Talk:Current events

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This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Current events article.
This article is part of WikiProject Current events, an attempt to expand and better organize information in articles related to current events. If you would like to participate in the project, visit the project page or contribute to the discussion.

See also: Wikipedia:How the Current events page works
For instructions on how to archive Current events at the start of a new month, see: Wikipedia:How to archive Current Events

Note: Proposed move removed. Article page had already been moved to location listed in vote. Just talk page was left at old space. Talk page now moved matching location to article page.

Also though nomination sitting here, no actual vote had been set up. [[user_talk:Jtdirl]] 22:00, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

Previous discussions:

  • General Archives:
    • Old: 1 | 2 | 3
    • 2004: 4 (Apr 26) | 5 (Jul 26) | 6 (Jul 26) | 7 (Aug 19) | 8 (Aug 19) | 9 (Oct 1) | 10 (Nov 29)
    • 2005: 11 (Mar 21) 12 (April 2005) 13 (Dec 16)
    • 2006: 14 (May 1)

Contents

[edit] Use of the word alleged for current events

The word alleged is only used when something is in doubt or is used as POV to undermine a statement.


[edit] Past or present tense?

The article starts with a (hidden) note "Please log news events in the past tense." Surely it must read "in the present tense". Or was there a recent change regarding this policy? Please advise. I suggest to write the rule in Wikipedia:How the Current events page works. --Edcolins 15:00, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

I changed the note. --Edcolins 07:15, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Merging Regional Current Event Pages

I have added a proposal to merge the regional current event pages on the WikiProject talk page. Your comments and suggestions would be appreciated. joturner 02:34, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Another Proposal: Overhaul of the Current events page

Another proposal has appeared on the WikiProject talk page. User:GT suggested creating a system whereby the last x number of days are always in the current events article. Although he didn't elaborate, I'll attempt to convey what he most likely meant (he can correct me later):

  • Putting all events in current events into article-templates. By that I mean create an article for each new day - May 2, 2006 perhaps - and include the article via {{:May 2, 2006}}. A similar system was used for the monthly articles (e.g. April 2005) up until late-2005.
  • The current events page would include the templates from the last x number of days. I'll use eight for example, which will include today, and the previous seven days. The current events article would therefore have the following text to include all the events from today and the previous seven days:
{{:May 2, 2006}}
{{:May 1, 2006}}
{{:April 30, 2006}}
{{:April 29, 2006}}
{{:April 28, 2006}}
{{:April 27, 2006}}
{{:April 26, 2006}}
{{:April 25, 2006}}
  • When an event is added to a new day (i.e. the first event is added to the May 2, 2006 article), the least recent date would be removed and that new date would be added.
  • Each month article would contain the appropriate daily article-templates, looking something like...
{{:April 1, 2006}}
{{:April 2, 2006}}
{{:April 3, 2006}}
.
.
.
{{:April 29, 2006}}
{{:April 30, 2006}}
  • Alternatively article names such as Current events on May 2, 2006 could be used to free up the date article names.

-- joturner 04:30, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Benefits

  • Both the Current events article and the monthly articles would be updated simultaneously.
  • There would be no monthly archiving which can be painstaking for the numerous related current events articles (e.g. Current events in the European Union)
  • Uniform appearance of the page (aesthetic benefit) -Fsotrain09 23:24, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Drawbacks

  • May be confusing to users accustomed to the old system
  • Appears to advance no benefit due to complexity, programming requirements and confusing archiving system. Current system allows easy and swift access to information
  • I disagree on this one. Perhaps my experience is clouding my judgement, but I don't really see removing the least recent date and adding a new date as especially difficult. And if someone doesn't know how to do something, someone else will be there to fix it (people have problems with the current page as well). And also, I'd like to point out that this was done for three years in the monthly articles. From January 2005, you see the regular edit links, but if you look at the wikicode on the page, you see they're separate included templates. A similar article-template scheme is used for request for adminship, featured article candidacies, and many other Wikipedia projects. It works just fine there. joturner 23:27, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Add a new drawback here

[edit] Comments on the Proposal

  • That's exactly what I had in mind. Thanks for illustrating my idea. — GT 20:59, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
  • I support both proposals. Especially the one on merging the less accessed country current events pages into continental ones. KI 22:46, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Add a new comment here

