![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 20 | ← | Archive 23 | Archive 24 | Archive 25 | Archive 26 | Archive 27 | → | Archive 30 |
What's with the new green coloring at Template:Did you know/Next update/Time ? It's not really needed, really only the Red Color is needed to alert the Admins when there is a backlog/overdue. Cirt ( talk) 21:49, 13 December 2007 (UTC).
As a matter of curiosity on my part, what happens to Expired noms that aren't used? Are they simply removed from the Suggestions page after a time, or are they moved to an archive somewhere? The page does not seem to say. -- EncycloPetey ( talk) 22:22, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
The result of the proposal was no consensus. There is no overriding need to rename the template, considering the confusion it may cause. The template itself can intuitively be discussed here. – Pomte 20:25, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
I cannot tag the template talk page for 2 reasons:
This is going to be posted on WP:RM.
So the discussion should be here. I propose the following move:
Template talk:Did you know --> Template:Did you know/Suggestions or Wikipedia:Did you know/Suggestions.
My reasoning is that this way the template itself can be discussed and it would make sense that this is what people might be searching for. If the move goesahead, the redirect on the template talk page can be got rid of for proper template discussion. Simply south ( talk) 00:54, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
"Bactrian Greeks led by Demetrius I (coin pictured) and Menander I conquered India and occupied a larger territory than the Macedonians under Alexander the Great" I have not seen any source that says that the Indo-Greek Kingdom was ever larger than the Macedonian Empire of Alexander. Indeed, looking at the List of largest empires, the Macedonian empire was larger than the Mauryan and Mughal empires at their greatest extent, both of which contained far more territory than the Indo-Greek Kingdom. Seleucus ( talk) 23:50, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm not an admin, but as non admins are allowed to help out in DYK areas where possible, I'm just wondering; when the next update page is prepared for the next update, would it be considered acceptable to add the templates to the article talk pages and user talk pages before its update on the Main Page? I don't think it would be much of a big deal, and would save the admin updating it a lot of work. Thoughts, please? Cheers, Qst 20:28, 20 December 2007 (UTC)
While we're on the subject of updating: all admins, PLEASE remember (when you promote the next update) to unprotect the image that was featured on the previous round of DYK. -- EncycloPetey ( talk) 14:30, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
I followed the comments and it looked like you were using Riggins v. Nevada (originated on December 21) but now it has disappeared without explanation. It is not crossed out on the December 21 page, not in the archives, etc. Thanks! Mattisse 19:03, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
I've seen a few "expansion" articles recently that didn't seem very close to a 5x expansion. I noticed On Famous Women in the update since it looked like a good candidate for a double with On the Fates of Famous Men. But, the version from 10 December (just before the current expansion began) has 2458 characters (no TOC) by my count, and the current text has 5058 (including TOC and headers, but excluding external links and sources). This excludes the list of names in both numbers, which would only make the ratio lower. What's the standard way the article size is counted? Gimmetrow 08:10, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
Okay, I managed to find a former DYK article, and judging by it's state, I think I can not only eliminate the cruft, but also verify facts, add more info, and maybe expand it abit in time for possible January 1st inclusion (maybe submit it during December 29th). But, it was a former DYK, and given the standards before, I was wondering a former DYK will automatically disqualify it from competing?-- 293.xx.xxx.xx ( talk) 06:19, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
We have had a number of nominations come through lately where a question has been raised about eligibility. In nearly all of these cases, the point appears in "The Rules", but the person who made the nomination either was unaware of the Rules or did not understand them. Looking at how the Rules have been worded and organized, I can see why. The Rules have been edited piecemeal for so long that it is difficult to see what is truly important. I have been BOLD and revised "The Rules". All the former content is still there, as well as some content that previously appeared only on the nominations page. I think organizing the selection criteria into three main points will make it much easier both for nominators to see what is required, and for us to explain issues to those with questions. Comments? -- EncycloPetey ( talk) 18:03, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
I observed my DYK Vajreshwari temple nomination had just disappeared from the Suggestions page. I traced its disappearance here. [1]. I was curious if this step by the editor involved was valid. (if failed, my nom should go to Expired norms, right????) Also a note was left by the editor at 05.55 today (29 December 2007). When the nom was removed, it was 15:56, 29 December 2007. Isn't too less time to answer the objections ???? Please help. Thanks. -- Redtigerxyz ( talk) 17:01, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
I am concerned at the large number of submissions made which fail to provide either any source whatever for their hook, or which fail to provide an inline citation for the hook. It makes it very difficult for editors who are trying to determine DYK eligibility.
To that end, I have strengthened the clause in the rules about inline citations to say that nominators must supply an inline citation rather than just "preferably" supply one. I've also added a few comments to try and underline the importance of providing proper citations. I hope these changes will meet with everyone's approval. Gatoclass ( talk) 07:03, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
As Royalbroil said above, without an inline citation it just takes too long to prepare updates. I can check an article's validity when it has an inline cite in a minute or two, or even seconds, but if it has no inline cite I might spend ten minutes trying to figure where the fact/s in the hook originated (and there is of course no guarantee there's a source for the hook at all, which makes the search futile). And if you're spending ten minutes on each hook you look at, it becomes very time consuming, particularly if you are preparing multiple updates every day. I mean we are talking hours as opposed to minutes. So I really think inline cites should be mandatory.
As for EncycloPetey's changes to the rules, I too thought they needed some cleaning up along similar lines, and in general I think I approve, but will need a little more time to consider them. Gatoclass ( talk) 04:33, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
I have frequently noticed on
AN or
ANI that the template is not always updated in a timely fashion. Has anyone considered auto-rotation? It could easily be done with switch statements that will rotate per hour or every few hours. {{#expr: {{CURRENTHOUR}} / 6 round 0}}
, for example, would give a number that would rotate every four hours. So {{#switch:{{#expr: ({{CURRENTHOUR}} - 3) / 6 round 0}} | 0 = did you know w | 1 = did you know x | 2 = did you know y | 3 = did you know z }}
would give you a different did you know every four hours, eg, "" for this hour. Another switch could be made to include day mod 2 or mod 3 so that they can be setup several days in advance. The so what of all this is that someone doesn't have to just so happen to be available right at the right time - if you want to setup the overnight DYKs, you don't have to be awake to do it - you can queue up the next day during waking hours.. --
B (
talk)
17:51, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
I counted over 40 hooks currently on this day. Have we had this many before? In either case, we have to get these updates in as close to every 6 hours as we can in order to clear that. Of course, we have to go and make sure they're all good, appropo hooks. Wizardman 17:11, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
Piotrus now has 175 DYK articles (written). Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Newsroom/Suggestions - I have proposed that this get put in the Signpost and it could do with some more lobbying I guess. DYK needs some good publicity, not just for Piotrus but for everyone at DYK, this is a success. Blnguyen ( bananabucket) 08:09, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Congrats Piotrus! Speaking of numbers... has anyone ever calculated how many articles have been featured at DYK? It'd be fun to track that for the major milestones. If the archives are really at 50-100 hooks then we're somewhere between helping generate and recognize 10,000 and 20,000 new articles that are more than just one sentence stubs. That's quite a feat, really. -- JayHenry ( talk) 08:17, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Well... according to Wikipedia Page History Statistics
Fifteen editors have more than 500 edits to T:TDYK.
Seven editors have more than 300 edits to T:DYK/N
Five admins have 300 or more edits to T:DYK itself.
Now, of course, this isn't perfectly indicative; all of the standard edit counting disclaimers apply. Some people take more edits to do the same task, some people make better points than others, etc., etc. I think it's safe to say that Carabinieri, with over 3,000 edits to the various DYK pages probably is "in the lead" although as ALoan always observed: it's not a competition. -- JayHenry ( talk) 16:24, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Please see Template talk:ArticleHistory#Back to the future. Simply south ( talk) 22:14, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Why is there the text "Look at me!" at the Maxwell D Taylor picture at today's DYK? Is it a sort of a joke?
