Wikipedia talk:In the news

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Click here to nominate an item for In the news. In the news toolbox

Upcoming ITN/R suggestions (Apr-Jun)

Nearly a quarter the way through the year now. This post attempts to highlight potential nominations that could be considered and where else to continue looking for news items. The recurring items list is a good place to start. Below is a provisional list of upcoming ITN/R events over the next few months. This may omit items that happen around this time of year but have yet a fixed date - for example, the 2017 Stanley Cup Finals in mid-June. Some events may be announced earlier or later than scheduled, like the result of an election or the culmination of a sport season/tournament. Feel free to update these articles in advance and nominate them on the candidates page when they occur.

April
May
  • 1 May: 2017 World Snooker Championship
  • 3 May: Dadasaheb Phalke Award
  • 4 May: Algerian legislative election, 2017
  • 6 May: 2017 Kentucky Derby
  • 9 May: South Korean presidential election, 2017
  • 13 May:
  • 19 May: Iranian presidential election, 2017
  • 21 May:
  • 27 May: 43rd G7 summit
  • 28 May:
    • June
  • 3 June:
  • 10 June: Expo 2017
  • 11 June:
  • 14 June: Man Booker International Prize
  • 15 June: Electronic Entertainment Expo 2017
  • 18 June:
  • 21 June: International Dublin Literary Award
  • 24 June: Turing Award
  • 26 June: Mongolian presidential election, 2017
  • 27 June: 2017 America's Cup
    • Other resources

    For those who don't take their daily dose of news from an encyclopedia, breaking news stories can also be found via news aggregators (e.g. Google News, Yahoo! News) or your preferred news outlet. Some news outlets employ paywalls after a few free articles, others are funded by advertisements - which tend not to like ad blockers, and a fair few are still free to access. Below is a small selection:

    Newspapers
    News agencies
  • Associated Press (AP)
  • Reuters
  • Agence France-Presse (AFP)
  • Agência Brasil
  • Anadolu Agency
  • Press Association
  • TASS
  • Yonhap
  • Xinhua
    • News services
  • ABC News
  • Al Jazeera
  • AllAfrica.com
  • BBC News
  • CBC News
  • CNN
  • Deutsche Welle
  • Euronews

    • Unlike the prose in the article, the reference doesn't necessarily need to be in English. Non-English news sources include, but are not limited to: Le Monde, Der Spiegel and El País. Which ironically are Western European examples (hi systemic bias). Any reliable African, Asian or South American non-English source that confirms an event took place can also be used.

    Happy hunting. Fuebaey (talk) 23:53, 25 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    On systemic bias, "importance" and other things

    Wikipedia has a problem with WP:Systemicbias. The thing is, failing to feature stories at WP:ITN doesn't help, anymore than painting over a crack in the foundation resolves the cause. The WP:ITN#Purpose of ITN is all about current events. It's time to stop trying to be an editorial board. WP:TFA doesn't require some sort of "global interest" (on paper, neither does ITN). Just stop it already, post stories with quality updates that are in the news. "We wouldn't post bar story if it happened in foo" so what? If a quality update about bar happening in foo were written you could. Just stop already with all of this "only of limited interest" (as if you know what WP:READERS are interested in). Just to recap: you're not solving the root cause of systemic bias at Wikipedia by screaming "systemic bias" at stories about regions/topics you feel are over-represented; all you're doing is a disservice to WP:READERS by ignoring WP:ITN#Purpose and failing:

    • To help readers find and quickly access content they are likely to be searching for because an item is in the news.
    • To showcase quality Wikipedia content on current events.
    • To point readers to subjects they might not have been looking for but nonetheless may interest them.
    • To emphasize Wikipedia as a dynamic resource.

