Talk:Main Page

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Grammatical Error

The "In the News Section" contains a grammatical error. "Defeat" in "Australia defeat England " should be plural. It should read "Australia defeats England". --Geoffrey Gibson 01:28, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

No, it shouldn't. "Australia defeat England" is correct. In both countries' varieties of English, groups of people are grammatically plural. —David Levy 01:34, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I still don't think it is correct. Groups of people are collective nouns and are considered singular. Ex: flock, herd, class, group.... all are singular collective nouns and a specified nation would fall into this category.Larry haven 01:28, 17 January 2007 (UTC)lary haven

This is truly bizarre usage and I was going to object as well, but it seems as though David Levy is right. Googling reveals it is common among sportswriters. I've never seen anybody do this when talking about the result of a war or something, though... Redquark 02:18, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

That's probably because most writers would use the past tense "Australia defeated England" it's just the ITN writing style that forces the use of this tense. These days due to the overwhealming amount of US media, in Australia both plural and singular are acceptable. It's almost to the point where "defeats" is becomming the norm. The logic is as David said above, a team is a group of people and therefore treated as a plural. Even though "a group" is singular in itself, it's to recognise a team effort. --Monotonehell 02:25, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

It still grates on the ears. I always thought that a group "was" singular in word but plural in concept. But I am American, not English or Australian, and I don't know cricket at all, so it's out of my range. However, if it read "Australians defeat England" or something along those lines, would it still be good sportswriterese? graphite_elbow 14:03, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

No, 'Australians' is not acceptable either. This is because You should not say "The Australian captain scored a century", but rather "The captain of the Australia team scored a century". Ditto "The England team", instead of "The English team". Carcharoth 11:57, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

A little off topic, I know, but "defeat" is the plural form of the verb. "Defeats" is the singular. The number in the verb must agree with the subject.--205.133.240.254 19:45, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm based in the UK, and can confirm that sports teams are often referred to in the plural: see various instances of this at http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/league_cup/6236687.stm. The grammatically correct form is, as far as I know, to refer to sports teams in the singular (Arsenal was playing Liverpool last night; Arsenal's players were playing Liverpool's players last night), and this usage is creeping in to the British media. However, the plural is still the most-used form. Because I'm so used to hearing the plural form, I find the American singular strange - the exact opposite of what User:Graphite_Elbow experiences. In general - and I don't know the reason for this, but I'd like to know - American grammatical usages are usually correct, whereas British grammar often deviates from the norms in various ways. --Jim (Talk) 08:58, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

No, I think you'll find that British English grammar generally adheres to British English norms very well; one of which is to treat a team as plural object (a team of players), hence the requirement for the plural version of the verb (see here, [1] and [2]. Bazza 16:52, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

When I find that a main page item seems linguistically incorrect or confusing to people from one nation or another, I attempt to devise suitable wording that eliminates the issue. Unfortunately, I've never managed to arrive at such a solution for the "defeat/defeats" problem (which arises from time to time). It seems impossible (without using awkward wording) to not end up with either an Americanism or a Commonwealthism.

I suppose that we'll just have to continue relying on the nationalities of the teams involved (or the event's location if the teams represent nations with conflicting rules), and accept the fact that a large segment of our readers will think that we've messed up. Let's just try to remember to include a hidden comment explaining the situation (to avoid accidental back-and-forth edit wars among people who all believe that they're correcting a simple typo). —David Levy 17:33, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Come, now! Let's say Australia defeats England.Wugo 17:58, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

This is a well-known difference between U.S. and British/Commonwealth usage, which has come up before on this and other pages. It's not just confined to team names or the sports(US)/sport(Br) pages; one finds the same treatment of an multi-member entity as plural (where Americans would expect the singular), in articles about music groups, for example. Newyorkbrad 15:47, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

I think the "reason" this works is that Australia and England in this case are kinds of an adjectival nouns modifying some assumed word such as a "players." As in the sentence, "Superman does good," the word good isn't acting as grammatically incorrect adjective as an adverb but a somewhat mysterious noun relaying terms we may already understdand; for example, "Superman does good [things for society]." Whereas "Australia defeat England" sounds weird, even to my American ears; it may be modern shortform of something like "The Players of Australia defeat the Players of England" that is, today, acceptable and understandable on it's own and which we understand within its content. Evidently this grew from the need to conserve space in newspaper print in the late 19th century and early 20th century. One can grammaticalls justify this by saying that there exists in some Indo-European languages the ability to replace whole phrases with one word but still give that word the grammatic properties of the entire phrase. Arthurian Legend 14:20, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia split?

Maybe there should be an english and american versions separate to wikipedia as a lot of the content is americanised and as I am english a lot of it takes figuring out which to be frank is not very good to do late at night.--99ghorner|Talk 01:26, 9 January 2007 (GMT).

Lets start with a capital "E" for "english", as in American. However not as in german or french etc (I think - to be confirmed). Osborne. 11:08, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

No, no no! We need to work on collaboration, not splitting up. A preferences for American/British English would be a lot better than a split. —Mets501 (talk) 01:35, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

A lot of articles are Britishized, and I really don't have a problem with it, though I'm American. A rule I use, is that if the article is about an American thing, use American spellings;if the article is about something British, use English spellings. If it has to do with neither, make a decision. --TeckWiz^TalkContribs_@ 01:47, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

A profoundly idiotic idea, if I do say so, and I am not usually rude about this sort of thing. Separating versions by tiny dialectic differences would only result in two inferior versions of Wikipedia, mostly overlapping and yet neither as complete as the current united project. Mets501's idea, which I'm certain has been proposed before, would be a solution—it's already done that way at the Chinese Wikipedia—, but it seems like far too much work for our programmers for piddling differences. (Chinese had a much larger problem of two different character sets to deal with.) I suppose I have some advantage in understanding both easily, being British-American, but I don't understand what causes such trouble in understanding. —Cuiviénen 01:51, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Same here, I don't have any problem at all understanding it and don't mind it's usage, so I would be opposed to user preferences. It may be the only way though, in the long run. —Mets501 (talk) 02:06, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Expect an answer similar to Bug 8327 if this is suggested to the developers. Titoxd^(?!?) 02:10, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

I also disagree, as loathed as I am to leave alone "incorrect" spellings like "color" (Oh the pain it took to leave the u out!) we don't need to make redundant British verses American WPs. What next? Australian verses Hong Kong english? In fact I'd like to see the en.WP introduce policy that the lead paragraph of an article must be in simple terms in order to merge in the simple english WP. As that's another redundant project. --Monotonehell 04:33, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Ladies and gentlemen, the vast majority of people on this planet who learned English as their first language are Americans. Can we agree to standardize (or standardise) on American spelling? The comments by Mets501 are well taken. - 209.221.240.193

Quite righte, a colourfule ideae. Ie agree withe alle the above. Britishe or Americane ise fine. ;-) | AndonicO ^{Talk | Sign Here} 15:51, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Why does first language matter? Surely all people who use a language have just as much right to define how the language is used regardless of whether's it's their first language or tenth language. While you can argue that there should be some consideration depending on how much they use a language, you can't IMHO argue that their views and usage should be ignored Nil Einne 14:32, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

We could also make sure that everyone is using the same American dialect. You know, replace all instances of 'pail' with 'bucket,' etc. We could use some of that $0.9Mil we raised to hire a team of linguists to standardise the entirety of the Eng. wikipedia into the same dialect.--205.133.240.254 19:50, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

The question then becomes...which one? There's quite a few distinct American dialects. How do we pick? And what about other languages/countries in similar (meaning, not Chinese) situations? graphite_elbow 16:04, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

You can't make everything American only. I'm sure there would be a lot of objection to that. Simply south 17:03, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

As long as it is not Ye Merrye Ole Englishe, people should be able to read articles wether they speak of the loo, or the restroom. FirefoxMan 17:18, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

How about a new policy? If an article begins with British-English keep it that way, if it begins with American English, then keep the rest that way. This way we have consistency. -- Kerowren (talk • contribs • count) 17:26, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

If i'm reading that right, it is a clever way of saying next article= British-English, articles aferward= American-English or am i jumping to conclusions already? Simply south 17:40, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Actualy, there is a manual of style pages on this. See Wikipedia:Manual of Style (national varieties of English) and WP:SPELLING. FirefoxMan 17:44, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

I've never associated the words "pail" and "bucket" with conflicting American English dialects. Here in New Jersey, both terms are commonly used (though "pail" most often refers to a small bucket, such as one used by a child as a toy). Of course, the word "bucket" is more fun, as one can comically use the pronunciation "bouquet." —David Levy 17:56, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

One pales at these suggestions, they are beyond the pale. etc. Rich Farmbrough, 11:45 16 January 2007 (GMT).

