This is an archive of past discussions on Wikipedia:Featured articles. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
The biggest argument against such protection is that newcomers should be able to edit it. And I agree this a valid argument. But the following data on the editons of several past FAs seems to indicate that 1) 90%+ of edits are vandals and revers 2) actuall improvements are very minor. My comparison times may be off by a few hours, since I used the server dates (from 0000 to 2400 of the day):
Hugo Chavez, which I think was mostly vandalised - see how much info was removed
You clearly weren't very careful or precise with your comparisons. All of those removals were made by me, and were put into sub-articles to provide some much-needed compactness to a severely bloated section. The fact that none of those changes have been reverted even weeks after the fact demonstrates that noone objects to them. -Silence01:45, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
See my user page for before-and-after main page diffs on Cheese and Black pepper. Cheese received an enormous amount of vandalism, but still saw significant improvements. Of course, it was a full-time job trying to keep up with and integrate the non-vandalism changes. I think that's what makes the difference: whether there is somebody who is really actively involved in watching over the page managing the changes on TFA day. I think the main author of Hugo Chavez, for instance, had grown a bit frustrated with the page and washed his hands of it before it was up. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 23:19, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but after seeing History of Miami, Florida get vandalized 15 times in 12 hours, I'm afraid this debate must begin anew. Featured Articles need to receive protection while they are on the front page. --Kitch13:35, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
15 times in 12 hours? That's really not much. This is Wikipedia. We expect to fend off a little vandalism here. Was the vandalism really that hard to revert? It's always been the bad good-faith edits that have made me tear my hair out when an article's on the main page. It's part of the price we pay for openness. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 15:05, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
15 times is not a lot, and certainly is nothing compared to real high profile articles (e.g George W. Bush). As Bunchofgrapes said, the problem really is bad good faith edits. Any article, featured or otherwise, suffers from them a lot more than vandalism. The nice thing about vandalism is that although it's a pain in the ass to constantly fix, it's clearcut and rather easy. When someone adds good content but in a non-neutral manner, or forgets to cite sources, or totally messes up the formatting - that's really ugly. It's not just immensely tedious and difficult to fix, there's just no quick and dirty solution to it. Vandalism is no excuse for protecting an article unless there's something like one vandalism incident every five minutes. 15 times in 12 hours? That's nothing. (Incidentally, where on earth is Raul's explanation of why protecting featured articles is a bad thingTM when you need it?) Johnleemk | Talk15:38, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Some replies to common objections to featured article nominations
In light of the recent slowdown in featured article promotion and the increasingly fraught process of nomination, I thought I'd prepare some FAC newbies for what they'll face. I feel like everyone reads Wikipedia:What is a featured article and Wikipedia:The_perfect_article and believes their article meet the standard, or, for some reason, believes their article is an exception that doesn't meet the standard. Anyway, to keep more newbies from being bitten, I wrote User:Jengod/Some common objections to featured status and how to avoid them as a way to alert nominees to the most common causes of the dreaded Object. Let me know what ya'll think and or just dive in and amend it. Hope this helps somebody! jengod01:17, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
One little thing: can the popup hint over the star be made into something more user friendly, like "This is a featured article - click here to see more" ? Lupin|talk|popups14:11, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
No - as I have said (many, many times) previously, we want to keep metadata out of the featured artices. It makes our articles much easier to reuse elsewhere, which is why we only put notices on the talk pages. Raul65415:37, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
Who's we? I think it is equally as useful as what we change when we introduce article validation. I think we should leave it in. We should be proud of our work, in the same way that the Spanish Wikipedia and the Dutch Wikipedia are. Talrias (t | e | c) 17:15, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
With respect, I disagree. We have plenty of metadata which makes the source code work better when the data is in Wikipedia - wikilinks, templates, categories, etc - but is a pain if someone wants to copy it. What we don't want is great banners plastered over our articles, like {{featured}}. This star is very discreet and I like it. -- ALoan(Talk)17:40, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
Wikilinks, templates, categories, 'etc are not metadata - they would work just as well for anyone who runs a wikipedia clone. On the other hand, the concept of a "featured article" does not exist on mirrors. The designation of "Wikipedia's featured article" is specific to wikipedia, which is why it belongs on the talk page. Raul65418:28, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
I'm afraid I'll have to agree with Raul on this one. It's a cute idea, but wouldn't actually be of any help to any readers whatsoever, and even its value to editors would be minimal at best. The entire concept of Featured articles exists chiefly for two reasons: (1) as an incentive to editors to improve articles; (2) as a way to distinguish especially good articles chiefly for the sake of showing off selections of Wikipedia's best work on the main page. The former is already satisfied well by the prestige of getting an article to Featured status, and adding even more patting-ourselves-on-the-back for our good articles (which often turn out to be deeply flawed even after going through the elaborate Featured process, or, even more commonly, degrade over time after being Featured without having their status removed for a long, long time afterwards) would do no real good. And the latter purpose wouldn't be served by a star on the main page, either. Plus it would confuse almost anyone who's not already familiar with the Wikipedia editing and FA process (i.e., the vast majority of people Wikipedia is actually written for: uninformed readers), and add needless clutter. What the Featured Article system needs is more improvements in the system, more incentives for people to get involved and apply a stricter and more comprehensive review of the articles being nominated (as well as a larger amount of improvement associated with an article being a candidate)—in other words, more content (and thus more real quality), not more bells and whistles and pretty graphics! -Silence19:08, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
"What the Featured Article system needs is more improvements in the system, more incentives for people to get involved..." And you think the gold star isn't an incentive? I think it's a great one. The 99% of editors who edit only in article space may be unaware that featured status even exists. It is useful for readers, if they learn that the gold star at the top means that the article has undergone more levels of peer review than most articles. The no-metadata argument holds no water—at any given time, a large percentage of our articles will have some template that is not strictly about the content at hand, whether it's a cleanup template, a dispute template, or whatever. Mirrors and clones already have to deal with these templates some way (usually by just blanking them). They can do the same here, if they need to (but if they're not running the standard CSS, they're not going to see the star anyway). --TreyHarris19:23, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
Making our articles easily transplantable to a clone is one of our best practices, regardless of whether or not others decide to ignore it. The featured articles are supposed to - almost by definition - follow our best practices. It clearly follows then, that such things do not go into the article. Raul65421:34, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
I don't see how using this template makes transferring articles to clones more difficult. If the clones use the wikitext, they can easily filter this template away (or make a blank template to replace it); if they screen-scrape the HTML, then they can easily filter it away or use CSS to make it invisible, or replace the star image with a blank image. Either way it doesn't seem to me to be a problem; certainly no more problematic than the fundraising site notices, interwiki links and so on. Lupin|talk|popups00:50, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
You said it yourself - they have to go to the trouble of blanking the template/removing it from the articles. That's exactly what we are trying to avoid. Raul65400:53, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
Um, no, it's pretty clearly not consensus, especially when just a few months ago we had a poll on more-or-less the same topic (whether or not to tag featured articles in the article rather than the talk page) [1]. The result was the same as I have been arguing here - that metadata belongs on the talk page. Raul65402:15, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
