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Transclusion problem?

I notice that some recent comments added to FAC reviews (including my own on Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Of Human Feelings/archive3 added some hours ago) are not appearing on the FAC page. Is there a problem here? Also – this may or not be related – the talkpage links to FAC on Talk:Jim Umbricht and Talk:Elizabeth of Bosnia appear incomplete. Can someone knowledgeable please take a look? Brianboulton (talk) 16:37, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

(later) The comments have now appeared, but there's still a problem with the links on the above two talkpages. Brianboulton (talk) 19:49, 4 January 2014 (UTC)
This seems to have been a problem a few days ago as well. Someone else made a similar observation before reverting themselves when the problem "fixed". Sarastro1 (talk) 22:09, 4 January 2014 (UTC)
Yes that was me who had that problem. It was the same thing that's happening above, however, I noticed a day or two later that it "fixed itself".-- Astros4477 (Talk) 23:57, 4 January 2014 (UTC)
Hmm, checking the FACs Brian mentions I can see that the talk pages still have the "initiate the nomination" bit after the nomination page has been completed. Trying to isolate the problem, has this only been occurring since the new year? Not sure why that would affect things as I don't recall anything similar last year but it's all the springs to mind first up. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:15, 5 January 2014 (UTC)
Actually, apparently not, I hadn't checked the links from Sarastro that refer to an issue in late December... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:18, 5 January 2014 (UTC)
I see it's just happened again with this nom and the article talk page, so at least the damn thing's consistent... Again trying to isolate things, @Brianboulton:/@Sarastro1: as long-time FAC participants, have you seen this before, because I don't think I have... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:36, 5 January 2014 (UTC)
Similar things have happened before re slow updating, on the WP:PR page. The delayed completion of the talkpage link to FAC is a new problem to me. I have used the purge process described above to complete these links, but for some reason this doesn't work with Elizabeth of Bosnia. Brianboulton (talk) 13:59, 5 January 2014 (UTC)
Wikipedia's cache is sometimes slow in updating. All you need to do is purge the pages by adding ?action=purge to the end of the URLs. :-) Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 04:49, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

This is, I think, proving to be a serious annoyance, since it is no longer possible to check progress on FACs from the FAC page. As I write, comments added more than 24 hours ago have yet to appear. We really do need a solution from the boffins. Brianboulton (talk) 09:49, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

It is if you refresh it, isn't it? --Stfg (talk) 11:04, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Requested Withdrawal

Please withdraw Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Orel Hershiser's scoreless inning streak/archive1.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 05:37, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

I have done this. Graham Colm (talk) 06:52, 10 January 2014 (UTC)
Am I on 2-week nomination probation now?--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 15:02, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
I doubt it. Just get the improvements in and then it'll garner support. Good luck! Sportsguy17 (T • C) 01:06, 12 January 2014 (UTC)
I am actually going to nominate another article.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 20:57, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Supporting your own nomination

Back in the early days of FAC, nominators would support their own nomination. I understand that that practice is frowned upon nowadays because of the obvious conflict of interest. However, Poeticbent and I will be renominating Treblinka extermination camp sometime in the next month, and I've been thinking about giving my support to the nomination (and explaining why I am undertaking such a step, of course).

My planned explanation is going to look like this:

Support: I support the promotion of this article on the basis of its prose and comprehensiveness. I understand that nowadays nominators never (or almost never) support the promotion of their own article, but please bear with me as I explain the unusual circumstances at work here. I've copy-edited/peer-reviewed the article three times, as you can see below:

1. I copy-edited and reviewed the article during its GAN in late October 2013 (48 edits to the GAN page and 76 comments).
2. I copy-edited and reviewed the article during its first run at FAC in early November 2013 (76 edits to the FAC review page and 15 new comments).
3. I copy-edited and reviewed the article immediately after its FAC was archived in mid-December 2013 (126 edits to the article talk page and 60 more comments).

Thus, I've copy-edited the article three times and made 675 edits to the article proper, bringing me to a total of 924 Treblinka-related edits, along with 151 comments. All of these 151 comments have been addressed by Poeticbent, so I believe the article is ready for promotion.

My question is: In these circumstances, would it be appropriate to support my own nomination? AmericanLemming (talk) 09:25, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Not meaning to sound flippant, but I thought that the understanding is that editors implicitly support their own nomination by nominating it for Wikipedia's highest status (with co-nominators also obviously being implicitly supportive). Nick-D (talk) 09:38, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
You're free to add details of peer reviews etc. or any other relevant facts you think of, to the top of the nomination. As Nick says, though, there's little point having an explicit "support" listed because it's obvious you support otherwise you wouldn't be nominating. And also, this process is not a vote. You could have fifty support "votes" listed, but if one editor raises serious and verifiable objections and you don't deal with them, then the article would not get featured. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 10:05, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
I think this is a bad idea. It merely advertises your involvement with the article. It's not about who did what; it's about how good the article now is. --Stfg (talk) 10:39, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
Alright, I won't explicitly support it, then. I agree that my involvement with the article is irrelevant in itself, but I would hope that three copy-edits/peer reviews. nearly 1,000 edits, and 150 comments says something about the quality of the article. But yes, you obviously need to deal with actionable objections in a timely manner if you want your article to be promoted. One of the main reasons it failed the first time around at FAC was the quality of the prose, so afterwards I went through the article a third time and nitpicked it to death. And of course we'll be inviting the reviewers who opposed promotion last time to take a look at it again.
@Nick-D, @Amakuru, and @Stfg: Thanks for the feedback, all three of you. By the way, Stfg, do you recommend not only not supporting it but also leaving out the part below as well? AmericanLemming (talk) 11:24, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

I've copy-edited/peer-reviewed the article three times, as you can see below:

1. I copy-edited and reviewed the article during its GAN in late October 2013 (48 edits to the GAN page and 76 comments).
2. I copy-edited and reviewed the article during its first run at FAC in early November 2013 (76 edits to the FAC review page and 15 new comments).
3. I copy-edited and reviewed the article immediately after its FAC was archived in mid-December 2013 (126 edits to the article talk page and 60 more comments).

Thus, I've copy-edited the article three times and made 675 edits to the article proper, bringing me to a total of 924 Treblinka-related edits, along with 151 comments, all of which have been addressed.

@AmericanLemming: I'd even leave that out. It doesn't add anything. At the very most, in the nomination statement I'd say something like: "All comments from the previous FAC review have been addressed, and the article has been thoroughly copy edited." This highlights that the new nomination respects the feedback from the previous review. I don't see the point in saying more than that. --Stfg (talk) 13:59, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
I don't have a strong opinion on whether you include those facts, but you have to bear in mind that they don't in themselves confer any higher status on the article. Copy edits are great, of course, in that they improve the language and prose of the article. They don't usually add anything in terms of content, article structure, sources and verifiability though, so if those things are lacking then the FA still won't succeed. As far as I can see the article hasn't actually been through a WP:Peer review - this is not the same as a copyedit, but it's up to you whether you find it useful or not. Secondly, the number of edits that you or anyone else have made to the page is almost irrelevant I'd say - one good edit could be more valuable than a thousand bad ones! Personally, I think the most important thing you need to do when nominating is to address all the points that were raised in the last FAC nomination, and explain to reviewers how those points have been addressed. Then of course those reviewers will look at the article and decide if they have indeed been addressed. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 11:38, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
Part of the difficulty is that the main FAC reviewer, Squemish Ossifrage, did not revisit his objections after they had been addressed; a cursory glance at the first FAC will tell you that Poeticbent has addressed all 122 of Squemish Ossifrage's comments (which were all very helpful in improving the article, I should add), but that the reviewer in question did not return to take a second look. I'm actually glad it was failed the first time around, as it gave me time to do a thorough copy-edit (improving the prose) and informal peer review on the talk page (in which I suggested where to add information), as well as revisit the FAC review page to make sure we actually addressed all of Squemish Ossifrage's comments (Poeticbent missed a few here and there, but there were 122 of them, so I don't blame him). I really do believe the article is of very high quality at present, and I am confident that those who opposed it the first time around will raise a few quibbles during the second FAC, after which they will support its promotion. AmericanLemming (talk) 12:54, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Bad idea, and proposal seems to be specifically thought of to salvage this case. It doens't matter how many times an article has been copyedited, peer reviewed, etc., it is the quality of the text itself that matters. FunkMonk (talk) 13:02, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
  • Nominating an article is tacit support of its promotion. No explicit statement is needed. If you want to detail your work on the article, you might do that in the nomination statement. It can't hurt, and it shows that you have thought out the nomination rather than just done a drive-by. --Laser brain (talk) 13:16, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

new FAs that don't have the star

It appears Voxelbot is missing to close some recent FA promotes. It got Nancy Mitford but didnt touch others like A Song for Simeon and Franklin Peale. Beerest 2 talk 14:48, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

Time limits

I was wondering why there's an informal time limit to the FAC process; e.g., why older FAC's might be closed prior to all active reviewers taking a stance on an article.

I'm not suggesting there isn't a good (possibly technical) reason for doing this; I just don't find the answer intuitive. (Note: My search in the archives for "time limit" just found a bunch of formal time limit proposals) Regards, Seppi333 (Insert 2¢) 02:47, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

I haven't been around Wikipedia that long (slightly less than a year), but my understanding is that is all comes down to a lack of reviewers:
1. Articles on technical and/or obscure topics are likely to have a hard time attracting the 3-5 reviewers necessary for it to be considered to have had "enough eyes on it", as the FAC delegates often put it. Thus, they end up at the bottom of the FAC list, and since the delegates can't leave them there forever, at some point they have to archive the nomination. I think the informal time limit is generally a month or two.
2. Another problem is that an "active reviewer" will frequently oppose promotion and list their concerns, the nominator will address them (or attempt to address them), but then the reviewer will never revisit their objections and say whether they consider their concerns to have been addressed. Thus, consensus to promote will not develop, and the FAC delegate will be forced to archive once it gets down to the bottom of the list.
3. Lastly, in light of the fact that consensus to promote often fails to develop, not because of the nominator's failure to promptly address any concerns that come up, but rather because not enough people review or reviewers fail to revisit their concerns, FAC delegates will sometimes waive the two-week waiting period. But that's only in cases of " no (or minimal) feedback", as the FAC instructions say.
4. Since amphetamine (your FAC nomination) received a decent amount of feedback but reviewers did not revisit their objections, consensus failed to develop. I'm sorry that it was archived, but Wikipedia is run by a bunch of volunteers (as you well know), so it can be hard to get people to commit to a review, especially at FAC. My first FAC only had one reviewer, and he didn't return to revisit his objections. It was probably for the better, since the article wasn't ready yet. AmericanLemming (talk) 03:40, 25 January 2014 (UTC)
Ah. I actually wasn't asking about my recent FAC in particular, though the answer obviously applies to it. In my particular case, two editors were still reviewing my FAC, 1 opposed and didn't respond for about a month, 1 remained neutral, and 1 supported at the time it was closed. Nonetheless, I'm more interested in the general reasoning as opposed to my particular case, since that's not going to be my only FAC. Seppi333 (Insert 2¢) 03:59, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia:The Core Contest

running for a fifth time - 10 Feb to 9 march....Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 21:22, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Demote/promote to GA instead of FA fail

Some time ago I proposed that FAC reviewers should be able to demote/accept as GA during a FAC review if they did not fulfil the FA criteria, and were not already GAs. Since the GA criteria are already inherent in the FA criteria, it would not be an "extra GA review" as some complained back then. There was quite some interest in the idea, but also huge protests and insults, from an editor who does not even review articles. Such a feature would spare a lot of reviewer manpower, since all demoted FAs would not have to be GA reviewed again, and a FAC fail would not necessarily be in vain if the article could become GA instead. It would mean more GAs, and it would mean less "humiliation" for nominators. And I stress again, it would not mean extra work for reviewers. And note again that this promotion would be optionable, not required. FunkMonk (talk) 13:09, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