[[Image:Maxwell D Taylor official portrait.jpg|100x100px|Look at me!]]
Jan.Kamenicek ( talk) 14:48, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
I know this is a frequent false call but HMS Bonadventure (a jan 2 hook) seems to have "gone". I have made a note on the suggestions page. Is it me? Victuallers ( talk) 09:18, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
(UTC)
Firstly let me say this is not my article (only my nom), however I feel the process has broken down. Late last night PHLai investigated what had happened to the hook. Reason said for rejection was "length of only 1478" ... no reason given for deleting the nom. I then did further research to add the next 22 chars. I am told the nom is in a "holding bay". I return today to find it is not there and not been published or in the discarded pile. Now there is no point in having a witchunt but surely if an article is below size or lacking in any respect then we comment on it and in time it gets to be a discarded nomination. 'Deleting articles just confuses people'. Nuff said except that I didnt know it was also a cut and paste from a previous article. I understand that we should not encourage that and it should not be published .... but we should have an audit trail. Thanks to all for listening to my rant. Cheers Victuallers ( talk) 13:06, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
For articles that are initially created in the userspace to work on, and then moved to the mainspace, is the date the article created in the userspace used when placing it on the suggestions page or the date when the article was moved into the mainspace? And on that note, would articles that sit in the userspace for more than five days be disqualified? Thanks, Sephiroth BCR ( Converse) 03:13, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
(Unindenting) At the risk of diverting off subject, I agree that in-line cites are not a magic pill but they are infinitely more helpful in the endeavor of verifying a source. Also note that while a claim might not be "controversial" to where someone thinks it is BS, it might be "curious" to where someone would want to follow up and understand the context from where that claim came from. While the article on A Tale of a Tub might look "pretty" without the footnotes, it is really not helpful to me as a reader as I see several things that seem curious but I have no clue of where among the haystack of sources at that bottom of the article that I might find the needle of information that I would want to follow up on. I have to echo Cirt's sentiments in that I don't think it would pass FAC these days as the culture of Wikipedia is changing more towards giving readers the tools to verify and expand on Wikipedia's content rather than handing them a list of books and saying essentially "go fish". Now... back to DYK-I have been trying to help out the process with doing some verification and, beside developing ever more respect for the work of the admins who daily toil with the tasks, I've become even more convinced that requesting in-line cites for at least the hook is a very fair and reasonable requirement. It takes time to verify sources and time is precious, especially when it is being asked of volunteers. It is so much easier to follow the footnote to the source and from there try to verify that it actually sources what the hook has proclaim is "special" about this subject. DYK submitters and article writers do receive benefit from having their work featured on the main page and it is a small price to ask in return for that benefit that they help smooth the process out by making verifying their hooks easier. Agne Cheese/ Wine 19:18, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
Just for the record, I think the rule would be best if it read along the lines of "The person who adds an article to the 'next update' page should verify, in a reliable source, that the hook is accurate." Thus if you don't know the topic, and don't want to read 5 references to verify the hook is correct, you don't add it to the next update page. But articles that meet WP:V without inline citations could still be added, if a reviewer went the extra mile. People could boost the chances of an article being reviewed (and thus accepted) by providing that inline citation. The real advantage of this wording is it asks reviewers to fact check the hook, rather than merely see if there's a superscript blue number after it, which a bot could do. -- W.marsh 19:42, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
I think this discussion has gone a little off-topic. The requirement for inline cites is for the facts in the hook only, not for inline cites in general. The requirement for inline cites for the hook is to help the reviewer quickly confirm that the hook is actually sourced and accurate, nothing more. The "nofootnote" tag on the other hand, is for articles which appear to make a number of questionable claims for which inline cites might be appropriate. Which is a completely different issue.
I initiated the requirement for inline cites for the hook because I got sick of having to work through half a dozen different refs for every submission, trying to find out where the hook originated. An inline cite narrows the search down to just one reference so it makes it much easier. I don't have time to go searching through half a dozen different refs for each submission, and neither, obviously, does anyone else. Gatoclass ( talk) 05:40, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
For my own information, could you explain why a hook for Godinez v. Moran on January 5 was not used. I checked it frequently and would have fixed any problems with it. Thanks. Mattisse 16:26, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
But as a test to see if length can be used to catch up...ok with me. Mrs.EasterBunny ( talk) 20:29, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't know how you guys do it, I just keep adding entries until they line up with this day's/the next day's "In the News" section (as displayed by the buttons on the update page) as appropriate. For example, there is currently (as of this post) space on the preview page for another four or five entries. [2]
I'm not sure if Matisse needs to worry about adding more entries either. Since PFHLai, who is normally a prolific nominator, is not currently active in DYK, and a number of the submissions have problems, I think we may be about to catch up. Gatoclass ( talk) 05:24, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Nomination is a great way of befriending lonely article publishers. Twould be a pity if we stopped. Better to "up the bar" in some way. Victuallers ( talk) 11:14, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Copied from the Main Page Discussion:
Okay, we definitely need some system in place to catch such possible factual errors before they creep onto the main page. I mean seriously, did anyone who puts the suggestions onto the template ever bother to fact check, or do they just do a cursory "Oh, it has a citation mark, put it on" type of deal? This is the second time I caught a DYK with a factual error!! Both citations contradict each other, not to mention one was an Opinion Piece and one was a Sports Report. -- 293.xx.xxx.xx ( talk) 23:57, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
Why do we have Abani Mukherji hook appearing twice?-- Isles Cape Talk 19:22, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
If I am working on an article in a sandbox over a long period of time and preserve that edit history by moving it into the mainspace when I am ready to go live, is the article considered "new" at the time of the move for purposes of dyk consideration? Or must I artificially lose that edit history by creating the article afresh to meet the technical requirement?-- Fuhghettaboutit ( talk) 03:49, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
A related discussion is taking place at Talk:Main Page#"Did you know" and "On this day" are getting too long. howcheng { chat} 21:00, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
I think we've finally gotten out the hole in regards to the backlog. I'm not sure if any of the remaining Jan 11 & 12th noms are useable but we may be just down to a one day backlog. :) Agne Cheese/ Wine 01:59, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
Today (at my 9.34, hour of Rome) all six out of six "did you know" in the main page concerned US or UK. Aren't there anything else interesting about other countries, even English-speaking ones? -- Attilios ( talk) 08:35, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
The signpost tutorial series is going to have an article on how to create an article that doesn't exsist yet. Since many people who do that meet here, i figured this would be the best place to ask for help. The two after this one will be on citations and making an article featured, if that helps. The Placebo Effect ( talk) 19:28, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
The current top DYK item starts with "Dhakis (bengali drummers) allegedly kill..." Allegedly is a WP word to avoid. Can't we replace it with something else, like "according to some estimates"? Thanks. ReluctantPhilosopher ( talk) 17:02, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
How was the required length of articles to be featured in DYK changed form 1500 to 2000 bytes? Did someone just be bold and changed it themselves? Mrs.EasterBunny ( talk) 16:17, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
As for icons, I think
is helpful. The others, not as much, but any visual cue to help editors is a Good Thing in my book.