Splitting wikipedia simply due to American or British English would be a ridiculous move. Its not that difficult to figure out the differences - its all the same language! If the spelling differences seem annoying to anyone, it really is a personal thing. The idea of keeping the dialect consistent in an article is a good one, but given the fact that anyone can edit articles, it would be very difficult to implement such rules, unless there are editors whose sole job would be to go around fixing articles. Personally, it seems like a waste of time. Not to mention the fact that there are plenty of people who use and contribute to wikipedia regularly who have learned English as a second language...for them American or British English isn't as obviously different. Bottom line though...wikipedia is here to share knowledge...why would we want to put limitations on that?? Eendrani 13:31, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

The current guidelines state pretty much that. And there are those disruptive elements / ignorant elements who insist on "correcting" everything to their understanding of what's 'right'. Look at the current mini-wars over the spelling of the chilli chili chilllliiii chilie tamagotchi and the classic color article for examples of how pigheaded some people can be as to their way is the only way. What we need do is recognise that there are differences and incorporate that into the articles when it's part of the subject matter, or just use one set of grammar in the context of the article when it's not. --Monotonehell 08:51, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure how Wikipedia is set up code-wise, but could a script either server or client side change whether users see American or English spelling? I'm certain it's possible to do without editing the page to do so, but may require downloading an applet or something. Just an idea. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 152.78.254.245 (talk) 14:57, 14 January 2007 (UTC).

But it's not just spelling. Pissed and pissed are my favo(u)rites. Bazza 17:16, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I mean if we're to make difference between Am Eng and Br Eng then maybe we should add South African english and Indian English? You got to be really tired or really drunk if you can't understand an Br Eng article?--NoNo 16:11, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

I think unless it is possible impose global guidelines on how people should speak and write this is a problem that will always come up. Instead of splitting hairs over another communities unique if incorrect spelling/announciation we should just accept to read an authors work how he intended it read.I meanas your average American to say aluminium or the common brit to say hatchet... oh and cricket sucks anyway.

What about simply translating the offending articles into Latin?

--Lord Terrance

Requested move

Main Page → Portal:Main page — Not an article, is a portal, contradicts Wikipedia's policy. Only reason last one closed is because of WP:NOT (as in democracy) and the RM was flawed with confusion about whether it would be at Wikipedia:Main page or Portal:Main page. While this move is highly controversial, it needs to be done as to prevent contradiction to Wikipedia policy. This will not create hundreds of broken links - not many pages redirect to Main Page any way and bots can fix redirects over time.--Hamedog_Talk|^@ 09:21, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

WP:NOT Wikipedia is not a democracy. Do not cast a "vote" please state an opinion and an argument. This debate will only be resolved by a consensus.

• I think you're confused about how policies came to exist on Wikipedia. They weren't handed down from on high, and are still open to modification. It seems easier to simply add a note to the policy, than to edit a billion links and/or force the servers to redirect millions more clicks. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-11 15:30Z
  • I'm not sure how you could fix many of my concerns below simply by editing a policy. Which policy to you intend to edit, and how? (If you're thinking of the Main Page fair use debate, there are plenty of reasons to move unrelated to that.) --ais523 15:42, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
    • I would modify Ignore all rules to include "especially the rules that would change traditions that span all wikis and have existed since their inception, and/or rules that result in a needlessly large burden on the servers and editing community with no positive gains to the reading community." This requested move fits both of those descriptions. If the work needed to do this move was on the same order of magnitude as the resulting benefit to the reading community, I might have a different opinion. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-11 16:00Z
      • Depending on the caching architecture of MediaWiki this could mean no performance cost at all, since no HTTP redirect is sent. You shouldn't worry too much about the severs since it is likely that this wont noticably affect the load and if it does it just temporary. As for the magnitude of the work I doubt that it can be that much. A bot or a team of editors would fix this quickly. Especially since most links to the Mian page probably are in templates. Your point about other Wikimedia Wikis is a very valid one though, but there is at least the Swedish Wiki has moved their main page to the portal name space.Jeltz talk 16:26, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
      • Not all wikis have their Main Page at Main Page (for instance, Wikia's main page is at http://wikia.com/wiki/Wikia). The Main Page can be selected by editing MediaWiki:Mainpage (see http://wikia.com/wiki/MediaWiki:Mainpage). The change would not be too big; most links to the Main Page are from templates (for instance, the entire first page of the WLH), so it would just be a case of changing a few templates. And as mentioned below, this would cause minor gains to the readers (the removal of the cite link, for instance, and the correction of the statistics). I admit that these aren't big improvements, but there's no reason to keep the Main Page at its current location apart from vague historical reasons. And Jeltz is right too: the Swedish Wikipedia's Main Page is at http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Huvudsida. --ais523 16:30, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
        • The English Wiktionary too: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Main_Page. --ais523 16:32, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
        • If you can think of any substantial gains to the reading community, it might be worth it. Otherwise, we're just wasting time satiating our own desires; there's no reason to fix something that ain't broke. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-11 16:38Z
          • So if someone creates Main Page (song) or Main Page (film), we'd add a dab page at the top? --Howard the Duck 04:18, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
            • We can deal with that if/when it happens. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-12 15:16Z
              • I disagree. As I've said before, IMHO the way things are means that this could happen. If it does happen and we just wait for it as you suggest, it will seriously restrict the potential solutions and it will mean things will ultimately be ugly IMHO. Also, we won't have time to reach a proper consensus etc. That's why, especially in a case like this, we need to anticipate potential problems not run around with out hands in the air when the problem arises. Personally, I don't want a dab link, but we will have to do so for a while if we follow your suggestion IMHO. Also, we will probably not be able to keep Main Page as a proper redirect for very long if at all. Nil Einne 16:56, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Look under Talk:Main Page/Archive 87#Another type for extra info. Simply south 16:36, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Okay, so some people, as in the last move request, will say it will disrupt the encyclopaedia and such what. That is not looking at the long term, only at the short term. Change the software to hid "Redirect from Main Page", point en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ to Portal:Main page and same with the portal. Having the Main Page in article space is a violation of wikipedia policy.--Hamedog_Talk|^@ 09:21, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

If I'm not mistaken, the inclusion of the survey sections led the proposal be closed. Can it be removed? --Howard the Duck 09:41, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Sure, it just comes up when you use the template it tells you to use in WP:RM. Feel free to remove it. But, on the other hand, shouldn't that template be changed to there is not survey section per WP:NOT? Dinner for me now--Hamedog_Talk|^@ 09:52, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

I removed the "survey" bit. It's pointless and yes it should be removed from the template. --Monotonehell 11:35, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually the WP:RM page says "if a survey will help..." - it's an option. I still think that bit should be removed though. --Monotonehell 11:52, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Wait, can fair-use images be used in portals? The Sky May Be 11:37, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