GA isn't some easy option. If an article fails at FAC it might well fail for the same reasons at GAN. Eric Corbett 14:18, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
I tend to agree with Mr. Corbett. Many FAs that fail FAR would not pass a GAN due to similar reasons; it's rare we demote articles soley because their prose isn't up to a brilliant quality standard. Pragmatically, having potential FFAs go through GAN seems like a good option for improving the quality incrementally anyhow. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs(talk) 14:47, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
I concur. Almost any article that goes through a GAN nomination ends up getting significant tweaks before being promoted to GA.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 14:51, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
I don't think there's any mileage at all in the idea that FA reviewers should be allowed to decide on GA status. And I say that as someone who's done loads of reviews in both places. Eric Corbett 15:05, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
As a FAR delegate, I agree with Eric, especially his comment from 14:18, 23 January 2014. FARs are usually brought due to referencing or NPOV issues, rather than prose, and generally fail the GA criteria as well as the FA criteria. It is completely allowable for a reviewer to say "hey, this article doesn't meet FA criteria, but I think it's pretty close to GA. Why don't you nominate it over there and I'll review it for you". However, automatically making demoted FAs into GAs is a very bad idea, given that, as I've already said, most demoted FAs don't meet either set of criteria. Dana boomer (talk) 15:17, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
For what it's worth, I agree with Eric, Dana, David and Tony. Any delisted article would do well to go through the GAC process again. J Milburn (talk) 15:54, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I think that it would make a alot of sense to have demotion/promotion to GA as an option so that a reviewer reviewing a FAR may choose to grant GA status if it is thought that it qualifies. It shouldn't be a default option, but in many cases a reviewer would be able to say that this doesnt qualify for FA but it meets the GAC.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 18:18, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
  • If FA reviewers were to have such an option, it wouldn't be long before someone would propose that it be extended to allow reviewers to have the option of grading FAR articles as A-class, B-class etc or to extend it to FA nominations so that an assessor could regrade an article as A-class, GA-class if it didn't meet FA criteria. I think the real problem lies in the disjointed quality scale (WP:COUNCIL/AFAQ), which has such similar sounding criteria for FA, GA, and A-class that you'd be forgiven for thinking they were just copy-and-pasted. I think it is absurd that A-class sits above GA but it doesn't require GA-status for an article to become A-class. The system could be improved by two changes: the A-class reviews could be moved from being done by Wikiprojects, to become a formal process like FA and GA; there could be a requirement that only GA-class articles could be nominated for A-class, and only A-class articles could be nominated for FA status. However, there shouldn't be automatic regrading for FAR fails etc. Green Giant (talk) 20:03, 23 January 2014 (UTC)
I don't agree with formalising the A-class structure. I think there's a sufficient amount of bureaucracy around the assessment process already. Given that editors' time is stretched and there's usually a big backlog of articles in WP:GAN and WP:FAC before we even consider WP:FAR, WP:FARC, WP:GAR and WP:PR, introducing yet another formal process for A-class would be too much hassle, for a limited benefit. The A, B and C classes are intentionally informal giving project users the opportunity to classify things within their projects and thereby organise their work, without having to wait around for formal processes to be completed. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 07:42, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

The point is being completely missed here, the purpose is not to make GA a dump for failed FAs. A failed FAC might pass as GA, or it might not. This idea only applies to those cases where it might. All it would do is spare reviewer time. I'm not sure what the supposed downside is. It is an extra option that will save time in those cases (few or not) where it would pass as GA, nothing more. Even if it would apply to only one in every ten FAC/FAR, it would be better than now. I guess the main hurdle would be how to implement it. FunkMonk (talk) 12:31, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

I don't have time or inclination to also do a GA review when reviewing FACs. The latter is quite enough.--Wehwalt (talk) 13:48, 24 January 2014 (UTC)
Someone else might have time and inclination. Noone is suggesting that it should be forced or automatic, simply an option.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 16:08, 24 January 2014 (UTC)
And I repeat from the first comment: "Since the GA criteria are already inherent in the FA criteria, it would not be an "extra GA review" as some complained back then." FunkMonk (talk) 16:48, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

I'm more sympathetic than most above to the idea in theory, but I expect it would lead to many more noms at FA by people who think they might get FA but should certainly get GA - ie what are really GA noms. Apart from other things, FA gets going much faster and avoids the wildly variable GA reviews that result from having a single reviewer - the great weakness of GA. So I'm opposed. Johnbod (talk) 14:26, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

I think we had this discussion not so long ago and the consensus was similar to what we have here -- a nice thought, perhaps, but more practical to leave GA to the GAN process and FA to the FAC process. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 14:31, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

Looking from the two POVs this offers:

  • FAR > GA: While the GA criteria is more lax than the FA one, the overlapping is so big that the reasons for being demoted of a bronze star probably mean the article would not pass the green shield review.
  • Failed FAC > GA: If the editor nominates an article straight to the FA and fails, that could get some priority in the GAN queue as the review during the two-week waiting period could help future noms. That's about it, cutting one review would be faster but that would not guarantee the article is up to standards. igordebraga ≠ 15:53, 24 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I agree that this may be better suited for FAR (in the cases where an article does fit the GA criteria, however few they may be), since as someone mentioned, people may nominate prematurely for FAC because they know it could end up as GA anyway. FunkMonk (talk) 16:51, 25 January 2014 (UTC)
  • I don't entirely accept Eric's comment as it stands. Indeed, GA should not be an easy option but, regrettably, it is too often treated as such. I have seen "good articles" at peer review that would struggle to justify a "C" status. GAs are sometimes awarded by overgenerous reviewers; such misplaced kindness serves to (a) raise false beliefs as to the quality of an article and (b) devalue the whole "Good Article" concept. Creating an option whereby unpromoted FAs might be given GA status would, despite the good intention, tend to devalue the concept further. The suggestion that every article must go through a GA and an A-class review before it qualifies for FAC is quite the worst idea I have heard since... the last time it or something similar was suggested. Brianboulton (talk) 19:22, 26 January 2014 (UTC)

A plea to all footie lovers

Would an editor with a liking for and a reasonable knowledge of football please take a look at Peru national football team, which has been on the FAC page since 5 January without gaining a single comment? I know nothing about football, but I am going to leave a few comments just to start the process. Some kind of review, however critical, from someone who knows the game, would be a big encouragement to the nominator who has obviously put considerable work into the article. Brianboulton (talk) 19:29, 26 January 2014 (UTC)

Football in South America is more about a series of minor military skirminishes than it is about the game, so I'm not surprised there's been so little interest. Eric Corbett 01:05, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Notification of a TFA nomination

In the past, there have been requests that discussions about potentially controversial TFAs are brought to the attention of more than just those who have WP:TFAR on their watchlist. With that in mind: Fuck (film) has been nominated for an appearance as Today's Featured Article. If you have any views, please comment at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests. Thank you. BencherliteTalk 12:34, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Continuing problems with FAC page

I am still finding that the page does not update recent comments to individual nominations, not even with the suggested ?action=purge added to the url. Sometimes the delay is more than a day. This means that it is difficult to browse the page and add comments, because you don't know how up-to-date the displayed comments are. It seems odd to me that this problem, reported a month or so ago, seems incapable of solution. Brianboulton (talk) 12:17, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

Has this been reported to WP:VP/T, does anyone know? I think that would be the next step to discovering whether it's a known issue, or possibly a bug in the software. --Laser brain (talk) 15:32, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

FAC comments after a FAC is closed

I am tempted to revert this edit by The ed17. I am just not sure what protocol is on edits to FAC discussion comments after a FAC is marked as closed.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 16:50, 4 February 2014 (UTC)

I completely fail to see why that would be necessary. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 16:59, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
Apparently others disagree. Eric Corbett has reverted your edit.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 18:07, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
There's 30 seconds of my life I'm never going to get back. --Laser brain (talk) 18:23, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
Which 30 seconds of your life do you ever get back? Are you a Time Lord? Eric Corbett 18:44, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Roughly what I was thinking, Laser brain. I didn't see the closing note at the bottom and the formal archiving tag wasn't on it, but I really can't imagine why this is a problem beyond a silly, petty way of getting revenge for my earlier comments about your ownership issues with WP:FOUR. Anyway, onto other things. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 18:46, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
Nope. Nothing to do with FOUR. I brought it here for broader consensus rather than my own perspective. Feel free to keep looking for fights though.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 18:55, 4 February 2014 (UTC)
I thought I had once added a late support after the formal close of a FAC, but went back through my edits for 5 years and couldn't find it, so maybe it was something I once contemplated and then decided against. Anyway, I think adding a late support after the formal close but before the bot runs does no harm when the nomination has no opposes. Adding an oppose or long comments would be unwise: issues that are identified after the nomination closes should be discussed on the article talk page. DrKiernan (talk) 13:41, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
I have to second DrKiernan's thoughts on the matter. I really don't see the point in changing an oppose or comments to a support after the article has been promoted, but I similarly don't see the need to revert such an edit. AmericanLemming (talk) 18:50, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
Depends on if the page has been archived or not, IMO. I had to manually archive it just now because VoxelBot still ain't doing its thing.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 01:05, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

Withdrawal request

How do I close and withdraw this nom? Thank you. —ATinySliver/ATalkPage 00:32, 9 February 2014 (UTC)

That's done now. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 06:56, 9 February 2014 (UTC)
Much obliged, thank you—and in response to your comment, it's as good as it's gonna get until and unless someone writes a book. xD —ATinySliver/ATalkPage 07:05, 9 February 2014 (UTC)

The Featured Content page in the Signpost

... hasn't been started yet for this week's issue (Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2014-01-15/Featured content). If anyone's interested in doing at least the promoted FACs, I can help. - Dank (push to talk) 21:35, 19 January 2014 (UTC)

Okay, I see Ed published without it ... maybe next week. - Dank (push to talk) 22:03, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
I punted it to the 22nd, in the hope that both weeks will be covered. Thanks for adding a note here, Dank, and anyone interested in helping can contribute by using Wikipedia:Goings-on. Regards, Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 23:15, 19 January 2014 (UTC)
I've covered the past few weeks, but I'm done now. I hope someone can step in, so that the Signpost can continue to have the Featured Content page. - Dank (push to talk) 15:42, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Signpost's featured content section

Hello everyone, I'm here once again to see if anyone has an interest in writing for the Signpost's featured content section. It's not (necessarily) too time-consuming; while I'd like to see original content, the summaries can be copy/pasted from the articles in the interests of saving time. Anyone willing to take the leap? Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 04:20, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

Word usage

I'd like to start a conversation on putting together a word usage guide based on some subset of Wikipedia articles. I know there's been interest among writers who show up at FAC ... I don't know if there's interest anywhere else, but I hope there is, and I don't have any preconceptions that the guide has to be based just on word usage in Featured Articles, so I've notified WT:GOCE, WT:MOS, and WT:MIL ... please notify any wikiprojects you think might be interested.

It's apparently impossible to write a general-purpose grammar checker that gives a lot of good advice and not much bad advice; I've tried all of the commercial ones, and they all suck. But it's not hard to write a script that searches an article for particular words and phrases that keep coming up at FAC as problematic, and that gives advice on those words and phrases (and we'd want to give the user a "got it" button that stops the script from continually flagging the same words and phases in their writing after they've "got it").

Dictionaries alone don't provide what we're looking for here, and lexicographers will be the first to tell you that. Dictionaries are designed to be permissive and to cover a wide "corpus" (sample text that determines how words actually get used). So, some of their definitions are widely rejected in style and usage guides, some are many years out of date, some don't apply to encyclopedic writing, etc. There's no one usage guide out there that is precisely what we want, but the advice I've seen from FAC copyeditors generally corresponds to advice given by respected usage guides. Even if there were one usage guide that worked all the time, there's not much chance we could get all our writers to buy it and read it ... but if we can write a script that will alert writers to common problems that come up with the words and phrases they're actually using, they might be willing to run the script and take the advice. Depending on how much effort we put into this, we might wind up saving some copyeditor time and providing our writers with information they can actually use. Thoughts? - Dank (push to talk) 15:18, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

It sounds like you have some ideas about what should be in this guide based on your experience with FACs. How about creating a draft, even if it's rough, in your userspace, so that we have something to comment on? This might end up being an Essay, or a FAC FAQ, or something else. I find it hard to imagine it becoming Policy, or even a Guideline, since accepted word usage is (as you describe above) so variable. – Jonesey95 (talk) 17:12, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
At some point along the way, there will be disagreements, and then we'll need closers to help moderate and close RfCs. I'm offering to be one of the closers unless people object or we get, say, three other volunteers for the job. I think I can also be useful in a "clerk" role; for instance, I can ask those of you who do copyediting around here what you'd like to include, and after that, I'll reproduce comments from FACs and edits to FAs that suggest rules, along with suggestions on those points from a variety of style guides. - Dank (push to talk) 18:17, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
I'm not quite sure how that addressed Jonesey's point. One of the things I'm missing at the moment is how this gets off the ground. Another is how it would be used in practice. There may be others, but these questions seem fundamental. --Stfg (talk) 18:43, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
It's already airborne, Simon ... since I'm trying to stay neutral, all I can do is sketch an idea and see what people want to do. I can't see this ever turning into a guideline or (!) policy ... we already have a lot of MOS pages, and nothing that comes from a quick survey would have the same level of consensus as a guideline. That's why I'm talking about it at WT:FAC ... participation in review processes is voluntary, and people generally react positively here to reasonable attempts at copyediting. I suppose the first question is what the corpus is ... I'm not wedded to FAs. Once we know what we're trying to describe, then I'll ask around for suggestions, and if there are a lot, we'll make a page for it. When the suggestions run out, I'll start systematically asking about copyediting edits and advice that have shown up at FAC. It will be a while before the results will be practical ... a long list will take a while, and a short list won't be very useful for many writers. There are a variety of reasons this might all turn out to be useful, but I'd rather let it evolve than push it in any one direction. - Dank (push to talk) 19:02, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
Also, since the first two comments here are from GOCE folks, I think it's fair to say that there has been occasional friction over the years between supposedly pro-FAC and anti-FAC viewpoints on copyediting. This friction has always seemed pretty pointless to me, and I don't mean to be trying to take a pro-FAC position by bringing this up at FAC. FAs are one logical corpus, because I've seen a lot of resonance between FAC advice and standard usage guides over the last six years, although there are differences of opinion, of course. But I have no objection to using a different corpus, and I'll enthusiastically support any direction the GOCE would like to take this, even if that means I'm working on two projects instead of one. - Dank (push to talk) 19:27, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
With no experience with FACs, I am unable to be of more help without a rough draft to comment on. I suggest that you compile some of these concrete examples of FAC usage debates that you have encountered. You said above: "it's not hard to write a script that searches an article for particular words and phrases that keep coming up at FAC as problematic". I suggest that you do this, or write a specification for such a script that lays out specific phrases and usages it would look for. Then we'll have something to talk about. Drop me a line or ping me here when you have something we can look at. I'm looking forward to it. – Jonesey95 (talk) 22:49, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
I'll work up something in AutoWikiBrowser that you can look at. - Dank (push to talk) 23:53, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

