Wikipedia talk:Featured and good topic criteria

Main article critiria?

Should we have a criteria about what the main article is and how it relates to the other articles? --Arctic Gnome 15:58, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I feel that the criateria shoudlexplicitedly include a requirement for a lead article. Something like:

• The topic should have a lead article, which introduces and summarises the topic.

I don't think anything more than that is needed... it can always be expanded later, depending how things go. Tompw (talk) 01:29, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

That sounds about right, and I'm in favour of making that criteria #6 (or #2, bumping the rest down one). However, it would make the Star Wars movies fail, and that's one of our best topics. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 01:48, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm adding this as a requirement. I've nominated a main article for the Star Wars topic. If that nomination fails, the topic will either be grandfathered in or listed for a FTRC. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 20:10, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

non-arbitrary groupings

Should criteria #1 be expanded to say that the grouping should not arbitrarily exclude items? I'm thinking that we want to stop any very specific topic groupings that weasel their way around making a gap. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 01:17, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree.... OK, maybe change #1 to something like:

• The articles should be grouped under one collective name and be in the same category. The topic name should not arbitrarily exclude items.

(This also removes some superfluous text). Tompw (talk) 01:29, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I think that the term "clear similarity" is the key goal of criteria #1, and we shouldn't take it out. How about:

• The articles should have a clear similarity with each other, should be in the same category, and should be grouped under one collective name that does not arbitrarily exclude items.

--Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 01:43, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm adding this as the new wording, but if anyone wants to suggest any amendments this wording is not yet set in stone. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 20:13, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Recommendations

This should probably eventually be spun off into a Wikipedia:Featured article advice-type article.--Pharos 19:11, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

"higher-level" articles within topics (or: Creator of an artistic work in the FT?)

The scope of this discussion may not only apply to music. There has been talk about whether to include the main article on scouting in the FTC of the boy scouts of America. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 05:25, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

In the event of artistic works being nominated for Featured Topic status, should the creator of that work also be included in the topic? Examples of this could include The Beatles if Sgt. Pepper's were nominated, Douglas Adams if Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy were nominated or Michelangelo if Sistine Chapel ceiling were nominated.

The principal pro arguments being:

• A artist's creation is not just a "sub-category" of the artist's page;
• An understanding of an artistic work is not complete without an understanding of its creator.

The principal con arguments being:

• No Featured Topics to date have a "higher level"/overarching article within the set (except the Featured Topic's heading article);
• The artist's page may not deal with the subject of the Featured Topic in any great detail, and if it does the information might be repeditive/circular (per Wikipedia:Summary style).

A further point is raised as to what happens when several artistic works (such as multiple albums by the same band) are Featured Topics - would the band's article need be in each Featured Topic set? This question grew out of a debate at the discussion of the candidacy for Gewn Stefani's Album "Love.Angel.Music.Baby" here. Witty lama 04:55, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

That last one is a good point, it would be a bit silly for an overarching article to be in tonnes of FTs. I'll have to sleep on this question. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 05:08, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

• I don't believe that the creator of the work should be included. Putting the creator as part of the series about a work implies that the creator is a subtopic and that the article about the creator contains more detail than the main article, which should be summarizing the others. For the articles in a featured topic to be at least good article level, they should already address any information about the creator that is relevant to the topic. ShadowHalo 05:09, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
• I believe the creator should be included to complete the depiction of the topic. TonyTheTiger (talk/cont/bio) 14:54, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
• I don't think it is needed. The main article is already the higher-level article of that specific topic, and I don't think there should be an even higher level than the main article. Hurricanehink (talk) 14:57, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
• If the topic os on an artistic work (or collection thereof), then the article on the creator should not be included. The reason is the work is a subset of the creator, not the other way round. Tompw (talk) 16:03, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
• I don't think it should be included. A featured topic as defined is a main article and all of it's sub-articles. Gwen Stefani is not a sub-article of Love.Angel.Music.Baby, even though she is obviously related in some way. To extend the arguement, Final Fantasy 8, a current FT, has the game (FF8), a characters article+ 2 chars that have their own article, and a music of FF8 article. It does not include the parent Final Fantasy series page, nor does it include Square Enix, the publisher/developer, nor Hironobu Sakaguchi, the executive producer. They certainly are relevent to the topic, in the way that Gwen Stefani is relevent to a topic about one of her albums, but they are not sub-articles of the topic and are thus not included. --PresN 00:16, 6 April 2007 (UTC)
• I think I'm going to have to go with ShadowHalo's point that the main article should summarize any relevant information about its own parent articles, and that including the parent article in the topic would be repetitive. So I'll say that we should not include parent articles of the main article in a topic. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 16:25, 6 April 2007 (UTC)
  • OK, that's cool then. Witty lama 19:28, 8 April 2007 (UTC)
• It looks like the general consensus is to not include parent articles in topics. However, if anyone finds a topic which they think is a special case, feel free to reopen this discussion. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 03:36, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Lead article a FA?

