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Hello all,
I am curious as to why an article regarding a Confederate American soldier is being headlined. I don't believe German-language Wikipedia features articles regarding Nazi soldiers, and I have yet to see a featured article that glorifies the Provisional IRA, the Ku Klux Klan, or other terrorist and seditionist groups.
On an unrelated note, why are articles discussing content from English-speaking countries that are not majority White rarely featured? The headlined articles focus almost exclusively on the United Kingdom, United States, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. I have yet to see a featured article discussing a figure or event related to India or an African country. They also use English Wikipedia 021120x ( talk) 02:49, 11 December 2021 (UTC)
Note for @ WP:TFA coordinators per the complaint above, Barthélemy Boganda was run TFA in 2009, and is looking to be a save by Indy beetle at FAR. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 15:03, 19 December 2021 (UTC)
I know that there's been some discussion previously, e.g. here, about FA editnotices, and {{ Medical FA editnotice}} is used fairly widely, as is {{ TFA editnotice}} for TFAs. I'm curious to take stock of where folks' views are about the idea of having a general editnotice that applies to all FAs. I think there are certainly a few things we'd like to communicate to folks about FAs (e.g. it's fairly safe to assume anything in them has been chosen deliberately through discussion, and it's a good idea to propose major changes to them first at talk), but I'm not sure whether any of them are so crucial that it's worth the cost in banner blindness. There's also the question of who we'd want to be communicating to: newcomers generally have more important things to learn, and experienced editors generally already know about FA norms. Typing this out, I think I've talked myself out of supporting them, but curious to hear from others. {{u| Sdkb}} talk 21:03, 18 December 2021 (UTC)
Editors are asked to take particular care when editing a Featured article; it is considerate to discuss significant changes of text or images on the talk page first. Explaining civilly why sources and policies support a particular version of a featured article does not necessarily constitute ownership. A link to this at the top of every open FA would be good. —— Serial 18:53, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
Cul-de-sac into an unnecessary diversion |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
, also this should justify the NOBOTS magic word as citations, etc., have also been considered at its candidature. —— Serial 17:19, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
|
Because ... long :)
Admitting I have a pony in this editnotice race, as I have a 2006 medical FA ( Tourette syndrome) which requires constant and extreme maintenance efforts, so it is irksome to find topics that are relatively easier to maintain falling out of standard, with the attached problem that they jeopardize the WP:OWN wording that should apply to all FAs, included my 2006 FA. Heck I even had to make some pretty significant changes just this week at dementia with Lewy bodies, which is a 2020 FA.
The short answer to your queries is, unless the FA is on a very obscure, little-read, and (rarely) static historical topic (take Red River Trails), they all turn to black goo on the internet unless constantly watched, upgraded and maintained. Because ... it's Wikipedia. Just that simple, and not something we can change by any means I am familiar with.
It is shocking to see the current versions of some FAs I promoted last decade, and what almost always divides those that are still in good shape from those that are not is far less attributable to (an off-miscited) change in standards than to the simple issue of whether or not the article has FA-knowledgeable watchers who are consistently maintaining and updating them. My shock of this week at WP:FAR was Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy; amazing to see what has crept in since I promoted it, while simultaneously, it hasn't been kept up to date.
On the other hand, some very old or older FAs do have watchers, but they may refuse to maintain them to standards; that's more of a behavioral issue than a matter of FA standards. URFA has, unfortunately, unmasked some previously prolific FA writers who just can't be bothered to update their FAs, which is sad. (Some of those had former collaborators who have moved on.)
You mention the essay WP:ENDURE.
Most content on Wikipedia naturally improves over time.You're familiar with that bridge in Brooklyn?
... but if maintenance is so complicated or tedious that only you would reasonably do it, it's sure to eventually fail... yes, and ? This doesn't really help us, because that means you shouldn't write Education FAs, and I shouldn't write medical ones. Not many FAs will endure in static form.
On your other specific questions:
My sense is that articles tend to get expanded, and that the new (or updated) stuff isn't up to FA standard. Is that right, or are there other major culprits?Two kinds of problems. 1. They actually don't get expanded and aren't kept up to date. This happens often in Geography, Education (as you know), Chemistry, Astronomy, Health and medicine ... lots of areas. 2. When the FA knowledgeable watcher moves on, poor quality additions do happen, alarmingly and quickly. I have taken lately to cleaning up MOS:SANDWICHing as the bellweather. When you look at an old FA that is chock full of images that are poorly laid out, you know the article isn't being watched by an FA-knowledgeable editor, and you're going to find deeper problems.
As a thought experiment, how many of articles that get brought to FAR wouldn't have been if they'd just stayed in their original FA state?This is a misunderstanding we should combat aggressively :) Barack Obama was featured before he was President; how could it have stayed the same? J. K. Rowling? I have rewritten Tourette syndrome twice since 2006; medicine advances. All city, state, country articles change. Lucky the few FA writers whose work is in topics that don't require constant vigilance and updating, but those are rare, and the idea that we can freeze an approved version of an FA is all wrong.
... our only current recourse is to try to get them to go through the talk page, where we hope that someone with more of a clue will intervene, yes, but on way too many of the Old and Very old FAs, there is no one watching the articles, much less responding on talk. This is a fact of Wikipedia that we have to accept (maintaining an article at FA standard requires constant vigilance from someone who cares, and editors move on or lose interest), and the only way to deal with this is to encourage active URFA, URFA, URFA, and FAR, FAR, FAR. Some of our most worthy articles have gained new watchers/keepers/maintainers as a result of FAR, hence the importance of WP:FASA (HINT, reminder, go enter your votes :)
Maybe it makes more sense to add notices/controls to historical FAs, since those don't need as much updating?)I hope my other answers have demonstrated the variability. Tourette syndrome is a 2006 FA; it is no different in quality than dementia with Lewy bodies, which is a 2020 FA. It is all about whether an article has active FA-knowledgeable watchers and maintainers. Those that don't need to go to FAR.