(←) I'm sorry to see that, Dan. Just a few thoughts:

  • If we find ourselves needing to pigeonhole each other as GOCE people or FAC people, we have a problem far more fundamental than just the usage of words. We can't afford such factionalism. Let's solve that first.
    • Responding point by point. I was a GOCE coord, I have nothing bad to say about the GOCE, and I can't recall friction with anyone copyediting in any capacity. These days, I know more about FAC than about the GOCE only because MilHist has been doing more with FAC than with the GOCE. Does this answer the question? - Dank (push to talk)
      • I hope so, Dan. It isn't about just you and/or me, but you wrote of friction, and it surprised me as I've never been aware of much friction between FAC and GOCE. A very little, but not much and not unmanageable. We certainly can't afford to be on different pages. (I'll post on the rest tomorrow, but I've only just got in after a very long day, and it's after midnight here.) --Stfg (talk) 00:37, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
  • To clarify what I meant by getting it off the ground: I imagine that the script you mention would need a database of things to look for and messages to emit when it found them. My question was how does that database get set up and populated?
    • I'll show you something in AutoWikiBrowser, that's one implementation.
  • Inside Wikipedia, I see no "corpus" better than FAC, but why would we want to base a guide on an internal corpus at all? For some time, I've suspected that a Wikipedia dialect is beginning to emerge. Why should Wikipedia differ from general academic writing style?
    • I couldn't agree more that bringing in communities from outside Wikipedia would make this even better, and I'll enthusiastically support any efforts to do that. At the moment, I'm searching for anything that amounts to consensus among Wikipedians, on any of this.
  • Good dictionaries take care to identify colloquialisms, slang and technical jargon. We can agree those aren't what we want in our best articles. But why are you worried that allowing anything else is too "permissive"? This is related to the next point.
    • This is best answered one word at a time. Dictionaries are better than they've ever been before, certainly.
  • Analyzing a "corpus" can yield an objective description of usage in that corpus, but to convert that into a usage guide requires the injection of opinion. I'm far from convinced that the opinions given in FAC reviews (or anywhere else on-Wiki) are any more valid than the ones given in published usage guides. We don't need to pick a preferred one -- any issue on which usage guides differ is an issue on which we can afford to remain permissive.
    • Yes and no. To pull one example out of the air, BritEng can use "in the event" to mean "in fact, as it happened". Americans almost never get that ... they hear "if", "in case of" or "during the event". So, usage guides ... and Wikipedians ... differ on what advice or warnings, if any, should be supplied to writers. Hopefully we'll be able to arrive at consensus in the usual Wikipedian way, namely, whoever shows up makes the rules, with the caveat that local consensus doesn't trump global consensus. I suggest throwing anything that turns into a big hairy fight into a pile, and tackling the pile from time to time in an RfC.
  • If this is going to be developed through a series of RFCs, how do we avoid this becoming another set of never-ending acrimonious debates such as we've seen at the MOS talk pages? One of the crying shames of Wikipedia history is how people who could do great writing have instead found themselves drawn into near-interminable debates about what constitutes good writing (or even merely visually elegant punctuation), and have ended up leaving in frustration and/or resentment. How do we ensure we aren't creating more of the same?
    • I hope my MilHist homeboys weigh in on this question. My perception is that we've done a pretty good job of getting people through the review processes without turning them off with overbearing copyediting, and a lot of the credit for that goes to Ian Rose, AustralianRupert, Anotherclown, Nikkimaria, and too many other dedicated reviewers to mention. And, at FAC at least, MilHist is more Hist than Mil ... we've supported a wide range of subjects with many nominators, so don't see why the success we've had in keeping the drama down couldn't be extended to "historical narrative" articles in general, and maybe other articles as well ... except that we don't have enough volunteer copyeditors to cover everything, of course, thus the need for software and wider participation. Having said that ... I don't mean to rope anyone from MilHist into this or speak for them, I suspect this initiative is more my thing than theirs.
  • Will it be understood to be advisory only (and will we be able to maintain that understanding)? How will we avoid it contributing to instruction creep? --Stfg (talk) 10:27, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
    • One reason for having this discussion at FAC is that review processes are completely voluntary ... I'm doing my best to "stack the deck" so that the discussion is always about voluntary software that can be used to help with voluntary article reviews. But I can't make any promises that no one will ever want to extend the MOS guidelines with anything discovered along the way. Thanks for your insightful questions. - Dank (push to talk) 14:00, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
        • I'm not sure whether I understood your idea correctly. I picked up on the words "usage guide" and started to have visions of Wikipedia's own instance of something like Fowler or Garner. Accepting your point made elsewhere about descriptive/prescriptive being a coarse distinction, it's still the case that guides like that tend to prescribe, and to proscribe, on grounds of taste and/or claimed logic that fly in the face of actual usage in peer-reviewed journals and professionally edited academic books. One difficulty a careful copy editor has all the time is to figure out how to improve poor writing without depriving the author of their voice. I think that we (including me) err on the side of over-"correcting" more often than on the other side. I would strongly object to creating a [[WP:Manual of Usage]] (MOU) because I just know that some people would use it officiously. On the point about RFCs: my experiences at FAC, PR and suchlike have been that these reviews are usually very rational and collegiate. We probably have to accept a few exceptions, seeing how much of themselves people invest in these processes, but it seems rare enough. What I'd fear if we created a WP:MOU is that we'd end up in the same kind of acrimonious, tendentious debates as occurred, for example, at WT:PLACE throughout last year, as people try to legislate on matters that have little if any effect on the readers' experience of Wikipedia. If, on the other hand, you're talking about a words-and-phrases-to-watch spotter such as Ian describes, which we can use in an advisory capacity the way we use Ucucha's Duplinks, then I'm all for it. And if it can spot those words and phrases that are understood differently by different populations for reasons like engvar, that would be golden. --Stfg (talk) 17:06, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
      • Matter of fact, Dan, this sounds like something that's crossed my mind in the past, i.e. a script that runs at the click of a button like Ucucha's duplicate link checker, which would highlight terms to watch like "in fact", "however"; weasel words like "alleged", "some said"; and peacock terms like "celebrated", "acclaimed", "award-winning", etc. Even if it just used all the examples in our existing words to watch guideline it'd be helpful. From my perspective, I'm not thinking so much of when I'm doing a serious review and copyediting as I go, since I'd pick up those things anyway, but when I just want to scan an article's prose, say at DYK or B-Class review, or as one of my final checks of an article before promotion at FAC. I agree there's potential issues about what to include, ENGVAR, etc, but if we start small, say with terms to avoid that we already spell out in the MOS, I'm sure it'd be a net gain. Like the duplink checker, you can always ignore what it highlights if you choose to. I suppose people could even create their own databases of words they'd like to check on, which would allow for ENGVAR, but perhaps we should be aiming at standardisation at a higher level. The bottom line is that if I had the time or skills to produce such a script for myself I would have done it, since I often find myself searching for certain phrases one by one in an article I just want to scan or spotcheck for prose issues. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 22:39, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
        • Peer Reviewer does some checking of ENGVAR, W2W and MOS issues. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:34, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
          • Thanks. I can't figure out how to get AWB to give the user an option of removing suggestions they no longer want to see ... but if a script resides in the user's skin.js file, the user can comment out the lines they don't want (until we write something fancier). I'll need help adapting a script. Guys, which interface would be more useful ... popups (a la WP:Tools/Navigation popups) that make a suggestion appear when you hover over the selected text, or something like Peer Reviewer, that adds suggested text to a page (such as a peer review page)? - Dank (push to talk) 03:06, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
            • Now you mention it, Nikki, I had seen the PR script but I never used it, partly because I'd figured it was more about structure than prose and partly because I was put off by the notion of an automated review. If the script can be applied to any article, whether at PR or not, I might try it and report back. Dan, I've always like the red-bordered highlights the duplink checker uses, rather than mouse-over, but let me see what the PR script does as well... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 04:02, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
              • I've asked a guy who has worked on duplinks for help. Btw, I just fixed a typo of mine above: "Dictionaries alone don't provide" instead of "Dictionaries don't provide". - Dank (push to talk) 16:28, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Quick update: This project has bifurcated, and the part that has to be done off-Wikipedia has to be done before the second part. It will be a while. Details on request. - Dank (push to talk) 15:08, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Help with nomination

Hi! I just nominated the article Pather Panchali, the nom is Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Pather Panchali/archive1. However, the FAC template in Talk:Pather Panchali says that archive number should be 2. This article had a failed FAC in 2008 (Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Pather Panchali (film)/archive1). The name of the article was different then (Pather Panchali (film)). I think that is why the talk page says that archive number now should be 2. I am not sure how to address this problem. Please help.--Dwaipayan (talk) 22:24, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

Does it make sense to move the new one to Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Pather Panchali/archive2 ? (I'd just do it, but am not sure whether it might cause a technical hiccup depending on how the templates work.) --Stfg (talk) 15:16, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
Moved it. Lets see.--Dwaipayan (talk) 23:06, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
Second and subsequent FACs for a given article contain links to previous FACs for that article. The move left .../Pather Panchali/Archive 1 redirecting to Archive 2. I've changed the redirect to point to .../Pather Panchali (film)/Archive 1, so that reviewers are shown the previous review. For accuracy I've removed the R from move category also. I think (hope :)) it's OK now. --Stfg (talk) 23:32, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
Oh, yes, thanks a lot. I should have thought about that.--Dwaipayan (talk) 23:35, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution

At Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution/archive1, the nominator has been blocked indef for unrelated reasons.

Should this FAC be closed at this point?

On the other hand, though there's no FAC nominator helping shepherd it along at this time, might be helpful to get comments on the present state of the article?

I'm not sure, I'll defer to others' judgment on this one.

Thank you for your time,

— Cirt (talk) 02:03, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I would let it run.--Wehwalt (talk) 02:15, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Armed Forces Special Weapons Project/archive1 not closed from January

Could someone look at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Armed Forces Special Weapons Project/archive1, which seems to have been marked for closure in January, but is the only ended discussion that has not been closed. All subsequent January and February discussions have been closed.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 14:43, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Nancy Mitford/archive1 is still open on the article's talk page, even though the article was promoted on 24 January. Brianboulton (talk) 10:20, 15 February 2014 (UTC)
Both done by hand. DrKiernan (talk) 20:57, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Lead length

Opinions are needed on this matter: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Lead section#Standard lead paragraph length. Flyer22 (talk) 01:55, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

It is now a WP:RfC; see here: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Lead section#RFC on four paragraph lead. Flyer22 (talk) 13:02, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

Inline cites for quotes?