    My two cents anyway. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 19:54, 15 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    ITN is not a news ticker. We actually are fighting systematic with what we are doing to avoid too much focus on US-centric stories and sensational news that dominate the mass media nowadays. --MASEM (t) 20:26, 15 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Nope, sorry, you're not "fighting" it at all, you're simply pretending it doesn't exist. Maybe WP:READERS care about "US-centric (whatever that means) stories". Maybe WP:READERS care about "sensational news (like random bombings in counties where bombings happen)". What you're absolutely 100% not doing in even the tiniest of ways is "fighting systemic bias". You fight it by writing and featuring articles about under represented regions, not by suppressing stories about "over represented" regions. Not helping at all, not even a little, just hurting, a lot. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 20:39, 15 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Fighting systematic bias works both ways, both making sure we do not overly feature stories from overly represented regions and helping to promote viable stories from under-represented ones. The new RD guidelines, for example, helps a lot here. --MASEM (t) 21:27, 15 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Fighting systemic bias works one way: improving articles about under represented topics. This is why neither TFA, DYK, OTD, TFP etc have this silly made up requirement, and neither does ITN except in the legend and lore that make up the consensus building process at ITN/C. The new RD guidelines help **significantly** in that area by removing the "notability" requirement. Regular stories have no such requirement, except in the minds of the "regulars". Since it does absolutely nothing to help fight the underlying issue of systemic bias at WP, and harms our WP:READERS by running contrary to the WP:ITN#Purpose it really needs to stop. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 00:33, 16 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Nope, it works both ways. Our policies on WP:NOT, WP:V, and other content policies are set to make sure that we are only including topics of encyclopedic importance, despite the level of coverage they might get in reliable media. (WP:NOT#NEWS first and foremost). Yes, we help by creating articles on topics from underrepresented regions that should be in an encyclopedia but we also avoid topics that are excessive for an encyclopedia even though they can be readily sourced (such as routine sports games). This is the basis of notability guidelines, among other p&gs. It is a balance between being more inclusive where there is a need, and being exclusive when there there clearly is no need but neither helps the project. --MASEM (t) 00:42, 16 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Sorry, but no, it doesn't work both ways. WP:NOT and WP:V apply to **all** items at ITN, and neither of them have anything to do with fighting systemic bias. Of course WP:V and WP:NOT should apply, I support those policies 100%, but if an item satisfies those policies, and the article is of a quality worthy of the main page, there is no reason whatsoever to suppress it in some attempt to fight systemic bias. You fight bias by improving articles about under-represented topics, not by suppressing articles about over-represented topics. Period. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 15:35, 16 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • I agree that working on article from subjects related to underrepresented areas is the best way to work against systemic bias, and that other stories shouldn't be suppressed just for the sake of doing so, but some editorial judgement is needed to balance the many competing interests and points of view. 331dot (talk) 00:03, 16 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Sure, I guess for now if the project wants to rail against celebrity gossip that's fine, but "fighting systemic bias" needs to stop being a justification for an oppose. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 00:33, 16 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree with CosmicAdventure. As I see it, it serves two purposes - (i) showcasing our material on the hot topics of the day, and also (ii) alerting people to slightly more fringe global stories that they may otherwise not have heard about. We may do OK on (ii), but on (i) we're failing horribly right now. Massive stories, which hit all the global papers, such as the announcement of the surprise UK general election and the first round voting in the French election, have been brushed under the carpet because of the arbitrary rule that "we don't do announce election results until they come out", even though those are the hot topics of the day. Similarly, on Trump's inauguration day, there was no other story dominating any paper worldwide, yet Wikipedia was silent until a reluctant acceptance that the protests constituted something out of the ordinary. WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS should apply just as much here as anywhere else on Wikipedia.  — Amakuru (talk) 19:22, 24 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Your point "i" is directly related to the fact that "ITN is not a news ticker". We know that there are stories that get huge coverage in the press, but that's their "newsworthiness", whereas ITN is trying to strive for "encyclopedicness" which are two different goals. (This is all atop quality of topic but that's a separate issue). If we used newsworthiness, even we accounting for article quality, we'd be excessively focused on US and UK stories, repeating the same points over and over again. It's why we try to limit stories like an election cycle to the only point that fundamentally matters, when the winner is determined, whereas if we went with newsworthiness, the last US election cycle would have probably had a story daily at ITN. --MASEM (t) 19:34, 24 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Which "ongoing" is perfect to serve. You've still not told me how wall-papering over bias at WP by suppressing stories at ITN actually serves the WP:READERS or actually solves the problem of bias. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 01:43, 25 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    ITN is not a news ticker, first off. If it were, we'd might as well replace the ITN box on the front page with an RSS feed to the BBC or the like. But since WP is an encyclopedia and not a newspaper, we are more selective, which is the first reason we have every ability to deny posting of blurbs that happen to be based on wide media coverage. Secondly, the ITN box is very limited in space, and unlike TFA or DYK, is updated when an admin believes a story is ready to go, meaning that there is no guaranteed length for how a blurb stays up. (some are gone in 24hr, some have lasted 2 weeks that I can recall). To that end, we also want to be selective to make sure we post stories that have longer-term relevance than just a day or so. So again, we're purposely selective there. Keep in mind this is not the same issue with standalone articles, where there is an infinite amount of space, for all purposes, and where only NOT#NEWS/NEVENT really applies.
