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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Anc516 (talk | contribs) at 21:23, 5 October 2012 (→‎Remove/discontinue ITN/FE: Comment). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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ITN/R discussion

I have opened a debate at Wikipedia_talk:In_the_news/Recurring_items#Remove_All-Ireland_Senior_Football_Championship in response to the ongoing debate over that nomination doktorb wordsdeeds 17:11, 25 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

'Alternative blurb' field in template

Hi. There's been a few occasions where I've felt like we could do with having a couple of suggested blurbs in the template, so I've gone and made this change to Template:ITN candidate/sandbox. It uses the field altblurb as in here:

Article: Elvis (talk · history · tag)
Blurb: ​ The King is dead. (Post)
Alternative blurb: ​ The King is not dead.
Credits:

Article updated

 --LukeSurl t c 17:50, 29 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I think this could be useful in cases such as A) There are two possible outcomes to a future event, i.e. which team wins a sports game, or B) For presenting an alternative blurb as part of the ITN/C discussion. It's an optional field. Any thoughts as to whether this could be part of Template:ITN candidate? LukeSurl t c 19:29, 29 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Makes perfect sense to me. Hot Stop (Edits) 20:20, 29 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Does the "composer" of the alt blurb put his/her name to it? Does it support 4 tildes? If not, it remains putting one editor's words into the signed contribution of another. Kevin McE (talk) 06:10, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Testing it out: yes, it looks like you could put 4 tildes in there if you like. LukeSurl t c 09:44, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
We should probably insert a new line for the alt blurb nominator. Hot Stop (Edits) 00:22, 3 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Merge WT:ITNR with WT:ITN

I would like to suggest merging WT:ITNR with WT:ITN and creating a redirect at WT:ITNR to here. It doesn't make sense to have two separate discussions for what is essentially the same topic (ITN). --IP98 (talk) 22:15, 30 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'd be in favour of this. The more centralised the discussion is, the better; especially given how relatively inaccessible the nomination procedure is compared to the other main page slots. GRAPPLE X 22:18, 30 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Why hasn't this be done already? Hot Stop (Edits) 00:02, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Because it had been proposed for less than 2 hours and only one person commented on it before you? Kevin McE (talk) 06:11, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I believe he meant "why has this not been suggested and implemented in the past already" and not "why has this new idea not been implemented now already". GRAPPLE X 06:15, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yep. Hot Stop (Edits) 03:22, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
If this merge is coupled with an idea I had some weeks ago - to have a 'confirmation hearing' for all current ITN/R choices - I'd be all over this. Far too much overlap these days, let's get them under the same label doktorb wordsdeeds 06:01, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I think the same oppose/support !vote used for normal ITN/C noms would work for this, no? --IP98 (talk) 12:32, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Personally, I'd rather ditch ITN/R altogether (having originally greeted in with enthusiasm), as it has become a tail that wags the dog: the result of little or no conversation is taken as overruling/preempting real discussion. But failing that, this would be a good idea. Kevin McE (talk) 06:11, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support Merge Why have separate talk pages for everything ITN? That means everyone has to keep tabs on multiple talk pages, rather than just one. The ITN talk page doesn't get crowded, so I seen no harm in combining them, as well as any other area of ITN that has its own talk page. -- Anc516 (Talk ▪ Contribs) 02:15, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I think you may have misunderstood the proposal, which is to combine the talk pages. The talk page of the main ITN page is not the place where we list events not on ITN/R: that is ITN/C. Kevin McE (talk) 18:39, 5 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Remove/discontinue ITN/FE