Could we discuss the addition to the "recomended" section....

That the Lead article should be an FA. The smaller the featured set, the more strongly the recomendation be imposed.

In cases where there is a larger number of articles in the set then this is not so important, but the smaller the set the more important it is that at least the Lead article is a FA. An example would be Saffron series which only includes 3 articles - this would not have passed if the lead was not a FA. On the other extreme is the Canadian Election Timeline series which probably would have passed even if the lead was not an FA. Witty lama 19:55, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't know if it should be a requirement, as the requirements are already pretty tight. While it would be nice, I don't think having the lead article be a GA as opposed to a FA should prevent the topic from passing (if that's the only objection). That said, some GA's are better than others. If the lead article isn't good (or was passed without a thorough look at the article), then it could be delisted and thus prevent it from passing. Hurricanehink (talk) 21:12, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

I sort of agree with Hurricanehink. I would support something stating that the lead article should be comprehensive so that the topic itself is properly covered (since GAs only have to be broad in their coverage). I think having the lead as a featured article is unnecessary though. I have a question too. I was looking at how the featured topics line up with the critieria, one of which requires that the non-FA articles "must be all Good Articles or A class except where achieving such a class is impossible". Is there a reason why most of the articles in the Michigan State University series are unrated? ShadowHalo 21:51, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Michigan U is being discused over at WP:FTRC. My argument is that they are good enough for our purposes, and if they were to be put in the backloged review procedure they would pass. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 22:49, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it should be a requirement either, but I like Witty Lama's idea to put it in the "recomended" section as opposed to the "required" section. The main article should, in most cases be FA, but there are cases where it doesn't need to be. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 22:49, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

So why not codify that in "reccomended" - that the larger the Featured set, the more lenient we can be on the overall percentage of FAs (and vice versa) especially with regards to the lead article. Witty lama 06:11, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it should be a requirement, not should it "reccomended". To be part of a Featured Topic *all* articles must be A-Class, GAs or better. I don't think the lead article shoudl be any different. Yes, it introduces the topic, but it is already required to be of high quality. Tompw (talk) 10:35, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Welding and the definition of "gaps"

I'm thinking about a topic I did a bunch of work on—welding—and am wondering whether or not it could be a featured topic. Currently, Welding is a featured article, as is gas metal arc welding, gas tungsten arc welding, and shielded metal arc welding. These three procedures are the most basic and well-known arc welding methods. The question is: what must be done to get a featured topic out of this?

1. Nothing—nominate now and probably pass those four articles as a "featured topic", with welding as the lead article.
2. Raise arc welding to featured status, and nominate that as the lead article, with the other three in support.
3. Do (2), and in addition raise articles like submerged arc welding, flux-cored arc welding and plasma arc welding to at least good article status.
4. Do (2) and (3), and in addition raise articles like welding helmet and shielding gas to at least good article status.

What do you think? Feel free to suggest combinations I didn't think of. --Spangineer^ws (háblame) 04:57, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Well, I think you've pretty much got the idea already! according to the first line of the "metalworking" template at the bottom of Welding, the important articles are: Arc welding, Shielded metal (MMA), Gas metal (MIG), Flux-cored, Submerged, Gas tungsten (TIG) and Plasma.