You asked what we can do about this deterioration. I have long advocated for (and been ignored by all but a handful of editors) two things:
You mention comprehensiveness standards having changed. Our standard for comprehensiveness has not changed at all, but whether or not FAC reviewers check that comprehensiveness is met is a separate issue. Ditto for every important aspect like POV, compliance with LEAD, involved supports, and the like. I often see reference to these rising standards, and would be entertained to know what those are :)
I tend to divide FAC into pre- and post-October 31, 2010 when the mainpage copyvio scandal left a permanent dent upon FAC (see yearly stats). Before that, standards had already increased: you can scroll to just above this section to see a footnoted list of the dates of significant changes at FAC or WIAFA. Looking at the changes to WP:WIAFA since the end of 2010 ... here is WIAFA then. An examination of past and present shows the early wisdom of FA leadership (although I'm not sure why it took us so long to add 1f).
1 (b) comprehensive: it neglects no major facts or details and places the subject in contextthe wording is identical to the wording today.
So, first, yes standards increased from the VERY VERY old FAs (2004 to 2008), but other than that, where is this oft-cited "increase in standards" notion coming from? What happens instead is the natural deterioration of a wiki if articles aren't constantly maintained. And the way to deal with that is ... URFA URFA URFA and FAR FAR FAR.
I would summarize my very long response to a) better coordination of and respect for the necessary (and once helpful) relationship between FAC, FAR and TFA; b) URFA URFA URFA, FAR FAR FAR; and c) restore active healthy debate to WT:FAC, so we can actually discuss these issues without personalization. We cannot change the fact that editors write on topics that interest them, and tend to eventually leave Wikipedia. We can make sure we bring deficient articles to FAR as soon as needed, so that we can then expect the project to defend the overall pool of FAs as examples of Wikipedia's finest work, which they no longer are in huge numbers, as demonstrated by WP:FARGIVEN and WP:URFA/2020. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 22:10, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
It's important to note that level of detail ≠ quality—if you look at e.g. many Encyclopedia Britannica entries, they're generally high quality but much shorter than Wikipedia articles, just since they've decided to write at a more summarized level. But granted, I don't have extensive personal knowledge of what Wikipedia used to be like, so I defer to you and others who have been around for longer.I suspect we would have FAR fewer problems eventually at FAR if WP:SS were more closely adhered to, ala Encyclopedia Britannica. To that end, when I was first writing the TS article, a most helpful mentor forced me to spin off the sub-articles on History, Management, Societal and cultural ... and I thank him every day for that wisdom. Imagine if I had to keep up with every bit of yearly detail on medication, and so on. And I can keep out a lot of the cruft by referring it to sub-articles (eg Societal on every notable person with a new TS diagnosis, or every new song about Tourette's). This is why I encouraged you to define your criteria at Pomona College. If you want more history of the process, do go and browse everything at {{ FCDW}}. I wish we would keep up that effort, but no one is interested. I'm unsure about the idea of more awards, as the reception to WP:FASA has been more lukewarm that I would have liked. What I do know is that if we keep losing some of the meatier old FAs via FAR, while gaining more niche topics via FAC, that will not bode well for the overall FA process. As to merging the talk pages, that could happen under a tabbed format, and we had the beginnings of a good discussion about setting up tabbed pages (similar to what you now see at WP:FASA and WP:URFA/2020, and where the idea of making FAR more prominent was quite clearly expressed and yet ignored), but the entire discussion was personalized and went nowhere, and I am no longer interested in dealing with that toxicity. Perhaps others can effect some improvements, but I am apparently not that person. In fact, if I propose something, I seem to increase the chances it will be rejected :) Bst, SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 00:04, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
Sounding good is often in tension with being accurate and true to the source material, since its often boring material we work with. As an editor who works mostly with such material (medicine), I believe it is even more important to make sure our prose shines in the "boring material" areas. I have often said that the problem with our math articles is not the math, but the english. (I saw an a journal article in this week's Signpost which seems to agree.) And Tony1 slaved over Tourette syndrome for weeks before I brought it to FAC (Tony1 is the language mentor mentioned in this Nature article). Now that Tony1 is gone from FA-level work, I relied on Ceoil, Colin, Outriggr, Yomangani and others for prose work at dementia with Lewy bodies. But that FAC no longer has the services of some of our top copyeditors (eg, Tony1 and Eric Corbett), no matter whether we label it brilliant or something else, prose standards have dropped. Tony1 and Eric could be counted on to quickly shut down FACs with deficient prose, where these days, we struggle through pages and pages and pages of commentary (causing WP:TLIMIT issues) trying to pull prose up to standards, and I believe we often don't make it there. The downward trend in prose reached a peak in about the period 2016 to 2018, when buddies pushed their buddies' articles through on a few prose nitpicks. The trend seems to be improving, but the absence of the Oppose button continues to produce sub-optimal results and poor allocation of resources. It would be more expedient to encourage those editors whose prose isn't up to FA level to go out and develop a network of collaborators-- which is what I have had to do, since my prose stinks.
For the more static historically subjects, I think it can suffice to do a new source search re comprehensiveness every three to five years or so.Possibly, but we generally aren't getting even that (although WP:URFA/2020 has prompted a lot of updating). In medicine, articles need at least a yearly check for new reviews; dementia with Lewy bodies research is moving fast, so I browse Pubmed at least every two months. Tourette syndrome is more settled (meaning the research money dried up), so a bi-annual check is fine. I wonder if we could come up with general guidelines ...