[edit] News about Wikipedia

  • News for wikipedia has appeared on newspaper from time to time. Most of these news are actually not any big event, but it's definitely interesting to wikipedian. For example, Jimmy Wales won a Pioneer Awards from the Electronic Frontier Foundation in 3 May for his role creating and overseeing Wikipedia. The recent war on entry for Cuba also appears on newspaper. Should we add it here? --Yau 17:06, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Being Bold: Revising / Implementing the Previous Proposal

Don't worry; the discussion isn't over. And I wouldn't be surprised if someone decides to revert the major changes, but it was absolutely necessary (see Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle). I'm looking for some discussion to get going on the proposed current events page and so I hope that some of the first people to notice the changes will hold off on reverting so others can gasp in relief / disgust / amazement / [some adjective] and decide to come to the talk page to say what's on their mind. Over the past week, contacting individual editors of the current events page and posting a message on the Community Portal has yet to yield much input.

The input I have received was favorable. One editor mentioned that the proposal above would have been too complex and I disagreed. When I attempted to change the current events page according to the above proposal, I found that the person who stated that Appears to advance no benefit due to complexity, programming requirements and confusing archiving system was in fact correct. And so, I simplified the enacted proposal. Basically, here's the revised proposal:

  • Unlike with the previous proposal, the current proposal has no article-templates. That is in accordance with the original.
  • The current events page would include the sections from the last x number of days. I used fourteen in bold change because it sounded reasonable and because it demonstrated what happens between months. This is different from the original.
  • When a new day is added, the least recent day is moved to its respective month page and de-linked from the current events template. If the date removed is from the previous month (as would be the case over the next few days), the number is removed completely. For example, when May 9, 2006 appears, the April 25, 2006 section is moved to the end of April 2006 and the number is removed from the calendar (since it is currently May, not April). Perhaps, the links for the current month could be linked to the monthly article (i.e. May 2006#May 1, 2006). Either way. This is obviously different from the original.
  • Nevertheless, there would be no monthly archival of news items (that can be quite a hassle, especially with the re-ordering). The only thing that needs to be moved are the deaths, elections, etc. on the right. This is different from the original.
  • At the beginning or end of the current month's article, there is a notice that refers the reader to the current events page for items within the past fourteen days. This is different from the original.

I hope I didn't miss anything. Once again, my intention was not to impose an unilateral overhaul, but to spark discussion where there had been none before. If you agree with this proposal, which is essentially a simplified version of the previous one, that's great. If not, say so. Right now though, the monthly archival is, at least in my opinion, a pain and often overlooked (many of the regional and topical current events pages never get archived). In addition, at the start of the month, there are little to no current events even though something may have occurred the previous day. This proposal would rectify both of those issues.

If you want to take a look at what the pages would look like, you can look at the sample sample current events page and sample April 2006 article in my userspace. You may also want to look back at the previous proposal. joturner 04:24, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion

Add comments, suggestions, and feedback regarding the proposal below

  • I personally believe that this implementation doesn't really help much, as it just spreads the monthly archiving hassle over a month by requiring you to manually transfer one day at a time. The nice thing about the templates was that the whole thing was automatic, especially if we could get a bot to the work for us (which wouldn't be hard to set up at all). Did you find something wrong about the templates, joturner, as I don't think the opposition to it was very well supported at all (since the templates should in fact make things much easier and clearer). — GT 16:28, 9 May 2006 (UTC)
  • I was all ready to implement that format, but found that it would be very difficult to explain to newer users how it would work. The bot would help out (although I think we should make sure a bot can actually do this), but there are still other issues. For instance, newer users would benefit from section edit links, but as you can see, they're all bunched up at the bottom. Perhaps that could be retified easily by moving the content on the right to the left side. So mostly it was about making it easy for new users (or even longtime users) to understand how things are supposed to work. joturner 20:53, 9 May 2006 (UTC)
  • I'm not going to argue over what should happen on this, the current events page, but I storgly feel that the old months pages (eg April 2006) should detail the entire month and not have to wait till the 14th of the next month. -- SGBailey 22:44, 9 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Perhaps a shorter time interval might work? Seven or eight days? joturner 23:44, 9 May 2006 (UTC)
  • And this is an instance where the article-template scheme would work better, so April 2006 and Current events can show the same events. However, I'm worried that it might be too complicated for new editors, especially when they want to start a new date. joturner 23:46, 9 May 2006 (UTC)
    • I suppose my original statement means that on May 1, April should become complete - even if current events includes (duplicates) many April days. If it is done as templates then that isn't a problem for me - indeed that would make swapping the newest at top of current events to oldest at top for past months easier. -- SGBailey 14:04, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
    • I have filed a bot request to see if any current bot owners can handle the maintenance for us. If so then only thing new users would have to know how to do would be to click edit. — GT 14:29, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Gatlin WR note moved

The Justin Gatlin World Record story has been moved from the Current Events page to the Sports page as it is a sports-related story. NoseNuggets 4:40 AM US EDT May 13 2006.