That was a concern last time. Fair use images can only be used in article space. Bit of a loophole really. --Monotonehell 11:52, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

That seems like a weak argument to me. Main Page is by no means an article, even if it is in article name space. Main page isn't an article about anything, it is a portal. I don't have any legal education but I can't see why the law should care about a technically such as name spaces. It is how you use the images that matters not Wikipedia's internal ordering and categorising. If you have a portal in article name space it is still not an article. Jeltz talk 15:05, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

My strong support has IMHO been sufficiently explained previously. I don't really with to get too deep into this but if there are any important questions about my previous points, please mention them at my talk page Nil Einne 11:32, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia has very few hard-and-fast rules. There's really no reason why the Main Page should not stay right where it is. Why break thousands of internal and external links? Redirecting just looks cheesy. --Nelson Ricardo 13:22, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

For some previous discussion, see WP:VPR#Main Page to Portal:Main. There are some points there which haven't come up here yet (Main page could go to home page even if Main Page can't (notice the caps), 'cite this article' doesn't work properly on the Main Page, and is disabled on Portals, and Current Events was moved to portalspace a while back (so there's a precedent)). There's also a rebuttal to the fair-use claims there; loopholes in Wikipedia policy don't affect copyright law, and anyway taking advantage of them would violate WP:IAR and WP:POINT (yes, I believe it's possible to violate WP:IAR). Feel free to list any points there I missed, especially as I support this and am probably biased in which points I copy across. --ais523 13:39, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Shouldn't it be Portal:Wikipedia instead of Portal:Main Page? Koweja 13:44, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

That would imply a portal about Wikipedia. My suggestion on WP:VPR was Portal:Main; the exact name to move to should probably also be decided here if the move is accepted. --ais523 13:47, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

"That would imply a portal about Wikipedia" Isn't that exactly what the main page is? Koweja 14:12, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

No, a portal about Wikipedia would probably have links to wiki, GNU Free Documentation Licence, and Jimmy Wales, rather than what's up there at the moment. --ais523 14:15, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Indeed Portal:Wikipedia would be the Community Portal, which it in fact already is a redirect to. Jeltz talk 15:07, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

I wish people would stop taking this seriously. No, do not move the Main Page. There is no reason for it. If people are looking for information about home pages and they type "main page" into the search box and get back here, they're going to figure out pretty quickly that typing "home page" would be better. Home page is a poor article, and if someone's knows enough about the internet to use it, they know what a home page is. I can't imagine that article gets many visits, certainly not compared to the TWO MILLION per day that the Main Page gets. And all that's irrelevant anyway. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page probably one of the most-linked-to pages on the entire Internet now, so if moved there would *have* to be a redirect to the new title. So the old name wouldn't be usable for anything – Gurch 15:09, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Have you read the arguments above? Here's some more that I've thought of:

• With the Main Page in article space, it's included in database dumps of articles, which means it's plausible that a bot or mirror would need an exception for it.
• My edits here now on Talk:Main Page add to my Talk-space edit count, when really they're nothing like ordinary Talk-space edits.
• Things related to the Main Page aren't in article-space, so redirects are needed on the subpage parent links (the links that link back to the parent of a subpage).
• The Main Page adds to the article count on Special:Statistics, so actually Jordanhill railway station was the 999,999th article. And I hadn't realised all this time! (A redirect wouldn't add to the count).

This is an entirely serious proposal; there are many reasons to move it on top of 'freeing up the space for something else', which is only a very minor benefit (I agree, the redirect would need to be maintained more or less forever). --ais523 15:17, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

The main page is the main page, whether its at Main Page, Portal:Main Page or User talk:Main Page on Wheels!, the same rules would apply to it regardless of its location in the wiki. There are some marginal benefits from a move to portal space as described by ais523 above. However, not one of those concerns matter to the readers. In fact, I think the main page should be at http://en.wikipedia.org and not http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page (most external links are probably targeted at the former). Likewise in an ideal world the title of the main page as seen in a browser window, should be "Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" and not "Main Page - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia". However as I understand things this would need the devs to change MediaWiki slightly, but at least that has value to the reader.--Nilfanion (talk) 16:20, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

This could also be Portal: Wikipedia. Simply south 16:36, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually I see no reason not to move it. Just because it's always been here doesn't imply that it always should be --T-rex 16:39, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

• It can if you want it to. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-11 16:42Z

Even if the Main Page is moved (which is almost unthinkable), a Portal is clearly not the apropropriate way to do so. The main objection to the current location of the Main Page is that Wikipedia pages do not belong in the article space; a Portal does not resolve this objection. Another elephant in the room is an article about "Main Pages" which would clearly be a perpetual non-starter, doomed to be an inferior article, accessed mostly by people trying to find Wikipedia's main page, most of whose history would be composed of people arguing about how to add a link to the "real" Main Page in that article. The Main Page is the sole exception to the article space being inhabited only by articles, and not a particularly bad one. It is rootly deeply in Wikipedia's history and thus even this forum is insufficient to generate a consensus suitable for moving it. This should also be taking place on the mailing list, etc. Savidan 19:46, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Portals aren't in the article space, they are quite separate. And why would an article on "Main Pages" (or a movie entitled "Main Page" etc.) be doomed to be an inferior article? And simply because something is rooted in history does not provide a sufficient defence - otherwise we still wouldn't have the wheel! I agree that this debate needs to be put out further. --Midnighttonight (rendezvous) 23:10, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Some traditions are more important than others. It's all subjective, but then so is the rest of this discussion. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-12 00:09Z

Well, the proposed move is saying that the rules should triumph over tradition. The rules were adopted for a particular reason, there is logic behind it. The Main Page being in article space seems to defy logic. If you were creating a new Wikipedia2 tomorrow, would you have the main page in article space or as a Portal? Related question: Did portals etc exist when Wikipedia was first created? --Midnighttonight (rendezvous) 02:13, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Portals are relatively new on Wikipedia. When I joined (late 2004) there were no portals other than the main page. WP:PORTAL claims they were added in 2005. English Wikipedia has existed since early 2001. Since there was no concept of portals in the early years of Wikipedia it makes sense to when they were added to move the main page to portal namespace. WP:PORTAL even uses Main Page as an example of a portal, and it perfectly fits the descirption of what a portal is. The portals were modelled after the main page from what I remember. Jeltz talk 11:10, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

So if portals are rather new developments, then surely Wikipedia should be fully adjusted to met the new technical abilities of Wiki-software. Whenever there has been a technical change, or a new space created there have been changes. The Main Page should be moved to reflect the continuing changes in technical ability available to Wikipedia, along with all the other arguments. --Midnighttonight (rendezvous) 02:51, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

As I said in the last long debate that we just finished, the main page is part of the encyclopedia. It should remain in the mainspace. --- RockMFR 22:20, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

I would contend that the main page is not part of the encyclopaedia, but rather a glorified contents page. We don't include the contents page as part of an encyclopaedia, usually they are not even on the standard page numbers in a book/paper encyclopaedia. --Midnighttonight (rendezvous) 23:07, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, my view on what is a part of the encyclopaedia is that it is just the articles and disambiguation pages for articles. Portals are meta information pages used for navigation and presenting parts of the encyclopaedia, like Main Page. These pages are vital for the project but not actual encyclopaedic content and therefore should be kept separate. Jeltz talk 23:27, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

My only question about this whole thing is whats gonna happen if you move the main page Buford444