You are invited to join the discussion at
Wikipedia talk:Today's featured article § Adjusting the TFA re-running period. {{u|
Sdkb}}
talk
17:26, 15 January 2022 (UTC)
At WP:FAS, there were 6,053 FAs end of January. For February so far, 25 promotions minus 13 demotions equals 12, so total should be 6,065, but Wikipedia:Featured articles show 6,066. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 16:40, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
Alright, here's my attempt to list resources for building FAs at this essay. What do you think? CactiStaccingCrane ( talk) 17:40, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
There are some misclassificationbs here. In "Literature", Illustrations of the Family of Psittacidae, or Parrots is what it says, a book of illustrations, with no text at all. It should go under biology (like Lemurs of Madagascar (book)) and art, but not here. Black Hours, Morgan MS 493 is a standard copy of the book of hours texts, also of interest only for the illustations. It should go under art, & possibly religion, though I don't think we do that. Probably we need a new category in Biology for the parrots, A History of the Birds of Europe, and Nature fakers controversy all far more biological than literary. Johnbod ( talk) 15:30, 4 April 2022 (UTC)
![]() | This
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Wikipedia:FA has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
Please replace everything with:
#REDIRECT [[Wikipedia:Featured articles]] {{Redirect category shell| {{R from shortcut}} {{R to project namespace}} }}
This would automatically tag the redirect with {{ R fully protected}} (which is handled by {{ Redirect category shell}}). – MJL ‐Talk‐ ☖ 18:13, 29 April 2022 (UTC)
An image of him in it would help fill up the space Pink Saffron ( talk) 08:35, 8 August 2022 (UTC)
Just wondering who the Georgetown University alum is who has selected Georgetown priests, presidents, and administrators numerous times over the past year and a half for the featured article? I have noted 5 times since Feb 2021 (I got tired of looking for 3-4 months earlier this year, so probably missed a couple). Hootgoestheowl ( talk) 17:28, 1 September 2022 (UTC)
As the subject says we seriously need re-assessment as most of the citations are WP:PRIMARY. This page should be handled carefully. -✍ NeverTry4Me⛅ C♯ 10:06, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
I'm curious, has anyone calculated the percentage of FA bios that are male vs. female? {{u| Sdkb}} talk 23:28, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
According to the WikiProject cleanup listing, there are 1,138 Featured Articles that have cleanup issues, or 18% of all Featured Articles. Is this something that should be receiving more attention? It feels like most cleanup issues would mean that an article does not meet the Featured Article criteria. Thebiguglyalien ( talk) 03:34, 19 December 2022 (UTC)
Hello all. Dietrich v The Queen is a former featured article. Delisted just over a year ago for various concerns, I spent months bringing it up to GA class. Having achieved that, I would like to return it to FA class. Not sure where to begin. Would any editors please provide me with some feedback on what they'd like to see, or if they feel it may be ready for a nom for formal review? I have not changed much since the GA nom, however the GA nom was much more strict than the basic GA criteria. The entire article was re-written from the ground up with the referencing system replaced.
Cheers MaxnaCarta ( talk) 00:32, 6 January 2023 (UTC)
Special leave to appeal to the High Court was made by Dietrich on the grounds the Court of Appeal erred in law by holding Dietrich did not have a right to be provided with counsel at public expense, and/or by not granting adjournment his lack of representation meant a miscarriage of justice had occurred, first by finding Dietrich did not have a right for publicly funded representation, and second by failing to find that a miscarriage of justice had occurred due to this lack of representation.
I happened to read today's front page featured article excerpt. The writing quality seemed poor, particularly in comparison with the actual intro to the featured article. How is the front page excerpt created? Wouldn't using the FA's intro be more representative, even if it was truncated for space? Tsavage ( talk) 03:05, 30 May 2023 (UTC)
@ Sheep8144402: Why? @ FAC coordinators: for information. Gog the Mild ( talk) 15:34, 25 August 2023 (UTC)
Have we ever considered indicating WP:VA status on the Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by featured article nominations. Could we add a number to the stars to show what VA levels some of the important FA contributions are recognized at. That would also encourage FA pursuit of the more important articles. User:RJHall (20 FAs, 17 current) with his FA of Earth is the only nominator with a Level 1 FA. User:Cwmhiraeth (24 FAs, 24 current) with his FA of Sea and User:Worldtraveller (24 FAs, 15 current) with his FA of Sun are tied for the most FA promotions to include a level 2. It would be interesting to see who has a lot of FA VAs especially at the higher levels.- TonyTheTiger ( T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 22:45, 27 September 2023 (UTC)
Hello, I was hoping to see if there was a way to submit a forum to inform an article. Since I think the directions were confusing for me, I would appreciate if there was any link or some guidelines to submit a request. (Also, I have a lot of certain articles that seem interesting…) Thank you to whoever reads this. If I might’ve formatted anything wrong in this talk page, please let me know. Ilikememes128 ( talk) 17:59, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
I noticed that the Walt Disney Article doesn't have links to the sources in citations. For example:
"Disney to Quit Post at Studio". Los Angeles Times. September 11, 1945.
Where the source, Los Angeles Times isn't an internal link. Is this preferred?