    Since we have to be selective to have ITN function as designed, that means we need to balance inclusion of news stories from underrepresented regions and exclusion from overrepresented region. The various ITNR are designed to try to assure inclusion from underrepresented regions (principally through ones like election results, or the various international sports events), but most of the time, we can't include these because either no one has bothered to write or expand an appropriate articles, or/and no one has bothered to nominate it. But on the other side, with stories from the US/North America or UK/Europe, there's an overwhelming number of editors that keep working on such articles, because there's no lack of sources for that. Arguably most of these meet the core aspects of what would make them ITN, but we recognize there's far far too many of these for ITN to handle and would flood out the underrepresented nominations. So we have purposely made decisions to exclude certain types of stories or only post stories at a certain point (the results of an election rather than lead-up or follow-on, the conviction of a notable person accused of a crime, etc.) We are fighting the systematic bias in a space where there is a practical limit by purposeful exclusion. Again, the situation is mainspace is far different, and we can include all those stories in the effectively unlimited space. But our choice to exclude stories from overrepresented regions in ITN is necessary to make it actually more useful to readers rather than a rapidly changing "ticker". I also add that we have Portal:Current events linked in the box to a separate page with more space and where there is less concern about exclusion since it has that space. Further by being exclusive to stories from over-represented regions, it helps to temper sensationalist news coverage that we should not be following per NEVENT (such as the United Airlines flight incident from a few weeks back)
    The TL;DR version: whereas exclusion of topics in an unlimited space like main space on WP makes no sense in trying to fight systematic bias, it is absolutely needed in a limited space like ITN. --MASEM (t) 15:55, 25 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Can we have an RFC to replace ITN with RSS feeds from the BBC? Because I am completely down with that idea... Only in death does duty end (talk) 16:03, 25 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Limited space? The box was stale for a week. You talk about stories from underrepresented regions being pushed out, but nothing was pushed out. The rest of the bits about sports or sensationalism or "overrepresentation" or whatever amount to WP:IDONTLIKEIT. When the box turns around every 48 hours you can talk about "curbing systemic bias", when it gets 2 updates a week -- AND quality updated good faith noms are being shot down because of "bias" -- frankly that argument seems pretty thin. PS: WP:ITN#Purpose I'm not seeing anything there about "preventing bias" or "under/over represented", so the whole thing is a totally made up nonsense rule that helps no one. I mean, I still think you're wrong, but thanks for clarifying "systematic bias in a space where there is a practical limit". PPS: Items stay on ITN currently for days, TFA and DYK turn around in 24 hours or less. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 01:33, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    We cannot control when the news happens, so it's impossible for us to aim for some type of box turnover rate since that is wholly dependent on external factors (whereas DYK and TFA are fully in WP's control). Instead, from experience, we have figured out what rough level of "importance" is so that there is long-term decent turnover of news stories. (I don't have hard stats, and that would actually be something to pursue, but I'd guess its about 2 new stories per day, ignoring RD/Ongoing). While we could argue for pushing that a little faster, the problem is that as we adjust that importance bar, the breath of potential news topics expands exponentially, not linearly, and so we'd run into the problem of far too fast a turnover of stories (and a capacity of candidates that I don't think ITNC is capable of handling; I'll defer to TRM about issues with quality of the fast-paced DYK that that can lead to). Our current bar, while maybe more exclusive than some wants, allows ITNC to work without any severe difficulties. --MASEM (t) 13:54, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    I think I'll support that idea Only in death. The present system is silly. Either amend the ITN criteria (and purpose) to say it's subjective what we post, and thereby allow every "I don't like it" type of rationale, or just do away with the whole process and link BBC. Banedon (talk) 01:28, 28 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Except that very little of the commentary on ITNCs are of the "I don't like it" variety. Nearly all opposes to stories are about keeping a fine line between sensationalist stories, news of low global importance, limiting stories that have several points of repeated ITN postings to one or two key points, and the like. This might seem like "I don't like it" if you are the nominator of these, but I really haven't seen anything of this type, unless editors are !voting in bitterness. Yes, it is subjective, but not subjective to personal feelings, but towards how well such stories fit ITN/s encyclopedic purpose. --MASEM (t) 05:06, 28 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    You sure? One of ITN's purposes is "To help readers find and quickly access content they are likely to be searching for because an item is in the news". The United Airlines flight 3411 nomination was