[edit] Moving the Sidebar?

Would anyone object to moving the tables on the right to left. It might be a bit counter-intuitive to have the sidebar to the left of the text, but all those section edit links are getting bunched up at the bottom. joturner 17:02, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

This would also be necessary for the above proposal to be implemented (it requires that the section edit links be next to their respective sections). joturner 17:03, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
Looks better on the right. Let's find another solution to the "bunching" problem. --Uncle Ed 15:59, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
Yes; I noticed; that looked absolutely terrible. That's why I quickly reverted. joturner 16:02, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
Never mind; that was you. We were both attempting to revert at the same time. joturner 16:03, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
We could always make a couple of buttons at the top, like Edit Today's News and Edit Yesterday's News, since the links are relative. How often does anyone add anything beyond the last 2 days? --Dhartung | Talk 18:12, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
Do remember that "Edit buttons" are a preferences setting, (which I have turned off) and anything you do needs to remain working without edit buttons. -- SGBailey 10:55, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Current events totally janky.

Why are 5/18 and 5/17's Current Events missing from the page?

There should be a separate mark-up and pre-final version of Current Events where people sandbox around and make edits, which are then submitted or approved every hour or so by a group of authorized people who can send the edits to the live version of th page. Current Events looks silly and unprofessional when entire days appear and disappear seemingly at random.

Anachron 17:38, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. That would go against the spirit of the idea of allowing (almost) everyone to edit (almost) anything. joturner 10:05, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
Disagree. Wiki is all about the freedom of editing and this would be curtailed by granting a chosen few the right to okay the submissions of others. doktorb | words 12:11, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
  • Disagree I believe that the page needs to stay accessible to all and up-to-date. A clearing-house approach would not allow for either. Kukini 21:57, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Further jankiness today: a silly scare-mongering headline on "chemtrails now being taught in schools!" -- obviously the author is capitalizing on the international status & readership of Wikipedia Current Events to highlight a non-event. If you read the link to the article, it turns out that ONE particular science text book happens to have a reference to chemtrails. Who knows how credible the publisher is, and how widely-distributed or used the book itself is. All indications are that it may have appeared in the hands of perhaps a few thousand students (out of tens of millions); no data on this significant point is given.

This event should be allowed to take up space and reader attention on the same page as other news items that DO merit national or international attention? I think not.

Set up a clearing house for wikipedia current events, that's my position. Anachron 18:41, 26 May 2006 (UTC)


Just removed the offending article; 5 minutes later it had been added back by an IP-address "user". Let's get a clue and add a bit more accountability to Current Events page edits.

Anachron 18:52, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Semi-Protect this page?

To be honest, I don't visit this page very often, but its high visibility makes it a target for vandals. I understand the need for normal users to edit this, since it isn't guaranteed that a WP administrator who checks this page will be on soon after an important event occurs, but is it really necessary for anonymous IP's to be able to edit this page? If you have any arguments, or if I'm being a total idiot, please enlighten me. Thunk

I'd be in favour of stopping IP addresses/non-registered editors from editing this page - there are too many cases when one act of disruption can mess up the whole page...doktorb | words 19:21, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
I haven't made an account yet, and my school's has a bad reputation, but I can definitely understand how it would help to protect it so only people with an account can edit it since someone might blank it or something.
I also agree - it seems to be vandalised fairly often, particularly by non-members. Ck lostsword|queta! 17:44, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Hm, I come here fairly often and I've only encountered obvious vandalism once or twice. Is it that frequent a problem? Administrators can revert quickly. --Dhartung | Talk 18:09, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
What's the number of page views per minute / per hour for Current Events page? If it's only a few hundred views per minute, vandalism is not a big deal, but if the readership is very much higher (>1000 views a minute), even a few minutes worth of vandalism can make a large impression on those who see it, especially those who aren't familiar with the way Wikipedia works. If traffic is high, the page should be a bit more secure than it currently is. Anachron 19:01, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV?