Nothing much, except that this discussion page will now be called Portal talk:Main Page, and the Main Page's URL will be http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Main_Page (with redirects from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page and http://en.wikipedia.org). Also, the 'cite this article' link will disappear from the Main Page (a context in which it doesn't work anyway), the article count will become correct, the article-only database dumps wouldn't contain the Main Page, and contributions to Talk:Main Page would show up in the Portal talk rather than Talk namespace. In order to actually move it, three MediaWiki messages will need to be changed (MediaWiki:Mainpage, MediaWiki:monobook.js, and MediaWiki:monobook.css), the page will have to be renamed by an admin, some double redirects will have to be fixed (I wouldn't think there'd be very many, and an admin with AWB could manage that easily), and Shadowbot2 will have to be told about the new location. --ais523 14:33, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

But what are the improvements for the reader? Otherwise, why waste time on this? Also, the article count argument is nonsense; that count is always changing as articles are deleted/created; its only real purpose is as an estimate. And, the "cite this article" link can be removed from the Main Page more easily than the work required for this move. The only real change I see is that editors interested in accurate edit counts will be happier, and that robotspeople obsessed with logic will not have their brains explode; but is that enough of a reason to justify all this discussion and work? — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-12 15:23Z

As Wikipedia expands, more and more of it is becoming automated (either by developers or by bots). For automatic systems, namespace is a big clue as to what happens. Removing the "cite this article" link would be more work than simply renaming the Main Page, because it would require a developer; and a specific Main Page exception will have to be coded into every other namespace-dependent feature for the rest of time. To take a slightly frivolous example, suppose the Main Page was proposed for deletion (not that it ever would be deleted, or the proposal would ever get further than a speedy keep). Would AfD or MfD be more appropriate? If MfD (like I would suggest), what would prevent the AfD template from coming up with an error? Likewise, on the list of most-viewed articles (which is of interest to readers, based on the frequency with which the question comes up on the Help Desk and the various Village Pumps, 'Main Page' is shown as the most frequently viewed article. Without changing the namespace, there's no way that current and future namespace-dependent tools are going to be able to handle the Main Page without special exceptions. --ais523 15:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Improvements for the reader will include being introduced to the logic of how Wikipedia works earlier, which could make them more able to access information, less confusing for those who want to sign up and get involved in the community, and show that rules must be followed. --Midnighttonight (rendezvous) 02:55, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

1. Main page is not an article.
2. Tradition means nothing. WP:CCC and WP:IAR say very clearly that rules and traditions are less important than making a better encyclopedia.
3. Main page is a portal, and ought to be treated as such.
4. There is precedent for such a move.

The only arguments against this are "tradition!" and that it'd be a burden, but arguing that it'd be a burden is making empirical claims without evidence. The precedent shows that it has in fact been done before and not been a problem, so why not do it here? Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 18:43, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

I have one problem and one problem only with a pagemove. Google for Wikipedia, and the first hit relevant to en is "Main Page - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia"; this is the same with other search engines. Portal:Main Page is more fitting in terms of WP namespaces but it is obfuscated to a wikipedian, why confuse matters? If someone can make a css tweak for the main page that changes the html title of the page to be just "Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" then that is a strict improvement. The location of the main page in wikipedia is an irrelevancy, compared to how it appears in external websites (like search engines). If this can be fixed, then does it really matter where the main page is? In short, nope - so a move would be much less contraversial.--Nilfanion (talk) 22:04, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes, very basic js could be added to MediaWiki:Common.js making the html title of the Main Page just "Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia". —Mets501 (talk) 23:39, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Has anyone considered a move to Wikipedia:Main Page?--Grand Slam 7 | Talk 20:48, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes. That was the subject of the first page move. See Talk:Main Page/Archive 87#Requested move. Although closed on WP NOT democracy, the majority of people opposed the move anyway. Simply south 22:53, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

The reason I personally prefer Portal: over Wikipedia: is that the main page in most ways (layout and contents) is exactly like the other portals. Jeltz talk 23:26, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Portal:Main page would be a portal about homepages. Whatever name you move it to, there's going to be some oddity causing it to be totally absurd. Both Main page and Wikipedia:Community Portal, which should obviously be at Portal:Wikipedia or Portal:Wikipedia community, predate the portal namespace and have contentedly remained in their original location since the hazy mists. I'm not sure why there is such a sudden panic to move the page, but the rapid-fire nature of the recent requests suggest an attempt to exhaust, rather than convince, the clear consensus to continue as is, as illustrated by the most recent discussion. I don't see the problem that this is purporting to solve. The only real encyclopedic content argument, holding the opinion that the main namespace is the justification for Wikipedia and all the other namespaces are just support functions to keep the real work progressing, to be made is that main page should be a redirect to homepage, which is so problematic that it will probably never be implemented. I don't see the point in having a bot make thousands of disambiguation edits and devs tweak how to handle incoming requests for something that appears to be trivial at best, and that doesn't actually address the issue as it relates to the content. - BanyanTree 23:52, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

The developers don't have to do anything at all for the main page to moved. Moving the main page is something admins do. It is if we don't do anything and still want the main page to be treated differently (like no cite link for example) that something has to be done by the developers, something which would litter the code base in spite of there already existing a solution. Jeltz talk 00:16, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

(copy and paste on the right article) Portal:Main_Page has no meaning at all for a guy coming here. The name in itself reflect to me subjectivly an idea of a technique change that has a meaning only to those who follow the rule to the letter. Even if there is a wikipedia policy (don't know wich one but let's assume that it exist) wich say that such page type should be sent into the "Portal" namespace. I think the Main Page should be an exception to this rule. This page is the first page that a visitor will see and if he see Portal_Indextypenamespace2.0:Main_Page, he will take wikipedia for something ruled by people too technical for him. Main_Page is simple, and appear better. Then let's assume that there are people wich got the Main Page in there bookmark. I know it's "not much" but how will they react when they see that they will be redirected to a new main page ? They won't understand. -- Esurnir 17:18, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Those who have bookmarked it wont notice much if anything at all. The main page will be the same main page but with another url and they will eb silently redirected. As for the issue of it looking technical and complicated I don't really think so. What is complicated about "Portal:Main Page"? It is a very descriptive and simple URL compared to most of the internet. Jeltz talk 19:46, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

(edit break)

It seems that Nilfanion's suggestion of putting the "Main Page" at http://en.wikipedia.org/ makes the most sense. It just "redirects" (silently) to the current Main Page anyway. It is in all probability the most referenced external link into Wikipedia (or would that be http://www.wikipedia.org/?). --Nelson Ricardo 11:34, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

• That seems like the best option (having the main page at en.wikipedia.org, but having the actual page for editing/talking stored at a Portal or MediaWiki page, maybe) — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-12 15:20Z
• Actually if Portal:Main Page is technocratic, having this page at the "root" of wikipedia would be far easier and better on my part. But how will be called the Talk page ? "Talk:" ? Perhaps stay with wiki/Talk:Main Page and have the main page itself as the root ( / ). Esurnir 17:23, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
• I can't possibly see the advantage. It doesn't open up the page name because if you don't put in a redirect lots of links (both internal and external) will die on us. Not to mention, the main page has been with us from the beginning. Moving that entire history will be a strain on the server and it really serves no useful purpose. - Mgm|^(talk) 19:59, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

You can't do this... Wikipedia pages don't actually "exist" as separate files. They're stored in the database and served up on request. All page requests are requests for the same page. Every page, including special ones, is just http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php with various parameters supplied. There is no page at "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page", it's just a shortcut which is converted into "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Main_Page". en.wikipedia.org is already a redirect to the Main Page, but the page can't "be" there because it's not something that can be moved, without changing the path for all pages to something else – Gurch 20:04, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually it can be done quite easily. I know how to do it with some simple URL rewriting tricks. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title= already redirects to the main page. Jeltz talk 00:05, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