That vote concerned placing a large bulky template on the article page, this is a little symbol in the corner. I see a few people who voted against the template in the old poll said they would have been fine with some other indication of featured status in the main article. In any event, I said "the consensus here," not "the consensus somewhere else," which remains true since I see seven people here in favor of the star and two against. Andrew Levine02:38, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
Is there any evidence that the selfref template is helpful in letting mirrors expluge this stuff (e.g, do they actually use it to remove self references)? Raul65418:30, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
The self reference template, {{selfref}}, makes it easy to remove all self references. Blanking the template means all self-references are removed. Talrias (t | e | c) 18:54, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
I have no idea. I'm honestly not interested in finding out either. Regardless, by using {{selfref}} we minimise the number of changes third parties need to make to just one. Talrias (t | e | c) 17:35, 28 January 2006 (UTC)
I support this template, it's like an award for a great article and may incite users to contribute more, plus it's discrete and won't bother any unintereseted reader. But we should agree to always put it on the bottom of any article and not forget to remove it once the article is no longer a FA. CG18:22, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
I like this idea too. Really, it's an extremely small effort for anyone reusing Wikipedia's content to get rid of the offending code -- a couple seconds and that's it. And using the selfref template like Talrias suggests obviates even the need for that. Andrew Levine16:33, 28 January 2006 (UTC)
I also support this idea. The gold star is definitely strong encouragement for any editor, and might even cause a few readers to become editors just to feel proud when they write articles and they get the gold star too. I would oppose having a big, bulky template like {{featured}} on the article namespace, but this one is unobtrusive. As for it being existing practice, existing practices can change, and that's why Wikipolicy isn't set in stone. :)Titoxd(?!? - help us)06:05, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
Considering how widely used {{link FA}} is, I don't really see the argument against this particular template. Why mark other languages FAs but not our own? (and yes, I think both are worth the minor self-reference) --grm_wnrEsc11:49, 31 January 2006 (UTC)
That an article is Featured is useful information for the reader. Therefore some indication on this on the article page, as opposed to just the talk page, is appropriate. — Matt Crypto18:17, 31 January 2006 (UTC)
As long as it's small, and in the corner, I think it's good. It's a good way of instantly noting that this article is likely very reliable. Fieari19:10, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
baloo_rch . I think it is a very good featured. It is a great help for multilingual users, so they can pick the best information regardless the language. Also it helps us the wikipedians to keep improving the wikipedias, taking the best and spreading quality content from one language into another,. baloo_rch02:38, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
Not sure why we'd want to add a pointless self-reference. Especially one that makes the article look like it was produced by kindergarteners, which hardly encourages people to take the project seriously. In any case, if people must have their star, at least use the far superior dark one (as noted by some others above). Christopher Parham(talk)07:55, 31 January 2006 (UTC)
A little bit late to the discussion, but I don't like it; there's no point in making a self-reference. In any case, our goal should be that all of our articles reach FA status; I don't see the need to mark those articles right now. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 17:00, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
Either star would be acceptable for me, but I strongly prefer the brown one too. The color gradient in the orange-yellow one gives it a slightly more blob-like and less star-like appearance. Andrew Levine01:04, 30 January 2006 (UTC)
Do the articles that are on the main page get the star automatically becuase I've pressed the edit this article tab and no template saying {{featuredarticle}} comes up. Also when this whole voting thing gets worked out, let me no and I'll help by adding the stars the the FA's. RENTASTRAWBERRYFOR LET?röck
I've already started adding the template onto articles. The vote is overwhelmingly in favor of the star, so I say go right ahead and add it. Andrew Levine05:07, 30 January 2006 (UTC)
I'd like to see more than 18 comment on the proposal before such a change takes place. Why? Primarily because 1) there is much momentum on not including any metadata on the article page, and 2) this change is highly visible and "concensus" should involve a larger sample. I suggest making the change in a few articles and seeing how it is accepted by editors who don't have the time to watch the policy pages. Trödel•talk13:40, 30 January 2006 (UTC)
Plus, I saw you have added the template on the top of the page. I would prefer that all meta-data go to the bottom of the page so they can easily be found. Anyway, shouldn't a bot be doing these inclusions? CG22:55, 31 January 2006 (UTC)
I didn't notice anything on the template talk page, and it was already on the Charles I article on the front page, so I went ahead and added this star to a few FAs. I'll wait a while, see how this turns out, and if it fails, I'll go through and remove them. — Rebelguys2talk18:43, 30 January 2006 (UTC)
FWIW, I'm all for using click on the FA image on the main page too. It's extremely confusing to new users/readers. Yes, seasoned users expect to be taken to the image description page when clicking on an image, and yes, the image description page gives important copyright information. To that, I would say that that's how it works (and should keep working) in articles; and the Main Page is not an article. — mark✎17:27, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
Well, the (more) thing got added because I thought it was a good idea so added it myself a few times until everyone thought it was usual (well, to be fair, some others expressed support in various places too). Perhaps you should just add the "click" thing to the next few days' Main Page featured articles on WP:TFA as an experiement and see if people like it? -- ALoan(Talk)02:55, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
But then, the Main Page goes flatly against Wikipedia's Manual of Style for articles, too, exactly because it is the Main Page. Again, the Main Page is not an article. ALoan, thanks for the tip, I'll think about it. — mark✎09:40, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
New Categories or Sub-Categories for Culture and society
I would like to create two subcategories under the "Culture and society" category on this page. I think this will solve an important problem. There are over 20 "popular" cultural features and there a handful of good anthropological feature articles. But, there are only a few sociological features. The sociology articles are lost in the current category.
In the future, there will be more featured anthropology and sociology articles and many more "popular" cultural features. For ease in finding different types of articles, I believe that eventually this page will have to include subcategories or more categories. I think subcategories is the best way to go, keeping "popular" and social scientific topics closely associated. An extra benefit: Creating sub-categories now may encourage work on the hundreds and hundreds of social science articles needing work to become feature quality (and some aren't too far from that). Below are the sub-categories I would like to create.
This has been suggested before. I'm against creating subcategories, at least until they are necessary. At this time, I do not believe it is. Raul65400:03, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the comment. I believe the time is now for Anthropology and Sociology to have a unique category, either sub-category or top level. So, if sub-categories are opposed in past discussions and practice so far, then a new category seems to me the way to go. Vir02:39, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
I would like to amend the above (and have edited the category headings below accordingly): There are several reasons an Anthropology and Sociology category is needed now. This will simplify finding such features and may encourage the creation of more such features.
While Anthropology and Sociology approaches to knowledge focus on culture and society, that does not mean that features discussing of social life in a non-social scientific manner, such as features on flags, boy scout merit badges, pet skunks, toilets, and so on (which talk about the design history of flags or how to take care for a skunk, etc.), should obscure by more numbers of features the ability of folks to quickly find features that mainly contain social science knowledge and approaches. While these popular cultural topics are often interesting and fine features (and can be also approached social scientifically as a few pop features are), Wikipedia readers in general and writers and editors of social science features would benefit from this new category.
[Additional points: Consider the nature of some of the current categories: Philosophy has 5 features in its category. Psychology has 4 features. So, precedent allows small top level rather academic categories. The new Anthropology and Sociology category would have 12 or so features. Wikipedia readers would benefit from a category for this important branch of knowledge, perhaps moreso than from the current Food and Drink category with 7 features, which could go under Culture and society, and perhaps moreso than from the current Awards category with 9 features, which could go under Politics, War or Culture. If those topics can have distinct categories, S&A really deserves one.]
