Wikipedia talk:Today's featured article

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[edit] Is there a way of knowing if a FA is still candidate for the front page?

Looking over the front page selection discussion page, I have a question: is there any way of knowing if a FA has been looked at and ruled out as a main page candidate? I'm asking because the articles are clearly not being chosen in chronological order of submission (which of course would be a silly idea anyway). But if something has been ruled out or is still under consideration, it would be nice to know.

Or is the list on this discussion page a list of articles still under consideration?

  • AFAIK all featured articles (save a teeny tiny number, such as Wikipedia) are always candidates for the main page. As for the stuff listed here, I've never seen a nomination removed unless the nominator directly withdraws it (for example, the Three Laws of Robotics has been up since January, doesn't even have a suggested box, but is still listed). Staxringold 11:33, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
    • Close - of the 980-odd featured articles, there are a handful (4 or so) that I wish to avoid putting on the main page, and I don't intend to re-run any of the 600-or-so that have already appeared on the main page (although I suppose circumstances could change in this regard). Raul654 11:44, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reforming lead-paragraph style

I think that the dense lead-paragraph style of the FA box on the mainpage has just become a turn-off to too many of our readers. Phrased from reposed snippets of text from the first couple of article paragraphs, these overreaching attempts at summary simply do not reflect the quality and interest of the articles that they are summarizing. Few in our audience are actually comfortable reading such large, artificial, blocks of text on what should be a headline-oriented frontpage. I would propose instead that the FA box follow some form of the "snippet" style of the three other major mainpage boxes, which readers can appreciate at an easy glance. There are any number of specific formats we could pursue, from a radically-shortened single-sentence summary, to a bullet-point summary of key sections, to a series of enlightening short extracts from the text, and certainly to other possibilities as yet unproposed. Any thoughts?--Pharos 00:46, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

I strongly disagree. First, I reject on its face the notion that there's a problem in the first place. While it's difficult to quantiy, studies by the developers showed that the FA is the most popular thing on the main page after the search box. The FA is probably the most regularly edited thing linked from the main page too. The first thing they teach in buisness school is that if you have a successful product, DON'T CHANGE IT. (The people at Coke learned this the hard way). All the evidence seems to indicate that the FA is doing exactly what it should.
Second, assuming for the moment you are right, it would seem that pruning it to keep it smaller would be the solution, rather than radically altering it to the list format you suggest. First, in addition to my usual comments that it is a degenerate form of prose, the list format is inherently unsuitable for addressing related items of content. What you are in fact proposing is, in fact, artificial - the featured article box is supposed to showcase a featured article (including its prose) and the list you propose just doesn't do it. So it would require major rewriting of the introductions, AND it would be substantially less useful than what we have now. Raul654 00:53, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
I disagree with Pharos as well. I feel since they are coming featured articles, the Main Page introductions ought to be of featured article quality. Moving to a list format or some other format that makes the article more basic seems to comprimise that image ("well-written" is, after all, one of the requires for promotion to featured article status). As long as the introductions give decent summaries of the articles in question, and for the most part I believe they do, I don't see anything wrong with the current style. joturner 00:59, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
I would also disagree with any change to the current way FAs are displayed on the front page. The summary in the box is simply the lead section of the article - lead sections are supposed to give a concise summary of the article, and if they don't, it's the article's fault and not FA's. A single sentence summary sounds like a far worse option in that regard, and a bullet-pointed list sounds horribly dumbed-down. If a box of prose is a turn-off to a potential reader, maybe they weren't really looking for an encyclopaedia :) I really don't see why the front page should be 'headline-orientated' as you suggest. Worldtraveller 01:15, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
I also think this is a solution looking for a problem. Titoxd(?!? - help us) 01:21, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
Agree with Raul654 and above. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 01:33, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
Disagree for most of the above mentioned reasons. There are a few things I'd like to have changed with how and what we put on the main page, but the todays FA is not one of them. It's very good as it is, don't change it. Shanes 02:17, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
OK, OK, actually to tell the truth I was leaning strongly toward a single-sentence summary myself but wanted to keep things a bit "open" in the discussion. My experience is just that, the well-written prose in a featured article's first 2 or 3 short pararaphs is typically mangled to fit the single-long-paragraph format, which is often somewhat poorly written in a process that is not subject to too much review.--Pharos 03:24, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
Can't say I've ever seen any mangling, or poor writing - the bit on the front page is just the lead section of the article and the only thing that's different is the paragraph breaks are removed. I don't know how it would look with breaks still in, but that's about the only change I'd think might be necessary. Could you point to an example of what you perceive as mangling? Worldtraveller 08:39, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
Sorry for not getting back to this earlier. The example of mangling that prompted my original post was [1] for History of Miami, Florida. At the least I would recommend that the FA box be approved as part of the original FAC process, so that it is subject to serious review in terms of writing style. As it stands now, there is very little collaboration on the boxes at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests.--Pharos 02:03, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] New TFA front page