That's not what I said. Lots of things redirect to the Main Page: "en.wikipedia.org", "en.wikipedia.org/wiki", "en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php", "en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=". The point is you can't "put the Main Page at en.wikipedia.org". All pages are returned by requests to index.php; MediaWiki can't work any other way. The page has to have a title, in order for it to exist in the database, it can't be blank – Gurch 01:36, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Sure it can be blank. The title argument can be the empty String. Both HTTP, Apache and PHP allows that as far as I know. "en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title="doesn't have to be a redirect, that is just a choice made by the developers. There is no technical reason for why the main page can't be at "en.wikipedia.org/wiki/". Of course another name would have to be used in the DB like "Portal:Main Page". I'm not saying that this is a good thing, just something which is technically possible to implement with the platform used for WikiMedia (and that I also know it would be done). Jeltz talk 10:21, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

• "If it aint broke, don't fix it". Yes, it probably does technically violate naming policy to have the entry page, which is not an actual article, in the article space, but so what? One of the most refreshing things about Wikipedia is that its internal rules don't have the burden of absolute consistency. Nothing above has shown to me a pressing need to move the page at all. Sam Blacketer 23:01, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I checked with Brion, and he says that http://en.wikipedia.org/ is imposible, /wiki/Portal:Wikipedia is ok. But I'm still against moving at all. -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 01:35, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

I have to agree with the "don't move it" crowd. This seems a good case to apply WP:IAR. —Quiddity 02:32, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

I was asked for my opinion, and while of course this sort of thing is not directly the sort of thing that I consider Up To Me, I thought it interesting enough to want to weigh in about it. Certainly a hypertechnical reading of some "rules" would suggest that our current naming convention is "wrong". And of course the main page is not an encyclopedia article but really in fact a portal. And ideally it would not be in the article space. However, it always has been, it causes no serious trouble for anyone, and I see no particular reason to change. It is a historical artifact. Certainly arguing for internal consistency within the rules is not much of an argument. The real question is: are there compelling usability reasons to do something extremely disruptive against nearly 6 years of tradition?--Jimbo Wales 13:52, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

So the God-King wants to break rules? Just like breaking the rules to keep himself in power? Tell the WikiTruth — Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.155.216.133 (talk • contribs) 23:22, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

The main argument here seems to be whether this move would be disruptive or not. I don't think there are compelling usability reasons to make the move; the move would only be a slight improvement. However, I don't think the move would be disruptive, so there's no reason not to do it. As this seems to be the issue, it's probably worth gathering statistics somehow on how disruptive a move is likely to be. --ais523 16:41, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Why not put Main Page in Wikipedia space? -137.222.10.57 17:01, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia: is for things about wikipedia, the mainpage is about the content. FirefoxMan 17:31, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Why shouldnet it be at Portal:Main or Portal:Main Portal? FirefoxMan 17:31, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Why are we even talking about this? What's the big deal about it being at Main Page. I completely agree with Jimbo's (^) statement of opinion. I suggest everyone read it as well. Alex43223 ^{Talk | Contribs | E-mail | C} 18:04, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

But what if it isn't disruptive at all and gives a slight improvement? Why not do it then. I have not seen any convincing arguments for why it should be a major disruption. Why not simply fix things that are slightly broken? If the Main Page would have been created today it would have been in portal name space so why not simply move it there and fix the redirects. Can't bee too hard, Swedish Wikipedia has already done it. A slight improvement is still an improvement and the disruptiveness wont matter in the long run. We don't plan to move our main page every fortnight. Jeltz talk 21:50, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't mind such a move, but it's a lot of work for rather little gain. I'd rather see people apply their talents and spend their time and energy working on improving wikiarticles instead of executing this 'arduous' pagemove. --PFHLai 22:33, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

How will this require much work? FirefoxMan 22:51, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Probably fixing numerous redirects after the move? --64.229.35.245 01:24, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes, and also moving this talkpage and all the talk archives. --PFHLai 00:19, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

(edit break 2)

People are complaining about all this work. What work? Moving the page would create a redirect to the new one. This means the [en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org] and everything would still go to the new page. What problems are there? --TeckWiz^TalkContribs_@ 22:55, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Probably fixing numerous redirects after the move? --64.229.35.245 01:24, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Almost all incoming links are from the "Did you know?" template. Jeltz talk 16:09, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Taking the time to read the opinions regarding this move, and making this contribution here, have kept me from improving wikipedia in other ways. It seems that all of our time would be put to better use not arguing over what something is called when there seems to be no technical benefit, for the most part. But then I'm probably just wasting my time : ) 74.255.97.139 02:06, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh, yes, 74.255.97.139. On this note, I'll make this edit my final edit on this topic here. --PFHLai 00:32, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

As for the 'how many redirects are there to the Main Page', here are all the backlinks to the Main Page in the article namespace (these should all be redirects or self-ref dabheaders if people have been obeying WP:ASR):

1. Index (self-ref dabheader)
2. Main (self-ref dabheader)
3. Mainpage
4. Main page
5. Main Path
6. English Wikipedia (was an internal link, now srlinked)
7. Main Page alternative (text only) (internal link; shouldn't this be in Wikipedia or Portal-space?)
8. Main Page/
9. Hauptseite
10. Portada
11. Hauptseiteen
12. Main (disambiguation) (self-ref dabheader)
13. Etusivu
14. %s (workaround for FireFox bug 298697)
15. Uncyclopedia (an attempt to link to the article home page, now piped)
16. In the News (self-ref dabheader)
17. Main-Page
18. Hovedside
19. MAIN PAGE
20. Accueil
21. Заглавная страница
22. Pagina principale
23. Forside
24. Main-page
25. Main+Page
26. MaIn PaGe
27. Strona główna
28. Main Page/errors (for the backlink from Talk:Main Page/errors)
29. MaIN PAGE
30. FORscene (Should have linked to Wikipedia instead. Jeltz talk 00:35, 16 January 2007 (UTC))
31. Huvudsida
32. MainPage (a recent creation, but the Main Page must have been somewhere in the days of CamelCase)
33. WP:MAIN (WP: prefix marks this as an XNR)
34. Ana Sayfa
35. 首页
36. Wikkipedia (meant to link to Wikipedia, now corrected)
37. Main pge
38. Min page
39. Hoofdpagina
40. Frontispicio

Some of these (MaIN PAGE, for instance) probably ought to be deleted, and some (Wikkipedia) probably ought to be retargeted (update: it was actually an article with an incorrect link --ais523). In fact, as they're all cross-namespace redirects, it may be worth deleting nearly all of them; if people here favour that, I may as well put them up for RfD. (I don't expect many backlinks from other namespaces once the templates have been corrected.) Note that one of the links above was an attempt to link to an encyclopedia article (at least how I interpret it), and also note that the Main Page alternatives seem to be in article space (moving these, to Wikipedia- or Portal-space, will probably be less controversial). Before posting this, I looked through some of the more suspicious entries and corrected them if necessary; I haven't checked all of them. --ais523 16:38, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

On one hand, I must commend you for cleaning the redirecting up, ais523. On the other hand, I wish some actual encyclopedic entries had gotten cleaned up. You seem to really want to make this pagemove. I ain't stopping you from doing things you really want to, but I wish something more constructive and useful gets done. Maybe something else at Wikipedia:Community Portal/Opentask would be next ? --PFHLai 00:30, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

How exactly are we going to come to a conclusion? Also, what are the available options? Simply south 18:02, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