What do you all think of creating the following new category (drawing on content from the current Culture and society category)? Vir02:39, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for feedback. I will wait a week or two or more to see what others think. Meanwhile, this process and various issues that came up got me thinking about what a thorough hierarhical categorization of features would look like. So, I played around creating that index. (And, in the context of the above process, the Anth & Soc category was refined a bit.) I find the following very helpful. So...
There really are not enough Featured Lists to have weekly entries; we don't promote very many of them. Maybe monthly, but they are never as high quality as FAs or FPs. —Cuiviénen, Monday, 3 April2006 @ 12:50 (UTC)
We have almost 100 featured lists now, but we are only promoting around 5 to 10 a month. I would dispute the contention that they are "never as high quality" as FAs or FPs. Glossing over the question of how you compare a list to an article or a picture, take a look at few entries on WP:FL: they are excellent in their own way. -- ALoan(Talk)10:57, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
"The Featured Articles are what we believe to be the best articles in Wikipedia." What does that mean? It sounds like how a corporation refers to itself-- "We do our best to serve our customers" blah blah. Who decides this? Is it wiki-based? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Twilight Realm (talk • contribs)
Yes but who's US in OUR featured article criteria?!! What, catch 22?! It REALLY sounds like a corporation refers to itself! First time I see it in Wikipedia. If I know who's that WE I would have described it in a, minor edit! Go! Maysara09:28, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Sports versus Games
Earlier, Gareth Aus split the "sports and games" section into seperate sections for "sports" and "games and amusement". I've reverted this, because sports are (almost by defintion) a subset of games (as well as amusements), and the line dinstinguishing the sports and games can get blurry pretty quickly. Raul65406:58, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
WP:Showcase article
I know this is probably a stupid idea that's been suggested before, but why not create a Showcase Article recognition. This article would be what is believed to be the very best article on Wikipedia and as such would be the "showcase" of Wikipedia. To even be nominated the article would have to already be a featured article. It would involve several rounds of voting during open pre-set time periods and elimination or promotion to the next round of voting. Yes, I know that there are dozens of extremely well-written and high-quality articles, but out of those the best one can eventually be selected. After winning the final round of voting by a majority of votes the article would become the Showcase Article of Wikipedia and would have a link to it identifying it as such on the Main Page. The article would be the Showcase Article for a set period of time of at least several months until a new round of voting either kept the article's status or replaced it with a new article as the Showcase Article of Wikipedia. Please tell me what you think. ¡Dustimagic!(T/C)23:11, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
I do believe this is a novel idea, but I don't think it's feasable. Comparing articles head to head (instead of against the featured article criteria) is an apples-to-oranges comparison. Who is to say that article A is better than article B? Also, the main page is already too crowded - linking to the same article day after day wouldn't serve much purpose. Raul65423:42, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
Yeah, you are probably right. For this to work some kind of criteria would have to be established (not all featured articles are perfect) and that would be complicated but possible to do. Having a link to this article would serve a purpose. It would show the very best article on Wikipedia. ¡Dustimagic!(T/C)00:00, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
All our featured articles are supposed to represent the very best of Wikipedia, and are showcased daily, so I think this would really be an unnecessary extra process. We shouldn't be aspiring to a pyramid of quality anyway, with one article at the very top - all FAs should theoretically be more or less equal in quality as the best on Wikipedia. Worldtraveller00:07, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
That's true, but instead of having several hundred featured articles to point to. We can have a single article right here to point to and say this is the very best of Wikipedia. I totally see what you are saying though and you're right we shouldn't be aspiring to a pyramid of quality anyway, with one article at the very top - all FAs should theoretically be more or less equal in quality as the best on Wikipedia. Thanks for the imput. Regardless of having this recognition, I still think it would be interesting to poll the Wikipedia community just to see what people think is the best article. ¡Dustimagic!(T/C)03:15, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
It also seems to me that having one best article would give a wrong impression to outsiders, something along the line of "Wikipedia has so few good articles that they can manage to pick the best one". I am not too keen on numbers (in particular, I don't like to cite the fact that en has about 1 million articles because many are of lower quality), but saying "Wikipedia has identified 900 articles as being the best of its articles" gives a better impression than having one article at the top. Schutz07:31, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
I tend to think "Showcase" might be a better term for the articles here than "Featured", but that's a non-issue.--cj | talk14:29, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
In which sense ? We don't have to type [[Image:Nuvola apps cache.png|12px|Lumière sur]], we just use a template fr:Modèle:Lumière sur, it's very easy to copy/paste and clear in the source code. For the visual complexity, fr:Wikipédia:Article de qualité is already more readable than its english counterpart since we gave up the bold. Of course, both templates (spoken and featured on the main page) should be before the article they refer to, I made a mistake here in my example.
That is much easier to read, but that's because there are nowhere near as many articles and the spoken icon isn't there. It makes it very difficult to read when there are two symbols per entry in a very long list. PS. Please remember to sign your posts (~~~~). violet/riga(t)22:19, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
This is a proposal taken from the French Wikipedia. Instead of creating new categories, we should improve the organisation of articles in each section. example:
Of course, the subsubsections should be refined and chosen correctly (it's just a quick example), but it improve the navigation and the readability of the page. Plus there's no problem over the articles that falls under many categories, because in case of a dispute we could just put it in "Others" CG20:01, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
But you have many more featured articles, so it may make sens not to add an additional end-of-line.
Cheers ;-)
I am very much against breaking this page up into sections. I do agree that the current page is long and could use a make-over. The look that worked when we had 150 articles listed here doesn't look good now we have over 900. It has too much bolding, and I don't like the spoken icons all over the place. But breaking it up into sections is not the answer. Raul65421:49, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Keeping pace
Eventually the page doesn't keep pace with the articles number (e.g. now it indicates 978,853 while currently there are 979,100). :) Brandmeister15:48, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
This page uses the {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} variable to display the total number of articles. Due to caching, that value can be slightly wrong, but there's simply no way to fix it. If you want hte exact value, go to Special:Statistics. Raul65418:09, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
How about "Featured templates"?
Considering all the templates out there, and the varying ideas of what constitutes a "good" template, how about adding "Featured templates" to this group of Featured articles, lists and portals? I'm sure such a designation would help improve the overall quality of templates as time goes by. Rfrisbietalk14:39, 20 February 2006 (UTC)
While this is an interesting concept, there would seem to be problems with how to evaluate which templates are the best. What criteria do you propose using? Common criteria such as completeness and verifiability do not apply to templates because they are labor saving devices and not encyclopedic content. A second concern is many existing templates deal with the administrative functions of day to day operation (like the various XfD templates or the list of warning templates listed at Template talk:Test) there is a concern about how featuring templates would work with Wikipedia:Avoid self-references. --Allen3talk16:01, 20 February 2006 (UTC)
I'm not saying it would be easy to define criteria. In fact, that would seem to be an argument for having featured templates. Because templates serve several distinct roles, I expect it also would be useful to identify some basic "high profile" types of templates, each with their own characteristic criteria. Initially at least, "featured templates" could be restricted to a few types, like navigational, infobox and taxobox. I would start defining criteria from the guidelines for creating these types of templates. Rfrisbietalk16:39, 20 February 2006 (UTC)
The page is getting longer and heavier. It is becoming really hard to navigate through the page and find a page on a particular subject. That's why I'm really for dividing each category into subcategories. I created User:Cedar-Guardian/FA to discuss suggestions about each category. I've already made for "Geography and places" and "Music". Open for discussions and suggestions. CG20:28, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
Our featured article of the day has legal problems
Triumph of the Will has a gallery of fair use pictures. There was a notice at the bottom of the article before it was featured on the main pageasking readers to viewImage talk:1936NurembergRally.jpg and the article talk for a discussion of the various images' copyrights, which appeared to imply the article's images are PD -- a rather poor excuse for not just tagging them as such and uploading them to Commons, which is for galleries (Wikipedia is not for galleries of images). However, the article talk only stated:
Now from what I gathered from discussing both with Riefenstahl and with producer at Synapse Films (they released Triumph of the Will on DVD in the early 2000's) copyright status can and has been avoided in various "versions" of the film (on DVD or VHS or in screening rights). These are versions that may have been held, like the one in the Library of Congress that Synapse utilized as 'public domain' or may have been edited slightly to avoid (is that the right word ?) infringement on Transit (or Riefenstahl for that matter). I have no idea how accurate these claims are but it may help explain why you have so many differing opinions on this matter of who, if anyone, holds the film rights.