I like the redesign and merger of TFA and TOFA. However, a few comments:

  • I think we need a more explicit link to the TFA archive than the one buried in the top-left panel. The TFA archive bar provides a quick and simply link to the archives, which is why I added it back here. Raul does not seem the like it :p
  • An increase the number of people reviewing the front-page blurb would help to avoid infelicities in the wording. I think that could be achieved by transluding the blurb for today's FA and tomorrow's FA side-by-side on this page.

Comments? -- ALoan (Talk) 08:52, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Like that... (I went for one after the other, as it was easier, but side-by-side would be better, I think) -- ALoan (Talk) 09:30, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
Where have you hid the main page purge button? Thanks, Highway Rainbow Sneakers 13:26, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cache

What happened to the Sever Purge Cache link for the main page? Highway Rainbow Sneakers 00:15, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] FA information incorrect

I apologize for this, but I just now noticed that the current introduction set to be used for the June 9th Featured Article is incorrect; since the article became featured the United States Navy has struck both of their battleships and will be donating them to the public in the coming monthes. The last two sentences of the paragraph should read as follows:

Wisconsin was last decommissioned in September 1991, having earned a total of six battle stars for war service in Korea and WWII, and a Navy Unit Commendation for service during the first Gulf War, and currently functions as a museum ship at Nauticus, The National Maritime Center in Norfolk, Virginia. Wisconsin was struck from the Naval Vessel Register (NVR) 17 March 2006, and is currently awaiting donation for use as a museum ship.

Again, I apologize for the oversite. Several pages have been effected by this development, and this one just happened to slip through the cracks. TomStar81 01:50, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Requesting TFAs

I'm not sure if this has been dealt with in the past, but I notice that the TFA request page contains predominantly self nominations of recently featured articles with no specific date requested. I think it's fair to say that all or nearly all FA writers want their work to appear on the main page, and as a result, I don't see the point of having a process to make such requests. It serves little purpose and shortchanges those who don't know about it. Thus, why don't we add a couple simple guidelines to the TFA request page that would restrict such submissions? I suggest that only two types of requests be allowed—ones for a specific date, and ones for articles that have been FAs for more than a given time period; perhaps 6 months. Furthermore, only allow self-nominations in the first case.

