Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Good articles/Project quality task force/Archive 2

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Archive 1 Archive 2

Proposals

Standardization

  1. Good article review is confusing considering that WP:GAC reviews are frequently referred to as GA reviews. It's my understanding that Good article review was once Good article disputes. I propose changing back to this, considering that's really what GA/R is.
    1. I also propose retaining the current shortcuts, but not advertising them on the page. Instead taking the shortcuts from Good article delisting, which is inactive.
    2. Lastly, I believe the GA/R process should more closely resemble that of WP:FAR.
  2. There have been concerns raised about the confusion between GAC and GAN. It is not necessary that we have two common terms; "candidates" and "nominees". For project consistency, this should be simplified. It is, apparently, particularly confusing for editors attempting to update {{ArticleHistory}}.
    1. I also propose changing {{GAnominee}} to {{GACandidate}}.
  3. The subcategories at WP:GA and WP:GAC should be identical. I propose we discuss and determine which page has "the best list" and change the other page to match. Or creating a new list altogether. This would be best determined before the mass re-reviews, as subcategorization can be taken care of during that process. Done
    Lara♥Love 06:36, 9 August 2007 (UTC) *Please see discussion below.*

Discussion

Good Article Review -> Good Article Disputes

  • On the Good Article Review-> Good Article Disputes move; I generally support it; however I disagree that it should resemble the FAR page... Articles that are unbeurocratically promoted should be able to be unbeurocratically delisted. The process works fine, but the name of the process is a bit confusing. FAR is a long slow process and mimicing it is not in keeping with the GA spirit. --Jayron32|talk|contribs 07:04, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
    • I was thinking of something different and forgot to expand... which I thought I did. Must have back-paged without saving and forgot. I was thinking that, like FAR, there would be two separate lists. The first to see if an article is even worthy of review. If so, then it would be moved to the other list, like FARC. So it would be procedure to just speedy delist those which should have been boldly delisted to begin with. However, it occurred to me that once this mass re-review is complete, this shouldn't be much of an issue. Therefore, I have stricken it. Lara♥Love 07:17, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
  • I don't think it makes a huge difference, really...for as long as the old link (WP:GA/R) is still active, I'm not bothered, so support. Giggy Talk 07:14, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
  • I prefer the current name, but if it is changed back might I suggest it be Disputed Good Articles instead? Tarret 16:51, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Well, I do support such a page move, i've seen people get confused more than once over the terminology involving the initial review vs. a GA/R, and no matter how many notifications there seem to be in comments or anywhere else, there still seem to be accidental GA/R nominations popping up from time to time. Homestarmy 22:47, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
    • I have started a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Good article review to further the discussion on the possible name change. Since there aren't as many eyes on this sub-project, and the issue directly deals with that page, I thought it prudent to bring it up there. I know carrying on two discussions on one idea is less than ideal, but I thought it more prudent to carry on the renaming discussion on the page where the renaming would actually occur... --Jayron32|talk|contribs 02:30, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

I propose to keep the GAR name as it will be consistence is FAR procedue name. Amartyabag TALK2ME 10:25, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

I think it's more important to have consistency and clarity within our project rather than sacrifice that in order to be consistent with another project. Lara♥Love 13:54, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

{{GAnominee}} -> {{GACandidate}}

  • GAC appears to be the Nom de Jour for the page and process. I would agree that in all cases, GAC should be the preferred term, though GAN should be acceptable for historical reasons (again, as a hidden-but-still-acceptable shortcut). --Jayron32|talk|contribs 07:04, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
  • I suppose so. Again, I don't think it'll have massive amounts of impact on anyone, so it should be OK. Support (btw. WP:GAN also exists). Giggy Talk 07:14, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
    • WP:GAN and WP:GA/N (where did that one come from?) would remain in use, but not adverted on the page. Lara♥Love 07:19, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
  • A reasonable change as far as I can tell. Homestarmy 22:49, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