shot down pretty hard (including by you) even though it was in the news for days and days, which constitutes a pretty blatant violation of ITN's stated purposes to me. Or do you think the purpose should change? Banedon (talk) 06:00, 28 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    The reason that the UA 3411 nom was not posted wasn't because people didn't like it, but it was sensationalist news by the news, the type that begs if it should really be included on an encyclopedia given WP:NOT#NEWS (in 1-5-10-20 years, will the event matter?) Yes, that's a subjective call, but its definitely not "I hate it" subjectivity. The problem is that what the media chooses to report on does not always match what we should be doing as an encyclopedia, so they has to be some necessary discrimination for ITN. Even the BBC focuses on stories that really can't be expanded in an encyclopedia in their leading stories list (like right now, 9th story I see is about an obese body that caused a crematorium to catch fire, which .. yeah.) --MASEM (t) 13:14, 28 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Sure, it's meaningless 20 years in the future. Yet one of ITN's purposes is "To help readers find and quickly access content they are likely to be searching for because an item is in the news". This item was obviously widely read, which is why different news agencies kept coming up with new developments on the story. If people are reading it, they are also likely to be searching for it because it is in the news. Why wouldn't we feature it? Or would you rather remove this line from ITN's stated purposes? There's an inherent contradiction here. Banedon (talk) 00:54, 2 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    There's an implied "because an encyclopedic item is in the news" (my emphasis on what is implied), because per WP:NOT, all of our topics need to meet this encyclopedic nature, and WP:NOT#NEWS expressly tells us not to focus on bursts of news. Sensational news items are covered in the news but they fail as encyclopedic topics; that's why we aren't going to report celebrity gossip which gets covered as far and as wide as natural and manmade disasters. --MASEM (t) 01:44, 2 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    In that case, why didn't the AfD pass? After all, if it's not encyclopedic, it is explicitly excluded per WP:DEL14. Banedon (talk) 02:43, 2 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Because as the closure noted, once these articles are created, it is difficult to judge their notability until after time has passed and a better assessment of long-term importance can be made. It would be better if editors held back and did not rush to create articles until this point was proven, but when they do, rapid deletion can be a problem. That doesn't mean the article meets WP's "encyclopedic" goal yet, and I know there's editors planning to renom it for AFD in June. --MASEM (t) 03:14, 2 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Are you implying that ITN's stated purposes may conflict with Wikipedia's stated purposes? It looks that way to me. Banedon (talk) 00:58, 3 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    ITN's purpose is to highlight good quality encyclopaedic articles about items that are currently in the news. ITN should be entirely reactive to the creation of encyclopaedic articles, not a prompt to create articles about things that are in the news whether encyclopaedic or not. Thryduulf (talk) 23:29, 3 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    To add, one thing that we (en.wiki) cannot nor should not to is enforce strict requirements for the creation of articles; we want people to create articles, but that also means that after creation we need several points of judgment to make sure it the article topic is encyclopedic (this being CSD, PROD, AFD, merges, etc.) - this is the reactive part Thryduulf explains. So we have to recognize that when a brand new event happens, as in the case of United 3411, someone will likely create an article on it even though NOT#NEWS/NEVENT suggests they wait, but there's not be sufficient time to really judge the encyclopedic nature of it. So ITN's purpose, among other goals, is to filter in cases of newly created event articles that clearly are going to be seen an encyclopedic in the future - which is usually why we have high focus on major disasters and terrorist attacks, as these are proven to be long-term encyclopedic by the nature. We may miss a few, but the goal is to avoid false positives and to not be over-inclusive to articles that we're not reasonably sure about the encyclopedic nature. For example, the verdict is still out if United 3411 is really an appropriate encyclopedic topic, so we should avoid featuring on the front page via ITN until that is met. --MASEM (t) 00:03, 4 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    ITN has four stated purposes, which I copy / paste:
    • To help readers find and quickly access content they are likely to be searching for because an item is in the news.
    • To showcase quality Wikipedia content on current events.
    • To point readers to subjects they might not have been looking for but nonetheless may interest them.
    • To emphasize Wikipedia as a dynamic resource.
    1 is met because the item was in the news for a long time. 2 is met because as far as I can tell, nobody disputed the nomination based on quality. 3 is met because the item was clearly interesting to the general reader, or news articles would not continuously report on it. 4 is met because the article ballooned to its current considerable size in a few days, clearly a sign of dynamism. I still perceive a contradiction. Arguments based on the article's unencyclopedic nature ought to be raised at an AfD for that article, not at ITN. Banedon (talk) 01:03, 4 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Failing NOT#NEWS/RECENTISM is an argument against quality, which several !voters brought up; as an encyclopedia, we don't include articles about every little random event. It was closed as keep at the time as , with the AFD as close as it was to the event, difficult to really assess how much NOT#NEWS applied and there was reasonable doubt that it could be possible to keep in the long-term. That doesn't make it a "quality" article, just one that is in a bubble until (I think) June when it is planned to be reviewed for AFD again. --MASEM (t) 01:34, 4 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    Strengthening consensus requirements for posting RD blurbs