As you said three of these are already FAs, and if you got Arc welding to GA and ironed out any major problems in the "submerged", "flux cored" and "plasma" then that would probably be the most logical set for a FT entitled "Arc Welding".

That said, if the three different types that you mentioned (which are FAs) are indeed the main welding methods, then you could probably get a FT with Welding, Arc welding and those three - so long as Arc Welding is not too shabby. Other relevant articles can be added in later as they get to a good enough standard - such as Oxyfuel. Witty lama 05:49, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

That's pretty much it. The linking templates on bottoms of pages are good indicators of which articles should be in a topic. For really broad topics, the articles linked from each of the section headings can go together to be a topic. In your case, the template on all the pages gives a pretty clear indication of all the articles connected to the topic. "Arc Welding" looks like its pretty close to being able to be nominated. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 03:43, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

I was the one who created the template in the first place, so to me it doesn't mean much; it just contains the articles I felt were most relevant. I suppose that since it's gone so long without being edited significantly suggests that it's acceptable for the topic, however, I don't think there are all that many major contributors interested in welding. --Spangineer^ws (háblame) 03:54, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

I'd say number 3, like the people above me. The template thing isn't a hard and fast rule, though- you can decide for yourself what the most important articles are, without relying on the template. If you exclude some that are in the template, though, you'd better be able to back it up with a good reason if anyone calls you on it. --PresN 18:31, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

why only articles?

why "topic" is limited to "collection of articles" (including lists)? what about pictures, portals and sounds which also "represents Wikipedia's best work in covering a given subject"? Amit il 14:16, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

That is a very interesting idea. I don't see why it shouldn't, either, and I'm in full support of including those other featured materials in the event that occurs. I don't think we've run into that situation, however. Hurricanehink (talk) 14:56, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

We're an encyclopedia first and foremost. Images, sounds, etc. are important parts, but they only exist to improve the quality of articles. If we have featured media related to a topic, any information conveyed should be included by adding the media to relevant articles. ShadowHalo 16:14, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

According to Wikipedia:Featured pictures "images... [are] the visual equivalent to featured articles" and it is well known that A picture is worth a thousand words. i don't think that the featured pic of saffron can be fully conveyed by text. (Hurricanehink - this is an exemple of a current situation) Amit il 22:41, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Well, the first part is pretty obvious. Featured pictures are the visual equivalent to featured articles, just as featured sounds are the audio equivalent of featured pictures. All that means is that the selection processes are similar, not that articles, pictures, sounds, etc. are all equivalent. And you're right that the image of saffron contains things that text can't; that's why articles combine text, images, and sometimes audio. ShadowHalo 23:38, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

In the case of the saffron featured pic, I think that should be included to the topic if someone nominates it. Hurricanehink (talk) 23:47, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

That seems pretty redundant since it's part of the Saffron and History of saffron articles. ShadowHalo 23:51, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with ShadowHalo. A featured article is our final product, which must necisarily include both text and media. Having the media both in the topic and in the article is redundant. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 03:20, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Precisely. If there is a FT on any given topic then one of its articles would by definition include the media that is a FP or FS. In the case of Saffron for example the FP of saffron is already included in the articles. Witty lama 03:32, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but it is not known that the picture is featured in the article. Furthermore, the FP can really be seen only with it's true resolution (with that resolution it wouldn't have been featured), not the little pic shown on articles, and featured portals are only linked by name. the pic/portal/sound are only linked in an article, like the other articles/lists of the topic. They do not appear in it Amit il 08:17, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Remember that since you can't cherrypick the items to put in a FT, you would have to include all images related to the topic, not just the one that you want to show off. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 16:06, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Which I think is the main problem with this proposal- if you wanted to add in the featured picture of saffron to the saffron topic, you'd have to add in every picture about saffron to the topic. I think featured topics should be limited to articles/lists. Also, while there's no requirement anywhere for a featured picture to get used in a related featured topic, there's no way it's not going to be. --PresN 18:33, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Dinosaur featured topic?