"Isreal kidnaps Hamas leader in Ramallah raid." (BBC)

This seems biased to me. 128.135.62.64 16:09, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] World Poverty

Is there a guideline on putting in articles on World Poverty? I.e. Today 24,000 children died from preventable diseases. To me this is news and is very worthy of inclusion in the current events. If there was a guideline set out for it already I can understand it being deleted, but I haven't seen one in my searches. Can anyone clear this up for me? -User:Dalta

Current events is usually reserved for current news stories with direct links to an accurate news source. If the story you are referring to has a source it can be added. doktorb | words 15:44, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Oh no, not again...

I'm watching CNN International, and there has been an earthquake in Indonesia. And things are looking pretty serious. Pacific Coast Highway blah • my tracks 04:54, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Proposal to reduce the Time zone list

I find the time zone list in the top right has grown too large to be helpful. I suggest replacing it by the UTC time and a link to all the other city info on a separate page. Comments? -- SGBailey 10:58, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Everyone wants their city listed so you won't have much luck trying to remove some of them. It doesn't matter how bad it looks like. 206.47.141.21 12:57, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
I meant remove them all! I think I'll just do it and see what happens. -- SGBailey 13:56, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
Two cities from each continent is enough, surely? doktorb | words 15:39, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
This is what I posted on SGBailey's talk page:
I agree that there were too many cities in the time zone list for the current events box, but perhaps some can be reduced instead of eliminating all of them. Although I don't really need it, others when adding an event to the current events page may use the list to help them determine which time / date the even occurred in locally. Perhaps to help restrict the number of cities, we could use primarily global cities. If we were to use the alpha and beta world cities, you'd get London, New York, Paris, Tokyo, Chicago, Frankfurt, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, Milan, Singapore, San Francisco, Sydney, Toronto, Zürich, Brussels, Madrid, Mexico City, São Paulo, Moscow, Seoul, Taipei. Removing San Francisco would probably be in order since it's in the same time zone as Los Angeles. Replacing Zürich, Brussels, and Milan with Rome would also be a good idea (all five cities are in the same time). Adding Istanbul, Cairo, Dubai, Tehran, or Baghdad (or two of the preceding) may also be a good idea to include a Middle Eastern city. So my suggested list would be: London, New York, Paris, Tokyo, Chicago, Frankfurt, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, Singapore, Sydney, Toronto, Rome, Madrid, Mexico City, São Paulo, Moscow, Seoul, Taipei, Istanbul, and Dubai. That's twenty cities instead of the original thirty-three.
That's all I have to say for now. joturner 16:00, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
One problem with the list was that the display was time offset rather then local time. I've been bold and edited it. I'm now opting out of this one and I'll let others decide where it goes. (Remember that this affects all the other Current events pages that incorporate the template as well.) -- SGBailey 23:11, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sporting events

Although I agree that ordinary sporting events do not belong on Current events, the Barry Bonds feat deserves mention as it is a historic event, in that he has passed Babe Ruth into second place all time in the home run statistics. Ruth held the record for many years before it was surpassed, and Bonds is the current home run hitting leader. His tying of Ruth didn't deserve a mention here, but his passing, I believe, does, as it's not just a US event, but noteworthy to baseball fans on at least three continents. Let me put this another way: If Bonds is removed, all mention of the World Cup should not be allowed, either. User:Zoe|(talk) 17:22, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

i've already noticed this 'news' in sports news page. Next to it there are news about formula one. Almost every race weekend gives us a number of records. Some of them are fairly historical. do we see them on a world news page? we don't. And we shouldn't in my opinion. The question is why! Probably because of number of F1 one residing in US and being WP admins and own POV pusher is equal to zero? Or because there are some people following the rules? In any way information on highly specific topic, having one reference (6 lines long) does not deserv being presented on a world news page. -- tasc talkdeeds 18:07, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