    Given that was have the current RD consensus that as long as it's reported and the article is updated that any RD can be posted, I would propose that the level that a blurb simply documenting an RD must be stronger than a simple consensus/majority and should be near-unanimous, discounting any useless "I don't like it"-type !votes. The current RD approach assures that the person will be given space in the ITN box as long as quality is met, so it is not that we are not highlighting this person. But as shown in the past, RD blurbs tend often to be popularity contests that editors try to back by pointing out the volume of news stories on the passed (see Carrie Fisher for example). Since we already have an assured slot for deaths of notable people, we should be much more discriminating when that death should be elevated to a blurb, and that requires a strong consensus to post. Taking the case of Emma Morano, where it was posted based on a 2-to-1 consensus , I would say that's not sufficient for what I would see, if we're going off pure !vote numbers.

    Note that this assumes the death itself is not unusual; something like Kim Jong-nam where the means of death was part of the news story would be a different matter, and treating it as a news item.

    Along these lines, I would make sure it is clear that if an RD blurb is being discussed, it is always appropriate to at least list the RD in the RD line while discussion continues, presuming that support for article quality is met. I know this is already done, just that if we're going to put something into guidelines, we should document this as an accepted approach. --MASEM (t) 15:41, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    • Oppose as instruction creep. We treat a proposed blurb as a proposed blurb. On the second issue, no need to add to guidelines, this is already done. --LukeSurl t c 15:56, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose Consensus is consensus, and we don't need "super consensus" for these things. Vote counting is discouraged, though a factor, and I didn't not see anything in the discussion which would indicate that posting this was a bad idea. Article is sufficient quality, and there was a consensus. --Jayron32 16:10, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Support until we develop some stronger guidelines on when a blurb is appropriate, it is appropriate that we get a strong consensus not just a simple majority. Thryduulf (talk) 18:10, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose as instruction creep. I also don't see this as a problem.331dot (talk) 19:23, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose this is a waste of time I'm afraid. We had the Fast and Furious guy, and an entirely unsuccessful college basketball coach, so we initiated the RD reform package. Since then, a few notable examples of grotesque and partisan abuses of blurbs for popular but not actually historically notable individuals have taken place. These are inevitable given the demographic of our users, and there's absolutely nothing we can do about it. The best thing we can do is to register our discomfort with the absurdity of equating Mandela with Fisher, and move on. I've actually been accused (hilariously, in this case) of being "racist, yes you are!!" because I've objected to the complete over-run of American RDs which have been mystically turned into blurbs. Racist? Americans? "Go figure". The Rambling Man (talk) 20:45, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
      • What you're saying points out that we're allowing RD blurbs to be decided by popularity contests, which absolutely should not be the case. We should not care how beloved a celebrity was, but if they weren't top of their field, we should be very careful to post. But without this type of caution, then as with Marano here, !vote stuffing will win out over valid concerns about importance. RD blurbs should be left to the most extraordinary people. --MASEM (t) 21:04, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
        • But that's what consensus is all about. You can't create a rule that stops Carrie Fisher from being posted as a blurb if there's sufficient consensus and emotion and American (yes, American) backing for it. How do you gauge a large majority in favour of actress who was truly notable for one single role and say "no, you can't have her as a blurb because she wasn't as important as Greta Garbo"? You just have to suck it up, note your opposition and move on. What is your proposal for dealing with situations when a vast majority vote in favour of a singularly average individual for a blurb? The Rambling Man (talk) 21:10, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
          • For one, discount !votes that do no supply any rational, or that tersely state "important person". For another, discount votes that point out widespread news coverage (Which should not be a reason for any ITNC; it should be in the news, but it should not be demanded because every paper in the world perhaps covers it, and/or lack of papers covering it as long as some Rses do). Admins closing need to evaluate rationales for and against posting that are beyond emotional pleas or popularity contests. --MASEM (t) 21:23, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
            • You, i.e. you personally cannot do that. What you're suggesting is censorship. I hated the blurbs for the above mentioned, and anyone and everyone will tell you that too, but you can't "discount !votes" based on your own "subjective" version of what you prefer. That's why we have admins who judge consensus. They mainly do evaluate rationales before posting or otherwise. That you think otherwise is more of a problem. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:46, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose My view is that blurbs should be functional and, per WP:NOTMEMORIAL and WP:NPOV, blurbs should be not a token of respect or worthiness. The function of a blurb is to provide some context and clarity. In the case of a really famous person such as David Bowie, a blurb is unnecessary because most readers already know who he was. Blurbs are best used for more obscure people who don't have that level of name recognition – people like the current Allan Holdsworth. This will then given readers the information they need in deciding whether to click through. I'd like to see RD reformatted to provide a brief summary of each person, rather than just a name: Allan Holdsworth, guitarist; Sheila Abdus-Salaam, judge; J. Geils, guitarist; Arnold Clark, car dealer. With such brief blurbs, we could then treat everyone alike. Andrew D. (talk) 22:30, 18 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose as waste of time. We posted the retirement of an English soccer coach, there is no limit to what gets a blurb. In all seriousness, the point of fixing ITN/DC was to eliminate more silly subjective criteria. Consensus at ITN/C has a lot of problems, way beyond deaths, so if WP:READERS aren't complaining, there is nothing to do. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 02:00, 19 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose as the exact opposite of what we should be doing, which is to recognise that consensus can change and take an interventionalist approach when and only when the nature of discussions is consistently inappropriate. If there's evidence of nationalistic bias from certain editors, that is obviously a different issue (though ironically it would probably be against policy to demonstrate this). StillWaitingForConnection (talk) 00:20, 29 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    [Closed] Stale

    I see no purpose in this continuing. If any user wants to see more turnover, they need to improve articles and nominate them. 331dot (talk) 08:12, 28 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