I've been told before that quotations need to be followed immediately by inline cites, even if it means duplicating the next following cite. I've been doing this myself, and have been advising others to do so as well. Now, I can't seem to find the guideline for this. Does it exist? Curly Turkey (gobble) 00:46, 2 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi Curly Turkey, there's nothing like that in WP:CITE, which is where it would be; I wonder if you're getting it mixed up with WP:INTEXT (the need for in-text attribution for quotations). SlimVirgin (talk) 17:12, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

Abusing reviewers

I stopped reviewing articles after the abuse I suffered in April 2013, and now, having returned to reviewing briefly, I see that matters have, if anything, gotten worse since then. Nominators and their friends should not be ganging up on reviewers who oppose. They should not be dismissing opposes as motivated by spite, nor attacking opposers as odd, contemptible, cantankerous or petty. If you disagree with an oppose, then either ignore it or say politely that you are not going to make the proposed change. I don't see why, whenever I mention a minor issue in passing, I get stabbed in the face. DrKiernan (talk) 08:47, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

If you call the reaction to your oppose on E.W. Hornung "being stabbed in the face", you're too delicate for this world. The people there were perfectly polite and told you that the discussion on the move page was perhaps a better venue to make your point. You didn't agree as you have a more absolutist view of that part of the MOS than most and came here in high dudgeon to complain. So your complain is noted, and assessed by me as unreasonable and an excessive reaction in relationship to its cause. You need to learn to tolerate disagreements better, especially when you think that you're right.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 10:11, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
Your final sentence should apply to nominators as well as reviewers. DrKiernan (talk) 11:46, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

Welcome back, DrK, I've missed your fine reviews and articles. On the matter at hand: WP:CONSENSUS is policy. There's an ongoing discussion whether to add the space or not. If anyone does something in another forum which has the effect (however unintended) of nullifying the discussion (by, for instance, asking that the FA star be withheld if the discussion doesn't go their way), that can have the effect of undermining the ongoing attempt to reach consensus, and therefore it undermines policy. Also, FAC is a little more easygoing than it used to be, and I don't personally regard the comments in the Hornung FAC as insulting. - Dank (push to talk) 13:48, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

Another thing: I see neither "E.W." nor "E. W." in the text of the article, so this argument is strictly about page titles (including how page titles appear in, for instance, navboxes). Page titles are a matter of policy (though MOS is also implicated), and FAC reviews haven't generally been the best place to argue questions where policy is involved. I'm hoping everyone will let the current discussion play out however it's going to play out, and take the results in stride. - Dank (push to talk) 14:02, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
Thank you, Dank. I never asked for the star to be withheld if the debate doesn't go "my way" (if indeed there even is such a thing). In fact, your own final comment echoes my own very first comment, which I quote directly, "oppose: if only to hold off promotion while the debate is in progress". That the article will be promoted after the debate is not in doubt. DrKiernan (talk) 14:32, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
Okay, we agree, I think. I missed that because it was in an edit summary, and not in the comments. Looking forward to seeing more of your work. - Dank (push to talk) 15:35, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

When a user seems fit to be creating an unnecessary fight on a infinitesimal minor matter of formatting on a claim that is ridiculous (especially since to space or not to space is an entirely subjective matter where no one is wrong and WP:ENGVAR and WP:RETAIN should prevail over such edit-warring bullshit), your attempt to come to a related FAC to purposefully place an oppose as if to thwart the candidate's promotion just because of a damned space is (a) spiteful (b) pointy, (c) tendentious, and (d) potential battleground mentality. It is entirely and unequivocably unacceptable and contemptible. The fact that you think getting called out for spiteful behaviour is the functional equivalent to getting "stabbed in the face"--aside from being WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT and ridiculous, it's reprehensibly arrogant. That's all I have to say on the matter. --ColonelHenry (talk) 21:13, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

Was that really a better way to go than "Please don't do that"? - Dank (push to talk) 21:32, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
  • Dank, probably. I see DrK and another user consistently abusing other users over minor style bullshit that is not wrong, only not their "preferred" style and going on a pointy harangue to beat them into submission. And seeing this seemingly spiteful oppose posited against an otherwise excellent article for something that isn't wrong in the first place and that was brought to a new battlefield by DrK after he was resoundingly refuted in debate elsewhere is something I will not countenance. Sometimes the fly deserves the hatchet.--ColonelHenry (talk) 22:39, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
I haven't even edited the article, so how can I be edit-warring? As I've said already, this isn't an ENGVAR issue. There's no difference in treatment of spaces between British and American English. DrKiernan (talk) 21:33, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
ColonelHenry, was that really necessary? Perhaps go for a walk before saving any more edits like that. DrK, does it really matter and note the spacing of my initials!? HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:44, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
No. That's my point. Why am I being abused over something so trivial? DrKiernan (talk) 21:47, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
Probably because you opposed, somebody took umbrage, and didn't take a deep breath before they hit 'save'. This is the Internet. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:01, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
You're claiming to be "abused" after you've spent the last few days browbeating someone over an insignificant matter of initials and spaces in an entirely unnecessary debate. You and your meatpuppet friend decided a few days ago to start abusing someone who had a perfectly valid reason for his perfectly acceptable formatting the name of an article--and yet again point out the incongruity of the inconsistent MOS and other perfectly logical policies. So don't try to play the victim with a faux surprise and mimic a Nancy Kerrigan-esque "why me?". You obviously and purposefully followed SchroCat around three different places to abuse him on the matter of initials and spaces. So, I call bullshit. I have never liked editors who try to feign victimhood after someone calls them out for imperiously abusing someone else with the imposition of arbitrary/subjective/no-more-correct-than-the-alternative style minutiae.--ColonelHenry (talk) 22:20, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
@ColonelHenry: while I do think opposing was overbaord, looking at the three discussions, I relly don't see any evidence of browbeating on DrK's part, or that they followed SchroCat around (the "three places", I assume, are the FAC and the two RfCs at Hornung's talk page and the MoS, right? I'm at all three—and I'm supporting the move—but I don't get the feeling I'm the "meatpuppet" you're talking about). I also don't see where DrK was "was resoundingly refuted in debate"—it seems that neither side has budged, and that much of the evidence provided has gone unanalyzed—"consensus" isn't stating your opinion and then running away. Curly Turkey (gobble) 00:07, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
I assure you, Curly Turkey, you're not the meatpuppet--I'm sure you have a good idea who I am referring to (i.e. the bête noire of colossal waste-of-time capitalization and punctuation bickering). This effectively boils down to someone says "style guide A, B, and C" says "this", someone else says "style guide D, E, and F" says "not this", MOS conflicts with other policies, so what...happens all the time. Both sides should just go home and ignore it so it doesn't get in the way of real content creation. The opposition of DrK needs to be struck since it seems vengeful and he should stop trying to play on everyone's credulous simplicity with his bullshit victim act. I don't support the move--as you know I hate subjective short-dicking debates of "is not/is too" over little shit--I'll not use a space and spell out "eleventh" and "twelfth", since it's perfectly acceptable, and the other side should go kick rocks before thinking they have the right forcing me to use a space or use 11th and 12th. So, that's why I'm shouting down DrK.--ColonelHenry (talk) 00:13, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
@ColonelHenry: Well, we've got two issues here: a disagreement, and the manner in which people disagree. The discussion on the disagreement is elsewhere, and the discussion on human interaction is here. I agree that the Dr's oppose was not the right way to go about things, but the reaction to it has been far more personalized and overboard, I think. Nor do I think the issue has been settled. Curly Turkey (gobble) 00:21, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
Perhaps, that's if the issue is ever settled. I'd wager that MOS won't be changed, after much arguing and like the French, British and Germans along the Western Front, there will be little progress in the trenches: there will be no consensus to move the article, no consensus at the MOS discussion to impose one style or the other and less of one to say "either way is acceptable"...then there will be a debate on how to pronounced either--with an 'eye' or an 'ee'....DrK's opposition will be ignored by the FAC masters and the debate gets punted to another article and another unwitting victim within a week just like DrK and his meatpuppet (or is DrK the other user's meatpuppet?) always seem to do. --ColonelHenry (talk) 00:33, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
I want to ensure that a new absurd rule based on a false premise "British English does not use spaces" is not imposed and it seems as though you agree with that desire. But my comments are not approached with a view to collaborative working or potential agreement. Instead, my comments are ridiculed and I'm harangued. DrKiernan (talk) 09:23, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

Non-closure of long-promoted FAC

I left a note here a while back, indicating that the FAC page for Nancy Mitford has been left open since the article was promoted almost 4 weeks ago. All subsequent promotions have been closed, up to the very latest batch. Can some please either (a) close it or (b) tell me what to do and I'll close it myself. Thank you Brianboulton (talk) 20:25, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

I've updated the article history template. DrKiernan (talk) 20:44, 21 February 2014 (UTC)
Prompt, and kind! Thank you very much. Brianboulton (talk) 21:04, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

More problems, alas. God's Man, Profumo affair and Gold dollar have not been closed, even though several articles promoted since these have been. Brianboulton (talk) 23:38, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

I see nothing wrong with them, but I notice you've visited them all in the past while I haven't, so I suspect that you're looking at a cached version. DrKiernan (talk) 07:26, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
They are showing as closed now, but the article histories are not made up. Brianboulton (talk) 23:13, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

Phoenix, AZ archiving

@Ian Rose: Well, that was a relatively discouraging experience. Pretty new to this, and the only reason that I nominated the article was it had been recommended during the peer review process. I was disappointed in the lack of civility and generally un-constructive criticism of the two negative people in FAC, Nikkimaria and ColonelHenry. Don't have to worry about me re-nominating the article, since I doubt I will do so with this, or any other article again. The level of negativity makes me question the entire motivation for the FA nomination process. I would like to thank Dontreadalone, Gareth Griffith-Jones and The Rambling Man for their effort and positive comments.Onel5969 (talk) 03:32, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

@Onel5969: I've read the FAC in question and don't see the same story as you. Nikkimaria, while rather impersonal in her review, and Colonel Henry only pointed out that close paraphrasing is (understandably) the closest thing to an automatic FAC-killer as you can get. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 03:38, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
@The ed17:. I appreciate your viewpoint, but even in your disagreement, you make my point. Thanks.Onel5969 (talk) 03:42, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
I'm genuinely sorry, Onel, but I actually don't understand the point you're trying to make. Were you expecting to receive only positive comments? Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 03:45, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
I'm not sorry, Onel5969, that you had a bad go of it. But when I see one odd line, search it, and find it verbatim in a book published 7 years ago, there's no way that's FA-quality and it's only a harbinger of more problems, often bigger problems. I will not discourage you from contributing to articles and working hard to get them up to FA quality, and I'm usually happy to work with editors who genuinely put in the hard work. But the work on this article is not FA-quality to myself (who has written several FA and GA articles, and reviewed dozens), and then you seem to scoff at being told it was no where close to FA-quality and ought to be withdrawn to come back later when it was improved. Further (1) criticizing me for pointing out blatant plagiarism for happening to second the comments of Nikkimaria (whose judgment and assessment while not to your liking is incredibly fair and in keeping with the FA criteria), and (2) disagreeing with Nikkimaria for objectively providing her critique of an article that has substantive issues and is thus substandard is not going to win you a gold star or a pat on the head. As for civility, I speak honestly without any sugarcoating and really don't care if I hurt your feelings. I'm brutally honest sometimes...I don't tell people what they want to hear, only what is the truth as I see it and as they need to hear it...but I'm always fair. Just like plagiarism is always wrong.--ColonelHenry (talk) 04:21, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
Onel, in other circumstances I might have been less blunt in my assessment, but the fact is at FAC we really cannot and should not be working with extensive and clear problems with paraphrasing. It's unfortunate that those issues and the others mentioned were present and not caught earlier, but it's not the reviewers' fault for pointing them out. If you are able and willing to work past your frustration at the outcome, resolve the listed issues, and make sure the article is free of similar problems, you would likely find your next attempt to be more productive. Nikkimaria (talk) 04:42, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
@Onel5969:: I understand your frustration; many first-time FAC nominators fail to understand just how high the standards are. I nominated my first FAC last August but requested that it be archived after I realized it had a long way to go and that I didn't have the time to make the necessary changes. My second FAC was also archived, even though the other editor (Poeticbent) and I had put a lot of work into the article and had made a good-faith effort to address all concerns that were brought up. But I'm really glad my second FAC was archived, because it gave us the time we needed to make the article the best we possibly could. Thanks to Ian Rose archiving Treblinka extermination camp the first time around, it's now the finest English-language encyclopedia article on the subject in the world. (We'll get around to renominating it when I have time, in May.)
In short, writing FAs isn't for everyone. You have to know your subject matter inside and out, be able to write at a professional level, and be willing to make changes based on reviewer's suggestions. Indeed, as the FAC directions state, "the main thrust of the process is to generate and resolve critical comments in relation to the criteria, and why such resolution is given considerably more weight than declarations of support." When it comes down to it, some people think that the standards are excessively high and the review process is unnecessarily hostile. I don't; I just think that newcomers to the process often come in with certain expectations and are disappointed when their expectations are not met.
Anyway, I hope that even if this experience deters you from nominating articles at FAC, you'll still continue to contribute to Wikipedia; I think you'll find Peer Review and the GA review process to be more to your liking. AmericanLemming (talk) 04:41, 13 March 2014 (UTC)

Featured article length stats

Hey all, I've updated the length stats for featured articles by wikitext and prose size. Barack Obama and Mitt Romney take first and second when sorted by wikitext, while Manhattan Project and Pope Pius XII take those spots when listed by prose size. Hope this is useful! Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 04:42, 16 March 2014 (UTC)

Thanks very much for this tedious but useful work! Johnbod (talk) 13:22, 16 March 2014 (UTC)
I win! I win! Miss Meyers for the win! Ealdgyth - Talk 13:27, 16 March 2014 (UTC)
I'd echo Johnbod's thanks - v. useful. Hchc2009 (talk) 13:34, 16 March 2014 (UTC)

Ref-tag mania

Colleagues, I came across this extraordinary example of stuffing multiple (often repeated) ref-tags after every clause. I used to be aware of this tendency among FACs where nominators/editors were nervous about verifying enough. Needs to be politely resisted with short examples of how to do it efficiently, if you ever come across it. Contentious statements in that example don't seem to abound, either. Tony (talk) 09:21, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

The article is so over-referenced (and virtually uneditable, with 4 cite-webs after every comma) that I suppose anything not referenced to death caused suspicion. I'll keep a link as an example of over-referencing, and inefficient referencing, though. Johnbod (talk) 12:13, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

Left aligned image after heading

The old guideline stating that "left aligned images should not be placed after headings" has been removed from the manual of style.[1] Yet people still make the suggestion in FA and GA reviews, likely because they remember the old version. So this is a heads up, please don't make the suggestion anymore. FunkMonk (talk) 13:55, 25 March 2014 (UTC)

Mirror symmetry (string theory)

Earlier this month, I nominated the article mirror symmetry (string theory) for FA status. At this point, I've gotten one very thorough review by a professional mathematician, but I'm having trouble finding others to review the article. I was wondering if anyone on here could read it through and leave comments. You don't have to be an expert on the subject; in fact, I'd really like to know whether non-experts find the article accessible.