GA and GAC subcats

  • I have been meaning to get to jiving the two lists myself. Maybe tomorrow. Too tired today. Incedentally, the list at GA appears to be the better of the two. We might want to simplify some categories between the two lists (such as having one TV category rather than a TV Series and a TV Episodes category) and in some cases having just a top-level category (such as Meteorology rather than one for each sub-sub category) but the two lists NEED to be better coordinated.--Jayron32|talk|contribs 07:04, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
  • YES PLEASE! - We really need this one, top priority I'd say. Giggy Talk 07:14, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I changed my mind

I still think GA/R would benefit from two separate lists. Sweeps is going to take forever and eight days to complete and GA/R is going to be blown up during all this. There either needs to be two separate lists or the allowance for speedy delist needs to be restored. And I still think that only certain editors should be processing/archiving discussions. Thoughts? Lara♥Love 16:41, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

GAC vs. GAN

One of the changes suggested above — viz. replacing {{GAnominee}} by {{GACandidate}} for consistency with Wikipedia:Good article candidates — has further ramifications, so it is worth listing them all. Of course they don't have to be done all at once.

  1. Move {{GAnominee}} to {{GACandidate}} leaving a redirect.
  2. Reword {{GACandidate}} and change the name of the category into which candidates are placed (see next point).
  3. Move Category:Good article nominees to Category:Good article candidates (requires an admin, unless it is a cut and paste.)
  4. Move Category:Good article nominees currently on hold to Category:Good article candidates currently on hold and change its category.
  5. Fix any links to these cats.
  6. Reword {{GAonhold}} and change the name of the category it fills as in point 4.
  7. Replace (preferably) all c.200 transclusions of {{GAnominee}} by {{GACandidate}} either using AWB or a bot.
  8. Reword WP:GAC to reflect the change of name. (This rewording is the reason it is preferable to replace the transclusions in the previous point.)
  9. Do something about Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles/GA nominees task force (e.g. delete it, as it is redundant with WP:GAC and Wikipedia:Good article candidates/List of reviewers).
  10. Rename {{PGAN}}, {{FGAN}} and {{GANOH}}.
  11. Update {{ArticleHistory}} to use FGAC as well as FGAN, and document the GAC terminology only.

I think that's all, but will update if I think of anything else.

All this makes me wonder whether it might not be easier to move Wikipedia:Good article candidates back to Wikipedia:Good article nominations... Geometry guy 21:03, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Well... when you put it that way, I vote for the last one. Good article nominations sounds good to me! We call them noms anyway, right? LaraLove 22:23, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I traced the history: Wikipedia:Good articles/Nominations was moved to Wikipedia:Good article candidates here following a surprisingly brief and uncontroversial discussion here. I guess we have to raise this at WT:GAC and see if it flies. Geometry guy 22:34, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Amending {{ArticleHistory}}

It would be great if someone could amend {{ArticleHistory}} to list the entries for the "topic" parameter, as well as link here. Right now, if I'm using the articlehistory template, I have to jump to WP:GAN to get the link to go here and see the list. Thanks, Bradford44 14:33, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I'll mention it to Gimmetrow and SandyGeorgia. Not sure it will happen though. Lara♥Love 19:54, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
Okay, I've amended the template to link to the section of the project page which lists the categories. Therefore, if you click the link on the table in ArticleHistory, it will take you directly to the list at WP:GAPQ#Categories. I hope that helps. Lara♥Love 23:09, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
Perfect! Thank you, Bradford44 00:17, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

{{ArticleHistory}} question

If an article is using this template and is still a GA after a sweep review has been done what action do we use to update the oldid? T Rex | talk 11:12, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

You'd add something like the following after the last number of the article history template (the "2", as pictured, is applicable if there's only one listing in the article history. If the last number in there is "4", then replace those 2s with "5"). Dr. Cash 18:55, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

| action2 = GAR
| action2date = 3 September 2007
| action2link = Talk:Article Name#GA sweeps review
| action2result = kept
| action2oldid = 123456789

K, thanks. T Rex | talk 20:28, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Category:Uncategorized good articles

Is there anyone who has a to-do list shorter than the Boston Marathon that can keep an eye on this category and keep it empty? I started on it yesterday, but only got two done before I was out of time considering neither had an adequate review and needed to be sent to GA/R. I'm still dealing with the fallout of the noms.