    I've been working on the Wikitribune topic. Natural comparisons are being made with Wikinews, which is generally thought to have failed. For example, NiemanLab says, "That site has not achieved its stated mission ... on Monday, its top article was a short, three-day-old one". Right now, the top article at ITN is about the London marathon. That's now three days old and the clock is ticking. It's not like there is nothing happening in the world. For example, today's news is that China has launched another aircraft carrier... Andrew D. (talk) 07:50, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    Feel free to nominate any stories you feel suitable at ITNC. The Rambling Man (talk) 07:59, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • I nominated a story yesterday and was the only person to do so. My limited wiki time today will be spent nominating that topic at DYK which is usually more receptive. The other sections of the main page – TFA, DYK, OTD – expect to have new material every day and there is unease and action when their supply starts to dry up. ITN seems comparatively dysfunctional and is as stale as WikiNews. Right now, there's the marathon which is three days old. The most recent death is four days old. And the Battle of Mosul has apparently been ongoing for over six months now! There's actually a lot going on in the world – elections in the UK and France; Trump's first 100 days and budget battles; the Chinese carrier and the sabre-rattling around North Korea. But ITN's coverage seems quite moribund. CosmicAdventure suggests above that the problem is the "regulars". Why are they not nominating more topics? Andrew D. (talk) 09:59, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • As you know, RDs are now only constrained by their quality, so feel free to pop one or two nominations up from the Deaths in 2017 article which lists a few that have occurred in the past couple of days. RD listings now are so much easier than they used to be when endless debate was held over the super-notability of given individuals, so starting there would be an easy way to spend only a short amount of time at ITN. The Mosul article is being updated regularly and was recently re-validated, so that's just fine. The items that are "going on" may be suitable for "Ongoing", e.g. the election campaigns in the UK and France, but I suspect there are election campaigns going on in many other countries too, so we'd hate to be called out for bias towards those I suspect. Trump's first 100 days and budget battles are "business as usual", barely noteworthy let alone main page newsworthy. I like the Chinese carrier launch, why not nominate that? Sabre-rattling and North Korea? Again, business as usual. The Rambling Man (talk) 10:11, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Are elections going on in other countries getting the same quality updates? ITN has 2 criteria: "In the news" and some bar of "quality". We routinely miss items which are ITN because of lackluster articles, and we miss items with quality updates because of some effort to "curb systemic bias". The box sits there, stale for a week. Noms get closed in 2 hours because "We don't post this", that's the "regulars" (full disclosure, I was one, for a long time, and a combative one at that). --CosmicAdventure (talk) 11:18, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Yep, both would be wonderful to put in "Ongoing" .... are they actively "In the news"? (That's kind of subjective now-a-days since you can search for a news article about nearly anything). --CosmicAdventure (talk) 12:02, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • It seems rather self-evident that they are very present in South Korean news and Iranian news. Notability is not constrained to the English language, and no preference should be given to English-only sources, excepting where such sources duplicate other sources. Where there is no English source, sources in other languages are NOT inferior. --Jayron32 12:16, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Ok, but that doesn't jive with concerns about "parochial". So ITN is unusual for MP features because it's driven by external factors ("The News") ... should the ITN section for the en wiki not feature en news? I might ask at the de, fr and es wiki's to see how they do it. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 12:57, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • As an admin, I can say the word "parochial" is a shibboleth for "ignore what I have to say because I believe what is important to me should be universal". People who object to posting an article because of the geographical area where an item affects are ignored by the instructions at the top of the page which tells people we don't consider votes based on geography. --Jayron32 13:09, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • That's a limited understanding of some people's use of parochial because, for instance, the appointment of judges in the US is certainly a parochial issue as it is "very narrow in scope", not necessarily because it's in the United States. The Rambling Man (talk) 13:44, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • That may be how such a word is supposed to be used (and I agree, appointment of judges is too narrow in scope, usually) However, people usually use it to mean "This isn't interesting to me (personally, as an individual) and thus should not be posted". --Jayron32 13:52, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • That's odd, I've always interpreted in meaning too narrow in scope for one of any number of reasons, not exclusively geographically. Ironically perhaps that's an ENGVAR thing. The Rambling Man (talk) 13:55, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • True, but see also dog-whistling which is at least tangentially related to this discussion here over word choice. --Jayron32 16:02, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Again, that's odd. Who's playing politics here? Most of us are just expressing opinion in our own language. How odd. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:27, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • IMO closing should be the exception, not the rule, and they're all premature. I won't run around undoing Stephens rapid closures, I just wish it'd stop. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 12:02, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • Well you have a choice, if you choose not to exercise that option, it's your call. The Rambling Man (talk) 12:28, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    The ITN box is stale, and the old argument "feel free to nominate" doesn't hold up when noms are shot down with "We don't post" comments. You end up waiting for some European sporting contest or a bombing or natural disaster. I'd like to see the box move faster, for quality updates to trounce anything else. If the box is turning around every 24 hours, that's a good problem, then the argument "No, this is sensationalist AND it will bump some other story thats still impacting" holds up. Two cents anyway. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 13:08, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    Well as I said above, the RDs are easily nominated and are posted on quality alone. The Chinese carrier is a good story, all the others suggested aren't newsworthy although we have demonstrated that many election articles are good enough for main page inclusion quality-wise, but consensus does not exist for them to post (at least it didn't for the French one...) The Rambling Man (talk) 13:44, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes, RDs are a shining star (sincerely). What I'm suggesting is that the whole consensus process at ITN has been one of exclusion for so long that the blurbs in the box get stale. "Newsworthy" ought be decided by news media. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 15:22, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    But "in news media" really isn't appropriate as a sole criterion; "we are not a news ticker" is a statement of purpose, not just a cliche. As I write this, United Airlines investigates death of giant rabbit, Britain struck by hummus shortage and Johnny Depp blames managers for money woes are all on the front page of BBC News (usually considered the gold standard as a neutral reliable source), but it doesn't mean any of them would be remotely appropriate for inclusion in ITN. ‑ Iridescent 15:36, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Sure, but where are the quality updated WP articles on those stories? WP:RECENTISM, WP:WEIGHT there are already really good policies for this stuff that cover the whole project. