I would like to start off by clarifying a few things. This page is a summary of my thoughts on where the Featured List process is now (March 2009). I made it because I hope to generate discussion and an overall review of the process. I am not trying to start drama, nor am I trying to criticize or blame anyone. My comments are all general statements and do not apply to any one user. I am not criticizing Matthewedwards, the reviewers (especially not Dabomb87 or Truco, their reviews have kept the process alive the past few months) or the editors who are simply doing what they are supposed to: improving content. If it sounds like I am blaming anyone in particular (other than myself), I apologize. It was not my intention.
For those who don't know what is going on, let me bring you up to date. Yesterday, I started a discussion in which I complained about music award lists ( An Awards list rant). I left negative comments on two active FLCs ( one and two) and then decided to test the water by nominating a list for removal. This morning I proposed a new criterion that I hope will stop content forks and usefulness-impaired lists from becoming FLs. So now, I decided to make a somewhat rambling page which summarizes my opinions.
As of late, I've become disinterested in the process. This is partially because I have been working quite a bit on some articles, but it's also partially because I'm bored. Looking through the current FLCs, I see the same types of lists being nominated. That being said, they are nice lists and nothing terrible, but I get the feeling that people are just reaching for the low hanging fruit and working on the easy FLs. A lot of them follow the same format, hence the term "cookie cutter" page (I don't mean it to be derogatory. If a format works, it should be used. But it's true that we have a lot of FLs that are quite similar). So instead of an important page like List of Toronto Maple Leafs seasons you get List of Toronto Maple Leafs head coaches. There's nothing wrong with that, users are welcome to work on whatever they like, but it's frustrating that people are aiming so low. What I am concerned about is that in many cases, pages are created (some with questionable notability) and brought to FL, whereas I would prefer to see more users improve existing pages. Because the majority of FLCs fall under three topics, reviewing the same things over and over again becomes boring and so reviewers are scared away. And the reason we are getting so many FLs in certain topics is because of how easy it has become to get them promoted. The problem isn't that these FLs aren't properly formatted, it's just that they seem to exist just so they can become FLs and that's a problem.
I blame four things:
Maybe I am being dramatic and creating a mountain out of a molehill but I think it is time to start examining where the process has gone and whether we want to continue letting it go that direction. We need to re-introduce a notability/usefulness criterion. In light of my failure, I almost decided to step aside as a director, but I would like to stay on and try to improve the process. I am going to do an audit of all FLs and make a list of lists that fit into the above categories.
It's going to take a lot of work and all opinions are welcome. Let's see if we can take the FLC process back to promoting pages that are undoubtably amongst wikipedia's finest work. -- Scorpion 0422 18:06, 20 March 2009 (UTC)
I would like to start off by clarifying a few things. This page is a summary of my thoughts on where the Featured List process is now (March 2009). I made it because I hope to generate discussion and an overall review of the process. I am not trying to start drama, nor am I trying to criticize or blame anyone. My comments are all general statements and do not apply to any one user. I am not criticizing Matthewedwards, the reviewers (especially not Dabomb87 or Truco, their reviews have kept the process alive the past few months) or the editors who are simply doing what they are supposed to: improving content. If it sounds like I am blaming anyone in particular (other than myself), I apologize. It was not my intention.
For those who don't know what is going on, let me bring you up to date. Yesterday, I started a discussion in which I complained about music award lists ( An Awards list rant). I left negative comments on two active FLCs ( one and two) and then decided to test the water by nominating a list for removal. This morning I proposed a new criterion that I hope will stop content forks and usefulness-impaired lists from becoming FLs. So now, I decided to make a somewhat rambling page which summarizes my opinions.
As of late, I've become disinterested in the process. This is partially because I have been working quite a bit on some articles, but it's also partially because I'm bored. Looking through the current FLCs, I see the same types of lists being nominated. That being said, they are nice lists and nothing terrible, but I get the feeling that people are just reaching for the low hanging fruit and working on the easy FLs. A lot of them follow the same format, hence the term "cookie cutter" page (I don't mean it to be derogatory. If a format works, it should be used. But it's true that we have a lot of FLs that are quite similar). So instead of an important page like List of Toronto Maple Leafs seasons you get List of Toronto Maple Leafs head coaches. There's nothing wrong with that, users are welcome to work on whatever they like, but it's frustrating that people are aiming so low. What I am concerned about is that in many cases, pages are created (some with questionable notability) and brought to FL, whereas I would prefer to see more users improve existing pages. Because the majority of FLCs fall under three topics, reviewing the same things over and over again becomes boring and so reviewers are scared away. And the reason we are getting so many FLs in certain topics is because of how easy it has become to get them promoted. The problem isn't that these FLs aren't properly formatted, it's just that they seem to exist just so they can become FLs and that's a problem.
I blame four things:
Maybe I am being dramatic and creating a mountain out of a molehill but I think it is time to start examining where the process has gone and whether we want to continue letting it go that direction. We need to re-introduce a notability/usefulness criterion. In light of my failure, I almost decided to step aside as a director, but I would like to stay on and try to improve the process. I am going to do an audit of all FLs and make a list of lists that fit into the above categories.
It's going to take a lot of work and all opinions are welcome. Let's see if we can take the FLC process back to promoting pages that are undoubtably amongst wikipedia's finest work. -- Scorpion 0422 18:06, 20 March 2009 (UTC)