If there are some that have the time and will to do this, that would be great. Be sure to check that it was given a decent review in the process and that will help with sweeps. Regards, Lara♥Love 16:45, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Inappropriate tone and lack of explanations

Hello. I resent the tone of messages that this task force is putting on pages like Talk:Hilbert space (diff). Threats and ultimatums are not how we work on Wikipedia. I have no problems with you GA people to apply your criteria more uniformly (though I wish your criteria had more to do with the quality of the article), but I think your comments on the article should be a bit more specific. Additionally, I'm surprised that one person can apparently delist an article, but that's of course up to you. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 02:12, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for posting your concerns here. I hope I can help clarify the situation. To answer your question on the article talk page, this task force is reviewing all of the 3,000+ GAs to ensure they continue to meet the criteria. You'll notice that the GA template that is placed on all GAs states "If it no longer meets these criteria, you can delist it, or ask for a review." So anyone can delist an article and/or request a review.
It's our preference that all GAs stay on the list, but that isn't really realistic considering many were promoted prior to the criteria being created. However, most articles reviewed and passed as having met the criteria, but that have now lost a little quality, can be improved and remain GA. So what we are doing is reviewing articles and posting issues on the talk page to be addressed. Some articles have been abandoned, so if there is no one available to make the changes and we're not able to do it ourselves, then the article will have to be delisted. So it's not meant as a threat. It's just a notification. Does that make sense? As long as effort is being put forth to correct issues, we're not going to delist it, but if seven days pass and there's been no response, then it will be delisted.
As far as the message template, I can alter the text if you have some suggestions that would make it clearer, less threat-like. I mean... I don't know, it's to the point. Perhaps that comes off as harsh or ultimatum-ish. It's not meant to, though. Let me know what you think would be better from the perspective of an article custodian whose article has been put on hold. Regards, LaraLove♥ 03:10, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Okay, that helps. I didn't like the message because it's not clear what's going on. I think it would help if you said that you're reviewing all articles and why. Furthermore, it's written like the reviewer has sole authority in the matter. You're right (of course) that anybody can delist an article and I believe this has been for ages, so that's fine (I asked about this because I found it strange that you need two persons to make a GA and one to unmake it, but on reflection, that's quite okay). However, in case of a conflict, it will go to GAR.

So let me write a message which may be less grating for "article custodians" (never heard that phrase before, but it's not a bad one):

"The Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles/Project quality task force is reviewing all Good Articles to ensure they meet the Good article criteria [perhaps add something or some link about the change in criteria or the background of the sweep]. I reviewed this article and I think there are some issues that need to be addressed. [explain problems] I intend to have another look in seven days. Articles that fail the criteria will have to be delisted (such a decision may be challenged through WP:GAR), though they can always be nominated again after improvement."

I understand why you want the "ultimatum" in, but it is a difficult one to word properly. Anyway, I'm not wedded to this text; I'm showing you to help you understand the kind of thing I'm thinking of.