Hopefully this would improve the noise to signal ratio for Raul when he's making these types of decisions, but of course these guidelines would not limit him from putting recently passed FAs on the main page if he so chooses. Remember, he sees all new FAs (he passes them), and if he wants one on the main page soon, he can get it there without an explicit request from the author. --Spangineer[es] (háblame) 13:30, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Sadly, in practice most articles that have been FAs for 6 months are in dramatically worse shape than ones that have been FAs for a couple of weeks. We'd practically have to peer-review such FAs all over again just to make sure that they haven't degraded too much. :) As you noted, Raul can freely accept, reject, and make TfAs as he wishes, so I don't see the point of restricting nominations unless he would find it more helpful and efficient to do so. From my perspective, it seems that it's better to have too many nominations (within reason) than too few, since it gives more options to choose from and gives more informaiton on those noms, plus it sometimes leads to highly fruitful discussion: for example, the TFA nom on the then-recently-featured Joan of Arc article led to a large-scale effort to improve the article further, which wouldn't have occurred if it hadn't been nominated then. Also, I know at least a few users who actually don't want their Featured Articles to appear on the main page. :) -Silence 13:37, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
i suggest making the TFA requests into an OPT-OUT rather than the current OPT-IN method. we can assume that 99% of all FAs want to appear on the mainpage, so the page should be limited to users listing their articles that they dont want to appear on the mainpage (e.g. because they fear the vandalism it causes). how about that? Zzzzz 14:01, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
How about both? One page for "opt-out", another for "opt-in"? However, I think the main reason this hasn't already been done is because a single user shouldn't be able to stand in the way of an article appearing on the main page, even if that user is the reason the article was Featured; WP:OWN, after all. Hence, although the person who helped get the saffron article featured didn't want it to appear on the main page, it appeared there anyway. (And really, nothing terrible happened as a result. Vandalism fears are usually overdone.) -Silence 14:05, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
I agree with Spangineer's original argument. I agree that most FA authors want their articles to appear on the main page, so why allow the TFA request page to become a mouthpiece for the loudest? The TFA requests page is cluttered with recent features, and the squeaky wheels are getting a lot of the oil. And let's not forget that the TFA requests are not the only options to choose from! This is not a critique of Raul; he does slip in non-requested articles sometimes (I never requested for "Dixie" to get the main page, yet it did). If an article has deteriorated significantly, that's not an argument against allowing older FAs to make the main page. Rather, it's an argument for closer monitoring of the FA queue. If, for example, you see that Raul has scheduled Joan of Arc for the main page on 9 June, you can mount your effort to improve it. I don't see why the TFA request page is necessary for this type of thing. In short, I'm not sure that the rules of the TFA requests need to be changed, but it would be nice to balance things more between FAs that were requested and those that weren't.
As for opting out, that's an interesting issue. There are currently three FAs that I significantly worked on that have not been featured on the main page. I've considered asking for them NOT to be featured the first week of August, since I'll be moving to Japan then and won't have internet access to monitor changes to them. It's not a bad idea. — BrianSmithson 14:18, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
"If an article has deteriorated significantly, that's not an argument against allowing older FAs to make the main page. Rather, it's an argument for closer monitoring of the FA queue." - I agree with this. Some of my earliest edits on Wikipedia were to random articles that were scheduled to appear on the main page in a few days, which I thought could do with a lot of improvements before we showcased them. The solution to the quality-degradation is not to forget about old FAs, but to work harder to maintain them. FA status should not be treated as a quality plateau. -Silence 14:43, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] USS Wisconsin (BB-64) for main page

I feel that adding USS Wisconsin (BB-64) as the featured article of the day was a rather poor choice. We already had her far more famous sister ship USS Missouri (BB-63) as the featured article of the day back in September of 2005. I don't see there was a need for having this article also appear on the main page. I realize this is after the fact, but I hope some consideration of potential situations like this is made in the future. Asking the question "Have we had something similar featured?" and reviewing past FA's on the main page would be a good step. --Durin 23:02, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Recently featured

I've finally managed to put my finger on it. This is why I thought TFA was the whole featured article system for so long as a newbie. It's that phrase... "recently featured". That's not true. The articles have been featured for ages. They have just been recently showcased on TFA. Can't this be changed to something less confusing? I would have loved to have known sooner that there were over a thousand of these listed on one page. BigBlueFish 10:46, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't really know how we can make it more obvious than "more featured articles" linking to the page will all the featured articles. Raul654 15:22, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
By not using the phrase "recently featured". I thought I made it fairly clear. Even "Recently featured here" would be better. Or "Recently showcased". I don't know. BigBlueFish 21:55, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
"Recently showcased" sounds ok. Titoxd(?!?) 20:32, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
Many portals also use "Showcased Articles" e.g. Portal:London and Portal:Christianity, which may get confusing, but as long as portals can retain this terminology then it's fine. Brisvegas 23:57, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
Portals use the 'showcase' terminology because *I* changed most of them. I objected to many of them using "Featured article" as a generic term. Raul654 00:37, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Changing from US to ISO 8601 format

All "Today's featured article" templates are currently saved using US format dates (June 6, 2006). I suggest we abandon this for the international standard (2006-06-06) - an unambiguous and clear presentation of the date. Obviously, a list ISO 8601 dates can be numerically sorted into a chronological list and it avoids conflict between those who are used to European formatting and those used to US. Since all existing pages are consistantly named they will easily be moved by a bot. Further, magic words can just as easily be used on the main page as they are for US format dates. --Oldak Quill 20:08, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me like a lot of work for, IMO, few benefits. Raul654 13:53, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
If anything, 6 June 2006 might be worth it, but the template names are all hidden, so this does seem trivial. -- Zanimum 19:51, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Featured Article Problem

This isn't very important, but the article usually changes to the next days featured article about half-way through the day. Microsoft was up for about a few hours, and then it changed to velocial raptors..is this because im from U.S. Central time, so it's suppose to change early, or what? I'm confused. andrew 08:57, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

  • The site works on UTC, meaning that US Central time is something like 5-6 hours (I'm on the East Coast and it's 4 hours). Thus, new articles are up at around 7 PM for you, likely. Staxringold talkcontribs 09:56, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

That makes sense. Thanks for clearing that up. --andrew 15:21, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Microsoft was changed to velocial raptors! Wow! How appropriate,... ;-) Dr. Cash 21:28, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Any chance of making Windows 2000 a main page article?