I have noticed that many articles have malformed sources, such as "New York Times" instead of "The New York Times" or "The Associated Press" instead of "Associated Press", which beg a link to assure appropriate spelling. Please advise. DarkLilac ( talk) 03:26, 16 October 2023 (UTC)
Even if the topic of an article is about something very obscure, is it possible for it to still be a featured article? Millows! | 🪧 03:26, 7 August 2023 (UTC)
Hey all, Appalachian Spring was just promoted the FA and I found that it was placed under the "Culture and society" section. This seems rather odd to me- other ballets, like The Rite of Spring, are under "Classical music works"- would Appalachian Spring not belong in the same place? Thanks! (ping for @ FrB.TG, the promoter) MyCatIsAChonk ( talk) ( not me) ( also not me) ( still no) 00:10, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
I worked on a few reconstructions of the pre-2003 "Brilliant Prose" log, originally in my userspace but, with some assistance by @ SJ and Wbm1058, now at WP:BrilliantProse. I have even used the Tim Starling logs to reconstruct some otherwise-unavailable "featured versions" in subpages, and I would love it if the @ FAC coordinators: would be so kind as to begin finishing this work and ultimately incorporating it into the FA log so we can have a near-complete archive stretching back to January 2001.
Many thanks!
– John M Wolfson ( talk • contribs) 16:48, 22 October 2023 (UTC)
@ SandyGeorgia: I believe you're mistaken in saying that Sex Pistols is the longest continuously-Featured article; that honor goes to Byzantine Empire, which has been BP since May 26, 2001, and has never been demoted since. Using the example of Byzantine Empire's talk page, I'd like to at least have our old BP's that survived the up/down vote era (and, possibly, those who didn't) have that status reflected in {{ Article history}}, and preferably, using the Starling logs (and possibly arch-WikiArchaeologist Graham87) reconstruct the "featured versions" of each article as I have done, for example, for Japanese Language. You're certainly correct that it's a bit of work for rather niche benefit, but I believe completeness of the FA/BP record (except from August to November 2001, which are well and truly lost with current knowledge and technology) is a worthwhile pursuit. – John M Wolfson ( talk • contribs) 19:16, 22 October 2023 (UTC)
I was wondering if there are enough articles relating to fashion to spin the topic out of the catch-all of Culture and society? I know Premeditated Chaos is trying to get every McQueen collection to FA, so the topic is definitely going to grow over time. My suggestion is to place it under Art, but I understand that it may be controversial to purists. -- Guerillero Parlez Moi 21:35, 26 October 2023 (UTC)
Dear gold star editors, i request your assitance in updating the metrification page on Wikipedia. I think this is a great achievement of the world universal system of measurement. 2406:3400:212:D700:3F52:FB52:BC6B:B290 ( talk) 22:44, 31 October 2023 (UTC)
Currently, out of the 122 Featured Articles in the "Business, economics, and finance" category, 106 are in the numismatics sub-section. I feel this is a bit unwieldy and awkward, as articles on numismatics topic often have quite little to do with business and economics itself, but rather the history and design of the coinage. Additionally, four FAs in the Numismatics sub-section are themselves biographies, matching the number of bios in *Business, economics, and finance biographies*.
Seperating it into its own category would allow the massive list to be broken up into sections, and better represent the current (low) number of FAs within the economics field. Generalissima ( talk) 19:16, 4 November 2023 (UTC)
Is there a json-file containing all featured articles or a module-function which could determine if the given article is featured? Want to use it in other module which would display a featured icon near the link if necessary. Kammerer55 ( talk) 03:43, 1 December 2023 (UTC)
I've always thought this article would fit the Art and architechture category, but considering that all of the recent comments about improving this article for the FA criteria have mentioned getting help from medical editors, reading medical articles etc. I have a feeling that everyone will disagree with me on this. Interested to see your thoughts on this. Realmaxxver ( talk) 19:46, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
What's the point of the map atop WP:FA? It's non-interactive, presumably out of date, and definitely not representative of all FA's (where does a biography go on a world map?) ~~ AirshipJungleman29 ( talk) 19:23, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
I notice that more than half the FAs in South America appear to be my work, and form a distinct cluster. Jo-Jo Eumerus ( talk) 11:48, 24 October 2023 (UTC)
I'm working on repairing a 2007 wrecked FA via translating a newer FA from another language; it appeared on the front page on February 2, 2008. It is approaching its 30th anniversary and though I won't quite have exactly 30, unfortunately, I'm hoping to have it in February if it's deemed eligible. I have in recent months seen old FAs re-run, but I don't remember just how old those examples were. dannymusiceditor oops 20:21, 1 January 2024 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Content assessment has an RfC for possible consensus. A discussion is taking place. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments on the discussion page. Thank you. Schierbecker ( talk) 22:39, 9 January 2024 (UTC)
Because I'm not sure what else to say. Wikipedia:Requests for comment/When there is no consensus either way is not getting many responses (possibly because the WP:Feedback request system seems to be down), and I've been racking my brains to think of a page that isn't too high-traffic (e.g., WP:VPP) or too biased (e.g., WP:FTN) but still cares about content. I picked you. If you have an opinion about what we really ought to do when there's no consensus – when you want to add or remove content from an article, and editors just can't agree – please tell me what the right answer is. Thanks. WhatamIdoing ( talk) 02:30, 10 January 2024 (UTC)
This is more of a little nitpick than an actual issue, but there are at least four theatrical building FAs in two separate sections. Two of them ( His Majesty's Theatre, London and Theatre Royal, Drury Lane) are under the "Theatre" subheader, and the other two ( Harris Theater (Chicago) and New Amsterdam Theatre) are under the "Architecture and archaeology" subheader. Should these articles all be listed under the Theatre subheader? – Epicgenius ( talk) 20:44, 7 December 2023 (UTC)
![]() | This page 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. |
Hello all,
I am curious as to why an article regarding a Confederate American soldier is being headlined. I don't believe German-language Wikipedia features articles regarding Nazi soldiers, and I have yet to see a featured article that glorifies the Provisional IRA, the Ku Klux Klan, or other terrorist and seditionist groups.