howcheng {
chat}
06:18, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
I believe it has been long-established practice that new, long articles that are created as a result of a merge or that are split off from existing articles are not eligible for DYK, correct? Assuming that this is indeed the case, it was brought to my attention that the rules don't specifically exclude this. Am I just wrong, or do we need to address this? Thanks. howcheng { chat} 17:50, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
How harmful and upsetting to the state of mind would it be to contemplate changing DYK policy to accept interesting facts from articles that are older than five days or have not been expanded fivefold in the last five days? - Neparis ( talk) 17:40, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
Let's say I created an article a few months back (I created a slew of stubs with maybe 200 bytes of prose). Would they be eligible for DYK if i were to make them 2,000 bytes with a referenced hook? I wasn't sure if me creating the article originally renders them ineligible or not. Wizardman 01:20, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
I was just wondering, if I don't click the "purge" link after updating DYK, how long the Main Page cache will take to display the new update? -- BorgQueen ( talk) 10:45, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
No one has put the templates for the current DYKs on the nominators' pages, or on the article pages. The next update is in less than a hour. Shouldn't someone do something?-- Bedford 03:45, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
Okay, maybe not Mary Lou Retton but it is her birthday and the recent discussion about character counts seems strangely reminiscent to gymnastic scoring. :p Anyways...I want to continue part of the conversation that started at Template_talk:Did_you_know#Articles_created.2Fexpanded_on_January_18 in regards to the Jack Brod nomination. But I do think this issue deserves broader treatment and thought it was best to open the discussion here. If Daniel or Gatoclass want to move their comments over here they are more than welcome to but I want to answer the reason why I, personally, started reviewing DYK noms and using icons. I think it is an unfortunate misconception that noms are being viewed as "vetoed" when a reviewer brings up a concern. Personally, I want to see nearly every nom submitted get featured because I appreciate the hard work and effort by editors that create these articles. But I do understand the need for having a criteria & consistent standards that are applied equally and to avoid issues being brought up at WP:ERRORs which can negatively affect Wikipedia and DYK. I actually see these reviews as way to try and get more articles featured by noting potential obstacles earlier so that they can be improved in time to get featured. It seemed that previously, a nom might not be reviewed till an admin was ready to feature it and if they noticed a problem then it was simply dropped and that was it. It is my hope that the nominator (or any interested editor for that matter) will note any concerns and address them so that the nom can be featured. I use icons as simple visual tools so that I can frequently keep tabs of noms that I review and see if any further comments have been added which would signal that the article should be reviewed again. I also see benefit for trying to make sure that DYK is updated on time since if an admin is "in a hurry", they can quickly identify suitable noms to be featured. I think DYK is a team effort with dozens of people pitching. From my perspective, reviews and icons can help this along but if it becomes more of a hassle then it is worth, I will gladly step aside. Agne Cheese/ Wine 12:59, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
I moved the rule back to 1500. 2,000 seemed a reasonable way of cutting down on the number of entries when we had a backlog, but with no backlog I see no reason to continue it. Gatoclass ( talk) 14:34, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
Just wanted to point out that 1500 is not exactly a "long-established" minimum. It was increased from 1000 character less than a year ago. howcheng { chat} 17:20, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
I think we should pick a number and commit to sticking with it for a while, like for the rest of 2008 for example. Changing it around all the time, as said above, isn't a good idea. -- W.marsh 19:25, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
Just to clarify, what is the current minimum? At the moment, Wikipedia:Did you know#Selection criteria says 1500, but Template talk:Did you know#Suggestions says 2000. PC78 ( talk) 16:31, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
DYK has been mentioned in an ANI thread: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Copyright_violation_on_main_page.3F -- W.marsh 16:19, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes, we know, hooks that are just fine for DYK stay there even after the 5 days expire. I have just assumed that the purpose of DYK if to show the new articles that come in. If this is the case, is it right to just auto-expire them without looking at them in five days? Example is just now, january 2 was expired though it's th 8th. Makes sense, but there's a bunch of hooks still there. I'm not pointing fingers or anything (since I don't know who to point to), but somethign needs to be done so we can cram through the backlogs and not have them falling three days behind (which i've seen) it's only going to get worse if we don't find a solution.
I guess the first step is asking ourselves which is better, a backlog past five days to cram the hooks in, or just chopping off nominations that have nothing wrong with them, but we're just out of room? Maybe we need to tighten the requirements? Wizardman 23:01, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
(←) DYK has a lot of space on the Main Page today and tomorrow. We've got room for 10-12 hooks in each update it looks like to me. If we keep T:DYK/N filled we'll be able to burn through most of the backlog and get back to speed. I have to get an early start tomorrow so I'm signing off for the night, but if somebody could do a Next-Update and a Next-Next Update right now, we could get off to a good start tomorrow :) -- JayHenry ( talk) 07:01, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't think increasing to seven days will help, it just moves the goalposts around. If there are too many nominations, then whether the cut-off is five days or seven, the same number of hooks will still end up missing out.
Also, although I originally authored the change re: inline hooks, I am thinking that maybe that should only apply to self-noms. I think perhaps in the case of new articles that are not self-nommed but which are obviously of very good quality and well referenced, that that particular requirement could be waived. Gatoclass ( talk) 10:20, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
A 7-day cutoff sounds good on paper, but it would be putting a band-aid on a broken foot. In fact it might make it worse, since extra hooks might pour in as a result. Little things like that are no longer going to help DYK. I do have another proposal that I don't know if I've brought up yet: We need to find a way to make the holding bay permanent. It might cause us to add another page or two, but doing this will certainly help.
Actually, what I think I'm going to do is put together a slew of different proposals I have for DYK, then bring them back here to look at, since I'm gradually thinking of more and more changes that could be made. Wizardman 19:05, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
A number of hooks are being rejected with the new 2,000 minimum size. How about reverting it back to 1,500? The hooks of previously selected articles of 1,500 to 2,000 length were sometimes very interesting. Archtransit ( talk) 20:08, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
I've always wondered how well DYK works in getting people to check out the pages featured. As I'm sure you all know, Wikipedia's built in feature to count how many times a page has been visited has long been turned off for performance reasons. I discovered a third party site today which purports to count Wikipedia page hits. Check out the stats for an article I created that was featured on DYK a week ago: page hits 4, 12, 3,500+! 68, 30, 15... Pretty impressive.-- Fuhghettaboutit ( talk) 01:14, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
I noted that PFHLai left the following comment on Archtransit's talk page:
I thought I could remind you, when updating DYK, to check the layout on MainPage. Putting in just 5 bulleted items when ITN and SA/OTD are a bit long, as you did in this update, makes a 'hole' on MainPage, at least on my monitor, between DYK and POTD.
I would like to fully endorse this comment from PFHLai about checking the layout to ensure the number of DYK entries matches up with the length of the "On This Day" column opposite. I've seen big gaps here quite commonly, and it looks untidy. But sometimes the opposite occurs and there are many more DYK entries listed than there should be.
I have no idea who is responsible for this because I don't keep tabs on who is responsible for the updating, so I'm certainly not singling out Archtransit here. But whoever may be responsible, I think it would be a good idea if updaters paid more attention to this issue when organizing the updates. Gatoclass ( talk) 00:54, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
As a fairly new admin, I recently did the DYK update for the first time (and have done it once more since). I have two suggestions for possible improvements to the update process.
First, would it be possible to have a "How to Update DYK Guide" for inexperienced admins? I realize there are instructions in various places for the process, but I think it would help to have all the directions in one place. This might also be a place for putting helpful hints, links to scripts used by some editors for updating, etc. (thanks to Royalbroil for pointing me here). My thought is that if there were concise directions, then perhaps more admins would help out with the update process.
Second, would it be possible to have a bot do the notifications (on article, author, and nominator talk pages)? The actual update is not that difficult or time consuming to do "by hand", but I have found the notices to talk at least half an hour. Perhaps the bot could leave a link to the updater's talk page in case there were errors / questions. Users are glad to learn that their article is in DYK, my guess is they would not care if a bot delivered the news. If FAC notices can be done via bot, it seems DYK can too. I also will note that I have not done the update at least once because I knew I did not have time to do the notifications.