The image talk page however, had the input of someone from the German Wikipedia, who stated:
In deWP we tag PD only images older than 100 years. The reason is the fact that nearly all pictures are to be evaluated as photo work and so a protection of 70 years pma is given.
Template talk:PD-Germany, which was cited by the discussion as evidence that the image was PD, has a notice at the bottom stating that the template was TfDed due to terribly inappropriate wording, and this was only rectified by altering the template's text. Furthermore, Image:1936NurembergRally.jpg is not even used in Triumph of the Will. From this, I believe we should assume the images are not PD, as there are very stringent laws pertaining to public domain images, especially in Germany. (There was a discussion on IRC earlier about whether the images are PD -- a British statute was cited, which stated that all German works imported into Britain between 1939 and 1951 were in the public domain, but the film was first released in Germany in 1935. Furthermore, as Wikipedia is hosted in the United States and the Wikimedia Foundation is based in Florida, I believe only United States law applies to it.)
Surprisingly, this troubling issue of fair use/weak claims of public domain, was not addressed by the FAC which passed this article. When it was first suggested for the main page, I brought this issue up. The article was nevertheless slated for the main page. Indignant, I complained in more detail on the TFA talk, and on the article talk. Now today, lo and behold, the article is on the main page, with my complaint having been totally ignored! Since apparently people think this can be just brushed aside nonchalantly because, y'know, them Nazis ain't ever gonna' sue nobody for using their pictures, I've made this excruciatingly detailed and long comment, and I will cross-post it to wherever I feel relevant. See also Wikipedia:Fair_use_review#Images. Yes, I know, some will scream m:Avoid copyright paranoia. However, we have insisted on removing fair use images from people's talk pages, even though there is a zero chance of being sued for their use (really, will the US Democratic Party sue us for using their logo in a userbox?), so why should we brush this off when an article supposed to be our best work and appearing on our gateway to the world so blatantly violates the provisions of fair use and/or the definition of a public domain image? Johnleemk | Talk15:09, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
There are probably legitimate concerns over what tags should be on all of those images; but they are primarily issues of semantics, as we could still use them in the article even if they were only tagged with a fair-use template.
More generally, though:
Fair-use images on userpages don't, as a general rule, serve an important encyclopedic purpose. The fair-use images here, on the other hand, are both important to illustrating the article and quite irreplaceable.
Purely legalistic issues aside (I doubt we'd be sued over these, or would lose if we were, but that's something for the legal people to consider), common sense suggests that we need not be overly concerned about infringing on the Nazis' moral rights. —Kirill Lokshin16:28, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
The gallery (which I removed) is not fair use at all. Also, let me remind you that HIGH-RESOLUTION images cannot be fair use according to our policies and even the various fair use templates. Johnleemk | Talk16:37, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Our policies are in place for practical reasons, not as an end to themselves. The fair-use policy, in particular, has two aims:
Legal: minimize the legal risk for Wikipedia as well as anyone distributing our content.
Ethical: respect the moral rights of authors and content creators
I would argue that, for these images, the legal risks are nonexistent and that the discussion of ethical use of them is somewhat absurd, given the circumstances of their creation. —Kirill Lokshin16:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Not when the fair use images are copyright 2005 by the estate of the filmmaker. I'd say there's a pretty good chance of being sued. Maybe I should just point you in the direction of Wikipedia:Fair use review, which discusses the problems WRT fair use in more detail. Johnleemk | Talk16:52, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
That's utterly daft, though. If the images were present in the film when it was released, then they're copyright 1937, regardless of what the estate may claim. (It may claim a copyright to a re-released version of the entire film, similarly to publishers claiming copyright on a particular re-printing of public domain books, but the original material cannot magically be "re-copyrighted" with a later date.) —Kirill Lokshin17:03, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
(indent shifted back) Regardless, the date of copyright does not come into play here, since it's doubtful the images are PD. What's clear is that someone still cares about the filmmaker's legacy, and we could very well be sued by this someone for the excessive "fair" use. Legal risk? I'd say, yes, there's a substantial legal risk, considering the lack of fair use rationales, the high-resolution images, the great proliferation of them, the fact that the estate of the copyright owner (whose copyright has yet to expire) maintains an active interest in preserving the copyright owner's legacy, and so on. Ethically? Well, since when are Nazis suddenly exempt from normal ethical consideration, especially since the filmmaker has argued she never really supported Nazism in the first place, and was more intent on making a work of art? Let's not lose track here -- the "fair" use isn't fair at all. Johnleemk | Talk17:16, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
I think it's a bit more complicated than that, legally:
Are we likely to be sued over these images?
If we are sued, are we likely to lose? Riefenstahl wasn't particularly successful on this in the UK; but this is for the legal people to consider in any case.
If we are sued and we lose, do the possible costs outweigh the potential gains (and there are some, not least of which the possibility of "Nazis attack Wikipedia" headlines in the media).
As far as the ethics are concerned, I would argue that the wishes of people making Nazi propaganda films shouldn't be catered to; but that's just my own view, and I can understand where others would disagree. —Kirill Lokshin17:54, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Well, we're not bloody likely to be sued for "fair use" of a lot of images. Doesn't mean we tolerate those "fair use" images. For instance, we're probably not going to be sued for, say, the surfeit of TIME cover scans we have, but Jimbo has made it clear they need to go. The facts here are simple: Under both our fair use policy and the US law pertaining to fair use, the current usage of several fair use images in the article are not really fair use, and would probably not stand up in court. (Let's face it: No fair use rationale; a real big bunch of images -- maybe a dozen or so, most of which contain scenes from the film not really discussed by the article; most of these images are high-resolution, which means they can detrimentally affect the copyright owner's profits from redistributing the film or stills from it; the list goes on and on. This could even be considered a textbook case of wrong fair use.) As for ethics, that's totally irrelevant. I may consider, for instance, the cartoonists of that Danish cartoon which insulted Muhammad, to be as wrong as the Nazis, but that doesn't mean their legal rights shouldn't be respected. Please educate yourself on how fair use works before, as the Manglish phrase goes, talking cock. Johnleemk | Talk18:27, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
My personal take is that the use of a small number of fair use images in that article is quite justified. E.g. the photo of the procession into the hall, and its comparison with similar scenes in Star Wars and other works, is a quite textbook example of fair use - it is being used for critical purposes! Similar justification exists for some others, or could be made. However, some of the images appear to be purely decorative and thus, IMO, unjustified, and the sheer quantity also gives that impression. The gallery is rather lacking in justification, and worse because galleries are generally considered unacceptable in Wikipedia itself regardless of the copyright status of the images.