On an unrelated note, why are articles discussing content from English-speaking countries that are not majority White rarely featured? The headlined articles focus almost exclusively on the United Kingdom, United States, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. I have yet to see a featured article discussing a figure or event related to India or an African country. They also use English Wikipedia 021120x ( talk) 02:49, 11 December 2021 (UTC)
Note for @ WP:TFA coordinators per the complaint above, Barthélemy Boganda was run TFA in 2009, and is looking to be a save by Indy beetle at FAR. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 15:03, 19 December 2021 (UTC)
I know that there's been some discussion previously, e.g. here, about FA editnotices, and {{ Medical FA editnotice}} is used fairly widely, as is {{ TFA editnotice}} for TFAs. I'm curious to take stock of where folks' views are about the idea of having a general editnotice that applies to all FAs. I think there are certainly a few things we'd like to communicate to folks about FAs (e.g. it's fairly safe to assume anything in them has been chosen deliberately through discussion, and it's a good idea to propose major changes to them first at talk), but I'm not sure whether any of them are so crucial that it's worth the cost in banner blindness. There's also the question of who we'd want to be communicating to: newcomers generally have more important things to learn, and experienced editors generally already know about FA norms. Typing this out, I think I've talked myself out of supporting them, but curious to hear from others. {{u| Sdkb}} talk 21:03, 18 December 2021 (UTC)
Editors are asked to take particular care when editing a Featured article; it is considerate to discuss significant changes of text or images on the talk page first. Explaining civilly why sources and policies support a particular version of a featured article does not necessarily constitute ownership. A link to this at the top of every open FA would be good. —— Serial 18:53, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
Cul-de-sac into an unnecessary diversion |
---|
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
, also this should justify the NOBOTS magic word as citations, etc., have also been considered at its candidature. —— Serial 17:19, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
|
Because ... long :)
Admitting I have a pony in this editnotice race, as I have a 2006 medical FA ( Tourette syndrome) which requires constant and extreme maintenance efforts, so it is irksome to find topics that are relatively easier to maintain falling out of standard, with the attached problem that they jeopardize the WP:OWN wording that should apply to all FAs, included my 2006 FA. Heck I even had to make some pretty significant changes just this week at dementia with Lewy bodies, which is a 2020 FA.
The short answer to your queries is, unless the FA is on a very obscure, little-read, and (rarely) static historical topic (take Red River Trails), they all turn to black goo on the internet unless constantly watched, upgraded and maintained. Because ... it's Wikipedia. Just that simple, and not something we can change by any means I am familiar with.
It is shocking to see the current versions of some FAs I promoted last decade, and what almost always divides those that are still in good shape from those that are not is far less attributable to (an off-miscited) change in standards than to the simple issue of whether or not the article has FA-knowledgeable watchers who are consistently maintaining and updating them. My shock of this week at WP:FAR was Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy; amazing to see what has crept in since I promoted it, while simultaneously, it hasn't been kept up to date.
On the other hand, some very old or older FAs do have watchers, but they may refuse to maintain them to standards; that's more of a behavioral issue than a matter of FA standards. URFA has, unfortunately, unmasked some previously prolific FA writers who just can't be bothered to update their FAs, which is sad. (Some of those had former collaborators who have moved on.)
You mention the essay WP:ENDURE.
Most content on Wikipedia naturally improves over time.You're familiar with that bridge in Brooklyn?
... but if maintenance is so complicated or tedious that only you would reasonably do it, it's sure to eventually fail... yes, and ? This doesn't really help us, because that means you shouldn't write Education FAs, and I shouldn't write medical ones. Not many FAs will endure in static form.
On your other specific questions:
My sense is that articles tend to get expanded, and that the new (or updated) stuff isn't up to FA standard. Is that right, or are there other major culprits?Two kinds of problems. 1. They actually don't get expanded and aren't kept up to date. This happens often in Geography, Education (as you know), Chemistry, Astronomy, Health and medicine ... lots of areas. 2. When the FA knowledgeable watcher moves on, poor quality additions do happen, alarmingly and quickly. I have taken lately to cleaning up MOS:SANDWICHing as the bellweather. When you look at an old FA that is chock full of images that are poorly laid out, you know the article isn't being watched by an FA-knowledgeable editor, and you're going to find deeper problems.
As a thought experiment, how many of articles that get brought to FAR wouldn't have been if they'd just stayed in their original FA state?This is a misunderstanding we should combat aggressively :) Barack Obama was featured before he was President; how could it have stayed the same? J. K. Rowling? I have rewritten Tourette syndrome twice since 2006; medicine advances. All city, state, country articles change. Lucky the few FA writers whose work is in topics that don't require constant vigilance and updating, but those are rare, and the idea that we can freeze an approved version of an FA is all wrong.
... our only current recourse is to try to get them to go through the talk page, where we hope that someone with more of a clue will intervene, yes, but on way too many of the Old and Very old FAs, there is no one watching the articles, much less responding on talk. This is a fact of Wikipedia that we have to accept (maintaining an article at FA standard requires constant vigilance from someone who cares, and editors move on or lose interest), and the only way to deal with this is to encourage active URFA, URFA, URFA, and FAR, FAR, FAR. Some of our most worthy articles have gained new watchers/keepers/maintainers as a result of FAR, hence the importance of WP:FASA (HINT, reminder, go enter your votes :)
Maybe it makes more sense to add notices/controls to historical FAs, since those don't need as much updating?)I hope my other answers have demonstrated the variability. Tourette syndrome is a 2006 FA; it is no different in quality than dementia with Lewy bodies, which is a 2020 FA. It is all about whether an article has active FA-knowledgeable watchers and maintainers. Those that don't need to go to FAR.