Most important though is to be explicit about the problem that the article has. Don't just state "contains OR" (for example) but give some specific examples. If people are really watching the article, then they may well think that everything is fine and it will not help to use a general phrase. Cheers, Jitse Niesen (talk) 07:12, 9 September 2007 (UTC) (PS: Thanks for your efforts in defusing the situation)

Thanks for your suggestions. What do you think of this:
This article has been reviewed as part of Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles/Project quality task force in an effort to ensure all listed Good articles continue to satisfy the Good article criteria. In reviewing the article, I have found there are some issues that may need to be addressed. [Insert detailed list of issues here.] I will check back in no less than seven days. If progress is being made and issues are being addressed, the article will remain listed as a Good article. Otherwise, it may be delisted (such a decision may be challenged through WP:GA/R). If improved after it has been delisted, it may be nominated at WP:GAC. Feel free to drop a message on my talk page if you have any questions. Regards, LaraLove♥ 18:23, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

That looks fine to me. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 03:50, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Alright. Good times. Thank you for your input. :) LaraLove♥ 03:54, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

WP:GACo

Needs attention. Go vote. Don't have to vote for mine, just vote, please. Thank you. LaraLove♥ 14:50, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Biased GA delisting of the Berlin article

The Berlin article still fulfils the criteria of a good article: " well written, stable, accurate, and referenced, have a neutral point of view, and show relevant illustrations with an appropriate copyright". Several Projects rated the Berlin article A - class. The number and quality of references are sufficiently provided for a GA status. Your delisting seems biased and not justified considering less referenced comparable articles like Chicago, Miami, L.A., Melbourne, Seattle (FA), Moscow. Are you going to delist them as well? If not, your work is not more than an unfair, hostile and highly biased nonsense of no value at all. If the mentioned articles keep their status you have to revert your delisting as soon as possible. Lear 21 15:20, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry your article was delisted, however, you received a thorough review that indicated precisely what needs to be addressed in order to bring the article up to GA standards, which is solely the addition of citations. That indicates to me that it's a very well-written, comprehensive article, but there's an issue of original research. When reading over the article, I agree with the assessment.
With that said, I'll address some of your points, made here and on the article talk page, specifically:
  • The GAs you have referenced have not yet been through the sweeps process. I'm sure when they are reached, they'll be handled the same way.
  • The FA you mentioned was promoted in early 2005 and has obviously degraded in the two and a half years since. So I will, in fact, nominate it at WP:FAC. Thanks for pointing it out.
  • As for the request being an FA requirement and not a GA requirement, that's incorrect. It's a policy. Please read WP:V.
If you disagree with the delisting and/or what I've stated here, you may seek remediation at WP:GAR. LaraLove 16:59, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

I don´t seek remediation, I seek immediate withdrawal from the delisting decision. After an advanced research of several City & Country article with GA or FA status it becomes clear that the Berlin article is one of the most referenced and balanced articles available. Several current Projects rated the Berlin article A - class as well. Claiming the need to cite sentences like "Funkturm Berlin is a 150 meter (492 ft) tall lattice radio tower " is ridiculous and has nothing to do with proper citation. I question the quality of this task force and its ability to judge high standards. Obviously it is not more than a random gathering of useless activities. Lear 21 22:51, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

References are required on any matter that could be disputed. Examples such as the year of event, dimension (length, width, height), people involved in the event. I found this phrase that I feel disputed. "With an area of 43 hectares (106 acres) and around 22,000 different plant species it is one of the largest and most diverse gardens in the world". How do you know there're 22,000 different plant species? Proof it to me. Most diverse garden? Bring me some proof that compares the # of plant species in that garden with other prominent gardens in the world. Another example: "The Volkspark in Friedrichshain, which opened in 1848, is the oldest park in the city". Are you sure it opened in 1848? Are you really sure it's the oldest park in the city? Right there that requires 2 references, unless a reference covered both points. OhanaUnitedTalk page 01:46, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

The mentioned sentences are simple statements and facts. Nobody talks about FA quality, this requirement for a GA status is useless. Consequently adapted it would lead to a proposal to reference every second phrase. The reference part would be more than double compared to the original text. There is no city neither one country article fulfilling this requirement. Again, there are almost 40 articles City and Country which are less referenced as the Berlin article. AND: references are one of many details adding to an articles quality. The delisting proofs a lack of measurement and comparison. It is biased, unjustified and has been enacted only on bureaucratic standards. The article has to be listed again or less quality articles have to be delisted as well. Immediately. Lear 21 03:10, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