I'm a newbie to FTC, so I figured I'd ask here. I was considering submitting a Dinosaur featured topic, because Dinosaur is a Featured article, and Wikipedia has a fair number of dinosaur-related articles which are GA or FA:

• Template:FA-inline Dinosaur
• Template:FA-inline List of dinosaurs
• Template:FA-inline Psittacosaurus
• Template:FA-inline Albertosaurus
• Template:FA-inline Velociraptor
• Template:FA-inline Tyrannosaurus
• Template:FA-inline Stegosaurus
• Template:FA-inline Diplodocus
• Template:FA-inline Triceratops
• Template:GA-inline Scelidosaurus
• Template:FA-inline Iguanodon
• Template:FA-inline Compsognathus
• Template:FA-inline Archaeopteryx
• Template:GA-inline Heterodontosauridae
• Template:FA-inline Thescelosaurus
• Template:GA-inline Amphicoelias
• Template:GA-inline Ankylosaurus

These articles seem to meet Wikipedia:Featured topic criteria 1, 2, 3, and 6. However, 4 requires "All articles in the series should be linked together, preferably using a template." and 5 states "There should be no obvious gap (missing or stub article) in the topic." Wikipedia has over 1,000 dinosaur articles, many of which can never become Featured Articles because there are so few published works on various poorly-known genera (one obvious example is "Unicerosaurus", but there are dozens of others). Would creating a Featured topic like this leave obvious gaps? How "obvious" is it to the average reader that there are hundreds of dinosaurs missing from the list? Does this count as a "gap"? Would it really be required for all 1,100 dinosaur genera to reach GA status to submit them to FTC? And would making this topic truly require a linking template? I thought self-references (like "Featured Dinosaur Articles" would be) was officially discouraged? Comments welcome. Firsfron of Ronchester 04:18, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

• In my opinion, trying to do a dinosaurs topic would be like trying to do a fantasy novels topic. There are simply too many for it to be feasible, and while it might be possible to do a topic of the most "well-known" or "important" ones, that's completely subjective. What might be better would be to go with Australian dinosaurs or feathered dinosaurs. On another note, does anyone know if categories like Category:Featured dinosaurs are supposed to exist? ShadowHalo 04:27, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the swift reply, ShadowHalo. I think your "fantasy novels" comparison might well be apt. Unfortunately, every continent is home to multiple poorly-known dinosaur genera: fossils of Australian dinosaurs are exceedingly rare (only a handful are known from even one relatively complete skeleton), but the other six continents are full of dubious critters, too. Articles on these dinosaurs are unlikely to ever reach FA status (because the FAC require an article to be comprehensive, while many named genera are based solely on teeth or bits of bone). Antarctica has only two named genera (FTC requires three articles) and the other continents have dozens or even a hundred nomina dubia. Feathered dinosaurs might be more appropriate, because (from a Wikipedia standpoint) we've included all the fossils known to have preserved feathers, but (from an outside viewpoint) the list of feathered dinosaurs will never be comprehensive, and some would include genera like Longisquama (had strange feather-like plumes) and Protoavis (some claim it has quill indentations on the fossils), while others would strongly object: it's contentious. I had considered various dinosaur families, but, again, every dinosaur family has plenty of dubious material assigned to it, and there would be "gaps". Maybe FTC just won't work for Dinosauria. If you (or anyone else) has further suggestions or ideas, please don't hesitate to make them. Firsfron of Ronchester 05:39, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

You could also try a smaller family of dinosaurs like "ceratopsid dinosaurs" as a topic. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 05:54, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the suggestion, Arctic Gnome. There are 57 articles in the Ceratopsian category, two of which have reached FA status. Do you think that "gaps" like poorly-known ceratopsian genera like Polyonax would be a barrier to FTC? Firsfron of Ronchester 06:20, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

