a non-Wikipedian friend who also meets that description, so I've reached out to them to see if they know/knew Martin. Thryduulf (talk) 10:47, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Unfortunately I can confirm, via the bell-ringing community in Kent, that Martin is deceased. His Wikipedia activities and username were known to several of them, and they mentioned unprompted that he was particularly happy to have improved the article about Rochester Cathedral, where he rang. That matches up with the thanks displayed on his user page. Thryduulf (talk) 13:12, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

In the light of this, and the amount of edits made on Wikipedia, I have added a brief description on the Wikipedia:Deceased Wikipedians/2024 page on this user, since the date of passing was in 2024. The number I have included is the amount of edits the Wikipedian actually made, which is different from the number of edits seen on Special:Contributions/Martin_of_Sheffield because, as we see, the 2025 edit was made by someone else. Iggy (Swan) (Contribs) 16:39, 4 June 2025 (UTC)