As the other articles are reviewed, they will get the same treatment. As far as what Ohana pointed out, "... it is one of the largest and most diverse gardens in the world" without a doubt needs a reference. Any sorts of statements that make such claims need to be sourced. Here's the thing, like I said above, the article is well-written and comprehensive. It's obvious that a lot of hard work has gone into it, but there is this one issue that needs to be resolved. It is not a biased delisting, nor is it unjustified. I'm sorry that you feel this way. But the point of this project is to ensure that all listed article meet the current criteria. All of it. Currently, this article meets all but one criterion. One issue addressed and the article can regain GA. LaraLove 03:44, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
There has been no action from this task force indicating to revise other city or country articles. It becomes clear that the delisting of the Berlin article is a singular action without sense of proportion. The Berlin article fulfils many high standard aspects including factual accuracy of every sentence. The task force actions proof to be short sighted, bureaucratic and lead to a highly biased ranking among city and country articles. The delisting have decreased quality, and diminished valuable examples of good articles. @LaraLove: There is no indication that I 'feel' this way. This assessment is based on comparison of Hundreds of articles and on factual insight. all the best Lear 21 16:38, 30 September 2007 (UTC)
We are not targetting just Berlin. Take a look at Atlantic City, New Jersey. It also got demoted from GA. The reason why Berlin got sweeped first is because we are doing this in alphabetic order. As we continue our sweeps, you will see more articles being put on hold or delisted. OhanaUnitedTalk page 17:07, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

This is absolutely ridiculous. Here's the last three points I will make:

  • "There has been no action from this task force indicating to revise other city or country articles." - That's absurd.
  1. Chinyingi (bold delist)
  2. Timbuktu (bold delist after hold)
  3. Alanya (on hold)
  4. Ashdod (on hold)
  5. Beit She'an (bold delist after hold)
  6. Ir Ovot (on hold)
  7. Lam Tin (pass after hold)
  8. Macau (pass)
  9. Mamilla (pass)
  10. Negros Oriental (bold delist after hold)
  11. Quneitra (pass)
  12. Shanghai ghetto (bold delist)
  13. Tel Aviv (pass)
  14. Tibet (bold delist)
  15. Adelaide (bold delist)
  16. Cullacabardee, Western Australia (pass)
  17. Diego Garcia (bold delist after hold)
  18. Melbourne (on hold)
  19. Palm Island, Queensland (pass)
  20. Riverina (pass)
  21. St Kilda, South Australia (pass)
  22. Summer Hill, New South Wales (bold delist)
  23. Sydney (bold delist)
  24. Wagga Wagga, New South Wales (pass after hold)
  25. Alby, Öland (bold delist)
  26. Altrincham (pass)
  27. Askam and Ireleth (pass after hold)
  28. Belfast (hold and pass)
  29. Berlin (bold delist after hold)
  30. Birmingham (pass)
  31. Bjørnøya (bold delist)
  32. Blyth, Northumberland (pass)
  33. Bratislava (pass)
  34. Bristol (on hold)
  35. Chew Magna (pass after hold)
  36. Chew Stoke (pass)
  37. Donetsk (on hold)
  38. Dublin (bold delist)
  39. East End of London (pass after hold)
  40. Eastbourne (pass)
  41. Evanton (pass)
  42. Hale Barns (on hold)
  43. Hampshire (bold delist after hold)
  44. Heilbronn (bold delist)
  45. Limerick (bold delist)
  46. London (pass)
  47. New England Quarter (on hold)
  48. Norfolk (on hold)
  49. Northern Ireland (bold delist)
  50. Paris (bold delist)
  51. Penmon, Anglesey (pass)
  52. Póvoa de Varzim (pass)
  53. Runcorn (pass)
  54. St Buryan (on hold)
  55. Santorini (bold delist)
  56. Scotland (on hold)
  57. Stockholm (bold delist)
  58. Wallachia (on hold)
  59. Widnes (pass)
  60. Zagreb (on hold)
  61. Žirmūnai (pass)
  62. Amarillo, Texas (pass)
  63. Atlanta, Georgia (on hold)
  64. Atlantic City, New Jersey (bold delist)
  65. Calgary (on hold)
  66. Chambersburg, Pennsylvania (pass)
  67. Chicago (on hold)
  68. Columbus, Ohio (on hold)
  69. Coral Springs, Florida (pass)
  70. Counties in Delaware (pass)
  71. Dallas, Texas (on hold)
  72. Denver, Colorado (on hold)
  73. Edmonton (on hold)