Just wondering. Full disclosure: I was the one who largely got it to FA status. - Ta bu shi da yu 17:10, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Shouldn't that be posted here? --Ajm81 19:34, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Cheers :-) Ta bu shi da yu 22:32, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lack of protection

Why is it that none of the daily featured articles are ever sprotected for the duration of being linked to the main page? They are always a target from IP vandalism on a minute-by-minute basis when they are featured on the Main Page, yet Semi-protection policy specifically mentions that the daily featured article should never be sprotected, yet the featured picture of the day is protected. Ryūlóng 01:35, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

See user:Raul654/protection Raul654 06:24, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Raul, why not tidy-up that page a bit, move it to Wikipedia space, and place a sentence at the top of this talk ("If you are considering suggesting...read this")? Marskell 12:22, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unofficial list

Quote: Raul654 maintains a very small, unofficial list of featured articles that he does not intend to appear on the main page. (For example, Wikipedia would not appear, because it is considered shameless self-promotion).

Where could we find this list? --Xyz or die 20:25, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Short of a brain-scanning device, nowhere - it's entirely in my head. Raul654 20:03, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lack of protection (part deux)

With a recent Willy-on-Wheels-type vandalism that struck today's featured article, the article was move-protected to prevent similar attacks. Since articles cannot be sprotected as that would take away from the everyone-can-edit openness of Wikipedia, why not move-protect the day's featured articles. Certainly the best articles that Wikipedia has produced should not be moved dramatically when they are shown to everyone who visits the website. Ryūlóng 05:56, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I have noticed that Brian0918 has been move-protecting daily FAs for a while now. I don't really have any objection to that. Raul654 06:17, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lack of Protection (Volume III)

Since it occured with Bulbasaur, perhaps the various templates that are utilized in the day's featured article should be sprotected as well. There were multiple times that unscrupulous editors altered the templates transcluded in Bulbasaur, and at one point may have had the photograph of a man masturbating transcluded onto the main page until the template it was used in was sprotected. I doubt that this vandalism was solely due to the content being a Pokémon, but the vandalism to the templates could avoid vandalism that occured yesterday. Ryūlóng 07:55, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

That's a lot of work to do. I'll make sure to substitute out any templates from the main page blurb, but beyond that, protecting all transcluded templates seems like a lot of work for little gain. Raul654 07:59, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
Well, perhaps just templates that are transcluded on the main page through the featured article thing, as with Bulbasaur, {{pokenum}} was vandalized, and that may have led to several instances where an image on the commons of a man masturbating was seen on the main page. Ryūlóng 21:04, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm well aware of that, which is why I said 'I'll make sure to substitute out any templates from the main page blurb' Raul654 14:44, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Today's FA Archive

Is there any point in updating the blubs that are in the archive? Specifcally, should DAB fixes be applied to them for those who are involved with Wikipedia:Disambiguation pages with links? Thanks in advance for your response. --Brian G 02:51, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

No, I don't really see a point. Raul654 03:30, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use images in Wikipedia namespace (TFA)

Criterion #9 in our image fair use policy expressly forbids the use of fair-use images outside of article space. I understand that an exception is habitually made for articles being currently featured on the main page. But what about the fair-use images in Wikipedia-namespace pages like Wikipedia:Today's featured article/August 2006, i.e. archived examples of previously main-page-featured blurbs? For example, in the page just linked, we have Image:Schabir_Shaik.jpg, Image:Kargil Bofors.jpg, etc. So does the exception extend to the use of these images? What about the ones posted in proposed blurbs on Wikipedia:Today's featured article/Requests? Andrew Levine 22:57, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Note. Today's featured article, Watchmen, contains a fair use image, on the Main Page. I don't see the necessity of including fair use images on the Main Page, notably when our policy expressly forbids it. I'd like to see some clarification, before we run the risk of encountering legal troubles as a result of it. Bastique▼parler voir 02:07, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Extra div tag

Why is there an extra /div tag being placed after the main content of the template. There's no corresponding beginning div tag and it's affecting the way my user page looks. It's not necessary. Harryboyles 13:13, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Broken image in archived copies