I have to agree with Tasc on the Bonds one; anything that can fit at current sports events has traditionally been removed from the main current events and moved there. However, I must question why the formation of Tropical Storm Aletta, as Tropical Depression 01E, was removed. It marks the start of a major phenomenon that will affect more than one country (i.e., hurricane season)... NSLE (T+C) at 23:42 UTC (2006-05-31)

because it did not affect any country yet. Because, no even storm warnings were activated. nothing!!! happened. it rained, nothing more. -- tasc talkdeeds 10:47, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Uh, you're incorrect. Tropical storm watches and warnings were in effect for over 36 hours for most of Mexico's southwestern coastline. NSLE (T+C) at 13:18 UTC (2006-05-31)

Thanks

It's not like every sporting event shows up here, just the historic ones, and hitting 715 is historic. If we are going to remove all of the sporting events from Current events, then why even have a current events page, just edit each of the individual pages -- Current events in the United States, Current events in Africa, etc. User:Zoe|(talk) 23:33, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

I definitely oppose putting Barry Bonds' and similar personal achievements on the main page current events, but it seems this would be newsworthy for inclusion into the general pool of current events. It is worth putting here not because of the achievement itself, but because of the attention the achievement has received. As an analogous example, Kobe Bryant's 81 points generated weeks of discussion, and as one can expect it is part of the record for January 2006. Not many non-sports fans know Ray Allen set the record number of three-point field goals in one season and moved into second place for the most ever this year--historic records in their own right--yet I'm confident many non-sports fans are aware of the records Kobe Bryant and Barry Bonds set simply because of all the hoopla they garnered. When reflecting on what 2006 was all about, such records may be some of the things that come to people's mind in the future, sports fan or not.—jiy (talk) 23:03, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Million Dollar Bill Seizure

I fail to see how it's "trivia." The June 3 blurb is continuing up on an ongoing news story. MessengerAtLWU (talk | contribs) 23:22, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

I think the first entry on that topic may be somehow newsworthy, but at least from an European perspective, it's not really "Current events" to learn how told what about this ongoing legal case. -- till we ☼☽ | Talk 23:24, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
Understandable. I'd like to hear other opinions as well as to how newsworthy it is. I know we're not the only two folks here right now. ;-) MessengerAtLWU (talk | contribs) 23:29, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Appearance of this page

This page is unreadable on a Macintosh. Using Safari I see a huge (I mean HUGE) black rectangle down the right side of the page. Using Firefox I see a HUGE black semicircle on the left side. In both cases the black sits on top of text and large white gaps are left too. I suspect non-standard Javascript. 202.45.98.61 13:42, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, for some reason the vandalism on the template went unnoticed (which seems hard to imagine since it looked so incredibly awful), but I've fixed it so should be fine now. Cheers, jaco♫plane 14:24, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
Yes, it's now fine. Thanks for your help. 202.45.98.61 23:26, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 06-06-06

is it notable that tuseday june sixth 2006 could be written 06-06-06 (666, number of the beast)?--Wan30ate 01:00, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Kinda, and kinda not. Everyone says it's just superstition. But still, I'm pretty much hell-bound in any case. :p Pacific Coast Highway (blah • typa-typa) 23:26, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
Yes, it's notable because for this one day, no one is going to get confused between the different date formats. On 07-06-06 (tomorrow, but you might read that as next month, or next year) we're back to the same old confusion.-gadfium 23:42, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
I read it as tomorrow (well, two days from now EDT). I'm used to it, my Global Studies teacher is Canadian. Pacific Coast Highway (blah • typa-typa) 23:56, 5 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't think that people think the world will end because The Omen is released today, somneone delete that, it is advertising IMO Vohod 20:10, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
Done. -Fsotrain09 20:21, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
Just as a belated point of interest, according to Bart Ehrman several of the oldest Greek manuscripts give a number other than 666 in this famous passage from the book of Revelation--616 for example, though other numbers around 600 occur as well. DSatz 15:34, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reform needed

As May turned into June we had the same old problems. May 2006 was in reverse order as someone didn't feel like reading/following directions. Current events had the same emptiness that it always does at the beginning of the month. I really think we need to start using templates and implementing the previously discussed system. If we put simple directions as HTML comments in the page maybe we won't need a bot to do it for us, as nobody has volunteered in that aspect yet. — GT 08:00, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The Omen

There should be something here about the release of "the omen." It was strategically released on 6/6/06. I'm actually surprised there wasn't some unusual news on the home page today about 6/6/06 related events.