Care to amend that claim?

  • "The Berlin article fulfils many high standard aspects including factual accuracy of every sentence." - The first part is accurate, the article does fulfill many high standard aspects, however, it does not provide verification of accuracy for every sentence. Perhaps if you had spent the time you've wasted here making inaccurate claims working on improving this one aspect of the article, it would again be listed as a GA. But until those improvements are made, it won't be.
  • As for any articles not listed with those 73 above, we'll get to them when we get to them. Lara❤Love 17:13, 30 September 2007 (UTC)
Seems like you won this argument because he couldn't figure out his rebuttal. He has a history of Wikipedia violations anyways. OhanaUnitedTalk page 19:45, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
I didn't really look at it like an argument, but I do hope that he now realizes that we didn't single out his article. Lara❤Love 20:13, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

The biased ranking remains as long as not all city articles are reassessed. @OhanaUnited : I have rather a 'history' of contributions to 3 high quality articles, all among the 1000 most read articles. Fortunately this task force didn´t influence the content of the articles in the first place. The evaluation system concentrating only on the amount of references is still not convincing. Lear 21 15:43, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

It's not what references and how many there are, it's how they are used that is of concern in this article specifically. You have several statements in the article (some listed out the GA/R) that use peacock terms, which implies a non-neutral point of view. However, and no one is denying you this, these are probably true statements. However, to make the use of the peacock terms acceptable, a secondary source must be provided. You could have hundreds of references in the article but if you don't cite sources for boasting statements that are factually true, you are not providing verifiability which is something that must be met for GA and FA status. --MASEM 16:05, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
Let's let this discussion come to an end. Clearly it can go nowhere productive from here. Sweeps will continue as planned. Regards, Lara❤Love 19:17, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

A-class review

How can I get A-class reviews for all Category:GA-Class Chicago articles?--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/tcfkaWCDbwincowtchatlotpsoplrttaDCLaM) 19:27, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

A-class reviews are usually done by the separate WikiProject, or at least thats what I thought. T Rex | talk 19:49, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
That's correct. A-class is awarded by projects, individually. So if you've got three projects listed on the talk page, one may rate it A-class while the rest may not. Generally speaking, however, if one rates an article A, the rest usually follow. Lara❤Love 06:17, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
Is the Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team considered a project. I have seen their A-class reviews on several articles?--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/tcfkaWCDbwincowtchatlotpsoplrttaDCLaM) 23:53, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
Yes. It is a project with various sub-projects. Lara❤Love 06:02, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Dubious

Why is this "Project quality task force" here? You may all have had the best intentions, but it is a breakaway group from the main idea of Wikipedia, which is to create good articles, and not have them policed by a small group. If anyone thinks an article is not good enough they can submit it for discussion, so there is no need for the task force. Why not help out on the articles yourselves? That's the idea is it not? This whole thing gives me the shivers. --andreasegde 15:20, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

BTW, is there an FA article task force, and a B-article task force? :) --andreasegde 15:36, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