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 15:38, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    But we shouldn't just post stuff for the sake of it, just because things are stale, should we? The fact that there's very little notable news going around the BBC website is indicative that nothing around the world is actually that newsworthy right now. The Rambling Man (talk) 15:55, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    I mean, the WP:ITN#Purpose is all about showcasing content. If the content is there, and the box is stale, why not? I'm not advocating putting up sub-par content just for churn (that's DYKs job) but I think the focus needs to be content first and "newsworthiness" second. There is concerns about problems that don't exist: no one is writing a GA quality article on Beyonces latest album and pushing it through on to ITN -- and if they were, would that be a problem? Editorialize when there is too much content, instead of all the time. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 18:21, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    But it's obvious that that approach would gradually lower the bar until we had to post Kim Kardashian's latest ass story, and from there, there's no coming back. Once the precedent is set, we're in tabloid-land. Incidentally, this nearly happened when we blurbed the guy out of Fast and Furious, we should never allow that kind of the thing to happen to this encyclopedia. Can imagine Britannica doing it? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:26, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Your arguments here remind me of the story Henny Penny. Very reductio ad absurdum. --Jayron32 18:35, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    How odd. CosmicAdventure is talking about reducing the notability threshold of news stories to embrace popular media. This is an encyclopedia. How many of the three of us is being absurd? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:44, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    +! to Henny Penny. The front page of https://www.britannica.com/ right now quite literally features US governance and Bob Dylan. If you're satisfied with the MP featuring nothing but week old bombings and sporting events, maintain the status quo. You don't get to tell people "feel free to nominate" when there is this whole tribal unwritten !rule system for what ITN does and doesn't post. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 18:59, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    I don't understand. Feel free to nominate anything you like. It's all too easy to have a nomination rejected and then sit back and declare the who system flawed. It really is, I've done it myself. It'd be better to actively work on improving it, but that does take time and energy. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:02, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    P.S. you need to look at [1] for the ITN equivalent. Right now that's stuck in March.y I wonder if that's because it's not being updated quickly enough, or because that particular encyclopedia isn't intended to be a news ticker, or because that particular encyclopedia bides its time to confirm every ITN story it posts? I honestly don't know, but given it's now nearly four weeks behind Wikipedia's ITN section, I'd say we're doing rather well in the timeliness regard... The Rambling Man (talk) 19:14, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Or maybe stale news sections is a uniquely British quality? --CosmicAdventure (talk) 19:54, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    I doubt it. The BBC News main page is updated almost by the minute, and if you look at that lately, you'll see there are very few actually meaningful stories with long-standing effects being posted at this point. Or did we miss one where the community consensus was rejected? The Rambling Man (talk) 20:08, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    I mean, I'm not asking for it to turn around every 24 hours, I'd like people to stop acting like it does, resulting in week long staleness. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 21:13, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Then you need to work to change consensus, not just post here and that's it. Nothing will change definitely if that's all you do. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:20, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    P.P.S. The conspiracy theories and accusations of tribalism are also interesting. If you want to do something about that, you should create an RFC to change the way in which consensus works at ITN. Do you have examples of stories that weren't posted because the consensus was incorrectly assessed? You say You don't get to tell people "feel free to nominate" when there is this whole tribal unwritten !rule system for what ITN does and doesn't post.. In actual fact, I do. Of course I do. Until you can prove some kind of unwritten rule system is actually controlling ITN, I can say this. Even then, I can say this. I have no control over anything, as you well know, but I have experience. It's better for you to do something rather than whinge and do nothing. What that means, it's up to you! The Rambling Man (talk) 19:22, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:In_the_news/Candidates#.5BClosed.5D_2017_French_presidential_election_first_round. "Long established that the final result's what get posted. It can wait two weeks." Established how? Written where? ZOMG, an unwritten rule! --CosmicAdventure (talk) 19:54, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Then challenge it, or else put up with the status quo which, in this case, as you know I'm sure, comes from ITNR's "permission" to post election results of this nature. It would be odd to post one story about the French elections just to then post it again a week or two later, right? The Rambling Man (talk) 20:05, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Have we sufficiently beaten this horse yet? Or is it still living?--WaltCip (talk) 18:42, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Indeed. I gave a few rebuttals to the OP, and some advice on how to proceed, this isn't achieving anything at all now, so perhaps someone would kindly close it down and let us get back to making a difference to the encyclopedic content of the project instead of this relentless chatter? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:47, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    No one is forcing you to participate TRM, though your input up until " making a difference to the encyclopedic content of the project" was most appreciated. --CosmicAdventure (talk) 18:55, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    I realise that no-one is forcing me to do anything, but thanks for your confirmation. This debate about speeding up the cycle of ITN is WP:PERENNIAL so I guess my advice would be, either do something about it, or put up with it. Either way, let's get on with improving the encyclopedic content of Wikpiedia, rather than just chat away here. I think that's reasonable. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:02, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    You're welcome! And I am doing something about it: trying to change peoples attitudes about "what we don't post" on a talk page without devolving into a relentless tit for tat at ITN/C with "well we didn't post X so I oppose Y waa waa waa". --CosmicAdventure (talk) 19:51, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    But you are doing that, with your "ZOMG, an unwritten rule!" style comments. This isn't helpful, and you have yet to really demonstrate any instance where the community consensus wasn't followed. If you want to change the community's thought processes, this isn't the way to do it. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:05, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