Fair use justification is not and cannot be an exact science, of course. However, IMO this steps over the line rather a bit. An important thing to realise is that the spirit of our fair use policies is not 'We will get away with as much as we believe we can get away with without losing in court', but rather more tightly defined than that. It's firstly a matter of ethics, secondly a matter of our free-content policies.
Err, the entire question of fair-use in the legal sense (as opposed to the WP policy sense) will only come up if somebody decides to sue. And there are still questions of who, exactly, holds the copyright to the film (another issue unlikely to be resolved without a court case); if the images are PD, then we're quite safe, regardless of the fact that we thought we were using them under the fair-use doctrine.
Our fair-use policies, on the other hand, shouldn't be the tail that wags the dog. If we decide that including these images in Triumph of the Will (a) helps us create a better encyclopedia and (b) is not a real liability (legally or otherwise), we shouldn't be prevented from doing so merely by the lack of a proper {{Probably-PD-Nazi-Government-but-nobody-really-cares}} template to add to the image pages. —Kirill Lokshin19:04, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
So if we decided how we use images based only on the question of whether we could be sued for their use, we would still keep non-commercial and permission-only images around, wouldn't we? These images aren't a real liability to us at all, and they are totally verboten. A gallery of images is not fair use, and attempting to justify keeping the gallery by arguing "our fair-use policies shouldn't wag the dog" is utterly illogical. Just because we won't get sued for using an image doesn't mean we should use it. And really, how does it help to create an encyclopedia by having a gallery? How does it help by providing high-resolution photographs one could use as desktop wallpapers? How? Didn't we create Commons so we could get rid of all these damn galleries? Johnleemk | Talk09:58, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
I believe we removed non-commercial and permission-only images out of deference to mirror sites, no? (And we do still have some of those images; they're just tagged with {{Non-free fair use in}} instead.)
As far as the gallery is concerned, it may very well be utterly useless and need to be removed; but that decision should be made for editorial reasons (e.g. having a gallery in this article isn't helpful), rather than image policy ones.
Finally, I would argue that, in this particular case, the irreplaceable historical value of these images (particularly when high-resolution versions are provided) should outweigh any purely legalistic quibbles. —Kirill Lokshin17:05, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
These aren't legalistic quibbles that can be brushed aside. The estate remains interested in the copyright, and as the images are probably not PD (see fair use review), if they want to they can sue us. I've debunked your nonsense argument that this is about the tail wagging the dog. And last time I checked, we were here to make an encyclopedia, not provide high-resolution historical images. There is no point in keeping desktop wallpaper-size images around for the encyclopedia, since no article is going to need an image larger than a few hundred pixels wide/tall. Johnleemk | Talk17:14, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
Do you have any evidence that the estate has actually been successful in claiming copyright on the film?
The filmmaker's copyright is still extant. That much is clear. The Library of Congress classifies most promotional photos produced by the Nazi government as PD, but this apparently does not apply to stills from the film (since the same uploader tagged the promos as PD and the film screencaps as fair use). The estate thus has the legal right to prosecute violators of the copyright, since the filmmaker is dead (copyright does not expire after the death of the copyright-holder). As for high-resolution, do bear in mind that the reason for this is to avoid a detrimental effect on potential profits for the copyright holder. The copyright holder (the estate of the filmmaker, obviously) may want to sell posters of the film, and providing images that are high-resolution now can hinder this. Is this unlikely? Yes. But is it possible? Yes. Better safe than sorry. Otherwise, we wouldn't be deleting irreplaceable high-resolution fair use images. Johnleemk | Talk18:15, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
I agree with you on all of that; but wouldn't it be worthwhile to consider the possibility that the uploader has mis-tagged the film stills, and that they are, in fact, PD as well? We shouldn't really be actively looking for reasons to delete images, in my opinion. —Kirill Lokshin18:22, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
(indent shifted back) Well, the solution would probably be to ask him (User talk:Palm dogg). He contributed substantially to the article, though, so presumably he isn't talking stuff out of his arse. Johnleemk | Talk18:33, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
The featured article notice is placed on the article talk page because it is meta-data, information about the status of the article instead of information about the subject of the article. --Allen3talk05:04, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
There's no "might" about it -- it very much is metadata, which is why I argued vehemently against the star. Raul65406:30, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
Right, but I don't really see what's wrong about bragging about it to everyone who sees the page -- unless of course we're afraid that might encourage vandalism. I guess I feel that it's always a good feeling to know that you're in the presence of something that's gotten a strong seal of approval. (That was poorly phrased, but I think you get the gist of what I was trying to say.) --66.229.183.10107:36, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Avoid self-references. I think the star idea sucks, but only because what bloody reader is going to make the connection? There's no explanation for it -- the star just appears there. Either we make the connection obvious ("OMG THIS ARTICLE IS TEH FEATURED, 1337!") or we put all this crap on the talk page. Anything in between confuses people. Johnleemk | Talk07:39, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
Well, the star does have a pretty good tooltip, so anyone that mouses over to it (which should be a pretty natural thing to do) will get the idea. —Kirill Lokshin17:05, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
Categorising FAs
I think it'd be great if we formed categories for featured articles. I mean, the list of articles looks good now, but in some point in time it will became just too big to be useful. Yes, it would mean we have two parallel category trees, but that won't kill us, right? It could be implemented like this: {{featured article}} could take one argument, which would be a category. --Dijxtra13:33, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
See my comment above: I am very much against breaking this page up into sections. I do agree that the current page is long and could use a make-over. The look that worked when we had 150 articles listed here doesn't look good now we have over 900. It has too much bolding, and I don't like the spoken icons all over the place. But breaking it up into sections is not the answer. Raul654 21:49, 3 March 2006 (UTC) At some point I'll be giving this page a makeover, but rihgt now I have no time Raul65414:15, 6 March 2006 (UTC)
I think in keeping with the spirit of Emperor Norton's "reign" over San Francisco (and his lack of influence in government politics), it would be more appropriate to move the Joshua A. Norton article to the "Royalty, Nobility and Heraldry" section.