Thanks for considering these ideas - I look forward to the discussion, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 05:25, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
There have been a few recent cases of people nominating major news story articles for DYK. These article have been featured in the "In the news" section. Our practice has been to not select articles that have been featured in "In the news" (ITN) because purpose for DYK is to give main page exposure to the best new articles to encourage new articles. These ITN articles already have main page exposure for far more than the 6 hours that DYK articles get. We should change the rules to explicitly state that articles that have already had main page exposure are not eligible for DYK. Royalbroil 05:14, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
Is the clock working properly at the moment? It seems to have just reset itself when it was about to go overdue. Espresso Addict ( talk) 17:32, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
I just wanted to note, for the record, that I was never officially informed that Fort Harrison State Park was used on the front page for DYK, even through I was the one who originally created it, expanded it, and nominated it.-- Bedford 23:08, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi, under current rules an article must be no more than five days old in order to qualify for DYK. I assume that reckoning of the period starts – when the article is first created (no matter how crappy it is) or expanded. I feel that five days from this date is really too short to get an article properly done, as it doesn't take into account the fact that editors may have other things to do. I would suggest a period of at least 14 days. — Cheers, JackLee – talk– 04:01, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
Gee, working on articles in my sandbox never occurred to me. Thanks for that. I suppose I might even do them offline in Notepad. — Cheers, JackLee – talk– 04:45, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
Actually, just after I said that I thought that it was better to compose articles in a sandbox since you'd be able to check the formatting by previewing or saving the page. But I guess you have a point too! — Cheers, JackLee – talk– 05:49, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
From Main Page errors for old set:
"...that Pandora Jewelry's charm bracelets feature a patented thread system that allows beads to be evenly spaced across the band?" The article linked to has an advert tag, and rightly so. Linking to an article of such dubious merit from the Main Page looks very bad. Surely something better could be found? Artie P.S. ( talk) 09:17, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
Espresso Addict ( talk) 14:18, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
Never mind, it's not important now. Artie P.S. ( talk) 14:55, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
PS There's also discussion of this under the main page talk section: Talk:Main_Page#Really_tacky Espresso Addict ( talk) 15:40, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
Well, thanks to both of you for paying attention to my grumbling. I do think keeping (even slightly) spammy articles off the Main Page is important, of course, but the tone of my original message was unnecessarily gruff. (I blame an early-morning caffeine deficiency...) Artie P.S. ( talk) 16:48, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
There's a tool out there that allows you to check page views for articles during Dec. and Jan. I thought it would be interesting to see how effective some of our DYK "hooks" have been to figure out what works and what doesn't. If the goal is to draw reader attention to new articles, this type of raw data may help improve future hooks. The data shows that DYK is working, but to varying degrees depending on how catchy the hook is. Does anyone keep track of what constitutes the average view rate when something appears on DYK? This is just a random selection, but it seems to show that the extremes are less than 400 views and more than 4,000 views. Here's what I found at the extremes:
Hooks that worked
Hooks that flopped
Proving the adage that sex sells:
I don't see why the short-lived gambler Dan Allen on 2/7 gets precedence over Anna Wilson, the madame, who did much more for the city of Omaha. A bit of sexism, perhaps? Dale662 ( talk) 19:52, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm as big of a fan of them as anyone, however I do not think their absence should be (in and of itself) a disqualification provided the article can still be easily verified. This is most relevant when there is an article that is sourced to a single reference or link. With a large number of books available on Amazon Reader/Google Books that provide a keyword search, I can normally verify the hook of an article based on that single source-even if there is not an inline cite. It requires little, if any, extra effort and we still end up with the desired verification. However, if there is a laundry list of sources and no cites, I'll tag the particular hook claim and request a cite because it is really not practical to go through that haystack of sources looking for a needle of information. While I certainly want to encourage the use of cites, I think it is reasonable to let articles that can still be easily verified without cites not be penalized unfairly. Agne Cheese/ Wine 21:00, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
I was the one who initially changed the rules to make inline cites mandatory, but a short time later I also said that there are circumstances where inline cites aren't really necessary. It's difficult though, to come up with a wording that doesn't end up making cites sound optional. And more to the point, even though we've had this rule for many weeks now, there are still a huge number of articles submitted that are improperly cited. So even with the mandatory ruling, lots of people still don't seem to be getting it.
In which case, I'm not sure that weakening the wording is a wise thing to do. I think perhaps it's enough that those doing the reviewing understand that the inline cite requirement can be waived in certain circumstances, such as when a hook is obviously accurate, or when an article is of high quality and very well referenced, or when there's only one reference to check anyway and so on. The problem is though, that if we start adding all these caveats to the rules, it's only likely to confuse people still further, and they don't seem to be grasping the requirements very well even now. Gatoclass ( talk) 11:44, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
It would appear ( diff) that the "Next Update" clock was reset without an actual update. Two questions: First, it seems we are (over)due for an update - can someone double check this (and if you know what happened, explain)? Second, it appears this was changed by a non-admin - should the update clock be protected? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 21:10, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
Wouldn't hurt to at least semi-protect it.-- Bedford 16:07, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
It is already semi-protected, thanks. I guess we can leave it that way unless this becomes a recurring problem. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 16:55, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
Would an article still be an eligible candidate for DYK if it was created and planned out in userspace a week ago, but was moved to the mainspace and nominated. Would that still be considered okay? Qst ( talk) 16:40, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
Why does the rollover image caption at Template:Did you know/Next update/Clear say "Look at me!"? It does remind the updating administrator to remember to change it. But if he forgets and it survives onto the Main Page, it looks like vandalism, and it happens about once a month. I suggest "Rollover caption not supplied yet. If this is on the Main Page, please report it at WP:ERRORS." Or almost anything would be better than "Look at me!" on the Main Page. Note that saying "Let's just remember to change the caption" is not a solution, unless you can suggest a better procedure that will cause the updating administrator to remember all the details including the image caption. Yes I know, we need a bot, but until then can we change the caption? Art LaPella ( talk) 02:29, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
I made the change suggested by JayHenry. Leaving it blank doesn't make the caption blank; it shows the name of the image file. But in most cases, the name of the image file will give some idea of what the picture is about, so maybe that's just as well. Art LaPella ( talk) 06:29, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
The hook on this is hardly new ..that in a college prank televised across the United States, spectators at the 1961 Rose Bowl unknowingly displayed the word "CALTECH" in an altered card stunt instead of the nickname of one of the teams on the field? the Great Rose Bowl Hoax has been on wiki for years Gnevin ( talk) 12:27, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
The nomination for an article I recently created, but did not nominate ( The Tribute Money), just expired, apparently because an editor was unable to check the references! Now, forget about the fact that no such policy has ever been announced as far as I'm aware, but if this is to be the way things are done from now on, it will just strengthen Wikipedia's tendency towards Recentism; something we should be trying to counter. Articles that actually use this oldfangled thing called books for sources won't stand a chance.
I'm sure someone will say that the nomination didn't expire because of the reservation about references, it simply fell victim to natural selection. That's just evading the question though, cause once that purple circle is placed next to the article, of course it's gonna drop to the end of the line. And I know this article was as good as any DYK out there. Does anybody want to address this? Lampman ( talk) 03:00, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
Not involved Lampman but just commenting. You have a point and your article looks great and everyone I am sure will agree it should be on DYK. Now how can we ensure that the next article like this gets accepted (assuming there is a consensus). Obviuously keeping an eye on the nomination is a good idea - the people who are checking the articles are trying to reject poor unreferenced articles but they are volunteers, busy and fallible. Suggestions I could offer are a) make the dyk hook from an on-line ref - that is the important one b) make sure the hook is obvious and uncontentious. c) change the (emerging) policy. I think we have not got perfection ... yet? Victuallers ( talk) 11:39, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
I havent put this is your article and it was only a one minute effort Victuallers ( talk) 11:45, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
My suggested hook for the 1860 Oxford evolution debate was edited from "Bishop Wilberforce is said to have asked Thomas Huxley" to "Bishop Wilberforce asked Thomas Huxley" but, as the article notes, we can't be sure of what Wilberforce actually said. The line is very widely quoted but some reliable sources reckon it's completely inaccurate. Maybe we could add "allegedly" or "supposedly" or something.