The release date doesn't make it news. Movies don't appear on the current events page because they are not news.-gadfium 02:50, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Policy on usage of {{current}} template

The original intention for the usage of {{current}} does not seem to match the current usage. I am trying to get some ideas of how to manage this and the backlog it is generating. See Template_talk:Current#Policy_for_using_.7B.7Bcurrent.7D.7D for discussion, any comments appreciated. GameKeeper 16:49, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] meteorite impact in norway

I added this to the news, since I think a meteorite hitting with the force of an atomic bomb is notable enough.--KrossTalk 21:50, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Should Current events be in the portal namespace?

I returned to Current events for the first time in a while to find a lovely addition to the beginning of the article, introduced here less than a week ago:

For the broadcast news genre, see Current affairs (news format).

IMHO this was an overreaching disambiguation link. It consumes top-of-the-screen real estate — particularly valuable on the current events page — to link us to a stub for a different-enough term that I was tempted to simply boldly move it to Current affairs and turn that redirect into a disambiguation. But it got me thinking that Current events should really be named Portal:Current events.

One reason to do is is that Current events seems to fit the Wikipedia:Portal definition:

The idea of a portal is to help readers and/or editors manoeuvre their way through Wikipedia topic areas through pages similar to the Main Page. In essence, portals are useful entry-points to Wikipedia content.

Other reasons include:

  • helping to clarify a distinction between what belongs here vs. Wikinews, a topic debated before (e.g. "promote content and encourage contribution");
  • better distinguishing it from traditional encyclopedia articles (e.g. no prefatory disambiguation links required, not even one for Current Events);
  • encouraging the introduction of good practices from Wikipedia:Portal/Guidelines and Wikipedia:Featured portals to the current events page, as they make sense, though the maturity of the current events layout suggests no need to rush into anything.

One reason against may be the work to make the namespace change may not be worth the effort, particularly if it impacts the current events archive process (assuming its more than moving Current events to May 2006).

I decided to broach this topic here as opposed to the Wikipedia:Portal/Proposals list. What do you think? Thanks. Kayaker 04:25, 12 June 2006 (UTC).

  • It's fairly inevitable I think that Current events will one day become a portal– the question is how to do this wisely and smoothly. It would be great if we had a proposed detailed structure or working mock-up.--Pharos 21:08, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
I support this idea. The layout of the Current events doesn't need to change drastically, if at all. But, the topical news pages would fit well with the related Portals. In fact, I have recently been going around the portals and tidying up the unmaintained ones. With Portal:United States, I added a current events box, and am using Current events in the United States to list and archive current events items. For sports news, Current sports events should be integrated with Portal:Sports and games, etc. Doing that would be mutually beneficial to the Portals and to the Current events pages. -Aude (talk | contribs) 21:22, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
The only thing on the Current events page that I think needs sprucing up is the "Other current events" box. It should highlight the portals that have news sections (e.g. Portal:Australia, Portal:Politics...) for such topics. -Aude (talk | contribs) 21:25, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
I support this, as per Kmf164. PHF 15:31, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
Was bold and spruced up the "Other current events" box, adding a couple portal links - politics and business - that have current events. (though, the Business portal needs attention) -Aude (talk | contribs) 21:43, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Turning Current events into a portal is a great idea. If someone does a sandbox mock-up and discusses it to get approval and uncover possible problems, that would be even better. Carcharoth 23:55, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

I see enough positive comments that I have proposed this on Wikipedia:Portal/Proposals while working on a mockup. Please direct further discussion there. Thanks. Kayaker 22:24, 20 June 2006 (UTC).

[edit] Zarqawi kicked to death?

In the article it does not say at all clearly state the military killed him by kicking him and its extremely hypothetical to assume a kick to the chest killed him when most likely the bombs that were dropped on him that gave him a head injury and caused excessive bleeding would have more of an effect. But again, whom am I to assume that the bombs did the most critical damage, its best left to leave the guessing alone and simply state he was kicked and interrogated. I changed the section to this below.