You asked what we can do about this deterioration. I have long advocated for (and been ignored by all but a handful of editors) two things:
You mention comprehensiveness standards having changed. Our standard for comprehensiveness has not changed at all, but whether or not FAC reviewers check that comprehensiveness is met is a separate issue. Ditto for every important aspect like POV, compliance with LEAD, involved supports, and the like. I often see reference to these rising standards, and would be entertained to know what those are :)
I tend to divide FAC into pre- and post-October 31, 2010 when the mainpage copyvio scandal left a permanent dent upon FAC (see yearly stats). Before that, standards had already increased: you can scroll to just above this section to see a footnoted list of the dates of significant changes at FAC or WIAFA. Looking at the changes to WP:WIAFA since the end of 2010 ... here is WIAFA then. An examination of past and present shows the early wisdom of FA leadership (although I'm not sure why it took us so long to add 1f).
1 (b) comprehensive: it neglects no major facts or details and places the subject in contextthe wording is identical to the wording today.
So, first, yes standards increased from the VERY VERY old FAs (2004 to 2008), but other than that, where is this oft-cited "increase in standards" notion coming from? What happens instead is the natural deterioration of a wiki if articles aren't constantly maintained. And the way to deal with that is ... URFA URFA URFA and FAR FAR FAR.
I would summarize my very long response to a) better coordination of and respect for the necessary (and once helpful) relationship between FAC, FAR and TFA; b) URFA URFA URFA, FAR FAR FAR; and c) restore active healthy debate to WT:FAC, so we can actually discuss these issues without personalization. We cannot change the fact that editors write on topics that interest them, and tend to eventually leave Wikipedia. We can make sure we bring deficient articles to FAR as soon as needed, so that we can then expect the project to defend the overall pool of FAs as examples of Wikipedia's finest work, which they no longer are in huge numbers, as demonstrated by WP:FARGIVEN and WP:URFA/2020. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 22:10, 22 December 2021 (UTC)
It's important to note that level of detail ≠ quality—if you look at e.g. many Encyclopedia Britannica entries, they're generally high quality but much shorter than Wikipedia articles, just since they've decided to write at a more summarized level. But granted, I don't have extensive personal knowledge of what Wikipedia used to be like, so I defer to you and others who have been around for longer.I suspect we would have FAR fewer problems eventually at FAR if WP:SS were more closely adhered to, ala Encyclopedia Britannica. To that end, when I was first writing the TS article, a most helpful mentor forced me to spin off the sub-articles on History, Management, Societal and cultural ... and I thank him every day for that wisdom. Imagine if I had to keep up with every bit of yearly detail on medication, and so on. And I can keep out a lot of the cruft by referring it to sub-articles (eg Societal on every notable person with a new TS diagnosis, or every new song about Tourette's). This is why I encouraged you to define your criteria at Pomona College. If you want more history of the process, do go and browse everything at {{ FCDW}}. I wish we would keep up that effort, but no one is interested. I'm unsure about the idea of more awards, as the reception to WP:FASA has been more lukewarm that I would have liked. What I do know is that if we keep losing some of the meatier old FAs via FAR, while gaining more niche topics via FAC, that will not bode well for the overall FA process. As to merging the talk pages, that could happen under a tabbed format, and we had the beginnings of a good discussion about setting up tabbed pages (similar to what you now see at WP:FASA and WP:URFA/2020, and where the idea of making FAR more prominent was quite clearly expressed and yet ignored), but the entire discussion was personalized and went nowhere, and I am no longer interested in dealing with that toxicity. Perhaps others can effect some improvements, but I am apparently not that person. In fact, if I propose something, I seem to increase the chances it will be rejected :) Bst, SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 00:04, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
Sounding good is often in tension with being accurate and true to the source material, since its often boring material we work with. As an editor who works mostly with such material (medicine), I believe it is even more important to make sure our prose shines in the "boring material" areas. I have often said that the problem with our math articles is not the math, but the english. (I saw an a journal article in this week's Signpost which seems to agree.) And Tony1 slaved over Tourette syndrome for weeks before I brought it to FAC (Tony1 is the language mentor mentioned in this Nature article). Now that Tony1 is gone from FA-level work, I relied on Ceoil, Colin, Outriggr, Yomangani and others for prose work at dementia with Lewy bodies. But that FAC no longer has the services of some of our top copyeditors (eg, Tony1 and Eric Corbett), no matter whether we label it brilliant or something else, prose standards have dropped. Tony1 and Eric could be counted on to quickly shut down FACs with deficient prose, where these days, we struggle through pages and pages and pages of commentary (causing WP:TLIMIT issues) trying to pull prose up to standards, and I believe we often don't make it there. The downward trend in prose reached a peak in about the period 2016 to 2018, when buddies pushed their buddies' articles through on a few prose nitpicks. The trend seems to be improving, but the absence of the Oppose button continues to produce sub-optimal results and poor allocation of resources. It would be more expedient to encourage those editors whose prose isn't up to FA level to go out and develop a network of collaborators-- which is what I have had to do, since my prose stinks.
For the more static historically subjects, I think it can suffice to do a new source search re comprehensiveness every three to five years or so.Possibly, but we generally aren't getting even that (although WP:URFA/2020 has prompted a lot of updating). In medicine, articles need at least a yearly check for new reviews; dementia with Lewy bodies research is moving fast, so I browse Pubmed at least every two months. Tourette syndrome is more settled (meaning the research money dried up), so a bi-annual check is fine. I wonder if we could come up with general guidelines ...