The GA requirements have changed to more stricter criteria within the last year or so; before then, an article could become GA without minimal criteria as long as a GA reviewer felt it looked fine. Many of these articles fail today's requirements. Thus the goal of the task force is to review all GA but focus on those passed previous to this year to make sure they meet the requirements; if there is a chance they do fail, they are put up for review. The reason why there's one for GA but not FA is because FA hasn't had a significant change in requirements since FA started, though there's a review process in the same manner; furthermore, there's more than one person deciding if an article is FA, while GA can be passed by a single person without review. B-class articles are decided by individual projects and are not WP-wide, so a WP-level task force for B articles makes no sense.
If there is a small fix that would make the article GA (such as fixing a reference) the members of this will usually fix it. However, since we are not involved with the article topic directly in most cases, it would not make sense for us to try to fix glaring bad problems that require more work that established editors of that page can do much better. --MASEM 15:46, 28 October 2007 (UTC)
I don't really understand what the problem is... or why you get the shivers. GAR doesn't get a lot of traffic. If we weeded out all these articles and nominated them at GAR, the chances of them being dealt with in any sort of a timely manner is slim. Additionally, articles that clearly have issues shouldn't go through GAR, they should just be delisted. Rather than have them stay listed until someone just happens upon them randomly, I created the task force for the purpose of finding them. Additionally, we have a set of standards to uphold, so it shouldn't matter how we accomplish it, as long as it happens. Lara❤Love 04:09, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for your replies, Masem and Lara, and I totally agree that the quality of good articles should be... erm... good :) The Good article list has 1,667, as I'm sure you know, so how long would it take to go through them all with a group of like-minded editors? It's not your co-operation I'm worrried about, it's the setting up of a Project quality task force, which seems to present itself as some kind of avenging vigilante group that knows better than the rules and systems laid down by Wikipedia concensus. You may think I'm over-reacting (I'm sure you do, but that's OK :) but I had a problem with another project about its own 'policy', which was away from the Wiki ideal.
I would feel far happier if you set up a Book references page which would encourage editors to buy or borrow a book to use for references, and show them (as simply as possible) how to format them properly. (You can check my GA articles if you like, because I was once accused of having too many!) I state again that I agree with your aims, but I think that de-listing instead of improving, and teaching others how to improve articles - is negative. Hilbert space being a case in point: "tactless ultimatums". (It also disturbed me slightly that one of your participants joined because he/she was "bored", BTW). No hard feelings, because I'm still on your side, and would love to see more GA articles go to FA. --andreasegde 16:49, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
Well, "task force" may be strong language, but unfortunately, that's how WP defines sub projects of a project; how the whole name presents itself may be unfortunate but it is accurate (we are a task force of the GA project to look at quality of articles) I dare say anyone is being going out on a limb to fail/delist as many GAs as possible because of the name, or even with that intent.
I've had to convert a mis-mass of references in articles before to get them to GA quality, and it is not a simple task. Again, if it was one article reference out of place, I'd likely go ahead and fix it, but if there's 50 references and 3 different styles among those, it's better to inform the editors that something's amiss and point to WP:CITE/WP:CITET. Judging by what I've seen pass through GAR, we're not failing articles because their references are badly formated (though dropping a cautionary note on the article talk page can't hurt), we're de-listing articles that, for the most part, fail at having references in the first place, which is one of the new additions to the GA criteria, and why so many before a year ago that were passed to GA are lacking these and being delisted. Finding those references is not something we (of this task force) can likely do, as we're not familiar with the topic at hand; that's what the page editors should do, and when the article is put to GAR and the editors notified, they should have a bit of time to respond and fix if they can. --MASEM 17:03, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
Precisely. We do fix small errors. We don't delist articles that show a potential to be improved quickly, but we're also not an improvement drive (See WP:GACo for that). We have the GA project's top reviewers working with the ultimate goal of ensuring that all listed GAs (for which there are over 3,000, not 1,667) satisfy the criteria.
As far as referencing, I do assist editors with this, as do others. It's actually a specialty of mine. I've overhauled three articles in the past couple of weeks (well, Elvis took over a month, but I just wrapped that up), so it's not as if we don't offer assistance and point editors in the right direction. I don't see the point of some sort of book exchange program, I actually don't understand your suggestion. We have sufficient resources available here on WP for free (WP:CITE, WP:CIT, and CAT:CITE). Why would we recommend editors purchase books for this?
Hilbert Space is a poor example of what we're doing. That was a misunderstanding that was swiftly dealt with, so that doesn't accurately represent the task force. And I don't see what it matters why anyone joins anything. I started editing Wikipedia because I was bored. Does that make me a less valuable editor?
With that said, I don't see how this task force goes against the spirit of consensus. GA is and always has been a project of one-editor decisions. One editor decides it's good enough to nominate, another editor reviews it and determines whether it pass/fails. As a back up, GAR exists to deal with any disputes. Just as with any other review, GAR can assist in disputed delists during sweeps. So, unless I'm misunderstanding you, your reasons for why you believe this task force is un-wiki-like, would also apply to the GA project as a whole. :/ Lara❤Love 17:36, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your replies (good grief, I think you can type faster than I can read :) Sorry to start on the extreme left, but it makes my eyes go funny to keep moving to the right..