The requirements do allow for a few articles to not be GA when there is not enough information about the subject to make a GA article, just make sure that what information you have is referenced and well-written. Secondly, although there is no maximum size for an FT, 57 articles is a bit big. Aim for whatever level of taxonomy is going to have between 5-25 members articles in most cases. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 20:26, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the advice, Arctic Gnome. I'll see what can be done. Firsfron of Ronchester 22:53, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Another way to create a dinosaur FT would be to bring the articles about the major taxonomic groupings up to snuff.--Pharos 03:35, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

I think that is something along the lines of what Arctic Gnome was suggesting. Unfortunately, there are only two FA/GA articles on taxa "higher up" than genus-level: Dinosaur itself, and Heterodontosauridae, which isn't exactly a major taxonomic grouping, and is only a GA anyway. Thanks. :) Firsfron of Ronchester 03:49, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

The major articles to me would be Dinosaur, List of dinosaurs and the orders and sub-orders. The latter are currently unassesed. Tompw (talk) (review) 13:52, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

We don't assess them. There are only 5 or 6 of us adding material and deleting nonsense. There isn't time to also assess a thousand articles. Firsfron of Ronchester

Criterion 4

This issue was first brought up at Wikipedia:Featured topic candidates/Love. Angel. Music. Baby., but I think this would be a better place to discuss. As it reads now, criterion 4 states that "All articles in a series are linked together, preferably using a template, and share a common category." This seems somewhat ambiguous to me, and it'd be good to clarify the meaning. What do we consider a common category? In this case, the songs are all contained in Category:Gwen Stefani songs but the main article is in Category:Gwen Stefani albums. The solution would be to create Category:Love. Angel. Music. Baby., but this would go against categorization conventions. It seems odd to state that albums and the songs on them can't be featured topics since it sounds like a legitimate topic to me, so would it be a good idea to move the common category part to the recommendations section or change "common category" to "category or supercategory"? Oh, and I'm going to shamelessly ask anyone who hasn't !voted at Wikipedia:Featured topic candidates/Love. Angel. Music. Baby. to please do so; it's been over a month, and there still aren't four !votes. ShadowHalo 04:38, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with your second recommendation, the Love Angel Music Baby FTC has shown that sometimes sharing a supercategory makes more sense than sharing a category. I disagree with moving categorization to the recommended section; all articles should be categorized, and a topic is lacking if it doesn't have its own category. We need to think of some way of phrasing it that makes sure that the categories are at least closely related and logical. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 13:48, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I think because of the vairety of subjects (and Topics) that we could have on FTC it would be impossible to clearly deliniate a univeral rule for what "linked together" means. Rather, it should be seen on a case by case basis with reference to relevant extant systems - i.e. templates, categories, lists etc. as it is now.

Indeed, this determining of whether the nomination is "whole" is the primary deliberating point at FTC. FA and GA looks at the quality of individual articles so we don't need to do that, our task here is to work out whether the Topic is complete. To set this in stone would be to take away from the dynamic process and make it much more of a pre-determined formula. Witty Lama 22:50, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Review process

I suggest we establish a perfunctory review process, per the discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Featured_topics#Suggestion_to_get_all_articles_to_GA_status. This would involve setting a deadline of January 2008 for the bringing of all the legacy FTs up to full compliance with criteria, as well as the automatic delisting of an FT after one quarter-year due to no longer meeting criteria in all its articles (leaving sufficient leeway to bring such articles back up to status). I think we should include a line in the criteria formalizing this as our practice.--Pharos 04:16, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes. I like what you've written on the criteria to that effect. Although possibly too strict - rather than "3 months", shouldn't it just be "after a suitable period" to allow for discretion. I don't like it when we take responsability away from ourselves and place it on an arbitrary rule - especially one that we ourselves made up. Otherwise, Great. oh, by the way, have we informed the people responsable for the legacy pages about this? Witty Lama 23:52, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I have to disagree with your making the process seperate from the FTRC process. The entire point of the removal process is to bring bad topics to the attention of the community and allowing others to weigh in on the demotion. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 01:45, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Fair enough. I had sort of hoped to avoid future debates about the grace period by giving it a definite length (especially if we're working with the objective criteria of whether articles have been demoted from FA or GA or not), but it's alright either way. I'm going to inform the legacy topics people shortly.--Pharos 03:04, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

"Several" is how many?