Wikipedia:Today's featured article/August 31, 2005 has a broken image link. Needs admin to fix. --Quiddity 00:14, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

another at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/May 17, 2004 (this one isn't protected, but I don't know the procedure for choosing FA accompanying-images).

another at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/July 6, 2004

Is this the best place for me to list them? (I'm finding them through Wikipedia:Featured content, which is replacing Wikipedia:Featured articles as part of the proposed Sidebar redesign.) Thanks :) -- Quiddity 03:08, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Systemic bias in TFA

I have been watching (and enjoying) TFA's daily for quite a while, and I think they're a great way of introducing Wikipedia's best work to newbies. I have a feeling, though, that there is a tendency for systemic bias in the selection of these articles. No doubt this is a result of the strong systemic bias of the FA's themselves (which is a problem in itself: consider that 5 different articles on Final Fantasy are FA's, but DNA is not). However, I believe articles showcased on the main page should represent more universally important topics than, for example, today's article. Seeing The Legend of Zelda placed right next to Nepal creates the impression that we think these articles are equally important. Perhaps there should be an additional criterion for accepting a FA into TFA, something like "universal interest"? --Zvika 07:36, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

  • There is a great great deal more systemic bias in only featuring what arbitrary people see as "important". Wikipedia is a bastion for all notable knowledge, meaning any piece of knowledge sufficiently developed to reach FA status should be ok for the Main Page (except those very few exceptions, like Wikipedia used to be, and maybe Fred Phelps). Staxringold talkcontribs 13:39, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
This is a long-standing complaint and the answer, as always, is try to aid in getting what you feel is important to FA standard. What gets to standard is what get's placed here.
Re importance, I don't agree it's totally arbitrary. Any reasonable editor would place a country above a video game, I think—even people who are really into video games. The main page tries, AFAICS, to balance very important topics with more idocyncratic ones (thus it may not be coincidence that Nepal and Zelda are side-by-side). Marskell 19:49, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
What's your point? We do think they are equally important, it's what makes Wikipedia great! :) Highway Daytrippers 19:53, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
Marskell: I see your point about displaying the diversity of articles like Nepal and Zelda side by side. My worry, though, is that newcomers to Wikipedia will have a first impression as though Wikipedia is a joke or some sort of geek cult thing (no offense Zelda fans!). --Zvika 22:16, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
We're not a geek cult thing? oh. :-( *disassembles his wikishrine; puts away candles, almanacs, dictionaries, and jimbo effigy* --Quiddity 23:08, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
Related: We're also somewhat dominated by males. --Quiddity 23:14, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
To Zvika, the answer is suggested. If your worried, start working on core topics.
To Highway: in terms of, for instance, selecting articles for Wikipedia:Wikipedia 1.0 or 0.5 there is no reasonable argument that would place our video games on the same footing as our countries. Things like Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Core topics and Wikipedia:Assessment scale assume that some topics are by nature of greater importance than others (of course, all of these projects vary in their activity level). The countries of the world must surely be in the four digits, or at most five, in any list of topics of what an encyclopedia must have. But this isn't to discourage work on other things. Let a thousand flowers bloom. Marskell 10:25, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
I definitely try to concentrate my effort on articles that I see as important, just like everyone else. My point is that there is a systemic bias: The mere fact that everyone works on what they think is important is insufficient to guarantee equal coverage of equally "universally important" topics. Sure, you can't accurately define "universally important", but even in a very rough attempt such as the Core Topics you mentioned, we fail miserably. Hence my suggestion that some anti-bias measures be adopted for TFA's. --Zvika 18:37, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
You're suggesting a systemic bias in the broad subject matter of Wiki, not on TFA itself. TFA reflects what happens at FAC, which reflects which articles get worked on in general. The only rule-based way to counter it would be through negative reinforcement, e.g., we aren't going to promote video games any more. This is unfair and will drive people away. Another less obvious means is to select certain topics with lesser frequency than others for TFA—this is already done. See under the Sports and games section at WP:FA that only one of five Final Fantasy articles have been on the main page, for example. Marskell 19:07, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
I couldn't really see how you can tell from WP:FA which articles have been TFA's, but I will take your word for it. I guess that satisfies my concern, more or less; I still feel some topics appear much more often than neccesary, but that's a matter of degree rather than principle. --Zvika 19:19, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
They are supposed to appear in bold though they aren't for me at the moment. Hit the edit link and you'll see a template wrapped around the ones that have been on the main page. Marskell 19:47, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
The bolding was removed, as it is only really helpful for TFA maintainers. If you add the following line to your userstylesheet, it will show up. (via) --Quiddity 20:31, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
span.has_been_on_main_page{ font-weight: bold; }