    Article talk link

    Please see Template talk:ITN candidate#Add a link to article talk page for my suggestion. Many thanks. Aiken D 16:43, 29 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    American news

    Is there a ban on American news? It seems odd that there is never anything about Trump, not to mention the Comey firing. 10W40 (talk) 23:05, 13 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

    Please see WP:ITNC where news items can be nominated and are discussed by the community. You're right that generally speaking, every minor move that Trump has made is generally considered to be trivial in encyclopedic terms (as gauged by the community), so we don't feature such minutiae on the main page. Feel free to join in on those discussions! The Rambling Man (talk) 23:10, 13 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    I just noticed the discussion above. I guess there is a ban. With all Watergate talk recently, there is an opportunity for Watergate-related links. And what about the Andrew Jackson episode earlier? At the moment, "In the News" is a misnomer. 10W40 (talk) 23:23, 13 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Your guess is wrong, there's no ban. Items are posted based on community consensus. It's worth noting this is English language Wikipedia, not American Wikipedia, so our contributors and readers span the globe from England to India to New Zealand. America is part of that spectrum, but not the totality. As for Andrew Jackson, he died in 1845, I'm not sure how in the news is part of that discussion. The Rambling Man (talk) 23:29, 13 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    A search for Trump "Andrew Jackson" on Gnews brings up 160,000 results like this one. He's definitely topical. 10W40 (talk) 23:38, 13 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    As I suggested in my first response, ITNC is there, waiting and able to host your candidates for inclusion in the ITN section of the main page! I have to confess to you that complaining here about anti-American bias is somewhat a perennial thing, mostly it results in "so do something" which, in this case, would be to nominate some more Trump articles to see how the community regard them in encyclopedic terms. Good luck! The Rambling Man (talk) 23:46, 13 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    There is no ban; we do post US news. But no one has been impeached; see WP:CRYSTALBALL. We are not going to use the main page of Wikipedia to spread fake news, sorry.Zigzig20s (talk) 23:58, 13 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • (edit conflict) There is a general consensus of longstanding at ITNC that we don't post most political news stories below the level of national elections and or changes in government/head of state etc. The reason is that if we go down that road, first we can't limit it to the United States, and secondly that will very quickly overwhelm ITN. I would note that we did not post any of the many stories dealing with the scandals of the former presidents of S. Korea and Brazil until they were actually impeached. We did not post the news relating to the recent hacking of emails on the eve of the French Presidential election. And I could cite many more examples, including that we generally reported nothing on the US Presidential election last year until the actual election happened. If/when President Trump is actually impeached, I am pretty sure we would post that. But otherwise we tend to steer clear of the political stories lest we turn ITN into a "Trump did X today" ticker along with the same sort of stuff coming out of every other country. That said, there is no ban on any subject that I can think of and anyone can nominate any story that they think will pass muster. and is linkable to an article of suitable quality. -Ad Orientem (talk) 00:04, 14 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • @The Rambling Man: I don't know that it matters where the readers are from, but FYI there are way more readers from America than from any other English-speaking country (21.7%), according to Alexa. Japan is our second biggest audience at 7.2%. 6.1% of our readers are on Japanese Wiki. That suggests the vast majority of Japanese readers are reading Japanese Wiki. 10W40 (talk) 00:21, 14 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
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