Currently the criteria require that "several articles are of featured class", but how many is "several"? I've always understood that means at least three, but the issue has come up, and I believe it should be clarified. Is three a reasonable number?--Pharos 03:09, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Three seems too much, especially since the minimum topic size is three articles. I think two FAs or a 25 percent minimum are probably more realistic. I think there's general agreement that it doesn't mean 3+, especially since the FF8 FT just recently passed after the criteria were forged. — Deckiller 03:14, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Three is fine to me - two seems too little. Three or more related articles as an FT sounds cool to me. LuciferMorgan 19:18, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

I strongly disagree. What if the topic only features 3-4 articles? Two or more is much more reasonable, and allows for a wider range of topics to be featured here. We also have a couple excellent topics that only contain 2 FAs; removing them because of a number issue would be bad for the project. Also, part of the reason I think that wording was left vague was for this exact reason: the number should really be a case-by-case basis, depending on the strength of the overall topic. — Deckiller 19:33, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree that a hard number maybe be too difficult for certain topics. I'd much prefer a percent of the total number of articles. Axem Titanium 16:01, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, or just a case-by-case basis (especially if the GAs are good enough to be A-class). — Deckiller 23:23, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree that it should be case by case. There should probably alway be two, and more for topics that are big and/or about a very widely known subject. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 17:59, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

OK, how about something modest for a start: for topics with three members (minimum size) at least 2 FAs, with nine members at least 3 FAs, with twenty-seven members at least 4 FAs. This conveniently grandfathers in all current FTs, while setting some sort of objective standard for future candidates.--Pharos 18:33, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. — Deckiller 19:00, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

And the idea in future maybe would be 2 for 3, 3 for 6, and 4 for 9... but I realize that's a ways down the line.--Pharos 05:32, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

Sorry to join the discussion late, but I don't think there should be any set standard for how many FA's there are. I think what should matter is if the articles cover the topic well or not. Some people prefer not to do the FA process, and so if the GA articles are FA quality without the FA star, it shouldn't matter. Hurricanehink (talk) 19:05, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, I think it's pretty well-established that a featured topic has to include some featured articles. The question we're addressing here is just how many.--Pharos 19:23, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

I don't know; I personally don't see it imperative that there has to have any featured articles. If the articles are of featured quality without the FA star, I don't mind calling it a featured topic, as long as the entire topic is addressed in full and there are no gaps. Hurricanehink (talk) 19:40, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, the problem is there's just no reasonable and fair way to determine if something is of "featured quality" without actually sending it to FAC. Of course that process is not perfect, but it is after all the central quality-rating process of Wikipedia, and we can hardly afford to just ignore it.--Pharos 05:32, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

OK, I've now added my proposed "how many?" standard to the front side of this page.--Pharos 04:41, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Take 'A' class out of criteria

I suggest we take all mention of the 'A' class out of the criteria. The reason is, that this essentially duplicates GA class, only GA class is more universally defined. I understand 'A' class was originally included to deal with articles like List of Nunavut general elections, which by their limited subject matter cannot achieve GA or FA – but I believe this special case has now been satisfactorily dealt with by means of the "individual audit". This is not to prevent any WikiProjects from rating 'A' class articles – but it is saying that if you do that, it should be in addition to seeking a GA status. (Yes, yes, I know the two systems really should be merged, but that's quite outside the scope of this sub-project.)--Pharos 02:26, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

I support that. I don't like the idea that an article could be A class without passing a GA review. If the A class article couldn't pass the GA review, then it shouldn't be A class in the first place. Hurricanehink (talk) 02:34, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