[edit] Lost as today's featured article / sell out

Tztz, interesting to put Lost as today's featured article a day before upcoming season's beginning. Maybe in the future other media events get featured as well - a first step towards "Wikipedia is today sponsored by...". --Abdull 15:50, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

I imagine that was one of the reasons it was chosen for today. This happens a lot: we feature articles about particular events on their anniversaries, articles about particular people on their dates of birth or death, etc. It's a very long step from picking 'today's featured article' because it has an immediate relevance to a particular day to 'selling out' to the media corporates. --ⁿɡ͡b Nick Boalch\talk 15:52, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
I second Nick Boalch's comment. -- Buffyverse 00:45, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
Yes, ABC was all too happy to give cash to this poor graduate student in exchange for featuring Lost on the main page. Just wait until you see what's cooking for sweeps week :) Raul654 01:04, 5 October 2006 (UTC)
Just out of curiousity, was it pure chance that V for Vendetta (film) was featured on 5 November? Laïka 21:28, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bias in selection of main article

I'm mumbling abaout how the FA article is selected. It looks there is some geographical and linguistic bias in the selection of FA article. I let me explain... I'm here since October 2005, and I've NEVER seen an article related to Italy (I missed last summer, however). Articles are mostly about US or UK arguments, often about figures of mediocre cultural interest (speaking of cinema star, videogames, etc.) Are all administrator from US or UK? To make some calculus, US and UK have some 350 million inhabitants. Italy 50. Of course, being this an encyclopedia written in English, I can expect some unbalance (say, a relative majority of articles regarding these countries or cultures)... but 1000 against zero looks too much. And I'm not saying this 'cause I'm Italian; I think it's the same with Sweden or Zaire or so... In Wikipedia:Systemic bias is stated that this is an international encyclopedia, so please take some move to correct the stuff. Good work. --Attilios 17:02, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

The Main Page featured article is selected from those listed as featured articles (which have all been approved by the featured article candidates page as meeting the featured article criteria). If you think a subject area or topic should appear on the Main Page as a featured article then you (and your friends!) need to edit so that it meets the requirements. Yes, there is a systemic bias, because editors only work on the subjects that that find interesting.
Regarding Italy, Sicilian Baroque appeared on the Main Page on 24 December 2005, and War of the League of Cambrai on 14 January 2006, and Palazzo Pitti on 15 March 2006 (two largely written by Giano as it happens). Other potential candidates include Battle of Bicocca and Battle of Cannae (although the latter needs some assistance). I'm sure Venice or one of the Victor Emmanuels or The Divine Comedy or whatever would make excellent featured articles. Be bold and sofixit! -- ALoan (Talk) 17:24, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
Don't forget Tenebrae (film), which appeared on May 27. We've also had swedish articles too: Swedish allotment system appeared in April 2006 (and I seem to remember a Swedish king biography too) Raul654 17:31, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
Yes, but are sady deficient on articles about Zaire (if it still exists - we do have Congo Free State but it is very old and not that good). We have a few decent articles on Swedish topics - IFK Göteborg and Swedish language too. -- ALoan (Talk) 17:44, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
The very question itself is flawed though. In a year, we featured 365 articles. There are over 210 countries in the world - so yes, it's a virtual certainty that there are countries for which we have not featured an article in the last year. That doesn't mean it's biased. I also find that allegation that we've under-featured Italy rather amusing, given the ethnic background of the person selecting them. Raul654 17:46, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Copyright violation on Iwo Jima image?

According to the licensing for Image:WW2 Iwo Jima flag raising.jpg:

Permission Note -- written permission was received from AP on 31 March 2005 which states:

Wikipedia is authorized to display these images to its users solely for their personal viewing and not for copying or redistribution in or through any medium, provided that the images are accompanied by credit in the following manner: Joe Rosenthal / The Associated Press

Please tag all thumbnails with "Joe Rosenthal / The Associated Press " to ensure compliance.

Shouldn't the use of the thumbnail be so tagged? WLD 00:19, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Roosevelt

I've made a couple of minor changes to the first paragraph of the Roosevelt article. Can the same changes be made to the template destined for the main page?

I'd like to note in passing that the variety of articles being featured is a lot better than it was a while ago when I moaned about a US/UK bias. Good work!