The only way this will end is with a vote. There is no middle ground between moving and not moving, and there are few if any arguments based on actual policy that would guide us in getting to consensus. All technical issues are fairly trivial, so there is nothing there to guide us one way or another. The only way "consensus" will be determined is by counting heads, and any such vote will result in not moving. So this whole discussion is fairly pointless. --- RockMFR 18:22, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Nah, that is not how Wikipedia works. A poll would instantly be closed since Wikipedia is not an experiment in democracy. Voting about this kind of issue wont work. Actually I have no idea how to resolve this kind of issues, I only know how it is not done. :) Jeltz talk 19:55, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia work by consensus, as long as everyone dont seems to agree on one statement (move it to xxxx). It won't be done.-- Esurnir 22:52, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, but it is more complicated than that. See Wikipedia:Consensus for cases like this everyone doesn't have to agree. I'm not claiming there is a supermajority any side (the result of the last poll was really poor since people from both sides didn't care about discussion and motivating their votes – it was starting to become and experiment in democracy), but I hope that more people will join this debate so we can try to reach a consensus (or fail doing that). Jeltz talk 23:39, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

I think that we have mostly reached consensus; all the pro-move points are fairly valid, and none all of the anti-move points have not been sucsessfully rebuted. I think we should begin looking toward closing the discussion.--Tom 03:18, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Lol would you care to remove some of those double negatives so we can understand your point better? --Monotonehell 15:49, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Time out

This discussion is very confused as there is no clear course of action proposed. I suggest that the proponents of a move sit down and work out exactly what they are proposing. Then provide detailed arguments as to why they are proposing that particular action over all the other actions suggested above, while considering all the comments above. A lot of this discussion is at cross purposes. A vote will not resolve this at all. --Monotonehell 06:41, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually I think that only one or two actions ("Portal:Main Page" and "") have been proposed by several users, but otherwsie you are correct. The debate is confused. Please fill me in if there were any suggestions I missed. Jeltz talk 21:28, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Main Page and Portal:Main have each been suggested by at least 2 users. (I'd favour them in the order "", "Portal:Main", "Portal:Main Page", "Wikipedia:Main Page", and then "Main Page", but clearly other people will have different views on this, and we want to avoid making this into a vote.) --ais523 09:23, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

I think I was the one who sugjested Portal:Main. Althogh someone else might have beat me to it. FirefoxMan 12:42, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

You suggested it on 14 January: [3]. I beat you to it by 5 days: [4]. --ais523 13:24, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Personally i think it should be left alone, if it ain't broke don't fix it, we should find something that actually needs fixed Buford444

Something doesn't have to be broken for it to be worth fixing. Bad spelling isn't necessarily broken either as long as the article can be understood. The discussion is about where the main page should be and if it is worth the effort to move it if it should be moved. The alternatives have to be weighted against each other and the effort to move it has to be estimated (which seems small compared to some things I have been involved in). I have not yet seen any good argument for why it would take a lot of effort or be disruptive. Jeltz talk 15:35, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Okay we're still going around in circles. If someone who cares about this proposal wants to redact (without bias) the arguments into their salient points then you might have a (re)starting point. Otherwise this discussion is no consensus. --Monotonehell 19:39, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Do you read the featured article?

Simple question. M3tal H3ad 07:41, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Simple answer: sometimes. — ceejayoz ^talk 08:04, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Rarely. There's been some weird stuff as FA lately.--Suleyman Habeeb 08:58, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

This has little to do with Wikipedia's MainPage. Please move this survey onto your own blog, M3tal H3ad. Or WP:VP. --65.95.107.148 16:01, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

I disagree. It's very relevant to this page (being that this page is for feedback on the main page) and in point of fact I'm interested in reading what is said here. Raul654 16:12, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

I always read the main-page summary of the featured article (except for days when I don't go near a computer). I usually (but not always) follow through to the article and at least read the beginning. I often read the whole article. Lately I've been copyediting a lot of featured article candidates. Several of those have since been on the main page. I don't usually read those when they are on the main page as I've already read them. However, I do check out the diff from the last time I read it and the main page version. Some main page articles are better than others. I don't always read the entire article when it's not very good. Seeing as I have the bad habit of doing most of my Wikipedia browsing from work, lately I've been following through to the article less and less because of the template-vandal. It'd be embarassing to have some of those images suddenly on my screen. However, I've yet to visit the main page or any of its articles when they've been vandalised, and I understand that problem's mostly solved by the new cascading protection stuff, so I'm getting back into the habit of usually reading the featured article. As for ITN, DYK, and Today in History, I scan ITN to see if there's anything I haven't already learned about from real news sources, and I read today in history, and sometimes follow through to an article. I also read whatever's in DYK when I chance to look at it, and usually twice a day; but it changes so frequently that I know I miss seeing stuff. The article that I contributed that was featured in DYK was featured while I wasn't on the computer so I missed seeing it. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 16:47, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

You can disable image-loading in your browser, so you'll never have to worry about inappropriate images. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-14 21:04Z

And why would I want to do that? Then I'd miss the featured pic of the day, and all the illustrations for any article - a huge part of Wikipedia. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 15:22, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

You can still view them easily. Any images that you want to load, simply right-click on them and click on Show Picture. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-15 17:46Z

Oh, and to disable image loading in IE, go to Tools > Internet Options, go to the Advanced tab, and under Multimedia is an option to enable/disable showing pictures. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-15 17:48Z

Same with all the sections on the main page - I only read something if it peeks my curiosity. So somedays yes, somedays no --Monotonehell 08:38, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

I read the main page summary pretty much every day and then if that really interests me I'll read the whole thing. Other than that I read it if there's a big "this shouldn't be on the main page" uproar or if it's something I personally would never have guessed there'd be an article/featured article on. Jellypuzzle | ^Talk 10:01, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

only if it looks interesting, but I will always look at the pic. --Midnighttonight <small><i>(<font color=black>rendezvous</font>)</i></small> 23:07, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

As a person with a mild case of ADHD, I think it's important to check out the main page every day and see what "sticks" or catches my eye as an ordinary reader. It would be nice if the FA didn't always mean very long, in my opinion. There are so many high quality articles that could be featured. That said, I read at least a portion of the FA every day. I bought my Uncle's birthday present based on the Rwandan Coffee article just recently. I try not only to read but to improve, comment, and congratulate. NinaOdell | Talk 15:01, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

• Very rarely do I read the FA of the day on the main page. Rarely do they interest me. My main page use is chiefly to log in, occasionally to check what happened on this date to check if i'm ignoring a day of religious observance or something (when I'm too lazy to pick up my prayer book and breviary) and check recent deaths to make sure my name isn't listed. —ExplorerCDT 21:10, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

I will usually read the summary on the main page then, if the article sounds interesting, I will read it. --Credema 09:54, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I usually read the main page article, unless it is simething very strange (like the pokemon one a hile back(which i read anyway))--Chickenfeed9 19:12, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

I read the synopsis (and everything else on the main page) daily, and the full F.Article if I'm personally interested (about once a week). —Quiddity 21:21, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Is it possible?