Does anyone have any complaints? Alexthe5th04:46, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
Bookmarklet for "Today's Featured Article"
I've created a bookmarklet so that you can have a link on your "links toolbar" or "bookmarks toolbar" that takes you directly to today's featured article. Firefox/Mozilla users can also use this bookmarklet to make their home page today's featured page. This bookmarklet is different from the WP:TOFA link. I find that the layout of WP:TOFA obscures the actual featured article, because of all the navigation, guidelines, and other stuff that comes before the featured artcile. The bookmarklet gives me the page with just the short-n-sweet version. --netjeff02:25, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
I did not know about the transclusion features. Based on the comments above, I created User:Netjeff/TOFA that has only the content for today's featured article. Basically the same deal as the bookmarklet I created, but the title in the browser might look a bit odd. It would be nice if there were an official shortcut link that would give the same results as my bookmarklet, but did not require a bookmarklet nor transculsion on a user page. --netjeff18:37, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
Havelock's category
Raul put Eric A. Havelock in the education category, in part, no doubt, because that category could use some fleshing out. He certainly was an accomplished educator and that's how he made his living, though I don't know if it's what he's remembered for. I'd like to get feedback from others, though, about another possibility: language and linguistics. So far it only contains articles about languages and features of languages, but it seems a philologist might belong there. Philosophy is also a possibility. Thoughts? Chick Bowen04:45, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
I admit that finding an appropriate category was a bit tricky, and that my choice might not be the best one. Raul65404:47, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
It is tricky. I'm not knocking your choice--I'm not sure myself, as I say. Thanks for promoting it, by the way. :) Chick Bowen04:49, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
Most likely, many people who come here looking for featured Biology articles would be happy to find the article about Aquarium. I therefore added it to the Biology and Medicine section (in addition to the entry in the Technology and Enggineering section). This was reverted with the motivation that it was a multiple entry. I have found no rule agains multiple entries and therefore have added it again. --Etxrge12:23, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
There's no rule against it because this is not a court of law; we don't have to have a complete list of do's and dont's. (In fact, as the primary maintaner of the featured-article related things, I generally like to keep them short and concise) In this case, the categories are mutually exclusive so that counting the featured articles can be done in a reasonable amount of time (e.g, by copying and pasting the list into excell). Having duplicates would make this impossible, so we don't do it. Raul65415:01, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
This is a very un-Wikipedian line of argument. Effectively you are saying that this is Your territory and therefore Your view rules. In reality you do not have a territory on Wikipedia. Please learn to accept this fact. The need to be able to count the featured articles is a substantial argument though. But this has to be weighted against other concerns. Your haven't done this and that is again very un-Wikipedian. The objective of this list is to help people find the featured articles. The objective of partitioning them into subject areas is to help people find the articles they are most likely to be interested in. I hold that it is obviously true that the vast majority of those that are interested in aquarium would go for the biology headline rather that the engineering headline. --Etxrge08:34, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
Raul is our Featured Article Director. If the only argument against a decision he makes is that his autocratic actions are unWikipedian, then he probably made the right decision. (I'm stating this as a general rule of thumb, and am not referring to this specific case.) Johnleemk | Talk17:02, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
I notice that this entry is listed under religion. Please move to history. The editors at the article had a long and difficult time balancing religious and secular aspects for NPOV. The current category suggests a hagiographic slant: although she's a very popular saint, she was no theologian, and the other aspects of her impact (military, nationalistic, political, cultural) have a combined force that makes her a historic figure. Durova04:01, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
Keep in mind that featured article candidacy is a discussion, not a "vote", and one substantial, valid objection may be grounds for FAC failure. That said, to leave comments, make sure to read the article in question thoroughly, then click "edit" next to that article's listing there, and leave your comments. The reasons why you support or object to an article are more important than the Support or Object itself. If you leave objections, make sure to monitor the FAC nomination and article to see whether your objections are satisfactorily addressed. If they are, you should strike your objections (enclose text with <s> and </s> to create the strikethrough) and change your summary judgment accordingly. If you want to nominate an article not already listed on WP:FAC, read the "Nomination procedure" there. — TKD::Talk01:12, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
a new icon directly equivalent to the featured article star on an article mainpage has suddenly appeared, withoput prior discussion, on hundreds of articles marked as "good articles". please vote on the issue of whether it should be there (note the GA process is not policy, and was formerly restricted to talk pages only, putting an icon on the main article page itself is the new development) at Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2006 March 25, please vote, thx! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Zzzzz (talk • contribs)
There is no "star" for the good article icon! The {{good article}} template places a small Good Article symbol () in the top right corner of an article to indicate that it is a good article on Wikipedia. —RJN10:40, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
Page redesign... similar to Good articles?
The layout of the page is pretty boring and hard to read... the good articles page is much easier to read and much shorter too. Would it be at all possible to convert that layout to this page? PaulC/T+00:23, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
That's not a very good layout; notice that, in the default show/hide configuration, it's impossible to use a browser's Find function on the article list. Kirill Lokshin00:34, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
The main motivation for setting up the good articles page like that seems to be that the good article people expect thousands of pages in their list...right now the FA list isn't growing fast enough to make the cost in legibility, searchability, and (I would speculate) breadth of browser compatability worthwhile. Christopher Parham(talk)22:38, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
The code that controls the hiding and showing of the bars is in Monobook.js an overall file, however, within your own monobook.js file you could add
var NavigationBarShowDefault = 28;
which is the present count of sections on the Good Articles page. By doing this, all the sections are shown on the page by default instead of hidden. I know this is a hack - but the code and GA are both new and finding their feet. However I thought other people may have been interested in this info. Bear in mind though that it will mean other pages with multiple bars will all show by default. However FA does have it's very own code already within Monobook.js, so if it was decided by consensus to change the look of the FA page I would imagine it would be possible to come up with a way to hide and show everything with one click, with the default being: Show all. Regards SeanMack18:03, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Change of FA on main page: what time ?
I was a bit puzzled earlier today; as far as I can remember, the FA on the Main page are changed at 0:00 UTC. However, at 23:19 UTC yesterday (as I remember from Wikipedia:Today's featured article, after purge), Today's featured article was already Frog. Seeing that Frog was indeed on the main page, I went ahead and bolded it (as I have done often in the past few weeks), as well as updated the {{Mainpage date}} template on Talk:Frog. However, I got a message on my talk page asking if it was really a good idea to update the template before the article is on the main page. Now I am really confused... Does anyone has any idea about what may have happenend ? This weekend was the start of daylight savings in Europe, but I don't think it would have any influence here... Schutz09:08, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
Ok, good — glad to see I am not the only one who has noticed something strange. If I am in front of my computer tonight at 0:00 UTC, I'll double-check that everything is back to normal for the FA. Many thanks for the answer ! Schutz12:17, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
Featured article tag?
I was wondering if articles have something (such as a template) on their pages to designate them as featured articles. If not, then it might be a good idea to create a new template for this. - Conrad Devonshire06:12, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
They do; see the template {{featured article}} which is placed at the bottom of each featured article and displays a star at the top right corner of the article. See also the discussion above where it was decided to create this template for the pros and cons of such template. Schutz08:38, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
It's still not appearing for me. It might have something to do with the spoken article tag. I'll check others with that tag. —Cuiviénen, Monday, 3 April2006 @ 19:48 (UTC)
"A little bronze star (as pictured above, but smaller) to the right of an article's title on its page indicates that the article is a featured article." This no longer seems to be the case. I have checked on both Firefox and Internet Explorer. Perhaps a policy change has been described elsewhere on this page, but if so, the text should be removed from the FA page.``StN21:23, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
Probably you guys are fed up with answering them so sorry in advance:
Why isnt this page semi-protected?
Except for the community portal, where can I find a list of recently featured awarded articles? ...especially since the community portal is in the process of a redesign and the current page does not list them.
1. See WP:SEMI; basically we don't semi-protect pages to prevent potential vandalism, we only semi-protect if the vandalism has already proved itself out-of-hand.