Thanks for your help. Polytope24 (talk) 18:12, 25 March 2014 (UTC)

Suggested shake-up of the nominations system at WP:TFAR

There is a discussion underway at WT:TFAR with several suggestions upon which the views of FA writers and others are welcome, including:

  • Doing away with points for "diversity" (that is, bonus points awarded for articles in FA topic categories with <50 FAs such as mathematics, food and drink, education) since this applies to very few articles at present (just 2), and very few articles come through FAC in these topics
  • Trying to make the process of nomination less complicated by doing away with points altogether (for an experimental period), leaving factors such as recent similar FAs / date relevance to be mentioned in discussion and taken into account on scheduling
  • Moving to a system of nomination subpages using templates such as at DYK, allowing simplification of the instruction process and easy reference to old discussions in archives.

Do come and join in the discussion, and perhaps try out the beta templates to see how they and their instructions could be improved, in case we go down that route. BencherliteTalk 22:50, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

Nonsense page

Someone has created Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Featured article candidates, a pretty awful thing on the same topic as Pather Panchali (novel). I'd have tried CSD A10, but I'm not sure if that works as it's not in article space, and it has links to a couple of useless (but much older) subpages linked to it that might be worth kicking off as well. Would an admin care to take a look? --Stfg (talk) 22:50, 5 April 2014 (UTC)

Further to my earlier message, WP:Today's featured article/requests is using a new system on an experimental basis. Firstly, the old requirement to calculate how many "points" the suggested article had has gone. Secondly, we are using a nomination template based on that used at DYK in the hope that this will make the process easier to complete. If you would like to nominate a featured article that has yet to appear on the main page – whether written by you or by others – please come along to WP:TFAR and give the new system a go. All feedback welcome. Thanks, BencherliteTalk 13:44, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

User:Wadewitz, very sad news

I'm very sorry to say that Adrianne Wadewitz, who was extremely active and productive on FAC for several years as both a reviewer and nominator, has died in a climbing accident. Condolences can be added at User talk:Wadewitz. Johnbod (talk) 14:29, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

Closing FACs

Would it be appropriate to ask here whether an FAC is ready to be promoted, closed, etc. after a certain point? Dan56 (talk) 05:08, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Adrianne

Can we have some comments at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests/Original Stories from Real Life? One of Adrianne Wadewitz's articles is going to run on the main page as "Today's featured article" on either the 14th or 26th, but we have 23 hours to find a consensus date. Thanks, Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 01:41, 13 April 2014 (UTC)

A discussion on WT:TFA highlighted the fact that the policy of "diversifying" the Featured Article of the day (ie attempting to maximise the gap between articles on similar topics) has exhausted the supply of articles on certain subjects. Obviously, TFA will have to relax its policy; but is there something that should be done to increase the diversity of FACs? Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:05, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Access to sources? I'd love to do an article on Lemon meringue pie, but I have no idea where to find appropriate sources (yes, I've looked—don't look so surprised!). I do know where to find sources for my area of "expertise", so, as that's the path of least resistance, I continue to do articles within a narrow field. Curly Turkey (gobble) 00:00, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
Reach out to WikiProjects on underrepresented topics? What are underrepresented topics? J Milburn (talk) 00:55, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
  • According to User:Bencherlite, the underrepresented areas are (with the number of articles that have not yet been TFA given after the category):
  • Awards, decorations and vexillology - none
  • Chemistry and mineralogy - none
  • Computing - none
  • Education - C. R. M. F. Cruttwell and History of Texas A&M University
  • Engineering and technology - none
  • Food and drink - none
  • Geology and geophysics - none
  • Language and linguistics - none
  • Mathematics - none
  • Philosophy and psychology - none
  • Everyone can of course think of the subjects that have much greater representation at TFA - biology, warfare, contemporary media/video games, etc. Dana boomer (talk) 01:56, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
    • Are the projects under the above categories maybe less aware of the FAC process? Is there some way to raise awareness and encourage those projects to push for FAC? Maybe encourage these projects to go through PR or GOCE? Experienced FAers from outside those areas of expertise maybe could offer their services to help bring some of those articles up to snuff? Curly Turkey (gobble) 02:07, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
  • The list is here. It has always been this way and frankly I don't see much changing, unless manic editing individuals in those areas come along. It takes vast amounts of work to build up the "bank" that some projects have done. In fact it has been worse in the past - Art & architecture non-run FAs were often counted on the fingers of one hand, but are currently 17. Johnbod (talk) 02:24, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
  • Although, sometimes, all you need is one devoted editor. Our Indonesia FAs have gone from 18 or so to 40 in the past two years, and our numismatics FAs are essentially all by one editor. It can happen. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 02:48, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
That's what I'm saying - it's all, or mostly, down to a small number of individuals. Milhist people dropping by to "help bring up to snuff" the odd maths article won't make much impact, not that I'm discouraging it. Johnbod (talk) 03:01, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
Maybe best to encourage some good GAs to be taken All the Way as well. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 03:37, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
There's an idea. An awful lot of them just need some polishing, and some editors avoid FAC out of fear or lack of self-confidence, rather than lack of skill. Curly Turkey (gobble) 03:46, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
Johnbod: It could encourage those editors to get more involved in the FAC process. I used to edit randomly until in a PR Nikkimaria mentioned one of my articles might possibly make it through FAC. I had never even considered it until then—didn't know anything about the process, assumed my articles were too obscure anyways, and didn't have nearly the self-confidence. Having gone through the process once gave me self-confidence and totally canged my editing patterns. I'd like to think there's the odd mathematician, philosopher, or vexillographer (?) who just needs the right handholding to set the ball rolling. Curly Turkey (gobble) 03:44, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
Not that I'm volunteering myself (still working on my copyediting software, almost ready to show it off!), but encouragement at the GAN and PR level to consider FAC is the way I would go. - Dank (push to talk) 17:19, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Definition of diversity

I think we should also consider how we define diversity. Besides for the obvious idea of varying the topics of the articles chosen to be featured on the main page, should we also consider trying to get some of our more important articles to be TFA? Clearly the idea of "importance" is subjective, but how about any article that's a level 1, 2, 3 or 4 vital article? Or how about any article with a million or more annual page views?
I understand that such articles are much harder to bring to FA status than articles on more obscure topics, but for that very reason shouldn't we try to encourage people to do so? Such articles are difficult to improve to FA status because of the staggering amount of time needed to find, read, and incorporate a large number of high-quality sources, improve the prose of a 8,000+ or 10,000+ word article, and resolve any possible disputes that come up in the process. I should know, having spent 30-40 hours bringing Treblinka extermination camp up to nearly FA status with another editor, who has put in a similar amount of time, I believe.
Anyway, I think our current initiatives to encourage the improvement of "important" articles are as follows:
1. Wikipedia:Million Award: rewards editors for improving articles with 250,000; 500,000; or 1,000,000 annual page views
2. Wikipedia:The Core Contest: yearly monthlong contest improving vital or core articles

Those are the only two that come to mind off the top of my head. Am I missing any? AmericanLemming (talk) 07:31, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

In the WikiCup (contrary to what some people like to believe) we award very large numbers of points for important articles, and, following an idea first proposed by Casliber, we judge importance based on the number of interwiki links. This generally seems to be a reliable indicator, certainly better than those vital lists and without the inherent problems of page views, and is difficult to game (not that people don't try). Many of last year's finalists were there on the back of highly important articles brought to FA status: sea, Phoenix (constellation), Battle of Hastings, Starfish, Norman conquest of England, Koala and Middle Ages were all from last year's competition (courtesy of Casliber, Ealdgyth, Sasata, Cwmhirarth and others). J Milburn (talk) 16:16, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
The bonus points given by WikiCup were highly successful in getting people to work on high profile articles at the FA level. They also encouraged collaboration, as this allowed the competitors to have two articles at FAC at the same time instead of just one, thereby increasing points and decreasing risk. Relaxing the one-at-a-time rule here might have a similar effect. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:37, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
  • My professional academic focus (rather than my Wikipedia academic focus, which branches considerably more) is Indonesian literature, a field which would fail the criteria put forward by AL and by J. Milburn (how many people do you know, aside from Indonesianists and Indonesians, who can honestly say they've read a book by an Indonesian author?). Even branching out into history, my most "core" FA thusfar (Sudirman, the first leader of the Indonesian military) has 11 interwikis and less than 100 views a day... not quite what would be "core" in these definitions. We simply have to face the fact that some areas of specialty (Indonesia, in this case) are inherently obscure, at least to the general populace... unless we want to jump on the popular bandwagon and expand something like The Raid 2: Berandal (136976 views in the last 30 days; five interwikis), though I shudder to think that a 2014 action flick is more "core" than a general who inspired generations of soldiers or a poet whose works are still read widely almost 70 years after his death. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 16:41, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
I revived the Core Contest and proposed ideas for the wikicup as the rigour of the FA process has made broader articles need much more work to get through - it has had some success at encouraging folks to work on broader articles. I have tried reviving wikiproject collaborations but these have resulted in very little activity in the past few years sadly. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:01, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
There's always a question on whether it is best to work on your field of expertise (where you may be the only editor with expertise in the subject) or to work on an article with broader appeal. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:37, 15 April 2014 (UTC)
I like the idea of the Core Contest; sorry I missed it this year. Broad articles are so difficult because they are really survey articles that need to summarize information on so many different sub-topics. Even if you think you get them all, one review cycle and people will question every editorial decision and every source. I tried working on music several years ago and every practically every edit was disputed. Exhausting. --Spike Wilbury (talk) 22:25, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

FA criteria question: which comes first, comprehensiveness or COI?

Hi, I've got a little dilemma. In RL I am preparing a journal article on the films of Saeroen, in which I argue (among other things) that he wrote Sorga Ka Toedjoe (our article is currently an FA). If this article were to be published, which would have to come first, the FA criteria for comprehensiveness (that is a fairly important piece of information, which is currently not in any sources I've found) or the Wikipedia COI guidelines (i.e. WP:SELFCITE)? There'd be other stuff too, as my emphasis would be on the representations of cities vs. villages in these films (which would also affect the FAs Terang Boelan and Asmara Moerni), but WP:UNDUE could possibly come into play there, particularly as I am unaware of anyone else crazy enough to do a thematic analysis of a film based on a novelisation / advertising material. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 04:16, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

As I see this, if the article is published by a reputable journal, and it is cited in a manner consistent with how all of the other sources are treated, then I don't see any issue with citing a source. At worst, post the changes you'd make to the article(s) on its/their talk page(s) for comments before making them. Imzadi 1979 → 04:31, 6 April 2014 (UTC)
  • Agreed - comprehensiveness trumps COI - FAC is a rigorous process - the material will be taken on its merits and deemed necessary to be included or otherwise. Maybe notify reviewers at the time and allow them to make consensus. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 13:18, 6 April 2014 (UTC)
  • Yes, WP:SELFCITE allows reasonable self-citing, but you should disclose it. So long as the emphasis is not undue, and there are no alternative/contradicting sources that are ignored (usually the problem with this), it should be within the guideline. Johnbod (talk) 13:26, 6 April 2014 (UTC)
  • I've done what Crisco is proposing, at Oregon Trail Memorial half dollar, and will most likely be publishing a second article, both in The Numismatist, which is certainly reputable, this November, on the same subject. Both are research from archival documents. As it was post-FAC, I saw no point in a notice to people. I did plan to speak to Bencherlite before I nommed it for TFA, but given the second article (I have to cut it some), I'll probably hold it for the 90th anniversary in 2016.--Wehwalt (talk) 14:20, 6 April 2014 (UTC)
  • Most of us appear to be in agreement here. As I was hoping would be apparent from my previous comments, I consider a talk page discussion really a worst-case scenario, but honestly you can probably make the edits directly without issue. Imzadi 1979 → 22:05, 6 April 2014 (UTC)
    Thanks everyone. If it gets published, I'll be sure to cite and add a note on the talk page. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 04:02, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Resources

As some of you may know, I have recently gotten some online resources from my local university, at least for the next year. I am willing to do online research in the databases available to me as a George Mason affiliate. Obviously response time will depend on my own schedule and so forth, when I travel, my access to internet is often limited. We'll see how it goes anyway. Email is the best way of doing this I think as it allows me to send documents directly to you.--Wehwalt (talk) 12:54, 12 April 2014 (UTC)

Fantastic, gratz on your appointment. - Dank (push to talk) 14:31, 12 April 2014 (UTC)
Want to offer my databases as well, if anyone needs a check czar ♔ 15:17, 19 April 2014 (UTC)

