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Samantha Harvey

The novel Orbital by Samantha Harvey (pictured) wins the Booker Prize.
Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby announces his resignation as a result of the John Smyth abuse scandal in the Church of England.
In Zhuhai, China, 35 people are killed in a vehicle-ramming attack.
Alliance for Change, led by Navin Ramgoolam, wins the Mauritian general election.
A suicide bombing by the Balochistan Liberation Army at the Quetta railway station, Pakistan, kills 32 people.

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The In the news (ITN) section on the main page serves to direct readers to articles that have been substantially updated to reflect recent or current events of wide interest. ITN supports the central purpose of Wikipedia—making a great encyclopedia.

Unlike Wikipedia's sister project Wikinews, Wikipedia is not an online newspaper and does not accept original works of journalism or first-hand reports. However, many Wikipedians are motivated to create and update encyclopedic articles of timely interest. ITN originated in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, when entries were created and put on the main page within minutes of the attacks. The entries led to an infusion of interest by editors in creating a main page section that linked to articles providing readers the context behind the news.

Events posted on ITN are listed in approximately chronological order, with the more recent entries appearing first. They are generally not sorted by any degree of importance or significance.

Purpose

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

Criteria

Candidates for ITN are evaluated on two main grounds: the quality of the updated content and the significance of the developments described in the updated content. In many cases, qualities in one area can make up for deficiencies in another. For example, a highly significant event, such as the discovery of a cure for cancer, may have a sub-par update associated with it, but be posted anyway with the assumption that other editors will soon join in and improve the article. Conversely, an editor may write an in-depth update on a topic normally considered marginal, thus convincing commenters that it is deserving of inclusion. A successful nomination will normally go through several procedural steps before being placed added to the ITN template.

Updated content

Each ITN item contains an emboldened link to an article providing a substantial quantity of directly relevant information, attributed to reliable sources. Typically, the article has been updated to include this text or created in response to the recent/current event.

The decision as to when an article is updated enough is subjective, but a five-sentence update (with at minimum three references, not counting duplicates) is generally more than sufficient, while a one-sentence update is highly questionable. Changes in verb tense (e.g. "is" → "was") or updates that convey little or no relevant information beyond what is stated in the ITN blurb are insufficient.

In the case of a new, event-specific article, the traditional cut-off for what is enough has been around three complete, referenced and well-formed paragraphs. An example of the minimum required update for a new article is Fuzhou derailment at the time of its posting.

If the recent/current event relates directly to previous occurrences (e.g. a major award honoring past achievements), the article can be considered sufficiently updated when there is consensus that it contains appropriate, up-to-date coverage of the entire chronology, irrespective of when the text was written or how many sentences pertain specifically to the recent/current event (apart from the requirement that it be mentioned).

Updated content must be thoroughly referenced. As with all Wikipedia articles, citations must be to reliable sources. While articles on topics such as sporting events and economics lend themselves to tables of numbers, updates must be at least in part written in prose to qualify for ITN consideration. References should be correctly formatted and not bare URLs.

Articles that are subject to serious issues, as indicated by 'orange'- or 'red'-level tags at either the article level or within any section, may not be accepted for an emboldened link.

An accepted blurb may be transferred to 'Ongoing' by an administrator if small, incremental updates are still appearing in notable news agencies, and if the administrator is satisfied that regular constructive editing is continuing on the relevant article(s). Major developments should be nominated for a new blurb. An article listed as 'Ongoing' should not be taken as being considered as a featured article or otherwise maintained on the front page for reasons other than its newsworthiness.

Procedural

There is a sufficiently updated non-stub article, with credible sources cited.
A blurb is listed at Portal:Current events or one of its subpages
The item has been nominated at Wikipedia:In the news/Candidates, with an emboldened link to the updated article(s). A freely licensed image to accompany the item may be suggested. Ideally this image should be covering the top news item. If there is no suitable image available for the top item a relevant image for an item further down the list should be used instead.
If there is consensus to do so, the blurb is added to Template:In the news.