3. GA is a much newer project, and they keep changing how it looks, which is a lot easier than changing the look of an older project like FA. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 23:06, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
This is not a vote. I do agree with Andrevan's sentiment that this page does not look particularly good - the style that looked good when we had 200 FAs does not look good now that we have 5 times as many. However, that said, there are things about the good article page I don't particularly care for; this page has a smaller, less obstrusive dot (instead of a diamond) used to seperate articles; I don't like the subsection counts (they are hard to maintain), and I don't want subsections in general. I don't like the teal color scheme, either. Beyond that, I want to remove from this page all of the spoken article links (I have never been fond of them, and now there are simply too many). I also am not sure if bolding articles is the best way to indicate they have been on the main page, but some visible way is necessary. Raul65405:36, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
I didn't mean to vote, I just wanted to express my support. Anyway, The FA page is about to list 1000 articles, so it's necessary to find a way to organise a page. If it's not subsections, what do you suggest? As for the sound incons, I'm also for their removal: What does they have to do with the FA status? CG09:25, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
The sound icons nothing to do at all with this page -- that project has a history of pushing big, flashy gratitious advertisements where they don't belong, including this page. Raul65417:03, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
I like the bolding; it provides a good balance between doing its job (articles that have been featured on the main page and the others both stand out clearly), and not being invasive (the sound icons, on the other hand, are more invasive, but I don't mind them too much). Schutz08:02, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Great, I started with the "Geography" section. And also we might consider using the hide/show option like in WP:GA. CG18:05, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
I just noticed something - WP:GA looks a heck of a lot better when viewed in the monobook skin than when viewed using the classic skin that I use - the diamonds aren't and big, and the css actually works. Raul65418:08, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
Do you think we should post a notice in the community portal to invite people to participate into this new redesign? CG
Provided the submissions follow the usability criteria I described above (in order to keep it reasonable for me to update), and as long as it doesn't turn into the big bruhaha that the main page redesign became, then yes, that's probably a good idea. Raul65422:32, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
I'm not very fluent in English. Could someone post the announcement instead? Thank you. CG11:24, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
Regarding the bolding: I must say, I find it pretty irritating. The information that an article has been featured on the main page has not much value for the normal reader but rather makes the list hard to read. On the other hand, the wikipedians need to know (and see) which article have been featured. German wikipedia solved the problem with keeping a second logfile but that's awfully buerocratic. So, what about an invisible marker? tag articles with a template (like a small star or whatever) which is set by default to invisible and everybody involved in maintaining the list can make it visible in his user stylesheet. --ElianTalk04:14, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
I am working on a possible replacement in my sandbox. It's not done yet; ignore that ugly whitespace caused by the featured lists thing. Style wise, any takers?--HereToHelp19:41, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
Page protection
Yesterday, April 8, I semi-protected the main project page after reviewing recent edits to the page. Most were vandalism/reverts. In my opinion the protection should remain since it seems like the only edits made to this page are vandalism. I don't believe that protecting this page will compromise Wikipedia's openess. ¡Dustimagic!(T/C)05:29, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
How do I add "" before "Equal Protection Clause" when the page is protected? Do I need to request this somewhere? --Speaker Eric10:44, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
To explain a bit further, the FA page is semi-protected, which means that users who are not logged in and very new users cannot edit the page. After a few days, you'd be able to edit it. — TKD::Talk14:36, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
"946 featured articles, out of a total of 1,070,743 articles...
...That means approximately 1 in 1130 articles is listed here."
That paragraph doesn't take into account that we have 100 featured lists. And the pages that we call "lists" are included in that "1,070,743 articles" statistic. I don't know if anyone else has ever brought that up. Coffee16:56, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
I have no idea how many lists there are so maybe it really is 1 in 1129 or even 1 in 1000 but does it really matter? It's much too few either way--MarSch15:18, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
There are almost 100 Wikipedia:featured lists - go and see! - but I would guess that Jeffrey's point is that 946/1,070,743 (1 in 1,131.863, rounded down to 1 in 1,130) is not awfully different to 1,045/1,070,743 (1 in 1,024.634, rounded down to 1 in 1,020). Having said that, it can obviously change the "1 in x" by a few notches. -- ALoan(Talk)16:45, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
1 in 1020 against 1 in 1130 is more than 10% difference. In that case I would like a non-MAJOR pay rise ;) Pcb21Pete10:27, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
I knew I would bugger up the maths somewhere (the denominator was wrong on one of my fractions, but I think the final numbers are right). It still around one in a thousand, either way. -- ALoan(Talk)16:27, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
Havelock again
Well, I've thought about it for a month (see above) and I think philosophy is the best category: of his 8 books, 3 are on philosophy including the most famous, 3 on philology which is not an option, and 2 on literature. Any objections to making the move, Raul? Thanks. Chick Bowen23:07, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
Why is Brilliant prose redirected here? It can be confusing to newcomers who are trying to understand what Wikipedia means by "brilliant prose". Just concerned about the newcomers that I am welcoming. Waikiki!!! ^_^ --ElectricEye09:15, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
"Brilliant prose" was the predecessor to the current featured article process, although with substantial differences. Raul65409:18, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
So that the redesign project does not take long and become confusing, here's a list of the issues that should be dealt with before redesigning the page:
Does the page really need a redesign?
What is the new subsectioning that we will adopt? Should we use the one used in Wikipedia:Good articles (with the show/hide function or without?). Should we consider splitting the page?
Should we keep or remove the sound icons?
Should we keep on bolding main page FAs or we use another way (maybe an invisible marker, or an another page?)
Yes, page can be redesigned, but I am not in favour of Show/Hide options and we should keep sound icons as well. I support to keep on bolding which appeared on the main page.Shyam(T/C)19:34, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
CG - to answer your questions and at the same time provide criteria for the redesign: The page does not require a redesign, but it would definitely benefit from one. The page WILL NOT be split into multiple articles. I don't think I can put it more simply than that. That would increase the maintinence work for me exponentially (check the archives for previous discussion on this subject). I'm against subsectioning for the same reason, albeit not as strongly. Whatever the redesign, it must have (or be capable of displaying) some visual indictation of which articles have appeared on the main page (so that I don't have to play guess-and-check when scheduling articles for the main page). If someone has something better-looking than bolding in mind, I'm all in favor. I'm against the sound icons because they are and always have been ugly and unrelated (and that project has a history of aggressively, inappropriately advertising itself). Beyond that, I cannot think of any pressing issues at the moment, so I'll leave the rest to the individuals who have redesigns in mind. Raul65408:49, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
There hasn't been the amount of response that I hoped for. Anyway, as a first step, if there is no objection, I suggest we remove all the sound icons. CG15:47, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps instead of bolding the articles that have appeared on the main page, bold the one that have not? That would kill most of the bolding in the page, and make those that haven't been featured in WP:TFA more prominent. Titoxd(?!? - help us)20:42, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
I like this idea. My hand started hurting 2 minutes into trying to change over the draft page though... Can someone do this with automated ease/speed? --Quiddity22:06, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
Adding a reference to the Good Articles
A few weeks ago, I proposed at the Village Pump that the Featured Articles and the Good Articles be placed in the navigation bar, and the proposal was approved and implemented, except for the Good Articles.
I appealed the point that the Good Articles be also placed there by citing the following points:
it is based on the same principle as "best foot forward"
they are better than the random articles which appear at the nav bar
attracting readers to the good articles will lead to improving these articles towards FA status, since readers usually have few interests and specific specializations.
Since the appeal did not prosper, may I suggest a compromise: put a reference to the Good Articles in the Featured Article Page, so as to lead the readers to the GA if they do not find what they are looking for in the FA.