FACs needing reviews

Is there any way (perhaps using a template?) to attract comments on an FAC with low participation? Also, how many supporters are usually required for an FAC to pass? --Jakob (talk) (Please comment on my editor review.) 22:23, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Hi Jakec, I could use a few comments on my FAC of Caelum, if you have the time. If you are inclined to do a source review (which Ian Rose has requested), it would be awesome. StringTheory11 (t • c) 04:49, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
I'll try to remember to comment on your FAC (since I presume that's why you're asking the question) when I get some extended free time. StringTheory11 (t • c) 04:50, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
In answer to the question of how many supporters are usually required for an FAC to pass, there is no fixed number, just consensus that the article meets the requirements, as adjudged by the delegate. In some cases, it may be very low indeed. The biggest problem with FAC at the present time is the low number of reviews. Hawkeye7 (talk) 06:07, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
@StringTheory11, I'll try to review the sources of the Caelum FAC this afternoon. --Jakob (talk) (Please comment on my editor review.) 11:05, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
Re; above comment (Hawkeye): I don't think that the basic problem is the low number of reviews, or reviewers. The present FAC page contains review comments from about 90 different editors, many of whom are contributing to several candidates. Admittedly, some of these contributions are brief, but the majority are substantial, or are based on previous review work at PR, A-class etc. The problem is more the distribution of reviews; some candidates have detailed attention from multiple reviewers, while others have absolutely none at all – see Money in the Bank (2011), nominated 1 April, not a comment in sight. Reviewers tend naturally to be drawn to articles that interest them or to editors whose work they know and/or admire, which is always likely to leave minority subjects short of attention and, it is apparent, in some cases ignored. Only a change in reviewer habits can deal with this: an increased willingness to engage with articles outside one's comfort zone. Brianboulton (talk) 08:31, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
Agree with this - it is important that articles also be as accessible as possible to those unfamiliar with a topic - reviewing strange topics is good. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 08:39, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
What I would suggest to those lacking reviews is that reviewing is a good way of getting reviews. Bread cast upon the water hopefully will not take many days, and odds are you'll get something out of it. I should add that by "reviewing", I mean substantial and useful feedback.--Wehwalt (talk) 13:08, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
Let me echo Wehwalt; in my experience you reap as you sow. I try to review at least two FACs for everyone that I nominate and balance between those on topics that I'm comfortable with and those with which I'm not. And I'm sure that that gets me reviewers that I might not otherwise have gotten, especially those that aren't knowledgeable with my field. And those are the best kind of reviewers, IMO, as they will catch the jargon and implicit assumptions that reviewers familiar with my topic will understand automatically.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 13:22, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
If you're unwilling to review noms, why should other editors review yours? And I tend to hew to a harder line on reviews than most; if you don't review, you're a leech on the system and don't deserve to reviewed yourself. Newbies, of course, are cut some slack on the issue, but tolerance does end. So if you're uncomfortable reviewing, read through existing reviews and the article itself and see if you understand the points the reviewer was trying to make. And don't forget that there are different types of reviews; some people are fanatics about bibliographic formatting and only review that while others do pictures or prose or whatever. All of these are valuable and you don't have to be a subject matter expert nor review an article in its totality to make a worthwhile contribution to the process.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 13:37, 23 April 2014 (UTC)
@StringTheory11 and Sturmvogel 66: I've made some comments on the Caelum FAC. Hopefully they're helpful. --Jakob (talk) (Please comment on my editor review.) 00:35, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
Those were very good points that you made. Ones, in fact, that I probably wouldn't have thought to check as I tend to assume that sources say what the editor says they said unless it's something about which I know a lot.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 02:13, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
TY Jakob. I'll address your concerns as soon as I get some free time (I have basically no time at least through next Wednesday). StringTheory11 (t • c) 03:05, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
While all the above comments are sort of true, they tend to assume, fairly correctly as things are, that there is a rather fixed pool of FA reviewers. What we really need to do is to expand the pool beyond FA writers and reviewers, especially in the direction of people with subject matter expertise, where our reviewing process is too often weak. I think more FACs should be notified to projects, and in particular the message got across that, especially for those with subject expertise, not every reviewer needs to cover all the MOS or minute prose points. Johnbod (talk) 01:14, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
  • A mix of subject experts and outside views is ideal. My articles tend to lack both—WikiProject Comics folk don't seem interested in contributing FAC reviews at all, and non-experts don't seem much interested in reviewing the kinds of comics articles I write about, either (not that I blame them). I've had a couple of these things archived for lack of reviewers already, and my current FAC seems headed solidly in the same direction. I don't think I've been stingy with contributing reviews myself—I've done at least three that are currently on the page. I also advertise my FACs on WikiProject talk pages. I've learned to accept that articles on boring subjects will have trouble attracting reviewers, just as they have trouble finding people to converse about them ...
    I do have to wonder how many editors have been permanently put off the process, not by the infamous FAC grilling and hairsplitting, but by the dead silence that leads to archive purgatory ... not that I have any proposals for solutions. Curly Turkey (gobble) 06:28, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
I think "reap as you sow" is the operative phrase. There are a few editors who review but rarely if ever nominate, but they are few and far between, and often tend to stick to restricted areas. I review anything that catches my fancy, but I tend to make sure that I include articles nominated by editors who also review my FACs. Jimfbleak - talk to me? 06:36, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
That's the bottom line, I think. I want to advance the process, but I have an interest in the progress of my own articles, including Oliver Bosbyshell, which has an interesting MilHist angle if anyone's game (/commercial).--Wehwalt (talk) 10:53, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
I try to do at least three reviews for every nomination I make. I don't think it should be mandatory, but it would be nice if we could find a way to encourage that as a moral obligation of some sort. --Coemgenus (talk) 12:29, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
@Coemgenus: yeah that's what I try and do too. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 13:52, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
Ditto, at least on average. Plus any VA or close within my fields of study will likely have me looking at it and reviewing.--Wehwalt (talk) 18:47, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
  • I added a review (my first) to the article by Sturmvogel 66, but something's gone awry. My review is showing as a numbered entry in the list of FA nominees. Could someone please fix this!

Singora (talk) 03:00, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

Some TFA statistics that might interest you

How long is the average gap between FA promotion and TFA appearance? What's the quickest it's been done recently? What's the longest wait in the last few months? What percentage of TFAs were promoted within the last 50 days? Why does Bencherlite like statistics, and does it have something to do with all the work that he's avoiding doing? Some of these questions, at least, will be answered for you at this particular TFAR thread, following on from my revamp of WP:TFAREC. And, while you're at TFAR, why not check out the newish nomination procedure? You could also comment on a suggested article or (even better) nominate one yourself, add an article to the pending list or date relevance chart, or think of other ways to improve TFAR. Thanks, BencherliteTalk 00:16, 13 May 2014 (UTC)

Review for FAC

Is there any way to get more reviews for FAC. I nominated Lionel Messi about a week ago and it will be better if it gets more reviews.Abhinav0908 (talk) 08:18, 10 May 2014 (UTC)

I will take a look - sometimes these things take a while. It also helps taking a look at some other folks' too. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 08:30, 10 May 2014 (UTC)
ThanksAbhinav0908 (talk) 08:31, 10 May 2014 (UTC)
Yes: Money in the Bank (2011), which I drew attention to a couple of weeks back, was nominated at FAC on 1 April, and is still waiting for its first comment, six weeks on. Why not help out there, while you await comments on Messi? Brianboulton (talk) 14:12, 12 May 2014 (UTC)
I've commented there, but I understand why others have not. Eric Corbett 00:21, 13 May 2014 (UTC)

Peer Review has broken down

THe bots that control WP:PR have not worked since 30 April. This means that no article nominated for PR since that date appears on the PR page, while articles closed since then remain on the page. Until the matter is sorted out, I advise no further nominations to PR. It would be interesting to know how many nominations have been "lost" in the past 12 days. Brianboulton (talk) 08:54, 13 May 2014 (UTC)

New operator needed for VeblenBot and PeerReviewBot

Please comment at Wikipedia_talk:Good_article_nominations#New_operator_needed_for_VeblenBot_and_PeerReviewBot to keep the conversation in one place.

CBM implemented and ran VeblenBot and PeerReviewBot, but is retiring from Wikipedia. I am in occasional email contact with CBM who wrote:

"It would be a good idea to find a different person to run the bot jobs. With the WMF Tools setup, I can actually just hand them the entire bot as a turnkey, they would not need to re-implement it. If you can find someone, please ask them to email me (and you email me) and I will be able to communicate with them that way."

VeblenBot updates Peer Review, Good Article Nominations, Featured List Candidates, and Featured Article Candidates, (see here) so I am asking at all those places. I already asked at Wikipedia:Bot owners' noticeboard, but got no responses there.

If you are interested in taking over these bots please reply here. They are usually pretty trouble free. My email and CBM's email are both enabled.

I do the monthly PR bot maintenance (making the files and categories) and that includes adding the new PR category each month on the VeblenBot account - I would be glad to keep doing that (and give details on email).

Thanks, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 22:39, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

Would it make sense for the delegates to run it? czar ♔ 05:06, 2 May 2014 (UTC)
It would, but I wouldn't know how to fix it if there were a bug. We need someone who understands the script. Graham Colm (talk) 15:02, 2 May 2014 (UTC)
I can do it for you, unless they require the admin bits to run. They are written in Perl, which I use for bots here. Hawkeye7 (talk) 00:30, 10 May 2014 (UTC)
Thanks so much Hawkeye7! Please email me and CBM (both of our emails are enabled). As I noted, I am glad to keep doing the monthly maintenance for Peer Review. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 16:39, 11 May 2014 (UTC)
Both bots are not working - CBM has been notified, just waiting to hear back. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 11:29, 14 May 2014 (UTC)

Close FACs

I'd like to ask whether an FAC is ready to be promoted, closed, etc, Ian Rose, GrahamColm? Dan56 (talk) 10:05, 14 May 2014 (UTC)

Reviewer summary tool

What job is the tool (on the left) supposed to be doing? It used to produce a list of editors active on the page, now it produces nothing useful that I can see. Brianboulton (talk) 11:40, 22 May 2014 (UTC)

Notification of a TFA nomination

In the past, there have been requests that discussions about potentially controversial TFAs are brought to the attention of more than just those who have WP:TFAR on their watchlist. With that in mind: Fuck: Word Taboo and Protecting Our First Amendment Liberties has been nominated for an appearance as Today's Featured Article. If you have any views, please comment at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests. Thank you. — Cirt (talk) 22:11, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Drive-by nomination

Please see my concerns at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Saturday Night Live/archive1.

The same nominator StewdioMACK (talk · contribs) also nominated the article G.I. Jeff for GA candidacy with zero contributions to that article.

Thank you,

— Cirt (talk) 16:24, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

Has been withdrawn by nominator. GermanJoe (talk) 01:30, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

VoxelBot

...continues to be a bloody pain in the arse. It hasn't run for over a week (possibly longer). We need a reliable script to keep the FAC process running smoothly. It seems that Voxelbot is not fit for the task, when it does run, it often attributes closure to the wrong coordinator and, even more often, does not update the articles' history. Manual closing takes an age and I do not have the time to do it. Suggestions please. Graham Colm (talk) 22:59, 29 March 2014 (UTC)

Groveling to GimmeTrow to bring back GimmeBot would be the best solution. That bot not only properly handled closing FACs/FARs plus FLCs/FLRs, it also consolidated DYKs, PRs, GANs, etc into the Article history template on a regular basis. Sadly, he was run away by people and the bot was shut down when he left.
VoxelBot only handled a small portion of GimmeBot's tasks, and if someone could just fix the bot to run reliably, we wouldn't have these issues. Imzadi 1979 → 23:34, 29 March 2014 (UTC)
Let's get grovelling; you don't know what you've got til it's gone. Graham Colm (talk) 23:56, 29 March 2014 (UTC)
In the interim, maybe FAC needs a clerk or two to manually update a closed nomination until a bot is reliably handling the function. Since we don't have a FA director anymore, I would assume that the coordinators as a committee (and this probably goes for all of them: FAC, FAR. and TFA) would have to discuss appointing any clerks. Imzadi 1979 → 00:09, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
How about WP:BOTREQ?--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 06:00, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

Note: Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Legobot 36 has now been filed, for FAC only so far. --Rschen7754 19:28, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