Also, I forgot to link to monkey. I don't wanna interfere with the next update though. Sideshow Bob Roberts ( talk) 14:39, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 20 | ← | Archive 23 | Archive 24 | Archive 25 | Archive 26 | Archive 27 | → | Archive 30 |
What's with the new green coloring at Template:Did you know/Next update/Time ? It's not really needed, really only the Red Color is needed to alert the Admins when there is a backlog/overdue. Cirt ( talk) 21:49, 13 December 2007 (UTC).
As a matter of curiosity on my part, what happens to Expired noms that aren't used? Are they simply removed from the Suggestions page after a time, or are they moved to an archive somewhere? The page does not seem to say. -- EncycloPetey ( talk) 22:22, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
The result of the proposal was no consensus. There is no overriding need to rename the template, considering the confusion it may cause. The template itself can intuitively be discussed here. – Pomte 20:25, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
I cannot tag the template talk page for 2 reasons:
This is going to be posted on WP:RM.
So the discussion should be here. I propose the following move:
Template talk:Did you know --> Template:Did you know/Suggestions or Wikipedia:Did you know/Suggestions.
My reasoning is that this way the template itself can be discussed and it would make sense that this is what people might be searching for. If the move goesahead, the redirect on the template talk page can be got rid of for proper template discussion. Simply south ( talk) 00:54, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
"Bactrian Greeks led by Demetrius I (coin pictured) and Menander I conquered India and occupied a larger territory than the Macedonians under Alexander the Great" I have not seen any source that says that the Indo-Greek Kingdom was ever larger than the Macedonian Empire of Alexander. Indeed, looking at the List of largest empires, the Macedonian empire was larger than the Mauryan and Mughal empires at their greatest extent, both of which contained far more territory than the Indo-Greek Kingdom. Seleucus ( talk) 23:50, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm not an admin, but as non admins are allowed to help out in DYK areas where possible, I'm just wondering; when the next update page is prepared for the next update, would it be considered acceptable to add the templates to the article talk pages and user talk pages before its update on the Main Page? I don't think it would be much of a big deal, and would save the admin updating it a lot of work. Thoughts, please? Cheers, Qst 20:28, 20 December 2007 (UTC)
While we're on the subject of updating: all admins, PLEASE remember (when you promote the next update) to unprotect the image that was featured on the previous round of DYK. -- EncycloPetey ( talk) 14:30, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
I followed the comments and it looked like you were using Riggins v. Nevada (originated on December 21) but now it has disappeared without explanation. It is not crossed out on the December 21 page, not in the archives, etc. Thanks! Mattisse 19:03, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
I've seen a few "expansion" articles recently that didn't seem very close to a 5x expansion. I noticed On Famous Women in the update since it looked like a good candidate for a double with On the Fates of Famous Men. But, the version from 10 December (just before the current expansion began) has 2458 characters (no TOC) by my count, and the current text has 5058 (including TOC and headers, but excluding external links and sources). This excludes the list of names in both numbers, which would only make the ratio lower. What's the standard way the article size is counted? Gimmetrow 08:10, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
Okay, I managed to find a former DYK article, and judging by it's state, I think I can not only eliminate the cruft, but also verify facts, add more info, and maybe expand it abit in time for possible January 1st inclusion (maybe submit it during December 29th). But, it was a former DYK, and given the standards before, I was wondering a former DYK will automatically disqualify it from competing?-- 293.xx.xxx.xx ( talk) 06:19, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
We have had a number of nominations come through lately where a question has been raised about eligibility. In nearly all of these cases, the point appears in "The Rules", but the person who made the nomination either was unaware of the Rules or did not understand them. Looking at how the Rules have been worded and organized, I can see why. The Rules have been edited piecemeal for so long that it is difficult to see what is truly important. I have been BOLD and revised "The Rules". All the former content is still there, as well as some content that previously appeared only on the nominations page. I think organizing the selection criteria into three main points will make it much easier both for nominators to see what is required, and for us to explain issues to those with questions. Comments? -- EncycloPetey ( talk) 18:03, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
I observed my DYK Vajreshwari temple nomination had just disappeared from the Suggestions page. I traced its disappearance here. [1]. I was curious if this step by the editor involved was valid. (if failed, my nom should go to Expired norms, right????) Also a note was left by the editor at 05.55 today (29 December 2007). When the nom was removed, it was 15:56, 29 December 2007. Isn't too less time to answer the objections ???? Please help. Thanks. -- Redtigerxyz ( talk) 17:01, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
I am concerned at the large number of submissions made which fail to provide either any source whatever for their hook, or which fail to provide an inline citation for the hook. It makes it very difficult for editors who are trying to determine DYK eligibility.
To that end, I have strengthened the clause in the rules about inline citations to say that nominators must supply an inline citation rather than just "preferably" supply one. I've also added a few comments to try and underline the importance of providing proper citations. I hope these changes will meet with everyone's approval. Gatoclass ( talk) 07:03, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
As Royalbroil said above, without an inline citation it just takes too long to prepare updates. I can check an article's validity when it has an inline cite in a minute or two, or even seconds, but if it has no inline cite I might spend ten minutes trying to figure where the fact/s in the hook originated (and there is of course no guarantee there's a source for the hook at all, which makes the search futile). And if you're spending ten minutes on each hook you look at, it becomes very time consuming, particularly if you are preparing multiple updates every day. I mean we are talking hours as opposed to minutes. So I really think inline cites should be mandatory.
As for EncycloPetey's changes to the rules, I too thought they needed some cleaning up along similar lines, and in general I think I approve, but will need a little more time to consider them. Gatoclass ( talk) 04:33, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
I have frequently noticed on
AN or
ANI that the template is not always updated in a timely fashion. Has anyone considered auto-rotation? It could easily be done with switch statements that will rotate per hour or every few hours. {{#expr: {{CURRENTHOUR}} / 6 round 0}}
, for example, would give a number that would rotate every four hours. So {{#switch:{{#expr: ({{CURRENTHOUR}} - 3) / 6 round 0}} | 0 = did you know w | 1 = did you know x | 2 = did you know y | 3 = did you know z }}
would give you a different did you know every four hours, eg, "" for this hour. Another switch could be made to include day mod 2 or mod 3 so that they can be setup several days in advance. The so what of all this is that someone doesn't have to just so happen to be available right at the right time - if you want to setup the overnight DYKs, you don't have to be awake to do it - you can queue up the next day during waking hours.. --
B (
talk)
17:51, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
I counted over 40 hooks currently on this day. Have we had this many before? In either case, we have to get these updates in as close to every 6 hours as we can in order to clear that. Of course, we have to go and make sure they're all good, appropo hooks. Wizardman 17:11, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
Piotrus now has 175 DYK articles (written). Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Newsroom/Suggestions - I have proposed that this get put in the Signpost and it could do with some more lobbying I guess. DYK needs some good publicity, not just for Piotrus but for everyone at DYK, this is a success. Blnguyen ( bananabucket) 08:09, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Congrats Piotrus! Speaking of numbers... has anyone ever calculated how many articles have been featured at DYK? It'd be fun to track that for the major milestones. If the archives are really at 50-100 hooks then we're somewhere between helping generate and recognize 10,000 and 20,000 new articles that are more than just one sentence stubs. That's quite a feat, really. -- JayHenry ( talk) 08:17, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Well... according to Wikipedia Page History Statistics
Fifteen editors have more than 500 edits to T:TDYK.
Seven editors have more than 300 edits to T:DYK/N
Five admins have 300 or more edits to T:DYK itself.
Now, of course, this isn't perfectly indicative; all of the standard edit counting disclaimers apply. Some people take more edits to do the same task, some people make better points than others, etc., etc. I think it's safe to say that Carabinieri, with over 3,000 edits to the various DYK pages probably is "in the lead" although as ALoan always observed: it's not a competition. -- JayHenry ( talk) 16:24, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Please see Template talk:ArticleHistory#Back to the future. Simply south ( talk) 22:14, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Why is there the text "Look at me!" at the Maxwell D Taylor picture at today's DYK? Is it a sort of a joke?