- Patman2648 06:07, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Hear that? Thats the worlds smallest violin and its playing just for Zarqawi. --KrossTalk 20:44, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] White space

Why is there a huge white space at the top of this page? User:Zoe|(talk) 23:34, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

There was some duplicate text at the top left over from when User:Mrmanhattanproject screwed up the article for some reason. That might have had something to do with it, although I didn't see any huge white space even before I erased it. Maybe it has to do with your browser settings? All I see is a one-inch white space between "From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" and the "to suggest a relevant news story" notice, but I wouldn't call that huge. Or do you mean there's a huge white space at the top of this Talk page? I don't see anything here, either.--Mr. Billion 00:10, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
I'm getting the same huge white space as Zoe.--KrossTalk 01:41, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
I uploaded a handy image here.--KrossTalk 01:54, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I come to this page every day, and the huge white space wasn't there yesterday. I see it both at work and at home. I'm using IE at both places. User:Zoe|(talk) 02:21, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Hm. It isn't there in Firefox. User:Zoe|(talk) 02:22, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
I concur.--KrossTalk 02:25, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
It was Template:Current events box that did it, by simple having an extra empty line at the end of the boxes. A phenomen I have noticed many times before. Not sure why it does that. Twthmoses 10:18, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
Sweet. Well caught. User:Zoe|(talk) 18:15, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] US Army suffers 2500 death...

Is reaching a number a significant event?

If so, does this number refer to all coalition forces?

If not, then it should at least say US Armed Forces, not the US Army. The US Army does NOT include the US Marines, the US Air Force, and the US Navy.

---mnw2000

[edit] US Supreme Court Tie Breaker?

The US Supreme Court has nine members, and a 5-4 vote is pretty common. We often see one of those five mentioned as the "tie breaker," as if the others in the majority were somehow counted differently.

The underlying assumption is that the "tie breaker" was more on the fence about how to vote than the others were. I see this as a very non-NPOV assumption. Comments?

SkyDot 22:14, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

According to this, the vote was 4-4 after O'Connor left, and before Alito joined the court. Alito's vote did actually break the tie. User:Zoe|(talk) 22:42, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Why English not we talk good?

I notice people keep leaving definite articles, forms of "to be", and other words out of their entries for Current Events. These entries are not headlines and there are no space restrictions. There is no reason to do that.

*Wikipedia editor doesn't know how to use words like "and", "of", "the", and forms of "to be". Source of problem not known. Other editors not know why do that.

When I notice people leaving out words like that for no reason, I think, "Holy crap, what idiot."
From MoS: Bulleted items, we get the guideline "Do not mix sentence styles; use all complete sentences, or use all sentence fragments." Current Events entries are bulleted items. Most of them are complete sentences. Does this rule not apply? --Mr. Billion 14:11, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Can anyone clarify the procedure

I recently updated the Current events page with the merger news of Arcelor and Mittal Steel. This is also a requirement for suggesting candidates for the Main Page. However, my edit was reverted, probably because this page is moderated (though not protected). Can anyone explain how to proceed if one wants to suggest news for current events? Last time I suggested one for the main page without listing here, I was told to first put it here. -Ambuj Saxena (talk) 18:25, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

News 1) should be notable (which was ok in your case). 2) should be referenced. (what hasn't been done). Fix it, and news will stay. Cheers. -- tasc talkdeeds 18:34, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
In this particular case, I believe that you didn't include a link to the news source reporting the event. It was probably removed because somebody had not heard of the companies involved and there was no link to check on it. Most company mergers wouldn't be important enough to list here, but this one may well be. I think the merger will produce either the largest or second largest steel producer in the world and I've seen reports of the negotiations previously on the BBC. Try adding it again with sources. If you can supply something like BBC and CNN links it would mark the event as relatively important, though others may disagree and remove it again. Current events is for major international stories and people will have different views on what constitutes such. --GraemeL (talk) 18:36, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bias on choice of words "Kidnapped" vs "Arrested"