There are four photos on the main page with the option to upload a new version. Suppose this was done. What if the image was something very, very wrong (may I remind you of the mutilated...erm...you know). Would this be possible? If so, can we stop it? DoomsDay349 06:25, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

All images on the Main Page are protected for precisely that reason; see Category:Protected main page images. If a non-admin attempts to upload a file with the same name as a protected image, the upload will fail. --Slowking Man 08:00, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure a bot auto-protects templates and images on the front page these days making such vandalism (in theory) impossible-137.222.10.67 15:42, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

I thought as much, it's just that the upload link was there and I was worried it might work. Just trying to look for any holes in the system. DoomsDay349 17:19, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

No, iirc, this particular feature has been on MediaWiki for years: Any non-sysop who tries to upload a file with the same name as a protected image will always get an error message. If this was not the case, the main page would have vandalism-only images every second. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 17:33, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

If in doubt, you can always try it (with a harmless image obviously). Nil Einne 12:21, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

CotW on Main Page

Cross-posted from the village pump Zunaid©®

I think it would be a good idea to have a "Collaboration of the Week" on the Main Page. This is a quick way to introduce visitors to collaborative editing and shows them how Wikipedia works. In addition, if there is a topic that grabs the readers' attention, we might gain a few good contributors to the project. Nominations for the Main Page could come from the various Wikiprojects which already organise CotW's amongst themselves. Zunaid©® 07:14, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

This has been brought up a few times (and added once or twice if I remember correctly), but the counter-argument has always been that the main page is primarily for the readers, not the editors. We don't want to give the impression that you "have" to contribute or anything. The community portal is for the editors. Besides, it's not like we have a shortage of editors or anything ;) Oskar 15:43, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

There is something relatively similar at WP:AID. Simply south 16:16, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Which isn't nearly-visible enough. Ideally, we want to turn readers into editors, so I think having a format similar to the Spanish, French, or Italian Wikipedias. Remember that consensus can change... Titoxd^(?!?) 04:42, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

It should be on Wikipedia:Community Portal for sure which is the main page for contributors. But Wikipedia:Main page is for readers. At least as the current main page design philosophy stands. Who knows what the next main page redesign review will bring. --Monotonehell 04:47, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Surely we want readers to become editors. Think about it, how did any of us start out here anyway? A collaborative project on the very first page readers see will draw them in much more quickly, show them that Wikipedia truly is an encyclopedia that anyone can edit, introduce them to collaborative editing, introduce them to WikiProjects (which has other benefits such an introducing them to policies and guidelines such as WP:V, WP:RS, WP:NPOV, WP:NOR and WP:MOS) and increase the number of useful contributors to the project. That is a good thing no? I cannot see any drawbacks.Zunaid©® 08:46, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Like I said, definitely something to bring up at the next main page redesign. --Monotonehell 12:52, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Front page discussion

Any guesses as to when the first "front page topic to cause a long discussion as to why the topic was so chosen" will be? (Some articles will not normally be included, and some won't be "caught" on clicking random article - and there will always be a grey area of topics which cause debate. How easy would it be to set up "an opt in" program - though I cna see there would alost propmtly be an "opt me out of medical/political/contortionist etc categories" squawkfest. The point is that you know what you are letting yourself in for (and don't look at it in the library etc) Jackiespeel 18:22, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I have no idea what the above paragraph is saying... Raul654 20:16, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm lost too. Tennis DyNamiTe ^{(sign here)} 23:38, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I think he's talking about having some porn article as FA. I could be completely wrong, though. Nishkid64 02:47, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Some pages cause much discussion however "innocent" they are - I was just posing the theoretical question. My comment about the article in question was that it/the image was far more tasteful that some of the things in tabloid newspapers - and that people who "don't mind" more varied access can have it. Jackiespeel 16:20, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Er what article? You mean the one about a month ago that had a picture some people called porn? There have already been a lot of featured articles with a lot of discussion. Pokemon articles tend to get a lot of attention, as have mathematical concepts which people don't understabd (0.999...) and anything remotely political at a time when Americans are politically sensitive... Nil Einne 09:50, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Typo in featured article section

...making it one of the most successful independent film in American movie history. should be films. 141.163.51.1 11:07, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Fixed. Thanks for reporting it. WP:ERRORS may get a faster response, by the way. — TKD::Talk 11:12, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

"In the News" bias

In my opinion, "In the News" is too biased toward political events, and under-represents space,science, and other events. --Ineffable3000 04:29, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

To counter this perceived bias, please update wikiarticles in underrepresented fields and then suggest new news headlines on WP:ITN/C. Thanks. --PFHLai 04:39, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

One of the troubles IMHO (I'm a biologist) is science rarely has events which are significant at the time. Often, only with the benefit of hindsight do we realise how important one event was. And of course, a lot of the time it isn't even single events but multiple events Nil Einne 09:44, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

DYK does not match article

It states "Anemonefish are born as males and only become females if they rise to the top of the hierarchy?" but the article says they are born sexless and become males if they rise to the top. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 205.132.76.4 (talk • contribs) 11:27, 2007 January 16 (UTC).

Actually, according to the article, they are born sexless, develop into males, and turn into females if they rise to the top. DYK is now fixed. Thanks for pointing out the error. Next time, please make use of WP:ERRORS. Service may be quicker there. --PFHLai 14:14, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

HAWAIAN Main Page

I introduce a wikilink inter-language between (en) and (haw) on the wiki-(haw) Main page.

Would you do the same therefore the hawaian main page would be linked on (and towards) every main page in any language thanks to the Thijs!bot

it's on haw:Ka papa kinohi so type [[haw:Ka papa kinohi]]

--BETA-kwAn 13:25, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

The issue of interwiki links for the main page has been discussed in the past (see Talk:Main_Page/Archive_82#Language_template). Due to the large space that listing all 250 different languages would consume, only languages with at least 20,000 articles are currently granted direct links from the English language Main Page. --Allen3 ^talk 14:03, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Background Image

Is there a way to havea background image on a table, I 've posted this in the new commers page and I don't think there is, but I don't want to risk there being a way and I ignore it. --Daniel()Folsom ^T|_C|^U 19:04, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

• It's possible, look into how Template:Click works. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-16 21:28Z
• Okay, maybe the Click template isn't the right thing, nevermind. But it should still be possible. Try asking at WP:VPT. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-17 13:50Z

Wikipedia - An ACADEMIC encyclopædia or not ?

Firstly, I must say that I've been a Wikipedia user/reader/visitor for quite a while now, and like and appreciate the project very much.

My concern is with the general content of Wikipedia (non language-specific). Although officially called an Encyclopædia, I find it more and more difficult to believe that those very, very long articles about TV shows, large companies, etc, are encyclopædic content. Don't get me wrong, I have no objection to the information (that is usually very carefully and completely put together) being available. However, I am tempted to call for a an official separation of Academic content from the Generic - perhaps Wikipedia Academic that would collate content of strictly academic value.

I'd like to hear what others, especially admins & mods, have to say about this.

Sergeroz 09:17, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not an "Academic encyclopedia"; it is simply an encyclopedia of all notable and verifiable topics. Just because you're not interested in a topic doesn't mean other people aren't either. In fact, if you look at the list of the top 1000 Wikipedia articles, the popular culture-related articles are by far the most popular. —Dark•Shikari^[T] 10:56, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

By no means do I oppose existance of any notable and/or verifiable topics, but shouldn't there be a distinction, perhaps at least a flag, to mark articles of academic value? It is otherwise unfair (if I may use such a flexible word) to compare Wikipedia to any other encyclopedia in size or otherwise. I also believe that in time to come (say, a couple of years) content that is very popular today, will become largely outdated and irrelevant, and any articles relating to those topics will not be updated. Thus, Wikipedia will slowly begin to emerge as a collection of outdated scrolls, rather than current encyclopedic knowledge/information. —Sergeroz 13:00, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

You're assuming that either the Wikipedia editing population will decline in the future, or there will be fewer topics of popular interest to write about in the future. Are either of these true? — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-17 13:53Z

Perhaps he is suggesting the pages on pop culture topics which are getting so much attention now will be left to stagnate once pop culture moves on. It's certainly something to consider. APL 16:40, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a television show, so you would consider it "generic", however there is a fair amount of academic study about it as well, so it is also academic. Should it be flagged as "valuable" or not? Koweja 12:48, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