As I think I've asked before, is there any reason why we can't do this until the new bot goes through? VoxelBot seems to have completely given up. If no-one has any objections, (and prompted by entirely selfish reasons as one of my FACs has just gone through!) I'll see if I can do the closures for at least the April ones. If anyone does object, feel free to shout at me. Sarastro1 (talk) 19:29, 5 April 2014 (UTC)
No objections, but be sure to follow the instructions at User:Maralia/FA bot. --Rschen7754 19:43, 5 April 2014 (UTC)
That's what I'm using; I'd be grateful if someone could check my working! Also, I'm going on the idea that the article becomes an FA when it is added to the FAC log page, and this is the time I'm using on the FAC page. I think VoxelBot used something else. Sarastro1 (talk) 20:07, 5 April 2014 (UTC)
Unless I've messed anything up, April should now be up-to-date. My eyes have started to bleed, so I'll try to do March tomorrow. It's tedious rather than difficult, so it's not too much of a problem while we are bot-less. Sarastro1 (talk) 21:07, 5 April 2014 (UTC)
Tks for your efforts, Sarastro -- proof positive of the virtue of selfishness... ;-) I checked most of 'em and they look okay to me (although how the peer review for Bobby Peel ended up in Imogen Holst's article history is anyone's guess -- I sorted it). Re. 'closing time', personally I've always considered an article as promoted when the delegate/coordinator adds the closing template to the FAC page but both Gimmebot and Voxelbot seemed to use the time the FAC page was added to the month's Featured Log, so what you did follows that rule. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 23:29, 5 April 2014 (UTC)
Historically, it was adding the article to WP:FA that caused it to be a featured article; we don't have to abide by that if we don't want to, but that's the old rule. The logs and so on were regarded as book-keeping. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:14, 6 April 2014 (UTC)
Just to keep people updated, I've now done all the promoted articles from March and April, which should make us up-to-date. There are still several archived nominations from March to do, which I'll tackle tomorrow (unless anyone else desperately wants to do them before that!). As I'm far from fallible, I'd again be grateful if someone could check I've not done anything embarrassing like add the wrong links through careless copying and pasting. Mike Christie: If I remember correctly, the articles became FAs officially when added to the WP:FA, but the link on the closed FAC page always went to the promoted/archived log; the only thing I'm not sure about is the date that the bot gave on the closed FAC. I've gone for the same date as it was added to the log, but perhaps it should be the date it went onto WP:FA. But VoxelBot did something quite random, so I don't suppose it matters (and I've no intention of going back and changing anything now!). Sarastro1 (talk) 22:03, 6 April 2014 (UTC)
On a related note, the article history is quite a pain to sort out, and as I think a few people have mentioned before, it would be useful if a few regulars could make sure the article histories are OK when they get to FAC. Sarastro1 (talk) 22:03, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

We are now up to date. Sarastro1 (talk) 19:23, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

A million thanks for doing all that tedious work. It is much appreciated. Graham Colm (talk) 20:06, 7 April 2014 (UTC)
The bot request is still going through, and seems to have stalled slightly, although I've no idea how these things usually work. Legoktm has written the code, and it seems to be working so far, but it is undergoing a trial. With this in mind, I have not been doing anything manually to allow the bot to do its thing; doing it manually at the moment would just slow down the trial. Sarastro1 (talk) 21:11, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
I know it's been almost two weeks for some bots to update promoted FACs. Any update, Legoktm? czar ♔ 04:52, 1 May 2014 (UTC)
Well, FWIW, my most recent FAC was closed by Ian two weeks ago and the bot still has not run. Montanabw(talk) 07:49, 3 May 2014 (UTC)
Actually, LegoBot has started working on them; the only issue I've spotted so far is that the closure time is out of whack but I've left a message on the bot talk page. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 08:01, 3 May 2014 (UTC)

Bots closing FACs etc

Following the Voxelbot thread above, I think we still need to keep an eye on this issue. As a couple of people mention above, there are multiple non-closed FACs from April and nothing has happened in May. The bot request for approval has basically been stale for a month. I stopped manually closing these because the request for approval wanted 50 trial edits and the bot couldn't run if the FACs were closed. I've no idea how many trial edits have been done, but we are getting into the same situation we were in previously with something of a backlog and nothing happening. I pinged Legoktm a couple of times, but he has not yet replied. Any suggestions? It looks a bit unprofessional again and I'm inclined to wonder if we should do another manual run and take it from there. Sarastro1 (talk) 19:48, 14 May 2014 (UTC)

Is there any update to this issue @Sarastro1:? Many articles still lag the article history and if we have to undertake manual intervention, it has to be now. Otherwise this list will become pretty big. —Indian:BIO · [ ChitChat ] 12:30, 22 May 2014 (UTC)
Replied in the thread above. Sarastro1 (talk) 19:39, 22 May 2014 (UTC)

Editwarring on Megadeth FAC

Can someone please do something about Eric Corbett editwarring over ENGVAR issues at Megadeth? Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 21:38, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

... or perhaps do something to educate Curly Turkey about the correct use of English? I realise that he's an American, but that's really no excuse. Eric Corbett 21:41, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Your superpowers are failing you here, Eric, Curly's right, hospital takes "the" or "a" in all uses in AmEng (to the point where the British usage is almost unknown), and the article seems to be in AmEng. (Having said that, I care less about the AmEng/BritEng/CanEng/AusEng divide than some ... hopefully some day soon people will at least have some familiarity with all those varieties. The division has always seemed an artificial one to me, mostly for the benefit of publishers, politicians and the entertainment industry ... if I'm not being redundant :) - Dank (push to talk) 21:45, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

As so often you're talking bollocks Dank. But so be it. Eric Corbett 21:47, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
The phrase "admitted to hospital" simply does not exist in American English. "Admitted to a hospital" is fine. —Designate (talk) 21:48, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
That at least has the virtue of recognising that there is more than one hospital in America, which the does not. Eric Corbett 21:51, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
I note that Dank has now modified his comment to make himself appear right. I rest my case. Eric Corbett 21:56, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
I said "the", and just changed it to "a or the" ... the point remains that the British usage of leaving off both, which you were edit-warring to restore, is almost unknown in AmEng, which you can find in any style guide or through a gsearch. And there's a subtle distinction in AmEng between "took him to a hospital" and "took him to the hospital" ... in some cases, the second is better. It's English; it's not supposed to make sense. - Dank (push to talk) 22:04, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Why are you accusing me of edit warring in trying once again, obviously mistakenly to try and improve this article's prose? Was Curly Turkey not also edit warring in his misunderstanding of the distinction between the definite and indefinite articles? Or is he a fellow admin, which I suppose might go some way to explaining your support for him and your ridicule of me. Eric Corbett 22:19, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Cute spin—you weren't adding an indefinite article, you were removing the article entirely. I already provided you with this link, which you apparently didn't bother to consult. The first page of results shows this book, which not only expalins the distinction between AmEng and BrEng usage, but also explains the difference in nuance between "the hospital" (for medical purposes) and "a hospital" ("going for some other reason than to receive medical care) in AmEng. Thus, Jakec, while I appreciate yu r attempt to help, "a hosptial" is incorrect AmEng in this case. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 22:32, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Unless you believe that there is only only hospital in America then the language was at best misleading. You claim to understand AmEnglish, but you chose not to correct the for a and instead start an edit war. That says all that needs to be said. Eric Corbett 22:43, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Your issue is with American English, not with me. I'm not the only one telling you this—your edit was incorrect AmEng, and that says all that needs to be said. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 22:45, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
AmEnglish does use either "a" or "the" before "hospital". It is incorrect to not have one or the other (I lean "a" but if the hospital is named somewhere, "the" works also.) Likewise "holiday" - Yanks never say "he went on holiday" - it's "he went on a holiday" (if they even use the word holiday - they are much more likely to say "he went on vacation"). Ealdgyth - Talk 22:08, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Ealdgyth there's a difference between "a hospital" and "the hospital" in AmEng, as explained above, but you seem to have misunderstood—Eric wasn't changing the definite article to the indefinite, he was dropping the article entirely, which is unacceptable AmEng. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 22:32, 27 May 2014 (UTC) Sorry , I misread. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 22:34, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Then why didn't you simply replace "the" with "a"? I made my objection to "the" very clear, but you chose to ignore it and begin an edit war. Eric Corbett 22:38, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
I've already provided you with a link to a book that explains why "a hospital" is incorrect AmEng in this context. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 22:50, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
(edit conflict) But why not "he went on a vacation"? Doesn't seem consistent. Anyway, so long as the article doesn't say "the hospital" I'm content. Eric Corbett 22:13, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
I never said it was consistent. It just "is". I'm just glad we managed to avoid all those useless "u"s cluttering up our words...Ealdgyth - Talk 22:16, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
It was a missed opportunity. Not to even mention aluminum... --John (talk) 22:18, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
I will never be converted to those inelegant "z"'s in words such as realized though, the overall shape is just wrong. Eric Corbett 22:24, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Although, most of the time, that 'z' isn't an Americanism. --John (talk) 22:41, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
  • Yeah, AmEng usage is weird but that's the truth of it. They never say "went to hospital", it's always "the" or "a". --John (talk) 22:09, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
    I'm quite happy with "a hospital", even though that seems like one unnecessary word to me, I was complaining about "the hospital", which implies that there is only one hospital in America. I've also been thinking about that comment of Ealdgyth's about unnecessary "u"s, and I'm tending to think that the extranious vowel is actually the "o", not the "u". When I say favour for instance, it actually sounds more like favur rather than favor. But that just might be my quaint English accent of course. Eric Corbett 22:34, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
    It's a harmless idiomatic phrasing like "to the toilet" or "to the doctor" or "to the zoo" or "to the gym", all of which exist in British English. You're singling this one expression out just because it's regional. —Designate (talk) 22:48, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
    I won't be commenting here again or on the review page, and my oppose will stand until I see a substantial improvement in the prose. Eric Corbett 00:37, 28 May 2014 (UTC)

Winter

There's a discussion at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Kronan (ship)/archive1 on "winter". John has made the perfectly reasonable point that if all a source can tell us is that something happened in winter, then that sometimes means that more accurate sources may be available. Names of seasons aren't reliable; some sources use a season name when they don't really know when something happened, and season names are regularly hijacked to mean whatever local custom says they mean ... "spring offensives" happen at wildly different times in different locations, and "spring semesters" are mostly in the (calendrical) winter. So the main question is: if an article at FAC says something happened during some season, and the nominator says they don't know anything more specific, when should we ask for better sources? A complication is that, although the relevant section at WP:MOS is silent on this point, WP:MOSNUM isn't silent ... but the logic there is self-contradictory (it happens, it's just a guideline). When disputes about MOSNUM (at WP:SEASON) come up, writers at MilHist typically either give the month instead, or rely on the "escape clause" in the guideline: "Reference to seasons may be appropriate when related to the point being made (the autumn harvest; migration typically begins in mid-spring)." So we don't generally have disagreements at A-class over this, but we sometimes do at FAC, and some discussion on this point would be helpful. - Dank (push to talk) 12:41, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Pre-industrial logging was generally done during winter. It's was easier to transport large timbers on snow sleds than dragging them through a summer forest. "Spring semester" and "spring offensive" is fine and all, but this is very obviously plain old seasonal winter, which just about anyone would know occurs approximately December through February. What kind of reader would be able to make it through a fairly advanced article on a 17th century Swedish warship but still not grasp northern hemisphere seasons?
Questioning Lundgren (1997) over an MoS-disagreement seems wholly irrelevant, btw. Even if there is actually a more specific record of when the first logging season for the timbers of a specific began, how is this in any way relevant in Wikipedia article? To me, "winter of 1664-65" seems no more problematic than "autumn harvest of 1668".
Peter Isotalo 15:37, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
I know. Why even be that precise. Why not just say "a long time ago"? It doesn't really matter, does it? --John (talk) 16:36, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
In India and most of Africa, where a majority of the English speakers of the world live, there are no seasons. There may be a dry season and a wet season, but these are different from place to place. Saying the summer of 1608 is not just lazy and ambiguous writing, it may also place a barrier to understanding between you and the reader. Why would you wish to do that? Would you accept an Indian writer saying the dry season of 1408? The situation is no different. --John (talk) 12:40, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
It would depend (as MoS makes clear) whether it was something like a harvest or a miltary campaign where the season makes a difference, or just as a lazy and half-assed way of talking about when something happened. The former is ok if the sources support it and proper explanation can be made. The latter never is. --John (talk) 13:01, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
No, I have no problems with an article about India assigning something to the dry season. It's just as relevant as winter being the logging season. You're welcome to call Lundgren (and myself) "lazy and half-assed", but that's as specific as we're gonna get. Let me know if you have more specific sources. I see nothing actionable here, though.
Peter Isotalo 17:13, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Mmm. Well, we know your opinion now. What do others think? Bearing in mind that SEASON is part of MoS, and MoS compliance is one of the FA criteria. --John (talk) 17:36, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
My opinion, for what it's worth, is that if specifying winter or any other season is in some way important then it might be helpful to say why it's important. For instance, if logging starts after the first snowfalls of the year then it would be easy to clarify that along the lines of "after the first snowfalls of winter". Eric Corbett 17:51, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Logging is infinitely easier in winter when the climate allows that. Most logging of big trees was done then in the past, if possible, because it was much easier to move the large logs over the ground. This especially applies to things like ship masts. (I know this because my father was deeply interested in logging railroads of North America. I've probably been to more logging camp museums than any female should ever have to be exposed to...) The MOS allows exceptions - including when the sources state things just with a season. Ealdgyth - Talk 17:53, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Not every country has snow in the winter though, even here in England we rather rarely do. Hence my suggestion to explain why winter is significant. Eric Corbett 18:14, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Here's an attempt at explaining with a note.[2]
Peter Isotalo 18:34, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
I think you need to say why it was easier, because of the snow. Eric Corbett 18:39, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
It also needs a source, as does the mention you sneaked back in of diving being a summer activity. If it's important enough to mention, it should be easy to find a source without getting into OR territory. --John (talk) 19:08, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Lundgren is still the source.
Peter Isotalo 19:42, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
You know, like an actual footnote, a link, or page numbers in a book. --John (talk) 22:01, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
Lundgren is the source, as specified in the following sentence.
Peter Isotalo 04:31, 28 May 2014 (UTC)

Comments appreciated

I feel that the discussion between myself and John at the Kronan FAC isn't really getting anywhere. I would greatly appreciate comments from uninvolved parties to get it back on a more positive track.