Ben Arnold 12:32, 10 October 2006 (UTC)


[edit] High American Political Content

With the US midterm elections and Donald Rumsfield's resignation in the news today, was there really a need to feature the Supreme Court of the United States as well? Perhaps some care can be taken in the future to choose an appropriate featured article to give the front page some balance. It wouldn't hurt to delay the featuring of an article by a few days, would it? Rawr 01:22, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Sometimes I think it is nice to have a front page that seems to all be related. I do not think it is somethign tha we should do all the time but I don't see the harm, if there were several oil, or enviornmental stories in the news, I think picking "did you know" and featured articlesthat went with the theme would be nice as well. Dalf | Talk 02:14, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Image for J. R. R. Tolkien

I have changed the image for today's FA from Image:Jrrt 1972 pipe.jpg to Image:Tolkien 1916.jpg (cropped, of course). The latter is in the public domain. Fair use should be used as sparingly as possible, and the PD image sufficiently illustrates the subject, I believe. --Slowking Man 03:11, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Offensiveness vs "NOTCENSORED"

This is an issue I thought of while trying to get an article to FA. I understand WP:NOT#CENSORED and all, but I was just wondering whether this extends to the choice of featured article? I can understand not using swearwords/profanity on the main page, but would an article such as, for example Arctic Monkeys, where both direct quotes and their album titles (Who the Fuck Are Arctic Monkeys for example) feature language which people object to, appear on the front page, and if not, where is the line drawn? Laïka 21:23, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 2007

I was about to suggest that we need to set up a 2007 archive, when I saw that USer:SmthManly did it a couple of weeks ago. Well done! -- ALoan (Talk) 19:48, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Any way to formally challenge a phoney FA?

Today's featured article, on the imaginary "Wrath of God" campaign is patently rediculous -- even the name "Wrath of God" comes from a single, widely discredited source, a New York publicity hound. And "Black September" -- it's just a cover for Yasser Arafat's Fatah group. (If it wasn't, who was it's leader?)

How in the bloody heck does this happen? How did something like this scandal pass a peer review. Is everyone at Wikipedia under Steven Spielberg's thrall?

[edit] civilization

In the featured article civilization is spelled wrong, this must be corrected.

Please see the (short) discussion on the article's talk page Talk:History_of_erotic_depictions#Images; civilisation is a correct spelling, particularly in BrE and other English variants. While the refusal to allow the use of -ization on the part of the article's creator may be debated (in fact, I think I'm about to start that very debate), User:Samsara's comment in that talk page is relevant. Carre 14:12, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Salsa Music as TFA

The article for salsa music as the TFA (Today's Featured Article) has invalid highlighted words, citations, and the how the beats go are out of place. Ace Fighter 14:34, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Automatic Semiprotect

There should be a policy of automatic semiprotection for featured articles. I mean, you don't want to click on History of the board game Monopoly and get pictures of penises. Gaterion 02:29, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

This has been discussed at length and most agree that the helpful contributions of casual readers who click on the featured article outweighs the trouble of having to police it more strongly than usual. -Elmer Clark 02:30, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
I think the statistics should be reviewed. There have been perhaps four valid, constructive edits since 00:00 UTC, and I don't know how many vandal edits. And anecdotally I think the problem is only getting worse. --JohnDBuell 02:48, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
Alright, with this example - lets review. Over a twenty-five hour span of time, from 00:00 UTC on 13 December to 01:00 UTC on 14 December the page was edited no less than 318 times. Breaking that down, there were five administrative actions as some form of protection was attempted. I don't know WHAT, as no semi-protect or protected message appeared on the article. That leaves us with 313. Of that, based on edit summaries, approximately 85 reversions took place against vandals, which struck at least as often. But one has to be careful with this, as some of the anon IP vandals deliberately put "revert", "rv" or something else in their edit summaries to make it look like they made a contribution. There were six "page replacements", three page blankings and two redirections. So, take those 96 (85 reversions, and 11 documented vandals) edits out, and we're left with 217. Without checking every single edit (which I'm not going to do at this time), I'm going to take a guess that half of that were vandals - or just over 100 vandal edits total, with 85 reversions. That leaves maybe, MAYBE one-third of edits in a 25 hour period as being legitimate, and most of those were minor changes in wording, removal of wikilinks, placement of wikilinks, addition of a category, and other trivia. There is NOT a huge difference in the article before it appeared on the main page and now. So I fail to see what purpose that NOT placing a "Today's Featured Article" under semi-protection (not allowing anon edits, and not allowing recently registered users) achieves. --JohnDBuell 01:31, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
Maybe this difference isn't too significant, but I think it would be hard to argue that the article isn't stronger. Since featured articles are so heavily policed anyway, the damage done by vandalism is fairly minor. -Elmer Clark 22:40, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
I can't say that it helped either - not ONE reference was added or removed. The only semi-significant changes were that in wording and phrasing. --JohnDBuell 16:52, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
Just FYI, so you know exactly what you are categorizing as "minor": according to a recent study, the Main Page featured article spends about two hours in a vandalized state during the time that it is linked to as the day's featured article.--DaveOinSF 18:35, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
If you go to Wikipedia talk:Main Page featured article protection and examine the early history, you will clearly see that this well-meaning but misguided decision became policy without significant discussion.--DaveOinSF 18:26, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Will we ever run out of Wikipedia Featured Articles to feature on the main page?