  • Why not have an explanation on the GA nomination page like this:

Performers, groups and composers

Please do not submit an article if.... (I leave it up to you to decide what goes in here) and stating that it would be best to look at this (your advice page about GAs showing an article that has passed and an article that would definitely not pass) first. (It would give them examples to compare their own work against the best work presented.) It would also save an awful lot of reviewers’ time, would reduce the backlog, and make everybody happy. I believe it's called "Heading them off at the Pass", as Sheriffs used to say when tracking down the bad guys.

If editors ignore your advice, you can save yourselves a lot of time and work by referring them to the Please do not submit an article if sentence. --andreasegde 22:27, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

No answer

I think the header says it all. --andreasegde (talk) 18:01, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

OK, I'll bite. Personally I don't have a massive problem with your suggestion, although it would need careful thought. A brief summary of the quick-fail criteria might be useful (eg "Please don't nominate articles that have the following: no references, improperly-licensed images..." etc). On the other hand, even when an article quick-fails editors are given an indication of why, which is all part of the education process that we hopefully try to work into our reviews. It may also put off editors whose articles would merit a hold rather than a fail - in which case, we have missed an opportunity to improve standards and reward editor efforts. I'm not sure what this has to do with the quality task force though ;) EyeSereneTALK 21:00, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
I thank you, EyeSereneTALK.
"when an article quick-fails editors are given an indication of why". If they had the knowledge and advice beforehand, they would not put up their articles in the first place. Fore-warning is better than criticism, is it not? Reviewing would be much easier, and save a lot of time, if editors knew what is good, or bad, rather than being told about it after the fact (which always hurts). It's a fact that thousands of editors don't know how to put an in-line citation in. Why? Because they didn't have a clear, and simple, explanation of how to do it. (I now love putting them in, but I had to learn how to do it by myself, which took a long time - call me stupid, but you're probably right. :).
I would suggest that rather than criticising them, we should teach editors (in a nice way, of course) how to do it. I have seen so many pages where the text came from books, but one realises that the editor was probably confused by the HTML/Wikipedia way of adding in-line citations, and didn't do it. What a pity.
Adding adjectives is also a problem. Why can we not have a wonderful (ouch!) page which details what a bad (ouch!) article is? We need examples, in a very straight-forward way. --andreasegde (talk) 23:25, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
P.S. If someone would write a really bad article, which would be full of adjectives and POV and a lack of in-line citations, wouldn't that be a good thing to show editors what bad really is? --andreasegde (talk) 23:31, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
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