Special cases

Deaths

Shortcuts

The death must meet at least one of the following criteria:

The deceased was in a high-ranking office of power at the time of death and/or had a significant contribution/impact on the country/region.
The deceased was widely regarded as a very important figure in his or her field.
The death has a major international impact that affects current events. The modification or creation of multiple articles to take into account the ramifications of a death is a sign that it meets the third criterion.

In addition, the article must have been satisfactorily updated and have no major omissions of the person's life and effect. The article must conform to WP:Biographies of living persons even though they are dead.

Deaths should not be added without consensus at Wikipedia:In the news/Candidates.

Most eligible deaths will be listed in the "recent deaths" section at the bottom of the ITN template. However, some deaths may be given a full listing if there is sufficient consensus to do so.

For previous discussion about this criterion, see Wikipedia:In the news/Death criteria.

Sports and other recurring events

Certain regularly recurring events are considered of sufficient interest to be placed on ITN every time they occur; they are listed at Wikipedia:In the news/Recurring items. Items listed there are considered exempt from having to prove their notability through discussion on the candidates page and may be posted as soon as a cited update is added to the article. Discussions on proposed inclusions and removals should take place on the talk page there.

Recognition

The following templates are used to notify interested parties that an article was bold-linked from ITN. Instructions can be found within each template's documentation.

Article creator's talk page: ({{ITN notice}}) {{subst:ITN notice|15 November|2024|Article name|7=created|subst=subst:}} --~~~~
Article updater's talk page: ({{ITN notice}}) {{subst:ITN notice|15 November|2024|Article name|7=substantially updated|subst=subst:}} --~~~~
Nominator's talk page: ({{ITN notice}}) {{subst:ITN notice|15 November|2024|Article name|7=recently nominated|subst=subst:}} --~~~~
Self-nomination: ({{ITN notice}}) {{subst:ITN notice|15 November|2024|Article name|7=recently nominated ''and'' substantially updated|subst=subst:}} --~~~~
Article talk page: ({{ITN talk}}) {{ITN talk|15 November|2024}} (Add a small=yes parameter if small-style templates are in use.)

Note: No one possesses special authority to provide recognition. If an editor's contributions have not been recognized, please feel free to do so.

Barnstar

Significant long-term contributions by a user to the In The News section may be recognised with this Barnstar:

Image	What to type	Description
	{{subst:InTheNews Barnstar\|message ~~~~}}	The In The News Barnstar may be awarded to recognise significant long-term contributions by an editor to the In The News section. This barnstar was designed by User:Melesse and User:Neutralhomer, and introduced in August 2010.

Notes for administrators

External links

RSS feed for In the news

@@ Line 38: / Line 38: @@
 Updated content must be thoroughly referenced.  As with all Wikipedia articles, citations must be to [[Wikipedia:Reliable sources|reliable sources]].  While articles on topics such as sporting events and economics lend themselves to tables of numbers, updates must be at least in part written in prose to qualify for ITN consideration.  References should be correctly formatted and not [[WP:LINKROT|bare URLs]].
-Articles that are subject to serious issues, as indicated by [[Wikipedia:Article message boxes#Categories and colours|'orange'- or 'red'-level article tags]], may not be accepted for an emboldened link.
+Articles that are subject to serious issues, as indicated by [[Wikipedia:Article message boxes#Categories and colours|'orange'- or 'red'-level tags]] at either the article level or within any section, may not be accepted for an emboldened link.
 An accepted blurb may be transferred to 'Ongoing' by an administrator if small, incremental updates are still appearing in notable news agencies, and if the administrator is satisfied that regular constructive editing is continuing on the relevant article(s). Major developments should be nominated for a new blurb. An article listed as 'Ongoing' should not be taken as being considered as a featured article or otherwise maintained on the front page for reasons other than its newsworthiness.