Theoretically, to keep up with the demands of FAOTD, there has to be more than 1 article per day on average that gets the Featured status every day. If, for example, we now have 1000 FA, we have featured 500 of them on the main page, and the rate of new FAs is 0.5 articles per day (1 FA status in 2 days), that means we will run out of FAs for FAOTD in 1000 days. --Orang gila 20:20, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

With luck, editors will see that as a call to action to edit more articles to the FA quality level. --JohnDBuell 20:26, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
I hope so. The first FAOTD was Mozart on February 22, 2004. Between then and now (December 14, 2006) there have been 1025 days, and we have 1197 FAs. That means we still have 1197 - 1025 = 172 FAs that have not been featured on the main page. --Orang gila 22:20, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
Well we also have to take into account how many FAOTD have been demoted from FAs, and how many FAs have been demoted from that status WITHOUT being featured on the main page. Plus there are some that any number of us would argue just don't belong on the main page. I would never nominate The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (radio series) to be on the main page, because The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy already was. --JohnDBuell 16:53, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] More explanation needed

"In order for the article to appear on the main page it must have a lead section and image suitable for use on the main page."

Could you expand on this a bit? Buc 02:00, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Shouldn't this template be protected?

We've protected the front page; wouldn't it be easy for someone to vandalize the front page by editing this template? --Ryan Delaney talk 03:21, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

The mainpage doesn't feed from this page here, it feeds from a separate page that is protected long before the date of featuring becomes available, thus, any edits to this page will be fruitless in messing with the mainpage. -- SmthManly / ManlyTalk / ManlyContribs 04:51, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] non fair use images only?

can a featured article be TFA if it only has fair use images? Nespresso 01:52, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes, there have been such instances before, and a FU image was displayed on the front page.--thunderboltz(Deepu) 19:46, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Today's featured article pages

Shouldn't the today's featured article pages such as this:Wikipedia:Today's featured article/January 20, 2007 be protected. Surely anyone can enter any artical they want and make it look like it's going to be on the main page.Buc 16:31, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Raul is the FA coordinator, so when an admin is protecting the template, he/she can make sure if it is the appropriately chosen article. Nishkid64 18:44, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

So what can they do if it's not?Buc 18:46, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Indian Standard Time

For today's FA (1/23), it fails to mention yesterday's FA (Indian Standard Time). Small error, you guys might want to fix it. JHMM13 (T | C) 00:10, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Time between FA and MP

is their a certain amount of time an article should be a FA before apperaring on the Main Page? The Placebo Effect 00:28, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

I think it can't appear on the Main Page the same month it was promoted or the month after. I say this because my first FA, Damon Hill, reached FA status in June last year and appeared on the Main Page in August the same year. But I don't know for sure whether or not that was the case for all the articles. --Phill talk Edits 13:45, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Images for TFA

Today's featured article (Ian Thorpe) has no image: the image that was originally in the article was one from Flickr which turned out to be a copyvio. I've noticed that we tend to be a bit slow, and only notice problematic images when they are on the main page. Ideally, the FAC process should pick up on these concerns; but FAC is not FPC and reviewers may well overlook this. In any case, the image selected may not have been in the article at the time of FAC so we should check it before it is on the main page in any case.

I've created a table in my userspace to analyse the past months TFA images. Out of the 26 images, fully a third of them I am not 100% sure are ok. Whilst I am being overly cautious, I think this indicates a serious problem. We should be giving the images a decent examination before they appear on the Main page...--Nilfanion (talk) 17:47, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

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