There is a lot of content in Wikipedia that I consider more appropriate to an almanac. For example the detailed sports results over a detailed article about the sport. But sometimes the line between academic interest and not is very hard to define. There would be endless discussions over whether XYZ is academic or not, since just about everything is studied at some level of academia. Already projects like Wikinews and Wikibooks have been splintered from Wkipedia when the difference is noted. Perhaps in the future Wikimanac will be a project and we can shove off a tonne of non-encyclopedic but valuable information to there. --Monotonehell 14:53, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Sure. I support this. Then again, I'm an academic studying comics and video games, so I'm not sure this distinction actually does anything. Phil Sandifer 15:23, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not Nupedia. --Ezeu 15:31, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Large companies and TV shows are indeed encyclopaedic subjects and you will find them in your encyclopaedia (example). And I actually have seen no problem with the length of our articles on companies. What bothers me somewhat is how long articles on for example TV shows can become, but it isn't easy to draw a line. Jeltz talk 21:20, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Why is this on every page, was it decided by the marketing department? I don't like it at all, it looks very unprofessional. People keep adding messages like that for promoting whatever, I completely hate it. Imagine a paper encyclopedia putting a message at the top of every page. And where is this discussed, I've never seen a discussion about it? Piet | Talk 11:24, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

• Every page? I have only seen that tagline on the front page. What are you talking about? —Dark•Shikari^[T] 11:45, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
  • It's just under the main heading at the top of the page, even on edit pages (for instance, it's the subtitle for 'Editing Talk:Main Page (section)' on the edit screen for me now. --ais523 12:01, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
    • For a paper encyclopedia, that would be unnecessary. But for a new visitor who has never been to Wikipedia, he/she might not know anything about Wikipedia, so even the small tagline might help. —Mets501 (talk) 12:05, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
    • many printed books, even, have the title printed in the header of every page. I don't see the problem. Since the content is GFDLed, the line also assures that mechanical copying results in a licence compliant copy, you'd need to purposedly remove the note to plagiarize the content. It would be enough to have "from Wikipedia" in the footer for this though. dab (𒁳) 15:28, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
• Discussed at MediaWiki talk:Tagline.--Kchase T 15:42, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
  • That's a (pretty inactive) vote on whether to change it. John Broughton | ♫♫ 17:31, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

So it's always been there? Gee, I only seem to have noticed today. Probably got out of bed on the wrong foot. Or has the size changed or anything? Pages suddenly looked different this morning. Piet | Talk 16:33, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

LOL yes it has Piet .. go back to bed ^_^ --Monotonehell 17:41, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Piet, if you want, you can get rid of it (if you don't like it). Just place the following code in your Monobook css file:
#siteSub {
display: none;
}
...but the site tagline doesn't seem so bad to me. It means free as in freedom, and while Wikipedia is free as in beer (of course, I'd prefer Wikipedia), but they're not the same thing (Gratis versus Libre). Gracenotes^T § 22:51, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Images

Is it just me - or are no images showing up for anyone right now?--69.143.167.110 23:04, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

it's you

Clear your page cache (Shift + Refresh for Firefox), then you should be able to see pictures. Kaushik twin 08:47, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Adjusting Image Height/Width but not Width/Height

Is there a way to adjust an image height but not width? Daniel()Folsom ^T|_C|^U 01:20, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

no — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.36.120.68 (talk • contribs)

No, I don't think so. :( But if you know that the image's default height is h, and its width is w, and you want a height of n pixels, then copy and paste the following to include as a parameter in the image:

100 px high

"There's something magical about that ratio!" he said. The crowd gushed "Auuuuuuuuu."

{{subst:#expr: n * w / h round 0}}px

(For example, Image:Example.png is 275×307, and suppose you want the height to be 100 px. So

[[Image:Example.png|thumb|{{subst:#expr: 100 * 275 / 307 round 0}}px|"There's something magical about that ratio!" he said. The crowd gushed "Auuuuuuuuu."]]

will do the trick on Wikipedia, or any other wiki with m:ParserFunctions. Of course, in the place of n and w and h, put the numbers that you want. Gracenotes^T § 02:36, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

It depends on what you mean. If you want to be able to make a perfectly square image into a rectangle by reducing the height while keeping the width constant... then no, Wikipedia always keeps the aspect ratio constant. However, if you want to reduce an image by specifying the new height rather than the new width just use a ridiculously large value for the width. That is, [[Image:Example.png|999999x100px]], would scale the image to the lesser of a 999999px width and a 100px height. Unless the initial image were already vastly wider than it was tall that would result in the height limit being the lower value and thus the sole determinant of the final image size. --CBD 13:43, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Complete list

Where is the code that makes "Complete list" show up as an interwiki language link in the left margin of the Main Page, at the end of the language list? I can't seem to find it in the code or transcluded pages. Dovi 15:07, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

The code is JavaScript. It's located in Common.js; search for "complete list." --Slowking Man 16:24, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! Dovi 16:36, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Captions for photos

Can I suggest photos and images on the main page be given a clear caption. particularly in relation to the people in the news section. Today I read the top story about the EU president and saw the photo next to it and thought okay that's him, but when I click the link for more info I see an entirely different photo. The guy on the front page is actually Saddam Hussein's brother. Conceivably both could argue you've tarnished their image and sue ;-) but the lack of clarity is the bigger problem, especially for the first page readers come to. Just a name under the photo would help, a reference burried in a second or third paragraph is not enough. Alternatively you could ensure the photo is always positioned next to the relevant caption but this may be more difficult to ensure.

a good news service though, thanks Pugsworth 01:43, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

If the "(pictured)" isn't good enough, you can also mouse over the image to get the person's name. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-01-19 02:40Z

This has been brought up many times but no one can agree on any of the fixes suggested for it. --Monotonehell 04:05, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Side note: "a good news service though, thanks" ahem. --Monotonehell 04:06, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Comet McNaught

Why is this not "In the News"? It's a pity that tonight and maybe tomorrow are the last chances to see it in the southern hemisphere before it disappears forever (northern hemisphere had a chance last week). I think we missed a golden opportunity to put something quite pertinent onto the main page while we had a chance. And perhaps a featured picture would not have gone amiss either. Zunaid©® 08:31, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Hmm both our article and the news sources I've read suggest it will probably still be visible in the southern hemisphere for a while yet, altho fading in brightness all the time... 203.109.240.93 12:08, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

It's not in ITN because no one has suggested it. Things don't happen automatically. ITN relies on people nominating candidates. See the info box at the top of this page for all the details. Eventually you'll want the candidate page which is here. --Monotonehell 12:48, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Why is the database closed?

database of Arabic Wikipedia and meta are closed for a long time. Why?

--196.202.53.248 12:19, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

It's not only Arabic. It affects almost all Wikipedias, except the English one, which benefits from a sort of positive segragation, where its maintenance always gets high priority. Meta is locked too, as well as French Wikipedia... which can be suspended for many hours instead of minutes for English Wikipedia...

Why don't we have a link in the maintenance message displayed on top of the edit page (when a database is locked) where we can see the current state of all databases, and possibly an history of database locks and unlocks?

It seems that not all Wikimedia projects have the same level of support, and WM database admins don't care much about other project than English Wikis... But I'd like to see a rationale for this behavior, notably because smaller Wikipedias should always be much faster to synchronize between servers than English Wikis. For now, English wikis are stealing all the ressources at any time... I think that the smallest wikis should have priority in all cases (and possibly Meta having top priority, so that coordination remains possible), even if this means that dabase locks will be longer for the largest wikis that have the most important number of changes to synchronize. Apparently, when maintenance locks are needed, projects are not sorted by their growing volume of changes to synchronize, as this should be (but may be these synchronization statistics are still not maintained in the software). What we see is that all databases are updated at the same time, then synchronization starts and take very long on some projects. I don't understand why databases need to be synchronized all at the same time, and why there is not a correct queuing system, to minimize the global impact. verdy_p 13:37, 19 January 2007 (UTC)