OK, I've now removed mention of 'A' class from the criteria. I waited until Kuiper belt, our last 'A'-class non-GA, had been promoted, so this will have no significant effect on current FTs.--Pharos 13:03, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Problem is that the GA evaluators sometimes go beyond the GA bounds, and the acception/rejection or articles is far more idiosyncratic than opinions expressed in a FAC. Circeus 16:40, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

And the problem with the standard article rating scale is that it's just completely idiosyncratic—anyone can give any article any mark without a second opinion even. That's a good system for doing rough evaluations cheaply and quickly, but it just fails when there's any incentive to give your own article a higher mark.--Pharos 17:00, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Suitable grace period

As the Final Fantasy Titles featured topic is currently in jeopardy, I feel this would be a good time to spell out how long those parties concerned have to work on articles that have been demoted. So here it is; I propose a one month deadline, during which time the article must return to either featured article or good article nomination, or procedures can begin to defeature the article. If it fails that nomination, the removal procedure can also begin. Judgesurreal777 03:54, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Star Wars was given roughly seven months; I think a similar time period would be appropriate. — Deckiller 21:26, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Agreed, a month is too little time, it would also waste peoples time constantly doing promotion/demotion nominations and such, just give it a bunch of time and let it get sorted out. Judgesurreal777 20:39, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

A month is too little time, though seven was a bit much. I'd suggest two or three months, though maybe a bit shorter in the case of lists. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 00:37, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Criterion 2

In the light of the recent failure of Wikipedia:Featured topic candidates/Wild cats of the United States (although it was doomed because Canadian Lynx is not GA), I think some discussion. Is there anything to do when the topic is very well defined, but there is no possibility of having a lead article? Here the two options were Felidae or List of mammals of the United States, both of which are too wide-ranging. Another example is found on the criteria page itself: how good are the chances of a Star Trek movies or List of Star Trek movies article?

Is it any reasonable to amend the criterion to "The topic, if at all possible, has an introductory and summary lead article." ? Circeus 02:46, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

I think that if a topic does not have a lead articles it is almost defiantly going to have a problem with 1b: a well-defined topical scope. If the subjects are a topic together, than there is going to be something article-worthy to say about them as a group. If it is not possible to make a lead article, than the "topic" is nothing more than a few articles on vaguely smiler subjects.

With the example of US wildcats, I think that the topic is too arbitrary a grouping to make a lead article, so the topic could not be featured. However, if you proposed "new world cats" as a topic, you might be able to write a lead article about their evolutionary history, the difference between old and new world cats, and how cats fit into the ecosystem of the Americas. If that would be a viable article, than the topic might also be viable. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 03:36, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Star Wars lead article

I don't know if this has been discussed or decided already, but can we please list the Star Wars article, so that people know its not GA and so it can be more widely known and fixed? It seems like a very logical idea to me. Judgesurreal777 20:40, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

To be included in the topic it would have to pass a nomination, which it would now fail. As of 2008, that entire topic will be up for FTRC. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 00:33, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Simpsons Featured Topic

I would like some clarification on the Featured Topic criteria. The topic criteria pretty clearly says that there now must be at least a 1/3 ratio of featured articles to the total article count, or 33% of them should be featured. The Simpsons article has 26 articles, so it should have at least 8 Featured articles, so 4 more than they have now. But some on the Wikiproject Simpsons page say that they have been given reassurance that 4 was enough. I just want to know what the deal is, as both of these things cannot both be true. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 01:16, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Criterion #3 is not set in stone, and in any case I don't see where it says 1/3 must be featured (if that has be added, there was no consensus to do so). The required number of featured articles increases slower than the size of the topic in which they are. For a small topic of only three articles, two of them (2/3) should be featured; but for a topic of nine articles, three of them (1/3) should be featured. For very large topics, having five or six featured articles is still fairly impressive. The Simpsons topic is pushing the lower end of acceptability, but I think having as many FAs and GAs as it does is impressive enough that I will not nominate for removal. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 01:26, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Ok I understand now, I had thought it was 1 FA for 3 articles, then 3 for 9, etc, not 2 FA's for 3....alright, thanks a lot. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 01:46, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Multiple lead articles