[[Image:Maxwell D Taylor official portrait.jpg|100x100px|Look at me!]]
Jan.Kamenicek ( talk) 14:48, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
I know this is a frequent false call but HMS Bonadventure (a jan 2 hook) seems to have "gone". I have made a note on the suggestions page. Is it me? Victuallers ( talk) 09:18, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
(UTC)
Firstly let me say this is not my article (only my nom), however I feel the process has broken down. Late last night PHLai investigated what had happened to the hook. Reason said for rejection was "length of only 1478" ... no reason given for deleting the nom. I then did further research to add the next 22 chars. I am told the nom is in a "holding bay". I return today to find it is not there and not been published or in the discarded pile. Now there is no point in having a witchunt but surely if an article is below size or lacking in any respect then we comment on it and in time it gets to be a discarded nomination. 'Deleting articles just confuses people'. Nuff said except that I didnt know it was also a cut and paste from a previous article. I understand that we should not encourage that and it should not be published .... but we should have an audit trail. Thanks to all for listening to my rant. Cheers Victuallers ( talk) 13:06, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
For articles that are initially created in the userspace to work on, and then moved to the mainspace, is the date the article created in the userspace used when placing it on the suggestions page or the date when the article was moved into the mainspace? And on that note, would articles that sit in the userspace for more than five days be disqualified? Thanks, Sephiroth BCR ( Converse) 03:13, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
(Unindenting) At the risk of diverting off subject, I agree that in-line cites are not a magic pill but they are infinitely more helpful in the endeavor of verifying a source. Also note that while a claim might not be "controversial" to where someone thinks it is BS, it might be "curious" to where someone would want to follow up and understand the context from where that claim came from. While the article on A Tale of a Tub might look "pretty" without the footnotes, it is really not helpful to me as a reader as I see several things that seem curious but I have no clue of where among the haystack of sources at that bottom of the article that I might find the needle of information that I would want to follow up on. I have to echo Cirt's sentiments in that I don't think it would pass FAC these days as the culture of Wikipedia is changing more towards giving readers the tools to verify and expand on Wikipedia's content rather than handing them a list of books and saying essentially "go fish". Now... back to DYK-I have been trying to help out the process with doing some verification and, beside developing ever more respect for the work of the admins who daily toil with the tasks, I've become even more convinced that requesting in-line cites for at least the hook is a very fair and reasonable requirement. It takes time to verify sources and time is precious, especially when it is being asked of volunteers. It is so much easier to follow the footnote to the source and from there try to verify that it actually sources what the hook has proclaim is "special" about this subject. DYK submitters and article writers do receive benefit from having their work featured on the main page and it is a small price to ask in return for that benefit that they help smooth the process out by making verifying their hooks easier. Agne Cheese/ Wine 19:18, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
Just for the record, I think the rule would be best if it read along the lines of "The person who adds an article to the 'next update' page should verify, in a reliable source, that the hook is accurate." Thus if you don't know the topic, and don't want to read 5 references to verify the hook is correct, you don't add it to the next update page. But articles that meet WP:V without inline citations could still be added, if a reviewer went the extra mile. People could boost the chances of an article being reviewed (and thus accepted) by providing that inline citation. The real advantage of this wording is it asks reviewers to fact check the hook, rather than merely see if there's a superscript blue number after it, which a bot could do. -- W.marsh 19:42, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
I think this discussion has gone a little off-topic. The requirement for inline cites is for the facts in the hook only, not for inline cites in general. The requirement for inline cites for the hook is to help the reviewer quickly confirm that the hook is actually sourced and accurate, nothing more. The "nofootnote" tag on the other hand, is for articles which appear to make a number of questionable claims for which inline cites might be appropriate. Which is a completely different issue.
I initiated the requirement for inline cites for the hook because I got sick of having to work through half a dozen different refs for every submission, trying to find out where the hook originated. An inline cite narrows the search down to just one reference so it makes it much easier. I don't have time to go searching through half a dozen different refs for each submission, and neither, obviously, does anyone else. Gatoclass ( talk) 05:40, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
For my own information, could you explain why a hook for Godinez v. Moran on January 5 was not used. I checked it frequently and would have fixed any problems with it. Thanks. Mattisse 16:26, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
But as a test to see if length can be used to catch up...ok with me. Mrs.EasterBunny ( talk) 20:29, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't know how you guys do it, I just keep adding entries until they line up with this day's/the next day's "In the News" section (as displayed by the buttons on the update page) as appropriate. For example, there is currently (as of this post) space on the preview page for another four or five entries. [2]
I'm not sure if Matisse needs to worry about adding more entries either. Since PFHLai, who is normally a prolific nominator, is not currently active in DYK, and a number of the submissions have problems, I think we may be about to catch up. Gatoclass ( talk) 05:24, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Nomination is a great way of befriending lonely article publishers. Twould be a pity if we stopped. Better to "up the bar" in some way. Victuallers ( talk) 11:14, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Copied from the Main Page Discussion:
Okay, we definitely need some system in place to catch such possible factual errors before they creep onto the main page. I mean seriously, did anyone who puts the suggestions onto the template ever bother to fact check, or do they just do a cursory "Oh, it has a citation mark, put it on" type of deal? This is the second time I caught a DYK with a factual error!! Both citations contradict each other, not to mention one was an Opinion Piece and one was a Sports Report. -- 293.xx.xxx.xx ( talk) 23:57, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
Why do we have Abani Mukherji hook appearing twice?-- Isles Cape Talk 19:22, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
If I am working on an article in a sandbox over a long period of time and preserve that edit history by moving it into the mainspace when I am ready to go live, is the article considered "new" at the time of the move for purposes of dyk consideration? Or must I artificially lose that edit history by creating the article afresh to meet the technical requirement?-- Fuhghettaboutit ( talk) 03:49, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
A related discussion is taking place at Talk:Main Page#"Did you know" and "On this day" are getting too long. howcheng { chat} 21:00, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
I think we've finally gotten out the hole in regards to the backlog. I'm not sure if any of the remaining Jan 11 & 12th noms are useable but we may be just down to a one day backlog. :) Agne Cheese/ Wine 01:59, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
Today (at my 9.34, hour of Rome) all six out of six "did you know" in the main page concerned US or UK. Aren't there anything else interesting about other countries, even English-speaking ones? -- Attilios ( talk) 08:35, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
The signpost tutorial series is going to have an article on how to create an article that doesn't exsist yet. Since many people who do that meet here, i figured this would be the best place to ask for help. The two after this one will be on citations and making an article featured, if that helps. The Placebo Effect ( talk) 19:28, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
The current top DYK item starts with "Dhakis (bengali drummers) allegedly kill..." Allegedly is a WP word to avoid. Can't we replace it with something else, like "according to some estimates"? Thanks. ReluctantPhilosopher ( talk) 17:02, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
How was the required length of articles to be featured in DYK changed form 1500 to 2000 bytes? Did someone just be bold and changed it themselves? Mrs.EasterBunny ( talk) 16:17, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
As for icons, I think
is helpful. The others, not as much, but any visual cue to help editors is a Good Thing in my book.