Peter Isotalo 14:43, 28 May 2014 (UTC)

A suggestion has been made at WT:TFA that the blurb links to a featured topic if the TFA is part of one. By bizarre coincidence, I used a Maya Angelou blurb as an example on the day before she died... I'm planning to reshuffle the scheduled queue to include a Maya Angelou TFA (probably her last autobiography) in the next few days, so there's a chance to include a featured topic link in the blurb. If you have views, please comment there, not here. BencherliteTalk 08:43, 29 May 2014 (UTC)

A question

Hi. I wanted to ask the coordinators of the project, is it feasible if a nomination fails the FA candidature, to attain A-class status (if all the parties involved in the discussion agree with that)?--Вик Ретлхед (talk) 10:06, 30 May 2014 (UTC)

  • A-class status is agreed upon by the related Wikiproject, if they have an A-class review. WikiProject Biography does not seem to have one, AFAIK. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 10:08, 30 May 2014 (UTC)

URAA, Commons, and FAC

Pinging Nikkimaria and German Joe (please ping any other people who often do image reviews).

Recently, Commons decided that "URAA cannot be used as the sole reason for deletion. Deleted files can be restored after a discussion in COM:UDR. Potentially URAA-affected files should be tagged with {{Not-PD-US-URAA}}." (see Commons:URAA-restored copyrights). This is, in effect, saying that images which are free in their home country but possibly not free in the US can be accepted on Commons, and several images deleted for URAA reasons have been restored (example). Admittedly, Commons is still debating how to integrate this decision into their policies and guidelines, but since we may end up seeing nominators with images like this in FACs soon, we should decide if we will accept images tagged with {{Not-PD-US-URAA}} as free enough for FAs. I don't want this to end up taking over some pour soul's FAC, so we should discuss this here. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 13:24, 30 May 2014 (UTC)

Since en.wp has required that images uploaded locally be free in the US (not necessarily in source country), has there been any discussion here about whether a similar change should be made to our policies? Nikkimaria (talk) 13:53, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
  • I am unaware of any discussions. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 13:55, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
    • en.wp has not required that images uploaded locally be free in the US per WP:NFCC. I think we should conform to Commons, but there will probably need to be another discussion in a wider forum. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:33, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
      • Agree, but we might need a temporary stop-gap. What if, say, Ian's next biography has an Australian image from 1951 that he's claiming as PD-Aus / Not-PD-US-URAA We shouldn't force the article to wait for what would no doubtedly be a long and contentious RFC. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 23:54, 30 May 2014 (UTC)
        • WP:CONEXCEPT means that decisions taken on Commons are exempt from discussion here, so if the image in question is on Commons then we must accept it as it cannot be challenged at e.wp and FAC. On the other hand, if it on en.wp, then we can agree to accept it at FAC, but it would still be liable to be deleted at WP:FfD. FAC requires that an article has images and other media, where appropriate, so if its images get deleted then it will fail FAC. Hawkeye7 (talk) 06:44, 31 May 2014 (UTC)
          • The last sentence of WP:CONEXCEPT gives me pause: it is "a reminder that the decisions taken under this project apply only to the workings of the self-governing community of English Wikipedia". That suggests to me that decisions made on Commons need not necessarily apply to the English Wikipedia, as in corollary decisions taken under the Commons project would apply only to the workings of the self-governing Commons community. If the English Wikipedia community refuses to accept images which are a violation of the URAA, that just means they won't allow them to be used on Wikipedia; they can stay on Commons without a problem. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 09:20, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

New bot tagging erroneously

this edit suggests that the bot thinks when an article fails at FAC it loses its GA status. Is there a new bot task in town?--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 23:48, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Note that I have also commented at User_talk:Legobot#FFAC_should_not_replace_GA_status.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 05:13, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Bot completely down?

As far as I can tell, there has been no archiving since May 26.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:57, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

The bot is still in development, and is waiting for replies at a request for approval (see various threads above!). As such, it is only running intermittently when the operator is testing it. I have manually closed the remaining promoted and archived FACs from May, and if nothing happens in a few days, I'll do some of the June ones. Sarastro1 (talk) 08:39, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

WP:TFASTATS

Since Tbhotch stopped editing in mid-March 2014, the TFA stats page has not been updated for TFA page views in March, April or May. Does anyone feel like taking this task on, working from the list of 2014 TFAs at WP:TFAREC? BencherliteTalk 17:19, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Additional views sought on some sources at Reculver

Hello all. At the FAC archive for Reculver, a small settlement in Kent, I have raised a question about the way in which the WP article in question relies upon the transcriptions and descriptions made by The National Archives about documents that they hold. I have a concern that these may represent use of a primary source and/or WP:OR, but I am interested in other views. The nom is being very helpful with the discussion, but we could use one or two extra sets of eyes. Anyone available? hamiltonstone (talk) 10:55, 14 June 2014 (UTC)

What to do when FAC nominator retires?

So Me5000 has suddenly retired in the middle of the FAC for Napoleon Dynamite (TV series). It's a shame—there are still some issues with the article, but I think they're all fixable. Is there a better solution than simply archiving it? Can FACs be adopted? I'd hate to see the reviewers' time go to waste. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 00:09, 17 June 2014 (UTC)

Of course he may return as suddenly, but while he has the retired sign up, I see no harm in an adoption. I vaguely remember precedents. Johnbod (talk) 00:12, 17 June 2014 (UTC)

When are short sentences too short

Right, cervix is undergoing alot of editing and heading towards FAC - Jmh649 and I are having a difference of opinion over prose - see here. Essentially I would say that these two pairs of sentences are too short to flow smoothly whereas he says they should be as short as possible. Opinions invited...if anyone wants to offer opinions on the rest of the article that's fine/great/appreciated but its a looooong page....Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:27, 17 June 2014 (UTC)

The lead should be written in simple English. This requires using short sentences and simpler words. The body of the text can be more written with more complicated language. We need to keep in mind our readers and that many of our readers do not speak English as a first language. Our primary goal is not to write brilliantly sounding prose that appeals to the very well educated. They already have excellent access to high quality medical content / advice. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 20:33, 17 June 2014 (UTC)
Errr, can we keep discussion in one place? I'll drop a note at WT:MED too Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:56, 17 June 2014 (UTC)

An article in limbo

I have left this article for FA review for over week ago and it has not raised any comments or questions. This is my first FA candidate and I'm asking that is it common that an article remains unattended in the review? Is the article uninteresting, aren't there any similar articles to benchmark or what could be the reason? --Gwafton (talk) 21:37, 17 June 2014 (UTC)

  • Unfortunately, this kind of thing does happen—the reviewers are volunteers, after all. I notice the article doesn't have the Good Article icon. Though not a requirement, most FAs do go through the GA process before FAC. If this is your first attempt at FA, I strongly recommend you do this first. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 22:59, 17 June 2014 (UTC)
    The article in its present condition wouldn't have a chance at GAN, it needs an awful of work. Eric Corbett 01:54, 18 June 2014 (UTC)
    What does an awful of work mean precisely? You already went it through once, thank you for that, but what else does it need? If the problem is related to grammar or spelling, any help is welcome. English is not my native language as you probably saw in the text. But if the content is missing some element or has to be restructured, I can do that myself. --Gwafton (talk) 05:41, 18 June 2014 (UTC)
    He meant "an awful lot of work" (an idiomatic expression that just means "a lot of work", not that it's awful). Rather than trying to get FAC reviewers to look at it, I'd bring it to WP:GAN and WP:GOCE (for copyediting), and then maybe bring it back to FAC. That would give reviewers more confidence that the article might be at FA quality (and thus worth the time and energy to review it). Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 05:51, 18 June 2014 (UTC)
    I just fixed a few bits and pieces to give you an idea of what I'm talking about Gwafton. I don't think this article has any chance at all of meeting FA criterion 1a, so I'd seriously suggest withdrawing its nomination and taking it to WP:GOCE, as Curly Turkey suggests. I know that's not what you want to hear, but I'm afraid it's the reality. Eric Corbett 09:34, 18 June 2014 (UTC)
    Thank you for your feedback, I made the changes you suggested before. I didn't know that it was so terrible (as I didn't get any feedback before). I hope that the links to the article about municipalities and foreign currency reserves are enough to explain the context – I would not like to explain more about them in the article, as they don't really belong into its scope. You are welcome to still improve the article and give suggestions. At least it would be useful to know which parts are incomprehensible. --Gwafton (talk) 17:17, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

Untranscluded FAC

See Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Advance Australia Fair/archive1. Should probably just be deleted as it's obviously not going to come close to passing FAC, but I wasn't sure if there was some other way it should be dealt with. Cheers, Jenks24 (talk) 14:22, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Thanks - I usually spot these. I have deleted the page. Graham Colm (talk) 15:06, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Not Closed

When I read Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Featured log/June 2014 most of the noms are not closed and the articles are not FAs. Why is this? wirenote (talk) 02:23, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

The closures used to be handled by a bot, which has been down for a while now. From previous discussions, I gather that a replacement bot is being worked on, but isn't ready yet. Until it is, all the closures have to be done manually, a tedious task that doesn't have a lot of volunteers. --RL0919 (talk) 15:28, 24 June 2014 (UTC)
What's required to do the closure manually? I'd volunteer do it for, say, a month. —Designate (talk) 17:20, 24 June 2014 (UTC)
I think it's updating the ArticleHistory, adding the FA star, and closing the FA nom, judging from the last closure by the bot. wirenote (talk) 17:36, 24 June 2014 (UTC)
See User:Maralia/FA bot for instructions. BencherliteTalk 17:59, 24 June 2014 (UTC)
I'll do them tomorrow if nobody objects. —Designate (talk) 22:43, 24 June 2014 (UTC)
If anybody objects, they can do it instead... Thanks very much for the offer. I've done a few and it's not exciting work but I imagine it gets easier with familiarity. BencherliteTalk 23:03, 24 June 2014 (UTC)
Sorry guys, already got to the ones on the Featured Content page at least (had a bit of free time today). I think I'm finally getting the hang of them... :) Ruby 2010/2013 02:50, 25 June 2014 (UTC)
All help manually closing FACs using the instructions Bencherlite linked above is very much appreciated, thanks. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 12:49, 25 June 2014 (UTC)

Looking for a collaborator on radiocarbon dating

Is anyone interested in working with me to bring radiocarbon dating up to FA standard? It's a fairly important topic in the sciences, and gets over 1,000 hits a day. I've been working on it in bursts over the last year, and have completed a first draft rewrite and expansion of the article, though I plan to do a copyedit pass on what I've done so far before going any further. It is now far too long, and will need to be reduced via summary style -- I would like some help figuring out what should be moved to sub-articles. I have never worked on science articles before, and would like assistance from someone who has more experience; although I do have some science background, all my FAs have been in the humanities. I know a professional archaeologist willing to review the article as a subject matter expert, when the article is ready for that, but I don't want to do that till I think the article is ready to be nominated -- I think more work is needed, and probably a peer review is necessary, before it is close to being FAC-ready.

I would love to have collaborators on this -- it's easily the biggest topic I've ever tackled. If you're interested, please comment at the article talk page, or my talk page. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:01, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

That's an impressive amount of work! You are right, it needs trimming, and some of the detailed calculations are probably a step too far. Although I have a scientific background, I'm not a radiation expert, and in any case RL events mean that I won't have the time. I'll be happy to take a look when you are ready for PR though. Good luck Jimfbleak - talk to me? 06:32, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

Uncertain on how to proceed with FAC

Currently, I have an FAC open for The FP, but complications have come up. When the review had just caught fire and received four support votes, my request for a copy-edit from the wonderful Guild of Copy Editors was answered, and Baffle gab1978 did an extensive (and excellent) copy-edit on the article. That said, many of the user's comments may now be voided. I'm wondering, do these comments and votes still count now that the article has been significantly rewritten? My common sense tells me "no they don't, stupid", and that I'll probably have to wait until the reviewers either a) come back and look through the article again or b) don't come back and review again, and makes their votes null. I don't really know FAC policy that well (this is my first experience with the process), so I'm spitballing. Anybody willing to help clear this up for me? Thank you in advance! Corvoe (speak to me) 14:53, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

  • So in the case that they don't respond, do there votes still count? I think that's what you're saying, but I could be wrong. And don't worry, I'm going to get in contact with them if I can. Corvoe (speak to me) 14:58, 30 June 2014 (UTC)
Remember they are not votes. As Crisco said it is better if the "voters" revise their comments to make it clearer but if subsequent comments feel that the copy-edit has addressed most of the issues no decent reviewer is going to stand by criticisms that no longer apply. Just make it clear which issues the copy-edit has fixed. Betty Logan (talk) 15:04, 30 June 2014 (UTC)
All of the reviewers' comments had been addressed and they had supported the article's promotion is what I meant. I guess I shouldn't keep referring to them as votes, my mistake. But I see what you're saying now. I've notified all of the editors on their respective talk pages, so I'm sure I'll hear back from everyone soon enough. Thank you Betty and Crisco! Corvoe (speak to me) 15:18, 30 June 2014 (UTC)
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