Just curious seeing that this former featured topic had two main articles, if two main articles are appropriate in a case where one is not, could they still fulfill the criteria? The specific example I'm pointing to is a topic composing Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (at WP:GAN, first main article), Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow (FA, second main article), Characters in Castlevania: Sorrow series (GA), and Soma Cruz (at WP:GAN). The second game is a direct sequel of the first, and thus each takes place within the same storyline. Although each is part of the larger Castlevania series, they compose a unified topic. Or should Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow alone be the main topic, as it was the one that Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow was based on? Clarification would be welcome. Cheers, Sephiroth BCR ^(Converse) 19:00, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Having only one lead article would be best given the current criteria. I would recommend using the original game as the lead article, unless one of the sequels is much better known than the original, in which case you might want to use it. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 00:30, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

The original would be better. The sequel doesn't overshadow the original game in the manner you're implying, so I believe it will be fine. In any case, would just one article at featured status be appropriate for this topic (1 FA with 3 GAs), or is two featured articles necessary? Thanks, Sephiroth BCR ^(Converse) 06:25, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

According to the criteria all topics need two FAs or FLs. Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 18:22, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Number of featured-class articles

I propose that the requirement gets formalised as follows:

• 3(a) A number of articles are featured class (featured articles or featured lists), dependent on the size of the topic:
  • Two featured class articles if a topic has three to eight articles
  • Three featured class articles if a topic has nine to fifteen articles
  • Four featured class articles if a topic has sixteen to twenty-five articles
  • One fifth of the articles (rounded down) at featured class if a topic has over twenty-five articles

There are only two current topics that wouldn't meet this - The Simpsons (season 8) and The Simpsons (season 9), which are only one short. Tompw (talk) (review) 20:42, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

There are a number of logical problems about your proposal; therefore, I propose this simpler version:

• 3(a) A number of articles are featured class (featured articles or featured lists), according to the following rules:
  • 3(a)(i) One fifth of the articles (rounded down) at featured class
  • 3(a)(ii) At least two articles are of featured class

Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 21:48, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Again this would only affect the two Simpsons articles. We would give them a grace period to fix that if we changed the criteria. Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 21:56, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

I like the simpler 1/5 model than the squareroot model. However, the 1/5 model is a bit too easy on the low teens, which would only require two FAs. How about we make it round up, so that a topic with 11-15 require 3 FAs. In this model the Simpsons are still the only ones affected, though more harshly, as each of them would require two more FAs unless we made a cap to the number of FAs required. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 20:39, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

How about:

• 3(a)(i) At least one fifth of the articles are featured class.

This removes the rounding and replaces it with an at least. Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 22:08, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

OK, I'll support "at least one fifth". Tompw (talk) (review) 22:25, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

But we still have to decide how we will do rounding, regardless of the wording of the rule. Does a topic with 14 articles need two or three FAs? --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 23:35, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Three as the "at least" proposal says. Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 23:40, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

One fifth of 14 is 2.8. You and I may both see this as requiring at least three FAs, but if we do not say that we are rounding up, I guarantee that many people will try to submit topic with too few. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 01:13, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

What about:

• 3(a)(i) At least twenty percent of the articles are featured class.

Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 02:22, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

There is a bit less chance for confusion with that, but why not just use your original wording with "round up" in place of "round down"? --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 04:53, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Because it is unclear what is being rounded the fraction or the number of featured class artilces. I thought that the round down was the faction, but you thought it was the number of featured required. Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 15:12, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Grace period again

I think we should have a grace period stated before this comes up again. I propose three months for a demotion of an article, and six months for a grandfather topic with a change in the requirements. Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 22:21, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me. Tompw (talk) (review) 22:25, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

If this gains consensus, it would be nice if we could also decide exactly when the grace peroid would begin and end; e.g., should the topic be nominated for removal so that in the two weeks to gain consensus the deadline passes, or should they not be nominated for removal until the deadline is past. Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 22:57, 11 February 2008 (UTC)