howcheng {
chat}
06:18, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
I believe it has been long-established practice that new, long articles that are created as a result of a merge or that are split off from existing articles are not eligible for DYK, correct? Assuming that this is indeed the case, it was brought to my attention that the rules don't specifically exclude this. Am I just wrong, or do we need to address this? Thanks. howcheng { chat} 17:50, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
How harmful and upsetting to the state of mind would it be to contemplate changing DYK policy to accept interesting facts from articles that are older than five days or have not been expanded fivefold in the last five days? - Neparis ( talk) 17:40, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
Let's say I created an article a few months back (I created a slew of stubs with maybe 200 bytes of prose). Would they be eligible for DYK if i were to make them 2,000 bytes with a referenced hook? I wasn't sure if me creating the article originally renders them ineligible or not. Wizardman 01:20, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
I was just wondering, if I don't click the "purge" link after updating DYK, how long the Main Page cache will take to display the new update? -- BorgQueen ( talk) 10:45, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
No one has put the templates for the current DYKs on the nominators' pages, or on the article pages. The next update is in less than a hour. Shouldn't someone do something?-- Bedford 03:45, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
Okay, maybe not Mary Lou Retton but it is her birthday and the recent discussion about character counts seems strangely reminiscent to gymnastic scoring. :p Anyways...I want to continue part of the conversation that started at Template_talk:Did_you_know#Articles_created.2Fexpanded_on_January_18 in regards to the Jack Brod nomination. But I do think this issue deserves broader treatment and thought it was best to open the discussion here. If Daniel or Gatoclass want to move their comments over here they are more than welcome to but I want to answer the reason why I, personally, started reviewing DYK noms and using icons. I think it is an unfortunate misconception that noms are being viewed as "vetoed" when a reviewer brings up a concern. Personally, I want to see nearly every nom submitted get featured because I appreciate the hard work and effort by editors that create these articles. But I do understand the need for having a criteria & consistent standards that are applied equally and to avoid issues being brought up at WP:ERRORs which can negatively affect Wikipedia and DYK. I actually see these reviews as way to try and get more articles featured by noting potential obstacles earlier so that they can be improved in time to get featured. It seemed that previously, a nom might not be reviewed till an admin was ready to feature it and if they noticed a problem then it was simply dropped and that was it. It is my hope that the nominator (or any interested editor for that matter) will note any concerns and address them so that the nom can be featured. I use icons as simple visual tools so that I can frequently keep tabs of noms that I review and see if any further comments have been added which would signal that the article should be reviewed again. I also see benefit for trying to make sure that DYK is updated on time since if an admin is "in a hurry", they can quickly identify suitable noms to be featured. I think DYK is a team effort with dozens of people pitching. From my perspective, reviews and icons can help this along but if it becomes more of a hassle then it is worth, I will gladly step aside. Agne Cheese/ Wine 12:59, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
I moved the rule back to 1500. 2,000 seemed a reasonable way of cutting down on the number of entries when we had a backlog, but with no backlog I see no reason to continue it. Gatoclass ( talk) 14:34, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
Just wanted to point out that 1500 is not exactly a "long-established" minimum. It was increased from 1000 character less than a year ago. howcheng { chat} 17:20, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
I think we should pick a number and commit to sticking with it for a while, like for the rest of 2008 for example. Changing it around all the time, as said above, isn't a good idea. -- W.marsh 19:25, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
Just to clarify, what is the current minimum? At the moment, Wikipedia:Did you know#Selection criteria says 1500, but Template talk:Did you know#Suggestions says 2000. PC78 ( talk) 16:31, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
DYK has been mentioned in an ANI thread: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Copyright_violation_on_main_page.3F -- W.marsh 16:19, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes, we know, hooks that are just fine for DYK stay there even after the 5 days expire. I have just assumed that the purpose of DYK if to show the new articles that come in. If this is the case, is it right to just auto-expire them without looking at them in five days? Example is just now, january 2 was expired though it's th 8th. Makes sense, but there's a bunch of hooks still there. I'm not pointing fingers or anything (since I don't know who to point to), but somethign needs to be done so we can cram through the backlogs and not have them falling three days behind (which i've seen) it's only going to get worse if we don't find a solution.
I guess the first step is asking ourselves which is better, a backlog past five days to cram the hooks in, or just chopping off nominations that have nothing wrong with them, but we're just out of room? Maybe we need to tighten the requirements? Wizardman 23:01, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
(←) DYK has a lot of space on the Main Page today and tomorrow. We've got room for 10-12 hooks in each update it looks like to me. If we keep T:DYK/N filled we'll be able to burn through most of the backlog and get back to speed. I have to get an early start tomorrow so I'm signing off for the night, but if somebody could do a Next-Update and a Next-Next Update right now, we could get off to a good start tomorrow :) -- JayHenry ( talk) 07:01, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't think increasing to seven days will help, it just moves the goalposts around. If there are too many nominations, then whether the cut-off is five days or seven, the same number of hooks will still end up missing out.
Also, although I originally authored the change re: inline hooks, I am thinking that maybe that should only apply to self-noms. I think perhaps in the case of new articles that are not self-nommed but which are obviously of very good quality and well referenced, that that particular requirement could be waived. Gatoclass ( talk) 10:20, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
A 7-day cutoff sounds good on paper, but it would be putting a band-aid on a broken foot. In fact it might make it worse, since extra hooks might pour in as a result. Little things like that are no longer going to help DYK. I do have another proposal that I don't know if I've brought up yet: We need to find a way to make the holding bay permanent. It might cause us to add another page or two, but doing this will certainly help.
Actually, what I think I'm going to do is put together a slew of different proposals I have for DYK, then bring them back here to look at, since I'm gradually thinking of more and more changes that could be made. Wizardman 19:05, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
A number of hooks are being rejected with the new 2,000 minimum size. How about reverting it back to 1,500? The hooks of previously selected articles of 1,500 to 2,000 length were sometimes very interesting. Archtransit ( talk) 20:08, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
I've always wondered how well DYK works in getting people to check out the pages featured. As I'm sure you all know, Wikipedia's built in feature to count how many times a page has been visited has long been turned off for performance reasons. I discovered a third party site today which purports to count Wikipedia page hits. Check out the stats for an article I created that was featured on DYK a week ago: page hits 4, 12, 3,500+! 68, 30, 15... Pretty impressive.-- Fuhghettaboutit ( talk) 01:14, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
I noted that PFHLai left the following comment on Archtransit's talk page:
I thought I could remind you, when updating DYK, to check the layout on MainPage. Putting in just 5 bulleted items when ITN and SA/OTD are a bit long, as you did in this update, makes a 'hole' on MainPage, at least on my monitor, between DYK and POTD.
I would like to fully endorse this comment from PFHLai about checking the layout to ensure the number of DYK entries matches up with the length of the "On This Day" column opposite. I've seen big gaps here quite commonly, and it looks untidy. But sometimes the opposite occurs and there are many more DYK entries listed than there should be.
I have no idea who is responsible for this because I don't keep tabs on who is responsible for the updating, so I'm certainly not singling out Archtransit here. But whoever may be responsible, I think it would be a good idea if updaters paid more attention to this issue when organizing the updates. Gatoclass ( talk) 00:54, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
As a fairly new admin, I recently did the DYK update for the first time (and have done it once more since). I have two suggestions for possible improvements to the update process.
First, would it be possible to have a "How to Update DYK Guide" for inexperienced admins? I realize there are instructions in various places for the process, but I think it would help to have all the directions in one place. This might also be a place for putting helpful hints, links to scripts used by some editors for updating, etc. (thanks to Royalbroil for pointing me here). My thought is that if there were concise directions, then perhaps more admins would help out with the update process.
Second, would it be possible to have a bot do the notifications (on article, author, and nominator talk pages)? The actual update is not that difficult or time consuming to do "by hand", but I have found the notices to talk at least half an hour. Perhaps the bot could leave a link to the updater's talk page in case there were errors / questions. Users are glad to learn that their article is in DYK, my guess is they would not care if a bot delivered the news. If FAC notices can be done via bot, it seems DYK can too. I also will note that I have not done the update at least once because I knew I did not have time to do the notifications.