You are invited to join the discussion at
Wikipedia talk:Today's featured article § Adjusting the TFA re-running period. {{u|
Sdkb}}
talk
17:26, 15 January 2022 (UTC)
At WP:FAS, there were 6,053 FAs end of January. For February so far, 25 promotions minus 13 demotions equals 12, so total should be 6,065, but Wikipedia:Featured articles show 6,066. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 16:40, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
Alright, here's my attempt to list resources for building FAs at this essay. What do you think? CactiStaccingCrane ( talk) 17:40, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
There are some misclassificationbs here. In "Literature", Illustrations of the Family of Psittacidae, or Parrots is what it says, a book of illustrations, with no text at all. It should go under biology (like Lemurs of Madagascar (book)) and art, but not here. Black Hours, Morgan MS 493 is a standard copy of the book of hours texts, also of interest only for the illustations. It should go under art, & possibly religion, though I don't think we do that. Probably we need a new category in Biology for the parrots, A History of the Birds of Europe, and Nature fakers controversy all far more biological than literary. Johnbod ( talk) 15:30, 4 April 2022 (UTC)
![]() | This
edit request to
Wikipedia:FA has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
Please replace everything with:
#REDIRECT [[Wikipedia:Featured articles]] {{Redirect category shell| {{R from shortcut}} {{R to project namespace}} }}
This would automatically tag the redirect with {{ R fully protected}} (which is handled by {{ Redirect category shell}}). – MJL ‐Talk‐ ☖ 18:13, 29 April 2022 (UTC)
An image of him in it would help fill up the space Pink Saffron ( talk) 08:35, 8 August 2022 (UTC)
Just wondering who the Georgetown University alum is who has selected Georgetown priests, presidents, and administrators numerous times over the past year and a half for the featured article? I have noted 5 times since Feb 2021 (I got tired of looking for 3-4 months earlier this year, so probably missed a couple). Hootgoestheowl ( talk) 17:28, 1 September 2022 (UTC)
As the subject says we seriously need re-assessment as most of the citations are WP:PRIMARY. This page should be handled carefully. -✍ NeverTry4Me⛅ C♯ 10:06, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
I'm curious, has anyone calculated the percentage of FA bios that are male vs. female? {{u| Sdkb}} talk 23:28, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
According to the WikiProject cleanup listing, there are 1,138 Featured Articles that have cleanup issues, or 18% of all Featured Articles. Is this something that should be receiving more attention? It feels like most cleanup issues would mean that an article does not meet the Featured Article criteria. Thebiguglyalien ( talk) 03:34, 19 December 2022 (UTC)
Hello all. Dietrich v The Queen is a former featured article. Delisted just over a year ago for various concerns, I spent months bringing it up to GA class. Having achieved that, I would like to return it to FA class. Not sure where to begin. Would any editors please provide me with some feedback on what they'd like to see, or if they feel it may be ready for a nom for formal review? I have not changed much since the GA nom, however the GA nom was much more strict than the basic GA criteria. The entire article was re-written from the ground up with the referencing system replaced.
Cheers MaxnaCarta ( talk) 00:32, 6 January 2023 (UTC)
Special leave to appeal to the High Court was made by Dietrich on the grounds the Court of Appeal erred in law by holding Dietrich did not have a right to be provided with counsel at public expense, and/or by not granting adjournment his lack of representation meant a miscarriage of justice had occurred, first by finding Dietrich did not have a right for publicly funded representation, and second by failing to find that a miscarriage of justice had occurred due to this lack of representation.
I happened to read today's front page featured article excerpt. The writing quality seemed poor, particularly in comparison with the actual intro to the featured article. How is the front page excerpt created? Wouldn't using the FA's intro be more representative, even if it was truncated for space? Tsavage ( talk) 03:05, 30 May 2023 (UTC)
@ Sheep8144402: Why? @ FAC coordinators: for information. Gog the Mild ( talk) 15:34, 25 August 2023 (UTC)
Have we ever considered indicating WP:VA status on the Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by featured article nominations. Could we add a number to the stars to show what VA levels some of the important FA contributions are recognized at. That would also encourage FA pursuit of the more important articles. User:RJHall (20 FAs, 17 current) with his FA of Earth is the only nominator with a Level 1 FA. User:Cwmhiraeth (24 FAs, 24 current) with his FA of Sea and User:Worldtraveller (24 FAs, 15 current) with his FA of Sun are tied for the most FA promotions to include a level 2. It would be interesting to see who has a lot of FA VAs especially at the higher levels.- TonyTheTiger ( T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 22:45, 27 September 2023 (UTC)
Hello, I was hoping to see if there was a way to submit a forum to inform an article. Since I think the directions were confusing for me, I would appreciate if there was any link or some guidelines to submit a request. (Also, I have a lot of certain articles that seem interesting…) Thank you to whoever reads this. If I might’ve formatted anything wrong in this talk page, please let me know. Ilikememes128 ( talk) 17:59, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
I noticed that the Walt Disney Article doesn't have links to the sources in citations. For example:
"Disney to Quit Post at Studio". Los Angeles Times. September 11, 1945.
Where the source, Los Angeles Times isn't an internal link. Is this preferred?