Just a statement which says, e.g.: We also have almost a thousand Good Articles, i.e. articles which have reached a certain level of quality. You can find them in...
considered, and rejected. GA is not policy, and has a history of inappropriate advertising. thanks!Zzzzz09:19, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
Concur with Zzzzz. Good articles are not a commonly accepted part of the Wikipedia featured content system; in fact, it is still tagged as a proposal. There's simply no need to mention it in FAs. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 16:24, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
It wasn't, but this is not a normal case. Its actionable objections weren't dealt with so it shouldn't have been promoted in the first place. Worldtraveller09:25, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
FARC is not there for removing articles promoted in error, as this one was. Please read the nomination page to see the objections which were not resolved. I asked Raul654 if he could give the rationale behind the promotion a month and a half ago, and suggested speedily delisting almost three weeks ago, and took no response as no objection. Worldtraveller09:25, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
Sure, it would be great for the objections to be addressed. Possibly this could be done through discussion on Talk:Chetwynd, British Columbia. But, the FAC did have 17 votes of support, with 3 object votes. Do FAC votes have to be unanimous? Or what? --Aude (talk | contribs) 15:44, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
If there are actionable objections, then FA candidates should not be passed. Even if there were 100 supports and one actionable objection, it should not pass until the actionable objection has been dealt with. Worldtraveller16:30, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
Farc is where you go if you believe the article was promoted in error. I have no opinion on whether or not the article is up to snuff or whether or not its promotion was an accident. I do have an opinion on the (not de-listing, but de-featuring) process, and the process should be followed. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*>16:23, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
Well, not really - the rule about not nominating articles too soon after their FAC nomination puts paid to that. Imagine that an article with only objects was inadvertently promoted - would you expect me to list it on FARC, or would you just de-list it? This is not much less clear-cut - significant actionable objections were not resolved, so the article must have been promoted in error, so it should simply be delisted. Worldtraveller16:30, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
I guess Raul will have to tell us whether the page was promoted deliberately or in error. Meanwhile, WorldTraveller's case seems very logical to me, and I agree there were serioous outstanding objections. So I've reverted. Bishonen | talk17:34, 26 April 2006 (UTC).
Jeffrey, you've reverted two different people. FARC really isn't for cases like this, just as it wouldn't be in the hypothetical case of something getting accidentally promoted with no support votes. Of course you'd just delist it. Have you read the FAC nomination in this case? Worldtraveller18:02, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
But Chetwynd had 17 support votes, not zero. You can't assume this was a mistake to promote it. In this case, I think it needs to go through a more formal process, such as FARC. --Aude (talk | contribs) 18:06, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
It is your opinion that the promotion was an accident. Not a fact. The FA had wide support, as noted. You were one of the objectors, so you are hardly unbiased in your assertion. That there is disagreement here, and on the FAC, means that the proper process should be followed. And unless Raul says otherwise, continuing to say the promotion was an accident is 1) not grounds for IAR, and 2) bullocks. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*>18:56, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
What a disaster, all these words spent discussing where to discuss the article. Can't we just fix it and the problem goes away? On that note, what is there to fix? I see Worldtraveller, Bishonen and Geogre were the three objectors. Maclean25 at least responded and seems to have made alterations based on all of their conents. Were they not sufficient to gain support? Why not? Let's get whatever unambigiously actionable objections on the table and I am sure any one of us will help fix them - all the problems seem to be of style rather than content anyway. Pcb21Pete18:49, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
Just to give my two cents here, I don't see any error in the promotion. FAC is not a vote, yes; it's a discussion used to find consensus. If consensus agrees that particular issues with the article are not major (many of the major objections were subjective things, e.g. writing or article length), then naturally it follows that the article ought to be promoted. Just because an objection is actionable doesn't mean it ought to be heeded or else nothing can proceed. (I could arguably object to every current FAC with the claim that "Prose is not compelling" with specific examples of text that I find boring; would it be fair if this resulted in each FAC failing, because everyone but me thought the article was great?) If you ask me, this ought to go through FARC (following procedure, of course; please point out on the talk what the issues are with the article and give some time for them to be addressed). Johnleemk | Talk19:09, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
I don't think there was any consensus that the issues raised were minor. That's why I presume it was an error, and I asked Raul for his rationale in promoting back in early March, but got no reply. I suggested delisting it three weeks ago and got no reply again, which I took as no objection. If Raul could just tell us whether it was an error or if not, why it was promoted despite the objections, that would help a lot. Worldtraveller19:50, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
In the absence of a pronouncement from Raul654 (is he ignoring us?), I assume that the promotion was not unintentional - having brought it to his attention, I am sure he would have corrected his mistake, if it was one.
No, I'm not ignoring hte discussion - I'm just insanely busy at the moment spending most of my waking hours coding a project that is already 2 days late). The decision to promote the article was intentional (although arguably it was a mistake - at the time I promoted it, it did look like most of the objections had been satisfied), and thus it does belong on FARC. Also, apologies to world-traveller for not responding to his questions in a timely manner - I'm usually pretty good about that but I dropped the ball in this case. Raul65405:08, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for that clarification! Good to know what actually went on, that makes things a lot clearer. I'll list it on FARC. Worldtraveller12:51, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
Suggestion: icon for front page features, not boldface
The pervasive boldface hurts my eyes. Ack. How about a little icon, just like the audio icon, to signify that the article was featured on the main page? Perhaps an exclamation mark, blue ribbon, or a gold star... PatrickFisher08:00, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
I agree the bolding looks terrible, but see the discussion above - there are problems with icons too.
My prefered solution is to add some div tags to each entry so that for most of us the list just looks like a normal list, but those very few people want or need to have the main page ones bolded can add a line to their personal .css file. Pcb21Pete09:45, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
Here's a novel solution: how about we only bold the articles that haven't appeared on the main page yet, since there's so much fewer of them than ones that have? :) -Silence15:31, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
I concur - I'm very happy with this solution, but the wikitext is, well, a mess. But if the article name and tag could all fit on one line, it would be perfect. Raul65420:07, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
Take another look now. I have wrapped the long wikitext in a template which has the advantage of allowing refactoring in a single place if ever needed, as well as being a lot shorter and a little neater. Pcb21Pete20:39, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
Horizontal scrollbar on featured articles in Opera
On all the featured articles I get a horizontal scrollbar in Opera 8.5 and the beta's of Opera 9. I've tried the site with Firefox and Internet Explorer and there's no problem with those. Does anyone else get this and would there be a way we can fix it? I've taken a low-quality screenshot to show this. Icey14:29, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
How disagreeable <subliminal>use SeaMonkey use SeaMonkey use Seamonkey</subliminal>. Not on any other articles? Only the FAs? Weird. Bishonen | talk17:02, 30 April 2006 (UTC).
Odds are, since it's the only thing different about FA articles, the problem is being caused by the little absolute-positioned top-right FA star that's put there with {{featured article}}. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 18:39, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
I think I've worked out what it is. In the CSS for the featured star, there's a bit that says "font-size: 100px", changing that to 10px fixes the problem. So I assume it's creating some really large text that goes over the edge of the page, but using a much smaller font size means it doesn't run over and no horizontal scrollbar is produced. Bishonen: Aye, SeaMonkey is a great browser. I'm just happy as long as I'm using a standards-compliant browser and not that waste-of-time Internet Explorer thing :) Icey21:14, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