Thanks for considering these ideas - I look forward to the discussion, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 05:25, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
There have been a few recent cases of people nominating major news story articles for DYK. These article have been featured in the "In the news" section. Our practice has been to not select articles that have been featured in "In the news" (ITN) because purpose for DYK is to give main page exposure to the best new articles to encourage new articles. These ITN articles already have main page exposure for far more than the 6 hours that DYK articles get. We should change the rules to explicitly state that articles that have already had main page exposure are not eligible for DYK. Royalbroil 05:14, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
Is the clock working properly at the moment? It seems to have just reset itself when it was about to go overdue. Espresso Addict ( talk) 17:32, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
I just wanted to note, for the record, that I was never officially informed that Fort Harrison State Park was used on the front page for DYK, even through I was the one who originally created it, expanded it, and nominated it.-- Bedford 23:08, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi, under current rules an article must be no more than five days old in order to qualify for DYK. I assume that reckoning of the period starts – when the article is first created (no matter how crappy it is) or expanded. I feel that five days from this date is really too short to get an article properly done, as it doesn't take into account the fact that editors may have other things to do. I would suggest a period of at least 14 days. — Cheers, JackLee – talk– 04:01, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
Gee, working on articles in my sandbox never occurred to me. Thanks for that. I suppose I might even do them offline in Notepad. — Cheers, JackLee – talk– 04:45, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
Actually, just after I said that I thought that it was better to compose articles in a sandbox since you'd be able to check the formatting by previewing or saving the page. But I guess you have a point too! — Cheers, JackLee – talk– 05:49, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
From Main Page errors for old set:
"...that Pandora Jewelry's charm bracelets feature a patented thread system that allows beads to be evenly spaced across the band?" The article linked to has an advert tag, and rightly so. Linking to an article of such dubious merit from the Main Page looks very bad. Surely something better could be found? Artie P.S. ( talk) 09:17, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
Espresso Addict ( talk) 14:18, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
Never mind, it's not important now. Artie P.S. ( talk) 14:55, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
PS There's also discussion of this under the main page talk section: Talk:Main_Page#Really_tacky Espresso Addict ( talk) 15:40, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
Well, thanks to both of you for paying attention to my grumbling. I do think keeping (even slightly) spammy articles off the Main Page is important, of course, but the tone of my original message was unnecessarily gruff. (I blame an early-morning caffeine deficiency...) Artie P.S. ( talk) 16:48, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
There's a tool out there that allows you to check page views for articles during Dec. and Jan. I thought it would be interesting to see how effective some of our DYK "hooks" have been to figure out what works and what doesn't. If the goal is to draw reader attention to new articles, this type of raw data may help improve future hooks. The data shows that DYK is working, but to varying degrees depending on how catchy the hook is. Does anyone keep track of what constitutes the average view rate when something appears on DYK? This is just a random selection, but it seems to show that the extremes are less than 400 views and more than 4,000 views. Here's what I found at the extremes:
Hooks that worked
Hooks that flopped
Proving the adage that sex sells:
I don't see why the short-lived gambler Dan Allen on 2/7 gets precedence over Anna Wilson, the madame, who did much more for the city of Omaha. A bit of sexism, perhaps? Dale662 ( talk) 19:52, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm as big of a fan of them as anyone, however I do not think their absence should be (in and of itself) a disqualification provided the article can still be easily verified. This is most relevant when there is an article that is sourced to a single reference or link. With a large number of books available on Amazon Reader/Google Books that provide a keyword search, I can normally verify the hook of an article based on that single source-even if there is not an inline cite. It requires little, if any, extra effort and we still end up with the desired verification. However, if there is a laundry list of sources and no cites, I'll tag the particular hook claim and request a cite because it is really not practical to go through that haystack of sources looking for a needle of information. While I certainly want to encourage the use of cites, I think it is reasonable to let articles that can still be easily verified without cites not be penalized unfairly. Agne Cheese/ Wine 21:00, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
I was the one who initially changed the rules to make inline cites mandatory, but a short time later I also said that there are circumstances where inline cites aren't really necessary. It's difficult though, to come up with a wording that doesn't end up making cites sound optional. And more to the point, even though we've had this rule for many weeks now, there are still a huge number of articles submitted that are improperly cited. So even with the mandatory ruling, lots of people still don't seem to be getting it.
In which case, I'm not sure that weakening the wording is a wise thing to do. I think perhaps it's enough that those doing the reviewing understand that the inline cite requirement can be waived in certain circumstances, such as when a hook is obviously accurate, or when an article is of high quality and very well referenced, or when there's only one reference to check anyway and so on. The problem is though, that if we start adding all these caveats to the rules, it's only likely to confuse people still further, and they don't seem to be grasping the requirements very well even now. Gatoclass ( talk) 11:44, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
It would appear ( diff) that the "Next Update" clock was reset without an actual update. Two questions: First, it seems we are (over)due for an update - can someone double check this (and if you know what happened, explain)? Second, it appears this was changed by a non-admin - should the update clock be protected? Ruhrfisch ><>°° 21:10, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
Wouldn't hurt to at least semi-protect it.-- Bedford 16:07, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
It is already semi-protected, thanks. I guess we can leave it that way unless this becomes a recurring problem. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 16:55, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
Would an article still be an eligible candidate for DYK if it was created and planned out in userspace a week ago, but was moved to the mainspace and nominated. Would that still be considered okay? Qst ( talk) 16:40, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
Why does the rollover image caption at Template:Did you know/Next update/Clear say "Look at me!"? It does remind the updating administrator to remember to change it. But if he forgets and it survives onto the Main Page, it looks like vandalism, and it happens about once a month. I suggest "Rollover caption not supplied yet. If this is on the Main Page, please report it at WP:ERRORS." Or almost anything would be better than "Look at me!" on the Main Page. Note that saying "Let's just remember to change the caption" is not a solution, unless you can suggest a better procedure that will cause the updating administrator to remember all the details including the image caption. Yes I know, we need a bot, but until then can we change the caption? Art LaPella ( talk) 02:29, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
I made the change suggested by JayHenry. Leaving it blank doesn't make the caption blank; it shows the name of the image file. But in most cases, the name of the image file will give some idea of what the picture is about, so maybe that's just as well. Art LaPella ( talk) 06:29, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
The hook on this is hardly new ..that in a college prank televised across the United States, spectators at the 1961 Rose Bowl unknowingly displayed the word "CALTECH" in an altered card stunt instead of the nickname of one of the teams on the field? the Great Rose Bowl Hoax has been on wiki for years Gnevin ( talk) 12:27, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
The nomination for an article I recently created, but did not nominate ( The Tribute Money), just expired, apparently because an editor was unable to check the references! Now, forget about the fact that no such policy has ever been announced as far as I'm aware, but if this is to be the way things are done from now on, it will just strengthen Wikipedia's tendency towards Recentism; something we should be trying to counter. Articles that actually use this oldfangled thing called books for sources won't stand a chance.
I'm sure someone will say that the nomination didn't expire because of the reservation about references, it simply fell victim to natural selection. That's just evading the question though, cause once that purple circle is placed next to the article, of course it's gonna drop to the end of the line. And I know this article was as good as any DYK out there. Does anybody want to address this? Lampman ( talk) 03:00, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
Not involved Lampman but just commenting. You have a point and your article looks great and everyone I am sure will agree it should be on DYK. Now how can we ensure that the next article like this gets accepted (assuming there is a consensus). Obviuously keeping an eye on the nomination is a good idea - the people who are checking the articles are trying to reject poor unreferenced articles but they are volunteers, busy and fallible. Suggestions I could offer are a) make the dyk hook from an on-line ref - that is the important one b) make sure the hook is obvious and uncontentious. c) change the (emerging) policy. I think we have not got perfection ... yet? Victuallers ( talk) 11:39, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
I havent put this is your article and it was only a one minute effort Victuallers ( talk) 11:45, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
My suggested hook for the 1860 Oxford evolution debate was edited from "Bishop Wilberforce is said to have asked Thomas Huxley" to "Bishop Wilberforce asked Thomas Huxley" but, as the article notes, we can't be sure of what Wilberforce actually said. The line is very widely quoted but some reliable sources reckon it's completely inaccurate. Maybe we could add "allegedly" or "supposedly" or something.
Also, I forgot to link to monkey. I don't wanna interfere with the next update though. Sideshow Bob Roberts ( talk) 14:39, 18 February 2008 (UTC)