I have noticed that many articles have malformed sources, such as "New York Times" instead of "The New York Times" or "The Associated Press" instead of "Associated Press", which beg a link to assure appropriate spelling. Please advise. DarkLilac ( talk) 03:26, 16 October 2023 (UTC)
Even if the topic of an article is about something very obscure, is it possible for it to still be a featured article? Millows! | 🪧 03:26, 7 August 2023 (UTC)
Hey all, Appalachian Spring was just promoted the FA and I found that it was placed under the "Culture and society" section. This seems rather odd to me- other ballets, like The Rite of Spring, are under "Classical music works"- would Appalachian Spring not belong in the same place? Thanks! (ping for @ FrB.TG, the promoter) MyCatIsAChonk ( talk) ( not me) ( also not me) ( still no) 00:10, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
I worked on a few reconstructions of the pre-2003 "Brilliant Prose" log, originally in my userspace but, with some assistance by @ SJ and Wbm1058, now at WP:BrilliantProse. I have even used the Tim Starling logs to reconstruct some otherwise-unavailable "featured versions" in subpages, and I would love it if the @ FAC coordinators: would be so kind as to begin finishing this work and ultimately incorporating it into the FA log so we can have a near-complete archive stretching back to January 2001.
Many thanks!
– John M Wolfson ( talk • contribs) 16:48, 22 October 2023 (UTC)
@ SandyGeorgia: I believe you're mistaken in saying that Sex Pistols is the longest continuously-Featured article; that honor goes to Byzantine Empire, which has been BP since May 26, 2001, and has never been demoted since. Using the example of Byzantine Empire's talk page, I'd like to at least have our old BP's that survived the up/down vote era (and, possibly, those who didn't) have that status reflected in {{ Article history}}, and preferably, using the Starling logs (and possibly arch-WikiArchaeologist Graham87) reconstruct the "featured versions" of each article as I have done, for example, for Japanese Language. You're certainly correct that it's a bit of work for rather niche benefit, but I believe completeness of the FA/BP record (except from August to November 2001, which are well and truly lost with current knowledge and technology) is a worthwhile pursuit. – John M Wolfson ( talk • contribs) 19:16, 22 October 2023 (UTC)
I was wondering if there are enough articles relating to fashion to spin the topic out of the catch-all of Culture and society? I know Premeditated Chaos is trying to get every McQueen collection to FA, so the topic is definitely going to grow over time. My suggestion is to place it under Art, but I understand that it may be controversial to purists. -- Guerillero Parlez Moi 21:35, 26 October 2023 (UTC)
Dear gold star editors, i request your assitance in updating the metrification page on Wikipedia. I think this is a great achievement of the world universal system of measurement. 2406:3400:212:D700:3F52:FB52:BC6B:B290 ( talk) 22:44, 31 October 2023 (UTC)
Currently, out of the 122 Featured Articles in the "Business, economics, and finance" category, 106 are in the numismatics sub-section. I feel this is a bit unwieldy and awkward, as articles on numismatics topic often have quite little to do with business and economics itself, but rather the history and design of the coinage. Additionally, four FAs in the Numismatics sub-section are themselves biographies, matching the number of bios in *Business, economics, and finance biographies*.
Seperating it into its own category would allow the massive list to be broken up into sections, and better represent the current (low) number of FAs within the economics field. Generalissima ( talk) 19:16, 4 November 2023 (UTC)
Is there a json-file containing all featured articles or a module-function which could determine if the given article is featured? Want to use it in other module which would display a featured icon near the link if necessary. Kammerer55 ( talk) 03:43, 1 December 2023 (UTC)
I've always thought this article would fit the Art and architechture category, but considering that all of the recent comments about improving this article for the FA criteria have mentioned getting help from medical editors, reading medical articles etc. I have a feeling that everyone will disagree with me on this. Interested to see your thoughts on this. Realmaxxver ( talk) 19:46, 8 December 2023 (UTC)
What's the point of the map atop WP:FA? It's non-interactive, presumably out of date, and definitely not representative of all FA's (where does a biography go on a world map?) ~~ AirshipJungleman29 ( talk) 19:23, 23 October 2023 (UTC)
I notice that more than half the FAs in South America appear to be my work, and form a distinct cluster. Jo-Jo Eumerus ( talk) 11:48, 24 October 2023 (UTC)
I'm working on repairing a 2007 wrecked FA via translating a newer FA from another language; it appeared on the front page on February 2, 2008. It is approaching its 30th anniversary and though I won't quite have exactly 30, unfortunately, I'm hoping to have it in February if it's deemed eligible. I have in recent months seen old FAs re-run, but I don't remember just how old those examples were. dannymusiceditor oops 20:21, 1 January 2024 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Content assessment has an RfC for possible consensus. A discussion is taking place. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments on the discussion page. Thank you. Schierbecker ( talk) 22:39, 9 January 2024 (UTC)
Because I'm not sure what else to say. Wikipedia:Requests for comment/When there is no consensus either way is not getting many responses (possibly because the WP:Feedback request system seems to be down), and I've been racking my brains to think of a page that isn't too high-traffic (e.g., WP:VPP) or too biased (e.g., WP:FTN) but still cares about content. I picked you. If you have an opinion about what we really ought to do when there's no consensus – when you want to add or remove content from an article, and editors just can't agree – please tell me what the right answer is. Thanks. WhatamIdoing ( talk) 02:30, 10 January 2024 (UTC)
This is more of a little nitpick than an actual issue, but there are at least four theatrical building FAs in two separate sections. Two of them ( His Majesty's Theatre, London and Theatre Royal, Drury Lane) are under the "Theatre" subheader, and the other two ( Harris Theater (Chicago) and New Amsterdam Theatre) are under the "Architecture and archaeology" subheader. Should these articles all be listed under the Theatre subheader? – Epicgenius ( talk) 20:44, 7 December 2023 (UTC)