While we're at it, let's ditch WP:ITN/FE too - quite simply nobody uses it. In general, shall we hold a fairly broad review of ITN? LukeSurl t c 11:53, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hiving off from above discussion. I didn't even know ITN/FE existed. It's clearly underused, if used at all, and with little reason to do so from what I can gather. No need to split ITN into "past, present and future". If we're serious about reform, let's start here. doktorb wordsdeeds 11:57, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Question does the bot automatically move discussions from ITN/FE to ITN/C? If no, then support killing ITN/FE, if yes, then keep it. --IP98 (talk) 12:30, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • There's either no bot movement, or it's failed to work on the one occasion I noticed there was something in FE. Could we reform the bot so it doesn't break if someone makes an entry for one or two days in the future in ITN/C? LukeSurl t c 12:57, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment "While we're at it"? What? What are we at? No argument has been presented that would speak for the discontinuation of the section. Usually, if something should be done, there's a reason presented as to why. I know WP:ITN:/FE is quite empty right now, but for example in June it had much more content. A year ago as well. The fact that there are not many expected events right now is not a very good reason to delete it, because a need could arise in the future, and then it would feel foolish that the page was deleted. --hydrox (talk) 18:06, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Of those four items in June:
      1. Euro 2012 was an ITN/R meaning it was always likely to be nominated normally anyway.
      2. Windows 8 still hasn't happened yet.
      3. The date of the Shard's inauguration passed without anyone noticing there was a nomination on ITN/FE. In that case ITN/FE harmed the project, by providing a place that an editor thought was active but wasn't.
      4. I think the Haiti one failed to be transferred either.
    • Overall ITN/FE is an unused, unnecessary, and potentially damaging page and should be disposed of. LukeSurl t c 20:52, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Highly unused page with little or no value to the project. Almost any event worthy of listing is inevtiably going to be nominated, and almost always without notice of FE. - Presidentman talk · contribs Random Picture of the Day (Talkback) 22:10, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Not much use. If something is notable enough to be posted in the future, we'll remember when it comes around to the day. SpencerT♦C 01:06, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Removal Highly unused and unvisited. I remember putting Euro 2012 on there as a test, and really nothing was touched on that page since then. Whatever was put on there in June appeared to have been forgotten by the original posters. There were nominations there that were old, and no-one bothered to remove from ITN/FE, or even nominate in ITN/C. I doubt it will be missed. If a bot were to be assigned the task of automatically transferring things over to ITN/C, we would more than likely open up a new problem: people posting events months in advance, just so they can get recognition for nominating it and assure themselves that no-one else will beat them to it. Not a huge problem, but could still cause disruptions. -- Anc516 (Talk ▪ Contribs) 02:03, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support removal it's outlived its usefulness. Hot Stop (Edits) 03:26, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support with the same caveats as the ITNR discussion. What I would really like to know is, who are the cabal that will really decide whether this will be implemented once consensus is clear, and why have they not implemented previously supported changes like the recent deaths ticker? μηδείς (talk) 02:54, 3 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment ITN/FE would be useful if we implemented the following change which was suggested several years ago (by myself and HJ Mitchel I think): use it to hold fully-formatted nominations for events on future dates, then automatically move those nominations to ITN/C when the bot creates the new day heading. That way it can be used to prepare nominations of recurring or otherwise predictable events, without the rush of creating the nomination whilst updating the article and without people posting things on the previous day. So long as all such nominations are flagged as a) copied from ITN/FE and b) in need of an article update, I think this would be a helpful tool. I agree that in it's current form it's fairly useless. Modest Genius talk 09:14, 3 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Question- Since there seems to be a clear consensus here, couldn't we just PROD it? I'm not so knowledgeable about deletion, but is it eligible for that? Bzweebl (talk • contribs) 20:32, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

ready tag removals?