I have noticed a slight bias in the choice of words used to describe the mutual capturing of Isreali and Palastinians around Gaza. Words such as "kidnapped" and "arrested" imply a value judgement on the action. While all these capturings could be described as 'kidnapping' it is incorrect to describe any, whether carried out by Hamas or the IDF as 'arrests', as this implies some application of law. I think use of the neutral word 'capture' is best. Seabhcán 12:05, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Words used as they should be used. Word 'capture' in not better. -- tasc wordsdeeds 12:32, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Why use 'Kidnap' for what the Palestinians do, and 'arrest' for what the IDF do? Its biased. Seabhcán 13:15, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Arrest: To take into custody by legal authority.
Kidnap: confinement without legal authority.
Capture: the act of taking of a person by force
It is clear that neither Hamas nor the IDF have any 'legal authority' to take these actions. Thus the use of the word 'arrest' is incorrect. I suggest we either use the word 'kidnap' or 'capture' consistently for all such events. Seabhcán 13:20, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
what makes you think that IDF had no such authority? -- tasc wordsdeeds 13:22, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
To 'arrest' ministers of a foreign government on foreign soil? Who could have given them this authority, themselves? If Hamas gave themselves the authority to capture people in Israel, wouldn't that make it an 'arrest' too? Seabhcán 13:28, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Its not wikipedia's place to make these kinds of value judgements. Its far better to remain neutral.Seabhcán 13:46, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Foreign government and foreign soil - are pov. Well hamas didn't, did it? -- tasc wordsdeeds 14:02, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
what makes you think that IDF Hamas had no such authority? Seabhcán 15:25, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Tasc, You have failed to convince me that the use of these words in not POV - I'm going to change it back. Seabhcán 16:26, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't have to convince you. I hope you understand this simple thing. -- tasc wordsdeeds 16:41, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Tasc, the words are biased, and wikipedia policy of is clear on POV. Please explain why you think these words are not biased - you do need to convince me, I'm afraid. You don't have ownership of this page. Seabhcán 16:50, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
It's your claim that the words are biased. I don't see how they biased at all. PA (+ Hamas) and Israel are not equal entities. -- tasc wordsdeeds 16:55, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
How so? They are both parties to the same conflict. Its not for wikipedia to judge which is right and which is wrong. Seabhcán 17:15, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
"Arrest" directly implies the authority to detain a person or persons, and "kidnapping" directly implies that the detaining party does not have legal authority to do so, thus being a crime. --Blututh 23:09, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Exactly. By using the word 'arrest' we wikipedians are awarding one side a legality they don't have. It is not NPOV. It should be changed. Seabhcán 23:21, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
I believe the NPOV term of art is usually "detained". The IDF detained members of Hamas. (The word is simply the Latin-root version of "hold".) --Dhartung | Talk 19:41, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
Detained is fine so long as we use the same word for when Hamas 'detain' someone. Seabhcán 22:06, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Turkish airport fire

What did happen to this - has it been put out? (I know - a "questions on items recently in the news" page would soon get very large.)

Jackiespeel 17:35, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

I remember that it was put out later that same day. Seabhcán 09:22, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Switch to Portal:Current events

As can been seen in an earlier comment (#Should Current events be in the portal namespace?), there has been a proposal under discussion for over two weeks to move this article to Portal:Current events. After discussion here and on Wikipedia:Portal/Proposals#Portal:Current events, the proposal was accepted, so I have created the portal, an associated template ({{Newsbrowsebar}}), and am close to being able to make the switch happen.

You'll note the two visible differences between Current events and Portal:Current events right away, since they are changes to the beginning of the article. Both were done to make it look a bit more like the other portals. The newsbrowsebar is a replacement for {{Current events articles}}, moved from the bottom to the top; the {{In the news}} template, used on the Main page, was included. The maturity of the the existing layout was a strong discouragement to engage in any wider redesign (though once the transition occurs who knows what the community will prefer).

The steps remaining include:

  1. Make some minor changes to Wikipedia:How to archive Current Events
  2. Redirect Current events to Portal:Current events.
  3. (insert forgotten steps here)
  4. Update currentevents-url in quickbar

AFAIK, the transition could be timed to happen when the transition from June to July happens in a few hours. Of course I could be missing something, so please speak up if you know of anything. I have already asked for feedback on what I've missed several times, including on this talk page, at Wikipedia:Portal/Proposals, and at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Portal:Current_events?.

Thanks—Kayaker 20:20, 30 June 2006 (UTC).

I've documented some near-term (as opposed to immediate) steps here and am looking for anything else that others can identify. I'll maintain the to-do list there instead of here.Thanks—Kayaker 22:19, 30 June 2006 (UTC).
I'm about to begin the migration steps, as listed at User:Kayaker/To Do List (Current events portal). Kayaker 00:00, 1 July 2006 (UTC).

I'm afraid I don't have time to check everything, but the whole process looks very well organised. Have you considered having the creation of this portal advertised somewhere where such things are advertised? Community Portal? List of Portals? Signpost? Carcharoth 02:36, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Montenegro what's new in podgorice?

[edit] Montenegro

Whatildes (68.110.96.103 04:43, 22 September 2006 (UTC)).

t is new in Montenegro? How are the people reacting to the separation from Serbia?

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