What in the world is going on that we have removals of the ready tags for Andy Williams, Eric Hobsbawm, and the Hong Kong ferry accident by editors critical of the nominations? And more to the point, where are our admins on this? Articles are ready when they have updates and no serious tag problems, regardless of consensus and the opinions of brash opionarians. (Hobsbawm, ]]a nom I opposed, ]]was tagged unready because of one single CN tag in the article, which was pointily made into an article-level tag, when even a section tag stands unwarranted!) Where are the admins on this? μηδείς (talk) 03:38, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think ready tags should be removed regardless, when placed by an editor whose been around here, unless it was made by some IP single purpose account or vandal-only account. Admins have to gauge consensus anyway, a ready tag doesn't change that. If there's no consensus, a ready tag doesn't guarantee a post. --Jethro B 03:45, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
This is a tempest in a teapot, something that was never a problem before. It's not explicitly stated in the instructions, but most people have seemed to interpret the [Ready] tag as indicating, at least in the opinion of whoever put it, that there is consensus to post and a sufficient update. You know, ready to be posted. If someone, generally an administrator but sometimes someone else, disagrees, it's removed. And no one seemed to complain about this process. In this case, someone (you) were aware that the story didn't have consensus, so there's no reason for the tag to go up. Having several stories that aren't ready marked [Ready] is no help to admins or anyone else. This seems quite intuitive and I have no idea why this is suddenly a problem. -- tariqabjotu 06:47, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I'd be happy if we just stopped using the tag, and have people say "Oi! Admins! This is ready!" in the regular comments. The tag seems to create more discord than its worth IMO. Do the admins actually find the tag useful? LukeSurl t c 12:20, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I don't post to ITN as much as I used to, but I do find the feature helpful. It is much easier to see a "[Ready]" in the table of contents or in my watchlist than to go a search through for the word "ready". Obviously, I could just search a page for the word "ready", but -- again -- this didn't seem to be a problem until now. -- tariqabjotu 14:03, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Agree with Tariq. I generally try to check late for stuff on ITN right before I sleep, so sometimes I miss stuff if it isn't obvious enough. That said, they're helpful, but not absolutely necessary. SpencerT♦C 20:11, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Keep the ready tags. They're a useful feature of marking which items are, well, ready.--Johnsemlak (talk) 12:42, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Scrap them: ill defined, introduced with no consensus discussion, additional grounds for dispute, enables aggressive editing, encourages anyone to claim the right to usurp the admin's responsibility. No doubt well intentioned, but more likely to do harm than any real good. Kevin McE (talk) 18:20, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm with tariq on this one. I find the ready tag very useful as a visual indication from the TOC that the list is ready to be updated. Of course, I always check both the discussion and the article to confirm, but the ready tag is a very nice, quick visual indicator that something needs admin attention. We've had several situations in the past few weeks where an article had widespread support, a proper article, and nothing happened for days; I suspect that in each of those cases they would have been posted if someone had thought to add the ready tag. It really does make it easier to know when to put my admin hat on and post the update. --Jayron32 19:34, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Cool. Maybe we could amend the instructions: Items can also be marked as [Ready] when they are ready to be posted (both in terms of article readiness and consensus to post), but the posting admin should always judge the consensus to post themselves. If you find an entry that you don't feel is ready to post is marked [Ready] you should remove the header. A [Ready] tag should not be added by the nominator of the item. - I think some people have considered [Ready] to mean "the article is ready" only. LukeSurl t c 19:57, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Because that is how it was introduced by the innovator.
If it is for the posting admin to determine consensus, why are we inviting someone else to declare their determination as to consensus in such a loud manner? And if that consensus (or the readiness of the article) is a matter of dispute, then the existence of the tab becomes a grounds for editwarring. No one opinion should be so much "louder" than any other. Kevin McE (talk) 20:10, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
But admins don't have any special privilege in "determining consensus" than any other editor does. Admins are required to perform the physical act of posting, because the template is hard protected, but that doesn't mean that Admins are granted "supereditor" powers in determining consensus. That can be done by any editor with enough experience to know how to properly make the call, so long as they didn't participate in the nomination or discussion themselves. --Jayron32 04:47, 5 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep ready tag and include consensus as a part of it. It speeds up rate of postings considerably if a user has determined it is ready to be posted. That way, no one has to go knocking on admin talk pages asking them to post. Bzweebl (talk • contribs) 20:30, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Recent deaths proposal

About a month ago, Medeis proposed that the recent deaths sticky be expanded. (See the original discussion here). There was a strong consensus for it, but, as far as I can tell, the proposal was never implemented. I propose that it be implemented now. - Presidentman talk · contribs Random Picture of the Day (Talkback) 12:50, 5 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Probably need a brave-enough non-involved user, preferably admin, to close and sum up the discussion consensus and then carry it out. Colipon+(Talk) 14:05, 5 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
It's archived, so no one will stumble across it. We would need bring the discussion to the attention of a random uninvolved admin. Then, once an admin has (hopefully) decided that the change should be implemented, we can start nominating people for recent deaths and leave a link for posting admins to the uninvolved admin's closure of the discussion. Any ideas on an admin to ask? Or perhaps a general noticeboard for these types of things that we can use? Bzweebl (talk • contribs) 20:03, 5 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
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